The Only Game in the Galaxy

by Paul Collins

  Staring at Anneke was a tall woman with strawberry blonde hair and a scowl. She had a blaster trained at Anneke’s heart.

  ‘We have to stop meeting like this,’ said the woman.

  ‘If you say so.’ Anneke relaxed into a readiness posture that, from the outside, looked anything but ready.

  The woman frowned. ‘What have they done to you?’

  ‘What has who done?’

  ‘Brown. He’s done something to you.’ The woman looked at the two bound people. ‘The Anneke I knew would never have killed defenceless people.’

  Anneke massaged her temples. She herself felt profound loathing for the actions she was to take. In fact, part of her wasn’t sorry she had been interrupted. But still her actions – or her morality – weren’t open to questioning by a complete stranger.

  ‘So I know you?’ Anneke asked, stalling for time.

  ‘I’m Alisk.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you. So tell me, Alisk, the last time we met, were we friend or foe?’

  ‘You’re suffering from amnesia?’

  Sasume sat perfectly still, not wanting to distract Anneke from this line of questioning or draw attention to herself.

  Anneke shrugged, seeing no point in denying it. Maybe this woman knew something about her but she had to keep her talking.

  ‘And the last time you saw me –?’

  ‘The last time I knew of you, you were on board Brown’s ship in orbit above Kanto Kantoris. Our sensors picked up that the self-destruct had been set – then the ship blew. We figured you’d died in the blast. Then you turn up on Lykis Integer a month later …’

  ‘And you followed me here.’

  ‘I wasn’t the only one,’ said Alisk. ‘The alien did too.’

  ‘Ah, his pet. Come to collect the package.’

  ‘Package?’

  ‘Yes, Jeera Mosoon, she was my primary mission, whereas –’

  She struck blindingly fast, using her powerful leg muscles to twist and kick the gun from Alisk’s hands. She continued spinning, conserving her momentum, and sprang at Alisk, who had let her guard down.

  If Anneke had the element of surprise, it did not aid her much. Her opponent was a fierce fighter and trained, clearly, in the deadliest school of fighting invented: the streets of the urban jungle.

  Anneke got in two hard jabs to the solar plexus, stunning Alisk, but the woman seemed to bypass the reflex paralysis and gag, coming back to deliver a jolting blow to the side of Anneke’s head. Anneke curbed her cockiness and settled into some hard raw fighting.

  Sasume and Bodanis didn’t bother struggling against their invisible restraints. Both knew there was no escape, not unless Anneke died or realised where her loyalties should actually lie.

  The blows and counterblows were fast, furious and severe. The captives watched on in silence, praying to their gods that Alisk would win.

  Anneke blocked a near-lethal larynx jab, deflecting the arm upwards, and delivering a short hard punch to the heart. Alisk staggered back, twisted, and feinted a spin kick, instead sweeping the feet out from under Anneke who landed heavily on her back, then swiftly arched up and flipped herself onto her feet just in time to parry another hail of blows.

  Then, anticipating her, Anneke ducked beneath one of Alisk’s feints, seizing her wrist in a twist-lock and throwing her whole weight into a horizontal twisting body spin, flipping Alisk off her feet and nearly breaking her arm.

  By the time Alisk registered what was happening, Anneke had straddled her and had the dart gun, scooped from the floor, pressed to the woman’s pulsing carotid artery.

  Alisk blinked. And smiled. Damn that woman. She actually trusted that Anneke would not activate the poison dart! What in space gave her such confidence?

  ‘Uncle Viktus would be proud.’

  Anneke reacted as if felled by a needler. Uncle Viktus. Uncle Viktus. The words rang in her brain, chasing themselves around her skull. She could barely move or breathe. She felt sick, dizzy and hot, and realised she was sitting on the floor, the room spinning slowly about her.

  Uncle Viktus.

  She started crying, wiping at the tears with the sleeve of her tunic. ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’

  Alisk nodded, but didn’t speak.

  Anneke sniffed. ‘I think I got him killed.’ Memories returned in a chaotic flood of images and sound bites. A lifetime of memories. ‘You’re Alisk. Lob Lotang’s lover. We were enemies. Then we were … acquaintances … bonded by an oath?’

  Alisk nodded again.

  Anneke suddenly frowned. A stream of memories poured in and another poured out. She clutched at them with her mind but they eluded her. With an almost audible click inside her head, she suddenly sat up straight. ‘Alisk. What am I doing here? And where’s here?’

  Alisk stared. ‘You don’t remember how you got here?’

  ‘Not unless this is Brown’s ship –? It doesn’t feel like we’re in space.’

  ‘We’re not. We’re on Se’atma Minor.’

  Anneke digested this.

  Alisk asked, ‘What’s the last thing you remember?’

  ‘Diving. The ship was going up. I had one way out. The jump-gate. So I dove through the field gate.’

  ‘And went where?’

  ‘Not sure. Jungle place. Hot. And confusing. Oh, then …’ She relived the memory. ‘I was snatched away from there. A ricochet.’ She looked up doubtfully at Alisk. ‘It must have been programmed to do that.’

  ‘So you ended up someplace else. Any idea where?’

  Anneke shook her head. ‘No. It’s all gone.’

  ‘You’ve had amnesia. Somehow, Brown got hold of you and tricked you into working for him. Judging from what I saw, he reinforced your memory loss with neuronosis. Probably with personality distortion or a renovation jacket that was – suitable.’

  ‘Why are they bound like that?’ Anneke asked, indicating Sasume and Bodanis.

  ‘Because,’ said Bodanis sarcastically, ‘you were about to murder us. On behalf of our dear friend, Nathaniel Brown, I hasten to add.’

  Anneke looked stricken. ‘I have no recollection of that.’

  ‘Do I look like I’m lying?’

  Alisk stifled a smile. ‘I’d say Brown worked on your deepest RIM training, including the … er … assassination doctrine.’

  ‘You said you were working for RIM!’ said Sasume.

  Anneke’s eyes went wide. ‘Then I must have known Brown in his RIM disguise! Spiffle! Why can’t I remember?’

  ‘It’s called reverse retrograde amnesia,’ said Sasume. ‘First you suffer amnesia and then, when memories return, the whole period of the amnesia itself is lost.’

  ‘Will they come back?’

  ‘They’ve already begun. Specific memories can take a while.’

  ‘I don’t suppose we could be freed?!’ Bodanis’ voice seethed with barely controlled anger.

  Anneke jumped to her feet, quickly releasing Sasume and Bodanis, then both systems of restraint – ixsin web and shaped fields – which were keyed to Anneke’s field signature. She apologised so often and profusely that the former captives finally forgave her.

  Sasume suddenly announced that she was in need of some Ruvian coffee.

  ‘Or something stronger,’ said Bodanis.

  She stole away for an hour. Stolen time. Where had she read that? Lines creased her forehead as she strove to remember, but not everything had come back connected. Most of her memory was there but it seemed some linkages would take a little longer.

  But there was one linkage she could not ignore. She had promised to get in touch with a slave child she had rescued on Reema’s End in the Cygnus Sector.

  ‘Deema?’ Anneke said tentatively. A small pale sleepy face stared back at her from the screen. She was in somebody’s office, the communication lines encrypted, the room itself erased from all scanning networks.

  ‘Anneke, is that you? The picture’s really blurry.’

  ‘It’s me, sweetie. I just wanted to h
ear your voice.’

  Deema yawned. ‘Are you coming home soon?’

  ‘As soon as I possibly can!’ said Anneke, with such deep feeling that the little girl looked at her in alarm.

  ‘Are you all right? You’re not doing anything dangerous, are you?’

  ‘Who, me?’

  Deema giggled, then wiped away tears. ‘I miss you,’ she said.

  Three simple words. Oh, how they hurt!

  ‘I miss you, too. Happy Birthday, Deema!’

  ‘But it’s not –’ Deema’s head swivelled, looking at something in the room she was in. ‘Oh, it is my birthday. It’s after midnight! You remembered!’

  ‘Yes, sweetie. I remembered …’

  An important meeting was underway. Ruvian coffee had been served along with alcoholic beverages. On a large screen at the head of the horseshoe table, familiar faces stared down at Anneke and the others.

  These were her friends and comrades-in-arms: Fat Fraddo, if possible, fatter than the last time Anneke had seen him; Captain Arvakur, looking handsome and debonair; and then, to cap it off, Lob Lotang himself joined the other onscreen faces.

  Anneke did not remember seeing him at RIM headquarters, but he quickly related the story. ‘And you don’t remember who I was with?’ said Anneke.

  ‘A young RIM captain. Thin face, dark hair, that’s about all. I had just received unsettling news about our friend Brown and I’m afraid I was imagining what it would feel like to kill the bastard.’

  ‘A pity,’ said Anneke, ‘since that was Brown.’

  Lotang slapped his thigh and cursed.

  She went on, ‘So you have come out and declared yourself? Isn’t that dangerous, Lotang? Brown will surely hear of it.’

  ‘I understand he already has,’ said Lotang.

  ‘But the slave narcotic –?’

  ‘Temporarily neutralised,’ said Lotang.

  Alisk’s face was etched with hurt and anger. ‘He means delayed. And delayed isn’t the same as neutralised!’

  Lotang’s expression softened. ‘We all die some day, my love.’

  Alisk sat back, scarcely able to control herself.

  Lotang added, looking at Anneke, but perhaps intending his words for Alisk, ‘My scientists can’t tell me how long I’ve got, but I mean to spend every minute of it – and every credit in my account – in destroying Nathaniel Brown.’ He glanced across to Alisk whose eyes were averted. ‘Well, not every minute …’

  Alisk gave a small spluttering laugh. ‘Idiot,’ she said, affectionately.

  Sasume said, ‘Can we get down to business?’

  There was a general laugh. Anneke nodded. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘First order of business, is to work out who’s got the location of the lost coordinates.’

  Sasume stared at her. ‘Amnesia is so boring.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Meaning that aside from Brown – who has Jeera Mosoon back in his possession, no doubt along with the coordinates – the only other person who has them is you.’

  Anneke blinked. ‘Me?’

  ‘Our logs show there was a retinal upload shortly before you and Jeera left her apartment. Colonel?’

  A man sitting at the back of the room stood up. He carried a retinal uploader and placed it in front of Anneke. She looked around the room at the various faces, shrugged, and pressed her face to the hood. The colonel tapped an icon. There was a brief flash on the screen and Anneke sat back, blinking as her pupils slowly returned to normal size.

  They all waited in silence. The colonel adjusted the retinal uploader and tapped in some information.

  Several moments later, lists of data and complex analysis appeared in longer vertical columns on a large plasma screen. They rapidly compiled, then a single brief series of code appeared.

  Anneke recognised it immediately and sat back with a soft gasp.

  ‘Well?’ said Fat Fraddo from the viewscreen.

  ‘Double that,’ said Arvakur.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Alisk. ‘Where are the damned things?’

  Anneke looked around again. ‘Arachnor,’ she said. ‘The final coordinates are on Arachnor.’

  ‘Well, that’s just frickin’ great, that is,’ said Fraddo.

  The meeting continued but no one discussed Arachnor or the challenges it would present. It was relegated to a later talk by silent mutual consent.

  Sasume and Bodanis wanted Anneke to enlist directly in their battle against Brown, but she pointed out that her affiliation with RIM, and her own personal feelings, meant she could not become involved in a mercantile struggle which was about profit.

  Bodanis slammed his fist on the table. ‘Believe me, Anneke, if Brown gets the old weapon caches and an endless supply of dreadnoughts, the issue will be about more than profit!’

  Anneke was unfazed. ‘We are fellow travellers, Bodanis. Our aim is the same, even if we have different methods. Let it rest at that.’

  After much grumbling and arguing, they agreed to disagree, while pursuing the same objective: the termination of Brown’s venture – and if possible, Brown with it.

  Anneke did not voice her feeling that if Sasume and Bodanis got their hands on the old weapons caches, not only would they cease to be partners, but the rest of the galaxy might still be menaced, though with more gentility and velvet-glove diplomacy than under Brown.

  Bodanis got an urgent n-space call. He listened through his earpiece, his left eye twitching. Finally he removed the earpiece. ‘I’ll … ah … put this on speaker.’

  He tapped a tab. ‘Please proceed,’ he said.

  A deep resonant voice echoed from the speakerphone. Anneke recognised it immediately. It was a Sentinel and, if she wasn’t mistaken, the same one she had spoken to on Kanto Kantoris.

  ‘I seek audience with Anneke Longshadow.’

  ‘I am present,’ Anneke said. ‘I am Ekizer.’

  ‘I am happy to speak with you again, Eki –’

  The Sentinel cut her off. ‘Humans will never truly understand time. Nevertheless, it is – as you say – running out.’

  Anneke looked startled. ‘We’re listening.’

  ‘As my voice reaches you, Anneke Longshadow, Nathaniel Brown takes ship for the lonely moon of Omega in orbit about Gamma Pavonis. What he intends there will have dire consequences. If you are to ward off an unspeakable crime, then you must go at once. To tarry would be to incur unbearable guilt …’ There was a stricken, sad quality to Ekizer’s voice that chilled Anneke. ‘I must go.’

  ‘Ekizer, wait! I need more information. What will Brown do on Omega?’

  ‘The unpardonable.’

  The connection was severed. Anneke looked around at the others. No one spoke. Slowly, she got to her feet, looking across at Bodanis.

  ‘I need your fastest ship,’ she said.

  The ship was fast but still, for Anneke’s purposes, agonisingly slow. The Sentinel did not exaggerate, did not embroider. But Ekizer had spoken of unconscionable acts. Anneke could not imagine what they could be.

  What was Brown up to?

  They were two days out from Gamma Pavonis’ moon and by long-range sensor had calculated that Brown would arrive thirty-two hours before they did.

  To fill the time and use up nervous energy, she trained and retrained the combat team Bodanis had loaned her – a crack unit of seasoned veterans with a phlegmatic, no-nonsense attitude. She warmed to them immediately. The unit’s leader was a man named Karkov. He had the look and feel of old leather, what Uncle Viktus called the ‘unkillable type’.

  Alisk joined her in all the training sessions, having insisted on coming along, despite Lotang’s disapproval.

  ‘He’s not the only one who can get himself killed,’ she muttered late one night when the two women were alone in the cramped quarters they shared.

  ‘You love him a lot, don’t you?’ Anneke asked. She had never been in love, though since starting this journey she had had unaccountable flashes, like waking dreams, of herself and Arvakur strollin
g hand in hand through a garden of trailing vines and exotic flowers. Each time the ‘flash’ stopped just as they were about to kiss.

  Alisk’s face twisted with pain and happiness, in equal parts. She muttered under her breath and nodded. After a while she looked up.

  ‘And you? Is there someone special?’ There was a slightly mocking, though good-natured, quality to her voice.

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Is he handsome? And tall? And dark-haired?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘With a smile that makes you want to smile back? Though it’s a pity about his ears.’

  ‘What?’ said Anneke hotly. ‘What about his ears? What are you saying?’

  Alisk gave her a look of innocence. ‘Excuse me? I thought we were speaking hypothetically.’

  ‘Hypothetically my rear end! And just for your information, I like his ears.’

  ‘He is kind of cute. But me, I like the bad boy thing.’

  ‘Well, Lob Lotang’s definitely cornered that market.’

  They both laughed.

  ‘Pity they’re not that bright,’ said Alisk. And they laughed again.

  They reached Omega on schedule, led by Brown’s tiny armada of ships which had just reached orbit, having apparently spent time searching for the small moon.

  ‘Put them up on screen,’ said Anneke. ‘Have they detected us yet?’

  The silent colonel from the meeting in the Fortress shook his head. ‘Cloaked, Status Alpha.’

  ‘Good. Let’s find out as much as we can before showing our hand. In the meantime, I want Tactical to assess the best attack route with maximum direct and collateral damage. If we go in, we go in blasting, take out as many ships as we can. Understood?’

  Karkov and the colonel nodded and bent to their tasks.

  Alisk stood beside Anneke and both stared at the screen.

  ‘What’s he up to?’ Anneke wondered aloud.

  Karkov looked up. ‘Just picked up an energy signature. Jump-gate. Looks like it’s on a grabbing mission!’

  Anneke frowned. ‘They beamed somebody up from the surface.’ Ekizer’s words echoed in her head. ‘I’ve got a bad feeling about this. We’re not going to wait for more data. Whatever Brown has come here to achieve, that process has already begun, and we have to stop it.’