Black Hole Sun (14 page)

Hell's Cross, Outpost Fisher Four
ANNOS MARTIS
238. 4. 0. 00:00

Dealing with the fallout from the Bramimondes' sudden entrance takes hours away from the job I want to do—getting ready for the real Dræu attack. Instead, we take care of her late husband/servant. We lay him in a makeshift grave and cover his body with a heavy tarp.

Ebi and Jean-Paul join us Regulators and a few miners to pay respects, but the Dame is too traumatized by the ordeal and demands a hot bath and a lie down. The lie down she gets. The bath—hot or otherwise—is a luxury nobody's going to worry about getting her.

And then the hard part. Finding out what the deuce the Dame is doing here, a thousand kilometers from home. So I call a meeting of all parties concerned. We gather in a room next to the infirmary on the arcade.

“We seem to have a new batch of visitors,” I say as we gathered around the table. “Mind telling us why you're here? Since they'll be staying with us for a while.”

“Staying here? I certainly shall not,” the Dame sniffs.

“It's not like you'd got much choice now,” Áine says. “Like it or not, you're stuck here.”

“Do not insult my intelligence,” the Dame says. “Do you really expect me to take the word of a group of emaciated dirt worms? Now, where is my son? I've come to—”

“Dirt worms?” Áine launches halfway across the table. “You bring the Dræu to our doorstep, and you insult us? I ort to spit in your face.”

“Ort?”
the Dame says, mimicking her. “Is that a word? I don't recall it being part of the bishop's Academy of Language. Although, I must say, your kind never had the benefit of hearing very much civilized speech.”

Áine curses under her breath. The Dame smiles, then looks to Maeve with a mocking eyebrow raised. The old lady only smiles in return.

It's not, I think, the reaction the Dame is wanting. But I'm getting tired of the game. We have to finish the redoubt before the Dræu attack again, our defensive tactics need tweaking, and I need to debrief my crew—the Dræu are much more than your common cannibalistic marauders.

“How is it,” I ask, keeping my voice calm and commanding, “that you came to be here, Dame Bramimonde?”

“Do you not listen? I told you that I have come to retrieve my son. Where is he? And that old man who led him here?”

“That's not what I asked you.”

“How dare you ask anything of me,
dalit
. I can barely tolerate sharing the same air with you.”

I ignore the insult. “You, your daughter, and your husband came to Fisher Four alone? For a son you don't care about. I find that hard to believe.” She cuts me a look, so I force the issue. “Wealthy folk like you not hiring bodyguards? That's unusual.”

“We did hire protection,” the Dame says. “The cowards fled as soon as the Dræu appeared.”

“Where are they now?” I ask.

“The Dræu pursued them.”

A pall falls over the room. We know what happens to people that the Dræu chase. “Where exactly did the Dræu appear?”

The Dame waves away my question. “As if I know anything about this wretched place.”

“Outside the station,” Ebi interjects. “It was an ambush. We were expected.”

“We, as in any humans?” I ask Ebi. “Or we, as in the Bramimondes?”

“We as in Bramimondes, I believe.”

“What difference does it make?” the Dame sneers. “Those animals only wanted to kill us. It is nothing short of a miracle that we found our way to safety.”

I doubt it's a miracle. More likely dumb luck. “It makes a very big difference, Dame. Was this a random attack, or did they target you specifically?”

The Dame flicks imaginary dust from her cuticles. “How would I know?”

“They knew it was us.” Ebi says, coming to the table, where she plants her hands firmly on the rough hewn stone. She stares fiercely at me. “The leader called us by name. He even introduced himself. I killed three of them in the firefight before our bodyguards deserted us.”

“The leader?” Fuse says. “The one that the chief shot?”

Ebi nods. “Yes, that was the leader. His name is Kuhru.”

“And he was specifically targeting you?” I say, the hackles on my neck rising. I don't like the idea that the Dræu were waiting for them. “Why?”

“He said that their queen wanted us,” Ebi says.

“Mimi, is she telling the truth?”

“Affirmative,” Mimi says. “Her heart rate and respiration indicate that she is telling the truth, as she knows it.”

“Thanks for the disclaimer.”

“Lie detecting is not an exact science, cowboy,” she says. “The standard disclaimer always applies.”

“So,” I ask Ebi, “why would the Dræu queen want you?”

“Easy,” Jenkins butts in before Ebi can answer, “she's hungry. Can we go now?”

I order him to pipe down, then ask Ebi, “Why does the queen want you and how did she know you were coming to Fisher Four?”

“Kuhru didn't say, but before the shooting started, he told the other Dræu to search us for the treasure.”

“Treasure?” Jenkins's ears perk up.

“Which was ridiculous,” the Dame says. “We carried nothing of value with us. Our departure was rushed, so we took only the bare essentials.”

“Along with a group of bodyguards,” Fuse adds.

I feel the situation slipping out of my hands—too many people are interrupting me—so I clear my throat. “Back to my original question: How did the queen know you were coming to Fisher Four?”

“I don't know,” Ebi says.

The Dame rolls her surgically sculpted eyes and taps a fingernail on the table. “As my daughter says, we do not know. We are not zoologists, after all, and I am weary from travel and from this inquisition. Lisette, accompany me to my quarters.”

“What quarters?” Spiner scoffs. “You've not been invited to stay amongst us. You'll be damned lucky the miners don't drop you down a chigoe hole.”

The Dame stands. “I will not be addressed in that manner.”

“You high-faluting hag!” Spiner launches off his stool. “Up in New Eden, they might put up with your crap. While you're on miner ground, you'll act like you've got some manners.”

The Dame huffs and scoots for the door. Spiner, furious at the slight, starts to follow her.

I let loose with an earsplitting whistle. “Nobody's going
anywhere until I get some answers. What's this treasure the Dræu are after?”

“Durango,” the Dame says, stretching out my name like a threat, “I have no idea. But I am exhausted, and I must see my son. Lisette, follow me.” She leaves the room. Ebi, though, doesn't follow her right away.

“Chief,” Ebi asks me, “may I be dismissed?”

“Dismissed,” I say, and she follows her mother. I've had enough arguing. I need to talk to the one person who can answer my questions directly. “The rest of you go, too. All of you. Except Maeve.”

Áine objects, “I'll not be taking orders from the likes of—”

“Áine, please,” Maeve says. “Go take care of the children.”

Reluctantly, she follows the others out of the room. But not before flashing an obscene hand gesture in my direction. She slams the door behind her.

“You've hurt the girl's feelings,” Maeve says. “What happened between you?”

“Nothing,” I say, and even I don't believe myself.

“
Nothing
can be
something
,” she says.

“Exactly my point,” I say, trying to change the subject. “You keep telling me the Dræu don't want anything, but they clearly want something: treasure. I agreed to take this job, but I need honest answers, and I need them now.”

Maeve stands up. “If it's answers you want, then follow me.”

That was easy, I think.

“Yes, it was,” Mimi adds. “Too easy.”

“Is she lying?” I ask.

“The standard disclaimer always applies.”

I have no choice but to follow Maeve. With the hem of her robe leaving a thin trail in the dust, she leads me up to the arcade. At the corner she presses on a panel, which slides open, revealing a hallway I hadn't discovered yet. The hall leads to a room, and inside is a single table made of wood, two matching chairs, and a glass lamp. The walls are covered with shelves and the shelves are filled with books. Books made of paper and bound together.

“A library,” I remark. “I've only seen one at battle school.”

Maeve takes a seat and motions for me to do the same. “It belonged to my family. Books were more precious to us than food. Each of us brought them with us when we immigrated.”

“Immigrated?”

“I was born on Earth,” she says. “My family left Boston after the plague caused the fall of the United Corporations of America. My father said that it was our chance at a new life, but I knew it was a life sentence. Argued with him the whole time he sold off most of our belongings and left us with nothing but the clothes on our backs. He kept saying that the Orthocracy would take care of us. But even at seventeen, I knew that wasn't true.” She pauses. “Seventeen. That's the age you and Áine are now, if you count in Earth years. Tch. Children grow up so much faster on Mars.
Live less long, too. Not such a bad thing, I think.”

“You were going to give me answers.”

She spreads her arms wide and sweeps past the shelves. “Treasure you sought. Treasure you've found.”

“A library?” Somehow I doubt that the Dræu are interested in books. They don't eat paper. “It's precious to you, maybe, but it's not treasure.”

“Define treasure.”

“Coin. Precious metals. Things so rare or in demand they have value.”

“Guanite.”

My brow wrinkles. Why is she cursing me? “I'm not following you.”

“Once upon a time,” Maeve says, “guanite was the most useful resource on Mars. Not valuable, but useful. The Phase Two engineers decided that polluting the planet was the fastest way to build up an atmosphere, so they built mining outposts all over the southern lands. The Fishers were the biggest, and Fisher Four was the grandest of all. An underground wonder, it was. You've seen the ruins. The Cross is all that's left, now, but before, ah, I've seen the digigraphs. This was before the Orthocracy tried to lay Fisher Four to waste because the miners wouldn't leave when the Manchesters and the ovens shut down. Now all we've got left is a few crumbling buildings and a million kilometers of empty tunnels to call home. We're like the guanite. Once treasure, now useless.”

I rub my head. “So what you're trying to tell me is that you have no treasure.”

“No,” she says, rising to her feet. “What I mean is that if the Dræu think we have treasure, it doesn't matter whether we do or not. All that matters is that they are willing to do anything to get it, and that makes your job that much harder.”

“A more cynical man would say impossible.”

“Then it's a good thing you are not a cynic.” She gestures toward the door. “May I show you out?”

As we're leaving, Maeve locking the door behind us, Mimi chimes in, “Did you believe her story?”

“Not a word of it,” I say.

“That's good, cowboy. Because according to her heart rate and breathing patterns, she—”

“Was lying?”

“Through her rust-stained teeth.”

Hell's Cross, Outpost Fisher Four
ANNOS MARTIS
238. 4. 0. 00:00

The queen sits on her throne looking down on Kuhru. The miserable worm, he has failed again. Such a disappointment. When she took the Dræu in hand, she thought he would be the valiant, true warrior she could hold up as an example. His battle school record was stellar—freakish physical skills with an aptitude for sharpshooting and a thirsty ambition.

That's probably where I failed, she thinks. I mistook ambition for intelligence and intelligence for the ability to follow simple, straightforward orders.

“What possessed you,” she says, pulling the dagger from her sleeve, “to attack Bramimonde? Your order was plain. Threaten her. Remind her that we were watching her every move. Remind her of the fate that awaits her if she dares to betray us. At what point did I tell you to chase her across the tundra like a pack of wild jackals?”

“The old woman slapped me, my queen,” he says,
bowing, but looking at her through fierce eyes. “It's was an insult. I had to save face before the Dræu.”

“Your little feelings got hurt, so you almost killed my spy?”

“That was not my intention.”

“And that bullet hole in your temple?” she says, tittering. “Did you mean to get shot or was that not something you intended, either?”

Absentmindedly, he touches his forehead. “No, my queen. I meant to kill the Regulators.”

“The Regulators are nothing!” She takes the dagger, slides it into his cheek, and pulls. The razor edge of the blade slits the skin, and his mouth flaps open, blood pouring onto the floor as he groans and cups his hands beneath his chin. “Bring me Postule. And clean up that mess.”

Hell's Cross, Outpost Fisher Four
ANNOS MARTIS
238. 4. 0. 00:00

An alarm sounds. A moment later Áine appears at the door. She beckons for the old woman to follow her in. “It's the Dræu,” she says. “They want to confab.”

“With me?” I ask.

“With Maeve,” Áine says. “Nobody else.”

We all jog to the Cross, where Vienne is directing the miners to take their positions on the redoubt. As my Regulators wait for orders, Maeve looks to me. I can read the question in her eyes: What should we do?

No choice here. I tell her to meet with the Dræu. “You do the talking. We'll provide a show of force.”

“Should you be letting the animals know you're here?”

“Too late for that,” I say. “They already know you've got Regulators on board. They just don't know how many. Let's not let them find out.”

“What about me and my children? I have no desire to meet with that filth,” Dame Bramimonde calls out to me.
She is standing with Ebi near the exit that leads to the Zhao Zhou Bridge. So much for needing a rest, no?

I look to Maeve. “Can you hide them?”

“Mother can hide,” Ebi says, and pulls her armalite. “I will go with you.”

“Guess that settles the question,” I say. “You can join us, but you have to follow my orders.”

“Yes, chief.”

“The most important of which is to stick with Vienne and do only what she tells you to. Got that?”

“Yes, chief.”

“You say that, but it's only fair to warn you that Vienne breaks bones when folk don't do what she says.” I give the order to go and we all began to file out, except for Jenkins, who remains on near the exit, unmoving.

I elbow Jenkins as I pass. “Snap to it, Regulator.”

“But—but where is everybody going?” He reluctantly pulls his armalite. “I heard the word
treasure
. I thought there'd be treasure.”

“Sorry, Jenkins,” I say. “No treasure this time. Just one old lady fussbucket.”

“How about we just feed the fussbucket to the Dræu?” Fuse says as we move down the stairs to the path that leads to the Zhao Zhou Bridge

“Right. It would solve two problems. Get rid of her and poison the Dræu that ate her.” Fuse laughs.

But I don't feel like joining in on the joke. There's
something wrong here. Back in New Eden, Dame Bramimonde didn't give a rip about her son's life. She wanted to leave him with the kidnappers, so why would she travel to the end of the world to rescue him?

I don't believe her story about Ebi wanting to rescue her brother, either. The girl may love her brother as dearly as she says, but I doubt seriously that she holds that much sway over her mother. There has to be another reason.

“Chief?” Vienne points to a phalanx of Dræu crossing the Zhao Zhou Bridge. They carry a white banner tied to the barrel tip of a rifle.

In formation, we move forward to meet them. Maeve walks a meter ahead of us. Áine is directly behind her, and I'm after her. A few meters ahead, a man steps out from the phalanx and walks toward us. He wears long, flowing robes. His head is shaven, and his Buddaesque belly precedes him. He could pass for a monk if not for the sidearm holstered to his waist on a black leather belt that creaks when he walks. When he's close enough, I can smell perfume oils, sweat, and underneath it, the uniquely spicy odor of Rapture. It's in his pores, on his breath, and in his ruddy face like a perpetual blush.

“You!” Ebi shouts at the man.

“Him?” Vienne asks me. “Chief, what is going on here?”

“I have the same question,” I say.

Fuse turns back to me. “Who is that man?”

“His name is Postule. He specializes in kidnapping
children and squealing like a stuck pig. Used to work for Dame Bramimonde—”

A high-pitched scream fills the hall. Jean-Paul rushes out from nowhere, wielding a miner's wrench like a club. “I'll kill you, Postule!”

“—then he kidnapped her children and tried to ransom them.”

Before we can make a grab for him, the boy races past us. Jumps onto the wall. Moving faster than a neutron particle. Ebi starts to follow, but Vienne snags her by the wrist and pulls her back into ranks.

“Wait for orders. Chief?” she says, asking if we should do anything about the boy.

“Let him go,” I say. There's nothing we can do about him, anyway, unless we want to start a firefight.

Jean-Paul covers the distance quickly. Then takes one final leap and raises the wrench high. Postule lifts his arms to cover his face, and the boy takes the chance to land a thumping blow to the fat man's belly.

The wallop knocks Postule backward, but as the boy is raising the wrench to attack again, one of the Dræu grabs the weapon and lifts Jean-Paul into the air. He continues to fight and scratch, using his heels to draw blood on the Dræu's shins.

“What happened to the children that Postule kidnapped?” Fuse says.

“We rescued them.”

Fuse smirks. “But the kidnapper got away, no?”

“Affirmative. He beat me in a footrace.”

“Tch! Thought you were lighter on your feet than that, chief. The fossicker's just a couple biscuits short of a half kilo.”

“Fuse?”

“Yeah?”

“I was having a laugh.”

“Oy!” he says. “Give a jack a hint or summit, if you're going to give his nose a yank, no? Thought you were serious, what with them Dræu but a few meters off.”

“And now,” I continue, “Postule is apparently working for the Dræu.”

“I'm surprised they didn't eat him,” Fuse says. “He's fat enough to feed their lot for a fortnight.”

“I'm sure he's useful in some ways,” I say. “Or they realized he'd taste like guanite.”

Fuse laughs. “See, chief. That time, I knew what you was up to, and it tickled the funny. See what happens when you soften up the audience.”

“Call off your dog,” Postule yells. “This is a diplomatic visit.”

“Acolyte,” I call to the boy. “Stand down.”

Instantly Jean-Paul stops fighting. His body goes rigid, and the Dræu has trouble holding his dead weight off the ground.

“Oh, for pity's sake,” Postule barks at his escorts. “Let him go.”

A line of drool run from the Dræu's mouth and down his neck, but he reluctantly obeys. Jean-Paul sprints back to us. “Master, my first skirmish!”

Maeve steps forward to meet Postule. “We see your flag, so you've got protection as long as you raise no weapon. What is it you want?”

Postule offers a practiced bow. “The queen of the Dræu wishes to negotiate terms.”

“What terms would that be?” Maeve says warily.

“Terms of your surrender.”

The miners laugh, and Maeve cocks her head. “I'll humor you. What are the terms?”

“Simple. Turn over the treasure, and she'll only kill the Regulators. You may keep your children.”

The old lady laughs again. “Treasure? We've not got enough food to eat, and you've come here asking for treasure. You're mad.”

Postule blanches. Behind him, the Dræu are growing restless. Standing at attention obviously isn't their nature, and I can tell that their hinky mood worries the fat man. How did they travel here, I wonder. Postule is too fat to walk far. That means that their camp has to be close by.

“Don't play games with me, ruster,” Postule says.

“Speaking of games,” I say, “how'd you come to work for the Dræu, Postule? Last time we looked, you were spread-eagled begging for your life.”

“The last time you saw me,” he sneers, “I was escaping
from a piddle-poor excuse for a Regulator. I wondered when you would open your mouth,
dalit
.”

Vienne cocks her armalite.

“Is that a threat?” Postule says. “Just for that, I'm going to ask the queen to kill you myself.”

“Ask away,” Vienne says.

“You didn't answer the question,” I say. “How'd a high-class kidnapper like you end up with the Dræu? Or is it all thieving to you?”

The fat man puffs up. “I have always worked for the Dræu. Did you think they're just a bunch of wild animals living the end of the wilderness? There is more to the Dræu than you ever thought of,
dalit
. But let's consider your situation: a thousand kilometers from civilization. No food, no water, no communication. Only a few Regulators and a handful of malnourished miners against a ravenous horde. Who would be stupid enough to accept a job like that?”

“Here.” Ebi tosses a ring to Postule, who cups it in his puffy hands. “You want treasure to leave these people alone, take this and go.”

Postule sizes up the ring. It's yellow gold with a four blue diamond setting. Since there's no gold mined on Mars and the metal is embargoed, the ring is obviously imported from Earth. It is, I think to myself, worth a fortune.

“That ring will bring enough on the black market for a long retirement,” Ebi says.

Or several years' worth of easy prison time for my
imprisoned father. What would it be like to have so much that I could toss a fortune into the air like it's nothing? Even when Father was a CEO, we never had that much coin. Ebi is a very different kind of Regulator from me.

“You're very different kind of Regulator, too,” Mimi says.

“Not so different. Maybe from Fuse and Jenkins, but not from Vienne.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Of course,” I think, watching Postule.

He examines the stone in the light. “Very pretty, missy.” He pockets it. “But it's not the treasure. Is it, miners? You know what my queen is looking for.”

“Give me back the ring if you are not going to leave!” Ebi shouts.

Postule laughs and pushes her away. “You can ask the queen for it.”

“Thief!”

“Stupid, spoiled brat.”

Furious, Ebi lifts her armalite. Only a quick swat from Vienne keeps her from putting a slug into Postule's gut.

This is getting us nowhere. I walk straight up to Postule. “You've wasted your breath and our time. There's no treasure here, just megatons of guanite and a whole lot of Regulator bullets. Which is what you're going to find between those beady black eyes of yours next time you show your face in Hell's Cross.”

Behind Postule, the Dræu start laughing.

“Shut up!” Postule screams at the Dræu, then turns back to Maeve. “Ruster, you had your opportunity. The queen offered you good terms, and you spit in her face. Personally, I knew you were too stupid to do anything but lie. There is treasure here, and the Dræu will find it. Makes no difference to her how long it takes or how much flesh she's got to flail to get it.”

“You've got five seconds to get off our land.” Maeve spits in his face.

“Witch!” Postule backhands her. As she falls, he draws back his hand to deliver another blow. Vienne snaps her armalite out and blows a hole through his meaty palm.

“My hand! She shot me!”

“Nice aim,” I tell Vienne. Then I point to the opposite side of the bridge. “Go! Before my Regulators fill you full of chigoe holes.”

On cue, the Regulators bring their weapons to bear. The Dræu, realizing that it isn't an idle threat, grab Postule by the shoulders and steer him away. He stumbles, holding the bloodied hand against his chest.

“My hand, my hand, my hand.”

They kick his rear end to keep him moving. One Dræu covers their retreat, lobbing a smoke grenade for cover. When they reach the safety of the other side of the bridge, he roars out of frustration and fires off a few rounds of plasma into the billowing smoke. The shots carry a hundred meters, then drop impotently into the chasm below.

“So much for negotiations,” I say a minute later, when the Dræu have gone. “Let's get back to the Cross, we've got—”

“Chief,” Ebi calls. “Jean-Paul. I cannot find him anywhere.”

“He was just here,” I say as we all start to look around for him. “Mimi, locate Jean-Paul's biorhythm signature.”

“Negative,” she responds. “No biorhythms can be located within a half-kilometer radius.”

“Which means?”

“He is not here, cowboy. He's gone.”