“Typical man,” Lyssa moaned, rolling her eyes, “always going on about the size of his laser cannon.”
“You’ve not managed to hit us yet,” Haynes pointed out, hoping that Fate wouldn’t hear and be tempted.
“Oh you’ll be hit,” Millward assured him with total confidence. “It is remarkable that you have survived this long, but even that ship of yours can’t evade a barrage like this forever.”
“Though it hurts me to admit it,” the computer reported, “There may be some truth in what he’s saying.”
“You see,” Millward said with a smile that was all the more unpleasant for being eight feet wide. “Now if you were to agree to return my money...”
“My money,” Haynes disagreed.
“The disputed money,” Millward corrected, “and turned your ship around to come straight back then I might be able to rein in the dogs. It would, after all, be a shame to utterly annihilate such an interesting ship. And two such beautiful young ladies. I could see both of those taken care of.”
“In your dreams,” said Keely with a snort.
“Which is not a place that I would care to visit,” agreed Lyssa quickly.
Millward turned his attention back to Haynes, “Kaymer, that is the name that you’re using presently isn’t it?”
Haynes nodded.
“Come on Kaymer, this isn’t like you and we both know it. You are, above all things, a survivor. Who else could have gotten out of the prison I worked so hard to get you put into? You’re not going to throw your life away like this.”
The acceleration couch was rocked by several more abrupt course corrections severe enough to overcome the dampening fields.
“Would you let him go?” Lyssa demanded.
On the screen, Millward’s smile widened.
“Someone buy the man a decent toothbrush,” Keely muttered.
“Oh, he knows me far too well for that,” Millward demurred, “and wouldn’t believe it even if I said it. He would also, of course, be right. But he also knows that I wouldn’t kill him.”
“And perhaps you don’t know me as well as you would like to think,” Haynes declared suddenly. “Computer, I’m bored now. Cut the contact.”
“Goodbye then Kaymer Haynes. Such a waste...”
“Whew that’s a relief,” Keely sighed as the screen morphed back into a whirling view of death-laced blackness, “I don’t think I could have spent another second looking at that nose hair. What now?”
“You could answer your other call,” the computer offered.
“Another?” Haynes was surprised. Millward’s call to gloat over an enemy he thought soon to be dead had been expected, but who else..? “Put it through.”
The viewscreen resolved itself instantly into the image of the security headquarters that housed one Sergeant Crendon of Galactisafe Security Services. The man’s face was no less ruddy than it had been during their last conversation, though he seemed somewhat less flustered.
“Look we’re a little bit busy out here dodging certain death to be taking all these fan calls, so could you make your threats quickly so that we can get on with something more important. I have already spoken to your boss,” Haynes pointed out, feeling that skipping pleasantries with the man trying to kill him was quite justified.
“No threats,” Crendon said with satisfied shake of his head, adding with evident relish, “I just called to say what a pleasure it is going to be to spread your atoms across the whole system.”
“As I told your lord and master,” Haynes goaded, “You’ll have to hit us first.”
“That you have lasted this long is a touch surprising and somewhat disappointing,” Crendon admitted, “but the pool is still running. Not even you can escape our co-ordinated assault forever.”
“Cut transmission!” Haynes yelled decisively. “Did he just say ‘co-ordinated’?”
“He did,” the computer confirmed, “and I’m way ahead of you on that.”
“Well I’m not,” Keely pouted, fed up with always being the last to understand what was going on.
“The gun emplacements are talking to each other,” Lyssa explained, catching on faster due to long hours dealing with the intricate insides of complicated machines. “That means a signal...”
“And a signal can be jammed,” Haynes finished, “or hijacked.”
“Got it!” the computer announced jubilantly. “It really shouldn’t be so easy. I mean do they really call that a security cypher because...”
“You’re in?” Haynes interrupted.
“All the way and then some more,” the computer confirmed. “Damn! That was close.”
The ship shook and it was not all down to the manoeuvring this time.
“You want I should shut them down?”
“Hell no,” Haynes denied. “I want them firing, firing as much as they can, but randomly. Not so randomly that you can’t get us through, though.”
“OK, I give up,” Keely threw her hands up in front of her in a gesture of mock despair. “Why don’t you just switch them off and let us get the heck away from this place?”
“Two good reasons,” Haynes told her.
“No pursuit,” Lyssa guessed.
“Absolutely,” Haynes agreed. “They’re going to be stuck there until either the guns run out...”
“Which is not going to be any time soon considering the kind of fusion reactors that they use to power these things,” Lyssa commented.
“...Or destroyed, which would take the better part of the Star Fleet’s most armoured ships quite some time to achieve. Either way, we’ll see how those fine airs and graces survive once the canapés run out.”
Lyssa looked at him with something akin to respect, “Why Kaymer Haynes I do believe that you might possibly be a man of the people.”
“Or just incredibly vindictive,” he countered.
“Poor Gervais,” Keely said sadly. “He was only trying to help.”
“Only trying to help himself you mean,” Haynes pointed out sharply. “Help himself to a woman he thought was incredibly wealthy and able to help his cause. I’m sure that he will be well-placed when things turn ugly over the last hors d’oeuvre.”
“You took a dislike to him the very moment that you saw him, before he was able to do anything, for or against anyone,” Keely retorted angrily. “What was that all about? Did he threaten you? Did he remind you of yourself when you were young? You know you could try caring a little bit more. If I wasn’t trapped in this couch I would storm out impressively.”
“Erm, not wanting to rain on anyone’s parade or anything,” the computer interjected, “but now that I’ve reprogrammed the laser cannons you’re free to move around the cabin.”
“Well thank you!” Keely shouted. She struggled out of the clinging embrace of the acceleration couch, paused to compose herself, and then stormed out impressively.
“Wow, she wasn’t kidding,” the computer observed in the silence that followed her departure.
“She was right wasn’t she?” Lyssa asked quietly. “There was something about that kid that reminded you of yourself. Is that how you started out?”
“If I wanted to be psychoanalysed, I could afford to consult the very best professionals in the field,” he told her blankly. “I don’t need a shoulder to cry on or an ear to pour my problems into.”
“It wouldn’t hurt to let someone in every now and then you know,” she suggested, though not very forcefully.
“It always hurts to let someone in,” he replied sombrely and then added angrily, “Don’t you have an engine to look at or something else that you’re actually qualified to do?”
“Yes,” she agreed, rising out of the couch with a grace that Keely had singularly failed to manage and then walked out of the room with a lot less noise, but to the same general effect.
“You really do have a way with the ladies don’t you?” the computer asked archly. “Is that the technique that you used on the Capresi Harem Moon?”
&
nbsp; “Set a course for the nearest off-the-grid outpost, something with med facilities,” Haynes retorted irritably. “And stop reading my file.”
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE HALREPTOR KIND
The small ship, blacker than the blackness of space it inhabited, sat peacefully on the edge of the star system, every alert system it had registering near overload (and it possessed a lot of alert systems). The high-speed travel across the galaxy that was taken so for granted in the Republic would not have been impossible without these systems, but it would have been thoroughly fatal. A space freighter decelerating from light speed to normal space navigation through the core of your planet was a sure way of spoiling your day, and that of everyone on the freighter, and everyone else who had been living on the planet.
The sheer amount of energy currently being expended within the solar system was insignificant when compared to, say, a supernova explosion, but the effect of being caught up in it was approximately the same - instant atomisation followed by some mild scattering. It was certainly enough to light up the ship’s threat board to the point of making the average Christmas tree look dowdy and dull by comparison.
The ship’s lone occupant studied the readouts through sunglasses that were simultaneously harshly functional and supercool with an unfurrowed brow. Whilst others might have puzzled over the constant barrage of energy weapons in the absence of a target, or been confused by the random nature of the blasting or even been rendered quizzical by the distress call emanating from the heart of the defence system requesting assistance from any ship with super-heavy blast armour, he was in possession of a single word that explained everything.
Haynes
His quarry had been here and had left just as he emerged from hyperspace. The trail was no longer cold. An ionisation trail, recent enough to be detected even against the blazing background of endlessly firing energy weapons left an arrow-straight marker for him to follow. The end of the chase was at hand and he could conceive of only one possible outcome.
Lyssa strode into the kitchen without knocking or giving any other advance warning of her arrival, a sure sign that she was in no mood for chit-chat. Haynes was defiantly trying to master the finer arts of using the sophisticated cooking equipment, which was equally defiantly resisting his attempts.
“I want to talk to you,” she stated baldly, confirming his assessment of her mood.
“Let me save you the trouble,” he replied, abandoning the dripping yellow concoction that was supposed to be an omelette. “You’ve made a terrible mistake. You want me to drop you off at the first remotely available civilised spaceport and you don’t want me to argue with you.”
Lyssa’s mood was not made in any way better by having the wind brutally stolen from her sails to be sold on the black market. Her lips pursed until you could have stored quite a bit of loose change in there.
“I’ve just had the same conversation with Keely,” he revealed tiredly. This was exactly the kind of aggravation that caused him to work alone in the first place. Well, that and not being betrayed and imprisoned. “She asked me to take her back to Hochnar.”
“And what did you tell her?”
“I told her to take herself,” he sipped at a cup of coffee that proved to be drinkable. “Your shares of the money that we reclaimed from Millward have made you both very wealthy women indeed, wealthy enough to go wherever you want in a certain amount of style and comfort. Just look out for people like me when you get there.”
“I don’t fancy spending the rest of my life on the run from Millward.”
“Oh you needn’t worry about that,” he assured her. “He won’t bother about the hired help. It’s me he’ll come after, but I’m used to being careful. A new face, some carefully constructed new identities. I’ll keep him at bay.”
“All right then,” she nodded and departed the room as decisively as she had entered it.
Haynes look after her, brooding, his drinkable coffee going cold and his inedible omelette crisping a deep black.
“I don’t know if this is a good time for me to mention that I think we’re being followed,” the computer said with uncharacteristic softness.
“What?” Haynes asked, Not really listening.
“I’ve picked up a trace at the very edge of sensor range. It’s very faint and intermittent.”
“Keep an eye on it,” Haynes ordered automatically.
“I mean it could just be a glitch or a previously unencountered spatial anomaly of course,” the computer continued, unsuccessfully trying to make conversation, “but I really don’t think so.”
“That’s good,” Haynes mumbled an wandered out of the room, leaving a cup of mainly drinkable, but now cold, coffee.
The computer idly activated the fire suppression system to put out the flames from what had been intended as an omelette and spoke in general to the empty room, “I could also mention that my up-until-now incredibly accurate threat analyses indicate this to be a very unsafe part of space to be in right now.”
It surveyed the room (and all the others and in every frequency of the electromagnetic spectrum) with a jaundiced lens. “Humans!” it complained, but only in rooms where there weren’t any, “always letting emotions get in the way of efficiently ruthless decisions.”
The Halreptor ships did not so much race through the swirling patterns of hyperspace as elbow them brutally out of the way. The vessels treated the immutable physical laws of hyperspace with the same utter lack of respect that they had paid to those that governed normal space, using sheer power to pummel them into submission. Whilst Republican ships used elegant engineering solutions to surf and sail along the eddies and currents in the continuum, these ships kicked those same eddies and currents in the nuts and shouldered their way past. Where Republican vessels followed lines of force and potentiality in sweeping curves to minimise energy wastage, these ships followed a line that could be used to define the word ‘straight’ in any dimension’s dictionary. Their forceful passage created ripples in the amorphous fabric of hyperspace that upset the intricate mathematical constructs necessary for navigation through it. As a result, for the following decade ships would return to normal space to find themselves not quite where they intended to be.
These were ships with a mission and a purpose. A mission, a purpose and intent. The intent radiated out of every visible (and several non-visible) facets of their surface material. If the ships had possessed faces and those faces had possessed eyes then those eyes would have been focussed on a single point with tunnel vision so tight it could have passed through the eye of a needle.
They had, however, come to a junction in the tunnel and two objects had shone torches down the side access. Questions had been asked and decisions were being made. The mission was, of course, their most immediate priority, but there were other, larger considerations to be, well, considered. The two objects almost directly in their paths were just such considerations.
The ships came to a halt with all the grace of a supertanker pulling a handbrake turn. The abrupt manoeuvre sent shockwaves rippling out along their intended path.
They also sent something else.
Shrill alarms sounded throughout the ship bringing Haynes onto the flight deck at a full run. Keely was only moments from tripping over his heels.
“What’s happening?” she demanded breathlessly.
“I just got here,” he told her. “Computer enough with the alarms already.”
The silence was so complete that it took a few moments to register.
“Was that noise absolutely necessary?”
“I could have just said politely that there was a bit of a major emergency going on and would you like to come to the control deck I suppose,” the computer admitted archly, “ but I don’t think it would have gained the same response do you?”
“What emergency?”
“We’re being probed!” Lyssa declared, wiping some sort of industrial lubricant off her hands as she strode purposefully into the room. Striding
purposefully was something that she was becoming noticeably good at.
“No way sister!” the computer denied. “That’s the kind of rash and unsubstantiated comment that undermines my position as controlling AI on this vessel.”
The three humans looked at the viewscreen in puzzlement.
“I mean I would have noticed,” the computer added, somewhat lamely.
“We’re being probed telepathically,” Lyssa challenged. “Do you have a sensor for that?”
“I don’t have sensors for probings of the mental or anal variety,” the computer said with an audible pout.
“Well I do,” Lyssa pointed out, “for the mental ones, I mean. I know when someone’s trying to read my mind and someone’s trying to do it right now.”
“Millward?” Keely surmised.
“He couldn’t have gotten someone out here that fast,” Haynes objected.
“But the thing is,” Lyssa said slowly, as though trying to work things out as she went, “this doesn’t feel right. It doesn’t feel human.”
“That does not sound good,” Keely agreed begrudgingly.
“Wait a minute,” Haynes swung around to face the viewscreen, as they all did when speaking to the computer, “You sounded the alarm.”
“Yes, that was me,” the computer conceded.
“But you didn’t know about the probe.”
“I can’t be expected to detect everything in the known universe,” the computer complained defensively. “I was built by humans you know.”
“So what was your emergency about?” Haynes got to the point.
“Giant wall of displaced hyperspace energy coming right at us,” the computer immediately obliged.
“And that’s a bad thing?” Keely asked.
“Imagine you’re a rare and fragile butterfly,” Lyssa told her.
“OK,” Keely agreed with a nod.
“Now a nuclear bomb just went off about a half mile away...”
To Infinity Page 15
