by Wen Spencer
"Hardin is using Mary's Landing greed to manipulate them. No one would blame Mary's Landing for what happened to Fenrir. They can prove that they planned to move the engine and it was an accident. Not very damning considering . . ." she gasped as she realized what Hardin was truly hiding. "That snarky bastard, he's protecting only himself. If high command found out what he did when the Dakota sank, nothing would save him from being court marshaled."
Ethan nodded slowly. "And Fenrir was a united colony ship. That means a certainly responsibility to the survivors by a U.C. officer."
"He's blocking cooperation with Mikhail so he can keep a stranglehold on information on himself."
"We need to go." Turk caught her by the elbow and gave her a tug toward the door they'd come through.
She resisted. "Ethan, we need to get Volkov's ship back to normal space first. Do you have what he needs or did Hardin take it?"
Ethan sighed. "Hardin has Eraphie. He'd said he hurt her if I didn't smuggle out the one set of modification parts that I had done. I'm trying to get another set down quickly, before Mary's Landing realizes what I did."
"So there's nothing here for Volkov?" Paige asked.
"There's these." Ethan rolled up the papers he'd been working on. "These are plans to build more. It's all we really need."
* * *
Turk only relaxed slightly when they reached the safety of the Hoto's ship. Ethan had known secret ways all through the Queen Mary Iv, so they managed to slip out without trouble. Mary's Landing, however, would probably suspect Paige would return to the minotaur ship and the pumps hadn't been brought to the docks yet.
Paige was still half-naked, though, and he needed to let Mikhail know what they found, just in case the worst happened.
Mikhail sounded stable, which was a good sign. Turk wasn't sure if it been wise to leave so soon after returning to the Svoboda, but the minotaurs wouldn't wait.
"The good news is that we have Ethan Bailey and the plans for creating the modification parts for the Svoboda's engine. The bad news is that Hardin has a working set too. Ethan says is fairly simple to hook up and Hardin has the engine crew from the Dakota on the Red Gold. All he needs is a warp engine. Paige says there are half dozen landings that have their engines intact."
"If Hardin doesn't move the engine away from whatever landing he picks, it will be Fenrir's Rock over again," Mikhail said.
"I get the impression," Ethan said, "that Hardin is feeling pressure to act quickly. He might not take the time to move the engine."
"So he'll pick an landing close to Mary's Landing that still has an intact engine?" Mikhail asked.
"Not necessarily." Paige said. "There were engines closer than Fenrir. Hardin probably selected Fenrir's Rock because Fenrir had been a New Washington origin, United Colony, military ship." Ethan nodded to confirm her guess. "There's this 'we're in this together' way of thinking with the NWUC. Challenger Landing. Omaha. Nimitz." And then, lastly, reluctantly, she added her own hometown. "Georgetown. Once they verify the registry of your ship with another New Washington Landing, the Fenrir people treated you like you were one of them."
"Damn the man." Over the radio came the drum of Mikhail's fingertips as he thought. "So we don't know which one and they're most likely thousands of kilometers apart?"
"That's it in a nutshell." Ethan said.
"Do you know if Hardin still has Eraphie Bailey with him?" Mikhail asked after a minute of noisy thinking.
"Yes," Ethan at least looked guilty. "He's holding her hostage to keep me in line."
"I bugged the reader I gave her," Mikhail said. "If she's with him, we should be able to pick up the Red Gold."
"Good." Paige said. "We need to get her away from him before he can hurt her."
"I'll try. I might have to sink the Red Gold to keep Georgetown safe."
Paige look stricken but nodded. "Eraphie would want Georgetown protected over . . .over being safe."
They explained to him the item that the seraphim told Ethan to find.
"We haven't found anything unusual in the wreckage." Mikhail went on to explain his theory that the nefrim ship struck Loki and left the item that the Seraphim were searching for it on the floating island. "Orin says we'll need kites . . ."
"And quickly!" Ethan cried. "Once Loki is beyond human waters, the kites won't take us up."
"It's all a wild goose chase, if you asked me." Paige said.
"Turk, I'll leave that up to you." Mikhail said. "You know I trust your judgment."
In other words, Turk would have to decide to go or not and then convince one of the two Bailey's to change their mind.
23: The Seraphim Thingy
Mikhail checked the files that Director Heward had given him on the lost United Colonies' ships. Challenger had been a minelayer about the size of the Svoboda. Nimitz had been a small destroyer. Both the Omaha and Georgetown had been carriers like the Fenrir. If Hardin used the same set of criteria, then along with choosing a post-United Colonies New Washington ship, he'd also be looking for a carrier.
Mikhail had scanned in all the charts that the Rosetta had to the Svoboda's computer. He plotted courses to both Georgetown Landing and Omaha Landing. They were eighty thousand kilometers apart. A small distance in the comparison to the overall size of the Sargasso, but still if he chose the wrong landing, Hardin would have even more time to destroy the landing.
Mikhail tapped his comline. "Tseytlin, I need to find that reader that Eraphie Bailey was carrying."
"Yes, sir."
He searched out Orin. "The Svoboda needs to leave." He explained as gently as possible what he knew and suspected.
Orin looked stricken at the news. "I—I can't believe he'd do something like that on purpose."
"I hope not." Mikhail said.
"Hardin is a ruthless man." Kenya Jones said from her station on Rosetta's forward gun. "He is capable of anything. He will kill anyone, destroy anything, to get what he wants. I don't know how he lives with himself, but if there's a God, he's going to hell when he dies."
Mikhail gazed up at the black woman that had said so little in the past. "How do you know?"
"I was on the Dakota when it went down. We cobbled together a raft of everything that would float with cots strapped to the sides of the ships to keep them from grinding together. It was sprawling monster of a raft and it was tricky just to get from one end to the other. Because all the weight had to be evenly spread out—or at least that's what Hardin told us—so we were discouraged from moving around.
"The highest ranking officer wasn't Hardin, but the Red Commander, a man named Jensen. He'd saved several hundred of his Reds. They were fiercely loyal to him and he loved them like they were all his children.
"Jensen and Harding butt heads from the very beginning. Hardin was popular with the crew, but Jensen had the Reds, and was higher ranked, so at first we did everything Jensen's way. Food started to run tight, but then Hardin started a crew fishing to catch 'fish.' Hardin convinced Jensen to hold onto the emergency rations because they wouldn't go bad. We would the 'cat fish' while it was fresh. Days and weeks went by before Jensen realized what Hardin was doing."
Jones swallowed hard and looked away. "Hardin was butchering the Reds and feeding them to us."
"Good God!" Mikhail cried.
"Hardin was shifting the Reds around, and lying on head counts, so they'd disappear quietly, one by one, to one end of the raft. He had a butcher shop set up. He'd kill them while they were locked in restraints, hang them up to bleed out, and then cut them down to cook them."
"Jensen caught Hardin and the idiot decided to court-martial Hardin instead of executing him on the spot. Both Jensen and the emergency food were 'washed overboard' before the trial. A few of the remaining Reds tried to take Hardin down, and Hardin had them destroyed for 'mutiny.' After that, Hardin didn't bother to hide what he was doing. By then, we'd been living on . . .them . . . for weeks without realizing it. By the time most of us found out, Hardin had made
sure we had to continue eating . . .it . . . or starve. I lost thirty pounds trying not to eat, but God forgive me, I got too hungry at the end."
Mikhail could only stare at her in horror. When Eraphie had told him that Hardin had 'lost' his Reds, he assumed that Hardin had neglected to keep them from drowning, or let them starve. This wasn't about eating to survive, not at first. It was a coldly calculated move to eliminate Jensen's power base and take over as commander of the survivors.
Orin had gone white. "Good gods, that monster is heading to my home. Manny!" He shouted for his cousin. "Take me with you, Mikhail. Manny!"
Manny popped up from below deck. "What? Where's the fire."
"I'm going with Mikhail," Orin said. "You're Captain until Paige or I get back."
"Okay," Mannie was more puzzled than alarmed. "Where you're going?"
"Orin, I don't know if Hardin's going to Georgetown yet." Mikhail said.
"But it's a fifty-fifty chance," Orin said. "And you're going to need to know all about either landing, regardless, right?"
"Yes." Mikhail had to admit that it would be useful to have Orin along, but he'd asked so much of the Baileys, he hate to put the young man into more danger.
"Half my family is in Georgetown, Mikhail. My baby brother. All my baby cousins. We thought the little ones would be safest there, so all Bailey children under the age of eight are at Georgetown. I can't sit here, knowing—something—anything—that might help you save them."
Mikhail nodded. "Okay, come with me."
* * *
He personally made sure that Orin was safely settled in. He didn't want a repeat of what happened with Eraphie. He had just reached the bridge when Tseytlin contacted him.
"I've got a lock on the reader." Tseytlin transferred his information to the Mikhail's station. Hardin was already at Georgetown Landing. Mikhail swore. Beating Hardin to his goal was no longer an option. They would have to assume that Hardin was entrenched and in control of all local resources as well as anything he had on his ship. Any resistance Georgetown Landing was offering would be crushed before the Svoboda arrived.
"Sir, I wasn't sure exactly you had been hoping for with this reader, so I did extensively modify it. We can access its memory; see novel she's read, how long she's taken to read a page, how many times she's read a page . . ."
"I fail to see the point." Mikhail trusted that there would be one, just that Tseytlin would circle it indefinitely if not nudged.
"The reader has a note taking function. Let's you annotate as you read."
"Eraphie been taking notes on something she's read." Mikhail guessed. She read then.
"Yes," Tseytlin said. "But she's leaving them in English. I—I can only read a few words in English. But the novel she's annotating? It's The Sea Wolf." Volkov translated to 'wolf' in English. "And each annotation starts with your name."
Eraphie was hiding messages for him on the reader? Tseytlin had to be mistaken.
The download from the reader appeared on Mikhail's station. He opened The Sea Wolf and checked for annotations.
Mikahil, I hope you're as clever as I think you are. An angel took me off the Svoboda and took me to the Red Gold. I thought it was doing what was best for me, so I didn't try to leave while the Red Gold was still in port. Stupid me. Hardin is controlling the angel somehow. Hardin wanted me so he'd have a leash on my cousin, Ethan. Please come get me.
Mikhail swore. What an idiot he'd been. He'd assumed that Eraphie had been frightened of him and left of her own will. He should have gone after her. She'd been part of his crew. He'd gone after any other crew member that had suddenly gone missing. The annotation was dated a few hours after Mikhail realized that she was missing from the Svoboda, days ago.
There was another annotation farther into the novel.
Mikhail, the angel took your reds too. Hardin has plans for them.
Mikhail gripped the edge of his station hard in anger. Damn the lying son of bitch! Damn him. How dare he just take Mikhail's Reds? What plans did he have for the Reds? And did he put Eraphie in with the replacements? If Hardin locked her in with the other Reds and let them gang rape her, Mikhail would gut the man. The spacing between the two messages seemed to indicate time had passed before she found out about the Reds. So hopefully that meant that Hardin was keeping her separate from the replacements.
He searched for more annotations.
Mikhail, I found out what he plans! Damn the man! He's heading for Georgetown. Stop him before he levels Georgetown too! Sink his damn ship if you have to!
The note was days old. There was nothing more. No sign that Eraphie was still alive. The usage log that recorded her reading noted that she stopped all activity at the time of the last annotation. Mikhail hoped that Hardin had confiscated the reader or that Eraphie had hidden it, guessing that Mikhail could use it to find Hardin.
* * *
Paige was ready to kill Ethan.
"There are kites in port," Ethan said. "If we take them to Loki, we'll have at least a day to search the vimana for the artifact."
"No," Paige said.
"We can not make a difference in what happens to Eraphie now," Ethan said. "If Volkov's locates via his bug, then he's going to move before we reach him. Even if we catch him and install the engine modification, that won't change what Hardin knows. He believes he has a chance to jump out of system and arrive in normal space first."
"You could lie and say Mikhail jumped already." Turk offered, unknowingly helping Ethan.
"Then he have no reason to keep Eraphie alive," Ethan pointed out the logical end to that. "And every reason to kill her to punish me. The most efficient means of saving Eraphie lies with Mikhail."
"I hate you." Paige growled at her brother.
"Paige, please." Ethan managed to sound truly hurt by her statement. "I'm just being reasonable."
"You've put Eraphie in harm's way," Paige said. "And now ignoring the danger she's in to make yourself happy."
"I love Eraphie just as much as you do," Ethan said. "Maybe even more as I've always considered her hot and if she didn't think I was a complete twerp that I'd ask her out."
"Your cousin?" Turk asked with disgust plain in his voice.
"Our fathers are from the same Red lot and raised as brothers," Ethan said. "It's not quite the same as true biological brothers. There's a more genetic variation."
"Bailey's have never been about blood relations," Paige said. "We're family because we decided to be family."
"Even in real family, cousins can marry cousins," Ethan said.
Paige glared at him to shut him up.
"I know what you did with Jack," Ethan continued.
"And you killed him," Paige growled.
"Jack killed himself," Ethan said.
"I'm going to hit you if you don't shut up," Paige growled.
"We need to find the item that the angels . . ." Ethan started.
"They're not angels!" Paige cried. "They're disembodied nefrims, Ethan. That's all seraphim are! Out in norm space, they're laying waste to the human race. We have no reason to help them."
"Listen to me, please," Ethan said. "Please Paige. Just listen."
"I have listened," Paige said. "And you've not said anything that changed my mind."
"I always suspected that they weren't angels," Ethan admitted. "Really. But that doesn't mean that helping them isn't the will of God."
She hit him then, harder than she intended. She felt his nose break under her fist and blood instantly scented the air. He staggered back and dropped to his knees. "God damn you, Ethan!" She controlled the temptation to kick him for making her lose her temper. For making her hurting someone in her own family—even if it was just Ethan. "Don't grasp at straws to justify your own stupidity."
"Just look at what's been going on!" Ethan cried, ignoring the blood streaming from his nose. "Look at this world! Do you think its just some happy mistake that it's perfect for humans. Do you think its good luck that the human ships all land cl
ose enough together that we can help each other? Do you think its just chance that made just Blues that can pull languages out of our butts so humans can talk to their neighbors? For once, just look at the universe and all its parts and see the ordering of events, through out history, has been to the benefit of mankind."
Paige's hand jerked back in a fist before she could catch herself. "I . . .am . . .not . . .in . . .the mood for . . .theology . . .at the moment."
