StarCraft II: Devils' Due (25 page)

grotesque endeavor, the brutality al eviated only by

the fact that Forrest had been a despicable example

of a human being. Jim was down to the bones now,

trying to sever the hand from the wrist. His hands were

warm and sticky, and the smel was turning his

stomach. If Daun started playing the sounds of Feek’s

screaming, Jim wasn’t sure if he could keep it

together.

Another smel was assaulting his nostrils.

Something was burning. He poked his head

cautiously out from under the table and looked up to

see that one of Forrest’s legs had fal en next to one of

the gas burners: low flames were rippling along what

remained of the fabric of his pants. And of course

Daun had deactivated everything—including any

automated fire prevention.

“Shit,” he muttered, ducking back under the table.

He hadn’t gotten the box off Forrest’s arm yet, but with

al the chemicals in here, he had to stop the fire. He

tore off his suit jacket, backed out slowly from under

the table, and began trying to slap out the flames.

“It was amusing to discover you had gone crawling

to Scutter O’Banon. One might say, ‘Out of the frying

pan into the fire.’ I offer release; he offers slavery.”

Jim ignored him. Tychus was silent as wel , which

told Jim he was utterly focused on finding Daun and

taking him out. Jim was completely fine with that. He

continued slapping out the fire, reaching to turn off the

burner. As his fingers closed on the knob, he jostled it

slightly, and something in the beaker atop the burner

splashed out and landed on his jacket sleeve, burning

a neat little hole in it, but it didn’t seem to eat its way

through to his arm.

He stared, and then his fear started to abate. The

fire that had been consuming Forrest’s pants leg now

extinguished, Jim dropped to the floor and crawled

underneath the table again. Calm now, he gave the

wrist of the late Forrest one final chop, tugged the

hand off, and slipped the smal lockbox off the

doctor’s arm and into his pocket. Then he got a firm

grip on the torso.

Suddenly, Jim began to sob loudly. “I can’t take this

anymore!” he cried. “I can’t take living in fear!”

“Jimmy, what the hel you saying, you idiot?”

“I can’t take it no more, Tychus! He’s right: Scutter

can’t protect us. Nobody can. We’re dead men, just

as dead as Forrest!” He hoped that Tychus would

pick up on what he was planning; he couldn’t be any

more obvious than he already was. Daun was as

intel igent as he was terrifying.

“Why, Mr. Raynor, I’m surprised to hear you fibbing.

Though it was quite a good performance. You might

have missed your cal ing.”

Shit. Daun was an empath. No actor in the world

could have tricked him.

“Defiant to the end,” Daun continued. “Al the more

fun for me, after the merry chase you’ve led me on.”

Swearing, Raynor half-stood, swiftly raising

Forrest’s torso above him with one hand. Gunfire

came from a corner of the room near the window, and

despite what Daun had said about toying with Jim,

bul ets spattered Forrest’s body. At the same

moment, Jim reached out for the beaker on the

burner, hissing as his hand closed on the hot glass,

then threw it in the direction of the gunfire.

Daun screamed in agony. He stumbled forward,

Jim and Tychus forgotten, clawing at his eyes. Jim

realized with a jolt of cruel pleasure that the acid had

struck the bastard ful in the face. Jim heard gunfire

behind him as Tychus took a few shots at their enemy,

but Raynor was already heading for the window. The

room wasn’t that high up, if he recal ed correctly, and

it was safer than being in the lab with Daun and a

whole mess of chemicals that might—

He and Tychus crashed through the window a scant

three seconds before the laboratory in the research

and development branch of Besske-Vrain & Stalz

Pharmaceutical Corporation exploded in bal s of

black and orange hel fire. The heat was at their backs,

and Jim and Tychus instinctively waved their arms

and legs as if trying to swim away from it.

The fal seemed to take forever, but as they

crashed into springy green bushes that some

landscape designer had blessedly decided to plant

along a walkway, they realized that (1) the fal was

only about three stories and (2) they were alive.

Hurting, but alive. Jim was pretty sure something

was broken in his already burned hand, and he felt as

if he’d been shaken like a rat in the jaws of a lyote, but

they were alive.

“Don’t nap, Jimmy! Get your ass outta that bush!”

Tychus growled. He pressed a hand to his ribs but

seemed to be moving briskly enough. His face was

scratched, and Jim tasted blood from his own split lip.

Jim clambered out of the lifesaving topiary. Sirens

were already wailing, mixing with the sounds of

people screaming. Tychus pointed at the crowd of

people fleeing the building. Guards tried to instil

some sense of calm, but it was useless: the terrified

doctors, technicians, and office drones were not

having any of it. “That’s our cover,” he said. “Let’s go!”

Before Jim could object, Tychus was hightailing it

toward the stream of terrified people, waving his

hands in the air and screaming like a little girl. Jim

shrugged mental y and joined the flow, shrieking and

flailing, too, and the two let the crowd carry them out.

The chaos was indeed perfect cover, and less than

three minutes later Jim and Tychus had fol owed the

stream of Besske-Vrain & Stalz employees al the

way to the parking lot.

Many of the groundcars were beautiful, befitting

their task of ferrying obscenely wealthy business

executives. Others were a bit simpler. In the

confusion, Tychus approached one of the executives

just as he was about to get in his vehicle, knocked

him unconscious with a wel -landed punch, and

hopped inside while Jim tumbled in the passenger

side.

Jim’s face split into a grin, despite the terrible pain

of the gesture and the agony in his hand, as the long,

sleek silver groundcar roared to life, and a few

minutes

later

the

panicky

throngs,

wailing

ambulances, and plumes of smoke were fading in the

rearview mirror.

“Tychus?” Jim said after they had made certain that

they had indeed escaped undetected. “I … don’t know

if I can keep doing this.”

“Doing what?” Tychus asked. He pressed a hand to

his side briefly, then reached in the breast pocket of

his suit coat and removed a smashed cigar. He

sighed sadly at the waste.

“This. That bastard is a damned shadow. We can’t

shake him. The only reason we’ve been able to

dodge him twice now is because we’ve been lucky.

That’s it. Not because we’re smarter, or better, or

sharper shooters—but because of blind, stupid, fickle

luck
. We got out last time using some poor bastard’s

body as a shield, and this time only because of a

damned Bunsen burner and the beaker on top of it.”

Tychus grunted. “Wel , I won’t argue that we’ve been

lucky. But I don’t think Daun could have survived that.”

His lips curved around the cigar in a smile. “Was

awful nice to hear him screaming. Nice touch, Jimmy.”

Jim shook his head and cradled his injured hand. “I

don’t think he was kil ed. I don’t know that he
can
be

kil ed.”

“Now, that’s just scared speaking.”

“He might have survived. I don’t know how, but he

might have. And if he has, he is going to come back

after us with a vengeance. How the hel did he know to

show up there, anyway? So much for O’Banon

protecting us,” Jim said in disgust.

“I said, I think Daun’s crunchy on the outside.”

“Tychus, we almost got kil ed! By al rights we

should have been! Scutter was supposed to protect

us!”

“Look. If somehow Daun did survive this, O’Banon

wil make a deal for us, Jimmy, and then that psycho

wil go away.”

“A deal that wil make us slaves to him. Tychus,

there’s nothing about this that doesn’t stink to high

heaven. Not a damned thing.”

“
You
stink pretty bad,” was Tychus’s only comment.

“Gentlemen,” said the image of Scutter O’Banon

from a computer screen, “I have to say, you are failing,

quite drastical y, to live up to your reputations. You

have been given exactly one mission, and it was a

complete disaster.” The voice was clipped, cool with

barely concealed anger. O’Banon himself was off on

business and not physical y present, which was

probably a good thing. A stone-faced Cadaver had

col ected the lockbox when Jim and Tychus had

arrived at the mansion, and had left them alone in the

receiving room with the computer.

Tychus blew out a breath. “Now, sir, I wil remind

you that we came under attack by a very zealous

bounty hunter. We adjusted our percentage with you in

order to be protected from this same asshole. And

despite this, we survived and came home with the

formula for and a sample of Utopia. Frankly, sir, Dr.

Forrest was a dick, and I say we brought you the

better end of the deal.”

“Your job was to bring back both the lockbox and al

it contained
and
Dr. Forrest. It seems the late doctor

failed to include a very important part of the formula.

It’s going to take weeks to determine the missing

element.”

Tychus feigned shock. “Real y? Why, that

treacherous bastard! But that ain’t our fault that he did

that. You know, upon reflecting on the entire incident,

I’d say that it was hardly a complete disaster. Looks

like neither of us held up our ends of the bargain.”

“I don’t care if you were under fire from the entire

Confederacy. You have failed.”

Jim gritted his teeth, almost literal y biting back

words.

“I bet you we’d be a hel of a lot more efficient if we

didn’t have to worry about Daun nipping at our heels

al the time. That was our deal, Scutter: we come work

for you, you keep us safe while we’re doing it.”

“I don’t know that you’re worth trying to keep safe if

you can’t even manage a heist a toddler could

handle.”

Jim had had enough. “I’m outta here,” he said,

turning for the door.

Tychus muted the mic. “Jim, wait a—”

“Hel with waiting. I need a drink.” He stalked off as

Tychus resumed trying to placate the shark.

Tychus found Jim about an hour later. He was in

a darkened corner of the bar in one of the

comparatively quieter establishments. He’d ordered

an entire bottle of Scotty Bolger’s Old No. 8 and was

wel into it by the time Tychus’s large shape loomed

up in front of him.

“This place is utterly dead. What the hel you wanna

c o me
here
and party for?” Tychus reached out a

dinner plate–sized hand, grasped the bottle, and took

a swig.

“I ain’t come here to party,” Jim said.

“I don’t know what’s going on with you, Jimmy, but

you ain’t been a lot of fun recently. And as nothing

else
has been a lot of fun, either, that kinda pisses me

off.”

Jim poured himself another shot and downed it.

“You wanted to know what business I had on Shiloh?”

“Yep.”

“My mother died.”

There was silence. “Wel , Jimmy, I am right sorry to

hear that,” Tychus said quietly, and Jim knew he was

being sincere.

Slightly mol ified, Jim nodded and asked, “What

happened to your parents?”

“Don’t know, don’t care. Ran away from home at

age twelve and ain’t never looked back.”

“You’d care if you heard they was dead.”

“I don’t know about that,” Tychus said, again with

total honesty. “But it’s obvious you do. And like I said

… I’m sorry.”

Jim smiled a little. “Thanks. I just want to sit here for

a bit and drink and think.”

“Usual y the former don’t help with the latter, but

sometimes it does. You do whatever you gotta,

Jimmy. Me, I gotta get trashed and make little Tychus

happy.”

Jim laughed aloud at that. “You go take care of

that.”

“I’l come find you tomorrow.”