As usual, Desik was not happy at his arrival. Having a human lord it over him, whatever small benefits Kepper's work did for him, did not sit well with the Harr'al's pride. He had that same rubbery skin texture as the rest of his species but with a pinkish tint that was rare among Calnin. He looked pensively at Kepper with violet eyes. "This isn't going to be easy," he warned. "This ship is here working for the Trade Minister of Lusitania. Lord Sikna paid for his cargo. I must have a strong reason to suspend the ship's departure with such personages involved."
That tidbit interested Kepper. The Trade Minister of Lusitania, Duarte Vitorino, had a growing reputation as a man with wealth, taste, and a position that let him enhance both. He was also known for getting things done and had his own network among various Trifid Nebula Region worlds, even private trade routes. Is he involved with the mark in some way? Or the League's interest? He filed that thought away for later.
What was more immediately important was that the Shadow Wolf's departure was about to be approved.
"You can't demand an inspection?" Kepper asked as he surveyed Desik's lavish office. "I just need time to move a team into place and take my target back out."
"My authority is limited on these matters. I can't stop a ship without cause."
He considered options. A small grin came to his face. "Lord Sikna can't complain if a man is keeping a servant from running, can he?"
Drisk scrunched his nose. "I think I see what you are suggesting. I can order the ship's launch suspended if we have reason to believe an escaped slave is aboard."
"Sounds good to me."
"But all I can do is order a brief suspension," Drisk warned. "Without an actual database-identified slave verified, I can't even get permission for a security team to respond. You might have an hour before my suspension will be revoked. Maybe less."
"You let me worry about that," said Kepper, already considering his available courses of action. "Just stop that ship."
"I'll send the suspension order, then. Just don't mess this up."
"I don't intend to."
* * *
Cera and Tia returned the helicar after using the ship's industrial cleaners to bleach out the blood spots. The rental agency was still quite unhappy, and Tia did not look forward to Henry seeing the bill when it came. They returned to the ship via a smart aircar taxi and went aboard, Cera to begin pre-flight checks and Tia to check on their patient.
The infirmary was on the upper deck and astern of the living quarters. The nearest of the three beds to the door was occupied by Miri Gaon, who didn't stir at the noise. Oskar and Brigitte stood on opposite sides of the bed, each holding a scanner. "She is still alive and continuing to stabilize," Oskar assured Tia. "You did the right thing in treating her. As if you have done so before."
Tia swallowed and nodded. Her gray eyes turned distant, as if seeing into the past. She remembered a young woman with the same complexion as herself, a missing limb, and so much blood, while the roar of heavy arms fire filled the air. "I have experience, yes," she managed to say.
"Ah. How silly of me." Oskar sighed. "I momentarily forgot your background. I am sorry for dredging up terrible memories, Tia."
"It's fine," she said, even though it wasn't, but that wasn’t Oskar’s fault. Felipe's words and attitude still rubbed raw against her emotions. "What is her condition, beyond stable?"
"Pulse shot to the upper right arm and slugs to the left shoulder and side," Oskar recited, even as he took the scanner from Brigitte to look over the results. "The characteristics of the wound are consistent with magnetic firearms."
"A mag-pistol and a pulse pistol. This man was ready for a fight." Tia got close enough to look at the sleeping form of their passenger. Even resting, there was tension in Miri's expression and body that told of demons in her past. "She's spent years running, according to al-Lahim. And now she’s caught up in this."
"The League will stop at nothing to capture her if they have a KC order. I do not recognize her as a dissident, however."
"She's Coalition Intelligence, or former anyway. Maybe she did something to them?"
"I hope it bloody hurt," Brigitte said, never one to pass up a chance to lash out verbally at her former nation.
"It likely did. They are treating her like they would a defector or traitor," Oskar pointed out.
"You mean like you?" Tia asked.
"Yes. Like me. Brigitte, as well, although since she was a civilian without an official position, she would not face the same."
Brigitte crossed her arms and scowled. "No, I'd just be sent back to a damned resocialization camp and broken down into a good little Society drone." After speaking, Brigitte's expression lightened slightly. "I wonder what the captain’s going to do? He can’t have both Caetano and Vitorino take custody of her, can he? And Coalition Intel wants her on the run.”
“I think he’s still figuring it out,” Tia said. “But in the end, I think he’ll go with Caetano. Even if it costs us work, she’s in a position to make life for us a real hell, not just make jobs scarcer."
"Yeah." Brigitte frowned at their choices. "A shame we had to be caught up in this crap. Like we haven't had enough happen."
"Given the state of the galaxy, we cannot always evade events," Oskar remarked. "We just have to trust in each other and Captain Henry."
"Always," Tia agreed.
* * *
Henry went to the bridge in anticipation of the launch clearance he was expecting any moment. Piper was present at the first mate's station and Cera at the helm, running pre-launch checks. "Everything green?" he asked. The sooner this job is over, the better.
"As green as a New Connaught shamrock, sir," Cera promised. "Pieter's checkin' a line, but I'm showin' no problems on the system."
"As soon as we get clearance, I want to get out of here," Henry said, even though he was still wondering how to satisfy everyone back on Lusitania. Given the choice of more time to make a plan or getting off Harron, he would have always picked the latter. The way the planet did things was too frustrating, as was its very existence. "How did things go at the helicar agency?"
Cera winced, although Henry couldn't see it. "Oh, they took th' car back, sir. But I have a feelin' that you won't be likin' th' bill."
"That bad, huh?"
"Yeah, that bad, sir."
Henry sighed. Yet more expenses, but it couldn't be helped. "Well, that's how things go in these kinds of jobs. You did good, by the way. Got our passenger out of harm's way."
"Thank you, sir." Cera beamed with pride. "I've always wanted t' try that kind o' spin in a helicar. He just gave me an excuse."
"The woman you recovered has reason to thank you, since she's on the League's hit list. Odds are, you kept her from being spaced."
At that, the others shivered. "Such a terrible way to go," Piper lamented. "And they claim they're the superior, 'enlightened' ones."
"Dictatorships tend to bury those sorts of things in the fine print." Henry shared a brief chuckle with Piper.
Piper's laughter was interrupted by a beep from the console. She tapped at it. "Shadow Wolf, here.”
"Vessel Shadow Wolf, this is Spaceport Control. Your departure clearance is denied."
Henry heard that and scowled. "What? Why?"
"Your ship has been flagged as potentially harboring an escaped slave," the official replied. "We are examining the order now."
Right away, Henry knew what was happening. "It looks like the guy you ran over wants another go," he said to Cera. "And he might be bringing friends."
"Give me th' word, an' we're headin' for vacuum, sir," she said.
"Be on standby." Henry weighed his options. The locals, like any slavocracy, took a dim view of underground railroads, especially since they had almost no hope of reclaiming escapees. They could potentially have the system defense fleets after them if they tried to run under that suspicion, and Henry didn't want to deal with those odds if he didn't have to. He tapped a key to reopen the channel to
traffic control. "We acknowledge and protest strongly, Traffic Control. We have no escapees aboard, just union-recognized spacers."
"Your protest is acknowledged, Captain. We will inform you of any further issues."
"Thank you." Henry cut the line and turned on the intercom. "Everyone, be ready for either a scramble or a firefight. Someone's up to fishy business."
* * *
An hour, maybe less, was how long Drisk gave Kepper, and he knew better than to push it. If anything, it aggravated him that he couldn't employ that kind of gambit more thoroughly by actually forging an entry for the mark in the slavery database the local authorities kept. It wasn't impossible, but it was notoriously difficult and exceedingly dangerous, as the Harr'al were understandably sensitive to anyone messing with their slave database—after all, anyone who could add someone illicitly could also remove someone. It was, in short, incredibly expensive to make stick, more costly than his payment for the job made worthwhile.
But he would have taken the blow to his accounts had he known how the job would go. His mark was about to leave the planet, and he had no idea where they were taking her. Sektatsh only required flight plans filed for in-system travel, not ultimate extrasolar destinations. If he didn't want to fail, he needed to know where they were going, or even better, where they would be.
That was why he went straight to his helicar and flew to within a kilometer of the hangar where the Shadow Wolf was berthed. After grabbing his gear from the trunk, he rushed to the hangar on foot. An unguarded side entrance had no active life signs near it, so it seemed his best option. There was a security lock, of course, but it was a cheap one, and Kepper had the necessary means to bypass it. He didn't let the door open on its own but set it to manual mode. With that done, he widened the door only a tad, just enough to fish a fiber-optic cable through while remaining out of sight.
The Shadow Wolf was not a bad ship by independent standards. Run-down a bit, certainly, but she was maintained to an acceptable degree. He wasn't familiar with exact models of vessels, but he suspected it was one of the Holden-Nagata lines by the frame. From his angle, he was looking mostly at the ship's rear, where four big engine nozzles sat side by side. They looked irregular, modified in some way, although he wasn't sure how.
It wasn't the only modification. From what he could see, the ship had two quad-pulse gun turrets mounted on the starboard side, and thus likely on the port as well. The housing for a tracking plasma cannon and three auto-turrets was also visible. Kepper approved of the practicality of the ship's captain, if not for what it meant for him. Independent trading could be dangerous, given piracy and privateer activity. Captain Henry expected some trouble.
That the Shadow Wolf was well-armed ruled out Kepper's plan of hiring mercenaries to chase the ship down and disable it. Had the vessel been only minimally armed with a few auto-turrets, a couple of heavy gunships would have been more than ample to compel her obedience or cripple her, but the quad mounts and plasma cannon would make short work of the mercs he had means to employ. He didn't have the funds to hire anyone with sufficient armament to defeat the Shadow Wolf, and he doubted that Li would agree to advance him anything to that scale. There were drawbacks to working alone and at the level he usually did.
So as always, he adjusted. Kepper would give Li a shot at arranging a space intercept, since Li probably had the means he lacked, and even if it weren't a personal capture, his reputation would remain reasonably intact. If the League couldn't manage it, Kepper would follow and try again elsewhere.
To accomplish his plan, Kepper brought out a medium-barreled mag-rifle and a clip of unique, costly ammunition. The rounds within were not lethal rounds but micro-QETs, Quantum Entanglement Transmitters. He'd acquired them months prior as a side bonus to a demanding job and used them sparingly, knowing he would never likely afford more. They were tracking devices that, like all quantum entanglement technology, connected across interstellar distances. They would last for a couple of weeks or so and allow him or anyone to whom he gave the QET signature to track the ship across space.
As he finished loading the weapon, he heard a growing mechanical whine. The hangar roof was opening. The Shadow Wolf was about to depart, and he was out of time. He brought the weapon up and lined up the Shadow Wolf in the crosshairs. As the ship's launching thrusters began firing, he looked for a point where his micro-QETs wouldn't get roasted by plasma or thruster exhaust. Steady… steady… there!
He stroked the trigger and felt a slight kick as the rifle generated its firing field. Through the scope, he saw the micro-QET affix itself to the Shadow Wolf's hull, along the ship's stern below the engines. Kepper reached into his pack and found his QET receiver. He checked the signature of the round he'd fired. A smile formed on his face as he saw the return from the tracker. It was working.
A roar grew from the hangar while Kepper closed the door and reset the security lock. By the time he was done, the Shadow Wolf was disappearing into the twilight sky of Sektatsh. He watched it go for a moment before returning to his helicar. Once he stowed his gear, he activated the commlink and called Li.
After several moments, Li appeared. "What?"
"The mark just left Sektatsh aboard an independent trader. I've tagged them with a micro-QET," Kepper said, rushing the second line as a deep frown started to form on Li's face. "I'll send you the signature. I'm going to arrange the means to chase her myself, but if you want, you can make the grab. I'll reduce the fee for you."
"Very gracious of you, Kepper, to make amends for your failure," Li replied sourly. "I have indeed prepared my own means to intercept the ship. Provide the signature, and your services will no longer be required in this matter."
Kepper did so and hung up. He supposed he could have warned Li that the Shadow Wolf was not going to be an easy target, but the Leaguer’s attitude made him decide against it. The arrogant bastard probably already knew, and if he didn't, Kepper would enjoy his squirming when he inevitably asked for help.
21
The big liquid crystal display surface of the Shadow Wolf's bridge showed the planet Harron recede rapidly as the ship burned for the Lawrence limit. "Good riddance," Piper grumbled from her station. "I feel lucky we got out of there."
"Someone tried to stall us," Henry agreed.
"It was probably that bastard I ran over," said Cera. She didn't look back from her station. "Wouldn't be surprised if a man like that could bribe his way into a cloister."
"Sektatsh has that reputation." Felix provided that observation from Tia's usual place. Since she'd had to help clean the helicar, Henry had her resting. The only reason Cera wasn't was because he wanted her at the helm if things went dicey before they left the system. He glanced toward Henry and asked, "So back to Lusitania?"
"That's the plan," Henry said. "I suppose it's a shame we don't have a cargo to run back. I always feel like I'm burning money when we make an empty-hold run."
"Like we did in that two-week run to Yan'katar last year?"
"Yeah, even though Lou specifically paid enough for both ways."
"There's still the matter of how we appease all of the people who want to see Gaon." Piper glanced toward her screens for a moment before continuing to speak. "You can't deliver her to Caetano and Vitorino at the same time."
"Knowing Caetano, she'll have people waiting at the hangar. Vitorino… maybe not." Henry allowed himself a wistful little smile as he looked over the holotank display showing nearby space. All of the markers for other ships were well away from the Shadow Wolf. "Although it'd be nice if they did. Caetano can't blame me for Vitorino hiring us, too, can she?"
Felix shook his head. "She's a fascist dictator in the making, Jim. She'll do whatever she wants."
Henry nodded. "For the most part. But I do get the feeling that there's more to her than that."
"I never said she wasn't charming, Jim. She'd have to be." Felix's expression was hard. "But that doesn't change what she is or what she's doing to her world."
/> "You'll get no argument from me," Henry said. "None at all."
* * *
Chantavit Li was enjoying a meal with Ambassador Salinas, although "enjoying" was too strong a word for him. She was a vivacious woman of American background, Latin and Anglo, and Li had no doubts about her loyalty to the Society, although he greatly opposed her pacifism. She was one of the deluded members of Society who believed in peaceful expansion only, forgetting that by their very existence, they would provoke war from the reactionaries that still plagued the galaxy. Nor did they care that they would be abandoning countless generations of people to the chaos that persisted outside of Society.
"I have high hopes for the peace talks," she said. "Once we have peace with the Coalition, we can focus our resources on consolidating our colonies and presenting the best of Society to these poor people."
"So you say." Li had little warmth in his voice.
"Did you hear back from the committee? About those visas I requested?"
"I am afraid they were denied," Li replied. He noted her disappointment with satisfaction. "You must understand, Ambassador, that in these times, we must be careful about allowing the unsocialized to enter the Society on visits. They could be enemy agents in disguise."
"Oh, don't be so foolish," Salinas insisted. "They are young people full of optimism and hope that the Society can be brought to their world. What better way to encourage them than to show them how life is in the Society? How their world will be improved? An end to the poverty that our neighbors endure because of the capitalist class?"
You have not been to New Hathwell. Or to many other League colonies he'd seen in his life, where standards were little better. The League had only so many resources to go around, after all, and some worlds required social austerity and discipline. But Salinas was not the first silly official Li had ever dealt with—nor would she be the last, he imagined. He pondered that if he ever wound up on the Committee of Social and Public Safety, he would promote adding this silliness to the list of anti-Social behaviors. It would not be keeping in the spirit of said list, of course, since Salinas was an enthusiastic advocate for Society. But the thought still had its appeal.
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