Kilgour followed Sten. He, too, looked down at the tiger's skeleton, then, without realizing it, at Sten's back. Clot, he thought. Ah heard th‘ story, but really didna believe it. Ah ne'er, ne'er woulda gone f r it.
Somewhere across the dome, Sten heard a noise. Or thought he did.
He froze, waiting. Nothing. He chanced a look back at Alex. He could see Kilgour shake his head from side to side through the faceplate. He'd heard nothing.
Sten continued on.
He half expected to find Thoresen's skeleton next, rib cage shattered where his heart had been torn out, still beating. But the body would have been removed and given some kind of burial, or at least dumped into space.
Wouldn't it?
Here was the wall where Thoresen had hung his weapons collection, everything from an archaic flamethrower to a broadax. The racks were empty, weapons most likely souvenired by the victorious Guardsmen as they poured through the dome.
Over there. Thoresen's office. The huge slab that had floated, held invisibly up by McLean generators, was canted against one wall.
And then Baron Thoresen walked out of the gloom.
Sten's willygun was up, finger pulling through to full auto, mind screaming, Goddammit, you aren't there, you aren't there you're dead goddammit or by Christ you're going to be because there aren't any ghosts full magazine right in the middle of that clotting robe, right between where those skinny arms are stretching out for my neck...
He heard the baron's voice through the open mike:
"Don't kill me. Please don't kill me."
A scratchy, wavery old being's androgynous voice.
One thousand out of one thousand normal people would have already opened fire. Nine hundred and ninety-plus Guard-trained combat-experienced soldiers would have, too.
Sten's finger came off the trigger.
"Don't kill me," the old voice said again.
Sten's helmet light slashed on.
In front of him was an emaciated man, ancient skeletal claw arms and hands outstretched, trying to ward off the death he saw from the suited killer in front of him. The few strands of hair left sprayed wildly out above his head.
"I won't hurt you," Sten managed.
The old man was wearing a set of Thoresen's formal robes, the same sort Sten had seen him wear once, when delivering the mock-pious funeral oration for his parents. Stolen from Thoresen's unlooted wardrobe?
Sten lowered his weapon.
Kilgour did not.
He crabbed sideways, around Sten.
"Who're you?"
His voice, amplified, boomed through the chamber. The old man winced.
"Please. Please. Not so loud."
Kilgour brought himself back out from Controlled Panic— Lethal Mode, and his outside speaker control down as well.
"ID yourself."
"I'm not anyone. I'm Dan Forte."
"Where's your ship?"
"I don't have a ship. The others have the ship. They left me here. They said I had no right to live. They said I was... it doesn't matter what they said I was, does it."
"Somebody stranded him," Sten wondered. Alex nodded—he guessed so.
"Ah wonder whae th‘ lad did't' get marooned?"
"Maybe we don't want to know."
"Aye. Dinnae y‘ turn y'r back on th' rascal."
Kilgour went to Forte—the man flinched—and swiftly, expertly, checked him for weapons. "He's clean, metaphoric'ly speakin't... but Ah'd noo be openin‘ m' faceplate't‘ hae a sniff."
"How long have you been here, Dan?" Sten asked.
"Not long. Not long." The old man started laughing, and then singsonging: "A bottle here/A bottle there/A ratpack here/A ratpack there/Breathe it ouf/Breathe it in." His singsong stopped.
"You know, the sun is going to die. They are going to kill it. The Tahn know things like that. What they know/They always know/What they do/They always do."
"Laird hae‘ mercy," Kilgour said. "Th' puir clot's been here since durin't th‘ war!"
"And I watch," Forte went on.
"I always watch.
‘Take me with you. Please. Don't leave me. There was another man. He wore a suit. Like yours. He had a gun. Like yours. I was afraid to ask him. He had a gun. But I was young, then. And afraid of more.
"Now I'm not afraid. There's nothing to be afraid of. Is there?"
Kilgour let his sling snap his rifle back against his chest to carrying port arms.
"No, old ‘un," he said heavily. "Thae's nae't' fright y'self. W're nae but friends."
"That man," Sten said carefully. "Did he leave something here?"
Forte quivered.
"And Moses smote the rock twice... and the congregation drank... and the Lord spoke... because you believe me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children... ye shall not bring this congregation into the land."
"Uh... we believe you, Dan."
"Then strike ye against the wall!" Forte shouted, waving.
Alex and Sten looked at each other. Sten nodded. Alex shrugged, aimed his willygun against the wall Thoresen had hung his weapons on, and snap-fired four times. Once against each corner of the wall.
And it crumbled and fell, as one piece.
Behind the wall, high-piled in a hidden chamber that could have been built by Thoresen or Mahoney, was the Secret. Stack after stack after stack of identical file-storage cases.
Sten rushed forward. Knelt in front of one case. It was neatly labeled, in Mahoney's militarily perfect handwriting:
ASSASSINATIONS, SUCCESSFUL
Official Denials
Suppressed Evidence
Rumors Circulating Following
Personal Theories
Another case:
THE SECRET YEARS
System Politics
Murders Ordered
First AM2 Supplies Provided by
Philanthropic Foundation Instituted
Yet another:
THE "CIBOLA" EXPEDITION Scientific Journals—Expedition Suggested As Possibility
No Other Info Available
No Hard Data Could Be Found
Personal Theories Only
Sten realized what he was looking at.
He didn't know—and suspected Mahoney didn't either—if these cases held The Secret that would destroy the Eternal Emperor—or even A Secret that might help. But he did know these cases contained enough dangerous data for the Emperor to be willing to sacrifice most of the Imperial Guard to recover. These were the notes for the never-written biography.
After the Eternal Emperor had been assassinated by the privy council, Mahoney had found it expedient to retire, and begin plotting the destruction of the council. As a cover he announced that, in deep mourning for his old leader and friend, he would write the Eternal Emperor's complete biography. At first, just a cover. But as he had told Sten, Mahoney would have been quite happy being an archivist instead of a general, and so his files got larger and larger, more and more thorough.
The thought floated up: perhaps if Mahoney had become a researcher he would have lived longer. But he shut that idea out.
The cover had become a fascination, as Mahoney discovered that all biographies of the Eternal Emperor were fraudulent, either authorized or unauthorized. Deliberately false data had been given; incompetent writers, researchers, and foundations had been encouraged while capable ones were shunted aside.
Mahoney found many, many versions of given events, versions that had been deliberately created by the Empire and used as red herrings.
Sten had wondered what the Emperor had been trying to hide, and Mahoney had retorted, "Damned near everything, from where he came from to how he got where he is... I'll just mention two of the murkiest areas, besides where the clot the AM2 is. First is that the son of a bitch is—or was, anyway— immortal.