Man-Kzin Wars IX, Larry Niven [leveled readers TXT] 📗

could be the way to achieve that. What humans would know he was a Kdaptist? He didn't know, he'd made no particular secret of it. He was sure he didn't recognize the human involved? Absolutely.

There was one correlate. Machine Technician's job was servicing loading equipment in the down-axis hub. That put him just five hundred meters from the point Miranda's body was found. It might be coincidence, but it was the only link I had.

I didn't charge him, I bought him a ticket to Wunderland. There were thousands of miles of wilderness down there, where Machine Technician could become Trail Stalker or Chaser-of-Gagrumphs with all the space he wanted and his own kzinrett if he could find one. Slave-of-Kdapt and dishonour would be forgotten. Pity for criminals is something a cop can't afford. Those feelings are reserved for the victims, but Machine Technician was as much a victim as Miranda. He'd been set up to take the fall, and he would have played his part to the hilt and to the death if Hunter-of-Outlaws' thorough . . . interrogation . . . hadn't allowed the truth to come out.

Or, come to think of it, the interrogation I had planned for him with UN Intelligence. Their methods are much gentler, but they're a lot less pleasant on balance. Machine Technician was lucky he'd been caught by one of his own.

He left, thanking me with embarrassing profusion. The one thing worse than an arrogant, dominant kzin is a pathetically humble one.

When he was gone, I went over the data and summed up.

Item: A male Wunderlander had left the Inferno with Miranda—if our only two witnesses were to be believed.

Item: A male Belter had sold her skin to Machine Technician, someone who knew him well enough to know he was vulnerable to this particular frame-up, but not so well that the kzin had recognized him.

Item: Machine Technician's admittedly inadequate description of the suspect was at considerable odds with the couple's.

So if there were two people involved, that pointed to a conspiracy and away from a schitz. If not, it pointed back at Jayce and Tanya. I still lacked too many pieces of the puzzle. I didn't even have a motive.

Tammy stuck her head in the door. "I hear you got a Kdaptist confession."

"Sort of. What we didn't get was a culprit."

"I heard that too. What's up?"

"Hunter tracked down this kzin who claimed he'd killed Miranda. It turns out all he really did was buy her skin from a human and try to claim credit."

"So he's an accessory after the fact. Why did you send him to Wunderland?"

"You hear a lot."

She grinned. "I keep my ears open."

"He was set up and framed, pure and simple. Now that his honour is compromised he's an outcast up here. I thought I'd give him another chance."

"What about using him as a witness?"

"Wunderland is still the safest place for him. How long would he have on Tiamat?"

She winced. "Good point. Well, I have to say I'm glad to hear it wasn't a Kdaptist after all."

I cocked my head. "Why is that?"

She held up her beltcomp. "Here's all the data I've tracked down on the Kdapt cult and current Kzin intelligence operations." She held her other hand up, thumb and forefinger forming an empty circle. "Zero."

"Sorry for the goose chase."

She smiled. "Don't be." She waved the beltcomp. "I've got a new contact and some leverage for a couple more out of it anyway. So where are we now?"

"We know there are at least two people involved. They must have planned to frame Machine Technician in advance of the killing—that's not the sort of detail you work out while you're hiding in a transport tunnel with a corpse. So Miranda wasn't chosen at random. That puts us back to Vorden and Koffman the love-birds, unless someone—some group—wanted her dead for a specific reason."

"It can't be the couple." She waved at the composite holo on the screen. "This is a male."

"We only have their testimony to say there's a second male. Anyway, I think it would be pretty easy to fool Machine Technician on that aspect. Loose clothing would be all it would take."

"Visually, yah, but he could smell the difference. But you're right about the testimony."

"Suppose it's a group for the sake of argument. They must have had a specific reason they wanted her dead."

"So what's the reason?"

"That's what we need to know. Something she knew or something she'd done. She just wasn't up here long enough to have become involved in anything serious. Trist Materials doesn't handle anything worth killing for and if they did the target wouldn't be their brand-new exchange student."

"So it must have been something she was already involved with down on Wunderland."

"Right. Especially since a Wunderlander is a major suspect."

"What groups operate both groundside and in the Belt?"

I considered. "Anyone could send up an assassin. Any of the crime rings, the Isolationists, Kzin intelligence, collabo underground, collabo hunters. Even a few branches of the Provisional Government if she crossed the wrong people."

She shook her head. "We know it's not the tabbies at least. The killers are human."

"But they could be working for the kzinti."

"Get serious. They tried to frame a kzin for the crime and ruined his honour in the process. If they were working for the kzinti, their bosses would eat them when they found out. Alive."

"Good point."

"We've got a lead, though. If she was killed by Wunderland assassins, they must have come up between her arrival and her death. That's a narrow window. Cross-check the Inferno's attendance list with the passenger manifests for every ship that arrived during that time period."

I entered the search request and we watched the screen while it collected the data and compared it. It came up no matches.

"Maybe they knew she was coming. Try the previous six weeks."

I tapped in the query. It took a little longer this time because there was more data to retrieve and sort. The result was the same. no matches.

"Damn!" I cleared the