The Icarus Hunt

by Timothy Zahn

  I shrugged. “We started flying the Stormy Banks together about six years ago,” I told him. “I can’t recall him ever mentioning military service in any of that time.”

  “Interesting,” Nicabar said. He had closed his eyes, and I saw now that what I’d taken to be thoughtfulness was merely a deep fatigue. “In some ways he thinks like a military man.”

  “Probably my influence,” I said. “I had five years in EarthGuard back in my twenties.”

  “Yes, Tera told me a little about your career,” Nicabar said, opening his eyes briefly, then closing them again. “Anyway, I hope you realize what a good partner you’ve got there.”

  I didn’t straighten up, or inhale sharply, or do any of the other things that traditionally accompany a moment of blinding epiphany. But with Nicabar’s words, the last of the stubborn pieces finally fell into place. I knew now who had murdered Jones, had tried to murder Ixil, and had been working at cross-purposes to us ever since the Icarus lifted off Meima.

  And perhaps even more important, I knew why.

  I was still working out all the ramifications when Ixil reappeared in the alleyway. “All clear,” he said, offering Everett a hand. “I can see the lights of an incoming tram headed our direction.”

  “Good,” I said, helping him get Everett to his feet. “You three get going. I’ll meet you back at the ship.”

  They looked at me as if I’d just sprouted a second head. “What are you talking about?” Nicabar demanded.

  “I’m talking about finishing the job I came here to do,” I said. “I never had a chance to get Shawn’s borandis. Speaking of which, Nask has all my cash.”

  “I’ll go get the borandis,” Ixil volunteered. “You head back with the others.”

  I shook my head. “They’re walking wounded, Ixil,” I reminded him. “You’re the only able-bodied person we’ve got this side of the ship. They need you to help them get back safely.”

  “But what about you?” Everett objected. “It’s not exactly safe for you to wander around alone, you know.”

  “He’s right,” Nicabar agreed. “Ixil, you help Everett back. I’ll go with McKell.”

  “Ixil might need your help, too,” I said. “Everett could still go into delayed shock and have to be carried. For that matter, Revs, you could go into shock, and there’s no way in hell I could lug you back by myself.” I craned my neck. “And if you don’t get moving, you’re going to miss this tram.”

  “But—” Nicabar began.

  “Save your breath,” Ixil advised, settling Everett’s arm in place over his shoulder, Pix and Pax scrabbling around for new positions out of the way. “It’s no use arguing with him when he’s made up his mind this way.”

  “And what if the Iykams find him?” Nicabar growled.

  “The Iykams are dead or scattered,” I said. “Personally, I’m more worried about what’ll happen if the Patth stumble onto the ship and none of you are there to defend it. Or do you really think Tera and Chort can hold off a concerted attack by themselves?”

  “I suppose he’s right,” Everett said reluctantly.

  “Of course I’m right,” I said. “Give me one hour after you get to the ship for me to catch up with you. If I’m not back, Ixil, you’d better try lifting off. Head for Everett’s hiding place, and I’ll try to catch up with you. And let me have some money, will you?”

  “Here,” Ixil said, pulling out his wallet and handing it to me, his eyes steady on my face. “There should be enough there.”

  “Thanks,” I said as I took it. There was a lot he wanted to say, I could tell, but didn’t dare do so in front of the others. “Now get going.”

  Ixil nodded. “Be careful.”

  “Trust me,” I promised.

  They headed out, varying degrees of unhappiness mirrored in their faces and postures. I leafed through the wallet—three hundred commarks; more than enough—making sure to give them a good head start. Then, diving into the crowd, I followed after them. Partly it was simple caution on my part, a desire to be in backup position in case the Iykams hadn’t all been killed or scattered. Mainly, though, I wanted to make sure all three actually got on that tram and stayed there. What I was about to do next I couldn’t afford to let even a hint leak out about.

  And so I stood half-concealed behind a group of Skanks and watched as they got aboard. I hung around until the tram pulled out; then, standing on tiptoe to study the flapping display flags, I headed for the nearest pharmacy.

  I had anticipated having no trouble picking up borandis in the middle of the Grand Feast, and no trouble was exactly what I got. Ten minutes after entering, I was out on the street again, two hundred commarks’ worth of borandis safely tucked away in my inner pocket. With any luck that would be far more than we would actually need, but it would look suspicious if I’d only brought enough to get us to Everett’s Beyscrim hideout. I made my way back to the station and hid in the crowd until the next tram arrived.

  Not surprisingly, the tram was quite uncrowded; with the revels in full swing the majority of the traffic was headed into the cities and not vice versa. The sparse occupancy meant I was more conspicuous than I might otherwise have been, but it also meant I got a seat all to myself, plus a few minutes of badly needed rest. All in all, I decided it was a fair trade.

  The ride was uneventful. I saw no Patth, no Iykams, and no sign that I was being either watched or followed. And after what seemed like far too short a trip the doors opened onto the Bangrot Spaceport platform.

  It was going to be another long hike back to the Icarus, unless opportunity and diminished crowd density enabled me to take one of the little runaround cars instead. But whichever, ride or walk, it was going to be postponed a little while longer. Instead of turning right and making for the Icarus, I turned left and headed to the StarrComm building.

  The receptionist at Uncle Arthur’s left me on hold for several minutes, which was a bad sign all by itself. It meant they were having to wake him up, and Uncle Arthur roused from his beauty sleep was never even remotely at his best. Add to that the news I was about to give him, and this was likely to be one of our less pleasant conversations.

  My first look at him, when the display finally cleared, was the first indication that my assessment of the situation had been ominously off target. Uncle Arthur was not garbed in sleep shirt and hastily thrown-on robe, his hair tousled into a multidirectional halo. He was instead immaculately groomed, every hair in place, and dressed in the sort of upscale finery I hadn’t seen him wear in years.

  Which meant that instead of hauling him out of bed, I’d instead interrupted a meeting with those higher up in the food chain than he was, out in those murky waters he’d spent so much of his life swimming in. I tried to decide whether that was better or worse than waking him up, but my throbbing head wasn’t up to the task.

  And then I took my first look at his face, and felt an icy cold begin to seep into my heart. It was a graveyard face, the look of a man who’s been backed into a corner by his enemies with nowhere else to go and no more tricks left to use. The look of a chess master down to his king and one pawn, with the painful knowledge that that pawn is about to be sacrificed.

  “Jordan,” he said, his voice studiously neutral. “We were just talking about you. What’s the situation?”

  “Mine’s not so hot,” I said. “How’s yours?”

  “Not very good, I’m afraid,” he conceded. “Where are you now?”

  “In the middle of the Grand Feast celebration on Palmary,” I told him. “And hoping to get the hell out as fast as we can.”

  “I take it you had some trouble?”

  “You might say that,” I agreed tartly. “The Patth caught up with me and let their Iykami underlings play a brief drum solo on my head. My crew was able to spring me, but two of them took plasmic burns on the way out. I know you don’t like getting overtly involved with my life, but we need some backup. And we need it now.”

  His expression, if anything, went a
little more neutral. “Do you have a destination in mind after you leave there?”

  “One of the crew has a friend on Beyscrim with an isolated lodge he’s not using,” I said, feeling the cold dread settling a little more deeply into me. He hadn’t responded to my call for reinforcements; and now the mention of Beyscrim should have had him busily punching his off-screen computer keys for data. But he wasn’t. “It’s supposed to be a five-day flight from here, which I figure should put it within reach of at least some of your people.”

  “Yes, it would,” he agreed heavily. “Jordan … I’m afraid there won’t be any backup.”

  I stared at him. “May I ask why not?”

  “To be blunt, because Earth has caved,” he said, his voice suddenly bitter. “Not fifteen minutes ago Geneva issued a formal notice that no public, governmental, or private organizations or persons with citizenship ties to Earth or Earth-allied worlds are to offer information, personnel, matériel, or any other assistance to the outlaw starship flying under the name Icarus.”

  His lip twitched. “You were also specifically mentioned in the order, Jordan. Along with Ixil and two or three others of your crew for whom they have names.”

  “This is nonsense,” I said, my voice sounding unreal through the noise of my suddenly pounding heart. Uncle Arthur had been my absolute last chance. “They can’t do that. The stakes here—”

  “The stakes are precisely what they’re thinking about,” he said with a grimace. “I didn’t tell you the other part. Approximately ten minutes before Geneva issued their order the Patth issued one of their own. The entire Kalixiri populace has been declared anathema.”

  I stared at him, Nask’s parting-shot curse against Ixil and his people echoing through my mind. “That was fast,” I said. “It wasn’t even an hour ago that the Patth ambassador made that threat.”

  “Yes,” Uncle Arthur said. “Whatever you did to irritate them, it would seem the Patth have suddenly decided to stop playing games.”

  I exhaled loudly. “I liked it better when they were skulking around not telling anyone who or what they really wanted. Has Geneva forgotten that Arno Cameron’s involved here?”

  He shrugged. “I presume not. If Cameron himself were there I’m sure he’d be pulling strings and cashing out favors all over the city. But as far as I know he’s still missing, and those kinds of strings don’t pull themselves.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Unless you know where he is.”

  “If I did, I certainly wouldn’t tell you,” I countered sourly. “At least not in the hearing of whoever the high-nosed flacks are back there who are listening in.”

  He glanced down at his clothing. “I suppose this outfit is something of a giveaway, isn’t it?” he conceded. “Yes, Geneva was thoughtful enough to send a pair of representatives to deliver to me a personal copy of their edict. However, they are not, in fact, listening in on us.”

  “I suppose I should be thankful for small favors,” I grumbled. “So much for our private little arrangement.”

  “So much for it, indeed,” he agreed. “I’m somewhat surprised the authorities hadn’t forgotten about me after all this time.”

  “A pity they hadn’t,” I said, probing carefully at the lump on the back of my head. It felt about the size of a prize-winning grapefruit. “All right, so you’ve been ordered not to deal with me, along with everyone else in the Spiral with ten toes and red blood. What exactly does that mean?”

  He sighed. “I’m afraid it means exactly what it says. I can’t have anything whatsoever to do with you.”

  I snorted. “Oh, come on. Since when have you worried about what anyone says you can or can’t do? Especially anyone in Geneva?”

  He shook his head. “You still don’t understand, Jordan. This isn’t some strategic or political decision on the part of reasoned statesmen. This is the panic reaction of people who are terrified of what the Patth might do to us if any human in the Spiral—any human—is seen to be assisting you.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I insisted. “The Patth are bluffing—they have to be. Human-owned and -associated shipping must make up four to six percent of Patth cargoes. They can’t afford to lose all that with the stroke of a pen.”

  “They did it with the Kalixiri,” he reminded me. “And yes, I know the Kalixiri total is minuscule compared to ours. But no one in Geneva is ready to call that bluff.” He hesitated. “And to be quite honest, I’m not convinced it is a bluff. Not when you consider that the Patth economic future could hinge on what the Icarus contains.”

  For perhaps half a minute neither of us spoke. Uncle Arthur broke the silence first. “What about Ryland or Antoniewicz?” he asked. “I doubt Geneva has been able to deliver to them a personal copy of the edict.”

  “They didn’t have to,” I said, frowning as a sudden thought struck me. “The Patth ambassador told me Brother John had already disavowed any connection between us.”

  “Too bad,” he murmured. “No matter what you think of Antoniewicz, his group might have had the resources to help you out.”

  “Oddly enough, Tera made a similar suggestion,” I said, thinking furiously as yet another layer of the Jones murder peeled away, onionlike, in my mind. “Though unlike you, she didn’t care for the idea of turning the Icarus over to criminals.”

  “I can’t say I care for it myself,” Uncle Arthur admitted. “But if it comes to a choice of Antoniewicz or the Patth having the Icarus …” He shook his head.

  I took a deep breath. This was it. All the pieces were finally in place, and it was time to make my pitch. “What if you could have it all?” I asked. “The Icarus, and everything else? Everything you’ve always wanted. How far would you go to get it?”

  For a long moment he didn’t speak, his pale blue eyes gazing at me in that way that always made me feel like he was trying to drill his way down through the various layers of my psyche to my soul. “You’re serious,” he said at last. It wasn’t a question.

  “Deadly serious,” I agreed. “I can do it. Bear in mind, too, that if we don’t do something, we will lose the Icarus. Either to the Patth or—”

  “All right, you’ve sold me,” he cut me off. “What do you need?”

  And for the next ten minutes, in great detail, I told him.

  There were, predictably, none of the little runabout cars available as I left the StarrComm building, which meant another long walk. Mindful of the hour’s grace time I’d given Ixil before he was to try his hand at piloting the Icarus, I hurried as quickly as my throbbing head and the need to remain reasonably inconspicuous would permit.

  None of the others was visible outside the ship as I finally dragged myself into view of it. But then, I wasn’t really expecting to see anyone, not with Ixil and Nicabar in charge of arranging guard duty. It wasn’t until I was nearly to the foot of the ladder that I spotted Pix crouched in the shadow of one of the ship’s landing skids, staying clear of the press of spacers wandering around even at this hour. I whistled, and he bounded away from his spot and scampered over to me. I managed to catch him before he could try his tree-climbing act with my shin and scritched him briefly behind his ears. “Ixil?” I called quietly.

  “Here,” a voice answered from above and to my left. I looked up, just as Ixil appeared from behind the festively glowing lights that had been set up as per my orders in the gaps of our camouflaging cowling. “Any trouble?”

  “None,” I said, watching as he eased his way through one of the larger gaps and dropped to the ground. “You?”

  He shook his head. “It’s been very quiet,” he said, waving somewhere behind me. I turned to look, saw Chort detach himself from a parked fueler and head toward us. “You like the job Chort and Tera did with the lights?”

  “Very nice,” I agreed, looking up at the lights again. “Nice little sniper’s position you found up there, too.”

  “Chort’s idea, actually,” Ixil said as he took Pix back from me and set him on his shoulder. “He was up there on guard when Nica
bar and Everett and I got back. Since Kalixiri are slightly more conspicuous than Crooea, I took it over and set him up in the more visible spot over at that fueler.”

  “Sounds reasonable,” I said. “How’s Shawn doing?”

  “Bad, but not critical. At least this time he didn’t get loose. Tera made sure he was securely strapped down before she set up her own guard position just inside the hatchway.” He peered up. “She should still be there, in fact—neither Everett nor Nicabar was in any shape to take over from her. Be sure to announce yourself before you step inside the wraparound; I get the feeling she’s still a little nervous.”

  “I know exactly how she feels,” I said dryly as Chort came up beside us. “You all right, Chort?”

  “Quite well, Captain McKell, thank you,” he whistled, peering closely at me. “I understand you have not had such fair fortune, however.”

  “I’ve been worse,” I assured him. “Looks like Ixil will be on engine-room duty for lift; I’d like you to stay back there with him in case he needs assistance. We did get fueled, didn’t we?”

  “Loaded and topped off and paid for,” Ixil assured me. “Easily enough to get where we’re going.”

  “Good,” I said, putting one foot on the bottom rung of the ladder and taking one last look around. There were no Patth or Iykams anywhere to be seen. Nor, for that matter, were there any police or customs officials visible, either. But then, now that the last onion layer had been peeled away, that didn’t especially surprise me. “Let’s do it.”

  CHAPTER

  22

  The five-day trip to Beyscrim was the longest jump at one stretch that we’d tried yet with the Icarus. We paid the price for such daring, too, to the tune of three hull ridges and a pair of hairline cracks. Each required from two to six hours of outside work; together, they added nearly a full day to our travel time.

  The most frustrating part, at least to some of the more impatient members of the crew, was that it was no longer clear whether such repair work was even necessary, given what we now knew about the true nature of the Icarus. The cracks and ridges were only in the outer-hull plating that Cameron’s people had layered over the artifact sphere, and there was no indication that the alien metal beneath was being affected in the slightest by the hyperspace pressure it was being subjected to. There were several lively discussions about that, in fact, most of them occurring while Chort and Ixil were busy outside with the latest repair job. But the arguments presented were for the most part completely moot. I voted to continue stopping for repairs, whether they were necessary or not, and no one else got a vote.