Jacks stood up too. 'You want them so badly you're willing to risk all our lives, and our cause, just for a chance at getting your hands on them?'
'Got it in one,' said Young Jack Random.
'No,' said Tallon. 'I can't accept this. My people are still exhausted from their last raid. You can't ask them to go out again.'
'I'm not asking,' said Young Jack Random, smiling. 'Anyone who doesn't march with us dies here.'
'You need us!' said Jacks.
'Now, where did you ever get that idea?' said the Fury. 'You are useful, nothing more. Pray you don't outlast that usefulness.'
'We can't fight Random and Journey!' said Tallon. 'Not them. They're monsters. They can do things no one should be able to do.'
'Not to worry,' said Young Jack Random, still smiling. 'We always thought some of the Maze survivors might turn up here. So we brought along a special little something just for them. Something that will make them merely human again. And then you'll have no trouble taking them, will you, gentlemen?'
'No,' said Tallon. 'We won't. They perverted and corrupted our cause. They made a deal with the Families instead of wiping them out. The same bastards are still running things, same as they always did. To hell with Jack Random and that psycho bitch Journey.'
'We were betrayed,' said Jacks. 'After everything we'd done for Loki, after all our blood and suffering, and the good men we lost—in the end it was all for nothing.'
The two humans looked at each other, seeing again old hurts from the past. Only by continually rehearsing their old wrongs and grievances could they keep their rage fresh, and excuse the terrible things they had seen and done in their alliance with Shub. They needed to believe they were still the heroes of their rebellion.
'When I took over as Planetary Controller, I thought the war was over,' said Tallon. 'I thought I could finally start making changes, real changes. But it was all a sham. My position meant nothing, my ideas were ignored. The people who actually ran things, who controlled the money and the bureaucracy, found more and more ways to obstruct and sideline me. I was helpless, little more than a figurehead, there to fool the people into thinking something had changed.'
'So all that was left to us was to rebel again,' said Jacks. 'And this time make sure we had enough power on our side that we couldn't be denied. And so we turned to Shub, and they sent you, Young Jack Random. You and all your killing machines.'
'And haven't we done an excellent job?' said the Fury. 'Our forces haven't lost a single campaign.'
'Campaign? You call slaughtering defenseless villagers a campaign?' Tallon glared at Young Jack Random. 'It has to stop! I won't stand for this anymore! Stop the massacres now, while we still have some popular support left!'
'We only do what is necessary,' Young Jack Random said calmly. 'We must destroy the morale of the enemy so that when we finally come to Vidar, they will surrender rather than face extermination. Thus, a lengthy siege and much loss of life on both sides is avoided. You did agree to these tactics before we began.'
'Yes,' said Jacks. 'We agreed. But we never thought it would go on this long. Never knew there'd be so much blood on our hands.'
'Better a few hundred die in a few villages than thousands in the city,' said Tallon. 'That's how you sold it to us. But Vidar still shows no sign of surrendering, and now they have the real Jack Random and Ruby Journey. They have monsters on their side.'
'Not to worry,' said Young Jack Random. 'You have me.' And he smiled on them both, and turned and left.
Tallon and Jacks sank back into their seats again, not looking at each other. Tallon's hands were clenched into fists on the tabletop. Jacks looked sick.
'Monsters,' said Tallon quietly. 'Wherever I look, I see monsters.'
'What have we done, Matt?' said Jacks. 'We've unleashed something we have no hope of controlling.'
'We have to go on,' said Tallon. 'We have to go to Vidar and win this, or all the blood and all the deaths will have been for nothing.'
'But… say we win. Say we take control of Vidar and then Loki? You think Shub is just going to pull its forces out and leave us to get on with running things? What's to stop them just slaughtering us all and making Loki into another Shub planet?'
'We're allies,' said Tallon.
'Are we? We're sure as hell not equal partners. Whatever Shub decides, we'll have no choice but to go along. We're damned, Matt, whatever happens.'
'Then we're damned!' said Tallon. 'And I don't care. Just as long as our enemies fall first. Just let me live long enough to see them all die, and I'll be happy.'
Jack Random and Ruby Journey strode through the crowded corridors of the city Council building, and people hurried to get out of their way. There was bad news in the air. Everyone could smell it, but no one knew what it was yet, or where it might fall. So they kept their heads down and hoped not to be noticed.
It was barely morning when Random and Ruby received a call from the city Council, demanding their attendance at once. Normally Random would have told them what they could do with their demand, but the barely restrained panic filling the comm clerk's voice convinced him this was something he and Ruby should see for themselves.
The chamber door was being guarded by four armed men, but they moved quickly aside as Random and Ruby approached. One even opened the door for them. Inside, de Lisle and his people were standing together, staring unhappily at two large wooden crates on the floor before them. The crates appeared perfectly ordinary, but the Councillors were looking at them as though they expected a Grendel to leap out at any moment. It was a measure of how upset they were that they looked at Random and Ruby with open relief. de Lisle patted his sweating forehead with a handkerchief, and gestured at the crates with a hand that wasn't as steady as it might have been.
'These were waiting for us here in the chamber when we arrived for work this morning, along with a polite little note, saying A Present From Shub. Nothing else. We have no idea how they got here. I can only assume there are traitors among my people, rebel sympathizers. We haven't dared open the crates. They make threatening noises if they're touched. They make equally threatening noises if we try to leave. We've been trapped in here with them for almost an hour.'
'Typical Shub terror tactics,' said Ruby, studying the crates interestedly. 'Have you tried scanning the contents?'
'Yes. The interiors appear to be lined with something our scanners can't penetrate.'
'Could be a bomb,' said Ruby, crouching down before the nearest crate and studying the lid with a professional eye. 'No lock, no clasps, no obvious electronic countermeasures. Maybe a warning of some kind. I say we open the crates and see what happens.'
'Sounds like a plan to me,' said Random. 'Ruby and I would probably survive a bomb anyway. But just in case, Councillors, I suggest you retire to the far end of this room.'
The Councillors did so hastily, not bothering to take their dignity with them. Random crouched down beside Ruby.
'I don't think we'll encounter any booby-traps,' he said thoughtfully. 'Otherwise, they wouldn't have bothered with two. One would have been enough for a bomb, or any other terror weapon.'
'Could contain some kind of Fury,' said Ruby, frowning. 'The crates are big enough for a smallish one. But why bother with a killing machine when a bomb would be just as effective?' She looked at Random and grinned. 'Want to toss over which one of us gets to open the first crate?'
'I'll open the first,' said Random. 'You always cheat.'
He took a firm hold of the lid on the nearest crate and yanked it open. A puff of refrigerated air rose, and Random and Ruby backed quickly away, but there was no other response from the crate. They moved cautiously forward and looked inside. A dead face with pure white skin flecked with frost looked up at them. The open eyes were frosted too. Random and Ruby looked at each other, and then looked back in the crate. A human body had been coiled inside the crate like a snake. He'd been cut open, from throat to groin, and his chest and abdomen were
