Lois Bujold: Captain Vorpatril's alliance

The first intruder strode toward him. Waving a stunner, Ivan noted wearily. “Who the hell are you?” the man demanded.

Two males. Komarran accents. And heights and general builds, though Komarran phenotypes were not nearly so uniformly blended as Barrayaran. It was all their centuries of trade, and passing traders, when Barrayar had been cut off from the Nexus at large. Dark clothing that might pass as street wear.

“A few minutes ago, I’d have said I was a completely innocent bystander, but now I’m starting to think I might be someone who was mistaken for you,” said Ivan amiably. “I don’t suppose you could untie me?”

“And why are you strapped to that chair?” added the other, staring.

“Tortured, too,” Ivan supplied inventively. Nanja, Rish, wake up! “Horribly. For hours .”

The second man peered in suspicion. “I don’t see any marks.”

“It was psychological torture.”

“What kind?”

“Well,” Ivan said, beginning with the first thought that rose to his mind, “they took off all their clothes, and then—”

The first man said, “Don’t talk to him, you fool! The job’s gone wrong. Toss the place and let’s split.”

“Hey, it gets better—don’t you want to know about the ice cubes…?”

“Should we grab him, instead?”

The stunner wavered in doubt, steadied, pointing all-too-directly into Ivan’s face. “Decide on the way out. Stun him first.”

And ask questions later? In some nastier locale, much harder for ImpSec to find…? Dammit, Miles could have talked two such goons into untying him. Yeah, and probably suborned them to his cause before the ropes hit the floor, to boot. The trigger finger tightened…

The staccato buzz of a stunner beam came not from the Komarran, but from the shadows of the darkened hallway. Two pulses, two direct head-hits, the most effective if you could make the aim. The range was short. The invaders dropped like sacks of cement.

Ivan controlled his involuntary flinch. “About time you two woke up,” he said cheerily, swiveling his head.

Rish padded into the light, followed at a more cautious tiptoe by Nanja. Neither woman wore filmy nightwear, Ivan saw to his disappointment. And apparently neither slept bare, more’s the pity. Instead, both wore body-hugging knits suitable for the gym. Or for snapping awake in the middle of the night and dealing with unpleasant surprises.

“You know, if anything I said maybe led you to think I didn’t quite believe you, I mean, about being a touch twitchy about uninvited visitors, I take it back,” Ivan began. He nodded to the two lumps on the floor. “Anybody you know?”

Rish knelt and turned them over. Nanja followed to stare down into their faces.

“No,” said Rish.

“Local rental meat,” said Nanja, in a more disgusted tone. Her face grew suddenly tenser. “They’ve tracked us. Not only to Komarr, but all the way to here . Rish, now what do we do?”

“Follow the plan.” The blue woman rose and stared down at the unconscious pair. “Kill them first, I suppose.”

“Wait, wait!” said Ivan, a twinge of panic running through him. She meant that, even if she didn’t sound very enthusiastic about it. “I mean, I agree with your diagnosis, local hirelings. Suggests they probably don’t know much. And I don’t think they were assassins—cappers. They were kidnappers, I bet.” He added after a moment, “And don’t I get any reward for saving you from them, just now? I mean, a kiss would be nice, but untying me would be more practical.”

Nanja, after long look at him, nodded. Under her blue companion’s disapproving glare, she knelt and undid Ivan’s bonds. He vented a whoosh of relief, rubbing his wrists and ankles before carefully standing up. The room only spun a little.

He really shouldn’t push it, but faint heart never won, and all that. He bent his head and presented his cheek to her, just to see what would happen.

A hesitation. A widening of her eyes, which, close up, were a clear sherry color, lighter than her skin, very striking framed with her long black lashes. To his unconcealed delight, she stretched her neck and bestowed a neat peck on his cheekbone.

“See?” he said, in an encouraging tone. “That wasn’t so hard.” The spot tingled pleasantly.

He poked an invader with his toe in passing, as Rish knelt to go through their pockets, then stuck his head out the big rectangular hole in the window through which a faint draft now coursed. A float pallet of much the sort used by techs to effect repairs on tall building faces hovered just below the frame. It bore a large plastic bin, typical of receptacles used to haul away soiled linens in hotels or hospitals. Empty. You could just about fit two stunned women into it, Ivan judged, if you folded them up snugly. Ah, the classics. But a cheap, common object; no one would look at it twice, so long as it wasn’t trundled through some very inappropriate location.

He drew back inside and turned to the two women. “Yep, kidnapping. Not murder. Unless they meant to kill you and then cart away the bodies, tidily. Any guesses which?”

Nanja stood hugging herself, looking cold. “It could be either, I suppose. Depending.”

“Any idea who would be sending you budget ninjas in the dark before dawn? No, silly question, belay that. Would you care to share with me who would, and so on?”

She shook her head. The clouds of curls bounced in a forlorn fashion.

“No IDs, no money, no nothing,” reported Rish, rising. “Just stunners, gloves, and pocket lint.”

The invaders, Ivan noticed for the first time, did indeed wear thin transparent gloves. Cheap, commercial, millions used to protect hands from dirty jobs all over the planet. Nothing unique, nothing traceable, which pretty much went for all of their equipment. Low rent, or cleverer than they seemed?

“You know, those goons could well have some sort of backup waiting outside,” Ivan opined.

“We have an escape route. Over the roofs,” said Nanja.

“Have you ever practiced it?”

“Yes,” said Rish, scowling at him, which was no clue, as she pretty much scowled at him all the time. “Start packing, Tej.”

Tej ? Well, Ivan had known that Nanja was an alias. The blue woman hadn’t made that slip of the tongue in front of him before. Starting to trust him, or just rattled?

“Do you know where you’re going? That is, do you have a place to go?” Ivan asked.

To which Rish replied, “No business of yours,” and Nanja-Tej said, “Why do you ask?”

Ivan promptly addressed himself to the latter. “I was thinking you might like to hole up at my place for a few days. Take stock, make your plans when not in a panic. I can almost guarantee I have no prior connection with you for your enemies to trace. It’s likely as good a safe-house as you could get on short notice. And it’s free.”

Nanja hesitated. Nodded. Rish sighed.

“What do we do with these, then?” said Rish, nodding at the lumps. “Safest to kill them…”

Ivan was still having trouble figuring out which woman was in charge. But the lumps did indeed pose a puzzle. The most obvious thing was to call ImpSec Komarr and have them send a professional cleaning crew to take the whole mess in hand. Reminded, Ivan retrieved his wallet, stunner, and wristcom. No one objected. The thing was…

Very belatedly, it occurred to Ivan to wonder what kind of fix Byerly was in, to send an HQ desk pilot to cover these women instead of, say, a trained ImpSec bodyguard or even squad, with all the high-tech trimmings. By’s idea of a joke was not out of the running as a hypothesis, but…just how delicate was By’s investigation? Was he simply out of range of his usual handlers, contacts, and blind drops, or was there some more sinister reason in play? By’s hints had suggested that his current bag of creepy playmates had high connections in the Service—how high? And which branches? Could By be on the track of some corruption within ImpSec Komarr itself?