The Knights of the Black Earth (5 page)

Xris opened his
mouth to introduce himself, but Wiedermann had shifted his attention to his
desk. He made a sudden dive at a pile, snagged and pulled out—from about a
quarter of the way down—a thick manila folder. The removal of the folder sent
everything that had been stacked on top of it cascading to the floor. Xris
leaned down to pick them up.

“Don’t touch them,”
Wiedermann snapped.

He opened the file
folder, flipped through the contents quickly. Satisfied, he returned the
green-eyed gaze to Xris.

“A gatherer,”
Wiedermann said.

“I beg your
pardon?” Xris blinked.

“I’m a gatherer.
As in hunter/gatherer. Racial memory. Our ancestors. Men were hunters, women
gatherers. Men went out, hunted food. Women foraged. Men could find game almost
anywhere. Women had to remember where the berry patches were located from one
year to the next, even after the tribe had moved from one hunting ground to
another. Nature gave women the ability to remember the location of various
objects that would guide them to the food.

“Take a woman.
Show her unrelated objects scattered at random on a desk. Remove her from the
room. Thirty minutes later, ask her what object was where and odds are she’ll
be able to remember. A man, given the same test, won’t have a clue. I’m a
gatherer, myself. I suppose, over the centuries, some of the gentler lines have
been obscured.”

It occurred to
Xris that a lot more than Wiedermann’s gentler lines had been obscured, but the
cyborg kept quiet. Wiedermann did not expect a response, apparently. He was no
longer paying attention to his client, had begun flipping through the myriad
documents in the file.

Xris shifted
restlessly. Tiny beeps from his cybernetic arm and the faint hum of his battery
pack blended with the hum of the various computers behind Wiedermann. The
detective continued to peruse the file, but Xris had the impression that
Wiedermann’s thoughts had drifted off somewhere else.

Xris decided it
was time those thoughts returned to him.

“Uh, look, Mr.
Wiedermann—”

“Ed. Ed
Wiedermann. The younger.”

“Fine. You sent
for me, Ed. I take it that means you’ve made some progress on my case?”

“Yes. Yes, we
have.” Wiedermann nodded, continued to study the file. “We’ve completed it
successfully, in fact.”

The surge that
went through Xris had nothing to do with his batteries. Elation sparked, its
jolt nearly stopping his heart with bright, intense pleasure. He spent a moment
reveling in the triumph, then said slowly, “You mean you’ve found him. Rowan.”

“Dalin Rowan.”
Wiedermann savored the name. “We’re close. Very close.”

Xris shut his
eyes. Emotion brought tears, burned behind the lids. His hand—his good hand,
resting on his good knee—clenched into a tight fist. Nails dug into his flesh.
Good flesh, warm flesh. Blood—warm blood, real blood—throbbed in his temples. A
buzzing sounded; his system was warning him that it was having difficulty
compensating for this sudden adrenaline rush that was unaccompanied by
strenuous physical exertion. He drew in several deep breaths to try to calm
himself down.

“Tell me—where is
he?”

“I don’t think so.
I’ve called a halt to the operation,” Wiedermann said offhandedly, frowning at
the file in his hands.

“You did what?”
Xris couldn’t believe he’d heard correctly, thought his auditory system might
have shorted out.

“I spoke clearly
enough.” Wiedermann was testy. The green eyes narrowed. “I’ve halted the
operation. I have a good idea—an excellent idea, in fact—where this case is
headed. And I don’t like it. We could find ourselves in a great deal of
difficulty. Our firm is not, at this point, prepared to accept the risk. I’ve
spoken with my father and he—”

With his good
hand, Xris shoved aside an enormous stack of folders, toppling them to the
floor. He leaned over the desk, planted the left elbow of the metal arm in the
newly cleared space directly under Wiedermann’s nose.

“You see this?”
Xris wiggled his metal fingers. “Nine years ago, this arm was real. So was my
leg, my eye, and all other parts of me. I won’t bore you with the details—you’ve
got them on file. I damn near died in that explosion. Dalin Rowan, my friend
and partner, saved my life. But I never got a chance to thank him. After the
accident, he disappeared.

“I owe him.” Xris
was forced to pause, readjust himself. He was experiencing momentary breathing
difficulty. “I owe him big. I spent a year of my own life searching for Dalin
Rowan. No luck. You’ve spent six years’ worth of my money searching for him.
You tell me you’ve found him, but you won’t tell me where he is. I think you
might want to reconsider. Hand over that file.”

“Certainly.”
Wiedermann was calm, not the least intimidated. “But you wouldn’t find it much
help. It’s not your case. Here, see for yourself.”

Xris backed off.
He’d played enough ante-up to know when a man was bluffing. “All right, then.
Where are my files?”

“In the computer.”
Wiedermann indicated the screens behind him.
“One
of the computers. You’ll
never find them, you know. Not if you searched a lifetime. And I didn’t say I
wouldn’t
tell you. I haven’t decided.”

“What do you want?”
Xris demanded. “More money?”

Wiedermann shook
his head. “We operate in this galaxy at His Majesty’s pleasure. At any time,
the galactic government could revoke our license. If that happened, the total
worth of the Crown Jewels couldn’t compensate us for our losses. If your case
results in legal action against us, I want to be certain we have a chance to
win.”

“Legal action?”
Xris snorted. “What legal action? I’m trying to find my friend—”

“It’s up to you,”
Wiedermann interrupted. “If we decide not to proceed, you won’t be charged for
our time. We’ll refund your retainer. You won’t be out anything.”

“Only eight years
of my life,” Xris said through clenched teeth.

“Tell me your
story.”

“I told you the
goddamn story once. Your operative, that is. It’s in the blasted files!”

Wiedermann leaned
back in his chair. Crossing bony legs over bony knees, he put the tips of his
fingers together.

Xris eyed the
computer screens. His fingers twitched. He was good with computers, but he wasn’t
that good. Dalin Rowan—now there had been the computer expert. In all these
years, Xris had never run across anyone as good as Dalin.

Slowly, reluctantly,
the cyborg sat back down.

Xris paused a
moment to get his thoughts in order. It didn’t take long. Not a day went by but
that he didn’t think about it. Wondering, trying to make sense of it.

“It was back
during the days of the democracy. I was a Fed, a member of the bureau detailed
to handle interplanetary crime. I don’t know how much you know about the
agency; probably quite a bit.”

Wiedermann smiled,
nodded. “The bureau hasn’t changed all that much under the new regime. Cleaned
up some, maybe. But basically the same.”

“No reason it
should change,” Xris said. “They’ve got good people. We were good, most of us.
Dedicated. Loyal. And if there
was
some corruption, hell, that’s only to
be expected in an organization that big. Of course, I didn’t know at the time
that the whole damn government was corrupt, from the president on down. Not
that it would have made much difference, I guess. I did what I did for the
bureau for my own reasons.”

“And those were?”

Xris shrugged.
Taking out the cigarette case, he held it in his hand, but didn’t open it. He
tapped it thoughtfully with a good finger.

“It’s no big moral
thing with me. Right. Wrong. Good. Bad. Ethics vary from planet to planet. On
Adonia twenty years ago, it was legal to abandon a child for being ugly. We had
a hell of a time with local laws. But that’s not important. What got to me,
what kept me going, were the people who got fat off other people’s misery.”

“Yes, go on.”

Xris shifted in
his chair, attempted to make himself more comfortable. Not an easy task when
half his body was metal.

“I don’t suppose
you’d let me smoke?”

Wiedermann shook
his head, patted his chest. “Asthma.”

Xris removed a
twist from the case, clamped his teeth down on it, chewed it. The bitter juice
flooded his mouth, washed out the faint metallic flavor that he always tasted,
despite the fact that the doctors told him it was all in his mind. Some days
the taste was stronger than others.

“It’s what kept me
from being on the take, I guess. I had my chances, but I knew where the money
came from: babies who were born whacked out from drugs, sixteen-year-old
hookers smashed up by their pimps, old people swindled out of their life
savings. These people were at the bottom and at the top were guys in the fancy
limojets who held handkerchiefs over their delicate noses when they drove
through the stinking slums they helped create. Bringing those guys down, making
them lie flat on the pavement in the muck and the filth, rubbing those delicate
noses in it—that’s why I worked for the bureau.”

Xris thrust the
case back in his shirt pocket. “I had money enough. Everything I needed,
everything I wanted. My wife and I—”

Xris stopped
abruptly, smiled easily. “But you don’t want to hear all that. It was a long
time ago, anyway. And it all came down to one job. One simple, routine job.. ..”

To unfailingly
take what you attack, attack where there is no defense. For unfailingly secure
defense, defend where there is no attack.

Sun Tzu,
The Art of War

Xris and his
longtime friend and partner Mashahiro Ito forced their way through the crowds
pouring out of the mass transit station, walked the short distance to the main
entrance of FISA headquarters. The season was spring on Janus 2. The gardens
decorating the grounds were just beginning to come back to life after their
winter’s hiatus. Budding trees extended protective limbs over the tentatively
blooming flower beds. Ito had once discoursed at great length on the symbology
of the protective trees, the helpless flowers. Xris, grinning, had once told
Ito what he could do with his symbology.

A large and
massive sign read
administrative
government facility, janus
2. The sign made no mention of the fact that
the Federal Intelligence and Security Agency was housed inside the building; it
was supposedly top secret. But everyone on the planet knew. Janus 2 was quite
proud of it. The building was a regular stop for tour shuttles.

The agents dodged
a group of uniformed schoolchildren, who squealed with delight.

I’ll bet he’s a
Fed!”

Hey, mister, can
we see your gun?”

Xris shook his
head, kept walking. A large and ugly electrified fence—a grim contrast to the
flower beds—surrounded the building. Xris was always meaning to ask Ito what
symbology the fence held.

“Any idea what
this meeting is about?”

“Nope,” Ito
answered, lowered his voice. “But it’s bound to be about the Hung. We’ve been
working on this damn case for months now. Word is it’s ready to break.”

“About time! I
hope this isn’t another of those goddamn ass-numbing talk sessions. Sit around
and yammer at one another for hours and get nothing done.”

Ito laughed, but
he wasn’t very sympathetic. He liked the planning part of any assignment,
considered it a “cerebral exercise.” Xris considered it bullshit He liked the
action—the forty-four-decawatt lasgun pointing at some punk’s skull and the “Freeze,
Federal agents! Hands behind your head!” part of the operation.

“Is Rowan coming?”

“I don’t know,”
Xris said shortly. “I haven’t seen much of him lately.”

Ito cast a sharp
glance at his friend. Xris was aware of the scrutiny, did his best to ignore
it. Dalin Rowan was the third member of what a few in the agency jokingly
called the Trinity. Xris, Ito, and Rowan: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, so named
because Xris was the oldest and the biggest; Ito was short, slender, and the
youngest; Rowan was quiet, unassuming, and could walk through a computer
without leaving a trace behind. The three had worked together for years now and
were one of the top teams in the agency. They were also close friends. Or
rather, they used to be.

The two agents
entered the first checkpoint—a small access building with two doors. One door
provided entrance through the electrified fence, the other door granted access
to the facility. Security guards checked ID badges and issued visitor passes to
those who were cleared for them.

The senior guard
looked up from his newsvid reader and nodded.

“Going to cause
any trouble today, Xris? I just need to know, so’s I can plan my lunch break
around you.”

Xris shook his
head. “Hell, that was an accident, Henry. I didn’t mean to set off the alarms.
I forgot I had the damn knife on me.”

“Huh-uh.” Henry
grinned. He’d been an agent once, until he could no longer pass the physical.
But that had been at age eighty. He still had a grip like a nullgrav steel
vise—as Xris had good reason to know.

“You’re in charge
of him today, Ito. I’m getting too old for this sort of thing.”

“You’ll outlive us
all, Henry.” Ito laughed.

Xris was to
remember that remark.

He and Ito entered
the main administration headquarters building, encountered another security
guard.

Ito pulled his
lasgun out of his shoulder holster and placed it on the counter. “Morning,
boys.” Folding his arms, sighing, he settled back to wait.

Xris laid his
regulation lasgun on the counter. He drew forth a small modified derringer from
his suit pocket and placed it on the counter. Next came a long, thin blade from
the back of his jacket, a needle-gun from a leg holster, and a boot knife.