Blackcollar: The Backlash Mission

by Timothy Zahn

  Marcovich could still remember his father's face the morning after his own conditioning had been completed—the look of horror that had grown there as Trendor explained with macabre satisfaction what had been done to his five-year-old boy. It was the last time Marcovich had seen his father before the execution, and in the years since then he'd often lain awake at night trying in vain to find a better memory of him to cling to. For a long time he'd tried to hate Trendor, even after he'd learned just how futile such a mental exercise was. On an intellectual level, he could easily list reasons for such hatred, but the emotions that could turn that logic into concrete action were simply not there.

  And were impossible to invoke.

  And it had taken him years longer to come to grips with the fact that that impossibility—as well as the accompanying inability to hate himself for such apparent weakness—wasn't anything he should blame himself for.

  Off to the side something moved among the dead leaves.

  Someone trying to sneak in past him? Marcovich took a careful breath, pretending he hadn't heard the sound. All he had to do was continue on, and the invader would go safely by, and within minutes Trendor would be dead.

  He spun abruptly, swinging his laser up into position as the slaved infrared floodlight fastened to a branch a dozen meters away turned with him. The squeeze of a switch on his rifle and the landscape beyond his goggles lit up like day.

  In the center of the view, a squirrel poked around for nuts, oblivious of both the invisible light and the lethal weapon aimed at him.

  Marcovich snorted with both released tension and amusement and shut off the flood. Almost immediately the calls began coming in on his earphone from the other perimeter guards, all of whom would have seen the sudden light. Marcovich calmed them down, and within a few minutes the watchful silence had again descended on the area. For men who don't believe anyone's coming, he thought wryly, they're sure jumpy enough.

  But then, staying a bit jumpy was how one remained alive in this business.

  And so Marcovich would stay jumpy, too. Drawbacks and all, life was still reasonably worth living...

  and besides, it would be a damned shame to get himself killed on such a glorious night.

  Throwing one last look at the stars, he continued on his rounds.

  —

  "I trust," Lathe commented dryly, glancing around the comfortable living room, "that this place is more secure than the last one we tried talking in."

  Bernhard didn't bother to smile. "It's safe enough," he said, eyes flicking briefly to Caine. "More of your team?"

  "Allen Caine," Lathe introduced him. "In charge of a separate commando team, temporarily under my command." This was no time to split hairs, especially when Bernhard didn't need the details in the first place. "You have a list for me?"

  "Not much of one," Bernhard said. He paused, and something unreadable briefly touched his face.

  "You really have made Security mad at you, haven't you?"

  "That used to be one of the things blackcollars did best," Lathe said mildly. "Is this sudden revelation the result of something new, or are you just now catching up on the day's events?"

  "If I were you I'd be less flip about it," Bernhard returned sourly. He jerked his head in Caine's direction. "Especially with civilians in tow."

  Caine stirred, but at Lathe's hand signal subsided. The comsquare had rather expected Bernhard to notice the lack of a dragonhead ring on the younger man's hand, but even so the other's reaction seemed oddly vehement. "He's had full training," Lathe said. "He knows what he's doing."

  "For all the good that'll do him." Bernhard exhaled loudly, and with a glance at Kanai drew an envelope from his pocket. "All right, here's your list. There are all of five names on it, none of them higher than major. Sorry, but it was the best I could do."

  Lathe took the envelope and slid it inside his tunic, combat senses abruptly flaring with the realization that something here was off-key. Bernhard's movements, his voice, his attitude—even on the basis of their single Shandygaff meeting, Lathe could sense the other's tension and his effort to keep it hidden.

  His tingler... but if Bernhard had drawn them into a trap, alerting Hawking and Skyler outside would bring down the net in double-quick time. "I don't suppose," he said, mainly to cover his own reaction, "that there's any inducement we could offer you to join our side?"

  Bernhard's lip quirked, almost invisibly. But enough. "No," he said shortly. "Okay, I've handled my end of the bargain. What about yours?"

  "You mean leaving Denver?" Lathe waved a hand, other hand curving into a brief hand signal that he hoped only Caine would notice: possible danger. "I'm sorry; but as I told you before, we have a mission here. Until it's completed we can't leave."

  "And that goes for the 'civilians,' too," Caine added tartly. "Maybe you don't realize it, Bernhard, but this is actually my mission—Lathe and his blackcollars are only along for muscle and advice." He glowered at both Bernhard and Kanai and then turned to Lathe. "Apparently these two feel even more strongly about letting strangers into your exclusive little private club than you do—and far be it from me to butt in where I'm not wanted. Whenever you're finished talking, I'll be waiting in the car. Doing the real planning for our next move." Turning his back on them, he opened the door and stomped outside, closing it behind him.

  "Krijing toad-face," Bernhard muttered after him. "If that's the best you could come up with, Lathe, you sure as hell aren't going to last much longer around here."

  Lathe shrugged. "He's a little hotheaded, but reasonably competent," he said. With luck, Bernhard would never learn just how competent Caine really was. Now the trick would be to stall off any attack until the blackcollars outside had been alerted. "But you see now why I want to have some more people like you behind me."

  Bernhard took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eye. "You're dead, Lathe. All of you are—you simply don't know it yet. Security has the edge in numbers, technology, and time, and there's just no way to fight it. We came to an agreement with them a long time ago, but I don't think there's any way at this point for you to do the same. Even if you were willing to. You're dead—and I'm not going down with you. Will you try to get that through your head?"

  "If you insist." And Lathe's combat senses were starting to scream at him. "I'll be in touch," he said, moving toward the door.

  Beside Bernhard, Kanai stirred. "Comsquare... 755-3984-581. That's my home phone number, if you need anything. It'll probably be tapped, though."

  Lathe nodded, mildly surprised and instantly suspicious. But if there was betrayal in the information it wasn't visible in Kanai's eyes. "Taps are easy enough to work around. Thanks."

  The attack didn't come as he hurried down the walk to where they'd parked their car. Nor did it come as he drove around the block, picking up Skyler and Hawking and Caine. As they passed block after block of normal traffic, Lathe finally was forced to admit that they'd just escaped from a nonexistent trap.

  "So when are you going to tell us what that was all about?" Skyler asked casually as they headed north toward Reger's home. "Just keeping us in practice?"

  Lathe shook his head slowly. "I caught something off-key from Bernhard, but apparently I misread him. I thought perhaps Security had already gotten in with an offer he couldn't turn down."

  "Such as his skin for ours?" Skyler suggested. "That would be all we'd need."

  "Actually, I think it's inevitable," Lathe told him. He was banking on it, in fact, though for the moment it didn't seem advisable to tell the others that. "But apparently that's still somewhere down the line."

  "But you weren't wrong about Bernhard," Caine said slowly. "I felt something wrong, too."

  Lathe shrugged. "Well, let's not let it worry us. For the moment, anyway, he can't touch us."

  —

  "Well?" Kanai asked quietly when the sound of Lathe's car had faded into the night.

  "Well what?" Bernhard retorted, his face unreadable.
/>   "Come on, Bernhard—we know each other too well for games like this. Something's wrong. What?"

  Bernhard held out for a few more seconds, then gave in as Kanai had known he would. "I had a visitor at home this evening just before I came here," he said with a sigh. "One guess as to who."

  Something cold crawled up Kanai's back. "It wouldn't have been General Quinn, by any chance?"

  "You got it. Just walked right in off the street, bold as a khassq-class Ryq. I didn't even know he had me located—and if he's got me centered, he's got all of us. I couldn't believe it."

  Kanai nodded. "He dropped in on me like that, too, wanting information on Lathe. Whatever they're up to, Security's sure worked up over it."

  "Yeah," Bernhard growled. "Well..."

  "So what'd Quinn have to say? Aside from threatening us if we help Lathe, that is?"

  Bernhard's mouth quirked. "It seems to have gotten worse since he talked to you. He's decided that our leaving Lathe alone isn't going to be good enough."

  Kanai stared, the muscles of his throat tightening. "No."

  "Yes." Bernhard nodded heavily. "No choice, Kanai. As of an hour ago we're officially on the Security payroll."

  "We can't do it," Kanai insisted stubbornly. "Bernhard, we can't betray another blackcollar team in cold blood—"

  "You think I like it?" the other shot back. "I'm a blackcollar, too, in case you've forgotten. We have no choice, dammit. Our own survival's at stake here—our survival, against bringing down a little sooner a team that's doomed anyway."

  Kanai took a deep breath. "I don't give a damn," he said between clenched teeth. "I'm not going to be a party to this. Quinn can go straight to hell—and if you do his snake work you can go with him."

  Anger flushed Bernhard's face. But the emotion quickly vanished, to be replaced by weariness. "I understand your feelings, Kanai. I wish to hell myself this wasn't necessary. But it is. You don't have to help, but I at least need you to stand out of the way."

  Kanai hesitated. To say no, to break all ties with Bernhard once and for all, to cross over and ally himself with Lathe... but he knew down deep it was all just wordplay. He'd fought too long at Bernhard's side, shared too much history with him and the others. "All right." He sighed. "I'll stay clear. I hope you realize he's not going to be an easy target."

  "I agree." Bernhard's eyes searched Kanai's face. "But his allies may not be quite as tough or slippery. Where is she?"

  "Who? The Shandygaff woman?" Kanai's lip twisted in contempt. "So you're giving up already on the bull and instead going after the calf?"

  "If what she did in the bar is any indication, she hardly qualifies as a calf," Bernhard replied dryly.

  "Would you rather some friend of the late Mr. Nash finds her?—and he had a lot of very nasty friends."

  "They don't even know where to look."

  "You know better than that. Eventually someone will get to her. And... well, I've seen some of the ritual executions that've been done in this town. I guarantee you don't want her to go that way."

  No, Kanai didn't, and once more he found himself in a no-win situation. Honor—what did honor demand here?

  But for once he couldn't even rationalize an answer to that question. Perhaps because honor had no meaning to a man who'd betrayed himself and others so often.

  And was about to do so again. "She's alone in a house about a mile north of the Shandygaff," he said, giving up. "Some place Lathe set up." He supplied the address. "I suppose you'll immediately turn her over to Quinn?"

  "I don't know. I'll try to get permission for us to question her ourselves first."

  "But if you don't learn anything, you'll let him have her. Sure—I understand."

  "Kanai—"

  Silently, Kanai turned his back and walked out, suddenly feeling the need for solitude. Solitude, and cleaner air.

  Chapter 23

  They took her at dawn the next morning—Bernhard and two of his men, entering the house with a silence and speed that had her before she could get to her gun. Hawking, watching from a safe place, was too far away to go her aid and therefore didn't even try, which probably saved his life minutes later when the Security forces appeared to take her from the blackcollars.

  "Damn them," Caine snarled, squeezing one of Reger's expensive handmade mugs viciously with both hands. "We shouldn't have let her stay there alone. Dammit, Lathe, why didn't you let us bring her back here, anyway?"

  "Because we didn't know if we could trust her," was the comsquare's even reply. Caine glared at him—how could he take this so damned calmly? He opened his mouth to speak, but Pittman beat him to it.

  "Didn't her actions at the Shandygaff prove anything?" the other youth demanded. "She risked her life to save yours."

  "Not really—we could have taken Nash ourselves." Lathe shrugged slightly. "And you ought to know by now how easily something like that can be staged."

  "Maybe this part's been staged, too," Alamzad suggested. "Or is that ridiculous?" he added as Pittman sent him an astonished look.

  "Not out of the question, actually," Lathe said. "But I don't see this Security office as being that subtle. No, I think it was the real thing."

  "So Bernhard and Kanai have gone over the line," Skyler said, almost as to himself. "You were right about Bernhard, Lathe—just a bit premature. I suppose the next question is what we do about it. If anything."

  "Can't we go into Athena and get her out?" Colvin asked. "I mean, she has now pretty well proved herself, hasn't she?"

  "Only in a negative way," Hawking said dryly.

  "Besides, we're not in the rescuing business this time around," Caine told Colvin, throwing a baleful glare at Lathe. "Our mission's apparently the only important thing on the list, and there's nothing in the schedule for caring about Anne or anyone else."

  Lathe cleared his throat as Colvin started to protest. "Actually, I think that we're going to have to make an exception on this one," the comsquare said.

  Caine stared at him, unable to believe the other's reversal... and a nasty suspicion began to grow within him. "Oh—I see now," he said bitterly. "When it's people whose deaths are going to be on my conscience, it's one of those things I have to learn to live with. When it's someone on your conscience, we do something about it. Is that it?"

  Lathe returned his gaze evenly... and only then did Caine notice the tightness around the comsquare's eyes. "It's nothing like that," the other grated, "and if you'll turn your glands down for a minute so you can think straight you'll understand that the cases are entirely different. The truckers aren't connected with anything subversive—us or Torch or anyone else. A simple, nondamaging interrogation will establish that, and they'll be released forthwith. Anne Silcox is something else entirely, and whatever she knows about Torch will eventually be drawn out—and it's not likely to be easy on her."

  "Though it doesn't sound like Security will get a hell of a lot from her," Hawking put in. "And what little she knows is five years out of date, besides."

  "True," Lathe said. "But we can't take the chance some of it might still be useful." He looked at Caine. "Do you follow the argument? I don't want you thinking there's anything personal about this."

  Caine consciously unclenched his jaw. "I suppose so," he said grudgingly. "So... how do we go about it?"

  "I've got some ideas," the comsquare said, sweeping his gaze around the room at all of them.

  "Jensen, find Reger and get a couple of vans from him. You, Colvin, and Alamzad will get to work reinforcing the bodywork and frame, particularly the front. Hawking, did you get that supply of paraldart antidote Reger promised us?"

  Hawking nodded. "He delivered both that and the darts themselves yesterday evening. The bellybomb will take a few more hours to put together, but I can probably have it ready by noon. The limpet mines and special nunchaku are already finished."

  Lathe nodded. "Good. That'll be your project for the day, then."

  "Belly-bomb?" Caine frowned. "What's a belly
-bomb? And what were you rigging up mines and special weapons for?"

  "I'll tell you later," the comsquare said briefly. "Mordecai, you'll take Caine and Braune into Denver to pick up some high-temp ablation paste to coat the vans with—Reger can tell you which businesses in town may have some stashed away. Skyler and I will meanwhile work out the details and contingencies. Pittman, you'll assist us in that."

  "Me?" Pittman asked, sounding startled. "I mean—why me?"

  "Because you're the one who's left," Lathe said reasonably. "Besides which, you'll be driving one of the vans and I'll need to know exactly what you can and cannot do with one of the things."

  Pittman seemed to straighten in his seat. "I can do anything the van itself can take," he said with a touch of pride.

  "Good." Lathe glanced around the room. "Let's get busy. I don't know if Torch gave its members any psychor training, but I doubt Anne can hold out for too many hours. If we're going to spring her, it has to be tonight."

  —

  The detention cells and interrogation rooms took up most of the Security building's fifth floor, only a single row of offices along the northern end not devoted directly to that purpose. Galway took the elevator up from the fourth floor—the only way in or out of the level—and headed down the hallway, an odd shiver running up his back. This was possibly the most secure place in Athena, but he couldn't help recalling that the interrogation rooms in Millaire on Argent had been along a hallway very similar to this one.

  And he'd nearly died while sitting in one of those rooms.

  Two of the interrogation cells near the end of the hallway showed the glowlights that signaled occupation, but only one had guards posted outside. Reasonable enough—most everyone else had agreed hours ago that the two trucker women were totally harmless. The sole reason anyone was still questioning them was that Quinn had ordered it done. Galway grimaced in mild disgust, but at the moment he had far more urgent things on his mind than Quinn's treatment of innocent civilians.

  "The general inside?" he asked the guards as they saluted him.