Empire of Dust

by Jacey Bedford

  “Victor, no,” Rena began to protest.

  “Yes. Someone has to look after the evacuees. Jack can supervise gathering everyone together. I won’t leave until the last person is safe. That’s my job.”

  “With Mrs. Lorient’s permission, the first flight leaves just as soon as ninety people are on board,” Benjamin said. “First thing in the morning. Hand baggage only. Lives are more important than possessions.”

  • • •

  After everyone had departed, Ben slumped in a chair in ops.

  “Well done,” Cara said.

  He looked up at her. “Lorient didn’t make the obvious snap judgment? After all that’s happened, I wouldn’t have blamed him in the slightest if he’d accused us of trying to get rid of the settlers so we could keep the platinum for ourselves.”

  She shook her head. “He looked like an old man. For the first time ever I think I felt sorry for him. You think he’s learning at last?”

  “I hope so.” Ben shrugged. “Nothing I can do about it anyway.”

  “So quit trying, at least for tonight. You look dead beat,” she said.

  “I probably am if I stop to think about it. That’s how I’ve survived so far—by not stopping to think.”

  “Do we have a chance?” Cara perched on the edge of a desk.

  “We stand a chance of getting a few thousand settlers off planet or hidden before things get nasty.” He shrugged. “After that, we’ll see.”

  “You need some sleep. Go to bed.” Cara took his hand and held it to her cheek.

  “Only if you come with me.”

  Cara ignored the half-smile on Wenna’s face as they headed for the door. In their room, she turned up the opacity of the window to maximum and shut out the gray daylight. Ben sat on the edge of the bed, not moving. She undressed him like a child and rolled him into bed, then quickly stripped off her own clothes and slid under the covers. They held each other tight until Ben drifted off into a deep sleep.

  Cara lay still and listened to his even breathing, making sure he wouldn’t wake, and then let herself think about Ari and what the consequences might be of seeing him again. Was anything else hidden inside this head of hers waiting to trip her up?

  • • •

  The following morning Gen, Jon Moon, and their hastily assembled crew took the first bunch of settlers off-world. Rena Lorient led them on board, calming them all with kind words of reassurance and barely looking back at her husband. Cara wondered whether she was pleased to get away from him and whether he was secretly relieved to be free from her disapproval. There seemed to be a chasm between them since Danny’s death.

  Settlers and psi-techs worked together. Why did it take the threat of imminent death to suddenly make people realize that their similarities were more important than their differences? Even Lorient was working with them, if not exactly relaxed, at least resigned. Cara wasn’t sure how much of it was an act and how much was genuine. How long would it last before his personality flipped again?

  Yan Gwenn’s airbus crews collected settlers from the outlying farmsteads first. Two of Mother Ramona’s smaller carriers arrived on schedule and took six hundred passengers safely away to Crossways. The first cruise liners arrived three days later and though they took a further six days to load, they carried away almost four thousand to safety.

  The autumnal weather was on their side so far with no more fierce storms and only a minimum amount of rain. Despite Lorient’s best efforts, however, the settlers were angry and upset at having to leave their new farms behind, farms that had already taken their blood, sweat, and tears and—in some cases—the lives of their loved ones. Three villages refused point-blank to leave their homes until Lorient himself commandeered a two-man flitter and a pilot and went ahead of the evac teams to warn the settlers and explain as best he could. Chastened by the director’s admonishment, they cooperated, but unwillingly. After that Lorient undertook a whistle-stop tour of all the settlements, sympathizing, explaining, cajoling, wheedling, and only when all else failed finally ordering them to toe the line or be left behind.

  “I never thought I’d actually warm to the man,” Cara said, watching Lorient climb down from his flitter in Landing at the end of a very long day. “But he came through.”

  “Yes, he has.” Ben put his arm round her shoulders and gave her a brief hug. “I hope we come through for him. At this rate it’s going too slowly. We need a Dunkirk.”

  “What’s a Dunkirk?”

  “Something that happened way back on Earth in the mid-twentieth century during a civil war. British troops and their allies were trapped on the beaches of Northern France about to be captured or wiped out by an encircling enemy army. They were saved by a fleet of little ships: fishing boats, pleasure steamers, ferries, and anything that could float. That’s what we need now. Can you connect me with Mother Ramona?”

  • • •

  The little ships began to arrive in the evening on the third day. Some could only take four passengers, but others could take twenty or even thirty at a pinch. Every one of them was welcome and every one of them would be paid well for their services when the platinum started to pay off. In the meantime they took promissory notes from Norton Garrick.

  Altogether, they evacuated almost four thousand settlers in four hundred and thirty-two vessels. A hospital ship took the patients from the med-center, including the cryo unit that held Colchek. Cara hoped Max and Mother Ramona had adequate accommodation organized at the other end, but Crossways was the least of their worries.

  The influx of little ships all ground to a halt with a storm warning.

  They’d evacuated approximately nine thousand settlers, leaving around seven or eight hundred and some lonely graves. Cara had helped to bring in the settlers from outlying settlements, but once the storm kicked in, she was pinned down in Landing with everyone else.

  “Tired?” Ben steered her toward their room.

  “Yes, but . . .”

  “No buts. Sleep now. Work tomorrow.”

  The storm raged outside. Temporarily safe in Ben’s arms, Cara tried to sleep, but couldn’t. Thoughts of plague, Ari, and platinum chased themselves around in her head. Eventually, she must have dozed off because she dreamed.

  She’s surrounded by dark, as thick as velvet. She can feel it running through her fingers. Ari’s voice comes from somewhere beyond it. “It’s not over until I say so.”

  Then a different voice, a woman’s voice, drums though her brain. “Mr. van Blaiden wants to know that his secrets are safe.”

  She woke, cold with fear. She could feel Ben awake, too. His arms were still around her.

  “You cried out,” he said. “Nightmare?”

  “My imagination’s working overtime. I dreamed that Ari was already here on Olyanda. It was so real.” A little thrill of anticipation, tinged with dread ran, unacknowledged, through her body.

  “You’re so sure it will be Ari in person?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “You’re not on your own this time.”

  “He’ll come because of me. This is my fight, Ben.”

  “That makes it mine, too.”

  He leaned up on one elbow and kissed her. She put her arms up around his neck and pulled him closer. Ben was warm and solid. She needed him tonight more than ever to help drive the ghosts away.

  Long after Ben had drifted back into sleep, Cara lay awake. The echoes of their lovemaking still tingled through her body. Ben and Ari; Ari and Ben. A direct comparison was impossible. They were so very different. She loved Ben. Of course she did. The feeling had grown without her even being able to detect when like and respect turned to love. But did that mean she had stopped loving Ari van Blaiden? Could she be in love with two men at the same time? Reluctantly, she had to admit that just because she loved Ben, it didn’t prevent that clutch in her guts when she thought about Ari. Fear, loathing, and love. She couldn’t separate any one from the others.

  • • •

  *Incoming.
* Wenna’s warning came as the storm died away in the deep blue just before dawn.

  *Sure?* Ben asked. It wasn’t the first blip they’d spotted; the magnetic storms played havoc with their instrumentation.

  *Mother Ramona’s spotter saw a fleet of at least nine ships emerge from the gate, but they’re not from Crossways.*

  Ben sent a message via Cara to every psi-tech. *They’re here. You know what to do. Good luck.*

  In the half-light they scattered, moving deep into the woods, taking the remaining settlers with them.

  Cara contacted Gen and Jon Moon on the Solar Wind just as they were about to enter foldspace for the return journey. *Go back to Crossways. You can’t do any more here. The few settlers who are left will have to scatter with the psi-techs.*

  “Let’s get out,” Ben said. “Everyone clear on what happens next?”

  They were.

  Cara ran for the horse barn to meet up with Ronan, Gupta, Archie Tatum, and Yan Gwenn. She took the reins of a bay mare, patted her on the neck, checked the girth, and mounted quickly. Ben swung into the saddle of an iron gray. One by one, the rest of the team hoisted themselves aboard their mounts, some more easily than others, though all psi-techs were supposed to be trained to operate all forms of transport, including animate ones.

  Cara’s mare caught the excitement of the moment. She tossed her head and danced on the spot. Cara took a moment to settle her down. Then they all clattered over the pontoon bridge, past the shell of the tank farm, and across the plain toward the nearest finger of woodland, a ten-klick ride accomplished without incident. Once there, they retrieved the first stash of food and equipment. Sharing the load between them, they moved deeper into the forest toward the base set up for emergencies. The going got much easier once they were under the heavy canopy of the broccoli trees, thankfully just as dense now as in the height of summer.

  They heard four craft, heavy freighters by the sound of it, roar overhead and farther away there were sounds of lighter craft and the unmistakable sound of a series of explosions coming from the direction of Timbertown. A quick check with Wenna reassured Cara that everyone was clear and that she and Lorient were safely hidden with a mixed party of psi-techs and settlers, including Jack Mario and Saedi Sugrue, well away from the town.

  “Glad we didn’t have to say I told you so to the survivors.” Cara glanced across at Ben.

  He nodded. “I didn’t necessarily want to be proved right. I’m surprised they haven’t hit the LV yet.”

  “I think Ari wants me in one piece.” She shuddered.

  “Well, he’s not having you. All we have to do is stay out of trouble for another few days,” Ben said. “Mother Ramona should be here soon with a fleet.”

  All during the first day they kept on the move, traveling steadily. They could hear light craft flying search patterns, but none came close enough to spot them with heat scanners.

  That night they slept under bivouac shelters, quickly erected between trees with polytarps, their buddysuits providing insulation from the cold, hard ground, though Cara found snuggling up to Ben an enormous comfort.

  “It’ll be all right,” he whispered.

  “You don’t know that.”

  He didn’t answer.

  • • •

  On the second day they heard a flitter overhead. It was not one of their own as Yan Gwenn had taken care to immobilize them before they left by removing the drive couples. As the flitter came closer, they pulled up their horses and dismounted, crouching underneath their mounts so that the heat signatures would look like nothing more than a herd of wild creatures.

  “Whoa, good girl, steady,” Cara told her surprised mare, thankful she’d never shown any inclination to cow-kick. She crouched there while the flitter circled, but then it moved on, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Did that work?” Cara asked.

  “Let’s hope so,” Ben said. “If not, I guess they’ll be back.”

  Their woodland base was well camouflaged, just a few rustic timbers hastily felled with flash-cutters and roofed with polytarp and fronds of a fern-like native plant. The horses were safe enough, corralled together close by, and they had a stash of ration bars. They slept together, always with at least two people on watch turn and turn about.

  When it was Cara’s turn to go on watch, she took a rat-bar, a small smart-dart pistol, and stationed herself to the north of the camp.

  One minute she was walking the perimeter, alert for anything untoward and the next she was running soft-footed toward her destination, with a vague memory of having immobilized Yan Gwenn with a single dart, leaving him unconscious on the leafy floor. Her feet kept moving while her mind said stop. Feet won. She reached down for her pistol and found the holster empty. She tried to access her implant to contact Ben, but found a wall between herself and the technology she had relied on all her adult life. She opened her mouth to shout, but no sound came out.

  Heart pounding like a kettledrum, she put all her effort into controlling her feet and managed to slow them down to a steady jog. She reached for a tree, smacked her hand into it painfully, but didn’t manage to get a firm grip.

  Try to turn . . . turn . . . turn. . . .

  But her feet knew where she was going even if she didn’t. She knew who would be waiting for her when she got there, however. Fear washed over her in waves. In the back of her mind she recognized the voice that had plagued her intermittently since Sentier-4. Mr. van Blaiden wants to know his secrets are safe.

  So much for breaking the Neural Reconditioning. She never knew this part of it was here, waiting to be activated. Damn Ari van Blaiden to hell and back. Her mind failed her, but even as she whirled into blackness, she realized her feet were still moving.

  When she came to her senses, she was standing in a clearing. Her feet had stopped, her hands were shackled behind her back, and standing barely a meter in front of her, leering—there was no other word for it—was Robert Craike. Behind him, an anticipatory grin on her face, Donida McLellan.

  Oh, fuck!

  • • •

  Ben quartered the ground again, wishing that Sami Isaksten was still with them. She’d have been able to find Cara instantly, or at least pinpoint a direction. It was barely three hours since Ronan had been alerted by Yan Gwenn’s return to consciousness that something was wrong. Morning light filtered through the canopy and although they’d found Cara’s trail, it had dead-ended in a clearing.

  “They must have had antigrav sleds,” Gupta said. “There’s a horizontal abrasion on this tree trunk at about the right height, but no vehicle tracks or hoofprints or footprints leading away from here. They could be anywhere by now.”

  Cara said van Blaiden wanted her, but how had they’d taken her with such surgical precision unless she’d knocked out Yan herself and deliberately gone out to meet them? He wouldn’t let himself think that she’d done that on purpose.

  “There’s another rationale,” Ronan had said when Ben had finally voiced his fears. “We thought she’d broken the conditioning, but sometimes these things run deeper than anyone realizes. There could have been a sleeper element built in, just waiting to be activated.”

  Ben couldn’t reach Cara’s mind, but he knew his own telepathy was weak. When Ronan couldn’t reach her either, he began to really worry. Could she be dead already? He thought he might know if she was, but that could just be a lover’s conceit. He stretched his awareness out as far as he could but only sensed a steady nothing.

  Cas’ settler group was the closest, and they had Bronsen with them. Gupta took Cara’s mare and rode off to meet him in the forest and bring him to join the search party.

  Cas formed a link from where she was; through it, Ben contacted all the parties to check on their status. Everyone else was safe and accounted for, but Lorient’s party was in chaos and Wenna was spitting feathers.

  *He’s gone to freaking Landing. Thinks he can negotiate with the invaders.* She was just setting off after him. *Don’t wor
ry, Boss, I’ll catch up with him.*

  Chapter Thirty-five

  TURNING

  Cara’s head swam. Where was she? Her cheek pressed against floor grating and her arms, half-numb, were fastened behind her back. The amount of feeling left in them was pure pain. She took a deep breath and ran her tongue round her mouth. Ugh, she’d been drooling. How long had she been unconscious, and what had they given her?

  Ben? She reached out through her implant, and the world shifted. There was nothing there except a sickly emptiness. Reisercaine. She recognized the psi-suppressant from her time on Sentier-4. Being on her own was the loneliest, most frightening feeling she’d ever experienced. At least during her time on the run she’d deliberately isolated herself from her implant. She’d been in control and all the time was buoyed up by the knowledge that she could switch it on again anytime. Now she was at the mercy of someone else. She tried to recall what it had been like before taking the test and coming up psi, before the academy, but she couldn’t recreate what it felt like not to be connected.

  This place looked awfully familiar. She was in the body of the LV. From this angle she could see into the compound that had been her home for months, though now there were sleek personnel carriers there as well as combat skiffs about the size of flitters, but faster and armed.

  She heard a voice and her world shifted. Ari! After so long.

  “Well, Miss Carlinni. Awake, I see.” She recognized this other voice as well, female and mean.

  “Ari. Where is he? I want to see him.”

  “Good.” Donida McLellan’s face came into her field of view, canted over at an angle “He wants to see you, too, but first we need another little talk.” The face vanished.

  “Bring her.”

  Cara heard the command and then yelped as someone gripped her arms and hauled her upright, propelling her toward the door of the little cubbyhole that used to be Ronan’s office. Ronan. The image of the young medic conjured the memory of the stone lodged between her fingers. Remember.