Part 7 (2/2)
Harry nodded.
”Good, we were hoping we could bank on that. Personal acquaintance should smooth things out a bit.
I'm not sure most Templars would be eager to cooperate in a project, once they knew it was being funded by Winston Cheng.”
Harry recalled the rumors of ill-feeling. ”You may have a point there.”
”There will be one more part to your mission, Harry. It's a fairly important part. If it is at all possible, you will bring the inventor back here with you. Mister Cheng intends to offer him a job as a consultant.”
”A consultant. Not to go on the a.s.sault?”
”I should hope not.”
”And if he doesn't want to come?”
The lady smiled faintly. ”Well, we don't expect you to use force. Actually I suspect that you may find him rather eager, when he learns the offer's source.”
”Oh?”
”Of course, if he should be reluctant, do your best to persuade him. Mister Cheng and I both feel he could be very useful as a consultant in the final stages of this project.”
”His s.h.i.+p is that tricky to operate?”
”He claims the very opposite, that any qualified pilot should have an easy time. But the truth is we're not sure yet.”
”Great.” Harry's tone reversed the meaning of the word. ”And I get to drive. What inducement can I offer him?”
”As far as the price we are offering for the s.h.i.+p goes, just tell him you don't think he'll be disappointed.”
”I can do that.”
”I would strongly advise that you not reveal the exact nature of our project to Professor Gianopolous, until you are both on your way here in his s.h.i.+p.”
”I can see that. Well, I'm not the smoothest salesman you could find.”
”You underrate yourself, Harry. Sincerity counts for a lot. If you can't sign up the inventor-well, we'll manage without him. But be sure you bring the s.h.i.+p.”
”I understand.”
He was on his way out when the lady called after him: ”I think you'll find it an interesting experience.”
Harry grunted. Then when he was halfway through the doorway he stopped and turned to ask: ”Are you talking about the s.h.i.+p or the designer?”
The Lady Masaharu showed him one of her rare smiles. ”I doubt that you'll be bored by either one.”
EIGHT.
Winston Cheng's visits to the wanderworld were never more than two days apart, and there was at least one standard day when he dropped in twice. Harry didn't see much of the old man during most of these appearances, but thought that Cheng was starting to look grimly, quietly frantic. Not that Harry was paying much attention to the behavior of other people; he had enough trouble trying to organize his own.
On some of his drop-in visits Cheng got no farther than the dock, or the enclosed platform just inboard from there, an air-filled s.p.a.ce where everyone could take helmets off and converse in relative comfort.
There the tyc.o.o.n stood or sat talking to the Lady Masaharu, never penetrating any farther into the base, before he jumped back on the s.h.i.+p that had brought him, or another that was standing by, and hurried away again. Doubtless there were business matters that needed his personal attention, even more than usual when he was forced to marshal extra resources to prepare and supply his striking force. Once he told Harry that he wanted to give, as much as possible, the impression of maintaining his regular activities.
At other times Cheng walked through very nearly the whole base, looked at everything there was to be seen, talked to everyone, and prolonged his visit for several hours.
Mostly the old man arrived in one or another of his fast business couriers, but there came a day when Cheng arrived aboard his favorite armed yacht,s.h.i.+p of Dreams , and abruptly ordered Del Satranji to drop everything else that he was doing to take over as his personal pilot.
As Harry heard the story later, Satranji seemed almost stunned. He immediately protested that he wanted to be involved directly in the fighting.
Cheng a.s.sured him that he would be. ”I can a.s.sure you, my friend, that by staying close to me you will see all the action anyone could possibly want.”
The pilot had tried further argument, everything short of threatening to quit. But Satranji's toughness, in a matter like this, had to crumble when it ran into the old man's. Cheng closed the discussion by saying Satranji could follow orders, or he could pack his things and leave, and an immediate decision was required.
There was one slight hitch involving the robot Dorijen. Be it wife, chattel, or a.s.signed to some other category, Cheng would not have it on his yacht, and Satranji was forced to put his robot into storage on the base.
Now, at last, the nature of the secret weapon could be revealed to the whole a.s.sault team and their support people.
Cheng said to the a.s.sembled crew, or as many as could be gathered at one place at one time: ”The secret weapon I have been talking about is, as you will see in a few days, indeed a s.h.i.+p. Not a very large vessel, or especially heavily armed. But it has, from our point of view, one outstanding attribute: it can disguise itself as a Type-B berserker.”
That made an impression on Harry, and the vast majority of his other listeners, and drew a murmur.
The old man went on: ”The disguise is not only visual, but extends to identification codes and signals. It can carry a combat crew of six humans, and has a cargo bay that can hold several tons of machinery, such as small a.s.sault vehicles. If all goes well, it will enable us to reach the enemy base before the enemy knows we're anywhere around.”
Harry raised his eyes abruptly, to give Cheng a searching stare. It was Lady Laura who met Harry's gaze, and her lips silently formed the one word:later .
Winston Cheng continued briefing his team. He was convinced that the mission's chance of success depended very heavily on deception, on being able to fool the defenses of the enemy base. To trick casual human observers ought to be comparatively easy-but to deceive the real thing, with all its IFF capabilities, over a span of approach time that might equal a full minute or even more, would pose a tremendous challenge.
Minutes after the meeting broke up, Lady Laura told Harry privately: ”Naturally, Mister Silver, it will have occurred to you that this vehicle, or something like it, could have been used in one or both of the abductions. That the identifiable berserker hardware recovered in one case might have been deliberately seeded in nearby s.p.a.ce in an attempt at deception.”
”Naturally. Except I still don't know why anyone would want to do it.”
Cheng stepped in. ”I a.s.sure you, we have considered the possibility, however faint. But we have solid evidence that the s.h.i.+p we are about to purchase was in dock on the day I lost the people dear to me; and very recently I have learned that the Templars were testing the same s.h.i.+p when your family was taken. To the best of our knowledge, no similar craft exists anywhere.”
Cheng's investigation had still not been able to discover any connection existing between their families before the kidnappings, nor could Harry remember anything that might have formed one. Whatever a.s.sociation existed must have been forged during the few days that had pa.s.sed between crimes. The only alternative seemed to be that the second set of kidnapping victims had been chosen purely at random, a coincidence so monstrous as to be a practical impossibility. (Harry remembered the caution about coincidence that he had recently received from Doc.) No matter what explanation was tried, puzzling questions remained. The fact of the first meeting between Cheng and Harry, even if berserkers had learned of it as soon as it took place, would seem to give them no reason to go out of their way to pick on Harry's family. Human tyc.o.o.ns and pilots were holding meetings all the time, a habit they shared with much of the rest of their restless race.
Endless speculation was possible, but no certainty, except for this: something-or someone-had deliberately selected Becky and Ethan as targets, in the process effectively destroying Harry's life.
Again and again, Harry found himself calling up a mental image of Satranji, who was no longer on the base, but spending all his time aboard thes.h.i.+p of Dreams . . .
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