by Jaleta Clegg
I went to the cockpit and started the scanning equipment running. The vid feed and recording loop still worked. I set it for motion triggered recording. I wanted to see who was out there when I wasn’t.
The rest of the ship systems were on standby, green and yellow lights blinking softly. I’d done what I could. I went to the mess hall.
The galley was one of the automated ones. I accessed the menu and picked the dinner least likely to taste horrid. It turned out to be a pasty spaghetti with rubber meatballs. I took the remaining ration bars out of my pocket and lined them up. I had ten left. I gathered the bars and tucked them into my one remaining pack. The other one I’d filled with supplies and cached after the water and food was gone.
I wandered the ship for a while. I was tired but restless. The constant silence, broken only by the thin whine of the wind and any noise I made, rubbed my nerves raw. I went back to the cockpit and played with the com system. The static was as thick as ever. The emergency beacon wasn’t working. Just like all the other ships I’d checked.
The weapons board showed solid red lights, the ones that weren’t completely dark. I stared at the controls for a while. There were shields and blast cannons and possibly solid projectile launchers, but they did me no good whatsoever. I had never been trained on weapons systems.
I sat in the captain’s chair and turned on his comp station. I pulled up the ship library and played with it for a while. I found some entertainment vids and watched one. I fell asleep in the captain’s chair.
I woke some time later, stiff and cramped. The comp blinked, asking if I wanted to watch another vid. I told it no.
I went to the lower level and used the facilities, then made myself sleep in one of the crew bunks.
I woke to a loud thumping on the airlock door. I scrambled under a nonexistent pillow looking for a weapon, an old habit I hadn’t managed to shake. I’d always kept anything I treasured under my pillow. It was the only way to still have it in the morning at the orphanage. At the Academy, it was required. I’d slept with a stunner so often that I could trace the dents in my skull where I’d lain on it. I didn’t keep weapons under my pillow on the Phoenix. I kept them in a bin just over my head.
Not that they did me a lot of good here, I thought as another loud thump rattled through the ship. I went back to the suit locker room just outside the airlock. I keyed the vid screen on.
Five of the golden men stood outside the ship. Two of them swung a big rock at the airlock doors. The other three argued with each other. I turned on the sound.
The language was different, not something I’d ever heard before. I watched them for a while. I could guess what they were saying. They kept pointing at the airlock controls. The rock hammered at the door without noticeable effect.
They’d come back here and were upset to find the door shut and locked. They knew I was inside, I realized with a sudden cold sinking in my stomach. I’d left a trail so clear that even I could have followed it. Not only was the vegetation trampled and broken, but the ships were closed and sealed.
I sank down until I was sitting on the floor, staring up at the vid. How stupid could I be? I should have shut the ships down completely and left them as I found them. It was too late to fix that now.
I checked the time. It was midafternoon. If they left when the sun started setting, I still had at least four hours to endure. Another loud thump rattled the cameras. What would I do if they didn’t leave? I could stay indefinitely on the ship, at least until the food ran out. But how long could I stay sane if they kept me trapped here? I had to hope they would leave when the sun set.
The rock jarred the door again. I watched the golden men change places. The rock hit the door again. One of the men, brighter than the rest, tried to open the door using the controls. He pushed on the control panel several times. He looked upset as he walked over to start arguing with the others again.
Two of them left, walking across the slope towards the canyon. I hoped they weren’t going after their black box. I didn’t know if I could resist again.
Two of them kept the rock banging against the door. The last one watched, tapping his wand against his leg. Nothing changed for a long while.
I made myself get up and collect my supplies and shut things back down. I sat in the control room and watched the men as the day wore on. They stopped bashing the door with a rock after a while. The three of them walked a little distance away and squatted down, watching the ship.
The other two came back carrying a black box. The men set it down. All five of them clustered around it, arguing again, with lots of hand waving. I fidgeted, hoping the sun would set and they would leave before they turned the box on. I didn’t have that kind of luck.
They came to an agreement. The frantic arm-waving stopped. One crouched down and adjusted something on the black box. All of them stood back, behind it. A wide cone unfolded from the front of the box.
Nothing happened for a long time other than a strange itch at the base of my skull. The golden men stood like statues for almost an hour.
One of them moved forward and snapped the box off. The itch in my head went away and the cone folded back into the box. They picked up the box and walked back to the canyon, the three not carrying the box waving their hands wildly as they continued to argue. The leader glanced at the sky, then called out something. They jogged faster towards the canyon.
I watched them go with a deep sense of relief. They’d be back the next day. I had tonight to find another hiding spot and figure out a way of getting there that didn’t leave an obvious trail. I pulled out my map and studied it.
Five ships with working transponders lay scattered over five miles farther the direction I was headed. It was going to be a very long night.
I ate again before gathering my pack. I went to the airlock and popped off the cover. The disconnected wires dangled in front of me. I raised my hand to reconnect them. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t face the thin cold night air. I couldn’t leave the relative security of the ship. I leaned against the wall next to the airlock.
I couldn’t do this. I had to do this. If I didn’t do it, Jasyn and Clark were as good as dead and so was I. I couldn’t lift a ship by myself. I couldn’t program the course even if I did manage to get off planet. And that wasn’t including the tractor beam and force fields that I had to get turned off somehow.
I could stay in the ship until I went mad or the food ran out or the golden men came back with the black box and drove me out. Or I could go now, while I still had supplies.
“I can do this,” I said out loud. “I have to do this.”
I plugged the wires back in. The door slid open partway and jammed. The rocks had left some sizable dents. I stepped out into the rapidly cooling air. It was already thin, burning in my chest as I tried to suck it in. The door wouldn’t close behind me.
I hammered on the controls like a mad woman. I shouted incoherently, cursing the planet, the strange men, the uncaring sky overhead, and my abysmally bad luck. I cut my hand. The pain dragged me back. I leaned against the ship sucking at the shallow cut.
I was still alive and free. I had to be a lot smarter if I wanted to stay that way. I couldn’t afford to lose control.
I took several deep breaths, steadying myself before I opened the controls for the door. I used the override to force the battered doors closed. They screeched loudly but they shut. I pulled the wires then put the cover back on. My hands shook so badly it took three tries.
I faced outwards, standing on the lip of the airlock. The golden men had left a broad trail leading to the canyon. My own trail traced to the north, a lot thinner but still very noticeable. The ships I was trying to get to were to the south, away from the canyon. If I went straight there, I’d leave a trail for the tall men to follow.
I decided to take the trail they’d left and hope I found something else to get me where I wanted to go. I could at least confuse any trail I left, even if it added miles to my hike.
I stepped down from the ship and started along the path. The sharp smell of the crushed plants made me sneeze. I jogged at a pace I hoped I could keep up.
I was breathing hard by the time I reached the taller trees at the top of the canyon. The crunchy plants didn’t grow here. The ground under the trees was mostly bare, dry layers of old leaves and shed bark. I stopped where I could just see the purple haze of the force field over the canyon. The trail I followed kept going, right up to the edge of the canyon and over. I wheezed trying to catch my breath in the thin air.
I turned to the side and picked my way through the stunted trees. I reached a rocky outcrop and climbed it. I looked back. I couldn’t see where I’d left the trail, at least not in the dim light afforded by the night sky overhead. I hoped it wasn’t visible in daylight.
The rocks I stood on kept going, a long ridge climbing slowly away from the canyon. The plants didn’t grow on the patches of bare stone that grew larger and more numerous the farther I went from the canyon. I tried to stick to those patches, where I couldn’t leave footprints if I tried.
The ridge took me a good distance away from the canyon, towards the last few ships. It also kept rising until I walked along a rocky ledge high above the low swells of ground below.
I let my mind drift, chewing over some of the things that didn’t quite fit. The biggest piece that bothered me was the fact that the ship transponders had gotten clear signals through. All other com signals were jammed. Why did that one pulse of information get through when nothing else did? Was it because it was a single pulse of data? Was it because it was on a different wavelength than the rest? If one of the ships had a working scan system I was going to test some ideas.
I came in sight of the ships about midway through the night. Three were clustered in a valley below me. The remains of another ship were smashed against the base of the rocky ridge.
I worked my way down the steep slope to the ships, climbing carefully and trying to avoid the plants that clung to the pockets of thin soil.
The key to getting free of the planet seemed to lie in the force fields that pulled ships in and kept them glued to the planet. If I could figure a way to short them out, the way off planet was clear and open. That just left the golden men and their wands. Would weapons work again if the fields were off? I hoped so, it would make things easier.
I needed to get my hands on a wand. I needed to know how they worked. I needed a black box. I needed to know Jasyn and Clark were safe and alive. I needed to know we were going to escape this planet. I could choke myself with my needs.
I reached the bottom of the cliff. The wrecked ship was to my right, tangled masses of metal lying in the shadows. Maybe I’d take a look in daylight. It was too dangerous in the dark night.
The first ship I came to was an old freighter. The door gaped open. No lights showed. I flicked on my handlight and went inside.
It was the same thing I’d found on the other ships. Nothing left that wasn’t bolted down. Even the galley chairs were missing. The ship was dead. The engines didn’t even flicker when I tried to start them up. I checked the name of the ship against my list of transponders, and marked it off as completely dead. I was a bit surprised that the transponder had still worked. I noted that next to the ship name.
It only took a few moments to get to the next ship on the list, a small scout ship, the Patrol Exploration logo blazoned on the side. I pointed the handlight at the side and noted the name. Trailblazer. Brave name for a ship that had been holding down dust for quite some time, to judge by the sand drifted against the boarding ramp. I went inside the open door.
I checked the tiny crew cabins, opening every bin. I found a pair of socks under one mattress, but nothing else. There were two locked bins in the captain’s cabin. I tried to open them, but not very hard. They looked like they held personal effects.
The cockpit was still on standby, waiting for a crew that hadn’t come back. Judging from the way the ship had settled, they hadn’t crashed. They’d landed on purpose. The scan equipment was fully functional. I set it running, checking everything I could think of that might help.
While the scans ran, I accessed the ship log. No vid, just voice records. I scrolled through to the last entry and opened the file. The captain’s voice filled the ship. I leaned back while he stated the date and log entry number. He gave the ship’s name and his own. I sat up in shock and stopped the recording. I rewound it and listened again.
“Captain Darus Venn recording ship log.”
I stopped it again and played it back.
“Captain Darus Venn. . .”
It couldn’t be. I pulled up the ship personnel files. A single small picture showed next to each name. I ignored the others, all my attention for the captain. The picture was small, grainy, not quite in focus. Darus Venn was an older man, his hair grizzled gray. He grinned in the picture, a quirk of his lips that was very familiar to me. I’d seen it often enough on my own face. I enlarged the picture and stared at the fuzzy face.
Darus Venn was my father. I’d never met him. When I was seventeen, the Patrol had informed me he was missing and presumed dead. I was his only beneficiary. His pension made it possible for me to escape from Tivor. I’d used it to buy my first ship, the one that had been blown up by an incompetent crew, stranding me on Dadilan.
I stared at the picture. Darus Venn. It couldn’t be my father, but I saw the resemblance in more than just his smile. His eyes were the same shape mine were, although his were a pale gray. I touched the screen, tracing the line of his jaw. Could it really be my father?
All of the old pain came back. Why had he left me on Tivor? Why hadn’t he ever come for me in the orphanage? Why had he left me there? Hadn’t he loved my mother? Did he care for me at all? If he did, why hadn’t he come for me?
The picture blurred. I wiped away tears I thought I’d cried out before I was nine years old. Darus Venn, captain of the Trailblazer. It fit too well with what little I knew. I sat back and rubbed my hands over my face.
It didn’t matter if he was my father. Nothing would matter if I couldn’t find some way off this planet. For all I knew he was dead. I turned to the scanning equipment.
I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t make myself keep looking for answers. I closed the airlock door and found an empty bunk. I lay down, choking on thick sobs. I wasn’t sure if I cried from exhaustion, loneliness, shock, relief, anger, or sadness. It didn’t matter. I wanted someone to touch, someone warm and real to comfort me. I wanted Tayvis. I wondered if I’d ever see him again.
Pitiful, really. I thought I was so strong, that I could handle anything life could throw at me after Tivor. I’d never been so wrong.
Chapter 10
Clark rubbed blisters and wondered how many days it had been. Six? Seven? Ten? Three? He couldn’t remember and he’d lost track. At least they weren’t working today. Clouds had rolled in during the night. Rain dripped through the canopy of trees, warm and persistent. He quit trying to stay dry and just concentrated on enjoying not having to move.
He was in a wide clearing with twenty other men and women, walled on three sides by thick thorn bushes. The last side was a sheer wall of rock. A tiny spring bubbled out of the rock wall thirty feet above, dripping over the sheer wall to gather in a small pool in the sand at the bottom. They used that for drinking.
He held out his hands, letting the rain wash some of the grime off. His nails were broken, rimed with black dirt that wouldn’t come clean. The sluggish stream that ran through their encampment wasn’t enough. He needed soap. He rubbed dirt from his hands, smearing it with the rain. He wasn’t going to get clean until he escaped.
That looked hopeless. Their routine hadn’t varied, until the rain started. An hour or so after sunrise, the golden men came with their wands and opened the thorn wall. They herded the prisoners down a path next to the stream. They stopped in a different clearing each day. The clearings were inevitably muddy and covered with stubble. Each prisoner spent the
day jabbing holes into the ground and planting tiny green shoots one at a time.
Midmorning they were given a short break. A basket of white bricks was passed out. They were allowed to drink from the stream and eat the bland pasty things. They worked through the rest of the day until close to sunset. They were herded back to the clearing and given another food brick. The thorns were closed.
The first night, Clark had tried to talk with the others, although he was so tired he could barely move. Only one man had responded. He wore the tattered black uniform of a Patrol Enforcer. When Clark tried to talk, the man turned haunted eyes to him.
“Quiet,” he whispered. “Or they will come.”
The others who had watched turned away to their own private miseries.
He’d woken to the rain this morning. The Enforcer had seen him moving.
“Rain day,” he’d said cryptically and closed his eyes, enduring the endless drizzle.
No one else moved. Clark studied them. They all wore shipsuits. Half of them were Patrol uniforms. One woman in silver caught his eye. Her blond hair hung in wet strings. She sat next to the tiny waterfall, her back against the rock. Clark crossed the small clearing to sit next to her.
“What is this place?” he said quietly, keeping his voice just above a whisper.
She shrugged.
“The name’s Clark.” He stuck out one battered hand.
She looked at it blankly for a long time. He was ready to pull it back when she finally moved. She touched his hand with one that was calloused and rough. She clutched at his hand.
“It’s been so long since anyone talked,” she said, whispering. “Jerrus won’t allow it.”
“Why not?” Clark whispered back.
Jerrus, the Enforcer, was currently asleep, snoring loudly on his back with rain dripping through his ragged beard.
“Because they don’t allow it,” she said, jerking her head at the wall of thorns. She didn’t need to explain who they were. “Not in the fields. They’ve never done anything about it in here as long as we keep it low.” She reluctantly let go of his hand.
