The Peyti Crisis: A Retrieval Artist Novel: Book Five of the Anniversary Day Saga (Retrieval Artist series 12) (9 page)

He had never seen her like this before.

“Not exactly,” he said. “I told you about that Retrieval Artist.”

“
He’s
working with the authorities,” she said.

“Yes,” Deshin said. “He wants my help with designer clones.”

“What can you do?” She asked. “You never had any respect for people who used them. And you hated it the one time someone planted a clone in our…”

Her voice trailed off. She was clearly beginning to understand.

“These people, they saved our lives,” Deshin said. “They stopped the Peyti clones.”

“Yes,” she said, head down.

“But they have no idea how to investigate the designer clones, and honestly, if they tried, the makers would scatter like the insects that they are. But they won’t run from me.”

“Won’t they know?” she asked. “Won’t they suspect you’re doing something with the government if you come asking about Peyti clones and PierLuigi Frémont?”

“I won’t asked about Peyti clones,” he said. “That would tip them off.”

Deshin was known for not using aliens in his business.

“But,” he continued, “I can ask about Frémont, as long as I have the right kind of bank roll.”

“You’d offer to buy…?” her voice trailed off again. “Luc, can’t you send some of your people to do this?”

“Maybe,” he said. “I’m not sure. But as I was thinking about it, I realized that I would be worrying about you and Paavo the whole time. And I can’t, Gerda. I can’t be here for you. If something happens on the Moon, we could all die in an instant, even if we’re together.”

“I’d rather die together,” she said softly.

He waited until she looked at him, chin out defiantly.

“You’d condemn Paavo to that?” he asked. “An early death? Or maybe outliving us, and having to survive in the wreckage that would be the Moon.”

“Don’t put it like that, Luc,” Gerda said. “That’s not fair.”

“The truth isn’t always fair,” he said.

She glared at him. When she did that, he knew he had moved her. If he didn’t push, she would come around.

“How long would we have to be gone?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he said.

She swallowed hard, then crossed her arms.

“Will you live through this?” she asked softly.

“I hope so,” he said.

“You have to promise me,” she said fiercely. “You have to promise me or we won’t go without you. I’ll make you stay with us. You have to promise me.”

He hadn’t expected this level of vehemence. It told him just how terrified his wife was underneath her calm façade.

“Gerda,” he said gently. “You know I don’t make promises I can’t keep.”

She burst into tears.

He got up and put his arms around her. She felt marvelous, all warm and soft and perfect, his familiar and very strong wife.

He kissed the top of her head.

“I can’t live without you,” she said into his shirt.

“Of course you can,” he said, nuzzling her hair. It smelled of fresh bread. “You just don’t want to.”

“Damn right,” she said. “Don’t make me, Luc.”

“I don’t make you do anything,” he said, “except consider Paavo.”

She stiffened in his arms. Then she leaned back so she could see his face.

“Bastard,” she said, but the word wasn’t vehement. It was a capitulation.

“Yeah,” he said. “And that’s exactly what the Moon needs right now. Bastards like me.”

TWELVE

AVA HUỲNH STALKED down the halls of the Earth Alliance Security Office. She really shouldn’t have left her department, Earth Alliance Security Headquarters for the Human Division, but she couldn’t remain there any longer.

Someone
was going to have to take care of this, and since no one was, she was going to step in. She had thought about it all night, and when she got up, she put on battle clothes.

Not that anyone else would know what those were—her most comfortable outfit, a blue pair of slacks, a matching blue shirt, and her favorite blue shoes—but she knew. And that was what mattered.

That, and the fact that she had been right all along.

She got to the “sky bridge” which connected the Human Investigative Unit and the Joint Investigative Unit, and continued to stomp. If she were going to change her mind, this was where she should have done it, right here, as she crossed out of her jurisdiction to the one she got criticized for consulting all the time.

But she had come here six months ago, and had been shot down, and she had been
right,
dammit. She had believed that humans and aliens should have been
jointly
investigating the Anniversary Day attacks, because—despite what everyone said—the Moon was not just a human place.

It was the gateway into the heart of the Earth Alliance. Earth herself, the very center of the Alliance, the place where it had all began.

Not to mention the fact that every species traveled to Earth at one point or another, and that meant
every species
traveled to the Moon.

But noooo, Xyven would have none of that. Xyven believed the bombings on the Moon had been a human problem. Xyven had turned down her petition for joint investigatory teams.

And she couldn’t help think that there might have been more to it.

She had spent all night trying to shed that thought, but she couldn’t. She wasn’t sure if she was being as bigoted as Xyven had been when he quashed the idea of joint investigations or if she had reason to be suspicious.

And, since she was the kind of woman who didn’t even know how to be circumspect, she was going directly to Xyven
first
, even though she probably should have gone farther up the ladder, to the Director of the entire investigative unit—the one that coordinated every single department, human and alien, and the joint department where humans and aliens investigated
together.

She hated this damn sky bridge. Because there was no sky. She was on starbase that housed all of the Earth Alliance’s Security division. She thought of the entire thing as a giant spider web, with smaller bases encircling the larger base, and all of them attached by tunnels and “bridges” and all sorts of other walkways and passageways that made the place the most confusing she had ever worked.

At least she had memorized it. So many staff members simply let the maps on the links guide them, which she figured would bite them in the ass one day. What would they do when the systems went down and they had to get from one part of the base to another?

They’d have no idea where to go or how to get there.

But she would.

She slammed her way through Joint Unit’s green and gold reception area, past the android receptionist that sent a panicked message to her links:

You do not have an appointment!

She never had appointments, but she knew one day that bipedal thing with the green/gold/blue eyes and the face that tried to shift from preferred species to another would try to stop her from entering.

If it tried today, she’d—oh, she had no idea what she’d do, but it would be bad.

She ignored the insistent messages, and stomped down the Disty-decorated hall. Because the first director had been Disty, everything was warrenlike—small and twisty. Fortunately, she wasn’t very tall either. Some of her colleagues couldn’t even stand upright here.

A few other android security officers tried to stop her along the way, but she put her security clearance badge as a response to all messages, and that slowed everything down.

Then she reached the rack of environmental suits, and those did stop her. For one brief moment, she thought about returning to her office, and summoning Xyven there.

Of course, he wouldn’t come. And then she’d have to go through this all over again.

But it was hard to keep a mad on when she was having to pick through the suits, slide one over her clothes, and find a mask that wasn’t too funky.

Somehow she managed to get the stupid suit on and maintain her mood. She hurried down the hall to the Peyti unit, put her gloved hand on the divider, and tapped her personal code into the material. Then she stood still as it did a retinal scan.

The divider opened right away, which surprised her. She would have thought that this week of all weeks Xyven was going to deny her entry.

Maybe he was political enough to realize that if he had refused to see her, she would have gone above his head. Hell, she might even have tried to get him fired.

She still might do that.

She waded through the murk that mimicked the environment on Peyla, the Peyti home world. The atmosphere was thicker here, and even though she couldn’t feel it against her skin, the atmosphere still slowed her stomp into Xyven’s office.

She managed to arrive at the end of that long corridor just as Xyven’s door opened. She half expected him to be standing there, like he had the last several times she barged in, but this time, he wasn’t.

She stalked inside.

He stood in front of his human-like desk, amidst the clutter of human, alien, and Peyti furniture that he somehow felt he needed to fill the room.

His arms were at his sides, his thin fingers nearly touching his knees. His face had a mournful expression, which she wouldn’t have noticed if he were wearing the usual mask that the Peyti wore in an Earth Normal environment.

I was wrong
, he sent her on her links.

Xyven always insisted on a link conversation between colleagues, so that he could save the information.

She was half tempted to yell at the top of her lungs, just so she wasn’t following all of his rules.

She took a deep breath of the manufactured air. Damn him. He took control of the conversation before she could even say a word.

Wrong about what?
she snapped.

Alien involvement.
You were right: it should have been a joint investigation from the start
.

She sucked in even more flat air. He had never, in all the years they’d worked together, admitted fault in anything. Never.

She wondered if he did it now to derail her.

Probably.

I’m appalled at the Peyti involvement. Appalled.
His skin was a faint blue.
Xivim has already been here to see me. She wanted to send investigators to Peyla, but I asked her to wait until I spoke to you
.

He…what? Huỳnh felt like he had physically pushed her back. She hadn’t expected any of this at all.

Why wait?
Huỳnh managed.

Because I wasn’t sure about the status of your investigations,
he sent.

She had over 150 investigators on the Anniversary Day cases, but all were on the Moon.

I don’t have anyone on Peyla
, she sent.
But I’ll send them if we’re not doing a joint investigation
.

Obviously, we are now,
Xyven sent.
I’m so sorry, Ava. It is my mistake.

She wanted to ask him if he had decided it was his mistake after he learned what happened on the Moon or after his superior had spoken to him.

Ultimately, though, it wasn’t her business.

What was her business was that there would now be a joint investigation.

I know Joint Investigations is your jurisdiction,
she sent,
but I’m six months into this. I’m going to coordinate it
.

She didn’t ask. She didn’t tell him she’d go over his head. She wasn’t going to give him that courtesy.

I hoped you would say that,
he sent.

She had never seen him be so contrite. She wondered what was behind it, then made herself take a third deep breath. It wasn’t her business why he had a change of heart.

What was her business was making certain that the Earth Alliance investigation into Anniversary Day and the second attack were conducted properly, and with respect to the investigations her staff had already put months into.

All right
, she sent, still feeling off-balance from the lack of a fight.
The sooner we can augment this investigation, the better. I want a meeting within the hour, along with plans from our colleagues in the other departments
.

Done,
Xyven sent.

Then he folded his twig-like fingers together and held them just below his chin. She had read about this gesture, but she had never seen it. It represented very deep emotion for a Peyti.

Please
, he sent,
accept my deepest apologies. This second attack might be my fault. I did not listen to you. If I had…

He let the thought trail off, maybe in the hopes that she would step in and utter some platitude about it not being his fault at all.