The League of Spies (4 page)

Cherek undipped the comlink again. “Good, good. I’m going to give you to Mapper. Maybe Mapper can talk you through disabling them. Mapper’s a good agent.”

Mapper asked Tinian questions about the security array on the door, then began providing detailed instructions on how to deal with the devices. Joram half-listened but kept most of his attention on the surrounding speeders and pedestrians. Traffic was increasing, and four people sitting for a protracted period in a parked airspeeder would eventually become conspicuous.

“I think I’ve got it,” Tinian said. The last display is green now. It reads ‘Clear.’”

“Good job,” Mapper said. “I’m giving you back to the boss.” He handed the comlink over. ‘The door’s about halfway along the north wall. She hears speeder traffic, so it’s exterior,”

“We’re coming for you, Grimtaash-Two,” Cherek said. He exited the airspeeder. Mapper and Joram followed. Livintius scooted over to be behind the controls. He had been thrilled to be made the speeder-man, the unit’s getaway specialist, for this operation, On the short walkover, Cherek said, “Now, how do we get from the basement to the cell block?”

They walked in silence for a minute while Joram formulated his response. Finally he said, “I have an idea-a partial idea, anyway. But there’s a problem with it that I just can’t work out. So it probably won’t succeed.”

“Probably not,” Cherek agreed. “Let’s hear it.”

“We have Livintius watch the front entrance for a few minutes. At the point a unit of PlanSec agents brings in one or more prisoners, we have Tinian and another one of us stand by at the basement door, peeking out. She and the other fall in behind the agents and their prisoner, and see if they can get into the secure hall on their shirttails. Livintius can run back to the speeder then.”

“Ah,” Cherek said. “But Tinian’s the only one of us in uniform. Even if they let her in, why would they let the other one in’”

“He’s her prisoner, see. Hands bound behind his back, he puts on a perpetrator face... you know.”

Cherek nodded, considering. “So what’s the insoluble problem with this plan?”

“Well, of the three of us, none of us is dumb enough looking, or disreputable enough looking, to pass as a criminal.”

“Ah.” Cherek thought about that as they turned the corner, crossed the narrow traffic lane between the security building and the building adjacent to it, and reached what had to be the access to Tinian’s door - a flight of duracrete steps descending into shadow. The three of them looked around, making sure that no one was watching, and trotted down the stairs.

Cherek said, “Joram, it’s time for you to redeem yourself. I’m sure you can pull off that role.

It’s almost no acting required.”

Joram made his voice light, his tone naive. “You really think so?”

“I do.” Cherek clapped him on the shoulder, then capped on the door.

Her hand on the small of his back, occasionally shoving to propel him forward, Tinian kept Joram close behind the trio of uniformed PlanSec agents and their prisoner, a spindly woman who persisted in complaining that she’d divorced the man, that he was now remarried on Corellia, that she had no Republic leanings.

The secure portions of the building seemed packed with PlanSec agents, all energetic, all discussing the war to come. Snatches of defense plans, evacuation plans, and retaliation plans drifted past. Joram knew that he had to be pallid and sweating but decided that it would merely lend authenticity to his role.

Then they were past the first set of offices and cross-corridors, leaving most of the crowd behind.

A uniformed officer up ahead-tall, balding, with a build like an athlete twenty years younger than his apparent age-noticed them. “What’ya got there, guardswoman?”

“Prisoner delivery,” Tinian said. “From Dandahass, that’s my station. This guy was named by one of your prisoners and wants to work a deal. He’s a Republic Intelligence contact,”

“One of our prisoners?” The officer eyed Joram speculatively. Joram held his gaze for a moment but then broke eye contact as if unable to withstand the man’s stare.

They were close enough now to the man that Tinian could drop her tone. “Yes, your guy is...”

She consulted her datapad, unnecessarily. “Edbit Teeks. This one, Varpo Prabb, admits to being his main connection among native Tarhassians.”

“Good, good.” The officer gestured for them to follow, then led them down the corridor.

“Teeks. Fine work. Come into my office.”

Joram and Tinian followed, Joram taking a; fast an impression as he could of the office. He saw a semi-opaque viewport for privacy, chairs that seemed skeletal compared to all the others he’d encountered here, a desk heaped with stacks of reports, datachips, odd-shaped knickknacks.

For the moment, they were out of sight of anyone in the hallway, Tinian drew her blaster-Renkel’s blaster. “Don’t move.”

The officer froze. Joram could see him calculating-was it worth it to shout and warn his fellows when it might mean death? Was there any chance this woman would hesitate, not fire at all’

Joram kneed the officer in the groin, putting all his mass into it. The officer folded forward. His groan was loud enough to carry, but the noise from the hallway was also loud. Joram twisted his wrists out of the bonds loosely wrapped around them and tapped the wall button; the door slid shut with a whoosh. Then he took a metal model of a PlanSec corvette from the desktop and brought it down on the back of the man’s head. It took three blows, but the officer finally fell unconscious.

“Joram, I’m not sure I’m fit to do this,” Tinian said. Her voice was shaky. She looked at the blaster in her hand as if puzzling out what to do with it next. “I’m not a killer like you and Mapper.”

“We’re not killers like us, either.” Joram weighed matters. Compartmentalizing information was usually a good idea, but not when it caused distrust among a Hies one depended on for survival.

“The Renkel woman is still alive.”

“What?”

“She is. Cherek and Livintius don’t know. Listen, you’re doing fine. Get this man’s restraints from his belt clip and bind him. Then gag him.” Joram reached down to pull the man’s datapad from his belt pouch. “Let’s find Teeks. “

At this hour, the second-floor cell and interrogation area were lightly guarded and trafficked.

Tinian, again working her prisoner-delivery story, put Joram in front of an outer-perimeter guard, then an inner-perimeter guard. Each time, while pretending to hand the guard her datapad with the documents on her prisoner, she lured the guard into reaching through the bars for it. Joram grabbed each man in turn, dragged him into the bars, and held him there while Tinian stunned him with Renkel’s blaster. Then the identity disk of the officer they’d captured downstairs gave them access into the detention area beyond.

Finally, they stood outside the cell marked with the number that corresponded to Teeks. Joram could see through the transparisteel panel in the door; a middle-aged man of medium build, a light and unkempt beard on his face, dressed in prisoner pastel violet, was asleep on the cell’s bunk. On the far wall, a high viewport admitted exterior light. Joram waved the officer’s identity disk in front of the door sensor, but its readout remained resolutely red.

Joram keyed his comlink. “Grimtaash-Five to One, come in.”

“This is Grimtaash-Four.” It was Mapper’s voice,

“Four, where’s One?”

“Asleep.”

Joram grinned. “How’d that happen?”

“I didn’t make him any promises, Five. He bumped his head,”

“Right. We’re just outside the pickup point. We’re going to need a distraction as soon as possible. A big, loud one. Do that, then exit. We’ll becoming out on the north face, too. Three, are you ready to stand by?”

“Moving into position.” Livintius’s voice was unnaturally high. “What do you mean, he’s sleeping?”

“Well, he’s waking up. Still a bit groggy. And he’s going to be mad. I’ll be ready with your distraction in thirty seconds.”

“Set it off, don’t wait for further instructions.” Joram pocketed his comlink, then began setting up his explosive charge on the cell door.

Moments later, there was a muffled boom from below. It seemed to have little effect. There was a faint vibration in the floor, but there were no shrieks, no rattling of ceilings and walls, no cascades of duracrete dust from above.

Then the sirens started. They were shrill whooping noises, a constant cycle of auditory pain. The comlink Joram had stolen from the unconscious officer blared with its own message: “Intruders, basement level. We’ve had an explosion event. Repeat, an explosion event.”

Suddenly there was a face on the other side of the viewport: Teeks, awake but sleepy, confused.

Joram keyed the comlink on the door. “Teeks, get against the far wall, cover yourself with your mattress.”

Teeks nodded and disappeared.

Joram set the timer on his charge, then he and Tinian withdrew along the corridor and around the first corner. Faces now filled most of the cell viewports. Some of these men and women were hammering, others talking, some pleading with nothing but their expressions. Joram ignored them.

He and Tinian were barely in place when the charge blew, hurling metal fragments all along the corridor. They rushed back into the cell.

Teeks rose from behind his improvised barrier. ‘Tell me this is a rescue. “

“This is a rescue,” Joram said. “I’m Joram. This is Tinian.” He slapped his other explosive charge on the exterior wall just beside Teeks’ knees, He set the timer for thirty seconds. “Tinian, cover the hallway.”

Teeks moved away from the new explosive. He took his mattress with him. “Do you know anything about my girlfriend? Is she under suspicion? Under arrest?”

“No, she’s not. She’s safe.” Joram moved away from the explosive, watched its timer count down, and something clicked into place for him. Renkel should be under suspicion. The fact that she’s not suggests that PlanSec’s certain that she’s innocent. Which they shouldn’t. Unless they have inside information about Teeks’ personal life and knew she wasn’t part of his team. But how would they know that and yet not know to pickup contacts like Thoib?

An agent would include personal details in his reports, but keep information about his resources, his contacts, secret.

So PlanSec has access to information from Teeks’ reports to his Intelligence superior. Maybe to the reports themselves.

Tinian said,

“Five.”

“What?”

“Four,” she said.

“Oh.” Joram joined her and Teeks behind the mattress.

“Three. Two. One,”

The wall blew out, this explosion sending duracrete dust into the air- mostly outward. Before the echoes had faded, Joram ran forward and peered out through the hole.

Below, the walkway and landspeeder lane were littered with-chunks of duracrete, Cherek’s rented airspeeder was parked twenty meters off to the right, directly in front of the basement doorway access. Mapper and Cherek, the latter staggering slightly, were already emerging from the stairwell.

“Are you ft for a one-story drop?” Joram asked. He had to shout; his hearing wasn’t what it should be, and be assumed that the hearing of his companions was similarly affected.

“Rather too late to ask,” Teeks shouted. “But yes.”

“After you,” Tinian shouted.

Joram slid feet-first through the hole, its broken edges scraping across his back, and dropped.

He landed on the unyielding walkway and continued his motion into a forward roll, a little clumsy-his back would be bruised tomorrow. But it was better than having a broken ankle or twisted knee.

He stood.

Teeks hit the walkway behind him. rolled nimbly to his feet, and gestured up for Tinian to follow.

Ahead, Mapper, on the street side of the airspeeder, and Cherek, on the walkway side, had its doors open.

Then a uniformed PlanSec officer, a young man with dark hair, leaped as if catapulted up from the basement stairway and planted his blaster in Cherek’s side. Even with his diminished hearing, Joram could hear the man’s shout of: “Do not move!”

Joram grimaced. It was amateur against amateur. No well-trained guardsman with a blaster would get that close to a perpetrator. And Cherek didn’t have the sense to-Cherek raised his hands as if to surrender, then made a move to knock the blaster aside.

The guardsman fired. Cherek, his chest smoking, a surprised look on his face, fell. The guardsman adjusted his aim toward Mapper and Livintius.

Tinian’s blaster shot struck him across the neck and shoulders. The man jerked and fell.

Mapper bad Cherek in the back seat before Joram and the others reached the airspeeder.

Livintius had the airspeeder in motion before they’d dogged the doors closed.

And they had a kilometer between them and the PlanSec building before the first security speeder left the building.

Mapper straightened from beside Cherek: bed. They were back in the dubious and temporary security of Cherek’s chambers. “I think he’ll live,” Mapper said.

But Cherek did not respond to the hopeful pronouncement; his chest bandaged, his eyes closed, he remained in the sleep of the badly injured.

Teeks rose from the room’s puffy chair. “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, but you’d better get off-world before they have enough information to catch you.”

“We can’t leave him,” Livintius said. He continued to eye Joram with suspicion, as if Joram had shot Cherek by remote control.

“Yes, you can,” Teeks said. “Get him into the speeder and I’ll take him to a safe house. I have safe houses, cover identities, money accounts all over.”

Livintius shook his head. “They’re found to be compromised. By your dead lover.”

“Zazana doesn’t know anything about my work.” Teeks shrugged, “I expect to tell her about it when I propose to her.”

Livintius pointed an accusing finger at Joram. “You didn’t tell him...”

Joram put a finger to his lips to hush the academic.

Joram didn’t begin to relax until he could see Tarhassan shrinking in the holocam view on the screen in the transport’s main cabin. In minutes, they’d be jumping to hyper space, headed for a planet that remained neutral as war flared up all around it. From there, they could make their way back to Coruscant. Meanwhile, he’d privately warned Teeks against communicating with Republic Intelligence or accessing accounts he’d mentioned in his reports-at least, not until Joram could form an impression of how Teeks had been exposed.