'I thought you said you hadn't had much practice on a gravity sled before?'
'I haven't. Half the time I feel like I'm riding a crashing elevator. But I can follow anywhere you lead, Deathstalker.'
'Wouldn't doubt it for a minute, Hazel. We're almost there, so stand ready to guard my back. Remember, they stripped these sleds down to basics for extra speed, which means we have only minimum shields. One good hit from a disrupter, and they'll go down faster than a backstreet whore. So I'm counting on you not to let anyone hit us. On the other hand, please also remember we're supposed to be the good guys here, so try not to kill anyone except the Imperial Guards. It's important we make the right impression here.'
'Details, details,' Hazel said airily. 'You concentrate on your map and leave the fighting to me. That's how we work best.'
Owen felt a strong answer to that rising up in him, but he forced it down. He was going to learn to be polite and charming to Hazel if it killed him. He pressed on through the city, whipping back and forth between the towers and fighting the sudden updrafts. The city was only just waking up, still wrapped in early-morning light. The sky was a bloody red, painting the pastel towers with crimsoned shadows. There was hardly any air traffic yet, but that would change in a hurry once the sun was up and the business day began. The plan called for Owen and Hazel to get into the Tax and Tithe HQ, do the dirty, and get the hell out while the skies were still comparatively uncrowded. Owen piled on the speed, and the force shield snapped on again, giving his tearing eyes and numbed face a break. He and Hazel were on their own till they could land and make contact with the underground, and right now he felt very alone and extremely vulnerable.
He could feel Hazel crowding close behind him. He didn't look back to make sure. He didn't need to. All of those who'd passed through the Madness Maze were linked to each other now, in some deep fundamental way that none of them understood yet, but none of them doubted. It was a kind of low-level esp, an unquestioning certainty as to where the others were at any given moment. They couldn't read each other's thoughts, for which Owen for one was very grateful, but as Hazel had already proved, whatever gifts or talents one possessed, the others now had, too, as though they'd always had them. Owen could feel Hazel's presence at his back. It felt reassuring. He whipped around a tower, so close he could have reached out and trailed his fingertips across the windows flashing past, and then, right before him, dead bang where it was supposed to be, was the Tax and Tithe Headquarters, in Tower Chojiro. Owen grinned fiercely and opened his secure comm channel again.
'Almost there, so brace yourself. And, Hazel, don't use the boost unless you have to. There are things about it you don't know. It's… unwise to use it too often.'
'Nag, nag. You always were a bit of an old woman, Deathstalker.'
Owen decided he wasn't going to answer that one, either, and made himself concentrate on Tower Chojiro as it loomed up before him. He cut his power and slowed steadily, but kept the force shield up. The sled's built-in cloaking device was supposed to be keeping him invisible, as far as the tower's sensors were concerned, but he didn't feel like taking chances now he'd got this close to the objective. Tower Chojiro was the tallest and ugliest of the immediate towers, a gleaming monument of glass and steel, the Clan colors and signals clearly marked. It was also undoubtably bristling with hidden weapons and other nasty surprises. The Hadenmen had assured Owen on more than one occasion that his and Hazel's sleds had been carefully adjusted so that they would slip past the tower's defenses unmolested. But of necessity, there had been no way to test this in advance.
Owen shrugged mentally. It was a bit late to be worried now. Either it would work, or he and Hazel would end up spread across the tower's energy fields like flies on a windscreen, and the rebellion would have to start somewhere else. Oddly, Owen discovered that he didn't feel particularly nervous. The Hadenmen had assured him their devices would work, and he had no reason to distrust them. Not over that, anyway. Everything else, maybe. He took a firm hold on the controls, braced himself, and headed the sled straight for the top floor of the tower. The windows came flying toward him at incredible speed. Owen just had time to realize he must have passed safely through the tower's force shields before the sled slammed through the toughened steelglass window, as though it wasn't there.
The gravity sled screeched to a halt some twenty feet past the shattered window, and its force shield snapped off. Owen released his death grip from the controls and stepped down, just a little shakily. He looked quickly about him but the top floor of Tower Chojiro was deserted, just as it was supposed to be. There was a little furniture scattered here and there on the thick carpeting, all of it designed within an inch of its life, and just the occasional small painting on the walls. Originals, of course. Clan Chojiro were famed for their minimalist approach. Owen hoped it applied to their interior security systems as well, but he rather doubted it. His and Hazel's entrance had to have set off all kinds of alarms, and since the interior weaponry hadn't finished them off any more than the exterior force shields, the odds were that a large number of heavily armed men were currently on their way up to find out why. Of course, they'd have to start at the bottom and work their way up floor by floor, to make sure everything was secure. Which should take them some time. More than enough for him to deal with the computers and leave. Theoretically. He drew his disrupter and activated the force shield on his wrist. The oblong of glowing force formed instantly on his arm, its familiar low hum distinctly comforting. Hazel moved in beside him, a gun in each hand.
'Tax and Tithe is four floors down, right? Elevator or stairs?'
'Stairs, of course. The elevators can be overridden by the tower's central computers. Didn't you attend any of the briefings?'
'I leave all the heavy thinking to you, stud. Just find me something I can shoot at, and I'll be happy.'
Owen decided there was nothing to be gained in answering that, and led the way out of the empty room and on to the stairwell. It was well posted and exactly where it was supposed to be, which cheered Owen up a bit. At least the intelligence reports seemed to be accurate. The stairwell was narrow, brightly lit, and looked as though it had last been whitewashed sometime in the previous century. After all, who used stairs anymore, except in emergencies? It was all deathly quiet, apart from the racket Owen and Hazel made clattering down the bare steel steps. No doubt the tower defenses were sounding all kinds of alarms, but that would be on the tower's private security channel, and Owen didn't have the time to search out which particular channel they were using that day. No doubt security changed it regularly. He would have. Hazel checked the lock at the bottom of the stairs, a simple combination mechanism, and sniffed disparagingly.
'This wouldn't stop a ten-year-old on Mistworld. I'll have it open in a few minutes.'
'No,' said Owen. 'Let me try.' He bent over the lock, studied it carefully, and then entered a short series of numbers. The lock clicked open. Owen straightened up and smiled at Hazel. 'You got the boost from me; I got breaking and entering from you. Somewhat improved by the Maze's changes. Wonder what else we've got that we don't know about?'
'This is getting spooky,' said Hazel. 'At this rate, we'll end up with more augmentations than a Hadenman.'
'Now, that is a disturbing thought. But it'll have to wait. When I open this door, everyone in the room beyond is a target. We don't have the time to deal with prisoners.'
'Suits me,' said Hazel. 'Never did like tax collectors.'
Owen put his shoulder to the heavy steel door, and it swung open inward with surprising speed. Five technicians looked up, startled, and barely had the time to draw breath to cry out before Hazel picked them all off with separate shots from her projectile weapon. Owen quickly swung the door shut behind them, and everything was quiet in the computer room. He was glad he hadn't had to use his disrupter to back Hazel up. Using an energy weapon in a confined space full of delicate equipment was rarely a good idea. He holstered his gun and leaned over the nearest body to make sure it was dead. He grimaced in spite of himself. Projectile weapons got the job done, but they were extremely messy. There was blood all over the floor and holes in the bodies big enough to stick his fist into. Disrupters tended to be much neater and cauterized their own wounds.
'Marvelous weapons,' Hazel said happily, studying the wounds she'd made. 'Don't you just love them?'
'Check they're all dead,' said Owen flatly. 'I don't want any surprises while we're working.'
'Oh, sure,' said Hazel. 'You have a bash at the machines, and I'll guard your back. What I know about reprogramming computers could be engraved on my left thumbnail.'
'It shouldn't be that complicated,' Owen said hopefully, studying the terminals before him. 'Jack Random and the Hadenmen worked out the programming between them. All I have to do is load the discs and let them run. If you'd like to cross your fingers at this point, feel free to do so.'
He pulled up a chair and sat down before the massive bank of computers that covered the whole wall before
