Ghost Legion (11 page)

Tusk reported. He described the first message, then the follow-up.
"What do you want me to do, sir?" he finished. "I can
make the flight, but I'll have to leave within the hour. You know, a
pilot'd have to be desperate as hell to consider somethin' like this.
There aren't many who could cut ties and lift off in an hour of
receiving those coordinates."

"It certainly is suggestive...." said Dixter thoughtfully.

"Of a rip-off" inserted XJ. "They've just made a
thousand eagles without turning a hand. We'll probably get a 'Thank
you, sucker' card in the mail!"

"I wonder what would happen if I showed up," Tusk pondered
out loud.

"They'd pin a sign on your back that says 'Kick me.' "

"It would be interesting to find out," said Dixter. "But
it could also be dangerous." He was silent again, considering.
"Let's not make the jump until we know a little bit more about
what's ahead. We can always contact them again, schedule another
appointment. I'd like you to do some more investigating, if you don't
mind, Tusk."

Tusk let out his breath. "Sure thing, sir." He shrugged, as
if it didn't matter.

"First, have Link contact them. See if he gets the same
response, the same coordinates, the same time restriction. Next, get
in touch with some of the other members of the old outfit. Find out
if any of them have followed up on this, maybe even gone through with
it, joined up. I'll do some checking on my end. Let me know what you
discover. Keep my name and His Majesty's out of this. You're doing
this strictly on your own."

"Yes, sir. Anything else, sir?"

"No, I think that covers everything."

"Uh, excuse me for asking, sir—I know you're busy and all—
but how is Dion? His Majesty, I mean."

"Fine, Tusk. I spoke to him this morning, advised him of what
you're doing. He sends his regards to you and Nola."

"Does he?" Tusk brightened, felt warmed. "Well, uh,
send ours back. Regards. However you're supposed to say that to a
king."

Dixter very carefully did not smile. "I will, Tusk. Let me know
what you find out. ASAP"

The image faded.

"He looks tired," said Tusk.

"He always looks tired. He's looked tired ever since we've known
him."

"I wonder what the hell's going on. What he knows that he's not
telling. Dangerous, he says, but he doesn't say why. And the king
himself's involved. Not much like the old days. The Dixter in the old
days would have told us everything."

"Must have been a Dixter I didn't know," XJ retorted. "Most
of the time the general said shoot this' and we shot it. Or it shot
us. We never asked
why,
just
how much.
You're getting
old. Old and soft."

Old and soft. Cookie crumbs. A small, freckled, chocolate-complected
face on Nola's breast. Her swollen belly. Twins.

Shoot it. It shoots us. The pain. The bright, blinding explosion. The
bright, blinding pain ...

"I said, should I wake up Link?" XJ repeated loudly.

Tusk stirred. "Yeah. Go ahead. And find out how much money he
lost last night. Not that he'll tell you the truth."

XJ busied itself. In the background Tusk could hear the buzz of a
commlink, hear Link's muffled, sleep-slurred response. "Yeah?
Wha? Wha' time 'sit?" The computer's strident, snappish answer.

Tusk sat with his arms folded across his chest, staring at the blank
vidscreen. The ensuing irritable conversation between Link and the
computer was nothing more than a drone in his mind, like the drone of
the ship's engines on a long flight. At first it was all he heard;
then he didn't hear it at all. XJ spoke to him two or three times
before he realized the computer had—so to speak—returned.

Tusk shifted his gaze to the monkey-face box that was XJ-27. "You
say something?"

"I said, you're glad Dixter let you off the hook."

"Glad?" Tusk repeated, as if he didn't understand.

"You're glad Dixter didn't send you on this job. I heard that
sigh you gave. And don't tell me it was a sigh of regret. I know
better."

A tingle started at the base of Tusk's spine, down in his buttocks.
It crept up his back. His heart started to race; he began to sweat,
to breathe too fast. He put his hand to his chest, a hand that shook,
felt the scar tissue, tough and roped, beneath his fatigues. He was
always surprised to feel it, always surprised to feel solid bone
instead of mush. He was always surprised to look down at his hand and
not find it covered with blood.

He didn't remember much about that time: the time Abdiel's mind-dead
had blown a hole in his chest; the time Xris the cyborg had carried
him back aboard the plane; the time Dion had healed him in what the
church was now calling a bona fide miracle. Tusk didn't remember much
of anything, but something inside Tusk did. It remembered at night,
in his sleep; it remembered at times like this: it remembered now.

He stood up abruptly, grabbed hold of his flight jacket, and pulled
it on, though it was scorching hot in the mid-aftemoon sun. He could
have cooked a full-course breakfast on the metal hood of the
hoverjeep and he was shivering with chills.

"Where're you going?" XJ demanded. "We have work to
do."

"I'm doin' it. I'm going to Link's."

XJ whirred in anger. "You can get juiced just as well here as
you can there."

Tusk stopped, gritted his teeth, tried to stop the tremors. He wasn't
at all certain he could make it up the ladder. "Look, I want to
see for myself what they tell Link. You try to reach Gorbag the
Jarun, Reefer, and any of the rest of the old outfit you can think
of. Make it casual. Like we're checking this Ghost Legion out, just
to see if it's as good as it looks."

"You're getting old," XJ repeated. "Old and soft. You
were glad."

Tusk climbed the ladder, stomped up the rungs, felt the metal vibrate
beneath his fingers. XJ had the hatch open by the time Tusk reached
it.

"Call Nola, will you? Tell her I may not be home for dinner."

"Old," muttered XJ. "Old and soft."

The computer waited until it could no longer register the sound of
the whining clunk of the hovercraft's engine. Then it raised Nola on
the commlink.

"This is me, Nola. Tusk won't be home for dinner tonight. . . .
Yeah, he's got the shakes again. Bad this time. He's gone over to
Link's. . . .
Over
a year. It was that job Dixter wanted him
to do. . . . Naw, Tusk's not gonna do it, but it looked like for a
while he might. . . . What? Oh, sure, it figures, Dixter. Dion. No
wonder. Brought it all back... . Me? Of course I was sympathetic and
tactful!
Tact
is my middle name. I told him he was getting old
and soft. . .. No, he didn't say anything. ... What?
Twins?
Oh, great. Fine. Yeah, that's just dandy. Look, if you two haven't
figured out what's causing this yet, I'll be happy to buy you a
manual!"

XJ ended the transmission with a vicious click. "Twins!"
the computer repeated in a gloomy tone, and immediately called up the
computerized grocery service, ordered out two cases of cookies.

There's fennel for you, and columbines; there's rue for you; and
here's some for me ...

William Shakespeare,
Hamlet,
Act IV, Scene v

Three years ago, and almost eighteen years before that, the Academy
had been a ghostly place. Once it had been an institution of learning
for the children of the Blood Royal. Brought here at an early age,
the children, whose genetically altered bloodlines gave them special
talent for leadership (or at least that had been the plan), were
raised in an atmosphere dedicated to learning.

The site had been chosen with care. The Academy was built on a planet
whose atmosphere and environs were as close to old Earth
(pre-devastation Earth) as the designers could possibly find and far
from all major cities, trade routes, and any other type of disturbing
influence.

Built among rolling, thickly forested hills, the Academy's halls and
libraries and classrooms stood solemn and quiet, each connected with
the rest by winding paths which led through groves of towering oak
and poplar and aspen, gardens of flowers and vegetables (the students
and professors were required to grow much of their own food),
rambling brooks and placid lakes.

Following the downfall and purge of the Blood Royal during the
revolution, the Academy was abandoned. Attempts at various times to
use the buildings and grounds for other purposes—from public
housing to a retirement center—had all failed. It was rumored
to be haunted, if not by genuine, chain-rattling ghosts, then by the
ghosts of childish voices reciting Shakespeare or the multiplication
tables, ghosts of youthful voices discussing quantum mechanics or, in
the spring, Walt Whitman and D. H. Lawrence. Perhaps it really was
only the rubbing of tree limbs, one against the other, that created
the odd sounds, but no one could stay on the Academy grounds long
without hearing them. Most left, immediately.

But now all that had changed.

One of Dion's first official acts, following his coronation, had been
to reestablish the Academy, open it as an institution of higher
learning for any student creatively gifted, academically talented
enough to qualify for admission.

Old buildings had been lovingly renovated, new buildings added, their
designers careful to coordinate them with the old. Grants were
established, many in the names of those who had died in the fight to
end the corrupt republic, bring the rightful heir to the throne.

A memorial chapel, located in the new wing of the library, the Platus
Morianna wing—had been set aside, by the king's command, to
honor the dead. It was this wing, this chapel, that were to be
dedicated today.

The ceremony was to take place in the evening. Before that, in the
afternoon, Dion was accorded the honor of a private tour of the
Academy grounds. The new buildings had been completed and open for
use for several months prior to the dedication, the king's busy
schedule having precluded him from coming earlier. But the buildings
had all been closed the day before His Majesty's arrival for cleaning
and decorating, done by the students themselves.

The dean of students was the proud guide. She walked His Majesty
relentlessly over every centimeter of the new structures, pointed out
every new feature of the new library, and would have undoubtedly
exhibited each new volume individually had time allowed. His Majesty
was interested and attentive, however, and if Dion's eyes
occasionally strayed out the windows, to the crowds to students
massed outside to catch a glimpse of their king (and he was
their
king, being the same age as most of them), no one noticed the lapse
except D'argent, who noticed everything, and the captain of the Royal
Guard, whose duty it was to watch over His Majesty's every move.

And perhaps by the headmaster, a quiet and unassuming man, who
reminded Dion of his own mentor, Platus.

"You have done a splendid job, Dean, Headmaster," said Dion
when they were nearing the end of the tour. "This
is
exactly what we had in mind. We couldn't be more pleased."

"Thank you, Your Majesty." The headmaster smiled with quiet
pride. Both he and the dean were dressed in their academic
gowns—long, flowing-sleeved black robes with silk-lined hoods,
which had been a tradition among scholars for centuries.

"Working on this project has been a true labor of love for me
and for my staff. We deeply appreciate Your Majesty's support."

They had emerged from the new music conservatory and were standing at
the end of a corridor, on ground level. "But where is the
memorial chapel?" Dion asked.

"Ah, we have saved the best until last, Your Majesty. This way."

The headmaster, accompanied by the dean, and the king, accompanied by
the ever-present, ever-vigilant Royal Guard and the quiet,
unobtrusive D'argent, proceeded to the end of the corridor.

There were no other rooms in this part of the building, no windows.
The walls were painted in soft, subdued colors; the lights gradually
dimmed as the party proceeded down the corridor, giving an effect
both soothing to the eye, calming to the soul. At the end of the
corridor stood a large double door, carved of oak, bearing the emblem
of the lions-head sun, the king's standard. The doors had no handles,
no locks.

"As Your Majesty requested," said the headmaster. "It
is open to all, day and night."

Dion gave the doors a gentle push, walked inside.

The chapel was a round room, cloistered, but light and airy. Its
walls were of marble, whose stern aspect was softened by a row of
slender columns forming a series of arches around the chapel's outer
perimeter. Diffused light, from a glass dome in the ceiling, cast the
columns' shadows against the marble walls behind them, forming a
delicate pattern of light and darkness.

Beneath the skylight was a fountain, carved of limestone, unadorned,
plain and simple in design. The name
platus morianna
was
engraved in the stone.

Dion walked up to the fountain, stood a moment in silence, his head
bowed, his thoughts with the gentle man who had raised him, who had
given his life for him.

The headmaster held back a moment, out of respect. Then he came
forward to stand by Dion's side.

"The chapel is quite popular with the students, Your Majesty.
Several traditions have already sprung up concerning it. It is said,
for example, that the sound of the falling water has a soothing
effect upon troubled spirits. Those who are depressed or unhappy, sad
or worried, have taken to coming here. They sit there, on the
fountain's base, and many swear that they hear a soft voice in the
water, offering counsel and sympathy.

Dion stood still, listened to the musical sound of the gently
splashing water, imagined the water was washing over him, cooling the
fever and soothing the turmoil in his soul. He had the impression
that, if he sat here long enough, he, too, would hear Platus's voice,
receive his wise council.