One Jump Ahead-ARC Page 26

  Amendos. The name took a moment to register, and then I had it: the auditor I met at the Macken jump station. No way could this be a coincidence; he had to be Slake's man in this affair. As I tuned back in to what Earl was saying, I realized I'd missed a couple of words.

  ". . . unable to complete his tour, it seems, because something attacked and destroyed the sat. He also could find no sign of corporate involvement, so he went to Vaccaro, who promptly called me." He leaned back in his chair and looked casually around the room. "I don't suppose either of you could help us with those investigations."

  "Why are you—" Lim said, stopping only when I touched her leg and shook my head.

  "I'm simply doing my job," Earl said, leaning forward again, "as I think the head of any security group, even a small one, would understand if she wanted the group to stay in business."

  "You—" Lim said.

  I cut her off, raising my voice a little. "Is this room completely secure?" I said.

  With visible effort Earl turned his attention back to me. "Of course."

  "Are we being recorded in any way?"

  "No," he said. "Based on your comments in our last meeting and your request to Top for this one, we're secure and off the record, at least at this point."

  "Then let me answer your questions," I said. "As you knew from our last meeting we would, we kidnapped Chung. We later returned him unharmed, a fact I hope Larson mentioned." Earl nodded, and I continued. "Lim destroyed the Kelco satellite after rescuing me from it."

  "You appreciate, I assume," Earl said, "that though our last meeting left certain possibilities open, having you directly confirm these accusations places me in an awkward situation."

  "That's garbage," Lim said. "I know how much flexibility you have, and unless Jon has misinformed me, you also understand the opportunities this situation offers all of us, the Saw included."

  "You may be able to make up the rules when you're dealing with minor policy issues in a jail," Earl said, "but when one has a planetary security contract, one has to treat a great many matters much more formally."

  "That's total—" Lim said, before I cut her off again.

  "Colonel, Lim," I said, trying to keep my voice level and my tone formal. "I appreciate that this meeting is uncomfortable, but I assure you that it is both necessary and worthwhile for all of us." I faced Lim. "You understand completely what's at play, and you chose to participate." I turned to Earl. "The stakes I mentioned in our last meeting have not lowered, though they have mutated." I paused a moment, then continued, "We're all professionals, so I've assumed we could work together successfully. If I'm wrong in making that assumption, please tell me now and save us all a lot of time."

  I glanced at Gustafson. He'd pushed slightly back from the table, so he was no longer in Earl's direct line of sight, and his face was a carefully composed neutral.

  Lim's cheeks were taut and slightly flushed, but she stayed quiet.

  After a few moments, Earl said, "You said the stakes have changed. What exactly is different now?"

  "The capsule version is this," I said. "I blamed the wrong person and the wrong company. Kelco, not Xychek, has been buying arms from Osterlad, and Slake, not Chung, put the bounty on me. I learned some of this from questioning Chung, and some of it from the fact that Kelco kidnapped and tortured me."

  Earl chuckled and rubbed his hands on his trousers. "So Kelco was already after you," he said, "and now Xychek is, too. Lovely. Are there any more highlights I should know? Anyone else you've managed to antagonize?"

  I hesitated, not wanting to talk about Jasmine, but then realized there was no way my plan could work if everyone here didn't have all the relevant data. "Slake kidnapped Chung's daughter, took her to Macken, and used her to force Chung to withdraw the Xychek bid . A group on Macken grabbed her from Slake. I rescued her—well, I thought I was rescuing her—and returned her to Slake." I paused a second, then added, "And as you might imagine, Chung wasn't too happy to learn all that."

  Earl laughed outright this time, and Gustafson joined him, shaking his head in wonder. Even Lim smiled and chuckled.

  I could see the humor in what I'd said, but I couldn't feel it; memories of the torture and images of Jasmine's face kept crawling to the edge of my consciousness. Their laughter triggered a reflexive anger, but I shoved it down and stayed under control; the job was to get the Saw's help and rescue Jasmine, and the job was what mattered most now.

  "Exactly how," Earl said, "did you manage to so royally fubar this situation?"

  "By screwing up one thing at a time," I said, "in a long sequence of nothing but missteps."

  Earl stopped laughing and turned serious. "I think it's time you ran it down for us," he said. "As you noted, we're all professionals, and as such I'm sure we all want as much information as possible before we decide what we're going to do."

  I couldn't decide if he was trying to provoke me, getting in his licks, or simply saying exactly what he meant, but his intent didn't matter. He was right: They needed all, or nearly all, of the information. "Okay," I said.

  I walked them through what had happened, omitting only my killing of Johns and Osterlad and my use of my nanomachines. None of that information was vital to the mission at hand, and I didn't trust anyone enough to expose myself to the kinds of problems those data points could cause me. When I was done, I sat back and waited for Earl to process the story.

  It didn't take him long. "So why not walk away?" he said. "What's in this for you?"

  "Several things," I said. "Most of all, I want to return Jasmine Chung to her family. The Gardeners might've done that eventually, but I stopped them. Slake and Kelco have caused me a lot of pain, and I want to make them pay for that. And the money, of course. I still believe we can all profit from this."

  "Is that really the order of your motivations," Earl said, "or are you just looking for a big payday?"

  I felt my face flush, and I gripped the arms of my chair. "Colonel, I know it's been a long time since I reported to you, but I hope you remember enough about me to know that I've never done anything only for the money. Yes, the income potential here is high, and, yes, I'd like to get paid. But whether there's any money in this or not, and whether anyone helps me or not, I'm going to rescue that girl. And as much as I'd like to make Slake suffer for all he's done to me, that's nowhere near as important to me as saving Jasmine."

  Earl studied my face, then nodded and turned to Lim. "And you?" he said. "What's in it for you?"

  She shrugged and said, "Mostly the money, but also finishing the job. I told Jon I was in to the end, and the job's not over, so I'm still in."

  Earl nodded again and looked at me. "Fair enough. I understand your motivations. What are mine? Perhaps more importantly, what are my employer's? If the Frontier Coalition doesn't win, I can't believe my bosses will let us get involved."

  "You told me before that the FC was tired of being the weak third party in this quadrant," I said. "We handle this situation correctly, and Kelco will lose its exclusive rights to the new Macken gate and also end up with a great deal less local power in the process. If no corporation has exclusive rights on Macken, the FC will have to play an arbitration role there. That role will bring them involvement and more power."

  "And the Saw?" he said. "What will we get out of this?"

  "A stronger relationship with the FC, more presence in the region because the FC would have more power, and a chance at another planetary contract, this time for Macken. With two actively competing conglomerates there, the FC will want a continuing peacekeeping force."

  "Macken is still a developing world," he said, "so the FC might well not have enough need to warrant the price we'd demand."

  "Then you'd control the subcontracting," I said, hoping Lim would see the potential opportunity as motivation for playing nice, "and make at least the usual small profit in the bargain. Even if there's no direct money in it for the Saw, you'll still win because you'll have stopped an illegal arms buildup
. Keeping down the local corporate weapons inventory has to be in your best long-term interest."

  Earl pondered the situation for a few minutes. I knew the gains I was offering the Saw weren't huge, but the potential for the FC was large, and anyone as skillful as Earl could turn being the agent of such a win for a client into a positive factor in that relationship. Lim had clearly picked up on the potential subcontracting role, because she looked like she wanted to jump in and try to persuade Earl further. I caught her gaze and shook my head slightly; we needed to give him all the time he wanted to think, and we definitely didn't need his feelings about her coloring the whole pitch.

  When Earl finally spoke, his manner had changed, and it was clear he was with us. We were no longer selling him; he was helping us plan. "I don't think we need to burden Vaccaro with most of the details of what's happened in the past," he said, "because if we did she might feel obliged to order me to get involved. By omitting those details, however, we'll leave you, Jon, without any apparent motivation. You mentioned money, which she'll certainly understand. She will, however, wonder the obvious: Exactly which group will be paying you?"

  I sat forward a bit, excited that Earl was on board. "Xychek. I believe I can persuade Chung to pay both a fee for Jasmine's return and another for helping him gain access to the new gate on Macken."

  "So where do we start?" Earl said.

  "I call Chung," I said. "I don't think he needs to know about your involvement at this stage, and on the chance that he turns me down, it's better for you if he never learns we met. Can you set up a private call from here?"

  "Of course," Gustafson said. He tapped on the desk in front of him, murmured a few instructions and made some adjustments, then pointed me to a section of the wall at the far end of the table. One large panel showed a close-up of my face; the other glowed a soft, sleeping black. "The left is what he'll see. You'll view him on the right."

  "Xychek tracks every call," I said, "so they'll be backtracking the moment we initiate. How long will I have before their software finds us?"

  Gustafson and Earl looked at each other and smiled.

  "Gunny," Gustafson said, "either you've been away longer than I thought, or you've forgotten a lot. First, do you think there's any chance we'd use less capable software than a corporation? Even if you do, do you honestly believe there's any chance I'd propose this call if I didn't know for damn sure that the line was secure?"

  "My error, Top," I said. "I tend to be overly cautious."

  "Fair enough," he said. "Do you want to call his direct number, which we have, or wade through the software flak catchers?"

  "He might wonder where I got the number," I said, "but I see that as only good for me, so let's save the time. Call him."

  The voice that answered was as perfectly appealing as the previous time I'd contacted Chung's office, and the face that went with it was so flawless it had to be a construct. "Mr. Chung's office," she/it said. "May I help you?"

  "I'd like to speak to Mr. Chung," I said.

  "As I'm sure you can appreciate," she—the construct was too gorgeous not to deserve the pronoun—said, "Mr. Chung receives a great many communications, so he asks us to handle them if we can. May I perhaps help you?" This was the same greeting as last time; apparently Xychek wasn't a slave to the current corporate "back to people" trend, in which a company demonstrated how successful it was by wasting money placing people in human-facing jobs that software could just as easily perform.

  "No. Please tell Mr. Chung that he and I met on his recent outing and that I'm calling about Jasmine."

  I didn't need to give any further instructions this time. Chung was clearly waiting for me to contact him, because he appeared within a few seconds. He was also better composed than last time, so he must've decided that I might have some value to him. That was good; negotiating is vastly easier when everyone involved starts out calm.

  "Thank you for calling," he said. "When I last saw you, you said I'd get Jasmine back. I hope you're calling to explain how that will happen."

  "Yes. I want you to know first, though, that if I had fully understood the situation I would never have taken her back to Slake." I might be the only one who cared that I made that statement, but I had to make it, if only so I'd told him directly.

  Chung's eyes, so much larger than life on the wall display, stared impassively at me. If I had looked only at them I might have believed he wasn't upset. The tension in his cheeks and the way he clipped his words when he finally spoke told me otherwise, and I admired his effort at control. "If you need me to make you feel better about what you did," he said, "and if that's what it takes to get my daughter back, I'll try." Even his eyes gave him away now. "What matters to me is getting her back."

  "No," I said, "I don't want that. I'm not only going to return your daughter, I'm also going to get Xychek shared rights to the new gate on Macken." I leaned forward. "And you're going to help."

  "How?"

  "By cooperating, and by paying."

  "So this is all about money after all?" he said.

  "No," I said, "it's not, but money is a part of it."

  He nodded. "Isn't it always? Tell me what you want me to do."

  "He'll stick to the plan," I said after the call was over.

  Earl nodded in agreement. "He's got the most to win, and almost nothing to lose. I agree."

  "One more call," I said, "and you start this one: Vaccaro."

  "She'll need to understand your role," Earl said, "and Lim's."

  "Portray us as consultants and informers," I said, "as well as former Saw soldiers. Tell her whatever you think will work to get her involved, but make it clear that we can't risk attacking Slake directly on Macken. The only real evidence of any wrongdoing that we could produce is Jasmine Chung, and we don't want to give him any reason to dispose of her before we can find her."

  "So you want me to sell her on this whole thing?" he said.

  I laughed. "No, Colonel, I most definitely do not want you to try to sell her. With no offense intended, I've never considered sales your strong suit."

  "Good," he said, "and for whatever it's worth, I'd only be offended if you did think sales was what I was best at."

  "What I need you to do," I said, "is to let her know you vouch for us and that you're signed up for the plan that I'll then explain to her. I'll take care of the rest."

  He turned to Gustafson. "Top, please take them outside for a few minutes. This will go a lot better if I don't have to worry about anyone else being in the room."

  I considered protesting, because I hated not hearing what he said to Vaccaro, but I knew he'd be most comfortable talking to her alone. For this to work at all, I'd have to trust him at some point, so I figured I might as well start then.

  Gustafson stood and motioned us to the door.

  When Earl led us back into the room, Vaccaro's face was staring at us from the wall opposite the door. She was beautiful, a very different kind of beautiful than Lim but definitely beautiful. Thick blond hair framed an oval face with large blue eyes, a fine, straight nose, and perfectly shaped lips. Her skin shone the whiteness of the Macken beaches. I might have misjudged Lim: Heavily engineered beauty might be the new corporate norm. I wondered if cosmetic software was refining her image or if her skin was really fine enough to appear this perfect at such large magnification. I forced myself to look away and composed my thoughts as Earl motioned to us to sit.