With a kind of numb horror Caine listened as Lathe outlined his theory. It was a possibility that had never occurred to him. His parents, the Resistance people who'd trained him—none of them had ever hinted that he was anything special. But it made sense... and the more he considered it, the more sense it made. There was no other way to explain how Rienzi's medical records had been such a perfect fit for him. No wonder Kratochvil and Marinos had been so casual about the ID records—all the hard work had been done twenty-seven years earlier!
Lathe finished, and for a moment there was silence. "Well, it's an interesting theory," Tremayne said at last. "Unprovable, of course."
"I only offered it as a possibility," Lathe reminded him.
"Yes. I suppose we'll have to settle for that." Tremayne glanced at Valentine, but the blackcollar offered no objection. "All right, then. We'll let you know about the vets; and you'll let us know your plans for getting them out."
Lathe nodded. "As I said I would."
The meeting broke up, and Caine headed straight for the door. He wanted to be alone, to sort all this out in privacy... before he reached the door Novak and Mordecai had fallen into step with him. He ignored them as he strode out into the hall. A clone. A duplicate person—and if one, why not more? He'd assumed the personal tutelage had been a normal part of Resistance agent training. But now he doubted that. Special treatment went with special tools. How many more Allen Caine Specials were there on Earth, being as carefully maneuvered through life as he had been?
A puppet, that's what he was. A clone-puppet, his broken strings picked up by Lathe and Radix.
A clone. I should feel something, he told himself dully. Anger; resentment. He'd been lied to his whole life; a piece of biological merchandise told he was a human being while everyone else chuckled at his na?vet?. At the very least, he thought, I should feel shame. But all he had was numbness—numbness and the knowledge he still had a job to do. His conditioning was too good to fall apart over even a revelation like this.
"Caine?"
The figure waiting across from the blackcollars' room stepped forward. Stopping, Caine pulled his mind back from its brooding and forced his eyes to focus.
It was Lianna Rhodes, the Radix leader from Janus. "What?" he growled.
"I'd like to talk to you a moment," she said.
The last thing in the universe he wanted at the moment was to talk to an Argentian, and he was opening his mouth to say so when Mordecai butted in. "Probably shouldn't," he muttered.
Something deep within Caine flipped polarity. "Sure," he told Lianna instead. "Come on in."
Just this once, the puppet was going to handle his own strings.
If Mordecai was upset by the decision, he didn't show it, and Novak similarly made no comment as he unlocked the door and slipped inside for a quick check. Once inside, Caine led Lianna to a pair of chairs near the window. The two blackcollars made no effort to follow them, but took up their usual positions near the door.
"What can I do for you?" he asked, motioning the girl to one of the chairs as he sank into the other. Over her shoulder he could see Novak and Mordecai and realized that he'd instinctively seated Lianna with her back to them, allowing the lip-reading blackcollars to confirm he wasn't giving away any secrets and putting her into the worst possible combat position. Even in a rebellious mood, he couldn't shake his training.
So much for handling his own strings.
"Caine—"
"Allen."
"Whatever. Look, we've been stuck here for a week now, waiting on thin-shelled eggs for something to happen. My men are getting bored and edgy—a combination I hate. We've heard about that crazy raid of yours, and rumors are flying about a massive assault against Henslowe Prison. I need to know whether or not that's true."
"I don't know, but I doubt it. Certainly not any time soon."
"So what are you planning?"
Caine shook his head. "Sorry, but the mission's still confidential."
"I'm not asking about your damn mission," she snapped. "I don't really care what you and your hotshots are up to. All I want to know is how my men are going to be involved, because I'm not going to throw them blindly into something unless I know their chances of coming out alive."
Caine looked at her with sudden insight. The slightly sarcastic manner with which she faced the world—it wasn't impatience or ego. It was fear. Fear for herself, perhaps; more likely fear for her people. To lead a resistance cell on a world like Argent was a heavy responsibility. "You must care a lot about your men," he said. "That's the sign of a good leader."
Her lip curled. "Yeah," she said, almost harshly.
"I meant that as a compliment," he told her, frowning.
"I know." She dropped her eyes. "I'm sorry. I'm... I don't plan to be a leader much longer. Or a follower, for that matter."
Caine blinked. "You're quitting Radix?"
She nodded. "Just as soon as someone's willing to take over Janus sector. Why? Is that so strange?"
"I thought your father...." He trailed off, not knowing a safe way to end the sentence.
She raised her eyes again, and he was struck by the bitterness there. "Yes, my father did raise me to be a good Radix member. It's about all he ever did for me." She shifted her gaze to the window. "Radix was my father's whole life. He never gave my mother and me enough of himself. It hurt Mom terribly. I hated him for a long time because of that." She rubbed a finger across her lips, almost savagely. "I'm not going to make that mistake. I'm getting out now, before the damn thing takes over my life."
"Why are you still here, then?" he asked after a moment.
A sardonic smile. "I guess that's something I got from both of them: a sense of duty. I have to stick with it until someone can do my job." She shook her head. "Look, I didn't come here to cry on your shoulder. All I want to know is what kind of risks my men will have to face."
He'd almost forgotten her original question. Meeting her gaze with his own, he tried to think.
What could he say? He didn't have the foggiest idea what Lathe intended to do—and even if he did he couldn't risk telling Lianna. Not that she was particularly untrustworthy; his instincts felt better about her than many others he'd met in Radix. But instinct wasn't enough to go on here. For an instant he saw in her his own demand to know more about Dodds's mysterious mission, and abruptly felt a twinge of sympathetic pain. Her responsibilities were every bit as important to her as Caine's were to him, and she was even more in the dark than he was.
And he had to leave her there. "I'm sorry, but I can't tell you anything that'll help you. All I can do is promise you won't be put into action without some kind of information."
Nodding heavily, her lips pressed tightly together, Lianna stood up. "I expected that answer, but it was worth a try," she said as Caine got to his feet as well. For a moment she impaled him with her eyes. "Just remember that this can't stay under your armor forever... and if we're being set up for a slaughter you'll have more trouble than you want. Rural Radix cells like mine are pretty tight; we don't take orders well from outsiders when we don't know what's going on. I don't care if I get the explanation five days or five minutes in advance—but I have to have it sometime. Keep that in mind."
Nodding to him, she turned and walked away. He stayed where he was, watching as she exchanged nods with the blackcollars and left. The door thunked solidly behind her, and Mordecai sent a questioning look at Caine. "Well?"
"Nothing important," Caine muttered, turning his back and sitting down in the chair Lianna had just vacated. If they felt insulted, that was just too bad.