A Dark and Hungry God Arises (44 page)

Then he met Angus' scowl again.

'I don't trust you, Captain Thermo-pile. I know too much about you. How do you expect me to believe you won't renege as soon as you get your hands on her?'

'I don't. ' Still praying that Nick would attack him, Angus lowered his fist until it rested on the command board. 'In fact, I may decide to do exactly that. This is the price you pay for not telling me he's my kid - for not warning me. He doesn't leave this ship until you bring Morn Hyland here. '

Now Davies was staring at his hand on the deck rather than at Nick's boots. Painfully, stiff with cramps, he unbent his other arm, straightened his knees a bit.

Nick raised his fingers to rub at his cheek, but he didn't seem aware of it. Darkness filled his eyes. 'In that case' - a lopsided smile bent his mouth - 'you can kiss her goodbye. ' He laughed like breaking glass. 'I mean, you already have kissed her goodbye. There in Mallorys was the last you're ever going to see of her.

'Don't bother coming with me. ' He laughed again.

Now it sounded like breaking bones. 'I can find my own way out. '

He turned for the companionway.

Davies pushed himself up onto his knees and lunged forward, grabbing Nick around the legs.

Nick staggered a step; recovered his balance. Angus assumed his son was strong: he'd been strong himself at that age. But the stress of clamping his body into a ball so tightly had left the boy weak. He couldn't pull Nick off his feet.

Nick wrenched himself around despite Davies' grasp.

'Let go of me, you little shit. '

Davies' mouth gaped open. A croak like a crippled howl came from his straining throat. Driving one leg under him, he managed to knock Nick back against the companionway.

As Nick hit the treads, he snap-punched Davies in the temple so hard that the boy slumped aside.

But Davies didn't let go. He'd lost his hold on Nick's legs, so he clung to one of Nick's ankles. A constricted frenzy flamed on his face.

Quick as a piston, Nick kicked him in the solar plexus.

Davies must have seen the blow coming, however. He had Morn's training - and Angus' instincts. In spite of his weakness and pain, he released Nick's ankle; as Nick's boot slammed into him, he flung his arms around that leg and heaved sideways, pulling Nick over him and down.

Milos was on his feet - not to intervene, just trying to put as much distance as possible between himself and the fight.

Angus sat where he was, gripping Morn's id tag so hard the metal cut into his palm; studying his enemy.

Once more he had the dislocated sense of being more than one person; of existing simultaneously in separate realities. One part of him left his g-seat and jumped eagerly into the fray, savage for a chance to use his new resources - to make Succorso pay some of the cost for his long ordeal. Hell, with his welded force he could easily kill Succorso. And the strange pangs were growing stronger. Davies was his son —

A more vulnerable version of himself.

Weak with cramps and his mother's absolute chagrin.

Yet Angus didn't move. Prewritten instructions held him still, instructions which denied him the right to hurt anyone with any kind of UMCP connection - and which placed no value on Davies. He sat and watched the struggle as if it were purely of abstract interest, while inside his skull he howled like his son.

Nick was good: Angus had to admit that. The instant he hit the deck, he rebounded to his knees. One two three times he pounded Davies in the face, and again, onetwothree, too fast for Davies to block the blows.

Blood splashed from Davies' cheeks, his mouth, his brows. Gulps of air panted in and out of his mouth like aborted screams.

Nevertheless Davies didn't quit. Ducking his head against Nick's fists, he tightened his grip as if he were fighting for Morn's life and strained to haul himself up Nick's body, reach high enough to do some damage.

'Shit!' Milos gasped suddenly. 'Angus, Nick's going to kill him!'

With the same abstract abhorrence which kept him still, Angus wondered whether Milos was about to issue a Joshua order.

He couldn't take that chance.

'All right, Captain Sheepfucker, ' he growled. 'You can stop now. If you hurt him any more, even the Amnion won't want him. '

Nick flashed a glance at Angus, showed his teeth.

In a spray of blood he hit Davies again onetwothree.

Davies' hold on Nick slipped an inch; started to fail -

— and a restriction lifted in Angus' head. Between one instant and the next, his programming shifted along a new logic-tree. New implications were considered: new standards applied.

Davies was Morn's son.

Joshua was here to rescue her.

Therefore whatever she valued, whatever she needed or owned, might be important; might be crucial.

He exploded out of his g-seat.

Before Nick reached four, Angus caught him by the back of his shipsuit, snatched him into the air and pitched him against the rear bulkhead.

Nick hit; twisted to land on his feet. Wild and desperate, at the end of his endurance, he charged at Angus as if he meant to prove that he never lost.

Snarling avidly, Angus punched him straight in the forehead with a fist reinforced by implanted struts and plates - a fist as effectively massive as a block of stone.

Nick dropped to his knees like a bull in an abattoir.

He didn't fall; but his eyes glazed, and his head lolled.

His hands thrashed like dying fish at the ends of his arms.

Angus felt a rush of raw pleasure as acute as lasers, as clean as matter cannon fire. 'That's twice, Succorso. '

Twice he'd beaten Nick physically. 'The third time, I won't just tap you. I'll split your fucking skull. '

Panting for violence, he bent over Davies to see what shape the boy was in.

Despite his bloody breathing and stunned gaze, Davies was conscious. His hands groped for Angus, plucked at Angus' sleeves. His mangled lips moved dumbly, as if they were trying to form words.

After a moment he managed to moan, 'My father—All of them -' Then he choked. 'Oh, God. '

Roughly Angus picked Davies off the deck. He considered sickbay; dismissed the idea. He needed answers, and he needed them now. Half carrying the boy, he moved back to Milos' station, seated his son there.

With his hands braced on the arms of the g-seat, he peered into Davies' face.

'Pay attention. Try to keep it straight. That was then.

This is now. And that was Morn. This is you. Just because you remember her past doesn't mean the same things happened to you.

'All right?'

Davies twitched his head. He may have been trying to nod.

Angus pulled away. The pleasure-rush was gone. Seeing his son beaten and bloody was too much like seeing himself in the same state. A sudden pressure filled his throat. Swallowing it harshly, he rasped, Then let's start making sense. You don't want me to let Captain Sheepfucker leave. I figured that much out. So I won't. He's going to stay until we're done with him.

'Now tell me what the fuck you think you're doing. '

Davies groaned softly. A bubble of blood formed on his lips and burst. With a heart-wrenching effort, he brought his eyes into focus.

'I know him. We didn't spend all our time fucking. He talked. I wanted to kill him just to make him stop talking. '

A new pain pulled like a laceration through Angus'

chest. 'I said, keep it straight!' As if he were telepathic, he understood Davies perfectly. That was Morn. The kind of fucking he gave you was completely different. '

Davies tried to nod again. Abused and urgent, his eyes clung to Angus. 'But I know him. He doesn't have her. '

Angus froze. Milos seemed to be strangling on smoke.

Nick took a breath like a shudder and lowered his head as if he were waiting for the axe.

As clearly as he could, Davies articulated, 'He can't trade her for me. He already gave her to the Amnion. ' A spasm of pain stopped him. When it passed, he finished, The Bill told me. '

Milos covered his face with his hands.

Morn!

Angus' fury was nearly as fast as his microprocessor; nearly fast enough to lash out before his datacore could stop him.

Gave her to the Amnion.

That was the point of Nick's distractions; the real cheat. He'd turned her over to mutagens and ruin. And then he went on using her as a bargaining chip as if he still had her.

Angus would have been willing to die for a chance to hit Nick again.

But his passion slammed into the neural wall of his zone implants: he couldn't move. Outraged and heart-sick, he couldn't do anything except stand still and let his programming make Warden Dios' decisions.

Madness crowded his head. Like Nick, he'd come to the end of his endurance. He was on the verge of breaking - right on the edge of his personal abyss - when he heard himself say, 'In that case, we'll have to get her back. '

'Oh, shit, ' Milos breathed. He didn't seem to have any other words for his dismay.

'That's crazy. ' Nick brought the words up from the pit of his stomach as if he were coughing. 'She's in the Amnion sector. You'll have to fight them and the Bill and two warships just to find her. And they've already given her their mutagens. She's already one of them. '

And you did that to her! Angus howled at him. She gave herself to you, she gave you everything I wanted, and you turned her over to them. '

At the same time he said calmly, We still have to get her back. ' He sounded as lucid as a machine. 'If she's one of them now, we'll kill her. Otherwise we'll rescue her. '

She was a cop: Dios couldn't afford to let the Amnion have her.

'Yes, ' Davies gritted through his teeth. Behind his mask of blood, his eyes glittered. 'Yes. '

'I'm going to sickbay, ' Milos announced stiffly. He sounded like he was grieving. 'I'll get some swabs and antiseptic. '

Keeping his face turned away, he went to the companionway and moved upward out of sight. -

'You're both crazy. ' Unsteadily Nick gained his feet.

'You're going to get her away from the Amnion, sure. '

His eyes were recovering focus, but his balance remained unreliable. Stress tugged at his cheek like an erratic heartbeat. 'You and what army? There's a warship with her guns lined up on us right now. Super-light proton cannon. Even if you can get into the Amnion sector and get her out' — weakly he tried to hammer the words —

'you're never going to get away.

'You're as dead as I am. ' He attempted a grin, but the effort failed, pulled apart by the tic in his cheek. 'Unless you let me give them your brat.

Then some of us might survive. '

Even though he was beaten, even though Davies had exposed his treachery, he went on groping for an exit to the cul-de-sac.

'No. ' Angus dismissed the idea as if he'd considered it seriously for a moment; as if he understood or cared about the need in Nick's voice. That won't work. ' He didn't understand or care, however. He paid no attention to Nick's appeal. He was simply talking to fill the silence while he waited for Dios' instructions to come through the gap in his mind. 'If I let you take Davies there while I went after Morn, it might be useful as a diversion. But as soon as they lost her they would keep both of you. '

'That isn't what I -' Nick began. But then he stopped.

He must have been able to see that Angus wasn't listening.

Squinting through blood and fear, Davies watched Angus. Carefully, trying not to put pressure on his hurts, he straightened himself in the g-seat. In a voice like a metal-rasp, he asked, 'Why do you want her back? Didn't you get enough out of her the last time?'

'That isn't it. ' Nick made a thin effort to sound sarcastic. He, too, watched Angus closely. 'He likes hurting women - don't you, Captain Thermo-pile? — but not enough to risk himself for it. He's too much of a coward for that.

'He has a different reason. ' He glanced briefly at Davies. 'You've got the mind of a cop. You'll love this.

The real reason is, your dear father works for the UMCP.

He doesn't want to, of course, but they've got his neck in a noose. He's doing this little job for them to keep them from snapping his spine. '

He seemed to think this revelation might upset Angus.

It didn't: Angus hardly heard it. As if Nick's words were a code or a catalyst, the window in his head opened, and data streamed into his mind - a torrent of precon-ceived plots and needs, exigencies and questions.

'Milos is probably just here to keep track of him, ' Nick concluded, 'report on him if he doesn't do what he's told. '

Frowning around his cuts and contusions, Davies asked Angus, 'Is that true?'

Abruptly Angus' attention snapped back into focus.

He was alive on disparate planes again, existing in separate realities; multi-tasking urgently. But now the data which poured and processed through him required him to concentrate on Nick.

Well, there's one thing sure, ' he muttered while his datacore filtered possibilities through the back of his brain, testing options against his experience with Billingate and the Amnion. ' "Report" is what Milos does best. '

He glanced up the companionway to be sure his second was out of earshot. 'You may be interested to hear, Succorso' - his programming kept him too busy for obscenities - 'that you aren't the only one he talked to while we were coming in. He also sent messages to Tranquil Hegemony.

'They answered before you did. '

Nick flinched and turned pale as if he'd been hit in the stomach. His mouth shaped curses which were inaudible because they had no breath behind them.

Angus liked that. He wished he'd done it of his own free will.

'What did they say?' Davies asked.

Angus shrugged. The codes are too good. I couldn't break them. '

The boy didn't take Milos' betrayal as hard as Nick did: maybe he didn't understand it. He pursued the matter impersonally. 'Then what's going on? What's he doing?'

'Playing some kind of bugger game. ' That was obvious.

'Me and Succorso and the UMCP and the Amnion, all against each other. ' Fears and alarms roared in Angus'