Voices

Chapter 16

Talia Winters squealed with delight when she pulled the curly brown wig out of the hat box. She glanced behind her in the wavering lamplight of the cave to make sure that no one had heard her. It was a quality wig made from very good synthetic hair, and the hat box had kept it in decent condition. She put the wig on, tucking her blond tresses out of sight, and admired herself in the mirror. She saw that the wig was long and curled down her back, and she decided she would leave it that length. To complete the effect, Talia grabbed a beret and pulled it down on her head. Not only did the beret help to hold the wig in place, it gave her a slightly Bohemian look that went with the unruly hair and the old clothes.

Talia had chosen the most expensive outfit she could find to wear, even though it was ten years out of date, on the theory that expensive clothes always showed their quality. Better for a stranger she met in her travels to think she once had money, and didn’t have it any longer, than to think that she had never had money. It was a designer pantsuit in navy blue, and she had found a plain black jacket to go with it. To see how the ensemble looked with the hair, she stripped off her white jumpsuit and tried everything on.

The effect was dramatic. Talia no longer looked her sophisticated, elegant self but more like … like Emily Crane. That is, she looked a bit mousy and frumpy. Was this the way Emily had mastered her deception, by trying on mismatched hair and outfits until she had achieved the requisite dowdiness? It depressed Talia to think that she had been fooled so easily, but more and more she couldn’t think of any other explanation for a bomb being in her bag. Garibaldi was right—Emily was the only one who could have given it to her.

She could get confirmation about Emily from Deuce, but she could also get shot between the eyes for asking him. She would just have to ask Emily herself. Damn, she wished Boston weren’t so far away.

The telepath tried to imagine what kind of person Frieda Nelson of Eugene, Oregon, was. With these clothes, Frieda was probably an artist of some sort, maybe a person who wrote plays, painted pictures, or constructed homey crafts out of gingham and wood. She might even be the sort of person who would like hanging around at Bilagaani Pueblo with persons named Rain and Lizard. She was not Talia Winters, that was for sure.

“Knock, knock,” drawled a voice. “Are you decent?”

She said nothing; she just waited for Deuce to crawl into the cave, carrying his ever-present briefcase and duffel bag. As soon as he got an eyeful of her, he burst out laughing.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “You look like a teacher I once had. I didn’t like her much, and I put a firecracker in her wastebasket. That was the last bit of official education I ever had.”

When Talia said nothing, he reached into his pocket and pulled out an identicard. “Here’s yours,” he said. “I want you to know that this card and your transportation cost me a one-carat diamond. I don’t know when you’re going to pay me back, but I always remember my debtors. And I charge interest.”

She snatched the card out of his hand but didn’t promise him anything. At least now she knew what he carried in that black briefcase, and why he guarded it so closely.

“Lizard told me he already explained to you about these cards. They’re okay to use a couple of times, but you’re pushing it after that. We’re supposed to be leaving at midnight, after their sweat.”

She gave him a quizzical look.

“Sweat lodge,” he explained. “Those small lodges out there—they heat up a bunch of stones, beat the drums, sing songs, and pray to their grandparents. And sweat. We’d be welcome to join them, I’m sure.”

Talia shook her head.

“Deuce! Rain!” called a frightened voice.

They whirled around to see Rain, the teenager with the green eyes, come crawling into the cave. She looked worried, and she pointed to the sky.

“A black shuttlecraft just flew over,” she said, panting. Very high up. Brother Sky says it’s Psi Cops!”

Talia felt as if she had been stabbed, the grip of panic was so strong on her chest. Deuce just looked disgusted.

“Bastards always spoil everything,” he muttered. “If they find that cargo container out in the desert, we’re pretty much had.”

Talia suddenly realized that she was not going to change her clothes. She was going to make a run for it dressed like this—Cinderella before the ball. But where? How? There were voices in the narrow tunnel leading into the cave, and she waited tensely to see who it was. Nervously, she balled her hands into fists.

Sky entered, followed by Lizard, and both men looked equally grim. “We saw them,” said the old man. “The buzzards are circling. You must leave now.”

“How?” growled Deuce. “Do you want us to walk?”

“We’ll sell you a Hovercraft,” said the old man. “Two stones.”

“Whoa!” the gangster wailed. “That’s highway robbery! What the hell do I need a Hovercraft for? Just get me to a town, and I’ll be all right.” He pointed rudely at Talia. “I don’t care what you do with her.”

Lizard stepped forward, the muscles on his chest tight with anger, and he grabbed Deuce by the neck and shook him. “You came down with her, and you have to look after her! Remember, we could take all the diamonds and show the cops where your body burned up. There would be just enough left to identify.”

When Deuce reached for his PPG, the old chief was quicker and grabbed his wrist. Talia also attacked Deuce, whirling around and punching him in the stomach.

“Okay, okay,” croaked the petty crook. “Two stones it is!”

The Bilagaani dropped him to the floor of the cave, and he scrambled for his briefcase. “I want a fast one, and I’m gonna pick it out myself.”

Eyeing everyone suspiciously, Deuce extracted two diamonds from his briefcase and gave them to Brother Sky. The old man pointed toward the hole leading out of the cave and nearly pushed him through it.

Talia started to follow, and she felt Lizard grab her arm. She wrenched it away from him and glared at him. She wasn’t in a mood to be friendly, especially to a guy who would kick her out into the midday desert with Psi Cops patrolling the air. She glanced around the graveyard of ancient clothes and decided it was more like a tomb.

Lizard shrugged helplessly. “We’ve got to get you out of the pueblo, that’s all. Too many people’s lives would be in jeopardy. Personally, I would like you to stay.”

She nodded, softening a bit. It really wasn’t his fault or the tribe’s fault that she was a fugitive. It was her own damn ambition and foolishness. She touched Lizard’s bare chest once, briefly, before she crawled out of the cave, and she hoped that would give him a strong enough impression to remember her by.

The sun was brutal, baking the pueblo and the plateau to a dusky brown. But she noticed that it had slipped substantially toward the west, and she guessed that it was about four in the afternoon. Talia didn’t know much about fleeing across a desert, but she figured that nighttime was the right time. Well, it would be dark in a few hours, and maybe they could elude capture until then. She didn’t want to count on her luck, because she hadn’t had any lately.

Talia didn’t know whether Deuce had picked the fastest Hovercraft, but he had picked the one with the loudest, brightest paintings on its hood. She guessed there was some logic in that—if they were spotted from above, it would be assumed they were Bilagaani. She was glad now that she had the long hair to fit the image of a Bilagaani plainswoman.

As Deuce was already in his seat, she climbed aboard without another word. The tribe was gathering around to see them off, and they were silent and noncommittal. Morning, the middle-aged woman who had comforted Deuce, was the only one who was crying. What a strange place this speck of North America was, thought Talia, odder than anything she had seen on Babylon 5.

“They were traveling west,” said Brother Sky, pointing toward the sky. “If you travel northeast, you will find the town of Clement. Beware the salt flats.”

“Thanks,” muttered Deuce, not sounding like he meant it. Lizard suddenly handed Talia a waterskin, and she gripped it for dear life. “Peace,” he said somberly.

She nodded and tried to give him a smile. Deuce started the engine and gunned it, but the solar-powered turbine didn’t make much noise. The Hovercraft lifted into the air a few centimeters and blew sand all over Lizard, Sky, and the others, but they stood their ground. A few even lifted their hands in a gesture of parting. Talia gripped the roll bars as they rocketed out of the Hovercraft pen and headed for the mountains to the northeast.

The crabcakes and sirloin tasted great, but they didn’t sit very well in Garibaldi’s stomach. He kept thinking about all the things he should be doing and all the places he should be running. The sedate Washington restaurant wasn’t distracting him enough. The conversation of Marlon and Harriman wasn’t doing him any good either, as they kept reliving fraternity pranks and trips to Fort Lauderdale. Then Gray launched into a description of his apartment in Berlin, and soon they were both discussing decorating ideas. Garibaldi wanted to climb the drapes.

“Excuse me,” he said, rising from the table. “I need to take a little walk. We don’t get rich food like that on Babylon 5, and my system is staging a revolution. Maybe I’ll find a commlink and check in.”

Gray gave him a quick look of concern, and Marlon paid no attention as the security chief slipped away from the table. He shot through the French doors and lacy curtains and found himself on the patio. He took a flight of curving stairs down to a meandering garden.

The out-of-doors smelled wonderful, and it began to lift his spirits immediately. There were gardens and open spaces on Babylon 5, but you had to seek them out. He seldom had time. The air of Babylon 5 was the best money could buy, but it couldn’t compete with the pine aroma of the trees and the genuine steer manure on the lawn. It made him wonder how he could spend his days on a space station, revolving around a spooky, half-dead planet, when there was this planet, perfectly designed for the habitation of humans.

He thought about having to go back to Boston tonight, or first thing in the morning, and he realized what he missed about B5. It was self-contained. No running around in funny little vehicles trying to see people—everyone on B5 was a twenty-minute walk, or closer. And a quarter of a million people was considerably more manageable than four billion. Yes, the air smelled good on Earth, but it wasn’t home.

After a few more sniffs of the real thing, Garibaldi went around to the front of the converted mansion. He thought he had seen a public commlink by the bathroom. Yes, he was right.

The commlink wasn’t busy, and Garibaldi ran his chit through and punched in his commands. Then he leaned against the wall to wait, knowing it could take a few minutes. Some very elegant women were arriving with their dates, and they reminded him of Talia—thoroughbreds, smart, fast, gorgeous. He didn’t know whether he would ever see Talia again, and that was beginning to depress him. Not that she had ever given him much more than the time of day, but she had been so assertive, confident, and proud of her accomplishments. It pained him to think she had been reduced to running like an animal, scared of every shadow.

He didn’t know how it would be possible to find Talia before the others, but he had to try. There was always the possibility that she hadn’t fled to Earth and had hitched a ride to the far ends of the galaxy. But he felt certain she had come to Earth. Not only was Emily Crane here, but this was familiar territory for her. People usually ran from the strange and to the familiar, not the other way around. Garibaldi often thought that if he ever had to run from B5, he would go back to Mars. He figured Talia would come here.

Earth was logical for another reason. If you were a human and you wanted to hide, you didn’t go where humans were rare—you went where there were a lot of humans. Unfortunately, that just made his job more difficult, and nothing short of finding her would help her now.

A synthesized voice startled him. “Hang on for your link to Babylon 5.”

“I’m hangin’, I’m hangin’,” he assured the computer.

An empty chair appeared on the screen, but presently Captain Sheridan dropped into it. “Garibaldi,” he frowned, “we’ve had a development here.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Mr. Bester has flown the coop. His supposedly private doctor arrived, but they were really just a bunch of Psi Cops who whisked him onto their ship. We never saw a doctor, but we did see some orders that made it all official. Dr. Franklin doesn’t know whether to be angry or relieved.”

“Can Bester get around?” asked Garibaldi.

“Not well. The doctor said that in a few days he could get around on crutches or a cane. Since he’s refused all medication, he won’t be in a very good mood.”

“What do you think his plans are?”

“To get Ms. Winters,” answered the captain. “That’s all he could talk about. How are you coming along?”

Garibaldi glanced around and lowered his voice. “We’ve got strong leads on both Arthur Malten and Emily Crane. It’s good stuff, but we can’t pin them without Talia.”

“That is a problem,” conceded Sheridan. “We’ve got some happy people now that the last of Psi Corps is gone, but everyone feels badly about Ms. Winters. I wish we could have handled it differently. What’s done is done.”

“Don’t bet against me,” declared Garibaldi. “I’m going to bring her back, alive and free. Good-bye, sir.”

“Good luck. Sheridan out.”

Garibaldi signed off and paced around the foyer for a few seconds. He had to do something! Go somewhere! After all, they had learned everything they came to Washington to learn. Maybe he would go back to Boston right now and hang out in Emily Crane’s front room. Was the woman from the Mix so confident that she wouldn’t make a run for it? She and Malten had strong motives to stage these bombings, and that might inspire them to do something crazy.

Garibaldi tried to imagine a Psi Corps without the military trappings, threats, and overbearing nastiness, and he liked it. He liked it a lot. That thought made him realize that, philosophically, he was on the side of the bombers! Geez, why couldn’t things be white and black, good guys and bad guys?

The main thing was that he couldn’t sit around talking about Berlin, debutante balls, or frat parties. He had to ditch Gray right away. The telepath had been of surprising usefulness, being right about the Mars bombing fitting in with the B5 bombing. He had saved them a great deal of time by calling Marlon, but his usefulness was at an end. They knew everything they were likely to know without collaring either Emily Crane or Arthur Malten. For that they needed a bloodhound, which Garibaldi was. It could get rough, and Gray would just get in the way.

Garibaldi started out the front door of the restaurant, prepared to jog to the corner to catch an autotaxi, when he heard a loud, “Harrumph!”

He turned to see Gray, standing in the shadows with his arms crossed. “I wondered when you would run out,” the telepath said accusingly.

Garibaldi shrugged. “Listen, I just heard that your boss, Bester, is on the prowl again. I thought maybe you might want to connect up with him, make a report or something.”

“I thought we were a team,” said Gray, clearly wounded. “My orders were to get to the bottom of this, and working together we were getting to the bottom of it. I’m sorry that you don’t think our partnership is worthwhile.”

“Aw, look,” said Garibaldi with a smile, “I’m just antsy. I’ve got to do something. Tell you what, I’ll meet you back at Emily Crane’s office tomorrow morning at nine hundred hours. You can finish your dinner with your friend.”

“You’ll meet me tomorrow morning?” asked Gray doubtfully.

“Didn’t I just say I would?”

“All right,” said Gray. “Really, we’re the only ones who know what’s going on. We need to back each other up.”

“Yeah, yeah,” muttered Garibaldi, hurrying off. “See you tomorrow.”

“What about your part of the check?”

“Thanks!” hollered Garibaldi, disappearing down the driveway.

Talia Winters peered out the rear of the Hovercraft with Deuce’s beat-up binoculars. She wondered if she could spot the shuttlecraft before they spotted the Hovercraft. Probably not. Even if they did, that was only half the battle, because then they would still have to hide. They were skirting a ridge that had been formed by an old earthquake fault line, but it didn’t really offer any hiding places. They had to face the fact that they were ducks on a platter out here in this desert.

“This trip was only supposed to cost me one diamond!” complained Deuce. “And now it’s cost me four!”

As this was the two hundredth time he had complained about that particular injustice, Talia ignored him and pulled her wig and her hat down on her head. She guessed they were making good time for such a primitive craft, even if she was getting encrusted with sand; but it bothered her that she didn’t know where they were going. Clement? It didn’t ring a bell. They had to trust in Brother Sky’s directions.

“You know, those kooks might not have seen anything!” snarled Deuce. “You didn’t see a shuttlecraft, did you? Me neither!”

That thought hadn’t occurred to her before, and Talia turned to look at the gangster. “Do you think they just wanted us out of there, so they made it up?”

“Sure, maybe they turn us in and say we stole their Hovercraft. I doubt if we’re going to live to argue about it.”

Talia banged on his shoulder and shouted, “Stop this thing! Park it somewhere!”

Deuce let up gradually on the accelerator, and the Hovercraft came to a stop and thudded into the sand. He wiped the sand off his face and demanded, “What’s the matter with you?”

Talia jumped out of the craft and stretched her legs. “Stop and think about it,” she said. “They got us out of the village because they know, one way or another, somebody is coming after us. Whether they sent for them, or they spotted us, or they intercepted a message, it doesn’t matter. They know, and somebody’s coming. There’s no way to get across this desert by daylight without being spotted, so let’s camouflage this thing and wait it out until nightfall.”

Deuce stared at her for a moment, then stared into the unforgiving sun to the west of them. He grinned foolishly and scratched his stubbly chin. “Maybe we’re doing this all wrong,” he drawled. “Why should we run in a piddly Hovercraft, when they’ve got shuttles? Why should we run at all? Let’s set a trap for them. How many of them can there be?”

“Well,” said Talia, adjusting her wig, “assuming they’re Psi Cops and they’re after me, they won’t alert any other authorities. They like to bring down a rogue themselves, without anybody interfering. They probably have several two-man shuttles spread out over this area.”

Deuce grabbed the bumper of the Hovercraft and began to rock the vehicle. “Come on! Help me turn this thing over!”

“Why?” asked Talia, leaning down to grab the bumper.

“To make it looked like it wrecked.”