"My name," the young man says, pulling a vibroshiv from a pouch on his utility belt, "is Sam Francisco. You killed my sister. Prepare to die."

 -----
BIA#2: 'The Least Dangerous Game.'
Chapter Ten: "She's So High"
by Eddie Robson
-----

 Back in the bar, Benny sits back in her chair, satisfied with how things have turned out. In fact, she feels uncommonly happy. She feels a tap on her shoulder and turns around.

 There's nobody there.

 Oh. Other shoulder.

 She looks up and sees the face of one of the bar staff. He seems to be miles away. Bernice attempts to get him in focus.

 "Excuse me, miss, could you keep it down? The other customers are complaining."

 What was he on about? She hadn't said anything for ages. She'd just been sitting here, thinking.

 "I'm afraid that if you don't co-operate, I'll have to ask you to leave."

 Benny concentrates on this very hard indeed. Yes, there is a noise. Somebody's laughing. Very loud.

 With a start, she realises that it's her. She's been laughing hysterically for the last twenty minutes. She catches her breath, stops, wipes away the tears. What's going on?

 The barman's speaking to her again. She knows she must pay attention. This could be important. It could be the answer to her question.

 "And could you please tell your friend to put her clothes back on? It isn't that kind of place." He walks off, shaking his head.

 Benny looks to her left. Beth has removed her dress and is chatting away to Robin and Arthur. Benny doesn't know what's more surprising, the fact that Beth is sitting there in her underwear or the fact that the boys are looking at her face.

 Benny feels the panic rise. Something's gone very wrong. She holds her head in her hands. She can't concentrate, her mind's awash with gibberish. *I've got a bike you can ride it if you like it's got a basket a bell that rings and things to make it look good I'd give it to you if I could but I borrowed it -*

 The question. She'd asked something important and nobody has answered her yet.

 *Just one more thing. Who was Mr Raiph working for?*

 *Oh yeah,* thinks Benny as her head sinks onto (or is it into?) the table-top. *Oh, shit.*

 The dagger. She still had that, didn't she? She checked her secret Stash-O'Matic pocket.

 She didn't have a secret Stash-O'Matic pocket.

 Of course she didn't. The whole idea was obviously bollocks. So why had she thought that she did? And where had she put the dagger?

 "Oh look. Everybody's turning into lizards," burbled Robin happily.

 *Arse!* thought Benny. *We've been drugged.* It looked (and felt) like some kind of hallucinogen. When had that happened? She remembered meeting Beth at the spaceport, and asking who Raiph was working for, and then the Chelonians turned up...

 Chelonians? Here? No, that had been an illusion, hadn't it? But after that, they'd completely forgotten about whatever dastardly plots were behind the events of the past couple of days, and just pissed about instead. That must have been where it started. And as for the dagger...she'd probably just dropped it on the floor, trying to get it into her non-existent pocket. Whoever had drugged them must have done it to get the dagger off her and escape whilst everybody was too out of it to notice. And whoever that was, they had to get after him. Or her. Bugger! She couldn't remember a thing.

 "Fiera!" she said, kicking the woman on the floor. "Robin, Arthur. C'mon, we're leaving." Her body was used to sobering up in an emergency, but the others might take a bit longer to come down.

 "Oh, but I'm having fun!" wailed Beth.

 Benny picked Beth's dress up off the floor. "Put this back on. We're getting out of here, now. Where the bloody hell's George?"

 A girlish scream came from the direction of the toilets.

 "Sorry! I'm sorry! I didn't mean it! Please don't kill me!" he blubbered.

 "George!" Benny tried to pull his hands away from his face. "Bloody calm down!" She wanted to slap him, but that would only make things worse. "Ground control to Major George! It's me, it's Benny! It's Benny."

 George finally stopped flailing and opened his eyes. "Benny?" He looked around in panic. "But - where's Sam Francisco?"

 Benny smiled. "Seeing as that's just about the most ridiculous name I've ever heard, I very much doubt that he's anywhere. It's OK, George. You imagined it."

 "What? But...er...what?"

 "I'll explain when you're lucid. Come on."

 "So, what happened?" asked Beth.

 "We were all spiked with LSD, and somebody took the dagger whilst we were acting out 'Fear and Loathing in Eis Moseley'," Benny told her. "It's easy enough to do - you can slip a stim-patch onto somebody and they probably won't notice at all. And the likely candidate right now seems to be the Deadly Assassin."

 "What about the man I saw in the toilets? The one who wanted to kill me for using his sister as one of our damsels?" asked George.

 "Probably nothing to do with the plot. The fiendish plot of whoever's trying to get hold of the dagger, that is. LSD has a tendency to awake the subconscious, and make people face up to themselves. Do you feel guilty about the women who've died in all your little games?"

 "No, why should we?"

 "Hmm. I would say that your subconscious thinks otherwise."

 George just looked at the floor. One might have taken this for shame, but in fact he was just thinking really hard.

 "What makes you think that there is a fiendish plot, anyway?" said Fiera.

 "In my experience there usually is. Too many people have gone to extremes to get their hands on this dagger for it to be just a valuable trinket."

 "No. If there was something more behind this, Brax would have told me," offered Beth.

 "Oh, Brax never tells anybody everything."

 "Too right," said Fiera. "He didn't tell me that the Deadly Assassin was gonna trip us all out and steal the dagger for one thing."

 Benny shook her head. "If it was the Deadly Assassin who did it, I don't think it was on Brax's instructions. Why would Brax have sent Beth here if he was going to do that? And why did the Deadly Assassin claim that he shot me as part of a plan to mislead Raiph? Raiph was dead when he arrived." She sighed. "Oh, none of this makes any sense."

 "Perhaps I can help to clarify matters," said a voice behind Benny.

 Fiera leapt instinctively in the direction of the speaker. Before anybody else had turned their heads, she had the muzzle of her gun pressed to his temple.

 "Gettin' slow in your old age, Gordy," she said with satisfaction.

 "Not at all. I wasn't trying to kill any of you. I have some important things to tell you, if you'll only listen like I wanted in the first place."

 Benny eyed him suspiciously. "Yeah, OK. It's not like we have anybody else we can listen to."

 Fiera gave Benny a questioning look. Benny nodded and Fiera reholstered her weapon.

 "Thank you," Gordy said tersely. "If you'll excuse me, I must get something to drink first. I've hardly stopped since I followed you off Dellah. You people move fast, considering that you don't know where you're going."

 "How did you describe the Deadly Assassin?" he asked.

 "Er...nondescript," said Arthur.

 "Right. Well, I'm sure that wasn't the Deadly Assassin, because I've met him and he's a tall chap with curly hair and distinctive features. The man you met sounds exactly like my employer, Martin Prince."

 "But he couldn't be an impostor. Robin here hired the man himself."

 Robin looked up. "No, I didn't. I thought you hired him." They both turned to George.

 "Don't look at me, I was just going along with you," said George.

 "Oh," said Arthur. "In that case, er...never mind."

 "But he would have made a brilliant assassin," said Robin. "He was so bland, nobody would ever have been able to identify him."

 "I know. Ironic, isn't it? Anyway, Prince employed me for an eight-hit contract earlier this year. There were two weird things about the job." He took a gulp of coffee. "One, none of the targets had anything to do with him, as far as I could see. Just ordinary people. Could've been selected at random. And two, I had to kill them all by stabbing into the base of the spine with a dagger. One particular dagger." He smiled. "I don't really need to say the whole name, do I?"

 "Isn't it frightfully dangerous, assassinating people with a dagger?" asked George.

 "Oh yes, very dangerous," said Fiera. "That's why you took the contract, isn't it? The knife is the last thing they teach you. You have to get closest to the target."

 Gordy nodded. "At my age, you need new challenges."

 "Where do I come into all this?" asked Benny. "Was I on the list of victims?"

 "No. By the time I'd finished the seventh hit, I was getting curious. I figured that if I completed the contract now, I'd never see Prince again and I'd never find out what it was all about. So, before he sent me on the eighth one, I had a little root around. And I didn't like what I saw. In fact, I was scared. I couldn't finish the contract."

 "How very unprofessional," smirked Fiera.

 "I'm deadly serious, I assure you. It wasn't that I couldn't live with myself if I'd done it, it's that I couldn't allow it to happen. I wouldn't have taken these risks over my conscience."

 That shut Fiera up.

 "Go on," Benny told Gordy.

 "So I ran. I knew it was only a matter of time before Prince realised that I wasn't coming back; before that happened, I had to get the dagger somewhere safe. I needed to get it back to Braxiatel, but I didn't know where he was. Then I heard about the contract on Miss Summerfield's life, and I realised that I could get in touch with him via you."

 "How did you know that I know Brax?"

 "You thanked him on the acknowledgements page of your book."

 "Oh. Oh, that's so sweet, you read my book!" Benny was suddenly all smiles.

 "Well, you need something to keep your mind active on those long trips. It was rather good, actually, really demystified the whole subject for me."

 "Oh, marvellous, thank you very much," said Benny, blushing.

 Beth groaned. "There'll be time to inflate her ego later, if you don't mind..."

 "Sorry," said Gordy. "So anyway, from there it was just a case of getting to you before the other assassins. It would have been very simple if you hadn't stuck a salad fork in my leg. And if you -" he gestured towards the Noble Chivalric society - "hadn't taken her to another continent and smashed me over the head with a pot. And as for you -" he pointed at Fiera - "if you'd told me that you were working for Irving, I'd have given you the blasted thing. As it was, I thought Prince had sent you."

 "Oh, well sorry," said Benny, a little sarcastically. Well, a lot actually. Then she wailed, "But I *still* don't know who Mr Raiph was working for!"

 Gordy sighed. "Prince, of course. Prince sent Raiph after the dagger, he's been on my tail for weeks. You say the Lonely Gunman killed him?" Benny nodded. "Hmm. Maybe Raiph was getting ideas above his station. Anyway, it's no coincidence that Prince showed up five minutes later to collect the dagger from the body. He must have got wind of Brax's plans and intercepted the Deadly Assassin. Speaking of which, we need to get after him."

 "Hold on," said Benny. "Why? What's Prince planning to do with it?"

 "Well, that's what I found out when I looked into his affairs. The Cult of the Resurrection of Phu-Tan-La the Eighty-Third is not a thing of the past. It's very real, and Prince is one of its key members. And they've got plans for that dagger."

 "But what's so important about the dagger? It's very valuable, and very interesting from an archaeological -"

 "- and historical," put in Beth -

 "- point of view, yes," finished Benny, shooting a withering glance at Beth. "But you speak as though it were terribly dangerous."

 "Of course it's dangerous," said Gordy. "It's the Ceremonial Sacrificial Dagger of the Cult of the Resurrection of Phu-Tan-La the Eighty-Third. I emphasise 'resurrection'. You know about Phu-Tan-La the Eighty-Third?"

 "From legends," Beth replied. She decided she'd better explain for the benefit of the boys. Plus, she could show off in front of Benny. "He ruled this system, hundreds of years before humankind came anywhere near it. One day, he declared that the Beccalevians were going to move out into the neighbouring systems and take them by force. When the spaceships were built, his armies boarded them and vanished into space. A few years later, they came back, announced that they'd colonised a new planet and Phu-Tan-La's remaining subjects were welcome to come back there with them. And they all just went, every last one of them, and left Phu-Tan-La with his ghost town of an empire." Beth beamed at her own eloquence.

 "That's pretty much it," said Gordy. "But what you don't know is that Phu-Tan-La realised that somebody else would come to this planet one day. So he looked at what technologies his people had left behind, and devised a plan. He constructed the dagger, and left instructions for how it was to be used. Finally, he arranged for himself to be put into suspended animation, and closed himself up in his palace, and waited. When the humans came, and their archaeologists uncovered him, he only needed a greedy man to find out about him, and the Cult would be formed.

 "As I said, the Cult has been up and running for quite a while. It's just that they've never been able to find the dagger, Braxiatel made sure of that. Now they've got it back, they just need one more sacrifice and Phu-Tan-La will live again."

 "How can a dagger bring somebody *back* to life?" asked Arthur.

 "When it's a highly sophisticated piece of alien technology. If plunged into the nervous system of any sentient creature it can extract its life-force, its 'soul' if you like, and store it. And once it takes its fill - eight lives - the energy will be used to rejuvenate Phu-Tan-La's body."

 "But how can he be dangerous again?" asked Benny. "His power base has lapsed a tad in the last millennium or so."

 "His Cult hold the power. Amongst its members are some of the richest and most influential people on the planet, including several of the Founders. That's why they hired me, they couldn't take the risk of being seen. Between them they own about sixty per cent of Beccalev. And they'll give that power to Phu-Tan-La. Once he has his home planet back, he'll use its resources to rebuild his empire."

 "Shit," said Beth. "This isn't good, is it?"

 "I hope this doesn't set a precedent," said Beth. "I don't want Brax thinking of me as just his errand girl."

 "You're welcome to come with us and retrieve the dagger if you'd prefer."

 "Hmm. I'll pass."

 "Too bloody right. Just get back and tell Brax what's happened."

 "Yes, all right, I know," Beth replied tersely. "I'll see you later, I suppose."

 Benny snorted. "You'd rather fill in on one of old Professor Alisneuse's classes than bump into me again."

 "Oh, I don't know. The University should be big enough for the both of us." She eyed Benny's beer belly. "Just..." Satisfied with her parting shot, she headed towards the shuttle to Dellah.

 Benny tried to think of a witty riposte before Beth was out of earshot, but failed. She noticed that George had just arrived at her side.

 "Here's to you, Doctor Robinson!" he cried, and then "Ow!" as Benny punched him in the arm.

 "Don't be a smartarse. Where are we going now?"

 "Gordy says that the Cult owns one of the moons of this planet."

 "Yes, Raiph mentioned that."

 "Well, that's where we're going."

 "You don't have to come with us, you know. Gordy and Fiera are professionals, and Goddess knows I've been in situations like this enough times to be able to handle myself. But you and Robin and Arthur don't have to be heroes."

 "Of course we have to be heroes. That's what we do," said George, with a distinct lack of conviction. "Come on, they'll be ready to leave by now." He walked off.

 Benny followed him, wearing her most sceptical look.

 But the journey was fairly uneventful, so let's get to the interesting bit.

 "What?" Arthur's voice.

 "Come down," hissed Gordy through gritted teeth. He was increasingly of the opinion that those three were more a hindrance than a help. The amount of times they'd nearly tripped the security systems on the way here defied belief. He watched as Arthur, Benny, George, Robin and finally Fiera clambered to join him.

 "You're sure this is where the dagger is?" asked Benny.

 "No, but it's a good place to start. This is where the Cult hold their top-level meetings. I've never been in here, but I saw Prince come and go quite a few times."

 "Is there a light switch?" asked Robin.

 "I wouldn't have -" Gordy snapped his head up. "Someone's coming. Quick, hide."

 "Where?" George said, panicking already.

 "Anywhere," said Fiera "They'll never see us in this light." They scattered to conceal themselves behind the relics of Phu-Tan-La that lined the room.

 The eleven men took their places around the darkened table. Abraham was the first to speak. "Put that out, please, Mr Prince. Have you no sense of occasion?"

 "Sorry, Mr Abraham," said Mr Prince, complying.

 "Thank you. Now, the dagger if you please."

 "No, I don't think so," he replied. "They haven't made the eighth sacrifice yet."

 "How do you know?"

 "Believe me, you'd know."

 "Err..." Prince broke the silence. "What are we going to do for an eighth sacrifice now?"

 "I've been thinking about that since you went after Raiph," Abraham replied, putting the dagger on the table. "And I've come up with a little plan. No fuss, no involving untrustworthy outsiders."

 "Oh, good."

 "Yes," smiled Abraham. "I've decided that we're going to kill you, Mr Prince."

 Prince's face fell. "Bu...ha..."

 "Hold him." Two of the other Cultists grabbed his shoulders. "Your feeble planning skills have hampered us for too long. You couldn't organise an assassination in a book depository."

 "I'll do better!"

 "That's commendable, Mr Prince, but I don't care. Once we have you, we have all the life-force we need. So we won't need you any more. Ironic, isn't it?"

 "Whuwhuwhu..."

 "Yes, I thought so. Anyway, to business." He motioned to the men holding Prince and they splayed him roughly, face down, across the dark stone table. Abraham lifted Prince's jacket and shirt away from his back and pulled a magic marker from his own pocket. After a few moments' thought, he uncapped the pen and drew an 'X' at the base of Prince's spine. Then he picked up the dagger.

 "Goodbye, Mr Prince," he said and held the dagger high above Prince's quivering body. After a brief pause for dramatic effect, he plunged it into the spot he'd marked. Prince made a choking, gurgling noise, and died. Blood ran from his mouth and made an awful mess of the table.

 However, nobody was looking at Prince's mouth. The dagger was rather more interesting right now. It glowed gold for a little while, and there was a little tingly noise. At the same time, Prince's body was becoming noticeably paler. Then it stopped, and the body crumbled to dust, making an even worse mess of the table. The dagger dropped into the pile of dust with a gentle *thud*.

 Then, it turned gold again, a more brilliant gold than before. It *burned* with light. The jewels in the eye sockets of the Gumdin skulls glowed red, and the lesser jewels around them pulsed with smaller, multicoloured lights. This was all for show, of course. The same thing could have been achieved with a little indicator that flicked from 'empty' to 'full'. But this was the sort of thing people expected. Phu-Tan-La had known that when he made it.

 Abraham picked up the dagger, gazing at it lovingly. "I'd heard that it would be beautiful, but..." He restrained himself from tears, and turned to the rest of the group. "We're ready," he told them triumphantly. "At last!" He flicked a switch on the underside of the table and the table-top cracked down the middle. Light poured out. The two halves split apart to reveal a pallid, wizened humanoid figure, dressed in simple white robes, lying face down. "Phu-Tan-La," he said, raising the dagger above his head once more, "return and lead us to victory!"

 And with that, he plunged the dagger into the base of Phu-Tan-La's spine. Its golden glow spread to cover the entire figure. Within seconds, the body began to change. It became younger as the assembled Cultists watched, shedding wrinkles and liver spots. The hair went from grey to jet black. Finally, as the glow faded, the figure began to stir, climbing unsteadily to his feet. The dagger fell out of his back and clinked on the floor of his 'coffin'. The wound where it had entered his body simply healed up, leaving no trace that it was ever there.

 Phu-Tan-La stood in the light, regarding first his rejuvenated body, then the faces around him. Then he began to laugh. "Yes!" he cried. "Now, finally, *I will build the empire I have sought!*"

 "Shit!" swore Benny. "Now we *are* too late."

 Gordy nodded. "I'm afraid you may be right, Miss Summerfield."

 TO BE CONTINUED...