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The Peytabee Omnibus

Page 72

by neetha Napew


  ‘They lose her as hostage and they’ve no leverage

  ‘Damn it, Whit, what d’you mean by that?

  ‘That if she’s sick, they’ll bloody well see she gets better! Of course. What’d you think I meant?’ Sean murmured something but Whit went on. ‘The commander of Gal-Three’s organized a massive search of and contact with every vessel that left the docks since before Yana, Marmion and the kids went missing. They’re leaving nothing to chance.’ Whit gave a groan. ‘But it’s going to take time. That’s one of the busiest stations in the whole Intergal net. I’ve also had a word with Anaciliact and he’s none too happy with that PTS group. He’s going to get an injunction against them to prevent any further unauthorized trips to the surface. I’m going one better. I’m getting permission for you to have a representative in the SpaceBase control tower so you can trace any drops they might make before that injunction is served. We gotta find them first.’ Whit made a noise of total disgust and annoyance at the obstacles. ‘We don’t need any of this right now!’

  ‘Precisely why we have it,’ Sean said bitterly. ‘Can you spare Johnny to watch the screen?’

  Whittaker shook his head regretfully. ‘No, much as I’d like to but he’s far more useful elsewhere than sitting on his duff looking at a screen for hours on end.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Get Una to see what she can come up with.’

  That was not only heartening advice but a good notion: Una possessed a knack of finding people with unusual, and very useful, talents.

  Til ask her.

  ‘I’ll keep in touch, Sean, and see what else I can learn that’s going on at Gal-Three.’

  ‘Find out where Luzon is,’ Sean said dourly.

  ‘I did. He’s doing intensive therapy in some fancy spa to get active again.’

  ‘Again? He’s never stopped being active - against Petaybee.’

  ‘If we could prove that, Sean,’ Whit said in a savage and none-too-hopeful tone, ‘we’d do Intergal a big favour.’

  ‘Count on me.’

  As soon as the link broke, Sean explained to Una what was needed and why.

  ‘One of my first group, I think, had some station-keeping experience,’ she said after a long moment’s thought. ‘I thought it very odd indeed that we were landed so far from any place civilized…’

  Since she implied that Kilcoole was civilized, Sean burst out laughing. She regarded him in some surprise.

  ‘You do my heart good, Una. You consider Kilcoole civilized?’

  ‘Comparatively speaking,’ she said with a slight grin, but inwardly she was gratified that she had eased the haunted look on Sean’s face. She had come to admire him very much in the short time she’d been working with him, helping him with impossible burdens: not the least of which was this continuous influx of unnecessary people, especially the commercial types who seemed so eager to raid whatever wealth this planet held. ‘We were told that the SpaceBase had been destroyed so we would have to be landed at a distance from the nearest community…’

  ‘Only the exact distance wasn’t specified…”

  ‘That’s it. Had I known what I know now…’

  ‘Tell me, Una, exactly what were you told and by whom?’

  She paused, organizing her thoughts: Sean had discovered that organization was her strong suit.

  ‘Well, first there was the bulletin about Petaybee being a sentient planet. So I tagged the word on my terminal for any further information, knowing, you see, that some of my family had been sent here. Petaybee’, and she gave him a little smile, ‘was suddenly much in the bulletins and then the advertisement appeared, offering safe and quick transport facilities to the surface of the planet.’

  ‘Just like that?’

  ‘Well, about three weeks after the first mention of Petaybee. I had enough frequent-flyer hours to my credit to get to the Intergal Station easily enough. And the cost of getting to Petaybee’s surface was not all that much, considering. In fact, rather cheap.’

  ‘Cheap enough to attract passengers, huh?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘When I got to Intergal Station, the transit desk told me to book in at the Mallside hostelry where all Petaybean passengers had to register. When I checked in, I had to deposit the fare and then I was given a departure time.’

  ‘Just like that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘By whom?’

  ‘The clerk at Mallside. Oh, I got a stamped passage chit or believe you me, I wouldn’t have handed over most of the last credits I had to my name.’

  ‘You wouldn’t happen to remember the number of the account to which you credited the fare?’

  ‘I do. BM-20-2334-57.’ She repeated it so that Sean could jot it down. ‘The next morning I was given a time to assemble in the hotel lobby. I must say I was a little surprised at the… diversity of my fellow passengers. And relieved to find that there were other folks trying to find their Petaybean relatives.’

  ‘What did your courier look like?’

  ‘There wasn’t one. When I arrived… a little early, I admit, because I was so eager to be on time. Some small link transports don’t wait so it’s wiser to be on time,’ she told Sean in her earnest manner. He nodded and she continued, ‘There was a printed notice that we were to proceed to the departure gate. Anyone not on time would forfeit their fare.’ She paused. ‘The only thing that reassured me was that the transport was so obviously new and one of the other passengers said it was even state-of-the-art.’

  ‘Would you have forfeited your fare if it had been a ramshackle vehicle?’ Sean asked.

  She gave a little laugh. ‘No, I’d sold up to get here. But to the business at hand, Sean, it’s Simon Furey who might stand watch for you at SpaceBase. He’s the one who noticed how new the transport was.’

  ‘Where’s he right now?’

  ‘We can ask Wild Star. She’s teaching in the latchkay shed.’

  Wild Star was certain that her husband Simon would be quite willing to help Sean out. In the first place, he’d love to get his hands on the guy who had dumped them down in the middle of nowhere. If it hadn’t been for Cita, they could have frozen to death their first night on the planet. In the second place, he’d two badly blistered hands from chopping wood, which was the chore he’d been assigned in Kilcoole.

  ‘I don’t mind doing my share, like,’ he said, displaying the bloody signs of his industry, ‘but I’d rather a chance to toughen up more gradually, like. Ya know what I mean?’

  He said he’d s*ood enough watches on the mining vessels he’d worked over the past twenty years so that he felt himself able to do what Sean wanted.

  ‘Just don’t mess the guy up so much we can’t get civil answers out of him, will you?’ Sean said.

  The shuttle was due to make its weekly descent to Petaybee within the next thirty-two hours and Simon was able to plot from its trajectory where it would touch down - in the forest nearer Shannonmouth than Kilcoole. There was no pilot to remonstrate with or wring information from. A highly sophisticated remote-controlled module guided it to and from Petaybee.

  This Simon Furey discovered when he barged past the disembarking passengers and attempted to get into the pilot’s compartment. He’d come prepared with a device that would disable electronic locks so he was able to get into the forward cabin.

  ‘If I’d had just a little more time, I could have bollixed up the remote so the shuttle couldn’t take off again. But it’ll come back, won’t it? I didn’t mess up the panel, like, disabling the lock.’ He looked at Sean for reassurance.

  ‘As long as whoever’s running this show doesn’t realize the lock was tampered with… What would you need to bollix the controls?’

  Simon grinned. ‘It don’t take so much, really, if you know what to do. I’ll have another look through the refuse skips at the SpaceBase. They’re jettisoning an awful lot of useful stuff.’

  ‘They are?’ Seamus and Adak chorused together.


  ‘Thanks, Simon,’ Sean said, clapping the older man gratefully on the shoulder. ‘We’ll take any salvage you can hoist.’

  ‘Figured.’

  ‘Now,’ and Sean’s expression altered from amusement to anxiety, ‘let’s see where we can stash this bunch of pilgrims!’ For there were more robed figures huddling in the miserable knot of the disembarked passengers. Clodagh was still in the Kilcoole cave with the first bunch of Rock Lovers or whatever the’religious’ seekers called themselves.

  Shannonmouth agreed to shelter the seven who were looking for their families. Nine of the religious had rock and stone names and demanded to be taken to Brothers Shale and Granite. So Sean took them back to Kilcoole to commune with their brothers and sisters. Three more hunters and another drug company representative made up this passenger complement. They, too, had to come back to Kilcoole though Sean didn’t know where he’d be able to stash them. Now, if Simon should be successful in aborting the transport’s return to the Intergal Station, maybe this would be the penultimate group he’d have to worry about. And with winter closing in, he’d have to sort the whole kaboodle real fast. Trying to spread the burden of extra numbers on the already stretched economy at least kept his mind off Yana.

  12

  Gal-3

  Contents - Prev/Next

  The ‘unseen eye’, aka Charas Parclete, who had been instructed to keep a close one on Yana had followed the target subject and her escort through the maze and down to the cargo bay area. Since it was obvious that the two women were in the company of a more than capable-appearing male - and someone the ‘eye’ had better get some gen on if he was to be much in their company - the ‘unseen’ remained covert. In fact, the target subject and her companions were out of sight a good deal of the time as Charas had to remain unseen. Suddenly there was a bit of confusion ahead and when the covert watcher moved to a better viewing position, a whiff of the gas wafted across her face. Gagging and trying not to breathe while still attempting to clear her lungs gave the watcher a bit of trouble - especially as the mayday reached the mastoid implant which was linked to Marmion’s alarm pad just when the gas effected a very short period of unconsciousness. Struggling to regain full use of her senses, Charas staggered unseen around the crates and cartons and saw only one body on the ground. Pressing the emergency signal for help, she dashed to the body.

  ‘Fat lot of help you were as escort,’ and Charas resisted the temptation to kick the unconscious man for his dereliction of duty. There were other more pressing matters - like following the faint whiff of gas through the maze of installations and cargo bays. This was a down time in the cargo bay when all but the most urgent jobs were suspended. Some ship was being loaded on the far side of the dock but it might as well have been on another planet as far as crowd protection went. The time had been well chosen. And the abductors had also had access to the intermural passages which separated cargo areas. Alternately sniffing for the trail of gas and choking on the residue, the eye continued until there was no smell at all, backtracked to where vestigial traces remained, used the special key to open the panel and stepped out into a workshop area: empty, of course. Pausing long enough to key in the new position to Commander an Hon’s security board, Charas proceeded into the chamber. The trail of gas could be followed to the airlock. Then quit.

  ‘I must have been out longer than I thought,’ the operative murmured, keying into the security board in Commander an Hon’s office. ‘Charas here. There’s an unconscious man at Sector 45-Z-2, Cargo 30, and Marmion de Revers Algemeine and her guest, Colonel Maddock-Shongili appear to have been kidnapped.’

  ‘’What did you say?’

  Charas sighed and repeated the message.

  ‘Are you sure?’ This time it was the Commander himself asking.

  ‘Yes. Stop all out-going vessels.’

  ‘No implant messages?’

  ‘Only the mayday,’ Charas said grimly.

  ‘We’re instigating stop-and-search procedures.’

  ‘Good. First check what was logged in at Bay 30-47N.’

  There was a brief pause. ‘A damaged pleasure yacht to be repaired, with a hole the size of a shuttle…’ Some rather inventive cursing followed. ‘And a shuttle is registered as pulling out of that sector.’

  ‘Have the corvette pick me up here.’

  ‘Since it’s only a shuttle, can do,’ said the Commander.

  ‘And send someone to collect that idiot who was escorting them.’ Charas gave the location again. ‘I want a tape of the rescue. First impressions are invaluable. He may know something he doesn’t know that we can use.’

  Charas waited impatiently for the appearance of the corvette which docked using the airlock through which the abductors had taken their victims. There was only the faintest whiff of gas left.

  The security corvette was fast. Surprisingly enough, the escaping shuttle was almost faster.

  ‘I don’t believe these speeds,’ the corvette captain said. ‘Everyone on board must be out!’

  ‘Some of ‘em are,’ said Charas grimly, aware of her own ‘working’ dishevelment in the presence of the naval neat-and-proper corvette crew. But her diminutive size allowed her to dress as a station urchin, which, in turn, allowed her to move about with more freedom than an adult could. Especially with the security bracelet in place that gave her access where even adult bodies would not fit.

  In terms of manoeuvrability, the shuttle was nearly as agile in space as the corvette and led them a chase through the storage pens that circled Gal-3 at a distance: anything from recyclable debris to cold storage. Like threading a needle through a haystack, Charas thought, having strapped herself into the chair.

  ‘We’ll get the buggers now,’ the corvette captain said as the shuttle cleared the last of the obstacles.

  He signalled the helmsman for more thrust and the corvette steadily gained on the shuttle. ‘Must have souped-up engines to do this. Halt and prepare to be boardedl’ he announced over the comlink.

  The corvette was matching speed and position, edging closer and closer when the shuttle exploded. The corvette was skewed sideways, any crew member not strapped down to something bounced about like a wad of plastic. The corvette had taken a broadside and would limp back on navigational thrusters alone. But the worst part of it - or maybe it was the best part of it - the implant in Charas’ mastoid bone had not rung the death knell of the person she thought she was about to retrieve from the kidnappers.

  ‘That shuttle was a decoy,’ Commander an Hon told Charas when she got to his office.

  ‘And stop-and-search has produced nothing?’ she asked, slumping in the chair an Hon had gestured for her to take. She was very weary and the effects of the gas, despite a marginal inhalation, could still be felt.

  ‘Not yet, but there were damned near thirty ships leaving Gal-Three at within the target hour. You’re sure Marmion de Revers Algemeine is still alive?’

  ‘Yes,’ and she touched the mastoid bone. ‘What about that faller?’

  ‘Hmmm, yes,’ the Commander said. ‘Macchiavelli Sendal-Archer-Klausevitch…’

  ‘Say what?’

  There was a twitch of a smile on his lips when an Hon repeated the name. ‘Recently appointed as CEO of a Rothschild’s subsidiary based here on Gal-Three. Pharmaceuticals, mainly, but with broad powers. I’ve sent for background gen… an in-depth study, more than was initially received when he was assigned to the Gal-Three offices. But, let me just play back that rescue tape.’

  That made Charas sit up and she rearranged her weary body in the conform chair. Such tapes were generally used to affirm treatment on emergency calls, more to protect the Samaritan than the victim, but were helpful in establishing little details when victims would not be as compos mentis as they would like.

  Charas watched and then, smiling ever so slightly, turned to an Hon who was blandly anticipating her reactions.

  ‘Oddly enough I don’t believe he was as thoroughly gassed as he appeared.�


  She knew exactly how one felt coming out of that sort of encounter. The tape showed the rescue team advancing on the body, went through the whole routine of administering oxygen to counteract the effects. The too handsome man went through the gagging, the disjointed motions and lingual distortions the gas caused. The med-team administered a hypospray to reduce the nausea. But something about his behaviour suggested to Charas that it was a performance.

  ‘And the lungs?’

  ‘They showed only a minute residue of gas - not a full measure. Certainly not one that would have rendered him unconscious so long. He also had the ransom note!’

  ‘Well, what about that?’

  ‘Yes, what about it?’

  ‘I think we watch this… what’s his name again? Never mind. He’ll be Mac in my books.’ And she didn’t give Mac the respect the name so often deserved.

  ‘Indeed we will. Here’s the note.’ And the

  Commander passed over the slip as gingerly as if he expected it to explode in his face.

  Aboard the pirate ship

  When the voice contact with her beloved Sean had been summarily curtailed by Megenda, Yana was close to lashing out indiscriminately with her fists at the big first mate and the monstrous hologram of Captain Louchard. Either would have been a foolish waste of time and as it was, another paroxysm of coughing racked her.

  ‘Haul the female to Doctor Mendelsky. She can’t be dying on us. Or we lose our leverage with the planet,’ Louchard had growled.

  Doubled-up as she was, Yana was bundled out of the cabin and, after a very short distance down the corridor (which confirmed her notion that they’d been deliberately toured every deck of the vessel to confuse them), she was pushed into a considerably larger accommodation. Not that spacious but it had bunks along three sides, a narrow table in the centre with benches under it, and two narrow doors that she would later discover led to the sanitary facilities: the shower behind one door and the ‘head’ behind the other. She half-staggered, half-crawled to the nearest bunk and lay down upon it, coughing, gasping, hacking and wondering if she’d have anything left of normal throat lining.

 

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