Shadowline - Starfishers Triology - Book 1

Thirty-One: 3031 AD

It was a very exclusive toy shop. It even served tiny cups of coffee or tea with cutesy little cookies. Cassius was in hog's heaven.

"Not very exciting, is it?" he asked.

Mouse squeezed his eyes shut in a fierce squint. "No, it's not." He could not stay awake. They had been on The Big Rock Candy Mountain four days. Cassius had not given him much chance to sleep. "All we do is hunk around asking the same old questions."

"That's what intelligence work is, Mouse. You knock on doors and ask the same old questions till you get the right answers. Or you sit at headquarters and feed the computer the same old answers till it gives you the right question." He wound the music box again. It played a tune neither of them knew. A tiny porcelain mouse twirled and danced to the music. "Isn't that cute?"

"It doesn't seem worth the trouble."

"Mr. Russell. I'll take the music box: Can you have it shipped?"

They did have a few leads. Cassius had good, highly placed contacts on The Mountain, on both sides of the law. He had them asking questions too.

Michael had not worked hard to conceal his presence. They had unearthed a dozen people who had seen him here, there, or somewhere else, usually with Gneaus Storm. A few had seen him with one or two other men not locally known. They had had a hard look.

Dee had stopped being evident after Storm's departure, though he had not himself departed for several days.

"It's worth it. There's a pattern shaping up."

"What pattern?" Mouse signaled the sales clerk/waiter. "May I have another coffee?"

"That I don't know yet. I can see just a little of the edge. We've spread out plenty of money and eyes. Something will shake loose pretty soon."

"Speaking of eyes. Your friend the Captain has been watching us. Through the window and from next door. He doesn't look happy."

A hint of frown wrinkled Cassius's brow. He turned, gazed into the crystal shop connected with the toy store. His gaze met the policeman's. The officer took a deep breath, shrugged, and came through the connecting doorway. He seemed both angry and defensive.

"You might as well join us," Cassius said. "Easier to stay with us. What's the problem, Karl? Why do I suddenly need shadowing?" Cassius squatted, pushed a knobby plastic disk into the back of a caricature of a railroad train engine. The toy began chugging around the floor, tooting an old-time children's tune. "The only thing wrong with collecting these things is, if you want to do anything but sit and look at them, you have to special order the energy cells from an outfit on Old Earth. They're not even remotely like anything we use today. Russell! You sure this isn't a reproduction? Do you have a certificate?"

The waiter/clerk brought Mouse's coffee. He brought a cup for the policeman, who turned it slowly between his fingers before saying, "Maybe I'm watching you for your own protection. What're you up to, Cassius? A favor for a friend, that's what you told me. I owed you one. I didn't figure on getting caught in a crossfire."

"Something has happened."

"Something has happened, he says. You're so goddamned right. You've stirred up something I didn't count on."

"What's wrong, Karl?"

"We picked up five bodies this morning, my friend. Five. That's what's wrong. And I don't like it. The Mountain is a quiet place. People come here to get away from it all. They lease little houses in the outback, guaranteed to be fifty klicks from the nearest neighbor. Once a month they fly maybe halfway around the world to come in and pick up groceries or meet a buddy for a beer. If they wanted gang wars they could stay home."

"Karl, you'd better back it up. I missed something."

Mouse shook his head vigorously. Sleep had snuck up on him again.

"The word in the street is, you asked Clementine to do some poking around for you. Somebody took exception. Violent exception. Four of his boys went down this morning. We don't know who the hell the other guy is. An offworlder. No ID. Took a slug behind the ear. Clementine's old-time autograph."

"Curious," Cassius said.

"Curious, my ass. We've got a little unofficial kind of deal here, friend. We don't bother Clementine. He behaves himself and doesn't scare the tourists. We pick up enough hookers and gamers to pacify the straight-lacers, and the judges release them on their own recognizance. Clementine pays their fines. They're part of what brings the tourists in, so everybody comes up happy. He stays away from the stardust and windowpane and other heavy stuff and we stay away from him."

"A civilized arrangement." Cassius puttered with a toy steam shovel. "Don't you think so, Mouse?"

Mouse shrugged.

"Cassius," the officer said, "it's been four years since we've had a gang killing. There's no competition. Clementine keeps his people satisfied. So I get a friend come in doing a favor for a friend, and all of a sudden I've got bodies all over town."

"I'm sorry, Karl. Honestly. I didn't expect it. I don't understand it. You're sure it's because of me?"

"That's the feedback I get. Some high-powered out-worlders don't like questions being asked. They're sending Clementine a message."

"Who?"

"We don't know. Somebody important, I'd guess. From the Big Outfit. Maybe there's a meet on neutral ground. Nobody local would have the balls to push Clementine. He don't push."

"Yeah. I see what you mean. Russell? How much for the shovel?"

"I'm scared, friend," said the policeman. "Clementine is a peaceful guy. But when he gets riled he doesn't have sense enough to keep his head down. He'll fight. If it's the Big Outfit... Well, let's just say I like our arrangement. We get along. We don't have any trouble. We all know where we stand. If they move in... "

Something buzzed. The officer removed a handcomm from his pocket. "Heller." He pressed the device to his ear. His face became grave.

He put the comm away, considered Cassius momentarily. "That's three more down, friend. Two of theirs and one of Clementine's. It's got to be the Big Outfit. One looked Sangaree."

Cassius frowned. Mouse lost all interest in sleep. Baffled, he asked, "Sangaree? Cassius? Did we walk into something?"

"Sure as hell starting to look like it. Karl, I don't know what the hell is coming down. This isn't what we expected. We came looking for one thing and found something else. I'll talk to Clementine. I'll try to calm him down."

"You do that. And keep in touch. I don't like this. I don't want those people in here." Heller downed his coffee in a single gulp, started away. "Look out for yourself, friend. I don't want to scrape you up, too."

Mouse and Cassius watched him go. "What do you think?" Mouse asked. The boredom was gone. Sleepiness was forgotten. He was extremely uneasy.

"I think we'd better get back to the hotel and lay low. This doesn't look good."

Cassius paused at the hotel desk. "Suite Twelve," he said, requesting the key. "Any messages?"

Mouse leaned against the desk, watching the clerk hopefully. There might be something from his father. There wasn't. Nothing but a brief instelgram from the Fortress of Iron. Cassius read it aloud.

Mouse watched a lean old man come off the street. He had seen the man outside, watching them come in. There had been something strange about his eyes... "Cassius! Down!"

He dove toward the nearest furniture, drawing a tiny, illegal weapon as he flew. Cassius tumbled the other way.

Calmly, the old man opened fire.

A hotel patron screamed, fell, writhed on the plush lobby carpeting. A bolt hit Mouse's protective couch. Smoke billowed.

Cassius hit their attacker with his second shot. The old man did not go down. Wearing a mildly surprised expression, he kept hosing the lobby with beam fire from a military-type weapon. People screamed. Furniture burned. Alarms wailed. Diffused beams skipping off the mirrored walls made it impossible to see.

Mouse gagged in the smoke, snapped a shot at the old man. His bolt singed the assassin's hair. He did not seem to notice.

Cassius hit him again. He turned and walked out the door as if unharmed...

"Mouse," Cassius shouted, "call Heller. I'm going after him."

Mouse placed the call and was outside in seconds.

The old man lay on the sidewalk, curled in a fetal position, his weapon clutched to his chest. Cassius stood over him. He wore a puzzled look. Heller arrived almost before the crowds started gathering.

"What the hell, hey?" the policeman demanded.

"This man tried to kill us," Mouse babbled. "Just walked in the hotel and started shooting."

Cassius was kneeling now, studying the man's eyes. "Karl. Look. I think it's one of them."

Someone in the crowd said, "Hey. That's Cassius. The merc."

"Crap," a companion replied.

The word spread.

Heller snarled at a uniformed officer, "Get this cleaned up before the news snoops show. Take the body down to the plant. Cassius, I've got to take you and your friend down. I can't take any more of this."

Ten minutes later they were inside the police fortress. The street outside had filled with news people. The name Cassius had that effect.

"Just plan on sitting tight till we get this straighened out," Heller said, responding to Cassius's request that he be allowed to visit the man named Clementine. "He can come here if you've got to talk."

The shooting was all the news that evening. The net-folk were trying to establish a connection between the various murders. The editorialists were working the Legion over, insisting that The Mountain did not need its kind. Mouse listened halfheartedly while watching Cassius work.

Walters pulled out the stops. He used all his connections. He drew on the Legion's considerable credit to have the old shooter resurrected. The attempt failed because the man had been too old. He shifted his thrust to the instel nets, where he spent fortunes.

"Karl, you got that stuff ready to go out? I've got a connect with my man in Luna Command."

Heller was impressed despite himself. "Push the red button. It'll squirt when you do."

Cassius punched. "On its way. If there's anything on record about the old guy, Beckhart has it. He runs their Sangaree section. Good man. Taught him myself, years ago."

"I've heard of him," Heller replied. The last few hours had dazed the policeman. He was in over his head. Cassius had turned a local affair into an interstellar incident. He did not like it and did not know how to stop it.

Mouse watched with mild amusement till he fell asleep.

The sun was up when Cassius wakened him. "Come on, Mouse. We're heading home."

"Where?"

"Home."

"But... "

‘We got what we came for. You do the flying. I need some sleep."

Heller escorted them to the port, which the police had closed till they got the crisis in hand. His okay was necessary before any vessel could lift off.

"Cassius?" Heller said as Walters was about to board. "Do me a favor, eh? Don't hurry back."

Cassius grinned. For a moment he looked like a boy again, instead of a tired, old, old man. "Karl, if you make me apologize one more time I'll puke. All right? I owe you one. A big one."

"Okay. Okay. You didn't bring them here. Go on. Get out of here before I forget I forgot to charge you with carrying illegal weapons."

Mouse glanced over as Cassius settled into the acceleration couch beside him. Walters said, "Set a base curve for Helga's World."

Mouse began the programing. "Why there?" He was baffled. By everything. "Cassius? What happened last night?"

Cassius answered with a snore.

He slept nine hours. Mouse grew ever more impatient. Cassius seldom slept more than five, and resented that, as if it were time stolen from his alloted span.

Mouse took the ship offworld, aligned the Helga's World curve, put her into a power fly while getting up influence to go hyper.

"Keep putting on inherent," Cassius said by way of announcing his return. "On this base you lose about a thousand klick-seconds on your inherent when you drop and we may want to make a fast pass when we get there."

"Now will you tell me what happened while I was asleep?"

"We got an ID on that old shooter. From my friend Beckhart. Turned out nobody else could have filled us in. The guy was supposed to have been dead for two hundred years."

"What?"

"Beckhart's got a computer that remembers everything. When he fed it the guy's personals it dug all the way back to personnel records we captured on Prefactlas. That's where it found him. His name was Rhafu. He worked for the Norbon Family. The Norbon station was where we caught them with their fingers up their butts."

Mouse examined the idea more closely than it seemed to deserve. Cassius's attitude implied that the information was especially significant. "What's the kicker?"

"Beckhart didn't just answer the question I asked. He went looking for the meaning. He instelled us an abstract of his printouts. This Rhafu wasn't the only survivor. The Family heir, a sort of crown prince, made it through too. They managed to get off Prefactlas and somehow reclaim their Family prerogatives. Very mysterious people. Their own kind don't know any more about them than we do, but they're mucho respected and feared. Sort of the Sangaree's Sangaree. They've turned the Norbon into one of the top Sangaree Families. Their economic base is an otherwise unknown First Expansion world."

"What's the connection with us? That old man didn't try to kill us because we had the wrong color eyes. He meant it personal."

"Very personal. You'd have to have Sangaree eyes to see it, though."

"Well?"

"They'd figure a personal involvement got started the night your grandfather and I spaced in on Prefactlas. Nobody has ever quite figured out how they distinguish what's business, what's the fortunes of war, and what's personal. It's a violent and volatile culture with its own unique rules. The Norbon seem to have decided the Prefactlas raid wasn't just war."

"You don't mean they've picked us for the other half of one of those Family vendettas?"

"I do. It's the only answer that makes sense. And our burning this Rhafu will only make them madder. Don't ask me to tell you why. They don't understand us, either. They can't figure out what makes us want to destroy them."

"I'm lost, Cassius. What's the connection with Michael Dee? Or is there one? Wouldn't there have to be? To have brought the old man out?"

"There may be one. I want to think about it before I say anything. You've got a red and yellow on your comm board. You might better see who wants to get hold of us."

Mouse did so. After listening a moment, "Cassius, it's a Starfisher with a relay from Wulf and Helmut."

"Shut up and listen to the man."

In fifteen minutes they knew the worst.

"Push your influence factor to the red line," Cassius told him. "Keep putting on inherent. I want to be going like the proverbial bat out of hell when we go norm again." He remained calm and businesslike while studying the displays the computer brought up on the main astrogational screen. He fed in everything the Darkswords had given them. He plotted alternate hyper arcs for Helga's World.

"But... "

"She'll take it. More if she has to. Check the register. I need the c-relative on the boat Dee swiped."

Mouse punched it up. "Old Mister Smart, my uncle Michael. He grabbed the slowest damned ship we had. Almost, anyway. Here're a couple of trainers she can outrun."

"One break for the good guys. About time we got one. Well. Look here. We're going to get him. About an hour before he sneaks under Helga's missile umbrella. Sooner if he has to maneuver to get around your father. Start a check down on the weapons systems."

Mouse fidgeted.

"What's the matter?"

"Uh... You think there'll be any shooting?"

Cassius smiled a broad, wicked smile. "Goddamned right, boy. There's going to be beaucoup shooting. First time for you, right? You just hang on and do what I tell you. We'll be all right."

The waiting bothered Mouse. He was not afraid, much. The hours piled up, and the hours piled up, and they seemed no closer than before...

"Here we go," Cassius said, almost cheerfully. "Got your father on screen. And there's your idiot uncle, hopping around like a barefoot man in a sandbrier patch. Give your guns a burst."

The hours became minutes. Cassius kept boring in. "Ah, damn!" he swore suddenly. "Gneaus, what the hell did you have to go and do that for?"

"What?" Mouse demanded. He shed his harness and leaned over. "What did he do?"

"Sit down, shithead. It's going to get rough."

It got rougher than Mouse could imagine.