The Passenger Ch. 06

The Passenger

Chapter 6

Making a living flying through space, all by yourself, usually gives you a good background in crisis management.

At any moment you may wake up to the sound of a failing energy converter, which could drop you out of hyperspace in the middle of nowhere at any moment, or to an impending problem with the life support system, which could leave you with only a limited amount of time to fix it before you die.

The second something like that happens, you switch into crisis mode. You drop everything and you deal with the situation as quickly and efficiently as possible. Sometimes you only have a few seconds to assess the problem and decide what to do about it. Sometimes you don't even have a few seconds.

So I got back on my feet without missing a beat, knowing that we had less than a minute before all hell would break loose. Some fast footwork was definitely in order.

First things first: where was Anne?

With some relief I realized that she was still in the Pride's hold, which meant she would have been hidden from view during the fly-by. The first thing to do was to keep it that way. A few steps took me to the Pride's open cargo doors.

"Anne!" I shouted. "Stay where you are!"

"The hell I will," she said, with some heat. "We're all in this together. You're not going to get your ass shot off while I'm sitting here, Harvey Ross!"

Which was more or less what I had expected. That's Anne for you. Which makes me proud and happy, but also complicates my life considerably now and then. However, I could understand her point of view. In her place I'd probably feel the same way. I also realized that this was one time when I was going to have to explain my orders. There wasn't really time, but the was no help for it, either.

"Anne, please do as I say. They're after you, which means they won't start shooting until they know where you are. The best way you can help to keep us safe is to stay out of sight for the moment."

"He's rrright," Raz rumbled from behind me. "Anne, go to the back of the carrrgo hold. It's closest to the engine rrroom. Morrre difficult to scan."

Anne looked deeply unhappy, but she turned and disappeared behind the shipping containers that still filled half the hold. I turned to Raz.

"What weapons do we have?"

He shook his head.

"None that we can get to in a hurrry."

"Right. Layne?"

Layne, who still stood by the tanker's cabin, thought for a moment.

"Nothing conventional," he said. "But... Hang on."

He turned around, bent down and peered underneath the tanker at the mess of old and broken repulsor field coils that hung there. After a few seconds he got up, looked at us, and shrugged.

"We may as well try it," he said. "Cross your fingers."

"That doesn't sound encouraging," I said. "What do you have in mind?"

He looked over my shoulder and shook his head.

"No time," he said. "Just do as I say. Do you have any metal objects on you?"

I shook my head.

"No," Raz rumbled.

Layne reached into his pocket, took out a small knife and threw it away as far as he could.

"Any implants?" he asked.

"Anne," I said. "She...""

"She'll be safe in the hold," he said. "We're out of time. Stand here, and when they come for us, try to get them as close to the tanker as possible."

As he turned and climbed into the tanker's cab, the fighter completed its turn and began to descend. It fell like a brick for a few long moments before it braked savagely on its underjets. The sound was like the roar of an angry god; it easily drowned out the asthmatic noises from the tanker's turbine, which was still running. The dust storm created by the blast from the jets was like the end of the world. Then the fighter's suppressor field kicked in, and the dust settled as quickly as it had risen.

Before the landing struts had even touched the dirt, the fighter's aft hatch opened. Three men jumped out in single file. They immediately cleared the blast area and came running toward us, falling into a standard military leapfrog maneuver. One of them would drop on one knee and brandish a blaster rifle to provide cover for the other two as they advanced, then the next one would take over and cover the rest of the team while the first one caught up. They were obviously very well trained, very professional, and very bad news.

Within seconds they had reached us, and I found myself staring at the wrong end of a blaster. Raz still bore the scars from the last hit with one of these babies, and I tried not to think of what they would do to my far less massively built body.

The three shock troopers appeared to be lightly armored, which heartened me a little. I've encountered any number of security heavies over the years (you can't really avoid them when you visit as many worlds as you do in interstellar shipping) and when they go in hot and heavy, they tend to be encased in full body armor to the point where you can't even determine what species they are. But these guys were human, or at least humanoid, and while they wore heavy suits that were obviously highly resistant to blasters and projectile weapons, their helmets did not fully cover their faces and their dun-colored fatigues were tucked into what looked like standard issue combat boots. In other words, they didn't expect much resistance from us. Which was a fair assessment, of course, because short of kicking them in the nuts (something their combat gear could easily cope with) there was very little we could do to defend ourselves.

"Don't move," one of them said calmly to Layne, who was sitting in the tanker's cab like he belonged there.

"Yagodda wrong guy, pal," Layne drawled. "I ain't dun nuffin'."

The trooper raised his blaster rifle.

"Quiet," he said, in a strangely dead and flat voice.

The one closest to me, whom I had tentatively labeled as the team commander, consulted a s mall display on his wrist. Then he turned to me.

"He's the one," he said.

He aimed his blaster at my breast bone and looked at me without any expression on his face.

My initial impression appeared to have been right: these guys were seasoned professionals. An amateur would have stepped forward and shoved his blaster into my chest, but this guy kept enough distance so that the barrel of his weapon was just beyond my reach. His colleagues covered Raz and Layne in a similar manner.

"Where's the prototype?" he asked me in that strangely dead and flat voice.

"What prototype?" I said.

His expression didn't change. Or rather, he still didn't have any expression. All of them had these strangely dead-looking eyes, as if their current business was nothing but mind-numbingly dull routine.

"I'm not going to ask you again," he said. "I don't have time for this. Last chance."

Well, he'd never get his answer if he shot me, so what the hell.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

His lack of expression didn't change. Keeping his blaster on me with one hand and without taking his eyes off me, he reached into a hip pocket and took out a small, gleaming metal rod. He pointed it at me and pushed a button.

Suddenly I was in agony. Ice-cold fire ran through my body, burning me with the searing heat of liquid nitrogen. I fell down, writhing, and the pain was beyond anything I had ever dared to imagine. I couldn't even scream. Which, although I didn't realize it right then, was probably a good thing, because it would have gotten Anne out of hiding, which was the last thing we needed.

Someone was making soft, mewing sounds, like an abandoned Cht'ih cub, and it took my confused brain a while to realize that it was me who made those sounds. The waves of pain had stopped, but the echoes of it still reverberated through my nervous system. When the bright lights that had obscured my vision slowly cleared, I saw the trooper standing over me, his face still devoid of any expression.

"I can do this all day," he said in that emotionless voice. "But I don't think you can. So I'm going to ask you once more, before I push this button again. Where's the prototype?"

"Urgle," I replied, in an attempt to buy me some time. "Grlgh."

"Harrrvey!" Raz said. "Arre you alrrright?"

"Zrswozrgl," I managed.

I was exaggerating ut just a little, but not all that much. I felt awful.

"Let me nearrr him," Raz said.

"Get back," one of the troopers snapped.

But Raz sidestepped him and went around him. The trooper moved to cut him off, and the guy standing over me took a sidestep in anticipation of stopping anyone who might make a run for it. That put both of them next to the one already standing beside the tanker.

I was not prepared for what happened next.

The pitch of the tanker's turbine suddenly dropped as its load increased sharply. The trooper standing closest to me fell backward as if he had been kicked in the chest. He rolled over in a very strange and unnatural way, and then...

Once, years ago, on a world named Tpaaz, I had seen of the flash hurricanes that that world is so notorious for. The Tpaazi, although they are short and squat and therefore fairly well able to resist the local winds, get swept away by these freak storm blasts on a fairly regular basis. It's a weird sight: suddenly they're blown over; sometimes they bounce a few times, and then they take off as the turbulent winds grab them.

And that's exactly what this looked like. The trooper suddenly moved sideways as if the hand of an invisible giant swept him away, throwing him straight into the side of the tanker. The other two were right behind him. The first one hit with a sickening crunch, then the others slammed into him in a similarly unappetizing way. A moment later it was all over.

All I could do was stare. Then the noise from the tanker's turbine changed again. First its pitch rose when whatever load had been put on it was disconnected, then it began to spin down. Layne must have turned it off. I slowly sat up, still shaking and feeling dizzy with the aftereffects of whatever it was that the trooper had used on me.

"What..." I croaked.

"...The hell?" Anne finished my sentence as she stepped out of the cargo hold.

She ran to me and knelt down next to me.

"Great gods, Harvey, what have they done to you?"

"I'm not entirely sure," I admitted. "There doesn't seem to be any permanent damage, though."

"A neural disruptor, from the looks of it," Layne noted.

I looked up. I hadn't seen him climb out of the tanker's cabin. He held out his hand to help me up. I took it, and with a little support from Anne I got back on my feet. My legs felt a little wobbly, but they still worked.

"Harrrvey?"

"I'm fine, Raz. Just a little shaky, that's all."

I turned to Layne.

"Not to repeat myself," I said, giving him a what I had intended to be a stern look failing horribly due to my double vision, "But what the hell? What in the name of all that's unholy was that?"

Layne looked at the remains of the troopers, which now lay in a heap on the ground next to the tanker.

"That?" he said. "That was a stretched compression field. That idiot Blaar, the guy who works for me, decided to try and repair the tanker's repulsor lift coils when they failed. So he took the coils and the capacitors out of the drive section of one of those," and he pointed at the two derelict hulls standing at the edge of the landing field, "to put under the tanker. He thought that would fix it."

"But of courrrse those arrre compression field coils," Raz rumbled, peering underneath the tanker. "Not rrrepulsorrrlift coils."

Layne nodded, a long-suffering look on his face.

"Don't I know it. Blaar destroyed half the workshop when he switched them on. Every single bit of metal fell into the compression field. Instant scrap all around. We were lucky none of us was hurt."

He turned to look at the remains of the troopers, a puzzled look on his face.

"Which brings us to the second half of your question," he said. "My intention was only to disarm them. The field should have attracted their weapons but not their bodies. So, as you say, what the hell? Quite frankly, I'm not sure what happened."

"Urrr. Let's find out," Raz rumbled.

We slowly walked over to what was left of the shock troopers. As we approached, I was relieved to see that there wasn't much blood. I had expected a nauseating display of gore and entrails, given the crumpled state of their bodies, but there didn't seem to be a lot of that.

Raz removed a blaster that had become stuck between two of the bodies and looked at it. It appeared to be undamaged. He pointed it to a spot on the ground about ten feet away and pulled the trigger. The bolt hit with a deafening thump and left a crater more than a foot deep. A hollow feeling found its way into my stomach. This was no ordinary blaster. High power models like this are rare, and that's fine with me. If any of us had been hit by a shot from that blaster...

Raz saw the look on my face and nodded.

"Rrrrr. Nasty," he rumbled.

Layne gave him a long look.

"That's some serious heat you've attracted there, Raz," he said. "Is there anything you might want to tell me?"

"Perrrhaps. Firrrst let's see what we have herrre."

He bent over the bodies and began to move one. But suddenly he stiffened.

"Harrrvey..." he said slowly, pointing at one of the bodies.

I took a step forward to look. What I saw suddenly made my mouth go dry.

My first thought was to get Anne away from here. She shouldn't see this. But how? If I took her inside the ship now, she'd know immediately that something was up. What could I do? But by the time I had thought these thoughts the whole question had become academic already.

"Harvey?" she asked. "What is it?"

She stood next to me, and I realized there was no way I could protect her from this. She looked where I looked; she saw what I saw.

One of the trooper's legs had a deep cut in it. There wasn't much blood, but deep inside the wound there was the silvery shine of metal. Anne looked up, understanding slowly dawning on her face.

"They're..." she started.

"Yes. Drrroids. The compression field affect theirrr metal components. Arrre you alrrright?"

She nodded slowly.

"Yes. I'm fine, Raz. It's just..."

I put my arm around her shoulder.

"I know," I said softly.

I wasn't sure what I meant by that, but it seemed the right thing to say. All I knew was that I was glad she had been back in the hold of the Starman's Pride. If she had been any closer... Layne must have seen something on my face, because he looked at us with raised eyebrows. He said nothing, but the look on his face spoke volumes. Raz nodded.

"Yes. Some explanations arrre in orrrderrr. But firrrst things firrrst."

He looked across the field at the assault fighter.

"Therrre is a chance they did not leave theirrr ship unguarrrded. We must make surrre this will end herrre."

He checked the charge indicator on the blaster, then looked across the field, estimating distances. And I suddenly I realized what he had in mind.

"No, Raz," I said. "No way. That's suicide."

He looked at me and smiled his bad mile.

"Yes. Forrr them."

He took the blaster in his teeth and dropped down on all fours, dug his claws into the dirt, and took off.

Seeing a Gawrran sprint on all fours is something quite unique. It's not just that the speed they develop seems totally impossible for such a massive creature. It's the sense of incredible power they have about them when they run. You get the feeling that this is the proverbial unstoppable force, and the proverbial immovable object hasn't got a snowflake's chance in hell.

But all I felt right now was that sinking sensation of "Oh no, not again!" Because this was vintage Raz: ignore the risks, ignore the stupidity of what you're doing and just plow ahead. But there was no opportunity right now to discuss all that in detail with him, so in the interest of saving time I expressed my feelings concisely as possible.

"Shit," I said.

Then I turned and ran after him. There was no way I could keep up with him, of course. Before I had covered a quarter of the distance, I saw him cross the ramp of the opened aft hatch and disappear inside. When I eventually reached the ramp, he was nowhere to be seen.

I quickly stuck my head around the edge of the entrance for a fraction of a second, then pulled it back as fast as I could to dodge any blaster bolts. But nothing happened. I carefully inched my head around the edge again until I could see in with one eye. Nobody. The entrance looked like a military grade triple-door airlock, and all doors were standing open. Behind the lock a dimly lit corridor extended into the ship.

I loud thump and a human-sounding grunt came from within, followed by a chilling Gawrran battle roar. Then a scream, which was definitely human. Time to see what was going on, I decided. I looked back, saw that Layne and Anne had followed me. I gestured at them to wait, and then I carefully walked up the ramp, trying to make as little noise as possible and wishing I had a blaster. There was a small chance that another one might have survived the stretched compression field, but Raz had left me no time to find out.

"Harrrvey? We'rrre clearrr," Raz' voice came from the end of the corridor.

Ignoring the doors set in the bulkhead, I walked on, knowing that if anyone had been lurking in there, Raz would have smelled them and dealt with them.

The corridor ended in what appeared to be a small crew compartment and cockpit combination. A set of controls dominated the front of the area, and bunks lined the walls further back. It was the standard military arrangement that allowed sleeping crew members to be up and on the job immediately if the situation demanded it.

The man against the bulkhead looked vaguely familiar, although the blood on his face, not to mention Raz' claws around his throat, made it difficult to make out his features in detail.

"Meet the fourrrth memberrr of this little crrrew," Raz rumbled. "Orrr should I say the last surrrviving memberrr?"

"Please..." the man pleaded. "Don't hurt me."

As soon as I heard his voice, recognition clicked.

"Pete? I'll be damned."

Raz looked up.

"Harrrvey, do you know this man?"

"Yes, we do," Anne said from behind me.

I looked up., raised my eyebrows.

"Didn't I ask you to wait outside?" I asked.

Anne gave me a no-nonsense look.

"Not to get technical, but no, you didn't," she said. "So when Raz said it was clear, I decided to come in and watch your back. You're welcome. And before you throw the book at me, you're on another ship that has not been handed over into your care, so right now you're not the captain here."

Layne laughed.

"It looks as if you've got a regular space lawyer on your hands here, Harvey."

I sighed, nodded. "Why me?" I asked myself.

Myself snorted.

"Serves you right, chump," he said.

"Alright," I said to Anne. "You do have a point. And thank you. I appreciate you looking out for me."

She smiled.

"Any time," she said. "You know that."

"I know," I said. "I do."

But we had more immediate things to worry about right now, so I turned to the top item on that list.

"Pete," I said. "You have been a naughty boy."

Anne stepped forward and peered at the bloodied face.

"I guess Brax didn't scare him all that much after all," she said.

Pete gurgled. Raz smiled his bad smile and squeezed him a little harder. That had to stop, or we'd have four dead crewers on our hands and no answers.

"Gently, Raz," I said. "Don't kill him just yet. He needs to talk first."

Not that I intended to let Raz kill him, of course. But Pete didn't know that, which suited me fine right now. I opened a service closet set in the bulkhead and found what I was looking for: a spool of the regular luggage webbing that just about every ship carries. It's incredibly handy stuff to have around in case you need to keep something from moving around a cabin or floating away in zero gee. I pulled out a generous length of webbing, using the spool's integrated cutter to sever it. Then I twisted it into a makeshift rope and stepped around one of chairs that were bolted to the floor at the rear of the cockpit area. Raz nodded approvingly. Still holding Pete by neck, he dragged his captive over to the chair and sat him down in it with a no-nonsense gesture. Pete gasped as the force of the impact squeezed the air out of him. The chair was sturdily built; it didn't break. Less than a minute later Pete was safely secured to it.