by John Bowers
She stepped inside. The air was stale but breathable. She didn’t detect any chemical odors, and a glance at the overhead revealed vents that could be activated by the touch of a switch. She found the switch panel beside the door and experimented until air began to flow into the room. Within a few minutes the staleness began to dissipate.
She checked her wristwatch. It was late in the day by normal time, though day and night here bore little relationship to her internal clock. What mattered at the moment was that she was tired—emotionally drained, actually—and could use a nap. She set the luggage on the table and closed the hatch, dogged it, and stretched out on the bunk.
Thirty seconds later she was asleep.
*
She jerked awake when someone pounded on the door. She sat up and reached for her rifle, swinging her feet to the floor.
“Who is it?”
A man’s voice replied, but it sounded muffled. Victoria stood up and walked to within a couple feet of the door.
“I didn’t hear you. What was the name?”
“Jones.”
She felt her skin crawl. If it really was Nick, it sounded weird to hear him using that name. She un-dogged the hatch with her left hand, keeping the rifle ready for action. She took a step back.
“It’s open.”
The hatch opened outward. He stared in at her with a neutral expression.
“You won’t need that.”
“Are you sure? Do I know you?”
He stepped inside and pulled the hatch shut. He took off his hat and dropped it on the table.
“Nice room,” he observed.
“I got it cheap, too. How did you find me?”
“Only one place where you can rent a room. I just asked at the front desk.”
His eyes roamed the compact little cell and then rested on her face.
“You look good, Vic.”
“I wish I could say the same for you.” She laid the rifle on the bunk and sat down on the end of it, facing him. “I would offer you a chair, but as you can see…”
He leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. His eyes seemed a little glazed. From the smell of him, he was still drunk.
“You shouldn’t have come, Vic.”
“I’m starting to agree with you.”
“Why did you?”
“If you have to ask that, then you don’t need to know.”
“I’m not coming back with you.”
“I kind of got that impression. But I have to ask you again—what’s here for you?”
“Not a goddamn thing.”
“Then why stay?”
“Nobody here knows who I am, and as long as they don’t find out, they give a shit less.”
“Sorry about earlier. I guess I almost outed you.”
“Yeah. Well.”
“You’ve been reinstated.”
“Reinstated?”
She nodded. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a badge. She tossed it to him.
“All you have to do is sign a form and you have your old job back.”
He stared at the badge as if he’d never seen one before.
“When did they do that?”
“Almost a year ago, as soon as the court injunction ran out. Marshal Bridge has been holding that in the hopes you would come back.”
He tossed it back to her.
“Why would I want to do that?”
“Well, maybe you don’t. Unless you’re finished feeling sorry for yourself.”
His eyes narrowed and his face pinched with anger.
“Fuck you, Cross. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, I think I do. I recognize the symptoms.”
“What symptoms?”
“Self-pity. I went through a period like that myself not so many years ago.”
“Christ, are we going down that road again?”
“No. I didn’t come here to win your love, Nick—that starship launched a long time ago. But I’m not going to stand idly by and watch you self-destruct over something that wasn’t your fault.”
He stared at her for long seconds, pain in his eyes.
“How do you figure it wasn’t my fault?”
“How do you figure it was?”
“Suzanne only came to Alpha 2 because of me. Nathan only went to the Academy because I recommended it. If they had never met me, they would both be alive today.”
“You don’t know that. If Suzanne hadn’t followed you to Alpha 2, the odds are she would have ended up in a Sirian slave market. Kristina, too, from what I’ve heard. As for Nathan…well, he could have joined the Star Marines and got himself killed in training. Nobody can see the future, and nobody can second-guess the past with any accuracy. You’re torturing yourself for no good reason.”
“I don’t expect you to understand.”
She stood abruptly and stamped her foot.
“Goddammit, I do understand! I told you, I did the same thing to myself for several years. How many times do you think I kicked myself for driving you away? Do you think I just brushed it aside and went on my merry way? We all make mistakes, Nick, and we punish ourselves for them. But you didn’t do anything wrong. It was just shitty luck that killed Nathan and Suzanne.”
“Nathan, maybe. But I could have saved Suzanne, if I had been more alert.”
“How?”
“That girl, Tracy. She caught me completely flat-footed. She stepped out of the crowd and I wasn’t even watching for her. If I hadn’t had my head up my ass I could have taken her down before she even drew that weapon.”
“Nick, I was there, too. It was crazy. Judge Moore had just died and we were all in a state of shock. I was trying to figure out what effect his death would have on your court case and I didn’t see her either. You can’t hold yourself responsible for that.”
He stared at her, his expression stony, as if her words bounced right off him. He glanced at his watch.
“You want to get some supper?”
She felt her face flush with frustration. All the logic in the ‘verse wasn’t going to touch him, apparently. Maybe she really had wasted a trip.
But…at least he was still talking to her.
“Sure. Any five-star restaurants around here?”
*
The Redwood Inn was about as impressive as the saloon had been. The room was a little larger, but the tables were metal and a fine red grit coated the floor. Not exactly gourmet, but a person had to eat.
Nick picked a table and they sat down. The menu had been printed years ago and was so faded that half the entrées were unreadable. Victoria squinted at some of the dishes.
“What’s good here?”
“Stay away from the meat.”
“What’s wrong with the meat?”
“Nobody knows what it is.”
“Not even the chef?”
“Chef? Where do you think you are?”
“Surely somebody knows what the meat is.”
“Maybe they do, but the real question is who the meat is.”
Victoria gulped. “Are you serious?” She suddenly remembered her initial concerns about bodies under the sand.
Nick actually grinned.
“It’s a joke. But seriously, stay away from the meat.”
Victoria ordered vegetable broth and bread. Nick ordered a ham sandwich. As the waiter walked away, she frowned.
“I thought you said stay away from the meat.”
He shrugged. “I’m sure it’s not anybody I knew.”
She shook her head, smiling in spite of the situation. A joke like that was just a tiny glimmer of the Nick Walker she had once known and loved. Maybe there was hope for him yet.
They drank bad coffee while they waited for the food, gazing around the nearly empty dining room like a bored married couple who had run out of words years ago. Finally the food came and they began to eat. Victoria’s broth was tasty enough and the bread wasn’t more than a week old. She was hungry enough not to care.
“How long have you been in Dugger Dunes?” she asked presently.
“A few months.”
“Where were you before that?”
“Pretty much everywhere.”
“I followed your trail, but there were gaps in it.”
“I left a trail?”
“Everybody leaves a trail.”
“I took Kristina back to Vega 3,” he said without looking at her. “It was the only logical place for her to go.”
“I guess she was glad to get home?”
He shook his head. “She had never been there. Suzanne left Vega as a teenager; Kristina was born on Sirius.”
“Does she have family on Vega?”
“Distant cousins. She didn’t know them, but they were glad to see her.”
“Is she going to be all right?”
“I think so. It’ll take time. She lost her mother and her husband in the space of two days.”
“Why didn’t you stay with her?”
“I’m just a reminder of what she lost. She’ll be better off with her own people.”
Victoria laid down her spoon.
“Did Kristina say that, or is that your guilt talking?”
He scowled at her, but didn’t answer.
“I didn’t go to Vega, but I tracked you to Beta Centauri, then to Ceres, Terra, and finally to Mars. You did get around.”
“I had things to do.”
“Did you talk to Nathan’s parents?”
He nodded. “And Kristina’s father. I couldn’t go see them but I contacted them by subspace.”
“Why couldn’t you go see them?”
“I’m a wanted man in the Confederacy.”
Victoria was silent for a moment.
“You didn’t find him.”
“Find who?” His eyes looked innocent, but she wasn’t fooled.
“Ken Saracen. You’re still looking for him.”
“Not anymore.”
“Why not?”
“Because I can’t find the bastard. He has his own starship and more money than God. He can go wherever he wants and he’s an expert at staying ahead of the hounds.”
Victoria drank some more broth.
“Maybe I can help you.”
He laughed. “Sure you can.”
“I’m serious. If you think you can stand the sight of me for a few days, I can help you find him.”
“What makes you think you and I together will have any more luck than I had alone?”
She was silent long enough to force him to meet her gaze.
“Because I know where he is.”
Chapter 3
Nick sat up straight in his chair and stared at her.
“You know where Ken Saracen is hiding?”
“To a ninety percent certainty.”
“How did you find him?”
“I’m an attorney.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m pretty good at forging documents when I need to.”
“What kind of documents?”
“Warrants, for example. Subpoenas. It’s not the sort of thing one would want to do very often, but when there’s a need for it…”
“How do those things help?”
“When you want to collect records on private starship movements, for example—fuel records, ports of call, passenger manifests—things like that. I’ve tracked Saracen’s yacht every parsec since it left Alpha Centauri two years ago.”
Nick set his fork down, his face rigid with suspense.
“Where is he?”
“Have you heard of TC?”
“Tau Ceti? Sure. Half a dozen planets, only two of them habitable; roughly twelve light years away.”
“Thirteen planets, actually, but who’s counting? Also a large debris field larger than our own asteroid belt.”
Nick frowned. “You think Saracen went there?”
“His last recorded departure was from Sirius and he was headed in that direction. Sirius isn’t in a direct line between here and TC, but it’s the nearest populated star system in that part of the galaxy, and the distance between the two is roughly the same as from here to Sirius.”
Nick sat in thought for a moment.
“I didn’t know TC had any settlements.”
“There hasn’t been any mass migration like there was to the other inhabited systems, but the preliminary work has been underway for over a century. There are probably two hundred thousand people scattered across the two planets and the debris field. And…” She held up a finger for emphasis. “…the Federation hasn’t established a jurisdiction there. Which means—”
“No U.F. Marshal. No law and order.”
“Bingo. You get to eat the display cake.”
Nick sat back in his chair, the ham sandwich forgotten.
“How long does it take to get to Tau Ceti?”
“About three weeks, give or take. Depending on the starship.”
“How do we get there?”
Victoria’s eyebrows arched. “We? All of a sudden it’s ‘we’?”
The airlock cycled and the inner door opened with a burst of compressed air. Red grit swirled across the floor and rose in a thin cloud as a man staggered inside and stopped, grabbed a chair for support, and looked around. Victoria recognized him as the pushy drunk from the saloon. He spotted her almost at once.
“Well! Looky here, if it ain’t swee’cakes. I didn’t think you were gonna hang around.”
Obviously besotted, he lurched toward their table. Before he reached it, Nick stood up.
“Owenby, we’re having a private conversation here. Why don’t you get a table and drink some coffee? I think you could use it.”
The drunk smiled fondly and put a hand on Nick’s shoulder.
“Hey, how ya doin’, Jones? Ain’t she just the purtiest damn thing you’ve seen all day?”
“Yes she is. Now go find yourself a table.”
“Inna minute, Jones, inna minute!”
Reeking of alcohol, Owenby took another couple of steps toward Victoria and stood there drooling.
“Come on, sweet cakes, waddaya say? Have a drink wi’me?”
She gazed evenly at him and shook her head.
“No.”
His face twisted and he looked ready to cry. He swayed, but Nick grabbed his elbow to steady him.
“Aw, swee’cakes, tha’s no way to be! Jus’ one drink! Waddaya say?”
Nick was about to push him toward another table, but Victoria stood up. She planted herself in the drunk’s face.
“Owenby? Is that your name?”
“Yeah, tha’s me! Wha’s yours?”
“Tell me, Owenby…does your face hurt?”
“Huh?”
“Your face. Does it hurt?’
He frowned, trying to comprehend the question. He shook his head.
“No. Why?”
“Because it’s killing me.”
She turned to Nick.
“Let’s get out of here.”
*
Nick paid for their dinner and they stepped outside. The sky was dim because the sun was so far away, but it was still daylight. The wind had eased and the air was no longer full of dust.
“Is that your sand car?” Nick nodded to where she had left it outside the saloon.
“My rental.”
“You better bring it down here. A new rig like that might be too tempting for some of the locals to ignore.”
“Where do I put it?” Victoria glanced around. “I don’t see any parking lots anywhere.”
“Put it by the door. Won’t take long to load up my stuff.”
“You’re coming back with me?”
He nodded. “Right now I have one goal in life, and that’s to kill Ken Saracen. If you know where he is, then I’m coming with you.”
“Where do you stay?”
“Same as you.” He nodded toward the Dugger Inn. “Like I said, it’s the only place in town.”
“Do we have time to make Sagan Cit
y before dark?”
Nick glanced at his watch.
“If we leave right away. The rotational period here is almost exactly the same as Terra’s, just a few minutes longer. How fast is your sand car?”
“It’ll make a hundred knots.”
“You have enough fuel?”
“I filled up before I left; I still have a three-quarter full tank.”
“Then we can make it. Bring the car down and I’ll get my stuff.”
They split up, Nick going inside, Victoria to retrieve the car. Ten minutes later they had loaded all their gear and Nick stood facing her across the top of the vehicle.
“Did you get any sleep?”
“Maybe an hour. I’m alert enough. But first I have another matter to attend to.”
She turned back toward the Dugger Inn.
The same woman was sitting at the desk watching an old vid on a player. She didn’t bother to look up until Victoria rested her elbows on the counter.
“Is there a problem?”
“Change of plan,” Victoria said. “Looks like I won’t need the room after all.”
The woman’s expression never changed.
“Sorry to hear that.”
“So…”
“What do you want, a refund?”
“A partial refund, anyway. I only spent about an hour in there.”
“We don’t do refunds. You rented it for a night, so it’s yours for the night.”
“Like I said, change of plans. I have to head back to Sagan City, so I don’t need it for the whole night.”
The woman shrugged. “The contract doesn’t specify actual time spent in the room. You paid for a night, so it’s up to you how much time you want to spend in there.”
“Contract? What contract?”
“Didn’t I give you a receipt?”
“Yeah.” Victoria dug in her pocket and fished out the receipt.
“Read the back of it.”
Victoria turned it over and peered at it. The print was so fine she couldn’t make it out even by squinting.
“This is practically a micro-dot. I can’t read the damn thing.”
The woman pulled open a desk drawer and lifted out a magnifier, which she set on the counter. Victoria slipped the stub into it and the super-fine print displayed on the screen.
This contract limits our liability. All transactions are final. No refunds, transfers, or reassignments. Thank you for your patronage.
