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I woke from a nightmare where Keith had sent his Strike team to break into my unit and kidnap Lucas. When I discovered I was lying on the living room carpet with a blanket over me, I looked around urgently for Lucas, but couldn’t see him at all.
For a hideous second, I thought Lucas really had been kidnapped. I was on the edge of panic, when I realized the lump under the blanket next to me was Lucas. I relaxed and rubbed my face with my hands. The news that Keith had tried to take Lucas away from me had shaken me more than I’d thought.
I pulled down the blanket to reveal Lucas’s head. He was still asleep, and his pained expression showed he was having nightmares too. I instinctively linked to his mind, and saw his multitude of thought levels were being sucked into a swirling cloud of red and black that dominated his subconscious. I was sucked in with them and found a single fragment of memory at the centre of the cloud.
Lucas was sitting at the Tactical Command control bank in the Tactical office, his eyes fixed on the vast main screen that showed the mosaic of images from crystal unit cameras when I was on a run with the Strike team. There were several possible formats for that mosaic. In this memory, three words were glowing bright red at the top of the screen. “Focus Bodyguard Team.”
The six large images below that were labelled with my name and those of my five bodyguards. The images all showed views of the blue and white living room of the head of Hive Politics.
“Bodyguard formation two attack, three defence!” screamed Matias’s voice.
I was caught up by Lucas’s frantic emotions as he pressed his right hand tightly over his mouth.
... mustn’t speak. Can’t say anything to help. Would only distract Amber’s bodyguards at ...
I left Lucas’s mind, took hold of his shoulders, and shook him. “Lucas, wake up!”
Lucas sat up with a gasp, opened his eyes, and stared at me blankly for a moment before speaking. “Bad dream.”
“I saw it. Why are you having nightmares about what happened with Alvin? A research scientist with a knife was never going to get past five trained bodyguards to harm me.”
Lucas shrugged. “Lottery chooses Strike team members with the right personality to bounce straight back after a difficult run. Tactical team members are chosen for their ability to analyze situations in detail though. I can’t stop myself from analyzing that target breakaway, and working out all the catastrophic things that could have happened if we’d been dealing with a more dangerous wild bee.”
“You never really stop working at all.” I remembered something from yesterday. “Roden said you were juggling the demanding role of being constantly available as the telepath’s partner with the even more demanding role of Tactical Commander.”
Lucas gave me a wary look. “Please don’t let Roden’s comments worry you. He’s had no experience of working with a telepath like you, so he’s imagining me filling two entirely separate roles. He doesn’t realize that we aren’t just partners in the romantic sense, but also work together as partners to run this unit, so my two roles are actually merged into one.”
“I’m not too demanding a girlfriend then?”
Lucas grinned at me. “How often do I vanish off to work all night with my Tactical team?”
“About once a week.”
“Do you think a demanding girlfriend would allow that?” Lucas yawned, glanced at the main wall display, and rummaged through the clothes lying nearby to find his dataview. “It’s breakfast time. I asked Megan to call me when Gregas and Wesley arrived at our holding cells. I’d better check ...”
He broke off his sentence, and frowned at the dataview screen. “Why is my dataview on silent mode with all calls and messages queueing?”
A memory of yesterday evening surfaced. “That’s my fault,” I said guiltily. “I didn’t want anyone calling you while ...”
Lucas burst out laughing. “I understand, but people may have been a bit worried about me being flagged as unavailable even for priority calls.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I meant to set your dataview back to normal later, but I must have fallen asleep.”
Lucas laughed again. “Well, we both needed a good night’s rest.”
He tapped the dataview screen, and an automated voice spoke. “You have two hundred and seventeen messages queueing.”
Lucas made a peculiar squeaking sound, and started working his way through his messages. I felt this wasn’t a good time to be checking his thoughts, so I just watched nervously. Lucas could read at incredible speed and was dealing with at least one message a second. Finally, he gave a dazed shake of his head.
“Megan called me to confirm that Gregas and Wesley had arrived and been put under hypnotics. When she got the autoreply about me being unavailable, she called Emili instead, and that seems to have triggered a wave of panic across all the Telepath Units.”
“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “If Emili was worried, why didn’t she call my dataview and ask to speak to you?”
“Emili assumed I was unavailable because I was desperately trying to stop you declaring war on Mira. She wouldn’t risk calling your dataview in that situation, would she?”
I sighed. “I suppose not.”
“I’ll just send a general reply to all the messages, saying everything is fine.” Lucas tapped at his dataview, then stretched luxuriously and dropped into his speed speech. “Shower. Clothes. Large breakfast?”
I realized it was twenty-four hours since I’d had a proper meal. “Huge breakfast.”
We showered and dressed. I’d normally have spent ages dithering about what to wear for a shopping trip with my mother, but I was so hungry that I just grabbed a random set of casual clothes, headed for the kitchen unit, and ordered large breakfasts with double potato slices for both me and Lucas.
The kitchen unit produced our drinks rapidly, but then tormented me with cooking smells for what seemed like far longer than usual. It eventually made the longed-for binging sound and produced two heavily laden plates of food.
Lucas and I sat down at the table, and were totally focused on eating breakfast for the next few minutes. When I’d eaten everything down to the last potato slice, I sat back in my chair and asked the question that was bothering me.
“Why are people so worried about me starting a war with Mira? What have I done to make everyone believe I’d be that destructive? I admit I’ve lost my temper a few times, but ...”
“Nobody believes you’re destructive,” said Lucas. “The reason people are panicking is because of something that happened over a decade ago. Keith read the mind of one of Sapphire’s lovers, she was furious about it, and the Telepath Unit Tactical Commanders are still dealing with the consequences even now.”
I thought about my first call from Sapphire, when she’d told me about the telepaths’ rules of good manners. She’d said it was bad manners for another telepath to nose around inside her people’s minds, and extremely bad manners for that telepath to call her and gloat about discovering her personal information.
It had been clear Sapphire was describing an actual event, and I’d guessed Keith was the guilty party. Sapphire’s anger back then had made me think she was describing something that had happened recently, but it had to be the same incident that Lucas was talking about now. Over a decade had passed, but Sapphire was still furious with Keith.
“Was that a chance encounter like Mira’s Strike team arresting Gregas?” I asked.
“No, Keith deliberately planned it.” Lucas pulled a pained face. “Keith discovered one of Sapphire’s lovers would be celebrating his birthday with his parents at their apartment, and arranged to be on a check run near there on that day. He then invented a fake target running away, to get his Strike team to take him close enough to the apartment to read the man’s mind. As the final touch, Keith sent his Strike team charging into the birthday party to arrest the man.”
Lucas winced. “Keith’s Strike team leader recognized Sapphire’s lover in time to stop him from being arrested, but the main damage had already been done. It was obvious to everyone that Keith had carefully arranged the chase to get personal information about Sapphire. She was naturally incensed about it, and refused to co-operate in any way with Keith’s unit for years.”
“That must have made things very difficult for all the Telepath Units.”
“It was far more than difficult,” said Lucas grimly. “There’ve been at least a dozen times when Keith’s telepathy shut down on an emergency run, and his Tactical Commander wanted to hand the target over to Sapphire, but she refused to get involved.”
I remembered what Morton had told me about the long-ago mental battle to the death between two telepaths. That had happened because one telepath had taken advantage of a meeting during a target handover to launch an attack on the other. Our Hive had brought in special procedures since then, to make sure telepaths stayed at a safe distance from each other during target handovers, but I could see why Sapphire wouldn’t want to risk getting involved in one with Keith.
“I can understand Sapphire being worried that Keith was lying again,” I said aloud.
“I understand too,” said Lucas, “but people died because of Sapphire refusing to take over those targets. You can see why everyone was panicking that you’d suspect Gregas’s arrest had been deliberately arranged too. We’ll soon be down to only four operational Telepath Units. A conflict between you and Mira would be disastrous for the Hive.”
I stared down at my empty breakfast plate. Now I knew what had happened between Keith and Sapphire, everything made a lot more sense, and I had to admit that people had good reason to be worried. It was easy to misinterpret a situation when you had no direct contact with someone. I’d never have suspected Mira of deliberately arranging for Gregas to be arrested, but I might have wondered if she’d taken advantage of the situation to nose around in his thoughts.
All the potential misunderstandings had been avoided because Mira had called and told me about Gregas herself. The secret communication channel between telepaths, and the code of good manners, had saved the Hive from some serious problems.
“There’s no need for anyone to worry about a conflict between Mira and me,” I said aloud.
“Hopefully they all realize that now.” Lucas stood up. “It’s time for us to go on your shopping trip.”
As we headed for the apartment door, Lucas frowned at me. “You aren’t carrying a bag, Amber.”
I gave him a puzzled look. “Why would I want a bag? I won’t need to carry any clothes I buy. When my mother took me clothes shopping on Level 27 as a child, the shops delivered everything we bought to our apartment. Level 1 shops must do the same.”
“I meant that Buzz wanted you to take your beach dress on this trip,” said Lucas. “You aren’t wearing it, and you don’t have a bag, so ...”
“Waste it!”
I went back to the bedroom, took two minutes to find the beach dress, three more to find a bag, and then Lucas and I finally headed out of our apartment door. When we arrived at the lifts, Buzz eagerly stepped forward to take my bag. I frowned at the group of people waiting with her. I’d been expecting Buzz, Eli, Forge, and four Beta team bodyguards to be going on this trip. The fact that Rafael was there must mean that Adika had made his decision on which of Zak and Rafael to move to the Beta team.
“I hope you’re happy about being on the Beta team, Rafael,” I said.
Rafael’s eyes flickered in the direction of his new teammates. “I’m thrilled about it. I consider my move to the Beta team as being a promotion.”
Forge laughed and slapped him on the back. “You’re perfectly right, Rafael. It is a promotion. You’re going to be my right-hand man, helping me run training sessions and ...”
Forge broke off his sentence, and turned to look at where someone was running towards us. I grimaced as I saw it was Tobias. Forge lifted a hand to touch the crystal unit in his ear, and the camera extension unfolded at the right side of his face.
Tobias skidded to a halt in front of him. “Forge, why didn’t you tell me about this bodyguarding trip?”
“Why should I tell you about something that isn’t your business?” asked Forge coldly.
Tobias’s face flushed with anger. “This is my business. If you’re taking Rafael on this trip, then you have to take me as well. We’ve both just transferred from the Alpha team, so we’re your best men.”
I’d hoped that the shock of being transferred to the Beta team would make Tobias change his attitude for the better, but he was behaving even worse than before. Hadn’t he noticed the camera extension beside Forge’s right cheek? Didn’t he realize that meant Forge was recording this exchange to show to Adika later? I’d negotiated one last chance for Tobias, but he was throwing it away.
“When Adika transferred Jalen to the Alpha team, I was sorry to lose him,” said Forge. “Now I’m delighted to have Rafael to take Jalen’s place on the Beta team, but you ...”
Forge’s voice took on a withering edge. “I’ve heard all about what happened on yesterday’s run, Tobias, and feel you’re nothing but a liability to the Beta team. Adika explained your situation to both of us last night, and I listened carefully to what he said, but you don’t seem to have heard a single word. You aren’t one of my best men. You aren’t even a proper member of the Beta team.”
“But ...”
Forge’s voice grew louder, drowning out Tobias’s attempt to speak. “You were dropped from the Alpha Strike team for incompetence. Adika has notionally attached you to the Beta Strike team, to give you a last chance to stay in this unit. You may take part in Beta team training sessions, but you are not a proper member of my team, and you are absolutely not to be included in any of our runs.”
“But this isn’t a proper run,” said Tobias. “It’s only a bodyguarding trip.”
“Only a bodyguarding trip,” Forge repeated Tobias’s words in disbelief. “That statement sums up what’s wrong with your attitude, Tobias. Our primary duty is always safeguarding the telepath. The Hive has entrusted us with guarding the life of one of its most rare and vital resources. Anyone who can use the phrase ‘only a bodyguarding trip’ doesn’t deserve the honour of a place on a Strike team. Now get out of here, and that’s an order!”
Tobias held his position stubbornly. “I’m not going anywhere, Forge. You’re taking my words and twisting their meaning.”
I groaned. Tobias had just defied a direct order from Forge, in front of multiple witnesses and with a crystal unit camera recording him. I’d promised Adika that he could transfer Tobias to Hive Defence if he caused any more problems. Adika would say that this counted as a problem, and he’d be right.
Tobias was talking again, his fiercely entitled tone emphasizing that transferring him was the only possible option. “Adika said that I needed to impress him. How can I do that if I’m not allowed to ...?”
Lucas glanced anxiously at me and interrupted him. “Tobias, you’ve delayed this shopping trip for long enough. Amber was already under severe stress over the Gregas situation, and your behaviour ...”
“You stay out of this!” Tobias’s hand curled into a fist as he swung around to face Lucas.
Forge was reaching out to pull me away from Tobias, but I instinctively dodged him and stepped between Tobias and Lucas. “Tobias, stop!”
There was a flash of pain on my left cheek, and I was knocked sideways. I hit the floor hard, and lay on my right side, too dazed to move.
Somewhere out of my view, there was the sound of a fight, followed by gunfire and shouting voices. A second later, Lucas was kneeling next to me, his eyes wide with fear.
“Amber, are you all right?”
I spoke slowly because the left side of my face was stinging. “Yes, of course. Tobias just knocked me over.”
I tried to sit up, but there was a sharp pain from my right arm, and Lucas urgently shook his head. “Amber, you must stay perfectly still until Megan and the medical team get here.”
I sank back down again. Buzz was standing nearby, rapidly gabbling something into her dataview. Beyond her, Tobias was lying limply on the ground, eyes closed, with Forge and Rafael standing over him. I remembered the sound of gunfire and gasped.
“Has Tobias been shot?”
“You shouldn’t be worrying about Tobias,” said Lucas. “He was only shot on stun.”
At that moment, Adika came charging up, threw one look at me, and snapped a single word at Forge. “Report!”
Forge spoke in a despairing voice. “Tobias tried to punch Lucas. Amber jumped in the way, so Tobias hit her instead. We’ve stunned, sedated, and disarmed him. My crystal unit camera recorded the whole thing, so you’ll be able to watch the image sequence yourself.”
“A member of our Strike team punched our telepath,” Adika said savagely. “The entire unit is going to spend the rest of our lives scrubbing slime vats.”
“I won’t let the rest of you get blamed for this,” I said. “What happened was my own fault.”
I tried to sit up again, but Lucas grabbed my shoulders.
“I’m begging you to stay still, Amber.” He glanced across at Buzz. “Where the waste is Megan?”
“She’s on her way,” said Buzz.
A small crowd had gathered and was standing in deathly silence watching us. Adika stabbed a forefinger at Rothan who was in the front row.
“Get some of your men and take Tobias down to the holding cells. He’s to stay locked up, with double sets of restraints on him, and under constant guard until we decide what to do with him.”
Rothan nodded at Kaden and Dhiren, then went over to Tobias, and effortlessly slung him over his shoulder before walking away.
Megan came running up a few seconds later, towing a wheeled stretcher. Crista, our unit doctor specializing in injury treatment, was chasing after her.
Lucas hastily stood up and moved out of the way to let Megan kneel beside me.
“Amber, exactly where did Tobias punch you?” she demanded.
I pointed at my left cheek. “It was more of an accidental slap than a punch, but it knocked me off balance. I fell and landed on my right elbow. That’s hurting quite a bit.”
Megan waved some sort of mini scanner at my cheek. “Did you hit your head in the fall?”
“No.”
“Are you absolutely sure you didn’t hit your head?” asked Megan.
“I am absolutely, totally, and utterly sure that I didn’t hit my head,” I said. “As I told you, I landed on my right elbow, which is extremely painful.”
Megan continued scanning both my cheek and head for the next minute, then handed the scanner to Crista. I hoped Crista was going to do something about my elbow, but she spent at least two minutes scanning my head, and then had a brief, unintelligibly technical discussion with Megan.
Finally, Megan announced her verdict to the anxious crowd. “Amber has a bruised cheek, but there are no signs of brain trauma.”
There was a general sigh of relief, and I coughed pointedly. “My elbow still hurts.”
Crista scanned the painful elbow that everyone clearly considered of minimal importance compared to my telepathic head. “You’ve got significant bruising to your right arm, Amber, but nothing is broken. I’ll give you an injection to help with the pain and swelling.”
She gave me a shot with a pressure jet, and the pain in my elbow gradually faded away.
“Thank you,” I said. “Can I get up now?”
“Yes,” said Megan.
Lucas helped me to my feet, and I looked around. The silent crowd had now expanded to fill the large open area by the lifts and was overflowing into the corridors. As far as I could tell, every person in my unit was here, including all the cleaners and maintenance workers.
“Listen carefully, everyone,” I said. “You mustn’t blame my bodyguards for what happened, and don’t mention it to anyone outside this unit. It was entirely my own fault for jumping between Tobias and Lucas.”
“Yes, it was your fault,” said Lucas, in the murderous voice of someone who’d just moved on from being terrified about my safety to wanting to strangle me himself. “You must never, ever, ever do anything that stupid again. I’m perfectly capable of dodging a punch.”
I lifted my hands in surrender. “I accept that I shouldn’t have got in the way, and I shouldn’t have insisted on Tobias being given a second chance on the Beta team either. Now he’s going to be transferred to Hive Defence, just as Adika wanted.”
“I’m not sure that a transfer to Hive Defence will be possible any longer,” said Buzz, “but we can’t make any decisions about Tobias now. We need to give him until at least tomorrow morning to calm down and fully absorb what he’s done. After that, I can do a psychological assessment and decide the best options for his future. If you wish, you can read his mind as part of that assessment, to satisfy yourself that no errors are made.”
I tugged at my hair. “I will want to do that, but you’re right. Tobias needs time to calm down, and I have to go shopping with my mother.”
“You’re still planning to go shopping?” Megan sounded incredulous.
“Yes. I must have cancelled this shopping trip a dozen times already. I’m not abandoning it over a bruised elbow.”
