robert Charrette - Arthur 02 - A King Beneath the Mountain (19 page)

"You're asking. Ya didn't." She slumped back in the chair. I yes roving around the room, she chewed on a hangnail. "Must've been good junk they used on us. Felt like I was flying a couple times."

"1 don't remember leaving the car."

"Me neither. Pretty good trick, huh? These guys got real good toys. Ya know what they're playing at?"

"1 don't think they 're playing."

"Then what they want, huh? They came looking for
you,
not me. Me, I just got bused along for the ride. You're the one they laid this show on for. Gimme the prop. Who's boss and what's the deal?"

If only he knew. This was, however, an opportunity. "Maybe you'd be willing to trade. Roscoe and the Flake fingered you as the leader of the raid on my place. Who sent you after me and what do they want?"

"Them boys is just street muscle. Dumb boys with too much mouth."

"They said you had the connections. What connections are those?"

"That's biz confidential, ya know."

"I could say the same."

She gave him a hard, evaluating look. "Maybe ya could. But, ya know, 1 don't see we got a fair trade here. Ya been asking enough questions that 1 think maybe ya don't got any good idea what this seam's all about."

"I know about Bear."

"Ain't seen no Bear. Only seen this Wilson shrimp and the fine toys these guys got. Wilson says if I be quiet and don't make no trouble, that I don't get no trouble. Maybe I'll give Shorty a chance to show he's not touting the prop."

His bluff hadn't been much, but it had been worth a try. He could push some more, but his heart wasn't in it. Maybe the perscomp had some information; it wouldn't have a smart mouth. He slid his chair a little closer to the table. It was not like he was some whiz
CyberCowboy Chang
^EM
kind of decker, but he'd done a little fooling around. He might be able to get something out of the system.

Five minutes of trying every way he knew to get a response from the system got him nothing. Just when he was ready to quit, the perscomp beeped and the screen lit. Wilson's face appeared.

"Reddy?"

John didn't bother to answer; he felt sure that Wilson could see to whom he was talking.

"I know you're there and I know you can hear me. How are you feeling?"

"What's it matter to you?" Sue asked.

"I see the young woman has recovered. What about you, Reddy?"

"So you
did
drug us," John accused.

"You sound fine. Of course you were drugged. It was for your own safety," Wilson responded matter-of-factly. "If you want to leave here, it's best you not know where you are."

"And where are we?"

Wilson chuckled. "Beneath the mountain."

"That some kinda code word?" Sue asked.

John shushed her and spoke to the screen. "What do you want with us?"

"I want you to get ready for a meeting." A section of the wall opened, revealing another room. Through the door John Could see little more than a bed. Clearly Spillway Sue saw it too.

"Hey, this ain't like some creepo breeding experiment!"

"Don't worry, young woman. There are separate accommodations for you." A second panel opened to a second bedroom. Sue shrugged to John and hauled herself out of the chair. She padded to the doorway and peered in. "Active! I could get used to a place like this."

John hoped they wouldn't have to. Well, that
he
wouldn't have to. Spillway Sue could go her own way.

Sue entered the room, neck craning back and forth. "So where's the— Never mind." John heard the quiet
shuff
of a panel closing.

"All right, Wilson. It's just us now. What's this meeting all about? Where's Bear?"

For an answer Wilson said, "Shower. Change. Compose yourself. I will come to get you at ten."

"How am I supposed to know when that is?"

Wilson's face was replaced by numbers on the screen. They read "9:11:43." The seconds started ticking off.

Wonderful.

Shower he could and would, if they'd provided the facilities. It had been a while since John had taken a good, long, hot shower. Change? Maybe. Again, if they provided; but if Wilson was sharing his clothes, John would be badly dressed for this meeting. Compose himself? Not likely, while he was so completely under their control.

Since they were in charge for the moment, there wasn't much he could do. He checked out the bedroom, and was relieved to see that the shower facilities were modern rather than rustic. He tried the water; it was hot. He shucked his clothes and took advantage of it, letting the steamy, humid, soapy sensations and the pounding water wash his mind free of his problems.

"Nine-fifty," a synthesized voice announced.

Reluctantly, John cut off the water. If his captors were this compulsive about time, he'd better go along; he didn't know enough about them to risk antagonizing them. Not yet.

As he emerged from the bathroom, a panel opened near the bed. A closet. Towel wrapped around his waist, he poked through the offerings. There was a suit—pure salaryman cut—complete with snap-collared shirt, string tie, and shiny black wingtips. They looked close to his size, but they weren't his style at all. He found some briefs and a tank top on the shelf and took those; the clean cotton felt good against Ms clean skin. But the concept of putting on the suit was too weird. He pulled his old pants back on and strapped into his boots. The old leather smell and soft suppleness of his jacket was familiar and comforting, reminding him of his days with the Dons; those had been good times, the best since leaving Worcester.

When he emerged into the central room, Wilson was already there, apparently dozing. He perked up as John reached the table.

"Ready?" Wilson asked.

"Almost," Spillway Sue answered from her room. John caught a glimpse of her bouncing across the room to snatch something from the bathroom, and had to catch his breath as well. She'd found herself an impressive selection of clothes; she looked ready to hit the clubs and set some trends. Her look didn't match well with his concept of her at all.

She headed for the door, still toweling her dark curls. As the panel started to slide shut in her face, she yelped and darted forward. She wasn't fast enough to make it through, but got a hand on the door's edge. The panel insisted on closing whether or not she had any extremities in the way. She managed to save her fingers. Sue's howl of protest was cut off as the pane! sealed.

"Hey," John objected. "What's the idea?"

"She was not invited," said Wilson.

Divide and conquer was an old tactic. "I don't think I like flic idea of leaving her here alone."

"She will not be harmed so long as she behaves herself."

"Like she can cause trouble locked in her bedroom?"

"It should minimize her opportunities."

Wilson pointed at the door, indicating that John should precede him out. The corridor was still dark, but not quite so bad as before. Had the dimness been a function of the drug? This lime John noted that the walls were the same as in the waiting room, and so were the floors. Unfortunately, several of the archways they passed through were not as tall as the waiting room door; John bumped his head on the first, but the experience did teach him to duck for the rest. An experiment in using his greater stride to outdistance Wilson brought John to a halt in front of a sealed archway. Wilson, unhurried, rejoined him, and the panel opened. They continued on.

"Mind if I ask you something?"

"I'll answer if I can," Wilson replied.

"You're not holding Sue as hostage for my good behavior, are you?"

"Would it do any good?"

"No," John answered, trying to sound firm. He really wasn't so confident. His glimpse of Sue after she was cleaned up had made him rethink things. She didn't look at all like the streeter who had confronted him at his slump. What did he know about her anyway? One thing he knew for sure was that he was the reason Sue was here. He felt sort of responsible. He hoped Wilson wouldn't figure that out because he really didn't want to have to worry about being coerced by threats against someone who, when last left to her own devices, was threatening his life.

They came to a small chamber that looked remarkably like an elevator car. Wilson stepped in and turned around to face the doorway. John did the same and saw there were no controls.

"Wilson. Escorting Reddy."

The door closed and the car began to descend. The ride was smooth. Without a floor number telltale, John had no idea how far down they went. The car stopped with the slightest of jars and the door opened onto another dark corridor. Wilson led him out.

They came upon a short woman in a lab coat. She glanced back over her shoulder and immediately increased her speed. She stopped by a closed archway, laid her hand on the wall beside it, and disappeared through the doorway when the panel opened. It was closed again by the time John and Wilson reached it. John looked for the controls the woman had used, but didn't sec any sign of them. Since Wilson kept walking, he didn't think it prudent to stop and make an examination.

They took a lot of turns, and walked through a lot more open arches and past many more closed ones. How many people had disappeared behind those doors just before John and Wilson rounded the corner? What sort of place was this? The anonymous walls and doors offered no clues, leaving John with plenty of room for wild speculation.

At last they came to a set of doors unlike the others he'd seen in their ramblings. They were great valves of dark wood, bound and garnished with golden metal wrought into exquisite relief. Rows of strange faces glared down at him like disapproving gargoyles. Wilson walked up to the doors, stamped his foot twice, and said something that John didn't quite catch. It must have been a code word because when he'd said it, the doors began to swing inward, revealing a larger space than John had yet encountered in the complex. John couldn't tell how huge it was, since it was wreathed in shadows and Stygian darkness, but he sensed that it was vast.

Shoving John to get him moving, Wilson walked with him beneath the arch into the chamber.

Looming like the giant trees of a redwood forest, massive three-yard-thick columns of polished stone marched in parallel rows down either side of the chamber. The pillars reached up and out of sight into the deep gloom. Metallic flecks and veins made the material look exotic; the columns sparkled like cylinders of a night sky. The light reflecting from those mineral stars came from two beams spearing out of the overhead darkness to make ten-foot circles of brightness on the floor. One of the shafts fell on an empty expanse of the mosaic tiled floor, while the other, more distant one illuminated a raised area crammed with machines and consoles. In the midst of the hi-tech equipment sat a great chair of black stone, which faced the doors. A pair of carved dragons made the chair's arched back and writhed sinuously down its sides to meet nose to nose and form a footrest. Ivory teeth jutted up gleaming from the sculpted jaws, and red gemstones glittered beneath the hewn brow ridges. John found it difficult to tear his eyes from those of the dragons.

The shadows of the magnificent chamber were occupied. John estimated nearly two dozen people were moving about, coming and going in the darkness. Most wore gray or tan coveralls. A few wore long aprons or robes; it was hard to tell in the dim light. It seemed that every face he saw was bearded, many luxuriously so. But the most striking thing about the people gathered there was that the tallest came no higher than John's chest. Had they been at a hotel or conference center, John might have thought he'd wandered into a convention of little people. But that couldn't be the case here.

And Wilson—John looked at his escort—Wilson fitted right in. He was a little taller, and where John had thought him squat, he now looked slender compared to the denizens of this place. Who were these people?

John remembered the last time he had seen so many short, stocky people in one place: the Mitsutomo raid on the palace of the Lady of the Lakes. He hadn't thought it odd at the time; he supposed now that he should have, but so much had been odd in the otherworld. Were these people part of some kind of special Mitsutomo operation? Had Mitsutomo bred a genetic subspecies? If so, why? And what business did they have with him?

"Who are you people?"

Several of them whispered to their fellows, and someone John couldn't see laughed. Only Wilson responded directly to

him.

"You're supposed to be bright, Reddy. Haven't you figured it out?"

"Are you Mitsutomo chimeras?"

More whispers. The laughter guffawed. Wilson chuckled. "Mitsutomo only wishes it had that kind of biotech capability."

Not Mitsutomo? John caught sight of one bushy-bearded male, almost as wide as he was tall. No, those people were neither ordinary little people nor genetic constructs. There was another answer. "Some of you look like dwarves. I mean, real dwarves, like in stories. Are we in the otherworld?"

Wilson looked up at him. "Can't you tell?"

"You
are
dwarves, aren't you? You're not human at all."