Timothy Zahn - Blackcollar - The Backlash Mission

"Not if I don't want him to," Bernhard ground out.

"Only if you're willing to leave Denver entirely." Lathe shook his head. "And I'm guessing you'd just as soon stay in your comfy little sinecure."

"All the more reason to take you out," Bernhard said, but Caine could see the confidence beginning to fade. "But all right, then; let's hear your solution to the mess."

For a long moment Lathe gazed at him. "You can do what I asked when we first met. Help us carry out our mission."

Bernhard snorted. "Oh, that would be a grand idea, wouldn't it? Exactly the thing to get Quinn off our backs."

"You give us the help we need," Lathe continued, as if the other hadn't spoken, "and we'll provide you with some bodies to show Quinn. Bodies that even the experts won't be able to prove aren't us."

"What?" Silcox whispered at Caine's side. "He didn't mention any of that part to me."

He hadn't mentioned it to Caine, either. "Just stay cool," he whispered back. "He knows what he's doing."

If Bernhard found the suggestion outrageous, it wasn't immediately evident. "That's a damned big risk for us to take," Bernhard said, shaking his head. "Safer to just take you on."

Lathe shrugged. "That's your choice. But I'll tell you straight out: if you don't help us, you'll soon wish you had. We can take this city apart—you know it and I know it. And every raid we pull will nudge Quinn a step closer to ordering your own destruction."

"Suppose I offer to help you?" Kanai spoke up suddenly. "There's no need to take all of us down just because Bernhard won't cooperate, is there?"

Bernhard threw his companion a glance, but even as he started to speak Lathe shook his head.

"Sorry, Kanai. We may be able to use your help later, but first of all we need something only Bernhard can provide. Well, Bernhard?"

The other glowered at him. "I don't take well to blackmail, Lathe. Or to threats."

"I don't like them much myself," Lathe came back. "But our options at this point are limited, and I haven't got time for anything with more finesse."

"Damn you—"

"I suggest you think it over—you'll probably have at least a couple of days before Quinn gets impatient and drops the sky on you. Discuss it with your team; certainly with your boss, Sartan. In fact, maybe I ought to talk to him myself."

Bernhard's eyes narrowed. "Leave Sartan out of this—it's none of his business."

"Why not? I'd think he'd have a vested interest in protecting his roughneck squad. Well, no matter. If you don't tell him, there are other ways to get a message there."

"Oh, really?" Bernhard's lip twitched in an almost-smile. "Well, you go right ahead, then, and give him a call."

Lathe cocked an eyebrow thoughtfully. "You really don't care if I feed him my version of all this, do you? Interesting." He shrugged. "Well, anyway, between Quinn and Sartan I think you'll eventually change your mind about helping us. I'll be in touch for when you do."

Bernhard pursed his lips. "Lathe—"

"No, don't try it," the comsquare said. "I have a man through the doorway over there with a sniper's slingshot trained on you, and I don't think you'd like fighting me on your back."

A disbelieving look flashed across Bernhard's face, followed by a rueful smile. "I begin to see why Quinn is always underestimating you. You're good, Lathe... but in the long run it won't be enough."

Turning on his heel, he strode out the door. Kanai sent a last, unreadable look at Caine and Silcox, then followed.

Lathe inhaled audibly, let the breath out in a whoosh as he turned to Caine. "And that is that," he said. "For now, anyway. Well, Anne?"

She nodded. "He's the one," she said with a sigh. "Strange; they always referred to blackcollars so positively. Maybe he's changed since they vanished."

" 'The one'?" Caine asked, frowning. "The one what?"

"The blackcollar she occasionally saw with her Torch friends," Lathe told him. "More to the immediate point, the one who was there the day before they set her up in the Shandygaff and all disappeared."

Caine focused on Silcox. "Why didn't you say anything about that earlier?"

"Because it wasn't any of your business," she retorted. "And because if Torch is doing something special, I didn't want a group of self-appointed heroes charging in and shaking up the cart."

Caine snorted. "Nice of you to come around a little, anyway."

"I don't have a lot of choice," she shot back, throwing a glare at Lathe. "I don't like the way you're bulling around Denver any more than Bernhard does. The sooner you get out of here, the better it'll be for all of us."

Caine looked at Lathe. "We just make friends everywhere we go, don't we?"

The comsquare shrugged. "Get used to it. There aren't a lot of people like Torch around who are willing to risk their comfortable existence for the chance to be free someday."

Silcox bristled. "If that's a slap at me—"

She broke off as Skyler slipped in through the door. "Well?" Lathe asked.

The big blackcollar nodded. "No problems. They're both on track."

"Who are on what?" Caine frowned, a familiar suspicion tightening his stomach. "Lathe, what're you up to this time?"

Lathe's lips compressed momentarily. "I promised our... local benefactor that in return for sending a laser message to a scout ship Lepkowski left us we'd find out who the mysterious Sartan is that Bernhard's blackcollars are working so closely with."

"So you've got two of your men tailing Bernhard?" Silcox asked. "That's crazy—he'll spot them within five minutes."

"Of course he would," Lathe said. "That's why they're tracking Bernhard from inside his trunk."

Caine felt his mouth drop open. "You are kidding. Aren't you?"

"It's the only way, Caine," Skyler said with a shrug. But he, too, looked uncomfortable. "The state Bernhard's in, it'll probably never even occur to him to check a trunk that obviously hasn't been touched."

"Unless there are alarms or warners on it—"

"There were. Hawking took care of them."

"Great," Caine muttered. "Just great. That laser message better have been damn important, Lathe."

"It was part of my promise to Pittman," the comsquare said quietly. "Come on—we'd better call the guard ring in and get out of here. Anne...?"

She hesitated, then shrugged. "Sure, why not? I haven't got anywhere else to go... and I guess I'm pretty well committed now, anyway."

Lathe smiled faintly at her. "Welcome back to the war," he said.

Mordecai hadn't really liked the idea from the start, and his opinion of it had been going steadily downhill ever since then. There were a limited number of ways in which two men in full kit could wedge themselves into a car trunk, none of them comfortable for both straight-line travel and sharp turns. Gritting his teeth, he did the best he could, hoping like hell Bernhard wasn't headed somewhere on the far side of town.

In that, at least, they were lucky. They'd been riding for no more than Fifteen minutes when the car glided to a halt and both doors opened. Two sets of footsteps, on concrete or something equally hard... a door opening and closing... the whine of a sliding door's motor... and then nothing.

Mordecai gave the silence three minutes, then carefully popped the trunk.

They were, as expected, in a garage, though its generous dimensions were something of a surprise. A

sliding door exited—presumably—to the street; more ordinary doors led out one side and to the rear, probably to an attached building and outside, respectively. There were no windows, and a quick flashlight scan of the walls and ceiling turned up no likely cameras or other monitors.

"A good low-tech blackcollar hideout," Jensen murmured as they eased out of the trunk and worked the kinks out of their muscles. "Nothing to attract Security's notice."