Mary Rosenblum - Horizons

“Do you believe him?” A woman stepped front of him, her chest heaving with anger, her euro-latino face pale. “Laif ‘s on our side, he wouldn’t sell out.”

“Why say it if it’s not true?” A smaller mixed afroamericanasian man pushed between them. “We can check and—” his gaze went vacant as he checked the Con—“Oh, gods, it is true. It’s all over the Con. He bought the shares, he’s selling us out, can you believe it?”

Danefroze just for an instant. Bad. He glanced toward the podium, but Laif was no longer there, was down on the floor, gesticulating, not losing his cool but danm busy right now. They weren’t giving him much space, either. The afro—asian wasn’t the only one who had checked the Con

Dane made his way through the crowd,watching for the agitator. He wasgoo d. He was a stranger.

Might be a smart idea to invite him to the next little get together of NOW, get a handle on where he came from, what he was up to. He blinked into the Con. Yeah, a few hundred people had found the new purchase made by Laif or at least by someone with credit registered to Laif Jones Egret and hidden just enough to make it believable. If you didn’t think about it too hard.

Dane skipped across a half dozen Con threads, dropping cormmentsinto the raging torrent of words.

Dumb move for someone as smart as Laif. Pretty easy to really hide your tracks. Stupid to leave the evidence just sitting there, waiting for some fool to stumble over. Dane skipped here and there, using the various solid personas that Noah had hacked up for him, slick enough to fool even Con security. Bit by bit, his planted questions began to ripple through the outcry.

Without warning, his implanted link buzzed, tickling the skinon his shoulder. An alarm. He blinked his link open. Someone was trying to get past the security lock on Elevator 3B.

Which wouldn’t be a big concern except that Koi lay locked into the med-unit in the core, and 3B was the closest elevator to the core. Which suggested that someone was after Koi.

Good luck, Laif, Dane thought as he headed fast for the corridors and the nearest elevator bay. You’re on your own. As he reached the corridor he felt someone’s pointed attention on him, but when he looked around, the corridor was empty.

Damn.

This had the feel of a very well-planned set-up.

Dane pushed himself into a skimming run, taking the long flatstrid es that lowG allowed. He took the closest service elevator, thumbed in manual control and sent the bare unit up at max speed. He shot out of the door as it opened, pulling goggles from his belt clip, even as he soared through the aisles of ‘ponic tubes. A couple of Koi’s people flanked him, worrying. Hide, he told them silently. Just in case. They vanished instantly. He slowed as he neared the control room, checking his link. According to his security system, the intruder hadn’t managed to disable the lock on 3B yet. Dane kolled his momentum on the side of the control center, slung himself intothe lock and eyeballed the inner door open. He glanced at Koi’s glazed and dreaming face, then opened the main control field,one toe tucked under the grab bar in front oh the main console as the icons blinked to life.

Nothing. Dane stared for a long moment at the security readout, then shut down the field, pried loose an access panel in the conntrol wall, and slid his hand in behind a tangle of wires. Removed a small lethal-grade stunner. For a moment he stared down at the palm-sized gray oblong, then he slipped it into his singlesuit, and grim faced, let himself out through the lock.

Salad vegetables surrounded Elevator 3B, spirals of red, green, and yellow lettuces and leafy plants, herbs, tomato vines trained around the ‘ponic tubes. Dane slowed, drifting to a halt at the elevator entry, eyeballed the control scanner and paused, his eyes on the door.

If Li Zhen opened the door?

Dane slipped the stunner from his suit, thumbed the control to non-lethal. Killed the security lock. Then he pushed off, drifting away from the light, fading into the leafy vines of a tomato’s sprawl where the heavy crop of orange, ripening fruit would camouflage his NYUp uniform. The elevator whispered to a stop. Dane drew a slow breath, relaxed his muscles, stunner aimed at the door.

It sighed open.

The empty compartment yawned at him.

With a shrug, Dane pushed over to the elevator and sent the car back down. Frowning, he headed back to the control center to up the security levels for all access points. It would be a nuisance beecause he’d have to okay every shipment going down, but that was his only option right now.

Thoughtfully, Dane kicked his way back to the control center. There, he reset security, okayed the shipments scheduled to go out in the next shift, then turned to Koi. He touched the boy’s face and for an instant, Koi’s glazed stare sharpened into focus. He tried to smile.

“You’re just about finished here,” Dane murmured. “I think I’m going to let you out a little early. You can finish the job on your own, okay?” The fractures were 90 percent solid and the organ damage had already finished healing. He’d be okay kicking around and a whole lot safer than he was tied down here.

Dane overrode the med-unit’s program and ended the healing protocol.

Drifting, he watched Koi’s eyes brighten as the unit sent drugs down The microtubing implanted in his veins, banishing the heavy soporifics that kept him immobile for the enhanced healing, shutting off the stimulation protocol that kept muscles and tissues healthy and toned while healing progressed. Koi blinked as the microtubes and catheters withdrew and the unit opened to release him. He moved a shoulder and drifted upward with perfect control. Yawned and stretched, without drifting a hair.

“Did she come back?” Koi’s cloudy eyes glowed with memory. “The pretty one?”

“Ahni?” Dane shook his head. “I hope she’s safe.” His smile disappeared. “The people who took you tried to come back up here.”

Koi shivered. “It hurts down there. I can’t breathe.” He pushed himself off with one toe, drifted toward the refreshment panel. “The ones who took me… they hurt me. But the one down there, he looked at me for a long time. Took blood out of my arm, but he didn’t hurt me, like they did.”

“I think it was Li Zhen, the Chairman of Dragon Home. I sure wonder how he fits into this.” Dane closed his hand gently around Koi’s fragile arm. “You need to stay invisible. It’s really important.”

“We will.” Koi gave him a sideways look. “How come we scare them?”

“You scare them, because you’re different.” Dane let his breath out in exasperation. “The downsiders, I mean. The people up here… they’ll get used to you. Later. When the downsiders can’t do anything about you.”

“Stupid.” Koi pushed off delicately with one toe, arching into a slow and perfect back somersault, his body supple as an Earth-ocean dolphin. “I don’t want to live down there anyway.”

“You’re right, it is stupid, and it’s really a downsider fear,” Dane said patiently. “Right now, we’ve got some other things to fix.”

“Uh oh, is Laif in trouble again?” Koi rolled an eye at him. “He’s always in trouble isn’t he?”

”Not really.” But Dane had to smile. “It’s a tough job, trying to run the orbital from our end of the Elevator and from the North American Alliance’s side at the same time. But we need him.”

“Okay.” Koi pushed off harder this time, arching into another perfect somersault.

The chip in Dane’s shoulder tickled, and he pushed over to the control desk, brought up the field. “Laif’s on his way up. Let’s go meet him.” He snagged an extra pair of goggles from a gear hammmock, pushed off for the lock. Koi drifted along beside him.