Songs of Love & Death

He was worried because he was working blind, and not just because he couldn’t get a damned code fix on the damned 6K-1. It was because he had no clear concept of what Rez Jonas was up to. Only that it wasn’t what either he or his boss had expected. But without filing a sitrep, he couldn’t get answers from agency intel.

Of course, filing a sitrep now would set off more alarms than sloppily picking the damned lock would.

Pay attention, Nicandro.

“Reverse those two parameters.”

He glanced to his right and almost bumped noses with Serri. “What—”

“Those two.” She pointed to the small screen. “Have you forgotten what you taught me back at Widestar? That’s a loop created by an inaccessible exit command.”

He wasted another second to stare at her in amazement—and admiration—then reversed the two parameters and got to work.

“We’re in.” The snick-click of a well-picked lock never sounded so good. He would have kissed her, but there was no time. Plus, she was angry enough at him as it was. “Ten minutes, max.”

The room was little more than a dimly lit narrow closet, about twelve feet wide. It wasn’t the usual auxiliary control system, but an unmanned maintenance substation that serviced nonenvironmental systems. Newer stations no longer used them because of their potential overall vulnerability, but Jabo had been here for more than a half a century, and Filar and his predecessors were kept busy with rival pirate factions zapping each other in the corridors. The fact that someone might be able to compromise a few of the station’s nonenvironmental systems was farther down on the list of concerns.

Nic hoped.

Serri had already angled a console screen around that displayed system status. “Three intruder traps.”

“I see them. Can you—”

“First one’s already diverted.”

He realized then that she had a slim strafer pen in her fingers. Later, he’d ask her just what a nice girl like Serenity Beck was doing with such a delightfully illegal device. He prayed they had a “later.” For now, he let her work. Her record for unraveling code traps in Scout-and-Snipe had been damned near flawless.

“Shit!” She pulled the pen back abruptly, angling it away from the screen.

A searcher worm. Someone had upgraded the station’s security programs recently.

“I can create a subprogram to distract it,” she said, “if we have enough time.”

They didn’t. Frustration flooded him. “Options, Serri. Let the ship go. I’ll do everything I can to get you and Quin safely back in-system.”

Her lips thinned. “That’s no option. I could get another job, but Quin put everything he had into the Pandea.” She hesitated. “The bad guys must have the cargo by now. Case solved. Just go tell station admin who you are, make them give me my ship back.”

It sounded so easy. It would be so easy. There was a DIA stealth ship full of enforcement agents two hours out that could definitely provide the muscle, but that was something else he wasn’t permitted to reveal for at least another thirty-five hours. “Serri, if I could, I would. I can’t.”

“Please.”

The desperation in her voice tore at him. He wiped one hand over his face. “The best I could do is release some data so that you can prove a case against Jonas. You could get an attorney to file a civil case for damages—”

“When? A year? Two? Three? Didn’t you hear me? Quin has no resources left, financially and emotionally. I’ve worked with him for six years. He’s the kindest, most honorable, most decent being I’ve ever met. But since those death threats—”

“Death threats?” He knew the entire file on the Skoggi. It didn’t contain any threats, or the agency would have pulled the tagged cargo off the Pandea, knowing a secondary problem would muddy the investigation. “Because of—”

“Old news: his resignation from the council. He said it was probably just a sick joke, especially after all this time.”

“Damn it.” Nic spun for the door, angry at HQ for sloppy research, angry at Serri for not telling him sooner, and angry at himself for not asking all the questions he knew that he should have but didn’t. Finding Serri again restarted his heart but shut down his brain. “This could be the real reason Jonas assigned the cargo to your ship.”

“But why would Rez care about Skoggi politics?”

“Because Rez Jonas’s maternal grandfather was Manton Suthis.” The details on Quintrek James that eluded him earlier came back now with blinding clarity. “Suthis was the attorney for a Dalvarrian mining cooperative that allegedly funneled illegal political contributions to key Skoggi administrators ten years ago, in exchange for government contracts.”

She stared at him. “Quin never mentioned names. Just that he had proof, but the court refused to investigate.”

“That didn’t stop Suthis from committing suicide.” And Rez, Nic remembered, had always been devoted to his grandparents. His devotion might now have taken a deadly twist.

Serri stepped toward him. “Quin—”