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  Wama mistook the boy’s movement for an act of surrender, and was caught completely unprepared as the youngster drew the second blade and brought it upward. The underhanded blow, plus the difference in their heights, meant that the knife entered the monk’s unprotected abdomen. He felt tissues part followed by a dull pain. Wama released the belt knife in order to reach down and fondle the weapon that protruded from his belly. Blood mingled with the red dye and trickled down his bony legs. “Oh no,” the monk said reproachfully. “Look what you’ve done!”

  “I’m sorry! I really am,” Lee said, as he backed away. And he was. The horror of what he had done was still sinking in as the tears started to flow.

  Wama felt dizzy. He staggered but managed to keep his feet. “So tell me,” he said in Tilisi. “Was I wrong? Is that why I am about to die? Are you the Divine Wind?”

  Rain pattered on the leaves around them, causing each to bob and sway as Lee struggled to come up with an answer. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity but was only a matter of seconds, he spoke. “I honestly don’t know.”

  Wama’s eyes registered disappointment, rolled back in his head, and remained open as he fell. There was a splash and water flew in every direction as the body hit, and Rebo forced his way into the clearing. Norr followed so closely that she almost ran into the runner as he came to a sudden stop. The adults took in the body, the scared little boy, and could see what had occurred.

  Norr went over to wrap an arm around Lee’s shoulders. She could feel what he felt, and the weight of the boy’s sorrow was almost too much for either to bear. His body shook, he started to sob, and tears ran down his cheeks. “It wasn’t your fault,” the sensitive assured him. “You had no choice. Come on . . . Let’s get you into some dry clothes.”

  Rebo watched the two of them head back toward the lift and returned the Crosser to its holster. The woman seemed to know how to handle the boy, and for that he was grateful. The runner turned his attention to the body. It seemed safe to assume that the monk was a black hat assassin—but was he operating alone?

  A careful search of the monk’s robes turned up nothing more than a few coins. Just what one would expect of a professional. Disappointed, but not surprised, Rebo removed the blade from Wama’s abdomen and wiped it on the dead man’s clothing. Then, having retrieved the belt knife, Rebo left.

  The real black hat assassin waited a full five minutes before emerging from a thick tangle of vegetation to kneel next to the body. She had arrived too late to save the monk or kill the boy. Wama’s death had been useful however. It now appeared that two bodyguards had been sent to protect the imposter. The nun wondered how many more carefully disguised warriors were lurking among the passengers. Time would tell.

  The assassin took a moment to close Wama’s staring eyes and recited the prayer for the dead. The rain stopped, a mist rose and wrapped the nun in a steamy embrace. All of the blood had been washed away by then—and there was peace in the garden.

  FOUR

  The Planet Anafa

  Just as electronic media enabled homogeneous societies on individual planets, the advent of star gates laid the groundwork for a multisystem government having a common language, laws, and customs.

  —Heva Manos, Advisor to Emperor Hios,

  in his biography, A Web of Stars

  Though secret now, the subsurface facility had once been regarded as little more than a utility portal, through which low-ranking technical personnel could travel to distant planets to perform maintenance on the then-pervasive system of star gates that held the far-flung empire together. But time had passed, a terrible war had been fought, and the computer that controlled the network had been destroyed. Or that’s what most historians believed. But not Milos Lysander, who insisted that the artificial intelligence called Logos had been lost rather than destroyed, which meant that the days of nearly instantaneous star travel could be restored if the AI were located. It was the very thing the Techno Society had been founded to bring about.

  Now, as Jevan Kane made his way down into the catacombs lying below the Society’s headquarters on Anafa, the operative knew that the system he was about to use had been created to operate in parallel with the more important public network. The maintenance system worked then, and it still did, largely because it was extremely simple compared to the network that it had been created to support. A fact that enabled members of the Techno Society to move around with a degree of freedom unimaginable to most people.

  The stairs twisted down through a pool of light, descended twenty feet or so, and turned yet again. Steel clanged under Kane’s boots, and the operative’s stomach began to feel queasy as the radiation produced by the nearby power core invaded his body. The medicos weren’t sure what sort of long-term health problems might result from prolonged exposure to the core, and Kane had no desire to find out. The key was to get in, pass through, and put the potential danger behind him as quickly as possible.

  The stairs ended, Kane palmed a door, and was admitted to a clearly marked decontamination lock. Even though a great deal of knowledge had been lost over the years, the Techno Society’s scientists had studied the ancient texts and were aware of the problems that could occur were the organisms from one planet allowed to successfully colonize another. That’s why the operative was nude with the exception of his boots, which he removed as he entered the chamber. They would get wet the moment the shower came on—but that was preferable to the hassle of obtaining off-the-shelf footwear on a planet like Pooz. Clothes, weapons, and all the rest would be waiting for him.

  There was a hiss, which quickly transformed itself into a roar as jets of hot water mixed with a broad-spectrum antibacterial agent hit Kane from all directions. The wash-down lasted three minutes and was followed by blasts of prewarmed air. A door slid open, which allowed Kane to enter a circular room. He left wet footprints on the cement floor. The curvilinear walls were covered with hundreds of video tiles. Each displayed a still photo of a distant world with the appropriate name printed below. Roughly half of the images were darkened, indicating that the gate that once provided access to that location was no longer available. But the rest were lit, meaning that the operative could travel there if he chose.

  The square labeled POOZ showed a desert, a craggy-looking mountain range in the distance, and a scattering of high clouds beyond that. Having spent the better part of a month searching for Norr in and around Seros, Kane had concluded that the sensitive had boarded the ship and was in transit to the planet he was presently looking at.

  The operative double-checked to make sure that he had read the destination correctly, touched the mountain, and felt the tile give. The room lights flashed on and off as the voice of a woman long dead issued through overhead speakers. “The transfer sequence is about to begin. Please take your place on the service platform. Once in place check to ensure that no portion of your anatomy extends beyond the yellow line. Failure to do so will cause serious injury and could result in death.”

  Although Kane had never seen, much less used gates large enough to transport hundreds of people and tons of cargo from place to place, he imagined that flesh-and-blood attendants had been present to ensure that customers kept their extremities inside the transfer zone. Boots in hand Kane stepped up onto a raised dais, checked to ensure that he was standing at the exact center of the safety circle, and uttered a silent prayer. There were no recorded incidents of a gate’s failing during a transmission, but an unprecedented death was not what Kane wanted to be remembered for.

  There was a brilliant flash of light as all the atoms in the operative’s body were disassembled, transmitted through hyperspace, and systematically reassembled within an identical containment on the surface of Pooz. Kane felt the usual moment of disorientation, followed by a few seconds of dizziness and a bout of nausea. Then, eager to escape the room and the nearly palpable radiation present there, the operative stumbled into the local decontamination chamber, where he was disinfected all over again.
/>   Finally, having donned his soaking-wet boots, Kane exited into a stairwell and climbed four flights of stairs to a platform where Mar Von stood waiting. Containers of mail were sent through the star gates on a regular basis, and the station on Pooz had been told to expect the operative. Von was nearly six feet tall, a few years younger than Kane, and wore a two-piece outfit that revealed a well-toned midriff. She was an admirer of men, especially strong men, and was confident enough to let that show. Von took an unapologetic look at the Kane’s well-muscled body before wrapping it in a thick locally made robe and handing him both ends of the tie. “Greetings, Operative Kane. Clothes, weapons, and food are waiting.”

  Kane could feel the sexual energy that emanated from the woman but gave no sign of it. He would have her, assuming there was time, but only if his primary purpose on the planet had been served. “Thank you. Has the ship arrived from Anafa yet?”

  “No,” Von replied as she led the operative through a door and into an artificially lit hallway. “Assuming that the vessel is running on time—it should arrive in about two days.”

  Kane nodded. There was usually some dilatation involved in a transfer from one planet to another. Those who constructed the system had presumably calculated such differences and been able to forewarn travelers about what to expect, but such niceties were a thing of the past. He had departed Anafa a week early, or believed that he had, only to lose five days in transit. Still, the situation could have been worse, so he felt fortunate. “Good. Please call a staff meeting. I’m convinced that a woman of great interest to the society is traveling aboard that ship. Our metal friends may have taken her into custody by now. If not, it’s imperative that we intercept and capture this individual the moment she lands.”

  “Of course,” Von replied obligingly. “Welcome to Pooz.”

  The Planet Pooz

  Although the shuttle’s arrival wasn’t surrounded by the same level of excitement as it had been in the city of Seros on Anafa, quite a few of the citizens of Gos still turned out to greet both the ship and its passengers.

  However, because of the impact of climatic changes that had swept across the surface of Pooz during the past five thousand years, large areas of what had once been fertile land had been converted to desert. Then, as an army of sand dunes marched up from the south, walls had been constructed to protect Gos and its spaceport. Over time both the sand and the walls had risen until onlookers could gather around the rim of the circular retaining wall and look down on the shuttle as it discharged its passengers, a process that was a good deal more formal on Pooz than it had been on Anafa. Having stumbled down the ramp into the blistering heat of a spring day, the bleary-eyed travelers were funneled through a double cordon of brightly uniformed lancers and into the shade cast by a gently flapping awning.

  Then, each having waited his or her turn, the recently arrived passengers were shown into the presence of a man whose only qualification for his job was the fact that he was related to the Shah by an accident of birth. He was elderly, but still handsome, and dressed in immaculate white robes. Though never trained for the task, the official still took his duties very seriously and subjected each person to a long list of questions meant to establish his or her identity, reasons for traveling to Pooz, and their future plans. Information that was recorded by two serious-looking scribes.

  Then, having assured himself that none of the travelers had come to Pooz for the express purpose of overthrowing the Shah or joining the ranks of the unemployed, the official concluded each interview by demanding a hefty landing fee. Those who couldn’t pay, and there were six of them, were arrested and led away. Later, having served three months at hard labor, they would be freed.

  No one was allowed to approach the immigrants until they had been interviewed, which meant that there was nothing for Kane to do except scan the passengers through a small pair of binoculars and wait for the process to end. The sensitive had proven herself to be something of an expert where disguises were concerned, so the operative examined each face with care. But that turned out to be unnecessary, because it wasn’t long before Kane spotted a female sensitive standing next to a metal man, and knew his search was over. But what happened to the second robot? the operative wondered to himself. He didn’t really care however, not so long as Lanni Norr was in custody.

  Some terse orders sent Von and two of her functionaries scuttling along the circumference of the retaining wall to the point where two brightly uniformed heavies blocked access to the long, curving ramp that led down to the blast-scarred surface below. Once there, all Von and her men could do was elbow their way to the front of the waiting crowd and prepare for the moment when the last passenger cleared customs.

  It was midafternoon by the time the last person had been processed, a whistle blew, and the heavies stepped out of the way. Von and her functionaries ran down the ramp, plowed through the crowd below, and closed in on the couple that they had been looking for. Von was still ten feet away when she realized that something was amiss. Though mostly hidden by a tattered, ankle-length robe, the metal man’s face appeared to have slipped slightly, revealing a patch of olive-colored skin. And, now that she was closer, the operative could see that while made up to look like a sensitive, the woman who stood next to the machine was clearly a norm! She pointed a finger at the couple and yelled, “Grab them! Remove that mask! Wipe the makeup off her face!”

  Her subordinates obeyed, but rather than the tussle that Von half expected to ensue, the couple made no attempt to resist. Instead the young couple laughed, as if expecting to be intercepted and not the least bit concerned.

  Von examined the metal mask, saw that the faceplate had been removed from a real robot, and held it up for Kane to see. The operative lowered his binoculars, swore bitterly, and brought the device back up. Faces blurred as Kane panned the crowd, but the sensitive was nowhere to be seen. Somehow Norr had managed to neutralize both of the metal men and make her escape. The woman was maddening.

  Von arrived a few minutes later. Her breathing was normal in spite of the fact that she had run all the way up the ramp. “We missed them, but the imposters provided what could be some useful information. About halfway through the voyage the sensitive was taken into custody by one of the metal men—but another passenger freed her. Subsequent to that she spent most of her time with the man and his son. It seems the disguises were his idea.”

  Kane nodded thoughtfully. “Good work, Citizen Von. Put out the word. The city of Gos is a lot smaller than Seros. Given any luck at all we’ll find them.”

  In addition to the ramp that curved up along the side of the retaining wall to access the planet’s surface, there were three spaceport-level tunnels that provided access to the largely subterranean city and allowed the threesome to enter without going up onto the surface. It was a good deal cooler underground, and the runner noticed that new shops had moved in to replace some of the businesses he had frequented on a previous visit and that the efforts to reinforce the city’s once-sagging support columns had been completed during his absence. The basic layout was the same, however, and Rebo had no difficulty finding his way around.

  Hundreds of carefully maintained skylights, some of which were equipped with mirrors to direct the sunlight downward, served to illuminate the main thoroughfares, plazas, and squares. Smaller streets, and the labyrinth of narrow passageways that wound through the tightly packed residential neighborhoods, were lit with lamps fueled by natural gas. The system had been in place for more than a thousand years and drew upon a field located twenty miles away. It was an important resource and one that helped make the city of Gos possible.

  But what really kept the city alive was the Dimba River. It flowed through the middle of town and formed the community’s east–west axis. Not only did the Dimba provide the citizens of Gos with drinking water—it was the watery highway that brought raw materials in from the east. Finished goods were packed up and sent downstream to those who lived in the cities, towns, and villages l
ocated along the edge of the Great Sea.

  So, knowing how central the river was to life in Gos, and not averse to showing off a little, Rebo led Lee and Norr out of a side street and onto the river walk that ran along the river’s north bank. Having consumed nearly all of their supplies aboard ship, the group was only lightly burdened. Lee barely felt the weight of his pack, or so it seemed, as he peered through shop windows, jumped up onto the waist-high wall that kept people from falling into the Dimba, and was immediately ordered to get down.

  The first thing the newcomers noticed about the river as they looked down into its blue-green depths was that it seemed to be in a hurry to join with the great sea. The water was very clear. That meant they could actually see incoming cargo modules as they whipped past. Though more industrialized than the west end of the city, Mountainside as the locals called the neighborhood they were in, was a lot more interesting. Rebo pointed to rows of hand-operated cranes and the nets that were stretched between them. “They lower the nets into the river, catch the cargoes sent down from the highlands, and pull them out. It’s a fast, inexpensive way to bring raw materials down from the mountains.”

  “But how do they keep track of who gets what?” Lee wanted to know. “And how do they keep everything dry?”

  “Well,” the runner answered, “each merchant maintains an agent up in the highlands. They buy the materials and load them into special watertight containers. Weights are attached to achieve neutral buoyancy. Then they mark each barrel with a code and toss it in. The river does the rest. Clever, huh?”

  “Very,” Norr put in as she watched a wooden crane lift a net loaded with dripping containers up out of the river. “But what’s to stop thieves from deploying their own nets upriver?”