The Machiavelli Interface Read Free

began to outline what she wanted. It was a little frightening, somehow, that they would defer so readily.
    Dirisha took the holograph to the computer terminal in her room and began to prepare the unit to scan the image. Normally, Geneva would be here with her, just as Bork and Mayli usually shared room and bed. But for this, individual attention was needed. The plans for the prison in which Khadaji was being held needed to be as familiar to the matadors and matadoras as their own bodies. There could be no mistakes allowed, were they to survive.
    As the computer's molecular/viral brain digested the image placed before its scanner, Dirisha allowed the thought she'd suppressed earlier to surface.
    Yes, they could do it, if Khadaji stayed where he was. If they moved quickly enough, they might free him. But it would have to be very fast indeed; otherwise, what would be left might not be much. The brain that lit Khadaji and Pen might be broken on the wheel of the Confed's mental machineries, leaving only a husk without the ability to generate any thoughts. They would need a puppet for their show trial, and if that was to be avoided, there was no time to lose.

Three
    THE WALL regarded himself with a critical eye. He smiled, and his wraith returned the expression exactly. The dop-pelganger produced by the holographic mirror was a perfect twin; from a third viewpoint, it would be nearly impossible to tell which was the man and which was the image of the man. Had he been inclined to existentialism, Wall could have made some interesting observations.
    Ho, brother. We have changed, over the years, haven't we ?
    The image nodded almost sadly. Facing Wall stood a tall and physically perfect man who looked forty, though he was half again that age; the shade was dark-skinned, blue-eyed, and black-haired; it wore a face Wall's mother would not have recognized. Like the caster, the reflection was a careful sham, a construct built to hide the true form. Even the name was a disguise, full of historical psychology and no more real than the holoprojic image that regarded Marcus Jefferson Wall thoughtfully.
    "Off," Wall said. His twin disappeared like a light switched off. Wall grinned. He had come a long way from the Darkworld. He had been born an albino, one of the experimental sports that still bred true on the far world of Rim, a hundred years after such genetic tamperings had been forbidden.
    Chemicals and dyes and lenses had hidden the external signs; surgery and implants had changed his face. He no longer looked the part of an exotic, though he still had one advantage common to his pale brothers and sisters: he was pheromonically potent. Like all the albinos from the Darkworld, Wall held an almost magical attraction for normal humans. Such a thing wasn't totally responsible for what he had become, of course, but it had helped. Ah, yes, it had helped....
    Enough of this stroll through the memory vaults, he decided. Nichole would be arriving shortly; he must be ready. At the thought of the girl, Wall felt himself flush. Nichole Miyamoto was a trembling twelve, a rare and precious flower just beginning to bud. He was looking forward to opening her petals. That her father was one of Kokl'u's ministers made it easier, of course. The man was ambitious, and who better than Wall the Kingmaker as a friend? Wall trusted no man or woman past a near point, but he was generous with those he considered his friends. Minister Miyamoto could become a friend, through his daughter....
    "A visitor," the security comp said. The voice of the machine was soft, feminine, even childlike.
    Ah, Nichole!
    "Show me."
    The holoproj lit to his left, filling the space left vacant for it. The image coalesced from formless color, to show the elfin form of Nichole standing at the entrance to his sanctum. As he watched, the security computer scanned the image, giving for a brief moment a flash of bare skin under the thin silk robe. The skin faded to muscle and the shadows of