The Lazarus Particle (26 page)

“The only way Dell is going is if I’m going,” Alexia declared.

“That’s going to present something of a problem.”

“And why is that?”

“Besides the fact Kalifka Bazaar has a roaring fleshmarket trade, our primary contact comes from an extremely patriarchal and misogynistic culture. They don’t recognize the independence or equality of the females of their own species, much less those of ‘lesser species’ such as ourselves.”

“Then I’ll wear a disguise.”

“Out of the question.”

“Sir?” Torrey said. “If I may?”

“By all means.”

“With all due respect, Commander, I think if anyone’s demonstrated an ability to handle themselves in a difficult situation, it’s Alexia.”

Breed crossed his burly arms over his chest. “Likewise, sir.”

“Is my participation in this mission mandatory, sir?” Dell asked.

“Strictly voluntary. Dr. Perry stressed that as you are still technically under her care, it’s your call.”

“Then I’m afraid I’m with them, sir,” Dell said. “No her, no me. I can’t leave her here to worry about all of us after everything she’s already been through.”

Alexia twitched off a small smile as the boys went to bat for her. She quickly buried it when Commander Harm looked her over appraisingly.

“Alright,” he said, slapping his sides resignedly. “You boys drive a hard bargain.” He looked pointedly to Alexia. “Now for my terms: You wear a disguise and you do not speak under any circumstances, even in the unlikely event you are spoken to. If you are, signal one of us and we’ll handle it. Agreed?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Now, let’s move. Dr. Perry wants to put Dell through one last cattle call before she clears him to fly and we need to man you up some.”

Half an hour later Dell was medically cleared to fly and Alexia had been transformed. The disguise even fooled him for a second, and he’d known her all his life. Thankfully, someone with sense had ignored the obvious temptation to make her as mannish as possible. Given her frame and facial structure, that would have been virtually impossible. (Probably pretty comical, too.) Instead, they had relied upon a shapeless, rough-hewn cloak and cowl to disguise her figure. Some strategically applied makeup and highlighting completed the get-up. Short, cropped bangs up front; darker, thicker eyebrows and slightly hollower cheeks; and finally a dusting of fine metal shavings along her cheeks, chin, and neck to simulate a five o’clock shadow. Taken together, she looked convincingly androgynous. Someone might pay her a passing glance but in a busy market he doubted anyone would bother with so much as a second. Not in that get-up, anyway. Just another face in the crowd.

“What do you think? Not bad, right?”

“Sexy,” Torrey teased.

Alexia snorted. Not exactly the most feminine thing, but under the circumstances exactly what would be required. She was already getting into character. “If you think bound breasts and a wad of gauze shoved down my pants is sexy, I’m going to have to seriously reevaluate the state of our relationship.” Scowling, she shifted uncomfortably against the bindings. “Seriously, Commander, why is all this necessary if I’m going to be wearing the cloak the whole time?”

“We’re all going to be wearing them. The movement has some
friends in the Bazaar, but there’s bound to be plenty of eyes and ears we’d prefer remain as blind and deaf to our presence as possible. Discretion is the better part of valor, after all. There’s also a chance we might be searched prior to entry, so you not only have to look like a man, you have to feel like a man, at least so far as a cursory patdown goes.”

“Great,” she sighed. “I’m going to be felt up by some scummy gatekeeper. This day just keeps getting better and better.”

“Still time for you to reconsider.”

Another snort. “Like hell.”

“Right. Well, let’s get to it, people. No time like the present.”

The flight in was uneventful—just as the Kaliffi preferred it. Though somewhat patchwork in its construction, their naval presence was no less fearsome for it. (Several of their vessels would have looked right at home in an FPI fleet, Dell noted with interest.) Not that they were in the habit of turning away potential business. Far from it. Within minutes they were given coordinates to enter the low-orbital queue around the planet. From there they transferred to a skiff and were ferried directly to the checkpoint nearest their specified destination.

As they disembarked, a man on the other side of the checkpoint presented himself. He was large and unkempt, with a demeanor every bit as unfriendly as the cloying stench that seemed to follow his every move. Several others like him formed a rudely fashioned semicircle behind the man. “Halt,” he said. “Prepare to submit yourself to search.”

“No need, friend,” Commander Harm said, engaging the head man in an attempt to keep them from being patted down. “We’re carrying and we’d like to keep it that way. Small arms only. Personal protection, you understand.”

Technically not quite a lie. Dell, Alexia, and Commander Harm each carried a pair of DPC-35s lifted from their former enemies. Torrey and Breed, however, were each equipped with subcompact DPC-58ARs, a vicious combination of concealable size and heavy caliber firepower with virtually no recoil. The look on Torrey’s face when Commander Harm presented he and Breed with the newly acquired hardware was just short of orgasmic, at least according to Alexia. Too much information, Dell had replied.

“No weapons allowed in the Bazaar. No exceptions.”

“Oh, come now. You and I both know that’s not
entirely
true,” Commander Harm said. He produced a pair of chunky metal ingots from within his cloak. Palming them into the man’s hand, he added, “Send one of your runners to Ptsvy. Tell him ‘Cornelius’ sends his greetings.”

The man deftly accepted the ingots. An instant later they were gone. “Ki’ish,” he said with a quick jerk of his head toward a group of prepubescent boys gathered idly off to the side. One of the boys hopped to, hustling over quickly. The man leaned forward, relaying Commander Harm’s instructions. “Go.”

The boy took off like a shot, quickly disappearing within the bustling crowd beyond the well manned gate.

“It will be some minutes before he returns. Please step aside, that business may continue as usual.”

“Of course, of course.”

While they waited for the runner to return with Ptsvy’s imprimatur, Dell watched as a knot of freebooters allowed to enter ahead of them detoured down a narrow artery branching off from the Bazaar-proper. Headed for the fleshmarket and its many brothels, no doubt. Maybe it was just the workout talking, but envy and frustration spiked through him at the thought, jockeying for position within his id.

Beside him, Torrey raised a brow beneath his cowl. “Something on your mind, Dell?”

Dell felt his cheeks redden slightly beneath the cowl. He started to speak but his voice caught awkwardly in his throat until he cleared it. “It’s just I, ah, I’ve never really… you know.”

“Ahh.” Far from the laughing or teasing Dell might have expected, Torrey nodded understandingly. “And since you almost missed out altogether your first time around, you’re feeling a little antsy.”

“Something like that.”

Breed was a little more incredulous. Thankfully he at least remembered to whisper. “Seriously, man?
You
? You’re like the stud of the fleet. You could have any chick you want.”

“What? You’re fucking with me.”

“Oh my god.” Breed looked to Torrey, shaking his head as if to say
This guy
. “You haven’t noticed? Are you kidding me? Dude, all the ladies are crushing on you. You’re like this ripped, adorable back-from-the-dead puppy-dog mascot they all want to cuddle with. How are you of all people not getting laid right now?”

Dell was starting to regret bringing it up at all. “I don’t know, I just—”

“Don’t listen to him,” Torrey interrupted. “Look, if it makes you feel any better, we were all one at some point. My advice? Don’t overthink it. Just take it easy and let it come to you.”

“He’s got a point there. The only thing you’re missing out on down that way is a nasty case of VD and a month’s course of antivirals. Not pretty, trust me.”

“Okay, you can go ahead and listen to that part. That’s genuinely good advice.”

“Focus up, people.” Even shrouded behind his cowl, Commander Harm’s voice was no less sharp. The sound of it snapped them back to task as quickly as a whiff of smelling salts.

The child runner was on his way back, his little chest huffing and puffing as he clambered to a halt before his master, handed him a folded slip of paper, then promptly doubled over and vomited up the contents of his stomach. Indifferent to the boy’s plight, the man in charge unfolded the note. His eyes scanned slowly back and forth across the page as he read and reread its contents.

“Ptsvy instructs I am to extend greetings on his behalf to his old and most favored associate Cornelius. He further instructs I allow you to retain possession of your weapons. Make certain they remain well concealed at all times. You have two hours to conduct your business. Do you understand and consent to be bound by these conditions as they have been laid out for you?”

“On behalf of myself and my party, I understand and consent.” Two more ingots found their way into the man’s hand.

“You may enter,” the man said, standing aside. “Welcome back to Kalifka Bazaar, Cornelius.”

Dell carefully sidestepped the child runner’s sick as their party crossed the threshold into the Bazaar.

His first impression of the Bazaar was that it was teeming with humans and aliens of every type, more than he had ever seen in any one place. They were all humanoid, of course, all bipedal, all symmetrical, all bearing a roughly analogous set of physical features, but even so, the sheer variety and volume threatened to overwhelm the senses. And that was before he even got to the various others sights, smells, and tastes of the Bazaar. The stink of the dense press of humanity; the musky, feculent odor of pack animals bound for slaughter; the remnant, vaguely metallic tang of the recently slaughtered still hanging in the air; the sometimes sweet, sometimes spicy aroma of exotic spices and herbal remedies. All of these and more combined to create a cloying yet oddly compelling funk Dell had a feeling he and his companions would be smelling on themselves and their clothes well after they had taken leave of this place.

“We’re here,” Commander Harm said as their path through the complex layout of the Bazaar terminated before one of the more elaborate and imposing permanent structures Dell had yet seen. The compound was segregated from the rest of the Bazaar by two massive reinforced gates and tall walls covered top to bottom in a tight alien script he could only guess was some form of calligraphy. As they approached, the gate began to open outwardly. By degrees they revealed something akin to a glittering oasis in the middle of a scorched, barren desert. Well manicured lawns set around a grid of wide lanes. Decorative foliage strategically placed at discrete intervals around the interior. A stately fountain to which all lanes seemingly led. They started into the compound, all the chatter and foot traffic of the Bazaar-proper seeming to fade away as the gate closed behind them.

They were met at the fountain by a reedy, long-limbed humanoid with a chalky gray complexion and strangely opalescent irises that made it difficult to precisely identify the color of his pupils. “Cornelius,” he said, dragging the last syllable into something of a breathy hiss.

“Jobosk.” He affected a tight, not altogether sincere smile. “I see you’ve done well for yourself. Majordomo now, is it?”

“Let us not pretend to be friends, Cornelius. I have not the stomach for the tedium of it. Now, come. Ptsvy is waiting.”

“Lead the way.”

The interior of the manor was wide and capacious. Armed guards idly strolled a perimeter lined with trickling canals and lush, leafy greenery. Fountains burbled at each of the corners framing Ptsvy’s inner sanctum, where presently he stood at the center of what could only be construed as a preposterous show of wealth where little actually existed. It was all in flux, constantly moving, like the water through the fountains. Everything here was predicated on a standard, a kind of status quo, the ebb and flow of one conflict to the next. But then the wars, the conflicts, the petty squabbles and the accidental skirmishes, they would never cease. And neither would places like this, Dell concluded with a mournful pang.

Ptsvy himself in no way resembled the paunchy, well heeled warlord Dell realized he had been expecting. Arrestingly short at all of four-foot-nothing, he shuffled forward to meet them with an awkward, stiff-legged gait and an impish smile perfectly suited to his diminutive stature. To Dell, the man looked as if he had never once had occasion to use any of the singularly lethal technologies in which he trafficked. The worst kind of arms dealer. Someone who’d fought at least had a sense of the level of death and destruction they were peddling. This man wouldn’t give anything but profit so much as a passing thought.

“My dear, dear Cornelius! So long it has been! Ptsvy was beginning to think you had forgotten your old friend.”

Commander Harm grinned. “Oh, but who could ever forget Ptsvy? I just haven’t been in the neighborhood lately, is all.” Dell and the others hung back a few feet while the two embraced enthusiastically, laughing in the way of business acquaintances playing at old friends. “Business is well, I take it?”

“Business is well? Business is booming, Cornelius,
booming
! War is always good for business.”

“A sad truth, I’m afraid.”

“Ah, yes, for those fighting the wars. For those supplying the warriors, it is a celebrated mantra,” Ptsvy said, his eyes practically twinkling. “Ptsvy assumes that is why you are here, yes?”

“Ptsvy always has possessed a certain clairvoyance when it comes to taking the measure of his clients’ needs.”

“As you say, Cornelius, as you say. Come, Ptsvy senses we have much to discuss.”

So they did. Nearly an hour after disappearing into Ptsvy’s manse, the two men had yet to emerge. That left Dell, Torrey, and Breed little to do but mill about and try to discreetly shield Alexia from Jobosk’s eerily inscrutable gaze. The rangy, ashen-skinned majordomo seemed to have developed an unhealthy interest in her male persona. More than once he approached their group under the guise of solicitousness, asking in that rasping hiss of his if they were all quite certain they would not like to indulge in Ptsvy’s hospitality.