Miles Errant (44 page)

They exchanged a glance; Ivan cleared his throat. "Well. So. But you're on shaky ground, trying to undercut Destang. Say—if his hit squad is that close—where's Galen?" Alarm suffused his face.

"Galen's dead," Miles reported shortly. They were in fact just passing the dark cross corridor to the outer ledge where that body lay.

"Ah? Glad to hear it. Who did the honors? I want to kiss his hand. Or hers."

"I think you'll have the chance in just a moment." The quick tap of running footsteps, as of a person with short legs, was just audible from ahead around the curve of the corridor. Miles drew his stunner. "And this time, I don't have to keep him arguing. Maybe Quinn's spooked him back this way," he added hopefully. He was getting extremely worried about Quinn.

Mark rounded the curve and skidded to a halt before them with a hopeless cry. He turned, stepped, stopped, turned again like an animal in a trap. The right side of his face was streaked red, his ear was edged with oozing yellow-white blisters, and the stench of burnt hair crept faintly through the air.

"Now
what?" asked Miles.

Mark's voice was high and stretched. "There's some painted lunatic back there after me with a plasma gun! They've taken over the next watchtower—"

"Did you see Quinn anywhere?"

"No."

"Miles," said Ivan in puzzlement, "our guys wouldn't carry plasma arcs on an antipersonnel mission like this, would they? Not in the middle of a critical facility like this—they'd not want to risk damaging the machinery—"

"Painted?" said Miles urgently. "Like how? Not—not face paint like a Chinese opera mask, by chance?"

"I don't know—what a Chinese opera mask looks like," panted Mark, "But they—well, one—had colors solid from ear to ear."

"The ghem-commander, no doubt," Miles breathed. "On formal hunt. They've upped the bid, it seems."

"Cetagandans?" said Ivan sharply.

"Their reinforcements must have finally arrived. They must have picked up my trail at the shuttleport. Oh, God—and Quinn went that way . . . !" Miles too turned in a circle, and swallowed panic back to the pit of his stomach where it belonged. It must not be permitted to rise to the level of his brain. "But you can relax, Mark. They don't want to kill you."

"The hell they don't! He shouted, 'There he is, men!' and tried to blow my head off!"

Miles's lips peeled back on a dirty grin. "No, no," he caroled soothingly. "Merely a case of mistaken identity. Those people want to kill me—Admiral Naismith. It's just the ones on the other end of the tunnel who want to kill you. Of course," he added jovially, "neither of them can tell us apart."

Ivan made a derisive sputter.

"Back this way," said Miles decisively, and led on at a run. He swung into the transverse corridor and skidded to a halt before the outside access hatch. Ivan and Mark galloped up behind.

Miles stood on tiptoe, and gritted his teeth. According to the control readout, the tide had now risen higher than the top of the hatch. This exit was sealed by the sea.

Miles slapped his wrist comm channel open. "Nim!" he called.

"Sir!"

"There's a Cetagandan covert ops squad in Tower Seven. Strength unknown, but they have plasma arcs."

"Yes, sir," came Nim's breathless voice. "We just found them."

"Where are you and what can you see?"

"I have a pair of soldiers outside each of the three tower entrances, with a backup in the bushes in the parking area. The—Cetagandans, you say, sir?—just pumped some plasma blasts out the main corridor as we tried to enter."

"Anybody hit?"

"Not yet. We're flat."

"Any sign of Commander Quinn yet?"

"No, sir."

"Can you get a fix on her wrist comm?"

"It's somewhere in the lower levels of this tower. She doesn't respond and it's not moving."

Stunned? Dead? Was her wrist even still in her wrist comm? No telling.

"All right," Miles took a breath, "put in an anonymous call to the local police. Tell them there's armed men in Tower Seven—maybe saboteurs trying to blow up the Barrier. Make it convincing—try to sound scared."

"No problem, sir," said Nim earnestly.

Miles wondered how nearly the plasma beam had parted Nim's hair. "Until the constables arrive, keep the Cetagandans sealed in the tower. Stun anyone who tries to exit. The locals can sort them out later. Put a couple of point men down in Tower Eight to seal that end, have them work north and drive the Cetagandans back if they try to exit south. But I think they'll head north." He put his hand over the comm and added to Mark, "Chasing you." He lifted his palm and continued to Nim, "As the police arrive, pull back. Avoid contact with 'em. But if you do get cornered, go meekly. We're the good guys. It's those nasty strangers inside the tower with the illegal plasma arcs they should be after. We're just tourists who spotted something peculiar while out for an evening stroll. You copy?"

There was a strained grin in Nim's voice. "Copy, sir."

"Keep an observer in sight of Tower Six. Report when the police arrive. Naismith out."

"Copy, sir. Nim out."

Mark emitted a muffled moan and surged forward to grab Miles by his jacket. "You idiot, what are you doing? Call the Dendarii back—order them to clear the Cetagandans out of Tower Seven! Or I will—" He made to grab at Miles's wrist; Miles held him off and put his left hand behind his back.

"Ah-ah! Calm yourself. There's nothing I'd like more than a game of stunner tag with the Cetagandans, since we outnumber them—but they have plasma arcs. Plasma arcs have more than three times the range of a stunner. I don't ask my people to face that kind of tactical disadvantage without dire need."

"If those bastards catch you they'll kill you. How much more dire does it have to be?"

"But Miles," said Ivan, looking up and down the corridor doubtfully, "didn't you just trap us in the center of a pincers movement?"

"No." Miles grinned, exhilarated. "I did not. Not while we own a cloak of invisibility. Come on!" He trotted back to the T intersection and turned right, back toward the Barrayaran-held Tower Six.

"No!" Mark balked. "The Barrayarans might kill you by accident, but they'll kill me on purpose!"

"The ones back there," Miles jerked his head over his shoulder, "would kill us both just to make sure. The Dagoola operation left the Cetagandans more peeved with Admiral Naismith than I think you have grasped. Come on."

Reluctantly, Mark followed, Ivan bringing up the rear.

Miles's heart pounded. He wished he felt half as confident as his grin to Ivan had suggested. But Mark must not be permitted to sense his doubt. A couple of hundred meters of blank synthacrete jerked past as he ran on tiptoe, trying to make as little noise as possible. If the Barrayarans had already worked their way this far down the tunnel—

They came to the last pumping station, and still no sign of the lethal trouble ahead. Or behind.

This pumping station was quiescent again. It would be another twelve hours to the next high tide. If no unexpected surges came downstream, it should stay shut down till then. Still, Miles was disinclined to leave it to chance, and from the way Ivan was shifting from foot to foot, watching him with growing alarm, he'd better be able to offer a guarantee.

He began looking over the control panels, raising one for a look within. Fortunately, it was much simpler than, say, the control nexus for a jumpship propulsion chamber. A cut here, then there, should disable this pump without lighting up boards in the watchtower. He hoped. Not that anyone in the tower was likely to be paying much attention to their boards just this moment. Miles glanced up at Mark. "I need my knife, please."

Unwillingly, Mark handed the antique dagger over, and, at a look from Miles, its sheath as well. Miles used the point to pop the hair-fine wires. His guess as to which ones were which seemed correct; he tried to look as if he'd known it all along. He did not hand the knife back when he was done.

He went to the pumping chamber hatch and opened it. No beeping this time. His gravitic grappler made an instant handle on the smooth inner surface. Last problem was that damned manual locking bar. If some innocent—or not-so-innocent—came along and gave it a twirl—ah, no. The same model of tensor field lever, ally to the gravitic grappler, that Quinn had used to open the hatch to the ledge worked here. Miles blew a breath of relief through pursed lips. He returned to the control panel facing the corridor and slapped on his fisheye scan at the end of a row of dials. It blended in nicely.

He gestured toward the open hatch to the pumping chamber, as inviting as a coffin. "All right. Everybody in."

Ivan went white. "Oh, God, I was afraid that was what you had in mind." Mark did not look much more thrilled than Ivan.

Miles lowered his voice, softly persuasive. "Look, Ivan, I can't force you. You can head on up the corridor and take the chance that your uniform will keep you from getting your brains fried by somebody's nervous reflex. If you survive contact with Destang's hit squad, you'll get arrested by the locals, which probably won't be fatal. But I'd rather you stuck with me." He lowered his voice still further. "And didn't leave me alone with
him
."

"Oh." Ivan blinked.

As Miles expected, this appeal for help had more impact than logic, demands, or cajolery. He added, "Look, it's just like being in a tactics room."

"It's just like being in a trap!"

"Have you ever been in a tactics room when the power's knocked out? They are traps. All that sense of command and control is an illusion. I'd rather be in the field."
He smirked and jerked his head toward his double. "Besides, don't you think Mark ought to get the chance to share your recent experience?"

"When you put it that way," growled Ivan, "it has a certain appeal."

Miles lowered himself into the pumping chamber first. He thought he could just hear distant footsteps scuffing in the corridor. Mark looked as if he wanted to bolt, but with Ivan breathing down his neck he had little choice. Finally Ivan, with a gulp, dropped beside them. Miles keyed on his hand light; Ivan, the only one tall enough, shoved the heavy hatch shut. It was profoundly silent for a moment, but for their breathing, as they squatted knee to knee.

Ivan's swollen, empurpled hands clenched and unclenched, sticky with sweat and blood. "At least y'know they can't hear us."

"Cozy," grunted Miles. "Pray our pursuers are as stupid as I was. I ran past this place twice." He opened the scanner case and set the receiver to project the north-and-south view of the still-empty corridor. There was a very faint draft in the chamber, Miles noted. Anything more would foretell a rush of water through the lines, and it would be time to bail out, Cetagandans or no Cetagandans.

"Now what?" said Mark thinly. He looked as if he felt trapped indeed, sandwiched between the two Barrayarans.

Miles settled back against the slimy wet wall with a false air of ease. "Now we wait. Just like a tactics room. You spend a lot of time waiting in a tactics room. If you have a good imagination, it's—pure hell." He keyed his wrist comm. "Nim?"

"Yo, sir. I was just about to call you." Nim's uneven voice sounded as though he was running, or maybe crawling. "A police aircar just landed at Tower Seven. We're withdrawing through the park strip behind the Barrier. The observer reports the locals just entered Tower Six, too."

"Have you got anything off Quinn's wrist comm?"

"It still hasn't moved, sir."

"Has anyone made contact with Captain Galeni yet?"

"No, sir. Wasn't he with you?"

"He left about the time I lost Quinn. Last seen on the outside of the Tidal Barrier at about the midpoint. I'd sent him to look for another way in. Ah . . . report at once if anyone spots him."

"Yes, sir."

Damn, another worry. Had Galeni run into trouble, Cetagandan, Barrayaran, or local? Had he been betrayed by his own state of mind? Miles now wished he'd kept Galeni by him as heartily as he wished he'd kept Quinn. But they hadn't yet found Ivan then; Miles hardly could have done otherwise. He felt like a man trying to assemble a jigsaw puzzle of live pieces, that moved and changed shape at random intervals with tiny malicious giggles. He unclenched his teeth. Mark was regarding him nervously; Ivan was hunkered down not paying much attention to anything, by the way he was biting his lips locked in an internal struggle with his new-won claustrophobia.

There was a movement in the somewhat distorted 180-degree scanner view of the corridor, a man loping silently around the curvature from the south end. Cetagandan point man, Miles guessed, though he wore civilian clothes. He had a stunner, not a plasma arc in his hand—apparently the Cetagandans were now aware that the locals were on the scene in too great force to silence by a convenient murder, and were now thinking of de-escalating, or at least decapitalizing, the Situation. The Cetagandan scouted up the corridor a few more meters, then vanished back the way he'd come.

A minute later, movement from the north: a pair of men tiptoeing along as quietly as a couple of gorillas of that size could move. One of them was the numbskull who'd managed to appear on a covert op still wearing his regulation Service boots. He too had exchanged his original weapon for a more demure stunner, though his companion still carried a lethal nerve disruptor. It looked as if it really could be shaping up for a round of stunner tag. Ah, the stunner, weapon of choice for all uncertain situations, the one weapon with which you really could shoot first and ask questions later.

"Holster your nerve disruptor,
that's
right, good boy!" Miles murmured, as the second man too switched weapons. "Heads up, Ivan; this could be the best show we'll see all year."

Ivan glanced up, his absorbed uncertain smile transmuting into something genuinely sardonic, more like the old Ivan. "Oh, shit, Miles. Destang will have your nuts for engineering this."

"At present, Destang doesn't even know I'm involved. H'sh. Here we go."

The Cetagandan point man had returned. He made a come-on motion, and was leapfrogged by a second Cetagandan. On the other end of the corridor, beyond their view due to the curve, the remaining three Barrayarans came jogging. That accounted for all the Barrayarans that had been in the tower; any outer-perimeter backup was now cut off from them by the cordon of local police. The Barrayarans had apparently given up on their mysteriously vanished quarry and were in pull-out mode, hoping to exit via Tower Seven as quickly as possible without having to explain themselves to a bunch of unsympathetic Earthmen. The Cetagandans, who had actually witnessed the supposed Admiral Naismith run this way, were still in hunting array, though their rear guard was presumably closing up with the pressure from the locals coming on strong behind.