Larry Niven - Achilles choice

— Murder Mary Ling. That’d get media attention!

Beginning to puff now, she passed a lean runner and grinned back at him. He took it as an invitation and chased her. He was good, she was beginning to tire, and she faced forward and put some effort into it. She led him into a subway entrance, where he gave up.

She took the subway back to her hotel.

She stretched out on the bed and wondered if she would sleep. Or wake up.

— The vicious little rock-throwing bitch hadn’t trained as a fighter. Strangle her in public! Surrender immediately, then talk to anyone and everyone, tell every secret, announce always that the Council is bound to have Jillian Shomer murdered. When it finally happens, it’ll confirm everything.

Actually, it might work.

That was disturbing.

Jillian had been raised Episcopal; her faith had never flagged. She had considered tracking and killing her mother’s murderer… but her mother had been killed by a social pattern. Vengeance required breaking the pattern. But not murder! Surely her conscience would never tempt her to so great a sin.

Or to suicide; but last night she’d been close.

So look again. The Council’s dominance games have brought death and misery to hundreds of thousands of people. Killing one innocent to break that pattern still cannot be justified; but Mary Ling is no innocent. Her public strangling would buy the attention Jillian needed. The media would be hot to watch a hair-pulling match between two Olympic contenders. Especially if they were supposed to be fighting over a man, over Donny Crawford.

— Tell every secret: that was the flaw. They had cut her off from her data. Without Holly Lakein’s help she would have nothing. If she exposed Holly, Holly would die, too.

Jillian was almost relieved.

— Hold it. Let the media believe that she’d used her own data sources! Granted that the Council had silenced Beverly; but who would ever tell?

The wall pulsed, and buzzed gently.

This was actually getting to be fun; she didn’t appreciate the interruption. “Yes?” -

A man’s face appeared on the wall. She had never seen it before, but he was young, and pleasant, and officious. “Good morning. I’m Stewart Kaporov at Olympiad Central. Would you please report to our offices? There has been a slight irregularity.”

Too late. She’d never had a plan anyway.

For an instant she considered fleeing; but her face was known everywhere on Earth. She considered going as she was. Instead she took a quick shower, rinsed a mealy taste out of her mouth, and tried to do something nice with her hair.

Her whole body was beginning to cramp. She set out for the nearest subway entrance.

The streets were curiously deserted now, wistfully so. A few young men and women in silver blazers hustled here and there, and workmen were disassembling platforms and collapsing temporary scaffolding.

There was a nice, busy, alive sound in the air.

The subway was crowded. It must have been unbelievable during the games; it was the reason none of the contenders had tried it. An elderly gentleman offered her his seat; she refused with a smile.

The offices of Olympiad Central were in the Arts and Entertainments pavilion, and the guard at the front entrance recognized her and opened it at once, saying “Third floor, Miss Shomer.”

She nodded without speaking, walking straight to the elevators, giving him a clean shot at her back.

Nothing. She reached the elevator, and it bing’d and opened at once.

Where is Mary Ling, she wondered, right now?

The ride to the third floor was surprisingly uneventful. No cyanide, no sudden stall. No Ninjas dropping from the roof. A genuine smile curled her mouth at that image. She chuckled, a good sound.

Kaparov’s secretary ushered Jillian into a spacious office. A wall-wide vidscreen showed waves rolling peacefully in from the Aegean.

Kaporov entered, and stopped, and seemed to brace himself. He looked threatened, here in his own office. “Miss Shomer?”

“So far.”

“Ah — … yes. Well. We have a… difficult situation here.”

“Yes.”

“I believe you know Miss Osa Grevstad.”

“Of course.”

“There was a… diplomatic problem. The papers which allowed her to compete on North American Agricorp were never completely validated. She has lost her position. Considering the fact that your loss to her in judo cost you five points, you are now in position for the gold as opposed to the silver.”

Jillian was frozen, couldn’t even react when he extended his hand. Just like that. Could it really be that simple? Could they…

Oh God. Osa? The ultraconfident, brutally skilled strangler had just been given the death sentence. Because of Jillian.

She couldn’t take the gold. And yet…

If she didn’t, and the judgment on Osa’s status had already been announced, what good would she have done?

Jillian extended a trembling hand.

“Congratulations,” he said.

It took nearly forty-five minutes to push through the reporters and the crowds at Kennedy Airport. It was all a smiling, churning mob.

In twos and threes, the Olympians were hustled into cars. She caught sight of Donny talking to a phalanx of reporters. His smile seemed just as warm and sincere as ever. His gaze slid across her without stopping to focus.

She was ushered into a car with the Bulgarian Gilbert and Sullivan devotee. They waved at the crowd like newlyweds.

Once the car started moving, she closed her eyes and leaned back into her seat. The long-postponed fatigue came crashing down on her. Or else it was emotional whiplash from the changes in her life… or jet lag… or the beginning of the death that comes with Boost.

In a few days there would be another operation. She would be one of the Linked then, part machine, and death would no longer be inevitable. Death would come when she lost a dominance game… whose rules she had better learn quickly.

The Bulgarian put his hand on Jillian’s arm. “Your name is Jillian?”

She turned.

“I am Jorge.”

His square face was too close; his elbows and knees occupied too much of the space. He was one of the runners, tall and attenuated. Folding him into the car had been awkward. Any second now he’d go Sproing! and pop through both doors.

He grew tired of waiting for a response. “We don’t know each other, but we will both be Linked now. Special people we are.” He grinned infectiously, and she thought of Sean, lost love, left a world away. “Perhaps we could spend some time…”

Her smile was broken from overuse. She said, “I think we both need rest.”

It sounded stupid; small wonder if he didn’t take the hint. “Soon. We are both staying at the MGM Grand Hotel?”

The car had stopped for a traffic light. Jillian opened the car door and stepped out. To the astonished Bulgarian she said, “Later. Sorry.”

She just couldn’t face any more faces.

The traffic was moving again. She wove her way to the curb in a blare of horns, stepping on bumpers, vaulting over hoods, swinging across an overhead rail. She was too tired to word-dance with a man on the make; but not too tired for fellrunning in traffic.

Did she have to go to the MGM Grand? Her luggage would be going there, and she’d need a phone to get a reservation elsewhere. She would regret her rudeness later. Send him flowers? Ask him to dinner and apologize? She might need Jorge as an ally. She looked about her for a subway entrance.

The old concrete had taken on a thousand different shades. Time and travelers had worn ruts in the floor. The shops, gates, ticket dispensers, and barber booths varied from sparkling new through venerable to decrepit. The lighting was uneven; one could imagine muggers in the shadows.