Page 44 of Spark Transform

Samara’s expression softened for a moment. Her hand reached toward him, then dropped. She straightened and shook her head. “I’d rather trust Arco than the OII.”

A hard, bleak look settled on the janitor’s face. “Very well. Here’s what we’ll do…”

Chapter 16

Planet: Mabingion • GDAT 3242.201

The wind-driven, chaotic rain matched Renner’s mood as he walked through the alley that looked like a dead end. A chaos cauldron of emotions had driven him out of the townhouse on a past-midnight neighborhood patrol.

Their improvised scenario to deflect the auditor had been simple enough. The cleaner, whose name Renner never asked, erased the auditor’s recent memories. Renner loosened the armature, then bashed the auditor’s head with it hard enough to draw blood.

Akaramides and the cleaner had looked faintly queasy. Charrascos gave him an approving nod as she helped arrange the auditor’s limbs on the floor.

He and the cleaner went back to the office with the monitoring station. They were just in time to watch two concerned women helping the groggy auditor to his feet. Charrascos blustered brazenly. Akaramides fluttered with flustered grace.

The auditor left to tell his team to stand down because Akaramides was the victim. Charrascos had lured Akaramides to the space station on false pretenses for a supposed standard records interview with an ex-Jumper, then pounced. Since the CPS had recently banned her and her media company, she’d had to resort to ambush tactics to get anyone to talk to her. Really, Charrascos had asserted unrepentantly, it was the CPS’s own fault.

While Renner watched the action play out, the cleaner manipulated the body parlor’s records to support the scenario. The payroll now included an ex-Jumper as an occasional fill-in, and the business records now had a comms trail that suggested Charrascos paid the man to get Akaramides to the space station. The ease and speed with which the cleaner did so suggested superior skill.

Of much more significance, the cleaner had known a great deal about Renner.

While waiting in the lobby for Charrascos, Renner had turned on his percomp and pretended to read as a cover for monitoring her and anticipating threats.

Almost immediately, a fully cloaked and veiled person carrying multiple energy weapons had entered the shop. The person caught Renner’s eye and invited him to come along with a tilt of his head.

After considering risks and options, Renner powered off his percomp and followed the veiled figure into the office. Security displays on the wall showed the lobby and the shop’s front and back doors.

The person gave a slight bow. “As you likely surmised, I’m the cleaner. I’m told you are telepath-immune, but I’d like to verify that.” The expressive, tenor-range voice spoke English with no discernible accent.

Renner stilled. “Immune?”

“Yes.” The cleaner’s eyes crinkled in amusement. “You featured often Dixon Davidro’s journals.” Long fingers fanned artfully. “And you may thank Neirra Varemba. She asked me to save her friend, but I was too late.” One shoulder lifted in a shrug. “Regrettably, the lethal, mad-dog enforcer named Renner was a confirmed casualty last spring after a vicious urban turf battle between criminal crews.”

Renner had no trouble inferring the underlying threat. He knew zero about them, and they knew everything important about him. If he betrayed their secrets, they’d gift-wrap him for the CPS. They probably guessed that would be much worse than just ejecting him out of the nearest space station airlock.

He shrugged one shoulder. “Verify away. I can’t stop you.”

The cleaner’s head tilted, and his eyebrow twitched with amusement. “Imagine my shock if you could.” The eyes took on a distracted look for several long moments. “It’s true. I feel your presence, faintly, but I can’t touch you.”

Renner made his shoulders and back relax. He’d withstood probes and attempted manipulation by every one of Davidro’s various telepaths, but he’d hated the tests. If he’d ever failed, he’d always planned to self-terminate rather than be Davidro’s puppet.

The cleaner eyed him speculatively. “Did Neirra ever heal you?”

Renner ignored the question. Games irritated him.

The cleaner glanced at the clock display on the wall and frowned. “I ask because she had a trick of leaving information packets in people’s minds, keyed with nonsensical word sequences. I’d always assumed she used her telepathic twister talent, but now I wonder if it wasn’t her healer talent instead. Or in combination.”

Renner had been saved from answering by the unwelcome entrance of the CPS auditor.

He’d done as the cleaner asked and created a hasty distraction. It felt good to use that part of this talent again. However, he’d only agreed because Faraday Brenner was ostensibly on the planet below and thirty thousand kilometers away from minder with the unique ability to cause a localized power outage at will.

After that, Charrascos got selected memories erased and instructions from the cleaner on using the shields. Then it was shuttle and autocab rides, changing clothes, and slipping her back into the Novo-G building. At midnight, they’d headed for the townhouse.

She’d been distant and quiet after leaving the space station. Maybe it was her annoying habit of hiding hurts. Or maybe she was stewing about sacrificing her straight-shooter journalist reputation to protect Akaramides, or being forced to become entangled with a cause she might not believe in.

He wasn’t sure he believed in it, either, but Neirra had, and she was the best long-tail strategist he’d ever known. If Neirra’s machinations wounded the CPS, then he was her willing weapon. He owed her that and more.

After confirming the security team was on duty again, he’d grabbed his rain cloak and gone for his own patrol. Jumbled thoughts brought bad dreams that made sleep impossible.