The news crews also showed several pretty nasty demonstrations against the Ali'i-one right outside the Iolani Palace. The protesters must have had a shaman or mage among their number because the statue of King Kamehameha the Great had been magically altered to include bugged-out eyes, a bleeding tongue, and a noose around its neck. Nice.
I know a little about demonstrations from my time with Lone Star. No matter how nasty they may look, their real significance depends on who's involved. Average slobs-on-the-street, who really believe in what's going down? Troubling, chummer. Professional agents provocateur-"rent-a-mob?" Much less troubling… although it's still something you don't want to turn your back on. Which was it in this case? I had no way of knowing.
The tridcam focused again on the magically altered face of Kamehameha the Great, prompting a new thought. Did Gordon Ho know what was going down? I don't mean the bombings and the protests and that drek-of course he'd know about that. But maybe he didn't know that someone- probably Harlech-had blown my connection with the Ali'i. I'd promised to tell him anything that Barnard passed on to me about the situation, hadn't I?
And besides, I had the gross and chilling conviction that things were starting to come apart around me, which was giving me the strong urge to talk with somebody- anybody-about it. Ho just happened to be the closest and most convenient. I pulled out the mylar card the Ali'i had given to me, crossed to the telecom, and punched in the number.
I waited out the usual delays and ghost-clicks; by now I was getting used to cold relays. Finally, the Ringing symbol flashed on the screen. A few seconds later, one last click indicated the circuit was complete.
"Ia wai?" The screen stayed blank.
I hesitated. The voice didn't sound like Gordon Ho's… or was I just being paranoid? "I want to speak to the Ali'i," I said.
"Ka?" the voice asked. Now I was sure-it wasn't King Kamehameha V. "Who is this?"
I struggled to keep my face expressionless, silently cursing myself for placing this call with my own video pickup online. "The fact that I know this number means I don't have to tell you that," I said coldly, playing my corp hard-man act to the hilt. "Put the Ali'i on. Now."
"I'm afraid that's impossible," the voice said, matching my tone chill for chill. "The Ali'i is indisposed at the moment. Leave your name and contact information, and I'll pass it on."
I was already reaching out to slap the Disconnect key. With a sigh I leaned back in the chair.
Frag it to hell. Something was seriously wrong here. Ho had stressed to me that the number on the mylar card would reach his personal line, no matter where he was. If he couldn't answer for whatever reason-if he was "indisposed," for example-no one else would pick up the line. Obviously, the ground rules had changed. Maybe "indisposed" was just a polite circumlocution for "deposed." Was Gordon Ho still Ali'i of the Kingdom of Hawai'i?
I turned and stared out the window. Almost since this thing had started, I'd felt like a rat in a trap. Now the trap seemed to be shrinking. Options and alternatives were slowly being stripped away. For a while, I'd fooled myself into thinking I had a powerful patron in the Ali'i. No more, chummer. For all I knew, maybe Gordon Ho was swinging at me end of a rope, eyes bugged and tongue bleeding like the magically altered statue. Even if he wasn't, it was a pretty good bet he had more important things on his mind than the travails of one Dirk Montgomery.
And Barnard? Frag, I'd already given him my best pitch, and he'd decided to leave me "in-country" to reality-check his other informants. How could I convince him to pull me out? Snivel and whimper?
Maybe ALOHA was hiring. I wondered what the going rate for burned-out haole street ops was these days…
The telecom buzzed, and I almost went over backward in the chair. I glared balefully at the incoming Call symbol on the bottom of the screen.
Who had this LTG number? Monot, obviously, and anybody else she'd happened to tell at Telestrian Industries Corporation. And that was about it… wasn't it?
A little apprehensively, I tapped the key to accept the call, but only after turning off the telecom's video pickup. "Yeah?"
The screen filled with an image of Gordon Ho's strong features. "Mr. Montgomery?"
I hurriedly keyed my vid pickup back on. "It's me," I told him unnecessarily. "Where the frag are you?" And then an ugly thought hit. "And how the frag did you get this number?"
The Ali'i of Hawai'i gave me a tired smile. For the first time I noticed the bags under his eyes, the lines of strain in his face. "As to your second question, Mr. Montgomery, I think I told you once before that some members of my military intelligence community were still loyal to me personally. Fortunately, that still seems to be the case. As to your first question, I'd rather not discuss that, for reasons that should be obvious."
"What the frag's going down, e ku'u lani?" I asked.
His tired smile grew sad. 'That form of address isn't appropriate anymore, Mr. Montgomery."
I nodded. "A palace coup?"
"More or less. The throne has been taken-I prefer the term 'usurped,' of course," he added with a wry grin-"by a distant cousin of mine who apparently has been groomed for the position by certain factions within the legislature."
"A mouthpiece for Na Kama'aina" I translated.
"Of course."
"And you?" I asked him.
"Accused of high treason, what else? How else could Na Kama'aina have played it?" He shrugged his muscular shoulders. "I left the palace one step ahead of a warrant for my arrest."
I shook my head. Things fall apart; the center cannot hold, and all that drek. "You've got some people with you?"
"Some," he acknowledged. "Trusted friends."
"And a safe place to hang?"
"For the moment, yes."
I rubbed at my eyes, which suddenly felt very tired. "So what happens now?"
The erstwhile Ali'i smiled. "I think I'd rather not discuss that at the moment, Mr. Montgomery," he said quietly. "After all, my people have compromised this line…" He didn't have to finish the thought.
I sighed. "Yeah." What the frag else was there to say? Things had gone way too far beyond my ability to affect them-mat's the way it felt, at least. I was adrift on some dark, empty ocean, with no compass or rudder. "Well," I told the ex-Ali'i, "if there's anything I can do to-"
He interrupted gently. "That's not why I called you, Mr. Montgomery."
I blinked. "Oh?"
"I've been asked to pass on a message to you."
"From whom?" Suddenly, bleak fatalism morphed into paranoid imaginings.
"Someone who claims to know you." Ho's voice and body language were giving nothing away, no matter how hard I scrutinized him. "Someone who wishes to meet with you. It's your choice whether you accept the meeting or not, of course."
Well, thanks for that, at least, I thought. "Who?" I asked again.
"Two people, actually." Ho replied slowly. "That was made quite clear to me. Apparently, one of them you'll particularly want to speak with."
"Why? And who the frag are they?"