Idris faced up to the man, as much as he could given their difference in heights. “Your Elegance, let it be known that—should you make me your navigator—I vow to guide that ship into the deep void where monsters dwell. I will wake everyone aboard, so your people may experience the nightmares of unspace. Once they’ve gone mad, torn out each other’s throats and driven their own thumbs into their eyes, I will paint on the walls with their blood. Salvagers will find these words: ‘the Boyarin Piter Tchever Uskaro did this, who is no respecter of human freedoms.’”
He felt a wash of catharsis, then immediately knew he’d gone too far. Uskaro’s face had closed like a trap, the fake smile vanishing. A tightening grip on his arms told him that the two Voyenni were going to give him a beating as a matter of honour, and their master would plainly enjoy watching Idris learn his place. But perhaps not before these witnesses. So Uskaro merely nodded tightly and marched towards the exit, the Voyenni pulling Idris along in his wake.
Yet the doors didn’t open, and one of the clerks called from behind them.
“Kybernet says to hold the Int,” she explained when faced with Uskaro’s disbelieving stare. “Administrative matter.” When he demanded an explanation, she shrugged. “Don’t know, Your Elegance. Doesn’t say. Just routine.”
A movement at floor level caught Idris’s attention as he hung between the Voyenni. Like a rodent, a spider, a hand: a scuttling shape of metal and plastic. He knew it, of course. It was one of Medvig’s remotes, detached from the Hiver’s frame, come over to say hello.
Seeing that it had his attention it carefully balanced on three of its fingers and curled the rest in until it had made a creditable “thumbs up.”
Bless you, Medvig. Somehow they’d found him. Now he just had to worry about Rollo…
When the outer door opened, it was Kris they all saw, and she already had Rollo free and clear beside her. She must have extracted him from the cells via some other route.
“What is this?” Uskaro stared at her. “Why is this man free and who is this woman?” He was briefly too baffled to be angry.
“Your Elegance, I am Keristina Soolin Almier. Acting as certified advocate to the Hugh Civil Court for my client Idris Telemmier.”
Uskaro made a little spitting noise of utter incredulity. “It is not permitted a lawyer. It is under a leash contract.”
“I am now calling upon the Roshu kybernet to act as arbiter,” Kris announced grandly. “Respond, if you please.”
The voice emanating from the clerk’s console was flat and affectless. “Presence confirmed for the stated purpose.”
“I request the release of my client, imprisoned under false pretences. I have filed a request for damages, plus compensation for emotional trauma and loss of liberty, against the Family Uskaro. This will be dealt with under separate hearing once my client is freed.”
“He cannot be your client,” Uskaro hissed at her. Then he protested to the air, as the kybernet had no physical presence, “It is property, under a leash contract.”
The clerk, who looked as though she was enjoying herself, threw data up on a wallscreen. Idris’s birth records, from seventy years ago. Idris’s war record. Idris’s work history. Idris, old beyond his face.
Uskaro’s own features went slack, realizing simultaneously the sheer value of what he had seized, and that he wasn’t legally able to keep “it.” One of the original wartime Ints, with all those decades of skill and experience. But, for that self-same reason, out of his reach.
“But he’s—”
“Old enough to be your revered grandpa, Boyarin. Real, real old.” A grin from Kris, and Idris thought, sourly, Thanks for that.
“I look forward to your depositions regarding compensation, Your Elegance,” she finished up brightly. “Doubtless your lawyers will be in touch.”
She reached forward to take Idris’s wrist and, as simply as that, he was out of the Voyenni’s grasp. Medvig’s artificial spider-hand scurried up to sit on Kris’s shoulder, and Idris guessed the Hiver would have circumvented the office’s privacy screens to transmit events to the rest of the crew.
“Now let’s walk proudly out of Roshu Admin like free citizens of the Colonies,” Kris said quietly. “Then let’s get the fuck to the ship as quick as we can.” She glanced back, and Idris did too—meeting Uskaro’s bleak, hungry gaze. “I don’t think the Boyarin will restrict himself to legal measures.”
5.
Idris
Roshu Admin’s holding cells were in one of the more civilized neighbourhoods of Roshu Primator. Reaching the docking ring—and the Vulture God—was going to involve some legwork through districts where a little violence could be overlooked. Idris was painfully aware just how big and healthy those two thugs of Uskaro’s had been. Rollo could throw a punch and Kris was more than capable of looking after herself, but neither of them were professional heavies.
“Listen up, my children.” Rollo was speaking low, sending to all crew. “Extricate yourselves from whatever foul vices you’re engaged in and hightail it back to the God right now. We are no longer welcome here. Keep an eye out for Voyenni in green too.”
“Are we fighting now?” came Barney’s incredulous reply. “I mean, already?”
“No, my son, we are flying ahead of the shitstorm, like always,” Rollo told him. “Olli?”
“Does this mean no shore leave for me?” the drone specialist’s voice broke in.
“My poor luckless daughter, it does,” Rollo confirmed. “And I need the God ready for a speedy exit. Especially if bad neighbours turn up before we do.”
Olli’s response to that was anatomically challenging but probably indicated agreement.
“Kittering.” Rollo was striding down the dignified street at an undignified hustle, heedless of the stares they were getting: two dirty spacers plus Kris, whose ersatz finery looked like the imitation it was in this district.
There was a rattle over the comms, then the translation chirped, “Scurrying in progress!” Converting Hanni to human Colvul was more of an art than a science.
“Tell me we have somewhere to go, Kit.”
“Further employment has been secured through my own excellent offices, Captain! Good work, low risk!” Kittering’s translator yapped.
“Anywhere but here,” Rollo confirmed, as they hit the seedier side of town and prepared for trouble. “This way, children.” He bundled Idris and Kris onto a cargo elevator. “Next time, my daughter, bring backup for a caper like this, see right?”
“I… did take out some fight insurance. What with you being incommunicado,” Kris confessed. She had authority in emergencies, but ceding control made Rollo twitchy. “Seeing how the Boyarin get violent when they don’t get what they want, I hired us some extra security.” At his glower she added, “A concerned party who alerted me to your predicament, Captain, and offered their services.”
“We are going to have a talk about what your executive authority actually covers,” Rollo muttered, but then the elevator shuddered to a halt at a loading bay. They bulled their way out through a crowd of spacers and staff, all apparently trying to manoeuvre bulky a-grav crates and trolleys towards it at the same time.
Idris caught a flash of bottle-green uniform. “Trouble,” he hissed. A couple of Voyenni were shoving through the throng towards them.
Rollo nodded and vaulted the next cargo flatbed, heading away. But before Idris could follow, a third Voyenni loomed abruptly beside him—a big man in shirtsleeves, no doubt dragged from some dive by his master’s demands. For a moment he had Idris’s collar, hoisting the smaller man off the ground. Then Kris’s knife flashed out, its ceramic blade slashing the man’s wrist so he let go with a howl.
Now we run. Their undignified hustle abruptly became a flat-out pelt over cargo crates and around startled haulers and loaders. Rollo jinked towards another elevator, but the car was already departing—and Idris saw another Voyenni elbowing towards them from that quarter, a head taller than most of the crow
d.
There was only a railing in the opposite direction, surrounding a deep shaft. It had been built to transport containers into the bowels of the city from the docking ring above, and also housed the cargo elevator in which they’d arrived. Idris remembered seeing shafts like that as a child. It had seemed that you could step out into empty air and float down—just like those monolithic cargo pods. Except that each pod was controlled by the city’s gravitic engines. Jump out into that abyss and you’d plummet to your death.
Kris swore and whirled towards the approaching Voyenni, knife at the ready. But her scarf seemed to strike up a life of its own, tugging her towards the railing and the drop. She swore and swatted at the hand-like remote plucking at her.
“Get with the program! On on on!” Medvig signalled. Their remote sprang from Kris to land on an automated pallet stacked high with containers as it glided slowly alongside the shaft, a tonne of stately metal in motion.
Rollo didn’t hesitate, hauling Idris onto the pallet. A line of nacelles jutted from its upper surface, handles for gravitic steering, and Idris grimly wrapped his arms about one. Rollo boosted Kris up, then scrambled aboard himself. The Voyenni were already running, not seeing the plan but scenting there was one, and they now wielded short, studded bludgeons. Matters had gone past mere fisticuffs.
The pallet reversed dramatically, shunting pedestrians out of the way until it hit the buckling metal of the rail. “Grab on, organics!” Medvig chattered in their ears. “Rough transit alert!”
Without warning they broke through the rail, dropping into five storeys of empty space. Idris heard panicked screams as they began to plummet. A stomach-wrenching second later and they were climbing back up the shaft, the pallet clawing for purchase against the city’s gravitic field.
“Medvig—my children—you’d better all know what you’re doing!” Rollo yelled.
“In times of stress, have you considered singing happy songs?” Medvig, as an intelligence distributed across a knot of cyborg roaches, loved highlighting human frailties.
They passed the platform they’d just abandoned and the Voyenni were there, waiting for them. Surely they’re not going to— but they were angry and their boss probably took failure out of their hides. One of them, the boldest or maddest, vaulted the crumpled rail. He hit the floating truck hard, one hand closed tight around a gravitic pontoon. Kris slashed the shoulder seam of his coat, drawing a little blood, but he hauled himself up, the truck lurching madly as his weight skewed its lift calculations. In moments, the second Voyenni had gone for the leap. He’d left it almost too late, hands grabbling for purchase and boots kicking as he tried to pull himself up.
Rollo feinted at the first thug, who blocked the punch contemptuously, receiving a blow to his gut as payment. Then he was on Rollo, lifting his opponent with the clear intention of just throwing him into the chasm.
Medvig’s remote jabbed metal finger-legs at his eyes and the Voyenni reeled back. One huge fist caught the spidery machine and dashed it against a container’s metal lid, smashing it into fragments. The Voyenni’s other hand still gripped Rollo, and the man looked strong enough to lob the captain into the void one-handed.
Kris stabbed him. She looked ice cold for the three heartbeats it took to drive her duelling knife into his ribs four times, then horrified as the man toppled away. Rollo went with him.
Idris twitched to grab him and almost toppled from the wildly skewing container himself. It was Kris who snagged Rollo’s wrist, bracing herself with a leg over the corner of the container. All of this had their conveyance skewed almost forty-five degrees from level, with everyone clinging to its uppermost edge to keep them from the chasm below. At that point the other Voyenni hauled himself up.
Idris kicked him in the face, resulting only in a snarl from his victim as he reached inside his jacket. Idris saw the stubby barrel of a gun—not a high-velocity accelerator, but a laser or chemical firearm would be quite sufficient to kill any or all of them.
Something swung overhead and he had the sense of an armoured figure with stubby wings—gravity handles just like the pallet’s pontoons. The Voyenni jerked his arm up, appreciating the greater threat was above. But the flying figure dipped in the air, grabbed the thug’s collar and jerked sideways, tearing the man off the container and into open air.
Idris winced, waiting for the drop, but the flyer swung its victim over a railing into a knot of gawking officials and space crew. Its work done, it ascended to hover above them, keeping perfect pace.
“Is that…?” Rollo stammered. “Kris, child, what did you do?”
You couldn’t mistake that armour. Grey-blue metal and armour-plastic plate, a uniform that had been refined since the war but never really changed. Everyone knew the elite soldiers of the Parthenon, but you didn’t expect to just run into one inside the Primate House.
“Meet your new crewmate!” Kris shouted.
Then they were up top, outside the dome and next to the docking ring. Past the lumpy, repair-scarred hull of an ore transporter and another couple of haphazardly parked ships was the reassuringly ugly hull of the Vulture God.
“Yes!” Rollo whooped, then their container lurched and tipped them all off. They just about hit the dock, rather than plummeting down the shaft, before Medvig abandoned the pallet to its fate. For a moment it was beginning the long, slow tumble towards the shaft’s distant reaches, clanging thunderously off nearby traffic. Then the city’s system caught up with it, cushioning its fall with invisible hands.
“More bad guys! Move!” came Olli’s voice in their ears, and they pelted past the ore freighter towards the Vulture.
“Everyone aboard?” Rollo demanded.
“Full complement, aye,” she confirmed. “Or will be when you get your behinds through the hatch.”
“Ahead!” Kris shouted.
Idris, already feeling at least three decades too old for any of this, saw that the ordeal was nowhere near over. Another four Voyenni were charging towards them, emerging from the far side of the Vulture God. It hadn’t exactly been a mystery where they’d been docked.
They had guns, and they had strength and training on their side even without those. What Idris had was…
A friend, apparently. Even as they ran for the Vulture, the armoured flyer dropped down, blocking the oncoming Voyennis’ path.
One of the thugs had a gun levelled now, and in response the Partheni unslung her own weapon from its holding arms. An accelerator, about as absurdly illegal in this system as anything could be. If she’d turned it downwards she could have sent a hail of gravitically accelerated pellets through the city’s dome and a score of its separate floors.
Still, there was only one of her and four Voyenni, who might also consider themselves the galaxy’s elite. Not to mention they were all twice the bulk of the woman inside the armour. They began spreading out, grim looks on their long faces, determined to do right by their chief.
Then the Vulture’s hatch opened and Olli joined the fight.
Olli couldn’t wear prosthetics or take grafts, born without any awareness of how those absent limbs might work. Instead she had embraced the unnatural. She called the workframe she wore her “Scorpion”—designed by the Castigar and never intended for human use. It stomped out on four legs, half a dozen tool-arms flanking her central pod. A couple of big pincer limbs arched down from the top and a long, segmented tail lashed from side to side behind her. She’d fitted that with a grabber and cutting saw—which struck sparks from the docking platform. In her Scorpion, Olli was three metres tall.
The Voyenni looked from her to the Partheni warrior and obviously decided they were outclassed. Mulishly, they backed off as the rest of the crew hustled to board their ship.
“Get us up!” Rollo bellowed. “And fuck docking control if they try to complain.”
“Oh, I think they’re very glad to be rid of us,” Kris said. Idris could only nod weakly, dropping into the pilot’s seat. He set the Vulture’s drive again
st the gravity of the planet below, sending them leaping into the sky—if not like an eagle, then at least like an old bird that would live to see another day.
*
“Right,” Rollo said, when the Vulture God had broken atmosphere and was navigating the orbital debris that cluttered Roshu’s night sky. “My children, let us not do that again. I, for one, am too old for shit even vaguely related to that.”
Idris hunched awkwardly in the pilot’s seat. He was swinging the Vulture hand over hand, using its brachator drives, until it was in an orbit high enough for them to escape at the slightest provocation. The Vulture was nobody’s idea of a racer, but their foes no longer had an Intermediary. Idris would back himself against any pursuit. As part of what they’d made him into, he had an unmatched feel for the contours of space. He just had to open his mind to feel the texture of the gravitic foam that formed the barrier between the real and unspace, that the greedy little hands of the brachator could latch on to, to drag the ship about.
More than three hundred volunteers had been accepted onto the old wartime Intermediary Program, so he’d been told. Idris was one of just thirty who’d not only survived but left sane enough to do the job. The Liaison Board’s post-war hit rate, using convicts and debtors, was only a tenth even of that. The process was also ruinously expensive, even for successes. Doubtless the Boyarin Uskaro had paid well for a “fugitive’s” whereabouts. And now he knew Idris’s provenance, he’d be even keener to take possession—legally or otherwise.
“How do we stand with ground control?” Rollo demanded.
“A crapton of complaints but no demands so far. Though they’ve forfeited our docking deposit,” Kris told him.
“I want eyes all around: Olli, my children. A certain Boyarin bastard most definitely did not walk here from Magda. I don’t want his ship on top of us before we know it. Barney, how’re our feathers?”
Shards of Earth Page 6
