The Traveler

JOSEPHINE BAKER CONTINUED to sing. The drunk continued to snore. Up on the screen, the killing continued. Maya watched television news footage of top officials in different governments, all of them older men with dead eyes and smug smiles who controlled armies of soldiers and policemen. They were the Brethren or their supporters. We’re lost, Maya thought. Lost forever.

Halfway through the film, a man and woman entered the theater and sat down in the front row. Maya slipped the automatic out of her coat pocket and clicked off the safety. She got ready to defend herself, and then the man pulled down his zipper and the prostitute leaned over the armrest and began servicing him. Josephine Baker and the images of Traveler destruction had had no effect on the drunk, but now he woke up and noticed the intruders. “You should be ashamed!” he told them with a slurred voice. “There are places for that, you know!”

“Sod off,” said the woman, and there was a loud argument that ended with the couple leaving and the drunk tagging along after them.

Maya sat alone in the theater. The movie froze on an image of the president of France shaking hands with the American secretary of state. When the door to the projection booth creaked open she stood up, raised her automatic, and got ready to fire. A large man with a shaved head came out of the booth and climbed down a short ladder. Like Maya, he carried his Harlequin sword in a metal tube slung over his shoulder.

“Don’t shoot,” Linden said. “It would ruin my day.”

Maya lowered her weapon. “Were those people working for you?”

“No. They were just some drones. I thought they’d never leave. Did you like the film, Maya? I created it last year when I was living in Madrid.”

Linden walked down the aisle and embraced Maya. He had powerful arms and shoulders and she felt protected by his bulk and strength. “I’m sorry about your father,” Linden said. “He was a great man. The bravest person I’ve ever known.”

“My father said that you have an informant working for the Tabula.”

“That’s right.”

They sat down beside each other and Maya touched Linden’s arm. “I want you to find out who killed my father.”

“I’ve already asked the informant,” Linden said. “It was probably an American named Nathan Boone.”

“So how do I find him?”

“Killing Boone is not our immediate objective. Your father called me three days before you came to Prague. He wanted you to go to the States and help Shepherd.”

“He asked me to do that. I turned him down.”

Linden nodded. “Now I’m asking you again. I’ll buy the plane ticket. You can leave tonight.”

“I want to find the man who killed my father. I’m going to kill him and then I’m going to disappear.”

“Many years ago your father discovered a Traveler named Matthew Corrigan. This man lived in the United States with his wife and two sons. When it was clear that they were in danger, your father gave Corrigan a suitcase full of money and a sword once owned by Sparrow. Thorn was given the sword when he helped Sparrow’s fiancée leave Japan.”

Maya was impressed with her father’s gift. A sword used by a famous Harlequin like Sparrow was a precious object. But her father had made the right choice. Only a Traveler could fully use the power of a talisman.

“Father said that the Corrigans went underground.”

“Yes. But the Tabula caught up with them in South Dakota. We heard that mercs had killed everyone, but apparently the mother and the sons got away. They were lost for a long time until one of the brothers, Michael Corrigan, gave his true name to the Vast Machine.”

“Do the sons know if they can cross over?”

“I don’t think so. The Tabula plan to capture the two brothers and turn them into Travelers.”

“That can’t be true, Linden. The Tabula have never done that before.”

The Frenchman stood up quickly, towering over Maya. “Our enemies have developed something called a quantum computer. They’ve made an important discovery using the computer, but our informant can’t get access to that information. Whatever the Tabula learned caused them to change their strategy. Instead of killing Travelers, they want to use their power.”

“Shepherd should do something.”

“Shepherd has never been a very good fighter, Maya. Whenever I see him, he’s always talking about some new scheme for making money. I’ve thought about flying to the States myself, but the Tabula know too much about me. No one can find Mother Blessing. She’s shut down her communication channels. We still have contacts with a few reliable mercenaries, but they’re not capable of dealing with this kind of problem. Someone has to find the Corrigans before they’re captured.”

Maya stood up and walked to the front of the theater. “I killed someone in Prague, but that was just the beginning of the nightmare. When I returned to my father’s flat, I found him lying on the bedroom floor. I could barely recognize him-just those old knife scars on his hands. Some kind of animal had mutilated his body.”