The First One's Free (13 page)

“And what did that… that…”

“The gray woman? What did she want? She
likely wanted to kill Leitman. Or Luxhomme. Or whatever he called
himself to her. She did beat the hell out of him.”

“Why?”

“I can’t say much about it but the woman was
enslaved on her homeworld. Apparently, her master sent her to Metis
knowing that, once a person sets foot on a Compact world, human or
alien, they are freed. Seems her people recognize that as
liberation under their laws.
From what we could
gather, Leitman failed to mention the transfer of ownership, and
she didn't take the omission well
”

“What will happen to him?”

“Nothing. He broke no laws. He made no claim
on her to our government or any other human authority. As far as
those on Metis are concerned, he’s done nothing wrong. Nothing we
can prove, anyway. He did, however, book passage on the next liner
to Jefivah.” She looked down at the ornate watch on her left wrist.
“Which departed forty-five minutes ago. They should be at a
hypergate by now.”

Lovely. Luxhomme or Leitman or whatever his
name was had fled to Best’s homeworld while Best himself sat in
this cramped little room being interrogated.

“And what becomes of me?” he asked.

“That’s up to your government,” said Jovann.
She stood up and looked down at Best with arms folded. “I do know
your First Minister is rather upset with you for leaving The
Caliphate without the Grand Dimaj. Apparently, the Marilynists have
been rioting since you disappeared.”

17

“Well, well, well,” said Lattus Brac as he
stepped out of the boarding tube. They were on Ramcat, or rather
Araneeya, Ramcat’s giant orbital city. “If it isn’t my new
concubine.” The pudgy Gelt sniffed the air. “And you’re pregnant.
Lovely. I always wanted a son.”

“So Kai really is dead?” asked Tishla.

“Afraid so. Laral challenged him over the new
world, Cyal.” He shook his head. “Kai had a brilliant mind. His
sword work… He had a brilliant mind.” Brac strode over to her and
wrapped his arm around her waist. “Guess that makes you my
property. At least until your indenture contract… What?” he said,
noticing the look on Tishla’s face.

“The nanites are still in my blood,” she
said. “Go on. Activate them. Put that virtual slave collar on
me.”

“Well, if you insist.” Brac held up his
forearm, turned his palm in toward himself and fingered a small
bump on his wrist. The nano-tattoo embedded in his palm gave him a
message. “Deed nullified. Target person is Free due to transfer of
deed to a citizen of a nullifying authority.”

“I don’t understand.”

“The Compact, Brac. They have banned slavery,
even our benign version of it.” She patted him on the cheek. “And
as the mother of Kai’s child, I am Kai’s heir. Which makes you
subordinate to me.” She pinched the cheek she had just patted. “But
don’t worry, my new little brother. Daintier things than me have
felled mightier trees than Laral Jorl. Tell me, do we still have
possession of Hanar?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Well, that makes me their queen. Are there
any Tianese left alive?”

“Some. Why do you care? We’ll have them wiped
out by the end of the turn.”

“No.”

“No?”

“I want them alive. And I want them allied
with us. And I want the best swordsman in the Realm you can
find.”

Brac stepped back and looked at Tishla,
already bewildered to find himself subject to the whims of a former
concubine. “But why?”

Tishla withdrew Kai’s dagger from the coat
Athena had given her. “Because, my new little brother, I am going
to open Laral Jorl’s throat and cut out his testicles. Then I’m
going to cut his heart from his chest and eat it while it’s still
beating.”

*****

“They fired you?”

Best’s assistant Alyssa, a dark-skinned woman
from one of the more traditionalist districts of Jefivah, stood in
the doorway, her hand up to her mouth.

“I resigned,” said Best as he packed up his
desk. “I cited personal matters and gave up my seat in the House.”
He smiled. “At least I get to keep my pension and don’t have to
move until my seat comes up for election again.”

“But why?”

Best let out his breath in one big huff, his
shoulders sagging as he did so. “The First Minister wanted to sack
me, but it wouldn’t do to have a disgruntled ex-minister in the
House where he can make trouble for her government. Besides, you’ve
seen the talking heads on the local news feeds. They call me the
‘senior delegate for the Marilynists’ now.”

“That’s not fair, Doug. You’ve worked hard
for this government.”

“And for what? We’re still the laughingstock
of the Compact.”

“We have three colonies now, thanks to
you.”

“Only one of which lost a cache of weapons we
were supposed to turn over to the Compact. We’re lucky they didn’t
shut Marilyn down.” He managed a weak grin. “The First Minister did
offer me governorship of Marilyn after the next election.”

Alyssa’s eyes lit up. “Will you take it?”

“Have you been to Marilyn?”

She hadn’t, but Best had complained about its
desert climate enough that she understood. “Point taken.”

“I have an interview with Ron Paul University
in a week,” said Best. “A teaching position. Interstellar
politics.”

Alyssa feigned a shiver. “That’s on Belsham,
isn’t it?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Libertarian world. I’d be afraid to eat any
meat there.”

“You’re a vegetarian.”

“It’s always nice to have the option.” Her
left hand twitched. She looked at her palm, her eyes widening as
they scanned the message. “Well, you may not get the government
dispatches anymore, but I do.”

“What is it?”

“They found the
Etrusca Explorer
.”

*****

A large
Wilson
-class cruiser, the
Dag Hammerskjold
, towed the much smaller
Etrusca
Explorer
through its own projected wormhole. The bulk of two
ships would never have made it through a hypergate, especially any
of Jefivah’s outmoded ones. Best watched from the orbital port
center as the
Hammerskjold
, glittering with lights from
within and bristling with weapons, pulled the darkened freighter
behind it, a large gash in its hull.

“We found it orbiting a planet on the Yedevan
fringe,” said Commander Liu, back and still clad in his black suit.
He sounded just as warm and personable as he had the first time
Best met him. “We still don’t understand. They were supposed to
head straight to Tian, then the yards above Zeus once the Navy
cleared them.”

“What do we know about the Yedevans?” asked
Best.

“Nothing,” said Liu, “except they don’t
tolerate trespassers. And we only know that from the Laputans.”

Another officer, this one in the dress
uniform of a Navy captain, stood to Best’s left, watching the two
ships approach. Outside, two small tugs pushed up against the
Etrusca Explorer
. The
Hammerskjold
released the
Explorer
from its tow beam and shifted away from the port
center, moving out of sight. Even with the tugs pushing it into
position to dock, the freighter appeared dead.

“What happened to the crew?” asked Best.
“Never mind the cargo. Where’s the crew?”

The captain, an odd whimsical look on his
face, made a slurping sound.

Best started to reply when the glare on Major
Liu’s face stopped him.

“Really, Captain, is that necessary?”

The captain shrugged. “Do we actually know
anything about the Yedevans? The only time the Laputans talked
about them was during the war, and then only the prisoners would
talk about them. Now, they pretend the Yedevans don’t exist. We
don’t even know if they’re primates.”

“Most of the intelligent alien species we
interact with are primates,” said Best. “Even the reptiles look
like us. Sort of.”

“True, but no one’s seen a Yedevan, have
they?” The captain pointed to the crippled freighter outside. “When
we or the Zaras or the Laputans come across a primate intelligence,
we all basically see strange-looking people who talk funny.”

“Except the Grays,” said Liu. It was the
closest Best had ever seen him come to cracking a smile.

“The Grays are freaks by anyone’s standards,”
said the captain. “But if the Yedevans aren’t primates, they might
not see the crew as people.”

“What would they be then?” asked Best.

“Protein,” said the captain. “Delicious,
exotic protein.”

Best thought he would be sick.

Liu did allow himself the trace of a smile as
he turned to Best. “At least you get a degree of vindication, Mr.
Best.”

Best wanted to clock the intelligence agent
but thought better of it. “Commander, I am out of a job. I’ll soon
be out of a home. And twenty years of public service, when I could
have left this world a decade ago for something more fulfilling,
has been flushed down the toilet. How in the hell is that supposed
to make me feel vindicated?”

“Well, you can always cash in on your new
status as a Marilynist prophet.”

Best threw a lazy punch that connected with
Liu’s jaw and sent him sprawling. The captain went over and knelt
beside Liu, who lay stunned on the deck.

“Must have just waxed the floor,” said the
captain with a wink. “Come on. Let’s go check out the ship.”

“What about him?”

“They have aspirin and ice on Jefivah, don’t
they?”

*****

Alyssa’s fears proved to be unfounded. Best
could definitely eat the food on Belsham. He wondered how much
weight he would gain from all the luncheons and banquets he’d been
invited to in his week on the planet. Even Belsham’s government
came calling, though he couldn’t serve as an elected official (and
frankly, hoped he never would again.) Belsham had two colonies of
its own, but found Jefivah’s program of taking old military
outposts off the Compact’s hands intriguing.

“But,” the president’s chief of staff
cautioned, “we’d make those asses in the Compact military pick up
their own damn weapons.” She was the perfect combination of charm
and fury, Best mused, to be the right hand of a strong executive.
“So what do you say? Our cabinet departments work out of much nicer
digs.”

“Doesn’t that go against your small
government philosophy?” asked Best, whom, after a lifetime on
Jefivah, still couldn’t say just what his native world’s unifying
political philosophy was.

The chief gave him a thousand-watt smile. “A
small government means we can take better care of it. That’s why
Belsham is thriving and Walton is an abandoned colony.” Walton had
originally been Belsham’s mother planet, but like all radically
political worlds, it fell into chaos that made Jefivah look like a
utopia.

“Besides,” the chief added, “I can promise
you won’t see a single statue memorializing a World War Era
actress. Except maybe at a theater.”

“You make a tempting offer,” said Best with a
laugh. “I’ll have to consider it. But keep in mind, I’ve already
accepted the teaching position at Paul U.”

“Good,” said the chief. “Those egg heads
could use an outsider like you to shake things up.”

Best left the Executive Residence in good
spirits. The capital, Friedman, had a decent climate, clean
streets, and cheap but comfortable homes available. The teaching
gig, which Best originally thought of as being put out to pasture,
started to sound exciting. Initially, he would talk about his
experiences of working in a highly factionalized government with
limited resources and marginal influence in the Compact. The
humanities department also suggested he teach Earth history. The
offer from the president coupled with his academic duties would
more than wash the bad taste of Jefivah out of his mouth. Once he
settled here, he hoped he‘d never have cause to go back to that
cesspool again.

All that ceased to matter when he spotted
Luxhomme, aka Marq Katergarus, aka Marcus Leitman, strolling out of
a deli not three blocks from grounds of the Executive
Residence.

*****

Luxhomme opened his eyes only to see Best and
several police officers in riot gear surrounding his bed. The girl
lying next to him also woke up and screamed when she saw the
weapons all trained on the bed.

“Hello, Luxxy,” said Best. “Or Marq. Or
Marcus. Whoever you are. Do you know how much trouble you are
in?”

The girl screamed again, and one of the
officers grabbed a robe off the chair. Tossing it to her, he said,
“Here. Put this on and go wait in the living room.”

“And don’t try to run away,” said another
officer, a female. “We know where you live.”

Best crouched down beside Luxhomme’s bed as
the girl scrambled out of it. “It took a couple of hyperpackets to
Jefivah, but I’ve been delegated an agent of the First Minister
since, technically, my Citizenship still resides there. So, on
behalf of the government of Jefivah, Mr. Luxhomme, alias Marq
Katergarus, alias Marcus Leitman, I’m placing you under arrest for
mishandling Compact property and interfering with the lawful
functioning of a constituent authority.”

Luxhomme pulled his sheet up around him. “You
can’t do that. I have rights. Where’s your warrant?”

The female officer lowered her weapon, took a
small device off her belt and turned to point it at the wall behind
her. Luxhomme’s warrant appeared, duly signed by judges on Jefivah
and Belsham with a writ of extradition attached. “I know the
Belsham judge,” she said. “I can tell you exactly what he’ll say at
your extradition hearing.”

“‘Where is your counsel?’” Luxhomme tried
with a greasy laugh.