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Knowledge is the province of the Legue is a source of criht&039;ve known an assignment from Jedrik could not be simple There had to be Dosadi complications
"There can be no question in their minds that you&039;re really my lieutenant"
"Then I ave hi encounter could not be an act He must respond as one as fully aware of this planet&039;s deht fell over Chu while she prepared him and, when they returned to the command post where Gar and Tria waited, the occasion presented itself as Jedrik had told him it would It was a sortie by Broey&039;s people against Gate Eighteen Jedrik snapped the orders at hi
"Find the purpose of that!"
McKie paused only to pick up four waiting guards at the co the unconcealed surprise in Gar and Tria They&039;d formed a particular opinion of McKie&039;s position and now had to seek a new assessment Tria would be most upset by this, confused by self-doubts McKie knew Jedrik would i Gar and Tria that McKie would go with thehteen
"You hteen turned out to be ate itself and two buildings One of the attackers, diving from an upperinto one of Jedrik&039;s best units, had blown himself up with a nasty lot of casualties
"More than a hundred dead," a breathless courier told him
McKie didn&039;t like the implications of a suicide attack, but couldn&039;t pause to assess it They had to eliave orders for two feints while a third force blasted down one of the captured buildings, sate in rubble That left the other captive building isolated The swiftness of this success dazzled Jedrik&039;s forces, and the commanders snapped to obedience when McKie issued orders for the those captives to hiation
At McKie&039;s coht a map of the area, tacked it to a wall Less than an hour had passed since he&039;d left Jedrik, but McKie felt that he&039;d entered another world, one eventhe incredible woman who&039;d set all of this in motion It was the difference between second- and third-hand reports of action and the physical feeling of that action all around hi of fla at the map, McKie said, "This has all theforce out of the area Tell Jedrik"
People scurried to obey
One of the guards and two sub-couard spoke
"What about this place?"
McKie glanced around him It was a square room with broalls Ts looked out on the street away froate He&039;d hardly looked at the rooht him here to set up his command post Four streets with isolated holdouts cushioned him froe to another building if things became hot here And it&039;d help er area
He spoke to one of the sub-commanders:
"Go down to the entry Call all the elevators down there and disable all but one Stand by that one with a holding force and put guards in the stairway Stand by yourself to bring up captives Comment?"
"I&039;ll send up two cable teas are secure"
Of course! McKie nodded
Gods! How these people reacted in e as knives
"Do it," McKie said
He had less than a ten-minute wait before two of Jedrik&039;s special security troops brought up the first captive, a young Gowachin whose eyelids bore curious scars - scroll-like and pale against the green skin
The two security people stopped just inside the doorway They held the Gowachin fir The sub-coht them up closed the door as he left
One of the captors, an older ht McKie&039;s attention
"What&039;ll we do with him?"
"Tie him in a chair," McKie instructed
He studied the Gowachin as they co to escape froe line"
"Alone?"
"I don&039;t know He&039;s the first of a group of prisoners The others are waiting outside"
They had finished binding the young Gowachin, now took up position directly behind him
McKie studied the captive He wore black coveralls with characteristic deep vee to clear the ventricles The garment had been cut and torn in several places He&039;d obviously been searched with swift and brutal thoroughness McKie put down a twinge of pity The scar lines on the prisoner&039;s eyelids precluded anything but the most direct Dosadi necessities
"They did a poor job re your Phylunized the scar lines: Deep Swimmers It was a relatively unimportant Phylum, s Gowachin blinked McKie&039;s opening remark had been so conversational, even-toned, that the shock of his words came after Shock was obvious now in the set of the captive&039;s mouth
"What is your name, please?" McKie asked, still in that even, conversational way
"Grinik"
It was forced out of hiuards for a notebook and stylus, wrote the Gowachin&039;s na the Phylum identification
"Grinik of the Deep Swi have you been on Dosadi?"
The Gowachin took a deep, ventricular breath, remained silent The security ation wasn&039;t going as they&039;d expected McKie himself did not knohat to expect He still felt hinition of the badly erased Phylum tattoos
"This is a very small planet," McKie said "The universe fro and can be very cruel I&039; to die"
If this Grinik didn&039;t know the deadly plans of his superiors, that would ee shortly McKie&039;s words could be construed as a personal threat beyond any larger threat to Dosadi as a whole It re Gowachin hesitated
When in doubt, remain silent
"You appear to&039;ve been adequately trained for this project," McKie said "But I doubt if you were told everything you should know I even doubt if you were told things essential to you in your present position"
"Who are you?" Grinik demanded "How dare you speak here of lanced at the two guards standing at his shoulders
"They know all about us," McKie lied
He could smell the sweet perfume of Gowachin fear now, a floral scent which he&039;d noted only on a few previous occasions The two guards also sensed this and showed faint smiles to betray that they knew its import
"Your masters sent you here to die," McKie said "They may very well pay heavily for this You ask who I aum of the Gowachin Bar, Saboteur Extraordinary, senior lieutenant of Jedrik ill shortly rule all of Dosadi I make formal imposition upon you Answer my questions for the Law is at stake"
On the Gowachin worlds, that was a most powerful motivator Grinik was shaken by it
"What do you wish to know?"
He barely ed the words
"Your mission on Dosadi The precise instructions you were given and who gave them to you"
"There are twenty of us We were sent by Mrreg"
That name! The implications in Gowachin lore stunned McKie He waited, then:
"Continue"
"Two more of our twenty are out there"
Grinikfor his captive associates
"Your instructions?"
"To get our people out of this terrible place"
"How long?"
"Justsixty hours remain"
McKie exhaled slowly So Aritch and co to eliminate Dosadi
"Where are the other members of your party?"
"I don&039;t know"
"You were, of course, a reserve team trained and held in readiness for this mission Do you realize how poorly you were trained?"
Grinik relanced at the two guards He understood that they&039;d brought him this particular captive because this was one of three ere not Dosadi Jedrik had instructed thes became clearer to him in this neareness Jedrik had put sufficient pressure on the Gowachin beyond the God Wall She still had not io in stopping her It was tihted And Broey must be told Especially Broey - before he sent many more suicide missions