Diamond Star (61 page)

Tarex opened a cabinet and took out a crystal decanter, tall and rectangular. He poured gold liquid into a crystal tumbler. The liqueur looked so odd, going slow in the low gravity. Then he set down the decanter and leaned against the cabinet, facing Del while he drank.

Del wondered what was wrong with Tarex. Maybe he was an alcoholic. He had certainly acted like someone who needed a fix these past few minutes. But he could afford nanomeds in his body to stop the chemical processes leading to addiction, and he didn't seem the type to forego them.

"Look at you, staring like an Earth gazelle." Tarex raised the glass. "I've acquired a singer. It's why I came to Earth, but I didn't expect it this way. Who would have guessed you were such an incredible empath?" He shook his head with a laugh. "You Allieds are so foolish. No one wants to believe psions exist. So they waste your talents and let you go crazy in a world that has no accommodation for you."

"You offer such a great alternative," Del said acidly. "Torture for the rest of my life."

Tarex's voice quieted. "Life as a provider won't be as bad as you think. I'll take good care of you." He even looked like he meant it. "You won't want for anything. I'll give you luxury you can't imagine. You'll never need to worry about anything." Tarex downed the rest of his drink. "And my conglomerate will make billions from your singing."

Del couldn't believe he was so blithe about it. "No free citizen will buy the music of someone you kidnapped and enslaved."

"Oh, don't be stupid," Tarex said. "It will titillate people no end. Besides, you'll tell the media you wanted to come, that the life I offered fascinated you, blah, blah, blah."

"Like hell I will."

"By the time I'm done with you," Tarex said softly, "you'll do anything I damn well want."

Del clenched his fist. "Go drill it, Tarex."

"Oh, be quiet. I'm tired of your filthy mouth." He set down his drink and walked over to Del. "You said it, so that must be what you want, eh?"

Said what? Del tried to jump away, but he mistimed his moves in the unfamiliar gravity and stumbled. Tarex easily threw him back on the bed, on his stomach.

"You want to drill?" the Aristo said, kneeling so he straddled Del's hips. "Fine. I'll give you what you want."

"Stop it!" Panicked, Del tried to throw him off. Tarex shoved him back down and yanked on his belt, loosening it. Del's memory of that night at the lake flashed in his mind. This time, his brother wouldn't rescue him--because the Aristos had killed him.

Anger snapped within Del. He wasn't a damned helpless kid any more. He jerked his shoulders to mislead Tarex, and when the Aristo shifted his grip, Del twisted into a
mai-quinjo
roll, hurling Tarex to the floor. As he and Del both jumped to their feet, Tarex backhanded Del so hard across the face, Del slammed into the hull. Tarex's face twisted with rage. Del didn't know what was wrong with him, why he didn't call for help or use the disk clenched in his fist, why the ship hadn't sent in the security bots. He tried to dodge past the Aristo, but he couldn't go fast enough. Tarex hit him again and again, beating his shoulders and arms.

Del leaned back and kicked, ramming his foot into Tarex's gut. The Aristo grabbed Del's calf and flipped him backward. As Del crashed to the deck, hitting his head, colors shot through his vision. Dizzy and off balance, he scrambled to his feet. His training couldn't help him adapt to this gravity, but it kept him going even when he could hardly see. He kicked again, spinning so Tarex couldn't grab his leg, and hit the Aristo in the hip so hard, he heard the crack of bone.

Tarex's face contorted with fury, and he clenched his fist
hard
on the disk. Del's nerves burned with an agony of fire. He screamed and dropped to his knees, doubled over. But he refused to let it stop him. When Tarex grabbed his shoulder, Del reacted through the haze of pain, and threw himself into a roll, knocking Tarex to the ground--

The worst of the pain stopped.

Del rose to his knees, swaying as he gasped. Tarex lay under the table, his head bleeding. Gods
almighty,
would the police add murder to Del's crimes? How much worse could this nightmare get?

But no, Tarex was breathing. As much as Del hated him, he gasped with relief. He struggled to his feet and backed out of the quarters. He dreaded what would happen when Tarex awoke. Del was trapped here, and no way would the ship let him near the controls again.

Del looked around, dazed. Surely Kryxson, Bronzeson, the robots,
something
had picked up the fight. He staggered through the ship, unable to think through his haze of pain.

Del found Kryxson and Bronzeson in the cargo hold, sprawled on the deck, bruised and unconscious. It looked like they had been fighting. Del turned in a confused circle, swaying--

And came face to face with Lieutenant Gregori.

"Ah, gods," Del whispered. He was hallucinating.

Gregori came toward him with several officers. Wait. That one, the captain . . . she was familiar. Hadn't she been with the squad that rescued him from Raker? Captain Penzer. And Gregori! He had been part of the squad, too.

Gregori was saying something. Del struggled to concentrate.

" . . . you ride in the pod?" Gregori asked.

"Anything," Del rasped. He would stand on his head and chant in ancient tongues if it got him out of here.

Gregori opened the hatch of the pod, and Del climbed in. When Gregori tried to help, Del jerked his arm away. He didn't want anyone touching him.

It was cramped inside, with two seats molded into the hull, a panel curving around one side, an icer for food, and nothing else. Del kept his head bent until he sat down. When Gregori started to climb in, Del stiffened, remembering Tarex grabbing him.

"No." Del pointed past Gregori to Penzer. "Her."

"You'd rather have Captain Penzer ride with you?" Gregori spoke carefully, as if he thought Del might break. Del had no idea what he looked like, but he felt like a jigsaw puzzle about to fall apart.

"It's all right," Penzer said. "I'll go."

Gregori backed out, and Penzer squeezed onto the seat across from Del. He moved his knees aside, giving her space, but they were still cramped. Gods, he wished Ricki were here. Not that he could hold her; he hurt too much. He felt insubstantial, as if his mind were apart from his body. His nausea hovered like a bird, ready to swoop down. He had a horrible feeling this was a hallucination, or that if it was happening, Tarex would recover and stop the pod. Del jerked as the closing hatch sealed them in.

Within seconds, they were in space. Penzer activated a screen so Del could look out. He watched, dizzy and ill, as they drifted toward the police ship, which gleamed silver and blue.

"What happened?" Del finally asked. "Why did Tarex and his crew go crazy? Why didn't his ship stop you from boarding?"

Penzer was watching him with concern. "The pod was doped with nanos targeted at Aristo genes. We got the codes from your Jagernaut bodyguard."

Del's pulse leapt. "Tyra is
alive
?"

"Well, yes," she said. "Very much so."

Emotions welled up inside Del that he couldn't describe. He wanted to laugh, then to cry. "And Cameron?"

"He's fine."

They were
alive.
He hadn't killed them. "How many people died when the yacht took off?"

"No one," she said gently. "They had plenty of warning."

Del wiped his palm over his eyes, smearing away the tears. He hoped Tarex rotted in a worm-world slum-hell. "I'm surprised Tyra didn't demand to come with you."

"She wanted to, but we couldn't risk it. Tarex's security monitors might have detected her biomech. His systems respond to Skolian tech far more than they do Allied." She paused awkwardly. "Since you all had that war."

Of course. The Traders were always developing counters to Skolian technology. "What do the nanos in this pod do?" Raggedly he asked, "Can they hurt us?"

"They act on certain brain centers. But not ours. Only Aristo. They were supposed to knock out Tarex and any crew he had with Aristo DNA. Which was apparently both of them."

"I think it made them crazy, aggressive too."

Penzer grimaced. "Apparently." She glanced at his bruised chest, which throbbed where Tarex had beaten him. "I'm sorry."

"You don't have to apologize for their inhumanity." Del couldn't say any more. If he talked about it, his anger would scorch him. He stared at the screen, watching the police cruiser come closer. The Escort ships drifted in space beyond it. "Why aren't Tarex's Escorts trying to stop us?"

"They don't know what's going on," Penzer said. "Except that their vessels are in Allied custody." Her eyes glinted. " 'Tarex' just told them that he sent the empty pod back to us."

Del still didn't understand. "Surely they can monitor the yacht and this pod. They must know what's going on."

"Normally, yes. But your Jagernaut bodyguard knew some of their security codes, including a neutrino pulse sequence that could scramble their systems enough to let us tamper with them. For the next few minutes, they should read this pod as empty and that everything is fine on the yacht." She pushed back a straggle of hair that had escaped her braid. "It won't last long. And we weren't sure it would work. We had to get close enough to these ships for the nanos and pulses to act, which meant practically on top of them. No way would these people let us near Tarex if they thought we posed a threat."

Their behavior was beginning to make sense. "So you acted a little dumb."

"A
little
?" She snorted. "We acted like idiots."

"It played right into his opinion of us." Del's pulse surged. "We need to get to your ship faster, before they figure out what's going on."

"If we go too fast, it will draw attention. The police have no reason to rush back an empty pod."

"I feel a little . . . strange." He couldn't focus.

Penzer spoke quietly. "You look like you went through hell."

Del probed a bruise on his arm. The neural dust on his skin felt slick against his fingertips. "Tarex and I . . . had a fight."

Penzer indicated mammoth doors of a docking bay opening on the police crusier. "We have doctors ready to treat you."

"I'll be fine." Del had no intention of letting anyone touch him. His injuries didn't matter anyway. No one could treat his rage. He had spent one day with Tarex. What about the people he loved who had been prisoners for so much longer, who had
died
in that agony? Hatred filled him.

He wanted the Aristos to pay.

XXVI: A Simple Choice

When the police cruiser landed at the port, more police met them, and this time they were the real thing. They demanded Captain Penzer release Del into their custody.

"This is absurd," Penzer told the sergeant. "This man is the victim, not the perpetrator."

They were all standing on the tarmac, including Del, who had on a shirt the doctors had given him. He left it unfastened in the front so it wouldn't pull across his back and aggravate his injuries. Although he had let the doctors remove the neural dust and treat the bruises on his face, he had stopped them when they tried to take care of the lash wounds. By then his bruises were healing, and their fast recovery reminded him of the way Tarex's med-bot had treated his throat. That had also healed fast--because Tarex had wanted him to sing even after Del had fucking
screamed
for hours.

Del was too angry to care what the police thought. He stood there in his leather pants with chains, his shirt open, his chest banged up, and his hair in his eyes. The police scowled as if he were a dissolute punk staggering home after a night of misdeeds.

"We have to bring him in," the sergeant said. "He's a well-known figure involved in a major criminal incident." The officer looked harried. "The buzz is all over the meshes. They say Prime-Nova bribed us to let him off. If we don't bring him in, the publicity could cause major problems for the police commissioner and the precinct."

"You don't understand." Penzer handed him an ID cube. "Comm the people here. They'll explain."

"Why can't you?" the sergeant asked.

Del knew Penzer couldn't breathe a word about his identity. If it jumped to the meshes, it would cause far more furor than the police were worried about. She glanced at Del, and he shook his head slightly.

Penzer turned back to the sergeant. "My CO can talk to you."

He lifted the cube. "I'll give this to the chief. But we still have to take Mister Arden in."

Del stiffened as two officers came over to him, one carrying a pair of magnetized cuffs. He couldn't take being manacled, not after everything else that had happened. "No!" He stepped back from them. "Don't put those on."

Penzer stepped past the police, ignoring their warning looks. She spoke quietly to Del. "What do you want me to do?"

He knew what she was asking: should she tell them he had diplomatic immunity? They would want proof. If it became public that she claimed he had a status reserved for foreign dignitaries, it could turn into a mess. She couldn't give details, and neither could Del, but that would just make it worse, deepening the mystery.

Del was tempted to tell them so he could get away from this. He had to do a concert tonight. He couldn't think past it, couldn't settle his mind. He felt too dizzy to make decisions. His family would be furious over what he had done. What if he said something he later regretted, when his mind cleared? He didn't know what to do.

"Call Mac, my manager," he told her. They both knew she would call General McLane first, but Del wanted Mac.

"We'll take care of it," Penzer promised him.

Then the police took him away.

Del panicked when he saw the cell. Three of the officers took him down a corridor with blue walls. The simple cell at the end was a white room with a white table and chair, and a bed against one wall. As cells went, it was innocuous--except it looked exactly like the room where he had awoken from cryogensis.

"No!" Del balked at the threshold. "I can't."

"You're in a jail, not a hotel," one of the officers said. "You don't get to choose."