The Gambit with Perfection (The Phantom of the Earth Book 2) (8 page)

“Incredible,” Danforth said. “Look at her, my fellow Beimenians.” Brody thought he sounded like Chancellor Masimovian. “The famous carbyne-class shuttle in all her magnificence, a modern engineering marvel that has given new meaning to aerodynamics and suspension of disbelief …”

The shuttle moved by Danforth’s telepathic command, providing different views of its angular shapes when it turned, from top to bottom, side to side, in slow motion, as if he advertised one of the luxury residential units in Palaestra City.

“Is it this shuttle’s power that gives you confidence, or something else?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you seem … calm, considering you’ve been warned.” Danforth leaned forward and looked to the audience, then back to Brody with a foreboding expression. “We care about our captain, and we seek significant conversion. Will you deliver it for us?”

“I will
always
serve Beimeni.”
A good response,
Brody thought, for Danforth backed into his seat. While Brody couldn’t see the crowd, he heard a ripple of applause, and when they were silent, he added, “I will
always
serve Chancellor Masimovian.” This sent the audience into a frenzied applause. Danforth crossed his arms. Brody turned his head and noted the smiles upon Nero’s and Verena’s faces, as fake as his.

Bright blue rose petals matching Brody’s eyes rained upon the stage and the crowd, and Brody understood that Danforth, or someone else, had cut the interview then and there. The team took their bows, waved, and disappeared behind the curtains, where the aristocracy and ministry gathered to toast the mission. Brody accepted a glass of champagne from Daniel and held it high.

The aristocrats grew silent. A group parted, revealing Chancellor Masimovian with Lady Isabelle, his eternal partner, at his side. His bronze skin looked a bit flushed, and he wore more jewels than cloth. Staring at Brody, he swiped his artfully trimmed stubble beard, then raised his glass. “To our greatest strike team captain.” He waited for the crowd to raise their glasses with him. “May the gods protect you and your team in this most critical mission.”

Brody mouthed,
Thank you,
wondering why, if he truly felt this way, the chancellor would have issued the Warning, wondering further why Isabelle didn’t even hold a drink.

Several ministers and board members concurred with the chancellor, and after the group downed the champagne, a group of singers, flutists, harpists, and guitarists emerged upon a dais, where they played familiar Northeast songs. The lighting dimmed. Minister Tethys Charles and Prime Minister Carillon Decca conversed across the room. It seemed unlikely to Brody that Tethys would tell him anything more in Decca’s presence, given his reluctance to do so before.

“Good work out there,” Nero said, and when Brody didn’t respond, “Brodes?”

“They know more about the Warning than what we’ve been told,” Brody said, nodding toward the aristocrats and ministers.

“Captain,” Verena said, “if ever there was a time you were justified in using your telepathic talent, now is it.”

“I can’t.”

“You must.”

“I won’t—”

“Captain Barão, out of the RDD and out of his element,” Minister Kurt Kaspasparon said. The Portagen minister kissed his foster son on each cheek.

Brody didn’t know he would attend the prelaunch festivities. He was as Brody remembered him, a tower of a man with strong hands. He wore many layers of colorful robes that made it impossible to tell where the cloth ended and skin began.

“My lady and I have missed you in Portage,” Kaspasparon added, and to Verena and Nero, “and your team as well.”

Brody bowed, as did Verena and Nero.

Kaspasparon was speaking again, though Brody didn’t hear him or his team’s responses. He hadn’t seen the Portagen minister in Phanes since the first trimester last year, and he hadn’t returned to Portage since he had been an unregistered child, discovered by the commonwealth, and brought to Portage Citadel. Rather than send Brody to Beimeni City for judgment, Kurt Kaspasparon had arranged Broden Barão’s sale to House Variscan, which had created a special arrangement with the Office of the Chancellor to develop unregistered orphans.

Verena and Nero excused themselves and joined a group of RDD scientists at the bar while Kaspasparon talked again to Brody.

When he didn’t respond, the minister said, “Captain, are you all right?”

“I’ve missed you, Minister,” Brody said, ignoring his question, pondering whether he knew the meaning of the Warning. “So you’ll accept my apologies and know I speak honestly when I tell you that Reassortment and Regenesis take all of my time.” The minister raised his brow. “I rarely attend ministry sessions in Phanes,” Brody added. “How could I justify a visit to your citadel?”

The minister knew why Brody never returned. The memories of his parents, their illegal lives before they’d died—before Hari Barão killed himself and left Brody and Xylia, his childhood friend, to the Janzers—still burned Brody 111 years later.

“Captain,” Kaspasparon said, “you justify your actions every day, unwisely.”

The musicians hit their high notes, as did the conversations, and Brody could barely hear the minister when he delivered a familiar lecture.

“I know you, the boy who ran through my citadel and the developed transhuman you turned into.” He paused during the applause. Keeper bots handed out more champagne. “You’re a good person who—”

“Minister, they’re sending me to the Vigna system—”

“Where you will succeed. You will achieve significant conversion and return to those whom love you.”

Brody didn’t finish his thought—that they’re sending him to determine the status of an alien that he despised, an alien that ruined his friend Antosha, the man who had destroyed the lives of so many families and scientists.

The minister, as ever, knew what Brody would say, even after all their time apart. “The ansible transmissions didn’t turn Antosha mad.”

“You weren’t with us on Mars.” Brody felt his blood pump in his head. “You didn’t experience the Lorum with—”

A cloud of lavender in Brody’s peripheral vision silenced him. “Ah, the People’s Captain,” Lady Isabelle said, “he who has failed longer than any other strike team captain in history.” She glared at Chancellor Masimovian, who stood with his arms folded through his layers of robes and gems. He didn’t look amused. When the chancellor started dancing with two of his maidens, Isabelle twisted her lips, then turned her attention back to Brody. “It’s a pleasure to see you off.”

“It’s a pleasure to be seen, my lady.” He bowed deeply to her. “Your presence is always welcomed prior to commonwealth missions.”

“It would do you well to remember why he is the People’s Captain,” Kaspasparon said, “and to remember your place in this commonwealth.”

“And you, yours, Minister.” Isabelle pushed her hand through her hair, elegantly setting it down her right side. “Leave us, I will speak to the
People’s Captain,
alone.”

“As you wish, my lady,” Kaspasparon said, without bowing. He joined a group of aristocrats near the bar.

The musicians began a new verse, while keeper bots weaved through the crowd with curved jars from which smoke curled. It smelled like vetiver and citrus, filled with synisms designed to calm, no doubt, for Brody’s worries seemed to evaporate. The aristocrats and ministers danced. Even Nero and Verena seemed content. Lady Isabelle raised her hand for Brody to accept. He didn’t know what to do. Why wouldn’t she join with the chancellor?

Brody embraced her, and they swayed together.

“You think I lack insight,” Isabelle said, “don’t you?” She spun out of his way, her gown whirling around her, before she returned to his grasp. “You think I cannot hear with your ears, or see with your eyes, or understand the truth—”

“On the contrary, my lady, you are as wise and kind as the gods,” Brody lied, moving his feet quickly with hers, right and left, left and right, mirroring her movements but not her tone, “and more beautiful than all the stars.” Isabelle smiled wanly. “I speak and think only the truth, in your presence or not.”

“As do I,” she said. She pulled him close to her, and with her lips near his ear, she said, “We sent the wrong scientist to the Lower Level.”

Brody assumed she referred to Antosha. Who else could it be? “He killed—”

“You kill, Captain Barão, you kill us all with every failure, you kill the hope within the people, you allow a disease to fester, a corrosion to spread throughout the commonwealth.”

Brody backed away from her. She couldn’t be blaming
him
for the attacks in Palaestra, could she?

She spun into him, and he dipped her. “The people serve,” she added, rising. “They live forever, like you, but unlike you, they’re held accountable for failure, and I will not stand idle, I will not allow you to bring down this commonwealth.”

Brody was speechless.

The song ended, as did the dance.

“Fail the chancellor again,” Isabelle said, “and the next visit won’t be from a courier.” She swept herself away from him back to Chancellor Masimovian, who was guffawing, a glass of wine in one hand, a burning cigar in the other.

Brody still found he couldn’t speak. Accepting a glass of champagne from a waiter bot, he downed it, then connected to the ZPF. He didn’t think it wise to target Lady Isabelle or Chancellor Masimovian. Whom could he invade? Ministers Charles, Decca, Kaspasparon, Sineine, Gorstian, Portia, Orosiris, Blaylock, Avalonia?

Gods forgive me,
Brody thought,
I must do this.

He accessed the ZPF in an aggressive and deceptive manner he hadn’t in more than fifteen years. He pushed his consciousness into Prime Minister Decca’s mind, understanding him as he would a report in his extended consciousness. Decca’s secrets, his demons, his fears, loves, and soul flowed through Brody. That Decca felt annoyance over the chancellor’s defiance of the ministry in issuance of a unilateral Warning surprised Brody less than the prime minister’s musings about his dead daughter, Haleya Decca, for the chancellor, in allowing …
his
return, defiled her legacy …

“Captain?” Nero said.

The prime minister and Tethys were looking at him strangely.

Brody realized his heart was thundering, adrenaline pouring through him.

“Captain?” Verena said.

Brody exhaled and cut off his connection with the ZPF and the prime minister. He looked down. The glass he’d been holding lay on the floor, shattered. With all the noise, the crowd didn’t seem to notice before a keeper bot vacuumed up the mess.

“Excuse me,” Brody said, “I need some air.”

Verena led Brody by the elbow out onto the cobblestone walk. “What’s going on?” she said. “I’ve never seen you like that, Captain. You just froze.”

When Brody didn’t answer, Nero said, “Brodes, what’s going on?”

“They’re using the Warning and this mission as cover to bring
him
back,” Brody said.

“Who?” Verena said.

“Antosha Zereoue,” Brody said.

Verena’s and Nero’s eyes widened.

“He’s returning to Beimeni.”

Northport

Gallia, Underground Northeast

2,500 meters deep

“Thank the gods you’re here,” Minister Jaide Bartonia said. She embraced Lady Isabelle so tightly the supreme director’s breathe escaped her, then the minister broke away as if struck by Reassortment. “My lady, why aren’t you wearing a synsuit?”

“I’m the Master of the Harpoons,” Isabelle said. The minister’s eyes darted back and forth. Isabelle put her hand on the minister’s arm. “Falling earth can’t hurt me, child,” Isabelle fluttered her hand, “I’ll brush it aside like the gods.”

“Very well, my lady, you must be swift, or more lives will be lost!” The minister hand-signaled her guardsmen, who formed ranks behind them; Isabelle ordered her Janzers to follow behind the guardsmen.

The group hurried along the west side’s highland, a terraformed plateau that held Albireo Station, the city’s interterritory transport station. Oak and maple trees with hollowed trunks sculpted to look almost transhuman dotted the grounds. Swift artificial winds sent twisters of mulch, dust, and greenery airborne, spreading the redolence of pine, maple syrup, and oak. Isabelle gulped the scents into her lungs, preparing herself for the stench of death.

They soon neared the steps leading down to the intracity transport trench. Isabelle stopped. From this height and position, she could see the entire industrial city: the spiral-shaped and domed citadel lined with synthetic pearls in the center; canyons of carbyne buildings, rimmed and surrounded by lime-green phosphorescent light; the hum of hydroelectric plants near the aqueducts and runoff canals; alloy chiseled into enormous strands of DNA scattered about; ships docked along the wharfs of the Hillenthara River on the south side; and on the east side, smoke plumed upon the horizon intermingling with the Granville sky. But it was the skywalks that spoke loudest to her.

“I can’t believe how empty the skywalks are,” she said to the minister. The skywalks, which passed over crisscrossing aqueducts and through the buildings, hung eerily quiet at a time during the morning when they’d normally be so overcrowded they would seem like flowing currents in midair. “How bad is the damage?”

“The terrorists attacked a supply depot on the east side,” Jaide said, perspiration rushing down her face. “I sent my guardsmen to defend the city but …” The minister blinked away tears. Even exhausted and in crisis, she still looked as youthful as the woman who had garnered the first bid at the Harpoon Auction in 243 AR. Her gold and violet hair hung thickly around her fur-lined cape and whipped across her plump lips with a strong gust.

She pulled her hair away from her face, seething. “Two support pillars collapsed and with them the Seventh Ward.” The minister balled her left hand into a fist. “My poorest … my hardest workers, now buried alive, and the rest of the city paralyzed with fear.” She turned to Isabelle. “My lady, avenge my dead.” She raised her voice, speaking through clenched teeth. “Avenge your people’s slaughter! Hunt down the terrorists, every last one of—”