Ben Bova - The Silent War

She went to the lavatory and closed its door firmly. Pecking at her wristwatch, she saw that its link with the satellites that were supposed to be tracking her was dead. She tried the phone function. That was down, too.

Pancho leaned against the sink, thinking furiously. I’m cut off from the outside. He wants me to stay here overnight. Fun and games? Maybe, but there’s more to it than just a romp in the sheets. This place is huge. They’re spending more money on construction than Nairobi’s got on its books. A lot more. Somebody big is bankrolling them.

And then it hit her. Tsavo said to me, “Welcome to Shining Mountain Base.” That’s what the Japanese call this mountain range: the Shining Mountains. And that transfer ship outside is painted in Yamagata Corporation’s blue.

Yamagata’s behind all this, Pancho finally realized. They’re bankrolling Nairobi. And now they’ve got me here; I waltzed right in and they’re not going to let go of me that easy.

She heard the pop of a champagne cork through the flimsy lavatory door. Ol’ Danny boy’s working for Yamagata, Pancho said to herself. And I’ll bet there’s enough happy juice in that wine to get me to babble my brains out to him.

I’ve got to get out of here, she told herself. And quick.

Nobuhiko Yamagata paid scant attention to the bows and self-effacing hisses of his underlings. He went straight from the transfer rocket that had landed him at Shining Mountain Base to the room where Pancho Lane would be interrogated. It was in the base’s infirmary, a small room where his interrogation team surrounded an empty gurney. Father is right, Nobu said to himself. I can learn much more from Pancho than these hirelings could.

The team was gowned and masked, like medics. Two young women were helping Nobu into a pale green surgical gown. Within minutes he was masked, gloved, and capped with one of the ridiculous-looking shapeless hats that came down over his ears.

Then he stood by the gurney, waiting. The members of the interrogation team flanked him in silence.

Well, Nobuhiko thought, everything is prepared. Everyone is here except Pancho.

“Won’t you have some champagne?” Tsavo asked smoothly, offering Pancho one of the crystal flutes that he had filled with the bubbly wine.

“Love to,” said Pancho, smiling her best smile for him.

As he handed her the glass Pancho let it slip from her fingers. She watched with inner amusement as the glass tumbled slowly in the gentle lunar gravity, wine spilling from its lip in languid slow motion. Pancho could have grabbed the glass before it started spilling, but she watched it splash champagne over her coveralls while Tsavo stood there looking shocked.

“Aw gosh,” she said as the glass bounced on the thick carpeting. “Sorry to be so clumsy.”

Tsavo recovered enough to say, “My fault.”

Looking down at the wine-spattered front of her coveralls, Pancho said, “I better dry this off.” She headed for the lavatory, stopping momentarily to unclip one of her earrings and place it on the night table beside the bed.

There are many ways to incapacitate an opponent who’s bigger and stronger than you are, Pancho reminded herself as she firmly closed the lavatory door. One of them is to blind the sumbitch.

She leaned her back against the door and squeezed her eyes shut, but still she saw the flash behind her closed eyelids. Tsavo screamed. By the time Pancho had the lav door open again he was staggering across the bedroom.

“I can’t see!” he shrieked. “I’m blind!”

He crashed into the coffee table, knocking the bottle and chiller bucket to the floor and tumbled into the sofa with a painful thump, groaning, pawing at his eyes.

“I’m blind! I’m blind!”

“Sorry, Danny boy,” Pancho said as she scooped her travel bag off the bed. “You’ll get your sight back in a few hours, more’n likely.”

She left him moaning in a tumbled sobbing heap on the floor by the sofa and dashed out into the corridor.

Now we find out how much security they got here, Pancho said to herself, actually grinning as she raced on her long legs up the carpeted corridor.

Fuchs had thought about calling Astro Corporate headquarters to try to speak with one of Pancho’s aides, but decided against it. None of them would have the authority to give him the help he needed, nor the wit to see the necessity of it. With Pancho out of the picture, Fuchs realized he was on his own.

Just as well, he told himself as he rode the powered stairs down to Selene’s bottommost level. It’s better not to involve Pancho or anyone else. What I have to do I’ll do for myself.

Nodon, Sanja and Amarjagal were waiting for him at the bottom of the last flight of stairs. The corridor down at this level was empty, as Fuchs had expected it to be. Only the very wealthiest lived down here, in the converse of penthouses on Earth. No crowds here, he said to himself as the four of them strode down the broad, empty, quiet corridor. Fuchs saw that the walls here were decorated with bas reliefs, the floor softly carpeted. Security cameras watched them, he knew, but they looked like a quartet of maintenance workers, nothing to set off an alarm.

So far.

“Have you set the maintenance computer?” Fuchs asked Nodon.

The younger man nodded, his big liquid eyes looking slightly frightened. “Yes, sir. The water will be shut off to this level in…” he glanced at his wristwatch, “… three minutes.”

“Good,” said Fuchs. He had no idea how long it would take the maintenance people to discover that the water to level seven had been shut off. Long enough to get the four of us inside Humphries’s grotto, he hoped.

The corridor ended in a blank stone wall with a heavy metal hatch set in it. Beside the hatch was a keypad.

“Do you have the access number?” Fuchs asked Nodon.

“I haven’t had enough time on my job with the maintenance department to be assigned down here,” Nodon said, his voice little more than an apologetic whisper. “But I know the emergency numbers that work on the upper levels.”

“Try them.”

Nodon hunched slightly before the keypad and began tapping numbers. Fuchs watched with gathering impatience. One of those numbers should override the security code, he told himself. Humphries has to allow Selene emergency crews inside his private preserve, he’s got to. Not even he can refuse to allow emergency workers to enter his area. That’s written into Selene’s basic safety regulations.

The hatch suddenly gave off a metallic click. In the stillness of the empty corridor it sounded like a gunshot.

“That’s it!” Fuchs hissed. He set a meaty hand against the cold steel of the hatch and pushed. It opened slowly, silently. A gust of soft, warm air brushed past him as the hatch swung all the way open.

Fuchs gaped at what he saw. A huge expanse filled with brilliant flowers, warm artificial sunlight glowing from the lamps high overhead, the very air heavy with scents he hadn’t smelled since he’d left Earth. And trees! Tall, stately, spreading their leafy branches like arms open to embrace him.

“It’s a paradise,” Amarjagal whispered, her eyes wide with awe. Nodon and Sanja stood beside her, mouths agape. Fuchs felt tears welling up.

With an angry shake of his head he growled, “Come on. Their security alarms must be going off. Their cameras are watching us.”

He started up the brick path that wound through beds of bright colorful flowers, heading for the mansion they could see through the trees.

Paradise, Fuchs thought. But this paradise has armed men guarding it, and they’ll be coming out to stop us in a few minutes.

Nobuhiko pushed up the sleeve of his green surgical gown and looked at his watch. Turning to the chief of the interrogation team, he demanded, “Well, where is she? I’ve been waiting for more than half an hour.”