by Kate Elliott
“I estimate that we are here,” he said. A flashing bar pinpointed them on the grid. Bach rose to hang at Pinto’s shoulder. “That puts the target—”
Another marker flashed.
“It could be worse,” said Lily. “Twelve kilometers. We could have landed right on top of them.”
“I’m glad you’re optimistic,” replied Pinto caustically. “You don’t really think we’re going to get out of this, do you?”
Lily pulled the screen out of his grasp. “Do you suggest we just turn ourselves in? Somehow I don’t think you can persuade your father to intervene this time. Or shall we ask the local military to call Senator Isaiah at Central and see if his influence extends this far out?”
Pinto’s mouth pulled taut. He averted his face quickly and with obvious anger.
“Pinto.” She let her voice soften. “When I looked at the damage this boat took, I’m amazed you landed us in one piece.”
She paused to let the compliment sink in, but he only made a brief, negatory shrug with one shoulder.
“We have a good crew,” she continued. “Just because you think life has it in for you doesn’t mean—”
Pinto laughed abruptly. “Doesn’t mean that it does? Can you really stand here—here, now—and say that?”
“Didn’t you tell me something once about your luck? Hoy, Pinto. You can let circumstances rule you, or you can work to change them. I know which life is easier.”
She waited, but he choose not to reply. With a sigh, she swung around to lift up the main hand-pack radio that Rainbow had left before setting up her position. “I suggest,” Lily finished, more command than solicitude, “that you sleep while we have the leisure.”
He gave her a sarcastic salute and disappeared up the ramp.
“Hoy,” she murmured, adding a few exasperated phrases of music to which Bach wisely did not comment. She sat down again on the ramp and fiddled with the hand-pack, continuing to whistle. Bach. We need to contact Yehoshua’s team—if they’re still out there. And Two, as well. I’ll want five-second bursts of the Cairn’s codes, at random intervals, at fluctuating frequencies. I don’t know how sophisticated Landfall military’s detection equipment is. If we get a response, go to the classified code in a ten-second burst. And if it is Yehoshua or Sgambati, compress Pinto’s estimate of our position into no more than a fifteen-second burst. Cadenced with an interrogatory two note.
Affirmative, patroness. If I may suggest a more sophisticated strategy for avoiding detection by surveillance equipment—Bach paused respectfully.
“Bach,” Lily answered, rubbing the robot’s smooth sheen with one hand. “Do whatever you think is best. Just find out if either of them made it.”
Bach sang happily and drifted down to plug into the hand-pack.
Unfamiliar voices carried in from the front, a protest—Lily jumped up, unstrapping her pistol; paused when she heard the sharp bark of Jenny’s voice ordering silence. Lily kept her pistol loose as she came forward around the shuttle’s bulk and found herself face-to-face with a sullen adolescent boy of perhaps sixteen years and his smaller, female companion.
The Mule had a firm grip on the female’s bulky jacket. The girl, seeing Lily, shook herself hard and came up against the Mule’s strength for what was clearly the fourth or fifth time.
“She’s a slow learner,” said Jenny apologetically to Lily. The mercenary kept her rifle trained on the boy. “We found these two skulking around the next warehouse over.”
“Told you I heard something landing,” said the girl in a ragged but triumphant voice.
The boy, after a cursory and uninterested glance at Lily, had focused on the shuttle. “That’s a Gami Ten Eight Two,” he said loftily to his companion. “It’s got longer range capabilities than the Zu’s—and you said it was a military crash. But this one is modified.” His eye ranged over the shuttle with the eye of a connoisseur. “And damaged.”
“If you’ll excuse me,” said Lily sardonically, “I wonder if you can tell me what you’re doing here.”
“You’re criminals,” said the girl with conviction. “We don’t have to tell you nothing.”
“Oh shut up, Red.” The boy’s tone rang heavy with an old irritation. “How could criminals have this kind of boat?” Now he looked at Lily, but it seemed still a chore for him to tear his eyes away from the shuttle—despite the several guns trained on him. “What are you—smugglers caught in Security? I thought you all knew how tight it is here. Or haven’t you ever been to Landfall before? They won’t execute you, though, like I hear they do some places, but they’ll take everything you have and leave you stranded in Shanty with nothing more than the clothes on your back. That’s punishment enough.”
Lily glanced at Jenny, but the other woman had no expression at all on her face. “Is that what happened to you?” Lily asked carefully.
“Nah.” The boy shrugged casually. “Me Pap. I been here all my life.”
“What?” broke in Red hotly. “You going to pretend you don’t hate it here just so you can impress these?” Her glare raked Lily, and abruptly she put a hand to her hooded head in a gesture made doubly melodramatic by her sudden and very audible intake of breath. “White uniforms! They’re Jehanists! Bet you. Bet you, Blue.”
Blue shifted with sudden interest. In the banked lights that ran along the shuttle’s wings, Lily could see that what she had thought was a bruise mottling the right side of his face was in fact a pattern of circles and squares and triangles woven together, like a Ridani’s incomplete tattoo.
Jenny turned suddenly to level her rifle at the far door. A moment later Paisley entered and jogged over to salute Lily and wait for permission to speak, panting slightly from her run.
“Is that a real tattoo?” asked Red. “Are those real, or just painted on like Blue’s?”
Paisley turned to look at the girl, taking her measure. After a moment she blinked her eyes innocently and said sweetly: “Do you want to touch them?” She extended a dappled hand.
Red leapt back as if Paisley had offered her the plague, only to collide with the Mule’s unyielding chest. She yelped.
“Oh shut up, Red,” snapped Blue. “I guess you’re in charge here,” he said grudgingly to Lily.
“Hold on,” said Lily curtly. She looked at Paisley. “Report.”
Paisley beamed proudly. “Ya fields be on ya three sides of ya warehouses. Ya fourth be ya street. Sure, and it be ya rundown old place. Reckon ya people there be as poor as ya Ridanis. It be ya quiet so—so late. Or be it early here?”
“She talks funny, too,” muttered Red rebelliously.
“How about Rainbow’s people?” Lily asked Jenny.
Jenny nodded. “Well concealed. Knowing they were there, I had to look twice to see them.”
Lily considered Blue in silence for long enough that he regained his sullen mask and began to fidget, his eyes drifting occasionally to the shuttle.
“What do you know about Jehane?” she asked finally.
He shrugged. “Not much. Me Pap talks about him some with Red’s Mam and the other Shanty elders.” His lips lifted in a sneer. “Course, if you’re Jehanists, I suppose you’re going to say you’re here to save us.”
“No,” said Lily quietly. “I’m not going to say that. I’m going to have you and the girl take me to see your—ah—Pap and your elders.”
“Lily.” Jenny kept her voice low, but it sounded menacing nonetheless. “Shouldn’t we keep one of them here as hostage? For leverage?”
“Do you think that will make them trust us? No. I’ll go alone.” She motioned to the Mule to take the two kids aside for a moment. “Paisley, you’re to follow without being seen. Jenny, you and the Mule continue sweeps, but keep in contact with Paisley.”
“But—”
“No. We have to get their help without coercion. We can’t get out of here without real support, and that will only come if they trust us, and believe in Jehane’s cause. Or can be convinced to believe in it.”
Jenny frowned, but she sketched a salute to Lily and moved over to the Mule.
“Get going,” said Lily to Paisley, and then she restrapped her pistol and waved at the Mule to release the two captives.
“Are you really a Jehanist?” asked Red once they were clear of the warehouse.
“I work in Jehane’s cause,” replied Lily.
Red whistled appreciatively. “Old Elder Vajratti got thrown in the block last month for preaching Jehane’s cause. I heard she’s on a hunger strike now cause they won’t let her have a terminal or nothing, not to read or write on. And last week this one kid got shot by Security for—”
“What difference does it make?” broke in Blue. “Jai-Vinh just wanted to impress Sosa, and Vajratti’s half out of her vector anyway. You don’t really think Jehane can win against Central, do you?”
“That sounds familiar,” said Lily.
“And who cares, anyway?” continued Blue as if she had not spoken. “I’d love to see the modifications in that shuttle. I’ll bet they’re disguised so they can’t even be read by a cruiser’s sensors. I got into a locked file and got to see the specs on the cruiser they brought here last week.”
“A cruiser?” Lily asked sharply, realizing now that the feint on Bukharin must have failed, and yet hoping that there might be a different explanation. “Are you sure there’s a military cruiser in Landfall system?”
“Yep,” said Blue enthusiastically. “It’s a beauty. The firepower is way augmented from the old models.”
Lily considered this as they walked along the tarmac that paved the ground between the close ranks of warehouses. It had grown cracked from long disuse, making their footing precarious.
Red squealed abruptly.
Lily dropped instinctively into a crouch, whipped her pistol out.
“That was your ship, wasn’t it?” Red exclaimed, a vocal continuation of the squeal. “The one that blew up tonight. It lit up the whole sky.”
Lily let out her breath through closed lips and straightened up.
“And I’ll bet it can jump double windows, too,” said Blue, oblivious now that he was intent on recalling the cruiser.
“Hoy,” murmured Lily as they went on.
Blue’s Pap took a bit of rousing, but once he stumbled out into the drab, ill-lit kitchen and common room of his tiny apartment, situated over a junk heap of a small building marked with a sign saying: Blumoris’s Repairs and Metals, he greeted her civilly enough. And a clear, although bleary-eyed, look at Lily’s white uniform galvanized him into action: within twenty minutes six elders of Shanty sat sipping curdled-looking aris and staring raptly at Lily and her Jehanist accouterments.
Red had pulled down her hood to reveal a wealth of copper-orange hair. Blue lounged in a corner chair, ignoring the proceedings while he scribbled aimlessly on an old, battered screen.
Lily stood up and surveyed the company for a long moment in respectful silence, as much to let them look at her as to study them. But what she saw was hopeful. The room was shabby, sparsely furnished with secondhand appliances and worn, ugly furniture. The elders wore poorly fitting clothes burnished with age. A rash disfigured the pale skin of Red’s neck and jawline. Blue’s Pap had a puffy eye, and the elder introduced to her as Red’s mother kept coughing, a racked, painful sound. One elder had entered with a pronounced limp.
“My name is Lily Heredes,” Lily began. “Comrade Heredes, if you will.” The silence that greeted these first tentative words was expectant but cautious. “And I’m going to give it to you straight. We’re Jehane’s soldiers. Our ship was destroyed by Central’s fleet, and we need your help. And you look”—she paused to let her eyes sweep the room again, deliberately—“like the kind of people Jehane has been fighting for all along.”
Blue’s Pap rose from his chair, a bulky man who nevertheless moved with slow dignity. “I am Elder Blumoris,” he said. “This is my shop, and my living, here. I reckon you are what you say you are. It isn’t likely you’re anything else, unless you’re a spy from Security come to roust out a suspected Jehanish nest.”
A dry chuckle all around greeted this sarcastic remark.
“But you’ll have to prove it,” he went on. Lily nodded, acknowledging this request. “And I reckon we’d all like to hear why you’re here in the first place, and what help you can do us.”
Looking at them, Lily wished desperately that Master Heredes was here, because he would know what to say, and how to say it. She gave her tunic a self-conscious tug and banished such pointless thoughts. After all, she was Heredes now, and sooner or later she would have to truly assimilate that fact. She smiled slightly, thinking of the disparity in experience between her and Master Heredes, and was surprised to see the answering gleam of a smile on Blumoris’s face. His sympathy gave her confidence.
“I suppose,” she began, “that the easiest way to prove we are from Jehane’s forces is to see how quickly the troops here would come running if we gave up our position. But we’re not ready to do that yet.”
She adjusted a sleeve as she got a muffled chuckle from one of the elders, stopped herself from toying with the other sleeve, and lifted her chin a little. “The only proof I can give you is to show you to our shuttle and let you look it over. Otherwise, you’ll have to take us on trust. I don’t have any credentials, and they wouldn’t mean anything if I did have them. As to how we can help you, I’m not sure—” She paused as a thought occurred to her. “If you’ll excuse me a moment.” She raised one arm and, coding in the tightest possible channel, called up Kyosti’s identification code on her wrist-com, hoping he was within range. After a moment, he replied.
“I need you,” she said. “Have Lia return to base. And bring your kit. I’ll send Paisley back to base to show you where I am.”
“That won’t be necessary.” His voice sounded detached and almost alien over the tiny receiver clipped to her ear. “I’ll find you. Out.”
She looked across at Blumoris. “Elder, I’ve sent for one of my people. Perhaps you can set someone outside to watch for him.”
“Inocencio.” Elder Blumoris nodded curtly at his son. “Go on.”
Blue did not respond for a moment, as if judging whether or not this was a fit moment for rebellion. Finally, looking put-upon, he let out a prolonged sigh of adolescent disgust and rose with sullen lethargy to drag himself out of the room.
“I’m not sure what help we can do you,” said Lily as the door shut behind Blue. “We need your help if we’re to carry on Jehane’s fight. But turn comes turnabout—our success helps Jehane, and his will bring the reforms that will lift you out of”—she gestured with one hand—“out of this.”
“So Jehane says,” muttered one of the Elders.
“Well, Hoang,” said Elder Blumoris, “I reckon it’s a sight better promise than any Central’s given us these past twenty years.” He had a slow, almost ponderous way of speaking, but perhaps it was conscious, for he used it to let his words carry weight. “Not like in Rooce’s time, when she made jobs for them as hadn’t any, and helped those as couldn’t work through no fault of their own.” He nodded at the Elder who had limped in.
“It’s true there was more help, food and decent shelter, and medicine,” said Red’s mother, stopping after these words for a spasm of coughing to pass. “But Rooce governed here on Landfall, even if she was appointed by Central. Who’s to say how much reform will reach us even if this Jehane business does reform Central?”
“Surely it can’t get any worse?” muttered Hoang. “Vajratti always said—”
“Vajratti hasn’t any nav left to vector from—”
“I hear it’s a tattoo religion, this Jehane. Would you trust any tattoo superstition?”
“Central isn’t going to help us. They’ve made that clear. I still say we’re better off supporting them as at least cares for our troubles.”
“Elders! Elders!” Blumoris lifted both of his thick hands in the universal plea for silence. “Let us not tro
uble our visitor with our quarrels. Please continue”—he hesitated—“Comrade.”
Lily glanced toward the door, but it remained closed. She looked back at her audience. “Here and now, I can’t promise that I can make your life better. But I have faith that Jehane’s people believe in this cause, that they have dedicated their lives to bring reform to all of the Reft’s citizens. I don’t suppose you’ve heard of a speaker called Pero.” But as soon as she said the name, she saw recognition light their faces. “You have?” She could not keep the surprise from her voice. “All the way out here? Although I suppose it’s not so unlikely.” She shrugged, a little embarrassed.
“We may be a small place,” said Blumoris proudly, “but we’re not so very far out as all that.”
“But I thought,” said Red suddenly and loudly from her cross-legged seat on the floor, “that you rigged up that console specially to receive illicit channels and scrambled broadcasts.”
“Absinthe!”
“Do you know comm-consoles well?” asked Lily swiftly, caught by this confession.
Blumoris hedged by going to the counter to pour more of the discolored aris into his cup, and then offered it around to everyone else. “I’ve a bit of interest in that line.”
“He’s being modest,” muttered Hoang. “And if that son of his weren’t hells-bent on getting thrown into detention, he’d be sight-certain to get accepted into tech school.”
“Do you think so?” Blumoris for the first time sounded angry. “After twice Council let rents be raised on my shop so that I had to leave two decent locations downtown, and then they used the excuse that my premises were both unsightly and unsafe to drive me out of the third and force me to move here? My son will have no truck with their schools, not while I still breathe.”
Before this tender subject could be enlarged upon, the door opened and Blue ushered Kyosti in. The boy’s gaze was fastened on Kyosti’s hair with the rapt attention of an acolyte; in this light, in the drab surroundings, the finger’s-length of blue roots coming in showed up as glaringly as any painted-on tattoos.