a close colleague of Dr. Loxner for nearly thirty years, though they’d only officially been
partners for the last six years of Loxner’s practice. After Loxner retired, Rustin emigrated
to Kolokov, where he took the job as permanent physician to Duke Fyodor. Helena had
some idea of what he’d done from then until his death, when the Circus had investigated
the Duke’s activities.
The hotel room Helena had rented on the spur of the moment had been turned into the
central rendezvous point so Fortier wouldn’t learn about the Circus. Helena called the
room and spoke with Luise, acting as liaison. They set up another meeting with Duke
Etienne for later that evening.
Etienne and Luise were both fascinated to hear about Loxner’s connection with Immanuel
Rustin. It was Luise who had interrogated Rustin under nitrobarb and learned about the
robots in the fast place. She admitted to feeling a terrible sense of deja vu, as though the
universe were closing itself together in a tight knot.
The Duke, too, could feel events rushing toward some conclusion. “I think,” he said, “we
ought to pay a visit to Dr. Loxner on his private asteroid. There are a few questions I’d
like to ask him, and the answers might become very interesting indeed.”
Chapter 11
Turnabout
Despite the fact that it kept her perfectly safe, Tanya Boros was not happy aboard
Battle station G-6. She was a person who needed human contact about her, particularly
masculine contact. By the very nature of this station, she was completely alone. No ship
other than the one built to dock with it was allowed to approach unchallenged and de-
spite the station’s thoroughly planned defenses, she was unsure how well it could protect
her in an emergency. To be on the safe side, she’d hidden a blaster of her own just
inside the airlock of the mated ship. That personal touch made her feel much better.
Her only contacts with people -were over the subcom: most often with the killers hired to
lure Wombat and Periwinkle out into the open, occasionally with headquarters for her
daily reports. Other than that she had nothing to do, and the boredom was driving her
crazy.
She’d been excited to hear of Wombat’s capture, and had actually enjoyed her short talk
with him. Her great regret was that she’d be stuck in this damned station and never have.
the chance to repay him personally for having interfered in her affairs. By rights, she
should be Empress now; her father was the oldest recognized child of Stanley Nine, and
had been given a Patent of Royalty. Banian should have succeeded to the Imperial
Throne when Stanley Nine was killed in a spaceship mishap.
Instead, her father had been forced to hide in shame and plot to recover what was
rightfully his. Lady A had filled Boros in on exactly how large a role Agents Wombat and
Periwinkle had played in the capture and execution of Banian, and in Boros’s own exile to
Gastonia. Tanya Boros was in a mood for revenge.
She’d been frightened by the unexpected assault, but the battle station had worked
precisely as it had been intended to. Now, to her great delight, she had Wombat, and an
unknown woman who might well be Periwinkle, at her complete disposal.
The two SOTS agents were still alive and basically unharmed after their crashing fall.
The machines had helped Boros peel them out of their battle armor down to the light
jumpsuits they wore under it. They were now bound securely against the wall in the small
chamber just across from the control room in the central core of the battle station. Boros
knew she should report instantly to headquarters to let Lady A know of the capture, but
she postponed the call for a short while. Lady A would get them soon enough and could
interrogate them to her heart’s content. Boros intended to leave them alive, although
they’d probably wish they were dead by the time she’d finished.
Boros watched her captives intently over the next several hours. Their short, muscular
bodies showed they were from some high-grav planet, probably DesPlaines. The woman
was not as strikingly beautiful as Boros herself, but still very attractive; it was the man,
though, to whom she paid the most attention. She had an inordinate fondness for
masculine anatomy, and he was a prime example. She noticed some recent bruises,
possibly gotten from her own assassins. She made a mental note to discover what had
happened to them, although they must have been eliminated in some way. In the
meantime, Wombat and his superb masculinity were entirely at her mercy.
As the agents began to regain consciousness, Boros left them alone and turned, instead,
to watching them on the internal monitors. There was always the chance they’d talk to
one another when they thought they were alone and reveal something important.
Jules and Yvette came to and realized their predicament. They looked around, saw one
another, and smiled wanly. They each asked how the other was feeling; aside from
headaches, sore muscles, and major bruises they seemed in pretty fair shape. There
didn’t appear to be any breaks or sprains. Once the details of their health were
established, though, they weren’t interested in doing any more talking. After half an hour
of silence, Boros turned off the monitors in disgust and went to see her captives
personally.
“How good of you to drop by,” she smiled sweetly at Jules, undoing the seam halfway
down the front of his jumpsuit and baring his muscular chest. “I was beginning to think I
wouldn’t have the pleasure of your company this time around. And you must be
Periwinkle,” she added, turning to Yvette.
“What’s a periwinkle’?” Yvette asked innocently. Boros shrugged. “Just a minor
annoyance that will soon be eliminated. Nothing to worry about much longer.” The room
lapsed into silence for a moment. Boros took the opportunity to run a finger down the
front of Jules’s chest. “I’ve dreamed of you, you know.”
“Really? I’m flattered.”
“Oh yes, Gospodin Wombat. You’re naked in an arena, surrounded by swifters and
braknels and panna-cats. They’re all very hungry and trained to leap at your particular
scent. I play the scene in slow motion so I can watch every delicious moment. The claws
rake their way down your body like so.”
Boros demonstrated with her own fingernails, digging them -into Jules’s flesh and ripping
gashes so deep they drew blood. Jules made no sound; he merely watched Boros
coolly, trying to size up what she would and would not do. “You won’t get any information
by torturing us, I guarantee you,” he said calmly.
Boros looked him straight in the eye and merely smiled. “I don’t want information,” she
said, chuckling deep in her throat. “There are other people more skilled than I am who’ll
get that from you. As long as I leave you alive and able to talk, they’ll be satisfied. I have
my own interests in this matter.”
Yvette tried to divert the woman’s attention away from her brother. “That’s fine with us,”
she said. “The longer you delay, the more time you’ll give our friends to return with
reinforcements.”
“The ship that brought you here was blown apart right after dropping you off,” Boros
informed them. “I don’t think you should count on any help from them.”
Jules looked quickly over to his sister. Yvette’s face was stiff with shock at the news of
her husband’s death. It was always possible, of course, that Boros was lying to see their
reaction, but the calmness of the woman’s tone made that seem unlikely. They still had
Vonnie as the card up their sleeve, but that hardly comforted them in view of the fact that
Pias was dead.
Boros could tell her little bombshell had had its desired effect on her captives. Her smile
broadened. “Oh good, I was wondering whether I’d ever be able to hurt you. This is
going to be more fun than I expected.”
Pias found it hard to tell precisely when consciousness returned to him, surrounded as he
was by the blackness of interstellar space. When his ship had blown apart, the explosion
had knocked him unconscious and thrown him into the vacuum. Had he been clad in an
ordinary spacesuit, it would have been ripped to shreds and he’d have been asphyxiated;
but the battle armor he’d worn held up to the shock. It contained its own oxygen supply
good for many hours of breathing. Pias survived.
It took him several minutes to remember where he was and to realize the extent of his
predicament. He was stranded in deep space with several hours of air and no
transportation. Vonnie had been told to wait two days before sending in the Navy; even if
they spotted a tiny armored figure the instant they arrived, he would have been long
dead. No, he could not afford to wait for others to help him. He recalled the old proverb