“I’d have to go with you, sir,” said Rakkim. “Unless, of course, you decide to execute me, in which case I’d be declared the winner.”

“We’re going to have to have a long talk,” said the Colonel, still watching that patch of night sky.

Chapter 44

Rakkim sucked at the strawberry malt as the high-speed train raced across the Canadian Rockies and tried again to figure out why Baby hadn’t killed Moseby and Leo back at the house. It had to have been her decision-Gravenholtz would have killed them on general principles, beaten them to death just to hear their bones crunch. The maglev train rode smoothly four inches above the guideway, its magnetic propulsion system almost silent, but Rakkim felt a steady hum in his ears that gnawed at him, deepening his bad mood. So, why had Baby let them live?

On the other side of the compartment, Leo snored peacefully as he had for the last three days, ever since he’d tried accessing the computer cores detailing the construction of a hafnium bomb. Three days, waking only to stumble to the bathroom or push food into his mouth. He barely spoke, and what he said was a soft muttering in some other language. They had been on the train for the last day, hurtling along at 285 miles an hour. While Leo slept, Rakkim thought about Sarah and Michael; he thought about Malcolm Crews backing into the forest, and the Colonel’s tears and the sight of Baby looking down at him from the ascending chopper…Most of all, he thought about his own failure.

His mission had been simple. First, find the weapon. Then, steal the weapon from the Colonel and either bring it back or destroy it. Better to bring it back where it could be used to intimidate the Mexicans and the Mormons. Or even better, use it to establish trust between the republic and the Belt, start the reconciliation both nations needed. As a last resort, he was to destroy the weapon, so it couldn’t be used against them.

Yesterday, he had contacted Sarah from Montreal. Told her that he had failed. Failed to secure the weapon, failed to destroy the weapon, failed to kill Crews or Gravenholtz. Other than that, the mission was a total success. Sarah said she was just glad he was alive. Glad Leo was alive too. He told Sarah that his best guess was that the hafnium weapon was probably on its way to a research center in China, and Baby and Gravenholtz were richer than anyone needed to be. Baby, anyway. No way would she stick with Gravenholtz after she no longer needed him. Sarah said she’d alert the president to the changing global paradigm. He wasn’t sure exactly what that meant, but he suspected the president wasn’t going to order a parade in his honor or give him another of those a grateful nation thanks you private dinners.

All Rakkim had managed was a mild concussion and three teeth reseated back into his jaw by a dentist in Boonesville who smelled of clove oil. Even Stevenson’s shekel of Tyre was gone. He rubbed his right hand, checked it again. Yeah, the crucifix branded onto his palm was definitely fading, being reabsorbed. He could barely tell what the image was anymore.

Beautiful landscape through the windows, snowcapped mountains and blue vistas, but Rakkim wasn’t interested in sightseeing. He just wanted to be home.

He looked over at Leo lying there, mouth open, a trickle of drool crusted along his chin. Another of Rakkim’s great successes. When they’d left, Leo was the pride of his family, a human computer, a vast step up the evolutionary ladder. At least according to Leo. Now…now he was a glorified gort, one of those lobotomized clones that Swiss billionaires kept on ice for organ transplants.

Moseby had recovered fast, probably as much from Baby’s efforts as his Fedayeen recuperative powers. Another question Rakkim wanted to ask her someday. Moseby looked after Leo, sat beside him, praying, night and day. It couldn’t hurt. Moseby didn’t have much to say to Rakkim, too many bad memories between them maybe, but Moseby did have questions about Leo and his daughter. Not the kind of questions Rakkim would have anticipated, nothing about appropriate or inappropriate contact, of family honor violated. Moseby wanted to know if Leo was a good man. An honest man. He wanted to know if he made Leanne laugh. If he understood her when she said things like numbers were God talking to us in his own voice. He wanted to know if Leo made her happy. Then he drove off in Rakkim’s old car, drove off to join his family, giving the eye in the pyramid hanging from the rearview a spin for good luck.

Rakkim and Leo left the next day. The Colonel had actually embraced Rakkim at the airport in Nashville. Hugged him hard, said he wished all Muslims were like him, the world would be a better place. Rakkim didn’t have the heart to tell him it wouldn’t make any difference. Probably make things worse. The Colonel never said a word about Baby the whole drive to the airport, Leo bundled in the back of the armored personnel carrier while they rode up front. Not a word. They talked about Malcolm Crews, and the likelihood of wiping out his remaining forces. They talked about Leo and what various doctors might be able to do for him. They didn’t talk about Baby. Not until Rakkim was about to walk onto the plane, pushing Leo, who sat sleeping in a wheelchair. The Colonel laid his hand on Rakkim’s shoulder.

The Colonel tugged down his gray uniform, his posture perfect. “Young people…young women particularly…they’re easily led astray,” he said, not making eye contact.

It would have been easy to nod his head and agree, go along, but Rakkim respected the Colonel too much for that. “I’m sure that’s true, sir, but I don’t think there’s a man or woman alive who could lead Baby anyplace she didn’t want to go.”

The Colonel nodded. A sad smile on his face. “Yes…I always loved that about her.” He turned on his heel and stalked across the airport lounge.

The flight from Nashville to Montreal took the plane in a looping curve out into the Atlantic and then north over Canadian airspace. Service was only once a week, and space was reserved months in advance, but the Colonel had made a phone call. Rakkim and Leo had fake Belt passport chips, and a couple of Belt bank accounts-the flight went smoothly, the plane packed with businessmen, most of them foreign nationals intent on staking their claim to the Belt’s resources.

The Colonel said the new president had been selling concessions to the highest bidder since his inauguration, auctioning off chunks of prime real estate and mineral rights. There was even talk of turning the sunken city of New Orleans into a tourist destination. Japanese honeymooners were considered a particularly lucrative market. That’s what happens when you elect your presidents every few years, Rakkim had told him, turns politicians into shortsighted whores. You people and your president-for-life are just as bad, the Colonel had answered-what happens when Kingsley dies? The next one might be a despot, then what are you going to do?

The train hummed along, floating above the guideway, no noise, no friction, no pollution. Sarah said Canada used to be considered the little brother of the United States, slower paced, slightly backward. Today it was a leader in applied technology and research, a pristine ecological storehouse blessed with one of the highest standards of living in the world, ironically fueled by the wealth of its oil sands and natural gas deposits. Rakkim stared out the window as a vast herd of caribou champed listlessly at the tundra.

He kept expecting to hear Darwin’s whisper break the silence. Where’s the gratitude, Rikki? Maybe turn his head and see the assassin standing among the whirling dust motes or lying there when the bed opened up in the train cabin. He was alone, though, just he and Leo. Rakkim had sensed his presence a couple of times, thought of an enormous crab scuttling along the ocean depths…He rubbed the crucifix branded into the palm of his hand. That was real. It was fading by the day, but it was real. It had happened. Leo had asked why Rakkim was allowed into the Church of the Mists and Malcolm Crews left outside. Rakkim still didn’t have an answer.