Outlanders - Ghost Walk, page 8
Erica nodded to Brown as he handed her the steaming mug. A slightly built man with overlarge ears and a perennially grave expression, Brown acted as her clerk and secretary. “The call should be coming through momentarily, ma’am,” he said. She sat down at the table and picked up a wedge of buttered toast. “Thank you, Brown.” He inclined his head in a deferential bow. “Ma’am.” The first representative of the Millennial Consortium Erica had met was anything but deferential. In fact, he had been instrumental in usurping her position as Tui Chui Jian, the Dragon Mother, in China. After that encounter, with no place to go, Erica van Sloan sent out feelers to the consortium. Although her first experience with the organization had been decidedly adversarial, she hoped the people in charge would be pragmatic enough to realize she made a far more reliable ally than an enemy. When she learned that the consortium did not have a headquarters on the Eastern Seaboard, she traded her knowledge of Front Royal for a high rank. The millennialists easily displaced the ragtag band of former Magistrates who had occupied the keep since the fall of the baronies, and now Erica was back where she had started—with-out the wheelchair this time around. The monitor screen suddenly lit up with flashing pixels, dividing into four small square sections. One squares showed the interior of the conference room and part of Erica’s left elbow. Brown moved forward to adjust the video feed, focusing it on Erica’s head and shoulders. The image of a middle-aged man wearing the standard dun-colored coverall appeared on the screen. “Good morning.” Mr. Vermilion’s face was flat and unmemorable, and he spoke in a flat, fluid voice unmarred by any trace of accent. His hair looked like a steel colored skullcap, and his eyes were of no particular color. His tone was sterile, with a lack of inflection. Erica had never met the man in person and she wondered if he was a computer- generated hologram or an android.
“Good morning,” Erica replied. “It’s rather early here.”
“It’s early everywhere,” Vermilion replied. “I speak for central clearing. A sudden situation has arisen. You are familiar with Section Chief Breech, are you not?”
“I replaced him,” Erica replied, sipping at her coffee to hide her smile. “After he disappeared.” “Yes. When we dispatched him to investigate an opportunity you brought to the consortium.” “Has he reappeared?”
“Not as such. However, we received a report from your subordinate, Mr. Blue.” A blank square on the screen flickered and then displayed the head and shoulders of the man Erica knew as Blue. In many ways, he could have been the brother of Mr. Brown.
“Report,” Erica ordered. Blue shifted uncomfortably. “The station was exactly where you said it would be, Chief van Sloan, right at the base of the mesa. But Breech had been there long before us and he must have done something to the database. It was inoperable. We stayed there for two full days, trying to track Breech and his crew and download the files in the computer system.” He paused, licked his lips nervously and added, “We were unsuccessful.”
“There is more,” Vermilion stated. He did not ask a question.
Blue inhaled deeply, then blurted, “The ghost-walkers came back.”
Erica sat up straight in her chair and placed her coffee mug down on the table with a clatter. “How can that be? Explain!”
“It was like the last time, Chief van Sloan. We activated the Theta-pinch transmitter the way you indicated, but the ghost-walkers still returned. Then there was another complication.”
“Which was?” Erica inquired.
“Cerberus.” Erica nodded as if she had expected the one-word response. “Go on.”
“We set the transmitter to overload as per your instructions. The entire station self-destructed, but the theta circuit wasn’t broken. The ghost-walkers seemed unaffected. They killed one of the Cerberus people.”
“And there is more to tell yet,” Vermilion said quietly.
Blue’s lips compressed as if he was in pain. “I’m afraid so. Gray was apparently apprehended by Cerberus. We should assume he is their prisoner and taken to their base in Montana.”
Addressing Vermilion, Erica said curtly, “Gray knows very little. His apprehension is not dire.”
“Any information in the possession of an enemy is potentially dire,” Vermilion intoned. “Resourceful enemies like Cerberus can use that information to our disadvantage.”
“I am familiar with the Cerberus personnel,” Erica said, flicking a crumb from the front of her bodysuit.
“Yes,” Vermilion replied. “And you probably would agree with me that if one of their people was killed by these so-called ghost-walkers, they will most certainly investigate further.”
“I agree with that assessment.”
“We have enough different projects under way that Cerberus could interfere with in their efforts to find the culprits behind the death of one of their own. I do not care to shift schedules and remake our rosters. Therefore our primary efforts must be directed toward distracting Cerberus from learning our objectives.”
“Unless,” Erica van Sloan declared, “we do the opposite.”
For the first time, Vermilion’s face registered emotion. “Elucidate, please,” he said.
“I think we should draw more of the attention of Cerberus to our project and enlist their aid - turning enemies into allies.”
“A very risky proposition, Section Chief, without a clearly defined reward.”
“You know that Cerberus has access to resources that could be very useful to the consortium. That is why we have never staged a full-scale assault upon their base, true?”
Vermilion inclined his head a quarter of an inch. “True. The potential losses outweighed the gains.”
“In this instance,” Erica continued, “their resources can help the consortium complete our project with the Theta-pinch transmitter. If left unchecked, Breech will achieve controlled thermonuclear fusion and pose a threat not to just us, but the entire world.”
“We know Breech is in Area 51,” Vermilion droned. “But we have neither the resources nor manpower to search for him there. That is why we approved your plan to draw him out at the experimental station in Phantom Mesa.”
“It worked, but not sufficiently.” Vermilion said, “We cannot try it again. The station and the transmitter are destroyed. Our only chance, as slim as it may be, is to corner Breech in Area 51. I fail to see how inveighing upon Cerberus will help us flush him out.”
Erica smiled. “I have a history with Cerberus. I know far more about them than Millennial Consortium has been able to learn. For example—” She paused, both for dramatic effect and to collect her thoughts. Calmly, she said, “Kane was held prisoner in Area 51 for several weeks. He has intimate knowledge of the place and its layout that would prove invaluable to us.” Vermilion’s lips barely stirred. “A very audacious undertaking.”
“But necessary…if we ever to hope to locate Breech and break the theta circuit. We will use one enemy to destroy another. If we are fortunate, both of the consortium’s enemies will perish.” Vermilion’s image gazed at her unblinkingly. She met his gaze stolidly. Then, at length he said softly, “As I indicated…an audacious plan. But it is approved. Implement it immediately.”
Chapter 12
Overlord Enlil and Sindri had converted the Cobaltville Administrative Monolith into a gaudy house. Enlil wanted Kane to play the roulette table and he agreed before he remembered that he was scheduled to lead a Magistrate squad on a hard-contact probe down in the Tartarus Pits. So Kane ran through the cavernous halls of the monolith, looking for the Magistrate Division. Instead he turned a corner and found himself sitting at a ringside table in the Dai Jia Lou nightclub, watching Lilitu perform the Annunaki mating dance. Surrounded by the pale green halo cast by a spotlight, Lilitu’s arms weaved back and forth like cobras awakening from a nap. Her hips rolled in tempo with the drumbeats. The gems encrusting her gilded headpiece glittered and gleamed with every sinuous undulation. Tiny finger cymbals chimed in a clashing rhythm. Her and arms and legs flashed in intricate movements within the aura of hazy light. Her body curved, bending forward and backward as if her spine were made of rubber. Her dance was a dervish whirl of primal, maddening passions.
Kane watched as she writhed in rhythm with the music, feeling trickles of sweat flowing down his face from his hairline. Lilitu whirled on the balls of her bare feet, and glared directly at him, her eyes blazing with contempt and accusation. She opened her lipless mouth and demanded, “Are you going to sleep all day or what?”
KANE CAME UP out of a sedative slumber for the second time that day and wondered if he should have bothered. Reba DeFore leaned over him, a smile on her full lips but her brown eyes full of worry. A sturdily built woman with deep bronze skin and ash-blond hair, DeFore served as the Cerberus redoubt’s chief medical officer. She dabbed at his face with a wet washcloth. Kane squinted up at her, then down at himself, a little disturbed to see he wore a cotton shift and lay on a bed in the infirmary. DeFore’s face darkened around the edges and he felt his eyelids closing. A hard prod on his shoulder forced his eyes open again. DeFore said loudly, “Don’t go back to sleep, Kane. I want to make sure you’re not suffering from a concussion. If you are, you know what that means.”
“I do?” he whispered, his throat feeling raw and abraded, his tongue dried out. “I need a drink, I haven’t so much as a sip of anything wet since last night.”
DeFore handed him a bottle of water with a flexible straw extending from the neck. “It wasn’t last night, Kane. You’ve been unconscious for over a day. You woke up for a minute early this morning. Now it’s nearly noon. I thought you might be catatonic, but you were only reacting to the painkillers and sedatives. They should be out of your system now.”
Kane sipped at the water, swallowed and then propped himself up on his elbows. He almost immediately collapsed under the wave of pain that burst in his head. He clenched his teeth, squeezed his eyes shut and muttered, “Ow.”
DeFore took away the water bottle. “Let that be a lesson to you.”
“Is it a concussion?” he managed to husk out between clenched teeth. Slowly the pain abated. “No,” DeFore answered, “I don’t think so. As best as I can diagnose, you’re suffering from acute but external electromagnetic irradiation as the result of a shock.” She peeled back Kane’s left eyelid, and the narrow beam of a penlight caused him to wince and flinch. “Your pupils dilate and contract normally. Is your vision blurry?”
Kane carefully opened his right eye, then the other. It required several seconds for DeFore to come into focus. “Yeah, a little.”
The medic nodded. “The eyes are particularly vulnerable to EM radiation. Prolonged exposure can lead to cataracts and blindness.” An icy hand clutched Kane around the heart. “Blindness?” “Relax. According to Brigid and Grant, you got zapped by one of those little plasma bugs. It was like you were subjected to an electric shock of considerable voltage. It temporarily affected your nervous system and even parts of your brain.”
Kane massaged his throbbing temples with his fingers. “My second-favorite organ. Where is everybody? Are they all right? Brewster got smacked around.”
“He’s fine. He didn’t even need stitches, which is more than I can say for the millennialist you brought back. I had to perform surgery on his foot.”
“Brigid? Grant?”
“I’m keeping them apprised of your condition. Brigid is busy.”
“Busy with what?”
“She’s studying that little energy bee that stung you. It came back to Cerberus with you. Caused us some excitement for a few minutes.”
Kane struggled to sit up. “Where the hell is it now?”
DeFore lay a restraining on his shoulder. “Calm down. It’s been contained.”
Kane sagged back against the mattress. “Call Grant or somebody, will you? I want to check out of here.”
DeFore frowned. “That may not be wise until I give you a complete physical.”
Kane bit back the profane retort that leaped to his tongue. “A physical won’t tell you anything other than what you see right here. I don’t feel great, but I don’t feel terrible. If I start feeling worse, I’ll just come back.”
DeFore hesitated, her frown deepening. Kane smiled at her, waiting. At one time, the medic had been openly antagonistic toward him—or rather what he represented. As a former Magistrate, Kane embodied the totalitarianism of the villes, glorying in his baron-sanctioned powers to dispense justice and death. For a couple of years, Reba DeFore had believed that due to his Mag conditioning he was psychologically conflicted and therefore couldn’t be trusted. Although she had reevaluated her attitude, DeFore was still quick to take offense at what she interpreted as disrespect directed toward her position in the redoubt.
DeFore laid a cool hand on his forehead. “You don’t feel feverish.”
“I’m not,” he replied. “I don’t intend to do anything more strenuous than walk around a little and maybe go take a shower. There’s nothing wrong with my legs, is there?”
“No,” DeFore answered. “But your coordination and balance could be adversely affected.” “There’s no better way to find out than if I’m ambulatory, is there? Call Grant and let him take the responsibility.” DeFore nodded and walked into the adjacent room. Kane heard her make a comm. call to Grant’s quarters. Kane experimentally moved his arms and legs, wiggling his fingers and toes. Aside from varied degrees of stiffness in different parts of his body, he didn’t feel too badly. His head still throbbed and his eyes burned, but he figured those symptoms would disappear in time. Carefully he pushed himself into a sitting position, silently endured a brief spasm of vertigo and then swung his legs over the side of the bed. He saw his clothes folded atop a nightstand and he quickly dressed. Just as he laced up his boots, Grant sauntered in wearing his usual redoubt ensemble of black T-shirt, camo pants and combat boots. “Reba has put you in my custody,” he rumbled. “So if you fall down and break your head open, I’ll be blamed.” Kane took a tentative step. “Appropriate. Where’s the plasma bug being studied?” Grant pointed to the floor with his thumb. “Way below, in the sec area.” Kane nodded in understanding, running a hand first over his unshaved jaw, then his disarrayed hair. “I’ll take a shower after I see this thing.” Grant angled an eyebrow at him, then sniffed. “You sure you want to do it in that order?” It took Kane a moment to grasp the meaning of Grant’s query. Crossly, he asked “Why do you care? You couldn’t smell a dead stickie’s skin if you were wearing it.” Grant’s nose had been broken three times in the past and always poorly reset. Unless an odor was remarkably pleasant or violently repulsive, he was incapable of catching subtle smells, unless they were right under his nostrils. A running joke during his Mag days had been that Grant could eat a hearty dinner with a decomposing skunk lying on the table next to his plate. Kane took a few cautious steps toward the exit, testing his knee joints. When his legs didn’t buckle and he wasn’t assailed by dizziness, he moved out into the corridor. Grant strode beside him, ready to grab him by the collar of his shirt if he stumbled. Although he didn’t express his gratitude, Kane felt thankful that Grant was around when he was needed. It wasn’t always easy being the man’s friend, but then again, Kane reflected, he wasn’t the easiest person to get along with, either. As Magistrates, he and Grant had served together for a dozen years, and as Cerberus warriors they had fought shoulder to shoulder in battles around half the planet, and even off the planet. Through all of it Grant had covered Kane’s back, patching up his wounds and on more than one occasion literally carrying him out of hellzones. At one time, both men enjoyed the lure of danger, the risk of courting death to deal death. But now it was no longer enough for them to wish for a glorious death as a payoff for all their struggles. They had finally accepted a fact they had known for years but never admitted to themselves—when death came, it was usually unexpected and almost never glorious. All Magistrates followed a patrilineal tradition, assuming the duties and positions of their fathers. They did not have given names, each taking the surname of the father, as though the first Magistrate to bear the name were the same man as the last. The originators of the Magistrate Divisions had believed that only surnames, family names, engendered a sense of obligation to the duties of their ancestors’ office, insuring that subsequent generations never lost touch with their hereditary roles as enforcers. Last names became badges of social distinction, almost titles. The bottom level of the Cerberus redoubt lay some 150 feet below solid, shielded rock. It held the nuclear generators, various maintenance and machine rooms and the air conditioning core, as well as the water-filtration system. A semidetached wing contained ten detention cubicles and a vault where dangerous and stable substances were stored. The two men took the elevator down rather than the stairs. Kane tapped in the sec code on the door leading to the security wing. They walked down a dimly lit corridor that had once been bisected by a wire-mesh security checkpoint and turnstile. Only the frame remained. “Has anybody interrogated Gray?” Kane asked. Grant lifted the broad yoke of his shoulders in a shrug. “Both Domi and I had a go at him this morning, playing bad cop and worse cop. We didn’t get anything out of him, but I think that’s because he doesn’t know much of anything. I think he’s exactly what he claimed to be—a grunt.” They walked past an open cell door, guarded by one of Beta team, a burly ex- Mag from Mandeville named Crosco. Glancing in, Kane saw Gray sitting huddled in a corner, his left foot very professionally bandaged. He smiled around a mouthful of ham sandwich. He called, “Hey, Kane, glad to see you’re up and around. How are you feeling?” Kane paused, glaring at him. “Not so good. Who gave you that food?” Crosco cleared his throat and said contritely, “Miss Baptiste told us to feed him.” Kane continued glaring. “Mebbe once your belly is full, you’ll feel more like cooperating?” Gray took a swig of water from a cup. “I’d cooperate if I could. I just don’t know that much.” Kane began walking again. “We’ll find that out for sure, Gray.” A side corridor terminated in a disk sheathed in gleaming metal surrounded by three concentric steel collars. A sec-code keypad was affixed to the wall beside it. Grant punched in the three-digit entry code. With a rumble and hiss of pneumatics, the metal disk rolled into a slot on the right. Fluorescent light fixtures cast a yellowish light over three people standing around a trestle table loaded with a complicated network of electronics. Lakesh, Brigid and Philboyd all glanced toward him, but none of them seemed particularly surprised that he was up and on foot. “Friend Kane,” Lakesh said casually. “We were wondering when you’d wake up.” “Were you now?” Kane joined them at the table. “What a coincidence. I was wondering when I’d receive my get-well-soon bouquet.” “We were getting around to it.” Brigid peered at him over the rims of her former badge of office, a pair of wire-framed, rectangular-lensed eyeglasses. They were the only memento of the many years she had spent as an archivist in Cobaltville’s Historical Division. She wore a black T-shirt and jeans that accentuated her full- breasted, willowy figure. “Yeah,” Philboyd said. “But we got so wrapped up in bug-watching—”
