The Gap into Madness: Chaos and Order (67 page)

Fun.
Sure.

Morn
clutched her handgun.

They
couldn’t afford to hesitate now. Nick would expect immediate obedience from
Isaac. Any delay might warn him that he was in trouble.

Davies
thumbed the airlock controls. He and Morn tucked themselves into the corners on
either side of the outer door.

Her
heart beat hard enough to make her woozy. Step in front of him. Point her gun
at his face.
Arrest
him. She was a cop, wasn’t she? She was supposed to
know how to do this.

But
between them Angus and Nick had nearly dismantled her. She was a zone implant
addict. Weeks of overexertion and fear had exacted their toll. And the cops she’d
trained to serve were corrupt. The laser pistol felt like an alien artefact in
her hand: a construct she didn’t understand and couldn’t use.

And
Nick sent Sib and then Vector into the lock ahead of him as if he wanted to
make sure the way was safe.

Her
hand, no, her whole arm had already begun to tremble by the time Nick crossed
between her and Davies.

Sib
turned at the lift, caught sight of her. His involuntary surprise betrayed her.

She
jumped forward with her gun straining for Nick’s head. As if she were still a
cop, still believed in herself, she barked, “
Freeze!
”

But she’d
already failed. Her motion was too intense for the slight g. The pressure in
her legs drove her past Nick toward the ceiling; out of control.

Sib’s
surprise warned Nick; the sound of the airlock closing warned him. He ignored
Morn. Sudden and savage, he whirled on Davies. Morn’s frantic shot scored the
deck beyond his feet, but didn’t touch him.

Davies
wasn’t braced for it. He was expecting to attack, not be attacked. As Nick
spun, he jerked up his hands too late to stop Nick’s elbow from catching him
squarely on the cheekbone. His head hit the wall with a sodden double smack
like the sound of fruit being pulped.

The
doors whined shut; sealed the fight inside.

Morn
clashed against the ceiling and rebounded, flailing to aim her laser. But now
Vector blocked her. Trying to get out of the way, he blundered in the wrong
direction.

Nick
swung at Davies’ head. Davies was stunned, barely able to move. Still Morn’s
old training saved him. Reflexively he tossed up his forearm hard enough to
deflect Nick’s fist.

An
instant later Nick crashed into him. They both stumbled against the bulkhead as
Sib drove into Nick’s back with all his weight and force.

Sib had
failed too often, shamed himself with his own fears too much. Now his
desperation transformed him. His eyes blazed as he planted himself and began
hammering Nick’s back with his elbows, throwing the torque of his shoulders and
the strength of his arms like projectiles at Nick’s ribs and kidneys.

Roaring
with pain, Nick flung himself off Davies; twisted to fall away from Sib’s
elbows.

“Angus!”
he howled. “
Angus!
”

In a
frenzy of alarm, Morn heaved Vector aside; thrust herself headlong after Nick.

She
would have failed at that, too, if Vector hadn’t helped her. Awkward with old
pain, he braced his arms and legs, anchored his body so that she could launch
off him accurately.

She
landed across Nick’s back as he sprawled on his face.

She
couldn’t hold him down with her own weight; couldn’t fight him physically. She
didn’t try. As he bunched under her to pitch her off, she knotted her free hand
onto the collar of his shipsuit and jammed the muzzle of her pistol into his
ear.

“I said
freeze!
I can’t miss from here! You can’t flip fast enough to make me
miss! If you don’t
freeze,
I’m going to burn a red hole right through
the middle of your
brain!
”

She
didn’t know whether or not he believed her. She wasn’t sure that she believed
herself. Nevertheless he faltered —

An
instant later the butt of Davies’ impact pistol came down on his skull like a
cudgel.

His
body flopped raggedly, then slumped still. A small sigh like a groan escaped
him. “Angus, you bastard —”

After
that he was gone.

Blood
trickled through the hair on the back of his head. More blood marked the deck
under his face. Nevertheless he went on breathing thinly, like a man who didn’t
know how to die.

“Shit,”
Davies panted somewhere above Morn. “I’m sorry. I can’t seem to beat him. Every
time I fight him he does something I don’t expect.”

Slowly
Morn lowered her head, rested it for a moment between Nick’s shoulder blades
while she let herself go faint with relief. She may have looked like she was
grieving for him, but in truth she was suddenly so full of gratitude that she
could scarcely contain it.

“Don’t
be too hard on yourself,” Vector breathed to Davies. His own relief was
palpable. “As far as
I’m
concerned, you’re absolutely amazing. Whenever
I make the mistake of thinking you Hylands have limits, you do something like
this. How did you —” He cleared his lungs with a loud gust. “You take my breath
away. How did you get past Angus? I thought he was unreachable. Not to mention
invulnerable.”

“Can
you move?” Sib murmured close to Morn’s head. “I’ll help you. If you can get
off him, I’ll try to make sure we don’t have to go through all this again.”

Make
sure we don’t — ? With an effort she raised her head and saw that he had a roll
of strapping tape in his hands.

“This
stuff is as strong as flexsteel,” he told her quietly. “If I tie him up with
it, maybe we can stop worrying about him.”

Vector
began to laugh, a clean, happy sound like a blue sky. “Sib, you maniac, do you
always
carry a roll of strapping tape?”

Sib
blushed. “I put it in my pocket after Nick took over. I couldn’t find anything
that looked like a weapon. This seemed like the next best thing.” He met Morn’s
gaze for a moment, then looked down. “I’ve been praying for a chance to use it.”

Morn
managed a smile. “Do it.” Carefully, as if her relief were fragile, she rolled
off Nick.

At once
Sib set to work. He strapped Nick’s wrists together snugly behind him, ran
loops of tape around his upper arms to secure them, then hobbled his ankles,
leaving only enough slack to let him take small steps. Finally Sib stretched
more tape between the hobble and Nick’s wrists so that he wouldn’t be able to
jump or kick.

Davies
watched with grim approval. When the job was done, he said, “Keep that roll
handy. If his mouth starts to bother us, you can tape it shut.”

Sib
nodded. If he felt any relief, it didn’t show.

Morn
let some of her fear out in a long sigh. She met Davies’ questioning glance;
nodded assent.

Thumbing
the intercom toggle, he chimed the bridge.

“Angus?
We got him.” He paused, perhaps considering how much to say, then simply
repeated, “We got him. So far, so good.

“Vector
and Sib are here,” he went on. “Mikka and Ciro already came aboard.” He looked
at Vector for confirmation before he finished, “Vector got what we came for.”

Vector
tapped the side of his head with one forefinger. Loud enough for Angus to hear,
he said, “It’s all here. If I had the facilities, I could start mass-producing
it.” His smile was positively beatific.

After a
moment Angus answered, “I’m almost done.” Harsh strain twisted through his
voice. “Come on up.”

Davies
turned to Morn. A grin of his own spread across his face. All at once he looked
inexpressibly young — much younger than his father;
decades
younger than
Morn felt. A jig seemed to gleam in his eyes, as if he were dancing inside. “What’re
we waiting for? Let’s go.”

Morn
shook her head. Her relief had begun to curdle, soured by withdrawal and
comprehension. Her nerves felt the touch of acid again. And the pain was
growing: organic adrenaline couldn’t feed her hunger for artificial
stimulation. Nick was only one of her personal demons. Others still harried
her, defying exorcism. “First we need to talk.”

Everything
she and her companions did mattered too much.

“We’ve
got Nick. That’s a step in the right direction. But let’s not forget to be
cautious.”

Let’s
not forget what’s at stake. Or how precarious it is.

Trusting
Angus came hard.

“I
agree,” Vector said promptly. “Don’t misunderstand me. I’m so glad I can hardly
think. But I still want to know how you got past Angus. I thought Nick had him”
— the geneticist hunted for an adequate expression and couldn’t find one — “under
control. What did you do to him?”

Morn
put that question aside. “It’ll be easier to explain when you see him. But
there are things Davies and I need to know right now.” Things we might not want
Angus to hear, if he isn’t being honest with us. “For a start —

“Mikka
said Nick and Beckmann were ‘dickering’. What did Nick want?”

Sib
referred the question to Vector, but Vector passed it back with a gesture.

“When
we first went in,” Sib began, “Nick said we needed supplies. Which didn’t make
sense — but I guess that’s not the point. As soon as Vector was done, Nick told
Dr. Beckmann he’d changed his mind. He wanted something else.

“He
gave Dr. Beckmann the formula. For confirmation he let him have some of the
capsules.”

Vector
nodded. Mutely he held up Nick’s original vial. Only five or six capsules were
left.

“We got
permission to leave,” Sib went on. “And this.” He bent over Nick, rummaged in
his pockets, and produced a small metallic rectangle like an id tag. “It’s a
data-jack. According to Dr. Beckmann, it holds everything the Lab knows about
the swarm. The best chart they can put together. Composition. Internal vectors.
External stresses.” He offered the data-jack to Morn, but she waved it to
Davies. “If it’s accurate,” Sib finished, “we ought to be able to navigate out
of here blind.”

“Sounds
good.” Davies closed the data-jack in his fist. His eyes asked Morn as clearly
as words, Can we go now?

No, she
answered soundlessly. Small tremors of withdrawal rose in her. She hadn’t
accepted the data-jack because she hadn’t wanted anyone to see her hand shake.

Facing
both Sib and Vector, she said, “It seems pretty straightforward. What went
wrong? What happened to Mikka and Ciro?”

Vector
glanced at Sib, then returned his gaze to Mom. “I was hoping you could tell us.”

She
shook her head. “She and Ciro came aboard like she thought he was dying. But
she didn’t explain anything.”

Ciro
and I need to talk, so
leave us alone.

Sib
grimaced. After a moment he offered, “Maybe she thinks he
is
.”

“What’s
that supposed to mean?” Davies put in. Being reminded of Mikka and her brother
renewed his tension.

“It was
strange,” Sib answered in a perplexed tone. “As soon as Vector got permission
to work, Nick separated us. He sent Ciro off to req food stores we don’t need.
He told me to put in a list for other supplies — which we also don’t need. And
he didn’t let Mikka go with either of us. Instead he ordered her to stand guard
outside the lab where Vector was working.

“She
didn’t obey.” Sib shrugged. “I guess she couldn’t. She went looking for Ciro.

“But he
was gone. Security said he ‘wandered off’ somewhere. So she came to find me. We
were getting ready to start a search of our own, but then Security found him.
They said he wasn’t hurt, just ‘scared out of his mind.’ But they wouldn’t let
us go to him. We had to wait until Vector was done. We never got a chance to
talk to him.”

“Go on,”
Morn murmured.

Sib
paused like a man who needed to clear his head. Then he admitted, “I don’t know
why any of this happened. But Mikka —

“She
thinks it’s because of
Soar
. She thinks Nick used Ciro as bait.
Otherwise why did he make up that lie about needing supplies? He’s trying to
trick Sorus Chatelaine, trap her somehow.”

Sib
spread his hands to show his bafflement.

“Because
she’s the woman who cut him,” Morn breathed softly.

“That’s
right.
Soar
had a different name then, and maybe Sorus Chatelaine did,
too. He didn’t know it was her until he saw her on Billingate. But I guess now
all he can think about is getting revenge.”

“Wait a
minute,” Davies demanded. His eyes darkened expectantly. “What name?”

Sib
shrugged anxiously. “I don’t know what she called herself. Nick didn’t say.

“But in
those days
Soar
was called
Gutbuster
.”

Without
warning a new pain struck through Morn. It was as visceral as withdrawal, but
it was a different kind of hurt altogether — an intuitive and primal anguish so
acute that she nearly gasped and might have fallen to her knees. Even though
she hadn’t known it was there, it had crouched like a predator in the core of
her heart for years, waiting its chance to spring —