Inferno

Tonya. Tonya Welton. Even in that moment of horror and panic, there was still a tiny part of him that paused to marvel at the fact that the beautiful, hard-edged, tough-minded Settler leader loved him, lived with him, lived with a soft-spoken robot designer. There were not many Spacer-Settler couples in the universe, and there were good reasons for that. It was never easy living with Tonya. But it was always exciting, and always worth it.

“Tonya!” Gubber went to the bed and shook Tonya’s shoulder. “Tonya! Wake up!”

“Hmmn’? Hmm? What?” Tonya sat up in bed, yawning., ‘Gubber, what in the stars is it?”

“It’s Grieg! Governor Grieg! He’s been assassinated!”

“What?”

“Shot dead! Sheriff Kresh just a

“Burning hell,” Tonya said, shock and astonishment in her voice. “Last night. I saw him, talked to him last night. And he’s dead?”

“Dead,” Gubber agreed.

“And they don’t know who did it?”

“I don’t think so. They said they were still investigating. But they aren’t going to say anything for a while, no matter what happens.”

Tonya reached for him, and they threw their arms around each other, held each other tight. “This is trouble, Gubber,” said Tonya, her voice a bit muffled with her face in Gubber’s chest. “Trouble for everyone.”

“Yes, yes.”

“But who did it?” Tonya asked, pulling back a little to look into Gubber’s face. “Some lunatic? Was it a plot? Why did they do it?”

Gubber shook his head and thought a minute. “I don’t know,” he said, forcing himself to settle down and think it through, forcing himself to be rational. “It doesn’t matter. The chaos will be the same. All sorts of people will try and take advantage of Grieg’s death. If it wasn’t someone trying to take over who killed him, then someone else is going to try taking over now that he’s dead.”

Tonya Welton nodded, her expression dazed and confused. “I’m sure you’re right,” she said.

“Maybe we should try and get away,” Gubber said. “Get off-planet. There’s going to be trouble.”

“No,” Tonya snapped. Her face took on a hard, set expression. “We can’t. I can’t. I’m here to lead the Settlers on Inferno, not to run off and leave them when there’s trouble. ” She stared deep into Gubber’s eyes, but then she seemed to be looking right through him, past him, at something else “Oh, no,” she said. “Oh, no.”

“What is it?” Gubber asked, grabbing her by the shoulders, trying to get her attention. “Tonya, what is it?”

“The dust-up last night,” Tonya said. “I told you about it when I got in. The two men who got in a fight with me, and were taken away by the phony SSS agents.”

“Yes, what about it?”

“Don’t you see?” she said. “Don’t you get it? Kresh will assume-will have to assume-that the attack on me was part of it, part of the plot. A diversion, or something. That it was staged for some reason to do with Grieg being killed.”

And then Gubber did understand, and he pulled Tonya close and held her tight. He knew instantly that it would be impossible to talk her into leaving, that the Rangers or the Sheriffs Department would stop her from leaving even if she tried. Because he did understand, and understood far more than what she had told him. Kresh would assume the attack on her was staged because of Grieg’s murder: He would also assume that Tonya was one of the people who helped to stage it.

But far worse than that was the tiny bit of Gubber’s own heart. The part who knew how tough, how hard, Tonya could be. How she never flinched from doing what was necessary. She and Grieg never had seen eye to eye. Besides, Tonya and he had both been suspects in the Caliban case.

And Tonya Welton was a good actress. She could always convince Gubber of anything.

Never mind that Kresh would have to suspect Tonya of complicity in the Governor’s murder. The worst of it was that Kresh’s suspicion might even be justified.

Captain Cinta Melloy of the Settler Security Service was angry, and when Cinta Melloy was angry, no one else nearby was likely to find much peace and quiet-not that Kresh would have been likely to get much in any event.

She was leaning over Kresh’s makeshift desk in the ops center. I am shoving myself into your territory, her posture told him. You have slighted me, and I have to bully you to make sure you know to respect me in future. “Why the double-damned hell did I have to find out the Governor was dead off the morning news?” she demanded.

Because we suspected you in the plot-and we still do, Kresh thought. He couldn’t tell Melloy that, of course. Sooner or later that explanation was going to occur to Melloy, if it hadn’t already. If she chose to do something about it, then there would be major trouble, to put it mildly.

For the time being, however, Kresh was resisting the temptation to give Cinta her own back. One rarely got anywhere trying to bully a bully. “This is a Spacer matter, Cinta, pure and simple,” Kresh said in his most diplomatic tones. “A Spacer citizen was shot on Spacer territory. I agree that perhaps we should have contacted you as a courtesy, but there is nothing that required us to do so, and, to be honest, we had other things on our minds besides protocol. ”

“Didn’t it occur to you that my SSS has jurisdiction over nearly this whole damned island besides the Residence?” Melloy demanded. “Didn’t it cross your minds that you might need my help? Didn’t it occur to you that I might decide to see to it you got booted out of your job?”

Yes, and I took the risk eyes-open. “Cinta, we will take all the help we can get. I promise you there was no intent to insult you. ” Just to keep you isolated, and to make sure you weren’t ru

Melloy took her hands off the desk, and stood up straight, slightly mollified, but nowhere near satisfied. “I’m not quite sure I believe you,” she said. “It all sounds a bit too damned reasonable to be coming out of your mouth, Kresh. ”

“Be that as it may, Cinta, we could use your help,” Kresh said, attempting to move the conversation on into other topics. That is, we could use your help now that we’re fairly sure you can’t hurt us by suborning the investigation. “There are a hell of a lot of people being detained at Purgatory’s transport center. The people from the long-range aircars we diverted back from Hades and other spots on the mainland could cause us some trouble. We still have all airspace shut down for the time being, and things are likely to get a bit unruly.”

It was unusual for a place the size of Limbo to have a major transport center, but Purgatory was far enough from the mainland to be out of safe range for the average private aircar. The average citizen either had to use public air transport or a special-purpose long-range aircar to make the journey.

“How much longer can we keep the transport center shut down?” Melloy asked.

“Not long,” Kresh admitted, not failing to notice that Melloy had said “we. ” That was at least somewhat promising. “In fact, come to think of it, I didn’t have the authority to shut it down in the first place. Closing the ports was almost a reflex action, I suppose. First thing I thought of. ” That much at least was true. The odd supporting fact always made a lie seem much more plausible. “Limbo City and the island’s airspace are in your jurisdiction. You’ll have to decide when to lift restrictions. ” In other words, I’ve made a mess and I’m leaving it for you to clean up.