The Star-Keeper Imperative

by C N Samson

  With a rising sense of frustration, Rheinborne tossed the dataslate onto the desk. Gwynne’s revelation merely brought up more questions.

  Then again, as soon as he made contact with the woman he once knew as Kaye, he’d find out the truth.

  CHAPTER 8

  RHEINBORNE SLEPT FOR most of the trip to Dalajur, having obtained a sedative from Dr. Seldra. When he awoke, the chronometer on the desk screen told him that there was about two hours left in the journey.

  A security robot soon arrived and escorted him to the main crew quarters, where it commanded him to use the bathroom facilities and clean himself up. After Rheinborne had done so, he found that he had been issued a new set of clothes: standard underwear, civilian-style boots, black pants, a dark blue shirt, and a stylish black jacket.

  Once Rheinborne had dressed, the robot brought him to the ship’s conference room, where Gwynne and Dr. Seldra waited.

  Rheinborne glared at the other man as he took a seat at the far end of the table. Greetings were exchanged, small talk was made, then they reviewed the extraction plan. There were a few operational details that would have to be worked out later, but it was good enough for now.

  “What about communications?” Rheinborne asked.

  “Your module will have an encrypted link with the ship,” Gwynne said, “but no GSN access, even planetside.”

  “I meant with Valicia. Can’t I connect with her on that XCM thing you said she has?”

  “Not as yet.”

  “Well, have you spoken to her today?“

  “She knows that you’ll be the one to exfiltrate her.”

  “Has she asked about me?“

  “No,” Gwynne said again. “She’s focused on the plan, as should you be. Now let’s get you on your way.”

  THERE WERE THREE VESSELS in the hangar bay of the Adventurer. Two of them were basic shuttle pods, while the third was a larger spacecraft: a JT Industries PH-151. It was a general purpose vessel, usually used for surface landings or ship-to-ship transfers of cargo and personnel.

  “Very nice,” said Rheinborne, admiring the clean, sharp lines of the ship’s hull. “I used to fly one of these in the service.” He read the name on the starboard side of the craft: Hawkinston.

  Gwynne said that the vessel’s flight plan and transponder had been altered to match Rheinborne’s cover story. “It won’t hold up under close scrutiny,” he said, “but if you don’t act suspicious, there won’t be any checking done.”

  By this time, the Adventurer had come out of hyperspace at the edge of the Jurintho star system. Rheinborne would travel the rest of the way on his own, while the larger ship would follow along later, taking up orbit around one of the planet’s moons. A telecomm beacon would be then deployed into Dalajur’s orbit, in order to relay transmissions between Rheinborne’s ECM and the Adventurer.

  “You’ll also need this,” said Gwynne, handing Rheinborne a cash stick. “It’s got 16,500 jenn on it.”

  “Quite a fortune,” said Rheinborne, accepting the rectangular strip of metal. “You trust me not to run off with it?”

  “Five hundred is for your personal expenses,” Gwynne informed him. “The rest is for the people helping Valicia.”

  “So it’s a ransom?”

  “It’s more like a donation for a good cause.”

  “A bribe, then.”

  “Call it what you like. Just make sure they get it.”

  The two men exchanged a perfunctory handshake, then Rheinborne boarded the Hawkinston. Dr. Seldra followed him up and into the cockpit, where she gave him a small messenger bag.

  “Just some other things you’ll need,” she said. “A pack of nano food cubes, a medikit, some sanitizing spray. The usual necessities.”

  “Thanks, doctor. I’ll have a look in it later.”

  “Are you sure you haven’t forgotten anything?”

  Rheinborne slipped the cash stick inside his jacket. “It’s all here, in the secret pocket.”

  “Your inter-pass?”

  “Yes.”

  “Even your marriage token?”

  “That, too.”

  Dr. Seldra flashed a smile. “Okay, well, good luck then.”

  “Hold on a second, doctor,” said Rheinborne. In a low voice he asked, “What do you know about Valicia’s XCM? Gwynne won’t tell me about how it works.”

  “It’s classified,” she replied. “That’s all I can say.” Dr. Seldra patted his arm and left the ship.

  Rheinborne stowed the bag in an overhead locker. He hadn’t really expected her to give him an answer, but there was no harm in asking.

  He buckled himself into the pilot’s chair, made himself comfortable, then contacted the flight controller. After all the pre-flight procedures were complete, the hangar bay was cleared of personnel and depressurized. Overhead, the bay doors ponderously slid aside.

  Rheinborne fired up the ascent thrusters, and the Hawkinston rose into open space.

  The mission was on.

  CHAPTER 9

  FIFTEEN MINUTES AFTER leaving the Adventurer, the Hawkinston flew within range of Dalajur’s navigation beacon. The ship’s computer locked on to the signal and adjusted its course.

  “Status report,” Gwynne said over the ship’s comm.

  “All systems normal,” Rheinborne answered.

  “We’ll be on station in ten minutes. Check in at that time.”

  “Acknowledged. Hawkinston out.”

  Rheinborne leaned back in the chair and thought over the details of the plan to extract Valicia. His cover would be that of a courier, delivering documents to a client in the city’s Alchromia District. Once there, he would seek out a temple belonging to the Friends of Greal, a charitable religious organization. Some of the Friends would then take him to see Valicia. After she had verified his identity, the two of them would return to the spaceport, lift off in the Hawkinston, and rendezvous with the Adventurer. The survey ship that Valicia had arrived in had been impounded, so using it as a backup ship was out of the question.

  On the surface, it was a straightforward plan, but so much could still go wrong. For example, how was Valicia supposed to move from the district to the spaceport without anyone spotting her? Like most civilized cities, Langensbern had a public security system that included skydrones, bots, and surveillance cameras. Once she surfaced, it wouldn’t be long before she was identified. Gwynne had said that he could count on help from the people Valicia was with, but Rheinborne didn’t want to depend on that. He would have to assess the situation once on the ground.

  As the Hawkinston neared the planet, he let his thoughts drift to what he would say to Valicia.

  Hi, glad to see you aren’t dead? No, nothing so foolish.

  Another thought bubbled up: what was her marital status? The dataslate files had been silent on that subject, and Gwynne hadn’t mentioned it. So had she ever gotten married, had children?

  On the other hand, did it matter? He’d have agreed to rescue her, married or not.

  And anyway, why wouldn’t she have moved on with her life? Rheinborne himself had entered into several relationships over the years. But none of them had lasted; he now admitted that there was always something lurking in the far corners of his mind, a pang of nagging guilt that he was, somehow, being unfaithful.

  A voice crackled over the ship’s comm; it was the planet’s space traffic control operator. Rheinborne went through the usual procedures, requested a landing at Langensbern. He set the ship to automatically take over the descent and approach, and continued to ruminate over Valicia.

  Gwynne had said that Kaye no longer existed. That much was obvious; she’d had to take on a new identity once she came back to life, figuratively speaking. It was clear she still remembered their past, given the question about the Inland Preserve. What worried Rheinborne was her personality; would it be the same, or had it been altered by the brain operations? Indeed, is that what Gwynne meant? Did the girl he once knew as Kaye truly no longer exist?


  As the ship plunged into the planet’s atmosphere, Rheinborne felt his heart sink. If such was the case, then why was he doing this? The truth was, he’d been hoping to resume his relationship with her; and if he’d been honest with himself, then maybe he would’ve said as much to Gwynne, who no doubt would’ve dispelled such a hopeless notion.

  The ship announced that it had completed atmo entry and was on approach to Langensbern. Rheinborne stared out at the dull, rocky surface of the planet, looking without really seeing. When the city’s ground traffic controller contacted the ship, Rheinborne spoke in a mechanical tone, answering and acknowledging the man without enthusiasm.

  Minutes later, the Hawkinston arrived at the fixed-base operations facility to the south of the main spaceport complex. The ship extended its landing struts and touched down inside its assigned parking circle.

  Rheinborne powered down the ship, unbuckled himself from the chair, and retrieved the messenger bag from the locker. A glance out the cockpit window told him that an automated passenger vehicle was on its way. He took a few moments to inform the Adventurer that he had made planetfall.

  The vehicle arrived and waited, the orange lights on its roof flashing insistently.

  “Yeah, coming,” said Rheinborne. He exited the ship through the port hatch and dashed to the vehicle.

  It soon dropped him off outside the FBO building. Rheinborne entered, and by the time he’d been processed through to the main spaceport terminal, he had made up his mind. If there was still some trace of Kaye in Valicia, he would go along and help her recover the Chythex device. But if Kaye was no longer herself, then there was no reason to remain with her.

  “SHORE PARTY, REPORT.” It was Gwynne on Rheinborne’s ECM. “Is everything all right?”

  Rheinborne shook himself to alertness. “Yes. All good here.”

  “Your location?” Gwynne asked.

  It took Rheinborne a couple of seconds to recognize that he was standing amid a sea of people in Lofty Terrace Circle, a spacious circular shopping mall crammed with shops, hotels, and entertainment venues. He dimly recalled passing through customs, then taking a short mag-train ride from the spaceport to the mall. The whole way, he had been looking at old photos stored on his ECM, images of himself and Kaye. It was something he did when his self-discipline lapsed.

  “In the city. Topmost level,” Rheinborne replied. “Will check in at the next location.”

  “Acknowledged,” Gwynne said. “And try to be on schedule, would you?”

  “Yeah. Shore party out.” Rheinborne sighed and looked around him. Tourists were having their pictures taken beneath a huge “WELCOME TO LANGENSBERN” sign in the center of the mall. Nearby, a kiosk vendor hawked T-shirts that bore slogans such as “No Siddies Allowed”, “Hurlies Go Home”, and “Not Human? Not Welcome!”

  Rheinborne shook his head. That sort of attitude accounted for the distinct lack of aliens he had noticed thus far. Well, not entirely true, he corrected himself. There had been a couple of non-humans—a sidhreen and a hrulaphan—back at the spaceport. No doubt they were trying to get offworld as soon as possible.

  He pinged the public infolink with his ECM, but received a service message that said it was temporarily unavailable. With a scoff, he strolled over to the nearest information booth and tapped the screen, requesting a map of the city and the current sub-shuttle schedule. After the map downloaded to his module, a notice came up on the booth’s screen: sub-shuttle service in the Central Zone was temporarily suspended due to maintenance issues.

  “What the cockness?” Rheinborne said, irked. The plan called for him to ride the sub-shuttle network beneath the districts as much as possible, in order to avoid spending too much time out in the open.

  He punched the booth’s on-screen Help button, and the hologram of a pleasant-faced woman projected out from the screen.

  “Welcome to Langensbern!” she said with a giddy smile. “How may I help you?”

  “How long will the sub-shuttles be down?”

  “Service should be restored by the end of the business day,” the holo-woman replied. “Would you like me to suggest alternative modes of transportation?”

  “Just tell me how to get to Alchromia as fast as possible.”

  The digital woman was replaced by a holomap of the city. Her voice instructed him to take the hyperlift down to South Ring Place (a near-identical shopping mall two kilometers down at the main city level), walk through the connecting tunnel into the Central Zone (the city’s primary district, in the shape of a vast dome), and to then use the skytrain to travel to the northern tunnel, which led to the Alchromia District. As she spoke, his route was outlined in red on the map.

  “Wait, the skytrain? That’s for tourists!”

  The virtual woman reappeared. “All other ground transportation is being heavily utilized,” she said. “You will save approximately one point three five standard minutes by taking the skytrain.”

  “One fercocking minute, is that all?” Rheinborne echoed in disbelief. “What about air taxis?”

  “Pursuant to the Uniform Enclosed Area Transportation Act, travel by manned aerial vehicles has been disc-”

  “Yeah, thanks, bye.” Rheinborne stabbed the Done button, resetting the info booth. He spun around and nearly collided with a thin, scruffy man who was next in line to use the booth.

  “Excuse you,” Rheinborne spat, throwing him a nasty look.

  “Check your flank, fooz!" the man retorted.

  “Go wreck yourself,” said Rheinborne, and stalked away.

  CHAPTER 10

  ON THE NINTH FLOOR of the RaxiCorp Building, Ellis Norland sat in the small office that Prester had provided for him. It contained only the bare minimum furnishings: a desk, a chair, and a computer terminal.

  Norland contemplated a map of the city while reviewing reports from the members of his STAR team. Although their official role in the DSI was Support, Tactics, and Response, every one of them was a skilled soldier who would kill without hesitation. He had made certain, when recruiting them from the Treilath armed forces, that their loyalties would lie with him above all else.

  So far, though, they had found nothing. If his plan failed to produce results—

  An icon flashed in his visual field. It signaled a call from Agent Iverson, the soldier he had assigned to the upper shopping mall. Even though Iverson and the others had held the rank of either lieutenant or operations officer, they had all been given the same “agent” designation.

  “Go ahead,” said Norland.

  “Possible good contact, sir,” Iverson said. He reported that an independent operator had encountered a man of “military attitude” at an info booth, asking directions to the Alchromia District.

  “Is there a picture?” Norland asked.

  “Yes. Sending now.” Iverson said that he had bribed a maintenance tech to give him access to the booth’s user log, which included a snapshot of everyone who accessed it. The independent had then made a positive identification of the man in question.

  Norland thanked him and signed off. He consulted the map; who was closest to that area? It looked to be Agent Ranzka.

  An image popped up on the screen; it was the photo that Iverson had sent. Norland forwarded the image and a short text note to Agent Ranzka’s ECM. He thought about alerting Prester, but decided to hold off until there was something more concrete to tell him. Still, even though it may turn out to be nothing, any lead was better than no lead at all.

  FOLLOWING THE BOOTH woman’s directions, Rheinborne arrived in the Alchromia District. He walked along a broad pedestrian avenue that ran north for two miles. Automated cargo transport vehicles traveled quietly along a pair of maglev rails mounted in the median.

  This was the major thoroughfare of the district, leading to the industrial sector of the city. Trucks and personal automobiles were prohibited here, but small scooters and three-wheeled podcycles were allowed on the avenue, although restricted to special lanes next to the rails.
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  Unlike the clean, simple towers of the Central Zone, the buildings in this district were blocky, garishly-lit monstrosities that lined the avenue. Here and there, taller buildings stretched nearly to the roof. In the space above street level, enclosed walkways haphazardly connected to various buildings, like a metal spider’s web. Adver-blimps drifted through this aerial maze, pulsing with their holographic messages.

  The reports that Rheinborne had read noted that Alchromia had been designed to resemble Habarkai, one of Treilath’s great cities, and was known for its digital and electronics culture. All manner of counterfeit devices could be had for cheap. It was also possible to engage the services of neurodivers, synapse surgeons, and body mechanics, all willing to perform whatever quasi-legal procedures one required.

  Rheinborne accessed his ECM and called up the map of the district. The Friends of Greal temple was located three blocks to the north of his position. As he headed in that direction, he transmitted a text note to the Adventurer, informing Gwynne of his whereabouts.

  A female pleasure bot, wearing a narrow tube top and leather mini-skirt, beckoned to Rheinborne from the doorway of a love-shop. He hurried past, twisting away from the bot’s probing fingers. It was configured as a busty brunette woman, but the lifeless eyes and too-perfect silicone skin made its artificial nature quite apparent. Some people didn’t mind that sort of thing; he certainly did.

  At the next intersection, he checked the street name. According to the map, the temple was at the end of the next block. The traffic control device on the corner beamed a red “stop” hand into the air, allowing a cluster of people and podcycles to proceed past. When the hand changed into a green walking-man figure, Rheinborne began to cross with the other pedestrians, but something made him hesitate and retreat.

  Leaning against the building on the other side of the street was a buzz-haired young man, wearing sunshades and a black trench coat. He came alert and started walking in Rheinborne’s direction. The scabbard of a sword could be seen at the youth’s side as his coat parted with each stride.