Blake's 7: Criminal Intent

by Trevor Baxendale

  ‘He’s alive!’ Jenna said.

  ‘Yes,’ said Avon, fists clenching.

  ‘INFORMATION. LIFE-SIGNS ARE WEAKENING.’

  ‘We’ve got to do something,’ implored Jenna.

  ‘That’s the second time someone has told me that,’ said Avon. ‘I’m open to suggestions as to what.’

  A warning alarm sounded and a graphic display was overlaid on the forward viewer: a bright central dot representing the Liberator, and two red bullet-shapes homing in on it.

  ‘Pursuit ships!’ Vila realised. He dashed to a console and checked the readings. ‘Closing in on an attack run – pincer manoeuvre.’

  ‘The first ship is opening fire,’ said Cally, checking her instruments. ‘Plasma bolt launched.’

  ‘Evasive manoeuvres, Zen!’ ordered Avon.

  ‘Belay that order,’ said Jenna.

  Everyone turned to look at her in surprise.

  Jenna gripped the controls tighter. ‘I’m taking the Liberator deeper into the rings.’

  ‘Deeper?’ cried Vila.

  Avon look back at the pursuit ship icons and smiled wolfishly. ‘Do it!’

  ‘But we’ll be smashed to bits!’ Vila protested.

  ‘Vila!’ Avon snapped. ‘Jenna is more than capable of flying the Liberator without your advice. In fact, you’ll probably put her off. So come with me – now.’

  And with that he ran up the steps and out of the flight deck. Vila gave one last anguished look at the blizzard on the forward viewer and followed him.

  ‘Five seconds to impact,’ Cally reported. ‘The other pursuit ship has opened fire as well. Second plasma bolt closing in. Ten seconds to impact.’

  Jenna pushed the controls and the Liberator surged forward. The ship rocked as it flew deeper into the maelstrom of ice. On the viewer, the York had virtually disappeared in a cloud of glittering fragments.

  ‘Three seconds,’ said Cally. ‘Two… One…’

  The Liberator shuddered as the first plasma bolt hit home. Cally and Jenna braced themselves as best they could in their flight seats. They’d been on the receiving end of this kind of attack before. They knew what to expect from plasma bolts. What they didn’t know was what to expect from flying into the middle of a planetary ring system.

  The Liberator continued to rock as the blizzard intensified.

  ‘I’ve no idea what you’re doing, Jenna, but I hope it works.’

  ‘Angle the force wall against the ring debris,’ Jenna told her.

  Cally touched the requisite controls. She glanced back at the defence monitor and winced. ‘Second plasma bolt three seconds from impact…’

  There was a distant roar and a flare of light from one of the rear view monitors. Cally checked her instruments. ‘The plasma bolt exploded in the ring debris! There’s too much ice between us and the pursuit ships – they can’t fire on us again!’

  ‘And they won’t be able to follow us in here,’ Jenna confirmed. ‘We’re safe from the pursuit ships – and if we angle the force walls properly, we can deflect the worst of the ring debris.’

  The noise of the storm outside had dropped considerably. A jagged spray of broken ice and vapour streamed past the forward viewer from port to starboard – all that was left of the rocks hitting the force wall energy.

  ‘It’s working,’ Cally reported.

  ‘Right,’ Jenna said. ‘Now for the tricky part…’

  *

  The pod shuddered violently as another storm struck. Blake could hear klaxons sounding dimly. Or perhaps his eardrums had burst and he couldn’t hear them properly at all. He fully expected the pressure to drop suddenly and explosively as the pod was split wide open by the next iceberg.

  The instinct for survival was too strong, however. Despite the odds, Blake climbed back to his feet, pulling himself up the metal chair at the centre of the pod. He looked around and saw the mutoid, Kiera, dragging Kilus Kroe off Travis. She flung him to one side and helped Travis upright.

  Travis was in a bad way, Blake was glad to see. There was blood streaming from his nose. His good eye was staring wildly, searching for an exit. Kiera dragged him with her good arm to the airlock leading to the transporter ship. It was half-open, steam bursting every now again from the seals around it edges. One of the heavier impacts must have freed it, Blake realised.

  Immediately after that he understood what the mutoid was doing. She was saving herself and her commanding officer. Blake and Kroe were now expendable. There was no time to save them, no time for any spacewalk. The priority was escape. Survival.

  Blake checked the opposite airlock and he could see why the mutoid was in such a hurry to leave. The airlock hatch was visibly flexing and warping, issuing a series of metallic shrieks as the air pressure inside the pod threatened to blow it out. The pod on the other side must have been hit by a massive iceberg and ripped completely away. There was nothing on the other side of that single, flimsy airlock door now except space.

  Blake turned and ran across to where Kiera was struggling with the hatch. Travis was propped upright against the wall next to the airlock. He looked out on his feet.

  Kiera held up a pistol as Blake approached. ‘Keep back.’

  Blake saw the black blood bubbling on her lips as she spoke. Her left arm still hung limply at her side. ‘Let me call the Liberator,’ he said. ‘They may be able to teleport us all off this thing!’

  She shook her head, awkwardly, as if the movement caused her a lot of pain. ‘No time.’

  The pod shuddered again, although it seemed to Blake that the worst of the buffeting had stopped. Perhaps they were through the first of the rings, but he doubted it. It hardly mattered. The rear airlock was going to blow any minute.

  The mutoid pushed Travis through the half-open airlock into the transporter ship. She gritted her teeth against the pain, using her shattered shoulder joint. She kept the pistol pointing at Blake while she did it, although her eyes seemed to be losing focus. They looked drawn and shadowy in their sockets now. Blake guessed that she was in dire need of plasma serum.

  Only at the last minute did Blake realise that she was actually looking past him. He turned just in time to deflect a punch from Kilus Kroe. The man had launched himself at Blake, understanding like him that his only hope lay on the other side of that airlock. The transporter ship was the only thing that could save any of them now.

  Blake blocked another punch and kicked out, sending Kroe staggering backwards. He slipped and landed on the floor – right next to the jar of biovores, which still rested on the deck.

  A moment’s pause.

  Blake heard the airlock grind shut behind him. Travis and the mutoid were in the transporter ship. Safe, probably.

  That left him and Kilus Kroe.

  Kroe picked up the jar of biovores, smiling.

  ‘Don’t be an idiot, Kroe! Help me contact the Liberator – we can still get off this ship!’

  Kroe flipped off the biovore lid and the creatures stirred restlessly inside. He stooped and picked up his space helmet in his other hand. It was almost silent in the pod now, as if the storm outside had blown itself to an impossible standstill. All Blake could hear was his own ragged breathing and the groaning of the rear airlock.

  And then something else – a strange fizz of energy, and a flash of light which coalesced into Avon, standing right behind Kroe.

  ‘Time to leave,’ Avon said, throwing a teleport bracelet to Blake.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  ‘I thought you were dead,’ said Blake, as he clipped the bracelet around his wrist.

  ‘Sorry to disappoint.’ Avon raised his wrist to call the Liberator. ‘Vila – I’ve got Blake. Bring us up…’

  ‘Wait,’ Blake interrupted. ‘There’s something I want to do.’

  ‘Don’t hang around, Blake,’ said Vila’s voice over the communicator. ‘Jenna’s holding the Liberator in the way of the ice rings to protect the prison ship. The force walls are absorbing the worst of it but the power’s drainin
g fast!’

  ‘All right, Vila. Stand by…’

  Kroe was looking from Blake to Avon in confusion. But there was nothing confusing about the Liberator gun in Avon’s right hand, pointed straight at Kroe’s head. ‘Is this the infamous Kilus Kroe?’ Avon enquired.

  ‘The very same,’ Blake said. ‘I’ll take that.’ He carefully removed the jar of biovores from Kroe’s grasp, keeping it upright so that none of the little beasts could escape. They were trying to crawl up the slippery walls and each other, but they couldn’t reach the rim. Not quite. Not unless Blake tipped the jar slightly so that the climb was easier.

  He held the jar near to Kroe’s head, and the man recoiled as several biovores crawled up the slope towards freedom. ‘It’d be a shame to spend what time you have left alive with these things in your spacesuit, Kroe.’

  Kroe’s mouth was suddenly dry. ‘Wh-what do you want? Get them away from me!’

  ‘You told me that you had all the secrets of the rebellion, Kroe. Stored up in your head for when you really needed them. Well, you need them right now.’

  Kroe licked his lips, eyes wide as they watched the biovore jar tip a little more towards him. The biovores seethed. ‘All right, all right. I’ll tell you...’

  ‘Blake, we don’t have time for this!’ Avon insisted.

  ‘I want a location,’ Blake said firmly. ‘I want to know where Avalon is.’

  ‘Avalon?’ Kroe said, frowning.

  Blake tipped the jar a little further. ‘Location!’

  ‘Why – what do I get in return?’

  ‘We’re your only way out of here, remember. And these worms are hungry.’

  Kroe said one word – the name of a planet or a star system, Blake wasn’t sure which – and then seemed to sag on his knees. Blake caught hold of him.

  ‘Are we done here?’ Avon asked.

  Blake handed Avon the biovore jar, careful to keep it upright. ‘We’re done. Give him a bracelet. Let’s go.’

  ‘You want him on the Liberator?’

  ‘I’ll think about what to do with him then.’ Blake opened a channel to the ship. ‘Vila – this is Blake. Bring us up.’

  ‘At last!’ said Vila.

  Blake stepped back to await the teleport field.

  Avon looked at Kroe and said, ‘Oops,’ before tipping the biovores into the collar of the man’s spacesuit. Kroe started to scream – but was cut off the moment Avon slammed his helmet down and closed the latches.

  A bright circle of light contracted around Avon and Blake and then they vanished.

  *

  Kilus Kroe scrabbled at the helmet seal but the biovores were already crawling up his face and into his mouth and nostrils. Several entered through his ears. He hurled himself around the pod, trying to tear the helmet off before collapsing to the floor, twisting and writhing, shaking his head from side to side, spitting the worms out.

  ‘Get them off me! Get them off me!’ he shrieked as his throat cleared. He gagged, realising that he had just involuntarily swallowed a ball of worms. They squirmed madly in his gullet and started to feed. He coughed and a spray of red filled his helmet visor. Seconds later they found his eyes.

  *

  ‘I can’t hold her here much longer,’ said Jenna. She was pale and drenched with sweat. The buffeting from the ice debris was bad enough. The concentration required to hold position and shelter the prison ship was worse.

  ‘Force wall is still holding – but only just,’ reported Cally.

  ‘ENERGY LEVELS NOW AT FIFTY-TWO PER CENT CAPACITY,’ Zen added calmly. ‘ESTIMATED TIME TO SHIELD COLLAPSE – FOUR MINUTES TWO SECONDS.’

  Blake ran on to the flight deck with Avon and Vila in tow. They took up their positions, Blake in front of the forward viewer. ‘All right, Jenna – let’s get out of here.’

  With a sigh of relief Jenna pushed the controls forward and starboard, angling the Liberator into a steep dive out of the ring. The engines hummed loudly, propelling the great ship free of the maelstrom.

  ‘That’s better,’ Jenna said, relaxing back in her seat for the first time in – how many hours? She felt stiff and numb. ‘Clear space at last.’

  ‘The York won’t last long now,’ said Vila. ‘It’ll be smashed to pieces.’

  ‘At least we’re out of danger,’ Cally said.

  ‘INFORMATION: FEDERATION PURSUIT SHIPS ON INTERCEPT COURSE DELTA SEVEN.’

  ‘Evasive manoeuvres, Zen, now,’ said Blake urgently.

  The image on the viewer whirled sideways, the bulk of the gas giant sliding past as the Liberator wheeled out of the path of the oncoming rocket ships. They howled past and streaked towards the rings.

  ‘They’re Starburst Class,’ Vila noted. ‘They can turn on a credit chip. They’ll be back in a flash.’

  ‘No, wait,’ Cally said. ‘They’re not turning. They’re leaving us behind.’

  ‘They’re heading for the prison ship,’ said Avon.

  Blake looked up. ‘Travis,’ he growled.

  *

  ‘Commander! Commander Travis!’

  He opened his eye slowly. His vision was blurred. Fortunately his bionic eye was still functioning, and had been functioning all along, even when he was only half-conscious. He had seen the mutoid helping him towards the transport ship, shoving him through and then closing the airlock door, before Blake could do anything to stop them.

  ‘Can’t run,’ Travis said dully. The words tasted thick and stupid in his mouth. In the name of all the stars, was he dribbling? No. He could taste blood. His nose was broken. ‘Must not run.’

  ‘Sit down, sir,’ said the mutoid. She helped him into the flight seat. He slumped down without protest, weak and useless. His mind recoiled at the thought.

  ‘Blake,’ he said. ‘Not leaving Blake.’

  Dimly he became aware of the mutoid strapping him into the chair. One-handed, she was pulling the webbing tight across his shoulders and chest. With immense effort, biting her lip against the obvious pain, she used her broken arm to help close the latch.

  ‘Let go of me,’ Travis growled. He tried to sit up but he couldn’t move. The straps were too tight.

  ‘The Liberator is sheltering the York from the ring debris,’ the mutoid reported, quickly checking the instrument panel. ‘When it moves… the debris will destroy us.’

  ‘I’m not running,’ Travis protested. ‘I refuse.’

  ‘You will… die… if we stay.’ The mutoid slumped over the control panel. She barely had the strength to lift her head. When she did, she turned to look at him. Her eyes were dark, shadowy, surrounded by skin the colour of grey metal. Her lips were green.

  She had a name, Travis recalled. ‘Kiera…’ he said.

  ‘Sirrr…’

  Her speech was slurred, like a drunk. Travis hated drunks. ‘You need serum. Don’t you have a spare phial?’

  ‘Already used.’ Kiera leaned up, showing Travis the green cylinder embedded in her chest cavity. It was cracked and empty. Luminous goo was trickling down the front of her uniform. The rest of it was ragged, torn into charred strips around her left shoulder. Her carapace was split.

  ‘You look a disgrace, Kiera,’ Travis told her.

  The ship suddenly rocked to starboard, jolting Travis against the restraining straps. Kiera was shunted across the console and collapsed to her knees by his side. There was a terrible wrench and the whole transporter shuddered again as the last pod was torn away by the onslaught of the rings. One by one, pod by pod, the prison ship had been reduced. Now all there was left was the York itself. Soon there would be nothing.

  ‘The Liberator has left,’ Travis said. ‘We have to start the engines quickly.’

  ‘Serum,’ croaked the mutoid.

  Travis reached out with his bionic hand and pressed a series of controls on the panel before him. Nothing happened. The energy circuits were all offline. It would take minutes to charge them, calibrate the motors, start the engines. And that was before they could move so much as a metre u
nder their own power. Meanwhile, the ship was being buffeted by the ice pounding on its hull. It was sliding around on its axis, turning to face the blizzard. Ice silica pelted the forward viewscreens, exploding in bright stars on the exterior surface.

  His bionic eye registered the iceberg first. It was tumbling lazily towards the ship, a giant among the other fragments. It turned end over end, and gradually he got a sense of the real scale of it. Gigantic. Three times the size of the York, and on a direct collision course. It would swat the transporter like a fly.

  Travis smashed his fist down onto the console in annoyance, denting it. And something caught his eye. The emergency flight-seat release system. His lips parted silently inside his helmet as he sucked in a breath of approval.

  Kiera looked up at him and her eyes were huge and dark and wet. ‘Sir...’

  ‘You won’t need any more serum,’ Travis told her, and hit the ejector control.

  Latches disengaged from beneath his flight seat with heavy, automatic clunks. There was a hiss of pneumatic gas as a hatch opened somewhere. Travis caught a final glimpse of the iceberg bearing down on the cabin before the explosive bolts fired and the entire chair shot downwards and out through a shaft built into the base of the transporter.

  Travis felt a second’s dizziness as the ship suddenly appeared above his head and then shrank. He was swept along and buffeted by the storm of ice and then there was a huge, silent explosion as the giant iceberg pounded into the York. An immense ball of orange light threw dazzling shadows across the maelstrom and then Travis caught the shockwave and he was free of the ring system and spinning through clear space.

  There was blackness all around him. He caught slight of the planet turning above and below him and closed his eyes, fumbling for the seat harness. He unlatched it and shrugged out of the straps, floating free. He heard himself gasp for breath as, finally, he remembered to breathe. The oxygen flooded into his lungs and he felt a lightheaded urge to laugh.

  A beautiful red-orange rocket ship hove into view alongside him, slowing like a naval vessel picking up the survivor of a sinking ship.