by Ben Bova
The cyborg spoke in a deep, slow baritone, “Pleiades, you are listed as a stolen ship. Are you Victor Zacharias?”
“Yes, yes,” he answered impatiently. “I took this ship to search for my family. Please give me a nav fix so I can go to them.”
Neither the cyborg nor the old woman responded. They merely sat there like mute sculptures, staring at him.
* * *
Dorn froze the image of Victor Zacharias’s fiercely bearded face on the comm screen and turned to Elverda. “What should we do?” he asked.
“He says he took the ship to search for his family. If they’re aboard Syracuse…” She realized that she wasn’t certain which course of action they should take.
“I could call Ceres to verify his story,” Dorn suggested.
Elverda shook her head. Pointing to the registration data for Pleiades that had automatically come up on their comm screen once the computer recognized the caller’s name, she said, “Ceres will give us the same information that the computer files have.”
The message light was blinking frantically.
“He’s trying to talk to us,” Elverda said.
Dorn tapped the comm keyboard.
Victor Zacharias’s bearded face suddenly became animated. “Hunter!” he said urgently. “I’m trying to find my family! My wife and two children.”
Reluctantly, Dorn responded, “I’m afraid you’re listed as an outlaw. Ceres claims—”
“That I stole this ship,” Victor interrupted impatiently. “It’s true. I did steal it. To find my family!”
Elverda punched up the computer’s file on Syracuse and touched Dorn’s shoulder to get him to glance at the secondary screen: Missing since the Chrysalis slaughter. Four people aboard, all members of the Zacharias family.
“He’s telling the truth,” Elverda said. Then, to Victor’s image on the main screen, “Mr. Zacharias, we don’t want to be in the position of abetting a criminal. Let us go to Syracuse while you go back to Ceres and turn yourself in.”
* * *
Turn myself in? Victor echoed silently.
“No!” he roared. “I want to get to my wife, my children!”
It was impossible to read an expression on the half-metal face of the cyborg, but the woman looked troubled, concerned.
“Listen,” Victor said, toning down his fervor a little. “I’ll go back to Ceres and turn myself in after I see my family. I want to know that they’re all right.”
“Their message said they need assistance,” the woman said.
“They’ve been drifting through the Belt for more than three years,” Victor pleaded. “Of course they need assistance! We’ve got to help them!”
The cyborg started to say, “The lawful thing to do—”
“Don’t talk to me about legalities!” Victor insisted. “My family needs help! They could be dying while we’re here arguing!”
As unperturbed as a mountain of granite, the cyborg continued, “The lawful thing to do is for you to return to the authorities at Ceres while we go to your family’s rescue.”
“No!” Victor shouted. “No! I’ve got to go to them! I’ve got to!”
“We’ll take care of them,” the cyborg said, implacable. “You’ll see them when we bring them back to Ceres.”
“No!” Victor bellowed again. But his screen went blank.
“The bastard’s cut me off,” Victor groaned. He wanted to batter the screen with his bare fists, smash it into a million shards. Instead, he buried his face in his hands and wept like a man who’s lost his last chance for redemption.
* * *
Elverda stared at the suddenly blank screen. “That… that was… cruel.”
Dorn nodded minimally. “Perhaps it was.”
“He’s trying to find his family.”
“If he’s telling the truth. Perhaps he’s really a thief and he wants to take our ship. Or Syracuse. Or both.”
“That’s far-fetched.”
“Is it? Do you have any idea of how many people he has aboard his ship? Thieves. Pirates.”
“The data from Ceres said he was alone.”
Dorn almost smiled. “I’m sure that if he’s spent the past several months recruiting cutthroats to serve under him he wouldn’t send updates to Ceres about it.”
Elverda had to admit that Dorn was right, but she said nothing to him. Then she realized that Dorn did not want to be confronted with the man whose ship Dorik Harbin had crippled.
“Remember that other ship? Vogeltod?” Dorn said. “They claimed they were in the salvage business.”
“But…”
“It would be quite profitable to find a ship, get rid of its occupants, and sell it back at Ceres.”
“And you think that’s what this man Zacharias is doing?”
“I’m not willing to take that chance,” Dorn replied. “There are only the two of us here. I’ve got to protect you.”
“I don’t think we need protection from a man who’s trying to save his family.”
“If that’s what he’s truly doing,” Dorn said, looking up at the empty screen. Turning to the screen that showed the file on Syracuse, he noted, “There are four people in the Zacharias family. He claims to be one of them. How did he get aboard Pleiades?”
Elverda nodded grudgingly. “You think he’s lying, then.”
Dorn ran his human hand across the etched metal of his chin. “If he’s telling the truth, if he really is who he says he is and is trying to rescue his family, he’ll find a way to track us and let us lead him to Syracuse. A man desperate to save his wife and children will go to any lengths. A scavenging pirate will look for easier prey.”
Elverda hoped he was right.
SALVAGE SHIP VOGELTOD:
BRIDGE
The bridge was crowded, hot and sweaty with Vogeltod’s entire crew jammed into the compartment. Valker had called them all in to plan how to handle the ship that was nearing them.
“The Hunter,” he said jovially. “We haven’t lost her after all.”
“Only two people aboard her?” one of the crewmen asked.
The man on duty at the communications console looked up from the data displayed on his screen. “Two people,” he confirmed. “One’s listed as a priest and the other’s a woman.”
“A woman?”
“She’s over a hundred, for chrissakes. Some famous artist named Elverda Apacheta.”
Hunching forward slightly in his command chair, Valker remembered, “I met her, back when that Humphries captain forced us to give the ship back to her.”
“That’s the same ship that we’ve been looking for!”
“That’s what I said: the Hunter.”
“The ship we let go,” Kirk said, throwing an accusing glare Valker’s way.
With a widening smile, Valker said, “And now she’s coming back to us, nice and sweet.”
“So whattawe do?” Nicco asked, standing to one side of Valker.
“We take her, boys. They’re coming to help Syracuse but they’re walking right into our hands. A priest and an old lady.”
“On a nice, fat, shiny ship,” said one of the crewmen.
“She’ll bring a good price at Ceres. Better than this creaking old tub Syracuse.” Valker laughed. It was all working out beautifully, he thought. Maybe we can leave Syracuse, let her drift. I can bring Pauline and her daughter here aboard Vogeltod. The crew’ll be happy with the daughter and I can keep Pauline for myself—if I can keep Kirk and Nicco away from her.
“Yes, sir,” he said aloud. “We ought to thank that kid for sending out his distress call. He’s luring a good ship straight to us. What could be better?”
“You can have the old lady, skipper,” Kirk said, grinning. “We’ll take the two tarts from Syracuse.”
“Yeah,” one of the crewmen chimed in. “I bet the daughter’s still a virgin.”
“Not for long!”
They all laughed.
Holding up a hand, Valker said, “First things f
irst, boys. First things first. I hope none of you has religious qualms about slitting a priest’s throat.”
* * *
After posting his men for seizing the approaching Hunter, Valker got up from his chair, ducked through the hatch, and started down the passageway that led to his quarters. He didn’t have to look behind him to know that Kirk and Nicco were trailing him.
“Come on in, fellas,” he said amiably, sliding open the door to his compartment. “Have a drink on me.”
They stepped in, Nicco carefully shutting the door behind him as Valker went to the cabinet where he kept his liquor. Not much left, he saw. Most of the bottles were perilously close to empty. He pulled out the fullest, brandy from one of the L-4 habitats between the Earth and Moon, and opened it with a satisfactory pop of its plastic cork.
“Good times coming,” Valker said, pouring three meager drinks.
As he accepted his glass from Valker’s hand, Kirk said, “You banged the mother, didn’t you?”
Valker grinned at him. “That I did, Kirk. That I did.”
“How was she?” asked Nicco.
“Not half bad. Kinda tense at first, but I soothed her well enough.”
Kirk swallowed more than half his drink with one gulp, then asked, “When’s our turn?”
“In due time. We’ve got to grab Hunter first.”
“That shouldn’t be much of a problem,” said Nicco. “An old woman and a priest.”
“What’s a priest doing out here?” Kirk wondered.
“Isn’t he the one who’s supposed to be finding the dead bodies?” Nicco said.
“Yes, that’s him,” said Valker. “Some sort of religious fanatic.”
“Well, he’ll be a dead body himself in a few more hours,” Kirk said. Then he finished his drink with another swift gulp.
“Speaking of dead bodies,” Valker said, without offering to refill the drink, “we’ve got that boy to take care of.”
“We shoulda done that already,” Nicco grumbled.
“Naw,” said Kirk. “Let the kid finish swabbing the antennas. Let him do the work. Then we’ll finish him.”
Valker took a genteel sip of his brandy, then mused aloud, “Maybe we ought to take care of the kid before Hunter gets here. No sense having him around when we take the ship. Get rid of him now.”
Kirk glanced at Nicco, then shrugged. “Wouldn’t take much. We go out with him, finish the antenna job, then we yank out his air line and send him jetting into deep space.”
Nicco giggled. “He might be the first guy to reach Alpha Centauri.”
Valker saw that Nicco’s glass was empty, too. Taking both glasses and putting them down on the cabinet, Valker turned and laid a hand on each of their shoulders.
“Good thinking, lads.” Gently he nudged them toward the door. “Now you go out there and take care of the boy. I want him out of our hair by the time Hunter gets here.”
* * *
Victor Zacharias unconsciously scratched at his thick beard as he scowled at his communications screen. The system displayed a graph showing the direction from which Hunter’s message had come, but not the ship’s distance from him.
That damned half-robot, he growled inwardly. Telling me to turn myself in to the authorities. Victor refigured the keyboard beneath his fingers to call up the propulsion controls, then lit Pleiades’s fusion torch engine to full thrust, heading along the vector of Hunter’s message.
They’ll be gone by the time I get there, he realized. But maybe I can pick up their ion trail. If it hasn’t diffused too much. Maybe I can track them and let them lead me to Pauline and the kids.
Maybe.
ORE SHIP SYRACUSE:
PAULINE’S QUARTERS
She stayed in the shower until the ship’s life support computer shut off the hot water. As she toweled dry, Pauline said to herself for the ten thousandth time, You did it to protect Angela and Thee. It’s all right. You did what you had to do. You didn’t have any choice, really.
Still she felt grimy.
As she dressed she thought that it could have been worse. Much worse. Pauline had wondered, as she watched him strip and climb into bed with her, grinning like a wolf, if she could actually allow another man to make love to her. She closed her eyes, picturing Victor in her mind. I’ll fake it, she told herself. I’ll please him as much as I can. It doesn’t matter what he does to me. I’ve got to protect Angela.
To her surprise, Valker was a gentle lover, even thoughtful. All his swaggering, smirking attitude dissolved as he genuinely sought to bring pleasure to her. With some surprise, Pauline remembered what she had learned all those years ago, before she’d met Victor: you never know what a man is truly like until you’re in bed with him.
Once dressed she walked absently into the family room. Everything was still the same. All the chairs in their places; the sofa, the lamps and wall screens. But I’m not the same, she told herself. I’ve been unfaithful to my husband. I allowed that grinning hyena to use me. Then the truth slapped her in the face: I enjoyed it! I enjoyed having sex after all these years. My body overpowered my mind.
She sank into the nearest chair, guilt flooding through her like a tidal wave, and burst into racking sobs.
A noise from the galley startled her.
Stanching her tears, she went to the hatch and saw Theo sitting at the table, his back to her, scraping the remains of a meal from his plate.
Pauline hurriedly wiped her face, rubbed her eyes. She had to swallow hard before she could get any words out. “Thee?”
He turned and smiled at her. “Hi, Mom. Where’ve you been?”
Ignoring his question, “How long have you been here? In the galley?”
His youthful face wrinkled slightly with thought. “Oh, ten, maybe fifteen minutes. I thought I heard the shower running.”
“Yes,” she said, sitting beside him, hoping he wouldn’t notice her reddened eyes.
“I’ve got to go out again, finish the work on the new antennas.”
“Have you checked on Angela?”
“No, didn’t get a chance to do that. Those two apes were with me all the time I was out. I just got rid of them no more than a half-hour ago.”
“I don’t think anyone’s aboard right now.”
“Yeah, but they’ll be here in a few minutes to finish the antenna work. Maybe you can call Angie on the intercom while I start to suit up.”
Pauline nodded. “I’ll do that.” Silently she added, If the intercom is working today.
* * *
Angela was startled by the intercom’s sudden chime. She’d been pacing around the circular interior of the storm cellar, counting her steps: two hundred and fifty-three, two hundred and fifty-four… Nothing better to do, locked in the pod alone. Then the intercom chimed.
She touched the keypad and her mother’s face appeared on the tiny wall screen.
“Are you all right?” they asked simultaneously.
Pauline broke into a tight smile. “I’m fine, Angela. What about you?
“I’m bored out of my skull. There’s nothing to do in here!”
“Good. Just stay there. It’s the safest place in the ship for you.”
“But—”
“No buts, Angela. Stay in there. Stay where it’s safe.”
The screen went blank.
Angela stared at it for long moments, thinking, If it’s safe in here, that means it’s not safe outside, where Mom and Theo are.
* * *
Despite his headband, sweat trickled into Theo’s eyes, stinging, forcing him to blink. But through the glassteel of his helmet he looked with some pride at the finished antenna set that he and the two men from Vogeltod had painted along Syracuse’s curving hull.
He hung at the end of his safety tether, Nicco and Kirk on either side of him. Battered old Syracuse swung slowly through the dark emptiness, Vogeltod still attached like some mechanical parasite. The steadfast stars looked down on Theo, unblinking, solemn, terribly far away.
<
br /> “Try transmitting now, Mom,” he said into his helmet microphone.
In his earphones he heard his mother’s calm, steady voice, “This is Syracuse, testing its communications system. Testing, testing, one, two, three.”
Turning to Kirk, hovering in his nanosuit alongside him, Theo switched to the suit-to-suit frequency and asked, “Did it work?”
Kirk grinned and made a circle with his thumb and forefinger. “They heard her on Vogeltod loud and clear.”
Switching back to the ship’s frequency, Theo said, “Sweep through the comm channels, Mom. See what you can pick up.”
For several moments he heard no reply. Then, “Thee! I’m getting Ceres! And video from Selene! And Earth! It works, Thee! It works!”
Theo thought he should feel wonderful. Ecstatic. Triumphant. Instead he merely felt tired.
“Turn on the tracking beacon,” he said. “And the telemetry transmitter.”
“Yes,” Pauline replied. “Green lights! They’re working. At last, they’re working.”
“Good,” he said, feeling flat and somehow disappointed. “We’ll come in now.”
“You did it, Thee,” said his mother, her voice trembling slightly. “You did it.”
“I had help,” he replied, eying Kirk and Nicco, who were drifting closer to him.
He clicked back to the suit-to-suit frequency. “Okay, we can go back inside now.”
Nicco was close enough to see his toothy grin and crooked scar. Kirk had slid around behind him.
“We’re goin’ in, kid,” Kirk said. “You’re not.”
* * *
Aboard Pleiades, Victor cursed long and loud as he desperately tried to pick up the ion trail from the exhaust of Hunter’s fusion drive. I must have misjudged their distance, he said to himself between bouts of swearing.
“Maybe you got the motherhumping vector wrong,” he muttered to himself.
