The Dying Light (44 page)

know
the valise was destroyed, and I have always put your safety above my own. How else can you explain it?>

She put her head in her hands. She couldn’t explain it, none of it. It was all a mystery to her. It was all so crazy.

A hand touched her shoulder and she flinched violently.

“Hey, it’s okay, Morgan! I didn’t mean to startle you.”

She stared up at Haid, too disconcerted and confused to speak.

His hand withdrew. “Uri told me you’d had some sort of fit and I came to see if you were all right. Are you?”

“I—” She almost blurted out everything she’d just learned. That the Box was inside her and had been put there under circumstances the Box described as a “tactical necessity” but which she thought more akin to rape. That she was being used even more thoroughly than COE Intelligence had used her. That she had been betrayed—
again.

But something stopped her. Something the Box had said.

I have gone to great lengths to ensure that my true location remains unknown.

The fact that the Box—that the Crescend—might have gone to such extremes struck her as so strange and unlikely that it temporarily overrode any concerns she had for her own well-being. She could think of only one explanation for its behavior, and once the thought was in her head there was no denying it. Why else would it wish its existence in her to remain a secret even now, when the danger of the second clone warrior was past?

The Box was hiding from
Cane.

It was afraid of him.

“Morgan?”

“What?” She remembered Haid standing there. “Oh, I’m fine. Just thinking and working too hard, I guess. Didn’t mean to give you a scare.” She held out her hand and he helped her to her feet.

“Are you sure?” he asked, still studying her.

“Positive.”

“Maii? Is she lying?”

the reave said to both of them.

Roche breathed a small sigh of relief. If Maii was telling the truth, the Box’s secret could be kept a little while longer.

And as she thought this, she suddenly realized that she had already made up her mind: she
would
keep the Box’s secret. For now, at least. And not because anything it had said convinced her to, either. She hated what had been done to her, but her curiosity as to what the Box planned to do next was strong enough to override the anger she was feeling.

Haid was still watching her.

“Maybe I should spread the workload a little,” she said, smiling weakly. “If you’re bored, there are plenty of repairs to be done. I’m sure Uri could use a hand. And we’ll soon have shuttles from the
Starburst
docking to offload all these people. They have to be organized and ready to move. And what about supplies? Do we have enough to keep—?”

“Okay, already!” Haid raised a hand, laughing. “I’ll get on to it now, I promise. But do me a favor and make sure you get some rest soon, all right?”

“Sleep is for the faint of heart,” she said, quoting a lecturer from Military College. “If a lack of it makes you a little crazy, then you’re in the perfect state to fight. If it doesn’t, you’re in the perfect state to lead.”

Haid’s brow creased. “Sounds like rubbish to me.”

Privately she agreed.

* * *

It was only later, as she lay back on her bunk, that she realized how difficult it was going to be to find any time at all to rest.

Most of the refugees had been offloaded. All of the
Starburst
’s shuttles and three of the reconnaissance squadron’s cruisers had made two trips each. The remaining stragglers would go with the last shuttles, due to cycle through within the hour. Haid was in charge of liasing with the Armada while Kajic concentrated on repairing the
Ana Vereine.
Yarrow Jelena Heidik’s wizened body had been loaded aboard and placed in argon until someone was available to look at it. Roche had feigned exhaustion—no great task—to go to her quarters.

the Box said.

Roche sighed and lay back on the bed. It hadn’t taken the Box long to get back into the swing of things.

She closed her eyes.

Ana Vereine
when we first got on board; you corrupted COE Intelligence so they would think the Sol Apotheosis Movement was behind it all; you’ve done everything possible to lead searches in the wrong direction, and still you won’t let anyone know what’s going on. Why?>

< ‘Indiscriminate’?>

Roche nodded.

Midnight
, and that he and I colluded to ensure your escape from Sciacca’s World. If he has suspected that I am an agent for someone more powerful, and if he now believes that I am gone, then it will be interesting to see what he does next. And believe me, I will be watching him very closely indeed.>

That seemed a depressing prospect to Roche. As much as she didn’t want to believe that Cane would betray her, that would be better than drawing erroneous conclusions about the rest of his kind because he comprised a flawed data set.

she asked.

last
.>

She shook her head.

A chime interrupted her.

“Marine Commander Gent wishes to talk to you,” said Kajic.

put in the Box.

She ignored it. “Okay, Uri, put him through. Voice only, at this end.”

An image of Gent’s face came to her via her implants. He was standing on the bridge of the
Starburst;
his eyes wandered, having no fixed image of her to latch onto. “I have received a communiqué from—” he began.

“I know, and I appreciate you going out of your way to help us like this.”

Gent looked flustered for a second, then nodded formally. “It is the least we can do.”

Besides which, thought Roche, he was required by law to assist in any regional disaster.

“Well, Commander,” she said, “if that’s all...”

“Not entirely. I wanted to discuss the matter of Auditor Byrne.”

Roche frowned. “What about her?”

“She requested a ship to conduct a sweep of the outer fringes of what’s left of the system. I loaned her the
Lucetice-2
for a couple of hours, once it had finished ferrying passengers.”

“I don’t know anything about this.”

“But she said it was your idea.”

“She did?”

“Yes, and seeing as we’ve now lost contact with her, I thought I’d check with you to see what—”

She cut him off. “Give me its location.”

A chart superimposed itself upon Gent’s face. A red ring enclosed a small dot some distance from those marking the squadron. “They’ve drifted a fair way,” said Gent. “Given that we need to move smartly in order to make this rendezvous—”

Again she didn’t give him time to finish. A cold feeling had blossomed in the pit of her stomach. “Uri, I need Lud—
fast
.”

“Yes, Morgan.”

“Lud here.”

“This is Roche. Do you have genetic records of your clan members?”

“Yes. We keep detailed—”

“I need them. Can you send them to me now?”

“Of course.” The outrigger didn’t argue, even though the puzzlement was evident in his voice. “Give me a second to locate them.”

said the reave.

“Is something wrong, Roche?” Gent looked perversely pleased.

She ignored the question, and his attitude. “Target the
Lucence-2
, Commander Gent. If I give you the word, I want you to hit it with all you’ve got.”

“What?” His expression wavered between amusement and alarm. “Are you serious?”

“Just
do
it, Commander. And tell me: how well is that ship armed?”

“Well enough,” he said. “Look, what the hell is going on?”

“Transmitting those codes now,” said Lud.

“Thanks.” The cold feeling was growing.

The feeling in her stomach turned to nausea. “Gent—shoot that ship!
Now
!”

“Are you out of your mind?” Gent bristled, outraged. “I can’t just fire on my own people. I need a
reason
!”

“That wasn’t the clone warrior in the all-suit!” She was shouting now. “It was Auditor Byrne!”

“How could you possibly know that?”

said the Box, confirming that the body is neither the outrigger known as Yarrow, nor is it of similar genetic stock to Cane. Auditor Byrne died at least five days ago.>

“Fire, Gent!
Fire
!”

But the dot on the chart that was
Lucence-2
had already begun to move. Too rapidly for pursuit to begin, and much more quickly than Gent’s willingness to fire, it accelerated into the gentle gravitational well of the destroyed system.

Faster and faster it went, until it reached the minimum speed required for a slow-jump; then its hyperspace engines kicked in, space rippled, and—

It was gone.

* * *

Lud was the first to speak.

“
Byrne?
”

“The clone warrior hid in Yarrow’s all-suit after the ambush around Aro, as he thought,” Roche explained. In hindsight it was all too clear. “But then she killed Byrne when Byrne tried to heal who she thought was Yarrow. The clone warrior took on Byrne’s identity and hid the body in Yarrow’s all-suit, which she then teleoperated the rest of the way. It was she who broadcast the distress call that led me to Mok, and she who manipulated the spine into helping me. She led the attack on Galine Four, she wanted us to be suspicious of Yarrow and she even let us think she had died by letting Yarrow’s suit be destroyed...” Roche shook her head, appalled. “We’re lucky she decided not to stick around.”

said the Box.

“My ship—the
crew
!” Gent was still stunned by the sudden turn of events.

“Face it, Commander. They’re not coming back.”

“You knew this would happen!”

“If it’s a scapegoat you want, look no further than yourself. You let your guard down. You should have checked with me before giving anyone a ship.”

“But I—” Gent stopped, swallowed. “I was not fully aware of the dangers.”

Roche felt almost sorry for him. No one had expected anything like this. “None of us are,” she said, thinking of the Box as well as her.