Machine World (Undying Mercenaries Book 4) (30 page)

“Because we worked together to kill a Galactic—back on Earth. You remember that ‘accident’ that happened with an air car on top of Central?”

She nodded slowly. Her frown was bigger than ever.

“Didn’t that seem a little odd to you? Well, it was bullshit. Turov and Claver were up to all kinds of shenanigans, and the Galactic found out. She ordered me to kill him, and we faked the wreck together. Then we erased the Galactic’s latest mind back-up and pushed him over the side of the building.”

She snorted. “That’s absurd.”

“It happened. I was there. She was there. Check the logs, not the candied up news reports. Here’s something interesting—Graves and Leeson needed a revive after that accident, too. Why was that? They weren’t in the air car, were they?”

“Shut up for a second,” she said. She was working her tapper quickly. She brought up the official reports of that fateful day’s events and went over them.

“Okay,” she said after a few minutes. “Let’s say I believe your crazy story. How the hell did you erase the mental backup of a Mogwa official?”

“Now you’re thinking,” I said encouragingly. “The answer to that one is in Turov’s office. In fact, it’s probably in her pocket.”

She looked at me curiously. “She wouldn’t let us question you and perm you if all this was true. She has too much to hide.”

I laughed. “I’m not getting permed. Abused, yes. But not permed. I work for her. I just thought I’d give you a few pointers on how things went around here to help you out. If you stay quiet about all this, now that you know the score, you’ll keep your career intact.”

I thought I had her pretty bamboozled by now. Most of my story was true, but not my importance, which I was exaggerating. Hell, Turov was probably hoping they’d perm my ass after torturing me for a while.

Belter moved with sudden decision. She unclamped my right arm, then drew her sidearm, pointed it at my chest and stepped back.

“All right,” she said. “Free yourself and come with me. We’re going to talk with my primus.”

“How about your tribune?”

Belter looked troubled. “I don’t think he’s been revived yet.”

I brayed with laughter while I fumbled out of the clamps. “That’s old Turov again. She’s tricky that way. Doesn’t like high-level brass around. They argue too much when she wants to do something off-script.”

“She’s dramatically off-script on this campaign, I’ll grant you that. You’ll repeat your story to my primus, and you’ll go back to a cell. You won’t be permed until you’ve given a full deposition in front of an officers’ court.”

I knew now that Belter had taken the bait. She wanted to take on Imperator Turov, and she thought my testimony might be enough. Everyone in Solstice was mad at Turov for a stack of good reasons. I’d been counting on that.

She let me get dressed, signed me out of the detention center and marched me down the passages toward Gold Deck. I didn’t move on her until we were in a fairly lonely passageway.

I had a bloody streak down my ribs and was breathing hard before it was over, but she was face down on the deck, unconscious. I dragged her into a data closet and locked it.

Belter had fought well, but she’d made a critical mistake: She’d let me get my hands free.

-40-

Leaving Centurion Belter asleep in the data closet with computers humming all around her, I moved on determinedly. I strapped on her sidearm, happy that smart cloth uniforms could stretch to fit anyone, and marched the rest of the way to Gold Deck.

Fortunately, not every man in the task force knew me and my status as a prisoner. As it was a sensitive case, it probably hadn’t even gone public yet. No one wanted to create more witnesses than necessary for the Nairbs to question later.

I wasn’t challenged until I reached the hatchway that led to the command section, and there I used Turov’s name. They contacted her, and I waited and sweated.

Turov allowed me to pass the guards. That was a relief, sort of. I marched up to her office, and the door opened.

We greeted one another with guns in our hands. She was aiming hers at me, and I was aiming mine at her.

We both smiled tightly.

“Who ordered you to be released from detention?” she demanded. “I didn’t authorize it.”

“I wasn’t exactly released.”

She nodded, unsurprised. “All right then.
What do you want from me McGill, you crazy bastard?
”
 

I looked her straight in the eye. “The Key,” I said.

Her eyes widened. She hadn’t expected that one. “No,” she said quickly.

“I’ll bring it back,” I said. “I promise.”

“No way.”

“Then I’ll kill you where you stand and take it anyway. Your choice.”

She glared at me. There was blood on my face and scabs on my wrists. There was also a determined look in my eye that no one who knew me could completely ignore.

“Why did I let you in here?” she asked.

I wasn’t sure if she was asking me or talking to herself.

“I don’t know, sir. Maybe you like my smile. But here we are.”

She took a deep breath.

“
No,” she said again. “I can’t let you have the key. Not even for old times’ sake, James.”

“How long has it been since you killed someone with that pistol, Imperator?” I asked her. “This is a duel at two paces. That’s harder to win than it seems. And if I win, I promise, I
’
ll perm you.”

Her eyes narrowed, and her small fingers tightened on her weapon. “You’d go that far?”

“Yes. I’m on a mission.”

“I don’t like threats. If I win, I’ll do the same.”

I shrugged. “I’ve got nothing to lose. This is all up to you.”

She saw something in my eyes or maybe heard it in my voice. She could tell I wasn’t bluffing.

“Have you told anyone about the Key?” she asked.

“No. Not yet,” I lied.

She lowered her gun and walked away into her office. This surprised me, but when I thought it over it made sense. If she went along with my threats, she knew I’d probably let her live. On the other hand, even if I killed her right here on her plush imported carpet, she’d be revived in the end, and I’d be permed for my crimes. The guns didn’t even matter in a way, as long as she got me out of her office before I erased her data with the key. For her, dying would be unpleasant but only temporary.

I took her sidearm anyway, just in case she changed her mind, and then I took the Galactic key. She had it in her belt pouch like I figured she would. Something like that was too valuable to leave in a safe or under your pillow. You had to have it handy for emergencies, or it wasn’t worth owning.

Getting close to her and searching her body—that did something to me. I could smell her perfume while I dug in her pockets. Her body was warm and firm, and her eyes shone in the office lights as she glared up at me.

Angry, but pretty. I couldn’t help but recall a few blissful experiences we’d shared in the past. I wanted to kiss her, but I sensed this wasn’t the right time.

“I’ll be back in half an hour,” I said. “I promise, Galina.”

“You’d better be, or I’m going to have you arrested again with fresh charges.”

“Wait until I get back, or I’ll go public with the key.”

After our exchange of threats, she watched me leave. She wore a sour, wistful expression.

As I walked down long passageways back to the aft section of the ship, I reflected on the strange chemistry I had going with this particular woman. It had to be the oddest relationship of my long and storied career with the opposite sex. On any given day, we were as likely to engineer the other’s demise as we were to make love. We’d done both, in equal measure, for years now.

She could have had me tracked down and arrested right now, of course—but she didn’t. Personally, I think that deep down she didn’t want to see the last of me. No matter how much she talked about getting rid of old James McGill, I still turned her on at some primitive level. Maybe we were in twisted, mutually abusive love affair. One thing was for sure: we were a couple made in Hell.

When I made it back to the detention center, the guards stopped me and moved to arrest me. I was prepared for that. I pulled Turov’s face up on my tapper.

“Let him through,” she said glumly.

I knew she didn’t want me to blab about her key. She just wanted me to get this over with.

The door into the torture chamber opened and slammed shut behind me a few minutes later. My two best friends were there, talking and sipping coffee. Randy—that asshole—he was playing a vid of me on his tapper and laughing about it. On his arm, I was squirming in the chair. It must have been a different version of James McGill, as I couldn’t recall having had that many needles shoved into me all at once.

Neither man was armed as they didn’t want to risk a prisoner getting his hands on a gun.

Bill stood up and looked at my pistol. He knew the score, and he didn’t even say anything. His eyes focused on the bloody stained deck at our feet. That’s all.

I shot him in the face, and he sagged down like a sack of meal.

Randy
fought. One second, he was smiling and laughing at my video, and the next he snarled like a dog and charged me, getting in close before I could get my pistol lined up properly.

The gun spun away, and we were on the deck, trading vicious blows. He didn’t go down easy. I had to pin him. I even ripped out one eye, but he still fought on.

Maybe he knew what his fate would be, too.

When Randy finally lay still on the deck, I used the key on his tapper, and I erased him. Not just his life, but all record that he’d ever existed. Maybe his mamma had a few baby pictures saved somewhere back on Earth, but that was about it.

The only people who would remember him were those who knew him personally and could attest that he’d once drawn breath. As far as all the computers in the galaxy were concerned, he’d never been alive at all.

When I was done, I looked at the key...such power. I’d never permed a man before, and it felt strange.

I tried not to think about it afterward—but of course, I did.

Why’d I do it? Because such a man didn’t deserve to live.

What right did I have to perm another human being? I don’t know. What right did he have to kill seven versions of me in a row?

Like I said, I tried not to think about it...

But I did.

The detention people were understandably upset when they got to the torture chamber and found both their star tormentors dead on the deck.

They found me sitting on the steel chair, looking down at the bodies thoughtfully.

“Drop the weapon, Veteran.”

I did so. Then I held up my hands. On my forearm was a live feed, displaying Turov’s face.

“Let Veteran McGill go,” she ordered.

“Are you under some kind of duress, sir?”

“No. He has acted under my authority. He is to be escorted to my office immediately. But don’t listen to anything else he says.”

The guards weren’t happy, but they did as she ordered. They muttered and complained all the way back up to Gold Deck.

Centurion Belter made an appearance along the way, and she almost crashed the whole party. She was raving mad, half-naked, and she had a lot of grease and dirt on her. She must have had a hard time getting out of that locked data closet.

“Sorry sir,” I said when faced with her shouts and curses.

When the guards explained I was under Turov’s protection, she took her sidearm and left me, snarling about traitors and bastards. Since I felt I was neither, I didn’t feel the sting of her barbs.

It occurred to me as we reached Gold Deck that Turov might very well have me shot when I got there. But those were the breaks. I’d done what I wanted to do. I’d made my bargain with the devil, and I was going to keep my end of it, no matter how it turned out.

When I got there, she saw I was unarmed and so she waved my escort back outside into the passages. Her office door closed behind me, and we were alone.

I stood at attention as she walked around me, staring up curiously. She stopped when she got around to face me again, and she shook her head.

“You’re a wonder, James McGill.”

“Thank you, sir.”

She held out her hand. “Give it to me.”

I put the Galactic key into her small palm. She made it disappear like a magician palming a gold coin. One second it was there and the next it wasn’t.

Then she surprised me by putting her pistol on her desk.

“James, I’m sorry,” she said.

Of all the things Galina Turov might have said to me, this was probably the last one I was expecting. I glanced down, looking into her face for an instant. Our eyes met, and she honestly looked troubled.

“I reviewed the vid files while you were gone,” she said. “I didn’t know. I swear it. And I don’t want you to blame all of Solstice, either. My orders were to extract the truth. They were overzealous in their efforts.”

“You could say that.”

She stared at me thoughtfully for a second. “What happened on the Nairb ship? Give me the truth.”

I told her. I told her everything. About Claver, the Nairb death chamber, the squid missile pod—even the chocolate bar. She listened, shaking her head from time to time and making sounds of disbelief.

“All right,” she said when I finished. “I’m going to trust you on this one. What’s done is done, anyway. If the Nairbs don’t buy that the cephalopods destroyed their ship, executing you won’t have any effect on their condemnation of Earth. Your charges are dismissed.”

“Thank you, sir,” I said.

“Why did you need the key for simple revenge?” she asked. “You had a pistol—that would have been enough for the McGill I know.”

I thought about my answer. She didn’t know that I’d erased that guy, Randy. He just wasn’t there anymore in the computer systems, and anyone who’s ever looked for a ghost can tell you they’re not easy to find. You don’t even notice when they’re not around anymore.

“
What would you have had me do,” I asked her, “if it had been you in that chair for seven lives?

“Seven...?” she asked, shocked. “I didn’t know...”

I took three steps toward her. She backed up one pace and put her hand on the desk near her pistol, but she didn’t pick it up.

I touched her shoulder. I don’t know why, really. We’d been close once. Maybe that was it. Touching her just felt right.

She didn’t even seem to notice. She was looking into my eyes, not at my hands.

“Galina,” I said, “we’ve been through it, you and I. Life, death—love and despair. This is one more of those moments, that’s all.”

“But what did you do?”

“People think I do whatever I want, but it’s not true. I did what I had to do.”

She finally caught on then. “You
erased
them?” Her eyes were big. “That’s why you needed the key. Killing those two wasn’t enough?”

“
For one man it was—but not for the other.”

She nodded as if she understood. Maybe she did understand, I’m not sure.

She looked so young, but she wasn’t a kid. She’d seen a lot in her lifetime, just as I had.

“
I’ll cover it up,” she said. “Don’t worry about it.”

“
Thanks,” I said, “but I’ll never forget this day.”

She gave me a little kiss. It was a strangely gentle gesture, coming from her. I took my hand off her after that and left. She didn’t try to stop me. She didn’t say anything at all. It was hard to know what she was thinking.

I didn’t ask because I didn’t care. I’d had a long, hard day, and it was finally done.