Priestess stood over him. 'Get up. You want to die like a dog?' She kicked him again with all her might, raising dust. His ribs snapped. I could only watch, astounded, as my lovely, sweet little Priestess slowly and deliberately kicked that man to death. A cold wave crept over my flesh. What in Deadman's holy name was happening to us on this world? I had slaughtered a defenseless man, tied to a chair. And now Priestess was deliberately kicking a man to death. Priestess, the ultimate idealist. Priestess, who had joined the Legion solely because she wanted to help.
'Does it hurt?' Priestess asked, kicking him again. He was a broken mound of flesh now, whimpering, twitching in the dirt.
I found the girl and unhooked my canteen. She was naked, on her back, her arms tied behind her. I cupped her head in one hand and touched the canteen to her lips. She sucked at it greedily. She had short blonde hair—it looked as if her head had been shaved not too long ago. Her face was swollen and covered with ugly bruises. They had certainly been beating up on her. She didn't look much like Tara's exec.
'Why…' It was the Original, twitching in the dirt, whimpering, desperate.
'We don't like you,' Priestess hissed, 'because you're different!' She kicked him again, hard. I turned my eyes away.
'How's the girl?' Dragon asked, approaching us.
'Looks in bad shape. This isn't her, is it?'
'Don't know.'
'Damn it!'
'Don't let it drink any more,' the Sandman cautioned. 'That's enough for now.'
'Who is this one?' I asked the Sandman. 'Can we ID it?'
The Sandman bent over her. 'They took the slave bracelet for the gold,' he said. 'We don't know who this is. Can it talk?'
Priestess kicked at the Original again, viciously. The Original was not moving any more. I got up and walked over there.
'Priestess…stop it, will you?' She breathed heavily, weaving, her eyes glazed over. I put an arm over her shoulder and led her gently away from the body. 'The girl needs its help, Lady.'
Priestess knelt by the girl, staring into space, still breathing hard. She was not going to be any help.
The girl's eyes flickered. She breathed shallowly. Dragon knelt by her side.
'It's all right now,' I said to the girl. 'It's over. Can it hear us?'
Her lips moved, but I heard nothing. 'Can we give it more water?' I asked.
'Just a sip,' the Sandman said. I touched the canteen to her parched, bleeding lips. She bit at it like a dog, frantic. I pulled it away.
'Please give us its name.'
'…wrists.' I reached behind her back and slit her bonds with a bootknife. She sighed and her arms twitched. When she brought them around to the front her wrists were bloody. I noticed the bottoms of her feet were shredded.
'Its name?' I asked again.
'Four Oh Four,' she replied slowly. 'Our name is Four Oh Four. They killed it—they killed Two Six Four. It was our friend—our good friend!'
'It's her, Lady!' I said excitedly. 'Lady Arbell—it's her! Ranwan Lima! We've found her!'
Priestess was breathing a little easier now. 'Good,' she said quietly. She sounded completely exhausted.
'You're bleeding, Nine—you're wounded!' Dragon stared at his hand—it was covered in blood. He had just touched Priestess. Blood ran down the left sleeve of Priestess's field coat. We got her jacket off and examined the wound. A deep slash down her upper arm. I ripped open the civilian medkit we had purchased in Ostra Bal. My hands were shaking. If the Sandman noted Dragon calling Lady Arbell 'Nine,' he didn't say anything.
'It's nothing,' Priestess said wearily. 'Don't worry.'
'Your employer,' the Sandman observed quietly, 'is one tough cookie.'
'We know,' I replied.
Chapter 18:
Satan's Spawn
'It should not be much longer, Lady.' Our minder from the Ministry of Reform was the same slick young man we had first run into at the site of the aircar ambush. He was not letting us out of his sight. Priestess, Dragon, and I were being held with Maralee Whitney in a VIP lounge in Katag Starport. A young Ministry of Space officer was manning the information desk. He was certainly a security official, and there was no doubt the VIP lounge was a high-class detention facility.
'Our thanks, Cit.' Priestess was as cool as ice, but I was nervous and hyper. Whit, previously Ranwan Lima, now Ala-Ka-Sakara, was cruising on mags. She had sultry olive skin and wore dark glasses and a wig of curly black hair. Priestess had repaired most of the bruises on her face. Dragon was silent and moody, pacing like a caged beast. They had taken our bogus ID's and Systie travel permits. They had also confiscated our vac guns, politely but firmly. The Director of Reform, Japrad Marsh, was evidently making a major effort to get us off-world. He had provided Whit with the disguise, an excellent matching ID package and a fully-approved travel permit. However, it now appeared that a struggle was underway for our bodies.
'What do you think, Thinker?' Priestess kept her voice down.
'I think there's nothing further we can do to influence events, Priestess. We've done all we can. Now it's in the hands of the Gods.'
'I think Tara's plan is working,' Priestess said. 'Marsh wants all that money. If we don't leave, he doesn't get it.'
'We'll see.'
'If they detain us, we go to the next step.'
'I hope that won't be necessary.' The next step involved revealing our Legion affiliation as a last desperate attempt to frighten the locals into letting us depart quietly. Nobody wanted trouble with the Legion—but we were not on an official mission; it would be sheer bluff and it could backfire badly.
'The shuttle is leaving shortly,' Dragon remarked. I glanced at my chron; 1100 hours local. It did not look good.
'If this doesn't work,' I told Priestess quietly, 'we'll never see the light of day again.'
###
'Its men are to stand aside, Captain, or we open fire!'
'You have no business here, mister!'
'Our men are under orders to fire if fired upon! Consider the consequences carefully, sir!' The three officers were face to face, snarling at each other. The VIP lounge was swarming with armed goons, Ministry of Space security police dressed in black, Ministry of Reform troops in prison brown, and a third gang in dark blue uniforms, squaring off against the other two groups. The soldiers bristled with arms, SG's and autosubs and vac guns. Everyone was prepped to fire; and if anyone did, it would be a bloody massacre and there would not be many survivors.
'Terrific,' Dragon said glumly. The blue shirts had forced their way in first, and demanded to examine our documents. Then the Space and Reform crash teams burst in the door, attempting to eject the blues, and now it looked as if everyone was going to die. We sat in a corner, completely helpless.
