Stars Beyond

by S. K. Dunstall

  “Norris was watching me. He would have followed, found my boy.”

  They reached the cannon station. They’d come a long way from the early days of Another Road, where the controls had been the simple wired controls direct from the camera. Josune had wired up a seat and cameras from all around the ship. When she had time, she was going to link all three cannons into the crew room. And add a fourth.

  What would Laughton make of that?

  Gramps smiled at his protégé. “You fell in with good people, Snow.”

  “I was taught well.”

  They weren’t related at all. Nika couldn’t see a single feature that tied them together, except their mannerisms. How had Gramps ended up taking on Snow? One day Snow might tell her. Or he might not. How much of his silence about Gramps had been due to worrying about Norris? A lot, she suspected.

  Now they had two enemies to worry about. Wickmore and the Boost.

  “You okay here, Snow?”

  “Never better,” Snow said.

  Nika left Gramps talking to Snow and went back to the crew room.

  She took her blaster out of its holster and put it on the table in front of her before she took another piece of spicy flatbread. Holstered weapons took longer to draw.

  Roystan and Josune were talking tactics.

  “We come in down the side here.” Roystan tapped the star chart. “Slow, steady. Let those two ships fight it out.”

  “That’s too dangerous,” Josune said. “You’re going closer to the Vortex. You’ll kill us all.”

  “It’s safe if you do it right.”

  “No way. I’ve been here before. You’re going to kill us. We need to get as far from the Vortex as we can, before we’re sucked into it. We’re out of the Funnel. Nullspace out. While we can. While we’re still alive.”

  “I know this place,” Roystan said. “I’ve been here before too. Four times.”

  Nika stopped, flatbread halfway to her mouth, forgotten. Four times. The memory of an earlier conversation slipped into her mind. Josune, saying Feyodor had spent a lot of time around the Vortex, because she thought that Goberling had been there.

  Nika moved over to the calibrator console, which was next to the pilot seat. “You got your memory back.” She made it a murmur but knew Roystan was listening to it. “How much?”

  “All of it.” His murmur was equally low.

  She hadn’t touched his memory. Not since he’d started avoiding her because he didn’t feel well, two weeks before the arrival of Brand and Bouwmeester. Was that all it took? The ability to fine-tune the feeds to achieve real balance in the body? Or had his recent problems tipped some chemical balance and cleared some pathways in the brain?

  How was she going to find out?

  Nika looked at the calibrator, glad she didn’t have to manage it right now. Hadn’t had to manage it for a while, in fact. Roy Stanley Goberling remembered.

  Feyodor had been right all along.

  She was sweating suddenly. “I hope the Boost doesn’t kill us. Or that other ship.”

  “Me too,” Roystan said. “And we need to get out of this space while both ships are distracted. We’ll come back another time.”

  “I can’t believe—”

  “What about Zell?” Laughton demanded. “Why don’t you just go to Zell?”

  “Zell is the first place the Boost will look for us.”

  “We have to go to Zell,” Laughton said.

  Roystan looked at him with some pity. “It is the only place around here. It’s the logical place we’ll head for. Doing what they expect us to do is foolish.”

  Laughton snatched up the blaster Nika had left on the table. Pointed it at Roystan. “You’re going to Zell, and you’re going there now.”

  “Hey,” Nika said, partly to distract him from noticing Josune, who was reaching into a drawer for a weapon.

  “We have two warships between us and our destination,” Roystan said. “They’re still too busy to do anything about us, but you can be sure that by now they’ve noticed us. One of them is the Boost. Norris will come after us.”

  Jacques came up behind Laughton from the kitchen. “You’re not our captain.” Smashed a pan down on his head. “You don’t get to tell us what to do.”

  29

  ALISTAIR LAUGHTON

  When Alistair came around, he was in another genemod machine. He surged upright and looked around. He could still see. He couldn’t tell what was normal anymore, so he didn’t know if the colors he was seeing were the colors he was used to. He couldn’t tell here, in this room, which didn’t look like any ship room he’d been in in his life.

  “We didn’t touch your eyes,” Rik Terri said. “Although, we would like to know how they happened.”

  All three modders were there. Rik Terri, her apprentice, and the doctor from the Boost.

  Alistair looked at the walls.

  “What do you see?” Rik Terri asked.

  Snowshoe cleared his throat. “We don’t have time, Nika. You can ask about it later.”

  Alistair felt better than he had in a long time.

  “Nor did we change whatever it was you had in your blood. Or the tiny changes in your brain. You had those before, and it didn’t seem to bother you. Besides, we didn’t know how important it was for your eyes. Or your mods. You have a few.”

  “Thank you.” The Santiagan doctor had called it a virus.

  “We fixed the physical damage Norris did.” Snowshoe frowned repressively at Alistair. “And the hit from the fry pan. I wouldn’t have bothered, given what you did, but we thought you might have brain damage. Don’t forget we rescued you. It’s not the best way to thank us.”

  He would have been embarrassed, but they had to get to Zell. “I’m sorry, I’ve been chasing Rik Terri for weeks. My goal was to get her to Zell. Urgently. And Zell is right in front of us.” Assuming they hadn’t jumped. “I’d do it again if I had to.”

  Rik Terri looked at Snowshoe. He shook his head back.

  “Josune told us,” Rik Terri said. “Or she gave us some story you told her about your people being captive on Zell, and you manipulating the Boost to come here so it could shoot up the ship that’s holding your people hostage.”

  “Which is pretty stupid,” Snowshoe said. “For then you have the Boost instead. Which would be worse.”

  “It was the best idea I could come up with. I didn’t have time to plan.” He’d been hoping the Santiago warship and the Boost would wipe each other out. Or at least damage each other so badly they weren’t a threat. Just long enough for the settlers to escape from Zell. “I needed time. And now that they’ve had their battle, I also need to call my boss to arrange the rescue ship.”

  Rik Terri waited.

  “We need to get the people off Zell.”

  She crossed her arms. “You told Josune you had promised to take me to Zell. Now you’re telling me you want to call a rescue ship.”

  “Whatever that is,” Snowshoe said.

  “Yes, I did, and yes, I do.”

  “Explain.”

  How could an unarmed woman look so forbidding?

  “And don’t muck around. Tell it straight and tell it fast. Because of you, we’re about to be attacked. Roystan’s waited longer than he should to hear your story.”

  “Then let’s go talk to him.” He’d feel more comfortable on the bridge.

  “I can hear from here,” Roystan said.

  Alistair looked around. “What?”

  “He’s stupider than the other Justice Department agents we’ve met.” Carlos’s mutter came through the link clearly. “And that’s saying a lot.”

  Alistair took a deep, steadying breath and looked around the studio while he collected his scattered thoughts. This crew was . . . unusual. Even down to the fact that the studio contained three genemod mac
hines, which was bizarre for a spaceship this size. One of them a Songyan.

  “Is that the machine you stole from Songyan Engineering?”

  “Well, it’s certainly not the machine we ordered. That was destroyed while it was under your care.” Biting and more than a little angry. “The Justice Department will pay for it.”

  He nodded. It was only fair.

  “We don’t have time for small talk,” Roystan said. “Either tell your story or shut up and let us escape. We are here only because you arranged it, so do us the courtesy of being honest. And make it fast.”

  “Harsh words from your captain.” Gramps frowned at Snow. “Not what you led me to believe.”

  “He’s normally mild,” Snow said.

  “Except when his crew is endangered,” Josune said through the link. “When he’ll do anything to protect them.”

  Was everyone listening in?

  “I am trying to save our settlement.” It was Alistair’s home. “We took a contract with Santiago. Two years, plus bonuses if we delivered on time.” He took a deep breath. “We made the bonus, but the company never intended to pay it out. They came to kill us instead.” It was harder to tell than he thought it would be. Especially now Cam was gone.

  If he was gone. He still wasn’t sure if he’d hallucinated Cam on Wickmore’s ship.

  “Except they didn’t know about the Ort.” He paused, ostensibly to give them time to ask the obvious, but really to breathe again.

  His audience of three didn’t ask. Nor did the four other crew members on board, who might or might not have still been listening. Josune and Roystan kept a quiet murmur of stats going.

  “The Ort are sapient, but nonhuman. At first we thought they were local to Zell, but they turned out to be just as foreign as us.”

  “Aliens?” Nika asked.

  “Yes. They’d been watching us. They saw Santiago attacking us and came to our assistance. They wanted—” What did they want? They’d wanted Cam, and, “You. You modded Cam with transurides.”

  “Why is that important?”

  This would be where he lost her. He continued regardless. “Their race is dying of a plague. They’ve been inoculating us.” Gloss over how the inoculations happened. “They have a vaccine that’s effective on humans, even if not on themselves. When they tried to inoculate Cam . . . whatever it was you did with the transurides in his body blocked the plague virus. They think that if you could show them how you did . . . whatever you did with the transurides, they might be able to use it to save more of their own people.”

  He didn’t understand her quick glance toward the screen. Snowshoe did, for he looked concerned.

  “What happened with Santiago?” Roystan’s voice, coming out of the speakers, made him jump. “No company will give up on aliens, especially if they’re advanced enough to travel to other worlds.”

  “Santiago sent in an armed warship. We knew we were safe as long as the Ort dealt with us, not Santiago.” Alistair closed his eyes. He wasn’t proud of the next bit. “I said I’d find Rik Terri, because we all knew that if Santiago found her . . . you . . . first, then the Ort would work with Santiago.” They’d work with anyone who could help them save millions of lives by doing it. Alistair would have done the same.

  “Nika,” Snow began warningly.

  She waved him quiet.

  “My promise to collect you is the only thing keeping us alive,” Alistair said. “Santiago can’t talk to them, or they couldn’t before I left, and I haven’t told Santiago what the Ort need from us.”

  They must know by now that he was after Rik Terri. They just didn’t know what value Rik Terri was.

  “What happens when the Boost and Santiago finish fighting?”

  “The victor will still be weakened. Santiago hasn’t told anyone more than necessary. Not even their board. I have a ship on standby—if you’ll let me call them. They’ll come and get our people.” His agreement with Paola wouldn’t last forever.

  “Your people. What about the Ort?”

  “They’re our people too.” He supposed he’d better be honest. “They’re plague carriers. They can’t go home.”

  “It’s a stupid plan.”

  “Desperate times,” Josune said through the link, making Alistair jump again. “It might even have worked, Nika.”

  Nika sniffed.

  “We’ve done stupider things.”

  “I never said we hadn’t. You just don’t go against companies like this and win.”

  30

  NIKA RIK TERRI

  “The Santiago ship has been destroyed,” Roystan said. “They’re deploying lifeboats. The Boost will come for us next.”

  Nika looked at Snow, then at Alistair.

  “There are lifeboats everywhere right now,” Roystan said. “If you’re going down world, it will provide some cover, but you’ve less than five minutes to decide.”

  She’d already decided.

  “I’ll take the Netanyu. Snow, help me prepare. I need—” She didn’t know what she needed. “Do the Ort use genemod machines?”

  Alistair shook his head. “Not that I’ve seen.”

  “How did they do your eyes?” They had to be the ones who’d done his eyes.

  “Surgery. I think.”

  She forced herself not to shudder. Hundreds of years ago, that was the way of medicine, and they’d been good at it too. But still, his eye operation must have been awful.

  Snow packed a basic workroom for her. “Mutrient. Naolic acid. Arrat crystals. Sodium salts. Aluminum salts. Nerveseal. Plasmas. We should take the Songyan.”

  “No. That stays with Roystan.” Snow was going to stay with Roystan, too, although he didn’t know it yet.

  Or maybe he did, given the way he took time out from packing to glare at her.

  She finished the packing for him. “Let’s go.”

  They hurried down to the smaller shuttle, where Josune waited. “I’ve programmed it to land on Zell. It will land automatically, but if it doesn’t—”

  Nika didn’t know how to pilot a shuttle.

  “I’ve piloted shuttles,” Laughton said. “Not well, but enough.”

  “Good.” Josune gave him the codes.

  Snow pushed past them both to get onto the shuttle first. Nika grabbed him.

  “You’re staying, Snow.”

  “I’m your apprentice. I go where you go.”

  “Not this time. One of us must look after Roystan. He needs more time in the machine. I took him out early.”

  “You have to stop taking people out early, Nika. You know it’s bad.”

  “Sometimes you have to do what you have to.”

  “I’m still coming with you.”

  “What about Gramps?”

  Gramps tried to push his way into the shuttle. “I’ll come too.”

  Nika grabbed for him. He shrugged her off easily.

  Laughton reached over, pulled him out. “The lady has spoken,” he said.

  “Thank you.” Nika had thought he’d want as many modders on planet as he could get.

  “Snow,” Josune said, “Nika’s likely to get into trouble. She’ll need rescuing. And someone will need to put her in the machine when she comes back. Let’s not put all our modders, and our genemod machines, into one little shuttle.” The ship lurched. Not a hit. Flux. “Thirty seconds before the shuttle auto-launches,” Josune said.

  “Nika, don’t break our shuttle.” This was from Carlos in the crew room.

  “Why should I be any different to the rest of you?” Nika tried for upbeat.

  “I didn’t break our other one. Besides, it’s repaired. I checked the engine myself.”

  The door closed. The shuttle exited.

  * * *

  • • •

  Inside the shuttle it was quiet. Nika linked
in to Another Road. “All clear here.”

  “Good.” It was Roystan who replied. “With luck, no one will notice you’ve detached. Your trajectory will take you into the center of the lifeboats.”

  “How are you doing?”

  “Not too bad.” Roystan sounded as if he was talking through gritted teeth. “The Boost, at least, is cautious enough to get away from the Funnel before they take a shot.”

  Another Road would soon be too busy to talk. Nika clicked off.

  Laughton flicked open the controls to display the outside scene. It seemed all too soon before they slid into the middle of a group of other pods and shuttles their own size or smaller. Spatially speaking, they weren’t even close, but they felt it, and Nika had to force herself not to hold her breath.

  Josune had planned it well, for their shuttle stayed in the middle of the fleeing crowd.

  “How do you talk to the Ort?” Nika asked. “Do you speak Standard?”

  “It’s a combination of hearing and thinking and—” Laughton shrugged. “The Ort operated on us to make it work.” He shrugged again. “You’ll see when you go through it.”

  Not to her, they wouldn’t. Not if she could get a genemod machine to do it for her instead.

  “They’ve operated on all of you?”

  “Some of us. I was the first. Then some of the others. Probably most of them by now.” He took a breath. “They never operated on Cam. They weren’t sure—”

  Cam Santiago, whose body she had modded with transurides. The only person whose body had more transurides than Cam’s was Hammond Roystan.

  “How big are the Ort?” Would they fit into a genemod machine? Machines were set up for human, not alien, anatomy. Could they even use it? Would such a machine kill them? Maybe they could diagnose with it still? Veterinarians used modified genemod machines on animals. Would she have to reconfigure the Netanyu to alien specifications?

  “Tall.” Alistair turned to the screen. “I have to call Paola to arrange the pickup.”

  “Go ahead.”

  The woman who appeared on the screen was dressed in white nen-silk. Nika was surprised she even recognized nen-silk after all this time. Her old life seemed so long ago.