by C. G. Hatton
She didn’t reply and that wasn’t exactly reassuring.
“Skye?” he thought, and looked up as the door opened.
A medic stepped into the room, flanked by another two security personnel, both armed and wearing armour.
Hil stared at them. They weren’t Watch; these guys had the giveaway red flashes on their armour that tagged them as the Man’s personal guard. What the hell were they doing here? It seemed excessive and the medic seemed unimpressed by the state he’d left their equipment in.
“Mr Hilyer,” she said, “I see you’ve decided to leave us.” She looked him up and down. It was disconcerting, like he’d been caught trespassing, and with a slight shake of the head, she handed him a data board and pen. The two guards had stationed themselves at the door, but whether they were stopping someone from getting to him or stopping him from getting out wasn’t clear.
“Skye,” he sent, going through the motions of reading the information on display on the board. “Why the security detail?”
“Honey,” she said, “I’m trying to find out but I told you, I’m locked down here. I don’t have access to anything.”
Crap. He glanced up at them while he scribbled his signature with his left hand, twice as big as it usually was. He put a cross-eyed angry face in the descending ‘y’.
“Is that it?” he said, looking back at the medic and giving her the board. “Don’t I get any instructions to ignore? Am I done?”
The medic looked at him like she was used to patients being assholes when they left. Maybe she’d dealt with field operatives before.
“You’re welcome to leave,” she said.
“Free to leave?” he asked, glancing from her to the armoured figures at the door.
She waved the board at him. “You’re released from Medical,” she said and smiled. “What they do with you from here is up to them.”
He narrowed his eyes and walked to the door. They parted and let him pass, taking up position slightly behind and to either side, following as he walked into the corridor.
At the lift, Hil pushed the button for level ten and glared at the two bodyguards he seemed to have acquired, waiting and daring them to over-ride it with a twelve. They didn’t and as the lift took them up towards Acquisitions, it was hard not to wonder what the hell was going on.
Walking out onto ten, Hil felt about as low as he could go. The atmosphere in the halls was muted. Respect for Mendhel, curiosity about himself and LC he supposed. He couldn’t remember it ever being this quiet.
The guild’s massive cruiser had subcultures within subcultures. Acquisitions was the cold steel walkways of the barracks and spooksville, dominated by the endless depths of the Maze, where he spent every spare minute, and the noise of the mess with its rowdy bar and the always looming and ever changing board showing the standings, where every field-op was listed by points. It was a place of gambling and risk, rough and tumble amongst the grunts of the guild’s militia and fierce competition between the field-ops.
Each section in the guild had its own atmosphere and way of life. Legal had three decks of marble hallways and oak panelled staterooms. They controlled the library, the real library with the books crammed into aisles of wooden shelves. Dusty artefacts of long ago and hardly necessary when anything you wanted was at your fingertips through a data board but the library epitomised the compulsive nature of the guild to hoard. It wasn’t often that the field-ops got to visit the library but Hil had occasionally and it was an awesome collection. They had all that as well as the billions of items of electronically-stored information. Legal kept the maps and the star charts and the manuals. The guild owned the history of the human race, from Earth to all the colonies and out to Winter; knowing everything gave them a power that was almost unmatched.
Legal was the intelligence arm of the guild, gathering data, recording information and negotiating contracts.
Media was more superficial and more insidious even than Legal. Media was effectively the espionage branch of the guild, all comfy sofas and real coffee pots with a finger on the pulse of the future. It didn’t predict trends, it created them and used them to manipulate the colonies with a voracity for change that unnerved anyone caught in their vicinity for too long. They didn’t inspire, they dampened individuality and spontaneity by feeding the masses exactly whatever it was they decided was the current in, creating and destroying on a whim. Acquisitions collected. Legal controlled. And Media frog-marched them into the future.
Science was the fourth of the big four. They had a sphere at the very centre of the Alsatia and no one that Hil had ever met on board had been in there. They came out occasionally but any damage caused in there by their many explosions and accidents were dealt with by their own. Science kept to themselves except when they hurled a fast ball of evolution out to the field-ops to try in the outside. Science was also the main drop off point for in transit acquisitions. It was rare for a tab to go straight to the client; more often packages would go through Science first then back to the beyond. That way the guild made much longer term acquisitions itself than purely the price paid for the tab. It was simple and devastatingly effective.
When he tried to turn into the barracks corridor, a gentle push on his arm kept him from turning. He wasn’t feeling up for a fight so he let them lead the way. They took him straight ahead.
The Chief’s door was open. Hil hesitated at the threshold. He’d only ever been in there when he was in trouble and then that was only after Mendhel had cleared the air with the Chief. He’d never appreciated until that moment how much of a pain in the neck he’d always been to his handler. It was a horrible feeling to realise that he’d never be able to make it up to the man, who had always been more than a handler and more of a father figure to them all. He wasn’t sure if he could face the Chief.
He took a step into the room and the door closed behind him, leaving the security guys outside.
The Chief had his back to the door, standing over by his planning wall, wire frame outlines of maps, charts and lists moving constantly over its smooth surface. “Sit down, son,” he said and moved a hand over the control board – it all faded to black, leaving the room darker but easier on the eyes.
Hil sat on one of the three chairs in front of the massive black desk that dominated the room. He kept his head down, and scuffed his boots along the lines in the metal deck, trapping the trailing laces of one foot with the other.
The Chief walked over and sat in his chair behind the desk, quiet for a long time.
“I’ve managed to keep your ass out of the brig,” he said eventually, “for now. But I have to tell you, Hil, you don’t have a lot of friends on this cruiser right now.”
Hil looked up, his eyes hooded. “I don’t know what to say,” he said, trying not to sound as defensive as he felt. He didn’t want to let Mendhel down. “I don’t remember what happened.”
The Chief had a data board on his desk. He flicked through a few screens. “The staff in Medical have confirmed that you’ve had concussion with probable related amnesia. However,” he said, still looking down. When he looked up, he was frowning which was never a good sign. “They don’t think that the head injury completely accounts for your memory loss. They can’t even identify half the substances you had in your system when you got back here, Hil. What the hell were you doing?”
Hil rubbed absently at the brace on his wrist. “I don’t remember,” he said again, knowing how lame that sounded.
“Well, as far as the official report goes, you have amnesia. That gives us some time. But I have to tell you, Hil, I’d rather hear what happened out there from you than from some wiseguy in Legal if they get to the bottom of this before you manage to get yourself together enough to remember. Legal are having a field day with this. They’ve been muttering for a while that we’re too easy on you guys, that we give you too much leeway because of your particular talents. We’ve been holding them off because you’ve all been delivering the goods. This could tip the balanc
e. The last thing we want down here is for Legal to be pulling the strings of our operations. We’re all shocked to have lost Mendhel. You should know that people have been sent to investigate the circumstances of his death. If you have anything to add to that investigation, bring it here first. That will be the only way I can protect you, do you understand?”
Hil nodded, not really understanding at all.
The Chief stood up. “You’re off the list and confined to Acquisitions.”
That meant no tabs and pretty much house arrest. He’d had in the back of his mind that he’d be going out after LC.
“But…”
“No buts. Medical won’t clear you to go out and I don’t want anyone else to get their hands on you. Take it easy, Hil. Get back in the Maze. Keep your head down, get yourself back up to full fitness and we’ll take it from there. I’ve lost one of my best operatives – I’m not going to lose another.”
Chapter 5
“And do you see now why it was imperative that we place Hilyer under protective custody?”
NG nodded reluctantly. “I would never have predicted the animosity that a situation like this could create within our community.” It was the one thing that had affected him the most in all this and it was the hardest to admit. “I should have known. I don’t find it easy to see the worst in people.”
The Man smiled. “Why should you? You can read their minds. You see their hearts. You are a unique individual amongst your race, NG, with an extraordinary talent. You choose the best people and put them in the most appropriate positions for the good of the guild. For anyone to turn against us… that cuts deep. When one section of our guild finds satisfaction in the distress of another, we cannot help but feel anguish at the betrayal. Yet…”
He picked up his goblet and drank deeply. “Yet we place each and every individual under immense strain to perform and we set them against each other in competition that is bound to create stresses and weaknesses. Why then should we be surprised when cracks appear? Losing Mendhel and Anderton in such circumstances was bound to create tension, a catalyst for action against the arrogance that had been growing. Admit it, an arrogance that we had been nurturing.”
“Every section in the guild has a degree of arrogance. They deserve to,” NG said. “We do bring in the best. And we push them to become better. Maybe we push too hard.”
•
Back in the barracks, Hil left his escort keeping guard at his door, showered and fell into his bunk. He slept fitfully for a time and woke up in a cold sweat with no memory of the nightmare that had left him feeling on edge. It didn’t feel worth the effort to try to get back to sleep so he got up and made his way to the Maze, acknowledging a few friendly faces on the way but not lingering long enough to get caught up in any debates. He was thankful no one tried to waylay him into the mess.
His two security shadows stopped at the entrance and nodded respectfully as he went in. Only field-ops ever entered the Maze.
He logged in and got changed into the black work-out kit that he kept in his locker. Fliss was in there already he noticed from the log. She was the only one and it would be company he didn’t mind.
He checked the environmental control settings. Fliss had a habit of screwing with the norms and the last time he’d followed her through, she’d wound the temperature up, the gravity down and set a sprinkling of electrobes lose, to ‘give her a buzz’ she’d protested. The last thing he needed right now was a breath-full of those damned things. Someone had said once that the microscopic organisms that were the by-product of AI thought processes were going to take over the universe and wipe out all other life forms. He hated them and hit the reset, purging the system of any traces. Felicity would have to get her buzz another time.
He pulled his belt tighter, realising for the first time how much weight he’d lost, and took his time warming up, feeling the strain more than usual which was a real bitch because he’d been getting faster before that last tab. He shrugged it off and went for the Straight.
The Maze was a training ground for the field-ops and there were various routes through it, the toughest being the Straight – the most direct, difficult, treacherous, fastest route. LC was the only one who’d ever finished it faster than him and the two of them were the only ones who could complete it.
It was irritating to struggle and damned frustrating every time he lost his grip and fell, or lost his balance and tumbled, or most embarrassing just couldn’t catch his breath as he climbed and clambered. He ended up sitting atop a beam across the vast space that was known as the Void.
Skye was quiet, but then she didn’t usually disturb when he was in the Maze.
The dark stretched in every direction.
He almost fell off when a figure landed next to him and threw her arms around him in a hug that he hadn’t realised he needed.
“God, Hil! What the hell happened out there?” Fliss was small and slight and desperate to make her way up the standings. She was about fifteenth last time he looked and probably didn’t have a chance of getting higher. Except of course that was before one and two had just tumbled out of the picture.
“I don’t know,” he said simply, not even trying to dig into his memory. He was tired of trying to think about it.
She stood up and pulled on his arm. “C’mon, come with me.” She winked and dragged him forward.
Precarious as his balance was he almost pulled them both down into the hole but her forward momentum kept them on the beam and she led him out and up the shaft towards the Sphere.
“Hang on,” he protested when he saw where they were going, not sure he could stomach zero-g.
She glared at him with a piercing stare and gestured to the opening, flashing that sweet smile she liked to turn on and off when it suited her. The grunts fought over that smile. How could he refuse?
The Sphere was a massive dark chamber of artificially controlled gravity that hung in the centre of the Maze, directly in the path of the straightest route through. Hil paused at the entrance, holding onto the cold metal of the doorframe. It was the fastest way to get from one side of the Maze to the other, if you could handle the inertia and not break an arm. Usually they’d fly across it in one trajectory and tumble out of the far doorway in a roll. This time he eased himself in and kicked off gently into the zero-g.
Fliss floated up to the centre of the Sphere and twisted around to look at him. He floated up and enjoyed the moment for a change, turning head over heels and just letting go. Fliss caught his arm and pulled them both together.
“We need to talk,” she said. “Hil, how much do you remember? Because there are some scary ass rumours floating about.”
He didn’t feel like talking and just drifted there in the centre of the sphere.
She whispered in his ear, “They’ve taken you and LC off the standings board.”
“What?” The cold knot in his stomach clenched uneasily. No one was ever taken out of the standings – unless they died. “They can’t do that. The Chief said I was off the list, but off the board? Who the hell is top?”
“Hil, it doesn’t matter. What happened out there?”
He tried to pull away but she squeezed his wrist.
“Who said we’re off the board?” he demanded.
Fliss glared at him and narrowed her eyes. “Hil,” she said, “they can do whatever they want. But if you must know, Sorensen is top and he’s being a pain in the ass. Everyone else is saying what the hell do the standings mean any more if they can ditch you and LC so easily.” Her gaze softened. “What happened?”
He put aside the gut-wrenching ache from being dropped – she was right, it didn’t matter any more – and tried to sift through the mess of memory that was left rattling about in his head.
“I got the tab, picked up the package and crashed,” he said eventually. “Dropped out of jump and got shot down. We crash landed on some planet. Someone was after the package. I thought maybe they were just upset to lose it or set someone on my tail
to get it back.”
“The package was switched,” Felicity said.
“I know, Kase told me. I didn’t know. I don’t know how it could have been. It was a clean grab, Fliss, honestly, the acquisition was as simple as they go.”
“You remember that?”
It was surprising to realise that he couldn’t recall any details, just a clear notion that it had been simple.
“Do you know what they’re saying?” she asked and squeezed his wrist again to emphasise the question.
He shook his head.
“They’re saying that LC has screwed the guild over. They sent out Kase and Martha, for god’s sake, with six other teams. No one ever gets seven teams sent after them, no matter what they’re caught up in. We couldn’t believe it. We all thought you’d just had an accident or something, but for Kase and Martha to be sent out, good grief Hil, they’ve not pulled a run-of-the-mill extraction in years, not since they were bumped up to spec-ops. I knew something was wrong when they were sent out after you. There’s some crazy talk going around about who the client was and what the package was.”
“Like what?” he said, feeling cold again at the thought that it had taken Kase and Martha to pull him out of whatever it was he’d been caught up in.
“Like, you don’t want to know because if it’s true, you’re going to wish you’d never been found.”
He couldn’t help pulling away then and the motion sent them off at different tangents. Fliss caught hold of him and they tumbled together.
She glared at him. “Hey, I’m a friend here. And if things go the way I think they are heading, you’re going to need a friend, Hil. Mendhel was murdered. Did they tell you that? Someone even said it was LC that killed him, Hil. How mad is that? That’s the kind of rumour doing the rounds. We’re the Thieves’ Guild, Hil. We look after our own. And we’re the ones doing the taking, no one takes from us. No one messes with the Thieves’ Guild. No one.”
She pulled him close and kissed his forehead gently.