Voices, стр. 27

“Sir,” said Garibaldi desperately, “let me go after her.”

Captain Sheridan and the security chief regarded each other with a mixture of confidence and uncertainty. They hadn’t worked together very long, but they had been forced into a level of faith reserved for old comrades. Despite the way things had gone so far, thought Garibaldi, there had to be a way to pull this out of the fire. The captain had to trust him.

“How do you know she’s left the station?” asked the captain.

“We’re looking for her,” explained Garibaldi. “My people are all over the docks, but we’ve been so backed up with the conference—and the mass exodus after the bombing—that we’ve got transports taking off every five minutes! We’re eyeballing everything that goes out, but we could be missing something. In fact, we may already be too late.”

Garibaldi rubbed his jaw. “To escape like this, she must’ve had help. I have a hunch about who helped her, and I have a hunch about where she went. There’s a lead that only she and I know about—she might try to follow it up.”

From his hospital bed, Bester was leaning forward with interest. “I’m a great believer in hunches, Mr. Garibaldi. Tell me, where is she going?” He cocked his head, as if listening, then he smiled. “You don’t have to tell me. It’s Earth.”

The chief looked at the Psi Cop with disgust. “Your people are the ones who spooked her. They’re the ones who made her run.”

“I don’t agree with that,” said Bester. “I think fear made her run. But I agree that she had help. She’s had help from the beginning, and just like you, I want to find out who’s bankrolling this. So let’s make a deal.”

Bester grimaced as he shifted around to get a bit more height in his bed. “I will hold back my Psi Cops for a few days. Instead, let’s send Mr. Garibaldi and Mr. Gray to Earth to find her. And her accomplices.”

Garibaldi turned his attention to the pasty-faced Gray. “I don’t want him coming with me.”

“Okay, Mr. Gray,” said Bester. “Let’s alert my people on Earth—they can bring her down as soon as she steps off the transport.”

“Wait,” said Sheridan, holding up a weathered hand. “Mr. Bester is right about one thing—as soon as he calls the Psi Cops on her, it becomes an assassination. The local police will be after her, too. If we’re going to find out anything, we want her investigated. We want all the leads followed up. Garibaldi, if you think you know where she’s going, go there. And take Mr. Gray with you.”

Garibaldi shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “I work better alone.”

Bester smiled. “I think you will find Mr. Gray is very little trouble. And he’s not a Psi Cop—he’s not authorized to take her out. He’s just an investigator, like yourself.”

Garibaldi looked at Mr. Gray, who gave him an encouraging but nervous smile. He doesn’t really want to go, thought Garibaldi; he just wants to get away from Bester, and I can’t blame him for that. The security chief decided he would agree for the time being to take the telepath, and ditch him as soon as possible.

He scowled at Gray. “All right. The last transport for Earth is leaving in an hour, docking bay five. Let’s be on it.”

“Absolutely,” agreed Gray. “I have some theories of my own about this matter.”

Garibaldi started to tell him where to put his theories, but he decided to tell him after they were safely away.

Captain Sheridan took a deep breath and turned toward Dr. Franklin. “Why don’t you sedate your patient and get started.”

“Not a bad idea,” said Franklin. “Nurse, hypo!”

“Wait a minute,” protested Bester, thrashing around in his bed. “I need to report in! I need to call the president …”

Franklin administered the hypo.

Still scowling, Bester lay back in his bed. “Do a good job, you two,” he murmured. “You don’t want me to have to get out of this bed and come after you… .” His voice trailed off as he fell asleep.

“Mr. Garibaldi,” said the doctor, “before you leave, we could use some extra security on the door.”

“All right,” scowled the security chief, “but having extra people hasn’t solved any problems so far.”

“We need to think like these terrorists,” suggested Harriman Gray. “I have a lead of my own to follow up. I’ll tell you about it on the flight. See you later, Mr. Garibaldi.”

The slim telepath dashed off to follow his lead, and Garibaldi rolled his eyes at Captain Sheridan. “Sorry, sir, but why are you making me bring him?”

“Just like you said,” answered Sheridan, “by ourselves, we haven’t done much good so far. Maybe if we join forces with them—I don’t know, it’s worth a try. And I want to say, I know how you feel about Ms. Winters, but she’s a fugitive. Bring her in, if you get the chance.”

“I will,” agreed Garibaldi. He lowered his voice. “I think it was Ambassador Kosh who helped her. I haven’t got any proof, but he went to visit her half an hour before she escaped. Rupel, who’s a linguist, listened to their conversation and couldn’t understand a word of it.”

“All right,” said Sheridan grimly, “leave Kosh to me.”

Talia sat in total darkness, wondering if she was going to her death, to her freedom, or just going mad. Under Kosh’s orders, and against her screaming better judgment, she had ditched her Minbari outfit and crawled into a reinforced cargo box. And that’s where she had remained for the better part of an hour now. There had been no instructions from Kosh, except to show her how the pins could be removed from the inside to let the straps work themselves free. Not even a proper good-bye from Kosh or anyone else, and she had been sealed up in this box. Even though Talia knew she could get out by pulling the pins, she had no idea where she would find herself.

She presumed she was on a vessel and that her rescuers had left Bablyon 5, because she had been knocked around by some pretty good g-forces. Or maybe somebody had simply tossed the crate down a stairwell—it was impossible to tell! In the absence of instructions or guidance, what was she supposed to do, stay in the box forever? Or until customs sold it for unclaimed surplus?

Worse yet, she had started to hear scuffling sounds outside in the—wherever she was. The sound was too heavy and massive to be rats, she hoped, but that didn’t explain what it was. Could it be somebody moving the crates around? Or a heavy person just passing through? She had heard no voices, which for some reason made her think that it wasn’t the crew. And if it wasn’t the crew, who was it?

She had reached the level of endurance for breathing foul air and listening to strange noises in the darkness, while hunched in a terrible position. She had to find out where she was, or go crazy. So Talia reached for the pins that held the straps closed from inside. She already knew they would slide out easily, because she had been toying with them in the dark for the better part of an hour.

She felt the smooth sticks come out in her hands, and she knew the straps were now just lying across the top of the crate. All she would need was a swift push to be out of that stifling darkness. But once out, the secret of the box would be revealed. As with many boxes, there would be no putting back the surprise after it popped out. Whoever was shuffling around out there might view her as a stowaway and kill her. Or they might know Mr. Bester, who had to be looking for her by now.

It was the unknown either way, decided Talia, and she would rather die with light in her eyes, fresh air in her lungs, and her back straight. She pushed open the top and stretched.

A creature in rags gasped with flight and fell over a similar crate. Talia jumped out of her own crate and scrambled behind it. They peered at each other with fear and curiosity.

He had long, scraggly hair and a grubby beard, but he was at least human. She was about to welcome him with a big smile, when she saw his hand ease out from behind the box, and it was holding a PPG pistol.

“Suppose you just put your hands up,” he said in a Southern drawl. “I didn’t know I had company.”

“Me neither,” gulped Talia, raising her hands. She was instantly afraid she might be better off with aliens or Bester than this seedy character. She didn’t want to tick him off by scanning him, and she had a feeling he’d been scanned before and would know it.

She wanted to get a good look at the place where she might die, so she glanced around. To her surprise, she was in another, much larger cargo crate with alien lettering running all around the top. It reminded her of a Dumpster she used to play in as a kid. But there was a naked lightbulb and some sort of ventilation system supplying them oxygen.

“I’ve seen you somewhere,” said the man suspiciously.

She tried to smile. “Well, it’s obvious we frequent the same places.”

“Keep your hands up,” he snarled. He didn’t wave the weapon around like a maniac. In fact, he held it very steadily, as if it were an extension of his arm.

Talia looked around again, trying to see if there was any obvious way out of the Dumpster. There seemed to be a lid to the thing, and she could see what looked like a switch box amidst the alien lettering. But it didn’t look promising.

Conversationally, she remarked, “I think we have more in common than a lot of people who have just met.”

The man gave her a lopsided grin. “Well, maybe we do have some mutual friends. The question is—are you a plant put here to get me, or am I a plant put here to get you?”

He scratched his stubbly chin. “Since I know I’m up to no good, you must be a plant.” He lifted the weapon and aimed it at her breastbone.

“I’m running away!” she shouted. “I’m a fugitive!” She put her hands over her face in case he blasted her anyway.

But he lowered the weapon and smiled. “Yeah, now I remember—you’re B5’s resident telepath. They got you for the bombing!”

He howled with laughter, and she thought for a second about making a lunge for his weapon. She figured a second would be as long as she lived, if she didn’t make it.

He laughed so hard that he had to dab his eyes with his dirty sleeve. “I guess you’re in too much trouble to turn anybody in. My name is Deuce.”

“Deuce,” she breathed. “The one from Down Below?”

He bowed mockingly. “One and the same. I see my reputation precedes me even in the hallowed halls of Psi Corps.”