Forsaken Skies

by D. Nolan Clark

  “Have you seen this place?” Valk asked. “There are cops, yeah. They’re what you might call risk averse. If they actually investigate a disturbance, they might get hurt in the process, and that means lawsuits, and Centrocor hates lawsuits. No, the local cops are more interested in assigning fines and penalties after the dust settles.” He shook his head from side to side. “You want something like this done right, you do it yourself. My job’s on the line here. I’ve got an actual reason to chase Maggs down.”

  “Any thoughts on how we do that, then?”

  Valk stood up straight again, glanced around for a second, perhaps to orient himself. “Come on. This way.”

  He set off through a flock of pigeons that wheeled up around his legs and almost immediately settled down again. Lanoe followed, getting even less of a reaction. “Did you get another fix on Maggs?” he asked.

  “No,” Valk said. “Just a hunch about where he’s headed.”

  Maggs bought a packet of sealant foam from the hostelry before the pedicab arrived, a quick-setting resin meant for patching holes in space suits. He worked the sticky goo over his cryptab until it was completely obscured. No point getting to the docks only to have some passive scanner ping him and log his identity. He didn’t know if the authorities had put out an alert for his particulars yet, but he didn’t want to take any chances.

  At his request the three-wheeled drone took him down side streets and through a cramped alley behind a row of shops. It felt like the machine just crawled along. He wished he knew Vairside better but in the end he had to trust the drone’s limited brainpower. It took far longer to reach the docks than he’d hoped, but he got there without, to his best knowledge, being spotted.

  When he arrived at the portal to the big spin lock he stepped out and—thoughtlessly—directly onto his sprained ankle. The pain was worse this time, but at least once the spin lock ground down to zero he didn’t need to walk anymore. He floated through into the busy docks, dodging fuel and maintenance drones and the occasional human worker.

  The six arms of the Hexus met at six vertices, each of which comprised a spacious docking facility. Autonomic freighters and dismantling ships docked on the exterior, out in hard vacuum, but any ships that carried human crew or passengers were brought inside into warmth and air. Ahead of Maggs lay the berths, a honeycomb of enormous compartments in various sizes, half of them full.

  Naval personnel were allowed to skip the security checkpoints and head straight to their ships. The liner headed to Rarohenga sat in a medium-sized bay halfway up the stack, serviced by a tall gantry. Maggs queried the clock in his suit and saw he still had six minutes to get aboard before the hatches were closed. Ignoring the gantry, he grabbed a passing drone and then shoved it away from himself, using its mass to propel him through the air toward the berth.

  He was going to make it. He was really going to get away with this.

  He checked his pocket one more time. Counted the chits as he sailed through the air. Caught himself on the edge of the berth to stop himself from flying right past.

  The liner proved uninspiring. Maybe fifty meters long, its sides studded with viewports, its engines dark with carbon deposits. Its bulbous nose pointed outward toward the void and it hummed noisily as it powered up for departure. Judging by the shoddy paint job he reckoned he was in for some terrible food and even worse entertainment options over the next six days, but no matter. The liner meant freedom, freedom not only from pursuit but also from a cloud that had hung over him for far too long.

  A line led from the gantry over to the main hatch, put there for the convenience of passengers unaccustomed to microgravity. Maggs grabbed the line and hauled himself hand over hand toward the hatch. He saw a flight attendant peering out at him and he smiled.

  “Terribly sorry if I’m late,” he called out. “I have a second-class reservation for—”

  He stopped because suddenly the flight attendant ducked out of view, even as the hatch slid up and locked itself in place.

  No. That wasn’t acceptable. He had made it just in time. The crew were legally bound to let him board right up until the last minute. He was a lieutenant in the Navy, for hellfire’s sake. He had certain rights!

  “Hello,” he called. “I beg your pardon, but—”

  His heart stopped beating, then. His two pursuers, the giant and the old officer, came kicking around the nose of the liner, headed in his direction.

  He swiveled around and saw the blast doors of the berth closing behind him.

  No way out.

  Lanoe grabbed a stanchion on the side of the liner to steady himself. Hand-to-hand fighting in microgravity was always tricky, and he was pretty sure that was where this was headed. From the corner of his eye he saw Valk moving to the side, flanking the swindler.

  Then Maggs drew his Navy dirk from its scabbard.

  Lanoe watched the serrated edge. He had one of those himself, though he couldn’t remember where he’d stashed it. The blade was razor thin, made of an ultrahard ceramic that could punch right through a heavy suit and whoever was unlucky enough to be wearing it at the time.

  “You really want to go down that road?” he asked.

  Maggs looked up at him. The look on his face was more one of disappointment than desperation. “Hmm?” he asked. “Oh, this? I was thinking of falling on it, like an ancient Roman. The honorable thing, and all that. But not today, I think.” He released the knife and let it spin in the air in front of him for a moment, then grasped it by the blade. He held it out, pommel first, in Lanoe’s direction.

  Lanoe moved carefully over to take it. Maggs didn’t try anything stupid.

  Instead the swindler’s eyes flicked across Lanoe’s cryptab, and then Valk’s in turn.

  “I say,” Maggs chuckled. “The famous Aleister Lanoe and the Blue Devil. Why, I’m quite flattered.”

  Valk had moved up close behind Maggs while Lanoe took the dirk. “What’s he talking about?” the traffic controller asked.

  “I knew the Admiralty would send someone to track me down,” Maggs answered. “I had no idea they would put two such tigers on my trail.”

  “Nobody sent us,” Lanoe pointed out.

  “I looked at your records,” Valk added, “and I didn’t see anything about the Admiralty. You’re listed as AWOL, but there was nothing about bringing you in.”

  “Is that a fact?” Maggs asked. His face fell. “Perhaps…perhaps they knew why I had to leave. Perhaps they—”

  He didn’t get to finish the thought. Valk pressed a neural stunner against the back of Maggs’ neck and discharged it. The swindler’s eyes rolled up in their sockets and his mouth fell open, a tiny globe of spittle drifting off his tongue.

  Lanoe raised an eyebrow. “He was going to surrender peacefully,” he said.

  “The way he talks was giving me a headache,” Valk said.

  Chapter Six

  When they dragged the Lieutenant into the dark room, Roan could barely look at him.

  Some part of her had hoped that his face would be bruised and blackened, that the two Navy men would have beaten him. It was a terribly uncharitable impulse and she loathed it in herself at once, of course.

  The tall one, the one who wouldn’t show his face, shoved Maggs into a chair and then removed a small black box from the back of his head. The Lieutenant’s eyes swiveled around and he closed his mouth. He looked all around him, perhaps taking in his surroundings.

  Roan had been told that this place was a casino, though it was currently shut down. The tall one—M. Valk—had said that it had been a front for drug running and the owners had been arrested. It would reopen under new management in a few days but for now it was a place where they could meet undisturbed and without being overheard. It had red plush walls and it was filled with tables, each topped with the smooth gray surface of a powered-down display. Roan had tried to imagine what it would be like when it was functional, the holographic colors of the games, the bizarrely dressed people pressed in tight
around each opportunity to wager, cheering or groaning as the random number generators dictated. She thought it might be nicer than the mournful silence the place showed now.

  The old Navy man, M. Lanoe, walked over to Elder McRae and handed her the four development chits. She favored him with a nod and a quiet thanks. If he’d been expecting more his face didn’t show it.

  Having the money back was good. Roan was very grateful to the two men who had recovered it. Though it didn’t really matter in the end. The one chance Niraya had possessed—the one hope—had turned out to be false.

  She allowed herself to feel a crushing sense of disappointment.

  “Can you talk, yet, or do you need a minute?” Valk asked.

  “I am…somewhat recovered,” Maggs answered.

  “Don’t try to run away. Your feet’ll still be numb,” Valk told him.

  Maggs seemed to find that amusing. His mouth twitched upward in something like a smile. His sardonic mirth was too much for Roan, and she looked away again.

  “You mind if I sit in on this?” Lanoe asked.

  “I suppose you’ve earned it,” Valk said. “Just let me ask the questions, okay?”

  “Sure,” Lanoe said.

  Across the room Elder McRae watched the men with her accustomed calm. Roan supposed that fifty years from now, when she’d finished her own training, she might be able to master herself like that. She could see why that would be valuable at a time like this. She couldn’t help herself but ask, “Is he going to prison?”

  “That’s what we’re here to figure out,” Valk told her. “Now. Let’s get started. Lieutenant Maggs, I’ve seen your record. You’ve got a Blue Star, which means you’re a pretty decent pilot. You’re on the active list. Why are you here at the Hexus? Why aren’t you off fighting in some war right now?”

  “I think perhaps I should have an advocate present,” Maggs replied.

  “You’re not under arrest. You’re still in one piece. You want to stay that way, you’ll answer me.”

  Roan glanced over at Elder McRae, expecting her to protest—they couldn’t let anyone be harmed in their presence, not if they could help it. Their faith was one that abhorred violence. But the elder just sat there, watching. Maybe, Roan decided, the threat was a bluff and the elder knew that.

  “Oh, all right, if that’s necessary. I am on the active list, yes, but only as a staff officer. I fought in the war between Centrocor and ThiessGruppe, six years ago. You’ll remember that conflict, of course, because—”

  “I don’t pay attention to what the polys get up to. Not anymore,” Lanoe said.

  Maggs looked hurt. “Well, it was a nasty enough scrap, I assure you. After we mopped up the insurgents in the Mictlan Cloud I requested a transfer away from combat duty. I was seconded as an attaché to Centrocor. The work lacks the excitement of the front lines, but it pays better, and I had acquired certain…debts.”

  “What kind of debts? Gambling? Drugs? Unpaid taxes?”

  “The kind,” Maggs said, “that have to be paid back.”

  Valk grunted in frustration. “It doesn’t matter. How did you get involved with the Nirayans?”

  “It’s all very simple. They sent an official notice of distress to the Centrocor Terraforming Authority. The wrong people altogether, of course. The Authority is just a workgroup of Centrocor’s planetary services division. They aren’t qualified to handle this kind of request. It wasn’t about terraforming at all, you see—in fact it was a defense matter. Because I’m an attaché between Centrocor and the Navy, the request was passed on to me, so that I could get the official response of the Navy. I forwarded the Nirayans’ request through proper channels, and the Navy sent it back with a funding inquiry. Centrocor asked the Navy for an itemized estimate, and the Navy asked Centrocor for…well. This is how it works, you see. The giant bureaucracies that overhang our fates like constellations, those faceless monoliths, are actually made of a great many people. All of whom have jobs they wish to keep, all of whom have tail sections they need to cover. You understand?”

  “Not in the slightest,” Valk said.

  Maggs laughed. Roan grabbed the edge of a table and held on tight as rage burned inside her stomach.

  “Action was going to cost money,” Maggs went on. “And Centrocor hates spending money. So the case was just handed back and forth between the poly and the Navy. Like two marines with a live grenade, tossing it between them, not wanting to be the last one to touch it.”

  “But you got involved,” Valk pointed out. “You grabbed the grenade and ran with it?”

  Maggs sighed. “The Nirayans kept sending more and more requests for an answer to their dilemma. It was clear they were desperate. I sent them a message saying I was their Sector Warden and that I could help them. For a fee.” He shrugged and one of the gloves fell off his shoulder. “As I said. I have debts.”

  “You lied to them,” Valk pointed out.

  “Well, yes. Otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here now, would I? If I was an actual Sector Warden, I would be back at the marshaling yards around Earth, putting together a carrier group.” He laughed at the idea.

  “Let’s be clear about this, for the record,” Valk said. “You don’t have the power to raise a carrier group to help the Nirayans.”

  “No, of course not.”

  Roan couldn’t take this. She spun around and stared at Maggs, stared him right in the eye.

  He looked back, seemingly as calm as Elder McRae. There was no shred of contrition in his face.

  Roan dug her nails into the palms of her hands, to keep herself from screaming at him.

  “At this point, no one does. It’s just not going to happen, I’m afraid. Centrocor has already made a decision,” Maggs went on. “They had to do some very tricky math, but really it just came down to a risk-benefit calculation. There aren’t enough people on Niraya to warrant military intervention, not in any kind of cost-effective way.”

  “It would cost too much,” Valk said. “You’re saying they asked Centrocor for help, and Centrocor said it would cost too much to defend them.”

  “If you wish to put it in plain terms,” Maggs said, “then…yes.”

  Lanoe raised a hand, like a pupil at school. When Valk nodded at him, he said, “I’m confused. Why does a planet like Niraya need a carrier group in the first place?”

  “Didn’t they tell you already?” Maggs asked.

  Lanoe glanced over at Elder McRae but she didn’t move, didn’t speak.

  Maggs inhaled deeply. “Why, they’re being invaded, of course.”

  Lanoe turned to face the Nirayans. “Is that true?”

  The old woman’s face was a mask carved from wood. “M. Maggs asked us to be discreet. He told us that while what he could do for us was not technically illegal, Centrocor would try to stop us if they found out.” She nodded at Valk. “You have my apologies for being so abrupt with you when we arrived, but we were attempting to keep things quiet.”

  “So what he’s saying is true,” Lanoe said. “You’re being invaded.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  Valk shook his helmet from side to side. “But why? No offense, but from what I’ve seen Niraya hasn’t got much worth taking. I guess…it could be a strategic move. DaoLink is taking a lot of heat from Centrocor right now. They might be trying to open up a second front, to draw forces away from their main lines.”

  “We don’t know who the invaders are,” the elder said. “I am not prone to drawing conclusions based on scant evidence.”

  Lanoe sat down in a banquette, the wood creaking under the weight of his heavy suit. “Will you tell us what you do know?”

  The elder adjusted her hands in her lap. Lanoe suspected that for her that was the equivalent of an explosive emotional display. Well, if his planet were being invaded he supposed he would be upset, too. If he had a planet to call his own.

  “I suppose there’s no harm in speaking of it now. All right.”

  “Start as far back as
you can,” Lanoe said.

  The old woman fished a data tab out of her pocket. “I have all of our evidence with me. I brought it in case M. Maggs should desire to review it.” She plugged it into a faro table and then summoned a virtual keyboard. She tapped a key before she spoke again.

  “Niraya,” she said, “is a small colony, just starting out, really. Barely a hundred thousand people live there, mostly in two large habitable craters and then on a scattering of farms and animal stations.” As she spoke a globe of the planet lit up above the faro table. It looked like a dirty yellow ninepins ball. “We don’t see much traffic in our system. Centrocor has the monopoly on what trade there is, mostly bulk ore from a few mines.” She glanced around at her listeners. “I’m sorry, this is probably more than you wanted to know, but it will become important in a bit.”

  Valk sat down near the faro table. “Niraya was colonized as a religious retreat, right?”

  The elder nodded. “A little more than a century ago, before the revolt of the Establishment. My people—my ancestors—belonged to the Transcendentalist faith, as I do. The faith began on Earth but it became increasingly difficult to live a simple life there—modern life presents too many distractions to let one properly focus the mind. We needed a place where we could turn our faces away from worldly influence. Niraya was chartered as a place of peace, a haven for all seekers and those in need of tranquility of spirit. Few of the hundred thousand people who live there now practice any kind of organized religion, but we minister to the needs of their souls as they desire.”

  “You’re some kind of priest, then?” Valk asked. “Niraya is a theocracy?”

  The girl, Roan, rolled her eyes.

  The old woman ignored her. “I’m an elder. The Transcendentalist faith doesn’t have priests, or anything like that. I have devoted my life to the study of wisdom, regardless of its source. I pass on this wisdom whatever way I can. I am called an elder because I have grown old in this service. As far as theocracy, well, Niraya functions under a sort of benign anarchy. No one is officially in charge of the planet. Most of the colonists listen to us elders when it comes time to make decisions, but they are under no obligation to do so.”