Part 28 (1/2)
”What is it that you need?” he returned softly.
”Are we bargaining now for something?” Inside her head, the cat feet crawled. ”You want me to say that I need my biogate?” Her voice almost shook with the quietness of the fury that seemed to swamp her. ”You could order a wipe through the node in an instant, and when you were done destroying my gate and erasing my self, I wouldn't even know I'd been a guide.”
'There's always something left,” he said softly. ”Even after a thorough wipe. Have you looked in Striker's eyes? Do you want to be the same? Wondering where you came from? What crime had stripped away your person? Questioning with every reaction you had whether it was an old, unsurfaced habit or some new, conscious desire that pushed your emotions and thoughts? How often do you think she asks herself if she's descended from the lifers herself? One image from me to the node, and you would be just like that. But worse than a ghost; worse than a wipe-you'd be a naught forever.”
Tsia's jaw tightened. ”If you have the authority, then you also have the authority to negotiate a link.”
For a moment, he did not answer. ”A clear link,” he said slowly. ”Protected status. What would you give in return?”
Tsia's lips thinned. ”No giving here, Doetzier.” Her voice was almost a snarl. ”No half bargains or promises with me. A contract, legal and verified-that's what I want from you.”
”On what terms?”
”I get the biochips back. You give me a link.”
”Those biochips represent a threat to your world, not just to yourself or your gate.”
”A link,” she repeated softly. ”That's my price.”
”Not your sister?”
Tsia's throat tightened. ”I don't think my sister really exists.” Her voice was so low, he almost didn't hear it. ”She's gone from me. Giving up myself for her would not bring her back. It would only let her run further and destroy me with her running. I want a link, Doetzier.”
”You're a guide,” he returned flatly. ”You can't bargain for a link. It's not in your nature to allow anyone -even your sister-to destroy your world through the use of the biochips.”
She grinned, but the expression stretched her lips like a snarl. ”The zeks are your responsibility, and your workload is nothing to me. I want contract, Doetzier.”
”I want the biochips back.”
”In exchange for a protected link.”
”If you testify at the trial for the blackjacks we take in,” he shot back.
She hesitated.
”Afraid to take a chance?”
”On what?”
”On yourself,” he said deliberately. ”Or have you lived so long within your fear that you've forgotten
what it's like to be free?”
Her lips thinned and curled back from her teeth. ”Maybe,” she returned. ”Perhaps it is only fear which moves me.” ”No.” His voice was flat and he studied her for a long moment. ”Fear lies on you like a blanket, but it isn't a fear for yourself that you feel. It's the fear of what you'll find in your sister when you face her over the chips. It's the fear that you'll someday look in the mirror and see your sister's victim eyes staring back at you.” He paused. ”She'll have to stand trial,” he added softly. ”Like all the other blackjack.”
Tsia forced her lips to move. ”And me?”
”You were a rogue gate before, Tsia-nyefaz, and you're a rogue gate now. But I see no evil in you. The guilt you carry has never been justified away. You know what you did, and you know why you did it.”
He paused, and his eyes flickered with something akin to compa.s.sion. ”And I might have done it myself.”
She stared at him, her hands still clenched. ”A link, Doetzier.”
Slowly, he nodded. ”It is done.”
Like a waterfall that tumbled through her brain, the words came, over and over:... a legitimate link a legitimate link... Her guts were still tight, clenched like a fist. Her lips were still pressed together, as if she had to hold in the exultant snarl that threatened to burst free of her throat.
Doetzier moved up to the window and eyed the landing pad carefully. ”Have you gotten through on the node to link us back up?”
”No.” She shook her head. ”And my ghost line is still so thin that it could break at any moment. I did locate our ID dots-up skyside, in our skimmer. To the node, we don't appear to have left orbit at all. Scannet never registered our landing, let alone our crash. Kurvan did as tight a job as any three nodies put together: our DO dots are so buried in his webs that even if I had twenty hours instead of twenty minutes, I doubt that I'd get through.”
She could feel Ruka to her right, distant and gliding through the forest as he approached the s.h.i.+p from the south. The landing pad, still gray and rippling with the water that ran across its surface, looked like a long lake, on which a silver cricket sat. The three huts on the one side and the two huts on the other were like guardians of a gate. The main hut-the hub- was behind the structure where Tsia and the other meres waited. Decker left the s.h.i.+p and walked toward one of the far huts, disappearing inside. A moment later, the last ghost line in Tsia's head went blank.
”The jam on the node,” she murmured to Doetzier. ”It just went on full. I lost my ghost line.”
He shrugged. ”If we can't use it, neither can they. We're all on manual corns.”
”But if they jammed it, they're getting ready to lift.”
”I know. We can't wait any longer to move on the transport.”
Tsia glanced toward Nitpicker. ”Van'ei,” she called softly.
”I heard,” the pilot responded. ”Wren, help me with this stuff.”
Wren took some gear from her hands and distributed it in the pockets of his blunter. The pilot pulled at her blunter, wincing at the burn on her shoulder. With a muttered curse, she moved to the doorway. ”Where's Decker?”
”Middle hut,” Tsia returned, ”par side of the complex. Just went in.”
”Anyone with him?”
”No one.” She did not say that it was not her own eyes and ears which told her that, but Ruka's senses instead.
Nitpicker nodded. ”Tsia, you have the flexor: keep Decker off our backs and in case he's got a com, make sure he doesn't see us. Wren, Doetzier, you're with me. Once we're done at the s.h.i.+p, we'll head for the main hub.”
”You don't think the chips are in the s.h.i.+p?” Tsia asked.
”Kurvan wouldn't allow them out of his sight,” the pilot returned shortly. ”Nor would he put them on board before he himself is ready to go. If he's not at the s.h.i.+p, he'll be at the hub, and we can catch him there before he leaves.”
Tsia nodded and eyed the hut where Decker had disappeared. Her mind snarled through her gate, and Ruka's ready answer was quick. When she stepped out in the shelter of the eaves, the other meres stepped out with her. Doetzier touched her arm, and she looked at him with glinting eyes. He pressed something cold and flat into her hand. She looked down at his bios.h.i.+eld, then up again with a frown.
He nodded. ”Yours is fried.”
”But you-without this...”