A Murder of Clones: A Retrieval Artist Universe Novel (44 page)

She stood. Maybe it was her system. Maybe she had done something wrong.

She sent a message to Apaza.
Do me a favor. See if you can set up a new appointment with TwoZero for two days from now.

His response seemed a bit puzzled in tone.
Oooo-kay.

She knew it was an invitation to explain, but she didn’t take the bait. She checked her network, but found nothing wrong.

She was about to send a message to the warden of Clone Hell when Apaza got back to her.

He used a holographic image rather than an audio message. His image was just a floating head, which looked odd in her small office.

I just got the weirdest message
, he sent.
I was told that TwoZero is dead.

Gomez nodded.
I got that message too. That’s why I wanted you to try it. Can you see if it’s legit?

I already did,
Apaza said.
And I compared against other clones of PierLuigi Frémont. They’re all dead.

Even Thirds?
She sent.

Apaza shook his head.
They say he doesn’t exist.

She sighed. Then she thanked Apaza, and signed off.

She didn’t want to talk about this with him. She didn’t want to talk to Simiaar either.

Sometimes it was hard to ignore evidence, even when it was faint. The clones were dead. The maps lied. The ship had come from the Alliance.

Maybe she was paranoid.

But what if she wasn’t? What if there was a conspiracy?

What if a group was trying to dismantle the Alliance from within?

What could she do?

She had no idea. But she knew she had to do something.

FORTY-NINE

RAFAEL SALEHI PUT his hands over his face and closed his eyes for just a moment. His stomach twisted.

He had broken the link with Rafik Fujita, then checked the case log from Torkild Zhu. The bastard had defended a clone—of PierLuigi Frémont. But a clone that had been incarcerated during the Anniversary Day attacks.

Zhu had asked for the best transport captain, and Salehi had given him Fujita. Salehi and Fujita went back decades. Salehi had had an idea that this trip would be difficult, but not this difficult.

Had he known that, he would have—what? Sent an army? He had no idea.

He sent a message through his links to Torkild Zhu.
Get your ass to my office. Now
.

Then Salehi mentally sorted through his contacts at the Alliance. He knew council presidents and heads of departments. But he didn’t know anyone who could call off battle cruisers.

He sent another message, this one to one of the named partners in S
3
, Debra Shishani.

We have an emergency situation. You in the building? If so, my office, please.

He only added “please” because if he didn’t, Shishani wouldn’t show up.

My office
, Shishani sent back.

No
, Salehi sent.
I have others already here.

Or other, anyway. If Zhu arrived before Shishani, which Salehi hoped he would. Because right now, Salehi didn’t need a pissing contest. He needed to do something fast.

Salehi reset his entire office, getting rid of the desert sequence. He set up panels everywhere, mostly showing space, but also with one star map of Fujita’s proposed trip, the trip that S
3
had hired him for. Obviously, that trip wasn’t happening, but Salehi found illustrations so much better than any attempted explanation.

He also cooled the room down, so that it didn’t feel like a desert any longer. He wasn’t dressed for standard temperatures, but at the moment, he didn’t care if he got a chill. Shishani would complain about how hot it was, and that was the last thing he wanted.

He needed her to focus.

Then he opened the door to his office and made his desk disappear into the floor. He also had the chairs slide under the floor as well, so that no one could be comfortable.

“Hey.” Zhu leaned in, as if he were afraid to enter. He looked thinner than Salehi remembered, or maybe he was just noticing for the first time. “What’s going on?”

“That’s what I want to know,” Salehi snapped. “Who did you tell about your Anniversary Day clone?’

“He’s not an Anniversary Day clone,” Zhu said. “He was in prison—”

“Who did you tell?” Salehi asked again.

“Why?”

Salehi wasn’t in the mood for legal games. “You told me and who else?”

Zhu blinked, clearly beginning to understand that he wasn’t going to hold the upper hand in this conversation. “Um, I told you and my clerk, and I’m sure the warden knew, and so did the judge….”

His voice trailed off, as his face flushed. He knew something.

“What about the judge?” Salehi asked.

“It’s not important right now,” Zhu said. “I’ll tell you—”

“Now,” Salehi said. “You’ll tell me now.”

Zhu looked down. “She would only free Trey if I promised to recommend her for a position in this law firm.”

Salehi stomped to one side as anger filled him. He’d championed this idiot. “And you’re only telling me now?”

“I—figured—you know, it wasn’t important. We—”

“You think she knew when this clone was being released?”

Zhu shrugged. “What’s going on?”

“Did you tell the people who were going to rehabilitate this clone who they were about to take in?”

“No,” Zhu said. “I told them exactly what you told me. That they’d be getting a former prisoner, and that his room and board would be paid for six months, nonrefundable, and—”

“Nonrefundable,’ Salehi muttered. “Marvelous.”

Someone knocked on the door. Salehi looked up. Debra Shishani walked inside, looking at the screens. She was taller than both men, angular and busty at the same time, her brown hair piled on top of her head.

“I love what you’ve done with the place,” she said with that sarcasm that had once attracted Salehi, when he’d been a lot younger and a lot stupider.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” he said to her. “I just heard from Rafik Fujita. He’s under attack from, of all things, Alliance battle cruisers. He—”

“Battle cruisers?” she asked. “You’re kidding.”

“I am not kidding,” Salehi said. “He’s transporting a clone that Torkild here managed to get released. This clone’s been illegally held for fifteen years. But—and here’s the kicker—he’s a clone of PierLuigi Frémont.”

“Like the Anniversary Day killers?” Shishani asked, sarcasm gone.

“Yeah,” Salehi said.

“And he had nothing to do with the killings,” Zhu said. “He’s had no visitors, no nothing the entire time he’s been in prison. He wasn’t even made in the Alliance—”

Shishani turned away from Zhu as if he didn’t matter at all. Maybe he didn’t. “So the clone’s been released, he’s heading—?”

“To the Irr Sector, that halfway house we use.”

“And now there’s an attack?” Shishani glanced at the screens as if they had an answer. “From the Alliance? Why didn’t they just kill this guy in prison?”

“I’m not sure they knew what they had,” Zhu said.

Despite himself Salehi felt a bit of admiration for Zhu, standing up for himself however he could.

“And then you pointed right to him.” Shishani shook her head. “Did anyone stop to consider this was a stupid idea?”

“Initially Torkild went to find out what the clone knew about other Frémont clones,” Salehi said. “I have no idea how it evolved into a release.”

Zhu started to say something, but Salehi wouldn’t let him.

“The problem is that we’re about to lose one of our best transport operatives. He can’t leave the Alliance, but he can’t stay, not with this clone on his ship. I don’t know anyone who can stop this attack. Do you? And if you don’t, do you think Schnable does?”

“Yeah, I got someone,” Shishani said. “Let me handle this. Where are they?”

“I don’t know exactly. I think that’s by design. They started here.” Salehi went to the screen with Fujita’s route on it. “He sent me the registration of the initial attacking ships. I’ll send that on your links.”

“Thanks.” Shishani waggled her fingers at him, and left the room.

Zhu watched her go. Then he turned to Salehi. “What went wrong?”

“You tell me,” Salehi said.

“I don’t know,” Zhu said. “It took weeks for this to go through. It would’ve been easier to kill Trey in prison.”

Salehi stared at the screens. They told him nothing. But he played Zhu’s words over and over in his head.

They could have killed the clone in prison.

But they hadn’t.

They were killing him in a visible and dramatic fashion.

As a lesson to S
3
?

To all lawyers who wanted to represent the Anniversary Day clones?

Or was something else going on here?

“Did you ever find out what this clone knew?” Salehi asked.

“I don’t think he knew anything,” Zhu said. “He was in prison long before the attacks. I checked all of his documentation. He went from wherever he was created to some enclave on Epriccom to prison after some other clones tried to kill him. He killed them in self-defense.”

“He committed murder.”

“No,” Zhu said. “It wasn’t murder. It was self-defense.”

Salehi cursed. “This is all tied together somehow.”

“They should have killed him in prison,” Zhu repeated.

“And we wouldn’t have noticed,” Salehi snapped. “But we’re paying attention now, aren’t we?”

Zhu looked terrified. “Are they going to come after us?”

Salehi rolled his eyes. He couldn’t help it.

“Don’t you get it, Torkild?” he said. “They already have.”

FIFTY

TWENTY MANEUVERS LATER, Fujita wondered if he could simply hide the
Alus 15
. Go behind a moon, mirror the ship against an asteroid. Something.

But he didn’t know how to do any of that.

He’d fought off pirate ships, criminal vessels, a few stolen law enforcement vehicles, but never in his entire career had he faced battle cruisers.

Certainly not Alliance battle cruisers.

“Maybe we should give him up,” Stone said.

It was too late for that. They’d been running. Besides, Fujita hadn’t given up any prisoner, ever. It wouldn’t help his reputation, although in this instance, he wasn’t sure what would help him.

Maddix looked at him over her console. She seemed to think that giving up Trey was a good idea as well.

Five ships suddenly appeared in the holoimage at the tip of the triangle.

Five ships, surrounding the dot that was
Alus 15
.

Fujita tapped the screen in front of him. It showed the same image. Somehow it seemed more alarming to him when he saw the ships displayed as numbers and dots.

He tapped his encoded secure link to S
3
on.
You got something for me, Rafael?

Shishani’s in touch with someone in the Alliance. She thinks they’ll stop this.

Thinks?
Fujita sent.
We don’t have time for thinks. We’re surrounded. They’re going to fire on us.

What have they said?

Nothing,
Fujita sent.
They don’t answer our hails
.

“They’re firing,” Maddix said.

The ship shuddered as the shots hit.

All five ships had fired at the same time.

We’re not going to survive this,
Fujita sent.
They hit us a few more times, and we’re done. Make them stop, Salehi
.

We’re doing what we can
, Salehi sent.

“Screw it,” Fujita said to Stone. “Tell them they can have Trey. Tell them that now.”

“I’m doing it,” Stone said. “I already had the message ready. I’m sending it to all of them on all channels. I hope—”

The ship shuddered again, then the power blinked down.

“Shields are gone,” Maddix said. Her gaze met Fujita’s. “Do you think they’ll listen? I mean, we’re willing to give him up.”

“I know,” Fujita said, because he couldn’t say anything else. He looked at Stone. “Keep sending the message.”

“Yeah,” Stone said, but he was staring at his screen.

Fujita was staring at his too. Five points of light. Shots, coming from all five battle cruisers. Not small weapons fire either. Big laser weapons. Weapons of war.

I don’t know what the hell you got us into,
Fujita sent to Salehi,
but it’s bad. We’re—