Queen of Nowhere

by Jaine Fenn

  ‘It’s specific to Sid he gene-markers, not to a specific individual.

  In theory, any Sidhe has access to any other Sidhe’s knowledge -

  and thoughts. We’re big on unity.’ Nual’s voice was heavy with sarcasm. ‘You should be able to get around the system now; once they’ve unlocked their tech, they tend to let their minions do the actual work.’

  As Nual moved back, Bez asked a question that had been bothering her for a while, but which she hadn’t felt comfortable voicing before now. ‘What are the Sidhe? Your biometrics - the ones Jarek gave me to get your false ID - they’re human, right down to the signature sequence.’

  Nual shot her a wry sideways smile. ‘It’s a good job the Salvatines got their own way. If it was acceptable to hold complete genetic profiles for everyone, I’d never pass for human.’

  ‘So Sidhe are mutated humans?’

  ‘Yes. They diverged from humanity several millennia back.’

  Bez digested this. She couldn’t decide whether being not-truly-alien made the Sidhe better or worse. ‘Is that why they didn’t just leave us alone after the Protectorate fell? Did they feel … some sort of kinshi p?’

  Nual laughed, an unexpectedly light and carefree sound.

  ‘Not exactly. The Protectorate was accurately named: the Sidhe genuinely believed - and still believe - that their destiny is to shepherd the poor, unfortunate lesser race.’

  ‘I never thought about it like that.’

  More quietly, Nual said, ‘When humanity turned on them, it made the Sidhe reconsider. But they stuck to their principles. Even after the combination of monomaniac vision and limited resources led to stagnation, my people kept the faith.’

  ‘Yet you rebelled.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Nual. ‘I did.’ She straightened. Tllleave you with Taro now. I need to sort out some loose ends.’ By which she presumably meant those of Markeck’s servants who had only been tranqed, not killed outright.

  After she left, Bez said to Taro. ‘And you, uh, love her?’

  ‘More than life itself.’

  Bez turned back to the deskcomp. That, at least, made sense.

  Now she had access, Markeck’s system was easy to crack. And there was so much here.

  She only spotted the com call because it was in the ‘recent activity’ file, and she was curious about TargetZero’s final actions. She scanned the file while downloading a listing of Enemy agents in this sector. The message was voice only, and if she hadn’t spoken to him recently she would never have recognised the caller as Doctor Maht: Merice, this is probably nothing, but you remember that hacker girl from a couple of decades back that you said might not be dead after all? Well, she isn’t: I just saw her on the tubeway; I think I spooked her. I thought you should know.’

  That explained their reception. She considered keeping quiet about her findings, then decided not. She’d tell her allies later.

  Right now, she had a rich seam of compromising information to mme.

  ‘Er, Bez.’

  She glanced up. Taro stood next to her, looking vaguely apologetic. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Don’t wanna disturb you but Nual needs to know how much longer you’re gonna be.’

  Bez checked her chrono: she had been in Markeck’s system for eighteen minutes. ‘Is there a problem?’ Given that none of the night’s mayhem had taken place anywhere public, and the original alert was over, she had not seen any reason to hurry.

  ‘No problem,’ said Taro, ‘Nual just wants to know whether she needs to keep the servants under for longer.’

  ‘Wasn’t she just going to … finish them off?’

  ‘Nah, far better to plant a few false memories then let ‘em loose.

  That way, the authorities’ll be looking for a gang of local coves.’

  Taro raised his gaze, as though conjuring facts from the air. ‘They were dressed as ThreeCs security but probably weren’t, and they surprised Markeck on her doorstep, made her go back in, trashed the place a bit and knocked out her guards; they must’ve killed her with some sort of explosive round to the head.’ He looked down at Bez. ‘Somethin’ like that.’

  Bez could see the logic of this. ‘If I can have another fifteen minutes, I’ll have cleared the system out.’

  ‘No worries.’

  Bez wasn’t sorry to have two fewer lives on her hands.

  The Heart olGlass’s external cameras showed a man matching the publicly available holos of Frex Drelle. He was approaching the ship’s airlock carrying some sort of covered tray. He appeared to be alone.

  Taro had just commed to say they were about to leave the target’s apartment. Jarek considered stalling his visitor, but to turn him away now would sour any possible deal.

  Jarek threw himself out of his chair and hurried down the ladder. His com went; Sirrah Drelle was formally requesting permission to board. He ignored it for a moment while he double-checked the set-up in the rec-room. Then he went to stand at the end of the corridor to the airlock; the only other door off that corridor led to the ship’s cargo bay, and that was locked. A glance at the cam feed on his com showed movement outside the airlock, but the angle of the camera and the tiny screen didn’t give him much to go on. It could just be his expected visitor. Jarek ordered the corridor lights up full, then answered the call. ‘Come on in, Sirrah Drelle.’

  The airlock didn’t need to cycle so it opened immediately. Jarek thought he caught a glimpse of something or someone behind the man standing there. He tensed.

  Drelle smiled broadly and advanced into the corridor brandish-ing his tray. ‘As promised, some light refreshment.’

  And there she was, flitting out of the open ‘lock like a shadow, still partly hidden behind the grinning merchant. I fucking knew it!

  Jarek turned on the spot. He’d paced this out, calculating his moves exactly. The first part of his plan, to run, required no effort.

  Sidhe generally had that effect on him.

  One step. Two.

  He heard a noise of masculine surprise: the kind of sound a man might make if his host suddenly turned his back on him … or if someone unexpectedly barged past.

  Three, four steps.

  A crash, as of a tray falling to the floor. Everything was simultaneously too fast and too slow.

  Five, six.

  And now the tricky bit. There was plenty of debris on the rec-room floor to choose from, but he’d selected something soft when he walked this through; a black, narrow-brimmed hat that Taro thought, incorrectly, looked pretty stylish. All his pursuer would see was a small dark obstacle which-

  -he tripped on.

  He didn’t fall flat: that would be suicide. He ducked and rolled, just like he’d practised. The impact still winded him. No time for that, keep it fast and smooth; either panic or hesitation would be fatal.

  He rolled to the side, half sitting up as he did so, risking a glance back in passing.

  The Sidhe had reached the corridor, no doubt eager to get control of the situation - of him - before he fled into cover.

  One of the trickiest elements of the plan had been deciding where to put the gun. He’d tried wearing it on his hip, but there was a risk of losing it when he fell, and not being able to draw it quickly enough after he landed. Instead he’d left it orr the floor, among the other mess, exactly where he expected to fall. And had fallen. His hand closed on the butt of his pistol.

  If the Sidhe had a gun too, he was screwed. But why risk smuggling weapons through customs when you can disable or even kill with your mind?

  He looked at her.

  That act took considerable willpower, overriding instinct and bitter experience, but when he saw the Sidhe’s face he knew at once that his plan had worked.

  She was confused. And unarmed. Her fiery gaze had absolutely no effect on him.

  Jarek shot her.

  A needle-pistol was a less extreme weapon than the Angels’

  laser, but at close range it still made a nasty mess. The shot caught the side of h
er face, slicing off skin and flesh in a rain of accelerated micro-projectiles. The Sidhe shrieked and threw her hands up.

  Jarek fired again, because when it came to the Sidhe, you didn’t take chances. The second shot turned her chest to bloody pulp. She span and fell.

  Jarek began to laugh, not caring what his other visitor thought.

  Bez had had enough of blood for one day; perhaps for one lifetime.

  Jarek had cleaned the worst off the rec-room floor by the time she and the Angels got back to the ship, but she still got a whiff of that too-familiar smell, the same for Sidhe as for true humans.

  She looked over at the stranger sitting at the galley table. He shot back a look of naked curiosity. Jarek had said it was all right for them to come aboard, so she wasn’t going to let the presence of a bemused local merchant get between her and the medbay. Jarek was probably assuming that if the man gave them any trouble, Nual would simply edit his memories. Bez no longer found that idea as appalling as she once had.

  ‘I want to see the body,’ she muttered to Taro, who was currently acting as her crutch.

  ‘Don’t you wanna get that leg seen to?’

  ‘Yes. But I have to do this first.’

  Taro helped her to the hold, where Jarek had bagged up the body of the Sid he. Bez knew who it was and, though she had wanted to see the evidence, she had no intention of actually opening the bag. Target204, solo freetrader, thirty-four years old …

  She called up the full file, which confirmed that this wasn’t someone she would otherwise have got. Jarek had been rash to take on one of the Enemy alone - even with his secret weapon - but after her experience on Tarset station, Bez understood his reasons. He too knew what it was to be enthralled by a Sid he. And with the Sidhe in human-space about to go on the run, taking out their freetraders was a priority.

  Bez looked over at the comabox with the Consort in. It was still in the corner of the hold nearest the rec-room. According to Nual, the three of them had carried out extensive research to determine the exact range at which a Consort could nullify a Sidhe’s power.

  Jarek had had to partially wake the boy to utilise his abilities, but he was safely back in stasis now.

  ‘I’m done here,’ she said to Taro. He supported her while she made her way out of the hold.

  Back in the rec-room the merchant was discussing the current market in fresh foods with Jarek. Apparently he might buy their cargo. Bez glanced at Nual, busy deploying the medbay’s foldaway bed on the far side of the room. Apparently he might even do so of his own volition.

  As Bez let the Angels ease her onto the bed, the hapless trader was saying, ‘I’d heard a bit about recent events elsewhere - not officially, you understand, ThreeCs haven’t been reporting it, for some reason - but it never occurred to me that I’d actually meet a Sidhe! 1 mean, it’s unbelievable.’

  ‘And she convinced you to come here without you realising you were being compelled to?’

  ‘Exactly! That’s the worst part: I really thought it was just a good idea to trade with you; I had no conscious thought about the involvement of … that person.’

  ‘And do you still think it’s a good idea to trade with me?’

  ‘Well…’ The man sounded embarrassed.

  ‘I’d be willing to give you a very favourable price.’

  ‘Thank you. It’s just … all this…’

  ‘Yes, most irregular. Presumably you were logged coming through customs, so if anything odd were to be reported…’ Bez got the impression Jarek was enjoying himself.

  ‘I’ve certainly no desire to involve the authorities. In fact, I was wondering about the, the body-‘

  ‘This is a water planet with, I believe, quite a lot of carnivorous wildlife.’

  ‘Ah. Yes.’

  ‘So, then, shall we open negotiations?’

  ‘I can certainly discuss the purchase of a percentage of your cargo.’

  ‘Excellent. If you’re over the worst of the shock then perhaps you’d like to open that bottle you brought.’

  ONLY FOR A MOMENT

  ‘Excellent: you’re not limping.’

  ‘I’m fine. The knee’s almost healed.’

  Arnatt still insisted on moving the seat back for her. Bez wanted to be annoyed, especially given this was just a dockside bistro and not some smart restaurant, but instead she found herself amused.

  The more she got to know Arnatt, the more he reminded her of Imbarin, with his wilfully eccentric mannerisms and sardonic view of life. When she’d pressed him, he had admitted they were distantly related.

  ‘Sorry I haven’t had time to meet you in person for a few days,’

  he said. ‘Been busy.’ Arnatt was on Tarset’s Board of Directors, and hence more actively involved in running the station than Imbarin had been.

  ‘That’s fine, you don’t have to buy me dinner now.’ He had also been busy when J arek and his crew had dropped her back at Tarset last week. Given he considered Jarek such a useful ally, Bez found Arnatt’s tendency to avoid him rather odd. Or perhaps it wasn’t Jarek Reen but one of his companions that was the problem. That he avoided Nual implied Arnatt had something to hide, but Bez was satisfied that on the important matter of the Sid he he could be trusted.

  ‘It’s no trouble.’

  She and Arnatt chatted as they ate, going over recent developments in the ongoing fight.

  Markeck’s files had provided a whole new network of Enemy agents whose names Bez was in the process of disseminating to the relevant parties, supplemented by the recovered Setting Sun data.

  Meanwhile, more Sidhe were going to ground, disappearing before human vengeance caught up with them. Some would escape via the surviving Enemy freetraders, but at least they would be out of human-space. Bez found herself wondering at the symbiotic relationship between human and Sidhe. Nual had said the Sidhe were trying to save humanity from themselves, and it was true that some of what they did - such as the creation of transit-kernels - was in humanity’s interest. Bez had broken that symbiosis and her actions would condemn the remaining Sidhe to a slow and lingering decline. She was not as pleased with that outcome as she expected to be.

  Today’s big news was the Commission’s announcement that they intended to investigate ThreeCs. Bez could see the battle between the two great powers running and running, but she didn’t greatly care; without any direct Sidhe influence, ThreeCs was no longer a threat. The events she had initiated had already moved beyond her control.

  Bez only realised as she finished her spiced rice that they hadn’t engaged the table’s privacy screen, a lapse that would have been unthinkable a few months, even weeks, ago. Then again, if the other patrons worked out what they were talking about, then rather than considering them insane as might have been the case until recently, they would probably congratulate the two of them for their pivotal role in uncovering Sidhe influence.

  Arnatt ordered a dessert; Bez didn’t, and as he ate she said, ‘I’m thinking of leaving Tarset.’

  Arnatt swallowed, and raised his eyebrows. ‘Is it something I’ve said?’

  ‘Of course not. I’m just not used to staying in one place for this long.’

  ‘I realise that. But you have everything you need here.’

  ‘Yes, I know and-‘

  ‘Is this about credit?’

  ‘Frankly, yes. I’m grateful to you for honouring Imbarin’s wishes and continuing to provide an apartment and beevee access, but my personal funds are about to run out.’ She had decided to keep her promise to Imbarin and not do any financial hacking while on Tarset. But she had no intention ofliving off charity either.

  ‘But you would come back here?’

  ‘I … well, yes, obviously I’d come back here some time.’

  ‘I meant to stay.’

  ‘Stay?’ She looked at him hard.

  ‘I was thinking of offering you a job.’

  ‘A job?’

  ‘I know you can live off your wits, but I’m guessing that y
ou’ve been justifying your career as a data thief as a means to an end.

  And one day, in the foreseeable future, that end will, urn, end.’

  Bez glanced around at his tactless comment, but no one was paying attention. ‘Your point is valid,’ she conceded softly. There was also the matter of the other hub rebels. They had turned a blind eye to her more dubious activities when they served the same cause, but might not be so forgiving now.

  ‘In that case, I might be able to put a word in. Correct me if I’m wrong, but your background is in cryptology, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Obfuscating or illuminating?’

  ‘What? Cryptography originally.’

  ‘Excellent. I think that when you’re ready, a post can be found.’

  He went back to his meal.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, somewhat to her own surprise.

  ‘Not a problem,’ he said, through a mouthful of compote. ‘I like having you around.’

  By the time they left the bistro, Bez was giving his offer serious consideration. Back before she gained possession of the Setting Sun data, she had never considered what her future might hold after her mission was complete. Looking back she now saw that she had perhaps expected to die trying to bring the Sidhe down. When the memory-core had fallen into her hands, she had acknowledged the possibility that she might not only win, but survive; that there was an after. Getting the Sidhe ID data had confirmed that possibility.

  And now it had come true.

  Up until now, she had assumed that once she had done all she could, she had two choices: to settle down and retire using her remaining funds, or to carryon databreaking and travelling. The former would require picking the right persona - the Estrante ID would have been a good one - and might involve the kind of luxury she found annoying. Certainly there would be a risk of boredom. The latter was neither morally defensible nor, given the power of the hub rebels, advisable.

  But she had worked as a cryptographer once, and enjoyed it.

  Perhaps she could take the job Arnatt was offering on her terms, with scheduled time off to visit other hubs and planetary systems of interest. Travel wasn’t a habit she wanted to break. But she had already begun to think of Tarset as home. She felt comfortable here.