Free Merkiaari Wars: 02 - What Price Honour by Mark E. Cooper Page A

Millard could he? He couldn’t be Millard the revolutionary leader… could he?
    He was.
    Kate carefully sat on the edge of Millard’s bed and aimed her pistol at his face. He looked very peaceful sleeping there. It seemed a shame to wake him, but she wanted answers. Information was always desirable, especially when she might learn something to pay off her handler that much faster. Knowing the identity of his paymaster seemed a good starting point. She nudged Millard awake with the silencer.
    “What is it, Fleming?” Millard said, groping for the mask.
    Kate let him remove it. His eyes widened in shock, and he slid a hand under the pillow. “Naughty,” she said tapping him on the temple with the silencer. “Bring it out slowly, there’s a good boy.”
    Millard withdrew a small snub-nosed pulser, and Kate took it from him. It was a nice little weapon—short ranged and with a low firing rate, but easy to conceal. It would kill a person just as dead as her slug thrower.
    “I’ll keep this if you don’t mind, Mister Millard.”
    Millard’s lips trembled. “You know who I am. Who are you?”
    “Your executioner I’m afraid.”
    “I guessed that,” the podgy man said bravely. “Sanderson send you?”
    “That’s what I want to talk to you about, Mister Millard. Why was I sent to kill you?”
    Millard’s eyes narrowed in sudden calculation. “You don’t know?”
    “Would I be asking if I did?”
    “I am… I was building an army to fight President Sanderson…”
    “I know that,” Kate interrupted. “What I want to know is who cares enough about a piss pot planet like Tigris to have me sent here?”
    “Why should I tell you? You’re going to kill me anyway.”
    “True,” she said with a smile. “But I don’t like being used—especially not for something like this. I’ll make you a deal. After I kill you, I’ll kill the man who sent me here. How’s that?”
    “How can I refuse?” Millard said with lips trembling. “Sanderson—”
    She shook her head. “No, no, no. I won’t be fooled into finishing your little war for you.”
    “Sanderson has a deal with a corporation on Bethany I tell you. He—”
    “Bethany?” What chance this? He couldn’t know she was from Bethany. “You’re sure?”
    “Everyone knows. Sanderson is skimming from the harvest. He’s been doing it for years. The harvesters are desperate!”
    “Hush.” She prodded him with the gun. “So he’s skimming, so what?”
    “So he’s working with the Whitby Corporation. He supplies them with what they want, and Whitby supplies him with guns and men to keep the harvesters in line. You saw the APCs outside? We stole them from the spaceport before he could take possession. They’re brand new, diverted straight here from an Alliance weapons factory. God knows what they sent instead. Some General is probably spitting mad about that.”
    Whitby… her handler’s paymaster was a Whitby? Damn them! They were behind everything that was wrong with Bethany. They had destroyed her father’s life, leaving her alone and unprepared to care for her brother, and now here she was helping them! Sanderson had called on Whitby’s help to put Millard’s rebellion down, and there was nothing she could do about it… or was there? Her eyes narrowed as a plan began to form.
    Millard was still babbling. “…all his ships. Whitby keeps Sanderson in power. It must be Whitby who sent you. Was it Whitby?”
    Pfft!
    “I don’t know, Mister Millard,” she said to the corpse. “But I think I’ll finish this little war for you after all.”
    Kate stood and quietly left the building.
     * * *
     

Chapter 5
     
    Planet Tigris, Border Zone
    Back at the shuttle, Kate changed out of her sneaksuit and back into civilian clothes trying not to think about Whitby, but it was no good. Whitby was one of the ten ruling families of Bethany. Nothing of importance happened there without the Ten’s say so, which seemed to add credence to Millard’s