A hot shower and a fresh change of clothes did nothing to improve Clay’s mood. He sat on a couch in Ness’ office, staring at the ceiling, cursing his apparent lack of competence. The worker tunic Ness had loaned him fit tightly in several places and itched even worse in the areas where it wasn’t ill-fitting. Undercover as a corporate official on a local mission that should not have lasted more than three days, he had only brought business wear — although the outfits were specially tailored for maximum mobility and comfort. It seemed pointless to waste his two remaining outfits at this point.
“I’m afraid you would have been better off leaving that suit of yours back on Tahmo Island. There’s no way we’ll ever get the stains out, to say nothing of the smell,” Ness chided, setting a steaming cup on the table in front of him. “We’ll be lucky if metro security doesn’t just follow their noses straight here to arrest you. How’s the collarbone? My autodoc is pretty old and doesn’t always get the bones to knit exactly in the right place.”
He rotated his arm, only wincing a little. “Might need a pain suppressant for the rest of the day, and I should probably turn down any title fights I’m offered for a couple of weeks, but it seems to have healed up okay,” Clay said. “I appreciate your help. As for the suit, can you recommend a decent tailor in this neighborhood?”
“You stuck out like a sore thumb as it is. The government is putting your picture up every chance it can, and Tachibana’s Shadow has made sure everyone knows you’re dead if they get to you first. I hope your guys have a solid lock on that Alexandre Girard cover. If the government figures out it’s fake and a diplomatic incident breaks out over Directorate Agents operating on Notosian soil, this place will tear itself apart to collect the bounty on you.”
Clay waved off the disparagement. “Who’s running Tachibana’s Shadow with Hoefer out of the picture?”
“Normally, Hoefer’s second, but he’s not exactly in favor with the other higher-ups — some kind of scandal a few weeks back. I’ll make some quiet inquiries, but if I start sounding too curious, they’ll wonder why I suddenly care. I’ll also lay good odds that Berger’s the one who tipped off local security and Prevo’s Tokusha, making you the prime suspect. Might be part of his play to take over.”
Clay rolled his eyes. “I’m innocent of that one, you know. I wasn’t even armed. They have to know Hoefer scanned every guest before entry. I’d never have gotten in otherwise.”
Ness turned deadly serious. “Clay, nobody cares if you were set up for the part. Venter settled her score with Hoefer and served you up as the perfect stooge for Berger. Berger puts the heat on you and makes friends with the government and metro security. He avenges Hoefer’s death without having to accuse Venter and the real people behind it.”
“People? You think that was a paid hit?”
“Ursza isn’t bold enough to murder Hoefer on her own, and since Berger is still alive, with someone to pin it on, they’ve given him a chance to gather the people he trusts and prepare for another war. Technically, he owes you big time.”
“So happy I could be of help.” Clay frowned.
“I did try to warn you it stunk of a trap.”
Clay raised his finger, preparing to protest, but caught himself, and his voice instantly calmed. “Yes, you did. I apologize for not giving your judgment proper consideration.”
“Your humility means everything to me now that I’m harboring a state fugitive. Just make sure your bosses give me my bonus.” Ness smirked, then pressed a button on the table before Clay, activating a holodisplay. “Speaking of which, I gave Division 5 their status update. New orders came through while you were asleep. Primary objective: retrieve the Keraunos datarod. Secondary objective: eliminate Venter and Hēi Gēzi. Return to Pilatus Base for debriefing.”
Clay rubbed his eyes. “So, we’ve gone from ‘find out what Keraunos is’ to ‘steal Keraunos outright and assassinate two foreign nationals off-world.’ Did you tell them my cover was compromised and every law enforcement agency and criminal organization on the planet was likely looking for me?”
“No, of course not. To save you embarrassment, I kept everything after Hoefer’s murder out of the discussion. Should I file an amendment?”
“Never mind. I’ll muddle through. The less interference from Division, the better.” He winced, rubbed his newly knitted collarbone, and tried to stretch.
“Speaking strictly as your handler, are you sure you’re up to this, Clay?”
Clay shot her a look. “Strictly as my handler, do you think I’m not?”
“I think you’re letting your personal feelings get in the way of your mission objectives. Questioning my use of yorohito as a distraction? Offering to help that Venter girl get off-planet? Walking right into a setup that now has everyone on Notosia looking for you and may have blown your cover?”
“It’s still my mission, Ness. It’s still my call. As for Venter, don’t make assumptions. You know I may have to tell a lot of lies and break many promises to get what I want. Meanwhile, the blown cover and arrest warrant may yet play to my advantage. It gives me a little more leeway to be desperate.”
Ness smirked. “Always an answer for everything, but I don’t buy it. I believe if that girl hadn’t taken your gun, you’d have shot up that whole hotel for her.”
Clay sneered. “I guess, now, you’ll never know.”
Ness walked over to the chair across from Clay and sat down. She stared at him, concern creeping into her face. “So, you’re saying you’re okay with the change in mission? You’re prepared to kill Venter, despite your sympathies? You’re capable of killing Hēi Gēzi, despite your, shall we say, advanced age and current injuries? I get the impression you don’t even like killing. If so, you’ve chosen a strange profession.”
Clay waved her off. “I don’t mind killing for the right reasons, even in cold blood. I’d just rather do it in a fight and not shoot someone in the back when they aren’t looking.”
“That’s my point. You don’t have a dossier on these people or even full mission details. You don’t know why you’re going to kill them other than the fact that someone at Division wants them dead. Seems to me that’s against your nature.”
“It’s obvious why. Venter and Hēi Gēzi are the only two currently alive who may have decrypted the datarod and seen Keraunos. I assume that means Division either knows or has a pretty good idea what it is, and they’ve determined it’s too dangerous to be in the open.” He closed his eyes and lay back on the couch.
“And they don’t think it’s important that you know what it is?”
“It’s a mission objective. Mine is not to question why.”
Ness frowned, almost sad. “How long have you been in this game?” she said slowly.
“Longer than you, I’d expect.” Her gaze did not waver. Finally, he relented. “Forty years.”
“Seems like you know the drill inside and out, but you don’t believe it like you used to.”
Clay smirked. “I’m just out of practice,” he said. “In my youth, I was a corporate spy. Got recruited by Division 5 in my late 20’s. I started as an analyst, really just a human watchdog, while the synthetic intelligence agents did the real work. Eventually, I graduated to the jobs only humans can do – forward scout, courier, and field support like you. Now, I’m one of the most senior operatives they have. I’ve survived over a hundred successful missions, and they still find fieldwork for me once every couple of years. It’s just not often enough to keep the tools as sharp as I’d like.”
Ness sat back and crossed her legs. “Which was the mission that gave you the soft heart for yorohito and civilians in general.”
“It wasn’t a mission.”
“You’re kidding?”
Clay stared into the distance. Sadness crept over his face. “I had a daughter, Kathlyn” he said, deflated, as he twisted a ring on the middle finger of his right hand. A holo projected from the stone on top, displaying the image of a vibrant girl with a head full of curls, laughing. “She wandered into the wrong place at the wrong time. Got into trouble. It was outside of Directorate space though, so I couldn’t help. It was my job to protect her, but my hands were tied.” He paused and composed himself. “That was almost twenty years ago.”
“Jesus, Clay. So, that’s why you didn’t want to involve the yorohito that night? That’s why you’re trying to protect Venter now? Listen to me, it’s not the same thing at all on Notosia. You can’t always save everyone, and most of them aren’t worth saving.”
“How can you live on a world like this, Ness?”
“It’s all I’ve ever known. I’m third generation. My grandfather was one of the original colonists.”
Clay ran his history lessons back in his mind. “From what I know, all the original colonists were criminals and political agitators on Earth who chose to come to Notosia.”
Ness shook her head. “Not precisely. Most came as servants to legitimate colonists. It was humane enough to call a ‘work release,’ but it was just civilized slavery. My grandfather was a teenager, a foot soldier in the Yegorova Network. A bit too naïve to accept clemency, so he followed his mates out here. His son, my father, was a policeman. I followed in the family tradition.”
“I don’t get it, though. Even after the colonial government collapsed, your father would have been born a free citizen as far as Sol Directorate was concerned. He could have come back.”
“Come back to what? This is our home. He wanted to make a difference, make it better. That’s why he joined metro security and why I did too.”
“So, you were a police officer?” Clay asked, impressed.
Ness nodded. “Good one, too. Two years on the streets as Guardian, then ten years as Brigadier Inspector.”
“What happened?”
“Didn’t get so lucky with one of the regime changes. Got sent to bring in a terrorist suspect but figured out he was innocent. No matter who’s in charge, if you get brought in on those kinds of charges, you end up mysteriously dead before you even waste the state’s time with a trial, so I let him get away. They accused me of being a sympathizer. They couldn’t prove it, so they drove me out of the force. I ended up becoming a private detective.”
“I’m sorry,” was all Clay could manage to say.
“The pay isn’t as good, but you live longer, and the hours are better, anyway.”
“This planet is a lost cause, though. You really should consider bringing your talents back to Earth.”
Ness scoffed. “The Sol Directorate is just a bunch of rich corporations trying to control their customers in an emerging post-scarcity society by calling themselves a ‘government.’ Look at you. You’re risking your life to bring them Keraunos, and they won’t even tell you what it is. They’ve asked you to kill that girl, and despite your protests, I know it’s against your better conscience. Hell, they probably have a psych profile on you that calculates exactly how much personal conflict that order puts you under. What if it turns out Keraunos isn’t dangerous or important enough to lose your life and soul? Do you owe that much loyalty to people who set you up like this simply because an SI determined you were a cost-effective solution to a minor problem?”
Clay sat silently for a moment. “You’d make a lousy recruitment officer, Ness, but I forged my loyalties decades ago, so let’s get on with this mission.”
“Retrieve Keraunos and eliminate two targets. Should be easy. Where do we begin?”
“What do you know about Talbot?”
“The Alchemist? Oh, I could go on for days. He’s not a real player, though. Just some guy who sells drugs to lowlifes who use them to fund the small-scale street wars that get them noticed by the major players.”
Clay rolled his eyes. “Drugs for guns; guns for people; people for industry; industry for bigger people.”
Ness smiled and nodded. “See? You’re catching on to the new reality already.”
“No, I studied my history. So should this planet.”
“If history taught us one thing, it’s that nobody ever learned anything from history. Talbot’s a nobody though. He couldn’t afford to hire Hēi Gēzi to steal Keraunos.”
“He’s got to fit in somewhere. She went to too much trouble to point him out to me. He must have been the one who paid for the hit on Hoefer. She wanted me to know so I wouldn’t come after her if I escaped her little trap. The fact that he didn’t panic or even acknowledge me when I tailed him on the train tells me he has no idea she’s been playing both of us.”
Ness shrugged. “It’s a sensible theory, and it only took a day, two cranial contusions, a shattered collarbone, and one nice suit. What’s your next move?”
“Straight up and back to the basics. I need to see if this cover has any use left in it.”
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