Counterweight

by A. G. Claymore

  Cal shook his head. “I can get him out easier if we stay low-key. You should stay and enjoy the party, Grandpa!”

  Bel squinted back at his friend. “Gods! I’m getting old!”

  Bon Voyage

  Tsekoh, Capital of Chaco Benthic

  “How much longer do we plan on doing this?”

  Cal dodged a simulated barrage of weapons fire, or at least that was how it looked to the crowd. “If there’s anybody looking for us here, I’m not seeing them.”

  The battle simulator games were everywhere. Users inserted their credit chip, climbed aboard and used the holographic menus to join private battle lobbies or simply enter a random match. They served the company well.

  The games bled off aggression, a sort of catharsis for those who might otherwise be tempted into more than just grumbling about their lot in life. They also bled off funds that might otherwise be saved for the exit ticket.

  With the internal displays disabled, they also served as an excellent vantage point to scope out an area. Oddly enough, standing on a platform and leaping around like a maniac was a commonplace sight in Chaco Benthic. It allowed Cal to observe the inside of the station for almost a half hour without being obvious about it. To anyone who might look his way, he was simply a maintenance worker taking a break.

  He was reasonably sure nobody in the vast space was a watcher. Nobody seemed to be loitering for no reason. Few stayed for any longer than it took to say goodbye to loved ones or to buy a ticket and line up for departure.

  “Alright, leave the game,” he told the visitor, “and walk straight to the permit counter.”

  “What’re you going to be doing?”

  “I’ll keep watch from here,” Cal replied, “and support you if it looks like anyone followed us. Remember: get a room with a sunrise view, so you can see the signal. I got the message through so they might show up at any point in the next two days.” He’d sent a request to accelerate the pick-up. Whether or not a team from the Long Range Group could get to Chaco any sooner than planned was still an unknown. “Good luck.”

  “You too.” The link went dead as the Human stepped out of the simulator.

  Cal watched him pay for the exit permit and pass through the security gate to join the departure line. At least seven guards were on duty in the lounge, checking the permits and preventing unauthorized access to the line.

  So far, so good.

  Cal almost jumped out of his own skin when one of the Stoners walked by in front of him, heading for the permit counter. They must have had a flag put in the system for any Oaxians or Tauhentans buying exit visas.

  The one who’d tried to take Cal down in the plaza may have gotten a good enough look at the young visitor. Whether he’d been able to remember his face before taking fifty thousand volts to the groin at nineteen pulses per second was an unanswered question. Even if he didn’t, he was already aware of the tendency for Humans to pose as exiles from Oaxes or that planet’s colony on Tauhento.

  A quickly growing wind heralded the arrival of the elevator. Despite the constant efforts of the atmospheric pumps, some of the city’s air always found its way into the shaft.

  The elevator had unloaded by the time the Stoner reached the counter and shoved passengers out of the way. Cal left the simulator and began moving toward his large target. He would have to take him down as quietly as possible and then try to slip away.

  The Stoner looked over to the secure zone where the Human from 3428 was waiting to board. He left the counter and began making his way to the scanning gate.

  Cal adjusted his path to angle in behind him, taking out a holo-stylus used for accessing menus too small for fingers. He’d use it to stab the Stoner in the lower renal organ. They were a tough species but even a Stoner couldn’t stay conscious for more that a couple of seconds with such a wound.

  A simple bump in the crowd and he’d be at least ten feet away before the target began to fall.

  He was still closing in when a voice rang out.

  “There he doth progress!” a male voice screamed in archaic court Dheema. “Yonder tis that ruffian Stoner who got those magisters killed.”

  Cal recognized the voice through the accent. His young Human friend had learned Dheema from his ship’s pod system and it gave him an archaic flavor.

  The scene unfolding as a result of the outburst suddenly reminded him of his own capture at a Calgary bus station more than a century and a half ago.

  The Canadians had arrested him, given him a few friendly beatings and then extradited him back to the states to stand trial for what he’d done. If it hadn’t been for that little old lady recognizing him in the station, he probably would have died when the plague hit.

  Cal veered away from the surprised Stoner, silently applauding the young man’s quick thinking. He moved toward the exit as the Dactari guards began closing in on their hulking cousin. He glanced over his shoulder in time to see his friend slip past the wicket and duck into the half empty elevator pod.

  The boarding process had been interrupted by the accusation and the boarding guard, in a brief moment of distraction, failed to notice the young man slipping into the pod ahead of his turn.

  Cal barely managed to avoid shaking his head in amazement as he reached the main exit. The visitor was almost unnaturally lucky. He began to wonder if the wood was the second most valuable resource on 3428.

  Face to Face

  Tsekoh, Capital of Chaco Benthic

  Graadt had left his position outside the station when Kaans called for help. He pushed his way through the crowded pedway and walked through the main entrance, hardly noticing the flow of exiting citizens.

  He could see Kaans in the middle of a ring of guards. They weren’t quite sure what to do with the Stoner and the appearance of a second might be enough to scatter them.

  He suddenly stopped.

  One of the individuals who’d just passed him had moved aside, as they all do, but his face hadn’t shown any alarm. It was possible he was simply not paying attention but Graadt had a feeling.

  And an agent might make the mistake of hiding his alarm at accidentally meeting his enemy, forgetting that his cover identity would show alarm at meeting a Stoner. He might betray himself through his own self-discipline.

  “You there,” he called out, turning to see the receding figure. “The maintenance worker with the red harness – halt for inspection.”

  The figure kept moving, though others were turning to see who was calling the order. It was starting to add up. If the worker was preoccupied, perhaps with the departure of a loved one, he might fail to notice what was going on but an agent, having already betrayed his training through his calm, would pretend not to hear him in an attempt to get away.

  Graadt felt the blood coursing. He’d forced a change in tempo on his enemy – a disruption in his exit strategy, and he needed to take advantage of it before the Human could adjust his plans.

  He reached into his pocket, pulling out another stun ball. The distance to his target was now just a few steps and the Human angled left, toward the cab stand. Graadt angled farther left intending to cut him off before he could make a last-second dash for the nearest cab, but the Human veered right.

  As Graadt hastily corrected his own trajectory, he suddenly stopped in amazement. The Human simply stepped off the platform and gave himself to gravity. Graadt raced over to the edge in time to see the receding form throw a mag grappler at the passing levels.

  It was an unfortunate side effect of the company’s security policies. Maintenance workers, like prospectors or emergency personnel, carried tools on consignment. They were part of a lucky few who didn’t have to pay for their tools because half of them could be used as weapons and the company didn’t want to relinquish ownership of anything that might end up used against them.

  If a maintenance worker died on the job, his tools were unlikely to be stolen. It was a major offense for workers from any other trade to even touch them, and other maintenanc
e workers had no need to steal tools that they didn’t pay for in the first place.

  Because the expensive, company-owned tools were attached to the maintenance workers, the company displayed an incongruous interest in the safety of those employees. A four-hundred-story fall could seriously damage the equipment and so the innovative mag grapplers were standard issue.

  They didn’t want an expensive plasma line cutter crushed under some fool worker.

  As Graadt watched in frustration, the line slowed and came to a stop twenty levels down. The Human’s slight outward momentum ceased and he swung gently back beneath the rows of overhanging levels to grasp the railing. He severed the line and, with a last look up at his erstwhile pursuer, hopped over to the pedway and disappeared.

  Graadt cursed.

  “What happened out here?”

  Graadt turned to find Kaans with a fat lip and spatters of blood all over his clothing. “Human just got away,” he growled, waving a hand at the edge of the cab stand.

  “Took a cab?”

  “Walked off the edge…”

  “Well then,” Kaans declared in relief, “we can just go down and find the body…”

  “He had a magline,” Graadt retorted. He took another look at his comrade. “That blood yours?”

  A shrug. “Maybe a little.”

  “You managed to convince them of your innocence?”

  A grin. “Managed to convince them to stop caring so much about it.”

  “Good.” Graadt nodded back at the station. “Go back in and buy yourself a ticket.”

  Kaans grimaced.

  Graadt tilted his head. “What?”

  “Why should we risk our skins for the Republic? Those mice in there,” he jerked his head to indicate the station entryway, “nearly killed me and it wasn’t the first time those little bastards have tried, either.”

  “I was done risking my skin for those idiots a long time ago,” Graadt told him. “All I care about is redeeming our names so the Krypteian Council lifts our banishment. I want us to go home to our families.”

  “Fine.” Kaans was banned as well but had nobody waiting for him on Oudtstone. Still, he’d been through a lot with Graadt and he’d back him up. “I’ll go to the counterweight and find this…” He looked down at his wrist pad. “S’Pongebob Doofenschmirtz.”

  “Odd name,” Graadt grunted.

  “Must be Oaxian. Those folk seem to judge their status by how stupid their names are.” He waved as Nid brought the carrier close to the platform. “There’s a force of fifteen magisters up there,” Kaans said. “I’ll convince them to help search the place.”

  Graadt gave him a companionable thump on the shoulder before leaping the narrow gap to the carrier’s hatch. He clambered into the co-pilot seat. “Let’s get up to central control,” he told Nid. “We’ve got a face for our target now.” He tapped his headset. “We should be able to match him in the company database and finally put all those security cameras to work for us.”

  “Assuming the little bastards don’t try to kill us when we walk in,” Nid offered cheerfully. “They seem to think we started that magister riot.”

  “Well, they can listen to us and realize they have a real insurgency problem,” Graadt replied dryly, “or blame it on us and get caught with their tunics hiked.”

  New Purpose

  Under Pressure-ized

  Counterweight - Chaco Benthic

  Rick stepped up to the main counter, returning the polite smile from a young concierge whose expression spoke of a thousand meaningless greetings. “I’d like a room with a sunrise view.”

  She opened a holo screen, scrolling for a few seconds before tilting her head to the side. “I’m sorry,” she said, “but the only sunrise room left is a suite.”

  Rick grinned casually, already knowing the answer to his next question because he’d begun subvocalizing it by the time she’d gotten to the only room. “How much?”

  The apologetic tone took on an edge of regretful finality. “Nine thousand credits a night. Perhaps you’d care for a room on the sunset side?”

  Rick pretended to give it some thought. He didn’t want to seem desperate for the room but he didn’t want the last one to get booked while he dithered either. “No,” he said. “I’ll take the sunrise side. Three nights should do.” He handed over his chip.

  The clerk did a fairly decent job of hiding her surprise as well as her skepticism. Rick couldn’t blame her, seeing as he was wearing the EVA suit again. At best, he looked like a smuggler crewman, not the sort of mogul who took out expensive suites.

  She inserted the chip and, this time, he caught a slight rise in her eyebrows as she saw the transaction approved. “Have a nice stay, Mr.…”

  “Yo’Mamma,” Rick flashed her a smile as he held his hand out for the door code. Luckily his nameless friend down in the city had walked him through the process. A temporary barcode was tanned onto the back of his hand, giving him access to the door of his suite. He gave her a nod and walked past the check-in line to find the risers.

  The room, when he finally found it, was much larger than he expected. Small wonder it was so expensive – it was four times the size of the Human agent’s dwelling down in the city.

  Not wanting to waste precious time, he took his bag over and dropped it next to the floor-to-ceiling windows that supposedly gave such a magnificent view of the sunrise. After a brief glimpse, he set to work, placing prospecting charges around the perimeter of the central window.

  Before any other consideration, he wanted to be ready.

  He knew there was a possibility the Stoners would come after him. There weren’t many places to hide up here and interrogating him might lead them to their real target.

  His only hope was in the quick arrival of the scout ship.

  Once the charges were done, he managed to convince himself that ordering delivery of a good meal was really the best thing he could do to maintain his cover. He put in a request and dragged a comfortable lounger over to the window to start his vigil.

  As luck would have it, the ship did arrive early but only five minutes after the arrival of his meal, which smelled delicious. Chuckling over the timing, he put down the leg of whatever animal he’d been about to eat and slid the table out of the way. He gave a simple wave in the direction of the blinking lights.

  Just as he was about to push himself out of the seat, his head swung around in alarm and he stared at the door to the hallway. He cursed quietly – they’d come for him after all.

  He scrambled out of his seat, snagging a full tube of wine as he made his way to the wall by the door. He backed up against the metallic panel, activating his suit’s maglock and almost firing the detonation sequence in his haste.

  He could almost laugh at his own stupidity. He’d had the presence of mind to grab the wine but, if he forgot his helmet, the blast might kill him or, at the least, render him unfit for the transfer to the scout ship.

  He closed his helmet just as the door opened beside him and two magisters stormed in.

  The first one through the door scanned the main room, eyes coming to rest on the suited figure clamped to the wall. Rick saw his eyes dart down to where he was holding his finger over the trigger sequence on his wrist pad. The magister’s eyes widened in shock, his head darting back toward the windows. His left hand came up, too late, to push his comrade back out of the room.

  Rick felt a moment of doubt. This was obviously a good man. His first thought was to protect his fellow magister and, yet, he had to die if the plan was going to succeed. It was a war, after all, even if it was a cold one. He touched the pad and the front of his suit was hammered by the shockwave.

  The two magisters staggered back a few feet, then the air of the hallway behind them shoved them, just as roughly, back into the middle of the room and out into the black.

  He could faintly hear the sound of an alarm vibrating through the hotel walls and into the atmosphere of his suit. The door behind him slid shut as par
t of the station’s safety protocols and the remaining atmosphere in the room quickly vented.

  Rick realized he was still holding the tube of wine. Somehow, it hadn’t been smashed by the blast. He deactivated his mag-clamp, walked over to retrieve his bag from the washroom and shoved the bottle inside. Slinging the bag over his shoulders, he returned to the main room and put his back to the wall.

  Lining up on the faintly blinking lights, he launched himself from the wall at a dead run, resisting the urge to jump as he crossed the shattered threshold. He sailed out into the cold black – more or less on a straight line to the scout ship.

  The staff of the counterweight, he’d been told, was unlikely to come after him. Unless he carried the locator beacon of someone important, he’d be left to drift. Since the hotel was above the geostationary cut-off, he had no fears of falling into the atmosphere but he had a long trip ahead of him.

  He was still moving at the pace of a slow run but he had close to a hundred kilometers to cover before he reached the scout ship. It would take close to five hours.

  He finally had time to think about what lay ahead. He’d left 3428 as a hunted man and, if he were to set foot on that world again, he’d be killed but now he was on a trajectory that would take him back. The scout ship would take him to meet the nearest warlord and she would send a force to claim 3428, with him in some kind of advisory role to whomever was placed in charge.

  He could imagine how the residents of the Canal would see things. Rick was lower than low and if that weren’t enough, he’d stabbed Ted in the neck. Now he’d be following the new ruler of 3428 around, whispering in his ear…

  He’d be lucky to survive a week without finding a knife in his back.

  The trip was monotonous, despite the inherent dangers of travelling just under a hundred kilometers through space. Chaco Benthic, at least, had relatively clean orbitals. The planet had never experienced a space race. The company had arrived, converted a troopship into a counterweight, and started construction on the city. Some nuts and bolts had probably escaped but they were no threat to the counterweight’s nav shields.