A low desperate cry came from behind a door at the very end of the corridor. Shavash threw the door wide open.
Bemish noticed a pile of bloody rags in a corner, some pliers in a bowl and Ashinik's dead eyes. Completely naked, he was hanging head down on metal rings attached to a wall and Bemish's attention was pulled to his right hand — all the nails there had been torn out. Then Shavash stepped forward moving his friend aside and said in a tired and ironic voice, "The first set is finished. Take the pear off the branch."
They took half-dead Ashinik off the rings and seated him astride a chair. Shavash stood above the prisoner, pulled his head up and asked, "Who placed the bomb?"
Ashinik was silent. His black hair stood up straight soaked with blood. Bemish rushed to the youth but the guards blocked his way at once and one of them, baring his rotten teeth, silently stuck a gun into Bemish's side.
Ashinik's eyes were as empty as RAM in a turned off computer. Then he whispered something. His lips didn't work. Bemish understood only the end of the sentence — Ashinik swore dirty.
"That's not an answer." Shavash said.
Ashinik licked his broken lips and spit with all his strength at Shavash's face.
His saliva and blood were all over the official's lips and chin. Everybody froze. Shavash slowly turned and walked to an old sink built into the room's right corner. The splashing water and the washing official's snorts sounded very clear in the quiet room. Shavash closed the tap and approached the prisoner again.
"Do you hope that your boss will get you out of this?"
He spun to Bemish.
"Choose, Terence — this guy or the controlling stock block of BOAR."
The single second, that passed by, seemed like eternity to Ashinik. Then the Assalah general director pushed the gun, pointed at him, away and said loudly, "You are such a scoundrel, Shavash!"
Astonishment glanced in Ashinik's wide open eyes.
"You are free," Shavash told Ashinik, "And when you set up another assassination, take care that your boss is around, otherwise nobody will step in on your behalf."
Bemish pushed the official away, looked around and, grinning viciously, started pulling the pants and shirt off one of the torturers. The torturer squeaked fearfully, pulled out of the boss' hands and ran away. He came back in a minute, carrying clean clothes.
The second guard smiled exasperatedly and unlocked the cuffs holding Ashinik's bloodied wrists together.
"Shouldn't we wash the lad?" he asked.
Bemish hissed at him like a goose and started pulling the pants on Ashinik. Then he buttoned up the jacket on the youth and dragged him away.
Bemish had dropped his car right at the main staircase of the city manor. He threw the lad into the car like a sack and he drove the car over a flower bed planted with rare orchids while making a turn.
Bemish stopped at the first private hospital; they washed Ashinik and a physician with frightened eyes bandaged him. The youth was silent and he only cried occasionally.
Bemish looked at the crying Ashinik and thought that he and the official had not even discussed whether or not the lad was guilty.
When they arrived to Assalah, the sun was setting down. The pilot and Bemish picked up Ashinik and helped him to walk to the administration building. Ashinik was slowly getting over the shock and his eyes started looking more alert.
Bemish locked the youth in his office and went to deal with the representatives of the freight company SpaceMart.
When he returned in an hour, he had a white plastic folder in his hands. Ashinik had squeezed into a corner and he sat there shaking horribly. A comfortable leather armchair was next to him but Ashinik squatted in his ancestors' way. It was strange to see a man in Earth clothing squatting.
Bemish walked to the youth.
"Did you have anything to do with this explosion?"
"No."
"Will you lie to me, like you just lied to Shavash? Do I look like his executioners?"
The Assalah company vice president squeezed himself further into the wall.
"Ashinik, I know that there are people you must obey unquestionably. They could have given you orders. If this is the case, I wouldn't tell Shavash anything. I will help you to go to Earth, to any place where nobody can give you orders. Did you have anything to do with this explosion?"
"They told me that you had sold me to Shavash. That you exchanged me for a controlling stock block of the aluminum plant!"
"Oh-ho," Bemish muttered, "and you tried to kill Shavash. Did you try to kill me, too?"
Ashinik hid his face in his knees and burst in tears.
"Master! Why are you torturing me? It was Shavash first, now it's you! Not again!"
Bemish was silent. In six months he grew attached to this twenty-year-old youth as if the latter were his son. The lad was almost the right age. Bemish had gotten used to feeling like Ashinik's patron. He picked up a dirty guy with lice in his hair and crazy visions and he transformed him into a manager with a tie around his neck and a cell phone in his pocket. And now this manager seduced his concubine. He also tried to send to the other world a man who in a strange way had become one of Terence Bemish's closest friends. And, possibly…
Bemish paused.
"Our score is even, Ashinik," the Earthman said. "You saved my company. I saved your life. It's one to one. I don't owe you anything."
Bemish threw the white plastic folder at his deputy.
"You will find here your last check from Assalah Company, two tickets to Earth, and an application form to Havishem; it's one of the best business schools. I talked to Trevis — they will accept you to Havishem. Trevis will pay your tuition fees."
Ashinik pulled the papers out of the folder. His bandaged right hand shook slightly.
"There are two tickets," Ashinik said suddenly.
"Don't worry," Bemish snickered, "I'll buy myself a new concubine."
While all these unpleasant adventures related to the White Elder's assassination were taking place on the planet of Weia, Kissur napped in a wide first class seat of a passenger spaceship flying to the planet of Lakhan.
The flight took almost eighteen hours.
Kissur left the spaceport for a cheap hotel, took a shower, changed into old grey pants and a worn out shirt with a popular band's logo pictured on it, made a couple of phone calls and took off. He went to the western part of the city, to Danachin University; the famous Lakhan student uprising had taken place there ten years ago.
Kissur took the main street across the block, turned left and left again and, bending slightly, dived into the roar and light of a bar's entrance. He chose a table next a window, leaned to a wall and started waiting.
In half an hour, Kissur finally saw a tall and skinny guy with olive skin and a ponytail who was finding his way to the bar's stand.
"Hey, Lore," Kissur said.
Lore turned around and shuddered but he recovered and, having picked up a beer can, he joined Kissur.
"How is it going, dude?" Lore asked. "You haven't gone back to your Weia, have you?"
Kissur just waived his hand.
"I have a question to you," he said, "You've told me once that you knew a man who was ready to trade a tiny gadget."