Kowacs really wanted to be away from this place, though he didn’t have any objective reason for the way it made him feel. The only problem was, when they got back to Base Forberry, the interrogations were going to resume.
And if the “Milius” the security chief was looking for was the same woman Toby English had been talking about, Kowacs didn’t think he was going to like that much either.
* * *
As the trucks hovered at the base perimeter, waiting to be keyed through the automatic defenses by the officer of the guard, Commander Sitterson said, “Well, Kowacs. Now that you’re under my command, I want you to be comfortable. What can I do for you? Are your barracks satisfactory?”
“Huh?” said Kowacs. He’d been watching the prisoners lashed to the forward bulkhead, the burned kid in the center with an old woman on either side of him. “Barracks? Nothing wrong with them. They leak a bit.” So does the governor’s office. “But you know, there is something you could maybe do . . .”
“Name it,” Sitterson said, beaming.
The column got its go-ahead and vectored out of hover mode with a lurch. One of the women called the boy “Andy” when she asked if he were all right.
Andy told her to shut her mouth and keep it shut.
“Well, these trucks,” Kowacs explained. “We couldn’t decontaminate them properly after we searched the spaceport this morning, just hosed ’em off. If you’ve got any pull with the yard facilities, maybe you could get us time in a drydock to—”
“Trucks?” gasped the security chief. He half-rose from his bench seat before he realized how far out over the road that left him poised. “This truck hasn’t been decontaminated?”
“Sir,” Sergeant Bradley interrupted with a flat lie, delivered in as certain a tone as that of the Pope announcing Christ is risen. “They’ve undergone full field procedures and are perfectly safe. But we may have to spend twelve hours a day for the next month aboard them, so we’d like to be twice safe.”
“Yes, well,” Sitterson said, easing back down on the bench with a doubtful expression. “I understand that. Of course I’ll take care of it.”
Sitterson wanted the prisoners at his headquarters, not the internment facility. The trucks and their heavily armed cargo wallowed through traffic to the parade square, drawing looks of interest or disgust—depending on personality—from the rear echelon types they passed.
The Headhunters were in dual-use vehicles with enough power to keep a full load airborne without using ground effect. They could have flown above the traffic—except that above ground flight was prohibited by base regulation, and Base Thomas Forberry came under Naval control instead of that of the district government. The Shore Police would have been more than happy to cite Commander Sitterson, along with Kowacs and all four of his drivers.
When the trucks grounded in front of the Security Headquarters, dimpling the plastic matting, Kowacs’ men began unfastening the prisoners and Sitterson called into his helmet microphone, “Gliere, open the holding cells. We’ll keep all the prisoners here for now.”
Kowacs couldn’t hear the response, but as the building opened, Sitterson added, “Oh—there’s a body also. Have someone from forensics work it up for identification and then take care of it, will you?”
“This isn’t right!” shouted the boy, Andy, as the marines to either side of him manhandled him along faster than his burn-stiffened legs wanted to move. “You should be helping us! You should be helping us!”
“Come on ahead,” Sitterson ordered Kowacs. “I want you with me during the interrogation. They know you mean business.”
“Right,” Kowacs said on his command channel. “Daniello, you’re in charge till I get back. Keep everybody in the barracks, but we’re not on alert status till I tell you different.”
He strode along beside Sitterson and Hesik. The Bethesdan colonel seemed to be recovering somewhat, but he hadn’t spoken since the prisoner made her ill-advised leap for a weapon.
Or for the baby. Well, a bad idea either way.
Sienkiewicz was a half-step behind him. Kowacs looked over his shoulder—looked up—and said, “Did I tell you to come along, Corporal?”