The Ramal Extraction Read online

  Bap-bap-bap-bap-bap!

  Gunny looked at the timer inset.

  Just about a second from the time the knife appeared. Impressive, as always, watching Kay move.

  But was what more interesting?

  “No claws,” Gunny said.

  “Yep. You know that’s considered major contempt for an opponent on her world.”

  “Yeah. Cub play.”

  “I just downloaded the local medic’s report. Fool-boy Ganesh there has a concussion, a broken hyoid, two cracked ribs, a badly bruised testicle, and a broken nose. I’d guess he’ll be taking a few days off.”

  “And he’s lucky that’s all he’s got. You think he’ll try her again?”

  “Would you?”

  “Ah’d never have tried her in the first place. Ah wouldn’t want to risk shooting her from across the room.”

  “Me, neither.”

  “Probably wouldn’t hurt for us to keep an eye on ole Ganesh if we are still around when he gets back up to snuff.”

  “Yes.” He shook his head.

  “What?”

  “That expression. ‘Up to snuff.’ What does that mean?”

  She smiled. “Well, you know me, Ah’m just a poor ignorant gunnery sergeant trying to get by, not any kind of his-tori-an, but Ah do believe it has to do with an ancient stimulant made from powdered tobacco that was inhaled nasally. The sudden influx of nicotine into the mucosa caused a sharpening of one’s thoughts and feelings, thus the phrase originally meant that. Over time, it came to mean ‘meeting a required standard.’”

  He looked at her as if she’d turned into a big spider.

  “Who the fuck are you? What have you done with Gunny?”

  She laughed. Had to give a man who could make her laugh points for that. “Thanks for the show.”

  “My pleasure. Make you hot?”

  “It purely did. Too bad there aren’t any men around to take advantage of it.”

  “Get the fuck out of my office.”

  She laughed.

  ~ * ~

  Cutter sat across from Ramal and his perhaps-future son-in-law. He noticed that the head of security wasn’t there.

  “Where is Ganesh?”

  “He had an accident,” Rama said. He waved one hand, dismissing it. “Not important. We know who sent the message.”

  Cutter said, “Was there more to it than what you played for me?”

  “No.”

  “Then I don’t see how you know who sent it. I didn’t hear any identification. Were you able to source it?”

  Rama said, “There is no need! The tone of the words identify him as if he had spoken his name aloud!”

  Cutter nodded. “I see. Maybe you could explain?”

  Rama looked at Ramal. The older man offered a slight nod.

  The younger man said. “The land that abuts My Most Honored Rajah Ramal’s kingdom of New Mumbai to the east is Balaji, ruled by the Thakore Ilmay Luzor, a vile and despicable man begat by thieves and murderers and desecrators. His line has for a century frothed and foamed like mad freaux kits, yapping and trying to nip at the heels of his betters. He is a backstabber, a scoundrel without principles, an eater of scat who would stab himself if he could but bleed on our shirts by the deed.”

  Cutter kept his face impassive. “I see.”

  “It is the phrase ‘Sorry about the bird’ that reveals him. It is exactly the kind of thing he would say. My beloved Indira is assaulted, kidnapped, spirited away, and this piece of filth apologizes for killing a songbird! It could be none other!”

  Rama paused, appeared to gather himself a little, tamping down his anger. “The thakoredom has harried us—and I include my own father’s realm of Pahal in this, for we are bordered to Luzor’s territory to the north—for many years. Small insults, stings, disputes over the demarcator through the Inland Sea—never quite worthy of full-scale retaliation, but constant and irritating. This time, he has crossed too far the line. This time, he will pay with his blood in the dust!”

  Cutter said nothing, but if there was going to be a war, he wanted to renegotiate their contract if they were going to stick around and be part of it. Kidnapping was one thing; war rates were much steeper.

  “We could crush him,” the Rajah said. “Our combined armies outnumber his by three or four to one; however, a precipitous attack might cause the death of my daughter. We would win, but I and Rama would lose.” He paused a moment. “And war is expensive.”

  Cutter almost grinned but held it. The old man had orbited the local sun a few times.

  “Perhaps, a smaller incursion,” the Rajah said. “A surgical strike that cuts through to where my daughter is ...” He paused. “Once we locate her.”

  Rama said, “Now that we know who is responsible, my agents will find her. And once she is recovered, we will deal with Luzor once and for all.”

  Cutter said, “With the proper intel, we can make such a foray.”

  He sensed that the meeting was done. He nodded and stood. Rama also came to his feet. Rama said, “Honored Rajah, I will go immediately to harry my spies to greater action.”

  The Rajah waved one hand toward the door as he, too, stood.

  Rama headed out. Cutter made to follow him.

  “Colonel, bide a moment, if you would?”

  Cutter paused.

  Once Rama was gone, the Rajah spoke. “My future son-in-law is young and full of himself. His blood runs hot, and he is quick to righteous anger. His feelings for my daughter and his sense of outraged trespass might... cloud his judgment.”

  Cutter nodded.

  The Rajah stared past him for a moment, then pulled his focus back to Cutter. “The primary goal here is the safe return of my daughter, who has always been the jewel of my heart. That Rama would wade through rivers of blood to slaughter her killers in a white-hot rage would be of little comfort to me.”

  “I understand.”

  “You have children?”

  “I had a son.” Had.

  “Ah. So you do understand. Rama is a good boy and his intentions honorable, but I engaged you because I want a cool and experienced hand guiding this affair. Please do not hesitate to do whatever you think is necessary to achieve the goal. Accept Rama’s help or not, that’s up to you. If he gets in your way, be as diplomatic as you can be to go around him, but...” He trailed off.

  Cutter got that, too. “We will do our best, sir.”

  “Who can ask for more? Thank you, Colonel.”

  ~ * ~

  NINE

  In the still-chemical-smelly conference room:

  The colonel looked around the room at his core team. “So that’s it. Questions? Comments?”

  Gunny said, “So we are standing by to see what Rama finds out?”

  Cutter glanced at Jo. She said, “No, we are gathering our own intelligence. No offense to the locals, but they have axes to grind and might be a bit on the subjective side in that arena.”

  There were a few chuckles at that.

  “You all know how this game is played,” Jo continued. “Wink can talk to the medicos; Formentara will check with the augmentors—”

  “On this planet?” Formentara said. “They have augmentors?” Zhe offered an expression of mock amazement. “Using what? Abacuses and pickaxes?”

  Jo shook her head, grinning. “Gramps, go find the money. Gunny, there are bound to be working-class pubs. Buy somebody a drink, get the view from the street.”

  “There are other nonhuman species here,” Kay said. “Perhaps they might have information. I will seek them out.”

  “See if you can do that without killing too many of the locals,” Jo said.

  “I have killed none of them yet, save that guard.”

  That was good for a few more laughs. They’d seen the vid starring Ganesh the Incredibly Stupid. And that tag: yet...

  Part of the standard CFI contract was immunity from local laws. And more than a few times, that had been tested to the limits. It had been rescinded once, and
they’d had to shoot their way out of the port. Bad for business, when you had to square off with your clients. People got pissy about the littlest things, too. On that operation, they’d probably taken out thirty people on the field, wounded a couple dozen more. What the locals wanted to hang them for? It had to do with being out and about on a local religious holiday. Hey, you can pile the bodies anywhere you want, but don’t show your heathen faces on the Sacred Anniversary of Zanu’s Holy Ascension!

  “Fan out and find out,” Jo said. “Time is money. Quicker we clear this, the bigger our bonuses.”

  After the room had emptied, save for herself and Cutter, Jo said, “You think Rama is going to be part of the solution or part of the problem?”

  He shrugged. “Can’t say. The Rajah seems to think more hindrance than help, if I read him right, and the kid seems to have a major hard-on for the Thakore next door.”

  “I’m on that,” she said. “I’ll have a file for you to look at in a few minutes.”

  “Good. I think I might tool on over to the range and shoot a target or three; the rust is starting to thicken on my trigger finger.”

  “Hell getting old,” she said.

  “Yeah. Come back and see me when you’re my age.”

  “If you are still around.”

  He smiled. “There’s that.”

  ~ * ~

  Gramps knew all about money, credit, banking, and the shades of marketing: white, gray, and black. Somebody was always looking to get a bigger slice of whatever pie was available and always looking for easier ways to do it. It didn’t take him an hour playing on the local nets to figure out where the serious players were in the money games on Ananda. Legal, quasi-legal, criminal, these tended to blend together most places. A step this way, and you were above-board and clean as a new needle. A step the other way, and you were into the gray, where some things were fine as long as you didn’t look too closely, and others might get you lock-time if you got caught doing them.

  Another step or so, it was shoot-first-and-don’t-bother-to-ask-the-corpse-questions.

  Dealing with the mostly honest and clean shoes was usually the safest way to start poking around. If you couldn’t find out what you wanted to know there, you could always head for the crap-boot slums.

  Thus he found himself in the foyer of the Anandan version of the Orders of Patrons of Agriculture, the local growers association. It was a new building, high-tech, cold, and sterile, with art and architecture that showcased how much everything had cost. New money liked to flaunt itself; old money tended to be a little lower key.

  Fifteen stories tall, a lot of glass plate and exposed stress-plast girders, the headquarters, and paid for by, the exportation of Heavenspice, nearly all of which grown here was controlled by the association who owned this building.

  “Captain Demonde?”

  Gramps smiled at the sweet young man who had come to fetch him.

  “If you’ll follow me, Director Sergal will see you now.”

  Sergal was a tall, fit woman, probably forty or so, with carefully upswept and statically held jet-colored hair that made her look as if she were standing over an air grate. She wore silk cling in a shimmery silver and had a smile that would cut emeralds.

  Fine-looking woman, she was.

  She stood behind a desk carved from what looked to be a single piece of granite. There was a window behind her that offered a view of the city. The perks of power.

  “Captain Demonde. How nice to meet you. Please, sit. How may I be of assistance?”

  Gramps sat on the angular and ugly couch, which was every bit as uncomfortable as it looked. Sergal seated herself in her custom form-chair, which would be infinitely more pleasant an experience. He had to look up, since the couch was at least fifteen centimeters shorter than her chair.

  There were a number of ways he could go about this, but straightforward was the easiest. She would have had him checked out, as much as possible, and there was nothing to be gained from being devious.

  Well. Not yet.

  “As you are no doubt aware, Director, the Rajah’s daughter Indira has been kidnapped.”

  “I have heard, yes.”

  “I am with CFI, and the Rajah has employed us to aid in his daughter’s return.”

  “Of course.”

  First the carrot: “The Rajah has placed his full confidence in CFI and would be most appreciative of those who help us achieve the safety and freedom of his daughter.”

  “Naturally, we wish to be of any help in this matter that we can,” she said.

  “To that end, I need some information.”

  She waited, that hard smile set in place.

  “Who benefits the most financially as a result of this kidnapping?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  He leaned back as if the couch were the most comfortable seat he’d ever ridden. “Come, come, fem, it’s not that difficult a query. I’m not talking about some criminal collecting a ransom. Who benefits if the Rajah is distracted thus?”

  She frowned, and the smile disappeared. He could almost hear her mind working.

  “I’m not sure I would be comfortable discussing this.”

  So much for the carrot.

  So, the stick:

  “It is my understanding that the Rajah can raise the export tax on your products 100 percent with a wave of one hand, is this not so?”

  “He could. But he wouldn’t do that.”

  “Want to bet? Want to be the person who caused it to happen? Because I can guarantee you that everybody and her old fembot Milly will know who was responsible for that because they stood in the way of Indira’s safe return.”

  That got him a small smile—a real one, he thought— mostly in the eyes. “My. A soldier who knows how to play smashball. How interesting. What exactly do you need, Captain Demonde?”

  “Call me ‘Gramps,’ all my friends do.”

  “And you think we are going to be friends?”

  “Why not? Smart, successful, handsome fem such as yourself? A relationship could be mutually beneficial. Never can tell when you might need a soldier who knows how to play smashball. One hand washes the other.”

  She laughed. “Nicely done. I’ll get you a list of players and companies who might find a way to take advantage of the Rajah’s agitation.”

  “I would appreciate that.”

  “A word of advice. We here in the city are civilized—or what passes for it on this world. Out in the countryside, the growers and overseers and workers are, ah, somewhat more ... primitive and direct. Step off the path in the wrong place, and you’ll get your ass handed to you, and nobody will ever find it, nor you.”

  “Good to know, Fem Director.”

  “You must call me ‘Lareece.’” She paused for a moment. “Gramps.”

  They both smiled.

  It was always a pleasure to do business with a real professional in the field.

  ~ * ~

  “You can do that? Really?”

  Formentara gave the man a small shrug. “It’s not that hard.”

  The building was cheap castplast and the fittings and furniture new, but tacky. Bottom-of-the-line hardware, and the couches were plush but really ugly. The place smelled of vapor-nebulized hemp. I worked in this dump, I’d stay stoned, too.

  The man shook his head. “Not that hard? There isn’t anybody on this entire planet who can tune that aug that fine.”

  The comment was what it was, but it also offered hir a challenge: I don’t believe you.

  Formentara said, “If I may use your board?”

  “By all means.”

  The local had been doing a preop tune, no patient attached, only the aug itself, adjusting the factory presets to the specific patient’s scan record. You could do it once the ‘plant was over because you still had to do touch-ups anyhow, but it was easier to do the nuts-and-bolts stuff at this stage.

  Zhe sat, donned her own temple frame, and ran hir fingers over the board’s sensor. Zhe queried,
then logged onto the system, found the patient’s sig, and his aug-scan, and ran a quick call-and-response. For a good augmentor, this would take a minute. It took hir eighteen seconds. Green, green, and green.