“Oh, come in, Gil,” she snapped. “Tell me what Gregor is up to now.”
“Nothing new.” Guilliam marked how Penelope paced a convoluted pattern around her cluttered office. How she shifted one pile of books from chair to shelf, another pile from shelf to chair. She mixed textbooks intended for Temple education with the mostly picture books reserved for Worker caste children. Then she stamped her foot and began all over again with her sorting.
Nervously, she ran her hands through her thick auburn hair, the same color as Gregor’s until the HP began to go bald and then gray. She was trying to make order of the chaos of her thoughts with her actions and not succeeding.
“He still plans to bring that Lood here to our Temple,” she spat.
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll just have to get rid of her. Somehow.”
Guilliam groaned inwardly at the paperwork that would involve. And he’d just managed to complete the stacks necessary to get Miss Sissy into the Temple. He’d twitched and tweaked the procedure for a Worker to have their caste mark Lauded when they began serving at Temple.
The archivists hadn’t questioned a single paragraph when they accepted the thick folder for filing.
“I have a plan, Laudae.”
“You always do.” She paused in her constant shuffling of things to quirk a smile at him. “No one is listening. You can drop the title.”
Guilliam allowed himself a small smile. Remote cameras and microphones were listening. And he knew precisely who sat at the other end of the wires. It wasn’t Gregor. He had no idea the listening posts existed.
At least Gil hoped he didn’t.
“My Laudae, what if I shift a few acolytes around?”
“Who?” Her eyes gleamed as she caught his idea only half formed. “Laudae Shanet will soon lose her oldest girl to marriage to a Noble. I thought your Bethy might fill that place.”
“Bethy?” A moment of panic flashed across her face. She relied heavily on the fifteen-year-old girl.
“Yes. Bethy has experience with the religious curriculum from her time with you. She will be an excellent teacher.”
“But her loyalty is to me.”
“She can report back to you. You will know everything that happens in Miss Sissy’s quarters.” And she might learn something about the world beyond the Temple, something Penelope hadn’t managed to or taught to her girls.
“Excellent idea, Gil.” She touched his hand with affection born of many years of close association.
“I thought you’d like that idea. I’ll start the paperwork right now. All will be in place by the time Miss Sissy arrives in a couple of days.”
“Thank you, Gil.”
“My pleasure, Laudae.”
Sissy dialed a number on the telephone in her hospital room with care. She’d memorized the number for her family’s apartment complex her first day of school. In all those years, she’d only called it a handful of times.
She heard it ring three long and mournful tones before someone picked up.
“Kin y’all call Stevie da Jaimey to the ’phone?” she asked the sort of familiar voice. Two hundred families lived in the building. She knew all of them by sight. But the phone distorted voices just enough to scatter her recognition.
“That you, Sissy?”
“Yes, sir. Who’m I talkin’ to?”
“This here’s ol’ Zeb.”
“Old Zeb!” she cried in delight. The man was so old he’d lost his da name. Didn’t matter anymore, his folks had passed decades ago. Too old to work, he spent his days in the community room near the front door, monitoring the comings and goings through the building. Better security than the thugs Lord Chauncey paid to patrol his factories.
“How be ya’?” Sissy asked, suddenly so homesick she ached from her toes to her hair.
“Same ol’, same ol’,” Zeb chuckled. “So’s how they treatin’ ya’ over there in that fancy place?”
“Good, Zeb. Good. They’s takin’ care of me right fine.”
“Well, if’n they don’t, you jes holler and I’ll come teach’m how,” he chuckled.
“Please, Zeb, I need to talk to Stevie. Kin you call him to the phone?”
“Sure thing, Miss Sissy. You just hang on at your end a bit. I’ll have to send sum’un upstairs. I cain’t climb five flights no more.”
“I’ll hold.” This call would cost someone a fortune. She didn’t care. Somehow she’d find a way to pay for the call once she was released. At least she presumed she’d have some kind of salary in her new job.
And then there was the cost of all this hospital care and surgeries. Where’d she get the money to pay for that?
She really needed to hear her family. None of them had come back to the hospital since that first day. Three days she’d gone without them. Three endless and lonely days.
Four times Sissy set down the ’phone to check traffic in the corridor. Then she raced back to press the receiver tight against her ear, desperately afraid she’d missed Stevie. So far no hospital official had come to end her call.
At last Stevie came on the line. “Sissy? Is that really you?”
“Oh, Stevie, I’ve missed you,” she sighed. She let his familiar voice wash over her. Tiny muscles through her body relaxed, leaving her aching and limp.
“Same here, Sissy. Listen, I asked Anna to marry me, just like you said I should, and she said yes!”
“Oh, Stevie, that’s wonderful. When you gonna do it?”
“I’m really sorry I didn’t tell you first. I should’a told you first, but we didn’t know how to get through to you.”
A tear crept into Sissy’s eyes. “Soon’s I get over to t’ Temple I’ll git you a number to call. And Laud Gregor promised y’all could come visit on Holy Days and holidays.”
“We’ll be there. But, Sissy, you’ve got to be more careful how you talk. They’re going to expect you to sound educated. Remember to complete each word, just like they told us in school.”
“I’ll try, Stevie. I’ll really try.” So much to learn. How’d she fit it all in her brain? “So, tell me, when you and Anna gonna do it?”
Stevie chuckled. “Well we thought maybe since I’m now related to the High Priestess of Harmony that maybe I could ask her to perform the ritual.”
“Oh, Stevie, that would be wonderful. But I won’t be a priestess for months and months.”
“We’ll wait. For you, Sissy, we’ll wait.”
“Okay. Kin I . . . may I speak with Mama?” She could hear several voices clamoring in the background. Surely Stevie hadn’t trekked down five flights by himself. At dinnertime, they’d all be there, all gathered round for this special surprise of a ’phone call.
“You behavin’ yourself, Sissy?” Mama asked. She sounded breathless and excited despite the sternness of her words.
“ ’Course, Mama. I’m brushing my teeth every day and washing my hands.”
“Pickin’ up after yerself?”
“Not much to pick up, Mama. I’m still in hospital. Still wearing nothin’ but nighties. And mighty ugly nighties they be.”
“You jes remember your manners, child. Politeness belongs to ever’ caste.”
“Yes, Mama.”
“Your Pop wants to talk to ya.” Abruptly Mama handed off the ’phone.
Each of the family came on line in turn, right down to Ashel and Marsh, the two youngest. “Thitthy?” Marsh asked.
Sissy was surprised the boy actually said something. But then he’d always talked more with his biggest sister than anyone.
“H’lo, Marsh. Did you lose another tooth?”
“Yeth.”
“Good for you. Pretty soon you’ll be a really big boy and go to school.”
Silence.
“School ain’t scary, Marsh.” Not nearly as scary as going to the Crystal Temple and starting a whole new life. Alone. Without her family to come home to at the end of the day. “Ashel will be there to help you the first few days. Then you’ll have new fr
iends and new things to do every day.”
“Don’t want friends. You come home, Sissy?”
“I’ll try, Marsh. I’ll really, really try. But you and Mama and Pop and Stevie and the others will come see me real soon.”
“Pwomise?”
“I promise, Marsh. I promise by Harmony and Empathy that we’ll see each other soon.” She prayed she wouldn’t have to break that promise.
Laud Gregor wouldn’t make her break that promise. He just wouldn’t.
Would he?
“That’s a tight-beamed Maril laser, Jake,” Billy hissed.
Jake fired his bulky gun in the direction the laser had to have come from. Rapid shots covering a wide swath. The recoil of the gun destroyed his aim. The noise set his ears to ringing. Anger made him reckless. He advanced still firing, praying he caught something, anything that moved.
Billy ducked beneath a counter and mimicked his fire.
Glass beakers shattered. Metal projectiles screeched. One shot after another they destroyed the lab looking for the assassin.
“Get down, Jake!” Billy called.
A single black laser beam singed a hole in his sleeve. The suit’s gel armor compensated and closed the hole.
Jake concentrated his fire on the source.
“That’s a Maril, dammit, Jake, get down!”
“Not until I get a piece of that damned bird.” Two more steps brought Jake to a jumble of discarded equipment. He ripped through the clumps with one hand, keeping random shots firing into the mess. He didn’t stop until he hit stone wall and a neat square hole where a chunk of rock was missing.
“Looks like they chiseled through the mortar and removed a single stone to wiggle in,” Billy said, coming up behind him.
“Then retreated the same way as soon as the going got tough.” Jake changed ammo clips and loosed another series of shots into the hole out of sheer frustration.
Billy returned to Grecko’s limp body.
“He still alive?” Jake asked. He needed to hit something. Then get drunk. No way to salvage this operation now.
“Nope. But I found this.” Billy pried Grecko’s dead fingers away from something inside Grecko’s pocket. Then he withdrew a shiny new handheld. “Might be important. He clutched it tight in his death throes.”
“Bring it. We’ve got to get off this boiling rock and back to Pammy with the bad news.” Jake’s gut sank. He really didn’t want to have to tell Pammy that he’d failed on his very first mission for her.
“Worse news is that one of us is going to have to go to Harmony now and get the formula for real Badger Metal,” Billy said with a bit of chuckle in his voice. “Won’t be me or Mickey. Pammy’s magic nanobots won’t bleach our pure skin and turn us into Harmonites. They are all mutant Caucasian—to eliminate any Earth-bred prejudices. I’m going to miss you, Jake. No outsider has gotten into Harmony and back out alive in over fifty years.”
Jake opened the door to the outside and peeked out. The street looked as black and empty as when they arrived. He opened the door a few more microns to slip out.
A blinding white light flashed on. “Put your weapons down and come out with your hands up. You won’t get a second warning,” an androgynous voice boomed and echoed off the buildings.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
"DO YOU SUPPOSE, BILLY, that those rogue Marils are still hanging around the back door?” Jake asked as he slammed the front door closed on the light and the voices demanding surrender. “Would you?” Billy eased back down the dim hallway to the lab.
“Would you?” Billy eased back down the dim hallway to the lab.
“No, but then I’m not a Maril warrior, born and bred to fight and to suicide if captured. Never known one of those birds to flee anything but overwhelming odds.” Jake was right behind Billy, keeping his gun trained on the door. The alien projectile weapon began to feel comfortable in his hand, almost a natural extension of his need to express his anger and frustration. Something about the bang and recoil . . .
“I’d call the guys out front and us two inside overwhelming odds,” Billy muttered.
Someone banged heavily on the iron door. The hinges would break before the door did. But those hinges hadn’t been in great shape to begin with.
Jake hastened his steps and ran smack dab into Billy. “Get moving.” He bumped his partner, still facing the front and possible pursuers. The hinges and the doorjamb had begun to buckle and screech.
“Ah, Jake, do you know how to open those locks?”
“What?” Jake risked a look over his shoulder. A stream of curses erupted unbidden from his mouth.
Billy cringed from the venom in his voice.
“Watch my back,” Jake ordered. He holstered his weapon and ripped off his gloves. “Pammy hired me for a reason. Several reasons actually. Not all of them my pretty face.”
He let his fingertips caress the first of the locks. Simple electronics. “Let the handheld take care of that one,” he muttered and set it to talking to the circuits and codes. “Now this one will take some finesse.” He placed his fingers on the keypad and closed his eyes.
The memory of how Grecko’s hand had moved replayed in his mind, almost as clear as if he watched a holo. Jake let his fingers mimic the pattern.
The handheld beeped and the keypad clicked. “One more,” Jake breathed.
“Hurry it up, Jake,” Billy said anxiously. “The door is buckling.” He pressed his body closer as if trying for a few extra microns to separate him from the front door.
“Working on it.” Jake looked blankly at the old-fashioned keyhole. He’d heard about these things. Pammy had even drilled him. All he needed was a set of picks.
Like he’d known to requisition picks three times the size of standard ones intended for little locks. The tumblers inside had probably rusted their gigantic parts and would require a crowbar to loosen them.
“Hurry it up, Jake.” Billy didn’t sound happy.
“You know anything about picking a lock?”
“Nope.”
“Then what do I do?”
“This.” Billy flipped out his gun and fired three times into the lock.
Metal screamed and shattered. The lock hung loose.
“Come on, come on,” Jake shoved the heavy lab door.
The front door groaned one more time and crashed to the floor, bringing the jamb and the hinges with it. A dozen figures armed with wide-muzzled, long weapons boiled through the opening.
Jake put his shoulder to the lab door and shoved with all of his might, his fear, and his frustration.
Billy added his own weight.
The door flew open. They tumbled to the ground.
“Close it, close it, close it,” Billy jabbered.
Jake slammed the door closed shoved a workbench across the opening, and pinned the door shut.
They sprinted for the back corner, vaulting over benches and broken equipment. Jagged glass cut Jake’s bare hand. He hardly registered the injury. Adrenaline pumped through him. His legs churned up the intervening space.
A loud bang. Then the whine of a projectile zinging past his ear. He ducked and rolled the last two meters.
The scraping sound of the bench across the door being shoved aside.
Another bang.
The pile of debris covering the hole hadn’t moved since he’d been here a few minutes ago. He flung aside wooden crates, dirty clothes, brokenflasks, jagged bars of metal, rotten food. Whatever had outlived its usefulness to Grecko.
“Billy, time to go,” he called over his shoulder
No answer.
“Crap!” Jake risked lifting his head to the level of the nearest workbench.
No sign of Billy.
“Billy!” He crawled back the way he’d come.
Another bang. He caught sight of that God-awful huge muzzle sticking through a gap in the doorway.
Jake ducked and nearly banged his head on the toe of Billy’s boot.
“Come on, buddy. We got to
get outta here.”
Billy didn’t move.
Jake grabbed the boot and tugged. Still the man didn’t move. He looked beyond the half-meter-sized boots to the body and face. A dark hole opened a third eye in the middle of his forehead. “Oh, crap, Billy. What am I going to tell Mickey? Hell, what am I going to tell Pammy?”
More scraping and the sound of angry voices. Three people, a tenor, a bass, and an alto screamed something in the peculiar singsong accent of Prometheus XII.
Jake scooted backward.
“We know you are in there, Grecko. Come out peacefully and we’ll only confiscate your formula,” the alto called. “We’ll let you live in exchange for the formula.”
So that was how government on Prometheus XII worked. Pirates, one and all.
“And what will you do to me when you find Grecko killed by a Maril weapon?”
He didn’t wait to find out.
He dove through the hole and came up running. Shouts and weapons fire. Someone added a modern, and locally illegal, blaster to the mix.
Jake dodged and pivoted. He faced a maze of narrow streets. “Better to be lost than dead.”
Right, left, left again. He came to a broad thoroughfare. Bright lights. Music blaring from every corner speaker. Crowds of laughing and dancing bar-hoppers. A man on stilts juggled balls of fire. A sloe-eyed woman in gaudy skirts and scarves danced to the music of a cacophony of instruments. The crowd laughed and swayed and moved to some other tune out of sync with the lovely woman.
Nightlife on Prometheus XII was one long party.
Keeping close to the buildings and the shadows, Jake worked his way toward a wide intersection. His ship suit didn’t blend in very well with the scanty clothing worn by the locals. But there were a few off-worlders opting for the comfort of a suit. Maybe one suit for every twenty locals in brightly patterned shirts and shorts—not always color-coordinated.
Over the top of the nearest bar—all the joints seemed to be bars here— he spotted the familiar outline of the comm tower at the spaceport.
Jake dared a tiny bit of hope that he might get through this alive.
“Everyone, stand where you are!” an authoritative voice bellowed over loudspeakers.
Jake melted into the nearest shadow, keying the chameleon unit to darken his suit and dim the interior lights. With luck he’d look like part of the stone and brick scenery.
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