Queen of Nowhere

by Jaine Fenn

  Dern glimpsed movement behind his opponent. A fraction of a second later there was a nasty thud. Anand tensed, then slumped.

  Dern pulled back as the other man slid to the ground.

  His mother was holding up that awful metallic statuette of Dern as a young boy that she kept in the niche behind her chair.

  She looked down at Anand, who wasn’t moving, then gave a short, hysterical laugh, dropping the statuette. Dern heard it hit the carpet.

  The sight of blood on Ma’s face turned Dern’s stomach. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked.

  ‘Me?’ His mother frowned as if the question were unexpected, then touched her face. ‘Oh, that’s nothing. You …’

  Dern followed his mother’s gaze. Anand’s knife stuck out of his thigh. Tiny rhythmic pulses of blood forced their way past the buried hilt. ‘Oh shit,’ he said stupidly.

  His mother caught him as he fell.

  He felt her hand press against his leg, even as his old coach’s words rang in his ears: The worst injuries are the ones you don’t feel at the time, son.

  ‘I’m calling for help, Dern. You just hang on, you’ll be fine.’

  His mother’s eyes glazed over. Now he knew it was there, the wound’s pulsing filled his entire being. Despite the pressure of his mother’s hand, he could feel his blood, his life, oozing away.

  ‘Dern! Open your eyes, Dern!’

  He hadn’t realised his eyes were closed, but he opened them anyway. Mother’s face swam above him. ‘They’ll be here as soon as they can. Just stay awake. You have to stay awake, Dern. Who was that? Tell me!’

  Talking was a lot of effort, but Ma was as insistent as ever.

  ‘Worked for…’ Oh yes, that whole mess. No way did he have the energy to explain right now. He was beginning to feel cold; not an unpleasant sensation, but disconcerting.

  ‘For Starscape, yes. But he knew you. Why did he attack you?’

  She deserved to know. ‘Check my slate. Password’s Jerine4ever that’s … the number four.’ He experienced a brief flush of embarrassment at his sentimentality, but he wasn’t going to think about Jerine now, because that would hurt too much.

  ‘You can tell me yourself, Dern! You just have to hold on.’

  Then, so quietly he barely heard, she added, ‘Damned low-budget medical cover! Where are they?’

  ‘Look after Da,’ he managed, though he was down to whispering now, and he wasn’t sure she heard him.

  His mother leaned closer. Something wet - tears? Blood? -

  dripped on to his face. ‘You saved me, Dern. I’m so proud of you.’

  Actually, he wanted to say, I saved all of us. But speaking was too much effort. He closed his eyes. No amount of shouting from his mother was going to make him open them again.

  THE BEST WEAPON

  She must remain unconscious. Awake, it would all come back and that must not be allowed to happen.

  But unwanted images and feelings intruded:

  -Imbarin, falling-

  -Shooting wildly, people screaming-

  - Running through dark corridors-

  -Warm and mindless obedience, the deepest and most glorious violation-

  That did it.

  Bez opened her eyes and lunged for the side of the bed. Her stomach was empty, so she only coughed up bile. Afterwards she lay sprawled face down over the covers. There was no point mov-mg.

  Someone came in. She let them lift her and clean her. She was awake now, awake enough to check her chrono: it was three days since-

  - Imbarin, falling—

  She grabbed the woman who was wiping her down and rasped, ‘Is he dead?’

  The woman flinched, pulling away. ‘I’ll get someone,’ she said, and hurried off.

  Bez waited, trying to suppress the images playing out in her head. But oblivion wasn’t going to come just because she wanted it.

  Finally a man she vaguely recognised came in. ‘Imbarin?’ she said, her voice weak and small. Then with a start, she realised her mistake. ‘Is … what happened to Imbarin Tiered’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said the man.

  Some part of her had been holding onto the hope that, because she was a bad shot, because she hadn’t been able to see very well, that whatever else had happened, Imbarin had survived. That she hadn’t murdered him.

  She couldn’t breathe. Then suddenly she could, but only by drawing deep aching breaths that came out as huge, bone-wrenching sobs, violent enough to tear her apart.

  Hands tried to hold her down. She fought them. She lost, and got the oblivion she was desperate for.

  Periods of half-wakefulness.

  More stupid tears. A lifetime of suppressed emotion leaking out.

  Waking began to outweigh sleeping, but that was all right.

  Everything had become soft and distant. Bearable. The memories were there, but somehow dimmer and less excruciating.

  She registered where she was. She wondered if this was the same room in the same medical facility. Not that it mattered. Nothing mattered.

  People came and went, tending her body. She let them.

  Time passed. She let it.

  One day, as she was about to sink back into the soft chemical embrace after a period of semi-wakefulness, she noticed someone different in the room. A man, standing at the foot of the bed. She blinked. He didn’t go away.

  She opened her eyes fully and said flatly, ‘I killed him.’

  The man answered at once. ‘No, you didn’t. The Sidhe killed him.’

  Using me as a weapon. ‘Is she dead?’ He didn’t look like a hallucination, but Bez was in no state to judge.

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  She had an idea where she had first seen this person. ‘You killed her.’

  ‘Yes.’

  There was such finality, such satisfaction, in that tone that Bez whispered, ‘Good,’ and closed her eyes.

  When she opened them again a few seconds (Minutes? Hours?) later, the man was still there. Feeling marginally less bemused, she thought to ask, ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I’m a close associate of Imbarin Tierce.’

  Another of the local rebels. But not the one she had become attached to. Not the one she had shot. She made herself focus on her visitor. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Y ou can call me Arnatt.’

  ‘He never mentioned you. At least, 1 don’t remember him mentioning you.’ She should probably be concerned at talking to a stranger like this, but, between the trauma and the drugs, she appeared to have mislaid her paranoia. Ah yes, the drugs. ‘Just what have you people given me anyway? 1 can’t feel, not properly.’

  ‘I think the term is “a chemical cocktail”.’

  She snorted. He even spoke like Imbarin.

  ‘We can reduce the dose, if you like.’

  ‘I do not like.’

  ‘That’s understandable.’

  ‘So, while what you tell me can’t hurt, why don’t you explain how the-the prisoner got free?’ Details still nagged, puzzles needed solving. Other details, those that challenged her sanity (You let the Enemy dominate you!) and tore her heart out (You killed the only person you’ve cared about since Tand!), she was not going anywhere near.

  ‘In addition to the agents we know about, the Sidhe sometimes use sleepers,’ began Arnatt.

  ‘Wait. What d’you mean, agents “we” know about? You…’

  Some vestige of habitual caution surfaced. ‘I don’t know you.’

  ‘I realise that,’ he said gently. ‘But Imbarin and I shared everything. You can assume I know anything he knew.’

  Bez wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Then again, she wasn’t sure how she felt about anything right now. ‘All right. Carryon.’

  ‘The Sidhe sometimes put individuals attuned to contact with them in failsafe positions on hubs. Most of these sleepers never get the call. This one did. Because she was attuned, the Sidhe managed to make contact with her while semi-conscious. We believe the sleeper was living as a hab-rat. She go
t into the custody suite via tunnels too narrow for a normal human. She’s small, presumably because she originally came from a hi-gee world.

  ‘She entered the cell through a wall panel out of sight of the guard. She tranged him then dragged him into the ducts, where she slit his throat. We found his body crammed into a crawlspace.

  She gave the Sidhe a patch of strong stirn, which had just started to take effect when you and Imbarin arrived. When the Sidhe sensed you, she acted.’

  Bez skipped past the unbearable part. ‘What happened to the Sidhe when you caught her?’

  ‘I shot her with a monofil gun.’

  ‘And the hab-rat?’

  ‘We’ll find her.’

  Bez wanted someone to pay, wanted to see justice done. ‘She deserves to die.’ Bez was shocked at this new emotion, this hot desire for vengeance; such strong feelings chipped away at the careful chemical calm. ‘I want to sleep again now,’ she said.

  ‘Of course.’

  The next time she awoke, some of the fuzziness was gone. For the first time she considered her physical state. She was unharmed, so presumably she had only been shot with trang. Then again - she checked her chrono - eight days had passed since the Incident.

  She tuned out and took a shallow dip into the local infoscape.

  Everything appeared to work, although the drugs dulled her mental reactions.

  When a medic next came in with food Bez asked why they had reduced her dosage of sedatives.

  ‘Because we’re in the business of healing people, not letting them wallow in their pain,’ she said primly.

  ‘What if I want to wallow?’ she asked.

  More gently, the medic said, ‘See how you go, all right?’

  She ate the meal, insisting on feeding herself. Then she blinked herself virtual and accessed her datadrops. She was curious how the quiet revolution she had initiated was progressing without her.

  Arnatt arrived while she was checking her messages. She banished her overlays and said, ‘Have you caught the hab-rat?’

  ‘Not yet, no. She’s not a priority.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘Finishing what you started.’

  ‘And how is that going?’

  ‘Not as well as it could be, frankly. We need you back, Bez.’

  ‘Don’t call me that. You’re not Imbarin.’ Damn: saying his name actually made her throat close.

  ‘No, I’m not. But I share his vision. Your vision.’

  ‘I’ve done my part. It’s happening. Happened, possibly.’ She had earned a few months of medically supervised drug abuse. And maybe, one day, I’ll manage to forget what She made me do.

  ‘It hasn’t happened. We haven’t won. And I’m not sure we will.

  Not unless we can take down ThreeCs.’

  ‘Tar get Zero,’ she breathed to herself bitterly.

  ‘You called her that because you suspected she’s the most important single Sidhe in human-space. You’re right. We’ve removed about a third of them; a few dozen others have fled. But most of the Sidhe infiltrators remain untouched. They haven’t given up. And they won’t, not while they have someone in an unassailable position of power who can facilitate secret communications. If we’re to stop them regrouping, we have to take out Merice Markeck.’

  ‘Don’t you think that if I had anything on her I’d have used it by now?’

  ‘I’m not talking about having her arrested.’

  ‘Oh.’ In her current state it took Bez a moment to catch his meaning. Then she said, ‘I’m not an assassin. If you know someone who can kill her, why don’t you just send them in?’

  ‘Because it’s not just about killing her. If, as we believe, she is coordinating the Sidhe fightback, she’s going to be in possession of vital data: codekeys, details of Sidhe agents, beevee logs. We’ve taken this as far as we can with the intel we have. If we can get hold of that additional data, we can follow up on those Sidhe who have escaped so far.’

  This enticing possibility had occurred to Bez, but she had discarded it as impractical. ‘She’s not going to store such sensitive data anywhere easily accessible.’

  ‘True, though it won’t be in her head, so we can get to it.’

  ‘They don’t use neural implants, do they?’ Bez had surmised as much; presumably head ware interfered with Sidhe abilities.

  ‘No, they don’t. There’s another reason we need that info: as well as making sure the remaining Sidhe stay united, she can use her position in ThreeCs to gather intel on us. Specifically on our agents, and actions.’

  ‘I’m careful with my messages, Arnatt.’ But he had a point. If you had full access to all the corroborating data, any message could eventually be traced back to its source.

  ‘I know, and it’ll take her a while, but the time will come when she can turn the tables on us. Given the choice between waiting for the Sidhe to take out your agents, and getting the data you need to neutralise more of theirs, which would you choose?’

  ‘You know the answer to that. But it isn’t that simple. That woman is one of the most important corporate executives in human-space. We can’t touch her, and we have no means of accessing any data she chooses to keep offline.’

  ‘It’s not like you to give up.’

  ‘How dare you!’ Fury at the man’s presumption cut through the chemical haze. ‘I don’t even know you. Don’t assume you know me.’

  ‘Sorry. You’re right. But just think about it. Please.’

  ‘All right. Now kindly go away.’

  She did think about it. If nothing else, Arnatt’s proposition distracted her from the constant replays ofImbarin’s death.

  He commed the next morning, initially making polite enquiries about her health. She ignored them. ‘All right, what’s your plan?’

  ‘My plan?’

  ‘I assume you have one. One that includes me.’

  ‘It does. In short, we would make a physical penetration of ThreeCs HQ, with a view to killing TargetZero and getting hold of her secure data.’

  He made it sound so simple. ‘When you say “we”, who exactly do you mean? Are you intending to come along?’

  ‘I wouldn’t be the best choice. But there are people ideally equipped to deal with the physical aspects of the mission.’

  ‘Bounty hunters, you mean?’ Presumably if Imbarin had had access to such types, Arnatt did too.

  ‘Actually, I was thinking ofJarek Reen and his crew.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Well, you’ve met them. Him, at least.’

  ‘How do … what makes you think that?’

  ‘You had a meeting with him here, on Tarset, about a year and a quarter ago.’

  A meeting she had gone to considerable efforts to keep secret.

  ‘And if! did?’

  ‘You both came out of it alive, which implies you trust each other. We also believe you’ve been in contact since. To be honest, we’d assumed he was part of your plan, even if he didn’t make the news.

  ‘He was, originally.’ The comment slipped out before she could stop it.

  ‘And?’ prompted Arnatt. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I didn’t like the company he was keeping.’

  ‘You mean Nual?’

  ‘You know about her?’

  ‘Oh yes. We know about her.’

  ‘So why are you even suggesting I have anything to do with Captain Reen?’

  ‘Nual’s a rebel, Bez. In some ways she - and her companions -

  are the best weapon we’ve got against the Sid he.’

  Bez said nothing. When Captain Reen had tried to convince her that the Sidhe he travelled with was a friend, he could have been under Nual’s direct influence. But there was no way Arnatt could be. His organisation knew of the alleged Sidhe renegade and apparently agreed about her status. And nothing Bez herself had found out actually pointed to Captain Reen being an agent of the Enemy. She had to acknowledge she might have been wrong.

  ‘Bez?’

  ‘I tol
d you not to call me that.’

  ‘Sorry. Will you at least talk to him?’

  ‘We didn’t part on the best of terms.’

  ‘He strikes me as a pretty forgiving type.’

  She nearly said, But I’m not, then caught herself. This wasn’t about her. She could not let a previous mistake jeopardise future success. ‘I … maybe. If you think his people are the best choice for this.’

  ‘They’re the only choice.’

  Bez thought for a moment, then said, ‘All right.’

  PREDICTABLE GRACE

  It took Captain Reen a week to arrive, after she had summoned him using protocols she had never thought to u~e again. While she waited, she started weaning herself off the sedatives and mood-lifters. Not entirely, though: after a lifetime avoiding mind-altering substances, she allowed herself some leeway, especially given the alternative. She had no desire to experience fits of listless crying or to see Imbarin die whenever she closed her eyes. Given the choice between breaking and cheating, she chose to cheat for now.

  She moved back to the apartment 1mbarin had secured for her. She continued to monitor the progress of her plan, tweaking where she could, feeding through additional intel to those agents who were continuing the fight. Although belief in the Sidhe was gaining momentum, the Enemy themselves were proving elusive.

  Arnatt was right: the final outcome was balanced on a knife-,edge.

  When the Heart of Glass arrived in-system, Arnatt organised a privileged link into traffic control. She waited until Captain Reen was forty minutes out from Tarset station: close enough to avoid signal-lag but far out enough that if the conversation went badly, his permission to dock could legitimately be revoked.

  Against her instincts, she made the call with full holo engaged.

  Usually she avoided such overt contact, but she wanted to see his face.

  He took a while to accept the call and when he did his expression was one of bemused surprise. ‘Bez? I assumed you’d want to meet in person with the usual, uh, precautions.’