The Treasure of Lei Fong Wu

Chapter Twenty-Two

“How long has she been out there?” Simon asked, his breath fogging up the viewport. “Almost six hours. Suit’s rated for ten.” “Six . . . hours,” Simon said, amazed. “I woke up and she was gone. I thought she was just wandering the ship again.” “Tinker noticed her suit was gone a couple of hours ago. I thought she was just trying it out again,” Althea said. Her voice carried in a tone that was more concerned than worried – a mother’s tone, he realized with a start. Not a tone he could ever recall his own mother using. “Is she all right?” he asked, returning his attention to the viewport. “She’s alive. She’s conscious. She’s alert. But there ain’t no way that girl’s even a noddin’ acquaintance to all right.” Simon could see River’s suit outside of the lock, floating about a hundred feet away from the ship. To his relief, she had strung a lifeline to a support. Even though her new suit had built-in maneuvering jets that could, theoretically, bring her back to the lock, he didn’t trust them. Or her ability to use them properly. River was a genius, but some things you only learned from experience. She was at the very end of her tether, and twisting slowly in one direction – then a moment later he saw the spray of jets, and then she rotated in the other direction. “So . . . what’s she doing?” Althea looked at him, as if he was blind. “She’s . . . she’s dancing.” “Dancing?” “It’s odd, I’ll be the first to admit. But that’s what she told Tinker when he asked.” Simon turned and rested his back on the bulkhead. He closed his eyes and sighed in frsutration. “She’s . . . she’s insane!” he finally got out. “I spend every credit I’ve ever earned, and all of my inheritance, to break her out. I get us hidden on the most disreputable, trashy freighter I can find. I come to blows over whether or not we both live or die. I shield her from every negative influence, try to keep her safe. And she goes dancing – in a space suit – dangling from a thread – in the utter depths of space. She’s insane,” he repeated, more as a statement of fact than an exclamation. “That’s what you told us,” Althea agreed. “She’s a sweet girl, she really is. But moon-headed.” “Oh, no,” Simon corrected. “This isn’t the brain-damaged, government tortured River. This is pure, unadulterated obstinate teen-ager-in-a-snit River. I’m starting to get to know that side to her all too well. She was obnoxious as an adolescent – in a precocious sort of way – but this . . .” He looked back through the portal. “She knows I’m here, too,” he said in a voice filled with antipathy. “And she knows I’m upset. And she’s . . . she’s enjoying it!” Althea had to laugh. “Well, big brothers, they get t’bein’ overprotective, makes a girl want to get back at ‘em somehow. I know that one well. Had four older brothers.” “But she’s a genius! She’s supposed to be above all this!” he exclaimed, gesticulating in a refined manner. “What is she doing out there? Besides ‘dancing’, I mean.” “My guess? She’s poutin’. You’re her kin. Maybe y’all should chat.” Simon mulled that over. “Maybe I should,” he said at last. Reaching over to the console beside the airlock he grabbed the pickup. “River, this is Simon. Do you want to talk?” He let the comm. button up to listen for a response. The discordant sounds of a badly played harmonica came through the intercom, the same notes played over and over, pushed in and out with her breath. “River, talk to me,” Simon demanded. There was no change in the noise, unless perhaps it was louder than before. “River! Don’t be a ho tzu duh pi goo!” The harmonica twanged – still dissonant, but expressive of derision. “River, you’re being a . . . a stupid head!” he snarled. The harmonica managed an explosive snort of disgust. “Oh, fine, then!” Simon said, slamming down the mike in frustration. He glared one more time out of the viewport, and then turned back to Althea. “I know part of it isn’t her fault – they surgically removed her emotional ‘edit’ control. She can’t conceal her feelings any more than I could conceal a sunburn. I know that, at a solid intellectual level – so why is she so infuriating?” He took one final look at his twisting, twisted sister. “Promise me you’ll get her to come in before her air runs out?” he pleaded, quietly. “Anything for you, sweetie. I’ll keep an eye on her.” Althea had warmed to Simon considerably since he and River had come aboard, after finding him initially stand-offish. She had a common native Rim-worlder’s prejudice towards Core worlders as effete. She hadn’t necessarily changed her opinion, but she had come to appreciate Simon as a person. “Now, I got a sticky valve in the forward water tank what needs seein’ to. I’m sure you got stuff you need seein’ to your own self. Don’t worry ‘bout River. She’s in no danger. Never seen a girl take to EVA like that. Some prospectors spend twenty years in a suit, never get that comfortable with it.” Simon forced himself away from the airlock, knowing that if he tried to make an issue out of River’s spacewalks, then she would oblige him . . . in some disturbing and potentially dangerous way. He wandered back to the cozy little spare room he had been lent and settled into the bed, considering a nap. There was still a lot of research he could be doing on the reproductive/amygdala subject, but without River’s cooperation it was just background – and he really didn’t feel like it just then. A nap seemed more productive. Just as he had come to some decision about it, there was a knock on his door. “Cheeng jin!” he called wearily. Despite being a big family, the MacKlintocks made a point of observing strict rules of politeness and privacy. He expected Rowan – she had gone out of her way to flaunt herself at him at every available opportunity, secure in the knowledge that he was leaving soon. He was flattered at first, of course, but the last few days it had just gotten annoying, as if she knew some secret that he didn’t. He was slightly surprised, then, when it was the fourteen-year-old befreckled face of Heather MacKlintock that appeared. “D-doctor Tam?” she stammered. “Yes, Heather, what is it?” he asked, sitting up in bed. “Not feeling well?” “No, Sir, I feel fine. Doctor Tam, I was wonderin’ . . . how’d you get to be a doctor?” she asked, closing the door behind her. The question wasn’t one Simon had been prepared for. The truth? He had gone to medical school largely because he enjoyed the intellectual challenge and his parents thought it would be a good career. Oh, he had a vocation for healing, and a talent for the profession envied by his peers, but he lacked strength in some important areas: he was just impatient enough to want to see instant results. Hence his specialty in trauma surgery. “I . . . well, I guess I went to school for it,” he said, finally. “The Medical Academy on Osiris, to be exact. Why?” “’Cause . . . I think I might wanna be a doctor,” the girl said, blushing with embarrassment. “Could you teach me some?” “Teach you some . . .?” “Doctorin’!” she exclaimed, her voice breaking the tiniest bit. “Teach you . . . some ‘doctorin’.” He let the weight of that wash over him for a moment before he answered. “Well, Heather, being a doctor isn’t like becoming a mechanic, or even a pilot. It takes many, many years of schooling. It’s a comprehensive education. You must first, of course, complete secondary school, then college, and then get into a medical school. Then there is internship, residency – oh, all manner of things. I can’t just teach you a few things.” “Why not?” she demanded. “I got a pretty good education. Mom and Mom are always making me study, and I do a fair piece on my own time. I been studyin’ anatomy an’ chemistry an’ physics an’ biology – I can learn real good, Doctor Tam, really I can!” she said, earnestly. “Well,” Simon said. “Well, what?” she asked, eagerly. “You can learn ‘real well’, not ‘real good’. Sorry, pet peeve of mine. Look, Heather, I could probably teach you some first aid, maybe even some simple diagnostics. A little nursing, even. But becoming a doctor takes years. Becoming a surgeon, even longer. Much longer.” “If I learn me a little bit from you, an’ a little bit elsewhere, an’ study up on my own, couldn’t I learn it?” Simon choked off his objection before he gave it. The girl did have a point. He had met a dozen or so doctors out here in the wilds, and only a handful had a complete, formal education. One had been a veterinarian who did people on the side between calvings. A few had been self-taught or apprenticed. While the academic snob in him looked down upon them, considering how the medical profession started – and how it still was taught – that wasn’t that far from what was traditional. The clinical skills could be taught – indeed, they couldn’t be learned from books – and compassionate care was compassionate care, wherever you learned it. As far as the medical intuition needed . . . well, either she would have it, or she wouldn’t. That and clinical skills were the important things you needed to be a doctor. That and the vast amount of raw scientific information you had to absorb, from basic biology up through advanced genetics and embryonics. And truth to tell, almost all of that was available, free, on the cortex. If the child really did have the mind to study, and was properly guided, there was no reason she couldn’t become a first-class medic. Maybe even get into a real Medical School someday. “Tell you what, Heather,” he said, finally, as she looked at him expectantly. “Let me ask you a few questions. If you can answer them, then I’ll give you a list of things I think you should study, and consider teaching you some ‘doctorin’. Do we have an understanding?” “We do!” she said, excited. “Fine. Let’s start with . . . naming the parts of a cell.” “Plant or animal?” “Surprise me.” “Nucleus, cell wall, cytoplasm, ribosomes, centrioles, mitochondria, lysosomes, Golgi body. Probably a couple I forgot.” “Hmm. How about . . . major systems of the human body?” “Musculo-skeletal, nervous, circulatory, respiratory, limbic, endocrine, digestive, and . . . sensory?” “Close enough. Human body temperature?” “98.6 Fahrenheit.” “Oxygen-carrying molecule in blood?” “Hemoglobin!” He paused. “Well done, Heather. Well done. Yes, I think we can work with that. Let me get my encyclopedia, and I’ll draw up a basic course of study for you. Very basic stuff – no surgery or anything – but it should get you through the next year or so.” He pulled out his pad and started jotting. Heather stood there patiently, barely able to contain her excitement. “Why the interest, Heather?” Simon asked while he looked up his old secondary school curriculum. “Doesn’t your mom do a good job as medic?” “She does great,” she agreed. “Mama Win’s great at that sorta thing. She stitched Tink up right as rain last year when he gashed his leg – and when the babies all got sick, she knew the right meds to give ‘em an’ everythin’! And she’s helped deliver every one o’ Mama Al’s babies. She gave Uncle D a transfusion, that time, too, and set Daddy’s leg when I was little. But with her bein’ pregnant an’ all, just seems like a good idea, someone else knows how t’do stuff.” She looked away and kicked her shoe nervously. “‘Sides, what else is there for me t’do? Tink’s the mechanic, Rowan’s the pilot, an’ Brian’s the business guy – he helps Mama Win with the accounts. But there ain’t no kid medic, an’ it sounded like somethin’ I could do. Beats just gettin’ married off like a groundhog girl. Everyone needs a trade,” she affirmed, as if it were a religious truth. That took Simon aback. He had never considered being a doctor just a trade, in the classic sense. It was a profession, a career, a vocation – a calling, even. A job, at worst, but a always a professional job. But out here, the ability to heal and cure, while needed everywhere, was just as much a trade as being a mechanic. Especially with the utter lack of advanced medical equipment or drugs. ‘Doctorin’ was just another way to make a living. It was interesting, he found upon further reflection, and more than a little ironic. Since he first got his medical license being a doctor had pretty much defined his existence. By taking the Hippocratic Oath he had transformed from Simon Tam to Dr. Simon Tam, M.D., MOCS. It was a job with a certain status, in his society, which was ironic considering how much medical care was managed by machines and allied medics these days. Oh, it was still vital to have a live, well-educated human being making the important decisions, but for the most part the actual healing was done by machines or by highly trained technicians. There was research, of course – nearly every physician liked to think they were adding to the vast medical database, helping cure disease and advance the science of mending wounds. But many of his less-active colleagues on Osiris were content to see patients a few days a week, spending the rest of the time in other ways, letting the bulk of the curing go to the med techs and nurses and the medical computers. They were highly educated, superbly trained – and rarely used the mass of knowledge they had accumulated. Still, the title, ‘Doctor’, remained magical in the Core, prestigious, for some reason. When it came down to it, all the M.D. after his name did was give him the moral right to prescribe drugs and cut on people in a helpful manner. Here, where a doctor was his own everything – nurse, anesthesiologist, lab tech, dispensary, convalescent care, diagnostician, nutritionist, epidemiologist, genetic counselor – and yet here on the frontier it was just another job. A trade. It made him think. Treated like a mere job – say one he could quit – what, and who, did that make him? “I suppose they do,” agreed Dr. Simon Tam, quietly. “Here. Start at the top, read every text on the way down.” It was a good, solid mix of basic science, intensive biology, first aid and basic diagnostics. “I’ll be leaving tomorrow, of course, but I’ll wave you some practice tests. Under an assumed name,” he amended, smiling. “I am wanted by the law, after all.” He wasn’t prepared for the sincerely potent hug that came next, as Heather threw herself into his arms. “Oh, thank you, thank you Dr. Tam! I’ll study hard, I promise! I’ll do whatever you tell me to do. I wanna be a doctor more’n anything!” Reluctantly, at first, Simon hugged her back, starting to smile. Her enthusiasm was contagious. This was the first time he had really had a care about anything but base survival and his sister’s welfare since he left home. And he had never really been a role model before. It made him think.

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As worlds go, Madonna wasn’t particularly noteworthy. It was an 8000 mile rock that was the second moon (the 800 mile flyspeck called Niño was the first) to a much larger terrestrial planet, a hot, hellish, fluorine-tainted sphere 2200 miles wide called Diablo that would never, ever be adequate for terraformation. But it did have harvestable rare minerals and exotic chemicals of value, and Madonna was well positioned to support that future industry. That’s why it was there. When Valenzia Mining Corp, which owned the exploitation rights to the system, ran a long-term cost-benefit analysis on running a mining operation large enough to justify the expense, they found that building and maintaining a space station of the size and complexity needed to run the support facilities was actually more expensive than simply terraforming Diablo’s second moon. It didn’t have to be pretty, after all – it wasn’t even technically a livable world. Valenzia Mining Corp owned it, terraformed it, and would never apply for a certificate of habitation, because VMC wasn’t going to make money in real estate. They were going to make far more by mining Hell by the truckload, using Madonna as a temporary work camp, spaceport, and base of operations. They rushed the terraformation procedure, taking the moon from vacuum covered rock to atmo-shrouded breathability in just under twenty years. The usual carefully designed ecosphere was discarded in favor of the bare minimum flora and fauna needed to support continued existence. Just enough ice was added to keep the world damp, providing two long, shallow seas, and the only areas actively cultivated were the company farms, organically enriched as needed to force food crops to grow. Everything else was left fallow. VMC took twenty thousand minority Hispanocatolicos from Merovingia – mostly Basques and Catalans – and made them a deal: they provide the labor for the company’s Madonna support operations, and when VMC eventually abandoned the system, Madonna would be theirs, free and clear. They had eagerly accepted. Basque villages now dotted the valley that surrounded Nueva Barcelona, the capital city, and the downtown area was abustle with excellent restaurants, discreet brothels, discount shopping, and all manner of entertainments designed to part a lonely miner from his coin. The company-owned nature of the world also made it a favorite of the clandestine Rim-world freighters. While the Alliance technically had jurisdiction here (Universal Jurisdiction went part and parcel with Universal Sovereignty) Madonna was remote enough and unimportant enough to rarely garner attention from them. Security was company-controlled, bought and paid for. It was a benevolent dictatorship dedicated to one overriding principal: squeeze every last megacredit out of Diablo as cheaply as possible. Anything else – smuggling, politics, law and order, health services – that was secondary. Or lower. Madonna was a prime destination for unloading illicit cargo and goods of dubious origin. And chief among the professional fences were the Sanchez Brothers, Ramon and Jorge, who ran a ship-repair facility and took delivery on pretty much anything someone wanted to sell. They bribed VMC Security when necessary, had good relations with the rest of the underground economy, married portly little Basque wives, raised a passel of kids and enjoyed life. The Sanchez Brothers were friend to every honest smuggler on the Rim, and no one crossed them who didn’t want to lose the privileges their friendship implied. Serenity, of course, was well known to them, as was the Sky Hawk. This made Madonna a natural port of call to safely retrieve the Tams. Mal hadn’t realized just how anxious he was about them until he saw them. Especially River. River had always had a place in Mal’s heart, from the moment he saw her naked in a box. The strange, unworldly, mentally maimed girl was of little practical use, it was true, but she had certainly made life . . . interesting in the nine months or so she had hitched with them. To Mal she represented more than just a point of conversation, however – she was a living representation of Fate, of Fortune, of Lady Luck. He didn’t think of her that way, usually, as he wasn’t of such a mystical bent to imply anything supernatural was involved. But he was pragmatic enough to know to stick with a winner, and so far, despite the trouble, his luck had changed since River Tam set foot aboard his boat. He’d made more money in the last six months than the previous three years combined. And while Simon probably had more to do with that in practical terms, Mal Reynolds was not so wedded to sensible thought that he didn’t more than half suspect the real reason, the real charm, was River. In the last week he had been relieved, on the surface, not to have to deal with the possibility of the Alliance finding the Tams. Just the normal, run-of-the-mill anxiety involved in his less-than-legitimate smuggling business. But underneath it all he was uneasy with River off the ship. Things just seemed less . . . complete with her not around. “Welcome home!” Kaylee shrieked as she tackled River in a big teddy-bear Kaylee hug, which she repeated on Simon (though in a slightly more reserved but more overtly sexual way). “We missed you guys so much!” “Yeah,” agreed Mal. “The peace and quiet was unbearable.” “We missed . . . you, too,” Simon choked out under the force of her assault. “How was the planet of the prehistoric beasts?” “Cold, flat, and whole bunches of no fun,” Kaylee pouted. “But the mastodons were kinda shiny. I took captures. We’ll tell you all about it tonight,” she said as she helped River with her baggage. “Chou wang ba dan, River, what the hell is in this thing?” she asked, straining. “My new spacesuit,” River said happily. “I bought it with my wishing cranes. Look! I got a harmonica, too!” she said, holding it out for inspection?” “Shiny!” Kaylee beamed back. “Do you play?” “No!” Simon interjected. “Not one bit. Not even remotely. I’ve finally discovered a talent my sister doesn’t have coded into her DNA,” he said, stuffily, and headed for Serenity. Kaylee looked puzzled. “Why’d you get it if you can’t play it?” River looked her dead in the eye, brought the instrument to her lips, and softly played the first few mournful bars from Bashir’s Morning Dove Opera. Flawlessly. “Aw, sweetie, that’s beautiful!” she beamed. “Perfect! How can Simon not like that?” “Don’t play it around him,” River whispered. “Just puff on it. I like the noise.” To illustrate her point she blew a loud, raucous chord, loud enough to make Simon flinch from across the landing apron. “That’s . . . not a terribly pretty noise to me, River,” Kaylee said, trying to be diplomatic. “Not the noise it makes – the noise in Simon’s head when I play it.” “Uh . . . yeah, River, I’m sure it’s . . . fun. Look, let’s get your new suit stowed and then we can go down and help get supper ready – Maria and Corazon are making an incredible feast!” “I’m hungry,” River agreed. “Hi, Cappy,” she said in passing to Mal, who barely nodded. He needed a word with her brother. “Doctor, a moment,” Mal said, grabbing at Simon’s elbow as he passed. “Yes, Captain? I hope you don’t want a hug. Kind of hugged out, at the moment.” “Not before dinner, no. I just wanted to let you know, we’ve taken on some . . . guests. Things happened at Wuhan that warrant some illumination, and I fully intend on givin’ a full accounting a little later. For the present, I’d take it as a kindness if you’d keep your questions to yourself. This is a . . . delicate situation.” “If . . . if you say so, Captain,” Simon said, unsure of how to proceed. “I can keep my peace for the moment. But why . . .?” “Just trust me, Doctor. If we play this right, we could all come out with some more clink in our purses. Dong ma?” “Captain, I have no problem playing into your scheme,” Simon said, sighing wearily. “Treasure hunts, pirates, you can chase ruttin’ rainbows looking for pots of gold. Honestly, I don’t care if you want to wear a frilly pink apron to dinner and have us all call you ‘Aunt Suzy’, I just want to sleep in my own bed a few nights.” He looked distinctly irritated. “About that,” Mal said, putting his arm around Simon’s shoulder, “I kinda wanted to talk to you, give you a big speech about how we all need to sacrifice a little to make this work out right. See, we’ve taken on passengers—” “I know all about Johnny Lei – I was there, remember? There were pancakes involved.” “Yes, but while we were on Wuhan the situation, as I said, changed a mite. Johnny’s got two uncles who are tagging along, now.” “Disturbing,” Simon nodded, “and a little disconcerting. But we are in your hands, Captain. If you think they can be trusted, well, then I trust your professional judgment,” Simon said, his tone saying otherwise. “Good! I appreciate that, Doctor. Y’see, one o’ them is a former Imperial General who tried to have me killed on Epiphany, but who holds the last piece of the map. He’s also a Tong boss and is being actively sought by the Alliance for . . . well, I guess it don’t really matter much.” “Uh-huh,” agreed Simon dully. “The other is an eighty-year old Taoist monk who has the second piece of the map. Pretty nice fellow, all considered.” “Great. More clergy.” “Oh, and before I forget, there are three hired thugs employed by the General. So, in short, we’re carryin’ five more folk than we did when we saw you last. And six more than usual.” “And I’m waiting for the part that concerns—” “The upshot, Doctor, is that we gotta shuffle accommodations around a might – just temporary, mind. We hit our next port o’ call and they mostly go back to their ship. But that’s eight days away. So we shifted Johnny to bunk with the General. Two of the men can sleep in the other bunk, but that leaves Master Lei and one man. Book offered to share, and Lei don’t seem to mind, so we moved a hammock in there. And the other man is going to sleep in the lounge unless we can free things up a bit. So I’m gonna ask you and your sister to accept alternate accommodations for a few days. Just temporary. Things are going to be cramped, and I wanted to appeal to your innate patience and sense of dignity during this . . . difficult period.” “My . . . innate patience . . . and sense of . . . dignity?” Simon asked, trying to parse what Mal was really saying. The loss of his stateroom was staggering, he could see. Mal sighed. Sometimes the boy was as thick as an airlock door. He faced him, put a hand on each shoulder, and stared him in the eye. “Simon,” he began, “you put too many bodies in one tin can, before long tempers get hot. Especially when folks are armed – and everyone here is – and volatile. So I’d take it as a kindness for you . . . to do your absolute level best . . . to keep from being a whiney little hump and giving anyone cause to shoot you over the course o’ the next couple of days.” He smiled a big, fake, plastic smile and patted the doctor lightly, in a friendly fashion. “See? That wasn’t hard. I knew you’d understand.” Simon looked at him skeptically, still unsure of what he was saying. “We have wanted war criminals aboard, and you want me,” he said, pointing to his own chest for emphasis, “to stand on my dignity?” “Exactly,” Mal said, moving to greet Duncan and Winnie. “’Cause if you don’t,” he said with a smile, “I surely will.”

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“Okay, we got them hitching a ride to Epiphany, last known location, here,” Sinclair said, lighting up a star on the holographic map in the War Room. That was just a lounge they had converted into a planning room and think-tank, but War Room sounded shiny and impressed the rubes. He looked out at his audience and continued. “And then they leave, presumably on this same Firefly, and hit Humboldt’s Crossroads Station, here, for refueling and resupply,” he continued, a green dotted line helpfully connecting the two destinations. “They don’t get off the ship, according to our source, and there are no EVAs and no shuttles leaving while they are in port. Firefly shows up in the Core, is intercepted here, by the INS Cutlass and allowed to pass without inspection five days later. Two days later it shows up on Wuhan’s capital. Stays five days. Sells a little, buys a little, the Tams don’t show their faces. Firefly takes off, heads to parts unknown. “So the last place we have a confirmed Tam sighting is on Epiphany. The casino footage shows that it is definitely River Tam, who has an uncanny gambling ability, and an outstanding knowledge of dance. Interviews with locals suggest Dr. Simon Tam conferred under an alias with the sales rep for the colony in reference to a large real-estate purchase. No money changed hands, but there was definitely some interest shown in acquiring property. This suggests that he may well have a large amount to invest, and this ritzy tax haven with private security might be a good place for him to settle. And since we know for a fact that his personal fortune was spent or seized by the Feds, he may well have an undisclosed source of income – and a large one.” He looked around at the room, where a dozen of his operatives sat. Mercenaries, mostly, veterans of the War or private security firms. Trackers. Former criminals. Former cops. Researchers of the demimonde. All were intelligent. All were specialists in various interesting and useful disciplines. If any group could track the Tams, his boys could. Cory, a big merc who specialized in munitions, raised his hand. “What about the Tong killings? That suggests a financial link.” He was big – but none of his boys were stupid. Cory had a degree in accounting. “Indeed,” nodded Sinclair. “Four local Tongsmen were killed in his hotel, apparently by Tam’s people. Small time hoods, all of them. But at that same time we got a report – completely unofficial – that some big-time Tong boss was in the world at that same time. Fellow called ‘the General’. Leader of the Yellow Sash Tong, a Rim-world syndicate active in smuggling and eight other kinds of felonious business. They came out of nowhere about six years ago. They’ve kept a low profile, rarely venture into civilized parts. There seems to be some collusion between the Yellow Sash and the Yellow Ribbon, the local group on Epiphany. In fact,” he said, pulling up the file, “until about six months ago, the Ribbon group was led by a fellow named Lei. And the Sash group, the ‘General’ character, also named Lei.” That registered with someone, a very thin man with receding black hair in the back row, who raised his hand. “Morless, Sir. Don’t know if anyone else was active there, but I was with the 33rd Cavalry when we captured a General Lei and the rest of the Imperial leadership. Guess where?” “Wuhan,” Sinclair snapped. “Boil me for breakfast, I had forgotten about that. We’ll have confirm,” he said, nodding to Winton, his backgrounder, “but let’s go on the assumption that they’re the same man. Good call, Morless! So a former Imperial General and current Tong boss shows up on Epiphany at exactly the same time that the Tams show up there. Anyone want to say it’s a ruttin’ coincidence?” “Not if that ruttin’ Firefly went to Wuhan after,” Morless said. “That’s too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence.” “Scott, pull up the activity sheets from Wuhan for the last week – the whole time the ship was in port. Anything?” “Gimme a minute, boss,” Scott said, keying in the information. Scott was another research guy, a short, nearsighted kid with a knack for getting into and around secure data. “Here’s somethin’ interestin’,” he said, chuckling. “Local cops borrowed some heavy equipment – original request marks it as for a ‘pursuit-in-force’, later addendum says it’s a ‘training exercise’ on the steppes. Same time they do an Interpol inquiry about Lei and associates. And now . . . looks like they had a ‘training accident’ – twenty dead, another eighteen seriously injured. All equipment destroyed. Whatcha wanna bet that Lei was the cause of the ‘accident’?” “They sure as hell didn’t kill twenty cops on purpose,” Sinclair said. “Jesus! Looks like this war hero Tong boss doesn’t mind getting bloody! Winton, usual haunts, full bio, get it. What kind of connection do we have here? Dr. Tam and genius kill-crazy sister, with some sort of super-secret research connection, and a known criminal boss with an axe to grind against the Alliance. Lots of money involved. Does anyone smell weapons research?” “Most black box research projects are weapons oriented,” Scooter Davis said. Scooter was the procurement guy, and he was just back from a mission Julian had tasked him with. The result was in the ship’s hold. Anything you needed, Scooter could get for you. He was more plugged in to the cutting edge of everything than most scientists. “I’m guessing Dr. Tam and Sissy there invented or discovered a weapon system, and is in the process of selling it to Lei,” he pointed out. “The man’s a criminal already. He was a soldier with a cause. Going terrorist wouldn’t be out of bounds.” “What kind of funding does Lei have?” “Not a lot,” admitted Winton. “Interpol puts his assets somewhere in the . . . maybe low 100,000’s.” “You couldn’t get more than an apartment on Epiphany for that,” Sinclair said. “You guys should have seen it – money dripping out of every crack in the sidewalk, there. If Tam is looking to make a big real estate purchase, he’s going to need more than that. Which means Lei’s going to have to hit someplace with a lot of cash. Which means someplace in the Core. But they can’t be ready yet – something like that needs to be set up, and that takes time. “Okay, people, we’ve gone from a simple skip trace to an evil terrorist plot to overthrow the Alliance, in the space of about five minutes. And all of it is speculation and conjecture. As soon as Julian gets back from his meeting with our potential benefactors, we need to set an intercept course. Where are they holing up to plan this? Because I’ll wager a gorram thousand credits that that’s where we find the Tams – and if I’m not mistaken, Lei and his crew probably have a fair number of rewards outstanding, too. This could be a highly lucrative proposition. We do this right, and we can all look forward to a little more clink in our purse. But I need to know what course to set. Where does this General Lei do his laundry?” Winton suddenly looked up from his screen. “His last confirmed sighting was at Lincoln City, on Salisbury. Been spotted there six times in the last two years. Has a ship, undocumented. Refuels there – and buys a lot of fuel,” he noted. “Must get around a bunch.” “Salisbury, it is, then,” Sinclair agreed. “Lay in a course. Cory, you and Scooter shoot over to Wuhan in the mini and question the cop involved in that ‘training accident’; see if you can’t get some more data. Hopefully,” he continued, “Julian has pried a little extra cash out of the folks who want Dr. Tam and Company so badly to pay for expenses. They’re clandestine government types, though, so he wants to be careful – weird ones, too.” “Weird?” asked Scootet. He was always interested in weird, and he knew all sorts of things about Alliance government that he wasn’t supposed to. “Yeah, weird,” nodded Sinclair. “Two of them. No IDs, of course, but not military. Not one of our regulars in government. Kind of intense but stoic, real forgettable types. Except for the blue gloves. Don’t know why, but they wore blue gloves.” He shrugged. “Takes all kinds, I guess.”