Bitter Angels (30 page)

Without a pause even to look at me, four of the Clerks hurried toward the peeled core. Commander Barclay folded his hands behind his back, and I had the distinct feeling those hands were clenched. His jaw most definitely was.

I was bone weary. Behind me I heard the saints swearing and laughing and asking endless variations on a single question: “Are you sure you’re all right?”

I could have choked on my envy. As it was, I didn’t even dare glance toward them.

“I need your report,” Commander Barclay told me. “Take a moment to get yourself together and come straight to my office.”

I turned from him and found myself facing Terese Drajeske. Commander Barclay bowed to her and she to him, and the commander left to consult with the Clerks, but I suspect he did not go too far. Terese’s gaze kept flickering over my shoulder.

“What are you going to do?” she asked.

I sighed. Even having to stop to think about it brought a wave of weariness over me, but we were on the ground, and there were Clerks surrounding us, and Barclay was behind me. That precious moment in the black sky was gone for good.

“The first thing I’m going to do is check on whether Kapa’s been found by the Security.” I grimaced. “Or whether whoever sent them got there first.”
We might be able to bring Kapa back alive
. I remember thinking,
They don’t get to finish him. That’s my job
. He could do what he liked to the Blood Family, but he’d turned on me—on Emiliya—and that betrayal burned a stark, ashen line through my thoughts.

“Any ideas who did send them?”

I shrugged. “Could be any of a hundred.” I saw the city stretched out beyond the viewing platform; the broken, decaying city that had looked like an endless palace to me when I first blinked in its fading lights. “You could be seen as valuable in any number of ways.”

Her smile was mirthless. “Always nice to be wanted.” She hesitated. She was trying to decide how to proceed, trying to keep track of all the ears and all the potential harm she could do by speaking. It was odd to watch someone struggle with something I did as easily as breathing.

In the end, all she said was, “Will you help?”

“I understand,” Terese was saying. “If I can help…”

“Thank you.” I cut her off, craning my neck through the crowd of saints, guards, and Clerks, looking for the flash of white. But I couldn’t see anything. Emiliya had vanished. “But probably not.”

“Either way, will you come down and find us?”

I nodded. “Either way, I will.”

“Thank you.”

Terese turned away from me, and I turned away from her, both of us switching the other off from our awareness. My whole business was now to cross the dusty expanse of the port yard with the darkness yawning overhead, letting the reflected light from Fortress and the shining worlds pound down on the back of my neck.

Letting two Clerks fall into step behind me without letting myself be seen to care.

I still didn’t see Emiliya anywhere. It was as if she had vanished, or been spirited away.
No
. She was working for the Blood Family, for the Grand Sentinel. They wouldn’t have just taken her.

She was working for the Grand Sentinel and she had heard every word I had said to Terese Drajeske.

She was not like Kapa.

There were toilet rooms on the far side of the yard. I passed a battered piece of scrip to the ancient man who stood sentinel there and went inside, with the Clerks following close behind.

I relieved myself into the filter toilet. I rubbed hands, neck, and face over with cleaner and scraped it off and felt no better. The Clerks watched me in silence. They were both men. One was slim and delicate, the kind who’d grown up malnourished as a child and never recovered from it. The second was solid muscle from boots to bald, pale head. Their eyes were alert, engaged, darting back and forth as if they could see—or hear—more than I could. I thought about the rumors about their network again. Were they getting reports through the bones of their ears? It was certainly possible. The idea made me itch. I tossed the scraper and towel into the bin for the old man to clean.

“Where’s Hamahd?” I asked.

The thin, delicate one actually jumped. I watched him struggle to focus down on me.

“He has temporary duty elsewhere.” His voice was light, breathy. “He is expected to return to assignment here.”

“Are you his replacements?”

The block Clerk blinked rapidly. “That has yet to be determined. Are you finished, Captain Jireu?”

“Yes.” I turned toward the door. Hamahd had been “temporarily assigned” elsewhere before. Clerks, like the rest of us, needed to be debriefed, retrained, and reminded of all the different kinds of strings that held them in place. After the first few times, I managed, mostly, not to let it bother me.

Of course they hadn’t heard. They couldn’t have heard. There was no possible way Kapa would have disabled the flight safeties only to have the cameras on.

No possible way they could have heard unless Emiliya told them.

But even as my mind filled with thoughts of Emiliya, part of it was busy trying to calculate what the cost of maintaining two Clerks was going to do to my debt levels. This was what ten years in the Security had done to me.

By the time I reached Upsky Station, perspiration was trickling down my back. I walked down the shabby corridors toward Commander Barclay’s office. We passed the Clerks’ hive with its busy silence. I glanced toward them as frequently as I dared, searching for Hamahd’s form and wondering how bad things had gotten that even he would be a comforting presence.

When my new Clerks and I entered his office, we found Commander Barclay alone and standing by the window overlooking the Upsky park. The light outside flickered strongly at that moment. He waved me to a chair with a table and a full welcome jar beside it. I drank off two cups of the water far too fast for courtesy, but my throat burned and I wasn’t going to waste the chance.

Barclay watched me without comment until I set the cup down.

“What happened?” he asked simply.

I felt the Clerks at my back. I swear I could sense their gazes as they swept back and forth. I set that aside and gave as bland and factual an account as I could of how we had
spotted Kapa’s ship, how we had given chase and taken hold, and how everything had gone wrong.

Barclay listened, frowning, his dark brows drawn low over his eyes.

“He was known to you?”

Here it came. I had known it would. It had to. “We grew up together on Oblivion, and we were in the Breakout together.”

“And then the academy.”

“Yes.”
Keep it calm
, I ordered myself.
Keep it down. Let them ask the questions. Do not say anything you do not have to
.

“He resurfaced again just a few days ago.”

Of course. Of course. I kept my face calm. “Yes.”

“And you did not think this was worth bringing to anyone’s attention.” My commander glowered at me. I could feel he was trying to tell me something. It was beating against my mind, but I couldn’t understand it. He and I had never had any rapport. We had never wanted one.

“He said that he was paid up and legal. I believed him. I was wrong.” I was so tired. I wanted to go home. Did Father even know anything was wrong?
Where is Emiliya?

Barclay just looked out the window for a long time, not caring now if I saw his clenched fist behind his back.

“Your assistance will be required with the salvaged engine compartment,” he said. “The Clerks want to give the core a thorough going-over, to see what the pirates are up to in terms of beating the security protocols. If you’ve altered the commands at all, you are going to have to show them what you’ve done.”

“With respect, Commander,” I said. “It’s going to be difficult to shuttle out to Habitat 1 and still be on duty for the saints.”

I met and matched Barclay’s bland gaze. A peeled core—a working internal drive—was an incredible prize. It would be classified as Highly Dangerous under the Flight Guidelines, but if one handled the circumstances carefully—if one knew the right people to ask, the right records to tweak and send—it could potentially be sold for more than the average year’s debt. Especially if one had access to the right people inside the Clerks.

“Yes, Commander,” I said.

I found myself wondering afresh exactly where Hamahd had gotten to. Barclay might press a favor out of him in order to let him keep his easy posting here.

I bowed my head briefly in acknowledgment. If Barclay wanted to engage in an auction for the core, it didn’t matter to me. If Hamahd was in on it with him, it was none of my business. What I wanted to know was where the hell Kapa had gotten his hands on it in the first place.

Barclay’s glower had returned, trying one more time to force me to understand the meaning of his silence. I just looked back.
I’m tired. I’m hungry. Let me go home
.

“Dismissed. You have the night off, unless the Clerks need you.”

“Thank you, Commander.” I made my formal bow, received my dismissive nod, and left, my new pair of Clerks behind me.

I should have been suspicious when they didn’t demote me. I wasn’t. I assumed Commander Barclay had no one he liked better to replace me. All those years of not making trouble, of following orders and keeping the OBs from making more than the acceptable amount of trouble, were showing dividends.

I wanted to find Emiliya. It must have been brutal, having Kapa turn on her like that. I needed to make sure she was all right. But I had reached my limit. I had to rest, I had to eat. I had to let Father know what had happened.

I had to find a way to let him know I had thrown my lot in with Terese and the saints. I tried to picture what he would say, and I couldn’t. I could not even begin to formulate the thought.

And I had to find out what the secops on my station had been up to behind my back. They weren’t any more corrupt than usual, but there was more than one of them who would have the knives out if they thought a better place had opened up, and everybody’s back would be a target.

And we had not just one place vacant now, but two. The image flashed through me of Leda and Ceshame crumpled on the deck, the last of their life oozing out with their blood.

It was too much. I knuckled my eyes and tried to think. I turned to my new Clerks.

“Could either of you tell me…”

But neither of them was looking at me. They had both turned to stare up. I tracked their gaze. At first, all I saw was a figure in black, tearing along the upper walkway, dodging the other pedestrians, forcing his way through the crowds, and he glanced down and saw me staring up.

Hamahd. Hamahd racing across the bridge like a madman.

“Captain!” he shouted. “Captain!”

Hamahd saw them coming. He started backward, away from his own kind.

He looked down at me standing there gaping up at him. They were almost on him, moving smooth as machines.

Hamahd stood there for a moment, watching them come on. Then he swung himself over the rail and he jumped, diving headfirst toward me. His coat billowed in the wind as he fell down, arms outstretched, a great black bird diving down on its prey.

“Hold him!” shouted someone. I leaned out and snatched at the air, and somehow, grabbed his hand. Even in our light gravity, I about wrenched my arm out of its socket, and the rail bashed against my ribs and wobbled—it held. Pain blinded me for an instant, but I hung on.

“Captain,” Hamahd gasped. “They’re using you.”

“Hamahd, get up here, have you lost your mind?” The Clerks had changed directions, they were running toward us. I saw them and so did Hamahd.

“They’re going to use you to finalize the new network.” He curled his free hand around the railing. It was buckling. It was going to give. “Get out. The saints could still get you out.”

They were almost on us. Hamahd braced his feet against the balcony. I made to haul him up. But he arched his back, yanked his hand free, and fell.