At twilight the four survivors went out onto the glittering sand. Dead Nomun waited for them there, and on die black water the breathboats moved in slow grace.
Nomun stepped to the water’s edge. The passengers had discarded their privacy masks; some of the faces seemed familiar. Nomun studied them for a moment, then took an involuntary step backward. Three of the passengers wore his face. They saw his consternation and laughed. One dressed in the same manner as Jade Nomun, but in garments cut from finer fabric, called out. «Yes, we’re brothers, Nomuns. But we did not steal the name, so....» The man flung up his arms in an expansive gesture. «We’re here, and you’re there.»
Beside Nomun, Jade Nomun snarled and brought forth a chunk of crystal he had hidden inside his shirt. He threw it at the grinning faces, and it flew true until it struck the barrier. The warning tone rang out and the crystal burst with a flat ear- hurting crack, became a cloud of drifting sparks.
Young Nomun had come up behind them. «Tell us, what were your plans?» he asked. «Had you not wasted your weapon on the spectators?»
Jade Nomun walked down the beach toward the next node without replying. Nomun noticed that False Nomun was already gone. He looked toward the shelter, realized why False Nomun had left.
«Come,» he said to Young Nomun. «Who knows how the mech will react, when it finds the corpse. I would prefer to be in the jungle.»
Young Nomun nodded, distractedly. He seemed to be fascinated by the men in the breathboats. «Is this such a famous event then? That our brothers gather from the stars to watch us?»
Nomun did not reply. He walked quickly down the beach, so that Young Nomun had to trot to catch him before he reached the blue glow of the jungle.
«Wait Empty. Do we have the same arrangement?» He made to touch Nomun’s shoulder, but Nomun slid away from his outstretched hand. Young Nomun seemed surprised, then angry. «You mocked me for sparing the mad one. Do you criticize me now for not saving the brute?»
Nomun looked at him. «No, no. Who am I to judge you? Our agreement stands. I’ll go first tonight» He turned and stepped under the canopy.
The Blood Moon rose swiftly, a blot of crimson, and almost as soon as the crystal pulsed with hot light the storm began.
... and Nomun’s ship dropped, engines silent, through the thick clouds of Hell. A thousand planets bear that name, Nomun thought. But it’s especially apt in this case.
To setde himself into the proper emotional mode for the task ahead, he viewed a recording of FareLord Gegando, First Voice of that race in the Manichaean Reach.
Gegando addressed the Human Assembly: «... the natural condition of humanity is slavery.» The FareLord’s silver face was narrow, humanoid except for the eyes–protruding red balls set too far apart. «This truth is self-evident. Even were we to withdraw from those worlds where indentured humans perform the necessary work of the Holdings, their ‘freedom’ would rapidly prove to be illusory. Occasionally, we are driven from our Holdings by agitators and mercenaries. What happens? Almost instantly, the humans select a new slavemaster. We have seen this over and over.» Nomun clicked off the recording, smiled wryly.
Nomun inserted another wafer. His smile faded as he watched. He saw the melt mines, where humans trawled the magma in bottlecars, and died in fiery white implosions. He saw the pens in the highlands where millions lived behind the wire. He saw the deep catacombs full of mindless breeders. He saw the graceful spires of the FareLord palaces, high atop the most stable peaks. It’s good, he thought. It’s helpful that the FareLords are so easy to hate.
Nomun pulled the ship out of freefall when he had dropped below the highest ridges of the Moving Mountains, where for a time, he might be safe from FareLord detectors. He landed in a narrow canyon, just below the mouth of a cave from which a boiling river poured.
A welcome party awaited him; three figures muffled in cool- suits. He let them wait, while his ship scanned the landscape for any evidence of treachery. Eventually he shut the ship’s systems down and gathered his gear.
He stepped out onto the surface of Hell; his clients indicated with urgent gestures that he was to follow them. They led him up a precarious trail to the lip of the cave.
Just before he went down into Hell’s heart, he turned for one last glimpse of his ship. Workers were already covering the hull with concealing pumice.
They conducted him to a coolroom under the mountain, where ancient machinery wheezed and strained to keep the temperature bearable. Inside, the welcoming committee stripped off their cool- suits.
The spokesman was a tall cadaverous man with the spiraling tattoos of a firediver. He stepped forward, offered his hand to Nomun. «Welcome, Emancipator. I’m Kronerq; these are my adjutants, Maril and Wumorin.» A long uncomfortable moment passed before Nomun touched the hand briefly.
«Yes, welcome,» chorused the other two. One was a fat woman with metal eyes, the other a young man wearing a privacy mask, a headband which generated a black mist over his features.
«Thank you,» Nomun finally said, since they seemed to expect some response. «Shall we get to work?»
Kronerq’s lean face showed surprise. «Now? Will you not rest first, here in the comfort of the room prepared for you?» Nomun wiped sweat from his forehead, flicked it from his fingertips. Comfort? «Your contract is time-based, Kronerq. You say you can pay my fee for nine standard weeks. If I haven’t destroyed the FareLords by then, I must leave.»
«Surely that will be enough time....»
«Possibly.»
Kronerq sighed and sent the young man out. He returned with an armful of maps, charts, and datawafers; these he dumped unceremoniously on a long table.
Kronerq waved his bony arm over the table. «Here is what we have, Emancipator. Profiles of the FareLords, charts of their diggings, troop dispositions, organizational sheets for the various indentured cadres, ecological analysis of the various Holdings, estimates of sympathizer strength in the cadres. Everything else we thought you might have use for.»
Nomun leaned over the table, began pushing the mass into some sort of order. «This will do for now,» he said. «Leave me.» Kronerq was shocked again. «But, but, Emancipator. We have so much to discuss; I must convey the plan we wish you to carry out....»
Nomun made a gesture of dismissal. «You’ve somehow gotten the wrong impression. I’m not here to carry out your plans; I’m here to destroy the FareLords. That’s what my contract specifies: ‘reasonable and diligent efforts to eradicate the FareLord presence on Hell.’ Reread it, if you cannot remember. Any plan I execute will be my own.»
«Well, of course.... Still, Emancipator, it’s a good plan, made by Wumorin, who has demonstrated a fine aptitude during our struggle for independence.» The young man nodded, his face still concealed beneath the dark blur of the privacy mask.
Nomun was losing patience. «Then I’ll depart and Wumorin will put this paragon of a plan into effect, and you’ll save a great deal of money.» He reached for his coolsuit.
Kronerg’s tliin hands twisted together. «Wait, please. You’re right, of course. We lack your experience and aptitudes; had we been able to get the FareLords off Hell on our own, we wouldn’t have contracted with you. Please, we’ll withdraw now and allow you the privacy you require.»
When they were gone, Nomun turned to his task, feeding the data into the slate. An hour passed, and he began to develop a clear picture of the situation. He sat back, stretched. The FareLords had been unusually greedy. They had increased the scale of their Holdings on Hell far beyond their ability to control the slaves who won the precious substances from the magma.