Eros Descending: Book 3 of Tales of the Velvet Comet (13 page)

“Impressive,” admitted Gold as they passed through the foyer and entered a well-lit corridor.

“Thank you,” said the Steel Butterfly. “We're quite proud of it.” She signaled a door to open. “Here we are.”

Gold followed her into the room.

Vladimir Kozinsky, a small, portly man in his mid-forties, lay on his back on an air-bed, his eyes closed, his breathing harsh and sporadic. He was entwined in a maze of tubes, all of which led into a network of life-support equipment. There were tubes running into his arms, into his left thigh, into his neck, into his nostrils. His hands and feet were secured to restrain him from moving and dislodging any of the apparatus that was extending his life from one moment to the next. His torso was swathed in pressure bandages, but Gold noticed that they were starting to stain with Kozinsky's blood.

There were three large machines on the far side of the bed, each with a multitude of screens displaying complex readouts that changed constantly and were totally incomprehensible to Gold.

“They subdued him, and when he managed to get his hands on one of their weapons in the struggle, they shot him,” explained the Steel Butterfly. She stared at him. “What would
you
have done?”

“The same, I suppose—but I wouldn't have shot him six more times for good measure.” He stared in fascination at the tubes and the stains. “I'm surprised that he's still alive.”

“I'd feel a lot more compassion for him if he hadn't come up with a bomb,” remarked the Steel Butterfly.

Gold bent over the dying man. “Vladimir Kozinsky!” he said in loud, clear tones. “Can you hear me?”

Kozinsky opened his eyes.

“Thomas Gold?” he whispered weakly.

“I'm right here,” said Gold, laying a reassuring hand on the dying man's shoulder, then removing it quickly when he groaned at the touch.

“Would you like me to leave?” asked the Steel Butterfly.

“If you don't mind,” replied Gold.

She walked to the door. “I'll be waiting for you in the lobby.”

“How do I find it?”

“Just turn right when you leave the room, and follow the corridor.”

Gold nodded, then turned his attention back to Kozinsky as the Steel Butterfly stepped out into the hall and ordered the door to close behind her.

“Is it really you?” asked Kozinsky. His eyelids flickered, but didn't open.

“It really is,” said Gold, staring down at him. “How are you feeling?”

“I feel weak, but nothing hurts.”

“You're probably all drugged up.” He looked down at Kozinsky. “I'll be honest with you: they don't expect you to last out the day.”

“I know,” rasped Kozinsky. “That's why I asked for you. I want you to give me the Final Blessing.”

“That's what I'm here for,” said Gold. “But there's something I have to ask you first.”

“What is it?” asked Kozinsky.

“Was it
my
sermon that led you to try to smuggle the bomb onto the
Comet
?”

Kozinsky nodded his head, then moaned in pain.

“But why?” persisted Gold. “I never advocated violence.”

“Somebody's got to draw the line somewhere. I've seen what Vainmill has done to aliens out in the Declan system. When I heard about the Andricans, I decided I had to do something about it.” He looked dismayed. “I thought that you, of all people, would understand and approve.”

“You might have killed hundreds of men and women with that bomb,” said Gold. “How could I approve of that? What purpose would it have served?”

Kozinsky coughed, then clutched his side and lay back, gasping for breath. Finally he spoke.

“It would have taught those bastards at Vainmill a lesson. Maybe someone else would have been encouraged to go out and do the same to the new chairman.”

Gold shook his head sadly. “Where does the Bible say that you have the right to take human life and administer punishment on God's behalf? Vengeance is the Lord's, not ours.”

“But they're evil!” insisted Kozinsky. The effort left him gasping for breath again, and it was another half minute before he could continue. “You've been condemning them week in and week out! That's why I came to Deluros.”

“I told my audience not to patronize any merchant who had a store in the Mall, or to buy any Vainmill product or use any Vainmill service,” answered Gold. “I
never
exhorted people to go out and kill Vainmill employees.”

“It was implicit,” said Kozinsky doggedly. “You've always told us to confront evil wherever we find it.”

“There's a difference between confronting evil and trying to take a human life,” said Gold. “You must understand that by doing so, you have placed your soul at risk.”

“But I did it for you!” Kozinsky exclaimed in a barely audible whisper.

“We live with the consequences of our actions,” said Gold. “And you must die with the consequences of yours. The Lord has no use for the unrepentant.”

“I hope God judges you as harshly as you judge me!” muttered Kozinsky.

“He will,” replied Gold with a grim certainty.

“The Blessing!” whispered Kozinsky. “Please—while I can still hear it!”

Gold nodded. “Have courage,” he said more gently. “God is not without compassion.”

Kozinsky forced a smile to his lips, then lost consciousness.

“May God, in His infinite wisdom, have mercy your soul,” said Gold without much optimism, “and forgive you your transgressions.”

Then he lit a small candle he had brought with him, placed it on a nightstand, and recited the Final Blessing. Kozinsky was still alive—though just barely—when he had finished.

He stood in silence for a few moments, still unable to comprehend why a Jesus Pure would come to the
Comet
with every intention of committing murder if he didn't get what he demanded. Then he remembered the faeries, and suddenly had considerably less difficulty understanding how decent men could fall from a state of Grace.

He checked the screens on the monitoring apparatus, saw just enough fluctuation of lines and graphs to convince him that Kozinsky was still alive, and, pausing only to extinguish the candle, walked to the door, exited the room, and walked to the entry foyer.

The Steel Butterfly was waiting for him there—and standing next to her were Titania and Oberon, their eyes wide and staring. Titania, a number of flowers carefully positioned in her silver hair, was clad in a brief and revealing outfit made of a glittering metallic fabric which gave her the appearance of some ethereal temptress straight out of Earth's mythology, while Oberon wore a toga of spun gold and resembled some half-human boy-god on Mount Olympus.

“What are
they
doing here?” asked Gold, surprised.

“I told you before: they want to meet the man who made them famous.”

Titania opened her mouth to speak, and suddenly the room was flooded by a series of melodic trilling whistles.

“You forgot them again,” said the Steel Butterfly with mock severity.

Titania giggled and trilled something else in her native tongue.

“I'm not going to spend the next half hour trying to figure out what you're saying,” replied the Steel Butterfly. “Oberon, run over to the Home and bring back your translating devices.” Oberon grinned, whistled something to Titania, and raced out the front door of the hospital. “Some of our customers find their language so fascinating that they actually request that they leave the translators behind,” continued the madam, shaking her head wearily. “I don't know how I'm ever going to get them to wear them regularly.”

Gold was suddenly aware that his mouth had gone completely dry, and that he was sweating profusely.

“Is there any water around here?” he rasped.

“Titania, go fetch Doctor Gold a glass of water,” said the Steel Butterfly.

“I'd rather get it myself,” said Gold quickly.

“As you wish,” she replied with a shrug. “You'll find a lavatory right across the hall from Kozinsky's room.”

Gold followed her directions, and a moment later was standing before a sink.

“Cold,” he murmured, holding a handkerchief beneath the flow of water that followed. He wrung it out and began wiping his face.

When he was finished, he stared at his face in the mirror. It evinced no excitement, no unnatural longings, no immoral intent whatsoever. He spent a moment experimenting with each feature—mouth, jaw, eyes—and carefully set them into a mask of total disinterest.

Finally, satisfied, he returned to the foyer.

“Oberon will be another few minutes,” said the Steel Butterfly. “His quarters are almost half a mile away, and even if he took the tramway instead of the slidewalk he's still got to get up to the fifth level, find the translators, and then come back.” She paused.

“How is Kozinsky?”

“Unconscious,” said Gold, suddenly cognizant of the fact that he was staring at Titania, but unable to tear his gaze away from her. “I have a feeling that he's not going to wake up again.”

Titania, aware that she was the focus of Gold's attention, looked directly at him, trilled something, and grinned.

“What was that all about?” he asked uneasily.

“Who knows?” replied the Steel Butterfly with a shrug. She turned to Titania. “It's your own fault. If you'd stop forgetting your translator, people could carry on a conversation with you.”

Titania laughed.

“Of course,” said the Steel Butterfly wryly, facing Gold once again, “sometimes not being understood can be a distinct advantage. For all I know she's busily insulting both of us.”

“What's her real name?” asked Gold.

“I couldn't pronounce it even if I knew it.”

Titania touched her finger to her chest and uttered a brief, melodious whistle.

“She looks so human!” said Gold. “I don't know how she can make such sounds.”

“She's just chattering now,” said the Steel Butterfly.

“You should hear her when she sings.”

“How can you tell the difference?”

“Show him, Titania.”

The little faerie shook her head.

“This is a hell of a time to be shy,” complained the Steel Butterfly. “Usually we can't shut you up.”

Titania turned to Gold, a questioning expression on her face.

“Please,” said Gold, trying to hide his eagerness.

She smiled at him, looked directly into his eyes, and began to sing. The melody was slow and atonal, and her alien words sounded like the cold clear chimes of ice against fine crystal. As the tempo became faster, she began swaying her hips and torso in time with the music, while Gold, fascinated, stared at her intently with unblinking eyes. He felt that his hands were about to start shaking, and he quickly clasped them behind his back, which seemed to amuse Titania to no end. She placed her own hands behind her back, which caused her pubescent breasts to jut out at him, swaying suggestively as her undulations continued.

Gold watched her for another few seconds, aware of an insistent pounding inside his head.

"Enough!"
he yelled suddenly, startled by the volume of his own voice.

Titania stopped singing, puzzled.

“I will not be subjected to this!”

“To her singing?” asked the Steel Butterfly uncomprehendingly.

“To the lascivious display that accompanied it!” snapped Gold.

“Lascivious display?” repeated the Steel Butterfly.

“You know very well what I mean, continued Gold.” He glared at Titania. “Did you really think your sexual posturing would affect me as it does your unsavory customers? I am a moral man, and will not be treated in this manner!”

“Calm down, Doctor Gold,” said the Steel Butterfly in a soothing voice. “I'm sure it wasn't her intent to sexually entice you. She was simply caught in the rhythm of the music.”

“Rhythm be damned!” he snapped. “She was flaunting her body at me, deliberately trying to tempt the one man in the Republic who is fighting to save her from a life of humiliation and an eternity of hellfire! I won't have it!” He thrust his jaw out and glared at Titania. “I'm immune to you, you little jade! Do your worst—it will make no difference!”

Titania, terrified, scampered to a position of safety behind the Steel Butterfly.

“You're losing control of yourself, Doctor Gold and
I
won't have
that
,” said the madam firmly.

“I will not be led from the path of righteousness!” declared Gold.

“Nobody's trying to lead you anywhere. You're overreacting, Doctor Gold. She was singing to you, not seducing you. And if anyone's overstepped the bounds of morality, it's you.”

“Me?” he demanded.

“Or am I wrong about the Jesus Pures not listening to music?”

“God forgive me!” he muttered, stunned. “I forgot!”

“If Thomas Gold can forget what he believes in, can't an Andrican female sway her hips when she sings?” said the Steel Butterfly.

“I forgot!” he repeated unbelievingly. He continued to stare at Titania, his chest heaving as he gulped huge mouthfuls of air after his outburst.

Finally he turned to the Steel Butterfly.

“I want to go home now,” he said weakly.

“Oberon is due back any minute.”

“I don't care. Please take me to the airlock.”

The Steel Butterfly shrugged. “If you wish,” she said.

Suddenly her bracelet beeped.

“Just a moment,” she said to Gold. “What is it, Cupid?”

“We have a problem in the casino which, in my judgment, requires your personal attention.”

“Why not tell Tote Board about it?” she replied.

“Tote Board is asleep in his quarters, and I am compelled under these circumstances to contact the highest-ranking member of the
Comet
's staff.”

“I'll be there as soon as I attend to Doctor Gold.”

“The problem is not serious, but it
is
urgent,” said the computer.

She sighed. “All right. I'll be there immediately.”

She turned to Gold. “It's probably nothing more than a counter at the blackjack table, but I'm afraid I'll have to leave you.”

“I don't know if I can find my way back to the cargo airlock,” said Gold.

“That's all right. Titania can take you.”

The little faerie trilled something and continued to hide behind the madam.

“It's all right, Titania,” said the Steel Butterfly. “He won't yell at you again.”