Maximum Offence (30 page)

Shil glares at me.

‘Need a bath,’ I tell the general. ‘If that’s all right, sir? A bath, maybe another drink, some sleep . . .’

‘And her?’

‘Oh . . . She gets to scrub my back.’

‘Level five,’ he says. ‘A full suite.’ Turns out he is talking to his ADC, who nods and hastily does something to a key card, which he hands me with a slight bow.

The general watches us go with a grin on his face. Shil walks behind, more furious than ever now I’ve told her to carry the Vals for me. Picking our way between clapping tables, we head for an exit.

Although I take care to pass Neen on the way.

‘See you later,’ I tell him.

My sergeant wants to say something. But doesn’t know where to begin, and I don’t have time for him to work it out. So I nod to the Aux, then turn back and take a bottle of brandy from their table.

‘Later,’ I tell Neen. He gets it this time.

‘Yes, sir . . . Later. Hope you have a good evening, sir.’

Shil looks like she wants to slap him.

We make it to the door, watched by six hundred Death’s Head and fifteen hundred Silver Fist, plus more braids than I have ever seen in one place. Almost nobody meets my eyes. A few are obviously scared of me, but most are too busy looking at the trophies hanging from Shil’s hands.

A servant steps back.

He also looks, but his gaze is on Shil and there’s pity in his eyes.

A dozen servitors step out of my way in the corridor. None of them looks me in the eyes. Tells me all I need to know about the Ninth; they’re as big a bunch of bastards as their Silver Fist allies. Hardly news. It goes with the uniform.

‘In here,’ I tell Shil, punching a button.

The elevator opens to reveal a surprised Death’s Head officer. As I watch, a serving boy twists out of his grip and sprints away. He is at least thirty years younger than the major and lacks a paunch, so that’s him gone then.

Swinging round, the major registers that I outrank him and shuts his mouth with a snap. ‘Find another lift,’ I say.

We leave him tight-lipped and dangerous to anyone junior. I know I shouldn’t be enjoying this, but I am. Can’t help the way I’m made.

Don’t want to help it either.

It’s got me this far.

As the elevator opens onto the fifth level, three Silver Fist corporals step back to let us through. One sees blood on the lift floor, glances back to check where it’s coming from and sees what Shil is holding.

‘Fuck,’ he says, then realizes I’m an officer.

I wave his apologies away.

‘You see the other fights?’

He nods, wondering how I missed them.

‘Just arrived,’ I tell him. ‘So, what were they like?’

‘Fierce, sir.’

He has his eyes on my arm, which still juts its spike at the elbow and has a row of blades. They’ve ripped my sleeve, obviously. You can’t force a combat arm into a jacket cut for elegance without something giving.

‘Who fought?’

‘Volunteers . . .’ Catching my grin, he shakes his head. ‘I mean it, sir. I was thinking of volunteering myself. Our braid promised ten gold pieces and promotion to the pair that killed them.’

‘The pair?’ I say.

Eyes go wide. ‘Sir,’ he says. ‘You didn’t—’

‘Fight as one of a pair?’ I shake my head, grinning sourly. ‘No,’ I say. ‘General Tournier forgot to mention that bit of the tradition.’

This is the point the Silver Fist decides he needs to be elsewhere. Understandable really.

A HUGE ANIMAL SKIN FILLS THE MIDDLE OF MY SUITE. THE DEAD beast has eyes of golden glass, cracked teeth, a tasselled tail, and six legs that end in vicious claws. A badly mended hole in its neck shows how it died.

A terracotta girl simpers from one corner.

Her breasts are full, upturned and delicately nippled. That is pretty much all she is: simpering face, heaving breasts and bare shoulders, all shaded by a sloping hat. The sculptor hasn’t bothered with anything else.

A lacquer bowl of sweetmeats sits next to her.

Swiping a bottle from Neen’s table was obviously a waste of my time, because far better bottles sit in a row to one side of the simpering girl. There’s nothing resembling
cachaca
, but there is brandy, whisky, pepper vodka and something on ice that calls itself
aquavit
. The bottle frosts as I pull it from the bucket. It tastes of . . .

Not sure, weeds of some kind.

Shil’s not talking to me. She stands by the door with a look of absolute misery on her face. So maybe it was stupid to admit I’d promised Neen to rescue her. But it was true. I thought she would be pleased.

Removing my shirt, I tip half the bottle over my arm. It hurts like fuck and the pain gets worse when I pull open the gash to wash the bone with alcohol. Shil’s meant to be finding thread to sew it shut, so I turn my attention to the Vals, starting with the one who died first.

Her implant wriggles when it’s dumped in the ice bucket. That is good, although the lurch my kyp gives is less good. The kyp’s feeding on the implant’s distress. The second Val’s implant is in better condition. It wriggles so violently I almost drop it.

When I look for Shil, she’s vomiting.

‘That’s Haze’s trick,’ I tell her.

Not sure she gets the joke. So I wait as she wipes her mouth on the back of her hand and spits on the deck, only just missing the skin rug.

‘Shil,’ I say.

She watches me, warily.

‘What’s wrong with this room?’

It is a real question. But she doesn’t have an answer. So it seems to be time to wake my gun from standby. Shil stitches my arm, while we both wait for the SIG to stop pissing around with all its little lights. When it wants, it can exit standby faster than I can jack the slide.

‘Screening myself,’ it announces.

And then it takes a look around. A very slow look.

‘Moth-eaten rug,’ it says. ‘Black silk sheets. Cheap statue with over-sized tits. An apparently limitless supply of alcohol . . . Sven, I apologize. How could I have imagined Pavel’s city was good enough, when you can have all this?’

‘Listen . . .’

‘And that statue,’ says the SIG. ‘You know it’s a fake?’

Can’t say I did. Mind you, can’t say it matters either. Certainly not in the way it obviously matters to my gun.

‘SIG,’ I say, ‘what’s wrong with this room?’

‘You mean apart from the fact it’s ghastly?’

‘Yes. Apart from that.’

The SIG considers my question carefully. And Shil uses the time it takes to tie off the stitching on my arm. ‘Thanks,’ I say.

She looks through me.

Blood crusts the edge of her mouth, her eye is mostly yellow, her hair is slick with grease and I can smell stale sweat from here. I guess servants don’t rate quarters like these. She wants to say something. A bit like her brother, she has no idea where to start. I have that effect on some people.

‘Go take a shower.’

Her gaze hardens. ‘Is that an order, sir?’

‘Yes,’ I tell her. ‘That’s an order.’

Spinning on her heels, Shil heads for a cubicle without another word. She looks as good naked as ever. Although I catch her only in a first brief burst of light. After that, sonic waves begin and the cubicle walls turn grey again.

‘You could always tell her to take another shower,’ my gun suggests.

‘Didn’t know the walls were going to do that.’

It snorts, and turns its attention back to my room.

The décor is a Silver Fist take on Octovian taste, it tells me. Apparently Octovian taste is shit anyway, and so mimicking it is easy. All you need is a lot of gold lacquer, some naked statues, furry rugs, big mirrors and plenty of weapons on the walls.

Octovian taste is puerile, the SIG tells me.

I’d ask what
puerile
means but I don’t want to know.
Octovian taste
is my taste. The stuff we have in Golden Memories. General Jaxx’s passion for matt black and silver always struck me as a bit odd.

‘Now do your clothes,’ I tell Shil.

She scowls, but I am used to that.

‘They smell,’ I add.

‘Yes, sir,’ she says. ‘I know . . .
I’m wearing them
.’ Stamping back to the cubicle, she taps a switch and the light zaps her, clothes and all.

‘Time?’ I demand of the gun.

‘Six hundred sixty seconds to Zero.’

Little bastard’s adopted the digital clock.

‘
How did it get so late?
‘ The gun sniffs. ‘I guess time just flies when you’re enjoying yourself.’

I’m about to have a guest.

I know this, and the SIG knows this, because it has been tracking my visitor since he began walking along a corridor seventeen levels below.

Shil’s not happy when I tell her to take her blouse off again. She’d scowl, but she is doing that already. So she opens her mouth to protest and lets rip as I push her towards the bed. So many rude words.

When she halts at the edge, I grip her shoulder with one hand and reach for buttons with my other. That’s when I realize I’m still wearing my fighting arm. ‘Fucking hell.’

‘What?’ the gun demands.

‘This,’ I say, flexing the arm. Pistons hiss.

And they hiss again as I push Shil to her knees and undo my flies. Her back is to the door and she’s fighting to get to her feet.

‘Shit,’ she says.

Reminds me she hasn’t seen it close up before.

My hand holds her in place long enough for the man outside to knock. Shil freezes, which makes life easier. When I don’t answer, the five-braid knocks again, and then pushes his way into my room. ‘Not disturbing anything, am I?’

Yanking Shil to her feet, I fold myself inside my trousers. This is more difficult than it should be, because I’m not sure my body knows we’re play-acting here. ‘It can wait,’ I tell the braid.

Pointing his finger at Shil, he says, ‘You . . . Get lost.’

I shake my head. ‘No way,’ I say. ‘She stays here where I can see her.’

He glares at me.

‘You think I’m going to waste my time hunting her down again after you’ve gone?’ Nodding to Shil, I jerk my chin towards the bed. She’s not going to forgive me. Mind you, given her catalogue of my crimes to date, she’s probably never going to get this far down the list. What makes it all worse is the figure standing behind the five-braid. Although, given the blankness in his eyes, you would think Shil was invisible.

Haze comes into the room.

That’s it. Doesn’t say
hello
, doesn’t say anything. Seems I might as well not exist either. ‘You want a drink?’ I ask the braid.

He shakes his head.

‘How about your little friend?’

The five-braid shakes his head again, not bothering to check what Haze wants. ‘We’re here to talk.’

‘So talk,’ says a voice. It’s my gun uncloaking.

‘That’s—’

I sigh. ‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘Of course it is. Illegal in ninety-eight per cent of the known universe.’

Reaching for my holster, I buckle it round my waist and settle the SIG on my hip. Small things keep me happy. Small things and knowing I can reduce the five-braid to chopped meat if I am fast enough.

At my hip the gun shivers, loading and locking.

I must be closer to violence than I imagined. A knife hangs from my other hip, and then there’s the arm, jagged blades up its outside edge and that wicked spike at the elbow.

‘So,’ the five-braid says to Haze. ‘It’s true.’

Haze nods.

Fingers pick at the edge of my mind. Sounds stupid, but that is how it feels. Like someone’s trying to dig their nails under a scab or prise off a lid or something. So I hammer down on the lid.

And the braid steps back.

It’s almost a stumble. When he looks at Haze, his expression is rueful. He has just been proved wrong about something.

Turns out it’s me.

‘See,’ says Haze, and then amends it to, ‘You see what I mean, sir?’

The five-braid nods. Sweeping his gaze round my room, he hesitates only when he reaches the bed. He wants Shil gone, I want her here. At the moment, it’s looking like two against two. I can take the braid. God knows, I can take Haze. Just never occurred to me I would have to.

‘She stays,’ I say.

The braid tries to protest.

‘We talk,’ I tell him. ‘She gets to listen. If it’s that secret we kill her afterwards.’

He laughs. Shil and Haze say nothing. Though they say it in their own ways.

‘That fight with the Vals was impressive,’ says the braid. ‘I was doubtful, but the general said you’d come through . . . You know why you won?’

‘Because I’m better.’

Silence greets my remark. I don’t see what his problem is. I’m alive, the Vals are dead, their gutted heads are on a table in the corner of my room, and I have their implants in an ice bucket.

It’s obvious I’m better. If I weren’t, it would be the other way round. Apart from the implant bit.

‘Perhaps,’ says the braid, ‘we should be asking why you’re better.’

‘Quicker, stronger, more ruthless . . .’ I’m reciting from my most recent physical. The one I had on joining the Death’s Head. ‘Also, I mend faster, and pain bothers me less than other people.’

‘You need extremes,’ says the five-braid.

‘Crap.’

‘Brings you alive,’ he says. ‘Focuses your mind . . . And all that’s true, but it’s not the reason.’

I wait. He’s going to tell me anyway.

‘You’re one of us,’ he says.

This time he steps back for real.

Might be the gun in my hand. Could be the spike on my arm. My guess is the gun. It has clips whirring madly, while it fights off his attempt to close it down. From the scowl on the braid’s face, the gun is winning.

‘Flechette,’ I tell it.

The SIG suggests explosive. That gun has a fetish about big bangs.

We compromise on hollow-point ceramic. At this range, it’ll leave most of the five-braid’s brains on the bulkhead behind him.

‘Wait,’ says the five-braid. ‘You can’t—’

‘Wanna bet,’ the gun says.

‘Just listen,’ the five-braid says, eyes flicking sideways. He’s scared, angry and nervous. Bad mix, it makes me glad I’m the one holding the SIG. Something in the braid’s glance suggests Haze told him I would be willing to listen. I’m not sure why he thinks that. I’m no more of a braid than—