CHAPTER 31
There is a point where the human mind loses its ability to respond emotionally to stress; where successive shocks elicit diminished reactions or none at all... and as he gazed at Bakshi's stony expression, Caine sensed their group had reached that point. His shooting of Lathe was still too fresh for any reaction but confused numbness.
"What are you doing, Serle?" Tremayne growled, the question sounding inane in the stillness. Standing to his right and slightly behind him, Caine could clearly see the tightness in the Radix leader's neck and shoulders.
"Skyler, move closer to the others," Bakshi ordered, ignoring Tremayne. "Keep your hands at chest level—remember that my reflexes are as good as yours. And don't block my view of Caine's gun hand."
Peripherally, Caine saw Skyler obey, stepping to within half a meter of Caine's right shoulder before stopping. "Who are you planning to kill?" he asked Bakshi sarcastically.
"No one needs to die," Bakshi said in the same soft voice. "There'll be amnesty for everyone who participated in this mission, including Caine and your blackcollars, provided you surrender peacefully. Commander Nmura, inform the other freighter you'll both be landing back at Brocken on this orbit."
"If I refuse?" Nmura said stiffly.
"Staying out here won't do them any good—they don't know where the ships are yet," Bakshi reminded him.
"You traitor." The words came out of Tremayne's mouth with a bitterness Caine hadn't realized a human voice could achieve. "You lousy, murderous traitor."
"Send the message, Commander," Bakshi said. His eyes and laser, Caine noted, were firmly fixed somewhere to the left, past the console where Nmura sat. It puzzled him—and it clearly irritated Tremayne.
"Look at me, damn you!" the Radix leader snarled suddenly. "Or haven't you got the stomach to face me?"
The barest hint of a smile twitched Bakshi's lips, and he shook his head minutely. "Sorry, Ral, but at the moment you're not any danger to me. Commando Mordecai is a different story."
"Mordecai?" Tremayne glanced to his left.
Caine turned his own head more slowly. The best hand-to-hand fighter that ever lived, Lathe had once called him; but standing motionless in Bakshi's line of fire, a head shorter and twenty-five kilos lighter than the Argentian, he looked merely old. "You overestimate me, Comsquare," he murmured, echoing Caine's thoughts.
"I don't think so. Fuess, McKitterick, and Couturie were no blackcollars, but they were damn good fighters. I have a great deal of respect for anyone who could take them as easily as you did—far too much to take my eyes off you."
"So you knew they were fakes all along," Caine said slowly. "And vice versa, of course. A pity Mordecai didn't kill them more leisurely."
"It wouldn't have helped you," Bakshi said. "They never knew about me. I reported directly to the Ryqril."
"To the Ryqril." Tremayne's voice was quiet, almost calm. But his face was pale, and the one eye Caine could see burned with hatred. "Betraying your own race for a lousy—what's the going rate these days? Still thirty pieces of silver a person?"
Bakshi sighed. "I don't expect you to understand, but I was trying to help."
"Of course. Without traitors we couldn't possibly have functioned."
"You couldn't have survived," Bakshi snapped, his icy veneer cracking for a second. With a visible effort he regained his control... and when he spoke again there was infinite sadness in his voice. "Don't you see," he said softly, almost pleadingly, "that the Ryqril could never have let an effective underground function this close to the Chryselli battle front?"
"So you chose emasculation for us, did you?" Tremayne spat.
"It was that or mass destruction. Apostoleris had the Calarand and Millaire HQs infiltrated from top to bottom. You could have been wiped out in a single night if the Ryqril had ordered it. The outlying Radix cells would have been dealt with even more harshly—whole towns killed, probably, to make sure of getting everyone. Is that what you wanted for Argent, Ral? Really?"
Tremayne exhaled loudly. "There are worse things than dying for a cause you believe in. Living as someone's tame pet, for instance."
"I didn't think you'd understand," Bakshi said, his voice weary. "And get your hand away from your laser. You wouldn't even clear the holster with it."
"No." Tremayne's voice was even. "I'm not accepting Ryqril charity anymore. Let's see if your spineless toadying left you enough guts to gun me down."
"Ral," Bakshi began warningly—
And a chunk of silver light flashed across the room from Caine's right, catching Bakshi's gun arm at the wrist and knocking it to the side.
The impact wasn't all that great; Bakshi kept his grip on the weapon and would have had it back on target in half a second. But for Mordecai half a second was all the time in the world.
His spinning kick sent the laser clattering off the bridge wall with the sharp crack of breaking bone. Bakshi countered with an ineffective kick toward Mordecai's stomach and leaped back a meter, landing in combat stance. Mordecai was on him instantly, and for a few seconds the two men stood nose to nose, arms flashing in attack and counter with sudden speed. They broke apart for a moment, and Caine could see a bright line of blood trailing from Bakshi's tightly compressed lips before the Argentian threw himself forward in a final desperate attack. Mordecai stood his ground... and with one more flurry of punches it was over.
Tremayne, breaking out of his momentary paralysis, finally yanked out his laser. His eyes seemed uncertain of the proper target, though, flicking between Bakshi's crumpled form and the corner where Lathe had risen to his feet. "You can put that away," Lathe advised him grimly. "It's all over now. Nmura, give the other ship a course and get us moving before the Ryqril realize they've lost the ball."
"Uh... yes, sir." Caine glanced around in time to see a thoroughly confused-looking Nmura turn back to his console.
Lathe walked over to Bakshi, trailing flakes of charred flexarmor and the odor of burnt flesh as he did so, and squatted down to check briefly for a pulse. Rising to his feet, he faced Tremayne, the latter still clutching his laser. "It's all over," he repeated. "Unless you have doubts that Bakshi was really a spy, of course."
Slowly, Tremayne slid the pistol into its holster, his eyes glancing at the gash in Lathe's flexarmor. "Just another of your little tricks, huh?" he said bitterly. He shot an angry look back at Caine. "I suppose Caine's laser was specially rigged or something?"
Lathe shook his head. "It was just as deadly as yours—Bakshi wouldn't have been fooled by anything else. I'm wearing a double thickness of flexarmor, with a thin slab of raw meat between to give off the right smell. If Caine had somehow missed and got my head instead I'd be dead now." He had his gloves off now; tiredly, he wiped his forehead.
"We're on our way, Comsquare," Nmura spoke up. "Course heading about ten degrees from target."
"You could have told me," Tremayne growled. "Or didn't you think I could be objective where treason from my own top lieutenant was concerned?"
Lathe gave him a long look. "Your objectivity wasn't in question," he said quietly. "It was your loyalty I wasn't sure of."
Tremayne stiffened, but the explosion Caine had expected didn't come. "I trust you can explain," he said, his tone icy.