“Not you, RJ. Me. I failed to see how organized our enemy had become. I will not make this mistake again.”
Ryllen sniffled. “What do I do now?”
“You’ll need time. I’ve sent an agent to your flat in case the Constabulary hasn’t yet visited. They’re pathetic investigators, but I don’t wish to make it easy for them. My agent will remove any compromising evidence. In the meantime, stay where you are for a few days. Afterward, we’ll move you. Perhaps a few weeks at Barrio before you return to active duty.”
“Thank you, Lan. I’m still a patriot. I’m still with you.”
“I apologize for doubting, RJ. Give yourself time to recover. I’ll be in touch soon.”
After the call ended, Ryllen relaxed about fifteen seconds before considering a terrifying possibility: Lan needed to clean up this mess before it tracked back to him. He spent years organizing Green Sun while maintaining one of the most powerful corporate offices in Pinchon. Lan had to weigh protecting his soldiers against protecting himself and his large, unassuming family. If he didn’t see clear to doing both, he’d have to choose.
Suddenly, the safehouse seemed much less secure.
“No,” Ryllen told himself. “Lan won’t do it. He’s a good man. He wants the best for us. He’ll protect me.”
Ryllen snuck out of the safehouse shortly after noon, hiding a Tachtron reader, a memglass, and a Goodboy in a side pocket. Though no one in the Zozo district paid him any mind, Ryllen assumed they were reporting him for his many crimes. He was a killer, after all. But he found a quiet corner in a dank alley to examine the contents of the memglass, hoping Muna Lin Jee spoke the truth months ago about the data contained within.
“There is someone in Pinchon capable of breaking the encryption,” she told him. “He is ex-Chancellor. He works freelance intelligence for the seamasters. I used my contacts in Nantou to retrieve this man’s particulars. I give you a path, Ryllen. Take it now, while time stands in wait.”
Time was up, and Ryllen ran out of options. He’d never see his first family again, and the second one might be coming to kill him. He put the last ounce of his faith in a former Chancellor named Hamilton Cortez.
Muna Lin made Cortez seem like a man of considerable success – running intel for the seamasters carried hefty rewards. Yet he lived a few streets away in a second-floor flat. No one of importance lived in Zozo. Ever.
Given the man’s occupation, he proved surprisingly easy to find. Ryllen never had to enter the man’s building. Instead, as he passed a bar adjacent, he heard an angry woman shout:
“Say it again, you Randall cudfruck, and you’ll be answering to my brothers. Get. Out.”
Randall was an epithet Hokkis sometimes used to describe Chancellors who “went native” to live with the locals. Ryllen heard it directed his way once or twice early in school before he understood the implications. Back then, before the Ark Carriers left Hokkaido, his parents stood up for their adoptive son.
Ryllen’s target was seven feet tall, with broad shoulders above a lean build. He walked with a long, leisurely gait, smiling through a thick dark beard that complemented hair pulled back into a ponytail and draping halfway down his back. He wore a traditional gray Sak’ne suit joined at the waist by a broad red sash. Ryllen never saw such fashion among the common people, let alone the Modernists who dominated the island city. Was it possible he was a Freelander? The target smiled as he threw back a glass of green alcohol, most likely sanque.
“Hamilton Cortez?” Ryllen asked, maintaining a safe distance.
The man stopped, laughed like someone who lost all care about life, and continued on without looking back. Ryllen tried again.
“Honored Cortez. May I speak with you?”
The man whistled, held the empty glass up to the sun, and moaned.
“I’m all manner of things, but honored I am not.” He swung around. “And if you’re trying to be clever, I suggest …”
He caught himself when he took his first look at Ryllen.
“OK then. Was not expecting you.”
“Wait. Do you know me?”
“I should. Hold on, kid. It’s coming to me. Ah, yes. Jee. Family name. Yes? Ah, hold on. Brayllen? Galen?”
“Ryllen.”
“No, no. That’s not it. They call you RJ. Yes?”
“Wait, what? How do you know this?”
Hamilton Cortez shaded his eyes as he approached Ryllen.
“There are sixty Chancellor-born in The Lagos. We tend to stand out. Yes? I like to keep track.”
“I’m not a Chancellor.”
“But you were born on Earth. Same thing, more or less.”
“You know my story?”
“I know many stories. Some happy, some sad. Occasionally, tinged with a mild nose of redemption. What do you want from me?”
“I need your help. I think you’re the only one who can.”
“Huh. Two billion people on this big, gorgeous rock, and somehow, it’s down to me. For the record, there are other Earth-born you can play with.”
Ryllen revealed the Tachtron reader.
“I have a memglass with a Chancellor encryption. I was told you could break the code.”
“Almost certainly. Might take a few days, but I don’t do Chancellor anymore, kid. I’m Hokki now. Can’t you tell?”
“But you just said you kept track of …”
“Oh. That. Everyone needs a hobby.”
Ryllen lowered his voice. “Can’t we go somewhere and talk? I have a very important question I need answered. I think it’s on the memglass. Please, Hamilton?”
“For the record: Ham. And what is your grand question?”
“What am I?”
“Hmm. As interrogatives go, that’s an interesting choice. OK. Five minutes, kid. With me.”
Ham escorted Ryllen up the block to one of several empty benches surrounding a lifeless stone fountain.
