Horizons

SIXTEEN

“YOU GOT ANY GLIMMER YET? LAIF PACED THE CRAMPED admin space, came to a stop behind the skinny kid hunched over the holofield.”You asleep or what?”

“What.”

Damn smart aleck. Laif glowered down at the back of the kid’s neck, really wanting to smack him one.

The ticking of the clock inside his skull damn near deafened him and this kid just sat there like a lump.

Not that whatever was in that data dot was likely to be the magic wand to save their butts, but he sure didn’t have any other options. He glared at the tattoo circling the kid’s skinny wrist. He was almost one of Dane’s creepy kids. They were moving that way, Dane was right. He’d looked at some of the recent births and you could see that Koi kid in their skinny bodies and low birth weight. Best kept secret on the platform, he thought sourly. They bothered him, those kids. They didn’t look human.

”You have thirty-three minutes,” Laif rasped. “The Elevator’s at the top. You countin’?”

“I figure you are.” The kid looked up, his face showing strain, his dark eyes angry. “And every time you interrupt me, by the way, you cost me about two and a half minutes. That’s a grand total of fifteen minutes so far. You want to go do something else?”

“All right, all right.” Laif turned on his heel. The heads up from his informants at the Euro Elevator had come way too soon. They must have pushed the climbers past the limit of safety to get here this quickly.

“I’ll go see if I can’t stall our visitors and buy you back that fifteen minutes. When we run out of time…

go up to the hub, okay? Use Dane’s system. It’s separate and firewalled. They’ll probably take the main system over first thing. Depends on how good their sappers are. They may firewall you out.” He left admin, snapping his fingers for the Security cart standing by. Hopped aboard as it rolled up beside him.

“Arrival and pronto. Carrie, we’re out of time.” He lowered his voice. “I need to stall. Can you set something up? Call Dane for a flash mob?”

The Security Chief nodded. “I’ll see if I can do as good a job as that mob that Dane settled over in A3.

That what you need?”

He nodded, a single hard jerk of his chin. “Make a show, but nothing that’ll bring weapons out. We’ll round everybody up nice and efficient and dump all but a couple. Get volunteers for that and give ’em a get-out guarantee.”

“I don’t know if I can do that,” Carrie said slowly, her eyes on the corridor ahead, lips barely moving.

“Don’t know if I’ll have the keys.”

Yeah, stupid. Laif ran a hand over his scalp in frustration. Why would they keep his Security Chief in place? That was the first thing Arlin would do… dump Carrie. Arlin knew what she thought of him. She hadn’t exactly hidden her feelings. “They might send someone new up here.”

”You don’t think they will and I don’t either.” Carrie snorted, her expression hard. “Arlin’s the perfect puppet. Whistle and he dances. Laif…” Carrie hesitated. “After the shit hits the floor.” She gave him a sideways look. “I figure the odds are fifty-fifty for a forced relocation.”

“They can’t do that. We’ve got permanent leases on our space.”

“Laws can change.”

“It’d cost too much.” Laif laughed, but it had a hollow feel. Like whistling in the dark.

Carrie didn’t answer and her silence prodded him.

Laif let his breath out in a long sigh. “Well, whatever is gonna happen it’s gonna happen. I don’t think we can stop it, but maybe we can keep it civil.” The Arrival Hall opened before them, and Carrrie passworded them through the security curtain. Laif hopped out as the cart slowed. “Gods know, we might get lucky. Go get your mob.” He lifted a hand to her, got a grim faced nod in return before she whipped the cart around and rocketed back through the curtain and down the corridor. Laif hoped she’d put on a good show. Straightening his shoulders, he headed for the main doors, his skin creeping in the vast emptiness. Tourists had abandoned NYUp in droves. This much space–empty like this–bothered him. Been up here too long, he thought. Well, maybe not for much longer. Look up and see sky again, walk the Towers Plaza in Manhattan and get rained on while watching the jugglers and light artists work.

Would be good to be back.

Yeah, right.

A pair of uniformed CSF appeared in Entry B from the shuttle dock, blue berets perched aggressively, eyes flicking as they scoped the Hall. Weapons invisible anyway, thank you very much for that. Laif straightened his shoulders again. He was too damn old to go back to living on Earth. Back straight, he walked forward, annoyyance in every stride, aware of the surreptitious stares of the nervous Immigration staff. The vanguard of the CSF spotted him and fanned out… threatening in stance and position, but still no weapons in hand. One stepped forward, flanked by two more.

Captain? Not even a Major? Laif read the insignia. Scandanavian-euro mix, blonde, white as one of Dane’s damn flowers. And younger than him. A lot younger. I don’t like you, he thought. They gave you this as a training mission. “Major.” He strode forrward, doing a ‘dumb yokel’ smile. “Laif Jones Egret, Administrator of the North American Alliance orbital platform New York Up. Welcome. We’ve been looking forward to your arrival.”

“It’s Captain, sir.” The young officer said calmly. “Captain Bugloss. I am to report to the Administrator of the platform.”

I should be insulted, Laif thought. Clearly the CSP’s commanders had figured this for a cakewalk. But false expectations make a potent weapon. “Allow me to escort you to our offices… although…” He looked back at the uniformed men and women spilling from the enntry bay. Only ten? The rest must be waiting until the vanguard seecured the area?”You realize that your large numbers will present… ah…

a bit of a problem. We don’t have large amounts of public space up here. Do you plan to commandeer private hotel space?”

”We don’t plan on being here that long.” The young captain looked nonplussed for a beat. As if Laif had just read from the wrong script. “I don’t anticipate any difficulty in completing our mission within a few hours at most.” He handed over a Security Sealed data sphere.”We don’t plan to cause any unnecessary disruption.”

Huh? Something didn’t compute here. Laif looked at the sphere. “I’m sorry. Our communication has been down all day, so I’ve had no current report on your arrival.” He glanced at the troops. They didn’t act like an advance guard securing a beachhead. To hell with games.”Why exactly are you here?”

The captain’s eyebrows rose only a hair, but he made his surrprise at that question clear. “We are here to arrest a North American Alliance employee suspected of diluting the human genotype with transgenic applications. An employee named Dane Nilsson. You didn’t get the arrest warrant?”

Sweet Mohammad, Buddha, and Jesus. “I told you.” Laif’s voice didn’t quite squeak. “Our communication has been down.” He forced a look of mild surprise onto his face. “I know that man. While he’s not my friend politically, he certainly isn’t involved in anything like human genetic research. He works in the Platform agricultural hub. Pushes buttons and watches dials. Does a good job, too.”

The captain’s eyes had glazed slightly.”Yes, sir. I’m sure, sir.”

Laif itched with the need to call Dane now, plastered a smile onto his face.”We’ll have to go to Admin and verify your authorization.” He jerked his chin at the data sphere clutched in his hand. “Since I have received no notification.”

“Of course.” The captain didn’t look happy. “Just a moment.”

He turned away, touching up his link, clearly checking to find out if indeed, the platform had received the warrant. Turned back, his shoulders slumping a bare nanometer and no more.”You can ID the copy I brought,” he said with well restrained impatience.

Damn, damn, damn, if he hadn’t shut down communications.

Dane could be halfway to the Belt by now.

“Transportation?” Bugloss said.

“Well we walk everywhere up here,” Laif said apologetically, back to bumpkin mode. “But if you have people who… yo know… have difficulty… I can call for a cart. Or two.” Laying it on too thick, he thought, but no, the captain’s weary expressio suggested he bought it.

Good. He needed time. And a link to Dane.

The captain nodded once, and the ten members of his unit fell in, eyes flicking, not missing a detail. Six women, four men. They looked utterly competent. Laif halted as they reached a public restroom. “Excuse me just a moment.” He did a very credible job of looking utterly embarrassed. “Sorry. I’m just getting over a really nasty stomach flu.” Ducked into the restroom before the captain had finished nodding. One touristy looking man stood at a urinal, dreamily studying the colorful mosaic on the wall above the trough carrying the gently circulating water. The three showers were empty although a breath of steam in the air suggested they had been in use recently. Laif ducked into one of the stalls as the door whispered open.

Uh oh. CSF blue showed beneath the door. The man didn’t huse the urinal stream, simply stood there in the middle of the tile floor, booted feet visible beneath the stall door.

The back of Laif’s neck prickled.

Damn. So much for downsider stupidity.

He flushed, his muttered words lost in the brief whoosh of suction, unlatched the door and made a show of sealing up his singlesuit as he exited. The man waiting, very young, with a shadow of scalp fuzz and a very discreet heart inlaid behind his right ear in red light, stood aside with a slight nod and no smile at all on his Mediterranean face.

Not good. Laif marched out into the corridor, a fixed smile plastered to his face. Maybe the flash mob–

It happened and it was perfect… just enough people to block the sparse flow of traffic along the skinside promenade, send the few remaining downsiders scurrying for shelter. It didn’t do much good either. The captain looked to Laif for information and when Laif told him Security would handle it, he pulled his people back and they let Carrie handle it. Laif discovered that he had picked up a shadow, a buzz-headed woman who never strayed more than a meter from Laif’s side. And he hadn’t told Carrie that he needed some space. So she did a great job of doing what he had asked her to do and it didn’t do him one damn bit of good. But it sure made ’em look real good. Not that this bunch cared one bit.

Clearly they expected Security to do its job.

After she had cleared the hall with a credible show of compeetence and control, they resumed their march to Admin. With every step Laif’s heart sank lower. As they entered the main room, Bar looked up from his screen, and his eyes skipped from Laif’s face to the captain’s and back again. “Only ten?”

“Police action,” Laif said heavily. Noah was gone. Up to the hub. “You need to get hold of Noah,” he said in a carefully casual tone. “Tell him we’re on our way up.”

“No.” The Captain stepped forward. “No communications to anyone until we’ve completed our mission.”

He jerked his head at one of the women, who stepped forward, eyes on Bar.

Bar started to ask what about, and then a slow surmise began to stir in his eyes. He looked frightened.

He had a newborn son, Laif remembered wearily. One of the more extreme.

It didn’t matter that Bar guessed. The captain looked over his shoulder as he opened the data sphere and had Laif retina stamp the warrant. They had never set up any kind of emergency heads-up alert to the hub… not one that they could activate with someone standing over them. Big mistake, Laif realized.

He clenched his teeth as the captain issued orders. They used a shorthand language, a mix of acronyms and one-word commands that Laif could only guess at. “Let me call Nilsson up to Admin,” he said, trying for caasual, hick-mayor helpfulness.”No reason for him not to come. I consult with him now and again.”

“We need to do an evidence search.” The captain was checking a very small and compact stun gun.

“I’m coming with you.” Laif stepped forward, reading refusal in the captain’s narrowed eyes. “Simpler than issuing you a pass. You need an upper level security clearance to ride the elevator clear up to the hub… at least the agricenter part of it. It’s closed.” He dropped the useless act. “Damn it, it’s my platform.” For now. Until they had to reestablish communication or the real occupying force showed up.

At least this crew hadn’t brought a sapper.

The captain considered for the space of three seconds, nodded.

“All right. You do as I say.” He made eye contact with a small, tough looking woman with a semitic-mix face. Jerked his chin infinitesimally in Laif’s direction. The babysitter.

The captain left the hard-eyed watch bitch with Bar. So much for Bar tipping Dane off. Laif wondered bleakly who had started this ugly ball rolling. Whoever it was had clearly implicated Administration in the mess, but not enough that he was under arrest. Arlin, he wondered? But Boone was so utterly in the dark about anything that went on above the skinside level that it wasn’t likely.

At the captain’s order, Laif expressed the elevator so that they wouldn’t stop at any intervening levels.

Didn’t really matter. Dane would know the elevator was coming, and the kid would come to see…

They strapped in at the microG pause, then lifted the last stretch to the hub. They knew how to handle themselves in microG, Laif noted sourly. Probably trained over on New Singapore, where you could buy anything if you were buddies with the Prime. Competent bunch, but then they recruited kids from birth, he’d heard, bought up orphans, kids from permanent refugee camps, anyone who wouldn’t have much of a future. They grew up with no allegiance except to the Force. Ideal soldiers. Lifetime of training, and you could put ’em in anywhere with no complications of family or national identity. The woman who had been assigned to watch him was doing just that, dispassionately and competently. He wondered what her history was, wondered how the hell he was going to fix this mess.

Sweet Mohammad, Buddha, and Jesus.

The door chimed and opened, and Laif narrowed his eyes against the flood of light, cursing himself because he had forgotten to grab his goggles. Every damn one of them had donned a pair. “You stay back,” the captain said, indicating Laif but speaking to his watchdog. She nodded. Laif didn’t. Pushed off, got about two centimeters before she grabbed him and killed his momentum, still anchored to a strap.

She didn’t say anything and she didn’t have to.

For a moment, Laif thought they had figured it out, that Koi was already off in hiding with his family, that it would work out after all. His com link vibrated. Bar? “Yes?” he murmured, activating it. Nothing. He waited for a couple of heartbeats, then shrugged. Bar changed his mind.

Two members of the team pushed off gently, drifting sideways, eyes on small, handheld screens. Spoke cryptically. The captain noddded once. Sharply. One of the others raised a small, squat weapon, fired it casually, with no apparent aim.

Guided, Laif thought bleakly. By that scanner. A small exploosion of motion among the tubes sent three of the team pushing off hard and fast. They disappeared into the greenery. Laif pushed off reflexively, was tackled by his watchdog, who slammed them both into the side of the elevator housing. The impact knocked the wind out of him and they rebounded, drifting slowly, stalling in the open space around the elevator. Laif gasped for breath, his ribs aching, as the three returned, hauling a limp form with them.

Not Koi, thank the gods. One of the females — Koi said they all had names, but he didn’t know them.

Her eyes were open, glazed and unseeing, her limbs slack. The small bright orange butt of the guided stun dart protruded from her shoulder. The leader of the trio spoke a couple of syllables to the captain, shook her head. The captain swore one very English syllable and pushed over to them. Grabbed her neck, his frown intensifying, snatched open a pouch at his belt and slapped a small patch onto her carotid groove.

Dead. Laif stared, stunned. “You shot to kill and you did it blind? What the hell are you up to?” He kicked off from the elevator, arrowed over to them.”What the hell is going on here?”

“It was set on non-lethal.” The captain looked up, his own face reflecting shock. “Maximum, but not lethal.” He looked back at the narrow face and long, skinny torso, her breasts flat as any boy’s, her back gently arched, arms and legs drifting.

“My God, what is it?” The captain’s voice grated with the revulsion visible on his face. “Who would do this?”

“More.” One of the pair holding scanners spoke up.

Dear gods, the whole family might be coming, maybe hoping to save this one? “Get out!” Laif yelled it at the top of his lungs, n longer giving a damn what the consequences were. “Now! Get out of here!”

Too late. Koi burst from the leaves, his milky eyes wide, zoomming like an arrow straight at the cluster of CSF. The young latino-mix with the weapon pointed it casually…

…and went tumbling wildly, weapon flying, as Dane hit him from the rear, shoulder first, slamming him into a head-over-heels tumble into the planted tubes. “Koi, go !” He pushed off a tube, ricocheted off another, oblivious to a dart as it zoomed past him, not guided, just aimed. Hit a woman with just the right angle to send her cartwheeling, caught another tube and pushed off, aiming like a thrown spear for the captain.

A spot of bright orange appeared on his side.

He spasmed, arms and legs flying out, back arching briefly ane terribly, muscles all jerking at once.

Began to tumble, out of control spun by the captain and slammed into a tube planted to beets.

Rebounded in a cloud of torn leaves and droplets of crimson juice. Like blood, Laif thought numbly. He pushed off, blocked his watchdog’s grab almost without thought, eyes on Dane’s slack tumble, head full of white noise and a howl of pain like an animal dying.

Koi?

Laif reached Dane a heartbeat before the CSF, slammed into his limp body, going too fast, arms going around him, tumbling with his limp sprawl into another tube, blinded by a flurry of ruined leaves. Feel for it, feel — He groped, fingers finding Dane’s throat, searching for a pulse even as hands closed on him like claws, reeling him in.

“He’s alive, Koi,” Laif yelled. “Get out of here.”

They hauled him off Dane and they weren’t gentle. Hung for a lamb, hung for a sheep, he thought and wondered for a flickering instant where the hell that saying had come from. Then he got a foot planted on a tube, slammed his forearm into the throat of the woman trying to twist his arm behind his back and had the small satisfaction of seeing her do a backward flip, struggling to breathe, before someone got a choke hold on him from behind. They won at that point, and when the blackness cleared from his vision, his hands were locked behind him and someone had just finished strapping his ankles together.

“You just killed a person, a kid,” Laif rasped. “Hope you can justify child murder here.”

The captain spared him one icy glance. “That’s not human.”

”You haven’t seen the DNA readout yet. Don’t get too cocky.”

He didn’t know if the captain heard, or cared if he did. They weren’t going to look beyond that face, eyes and body. Not until they had the readout in their hands, and even then it was going to be hard.

He knew that well enough. Sorry, Dane, he thought. I really tried. He twisted, trying to get himself drifting so he could see how Dane was doing. But then one of the CSF hauled him into view, heading for the elevator. They had put a restraint collar on him and a moment later, another of the ‘Keepers was locking one around his throat, too. The woman fit it snugly, not tight, making sure that they’d get good contact if they zapped him, Laif thought sourly. You couldn’t take these things off without a key. Not if you wanted to keep your head.

They’d slapped a patch on Dane’s throat and he was coming around from the stun. They’d hit him with the top setting on the dart, Laif thought. He could have ended up like the girl. He watched Dane’s eyes focus, watched memory flush out confusion. A ‘Keeper grabbed him as he groped for something he could push off from.

“Koi’s okay,” Laif said conversationally.

Dane’s eyes flicked his way, his expression utterly unreadable. But he relaxed. A hair.

The captain was reading them both their status, that they had been taken into custody by the World Council, that they would be treated under the International Convention on Human Rights statutes for all detainees, that they would have access to legal counsel and so forth. Dane’s eyes had taken on a glazed, faraway look and Laif worried silently about that high-level stun. He could see a couple of the CSFs sealing the girl’s body into a body-bag. No sign of Koi. They hauled the two of them into the elevator, and when it halted at the micro point, the captain released their restraints and explained the action of the collar in graphic detail.

At least he didn’t demonstrate it. Laif silently thanked him for that small kindness.

Dane didn’t look at him, merely stared at the wall as the elevator dropped to skin level. He might have been any commuter on his way to a boring day job.

The skinside corridor was empty and the back of Laif’s neck prickled. Even the vendors’ carts were deserted, parked crookedly in the promenade, the shops closed, curtains pulled across display space.

The blue-uniformed figures guarding the first major intersection confirmed Laif’s guess. The CSF saluted their small force, their faces alert and incurious. One of them murmured something, clearly speaking over a link.

The group split and half of them hustled Laif down the intersecting corridor toward the alley that led to Admin. He craned his neck to see where they were taking Dane, but a sharp shove in the small of his back encouraged him to keep moving. Another pair of CSF guarded the entrance to the alley. This corridor was eerily empty, too, although in the distance, Laif could make out blue figgures clustered about at least a couple of residents. Arresting them? Answering questions? It was too near the rise in the corridor and he couldn’t sort out the scene.

Efficient, these guys.

Laif shuffled into Admin flanked by the captain and his babysittter. The rest of the team vanished, off to some duty or other. Admin was full of blue uniforms. Two youngsters, a pair of scrawny, freckled redheads that looked like twins worked on the controls. The sappers. Laif’s shoulders sagged. Three other CSF conferred over a holomap of the platform, speaking in link-voices. The captain gave a short, chest-high salute to an older man with a major’s insignia. Laif strained his ears, but his babysitter hustled him off with that hard and unloving hand above his kidneys.

She took him to the tiny conference room at the end of Admin, shoved him through the opening door, just hard enough to make him stumble. By the time he recovered his balance, the door had closed behind him. Unsurprisingly it didn’t open for him.

“Welcome to the holding tank.” Bar sat on the tiny conference table, swinging his feet. “These guys are really really good.”

“So I gather. What the hell happened here?”

“They showed up right after you left. I guess they came up on New Singapore’s elevator. You know how they are over there… if they want secrecy, they get it.” He grimaced. “Private contract transport over here. They hit the dock with a Council Directive that overrides everything, I guess, had our internal communications shut down about two seconds after Immigration gave me a heads up. I called you when they walked in the door, but they shut me down beefore you picked up.”

Oh yeah… that com-link prod. Laif’s lips tightened. He should have checked, would have maybe been alerted when the sysstem turned out to be down.

What did it matter?

Bar shook his head, his eyes bleak. “Man, next time some fool hotshot at a bar spouts off about taking on Earth in some kind of military head-on…” He laughed a short, sour note. “They just got to meet these guys. No wonder it’s so damn peaceful downside. You should have been here when they busted in the door. I damn near wet my pants.”

“I didn’t see anyone in the corridors.”

”They got the elevators locked down. No traffic between levels. Without authorization. And they shut down the Can.” He shrugged.”That took their net geeks a little time. They crashed it just before you got here–that’s when they stuck me in here. Hey, we impressed ’em a little bit there anyway. They didn’t like me much when I said I didn’t have a clue how to control it, but I guess they play by the rules.” He gave Laif a weak snllie. “At least they didn’t do some of the things they sort of hinted they were thinking about doing.”

And if they hadn’t managed to crash it? Laif hunched his shoullders, because you heard rumors.

The door whispered open again. A young CSF stood there, a broad faced African-mix wearing a Sergeant’s insignia, short and muscular, his posture a relaxed readiness that suggested good beehavior was a wise choice.”You the boss man?” He spoke an easy U.S. slang, no second-language stiffness at all, although his accent suggested he was more likely Confederated Peoples of Africa than New York.

“Yeah.” Laif lifted one shoulder. “I guess.”

“I guess you’re not anymore.” The man’s grin widened a hair. “Orders from downside. I guess your assistant’s running the show. Cooperative guy. So you don’t have to stick around.”

Laif glanced sideways at Bar. “We can leave.”

“Not him.” The Seargeant shook his head. “Just you. But we want you to stay home for awhile, you know? Just so we know that you’re not causing us any trouble.” He stepped aside. “Let’s go.”

Laif exchanged another brief look with Bar, who lifted one shoulder. Straightening, Laif left the small chamber, following the CSF through the now-crowded admin. Yeah, there was Arlin, practically bowing and scraping as he conferenced with the gray-haired Major. Laif kept his eyes straight ahead as he marched though the press of blue uniforms. Nobody paid any attention to him, and the comments that he overheard were cryptic at best, a mix of at least four languages he could identify, maybe more.

A security cart waited out in the hall, but there was no sign of Carrie. “What about our security people?”

Laif climbed into the cart at the CSF nod. “I hope you didn’t just treat ’em all like enemies. We’re not a hostile country, Sergeant. If your people don’t start something, nobody’s going to attack you.”

“That’s not what we’ve been hearing.” The sergeant swung himself into the driver’s seat with an athlete’s grace. “We just shut you all down for now. Simpler than dealing with a mess. Your Security people are assigned to quarters. For the duration. You all can have ’em back when we pull out of here.” The cart leaped forward at the maximum safe speed for this G.

“Where’d you guys practice in micro?” Laif eyed the abanndoned carts, spotted a couple of blue uniforms in the distance. “New Singapore?”

The sergeant didn’t answer.

“What happened to Nilsson. The other guy you arrested?” The sergeant shrugged.

You’re on your own, Dane, he thought bleakly. Better pray they do a DNA test on the dead girl.

The sergeant knew where he lived. The elevator opened as they approached and he drove the cart into it, sitting relaxed, arms crossed as the elevator lifted three levels. “Hey, you’re top dog here. Or you were.” He chuckled as he drove out into the corridor. “How come you live up here? I can feel my muscles wasting away just comming up here.”

“Skinside earns income.” Laif shrugged. “What’s the fixation with feeling heavy all the time?” He glanced at the sergeant’s dense musculature. “If you want big muscles, you spend time in a G gym is all.” The man was a bit awkward in the reduced G up here, but not as much as your average tourist. They had reached his door and Laif’s lips tightened as the door opened before he could even reach for the lock plate. So they were controlling it from Admin. Nice demonstration, thank you. “You want to come in?” he looked at the sergeant. “Look around for weapons?”

“We already checked.” The sergeant smiled, his white teeth gleaming against his dark skin. “We don’t want to get rough with you folk. But we can do it just fine if we have to. Just so you all know.”

“Don’t worry,” Laif said with only a tinge of irony in his voice.

“You made a believer out of me.”

“Nice to know. Turn around.”

“How come?”

”You want the collar off or you gonna wear it as a fashion statement?”

Huh. Laif turned, felt a touch at the back of his neck, then the collar dropped into his hands. He turned, handed it to the sergeant. Surprised him, just how glad he was to be free of the damn thing. He rubbed his throat. “I thought I was under arrest for interfering with you guys.”

The sergeant shrugged. “I guess you haven’t pissed off anybody really big.” His grin widened. “As for us, if you give us any trouble… we’ll hurt you. Okay?”

Laif met his stare. “Okay.”

”You stay home, like everybody else. We’ll tell you when you can go about your business.” He flipped his fingers in a salute turned neatly on his heel, and headed back to the elevator.

Just like that. They were damn sure of themselves. Laif rubbed his throat again. They had good reason to be. He wondered what the hell was going to come down now.

“Door close,” he said, and crossed his room in three strides, flung himself down onto the sofa bed.

“Sweet Mohammad, Budddha, and Jesus,” he said softly.

Now what? Laif got to his feet and crossed to the service wall to order up a juice. Thought about making it a shot of brandy, hell make it six shots, and just forget this mess. Paced to the door and glared at it. Bet it rang a bell in Admin. He opened it, stared into the corridor for a few minutes. Closed it.

Drank some juice. Opened the door again. Flung himself down on the sofa again and closed it.

Well, hell, it gave him something to do. He wanted to contact Noah, find out what he’d discovered with that medallion dot–but did it matter at this point? “Door open,” Laif snarled. They’d be monitoring his private link, his access from the room. He could appreciate what the wildcards had, right now. We lost, he thought. We don’t even know what the hell the game is about, but we lost it. “Door close.”

They could have installed a monitor to make sure he was in here. But why, when they could track him any time they wanted to? “Door open.” This time, he left it open.

After a good half hour, he decided that they weren’t going to come check on him. Maybe they didn’t really care.

He selected a vid–a remake of a twentieth-century Italian western –and started it.

He left the room, heading for the service elevator, hoping that his pass card still worked, even if they had disabled his personal acccess, hoping that they were busy enough securing the platform that they hadn’t assigned someone to watch him personally or watch these corridors. Made it to the service bay and slipped his card into the slot beneath the palm plate. The doors whispered open a moment later.

So far, so good. This particular elevator brought him up to the hub near the control center, but far enough away so that anyone

there wouldn’t spot him exiting. He sent it up at normal speed, since the elevators were supposed to be locked down. With any luck, the CSF were using the elevators and this might slip by.

If it didn’t slip by, all they had to do was stop the elevator, lock the door, and send someone up here to pick him up. He had a feeling he wouldn’t get sent home with a pat on the butt this time around.

The damn trip took forever, and half a dozen times, he was sure it had been frozen. But finally… finally… the door sighed open and that searing, wonderful light flooded him. He kicked off and arrowed into the deep green light between the tubes. Most of them were close to harvest here and leaves brushed his face and as he sped past.

Laif let himself drift to a stop, grabbed anchor on a tube, breathing hard, sweating as he listened for any sound of pursuit. They could find him with scanners, but the hub garden was a big place. Knowing he was there and catching him were two different things. And it would be dangerous if he was armed. Which he wasn’t, but they didn’t know that.

Better to leave him alone?

He sure hoped that was their conclusion.

A shape rocketed from the green shadows over his left shoulder. Wrong guess!

Laif had time for a single searing instant of fury at yet another poor choice, and then the universe exploded in shards of green and white light.