"Ten…" she gasped. "Three! Oh my holy God! You're real! You're alive! Oh my God!" Her face twitched, and she burst into tears, clutching us tightly, her arms snaking around our necks. "Where have you been? Where the hell have you been? Oh my God!"
***
Valkyrie's cube was quite a place. The Deep Dreams people appeared to be running a profit, to judge by the rooms they rented out. It was luxurious by Legion standards. Redhawk and I sat in yielding airchairs, accepting cups of dox served by Valkyrie's roomie, the little lovely with the thin silky hair. The walls were glowing with dreamy fantasy shots of fems disrobing and soaping each other down in improbable outdoor locations. When she finished serving the dox, the roomie settled down on a stack of cushions in one corner, watching us silently with big brown eyes. Valkyrie appeared from an inner room, completely composed, her face cold and hostile.
"You bastards!" she snapped at us abruptly. "How long has it been? Why did you abandon me? They told me all of Beta was gone. They said I was the only survivor! They said you were both killed. I saw your names in the Book of the Dead. Why didn't you contact me before? You bastards!" She was furious, icy emerald eyes, the color burning on her cheeks, the black Legion cross throbbing on her forehead. She reminded me of her fem lover, Gamma One, Boudicca, the Bitch from Hell, who had perished on Mongera in her arms.
"We only just found you, Eleven," Redhawk responded calmly. "I've been searching for you for close to a year—ever since I learned ConFree lied to us. We're all in the Book—you're in the Book, too. But we're not all dead."
She glared at us, her lips firmly set. "Who's alive?"
"We've found Dragon—and Cinta. Nobody else."
"Dragon! And Scrapper?"
"We haven't found Scrapper. We don't know who's alive, and who's dead. The bastards lied to us all, about everything—because of the Mound, because of the Ship. They told me the same—that everyone in Beta was dead, that I was the only survivor. That I had to change my designation, because of the Ship. And they psyched Thinker. They were trying to hide us from each other."
"Who did this?" Valkyrie stood in the middle of the room, as still as a statue.
"ConFree," Redhawk replied. "An Inner named Kenton Cotter-Arc. He's the ConFree Director for the entire Outvac. He gives orders to Starcom."
"And he did this to us?"
"That's right. He had a lot of help, but he's the man."
"He's dead," Valkyrie said. She said it with such calm conviction that I had no doubt she meant it. I stood up, setting my dox cup on a table.
"Come here," I said. She looked at me with glittering green eyes, and moved over to me in a trance. I embraced her, closing my eyes and floating away, a wave of emotion crawling over my skin. Her fingernails were digging into my back. Mine—she had once been mine. My head was spinning.
"Ten!" she called. He came over, and she pulled him close. We stood there in the middle of the room, the three of us, silent, embracing, trembling with emotion. I could feel the love, rushing over us. Beta was reforming—and the galaxy was going to regret it, I knew. Valkyrie's roomie was already regretting it, watching us gloomily from the corner.
"Dragon says hello," I said. "He said we're planning to kick some ass, and we'd like you to join us."
"Dibs on Cotter-Arc," Valkyrie gasped. It was so good to see her again, to touch her again, to inhale her lovely scent. I remembered it, from how many lost years ago, tugging at my heart. It was a taste of the past—my past. Her heart was thumping against mine. It was so damned good.
***
"All set?" Redhawk asked. We were standing silently before a door in a dimly lit, hushed corridor, Redhawk and Valkyrie and I, dressed in our blacks. It was a residential cube bloc in Quaba Base. Redhawk held a techscan against the doorlock, and it was glowing green. He triggered it, and the door snapped open.
We rushed silently into the darkness within. It was a largish cube with the bed set behind a little sitting area. She was in bed. We kind of expected that since it was 0100 hours, the pit of the night. Valkyrie and I were on her like a couple of bloodcats attacking a crippled bird. I grabbed a handful of hair while Valkyrie ripped the covers off and jumped right onto the bed, straddling her, seizing her arms. She was on her back, coming awake with a strangled gasp and a rising scream that ended abruptly when Valkyrie slapped her hard on the mouth.
"Shut down, bitch! Turn her over!" We flipped her over easily—she was just a little thing. Redhawk hit the lights. The door was firmly closed once again. I had a knee on the girl's neck as Valkyrie forced her arms behind her back. The girl cried out in pain.
"Cooperate, bitch, or I'll break your arm!" Valkyrie warned. Our victim was a petite little blonde with long slim legs, squirming beneath us in micropanties and a short, sheer negligee. Valkyrie was still struggling with her arms.
"Need any help?" Redhawk asked us with some amusement, his arms folded. Valkyrie had the cuffs on now, snapping them around the girl's wrists.
"She's going to need your help when I'm through," Valkyrie snapped, pulling the girl's panties down abruptly and jabbing her buttocks with a field syringe. It was a superflash sedative, and it slowed her down quickly. When the girl stopped struggling, Valkyrie pulled her roughly off the bed. She landed on her knees and cried out in pain.
"Keep your trap shut, bitch! Do what we say and you may live. Get up!" Valkyrie pulled her up by her hair, got a headlock on her, and marched her roughly into the sitting room. "Where do you want her?"
"Put her against the wall," Redhawk replied. Valkyrie slammed the girl back-first against one wall, then frisked her thoroughly. It hardly seemed necessary—we could see right through the negligee, and she certainly wasn't armed.
"She's clean," Valkyrie reported.
"Who are you?" the little blonde squeaked. Her light blue eyes were frantic, and she was deathly pale. She had a thick mop of pale blonde hair that hung down over one eye. It looked like she was going into shock, weaving unsteadily against the wall. "What do you want from me?" She was beginning to tremble. Her lips were swollen and bleeding. I remembered her from Uldo. I remembered a lot of things now, and I knew I had Tara and the Legion to thank.
Redhawk took something out of a pocket and activated it. It floated out of his hand and stabilized up near the ceiling, glowing. The little blonde stared at it in horror. Valkyrie approached her with a little black instrument and placed it just over the girl's right ear. It secured itself with little suckers and a green light came on. A shiver ran over the blonde's flesh. Cold sweat trickled down her brow. Redhawk and Valkyrie and I pulled up chairs around a little table as the girl remained against the wall, paralyzed with fear.
"Nice quarters," Valkyrie remarked casually, looking around the cube.
"Your designation is Three Four S Two Two Nine, Hqs Quaba Support Command?" Redhawk asked the blonde calmly.
"Yes," she replied in a quavering voice. She looked like she was about to burst into tears.
"We are a citizen's commission, charged with ascertaining the truth, so that justice can be done. You have been accused of several very serious crimes. Our only interest is the truth. These proceedings are being recorded, and the results will be passed to the Legion High Command. Any attempt to evade the truth will be detected and made a matter of record. Do you understand?"
"I haven't done anything wrong." It sounded like a plea for mercy.
"Your previous designation was Two Four S One Eight, Second of the Ship, Black Twelfth. Is that correct?" The blonde gasped audibly and went even paler.
"Is that correct?"
"Yes." It was a whisper.
"One Eight, you are accused of high treason, aiding the enemy in time of war, espionage in time of war, sabotage of a military unit in time of war, one confirmed count of murder as a result of sabotage in time of war, and twelve counts of attempted murder as a result of sabotage in time of war. These are all capital charges. The penalty for each is death. Do you understand the seriousness of these charges?"
She was trembling, unable to respond.
Redhawk produced a plastic printout and placed it on the table. "One Eight, I have here a record of the official inspection that was conducted on twelve A-suits of squad Two Four Beta in preparation for a combat mission on Uldo, a recon mission into enemy territory. The report concludes that all A-suits are fully combat-ready. The certificate includes your seal. Did you inspect those A-suits?"
"Yes." Her eyes were glazing over—she was in bad shape.
"Were all the A-suits, in fact, fully combat-ready?"
"No." She was in agony—her face was twitching.
"You'd better explain," Redhawk said grimly.
"They made me do it," she said hopelessly. Tears were streaming down her cheeks now. "They ordered me to do it. I didn't want to do it! They said it was a direct order." She was sniffling miserably.
"They made you do what?"
"They said to decharge the tacnet power reserves down to twenty-five percent and fix the charge status indicators to one hundred. They said it was Cosmic Secret, and the outcome of the battle depended on it, the lives of thousands of troopers. They swore us to secrecy, and threatened us with court martial and execution if we didn't. I didn't want to do it! Neither did Jano. But we had to."
"Who's Jano?"
"The Assidic. My buddy. We did the check together. The systems check was the final step. We were horrified when they told us."
"Who told you?"
"It was Two Four One. He said the orders came from the Ministry of War. There was somebody with him, from the Ministry. They stood right there and made sure we did it."
Two Four One! The information electrified us. Two Four One was Lowdrop, commander of CAT 24, a harsh and demanding autocrat. I had never liked him, I had never trusted him, but I had never expected treason.
One Eight was blubbering like a baby and blood was trickling down from her lips. I got up and found a tissue and gently daubed at her face. I brought her over to the table and let her sit down. Her arms were still bound behind her. I didn't enjoy bullying this poor little girl, but we were deadly serious about our mission, and we didn't have time to waste.
"We fix A-suits," One Eight whimpered. "We prep them for combat. We're proud of our work. They made us betray you—and ourselves. We didn't want to do it. I had nightmares for months."
"Two Four One," Redhawk reflected.
"I always hated him," I responded.
"We shouldn't be surprised," Redhawk said. "He was more concerned about his career than about his troops. His assets were all expendable."
"Did he survive Uldo?" I asked.
"I don't know," Redhawk said, "But I'll certainly find out."
"Describe this fellow from the Ministry of War," Valkyrie ordered our captive. She described him. It didn't sound like anyone we knew.
"The Ministry of War," Valkyrie mused. "That's ConFree."
"Are you going to kill me?" One Eight asked weakly. It was clear that she recognized us as the very people she had betrayed. Valkyrie reached over and grasped her by the hair and pulled her face so close they were almost kissing. One Eight was covered with icy sweat. Valkyrie must have been a terrifying vision to her, with that black Legion cross burnt onto her forehead.
"If we do decide to kill you, bitch, I promise it will be me." Valkyrie caressed her gently along one cheek. "I'll strangle you, with my own hands. Gently. I'll make sure it takes a long, long time. You'll be looking into my eyes as you die." Valkyrie released the girl abruptly and laughed.
"Easy, Eleven," Redhawk said. "One Eight, we're not going to approach the Legion on this until our investigation is concluded. When action is taken, everyone involved is going down—all the way up to ConFree. People at the lowest level—such as yourself—may even survive. But it's going to depend on how cooperative you are. Should you alert anyone else to our inquiries, for example, we'll find out, and you'll get the death penalty. Not a word to anyone—do you understand?"
She nodded, stunned and speechless.
We recovered our equipment, I released her from the cuffs, and we left. Valkyrie paused in the doorway on her way out, smiling. "Just think of it as a bad dream, bitch," she advised One Eight. "And remember—if you're a good girl, you'll never see me again. But if you're bad, you'll awaken one night with my hands at your throat."
I felt sorry for the little blonde. It certainly wasn't one of her better nights.
***
We weren't so gentle with the fellow from Recon Control. His designation had been changed as well, and they had stuck him out in a science station by himself, a little scimod bristling with sensors and comgear, in the middle of nowhere. Redhawk borrowed an aircar and the three of us set out into the rugged, eerily beautiful wasteland of Quaba 7, under two suns. Recon Control was to have guided our mission to the Mound on Uldo, but with our commo down we had quickly lost contact with them. We didn't know if Recon Control had been working against us or not, but this fellow certainly had some answers that we needed. We were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, for the first few fracs.
"So what did you want to know about?" he asked us. We were sitting around a table inside the scimod, sipping dox, surrounded by a dizzying array of scientific instrumentation. We had said we were from Starcom Science. He had been happy to see us. Apparently he didn't get too many visitors. He was a young trooper with an engaging smile, thick dark hair and smoky grey eyes. He seemed like a nice guy, but we were far beyond any feelings of pity or even mercy. We were bound for death, and it didn't matter if he was a nice guy or not. He had become entangled in the same web of conspiracy and intrigue that had been plaguing us from the beginning. Guilty or not, he was going to talk, and we didn't have time to explain that we were the good guys.
"We want to ask you about Uldo," Redhawk said. "You were with Recon Control for the Twelfth on Uldo. You were the mission officer for Black Jade. We'd like to ask you about Black Jade."
The color vanished from his face. His jaw worked soundlessly for a moment before he regained his voice. His panicked eyes flashed to each of us in turn.
"I…I can't talk about that," he stammered. "It's Cosmic Secret! I've been pledged to secrecy. I can't…" I stood up and shot him in the chest with a vac bolt from my mini. It was deafening. He crashed violently to the deck with his chair—the air crackled with electricity.
When he regained consciousness he was tied to the chair, the psymon was attached to his scalp, and the scanner was floating up by the ceiling, taking it all in. The three of us were still sipping dox, gazing at him calmly.
"Citizen's commission," Redhawk explained patiently. When he had finished describing the penalties for treason, Redhawk asked our captive if he understood.
"I…I understand. You're Black Jade!" The horror showed in his eyes.
"That's exactly right. We're the survivors. And all we want is the truth. Will you cooperate?"
"Yes!" He was sweating—just like the blonde. What had they told him?
"Were you aware of the effort to sabotage Black Jade's mission?"
"No! No sir! Your mission was the Mound—that's what they told us. I was there to support you. I didn't know about any sabotage!"
"Did you know our commo was down?"
"Not until you popped the nova. After that, we didn't hear from you. I called you to ask if you wanted evac. I asked you to pop another nova if your commo was down and you wanted evac. You didn't answer. Recon rules are a request for evac has to be confirmed. You knew that—so no evac."
"We don't blame you for that. Tell us about Blue Gold."
"They penetrated your AO in their aircar. It was completely unauthorized, not to mention crazy. I was about to order them off when Two Four One jumped me. He told me Blue Gold's mission was Cosmic Secret and none of my business and I was not to communicate with them or you. I didn't even know who was the MO for Blue Gold. I watched the survivors following you on foot after their aircar got blasted by the O's. I couldn't say a word to
you about it. Those were the orders. I figured there was more about the Mound than they'd told me."
"Two Four One!"
"That bastard!"
"If he was with Recon Control when Blue Gold intruded," I said, "it means he wasn't with the Twelfth when it perished. He's probably survived Uldo."
"Good point," Redhawk said. "Recon, did you see the O ship launch from the Mound?"
"Yes sir," he said glumly. "It went shooting up into the at and out to the vac, then went stardrive."
"You sure about that?"
"Yes sir! It was a big surprise to me. Nobody had told me anything about a ship."
"And there was only the one ship?" I asked.
He looked at me curiously. "Well…when all was said and done, it appeared that way. But for awhile, we weren't at all sure."
"Explain."
"Well…some time after you had entered the Mound, I turned away for some dox and when my eyes returned to the d-screen I saw what looked like a camfaxed ship, grounded on the desert, a few K from the Mound. It was barely visible, barely registering. It appeared to have landed. I did a frantic systems check but there was no approach track. It was a complete ghost. I called Two Four One over and we stared at it. It just sat there, in a wildly fluctuating mag field that distorted everything. It was fading in and out. I couldn't get any readings on it—nothing at all. Then the O ship launched from the Mound and shot up to the vac. The other ship was still there. I did everything I could to get a read on it. We finally diverted a Legion fighter to zap it with biotech, but the damned thing disappeared before the fighter got there."
"Disappeared?"
"It just wasn't there any more! No departure track—nothing at all. The fighter made another pass, but there was nothing there. Then I got another reading—very brief, very faint. Then it was gone again, and never reappeared. Finally we decided it must have been some kind of ghost image of the O ship that had been in the Mound—a mag ghost. It wasn't a good explanation, but it was all we had. Two Four One ordered me not to enter it into the log. So there's no record of it at all."
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