A Dark and Hungry God Arises (12 page)

Of course, there was always the possibility that the Amnion would make her into something like Vestabule.

If they did, she would retain some - most? - of her human mind; and they would learn that she was more valuable than they'd realized. But Nick couldn't help that.

It was out of his hands.

From his locker he took a vial of capsules — his precious store of the immunity drug — and poured two into his palm. A small tic pulled at his cheek, but he ignored it.

One capsule he swallowed immediately, just as a precaution; the other he shoved deep into one of the pockets of his shipsuit. Then he put the vial away and relocked the safe.

Rubbing his hands over his scars, he glanced at his chronometer. How long would it take to flush enough of the cat out of Morn's veins so that she could walk?

Not long. In another minute or two he would be on his way to the Amnion sector of Billingate: the place reserved for them, where they could breathe their own acrid air —

and set up their own defenses.

To go there was dangerous; but it was necessary. And it would give him at least a measure of revenge for Morn's lies.

While he thought about such things, another part of his mind was busy imagining how he might kill Mikka Vasaczk.

Women; always women. No sooner had he found a way to get rid of Morn Hyland than Mikka turned against him. And the question of how he would revenge himself on Sorus Chatelaine was still unresolved. He would simply shoot her, if that was the best he could do; but he wanted more, needed more. He was being undone by women: he owed it to himself to exact as much female pain as he could in recompense.

Marc Vestabule talked about 'recompense', but he didn't use the word with Nick's intimate intensity.

Sorus would have to wait, however. First Morn. And when that score was settled, he would turn his attention to saving Captain's Fancy. He felt sure that somewhere during that process he would be able to rid himself of Mikka.

Without realizing it, he'd begun to pace back and forth in his cabin as if he were shuttling feverishly between real and imaginary possibilities for revenge.

The sound of the intercom stopped him. 'Nick, ' Mikka said flatly. 'I've got her up. She's groggy, but she can walk. '

To vent some of his tension, he snap-punched the intercom toggle. 'Meet me at the airlock. I'll take her from there. '

Mikka clicked off without acknowledging him.

Promising murder, Nick keyed open the door and strode out of his cabin.

For the second time in little more than an hour, he had to leave his ship. And the second occasion was deadlier than the first: the Amnion were more likely than the Bill to do him active harm. Nevertheless he didn't delay. Tension wasn't the same thing as energy or confidence, but it could serve the same purpose.

He caught up with Mikka and Morn in the access passage of the airlock. They moved slowly: Morn's steps were nothing more than a stupefied shuffle; without Mikka's support, she would have folded to the deck.

From the back they looked like sisters with their arms around each other for encouragement.

Sneering his disgust, he noticed that Mikka had taken the time to put Morn into a clean shipsuit. Presumably Mikka had also cleaned Morn herself, washing off twelve or so hours worth of accumulated filth. Wasted dignity.

A woman who was about to lose her humanity entirely didn't need it. And he didn't want her to have any left when he handed her over to her ruin.

'Far enough, ' he growled at Mikka. 'You can go back now.

'I'm leaving you in command. I don't expect you to like what I'm doing. I don't expect you to forget about it when it's over. But I do expect you to take care of the ship while I'm gone. You aren't any safer without me. '

Nick had guaranteed that by telling Scorz to record his discussion with Vestabule. 'And I still know more about what's at stake here than you do. As matters stand, I'm the only hope you've got. '

Mikka glared at him. 'I'm not stupid, Nick. Don't make that mistake. '

'I'll be lucky if I get the chance, ' he retorted, driven by bitterness. 'You're too busy making it for me.

'Go to the bridge, ' he ordered so that he wouldn't have to listen to her anymore. 'Pull a raiding team together -

the best people we have for weapons, demolition, stealth-work. Take them off duty, get them rested, ready, equipped. I'm not sure what I'm going to do yet' - he admitted this because he knew it would make Mikka more likely to comply - 'but when the time comes we'll need to give it our best shot. '

Maliciously he encouraged her to think that he might try to recapture Morn from the Amnion.

She replied with a shrug of acceptance; but she didn't hurry away. Carefully she disentangled herself from Morn, checking to be sure that Morn wouldn't fall when she stepped back.

Morn wavered as if the muscles of her legs had gone to jelly. She stayed on her feet, however.

Giving Nick one last black look, Mikka walked away.

He keyed the inner door of the lock. The tic in his cheek tightened as he paused to evaluate Morn's condition.

Even when she'd been with Thermopile, helpless against his brutality, she'd never looked so pitiable. She was still half drugged, that was obvious. Her face wore its ineffable beauty like a bruise, as if she herself were the source of all her suffering. Her hair stood out from her head like the tag-ends of her life. As the cat relinquished its hold, she would begin to suffer zone implant withdrawal. And yet, despite long days of hunger and strain, days which had cut lines around her eyes and carved flesh from her bones, her breasts were still full, still seemed to yearn against the fabric of her shipsuit, and the line of her hips beckoned him to her legs.

Tension wasn't enough. If he couldn't be the Nick Succorso who never lost, sure of himself and his power over her, then he needed anger; pure incandescent rage to sustain him.

Grabbing her arm as if he were about to beat her up, he drew her into the airlock.

She made no effort to pull away; but she murmured, That hurts, ' as the ship's inner door closed and locked.

At least she was recovering consciousness. Soon she would be awake enough to know what was happening; enough to be appalled. That was something, anyway.

He engaged the sequence that opened the outer door.

Still grinding his fingers into her arm, he took her off the ship to face the Bill's guards.

To his surprise, there were no guards. Apparently the Bill had decided to keep his personnel out of the crossfire if the Amnion decided to stage an assault on Nick's ship.

Guards still watched over Reception - the Bill hadn't abandoned his own security - but none of them took any notice of Nick and Morn. They may have been instructed to ignore anything which took place between Captain's Fancy and the Amnion sector.

'Fuck you, ' he muttered to everyone and no one as he hauled Morn through Reception into the corridors which led toward the Amnion. Did the Bill like to get paid? So did Nick. Grimly he put this detachment of security, this diplomatic dissociation from Captain's Fancy's needs, on the Bill's tab.

That tab was getting longer by the hour.

'Please, Nick, ' Morn breathed between clenched teeth.

'I'm not going to fight you. You don't need to break my arm. '

He tightened his grip for a moment until he heard her gasp. Then he eased the pressure - not because she asked, but because his hand was tired.

'So you're awake, ' he sneered at her softly. 'Good. Do you know where we are? Do you know where we're going?'

She didn't reply. Her only answer was the increasing stability of her strides and the way she carried herself to minimize the strain on her arm.

'Good, ' he said again, nodding as if he were sure she understood. There are several reasons why we're doing this. ' I want to. You earned it. It's necessary. 'One is that I've had another talk with that mutated bastard Marc Vestabule. He issued any number of threats, but one in particular got my attention. He told me they "have the means to prevent" me from defending myself The same intuition which had restrained him from challenging Vestabule on the subject inspired him to broach it now.

'He said they can "paralyze" my ship. Completely.

'What do you know about that?'

She was silent for a few steps. Then she sighed, 'God, Nick. ' She sounded utterly exhausted, frayed to the ends of her soul; but she didn't sound scared enough, not nearly scared enough to satisfy him. What makes you think I can answer a question like that?'

He didn't have to grope for explanations. 'First, you're a cop. Before you joined me, you had sources of information I don't. You could easily know more about their technological resources than I do. And second' - reflex-ively angry, he squeezed his fingers into her arm again -

'you talked to them when you took over my ship, ' my ship, you bitch.

She bit down on another gasp. She hadn't looked at him since he'd taken her from Mikka; she didn't look at him now. But she was listening. 'All right, ' she said through her teeth as if she, too, were threatening him; as if even now, on her way to the Amnion, she thought she could still oppose him. 'I'll trade you. You tell me why you were talking to the UMCP before we ever went to Enablement. Tell me what your deal with them was.

What they hired you for. Tell me why they let you have me in the first place. And I'll tell you why the Amnion think they can paralyze your ship. '

She astonished him; surpassed him. Why wasn't she terrified? — stricken to the core? She should have been sobbing in revulsion and supplication, not trying to bargain with him.

The corridor was empty in both directions. The Amnion kept themselves apart from the rest of the installation - and nobody with any sense went looking for them. The Bill's bugeyes were watching, of course; but they probably couldn't pick out voices at this range. Nick let go of Morn's arm, clutched her by the shoulders, and swung her around to face him.

'Look at me, damn you. ' Why aren't you out of your head with fear? 'Look at me. '

Her gaze came up to his slowly. When he saw her eyes, the mad, dark passion in them almost made him flinch.

The extremity of her suffering, the depth of her abuse, was matched by a focused, absolute, and predatory conviction. She looked like a woman who could come back from her grave - or from Amnion mutagens — to destroy him.

Roughly he shoved her away. Helpless to defend herself, she stumbled against the wall; he caught her on the rebound and compelled her into motion again. He needed movement to control the dread rising in his guts.

'I already told you, ' he said as soon as he trusted his voice. 'I was dickering for you. I wanted the damn cops to pay me for not selling what you know to the Bill. '

'Bullshit, ' she retorted. 'I knew that wasn't true when you first said it. Now I'm sure.

'You knew how to contact them. You knew where the listening posts are. That means you were dealing with them long before you headed for Thanatos Minor. And I finally figured out that you must have had their permission to take me off Com-Mine. '

'How do you get to that conclusion?' he demanded.

His question was unnecessary: she was already answering it. 'You needed a source in Com-Mine Security to frame Angus. But you needed more than that. You and your source needed a contact at UMCPHQ - somebody who could give you the codes to make that bogus supply ship look genuine. So the UMCP knew what you were doing. You had their cooperation. Maybe you were just following their orders. Maybe that's what your whole precious reputation is based on. You do what the cops tell you, and they make sure you look good in the process.

'So you weren't trying to dicker for me. As far as I was concerned, your deal with them was already set.

Why were you talking to them? What did they hire you for?'

Nick tried to laugh, and couldn't. His mouth was too dry; his throat was too tight. A spasm in his cheek tugged at his scars as if they were fresh.

Nearly panting against his tension, he said, 'Hashi Lebwohl wanted me to do a job for him here. '

What job?' she insisted.

He was going to tell her; he was suddenly eager to tell her. He wanted to hurt her with it, wanted to do anything in his power that might erode the lunatic conviction which protected her from her fear. And he was going to hold her to her bargain.

'The point, ' he said although he could hardly breathe,

'was to do Billingate some damage. Maybe enough damage to put the Bill out of business. I already had Lebwohl's immunity drug. He wanted me to sell it to the Bill. '

This was the truth. Nick hoped that it would crack her heart.

Morn didn't gasp or protest; but he had the satisfaction of feeling her go rigid in his grasp, as if she were in shock.

Gradually the knots in his chest loosened, letting him inhale more easily.

'I was supposed to give the Bill the real thing to test on a live subject, and then supply him with an inert substitute to duplicate in his labs. He could sell his substitute to the illegals or the Amnion, it didn't matter which.

As soon as the truth got out - he was selling an immunity drug that didn't work - he would be in deep shit. '

Live with that, you bitch - while you can. That's the kind of people you work for, the kind you believe in.

'I may still do it, ' he continued, 'if I can't get the Amnion off my back any other way. But if I do, I won't bother with substitutes. ' Like the truth, this lie was intended to do Morn as much harm as possible. When I told Lebwohl I was in trouble, he cut me off. Now I don't mind selling him out. '

Thinking that he'd finally broken her, he put his arm around her and pulled her ear close to his mouth. 'Now it's your turn, ' he whispered almost companionably. Tell me how the Amnion think they can paralyze my defenses. '

'Oh, that, ' she muttered as if she hadn't felt a word he said; as if she were too numb or blind to be reached by his malice. 'You should have figured that out for yourself. '

Here it comes, he thought. Now she would try to get back at him.