Coyote Horizon

by Allen Steele

  “Da. It would destroy the ship. No question about it.” Carlos noticed that, as she spoke, her hands trembled ever so slightly at her sides. “And you’re wrong about the cargo bay being the only part of the ship that would be affected. It’s adjacent to the internal oxygen tanks, so a sufficiently powerful explosion would tear through the internal bulkheads and cause them to go up as well. And that…”

  “So you can’t chance it, can you?” The chaaz’maha stared at her. “Commodore, you must believe me. You have no other choice.”

  Once again, Carlos glanced at the wall screen. The Lee was less than fifty thousand miles from Starbridge Coyote; since braking maneuvers were complete, the vessel was only fourteen minutes away from hyperspace insertion. On the bridge, the crew was already linking the ship’s AI with the one aboard the nearby gatehouse, the prelude to an intricate ballet of quantum-level computations that would result in an artificial wormhole being created between 47 Ursae Majoris and Earth’s solar system.

  Fourteen minutes. Time was running out…

  “Very well. I’ll…trust you, even if I don’t completely believe you.” Tereshkova let out a breath; she’d also noticed the screen. “I’ll summon Mr. Heflin, have him put the suspect under arrest.”

  She started to turn toward the door, but the chaaz’maha reached out to stop her. “No, don’t do that. He’s high-strung enough already. If he sees a member of your crew…especially a senior officer…coming toward him, he’s liable to set off the bomb.” He paused. “I didn’t see him do so, but I believe he’s already armed the detonator. The pad has a timer, but I don’t think he’s using it. Besides the fact that his timing is critical, he really wants to blow the thing himself. That way he can kill me with his own hand. If he thinks someone is going to stop him, or you put the ship on alert…”

  “Can you jettison the cargo?” Carlos asked. “If you blow it out into space before…”

  “No.” Tereshkova shook her head. “Passenger baggage is sealed inside containers, which in turn are locked down inside the cargo bay. We can open the bay doors, certainly, but there’s no mechanism for jettisoning the containers themselves.”

  “Then maybe we can find the bomb, disarm it.”

  “No. We can’t open the canisters while they’re in the bay. They’re packed together too tightly.” The Commodore’s mouth pursed together. “No one ever anticipated this sort of emergency, I regret to say.”

  “So abort the jump.” Carlos shrugged. “If we don’t go through the starbridge, maybe he won’t…”

  “It won’t make any difference.” The chaaz’maha shook his head. “He’s already committed himself. Even if we don’t go through, he’ll explode the bomb anyway…and as the Commodore says, chances are he won’t need hyperspace to kill everyone aboard.”

  Carlos closed his eyes. “So we’re going to have to deal with this guy…”

  “Cosenza,” the chaaz’maha said quietly. “The Reverend Alberto Cosenza. Deacon of the Church of the Holy Dominion.” He glanced at his uncle. “If you intend to negotiate with him, you’d do well to know his name and who he is.”

  A Dominionist. Carlos quietly sighed. Although he considered the Church to be misguided, its tenets antiquated and archaic, he’d never thought it to be dangerous. And indeed, the institution itself probably wasn’t to blame. Just one man, so fanatically determined to defend his religion that he’s willing to commit mass murder in the name of God.

  Uh-huh, he thought. And how many times has that happened?

  “All right, then.” He pushed himself out of his chair. “Let me go back there. Maybe I can talk to—”

  “Nyet!” Tereshkova moved to block the door. “As commander of this vessel, I absolutely forbid it.”

  “But…”

  “In fact, I’m doing exactly the opposite.” She opened the door; her chief petty officer was standing just outside. “Mr. Heflin? Please escort President Montero and the chaaz’maha below and put them in a lifeboat…”

  “Ana!” Carlos stepped closer to her. “Dammit, don’t…!”

  Tereshkova laid a hand on his chest, started to push him back. Then, as if on second thought, she grabbed his arm and pulled him toward the door. “Take them below,” she repeated, ignoring Carlos’s objections. “Once they’re aboard, rig the lifeboat for automatic jettison in the event of a general alarm.”

  Heflin’s face went pale. He had no idea what was going on, but he knew better than to question his captain’s orders. “Yes, ma’am,” he murmured, then he held out a hand to Carlos. “Mr. President, if you will…”

  Carlos wasn’t about to be taken away without a fight. “Ana, you can’t…”

  “Mr. President, this is not open to discussion.” No longer bothering with common courtesy, she shoved him out of the cabin. “We’ll deal with him ourselves. Your safety…your nephew’s…are my prime concern just now. Chaaz’maha, please…?”

  “As you insist.” Apparently seeing the futility in offering any resistance, the chaaz’maha stepped past her. As he joined his uncle in the corridor, though, he turned to offer a solemn bow. “Sa’Tong qo, Commodore.”

  Tereshkova had no idea what that meant, but she gave him a quick nod in return. “Thanks. You, too.” Then she pointed toward a hatch at the forward end of the corridor and snapped her fingers. “Go now.”

  Carlos reluctantly nodded, then turned to follow the chaaz’maha. Then he stopped and looked back at Ana. “So what are you going to do?”

  “I’m…I’m afraid this is a situation where there are no good choices. Only ones less dangerous than others.” She hesitated. “We’re going to have to take him down.”

  Sitting in the back of the passenger section, the pad resting on the armrest beside his right hand, Alberto Cosenza felt a serenity that he’d never experienced. All at once, it seemed as if he perceived things with a certain clarity; he’d come to realize that his entire life had been leading up to this moment, that he was about to play a role that had been preordained since the moment of his birth. Nothing else mattered, save what he was about to do.

  Cosenza was vaguely aware of a minor commotion on the other side of the curtain, but paid little attention. He’d noticed Thompson’s reaction to him, how he’d abruptly rushed away. No doubt the false prophet had been sickened by the presence of a man of God; it was merely another indication that the deacon was being guided by a higher power.

  Cosenza rested his fingertips lightly upon the pad. The detonator was armed, the timer disengaged; all he needed to do was tap the appropriate command into the menu bar, and it would all be over. Gazing at the screen on the seatback before him, he was satisfied to see that the Lee was only seven minutes away from its rendezvous with the starbridge.

  Soon. Very soon…

  Carlos knew that Ana was making the wrong decision. But he had to wait to make his own move.

  The lifeboats were located on the deck below the passenger section, behind circular hatches tilted downward on both sides of a narrow passageway. Carlos let Heflin escort him and the chaaz’maha down the ladder, and quietly stood by while the chief petty officer opened the nearest lifeboat. The chaaz’maha climbed aboard, but Carlos paused to watch as Heflin opened a service panel beside the outer hatch, revealing a small keypad. Heflin tapped in a code number, then entered a series of commands, following instructions on the pad’s tiny screen. A soft double beep, then Heflin shut the panel again.

  “There. It’s set to jettison the moment there’s a general alarm.” There was a grim smile on the chief petty officer’s face as he turned toward Carlos. “All right, Mr. President…in you go.”

  “Of course.” Carlos ducked his head as if to climb into the lifeboat, then he hesitated. “Umm…I’m not sure how this works. The seats, I mean. How do you…?”

  “They fold down from the bulkheads. Very easy to do.” Heflin was becoming impatient. “Mr. President, please…”

  “Certainly. Of course.” Carlos put his shoulders through the hatch, b
ut when he saw that Hawk was having trouble lowering one of the seats, he withdrew again. “Look, I’m sorry to be a pest, but…”

  Heflin let out his breath in exasperation, but without another word he climbed into the lifeboat. The second he entered the small capsule, Carlos slammed the hatch behind him. Grabbing the lock-lever, he shoved it upward, sealing the lifeboat shut from outside. Heflin was already banging his fist against the hatch as the president sprinted back down the passageway to the ladder.

  As expected, he found Tereshkova in the first-class section, standing beside the curtain. Two midshipmen were with her; all three had stun guns in their hands. The Commodore’s eyes widened the moment she saw Carlos come through the forward hatch.

  “What the hell are you…?” she hissed, her voice an angry whisper.

  “Shut up and listen.” Keeping his voice low, Carlos held up a hand as he came closer. “That’s not going to work. If he’s already armed the detonator, he’ll set it off as soon as he sees you…”

  “I have two more men behind the hatch on the other end of the compartment.” Tereshkova jerked her head toward the second-class section. “We’re just the backup. On my signal, they’re going to come in from behind and—”

  “Ana, please.” He shook his head. “You heard what Hawk said. Cosenza’s got his finger on the trigger. If he sees anyone come in, either from the front or the rear…”

  “We’re just going to have to take that chance.” Tereshkova pointed toward the hatch Carlos had just come through, which still lay open. “Now do as you’re told. Go back where you belong.”

  Through the open hatch behind him, Carlos heard the hollow clang of footsteps running up the ladder. Heflin had managed to escape from the lifeboat and was pursuing him topside. “Look,” he said, trying not to raise his voice, “there’s a better way. Let me go in there…”

  “Out of the question.” Tereshkova gazed past him. “Mr. Heflin…”

  “Listen!” Carlos pushed past one of the midshipmen until he was right in Tereshkova’s face. “I’m with you on this. There’s no way we can talk him out of it. We are just going to have to take him down…but let me do it.”

  Tereshkova raised an eyebrow; this wasn’t what she expected to hear. She started to say something, but Carlos didn’t let her. “Look, he won’t suspect me…not if I go in to see someone else. There’s another woman back there…a reporter, Lynn Hu. That’s who Hawk was visiting in the first place. She’s sitting directly across the aisle from him. If I sit down beside her…”

  Heflin’s hand came to rest on his shoulder, but Tereshkova surprised them both by shaking her head. Heflin reluctantly let go of him, and Carlos went on. “If you give me a stun gun, then I’ll have a close shot. Way closer than any of your men.” He paused, swallowing what felt like a dry lump in his throat. “And you know I can handle a gun. I’ve been doing this sort of thing all my life.”

  That wasn’t exactly the truth, but Ana was fully aware of the years he’d spent as a guerrilla fighter. Long before he was President Montero, he’d been Rigil Kent, the man who’d led the fight to liberate the colonies. Yet Tereshkova still seemed uncertain. Her gaze flickered from him to the two midshipmen, then to the curtain, then back to Carlos again. “Time,” she whispered, glancing at Heflin.

  “Three minutes, twenty seconds,” the chief petty officer replied.

  Carlos understood. Hyperspace insertion would begin sixty seconds before the Lee entered the wormhole created by the giant ring of the starbridge. It would be at that one-minute mark when the Millis-Clement field would be deactivated and the ship would lose artificial gravity. He had to be seated by then.

  “Commodore…” He held out his hand. “Please. I know what I’m—”

  “All right.” Tereshkova made up her mind. She slapped her stunner into his palm. “Go. Do it.”

  Carlos nodded, but said nothing as he tucked the small pistol in the waistband of his trousers, carefully positioning it on his right side where he could easily get to it with his right hand. He pulled the front of his jacket around the gun but didn’t button it, instead letting his jacket hang open. So long as he kept his arms at his sides, the stun gun would remain hidden.

  Heflin patted his shoulder, a silent gesture of good luck. Tereshkova was quiet, but the look in her eyes spoke volumes. Carlos took a deep breath, then, as the officers slipped behind him so that they wouldn’t be spotted, he pushed aside the curtain and stepped out into the compartment.

  The passengers were gazing out the portholes, trying to catch a glimpse of the starbridge that lay directly before them. A few of them looked up as Carlos walked down the aisle; their surprise at his sudden appearance was obvious from the way he heard his name being whispered. He ignored them as he sauntered toward the back of the compartment, trying to appear more relaxed than he actually was.

  As he expected, Lynn was seated to his right, on the port side of the cabin. Across the aisle was Cosenza, seated on the starboard side. Although Lynn spotted him at once, the deacon barely seemed to notice him. Cosenza continued to stare straight ahead, his gaze fixed upon the seatback screen in front of him.

  “Mr. President!” Lynn’s mouth fell open. “I didn’t…I’m sorry, but I wasn’t expecting…”

  “I know, I know.” Carlos forced a congenial smile that he didn’t feel. “Getting a little tired of first class, so I thought I’d come back, ride the rest of the way with you.” He tried not to look at Cosenza. “Mind if I…?”

  “No…no, of course not.” Startled, she started to reach down to the vacant seat beside her, and it was then that Carlos noticed that she’d placed her shoulder bag upon it, even taking care to pull a lapstrap around it so that it wouldn’t float away when the Millis-Clement field was deactivated. “Just let me…”

  “Oh, no. Don’t bother.” Carlos couldn’t believe his luck; Lynn’s bag in the seat next to her meant that he had an excuse to sit beside Cosenza, thereby putting him in arm’s reach. “I’ll just sit here.”

  Not bothering to ask permission, Carlos settled in the vacant seat next to Cosenza’s. “Excuse me,” he murmured, keeping the rigid smile on his face even as he turned his head to glance at the deacon. For the first time, Cosenza became aware of him. Regarding Carlos with a gaze that was unnaturally intense, he shrank away, avoiding even the most casual contact.

  Carlos spotted the datapad. It was on the right armrest, Cosenza’s hand lightly upon it. Close, so close…

  A voice came over the ceiling speaker just then. “Your attention, please. We are on final approach toward Starbridge Coyote, with hyperspace insertion in two minutes. In sixty seconds, the ship will disengage its Millis-Clement field. When this occurs, we will lose artificial gravity. Please make sure your seat belts are securely fastened, and all loose objects are safely stowed…”

  “I’m so glad you’ve decided to join me.” Lynn was paying little attention to the announcement; she’d turned around in her seat as much as its straps would allow. “I really hate this part of the trip. Making the jump…”

  “Nothing to worry about. It’s perfectly safe, really.” Carlos buckled his waist strap. He pretended to tighten it, while in fact making sure that it was loose enough that it wouldn’t interfere with his movements. In that instant, he realized that he’d made a mistake; by sitting down next to Cosenza, he’d put himself in a position where he couldn’t easily reach the stunner concealed beneath his jacket. At least not without jostling the priest with his right elbow, therefore tipping his hand. He was close, yes…but too close.

  Perhaps he should first try to grab the pad, then go for his weapon? No. Forget the gun. The crewmen waiting for him to make his move would take care of Cosenza. The first priority was getting his hands on that goddamn pad.

  “Yes, well…you’re right, of course.” Lynn continued to blather on, oblivious to what was happening beside her. “Anyway, I just want to thank you for reading the message I sent you, and asking your nephew if he’d be willing to do a
n interview.”

  “Forget it.” Carlos prayed that Cosenza hadn’t heard her words. From the corner of his eye, he saw that the minister was still watching his screen. Its image had changed from a course map to a real-time view of the starbridge, as seen from a camera in the ship’s bow.

  “No, really. I just wish that he’d stayed longer, but he said that he had an upset stomach…”

  Cosenza looked sharply at her, then his gaze shifted toward Carlos. The deacon had caught that remark. Finally realizing who was sitting beside him, he’d become suspicious. Dammit! Carlos thought. Can’t that silly woman ever keep her mouth shut?

  “He’ll be…he’ll be fine,” he said hastily, and found that he couldn’t keep from stammering. “I’m sure he’ll…I mean, that he…”

  Four bells rang, the signal that the field was about to be shut down. A few seconds later, he felt his body rise from the seat cushion, held down only by the loosened strap. On the screen before him, the starbridge completely filled the view. Its broad silver torus was no longer empty at its center, though: a brilliant flash of defocused light, filtered slightly by the camera but nonetheless blinding, was replaced an instant later by a swirling haze of multicolored light.

  The Lee surged forward, rushing toward the opened wormhole, and in that second, Cosenza raised the pad from his armrest. Holding it in his right hand, he lifted his left hand, extended a forefinger…

  Now!

  Twisting around in his seat, Carlos made a grab for Cosenza’s left hand. He managed to get hold of the deacon’s wrist. Cosenza snarled at him, an incoherent protest that sounded like an animal’s angry growl, as Carlos yanked the priest’s hand away from the pad. For an instant, Carlos thought he had him. He heard Lynn yell something, and behind them there was the sharp bang of the compartment’s rear hatch being slammed open…

  Cosenza wrenched his hand free. Desperately, Carlos tried to lunge across his seat, but the strap interfered with him. “Don’t…!”