A Dark Horizon (Final Dawn, Book 3)

by T W M Ashford

  “There. I got it for you. Now tell me who put a bounty on my head before any more planets get wiped out.”

  He wasn’t sure how much of the water dripping off him was sweat from their escape or rainwater from the storm outside. Klik had only driven the stolen hoverbike about a single block from the garage before they abandoned it for the Scrap Rats to find. Stealing the black box for the Crimson Crosshairs was illegal enough – they didn’t fancy adding grand theft auto to their growing rap sheet.

  Ichor looked up from her reports and laughed.

  “Somebody’s got a pretty big estimation of himself, hasn’t he?” She put down her data pad and picked up the box. “First things first…”

  “There wasn’t a key,” said Jack, feeling his face turn hot. “You—”

  Ichor raised her hand and Jack stopped talking. She put the box back down, pulled open one of the drawers of her desk, and revealed a small, bronze key.

  “You had the key already?” asked Klik, who’d been allowed up to the penthouse office this time rather than confined to the bar.

  “No, I had a key.” Ichor slipped the key into the hole and turned it. “Come on. You don’t really think people in our profession get through locked doors by knocking, do you?”

  The tumblers fell into place and the top half of the black box popped ever so slightly open. Ichor smiled, pocketed the key and lifted the lid.

  Jack tried to peer inside but the upright lid blocked his view. He needn’t have bothered. Ichor triumphantly lifted the precious contents up for all in the room to see.

  “A wonderful vintage,” she said, turning the flask-shaped glass bottle so that its label faced outwards. “Ode always did have such refined taste.”

  “Whiskey?” Jack felt rage build in his chest. He gripped the edge of the desk and noticed Ichor’s bodyguards grow tense in his peripheral vision. “You made us do all that for a damn drink? You have an entire bar available to you downstairs!”

  “Yes, but it doesn’t stock this. Very few of these bottles were ever made, you see. Fewer still survived the fires of Bel’Roth. Ode and I planned on sharing it one day, but…”

  Ichor delicately placed the bottle back into its box and stashed the whole thing inside her desk drawer.

  “Besides,” she continued, her mood brightening again, “you didn’t ‘do all that’ for a drink, no matter how valuable it might be. You ‘did all that’ for an answer.” She leaned back in her chair and shrugged. “A deal’s a deal. I’ll tell you who wants you dead.”

  She brought up her holographic monitor with a wave of her hand. A few more elegant swishes brought Ichor to the file in question. Jack tried to look himself but, from his side of the desk, both the text and images were blurred.

  “Oh, this is very interesting,” said Ichor, breaking into a grin.

  “What? Tell me!” Jack knew he was dangling on the end of Ichor’s hook. Now that she had the little black box in her possession, she could do anything she wanted with him… including claim the original bounty on his head. “Please. I don’t have time for this. Was it somebody from the Mansa Empire or not?”

  “The Mansa…? Ha! Do you think the Mansa Empire would seriously come to us to have somebody killed? Damn egomaniacs wouldn’t trust anyone outside their own species with a job like that. No, your friend is from somewhere far less exotic.”

  “Where?”

  Ichor spun herself around so that she sat lengthways on her armchair with her back on one arm and her legs arched over the other. She gazed out the rain-lashed window and pointed up into the night sky.

  “Celest Verte,” Ichor replied. “One of the casino resorts. Well. That’s where she registered her address as being, at least. People don’t always tell the truth when it comes to filling that bit out.”

  The bottom fell out of Jack’s stomach. He froze. Oh no. This was bad. This was really, really bad.

  “The name we have on record is Llori Keeto,” Ichor continued, squinting at the hologram. “A member of the Ministry, of all people. Ring any bells?”

  “Oh, man. I knew something was up with her!” Klik laughed in exasperation. “She seemed way too into you, Jack. No offence.”

  “No, there must be some kind of mistake.” Jack shook his head in a daze. “A frame job, maybe?”

  “I’m just telling you what it says in the file.” Ichor kicked her feet up onto the desk and folded her arms behind her head. “Take it or leave it ‘cause that’s all you’re getting. Speaking of which,” she added, nodding towards the spiral staircase that led back down to the bar, “get lost. These bounties aren’t going to approve themselves.”

  “What are we supposed to do now?” said Jack, as they stepped out of the elevator and into the ground floor lobby of the Crimson Crosshairs building. “I was supposed to find evidence that the Mansa paid to have me killed. How am I supposed to corroborate my story about the stolen Solar Core and convince the Ministry to chase after Everett with this? If I go back and tell them Minister Keeto was the one responsible instead, all they’ll do is open another investigation. This whole thing has been a waste of time.”

  “I still don’t get why she wants you dead,” said Klik. “Or why she needed to bring you all the way to Kapamentis to do it. She must have wanted you to testify to the council… right?”

  “At this point, I haven’t a clue. I guess we ought to tell the Ministry everything we do know. Maybe they’ll at least take this seriously.”

  “Excuse me,” said a friendly voice from the reception desk.

  Jack and Klik turned around just before they reached the doors. One of Nai’s robotic units watched them patiently from behind the counter.

  “Yes?”

  “My apologies, but I couldn’t help overhearing that this minister of yours has an abode registered in Celest Verte. Great place. I’ve been there a few times – only virtually, of course.”

  “Good for you.” Jack turned back to the door. “Make sure you send me an e-card next time you visit.”

  “Apologies if I am not being very transparent. What I mean to say is, perhaps Mr. Jack Bishop would be interested in learning how to get there?”

  The expressionless robot extended a thin arm from within its cylindrical body and delicately retrieved something from an alcove underneath the counter. It held out a thin slip of laminated card for Jack to take.

  Jack crossed the lobby and turned the advertisement over in his hand. It had the size, weight and dexterity of a bookmark, but it felt sturdy like plastic. The images on the slip moved as if playing a procedurally generated video. Fireworks, showers of tumbling casino chips, dancing girls… and an address for a shuttle to take them up there.

  “Minister Keeto must have her reasons for wanting me killed,” said Jack, pensively shaking the slip at Klik. “I don’t make that bad a first impression. Perhaps a quick trip to this resort moon isn’t such a bad idea. Thanks, Nai. That’s a big help.”

  “You are most welcome. And remember: whenever you’re in need of somebody tracked, retrieved or otherwise dealt with – don’t hesitate to call the Crimson Crosshairs!”

  Back on Earth, New York was once nicknamed The City That Never Sleeps. It did, of course. Bakeries didn’t tend to stay open until three in the morning, even if that’s when they started baking. Neither did most doctors’ surgeries or electronics stores. On Earth there was a day and a night, and the cities, by and large, behaved accordingly.

  There was no day-night cycle on Kapamentis, because there was no day – only a constant night without start or finish. One citizen might rise when another went to sleep, but any market vendor or drone repair shop that didn’t cater to a twenty-four-seven crowd quickly went out of business. New York was practically narcoleptic in comparison.

  On the plus side, that meant there was no rush hour to try and beat. The downside, however, was that every hour was as much a rush as the last.

  “How are there so many people wanting to go to this place?” Klik asked as she and Jack push
ed their way into the crowded depot from which shuttles to the various resort moons regularly departed. “Is everyone here made of money or something?”

  “More likely the opposite. Half the people going to Celest Verte are probably up to their eyeballs in debt. They think one lucky break will get them out of it. It’s suckers who can’t tell the difference between a problem and a solution that make these casinos so profitable.”

  The shuttle depot advertised on Jack’s video-slip was located on the vast rooftop of a shopping complex the size of a small skyscraper. Like everyone else, they had to take a lift up the side of the tower to get to it. All the major resort moons had platforms there, plus ticket booths operated by overenthusiastic spokespeople, each competing to be the loudest and most irritating. A curved, iron roof kept the storm off everyone’s heads and ruby rope-barriers separated the queue for each resort from the others. High, neon-yellow forcefields stopped people from accidentally (or, if they were returning from the casinos, quite deliberately) falling off the edge.

  “If I was rich,” Klik continued, bumping her way through the gathering, “I wouldn’t go to places like this. I wouldn’t live on Kapamentis, either. I’d find somewhere hot and humid and sunny. Or maybe I’d buy a starship and explore the galaxy like you did on the Adeona. Oh! And I’d get somebody to wait on me hand and foot for a change.”

  “Sounds like a slave,” said Jack, distractedly, as he peered over everyone’s heads for the right shuttle platform.

  “Not if I pay them handsomely, it doesn’t. Hmm. Maybe they should be handsome, too…”

  Jack left Klik to her teenage daydreams. He was growing anxious. It was tricky to tell which queue they were supposed to join – the shuttles were all on the far side of the rooftop, and it was hard to peer above the crowd when so many of the aliens in it were a good few feet taller than him. But then a glimmer of green caught his eye, and he caught sight of it between two shuffling patrons over in the far right corner of the depot – the same Celest Verte logo from the advertising slip. He grabbed Klik’s hand and apologetically bulldozed his way into the appropriate queue.

  Shuttles were frequent – an empty one would arrive almost as soon as the last one departed – and it didn’t take long before Jack and Klik’s found themselves ready to board. Jack patted the various pockets and compartments of his spacesuit in mounting panic.

  “We haven’t got any money,” he hissed at Klik, who glared back at him through her mask with eyes that said, And you’re only just remembering that now?

  “Put that wallet away,” said the cheerful cephalopod beside the turnstile. She wore an eight-armed emerald dress emblazoned with the resort’s logo. “Your credits are not welcome here! Ahem. That is to say, all shuttles to and from Celest Verte are free of charge. Save your credits for the resort!” She pointed a tentacle at the shuttle doors in front of them. “Please mind your step and enjoy your visit!”

  Jack replied with a meek smile and stepped through the gate, which beeped as he and Klik were added to Celest Verte’s ever-growing population tally. The shuttle doors slid open. Jack wished the attendant hadn’t told him about minding his step. The gap between the shuttle and the edge of the rooftop was less than an inch wide, but as he stepped inside Jack couldn’t help noticing it was a very long way down.

  The shuttle was laid out like the inside of a subway car. He quickly chose one of the empty seats towards the back. Klik sat down between him and a scrawny Ghuk who wouldn’t stop fidgeting.

  “I guess they don’t want us wasting all our money on getting to the resort,” said Jack, watching the rest of the visitors file into the shuttle. “Not when we can spend ten times as much once we’re up there.”

  “Good thing we haven’t got a credit between us,” Klik whispered as the last few patrons hurried inside. “Then again, neither do most people here by the looks of things. Guess you were right.”

  As the doors closed and the shuttle’s engines rumbled to life, Jack thought of the winnings Minister Keeto had boasted about making down on the Pelastar’s lower deck.

  “Well, somebody up there does. Let’s hope she’s got some damn good answers to go with them.”

  16

  Automata Auditorium

  Rogan climbed the steps to Tork’s auditorium. He’d had it built as soon as Detri was founded so that every automata who wished to shape the future of their sanctuary could have their say. It would be especially busy today. All the original crew of the Adeona were encouraged to attend given their close relationship to the matter being discussed.

  Charon had harvested a sun from a populated star system, which was bad enough. But they couldn’t ignore the superstructure he’d had so many of them build for him out in Dark Space, nor what Charon had told Rogan back on Krett – that he would use it to create (and much to Rogan’s doubt, sustain) a black hole. A temporal singularity. Such an insane plan would surely put even more star systems at risk… if not an entire cluster.

  Somebody had to stop him. The question was simple: who?

  Despite her encyclopaedic knowledge, Rogan didn’t know if she had an answer to that one.

  Like everything else in Detri, most of the auditorium was built from metal and the rock from which that metal had been mined. At the top of the stairs (beside which wound a ramp for those designed with tracks and wheels) was a large but unassuming archway. Rogan couldn’t help but think a fleshy would have demanded a pair of self-aggrandising statues to stand either side of it. She steeled herself and passed underneath them.

  It was even busier than she expected. The circular seating plan cascaded down in nearly two dozen rows, with scores of automata standing, sitting and hovering on each step. Even a few of the city’s sentient ships floated above the auditorium’s open roof, waiting for proceedings to begin. Rogan noticed the Adeona amongst their number; she waved to her, and the ship fired off a gentle air thruster in acknowledgement.

  Hundreds of automata were in attendance – a fraction of Detri’s total population, but still. She’d promised Brackitt she would meet him and the rest of the crew inside but now, seeing everybody crowded together, she liked the idea of watching everything from afar a whole lot better. She doubted there were any free spaces near them anyway.

  A flat, featureless patch of stone lay in the centre of the auditorium beneath even the lowest row of attendees. It was onto this modest platform that Tork stepped forward. The apprehensive discussion amongst the automata quickly died.

  “Thank you, everybody, for coming,” he said. The louder Tork projected his voice, the more his internal speakers crackled and popped from the strain. Rogan guessed he’d been built before wide-band comm devices became standard. Through wireless comms, there was little reason for pairs of automata to ever physically speak at all. “Many of you may have heard stories from outside of Detri, stories of stolen stars and impending devastation. Some of you will have lived those stories yourselves, and so feel a misguided sense of responsibility towards those who would have you work in servitude. May I remind you that Detri exists as a sanctuary from fleshies and only continues to exist so long as we remain hidden to them.”

  His introduction was met with thoughtful silence.

  “That said,” he continued, “no one automata shall ever hold dominion over another. This is a matter to be discussed and decided as a people. The voice of the majority shall guide us. May the first voice of many be heard.”

  Tork scuttled to one side of the stone clearing so that another automata could take his place. Rogan nearly gasped when she saw who came rumbling out.

  “Hello, everybody,” said Kansas. The lights around the top of his small, tube-shaped body flashed nervously. “I think we should—”

  “Speak up,” said Tork, encouragingly. “Let everyone hear what you have to say.”

  Kansas’ lights flared brighter.

  “I think we should help the rest of the galaxy stop Charon,” he said.

  Shocked muttering rippled around the rows of
the auditorium. Even Rogan looked surprised. Kansas had a good heart, but he was always so quiet. She hardly expected him to be the one advocating for what might amount to war.

  “No, listen!” The crowd drowned Kansas out. “We need to… If we don’t…”

  “Quiet!” yelled Tork, almost blowing one of his speakers doing so. “Everyone will have their turn. Please continue, Kansas.”

  “Thank you.” Kansas tried again. “I know that fleshies haven’t always been good to us. We’re just property to them. Or tools to be thrown out and replaced once we’re of no use anymore. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help the universe when it needs us, especially when we’re the only ones who know what’s coming.

  “Some of you know what I’m about to say already. Others have only listened to the faint transmission our comm towers picked up from the emergency Ministry meeting. The truth is this: Charon plans to use the star he harvested and the Iris project some of us helped him build to ignite a black hole.” Kansas rolled one of his treads back and forth, ashamed. “If he can’t control it, who knows how many planets it will swallow. Whole star systems will be lost. Billions if not trillions might die – fleshy and automata alike. And nobody is going to do anything about it.”

  “It’s true,” said Brackitt, reluctantly raising his hand as the crowd started muttering again. Rogan spotted him sitting beside 11-P-53 near the front. “I’m not saying I think we should go help or anything, but it’s all true.”

  “Charon stole thousands of us to build that superstructure for him,” Kansas continued. “A few of us escaped, but most had no choice but to keep working. Who knows if any of them are still alive now, or if he had them all scrapped once the project was finished. Maybe you don’t want to help save the fleshies. Fine. I get it. So do it for all those automata instead.”

  Silence.

  “So, yeah. I think we should help.” Kansas shyly retreated from the stone clearing. “I guess that’s all I wanted to say.”