CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Nikki was gone when I woke the next morning, but she’d left a note at the entryway that she was heading to the StarrComm center to check her mail drop. I got some deep-maintenance tests going on the Ruth’s engines and sensor systems, and when Selene woke we had a leisurely breakfast and discussed the day’s strategy. At about ten-thirty I got a call from McKell saying they were ready for us, and we snagged a runaround and headed for the western end of the Trandosh ruins.
McKell and Ixil were waiting alone when we arrived. “I sent the other diggers for an early lunch,” McKell explained as we walked over to them. “I didn’t think they needed to see our secret weapon in action.”
“They certainly earned a break,” I commented, looking around. The whole area looked like it had been attacked by a garden party of compulsively neat moles, with an ordered array of thirty-centimeter-deep holes spaced a couple of meters apart, each hole with its own pile of excavated dirt beside it. “I guess it’s Selene’s turn now.”
“Yes.” Selene took a step toward the grid, took a few tentative sniffs, then waved the three of us downwind toward one of the mounds at the eastern end of the field. “It’ll be easier if you’re out of smelling range.”
“Right,” I said, beckoning to the others. “Signal if you get anything.”
A minute later McKell, Ixil, and I were seated along the base of one of the hills. “Last night I ran an analysis of the ground-piercing radar images for these mounds,” Ixil said as we watched Selene move methodically along the grid, pausing over each hole and dirt pile to sniff the air. “If you look at it properly the data are indeed consistent with a series of mortar blasts modified by a few thousand years of erosion. I’m surprised no one noticed that before.”
“You said it yourself,” I pointed out. “You have to look at the data with that possibility in mind. No one saw it because no one was looking for it.”
“Yes,” McKell said thoughtfully. “Makes you wonder what else is out there that no one is seeing.”
“It does indeed,” I agreed. “As a matter of fact, I have a couple of ideas about that.”
“Would you care to share with the rest of the class?”
“Let’s wait until we see what Selene turns up,” I said, peering off to my right as a movement caught my eye. One of Ixil’s outriders had rounded the hill we were sitting against and was hurrying toward us. “Trouble?” I added, nodding toward the animal.
“Not necessarily,” Ixil said thoughtfully as he held out his arm. “I have them patrolling the area. Still, he does seem to be in a hurry.” The outrider ran up to us—it was Pix, I saw now that I could clearly see the markings in his fur—and scampered up Ixil’s arm. He settled into his usual position on the Kalix’s left shoulder and dug his long claws through cloth and skin and into Ixil’s nervous system. Their symbiotic linkup connected their minds and memories—
“We have a visitor,” Ixil announced, still sounding thoughtful. “It’s your friend Trent.”
“Well, that’s awkward,” I said, scowling. “Damn. I would have sworn we weren’t followed.”
“Maybe you weren’t,” McKell said, craning his neck to peer as far as he could around the side of the hill. “Any chance he might be interested in the ruins for some other reason?”
“I can’t see him being interested in anything he can’t trade for quick cash.” Glowering, I got to my feet. “I guess I’d better go talk to him.”
“You want me to come along?” McKell asked, starting to get up.
“No, thanks,” I said, waving him back down. “I’d rather the two of you keep an eye on Selene. You have a location on Trent?”
“About two hundred meters that way,” Ixil said, pointing over his shoulder to his right. “He was moving slowly, so he shouldn’t have wandered too far.”
“Unless he’s picked up speed,” I said, starting around the other side of our hill. “Back in a minute.”
I didn’t see anyone moving as I maneuvered my way through the hills and pits toward the one that ought to give me a vantage point above Trent’s last known position. I reached my target hill and started up. Midway to the top, mindful of the fact that he was probably at least as good a shot as I was and that he had a lot more motivation to make trouble, I dropped to hands and knees and continued my journey in a commando’s crawl.
The centuries that had elapsed since the battle had left the hills covered in a spiny, purplish ground cover that seemed to have as many prickles as it did actual stalks and slender leaves. Fortunately, while the prickles were annoying, the barbs were thin and flexible enough that they didn’t penetrate the skin of my hands. I reached the top of my hill and cautiously eased my head up for a look.
It was Trent, all right. He’d made it about half a hill closer than Ixil’s estimate, heading toward the flat section of the ruins Selene and the others were working. Fortunately, he was moving slowly enough that my hill still put me on the high ground above him.
It was a perfect setup for a sniper attack, and my plasmic had more than enough range to make it a quick kill. Fortunately for Trent, I had neither the inclination nor any excuse for that kind of action.
What I did have was motivation to try to get him off our backs. Drawing my plasmic, I aimed carefully at one of the small bushes just behind him and fired.
With a muffled whoosh the bush burst into flames. Trent reacted instantly, leaping a meter forward and dropping into a crouch, a weapon magically appearing in his hand. His head whipped back and forth, his eyes darting everywhere as he tried to locate the source of the attack.
In this case, it was an exercise in futility. For all a plasmic’s shortcomings in the areas of range and stopping-power when compared with a chemical or missile-slug firearm, the weapon had the advantage of being virtually silent. A warning shot that landed behind a target where he hadn’t been able to see its visual track might as well have come straight down from God.
“Roarke?” he called softly, his voice barely audible over the rustling of trees and bushes. “Schlichting?”
I thought about dropping a second shot beside him, but of course this time he was likely to see it, which would make it pointless and probably a little childish. “Hello, Trent,” I called instead. “Just drop the weapon, there’s a good boy.”
Even with the background noises, he had my location before I’d finished my order. For a moment he stared up at me, probably gauging his chances for a successful hit against the small target cross-section I was currently presenting. Then, very deliberately, he stood up and just as deliberately tucked the gun back into its waist holster beneath his jacket. “I just want to talk,” he called, raising his hands to shoulder height.
“I’m listening.”
He looked around again, his gaze sweeping across the various hilltops. “Your bodyguard taking the morning off?”
“There’s one easy way to find out,” I said, wishing now that I’d accepted McKell’s offer of backup. Trent was in a lousy combat position down there, but as my father used to say, When arrogance and pride arrive at the party, logic and reason collect their coats and leave. If the pride is also wounded, tactical sense usually leaves with them.
“No, thanks,” he said, raising his hands a little higher. “You and Selene out for a stroll, I take it?”
“Bird-watching,” I told him. “I trust you didn’t come all the way out here just to play Twenty Questions.”
“Actually, you’re not far off,” Trent said. “I have a few questions I need to ask you. Simple questions, nothing that would violate confidentiality or bring trouble to anyone. A few simple answers, and I’ll disappear from your life forever.”
I felt my eyebrows go up. He had questions for me? “If any of them involve Nikki, you’re out of luck,” I warned. “I already told you she and I have jobs to do.”
“Yes, I remember,” he said. “And I have no further interest in her.”
“I’m sure she’ll be happy to hear that,” I said. “Would these questions be the same ones you were planning to ask when I woke up after you drugged me on Niskea?”
Even at our current distance I could see his face darken. “Yes, and I’m truly sorry about that. Rest assured that I reprimanded Beeks very severely for his impudence.”
I frowned. “Are you telling me Beeks drugged me on his own initiative?”
“Of course,” Trent said. “I would never have—”
“Without any orders from you?”
“I just said that.”
I shook my head sadly. “Oh, Trent, Trent,” I said putting some theatrical regret into my voice. “I realize some people get so used to lying that the fibs just pop out of their own accord. But are you really going to stand there and tell me that an underling—who you’re paying—would drug an invited houseguest without specific orders to do so?”
He drew himself up. “I’ve told you what happened. If you’re not willing to accept the truth, I can’t make you.”
“You’re absolutely right,” I agreed. “What you also can’t do is continue to waste my time.” I lifted my plasmic a bit. “The only question is whether you walk back to your vehicle and drive away on your own, or whether you get to ride with a couple of medics while they try to assess how badly charred your leg is.”
He snorted. “You’re bluffing. I’ve read your file. You wouldn’t shoot someone in cold blood.”
“You’d be surprised at how often those bounty hunter files miss something,” I said. “Anyway, I’m not the only one out here, remember? I’d make a small wager that my bodyguard wouldn’t hesitate a bit to take you down. And not just an injury, but permanently.”
Once again his eyes flicked around the area. But this time, when he turned back to face me, some of the defiance in his face and body language had faded. Tactical sense had apparently returned to the party, possibly bringing pizza. “This isn’t over, Roarke,” he warned. “I’m going to get the answers I want. One way or another.”
“Next time try saying please,” I said. “Oh, and before you go, just put your weapon on the ground, will you?”
Silently, he pulled out his gun and set it on the prickly grass. “Do take good care of it,” he said softly. “I’ll be retrieving it and the others you took away from me very soon, and you wouldn’t like what I charge for damage.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “Good-bye, Trent.”
I watched him make his way back around the hills and dips, wondering if I should follow to make sure he really left. But with this terrain there was no way I could keep him continually in sight, and I had no doubt he had a backup weapon tucked away somewhere. A couple of seconds on his own, and he would have little trouble getting the drop on me.
Still, as long as he thought there were two of us watching him, he would probably withdraw and look for a more promising time and place. And given that there really were two watchers who would be dogging his every step—Pix and Pax—we ought to be safe enough, at least for the moment.
So I waited until he was out of sight, gave it another couple of minutes to see if that wounded pride might still be doing his thinking for him, then went down and retrieved his weapon—this one a Golden 6mm—and returned to where I’d left McKell and Ixil.
I’d expected to find them still seated against the hill, watching Selene doing her sweep. Instead, they were about a third of the way out in the field of holes, digging industriously at the ground while Selene stood to the side watching them.
I hurried toward them, my heart suddenly pounding. Selene looked up at me as I approached and gave a silent nod. McKell also looked up, then returned to his digging. “Any idea how deep?” I asked as I came up to them.
“Not very,” Selene said. “A meter, maybe two.”
“That’s to the top, of course,” McKell added, tossing another shovelful of dirt off to the side. “Those hills the mortar rounds threw up must have been impressively high for a few thousand years of erosion to have filled in this much around the rest of the portal.”
“Unless it was partially buried to begin with,” I said, eyeing the deepening pit. “Time to call back your other diggers?”
“I’ve given them the rest of the day off,” McKell said. “I think we can handle this ourselves.”
“Agreed,” I said, thinking fast. If this was indeed the other end of Cherno’s portal . . . “I’d like to ask a favor,” I said. “If and when we confirm this is the portal we’re looking for, I need you to activate it, and then pull back. Cover the entrance a little or otherwise disguise it, and put everything else on hold for a few days.”
McKell paused, his shovel dug partway into the dirt. “Excuse me?” he asked.
“I know you’ll want to shout the good news to the admiral and get a crew in here to dig it the rest of the way out,” I said. “But it’s important that we keep this discovery strictly to ourselves for the moment.”
“Yes, I understand what you’re asking,” McKell said. “Still waiting for the reason.”
“I wish I could give it to you,” I said. “Later, I will. For now, I’m just asking that you trust me.”
“Ixil?” McKell invited, his eyes still on me.
“The admiral won’t like it,” Ixil pointed out. “The longer we wait, the higher the probability that the Patth will learn about this and move to take it away from us.”
“There aren’t any Patth ships on Meima at the moment,” I said. “I checked this morning before we left the Ruth.”
“You really were convinced we’d find a portal here,” Ixil murmured thoughtfully.
“Yes, I was,” I confirmed. “I’ll also point out that without Selene and me it might have been years before you even thought to look for it.”
McKell and Ixil eyed at each other. “He has a point,” Ixil said. “His theory about an attack on Meima was the key.”
“I suppose,” McKell conceded reluctantly. “How long will you need us to sit on this?”
“A few days,” I repeated. “Right now, that’s as definitive as I can be.”
McKell grunted and resumed his digging. Three shovelfuls later he paused again and gave a brief nod. “A few days,” he said. “No more. And if whatever it is happens sooner, you let us know sooner.”
“Agreed,” I said. “Selene?”
“We’re getting closer,” she said.
“All right, then,” McKell said. “Let’s find this thing.”
“And let’s make sure Pix and Pax are on the watch,” I warned. “Even if Trent doesn’t come back, there may be other inquisitive eyes out there.”
“Don’t worry,” Ixil assured me. “They’ve got it covered.”
* * *
They kept at it for another half hour, at which point I took over Ixil’s shovel so that he could concentrate on coordinating the outriders’ patrols. Selene watched us work, keeping track of the scent and occasionally fine-tuning our direction to keep us directly over the portal’s highest point.
Twenty minutes later, we hit portal metal. An hour after that, we’d widened the hole sufficiently for someone to get down there and access one of the hull’s hatches.
That someone, inevitably, was me.
* * *
“Remember, just a quick in and out,” McKell reminded me for the third time as I gazed through the hatchway. The opening was on the bottom of our pit, but at the top of the receiver module, which meant the portal’s internal gravitational field would be pointed the opposite direction to Meima’s.
Still, that just meant that I’d need to roll into and around the opening, the same maneuver I’d done a hundred times between various portals’ receiver modules and launch modules.
Sometimes I couldn’t believe I’d actually become proficient at such a bizarre skill.
“I ran the activation procedure and everything seems all right at this end,” McKell continued. “All you need to do is confirm the portal works—one trip there, one trip straight back. No surveillance, no recon, no walking up to Cherno and asking when’s dinner. And if the other end isn’t Cherno’s . . . ” He paused, his expression clouding over.
“I’m sure it is,” I said.
I truly hoped it was, anyway. Because if it wasn’t, Selene, Nikki, and I were gazing into a pit of trouble way deeper than the one we’d just dug.
“You usually are.” McKell gave a brisk nod. “Good luck.”
I nodded back and stretched myself out in the dirt alongside the portal opening. A good thing I hadn’t dressed for the occasion. Checking my plasmic to make sure it was secure in its holster, I rolled into the opening, around the rim, and inside the portal.
No matter how many times I did this there was always a flicker of disorientation as gravity abruptly changed direction. That moment had gotten shorter over time, but it had never completely gone away. I got to my feet and made my way through the soft directionless light to the rectangular opening that marked the entrance to the launch module. Once again I settled down beside the gap and rolled inside.
I stood up, taking a moment to look around. The first thing I checked was the section of the curved deck where the control board containing the home and destination panels would be on a full-range portal like Icarus. There was nothing there, fully confirming this was indeed one end of a Gemini portal.
Now came the real test. I walked to the black-and-silver extension arm and wrapped my hand around it. The module sensed my presence, and the local gravity shifted again, sending me smoothly upward along the arm. I reached the luminescent gray end; bracing myself, I closed my hand firmly around it. There was the usual tingle as the blackness dropped over me—
And a couple of seconds later I was floating in the center of a Gemini receiver module.
I took a careful breath as the internal gravity caught me and floated me gently toward the surface. I was hardly in Selene’s league, smelling-wise, but my comparatively frail human body did have a decent enough set of olfactory receptors, and the air surrounding me did smell very much the way I remembered the air in Cherno’s warehouse enclosure.
The portal’s gravity did its usual trick of suddenly increasing in the final meter of my descent, dropping me a bit hard onto the deck. But again, I was ready for it. Keeping my hand on my plasmic, I headed around the curved surface to the opening, lay down beside it, and carefully looked out.
A rush of exhilaration swept away a level of tension that I’d carried so long I’d forgotten it was there. I was indeed in Cherno’s warehouse, and we had indeed found the other end of his Gemini portal.
Two seconds later all that low-level tension reversed direction and came flowing straight back again. Now that this particular hurdle was past, we still had the fact that Cherno and Nikki were planning to murder someone.
I gave the visible parts of the warehouse a slow, careful scan, straining both eyes and ears. There was no indication that anyone was in here besides me. In retrospect, given how important the portal apparently was to Cherno’s plans, I would have been surprised if he’d shared the secret with anyone he didn’t absolutely have to.
Did that mean there also weren’t any guards in the tunnel leading to and from his mansion?
Carefully, I eased my way out of the portal. Crouching beside the opening, I gave the warehouse another visual scan, this time looking for cameras. The same logic that said no guards also suggested no cameras, but there was a chance Cherno was the type who liked to keep an eye on his possessions. But again, there was nothing I could see.
I shifted my eyes to the trapdoor leading down into the tunnel. McKell had said no recon, and I mostly agreed with him. But at the same time it would be handy to know if Cherno had hedged his bets by at least covering the approach to his prize. Walking across the room, I knelt down beside the trapdoor and lifted it a couple of millimeters. For a full minute I stayed there, again listening hard. No creaks of a chair being moved, no shuffling of feet, no sipping of a drink, not even any heavy breathing.
As my father used to say, Sometimes the best way to prove your innocence is to deliberately stroll into a trap. I’d never fully bought into that one, but this might be the time to test it. Lifting the door all the way, I headed down.
The lights that had illuminated the tunnel during our last trip had been turned off, leaving the whole passageway in darkness. I fished out my flashlight and turned it on.
Once again, my gamble had paid off. The tunnel was deserted.
I focused on the elevator at the other end, briefly wondering if I might be able to make it three for three. But as my father used to say, Stupidity is like a childhood disease. The later in life that you catch it, the worse it is. Still, there was no harm in taking a closer look.
The elevator itself was as I remembered it: heavy metal doors, an even heavier metal frame, and a single call button. What I hadn’t noticed my last time here was the pair of fifteen-centimeter-square ventilation grilles—one set half a meter above and to the left of the elevator door, the other set a few of centimeters above the floor directly beneath the first—that were circulating air through the tunnel and, via the gaps around the trapdoor, into the portal’s warehouse.
And air systems, as I’d learned a long time ago, could be very handy.
The lower grille was fastened to its housing with four screws, one in each corner. I unscrewed them, took off the grille, and shined my light inside. The duct ran horizontally for about ten centimeters, then made a right-angle turn and continued straight up. The inner walls had probably started out smooth, but years of sitting untended in the underground damp had left patches of corrosion and pockmarks where some of the metal had flaked off.
I’d be surprised if any of Cherno’s people had even considered the possibilities the ducts offered to someone like me. But then, I’d be surprised if any of them had ever seen a Kalix and his outriders in action.
Fortunately for me, I had.
As was usual for systems that didn’t have to support any weight except its own, the ducts were made of soft and fairly thin metal. A few minutes with my multitool’s auger, and I’d reamed out the screw receptacles enough that the fasteners simply rested inside without the threads engaging anything. I replaced the grille, slipped in the decorative but now useless fasteners, and headed back down the tunnel to the warehouse and the portal.
Two minutes later, I was once again on Meima.
I arrived in the receiver module to find McKell striding along beneath me heading for the launch module. “It’s all right,” I called down to him. “I’m here.”
He looked up, his determined expression momentarily softening, then roaring back full strength with a side order of anger. “Where the hell have you been?” he demanded.
“Looking around a little,” I said, wishing I could speed up my downward drift. Floating helplessly in the air, I was in perfect position for McKell to unload whatever choice invective he’d picked up during his long-past days in the EarthGuard auxiliary.
“I thought I said no recon.”
“This wasn’t a recon,” I protested. “I was just looking around a little.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Recon requires you to fill out paperwork.”
I could tell he wanted to roll his eyes at that one. But he didn’t, probably figuring it would be beneath him as my supposed superior to show that kind of reaction. Besides, I’d come back in one piece and not bleeding, and that surely counted for something. “So?”
“It’s the other end of Cherno’s Gemini, all right,” I confirmed. “There were no guards, either by the portal or in the tunnel leading into the mansion.”
“I’d make a small wager that there are eyes on the other end of the elevator.”
“Not a wager I would take,” I agreed. “But there’s an air duct by the elevator that one of Ixil’s outriders—”
“Hold on,” McKell interrupted. “If we’re going to talk strategy, let’s take it outside. No point having to go through it twice.”
Five minutes later we’d rejoined the others on the surface, Selene had expressed relief that I was back, Ixil had added his own vote of disapproval of my actions, and they were finally ready to hear my plan.
“As I was telling McKell, there’s an opening to a ventilation grille at the bottom of the elevator shaft that Pix or Pax should be able to get into,” I said. “It’ll be a straight-up climb, but the duct metal is soft and a bit corroded, so I’m hoping navigation won’t be too much of a problem.”
“How big is the duct cross-section?” Ixil asked.
“About like this,” I said, making a frame with my hands.
“That should work,” Ixil confirmed. “I assume you want him to be a scout?”
“Not a scout,” I corrected. “A courier.”
I laid out my plan for them. Midway through the explanation, Selene pulled out her info pad and started silently working it. “I know the gadget I need exists,” I concluded. “I’ve seen them once or twice. The question is whether we can find one in Barcarolle, or even just somewhere on Meima.”
“And find one that’s small enough to be carried through the ducts,” McKell added.
“There’s that,” I conceded. “Ixil?”
“The dimensions are really the only question,” he said, holding out his arm as Pax came trotting up with the latest scouting report. “Pix and Pax can carry considerable weight, even with the kind of climb you describe.”
“I’m not finding anything readily available for sale in the area,” Selene reported. “But do you really need something that specialized?”
“She may be right,” Ixil said as Pax climbed up his arm and sunk his claws into the Kalix’s shoulder. There was a moment of silence while Ixil retrieved the creature’s visual memories, then a second moment while he issued the animal his new patrol instructions, and Pax was off again across the landscape. “It sounds like the analysis software is the trickiest part,” he continued. “We should be able to put something together that will function well enough for what we need.”
“I have no idea how to do that,” I admitted. “But I’m sure you two are way better at gadgetry improv than I am. The question is whether you can throw something together in the next day or so.”
“I think we can,” Ixil said. “Is that when you’re going back?”
“That was my thought,” I said. “Cherno’s probably getting pretty nervous, and having us show up a few days ahead of his deadline should help calm him down.”
“There’s one other thing to consider,” McKell said, his voice going a shade darker. “Once he knows the Gemini is active, does he really need you and Selene anymore?”
I felt my stomach tighten. “Good question,” I said. “Not sure I’ve got an answer for it yet.”
“Well, let’s be sure we do before you go charging off,” McKell said. “We don’t have any cavalry available to send to the rescue.”
“Understood,” I said. “First things first. We need you to make me my new toy.” I nodded toward the hole. “And we need to disguise this thing somehow.”
“Already covered,” McKell said. “Here’s what we have in mind . . . ”