As he swiveled around to better see them, Hansen innocently switched off the screen and pressed another button that caused the keyboard to disappear deep into his desk.
“The least you could do is knock,” he said.
“You’re to come with us,” said the Trustee with narrowly placed, beady eyes.
Hansen sat back, trying to think, wondering why Trustees had been sent. They were notoriously difficult to deal with. He said, “Do you realize that Chief Monitor means I keep taps on everything that occurs on the Sun Works Factory?”
“That don’t mean nothing to us.”
“No?” asked Hansen. “You’re innocent of all wrong doing?”
“We’re Trustees. We’re immune.”
“Certainly,” said Hansen. “Until the moment you step out of line. And who do you think catches others doing that?”
The two Trustees glanced at one another. One of them laughed. The beady-eyed Trustee smiled nastily at Hansen.
“You’re trying to suborn a Trustee?”
“Never!” said Hansen. “I’m simply curious as to your errand. How you think you can barge in unannounced? I ask that you give me a few moments to collect myself.”
“No time, Chief Monitor,” said the beady-eyed Trustee, snapping his thick fingers. “Hustle your butt over here double-time, boy.”
Hansen blustered. “I’d like to come now, but I’m engaged in sensitive business. So, if you will tell me who sent you?”
The Trustees nodded to one another and strode into the office.
Hansen leaned forward and tried to click the foot alarm under his desk. A Trustee grabbed one of his skinny arms and jerked Hansen bodily out of the chair. The other Trustee grabbed the other arm. They hustled him out the office, through his secretaries’ rooms and past the desks of surprised monitors. His special team—led by Ervil with his heavily bandaged nose—rose from their chairs.
“We’re under the Praetor’s orders,” the beady-eyed Trustee said.
Dalt and Methlen sank back into their chairs. The shorter Ervil dared take a step toward them.
“We can come back for you later,” the beady-eyed Trustee said. “If you wanna be stupid about this, that is.”
Ervil hesitated and then moved aside.
5.
Nadia heaved a sigh of relief as she donned the vacc suit and reentered the observation dome airlock. It had been a gamble going after the dream dust. But she was going to need it. She was on her own again. To live one needed credits. That was an unpleasant fact. And the universal currency was drugs in demand. It was better than gold or platinum, something that even the common man wanted.
She made the long walk to her hideaway. Back inside she felt more claustrophobic than ever. She was glad she’d spent all this time studying astrophysics. Putting away the dust, she began rummaging through the pile of electronic equipment. What a packrat’s hoard. Finally, she sat, crossed her legs and went through the computer catalog. Ah, that’s what it looked like.
She searched until she found the code-breaker. Then she began to gather supplies.
6.
Hansen screamed. Only his head stuck out of the metal box. The rest of his naked body was strapped and secured within the pain booth as neurowhips lashed his nerve endings. He bellowed until his voice became hoarse. His beet-colored, flushed head, with sweat pouring out him, made it seem as if he was about to pop.
Female techs with earplugs impassively watched him. They wore long white lab coats and stood behind a panel, adjusting the pain intensity and making certain the Chief Monitor served no more or less than the selected time.
Hansen screamed, wheezed and started pleading, even though he knew they couldn’t hear him. He writhed, but the straps held him tightly, although he tore several muscles and tendons in his efforts.
Finally, a tech twirled a dial. The pain stopped.
Hansen gasped in relief, his eyeballs seeming to sink back into his head. For the first time in seven minutes, his body relaxed, although it continued to twitch and jerk. Tears that had streamed from his eyes began to dry on his skin.
The Praetor opened the only door into the soundproofed room. He wore his brown uniform, and with those intense pink eyes, he glared at Hansen.
The two techs removed their earplugs and came to rigid attention.
“Release him,” said the Praetor.
The techs moved like robots. They unlocked the pain booth, drew back the twin doors and began removing the sweat-soaked leather straps. Hansen shivered at their cold touch, they wore rubber gloves. He was naked and humiliated. Small, weak and helpless: he hated the feeling. They helped him stand, their cold, gloved hands on his skinny arms.
“Bring him here,” the Praetor said.
On shaky, trembling legs, Hansen wobbled near. He would have collapsed without the two techs.
“Chief Monitor,” said the Praetor.
Hansen looked up, way up at the giant Highborn. He felt like a child, a naughty boy brought before his angry father. He wondered if he was about to die.
“You have failed in your task,” the Praetor said. “The shock troops have left and I may no longer prove their disloyalty. While incompetence is the chief feature of premen, you surpass the common ruck. I wonder now why the former Chief Monitor trusted you with so many tasks.”
Hansen bowed his head. He wanted to confess and tell the Praetor that Marten Kluge had been a very busy shock trooper indeed. Why, Kluge had even had confederates. But Hansen knew that he had no wits now. Pain and this wretched treatment were meant to intimidate him, and it did, very much. Thus, he didn’t trust himself. As a policeman, he’d learned that unless criminals were very, very careful they always implicated themselves as they tried to explain. He didn’t have the wits to be careful, but at least he had enough to know that. He hung his head a little lower.
“The matter must rest for now,” the Praetor said. “But I do not want you to feel that I tolerate incompetence. I loathe it. I abhor and despise it. Seven minutes in the pain booth is hardly enough for this failure. Yet you premen are so weak that more might damage you beyond repair. In fact, my psychologists tell me that you are weaker in this regard than most of your ilk.”
Hansen let his head droop as far as it could go.
“A pathetic weakling, a wretched fool, a blunderer and a dolt. That is whom I have chosen as my Chief Monitor. My instincts tell me to throttle you on the spot. Instead, I have selected a new Chief Monitor.”
Hansen lifted his head halfway up.
“Ah, you don’t like that, do you?”
Hansen swallowed. He had too many loose ends. A new chief monitor might discover his… indiscretions. The new chief monitor would also have access to his desk and could replay all those spy-stick files and see Marten Kluge. This was a disaster.
“Yet I will not utterly demote you,” the Praetor said. “Moral Enforcer will be your new title.”
“Highborn?”
“I assign you a new task. It is a problem that has mushroomed. I speak of dream dust usage. The Sun Works Police Chief tells me that the sellers are very subtle. You must find and stamp out these sellers. Then you must discover where they manufacture this foul substance and destroy the sites. If you should fail me in this small task, Moral Enforcer, then these past seven minutes will seem like paradise in comparison.”
Without another word, the Praetor left.
Hansen sagged and his knees buckled. Fortunately, the two techs kept him from falling.
“Time to leave, sir,” said the taller of the two techs.
Hansen nodded and let them guide him to the dressing room.
7.
Nadia Pravda rode the pod to the secret hanger. She meant to leave the Sun Works Factory forever. Her heart raced and she dreaded the lack of running lights of the formerly thousands of busy space vehicles. Near space seemed so empty around the Ring-factory now. Would the station tracker pinpoint her and wonder about her unscheduled flight? She dared it because she couldn’t
hide in the crawl space any longer.
Her natural caution caused her to park and anchor the pod a kilometer from her destination. She towed a huge bundle of supplies and clang, clang, clanged her way along the habitat’s inner ring. Later she punched in the door code and went through the smaller hatch. She used the flashlight Marten had used the first time and then clanged to the stealth pod. Soon she reached the craft’s hatch, a smooth, black, oval-shaped door. She put the code-breaker over the lock and pressed a button. Lights flashed as the code-breaker went to work.
Time passed. Nadia grew impatient. After two hours, she switched oxygen tanks. Still the code-breaker winked its lights. She began to feel uneasy. She rechecked the code-breaker. Like the dumb little brute that it was it flash, flash, flashed, coming up with codes and testing each. She clicked the flashlight and washed it around the hanger.
Bad mistake, she realized.
Two men in vacc suits floated toward her.
She yelped in terror and clawed for her tangler. Dark clots flew at her. She ducked and swayed, but one hit her vacc suit and tangled her with strong, wiry strands. She struggled, but that only tightened them.
The vacc-suited duo floated closer. Their visors were dark so she couldn’t see who they were. At least they weren’t big enough to be Highborn.
The code-breaker flashed green as the duo reached her. One of them switched off her magnetic boots and picked her up. No! This wasn’t fair! Her stomach twisted and heaved. The other one opened the hatch and floated inside. Then, to her amazement, the second one entered the pod and took her along. She was in the ultra-stealth pod after long last, but not in the manner she had envisioned.
As the one man held her, the other explored the main cabin. He studied the board and pressed several switches. Lights came on and soon the oxygen bulb showed that the air was breathable.
The first man removed his helmet. It was Hansen. He had circles around his eyes and his mouth twitched. He seemed to be in pain. His eyes bored into her after the other man took off her helmet. Then the second man removed his. It was Ervil, with a big white bandage over his nose. He stared at her in a cold manner, as if she were an insect. He frightened her, he always had.
“What is this ship?” asked Hansen, wincing every time he moved.
“You mean you don’t know?”
“Tell me,” he said, trying to sound patient but doing a poor job of it.
“It’s a ship, like you said.”
Ervil grabbed a fistful of her vacc suit—to steady her, she realized a moment later—and slapped her across the face.
“Yes,” said Hansen. “I can see that it’s a ship. And you don’t need to hit her, Ervil.”
Ervil shrugged.
The setback was too stunning for tears. It left her flat, almost emotionless. She said, “Marten called it an ultra-stealth pod. It will, or should I say that it was supposed to have taken us to the Jupiter Confederation.”
Hansen’s foxy eyebrows rose. “You two have been busy. May I know why you wanted to journey to Jupiter?”
“Who wants to live under the Highborn?” she said. “But Marten also hates Social Unity, so Jupiter, is the closest system after Mars.”
“Word is the Martians rebelled against Social Unity when the Highborn first destroyed Geneva,” said Hansen. “And now the Highborn no longer garrison it with a Doom Star, not after May 10. Why not flee to Mars?”
She shook her head. “It’s in Inner Planets. Sooner or later it will be dragged into the war.”
Hansen glanced around, wincing as he did. He asked her, “Could this pod actually make to the Jupiter System?”
She couldn’t shrug with the tangle strands wrapping her. “The short answer is yes,” she said.
“What are you thinking, boss?” asked Ervil.
“Have you ever spent any time in a pain booth?” Hansen asked Ervil.
The short, wide-shouldered monitor shook his head.
“It’s unpleasant, an experience I don’t plan on repeating,” said Hansen. “It has also opened my eyes to reality. You can never please a Highborn.”
“You don’t think the Praetor would be pleased if you turned this up?” asked Ervil. “He might even make you Chief Monitor again.”
“He plans to stamp out all dream dust production,” said Hansen. “And to find the manufacturers and… I don’t know his plans for them, but that’s us, you and me—and you,” he told Nadia.”
Ervil touched the bandage swathed across his nose. His dead, emotionless eyes revealed nothing.
“I have a question,” said Nadia.
“Ask,” Hansen said.
“How did you find me?”
“Ah. When you last entered the habitat, to get your dream dust, I presume, a spy-stick shot an automated tracker onto your vacc suit.”
Nadia closed her eyes. She had forgotten to sweep her suit for bugs. Stupid. When she opened her eyes, she said, “So what do you plan?”
“Can you pilot this ship?” asked Hansen.
“Yes.”
Hansen blew out his cheeks in relief. “Then here and now I forgive you your errors.”
“What about him?” she asked.
Hansen regarded Ervil. “We’re finished in the Sun Works Factory.”
“You got too greedy, boss, that was the problem.”
Hansen stiffened. Maybe he wasn’t used to that sort of talk from his clean-up man. “Maybe so,” he said. “But I propose that we start fresh in the Jupiter System. She brought dream dust. So did I. That will be our stake in the new world.”
Ervil didn’t move and his gray eyes seemed to grow dull. “How long will the trip take?”
“Six months,” she said. “Maybe longer.”
Ervil shook his head. “You’ll go stir crazy, boss. And two men with one woman, that’s bad.”
“We need her to pilot the ship,” Hansen said.
Ervil turned his lifeless eyes on Nadia. He shrugged. “What about Dalt and Methlen?”
“They’ll have to fend for themselves,” Hansen said. “Five seems like too many people for this craft.”
Ervil grunted.
“Now untangle her,” said Hansen.
“Maybe it would be smarter to keep her tangled,” Ervil said. “She could tell you what to do and you pilot the ship. That way we don’t take no chances.”
Hansen seemed to consider it.
“Piloting is much trickier than that,” Nadia said. “I’d have to actually be at the controls.”
“She double-crossed you once already, boss. I don’t trust her.”
“We’ll watch her closely,” Hansen said.
“Take turns, huh?” said Ervil.
“Now, now, none of that,” Hansen said. “Don’t needlessly frighten her.”
“We can’t leave right away,” Nadia said, who was terrified of these two. Why had she ever gotten involved with drugs in the first place?
“Why can’t we leave?” asked Hansen.
“Things are too quiet,” she said. “We have to wait until the pods come back online.”
Hansen pursed his lips. “I destroyed my files, so we have a little time. The sooner we can leave the better.”
“Dalt and Methlen might be angry that you left them behind,” said Ervil. “They might talk too much once the Highborn catch them.”
“We’ll have to count on their staying out of sight for awhile,” said Hansen. He turned to Nadia. “Do we have a deal?”
She had no choice and she knew it. But she didn’t like the look in Hansen’s eyes, nor in Ervil’s. What would six months be like cooped up with these two? “It’s a deal,” she said.
“Good,” said Hansen, taking the bottle off Ervil’s belt. He sprayed her tangle strands and they wilted and fell to the floor. “Let’s get ready to leave.”
8.
Admiral Rica Sioux wore a spotless tan uniform, with a glittering row of medals. A snug, tan military cap hid her hair. She swiveled in the command chair, with a comlink embedded in her
right ear and a VR-monocle over her left eye.
Everyone else on the command capsule wore a stiff, tan uniform of the Social Unity Space Fleet. Most were webbed into their modules, with VR-goggles and twitch-gloves. A clean odor filled the capsule, while brisk movement and sharply spoken words added to the military bearing. The transformation in the past eleven days had taken hold throughout the entire ship.
Admiral Sioux shifted anxiously. Short, swift, gratifying days with command briefings, inspections and practice drills had changed a sluggish, orbital-sick crew into eager warriors. Not even the flock of blips picked up by tracking had been able to check this impulse.
It was too bad about the early radar probe and the subsequent missile launches. Enemy jamming kept them in the dark about the exact nature of the incoming missiles. To warm up their own ECM pods to try to defeat the enemy sensors would give away their exact position. No. Long-distance beam shots out of the dark were the Bangladesh’s MO. The spread of enemy missiles proved the Highborn hadn’t spotted them again… unless they had done so optically. In any case, it would take over a week for the missiles to get close enough to fire any missile-borne lasers—if they even packed lasers.
Unless—she tapped her armrest—unless the very spread of missiles was a bluff! Admiral Sioux frowned, creasing her face full of wrinkles. Maybe the Highborn had spread the missiles to try to fool me. Maybe they track us with a hidden, secret ship of their own.
Admiral Sioux sipped from a sealed cup. It was a special medicated drink that smelled like coffee. This way only the medical officer knew that she was taking drugs to help calm her nerves.
Why did she have to worry so much? She hated it.
The First Gunner broke into her reverie, saying, “Entering firing range… now.”
Admiral Sioux savored the moment. Now! The Bangladesh was intact. Despite her fears, the Highborn could surely have no idea about what was to commence. 30 million kilometers was a short distance in space terms, but in terms of Solar System warfare, it was a revolution.
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