Odd Girl Out

He was waiting just inside the passageway when I reached the ground. The passageway itself, I saw now, ended at a dark dirt face only a couple of meters away. 'What now?' I asked.

'This way,' he said, turning and starting down the passageway.

Again, I followed. He reached the end, and as he pushed the 'dirt face' aside to reveal a soft light beyond I realized that it was just a light-blocking curtain that had been set across the passageway. He stepped through, holding the curtain open for me. Bracing myself, I stepped through after him into a small, low-ceilinged room.

The furnishings were Spartan in the extreme. There was a cot, a small folding table and chair, and a drying rack that held both neatly folded clothing and a collection of ration bars. In one corner of the room a sink/toilet combination nestled up against a section of the wall that had been gouged out for access to the bar's plumbing system. Stacked neatly along one of the other walls were twenty gray metal containers about the size of standard Quadrail lockboxes, about fifty centimeters long and twenty centimeters high and deep.

And sitting cross-legged in the middle of the cot with her back against the wall, gazing at us with an unreadable expression, was a young girl.

'Hello, Rebekah,' Karim said. 'How are you doing?'

'I'm fine, thank you,' she said gravely, unfolding her legs and standing up. Her voice was definitely that of a ten-year-old, but at the same time there was also something very adult about it.

But then, she was apparently being hunted for her life. That sort of thing could age a person very quickly.

'Are you Frank Compton?' she asked.

'Yes, I am,' I confirmed, shaking away my musings and giving her a quick once-over. She seemed healthy enough, though her long confinement had left her a little thin and pale.

Aside from her build and hair color, though, she didn't really resemble Lorelei very much. Still, I'd known sisters who were a lot more dissimilar than this. 'You ready to get out of here?' I asked, keeping my tone light.

'Very much so,' she said gravely. Her eyes flicked down to the kwi still gripped in my right hand, but she didn't ask about it. 'Mr. Karim told you about my other needs?'

I frowned at Karim. 'What needs are those?'

He winced a bit. 'The boxes have to go with her,' he said, nodding toward the stack of gray boxes against the wall.

I looked at the boxes and then back at Karim. 'You're kidding.'

'Neither of us is kidding, Mr. Compton,' Rebekah said reprovingly. 'It's absolutely vital that those boxes and I leave New Tigris together.'

I stepped over to the stack and tugged experimentally on the top box. Ten kilos at least, I estimated, maybe as much as fifteen. With twenty boxes, that made for two to three hundred kilos of dead weight.

There were a dozen ways a ten-year-old girl could be smuggled past Customs and off the planet. Adding in a quarter metric ton worth of metal boxes instantly eliminated at least half of those options. 'Can we maybe cut it down to two or three of them?' I suggested. 'We can try to get the rest out later.'

'No,' Rebekah said, her voice leaving no room for argument. Her eyes flicked over my shoulder at the passageway. 'Is the other one with you?'

'The other one?' I asked.

'The woman,' she said.

'Oh—Bayta,' I said. 'Yes, she's just upstairs.' I raised an eyebrow. 'But you won't be able to talk her into this any easier than—'

'A moment,' Karim cut me off, pulling out his comm and holding it to his ear. 'Yes?'

He listened for a few seconds, and I saw his throat muscles tighten. 'Understood,' he said, and put the comm away. 'We have to get back at once,' he said, moving back toward the curtain. 'Three police cars are on their way.'

I glanced at Rebekah. Her face was tense, but under control. 'Looking for Rebekah?' I asked.

'I doubt it,' he said grimly. 'I think, my friend, they're looking for you.'

SIX :

Karim and I were back up the ladder in fifteen seconds flat. 'What is it?' Bayta asked.

'Cops on the way,' I told her, moving aside as Karim swung the trapdoor shut. 'Possibly looking for us.'

'We need to get out of here,' Karim said as he put his desk chair back into position over the trapdoor. 'Meet them out in the bar.'

'Wait a second,' I said. 'Have the cops been in this office before?'

'Yes, several times,' Karim said, still edging toward the door. 'Quickly, now.'

'And they obviously didn't find the secret entrance?' I asked, not moving.

'No, of course not.'

'Then let's just sit tight,' I told him, circling the desk and sitting down again.

He stared at me as if I were crazy. 'But what if they're looking for you?'

'What if they are?' I countered as Bayta sat down as well. 'We're honest, upright citizens of the Terran Confederation, here to see the sights of New Tigris.'

'In here?' Karim asked.

'Okay, so we're also here to sample the drinks,' I said. 'Look, nothing ramps up a cop's personal radar like people under suspicion hurrying to meet him. All that's happened here is that you took pity on a pair of strangers and invited us in to discuss the best places for tourists to visit. What exactly would those places be?'

'Probably Janga's Point and the Gilcress Mountains,' Karim said, reluctantly returning to his desk chair and sitting down.

'Scuba and climbing,' I said, nodding as I took the kwi off my hand and slipped it back into my pocket. 'Good. Now, where are the best places to buy or rent the necessary equipment?'

We were in the middle of a discussion of climbing styles when the police barged in.

They did barge in more or less politely, though, knocking before opening the office door. 'Excuse me,' their leader said, his eyes automatically checking out each of us before settling on me. 'Are you Mr. Frank Donaldson?'

'I am,' I confirmed. 'Is there a problem?'

'Mr. Veldrick asked us to look for you, sir,' the cop said. 'Your autocab record showed you were here in Zumurrud District.' He looked at Karim. 'Mr. Karim will tell you this isn't a particularly safe place for strangers to be, especially with dusk coming on.'

'I see,' I said, passing over the fact that dusk was at least two hours away. 'And who exactly is this Mr. Veldrick who has such interest in autocab records?'

The cop raised his eyebrows slightly. 'You don't recognize the name of the man you came here to see?'

'I'm terrible with names,' I said. 'Remind me.'

'Mr. Veldrick is the local administrator of Crown Rosette Electronics,' the cop explained. 'Which I believe Hardin Industries acquired a few months ago.'

I looked at Karim. His expression was studiously neutral, but there was a hint of tension showing beneath the mask. 'And one of Mr. Veldrick's duties is to keep track of autocab records?'

'Not all of them,' the cop said, smiling. 'Just yours. Would you come with us, please? Mr. Veldrick is most anxious to meet you.'

'Then by all means let's relieve his anxiety,' I said, standing up and gesturing Bayta to do likewise. Without knowing how the police were set up outside the bar, anything short of meek compliance would be potential suicide. Considerations of countermoves would have to wait until we could further assess the situation. 'Thank you for your time, Mr. Karim. Perhaps we can pick up our conversation again some other time.'

'Perhaps,' Karim said, nodding gravely to me. 'Good day to you, Mr. Donaldson.'

There were five more cops waiting outside, three of them engaged in a sort of pickup staring contest with