The Price of Conquest

Ayres and Paige! Kressa's mind shouted in alarm at sight of the two silent figures in the doorway. She leaped to her feet, her pulse gun aimed at the intruders.

No one else moved. And, Kressa realized with a horrified feeling, she couldn't move either. She couldn't even lower her gun as she became aware that Max, Torch, and Anna weren't staring in alarm at the newcomers, as she felt they should be; rather, they were looking curiously in her direction.

Max rose to his feet, plucked the weapon from her grasp, and then turned toward the door. "Juoran, Sevallen, release her. She's a friend." He reversed the gun and held it grip-first toward Kressa.

Kressa felt control return to her limbs, and she snatched the gun back.

"She would not be here were she not," came a quiet, familiarly accented voice from the door.

The two figures stepped into the room, and the light revealed their pale skin, fine features, and silver hair.

"Th'Maran, of course," Kressa whispered in consternation. "I'm sorry, I thought you were—"

"It is we who should apologize, Kressa Bryant," the taller of the two said and strode across the room toward her. "We should never hold a human like that, but it is best to be safe."

Kressa studied him as he approached. Th'Maran did not tend to show age as other humans did, but something about this one told Kressa he was older than most th'Maran she'd met. Tall and slender—so much so that she wondered how she could ever have mistaken him for Commander Ayres—he had beautiful features and dark gray eyes framed by a fall of long, snow-white hair.

"You did not know this place is too secure to allow enemies," he went on, his eyes holding hers, "and you are weary and have been through much."

Kressa acknowledged the truth of his statement with a slow nod. She'd had scarcely any sleep since arriving on Calton, having kept awake and alert primarily through the use of stimtabs and mental boosts. The fact that the th'Maran had been in her mind deeply enough to read all of that without her knowledge was further evidence of her exhaustion, both mental and physical.

"I am Juoran." He placed his long fingers gently against her hand and guided her gun back to its holster, and then he gestured behind himself. "My companion is called Sevallen."

Kressa looked at the younger, more ordinary (if any th'Maran could be said to be ordinary) th'Maran. He stood just inside the doorway, arms crossed, one shoulder braced against the wall in a casual stance. He acknowledged her with a smile and nod.

"Please, return to your seat, Kressa." Juoran moved his hand to her arm, and she found herself settling back into her chair without protest.

Juoran looked across the room to Max. "Racer told us what happened downtown. I thought it best to check in with you."

"I'm glad you're here," Max said. "Anna and Kressa are convinced Gaunis is dealing with Salkair House, and we're trying to come up with some way to prove it. Kressa wants to go to Salkair HQ and tap into their computer, but we haven't figured out how to—"

"A th'Maran could do it," Kressa said in sudden realization. "A th'Maran could get into the computer. I've seen it done."

"I'd rather not involve them in this," Max said. "I don't want to take them on anything this risky for—"

"That's our decision, Max," Sevallen said from across the room. "You can't expect us to hide forever."

Max looked at him with a worried frown. "I don't expect you to hide forever, Sev, but Gaunis's men are still looking for you, and they're looking for Kressa, too. I'd hate to give them the chance to pick up all of you at once. Besides, now that Kressa's here, she can take you off Calton to someplace safe."

"If there is no other way to get the information you need," Juoran said, looking steadily at Max, "then we must—"

Max stopped him with a shake of his head. "I'm not going to lose any more people, Juoran. Especially not you two. We'll find some other way into the computer."

"How?" Anna asked, her voice challenging as she turned Max's earlier question back on him. "Face it, Max, we need that information, and if Juoran and Sev are the only way we can get it—"

"We?" Max snapped. "What do we need the information for, Anna? You need it to prove something."

"How about what Kressa needs?" Anna asked. "And the Confederacy? I thought we were trying to help them."

Max opened his mouth to reply, and then shut it. He gave Torch a pleading look.

Torch shrugged. "You're the boss, Maxie."

"Thanks, Jan, I appreciate the support."

"Anytime, boss."

Max remained silent for a full minute, stroking his mustache. "All right, have it your way. But I want a tight plan before we start, and if you still intend to pull this off tonight, I'll need it within a couple of hours." He swept his gaze over everyone in the room. "Well? Get to work. Except you, Bryant. You get some sleep. I'm not working with anyone who isn't in top form." He waved her toward the open bedroom door. "You can use my room. Juoran, go with her and do whatever it takes to get her ready. With her permission, of course."

Kressa nodded and followed Juoran from the room.

* * *

Kressa had just closed her eyes and allowed her body and mind to succumb to Juoran's subtle mental urgings when a hand touched her shoulder and shook her gently. She rolled over, intent on admonishing whoever had the nerve to wake her so soon, but when she opened her eyes, she felt completely rested.

She looked up into Juoran's slate-gray eyes. His fair features appeared even lighter against the dark clothing he wore. He held a second dark outfit in a bundle under one arm.

"How long did I sleep?" she asked.

"Nearly two hours." He began to lay out the clothing.

She remembered other times she had used alternate methods, both mental and chemical, to go without sleep for too many hours. "I'm going to pay for this later, aren't I?"

Juoran smiled gently. "You did say it was worth it."

"Did I? I think when all of this is over, I'm going to regret that."

She slipped out of the bed and dressed quickly in the outfit he brought. He passed her holster and pulse gun to her, as well as a small comm-unit.

Kressa studied the items and pondered what she was about to do. Now that she was awake enough to think straight, she realized that accompanying a group of inexperienced university professors, students, and a pair of th'Maran on a foray against a well-organized Calton House backed by Gaunis seemed remarkably close to suicide. It was true Max and his friends had done an impressive job of snatching her away from the Salkairs, but they had never actually gone against the men. And for a goal as tentative as theirs, it seemed almost ludicrous to risk—

Anna appeared in the doorway. She wore all black, her gold hair hidden beneath an ebony scarf, her fair skin flushed with excitement. "Come on, Juoran, Kressa. We're ready to leave." Her voice held an unmistakable tone of eager anticipation.

Kressa watched her for a moment, and then felt Juoran's eyes on her. An almost imperceptible mental probe brushed her mind. She looked up at him, but his eyes were on Anna now, and Kressa sensed a silent message pass between them.

Anna cocked her head to one side. "Worried about us, Kressa?" she asked in a teasing tone, and then sobered slightly. "Don't be. This isn't the first time we've done something like this and… Well, Max knows what he's doing. He served for nearly a decade with the New Canada Reserves. Tactics."

Kressa did not bother to hide her surprise. The New Canada forces were the best organized and most influential of the private military corps sanctioned by the United Galaxy. If Max had served with their tactical unit, his forces on Calton were likely far from inexperienced.

"Never doubted you for an instant," she said with a smile. "Let's go." She followed Anna and Juoran into the main room. "I take it we've got a plan."

Max nodded. "I'll explain it to you on the way. Let's move."

They followed what Kressa assumed was the same route back to the Salkair building that they had taken from it. They reached the alcove behind the garage wall just as Max completed briefing her on the plan.

"If you've got any suggestions or revisions, now's the time to voice them," he concluded.

Torch switched off his helmet lamp to check on the activity in the garage through a peephole, and then he opened the hidden door that led into the parking structure.

Kressa shook her head in response to Max's solicitation for additional comments. The idea seemed sound enough. Anna and Sevallen would act as ground-floor lookout, with Torch playing sentry at the halfway point. Max, Juoran and herself would do the actual breaking and entering.

Torch gestured to her, and she slipped through the opening to join him, Anna, and the two th'Maran in the deserted garage. Max stepped through and sealed the door behind them, and then led his troops across the silent carpark to the lifts in the center of the structure.

While Max continued around the lifts to survey the rest of the garage, Torch crossed to a service panel and reactivated his helmet light as he squatted down before it. He unlocked the panel with one of a handful of soni-keys he pulled from his pocket and swung the door aside. A moment later, the nearest lift door slid open. Torch closed the access panel and started for the open lift car, waving for the others to follow him.

Max reappeared around the far side of the lifts. "The place is empty," he whispered as he joined them in the car. The door slid closed behind him. "I guess everyone's still out looking for Kressa."

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Torch nodded and turned toward the lift's control panel, but instead of activating the car, he used another one of his keys to open the panel and depressed a small switch. A hatch in the car's ceiling slid open.

With a satisfied glance upward, Torch closed the panel and moved to stand under the opening in the ceiling. He signaled to Max to give him a boost.

"Why not just use the lift?" Kressa asked in a perplexed whisper as Max hoisted Torch up through the opening.

"Same reason I didn't use the public controls ta open the car," Torch called down through the hole, his face shadowed by the glare of his helmet lamp. "There could be someone monitorin' 'em this time of night. Now, come on up 'ere." He thrust his hands back into the car.

"Your turn, Kressa." Max boosted her high enough to reach Torch's dangling hands.

Sevallen came next, followed by Anna, Juoran, and Max.

Torch closed the access hatch and herded them all onto a narrow platform that ringed the lift shaft.

"All right, Anna, Sev, you stay 'ere and watch," Torch said quietly. "If ya hear anything out in the garage, check on it, and give me a call if ya think it's trouble. I'll be right up there." He aimed his headlamp up a narrow metal ladder that scaled the side of the shaft, and then started up it.

Kressa, Max, and Juoran climbed the ladder in silence, following Torch's bobbing light. They passed fourteen floors before he signaled for a halt.

Kressa stepped off the ladder onto a narrow ledge too many meters above nothing. She hugged the wall behind her and willed away a dull ache the climb had induced in the muscles of her arms and legs.

Torch scanned their surroundings. The beam from his helmet spotlighted the walls, lift cables, and tracks around them. Kressa noticed the lightness of the cables and tracks that controlled the lift, and she realized it must be powered primarily by gravity generators; the wires and rails were needed only to guide the cars—another product of off-world technology utilized by the Salkairs.

Torch turned to face her but kept his helmet pointed high to prevent the light from glaring in her eyes. "Which floor'd ya say the Salkair office was on?"

"Twenty-seventh," she said and glanced forlornly upward. She was not looking forward to climbing another dozen or so stories.

"You can take the lift from 'ere." Torch glanced at Max for confirmation.

"I think that'll be safe enough," Max said. "If their security's so tight that they investigate each use of the upper floor controls, then we're dead anyway."

Torch opened a control box and began fiddling with its insides. "Keep close ta the wall."

An instant later, Kressa's stomach lurched as eddies of shifting gravity swirled out of the shaft. The lift car eased into position below them, and the access door on its top opened.

"Climb in," Torch instructed from the control junction. "Next stop, twenty-seventh floor. Give me a call when ya want ta come down."

The lift delivered Max, Juoran, and Kressa to their destination without mishap. The doors opened, and they peered out into the hallway beyond. The corridor was empty.

Kressa drew her gun and indicated the target door. Max leaned out of the lift, checked a reading on a small detector he held, and then slipped out. A moment later, he signaled for Kressa and Juoran to join him.

The Salkair's office door was locked. Max handed his detector to Juoran and replaced it with the device he'd used to open the door to his apartment. He made several adjustments to the dials on the gadget's face, and then waved it over the printlock. Nothing happened. A second series of adjustments to the device's controls got a more satisfying response. The door slid aside.

Max exchanged the electronic lockpick for the detector Juoran held, swept the device around the waiting room, and then nodded.

They entered the plush chamber and sealed the door behind them.

"The computer terminal's in there." Kressa indicated the closed office door.

Max opened the door with his electronic lockpick, and then scanned it with the detector. "It's monitored," he whispered. "Audio and vid. Don't move."

He backed away from the opening and rummaged through the pockets of his dark coveralls. At length, he came up with a lumpy metallic sphere sprouting several short wires and controls. He tossed the device into the dark room. It landed with a dull thump on the desktop. Several seconds later, a dim green light started blinking from its top.

"All right, it's safe," Max said, no longer bothering to keep his voice low.

The lights came on as he stepped into the room. He glanced around, beckoned to Kressa and Juoran, and crossed to the computer station against the left-hand wall.

Kressa gave the jumbled sphere of electronic circuitry on the desk a respectful glance. "What is that thing?"

"Signal duplicator," Max said as he examined the Salkair computer and communication equipment. "It made a recording of the signal the pick-up was sending, duplicated it, and is now sending it back. Anyone monitoring it will continue to see the same dark, quiet room. At least that's what it's supposed to be doing. Let's try to keep out of its way." He straightened from his inspection of the computer and looked at Kressa. "Any idea where to begin?"

She set her pulse gun on the counter beside the terminal and chewed her lower lip as she considered the problem. She had given little thought to the actual process one might use to get into a computer's memory. Emre and Ciroen had been able to control Connie and the Patrol computers at Eminence, but she had no idea how they had gone about it, or if it were even possible to do so with a computer this primitive.

"The information we want won't be stored in this machine," she told Juoran. "This acts only as a terminal to the Salkair's main unit. The first thing we have to do is establish a link with the central computer."

She looked at the terminal a moment longer and then tapped the keypad. The screen winked on. Nothing else happened.

Waiting for a password, she guessed and typed a random sequence of keystrokes.

The computer chirped, its screen filled with characters too fast to read, and then the text vanished.

Kressa glanced at Max. "I had to try something."

He shrugged. "It's progress."

She looked at Juoran. "Can you feel anything, Juoran?" she asked, indicating the silent terminal. "Is there anything there you can get hold of with your mind? Anything…?"

Her voice trailed off as Juoran took a seat in the chair before the computer. He stared at it for a long time. "There is… something. Not a presence," he said quietly, "but—activity."

"It's waiting for something," Kressa said. "Some kind of code or password. Can you sense that?"

"Waiting…" Juoran whispered. "Yes." His eyes drooped shut and his white lashes quivered against his pale cheeks.

A moment later, data began to appear on the screen, nonsensical at first, and then becoming legible as names, numbers, diagrams.

As if moving in a dream, Juoran lifted one hand slowly toward a pile of data cards on the nearby counter, pulled one out at random, and placed it in the reader. His other hand groped toward Kressa. He found and grasped her hand in a tight grip, and a tendril of his mind pressed against hers.

She opened to it.

Instantly, she sensed Juoran's need. It wasn't power he sought from her, it was a tie, a thread of awareness he could follow back to his own body if he became too caught up in the cold, mechanical being of the computer system.

Kressa understood that need all too well. Years ago, as the student of an Ilekian Psi-Master, she had made the foolish error of linking with the mind of a shemrel, a small Ilekian carnivore with the power of true flight. Her intent had been to experience the creature's being for a brief moment and then return to her own consciousness. But she had become caught up in the wonder of flight under one's own power, diving and soaring under Ilek's crystal blue sky, and she had stayed with the animal. She had stayed too long. If not for the timely arrival of her Master, she would never have escaped the shemrel's mind and found her way back to her own body. Even with the expert assistance of her Master, she had spent several days in a psychically induced coma no one had been sure she would awaken from.

She placed a hand on Juoran's shoulder and entwined her haphazard consciousness with his elegantly ordered th'Maran mind, providing him with the link she should have arranged for herself that day on Ilek.

Vaguely, she became aware of the places Juoran's mind traveled, the barriers he broke or bypassed, the data he set loose and fed to the terminal in the Salkair's office, instructing it to record on the data card.

After some time, Kressa sensed another presence in the link. At first it was no more than a faint strumming on the outer tendrils of her/Juoran's consciousness, and she ignored it. But it grew stronger, and she was forced to shield against it lest it disrupt Juoran's delicate concentration. It took several moments of holding back the intruder before she became aware of what its presence meant. With a silent gasp, she let it through.

Danger! Sevallen's unfamiliar/familiar mind warned. Danger, Juoran. Someone's coming!

Kressa pulled as much of her awareness as she dared from the link and glanced at Max.

He met her gaze. "What is it?"

"Sevallen warns… someone's coming," she managed to gasp, struggling to send the information to Juoran mentally even as she vocalized it to Max.

Juoran jerked her back into the link as he sent a response to Sevallen and strove for a line to the surface.

Kressa showed him the way, pulling his psychic self back and catching his physical self as his body slumped forward in shocked response to his abrupt return.

"Is he all right?" Max bent to get a closer look at the stricken th'Maran.

"I'll take care of him," she said. "Watch the outer door!"

Max dashed from the office.

"Juoran?" Kressa called with her voice and her mind. She helped him sit up straight in the chair, and then searched his clouded gray eyes and the mind behind them. "Juoran, come on! We've got to get out of here."

He blinked once, slowly. Awareness returned to his eyes, and the touch on her mind grew strong again. He started to stand, and then froze.

Kressa heard the outer door open and close. She scooped her gun from the counter. "Wait here," she whispered. She started for the office door, hoping Max had found a place to hide.

"No one just vanishes," a male voice drifted from the outer room.

Kressa thought she recognized it as one of the Salkair men who had been with Lusk earlier.

"Not even Kressa Bryant," the voice continued. "She must've had help."

"Yeah? Maybe." That was Lusk. "Maybe the governor helped her again."

The voices moved closer, and Kressa crept to the edge of the opening, alert for any sign that Max's presence had been discovered or that Lusk found the open door and lighted office unusual.

"Personally, I don't care what happened to her," Lusk went on. "We gave her to Ayres. As far as I'm concerned, that was the end of our responsibility. Anyway, she did us a favor, taking him down like that. I was getting tired of that bastard and his—"

"Glad to be of service, Lusk." Kressa stepped into the open office doorway, her pulse gun aimed point-blank between his eyes. "Get your hands up. Both of you."

With a single exchange of shocked looks, the two men did as she ordered.

"Now, take two steps back, real slow, because I've had just about all I can take of you Salkairs, and I'd love to take one of you down, as well. Max!"

Max appeared from his hiding place behind a potted plant in a front corner of the room. "Right here."

"Relieve these gentlemen of their weapons."

She studied the Salkair men as Max searched them. They were going to be a real snag in her plan. If she left them alive, the Salkairs would know she'd been in their office. That would put them on the alert, even if they didn't know what she was after. But killing two men in cold blood wasn't her idea of an answer, and taking them captive was too risky.

The solution to her problem drifted over the tenuous link that still bound her mind to Juoran's, and she mentally acknowledged his plan.

Max had completed his search and come up with a small handful of weapons from each of the men. He held two of the captured guns on their owners.

"What now, boss?" he asked Kressa.

"Now we bid these gentlemen goodbye," she said in a sinister tone. She stepped out of the office and began to circle toward the outer door.

The Salkairs turned slowly, hands held well away from their bodies. They kept a wary eye on Kressa and on the guns Max held leveled at them.

"I want to leave The Salkair a message about what I think of his hospitality," Kressa went on forebodingly. She took a step toward the two men and swung her gun between them as if trying to decide which one to shoot first.

They backed toward the office door.

"And I want to let him know how little I think of his choice of allies." She took another step forward, and Juoran appeared in the opening behind them.

The two Salkairs stumbled away from Kressa's advance, seeking the shelter of the office, and then collapsed at a touch from Juoran.

Kressa lowered her weapon. "Thank you, Juoran. Can you handle it from here?"

The th'Maran looked up from where he knelt beside the two men. "I will make them forget what has happened. When they awaken, they will continue their business as if nothing had occurred."

"Max, you can return their toys to them." Kressa went to the outer door, opened it, and peered out. Anna and Sevallen watched her from the open lift.

She waved to them to join her.

"Where's Torch?" she asked as they slipped past her into the outer room. She remained in the doorway and kept a watch on the long corridor.

"He's still in the lift shaft, waiting for our signal." Anna glanced around the room. "What happened to those two?"

Kressa followed her gaze to where Juoran and Max bent over the fallen Salkairs.

"Kressa scared them to death," Max said with a laugh, and then straightened. "Sev, what happened out there? Why didn't you use your commlink?"

"We tried, but we couldn't get through."

Max looked around the room. "This place must be shielded. Makes sense. I just wish I'd thought about it before we came."

"Well, I'll remember it in case there's a next time!" Anna said. "You scared me half to death when you didn't answer, and then when Sev couldn't get through to Juoran…" She broke off with a shake of her head and looked at Kressa. "Did you get proof that Gaunis is involved in all of this?"

Juoran stood and held out a data card in one fine-boned hand. "Better than that, Anna," he said. "We have proof that Gaunis owns Salkair."