"It can't be!" Staffa wheeled, smacking a hard fist into his palm. "There can't be eyes like that anywhere else! The age is right. Everything fits!"
"If you're trying to play on any latent sympathy I might have for my parents, it won't work," Sinklar declared, stepping forward. "Just what are you looking for?"
"My son!" Staffa told him, his jaw muscles knotted and jumping. "When I saw you-saw your eyes…. You see, my son had your eyes!"
Sinklar backed away a step, unconsciously moving closer to Mac, staring cautiously at the Lord Commander.
"Look," Staffa insisted, bringing a small holo cube out of his belt pouch.
Sinklar took the cube-Mac leaning over his shoulder to see-and thumbed the button. His breath caught.
"Rotted Gods," Mac whispered.
"Do you recognize her?" Staffa pleaded, panic in his eyes.
Sinklar nodded, a wooden feeling in his gut. "Arta Ferathe Seddi assassin who killed Gretta." He dropped the cube from numb fingers. "I think this charade is over, Lord Commander. I take it we're free to go?"
Staffa shook his head, a stricken look on his face. "Her name is Chrysla. She …… He swallowed. "Twenty-two years ago, she bore my son. The Praetor of Myklene abducted them both. I've spent all of my life looking, trying to find her… to find you. "
Sinklar could see the hurt in Skyla's eyes as she put a hand on Staffa's shoulder. "Maybe Sinklar isn't the one." "Maybe." Except Staffa didn't sound convinced.
For the briefest of moments, Sinklar's heart went out to the man. Yes, I know that feeling, the loss, the sensation of being adrift, without place. "I'm sorry I can't help you."
Staffa's lips quivered, as if halfway between a smile and tears.
The hatch slipped open again, and an old man with a bruised head hobbled in. He didn't see Sink where he stood to the side.
"Bruen," Mac growled.
Sinklar's teeth ground. Bruen? The twisted Seddi monster who'd started all of this? He stared at the old man and knew true hatred. To Staffa, Sinklai added hostilely, "Then again, considering the company you keep, maybe I'm not so sorry after all."
Bruen gasped at the sound of his voice and turned, eyes going wide. For a second he appeared stunned, then shot a frightened gaze at the Lord Commander. "You… you asked me to meet you here?"
Staffa seemed to pull himself together and pointed at Sinklar. "What did you do, Bruen? Sinklar says his parents are lying in the Criminal Anatomical Research Labs on Rega. Who are they? Sinklar Fist is my son, isn't he?"
Sink flinched at the fury brewing in the Lord Commander's words. He could feel Mac's tension, like a compressed spring.
Bruen closed his eyes and sighed. "I'm tired of lying, Staffa. The dance of the quanta cannot be denied. Everything the machine plotted and planned has come undone, and I'm no longer sure what's right anymore. It's all beyond me. Maybe if Hyde were still alive, he could-"
"Rot you, Bruen, answer my question!" Staffa knotted his fist in the old man's robe, hissing in a deadly voice, "Is Sinklar Fist my son?"
Bruen winced and nodded, sagging in defeat, his voice cracking dryly. "Yes. We got him from the Praetor." Sinklar shifted uneasily, slowly shaking his head. To Mac
he whispered, "They're all Rotted berserk!" "And Chrysla?" Staffa insisted.
"The Praetor kept her. Kept her until you gutted Pylos off Myklene. "
"And this Arta Fera? She's not Chrysla?" Staffa thundered.
"No!" Bruen pleaded. "She's a clone, Lord Commander. A clone provided by the Praetor!"
Staffa went white and loosened his hold on the old man's robe. "To assassinate me." He closed his eyes and walked wearily over to lean against the fireplace, propping himself on one arm. If looks were lethal, Skyla Lyma would have riven Bruen into slag.
Sinklar motioned to Mac, indicating the door, and said, "If you'll excuse us. I think-"
"Wait!" Staffa whirled, fingers curling. "Bruen, what about Sinklar's claim that he saw his parents in Rega?" "Tanya and Valient," Bruen said stoically. "Yes, they
were Seddi. Another of the machine's ideas. If Tybalt were removed before he could sire an heir, Rega's drive for Hegemony might be blunted. Oddly enough, a young security officer named Ily Takka broke the case, foiled the attempt, and we all know what happened after that. At the time it happened, they created a perfect excuse for Sinklar to be placed in Regan custody. Doing so kept him safe from discovery. "
"You know," Sinklar stated matter-of-factly, "I don't believe a word of this. I meant it when I said Mac and I are leaving. Now. Unless, of course, our safe passage was a sham as well."
"And if it was," Mac said coolly, "Shik is going to blow the hell out of this ship-outgunned or not. We'll die before we'll be prisoners." Mac stepped
up to Staffa, who stood like a statue, a lonely devastation on his face. "I took your word, based on what we shared down there in the dark. Are we free to leave?"
Staffa nodded his head and whispered, "Yes." Then he looked at Sinklar, reaching out with his hand. "I swear… you're my son. If I could run a serology, HLA, or DNA test, I could prove it."
"I think, Lord Commander, that I've had enough of this. Like I said, I don't know the game, but Mac and I are going to bow out. Good day, sir. Wing Commander, it was a pleasure to meet you."
Sink pivoted on his heel and walked to the hatch, palming it. It slid open easily and he and Mac practically sprinted out into the hall. Ark waited with crossed arms, and at sight of their faces led them wordlessly back to the transport tube.
What did it all mean? Sinklar's mind reeled in disbelief. Staffa kar Therma? His father? And Arta-a clone? He growled to himself and thrust it all from his mind. The Lord Commander had to be mentally disturbed. Brilliance and insanity were often linked.
They rode in silence. Only after they'd safely passed through the hatch into the Regan shuttle and the pressure door had slid shut did Mac speak. "Sink? What in Rotted pollution happened in there?"
Sinklar brooded for a moment as the shuttle pulled free of the grapples and powered up. "I'll be thrice-cursed if I know." He thumped his fist into the back of the seat ahead of him. "It's got to be more Seddi plotting. Some ploy to throw me off balance, maybe a psychological setup. The Seddi have an obsession with that."
"I got the feeling Staffa really believed what he was saying. "
"I thought he was crazy," Sinklar muttered, an unsettled feeling in his soul. "Keep in mind, this is the Star Butcher. That man-no matter what he seemed like on Targa-killed billions. Billions. And Bruen? Would you believe anything he said? The man's a monster, a vile monster."
Mac slapped his legs nervously. "It's crazy, all right, and I'm glad we're out of it, away free and clear. "
"We've got enough problems looming on Rega. Ily wants us to subdue the population. She thinks only the First Targan can do it. We've got another world to conquer-the final one."
"Yeah, right.
"You don't sound happy."
Mac raised an eyebrow. "What about Ily Takka, Sink? I don't trust her any more than I trust old Bruen back there." Sinklar grinned wryly. "Hey, don't worry about her. Just
who do you think's gonna win this war? Ily's a cobra, cold, heartless, and tricky." Sink settled back in the seat. "But I think I can handle her-as long as I keep the First Targan behind me. "
"And you will," Mac promised, a frown marring his expression. "You'll always have us-no matter what." Sink leaned back, trying to concentrate on Rega, on the
problems he and the First Targan would face there. Things would change-and he, Sinklar Fist, would make it so.
He couldn't shake the memory of Chrysla staring at him from the holo cube. Her amber eyes burned in the back of his mind-haunting, so curiously familiar.