Greg Bear - Mariposa

Fouad lowered one eyebrow, truly uninformed.

"Well, you handled him better than my guards. A magnificent job of defusing. I'm grateful."

"Is the programmer well?" Fouad asked.

He wondered why programmers as a group would be waiting to explode.

Price lifted one shoulder and grimaced. "No longer your concern."

He pointed to the rightmost monitor. A fast patrol ship in purple and green-Talos colors-was standing off from the cargo vessel.

"Gulf of Aden. You'd think I wanted to be Pompey the Great, with all the pirates my boys discourage and all the ships I recover. Started that business five years ago. When foreign countries want military assistance, they don't go to the U.S. government anymore-they come to me. I sell protective systems to ship owners, but they're slow to spend what they cost-so I charge them for recovery, ten times more expensive. It's hard, dangerous work. Never underestimate what a little boredom and a lot of poverty can do to a bunch of fishermen.

"A few years ago, when our snipers started blowing their brains out, the Somalis acquired a taste for blood as well as treasure." He grinned with a touch of boyish wickedness. "It's an old story-but they're getting tougher and meaner and more desperate every year, poor bastards. So we conduct our raids the same way they do. Surprise, speed, and ass-kicking violence."

Fouad could see no guns on the patrol ship, but recognized a prickly array of LED blinders-bigger versions of the light used on Nick in Buckeye-as well as seizure-inducing strobes, acoustic blasters, and even conical microwave pain projectors, mounted on the bow.

"My team commander has just given the pirates five minutes to abandon the vessel and leave the crew unharmed," Price said. "If they aren't away by then, he'll go in with a pulsed sound and light show-sends anyone topside into fits, and they don't even have to face the strobes. Backscatter does the trick most of the time. Anybody inside is going to have their sphincters open right up-the crew will be inconvenienced, but Hershey shorts are better than dying. Hell of a sensation. All my guys go through it, though not the strobe fits-too many side effects.

"But we get the ships back, 100 percent, and if the pirates harm anyone-or if any of the crew is severely affected by our recovery operations-then we hunt the pirates down on the open water and blast them to fish food. They never get home to squeeze their kids and kiss the missus."

"And if they depart the vessel as ordered?" Fouad asked.

"We let ' em go. Catch and release. They're one of our biggest centers of profit-fees plus 30 percent of assessed ship and cargo. You trained a few of these Starfish boys in Arabic and Aramaic a few months back. They seem proficient.

"You're very good at what you do, Mr. Al-Husam. All that you do."

"Thank you," Fouad said. His neck hairs had not stopped prickling since he entered the office.

The starfish had come within a few hundred yards of the cargo ship, which now switched on its working lights, lighting up like it was in port and waiting to offload.

Men with assault rifles scampered along the gunwales, as seen through a telephoto camera on the lead starfish.

Muzzle flare sparked from several points on the facing port side.

Price humphed. He slid off the stool and approached the monitors. "Getting tired of me, are you, aren't you, you skinny sons of oola-oola-oola black bitches?" He glanced at Fouad again, eyes sharp. "Watch this."

The camera lens was blocked by men erecting black foam barriers like curtains around the inflatable.

Bullets splashed in the last visible stretch of water.

"Curtains protect our crew from the worst of it. But all my Starfish team members wear diapers, just in case."

The camera winked out and another view took its place on the central monitor-from the bridge of the patrol ship.

Starfish bobbed like lumps of coal in the water, hundreds of yards from the cargo ship.

"Love this, just love this," Price murmured, rapt.

Blinker strobes lit up the ocean. Even through the monitor, Fouad could imagine the dazzle of the rapid-fire flashes of white and blue light, the laser beams drawing red squiggles along the vessel's upper works.

"Here it comes," Price said, folding his arms.

The first big pulse of sound from the bow of the fast patrol ship feathered the ocean like an invisible broom. Fouad could see the hull plates on the cargo ship actually ripple with the impact.

Men flew back like matchsticks.

Their ears would bleed-perforated ear drums, great pain.

Not visible at all were the microwave pain projectors. On deck, the men would feel their skin burn as if bathed in hot oil. The effects were temporary but felt mortal.

Next, through the speakers came a greatly reduced and muffled thum-thum-thum, rapid as the flashes of light. Fouad knew the frequencies of both sound and strobes-had witnessed them in training at the Academy, and after, when studying crowd control. Less than lethal, usually, but painful and disturbing.

The deck was soon clear of standing figures.

"That's it," Price said. "They won't abandon ship. We've pushed them too far. Now we board and take them out one by one-lots of skinny black corpses."

Price snapped his fingers and the monitors shut off. "That concludes tonight's show. We'll do the accounting and send off the bills tomorrow."

He focused his attention on Fouad.

"John tells me you're the best we've got with dialects. He's already seeing results with his Haitian boys in the field in Algeria and Libya."

One of Price's three senior partners, a former South African army colonel named John Yardley, was in charge of Talos's Special Forces Training division. The mercenary troops Yardley trained-mostly Haitians-called him "Colonel Sir."

"Your students are highly motivated," Fouad said. "I take pleasure in working with them."

"Good pay, great benefits, terrific prospects," Price said, nodding approval. "Uncle Sam has a moth or two in his pockets and not much more. We're paying our overseas contractors about eight times the average government salary, twelve times the typical military starting pay grade. Causes a bit of a stir."

Price walked to the window. Outside, a very large insect buzzed past. It wasn't an insect, of course.

"I'd like to move you up a notch," he said. "As you know, we've got a big conference in a couple of weeks. I've asked the campus supervisors who's best at translating Arabic dialects-and they all tell me it's you, hands down. You're also well-versed in Texan, I hear." Price chuckled. "Not easy to get a handle on how we talk around here. The food alone… well, Muslims aren't big fans of some of our favorite dishes."

Fouad remained smiling.

"We'll be hiding billboards and such that might offend some of our Muslim guests as they limo in from the airport. I've asked restaurant owners to cover up the pink neon pigs, that sort of thing. They're happy to oblige-they know how important this is to Lion City. But once our guests are here, I'd like a fellow I can trust to provide a running commentary, delivered straight to me, on how they're thinking, what they're saying, and maybe pitch in and correct misunderstandings, as need be. I'd like you to be that fellow."

Price gestured to a well-upholstered blue leather chair on one side of the desk, near the window.

"Take a seat, Mr. Al-Husam."

Fouad sat. This was not at all what he had expected. Best to show surprise and quiet pride. "I am honored," he said.

Price beamed. "I pick my people well."

The man could be charming. Many here could be charming and yet hold the most untoward views.

"Tell me what you think that sort of work would require, Fouad… if we can go on a first-name basis. And please, call me Axel."