Unfortunately, the money he was to have been paid for the data chip had been what he’d earmarked for his ship’s replacement. And his own probable retirement, when he got down to it; he wasn’t as young as he used to be, and reflexes slowed with age, regardless of species. Wy’Lyn would miss the excitement and the danger, but in the end, if this last caper paid off, he could settle down someplace out of reach of the Peacemakers’ Guild and live out his remaining days in luxury.
And then the Hunkajunk—as he had taken to calling it, long ago—broke down.
It figures, he decided. Just about the time things are starting to look up for me, all blagad breaks loose. Never fails.
He had been here, stuck in the Sakall system, for over ten standard days now, working to get his ship functional again. Not wanting to be seen, he’d slinked over to the gas giant so no one would spot him around the stargate. The system was essentially uninhabited; that was the whole reason he was there in the first place—no one would be around to see him hand over the chip to his secret partners in crime. But that also meant there was no way to obtain spare or replacement parts for the equipment that broke.
So Wy’Lyn had been using the tiny shop he’d created in a corner, for just such times, to repurpose this or that item aboard the ship, cannibalizing one part to refurbish another, as he attempted to get his ship moving again. He intensely regretted not repairing or replacing the fabricator when it broke down the year before, but he had been gambling on one or two large capers which had not panned out. His under-the-sensors mechanic was expensive. And required payment in advance.
He was only a few million miles from the rendezvous point, but the Hunkajunk was dead in space; it might as well have been on the far side of the galaxy, for all the good it did. Wy’Lyn had tried a tight-beam transmission to the meeting point several times, but had gotten no response; he wasn’t sure if it was because he’d been stood up, or if they had assumed it would take him much longer to evade pursuit and arrive than it actually had. Not that he’d arrived yet, really.
He had yet to decide if the unknown personages he was to meet should be considered his employers or his fences. But stealing the data chip from the Cartographers’ Guild had been their idea, done with their intelligence information, and at their behest. And his reward for delivery would be handsome...if he could ever make it to the rendezvous to deliver the karkafat thing.
He had been leery of working with anyone else. He was a loner by nature and had hesitated. But the remuneration was so tempting, so lucrative, he had agreed. And now he was regretting it intensely.
In point of fact, Wy’Lyn of Cochkala really was an asshole, a thief, and a cold-blooded killer. And he knew it. And cared not at all. If a living being stood between him and his goal, that being generally did not remain living long and often ended up in too gruesome a shape for the morticians to reconstruct; most of Wy’Lyn’s victims received closed-casket burials...or cremation, whichever seemed more appropriate.
But this time I think I’ve stumbled onto something far, far bigger than me, he decided as he worked, and it may be bringing down the kind of heat I’ve always been afraid of. Wy’Lyn knew he didn’t fit into the profile of most Cochkala, but while he might have been a psychopath by that race’s standards, he wasn’t crazy, exactly. He had heard the scuttlebutt at the few starports he’d been willing to use to refuel his body and ship that planetary alerts had been issued of the “dead or alive—preferably dead” variety. And like any other sentient being, he didn’t want to be dead.
I wonder who the Guild will send after me, he idly considered, using a wrench to hammer loose a rusted-on bolt. Word had it, back in the Tombstone, they had picked someone as dangerous as me this time. I suppose it stands to reason that someone in the Peacemakers’ Guild had to have some tough skin. Adversary only knows, they haven’t sent any after me like that to this point; so far, it had been a damn lot of weaklings and cowards.
Then again, he fully realized he was still free and alive because of that. No one his equal had ever been sent against him, at least in terms of sheer ferocity and determination.
I’d best be on my guard this time, he decided. Which would be easier if this kactafal ship would actually work! He kicked the nearest capacitor with an armored boot, then sighed.
“I’ve repaired all I can, in here,” he decided, looking around. “I’d best suit up, spin down, and go outside to see what kind of shit I’ve got.”
* * *
When the Uncle Billy arrived in the vicinity of the gas giant, Tilghman kept his EM masking on and discreetly began scanning. As he had seen earlier, there were no habitable planets in the brown dwarf’s subsystem.
That said, it didn’t mean there was no activity. Several of the moons were relatively rich in resources, and someone was using automated equipment to mine them. Tilghman had no idea who, but there were shuttles running here and there around the moons. There was also a single unknown ship drifting in an intermediate orbit around the gas giant.
Tilghman studied the layout of the gas giant’s satellite system, then plotted a course that would enable him to slip up on the ship by hopscotching between the moons’ line-of-sight shadows. Then he fired up the thrusters.
“Time to go find out who that is,” he decided.
* * *
When Tilghman arrived at the ship, he recognized it as the same battered old spacecraft whose imagery Mickey had provided. Same three longitudinal scratches, too, he decided, pulling up the imagery and running a digital comparison to the ship in front of him. Aha. Perfect match. And Uncle Billy agrees.
As the quiet, dark form of Uncle Billy moved closer, coming around to the starboard side of the Hunkajunk, where the hatch was, Tilghman saw a spacesuited figure next to the hull, a panel removed, its arms deep in the guts of the mutilated old ship.
Huh. That makes things a little easier, Tilghman decided. I don’t have to fight ship to ship. But it isn’t entirely honorable to take him at the point of a cannon barrel, either. Well, maybe a pistol barrel backed up by a cannon barrel, he thought with wry humor. Yeah, that ought to work. I have to take him into custody anyway, if I can. If I can’t—if he fights back—I’ll take him out.
So Tilghman maneuvered the Uncle Billy in as close as he could get it without Wy’Lyn noticing. Then he set up a sequence of applications enabling him to control his ship via pinlink, and spun down the ship. He unstrapped—he had prepared for this confrontation well before exiting hyperspace, and all he needed now was to don his spacesuit helmet and initiate EVA operations—reached for his helmet, pushed off, and headed for the airlock hatch.
* * *
Wy’Lyn was removing the broken part in the drive with an eye to repairing it when the voice sounded over his headset.
“Put your hands up, Wy’Lyn of Cochkala. You are under arrest.”
His instinct was to spin swiftly, but that was impossible in zero g, so he used his suit’s maneuvering thrusters to turn slowly, knowing there would probably be multiple weapons trained on him and fast moves were only apt to get him shot.
There, only a few tens of yards from his own vessel, lay another, larger ship, with a figure in shining silver-white floating outside it, weapon drawn and aimed at him. Wy’Lyn mentally cursed his luck, but put up his hands as instructed.
“Who are you?” he wondered.
“The name’s Bob Tilghman,” the white-suited figure noted, gun barrel never wavering.
“I’ve heard of you,” Wy’Lyn realized, a tight knot forming in his gut, even as he brainstormed ways out of his dilemma. “You’re a bounty hunter for the Peacemaker’s Guild. They call you the Last Guardsman. You’re from Earth.”
“That’s me.”
Wy’Lyn tapped the fingertips of his gauntlet to his palm; a small projectile weapon slid out of the wrist.
“Not for long!” he exclaimed, swinging his arm down and pointing it at the bounty hunter.
He fired.
* * *
But
Robert Tilghman had seen the hand motion, and before Wy’Lyn could discharge the weapon, he opened up with Grandpa Bill’s modified Peacemaker, firing off two rounds. Between the micro-gyro and the pinlink, as well as having excellent aim, it was rare for Tilghman to miss.
He didn’t this time, either.
One of the poly-ceramic bullets tore into Wy’Lyn’s midsection, the other slammed into the small weapon in his hand, breaking it into several pieces, which flew off into space. Wy’Lyn’s shot went wild, and he doubled up in pain as the momentum of the impact, coupled with venting suit gases, drove him back toward the hull of his own spaceship.
* * *
Wy’Lyn snarled, making a fist with his other hand; another weapon slid from his wrist into his grip, and he fired before Tilghman could react.
The round slammed into Tilghman’s belly on the right side, somehow managing to slide around the armor in his suit to reach flesh, and he gasped in pain, even as the vacuum-hardening goo in his spacesuit worked to close the breach. Ow, shit! he thought, and the pinlink in his suit responded and did its job. Instantly he felt the slight pinprick as the special device installed in the helmet cowling automatically injected the blood vessels in his throat with nanites to combat the wound. Within seconds they arrived at the wound, and fought to staunch the bleeding and repair the damage.
“You’re...you’re done, Guardsman,” Wy’Lyn panted, “no matter what happens to me!”
* * *
Judging by the pain, he’s right, Tilghman realized, shocked, and in distress he fought to hide. The nanites ought to be easing things by now. Instead it’s...uhn...getting worse. Aw damn. Did he use a nano-disassembler round? Armor-piercing, at that, to get through my suit. Those things are twelve kinds of illegal...but this is ‘Wily’ we’re talking about, here.
“I’m done with you,” Tilghman growled...and used his pinlink to fire Uncle Billy’s main gun at Wy’Lyn, the beam choked down and point blank.
A large hole developed in Wy’Lyn’s helmet, progressed straight through the forehead, and went out the back of the skull. The Cochkala went limp, eyes glazed.
* * *
Racked with abdominal pain as the nanites in the illegal round took apart his liver and began to spread out from there, his own beneficial nanites fighting them the whole way, Tilghman retrieved Wy’Lyn’s body, dragging it into the airlock and searching it thoroughly—both manually and with Uncle Billy’s full sensor suite—but there was no sign of the stolen data chip.
“Must be in his ship somewhere, then,” Tilghman muttered. “I better hurry if I’m gonna find it and arrange to—ugh—return it.”
With an effort, Tilghman dragged Wy’Lyn’s remains back out of the airlock and over to the Hunkajunk, using the dead Cochkala’s various body parts—hand print, retina scan, and the like—to gain access, circumventing any possible booby traps the crafty criminal might have set.
A quick look around the ratty cabin almost instantly revealed the location of Wily’s poorly-hidden smuggler’s safe. Tilghman pulled a pinlink device from a pocket, and jammed it into the locking mechanism, using it to jack the safe. Moments later, there was a pop, and the door of the safe opened.
Quite a few smaller items were contained inside, including a rather famous faceted gemstone, odds and ends of jewelry he recognized from the list of Bhay’va Jiv’ka’s personal effects, and several small poly bags of red diamonds. Next to them was a distinctive data chip, the compass rose of the Cartographers’ Guild engraved on its casing. It should have been in a plastic packet, according to his case briefing, but wasn’t.
Tilghman confiscated the chip, tucking it carefully into a stowage pocket, before attaching a Peacemaker homing beacon to the helm controls. He exited the Hunkajunk, sealing it behind him, and dragged Wy’Lyn’s cooling carcass back to the Uncle Billy.
* * *
It took over a quarter of an hour for Tilghman to stuff Wy’Lyn into a body bag, put him in stowage, log the chip as recovered, and tuck it safely away in his own craft’s safe. It should have taken all of five minutes, but by that time, he knew he was in a bad way. A quick readout of his ship’s medical bot told the tale: major parts of his liver were jelly. And the nano-disassemblers were now going to work on surrounding organs, including the intestines and pancreas.
He was dying. And he knew it.
He strapped into the pilot’s seat, spun up the ship and set it on autopilot, then initiated the hyperspace jump. A brief moment of nausea wracked his body as the ship transitioned, accompanied by horrific pain. He grabbed his helmet, which lay on a shelf close by, and threw up into it, then stared in dismay at its contents: the vomitus consisted largely of blood, mingled with bits of tissue. Part of my liver, I suppose. I’d better finish what I’ve got to do, and fast. Amanda, baby, I’m really sorry. I shoulda listened and retired last year, like you wanted.
He grabbed his slate, activated the imager in record mode, and began talking, trying not to pant or groan.
“Liiban, it’s Bob. By the time you get this, I’ll probably be long gone. Wy’Lyn got me with a nano-disassembler round, and it’s chewing me up. But I got him back, and he’s in the aft stowage in a body bag. He won’t be bothering anyone else again. The chip the cartographers want...is in my special safe. You know where it is; here’s the current passcode.” He held the slate in position to see his hand on the chair arm, and tapped his fingers in a special sequence. “So I fulfilled the contract, but it doesn’t look like I’ll...be around to collect. So I’m depending on you to...do something for me. I want you to collect for me and send it back to Amanda, my fiancée. I’ll append all of her contact info...to this vid file for you, along with...a personal message...from me to her. She can provide you with...her financial account information...”
* * *
When he finished with everything—the message for Amanda was handwritten with a stylus; he hadn’t wanted her to see a video of him dying—he put the slate to sleep, unsure if he would need it again. Then he gazed at the blank whiteness outside the viewport and sighed; it was the last time he would ever see this particular view. And never again would he see a star field. He swiveled the chair and turned away.
He found himself staring at the bulkhead containing the safe. He pondered it for long moments. Then he reached for the slate again, striving to focus against the intense pain and blood loss.
After he spent some time looking at a file on the slate, he re-activated the video recording application. It didn’t take long to say what he needed to say, but it was harder this time; his breath seemed short, and he fought to get the words out.
When he was done, he downloaded both videos to a data chip of his own, and laid it on the control console. Then he wiped the slate, down to its operating system, at a level he knew forensics could not reconstruct. He tightened the straps as snugly as they would go, picked up the data chip, and clutched it in his fist, looking out into the white nothingness of hyperspace.
Waiting.
The Uncle Billy drove onward.
* * *
When the Uncle Billy arrived at the pre-designated rendezvous point a week later, dropping out of hyperspace at the system’s L3 point, Liiban Aachat was waiting in his personal craft, along with Qwyllym ak Sykryn of the Cartographers’ Guild, two lesser-rank peacemakers, and a medic. The Sirra’Kan royal House Te’Warri had not sent a representative, opting to accept Liiban’s report instead; none of them were willing to risk facing the perpetrator if he should be alive, even in custody. The Uncle Billy cleared the emergence point, then retro-fired and slowed to a stop.
“That’s not good,” Liiban told ak Sykryn. “Robert isn’t answering my hail.”
“Perhaps he is busy with something else?” ak Sykryn wondered.
“It wouldn’t be like him. He’d be looking for us right away, not stopping dead in space like that.” Liiban shook his head. “We’d best see about docking and checking out the situation. If Wy’Lyn broke loose, he could have his hands full. He ma
y need our help.”
“Ah, perhaps I should stay here, then.”
“Are you any good with weapons?”
“...No.”
“Then yes, stay here until I call you.” He grabbed the controls. “Now to match the spins and line up the docking ports...”
* * *
When Liiban entered the Uncle Billy’s flight deck, flanked by his two subordinates—all weapons at the ready—his eyes narrowed, and he sighed in pained disappointment and grief.
Robert Tilghman sat in the pilot’s seat, firmly strapped in and upright. His helmet was off, lying nearby—and filled with what looked like dried blood—but his spacesuit was not; there was a nano-healed puncture in the middle right torso of the suit, with several gray smudges around it that told the tale to the experienced peacemaker. Tilghman’s face was white, his eyes open, glassy, staring emptily at the viewport. The final member of the Tilghman line, the Last Guardsman, had passed beyond the limits of spacetime to whatever lay Beyond.
But the sharp-eyed Peacemaker noted something in the dead man’s hand. Moving to the side of the chair, he studied it carefully before gently prying it from the stiff fingers. It was a data chip. He spun to his subordinates.
“You,” he said, pointing at one, “go fetch the cartographer and the medic. You,” he turned to the second, “see if there’s any sign of Wy’Lyn aboard.”
“Yes sir!” came the tandem reply, and the two split up.
* * *
By the time ak Sykryn entered Tilghman’s ship, the second junior peacemaker had found Wy’Lyn’s body, still in its full spacesuit, a hole all the way through the middle of the helmet and the head, wrapped in a body bag in the stowage lockers aft. She summoned Liiban and the medic to verify the fact. It would require an autopsy to determine if Wy’Lyn had asphyxiated or bled out or expired from extensive brain damage, but in any case, Liiban was convinced he was dead.
The Good, the Bad, and the Merc: Even More Stories from the Four Horsemen Universe (The Revelations Cycle Book 8) Page 22
