Branegate Page 19

  Meza took the elevator to third floor and walked the long hallway to the clinic. Security met him in east wing. One look at their faces, and he knew the surviving assassin was gone.

  “Too late?” he asked.

  Martin Emmerich was the chief security officer for the plant, a round man with coal black eyes and a beak of a nose. He cocked his head to one side. “Mmmm, maybe something. He was alert for a few minutes, cooperative, said they were hired for the hit. All of them were normals, all with records, mostly smuggling. Hired locally, all by telephone, but he did say they were being paid from off-planet. Had to wait weeks for their money, and the job was delayed because of it.”

  “Did he say who hired them?” Meza asked anxiously.

  “Yeah—said they were paid by The Bishop. That’s all he knew, We have the address for these guys; they lived together. We’re searching their apartment now. Do you want us to bring in the police?”

  “Absolutely not,” said Meza. “Outside of our gates, nobody knows what happened today. Understand?”

  “Got it,” said Martin. “Figured you’d want it that way. Think it was someone in the family?”

  “I do.”

  “Then we’ll just have to ferret ’em out for you.”

  “Do that,” said Meza, and shook the man’s hand.

  “I know who he was, you know. The kid, I mean. His bodyguard told me.”

  “Keep it quiet,” said Meza, and Martin nodded in agreement. As he walked away, Meza thought, and just how many other people knew about Trae’s identity? Terrific news.

  He took the elevator back down and went to the cafeteria, Myra was waiting there in the same booth where he’d left her. Her eyes were red and puffy, her cheeks flushed. He wanted to hug her, but didn’t. A few people were eating there, near the end of dinner hour, all of them scientists who marched to nobody’s beat but their own. Some even slept in their labs on occasion.

  “Hi,” he said. “Want something to eat before we go up?”

  “I’m not hungry,” she said.

  “Okay, let’s get out of here.”

  He took her hand briefly, then let it go. Boss holding hands with the assistant could start rumors even among scientists who normally wouldn’t notice such things. They took the elevator up to third floor again, but went left this time and over the enclosed bridge into west wing. Even being well known and wearing their badges they had to walk through the scanner at the security station there. The armed guards did not smile or show any signs of recognition of the man who paid their salaries.

  A thumb-scan let them into ‘Lab C’, now empty but well lit. Another station opened the door to ‘Special Projects’. A guard in an enclosed booth watched them come through, and gave them a nod.

  Floor and ceiling were silver plas-steel polished to a mirror finnish. Ceiling panels glowed a restful, light green. At first glance the walls were red, until one noticed the tier after tier of chambers separated from the room by clear polymer, all filled with a viscous red fluid swirling slowly in vortical plumes accented by bubbles the size of a human fist. A man sat at a concave console in the center of the room, watching row after row of small video screens and monitoring the life-signals coming from each chamber in the walls. He only glanced at them, quickly focusing again on the screens in front of him to watch the first movements of new human beings now only inches long, humans who would grow at astonishing rates in the enzyme-laden, oxygenated nutrient they swam in.

  They walked past him to an open doorway and down a hall past clear windows of other laboratories, some dark. Technicians hovered over what looked like a corpse on a gurney, attaching electrodes to its skull. The corpse was alive, and ready to be reborn. In another room two technicians chatted with a young woman in a hospital gown. Her body and head bristled with fine wires connected to a panel atop the throne-like chair she sat in. As she chattered away, the technicians were taking notes, and when she saw Myra looking at her she smiled beatifically. The joy in her expression was the joy of being alive again, and Myra wondered if Trae would feel the same way.

  The hall came out into the morgue. Two bodies lay covered on steel tables there, and a man was waiting for them. When he saw them he picked up a clip board and held out his hand. “I’m Harold Piznik, Mister Meza. Welcome to my lair.”

  “My assistant Myra,” said Meza.

  Piznik shook her hand, too, limply. “I do the autopsies here, following a residual scan. There is good news, and bad.” He consulted his clip board.

  “In the case of the man named Petyr, brain damage was catastrophic, and we could get nothing. We have in our library a scan done six days ago, so that’s the best we’ll be able to do. That’s the bad news.” He smiled.

  “The good news relates to the young scientist who I understand is very important to one of our projects. His last complete scan was also done six days ago, but when he arrived here there was still brain activity, though sporadic. I was able to get a residual scan before activity ceased. How much was there I can’t say, but we got something. With interviews and discussions post-manifestation it might be possible to fill in the gaps.”

  Myra stared at the two shrouded bodies on the tables, her eyes filled with tears. Piznik noticed it, touched her arm.

  “The people you’re here about are in another room. Did you want to see them?”

  “Oh, no,” said Myra quickly.

  “Ah, well, we can begin cloning immediately. The deceased included instructions in the archives; a particular vial was specified for the young man, some written suggestions for his bodyguard.

  “Timeline?” asked Meza.

  “Instructions were to keep a continuous age. My guess is eighteen months. Six of that is neural net and implantation, and a couple for orientation. Let’s say two years to get him back into the lab. Too long?”

  “Not if it’s the best you can do.”

  “So I’ll try to do better,” said Piznik.

  “Will you clone the body he has now? Will he look the same?” asked Myra suddenly.

  “I really don’t know,” said Piznik, flipping pages on his clip board. “One of our police died recently in an accident and he was in fourth lifetime. He’d lost his family, and did not desire rejuvenation. We’re cloning him for your Mister—uh—Petyr. In the case of—let’s see—Trae—hmmm, no last name listed—anyway, a vial was referred to that has been here for nearly a century. It was in an old section of the library reserved for the Zylak family itself. I thought there was an error, but then I found instructions in that same section reffering again to that particular vial and saying it should be used whenever requested by code number. The code numbers matched, and so the request will be honored. It appears that the new body for the young man named Trae will be that of a Zylak family member.”

  “Leonid Zylak?” asked Meza.

  “No, the name on the vial is ‘Anton’. He was the sole Zylak heir, and died in childhood. Quite an honor for this young scientist of yours, I think.”

  “It certainly is,” said Meza.

  Myra wiped her eyes dry. And it’s who he really is, she thought. But will he even know me?

  CHAPTER 25

  A hundred yards away he could feel searing heat on his face. The entire house was involved. Two priests tried to pull him back, another lay dead by the open front door. He broke away and ran around one side of the house, desperate. The big window of the sun room had blown out, shards covering the grass. Inside, he saw a clear lane towards the back of the house, crawled over the windowsill and bloodied his knees on broken glass.

  The fire was advancing fast. He knew where they would be, and opened the bedroom door. Flame spit at him from the ceiling; he covered his nose and mouth against a burst of hot gases from burning polymers. A figure lay on the bed, face down. Tatjana. He rolled her over, saw Anton unconscious beneath her. A priest shouted behind him, and he screamed back something, picked up Anton with one arm, his other arm looping around his wife. The priest helped—yes, the priest took Anton
. They carried them to safety. They were all right. No, no, something else—the gases, hot, toxic—that was it. They’d breathed it in. It wasn’t the fire, it was the gases. They’d breathed in the gases, then stopped breathing before he could get to them.

  Everything was in slow motion. The priests were taking them away, but now the bodies had somehow become charred. We’ll bring them back. You know we will. He didn’t believe them. His feet were wet in the grass, the fire burned, but now he felt no heat, only his heart squeezing tightly inside him. His family was gone, all that he loved taken away. He felt a tear on his cheek, but when he touched it nothing was there. Nothing . . .

  It was suddenly dark, and he was sitting on a hard floor wedged into a corner. His knees were drawn up and there was horrible pain in his stomach and bowels. He’d never had such pain, and he screamed. He couldn’t see Tatjana, but heard her screaming too. Others called to them in the darkness: Anton, a boy with another name he couldn’t remember, but familiar, and then Grandma Nat shouting, “Stop it. None of this is real, so stop it and wake up. We don’t have time for this!”

  With Grandma Nat it was always a command. Yes, ma’am. He tried to open his eyes, but they were stuck. He moved his eyes back and forth beneath the lids, and something gave way. He opened his eyes, and immediately shut them again before a fierce, blue light could blind him.

  “He’s here,” said a voice. “Go to deep red, now. We could use some suctioning, Dinae, ears and nose. I see residual nutrient in there.”

  Something tickled his ears deep inside, then went rudely up his nostrils, and he shook his head.

  “Ah, welcome back. Now try to open your eyes again. This should be better.”

  Two masked faces looked down at him. A bank of deep red lights glowed softly above them. He heard a regular clicking sound, and felt a gentle, cool breeze on his face. He tried to speak, but only a strange growl came out of him, and he coughed.

  “Can’t you sit him up?” asked a commanding voice.

  “In a few minutes, Madam. Not too quickly.”

  A new, masked face appeared above him. Even with the mask there was no mistaking the piercing stare of those blue eyes. She put a cool hand on his forehead.

  “Get up, you lazy boy. Tatjana has been up and around for two days, now. And we can’t leave until you’re fit for travel.”

  Now he remembered: arrest, imprisonment, the family visits, then the horrible pain in his cell. “Did I die?” he asked in a whisper.

  “Well, you were quite ill from what went into your food,” said the masked physician attending him. “Your clones were ready by then, and once we had you both in the clinic we could do your residual scans and then give you something to put you away for good. We even leaked the name of the drug to the press. It seems the Council of Bishops had you murdered before your trial. I can’t tell you how much fun we’ve had listening to the public reaction to that.”

  “Unfortunately we can’t wait around to see where it goes,” said the Matriarch of the Zylak family and empire. She gave Leonid a gentle pat on his cheek.

  “We’re packed, and ready to go. Seven ships are in our commercial orbit, and a shuttle is arranged with all the necessary papers. It cost me a small fortune, and I’ll not allow you to slow us down. I’m sure the good doctor will get you up as soon as possible, won’t you doctor?”

  “Yes, Madam.”

  “Good. Let’s do it, then. I’ve business to attend to.”

  “Where are we going?” asked Leonid, his voice raspy. The doctor fed him some water through a straw.

  “We’ve decided to split up. Ignacio and Luiz will set up our new manufacturing facilities on Delano’s Planet. We’ve been using it for years for new materials, but since the Bishops grabbed power we’ve turned smuggler to avoid their taxes. The planet isn’t even on their charts. My sons have already left, and send best wishes to you and Tatjana. They’ll also keep watch on The Bishops. I don’t think the political system can last; the people will tire of such strict rule. The rest of us are going to the other side, but I know I’ll want to return here someday, maybe in a lifetime or two. This has been my home, where my babies were first born. I’ll miss it too much to stay away forever.”

  Leonid cleared his throat, took another sip of water. “It won’t be so easy on the other side, either. So many of the worlds there are under dictatorships. Democracies are just starting, and the churches are more hindrance than help. The extremists always seem to get their way.”

  “But there are good worlds there,” said Grandma Nat, for that was who she was to him. She’d treated him like a son, and he loved her for it.

  “Yes. A few.”

  “Then you’ll find one for us. We’ll have over a lifetime to make a choice while our ships poke along at half light speed between jumps.”

  “And things can change in that time.”

  “Nothing will happen until we get to our ships.” She pulled up her mask, leaned over and gave him a soft kiss on his cheek. The doctor made no move to stop her.

  Her lips were soft and full, her nose tiny but finely arched. Even at an advanced age, the beauty of her youth still lurked there.

  “I want to see you on your feet tomorrow. I’ll be back.” A faint smile, and she walked away.

  “Better do it,” said the doctor, eyes twinkling above his mask.

  “Oh, I will,” said Leonid.

  And he did.

  The reunion was emotional for two reasons: first, they were just happy to be alive again and in each other’s arms, and secondly they’d both been restored in copies of their original bodies during mission work. Tatjana was as he remembered when she’d given birth to Anton, and she had first fallen in love with the high cheekbones and dark beard of a youthful Leonid.

  The clones had been aged to thirty five, and perforned magnificently during the first four nights they were together again. After that, all their time was spent escaping a despotic church rule and fleeing back to another universe.

  The power and influence of Tatjana’s family never ceased to amaze her husband. Grandma Nat was like a silent cancer: no obvious, detectable lump, but a spiderweb of tenticles reaching into every area at all levels in public life up to, but not including, the Council of Bishops. People she didn’t own she rented or bribed. People who could not be rented or bribed were removed from their positions by firing or promotion to areas less threatening to family operations in far away locations.

  The family came together just a month after Tatjana and Leonid had begun what was now their third lifetime together. Together with servants they totaled over a hundred people, even with two brothers and their families gone away.

  A standard shuttle held sixty-five. A second vessel was needed. Commercial shuttles were watched carefully, not just cargo but also travel destinations and time schedules. Military versions came and went at the discretion of senior officers. One vessel went on a training mission and was reportedly destroyed by explosion. Fragments of radioactive debris returned by a salvage scow indicated fusion reactor overun as likely. Apparently some miracle occurred, because the morning the family was to leave for space, that same shuttle was docked next to theirs, freshly painted and numbered to fit records of the family fleet. The fact it had not been listed when the fleet first entered orbit was written off as a clerical error and signed for by the same man who’d approved inspection reports and cargo manifests for the fleet. Years later that man, a minor cog in the machinery of bureaucracy, retired handsomely to Delano’s Planet, where he and his wife lived in great luxury in a mountaintop estate, and he kept himself busy with occasional consulting jobs from a manufacturing firm there.

  A twelve-minute burn and an hour of coasting later the two shuttles made rendezvous with Atlantia, the flagship of a fleet of seven hauling plas-teel and carbon-36 wire to Cay Benz. Two orbits later all had disappeared from orbit after final clearance had been radioed from the ground and recorded in a log there.

  Later, when the Council of Bishops fi
led charges against them, Orbital command denied issuing such a clearance.

  The fleet headed directly towards Cay Benz, where it was expected in two days. It never arrived. No communication had been received or acknowledged since the fleet had left the thousand-mile limit above Kratola. An optical and infrared search was made, but nothing was ever found. And nobody ever thought to search the vast dust clouds above and below the plane of the ecliptic for Kratola’s young star.

  They passed Port Angel at a distance of three million miles above the ecliptic plane. The station was a faint star, twinkling off and on. Even with a bow shock of ionizing radiation, enough dust still got through the protective field to play a tune at half-light-speed on the ship’s hull. Sharp fingernails drawn across a sheet of slate, thought Leonid, and tried to ignore the faint, dull shriek of it.

  Tatjana came into the observation lounge from behind him, put an arm around his waist, and leaned her head against his shoulder. “Such a long way to go. So much can happen before we get back.”

  “Trae will be a hundred years old, a true sage,” he said.

  “Anton,” she corrected. “He’ll always be Anton to me.”

  “I know. Once through the Grand Portal we should be able to reach him. He might already be changed.”

  A beeping sound interrupted them. Both pressed a finger to one ear to get the call.

  “Where are you two? I’ve been looking all over the ship for you.”

  It was Grandma Nat. “We’re in the level four observation lounge.”

  “Oh, well, get down to the bridge. There’s something here you need to see. It’ll give you an idea of what your missionary universe is going to be up against soon.”

  “On our way,” said Leonid, caught Tatjana by the hand until they found an elevator down to level two. The bridge was like a warehouse, now a mostly empty floor with a bank of instruments and a monstrous viewing screen at one end of it. Grandma Nat was there with three men, and they were studying something on a console screen.