The Vastalimi Gambit (22 page)

If Jo thought she was going to catch Wink flatfooted, she was wrong. He didn’t bat an eyelash.

“Hey, Jo, how you doing?”

She wasn’t going to let him get away with it. “So-so. Yourself?”

“Can’t complain.”

“We happened to be in the neighborhood,” Jo said. “Thought maybe you and Kay could use a hand.”

“I appreciate that, but I think we got it.”

Jo shook her head. “Christus, Wink.”

He laughed. “Yeah, yeah, okay, maybe we might could use a little help. When did you get to Vast?”

“Yesterday.”

“And it took you this long to come visit us?”

He didn’t ask how—he had a tracker implant, and Formentara could locate that easily enough—even if he were dead.

“We wanted to do some sightseeing first. Actually, we got a late start, and you were way out here in the country, then rolling away from us. We had to chase you.”

“The mission on Far Bundaloh done that fast? You been in the Void for what? Three weeks?”

“Seventy-two hours, give or take.”

“You took the shortcut?”

“We were in a hurry.”

That got him. “Damn. How, uh . . . why . . . ?”

“Kay’s brother called us. When you two turned up missing, he became concerned. When the last place you were known to be got blown up? He was more worried. We had pretty much cleared our opposition out, so Rags decided to take a ride.”

“You volunteered to risk that trip.”

“Of course. We didn’t know you’d gotten loose on your own.” She paused a moment. “I’m the point—the others are holding a klick back: Rags, Gramps, Gunny, and Formentara. And Singh, remember him? He found us on FB and joined; he’s here, too. Plus a newbie,
Mish
fem, goes by Em.”

“We got a new Vastalimi? When did that happen?”

“It’s a funny story, but how about I save it for after we get this done? Whatever it is.”

“That’ll work for me.”

“So, what’s the deal?”

Wink laid it out: “The guy in charge is rich enough to have a bunch of guards, and they are gunners. The compound is pretty stout for a civilian’s house, and they don’t like uninvited company. We never got through the front gate. We, uh, had to take several of them out.”

“Several?”

“Eight.”

“Where are the bodies?”

“Mostly piled up in an alley. Couple–three are in a cart by the river.”

“Great. You think those will stay hidden long?”

“We think the guy we are after owns the town, and the locals will keep their heads down.”

“You
think
.”

“Hey, what can I say? It’s what we have to work with.”

“And Kay is . . . ?”

“She’s doing a circuit, looking for a hole. We’re observing radio silence because we think they might have sharp hearing.”

“Why didn’t you call in the local cops?”

He said, “Well, Kay thinks maybe this is a better idea.”

“Because . . . ?”

“She thinks there might be a leak. We don’t know where.”

She nodded. Just good tactics. Fewer people who knew something, the fewer who might spread it around. “This is the guy you believe is good for the disease?”

“Either him, or he knows who is. He made money on it, somehow. His guys killed our ride. Glad you showed up, it was gonna be a long walk home.”

“Go on.”

“Last few people we went to talk to knew we were coming, and in theory, nobody but us should have known that. Somebody must have told them. This guy was waiting with guns.”

“Interesting. We met Kay’s sister. One of the reasons we are just getting here—we had to sneak off.”

“Yeah, well, we could use some help, and—here comes Kay now.”

Jo looked up and saw her friend strolling along as if she owned everything as far as she could see.

Like Wink, Kay expressed no surprise at seeing her.

“Jo Captain. Good to behold you.”

Jo shook her head. “Butter wouldn’t melt in your mouths.”

“Pardon?”

“Never mind. What’s the sitrep?”

“There are, in addition to our quarry, an unknown number of guards. The security on the compound is tight. Fence, gate, armed people at the entrance. I take it you did not come alone?”

“Six more of us,” Jo said, “including a Vastalimi named
Mish
fem.”

“A mercenary? How did you acquire her services?”

“It’s a funny story; I’ll tell you later. I’m going to go back and fetch the others. Wait here, would you?”

After she left, Kay turned to Wink. “This is an unexpected turn of events.”

“Ain’t it, though. They came to help us out when they heard from Droc we were in trouble.”

“That was but a few days’ past,” Kay allowed. “They could not have made a transit in such a period.”

He nodded. “Not ordinarily.”

“Ah.”

“Yeah. They risked the
Chomolungma
.”

“They have done us a great honor.”

“They risked dying to get here in a hurry. Foolish.”

“Would you have done any less in their place?”

“Well . . . no. But I’m an adrenaline and testosterone junkie, remember?” He smiled.

“And held in high esteem by your colleagues.”

“I’m sure they did it for you more than me,” he said. “Hard to give up a good Vastalimi.”

She whickered. “Our task is thus made easier.”

“There’s that.”

_ _ _ _ _ _

“Both alive and well,” Jo said. “Radio silence because their quarry is probably listening. They killed several guards.”

“Good they are alive,” Cutter said. “Situation?”

Jo repeated what she had learned.

“Okay, then, we’ll mosey on up there and see how best to achieve their goal. Formentara, you okay with manning the hopper here and keeping track of telemetry and coms and all?”

“Why not? Nothing else to do around here. There are fewer augmentation facilities on this world than there were on Far Bundaloh if you can believe that. When are we going to a planet with, you know, running water and power and inside freshers?”

“Maybe next time. Jo?”

“This way. Uh, Rags, maybe you should—”

“No. I’m going. I didn’t space all the way here to sit back and do nothing.”

“You could help Formentara—”

“Who doesn’t need my help in the slightest. Who signs the checks?”

“Mostly me, these days,” Jo said. “But I take your point. If you let anybody kill you, I am going to be really pissed off.”

_ _ _ _ _ _

Kay was aware her comrades had drawn nearer. “Here they come,” she said. “Take care.”

“I wasn’t going to shoot any of them,” Wink said.

“So you say.”

“Was that a joke?”

She smiled.

There were six of them: Jo Captain, Cutter Colonel, Gunny, Demonde Gramps, the Anandan Singh, and one of The People.

Formentara would be with the vehicle.

The unmet fem said, “Ah,
Kluth
fem, I have heard much good about you from these humans. I am
Mish
fem. I can recite my ancestors if you like.” She spoke
Govor
, not the most common dialect, which was interesting.
Govor
was the first tongue Kay had herself learned.

“I ken you, Mish. Let us dispense with the relatives. How do you like our team?”

“Best humans I’ve been around so far, but of course . . .”

“. . . that’s not saying much,” Kay said, finishing the old joke.

Both of them smiled.

“The one called Jo defeated me in bare-hand Challenge. You have taught her well.”

Kay said, “No shame, she has beaten me in practice many times. She is the most adept human that way I have ever been around, but of course . . .”

They both whickered.

“Kay,” Cutter said. “What do we need to do here?”

“The person who owns that house would seem to have information we want. His people tried to kill us, and I suspect there is a good reason why.”

“You and Wink haven’t been inside?”

“Not yet.”

“Have you come up with a strategy and tactics?”

“Yes. Your arrival has made it much more likely to succeed.”

“Let’s hear it, then.”

“Those hunting us had vehicles. We take those, approach the gate to the compound, we can get close enough to take out the guards there and get inside. We overcome opposition, capture the owner, and ask him some pointed questions.”

Gramps laughed. “Want to make
smeerp
stew? First, you catch a
smeerp
 . . .”

Both Em and Kay looked at him. “That is obvious,” Em said.

He laughed harder.

_ _ _ _ _ _

Em and Kay drove, stuck their arms out, and waved.

The guards opened the gate.

The four guards went down in a hail of projectiles. Served them right for being lax.

There were no guards at the house’s entrance, and if there were cameras monitoring the door, they were not apparent.

“Odd,” Cutter said. “You’d think they’d have somebody watching the entrance.”

“I’m for going in through a window,” Jo said, “just in case the door is rigged. No bars on the windows, and if we blow one in, and an alarm goes off, it will be too late.”

Cutter nodded.

“All right. Let’s do it.”

_ _ _ _ _ _

“Will you take the left?” Kay said.

Jo said, “Yes.”

The two fems split, moving fast.

The corridor was wide, but the branching ahead to the left was blind. She couldn’t hear anybody down it, but these were Vastalimi, and they could be quiet when they wanted to be.

Jo dropped to her left side and slid the last couple of meters on the smooth floor into the corridor’s intersection, both hands on the pistol—

The Vastalimi crouching ten meters away was fast, but not so much so that she had a chance to drop her aim from where she expected a target to appear in time—

Jo saw her eyes go wide as she realized her mistake and jerked the rifle downward—

—too late. Jo squeezed off two quick shots, both center of mass, then tracked upward for the third shot at the fem’s head—

—She missed the third because the Vastalimi had curled reflexively forward from the impact of the bioelectric darts that skewered her heart.

—Dead on her feet and falling . . .

Nobody else in sight.

Jo rolled up, gun leading, and ran down the corridor.

There shouldn’t be too many guards left by now. Wink had shot one, Gunny had taken three, and Gramps blew one up with a bisector. This one made six, and—

—a pistol went off down the other, a double tap. That was Kay—she could tell by the sound—and there was no return fire, so that would make seven—

Jo subvocalized into her com: “Seven down. Remember to keep some alive—”

A carbine went off, a pair of triplets, and Jo knew from that sound and pattern that it was probably Gramps—

“Repeat—what was that you said?” Gramps said.

“Take one alive,” Jo said.

“Sorry. My error.”

“You killed the last two?”

“I don’t know that they were the last two. Besides, they were Vastalimi, and they were armed.”

Gunny said, “A good shot could have taken them down without killing ’em.”

“Says the woman who killed three without a nanosecond’s hesitation.”

“That was different. We still had plenty left back then.”

Jo went into the main section of the place. Two dead Vastalimi males sprawled on the floor by Gramps’s feet.

Rags came around the corner nearest. “Clear, that way.”

Singh commed in: “The domestic staff and some fancy-looking fems are all dead up here. Along with whom I assume is the owner, Okloo. It appears they have been dead for a while. The blood is congealed, and they are stiff.”

“Killed before we arrived,” Em said. “Is that not interesting?”

“Well, crap. This will make it a little harder to get the information we wanted, them being dead and all,” Gunny said.

“It doesn’t matter,” Kay said. “I know who they were working for.”

Wink looked at her. “Really? When did you figure that out?”

“I have suspected it for a time. This is the final piece of the puzzle.”

Wink shook his head. “I must be missing something.”

“The staff and owner were killed before we arrived, so once again, somebody knew we were coming. They were cleaning up loose ends. I suspect we were supposed to be among those.”

Wink considered it for a moment. “So?”

“So, who sent us to see Shan the second time? From where the leaks must be coming?”

“ I . . . Oh . . .” He trailed off.

“Yes.”

“Well, fuck,” he said.

Leeth arrived next to the building’s back entrance and started for the door. Kay called out. “Over here,
Sister
.”

Leeth turned, saw Kay leaning against the wall in the shadow of a tall refuse container.

“Strange place for a meeting,” Leeth said.

“Appropriate. A dirty alley seems perfect, don’t you think?” She pushed off the wall, stood facing her sister. Her hormones were in flux, her stance tight.

There was a long pause. Finally, Leeth said. “So. You know.”

“Yes.”

“I am sorry it came to this.”

“Are you?”

“More that you figured it out than anything if I must be honest.”

“Honest? Why start now?”

There was another pause. “I didn’t know Droc was going to call you home.”

“Would it have made a difference if you had known?”

Leeth shook her head. “No. It was too far along by then.”

Kay shook her head. “My sister, the
Sena
, a murderer. I spit in disgust.”

“I wish you had not come back.”

“So do I. Aside from a few carefully chosen targets, the rest of them were just ruses?”

“Yes. The plan was for a thousand deaths, maximum, and if fifty of them were major criminals? Nobody would have thought twice about that, they would have been lost in the crowd.”

“Including our parents and our siblings.”

“That was a hard choice.”

“To make certain nobody would suspect you if it came to that. That is beyond frigid, Leeth. You wade in a river of nitrogen.”

She nodded. “It was necessary. If I could have stalled you for a couple of weeks? That would have been enough.”

Kay shook her head. “You were the most stellar of all the
Sena
. Your entire career. And now this?”

Leeth nodded. “Yes. I was the good fem, doing the right things for the right reasons. But the
Sena
were falling, and I had to come up with a way to stop it.”

“You planned it so that somebody would eventually realize that it was deliberate.”

“Of course. Our brother would, in time, have been given additional clues, then led down the proper road. It was not contagious, never an epidemic in the making. The majority of The People were never at risk. Droc got there sooner than expected, thanks to your human. I don’t think a Vastalimi Healer would ever have made that leap on his own.

“And, of course, your vision was too sharp, much as I tried to keep it clouded. And you wouldn’t let it go and leave it to me.”

Leeth sighed. “What gave me away in the end?”

“You were too good a Shadow to miss this, and yet, you dragged your feet at every turning, you kept putting me off. You sent me places where you knew I wouldn’t find anything.

“I didn’t want to believe it, but when everything else was eliminated, you were still there. The recent trap you set was the final piece in the puzzle. Who else knew Wink and I would be going there? Who sent us to see Shan again? Was he part of it?”

“Not as such. We have Shan under electronic surveillance.”

“I never considered that.”

“We use his own cameras. He has them everywhere. He is young and vain. He likes to watch himself do things. It makes it easy.”

Kay sighed.

“I didn’t know your humans would sneak off and find you so soon. How did they?”

“Does it matter?”

“No, not really.”

They looked at each other silently for a moment.

“You would have had me killed.”

“Caught. Wounded, if necessary, but not killed unless there was no other way.

“The first time you were collected, you would have survived even if you had not escaped on your own. That was the plan. You would have been held, eventually released. The plague would stop, you would leave, and all would be well.”

Kay stared at her. “There was a clue there, had I been listening properly. They told me they knew who my sister was. I came to realize what they meant. They didn’t know
of
you, you were the one who
set
them on us.”

“I would have spared you, if possible, I didn’t want you to die.”

“Your concern is touching.”

“What is it you want to hear? That I would have regretted it if you’d been killed? I would have.”

“But you’d have gotten over it quick enough, wouldn’t you? As you did the rest of our family you
murdered
.”

Leeth said nothing.

Kay let that go. “You set it all up toward an end that would have included a guilty party.”

“Of course.”

“Anybody I know?”

“
Shard
masc.”

“Ah. The Clawproof Uberpatro, Packleader of Packleaders. Cleaning out the den along the way to the biggest prey. It has a certain economy to it.”

“It took years to set up and put it into motion. Not many could have managed it.”

“I can appreciate that. And how far up are you on the list of plotters?”

“You don’t think I did it alone?”

Kay laughed, despite its being so awful. Nothing funny here. It was tragic.

“I am at the top, Sister. Others sharpened their talons for their own reasons, but one uses the tools one has. I was in it for justice.”

“
Justice?
You say that despite the hundreds of innocents who have died from this? People you
slaughtered
?”

“I deeply regret it, you must believe that. But their deaths were for the greater good.”

Kay stared at her. “The greater good? Are you truly mad?”

“The
Sena
are at a critical point. We are the wall between order and chaos, and we have been crumbling for a long time. When this is done, a diseased pack of longtime criminals—who over their lives killed many more than have died of the illness, but who were too clever for us to spike? They will be gone.

“More importantly, our prestige in solving the crime will infuse our ranks with a spate of new applicants, smart and talented people who will see the Shadows as I saw them long ago. As an adventure. As a higher calling.

“Order will be restored, better than it was.

“Yes, the deaths will stay with me to my own end, and I am sorry for them and their families—our family—you can’t know how much; but their lives balanced against the lives of the tens of thousands over the years that a reinvigorated
Sena
will save? There is no contest.”

“So the ends justify the means.”

“Yes, sometimes it does.”

Kay sighed. “But when it comes out that it was a highly regarded officer of the
Sena
who was responsible? What does that do to your recruitment strategy? Do you think that the door will be pounded open by the bright and talented rushing to join an organization that is responsible for mass murder? Or that at least a few Shadows with a conscience won’t resign?”

“That won’t happen.”

“You think not?”

“No one will reveal it.”

“Really? My status is low, true, but our Elder Droc’s is not, and he will have high-ranking ears to listen. And there are honest Shadows who can verify it. Once you know the guilty party, it is easy enough to backtrack and find the arrows that point to her.”

“You won’t tell him.”

“You
are
mad.”

“Lope away, Sister. Leave Vast and go back to playing soldier.”

“No.”

Leeth pulled her pistol and pointed it at Kay.

Too far away to try a leap.

“That’s it? You would murder me?”

“I will regret this most of all, but I can’t let you undo it. You left, you haven’t seen what I have seen. It is too important to our world. Try to understand.”

“Will you offer Challenge instead of shooting me?”

“As good as I am, you did defeat Vial. You aren’t the sib I used to bat around as a cub. I can likely beat you even so, but I can’t risk it. I am sorry.”

“Gunny,” Kay said.

Leeth frowned. “What?”

The shot tore the pistol from her grip, shattering the hard plastic into shards as it flew.

Leeth snarled, dropped into a fighting crouch, her claws snapped out—

Kay raised her hand. “Hold! My comrade—one of those who shoot so well—has you in her sights. Twitch, and die where you stand. She won’t miss.”

Leeth looked around, didn’t see the hidden threat. She relaxed, came up, retracted her claws.

“Again, I underestimated you. Always smarter than I expected you to be,” Leeth said. “What now?”

Kay had thought about it, what she would do, and while she didn’t like any of her choices, some were less onerous than others. “A bargain,” she said.

“I’m listening.”

“Give me the names of those involved in the plot with you—”

“No—”

“—hear me through! The names, no omissions. In exchange, two things: You will be allowed to perform
izvaditi utrobu
.”

Leeth nodded. “And the second?”

“And the blame for the murders will fall upon Shard, as you planned. I am assuming your evidence, whatever it is, is solid enough to bear inspection?”

“It is.” She paused. “You would do that?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you are right—The People need the
Sena
. If I blacken them with your sin, it serves no purpose. Your way was wrong, but I won’t deny that your goal is valid.”

“That’s it?”

“When I am done here, I will leave our world once more. What remains of our family won’t, and what you have done is wicked enough that it will hang over them like a cloud—should it become known. Why should our family suffer any more for your crime?”

“I understand.” She paused again. “You really would have made a great Shadow, Kluth. You have found the path that hews closer to right than any other.”

“It is still a path too far. Know that your accomplices and coconspirators will be punished. Most of them will likely die, Droc will see to it. Challenges, accidents, sudden illnesses, there is no place upon Vast where they will be able to hide. You cleaned out one kind of criminal nest, we shall clean out another. People who get away with such things will only be encouraged to do worse.”

“They understood the risks.”

There was a silence that threatened to expand to infinity. Then Leeth said, “There’s something else, isn’t there? Another reason you haven’t said.”

Kluth considered it. Yes. There was. And maybe it would be cruel to offer it. Her sister had been ready to shoot her like prey, for the greater good of her cause, but she had told her why. Leeth deserved the truth before she died, didn’t she?

Kay said, “Because kinship matters to some of us. We were born moments apart, we lay together as cubs and nursed on our parents’ disgorge. You were my favorite sibling. Central in my cubhood. I loved you.”

That dart struck home—she could see it. “Even after I would have killed you, you say this?”

“Yes.”

“You shame me.”

“No, you shamed yourself. Say the names, there is a recorder working. Give a link to the evidence we need.

“Hunt well on the Other Side, Leeth.”

Leeth nodded. “Thank you.”

Kay turned away.

_ _ _ _ _ _

When Leeth finished naming names and telling them where to find the faked evidence, she took a deep breath, and her claws snapped out. She looked skyward for a moment, closed her eyes, then crossed her wrists over her abdomen. She jammed her claws into her flesh deeply and uncrossed her hands, flinging them wide, shredding open her belly.

Her entrails spilled out with a gush, blood spewing.

She kept to her feet for what seemed like a long time before she sat down, then fell over onto her side.

On the roof down the alley, sweating in the shiftsuit, but mostly invisible, Gunny said, “Man. That’s hard.” She relaxed her grip on the carbine.

Next to her, Gramps, his own weapon no longer aimed at Leeth, said, “Yeah. Ripping out your own guts.”

Gunny said, “I was talking about Kay.”

“So was I.”

They looked at each other. Something passed between them, but Gunny couldn’t speak to it. She could only nod.