Confluence

CHAPTER NINE: DOMINIQUE RADKO

Radko calculated they had less than five minutes before Redmond sent reinforcements. There was no one in sight yet.

She waved to Han and Chaudry. “Go, go. Before the next lot get here.”

They scrambled out in an awkward run.

Radko snatched OneLane’s comms a second before Vilhjalmsson did, and the two of them ran out together.

Her comms started beeping as soon as they were outside. Van Heel. Radko flicked it on as they ran.

“I’ve been trying to call for five minutes,” van Heel said. “A team of Redmond soldiers went in there.”

“We found them.”

“There’s a backup team waiting one street south.”

They were headed south. Radko beckoned to the others and veered east. “How close can you get the aircar?”

“I’ll need at least two blocks if you think they’ll come after us.”

“Meet us two blocks east then.”

“Wait,” Vilhjalmsson said. “Maybe we could work together a bit longer. You have transport out. I have codes that should get us past Redmond military.”

His face was gray, covered in a film of perspiration. He couldn’t run far, or fast. He’d get caught quickly. Given the number of Redmond soldiers in the area—more when they saw the carnage inside the shop—they would find it hard enough to escape themselves.

He was Gate Union, Markan’s man, so he was likely to have codes he mentioned. Redmond and Gate Union weren’t working together at present, but they were still, officially, allies. They’d honor their ally’s codes.

“Give me the spear and we’ll drop you off on the other side of the city.” Radko hoped she’d made the correct decision.

He hesitated, then stumbled, winced, and tossed the spear to her. “It’s all yours.”

She covered him while he ran. From the way his back twitched, he didn’t like it any more than she did. Good.

They reached the aircar as the first soldiers came running around the corner.

“Go, go,” Radko said, and van Heel took off in a straight lift that pushed them all to the floor.

Vilhjalmsson grunted, the sound quickly cut off.

Radko pulled herself up, blaster trained on him. “Han, Chaudry. Cover him. If he moves—even a twitch—shoot him.” She didn’t look away as she backed across to van Heel. “How soon can we dump him?”

“It’s hard not to twitch,” Vilhjalmsson said to Han and Chaudry. “Not when I know she’s ready to shoot me.”

The two blasters were close together. Chaudry’s left arm against Han’s right. All Vilhjalmsson had to do was reach out, and he could grab them both.

Why did a left-handed linesman hold his blaster in his right hand?

“Move away from him,” Radko said. “Make him work if he’s going to take the weapon off you. A blaster set to burn is as deadly at two meters as it is at one.”

“Who is he?” Han asked. “Why so leery of him?”

“He’s a professional assassin. Reports personally to Admiral Markan.”

“So why help him?”

“He helped us,” Chaudry said.

If Chaudry thought like that about one of Gate Union’s best assassins, Vilhjalmsson would walk all over him. “He has codes he can use to get us past Redmond security,” Radko said. “We have an aircar. Mutual benefit, Chaudry.”

“We’re being pursued,” van Heel said. “I can drop him, or I can run, but I can’t do both.”

These were Redmond soldiers on their home territory. They couldn’t outrun them. How long would it take for Redmond to identify the aircar?

Radko looked at Vilhjalmsson. “Those codes you promised.” If he was working with Redmond, surely he would have let the soldiers capture them back at OneLane’s shop.

Vilhjalmsson stood up carefully.

“You should get your back seen to,” Chaudry said. “You shouldn’t be doing strenuous physical movement yet.”

Chaudry was never going to make a decent soldier. He didn’t have the personality for it.

The speaker crackled. “Aircar D-J-12351. This is Redmond Fleet. Please land in the nearest available landing space.”

“I need to call base over the aircar’s comms,” Vilhjalmsson said.

Radko nodded and held her blaster close to his back while he used the comms system on the aircar to call base. She didn’t relax even when an irate Redmond voice came through, demanding to know what was going on.

Vilhjalmsson explained—in Redmond as good as hers—that the attack on OneLane’s premises had interrupted a sting, and the team following them should remove themselves before they totally ruined it. He provided further codes, good enough that the Redmond carrier climbed high with a burst of speed and disappeared over the city.

“It won’t hold them long,” Vilhjalmsson said. “Redmond doesn’t share information about lines or line experiments.”

It was long enough for Radko. “We’ll find somewhere public to drop you off. The parking lot at SevenWays Plaza,” to van Heel. It was the largest shopping center in the city.

Van Heel set the controls.

Radko motioned Vilhjalmsson’s hands away from the controls with her blaster. He put them on the table, facing up. Empty. “I’ll buy the report off you.”

She laughed at him.

“Shopping center coming up.” Van Heel landed the aircar neatly.

“No?” Vilhjalmsson turned for the door. “I appreciate your not killing me this time.”

He winced and almost fell. Radko let him right himself. “Young Chaudry is right. I would have liked more leave.” He climbed out of the car like an old man.

“Vilhjalmsson. Catch.” She tossed him the spear. “You’ll need a weapon.” She didn’t trust Vilhjalmsson not to have put a tracer on it somewhere, and she didn’t have time to investigate, which was a pity because Vega would have liked that weapon. She turned to van Heel. “Go, before he shoots us all.”

Van Heel took off in a vertical lift.

They were five minutes in the air when Radko realized the comms she thought she’d rescued from OneLane’s dead hands was a military-style comms. The brand favored by Roscracian military.

Back in their rooms, Radko tossed the comms across to van Heel. “See if you can hack into that.”

Vilhjalmsson’s comms would be like their own. Provided especially for the mission and nothing personal on it.

“He seemed so nice,” Chaudry said. “And he was injured.”

Radko couldn’t work out if the niceness was supposed to prevent an assassin from stealing things, or if his injury was. She didn’t care. She wanted to shoot him.

“He must have swapped as we picked it up.” OneLane’s comms hadn’t been out of Radko’s pocket since. Or the comms she thought was OneLane’s.

She had to admire the cleverness of it. If she’d known he had picked up the comms first, she would have demanded it from him at blaster point. Instead, he’d offered to swap his comms for this one. She should have taken him up on his offer and seen him wriggle out of it.

“We didn’t see him swap it,” van Heel said. “Are you sure this isn’t the report?”

“Hack it and see, van Heel.”

Half an hour later, van Heel admitted, “There isn’t much on here. A code I can’t read. A ship booking from Roscracia to here. A restaurant payment for last night. He ate at a place called Sahini’s. He’s staying at the Grande Hotel.”

Radko would bet he wasn’t staying there anymore.

Like her own comms, there’d be deeper information if van Heel hacked further, but nothing to incriminate Vilhjalmsson, and it would wipe itself if they tried to discover more. One thing was certain. The comms with the report on in wouldn’t have last night’s dinner bill on it.

She dug into the tools on her belt. A tiny screwdriver. A metal knife. Some wire. She unscrewed that back of the comms, pressed the knife into the wiring, and wound the wire around the knife. She wound the other end of the wire around the screwdriver.

She was about to jam the screwdriver into the other end when she stopped. This would short the comms. There was a tiny piece of line five in each comms. She was about to destroy a line. Or a piece of one.

Could she do it?

She looked up to see all three of them looking at her.

“Are you okay?” Han asked. “You look green.”

Comms lines weren’t intelligent like a ten-line ship, but all the same. Was it murder?

“I’m fine,” Radko said, and jabbed the screwdriver down.

Ean would have told her the line had disappeared. All she got was the smell of burned plastic and hot metal. And a tiny wisp of black smoke.

When did lines become sentient, anyway. Surely all the small pieces of equipment weren’t. They didn’t seem to think until there were ten of them together and they were much larger than a single sliver. Maybe she should think of the tiny piece of line in a comms as like regenerated skin, being grown to match a human DNA. Not alive in a sentient way.

She tossed the comms away. Vilhjalmsson wouldn’t be able to track it anymore. Although it would be like him to bug something else.

“What if you were wrong about which comms it was?” Han asked.

“Then I’ve destroyed plans we were prepared to pay a lot of credits for.”

The trick to a successful operation, covert or otherwise, was not to think about what-ifs like that until after the operation, when you worked out what you could do better next time.

There were other what-ifs she had to think about now. Like, what if Vilhjalmsson had bugged them?

“We should all change,” she said. “Everything. Even our shoes if we have others. We may be bugged.”

Han followed her into the room she shared with van Heel. She didn’t see any signals, but van Heel lingered outside. “It’s not such a big deal,” he said. “Losing the comms, I mean. They can’t expect newbies like us to be a hundred percent successful first time around.”

What was he trying to tell her? “Han, with that kind of attitude you’ll never make it in covert ops.”

“I never planned for covert ops.”

Neither had she.

“I like my job. I like that I can go home every break.”

“I like my job, too,” Radko said. She missed her job. She missed Ean. And she didn’t have time for the small talk. “Tell me what you’re trying to say. I like honesty.”

Han looked at her.

“We don’t have time for you to muck around.”

He hesitated. She waited.

“Maybe you shouldn’t take it so hard. Losing the report. It’s okay to destroy his comms, but don’t you think this bugged business might be going too far.”

No wonder Vega liked him, but the Yves Han who’d burned his tutor’s arm wouldn’t ever offer advice like that.

“Humor my paranoia this once, Han. I know this man.” A lot better than she had two months ago. “Let’s all get changed and see if he has planted any bugs. I hear what you’re saying, but I am your team leader in this. I’m not doing it because I’m upset he stole the comms from me. I’m doing it because I think he’s bugged us.”

“And that business with the comms before?”

“That is a totally different thing. I don’t like destroying lines. Not even comms lines.” She pushed him out. “Go and get changed.”

Afterward, she checked their clothes. On the back collar of the business jacket she had worn as Tiana Chen was a tiny receiver.

Van Heel took it from her fingers. “Finest grade,” she said approvingly. “Do you know how much a device like this costs?”

Radko was sure Vilhjalmsson hadn’t worried about the price.

She tossed her jacket into the recycler, and got the others to dump their jackets as well. She sent the bug down with it.

“I can’t believe I let him do that.” She should have known better.

“He did save our lives,” Chaudry said.

“Chaudry, he’s a professional assassin.” Who’d probably kept them alive because he wanted to hear more about the line ships and their plans.

To be safe, Radko had them pack up and move elsewhere. They hired a new aircar halfway across the city, swapped their equipment over, then took both aircars across the continent, where van Heel dumped the first one. After that, they went back to Bane and booked themselves into an apartment to make plans.

“What happens now?” Han asked. “We go home, tail between our legs?”

“No,” Radko said. What kind of a team were they if they let a setback like that stop them? “We get our report from the source. What names can you remember from the list of contributors at the front of the report?” She remembered five. Jemsin, EightFields, Quinn, RiverSide, and Jakob.

“EightFields,” Chaudry said. “And that one you mentioned. Jemsin.”

“Jemsin, EightFields, and Quinn,” Han said. “There was a Dr. Quinn who tested—” He paused, and visibly didn’t finish what he’d been going to say. “I wonder if it’s the same one.”

Radko didn’t push. Han had probably met Quinn as a linesman. She watched Han rub his eyes—with his right hand, again—and wondered. How likely was trauma to change one’s handedness?

“Find out all you can about those five people. I want someone I can get the reports from. Or at the very least, I want to know where they’re doing their experiments.”

There were no records for Jakob, and it wasn’t a Redmond name. They had the whole galaxy to search, and they didn’t have the time or support to do it.

“There’s plenty on Jemsin,” van Heel said. “She wrote a lot of papers.”

“Forget about her,” Radko said. “She’s in jail.” If she’d spilled any information, the Yaolins would already know about it. “What about Quinn?”

“He’s still doing line experiments, apparently,” Han said. “But there’s nothing here about where he’s doing them. Or where he’s living now.”

Radko noted the “still.” Would he have a problem if they came up against Quinn?

“Concentrate on RiverSide and EightFields then.” They were both Redmond-founding-family names, likely to be well-known in society. That was good in one way, because there was a lot of information about the founding families. They just had to find those particular names among all the noise.

“EightFields,” van Heel said. “I can’t believe the names these Redmond people come up with.”

Radko’s early studies of Redmond had taught her the importance of the names. “When the first settlers arrived on Redmond, they renamed themselves according to their surroundings. Thus, the EightFields family had a farm with eight fields. TwoPaths had two paths nearby.” She tried to remember other founding names. “OneLane. FiveWays.”

“They’re still weird,” van Heel said.

Radko got van Heel to hack into OneLane’s records, while Chaudry and Han searched for other people listed on the report, and she tried to find out what she could about OneLane’s contacts. The woman had run a legitimate business over the top of her fencing activities. Radko could even have bought a jeweled egg her mother had been after for years.

A man named Daniel EightFields was a regular customer. It might only be coincidence, but once they were done with Adam, she’d get them to search on Daniel.

“Adam EightFields fancies himself.” Van Heel pushed an interview onto the main screen. EightFields was being introduced by a young reporter.

“Dr. Adam EightFields is one of our foremost line experts here on Redmond, and—”

“Not only on Redmond,” EightFields interrupted him. “One of the universe’s leading experts on linesmen and line theory.”

Apart from the fact that humans had only settled the one galaxy, there was a whole race of aliens out there whose children probably knew more about the lines than any single human expert. Radko would have bet Ean’s expertise over a whole roomful of people like EightFields, anyway.

“So how does the news of a new line eleven affect line theory?” the reporter asked.

“If it is a new line,” EightFields said. “The New Alliance claims it is, but is it really so?”

Radko checked the date on the interview. Not long after Michelle had been kidnapped, back when people were still arguing whether there really was a line eleven.

“Sounds like he took any opportunity he could to get on the media,” van Heel said. “Or he used to. Haven’t heard anything from him for months.”

“Can you find out where he works? Where he lives?”

“Last known employer, TwoPaths Engineering. But they have fifty sites. His address is here in the city, but then that’s the address of twenty other EightFields as well. Place must be a mansion.”

Han was checking the social pages. “He’s got a sister, Christina, who manages the EightFields estate. A brother, Daniel, who’s a spacer in the Redmond Fleet.”

“Only a spacer?” A founding family would have paid for a promotion for their son. Why hadn’t they? “Find out more about Daniel, Han. Tell me if he gets on with his family.” A disaffected family member might not be so loyal to said family. Or he might be broke. Maybe even sell a stolen report to a woman he shopped from regularly.

She went back to the shop records. “Callista OneLane sold a jeweled brooch to Daniel EightFields sixteen days ago. I want to know if that Daniel is Adam EightFields’s brother.”

Van Heel hacked into the city security system to view the records for the street near OneLane’s premises that day, while Chaudry and Han went painstakingly through each face she brought up and compared it to the image Han got from the social pages.

Meanwhile, Radko worked on five different escape plans. They not only had to find which engineering complex EightFields worked at, but they had to get off Redmond afterward, and the longer they stayed here, the harder it would be to get off.

Maybe they should go back to the original spaceport and convince the pilot who transported the shellfish to take them off.

But how long before he’d be back?

“Got it,” Han said. “It looks like the brother.”

Radko compared the images and had to agree. “So let’s go after Daniel. Find out where he is and when we can get to him.”

There was plenty in the vids about Daniel EightFields. He was a member of a well-off family, he was a lavish spender, and he was often in trouble. Much like the progeny of some of the Great Families on Lancia.

“Looks like his family sent him to the fleet to sort him out,” Han said. “We get them on Lancia. The parents get tired of bailing them out of trouble and send them off to the fleet to learn some discipline.”

Had that happened to Han?

“They’re useless as soldiers, and we can’t send them anywhere dangerous, or their family sues. So they stick around headquarters, getting into trouble, and we have to bail them out. Or we send them off to worlds where, if they do get into trouble, it doesn’t hurt them or us.”

Van Heel hacked the public comms codes, found Daniel EightFields’s comms, and they tracked it until he left the base. Vega was right. She was a class hacker.

EightFields finally stopped at a nightclub.

“Let’s go chat with EightFields the Younger,” Radko suggested.

Their images from OneLane’s shop were circulating on the news vids. According to the news, they were dangerous murderers, and anyone who saw them should call the fleet, not tackle them. Chaudry was unrecognizable as the regen victim, but his short, bulky shape was unmistakable. He looked nothing like the man on the vid, but anyone seeing him would report him because of his size. If the police investigated, they’d pass him over. Provided they didn’t talk to him. If they did, they’d soon work out he wasn’t a native, so they’d probe more.

Not the police, Radko corrected herself. The military. Redmond wasn’t treating this like a civilian murder gone wrong. They were treating it like a military problem. Even at OneLane’s premises, there’d been no local police. It had been a wholly military exercise.

The report had been co-branded with Redmond military. How far were they prepared to keep the information secret?

Han was more recognizable. It might be smart to keep them out of sight if she could. Radko looked nothing like Chen. Best if she did it alone.

“Van Heel, can you get the feed from inside the club? Han and Chaudry, stay in the aircar with van Heel. If I need you, I’ll call. Keep an eye on me.” With luck, she could be in and out quickly, without any need for backup.

She waited while van Heel hacked into the club feed. Even the screen inside the club showed their faces, with the words DANGEROUS KILLERS in large letters underneath.

“Have you ever had to kill anyone?” Chaudry asked.

She wondered, for a moment, if he was serious, for she and Vilhjalmsson had decimated a team of soldiers.

“Before today, I mean.”

“I’m not an assassin.” Not yet anyway. If she came across Vilhjalmsson again, it might be a different matter. Murdered in cold blood. “I have killed people.”

“Don’t you mind?”

“I don’t think about it.” She didn’t. It was her job. She was good at her job.

“I’ve killed people,” van Heel said. “Three of them. If you think about it, Chaudry, it gets to you. Don’t persist.”

Radko was glad Chaudry hadn’t harmed anyone earlier. Around about now, he’d be starting to feel bad.

“Thank you,” Radko said to van Heel, and glanced at Han, who’d probably killed his first enemy today, too.

He knew what the look was for. “I felt nothing.”

That just meant it hadn’t hit him yet.

“Got it,” van Heel said, and switched the camera view to pan on the patrons. They found EightFields with a group of people who laughed at every joke he made. Radko had had friends like that when she was a girl. The Yves Han that Radko had known as a child would have friends like that.

But she didn’t know this adult Han at all.

Which reminded her. “Han.” She took out her comms and tossed it across.

He caught it with his right hand.

“What do I do with it?”

“Nothing.” She took her comms back. “Testing your reflexes.” And his handedness. This spacer she had in her team showed a strong tendency to right-handedness.

Yet linesmen were always left-handed, and Yves Han had spent ten years with House of Sandhurst.

Ten years. Was he the real Han or wasn’t he? If he was the real Han, but wasn’t a linesman, then why had Iwo Hurst kept him on? Because he could be useful? Or because the man in front of her wasn’t the same man Hurst had trained?

She was starting to suspect he wasn’t the same man.

She pushed that question away. Tonight, they were here to get information from Daniel EightFields. She tucked her blaster into the back of her trousers and pulled on her jacket. Loose enough and thick enough to hide the bulge. “Don’t come after me unless I really need help.”

She swung out of the aircar.

The nightclub was fashionable and expensive, full of shiny, glittering surfaces, and a lot of flashing lights. Radko bought herself a drink and turned to look around the room.

EightFields’s friends were drunk. Their laughter overloud, their interactions with other patrons bordering on nuisance. In contrast, their host looked stone-cold sober, and he twitched every time someone entered the bar.

He twitched when Radko entered but relaxed when she ordered her drink. He twitched even more when a group of uniformed fleet officers entered and didn’t relax until they’d passed through into a private room.

A man with something to worry about? And from the way he looked broodingly at the screen every time Radko and the others appeared there, it might have something to do with Callista OneLane. Even if it wasn’t his brother’s report, Daniel EightFields had bought or sold something to OneLane, and he was worried he’d get caught.

The woman closest to EightFields called for another round of drinks. EightFields paid with an absentminded flick of his comms. Radko couldn’t tell if he always paid, or if he was just inattentive tonight.

Radko finished her drink and wandered over. “You’re Adam EightFields’s brother. Am I right?”

He looked at her, and there was no welcome in his eyes. “Who’s asking?”

“A friend of Adam’s. I haven’t seen him in months. Where is he nowadays? I’d like to catch up with him sometime.”

Daniel EightFields shrugged. “Don’t know. Don’t care.”

She pushed her way in between the drunk woman and EightFields. “Of course you do.”

“Hey,” the woman said.

“What’s more,” Radko said, quietly, under the other woman’s protestations, “you’ll tell me, or I’ll mention your visits to OneLane.”

She felt the hardness of a blaster shoved into her side. “Say anything, and I’ll kill you,” EightFields said.

Good. He had something to hide. She didn’t move. If EightFields was desperate enough to pull a weapon on her, he’d use it, despite the consequences. “Why don’t we go outside. They’ll have security watching the patrons. If someone sees your”—she indicated with her chin, but didn’t look down—“they’ll call the police.”

He looked around.

“Your friends are too drunk to be any help.”

He stood up. “They’re not real friends, anyway. The first sign of trouble, and they’ll be squalling for a team leader.” He stood close to her as they exited. “Do anything to draw attention to us, and I’ll kill you as soon as we get outside.”

“Trust me, I want to draw attention to myself as little as you do.”

EightFields led the way out through the back. The staff seemed to know him, for they let him go through.

“You’re well-known here.”

“Comes from being one of their best customers.” The back door led directly onto a street. “Keep walking. Straight ahead, then turn left at the black hole.”

Black hole was an apt description. Radko hesitated before she stepped in.

Van Heel couldn’t follow her here with the cameras. She’d have to assume she had no backup. She turned as she entered and chopped down and snatched the blaster out of EightFields’s suddenly inert hands.

He cried out. There was a squawk from the end of the lane. Or alcove, really, for it only went in two meters. A light flicked on. Two indignant faces peered at them from the end of the space.

“Find your own place.”

“Get out,” Radko ordered, pushing EightFields up against the wall so he couldn’t escape with them. He struggled. She wondered if she could hold him.

“We were here first.”

Radko waved the blaster at them.

Another squawk, but they scrambled out, grabbing their clothes as they ran.

EightFields stopped struggling. “You’re stronger than you look.”

“You’re not so weak yourself. I’m going to step back, let you go. Do anything stupid, and I’ll shoot.”

EightFields stepped back into the alcove. “What will you do with me?”

“Where is Adam?”

“Why Adam, of all people?”

Instead of answering, she said, “Did you sell the report to OneLane?”

“What report?”

They heard running footsteps, pounding toward them. Radko stepped into the alcove beside EightFields. “Give us away, and I’ll kill you.”

The footsteps stopped.

“Radko?” Han’s voice.

A bright light was shined into the alcove.

“Turn the light out,” Radko said. She nearly added “no names,” but that would draw attention to the fact that he’d used hers. “I said I’d call if I needed help.”

“Van Heel couldn’t see you out here,” Chaudry said. “This section’s not covered. And H—”

“No names,” Radko said, sharply. Between them, they’d give the whole team away.

Chaudry looked first at Han, then to EightFields. “He said Eightfields pulled a blaster on you. We thought.” He didn’t say what he thought.

If Han had recognized the movement, there was a good chance security had seen it.

“Let’s question him elsewhere.” Radko gestured with the blaster. There was only one safe place, and that was the aircar. She called up van Heel. “We’re bringing him in. Be ready for us.” He’d recognized them and would be able to describe them, but she didn’t feel safe in this alley right now. “Give me your comms,” she ordered EightFields, and waved the blaster impatiently in his face when he didn’t hand it over immediately.

He handed it over. She tossed it into the alcove, hard enough to shatter it, then jumped on it as it bounced back, and kicked it back in.

“She really likes to be sure,” Han said to Chaudry.

“Comms are harder to destroy than you realize,” Radko said. “Come on.”

The back door of the club opened as they reached the corner. Her heart sped up. Two bulky security men made their way down to the alcove.

Van Heel dropped the aircar into the street. “Hurry, this is illegal.”

Radko waited until Han and Chaudry were in the aircar, then shoved EightFields in and followed so close, she stepped on his heels.

Van Heel took off straight upward. Han, Chaudry, and EightFields fell; Radko, more used to speedy maneuvers, kept her feet. She patted EightFields down, checking for weapons.

EightFields hardly noticed. He was staring at Chaudry. “I know you. You’re the people at Callista’s shop.”

“You do not,” Chaudry said. “I don’t even look the same.”

Radko moved the blaster threateningly up to EightFields’s throat. “Tell us about the report.”

“Go ahead, shoot me.”

“I wouldn’t shoot you dead. Just enough to cause you so much pain you’ll want to tell me.”

“Go ahead. I’m used to pain.”

It sounded like the truth.

Chaudry made a sound that might have been shock. “Do you like pain?”

“Of course not. But I’ve been beaten before. Starved. Burned. Shot.” He looked at Radko as he said that.

“I’m happy to shoot you, too,” Radko said.

“Of course you are.”

“If someone treated you so badly, why didn’t you report them?” Chaudry asked.

“Why would you care?” and there was bitter truth in the words.

“If you allow yourself to be a victim,” Han said. “You will always be a victim.” He seemed to have forgotten he was part of this mission and reverted back to the policeman he would have been on Lancia. Radko thought he might have been good at his job.

What had Vega given her as a team?

Linesmen. Who didn’t always make the best soldiers, but they were damned good at what they could do.

“I don’t care how much you were bullied,” Radko said. “And you don’t either,” to Han and Chaudry. “We’re here to do a job. Let’s do it. Now,” to EightFields. “Tell me about this report before I shoot someone in frustration.”

EightFields laughed. “I wish I’d never seen that report.” He sobered quickly, then looked at them speculatively. “But you were buying it, weren’t you?”

There wasn’t any point denying it, and if he’d been jumping at Redmond soldiers earlier, it was probably even beneficial. “Yes. Did you keep a copy?”

“I didn’t even know what it was. It was just a comms Adam was fussing about.” He took a deep breath. “I have to explain some history; otherwise, you’ll think I’m crazy.”

Radko looked at van Heel. “Are we okay with pursuit?”

“So far.”

She was after Adam. She didn’t really care about the report Daniel had sold to OneLane, but if they could relax him by letting him talk, maybe he’d let slip where his brother was. Provided they didn’t run out of time.

“Go on,” Radko said.

“Thank you.” He settled into his seat, lance straight, like a soldier. “I hate Adam. I always have.” She heard the truth of it in his voice and suspected that Adam might be the source of the pain EightFields had been speaking about earlier. “He made my life a misery when I was a boy. That’s why I joined the fleet. To learn how to fight.”

If he was trying for sympathy, he was certainly getting it from Chaudry. Radko couldn’t read Han’s face. Van Heel looked skeptical.

“I’m doing okay, actually. I was up for team leader.” He stopped and took three quick, shallow breaths. “I hated Adam so much that when I was about fifteen, I spent three months following him around, trying to find something I could use against him.”

Radko hoped this story was going somewhere.

“Back then, Adam was spending more than his allowance. Than both our allowances combined. He stole one of Mother’s necklaces—Radiance of the Night, it was called—and took it down to Callista’s shop. I followed him there.”

Named necklaces were priceless.

EightFields’s voice turned reverential. “Have you seen Callista? Isn’t she something? She was my first crush. I kept going back though I had no money to buy anything. I must have spent my whole youth in that shop. I propositioned her once.”

Radko raised an eyebrow.

“She turned me down. You remind me of her, actually. Ice queen.”

“Thank you.”

“I think she liked that I liked her. Adam visited occasionally. I was there often enough. I saw him go out the back. I used to ask her what he wanted, but she told me to mind my own business.”

“So you tried to impress her by selling stolen goods?”

EightFields shook his head. “Adam came home to attend a function. Two hours before we were due to leave, a captain arrives with a full team as an honor guard. He wants Adam to finish something because they were about to get a twelve, and they—” He stopped, and stepped back. “What?”

Radko hadn’t moved. At least, she hadn’t thought she had. “A twelve?” The chase had suddenly become personal. Her pulse pounded from the instant adrenaline rush.

“I don’t know what it is, either. But Adam and the captain were excited about it. There was this massive fuss as they signed over the comms, like it was the most precious thing ever.”

“Did Adam talk about it?”

“To me? Of course not. But he boasted about how important the work was, and it took a whole team to deliver it. Adam invited the captain to stay for a drink.” EightFields paused, took a deep breath.

“I was up for promotion. Team leader. The captain mentioned it. Adam—” EightFields swallowed. “I turn up at work next day to start team-leader training and find I’m out of the program. That I’m unfit to be in charge of people. It’s signed by the captain from the night before.”

“So you decided to get your own back?”

“Not then. They placed me on special leave because no one knew what to do with me. My old position had already been filled. So I go home, and what should I see when I walk inside, but Adam’s precious comms on the table. And no one around.” He scrubbed at his eyes with the heels of his palms. “That’s when I took it. I went straight around to Callista’s shop.”

“Didn’t you think you’d get caught?” Radko asked.

“I had proof he’d stolen the necklace. If they traced the comms, I’d show them the proof about the necklace and say Adam had a history of selling things off.” His mouth twisted down. “I didn’t think it through. I was angry. There was this massive fuss about the missing comms, but they assumed I’d been at work all day. I was ignored.”

“And you’ve been jumping at Redmond soldiers ever since?”

He nodded.

And no wonder. “What else did they say when they delivered the comms?” Radko asked.

“They didn’t say anything. Except about how important and confidential it was. And how time was so short.”

She thought he was telling the truth. “And Adam. Where is he?”

He shook his head and raised his hands when she instinctively raised her blaster. “I truly don’t know. It’s supposed to be secret.”

Han stepped forward to stand beside Radko. “We’ve spent all this time hearing your story, and you haven’t got anything for us. Not even a report.”

“I don’t know for sure, but I can guess where Adam is. If you’ll listen before you shoot me.”

“Talk faster, then,” Han said.

“Adam was late.” EightFields rushed the words out. “This function we both had to attend. It was a major event. Everyone in the Founding Families had to attend. You disgrace your family if you don’t. We never miss it. But Adam nearly did this year. Because his lab was under lockdown.”

If a lab was under lockdown, it was usually for security reasons or because something viral had gotten out of hand. Either way, the company wasn’t going to publicize it. “We need more than that,” Radko said.

“But Adam is also a name-dropper.” EightFields watched Radko’s blaster warily. “When he dines with someone important, you know about it. And he dined with the Factor of the Lesser Gods three times in the two weeks before he came home.” He paused expectantly.

“Connect it for us,” Radko said. “The Factor of the Lesser Gods isn’t from Redmond.” In fact, he was supposed to be turning against Redmond by marrying Michelle.

“The lockdown,” EightFields said. “They had a lockdown at the Factor’s palace on Aeolus. It made the news. The Factor had some important visitor. So important they locked down the whole palace and the streets surrounding it. No one could get in or out for two days. Timewise, it matches perfectly.”

Van Heel ran checks. “TwoPaths does have a lab there. Although it’s listed more as a store nowadays. It is close to the palace. Right against the walls, actually.”

“Yes, but why put a comilitary operation on a world that’s not your own? And why leave it there if the two worlds are close to being enemies right now?”

“Maybe that’s what the twelve is about?” Han suggested. “Their plans to move.”

Radko shook her head. “That’s something different.” She watched EightFields carefully. She thought he was telling the truth. Otherwise, he was an accomplished liar. “Anything else you want to tell us?”

“No.”

She looked at the others. Han shook his head. Chaudry didn’t respond. Van Heel shrugged.

“Take us down somewhere safe,” Radko ordered van Heel. “We’ll drop him off.”