Rath's Gambit (The Janus Group Book 2) (13 page)

“
They
are not sitting in your office right now,” Beauceron reminded him.

The doctor licked his lips. “We flew to Xheshuan, but only for about ten days. After that a deep-space vessel took us straight from the surface of Xheshuan to the other location.”

“And where was that?” Beauceron asked.

“They never told us the name of the planet. We flew straight there, docked with a shuttle, and then they took us by air car to a floating platform of some kind, out on the water. When we left, they flew us back to Xheshuan, paid us, and then we caught flights home. They never said where we went. They told us not to ask any questions.”

“Who contacted you to make the job offer?” Rath asked.

“A friend, from medical school. He told me about the program, and when I told him I was interested, he told me to go onto a website – it was a numerical URL, not a web address, I don’t remember what it was. Anyway, I entered my information on the site, and about a week later I got a robo-call telling me I’d been accepted, and that I should plan on taking a leave of absence the following year, over a specific set of months.”

“And that’s the only contact you had with the organization?” Beauceron asked.

“Yes.” Soukhin nodded emphatically. “I’m not going to have to testify on this, am I?”

Beauceron shook his head. “No. If I were you, I’d keep this conversation a secret.”

Soukhin sighed with relief.

“But we may be back, if we think of something else,” Beauceron said, standing.

Outside the hospital, Rath jammed his hands in his pockets and sighed, waiting as Beauceron’s air car returned from the parking garage.

“A small victory,” Beauceron said, noticing Rath’s impatience. “We confirmed our theory about the medical staff.”

Rath tried to reply, but suddenly succumbed to a fit of sneezing. “Ugh, my throat is killing me.”

“Sounds like you’re getting a cold,” Beauceron guessed.

Rath scowled. “Fantastic. First time in eleven years.”

“Were you video-recording the interview?”

Rath nodded, distracted. “I told you it would be a dead end,” he sniffed. “The Guild is too careful about this stuff. We’re no closer to finding Paisen.”

“I think you need to prepare yourself for the likelihood that we don’t find her at all,” Beauceron said. “Forget needles in haystacks, this is like … finding a needle on a mountain made of hay.”

The car pulled up, and they climbed in. “I know it doesn’t mean much to you, but I owe her my life,” Rath told Beauceron. “I still think your theory that she got injured or arrested is a solid one.”

Beauceron punched in the coordinates for his apartment, and the air car rose into the sky. “It would explain why she didn’t make the rendezvous,” Beauceron admitted.

“So let’s confirm the theory,” Rath said. “Call your friend, let’s check the police database.”

“It’s not that simple,” Beauceron said.

“Why not?” Rath asked. “You didn’t have any issue getting your friend in the morgue to check stuff out for us.”

Beauceron shook his head. “I can’t go back in my station. I’m a pariah there now. I don’t mind being insulted or scorned, but I don’t want to expose my friend to that.”

“Okay, so I’ll go,” Rath said.

12

The knocking on Dasi’s cabin door was brisk and business-like.

One of the Senate Guards on the protective detail.

“Ma’am?” she heard.

Dasi fixed an earring in place as she finished dressing, then palmed the door switch open. “Yes?”

“We’ll be docking in ten minutes,” the guard told her. “They’ve reserved docking tube three for our use.”

“Tube three, got it,” she said.

Senator Lizelle and the three bodyguards were waiting at the tube when she arrived, along with his Chief of Staff, Inuye Garces, a short, stocky man with a salt-and-pepper beard. Garces had a reputation on the staff for being a stern taskmaster. Dasi had not worked extensively with him; she hoped to make a good impression on him during the trip.

Lizelle looked up from the news report on his datascroll when he saw her. “Good morning!” He smiled. “Sleep well?”

“I did, thank you, sir.” Through the hull, she heard the docking apparatus engage, and lock onto the spaceliner’s hull.

One of the Senate Guards was talking to a colleague over his phone. “Shuttle’s prepped,” he reported. “The spaceline is holding general passengers at the other tubes until we’ve disembarked, so we can proceed directly to the shuttle gate.”

Lizelle winked conspiratorially at Dasi. “They see enemies all around.”

“There are enemies all around,” Garces scolded him. “You know that, Charl.”

“Political ones, perhaps,” Lizelle allowed. “But I doubt any of the extremists in the Territories would bother going after me.”

“That’s probably what Senator Reid, thought, too,” Garces pointed out.

Lizelle shook his head in regret. “That was a tragedy. The investigation report can’t come soon enough.”

The pressurized door cracked open, then swung out of the way. A uniformed gate agent smiled at them.

“Welcome home, sir,” she said.

Lizelle thanked her, and then the protective detail hustled them off of the ship and onto the transfer station. They crossed several corridors, ducked through a service tunnel, and at last, emerged by the shuttle gate, where a member of the protective detail’s advance team stood guard.

“Here we are, sir,” the team leader told Lizelle.

“Excellent,” Lizelle said. “Your team’s work is the definition of professionalism, as always, Major.” He stopped at a viewing window, and took a long look at the gaseous planet below them, the brown and yellow clouds swirling slowly. Dasi waited several paces behind him.

“First time, right?” Garces asked.

“Sorry?” Dasi said, turning. “Oh, yes. I’ve never been on any gas planet before, actually.”

Garces shrugged. “Great for mining rare gases. Not so great for habitation. But a fitting place for a politician to call home.”

“How so?”

“Full of hot air,” Garces chuckled.

The senator’s shuttle bypassed Emerist’s primary spaceport and took them directly to the senator’s home, a massive, blimp-like vehicle floating in the upper atmosphere, buoyed up by clusters of gas balloons mounted under its hull. As they approached, Dasi saw that the structure’s top was open to the air, and covered with acres of manicured grounds, with trees, winding pathways, and even a small lake. The senator’s home sat on a rise at one end of the structure, looking out over the surrounding grounds. The shuttle set down in a landing pad cleverly concealed amidst a clearing in the trees nearest the house.

Dasi saw a crew member prepare to open the shuttle door, so she touched the arm of the Senate Guard sitting across from her. “The air’s breathable? I thought it was toxic.”

“Not up here,” he told her. “Lower down, it’s very toxic – the heavier gases are deadly. But they replaced the upper atmosphere with a human-friendly mix. Smells a little weird at first, but totally safe,” he reassured her.

“Thanks,” she said.

Emerist was warm and breezy, she discovered, and the air did have a strange tang.

Like the fizz when you first open a carbonated beverage.
Despite the warmth, Dasi felt a shiver of anticipation.

The senator’s house was enormous. His private apartment was at the top, and included a rooftop garden, but much of the building extended below ground level, into the bowels of the airship, where several air cars were garaged, and the staff lived and worked. A maid showed Dasi to a room in the guest quarters, with a small balcony overlooking the lake. She showered and changed for the fundraiser dinner, and then wandered through the rooms until she found the ballroom, which was being readied for the night’s event. To her surprise, Lizelle was there already, standing at a small podium on the stage, rehearsing his speech. He noted her presence with a brief nod, then continued. She pulled a chair out from one of the tables and sat to listen.

When he finished, she applauded politely, smiling.

“Old campaign trail habit,” he told her, waving away her applause. “I always like to rehearse in the same space I’m giving the speech. It was good?”

“Yes! But you changed the last section,” she observed.

“Yeah, it felt contrived,” he said. “I wanted to go with something more genuine.”

“I liked it,” she said. “I mean, check with Inuye, maybe, but I would go with the new version.”

“Don’t apologize for having an opinion,” he told her.

Dasi frowned. “I didn’t …?”

“You did. You felt you might be overstepping your bounds, so you checked yourself, and deferred to Inuye. That’s apologizing. It’s a sub-conscious thing many woman do in business settings, especially when addressing a superior. Have conviction!”

“Okay,” she told him, blushing. “I mean, I will.”

“Good.” The senator hopped down from the stage, rolling up his datascroll and the speech notes. “Now, let’s go over the guest list. I’m going to want you to steer some people in my direction over the course of the evening, and run interference on some others. Are you okay playing traffic cop?”

“Absolutely,” she said.

“It’s a thankless job, so if I forget later on, thanks in advance. Now, where’s Inuye? I want his take on who to prioritize.”

* * *

Lizelle’s speech went as smoothly as it had in rehearsal, and Dasi watched the audience closely during the final section, noting that his revisions elicited the reaction he had hoped for. Amidst the applause, he stepped down from the podium and handed her his datascroll, winking at her.

Nice job,
she mouthed, as the band struck up a jaunty dance number. Then the first of the guests approached, and she flicked the datascroll on, matching their faces with her guest list. She stayed by his side for the rest of the evening, sometimes indicating to Inuye Garces that he should intercept a guest, at other times stepping back to let them talk to Lizelle himself. She reminded him of their names as they approached, but soon stopped when she realized he had them all memorized.

Dasi took a sip of water as Lizelle shook yet another wealthy patron by the hand.

Orturo Kleins, District Judge,
her datascroll showed her, recognizing his face.
Widowed, two children.

“Orturo! My friend, how is your daughter? Doing well at her new job?”

Dasi smiled and shook her head.
He’s good.

Orturo returned the hand shake, but his face was creased with a frown. “She is doing well, thank you. But I’m afraid we have a problem.”

“Oh?” Lizelle asked.

“There’s a federal law that’s set to expire next month – I contacted your office about it, and several other senators, but I haven’t gotten a response.”

“What law?” Lizelle probed.

“An ancient one – at the time, the Senate put a hundred-year expiration clause on it, I’m not sure why, and we’re just about at that limit. A physician friend of mine brought it to my attention. The law governs the status of unconscious patients while in the care of a medical facility. The essence is this: if it is allowed to expire, hospitals will no longer be allowed to attempt to revive patients under certain conditions. At the time, it made sense, but medical technology has advanced to the point … well, it could result in the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.”

“You’re kidding!” Lizelle said, aghast.

“I’m afraid not,” the judge shook his head. “Now whether hospitals and patients are even aware of this, or decide to take action on it, I’m not sure. But all it would take is one civil suit against a hospital ….”

“… and they might have to take action,” Lizelle agreed. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention.”

“I have to warn you, you may face some opposition to this from religious elements,” Orturo warned. “Some of the fundamentalists disagree with the notion of medical interventions of this nature. And they make up a fairly large voting bloc here, as you know.”

Lizelle shrugged. “There are a number of them here tonight. But this can’t stand, Orturo.” He turned to Dasi. “Can you duck out for a minute and get hold of Senator Tranh on the Medical Committee? Tell him it’s urgent.”

It took nearly ten minutes for Dasi to get through to Tranh, who turned out to be in a different time zone, and fast asleep. His staff proved exceptionally reluctant to wake him, but she persisted, and once she had his senior aide on the phone, all it took was Lizelle’s name to sway him.

“Charl’s asking for him?” the aide asked. “Shit. Well, I better get him then, or I’ll never hear the end of it. Give me a minute.”

Dasi took the opportunity to step back into the ballroom and signal Garces, who herded Lizelle out into the corridor moments later.

“Senator Tranh will be on in a minute,” she told him. “They’re just waking him up.”

“Are they?” Lizelle smirked. “I’m impressed, Dasi. Good work.” He took the phone from her. “Vin? It’s Charl. Listen, I didn’t realize you were asleep, I’ll give my staff a slap on the wrist for waking you up,” he apologized, winking at Dasi. “But since you’re up, we’ve got a serious problem ….” Lizelle headed up the hall, wandering as he talked.

“Eat yet?” Garces asked Dasi.

“No,” she admitted.

“Go grab something, he’ll be a few minutes at least. I’d eat in the kitchen, if I were you – that way all the vultures back in the ballroom can’t pester you about getting a chance to see Charl.”

Dasi grinned. “Thanks for the tip.”

The last group of guests left well after midnight, and Dasi had to stifle a yawn as she shook hands with a drunk councilman and his wife.

I don’t even know what time zone my body thinks it’s in right now.

She had limited her alcohol during the evening, on the advice of one of her coworkers, so on a whim, she swung back through the ballroom, and headed for the bar.

One more drink should give me a nice buzz before bed.

The bartender was nowhere to be seen, so she poured herself a glass of wine and then slipped out of her high heels, tucking them under one arm. Around the room, the staff still worked to clear up, and Dasi decided to leave them to it – she wound her way through the tables, and then out the large windows at the back of the stage, into the cool night air. To her surprise, Lizelle was sipping a lowball at the railing of the balcony, enjoying the breeze.