The Mutant Prime (24 page)

“Let’s hope he’s not too powerful.” Skerry smiled wryly. “How about we team up and look for him? Considering that he seems to have made off with both of our ladies.”

“Fine with me,” Yosh said. “But I’m not much use against a mutant or supermutant.” He held up his hands. “I’m great with a claviflute, if that helps.”

“Try this.” Skerry handed him a laser rifle. “That’s cocked for medium power. I’m going to try out a long-range esper probe. If Ashman comes running, I may not be able to hold him for long. Use your own judgment, but try to hit him, not me.”

Yosh caught the matte gray metal weapon. It was so large that he could barely hold it with both hands.

“I’ve never used one of these,” he said uncertainly. What was he getting himself into?

“They tell me the best way is to learn by doing.” Skerry grinned. “Let’s hope you don’t need too many lessons.”

He closed his eyes. Waited. Cursed. Opened his eyes.

“All I’m getting are echoes. They’re not in this wing. Maybe not even in the building.” He set off down the corridor at a good clip. “C’mon. If you’re coming.”

“Wait. Where are we going?”

“I caught a bounce off of some screen that was used recently. Maybe I can trace Ashman if I can get my hands on the screen data for the past forty-eight hours.”

Yosh followed him through the corridors of Emory Foundation until they came to a large, screen-filled room.

“This is perfect,” Skerry said. He reached for the keypad. Pressed it. The screens remained dark.

“Let me,” Yosh said, and brushed past him. He tapped in Tavia’s code. Oddly, only a partial menu came up. “Hmm. Strange. Something’s blocking the main menu.”

“Figures. Do we have any outside-access capacity?”

“I think so.” Yosh punched in his own code. “Yeah. Here. We can call out on this.”

“Good.” The bearded mutant punched a special code in, waited, then smiled as his call went through.

“You have reached the home of Narlydda …”said a pleasant female voice. Yosh recognized it as the simulacrum that Narlydda had named Anne Verland.

“Code Y6Cadmium Blue,” Skerry said.

“Your identity is confirmed. All data files are open,” Anne Verland replied. “Data search available.”

“Anne, can you work a screen-to-screen search?”

“Affirmative. Specify data requested.”

“All activity on premises within past forty-eight hours.”

“Working.”

“And Anne?”

“Yes, Skerry?”

“What day is it?”

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

.

Senator Andrea Greenberg brushed a strand of dark red hair back into place, straightened her silver gray suit, and closed her screencase with a snap.

That’s it for the day, she thought. And good thing, too. These committee meetings are deadly. It’s a wonder I get any work done at all. I should have had my head examined before I agreed to serve on Appropriations.

With a wave to her staff she was out the door, and in seconds, the private elevator had whisked her up to the skimmer port. She walked out of the heated elevator cab into weak, wintry sunshine and a crowd of reporters. Her red hair danced in the chill breeze.

“Senator Greenberg, any comment on your connection to the Ryton, Greene and Davis spacedome snafu?”

“Senator Greenberg, are you worried that you’ll be linked to the substandard production of dome parts?”

“Could we get a sound byte for the nine o’clock news in Brisbane, Senator?”

“Over here, Senator—”

“Please, Senator Greenberg, your opinion on Michael Ryton’s attempts to undercut the space industry—”

Michael Ryton! My God, she thought, I haven’t heard his name in years. What in the world is going on here? Andie spun on her heel and stared angrily right into the heart of the braying pack.

“Now what’s this?” she demanded imperiously. “And one at a time, please. If you can’t run your ambush in an orderly fashion, I won’t answer anybody’s question.”

A blond-haired, green-eyed woman stepped forward. Andie recognized her as the Tri-Com anchorwoman, Lucia Silva. “Please, Senator,” she said, “we’d like your reaction to the revelations concerning the manufacture of substandard parts for Moonstation.”

“What revelations?”

“Well, Congresswoman Kate Fisher said that Michael Ryton’s testimony before the subcommittee was clearly self-incriminating.”

“Congresswoman Fisher is well known for her antibusiness sentiments,” Andie said. “I’m not familiar with her comments on this issue.”

“But you are familiar with Michael Ryton?”

“Yes. I met him and his father during Eleanor Jacobsen’s term of office.”

“Do you support his efforts at deregulating safety measures?”

“What are these measures you’re referring to?”

“The lobbying efforts to prevent additional safeguards—”

“That was more than fifteen years ago,” Andie said. “And the legislation targeted was for a specific project, already well covered by safety measures. As I recall, it had nothing to do with Moonstation.”

“Congresswoman Fisher says—”

“Kate Fisher should do her witchhunting someplace else, not on my time. And not with the taxpayers’ money!” Andie regretted the words as soon as she’d uttered them. She’d let her temper get the best of her. Her husband, Joel, had warned her about that. But it was too late. Besides, Kate Fisher was a thorn in her side, and had been since Andie had won her senate seat five years ago.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me. I have nothing further to say.” She whipped around and strode toward her skimmer, daring any foolhardy reporter to pursue her. Once safe inside, she locked the doors and leaned back on the broad, honey-colored leather seat.

“Home.”

At the sound of her voice, the skimmer sprang to life, humming gently as it cleared the exit ramp.

Michael Ryton, she thought. What trouble have you gotten yourself into this time?

She sped past federal buildings, their pale marble looking ghostly in the fading sunlight. Traffic was unusually thin, and in minutes, she was pulling into the driveway of her Georgetown co-op.

Joel was waiting for her in the kitchen. He was wearing a red sweater and jeans. His gray hair curled gently in a cap around his head.

She gave him a kiss and sniffed the air appreciatively. “Is that Thai garlic noodles I smell?”

“Your favorite.”

“Remind me again to congratulate myself for marrying the
Post
’s food editor.”

His green eyes sparkled with pleasure. Reaching for her, he pulled her close and held her in a brief hug. Then he turned back to the stove. As he swished the noodles around in the wok, he said, “I thought you might want a treat after the way those media vultures descended on you.”

“You saw that?”

“It’s already been broadcast. I made a tape for you.”

“Thanks, sweetie.” Andie dropped her fur coat on the back of the sofa, settled into the deep, soft blue cushions, and palmed on the screen. For a moment, all she saw was a flickering hail of orange and red specks. Then the image coalesced into blond, efficient Lucia Silva.

“Senator Andrea Greenberg denies any connection to the Moonstation tragedy,” the blond reporter said. “Although she acknowledged her link to Ryton, Greene and Davis, the firm identified with manufacture of the allegedly faulty dome parts—”

“My God,” Andie said.

“—she denied that she had in any way conspired with Michael Ryton to bring about the fatal deregulation of the space industry, which many experts, including Congresswoman Kate Fisher, say led to this disaster.”

The newscast cut to a commercial in which a large, bald man strapped to a white tuba and oxygen tank was floating through a long aquarium filled with office buildings and orange fish wearing gas masks.

Andie reset the autotape and shut off the screen.

“Here. Drink this.” Joel handed her a dark vermouth on the rocks with a lime twist.

“Thanks.” She finished it in three gulps and refilled the glass. “How could I have been so stupid?” She stood up and walked toward the table where Joel was setting down a steaming plate.

“I will not allow anybody to call my wife stupid. Even my wife,” Joel said mock severely as he ladled out the noodles onto their green acrylic plates. “Come sit down and eat before it gets cold. There’s nothing worse than cold, gluey noodles.”

“Yessir.”

The tangy food warmed her. As she ate, Andie relaxed and began to plot strategy.

“I’ll call a press conference.”

“Don’t talk with your mouth full.” Joel filled her plate again.

She made a show of swallowing. “There. Happy now? I’ll call a press conference with statistics from the results of the so-called fatal deregulation. Show how safe everything has been for fifteen years. Then I’ll find out what’s going on at that damned investigation. Kate Fisher’s media circus. That woman’s priorities need rewiring.” Andie stabbed with her chopsticks at a stray noodle as though she were working on Kate Fisher’s priorities.

The screenphone rang and Andie turned to answer it.

Joel rolled his eyes. “Not during dinner,” he said. “I thought we agreed that you wouldn’t take calls during dinner. The machine can handle it.”

“But it might be important.” Andie gave him an apologetic smile. “I know how you feel about this, honey, but please understand—”

“I know, I know. A senator’s never off-duty.” He switched on the screen near the table.

The round face of Chemen Astori, Book Keeper for the Eastern Mutant Council, appeared. Andie had met him several years ago. A strong, trustworthy leader, as she remembered. And an amusing man, to boot. But he looked sober now. Grim, even.

“Che? I’m here,” she said. “Just finishing dinner.”

“Sorry to interrupt, Senator.”

“What’s the problem?”

“We understand there’s a warrant out for Michael Ryton’s arrest.”

“What?” Andie almost dropped her chopsticks. “How? Why?”

“The Western Book Keeper, Rebekah Terling, just called me. Ryton didn’t show up for the last day of his testimony at Armstrong. Family emergency. His father is dying.”

Andie closed her eyes for a moment. She hadn’t spoken to James Ryton in years. But even now, she could see his features: the golden eyes, the thinning blond hair, the determined jut of the jaw. Dying? It couldn’t be. She opened her eyes as the Eastern Book Keeper continued.

“Kate Fisher demanded that a warrant be procured,” he said. “And she knows how to keep the media salivating.”

“Sounds just like her,” Andie said. “But why can’t Michael just request to be excused from the hearings?”

“He should have. I’m sure it would have been arranged. But he must have been so upset by the circumstances that he wasn’t thinking clearly—his father was seriously injured in what appears to have been a suicide attempt.”

“Gods!”

“And now that he’s gone AWOL, Kate Fisher has whipped up the authorities to get them on his trail. She’s determined to use this investigation to shut down the space industry. She seems to have some special bias against Michael’s company.”

“I always thought Kate was a bigot,” Andie said. “She’s terrified of mutants. And this is one way to hurt them—the space industry is filled with mutant engineers and designers. Poor Michael.”

“Senator, is there anything you can do?”

Andie leaned back in her chair and studied the screen carefully as she weighed her answer. What to do? Michael was certainly in a mess this time. But what was she supposed to do? Become Saint Andie the Good, saddle up, and ride to the rescue of mutants everywhere?

“I understand your problem,” she said. “I’m not sure there’s much I can do to help. Not that I don’t want to.” She shook her head and a few strands of dark red hair danced around her face. “I hate like hell to worry about political necessities. But I’ve learned to live with them and work with them. This issue may simply be too hot for me. I’ve got an election to worry about next year, and the media have already sniffed out my mutant connection.”

Joel gave her a look sharp with disapproval.

Onscreen, Chemen Astori’s eyes were wide, astonished. Obviously, he hadn’t expected her reaction. “But Senator,” he said. “We’re not talking about political expediency here. We’re talking about justice. About saving part of an industry vital to this nation’s economic welfare. And what’s more, we’re talking about an innocent man being hounded by congressional wolves—”

“Che, I’m sorry,” Andie said. “I’ve known Michael Ryton and his family for a long time. We used to be fairly close. But it’s simply out of the question. If I want to accomplish half of what I’ve planned—and this affects mutants as well as nonmutants—then I must play by the rules. And that means getting reelected.” She gave him a quick, pained look. “I’d like to help. But if Michael was absent without excuse, then I’m afraid he is liable. There’s nothing I can do.”