Sisterhood of Suns: Pallas Athena

by Martin Schiller

  Maya made for the nearest shadows and weighed whether to stay there and hide, or to keep running. But before she could decide, she heard a sound like sizzling meat, and a needlegun round ricocheted off a rusty support only a few centimeters away.

  Throwing herself forwards, Maya clambered through the maze of pipes without bothering to confirm what she already knew; Bel Marda had found her and intended to kill her.

  A few more rounds zipped past, accompanied by curses, but Maya knew that she had the advantage. She was much smaller than the other two women, and she was able to move through the area faster than they could. In a few seconds, she reached the opposite side of the platform, ignoring the bloody slash in her arm that she’d acquired from one of the rounds, and clambered back up onto the top of the dock.

  With her pursuers still below her, Maya looked around in desperation for a bolt hole. But this part of the docks had only a few ships parked in the launch cradles, and most of them had crewwomen working around them. Only one merchanter was unattended. It was the C-JUDI-GO, and its hold was wide open.

  She hesitated, but then she heard someone behind her shouting. Bel Marda was coming up over the lip of the dock. The policewoman hadn’t seen her yet, but in another moment, Maya knew that she would.

  Caught between two unappealing situations, she opted for the unknown. She gave Bel Marda another push with her talents, this time making her miss her footing and slip backwards off the dock. Taking advantage of the precious few seconds that she had gained, she ran straight up the JUDI’s cargo ramp.

  Bright lights came on automatically as she entered the hold, and she cursed at them for stealing away the chance for concealment. But there was little to be had in any event: the hold was mainly empty, and what cargo there was, was arranged in low neat rows that offered nothing to hide behind. The only solution was to go into the ship itself.

  She didn’t relish the idea one nano, but it was her only real option. Fortunately, the hatchway at the far end of the hold proved to be unlocked, and once it opened, she found herself in a small egress hall. More hatches were situated up and down its length, and at the far end there was a brightly painted ladder that led up to the control cabin.

  Not wanting to risk an encounter with a crewmember, she ignored the ladder and chose the nearest hatch instead, praying to the Lady as she went in that the chamber was unoccupied.

  Just as she had hoped, the space was empty. It contained a tiny foldout desk and chair, and two bunks were set into the bulkhead, with drawers for storage beneath them. But none of it offered a decent hiding place. With no better solution, Maya palmed out the light, flattened herself against the cold plastic, and listened.

  Footsteps came up the cargo ramp, accompanied by muttered profanities.

  There’s nothing here, she thought, focusing her talents in their direction. She went the other way. It was a gamble, but one she had to take.

  The footfalls slowed, became indecisive, and then took on more purpose as she heard them heading back down the ramp. After a few minutes, the only sound that came to her ears was the normal background noise of the port, and she let out a sigh of relief.

  For the moment at least, the Goddess had seen fit to pardon her for her life of crime, and had granted her a temporary reprieve. She whispered up her thanks, and stayed where she was. After counting out a full two minutes, she finally decided that it was safe to leave.

  The ship, however, had other ideas. When she went to open the hatchway, it refused to release. It took her a few more tries, and finally hammering at the stubborn controls, before Maya realized that she was locked in. Her hiding place had transformed into a prison cell.

  ***

  Captain Inish bel Lissa and her Second, Zara bel Trina were at lunch in the Port when they were alerted that a problem of some kind had occurred aboard the JUDI. Their Third had refused to go into any details, only saying that it required their immediate attention.

  Both annoyed and alarmed, Bel Lissa and her companion returned to the docks just as Bel Marda and her partner were conferring with one another at the foot of the launch cradle. This only increased Bel Lissa’s sense of apprehension and irritation. Even so, she put on her best smile, and approached them calmly.

  “Officers? Can I help you with something? I assure you that all our manifests are in order, and our vessel is up to all local and interstellar safety codes.”

  Bel Marda frowned at this. She knew all about the JUDI, and she didn’t like the ship, or its crew. For some reason that had never been adequately explained, her Lieutenant had made it abundantly clear that the JUDI was one ship that she was not to attempt to skim any graft from. The vessel was untouchable, and it made her want to go fekking nova when she thought about all the credits that she was missing out on. But she didn’t dare disobey her superior. Kaapers in modern correctional colonies didn’t fare any better than their ancient predecessors ever had.

  “Yes,” she growled. “Your ship looks like everything is straaked away proper, Captain. But we aren’t here to check up on you. We’re looking for a fugitive that came this way.” Her monocle projected a holo of Maya for Bel Lissa to see. “If you spot this girl, you give me a call. No one else. Zat klaar?”

  “Of course,” Bel Lissa agreed, more than a little nonplussed. Whatever the problem was aboard the ship, it didn’t seem to have anything to do with the law. “I’ll call you right away. Now, if you’ll excuse me? My Second and I have some things to attend to.”

  Bel Marda nodded curtly and stomped off with her partner in tow.

  “Well,” Bel Lissa said, “that was more fun than I think anyone should have a right to have. Shall we go aboard and see what this so-called emergency is over a cup of kaafra?”

  “Aye-yah, Captain,” Zara replied, just as confused as her superior. They ascended the ramp together, casting their experienced eyes over the cargo in the hold. It wasn’t their real cargo, of course. That was safely hidden away in special compartments deep inside the ship, but none of the decoy containers looked as if they had been disturbed.

  Their Third, Hari, met them at the inner hatch.

  “Well?” Bel Lissa inquired, “I saw the customs officers and they didn’t want anything except to tell me about some girl they’re looking for. What’s all this about?”

  “It’s about the girl,” the woman answered. “I was doing the preflight systems checks when the ship detected someone coming aboard. The AI activated the security protocols and locked her inside the aft crew quarters. She’s in there right now, and mad as a kaatze.”

  She called up a holo with her psiever for Bel Lissa to see. It displayed an image of the girl, pounding on the sound-proofed door of the Crews Quarters, and then kicking at the tiny fold out chair in frustration. Bel Lissa’s lunch started to go sour in her stomach.

  “I see,” she remarked. “And why haven’t we shown her off the ship, or given her up to the kaapers?”

  And why, she wondered, wasn’t the inner hatch properly secured against unauthorized entry in the first place? But this was something that she didn’t want to get into just then. In her short time aboard the JUDI, Hari had gained a reputation for sloppiness when it came to security, and for the thousandth time, Bel Lissa considered replacing the woman at the next opportunity. First though, there was the matter at hand to deal with.

  “It’s Sarah, Captain,” Hari explained. “After the girl came aboard and got herself locked in, the ship alerted her.”

  The JUDI’S AI was programmed to notify the woman of any significant events, and often without including Bel Lissa in the information loop. It was an annoying feature, but something that she was in no position to argue over. Unlike other ships, Sarah n’Jan, and not the Captain, was the final word on all matters. That was the way their employers wanted it.

  “As soon as Sarah got the alert, she asked me for a holo-feed,” Hari continued, “Then she told me not to let anyone know about the girl, and keep her here until she arrived. She was already on her way
for the flight, but she said she was going to expedite. She also said that she’d deal with the girl herself when she got here.”

  Bel Lissa watched the holo for a moment longer as their inmate vented her anger against one of the storage drawers. Thankfully the drawer was locked, and reasonably strong enough to be proof against the assault. For a while at least.

  “Very well,” she finally said, not at all pleased with the idea that they had a wanted fugitive aboard. “I suppose that there isn’t too much that she can break in there. Let me know when Sarah arrives. I’ll be in the galley.’

  “In the meantime, I want us to be ready for take-off and transit in one hour--unless Sarah says differently, or someone else sneaks aboard.”

  ***

  After ensuring that everything was being done to prepare the JUDI for flight, Sarah n’Jan went directly to her private cabin. There, she sent a command through her psiever to a small, hidden compartment set inside the bulkhead. When it slid open, she brought out a palm-sized case that she had been carrying under her traveling cape, and put it inside, along with an unlabeled plastic spray bottle.

  Then she resealed the cache and removed her cloak, hanging it on a peg. Her needlegun came off next. After checking its ammunition level, she set it on the nightstand next to her bed, and sat down on the edge of the mattress with a tired sigh, giving herself a moment to relax.

  Because of size constraints, the cabin didn’t have much in the way of amenities. But since it served as a home for her as often as it did, she had equipped it with a few small items that made it seem less Spartan, and a little more welcoming.

  On the far wall, was one of these decorative touches. It was a holopic of a rugged, empty looking landscape. A trio of tiny blue-white moons dotted the picture’s horizon, casting triple shadows over the bare, rocky earth. Although others might have found the scene eerie, for Sarah, the silvery light that the moons cast on the rocky expanse was comforting, and easy on her eyes.

  The holopic was an oft-reproduced image of the Plain of Trials that anyone from Nyx took with them off-planet. Although she was only half Moonborn herself, the image reminded her of the world that she considered to be her true home, the home of her heart. And the sere vista never failed to restore a sense of calm and order when she needed it the most. She drank in the image with her eyes, and then reached into the nightstand for her Tarot cards.

  Like the holo, they were another Nyxian import that had their roots on Old Gaia. No one, not even her Nyxian teacher, knew the exact origin of the Tarot, but they had served as a guide for humankind, and then Womankind, for centuries, and were an integral part of the culture of the Nightworld.

  Had she encountered Maya only once, she would have had no reason to consult them. In fact, their first meeting had seemed purely accidental and completely unimportant at the time. More of a curiosity than anything else.

  Then she had come across her at the port. Being an experienced operative, she had immediately doubted her initial assessment, and had chosen to force their psychic link to determine the girl’s true motives. In the end, however, all that she had managed to confirm was what she had initially suspected. That Maya was not an enemy agent and possessed no hidden agenda.

  Once again, she had passed it off as a simple coincidence.

  But then, out of all the other ships in the port that she could have chosen for herself, Maya had hidden aboard the JUDI, and Sarah had been forced to adopt a new theory. One that most new agents, lacking her training and experience, would never have entertained.

  Although it was still quite possible that she was being deceived, Sarah was becoming more and more convinced that the agency of fate itself was responsible for their encounters. It was illogical, but thanks to her experiences as a military psychic, and the training she had recieved on Nyx, she understood that the paranormal and the irrational sometimes factored into life’s equation. If this proved to be the case, then she knew that they would continue to cross paths until they took care of whatever business the Goddess intended for the two of them.

  “Let’s just see what we have then,” she said to herself. She uttered a quick prayer to the Lady of Darkness for clear council and took the round cards from their pouch. Then she sorted through them until she found the one that best suited Maya’s nature.

  This was the Daughter of Knives. It signified an impetuous young woman with a fiery and aggressive disposition, given to the use of trickery and guile when it suited her. In the holographic image, a girl with dark hair stood in the desert twilight with her Tej knife raised up against an unseen adversary.

  It was the perfect signifcator for Maya, Sarah decided, and she laid it down on the bed cover, shuffled the deck, and dealt out nine more cards. Then she called up a small glass of wine from the ship’s galley and considered each of them carefully.

  Her Nyxian mentor had taught that the last card was always the most important one in a reading. It stood for the Outcome of the Matter, and when she saw it, Sarah realized that she had known all along what it would be, even before it had been dealt.

  It was the Journeyer, and one the most profound of all the cards in the deck. In the image, another young woman stood atop a mountain peak. Behind her, the three moons of Nyx, Eris, Eros and Geras, were in the sky, and on the horizon, the planet’s tiny sun, Morpheus, was just beginning to rise.

  The girl was depicted stepping forwards, with one foot raised to take a step that would send her off the edge to her death while the other was still planted firmly on the promontory. She carried a knapsack typical of those used by the young women who went on the Tej, and her Tej knife was in a sheath at her waist. A small wissaq beast, a harmless herbivore native to the Nyxian desert, trailed behind her, either croaking its encouragement for her to go on, or warning her of the peril that she faced.

  Very interesting, Sarah thought. She looked at the next card. It represented What Might Come, and what was most likely to occur if the questioner resisted the Goddesses will. This too, failed to surprise her.

  It was the Nine of Knives. Another young woman lay at the bottom of a canyon, with eight Tej Knives arrayed on the rocks around her. Her right leg was twisted at an unnatural angle, suggesting that she had broken it in a fall from the heights above.

  The ninth dagger was in her hand, its blade shattered, and hovering above her body was a ferocious taarq. Its saber-like fangs were bared, and the gruesome image showed all too clearly that the predator had ripped the girls’ throat out, a fate that sometimes occurred in real life for those who went on the Tej. But unlike the Death card, the Nine of Knives did not symbolize spiritual death. Instead, it was the harbinger of real physical destruction in the near future.

  Sarah considered these two final cards, and looked over the rest, but she found nothing among them that disagreed with the overall prediction. Finally, she returned the deck to its pouch and took another, long sip of her wine.

  The Goddess wills the way, she thought, making the sign of the Lady. The cards had shown her fate’s design, and she didn’t envy Maya for the destiny that the patroness of Nyx, Elatsha, the Lady of Darkness, had ordained for her. But Elatsha had made her will clear and Sarah now knew the part that she was intended to play.

  She left her quarters and joined the rest of the crew up in the control cabin. Bel Lissa looked up at her as she took her station.

  “Preflight is almost done. We should be ready to take off on time,” the woman advised, “I also received confirmation that the Belle Starr will meet us at the L2 point and give us our escort until we reach the Thalestra system. That will mean one transit with them, maximum.”

  “Good,” Sarah replied with satisfaction. “That will keep our escort fees within budget. We will have to make sure to use them again in the future. I like that their Captain is so willing to work within our needs and not gouging us for credits like the last escort did. Please make sure that we add in a small tip to show our appreciation to the good lady and her officers.”

  �
�Definitely,” Bel Lissa agreed. “Any instructions about our special guest before the trip?”

  Sarah called up a display of the Crews Qaurters. From what she could tell, Maya had finally stopped beating on things. “No,” she answered, “Let us leave her be for the moment.”

  “Very well,” Bel Lissa said, turning back to her instrument panel. “Preparing to call the tower for final departure. Zara, how’s our draw doing?”

  Lately, the main engines had been pulling a little more power than normal from their positronic reactors, and everyone hoped that the problem had been worked out. When Zara looked down at her readings, she smiled.

  “She’s in the clear, Captain. Performance is in the green. And I think,” she added, rapping her knuckles on the control panel for luck, “that we lost that little gremlin that was playing tricks on us.”

  “Let’s hope so,” Bel Lissa remarked. “I don’t want to have her taken apart and come up empty again.”

  Like all machines, spaceships had a tendency to misbehave until a qualified mechanic was standing over their innards. Then their problems would miraculously vanish—at least until they were out of the maintenance bay. And in the JUDI’s case, the mechanics that they used were very expensive. Discretion wasn’t cheap.

  Bel Lissa initiated the take-off sequence. “The tower’s cleared us for launch. All hands prepare for take-off.” While the C-JUDI-GO’s gravitational drive wound up, heavy blast shields dropped down around the merchanter. This was followed by the familiar thump and hiss of the docking cradle and umbilical lines detaching themselves. Seeing the confirmation on her holodisplay, she brought the secondary thermal antimatter engines on-line.

  “Ship’s gravity at maximum,” Zara informed her. A low-pitched humming now reverberated through the control room. On the screens, a graphic displayed the positively charged gravitational field that now surrounded the ship.