by Matt Thomas
"You really think he tried to kill you and then spent two weeks with you without killing you?"
"Maybe he was spying on me."
She actually had the nerve to laugh at him. "Okay, now you're being ridiculous."
"Shut the fuck up." Lind yelled.
Donovan remained calm. "Look, I got it, you spent all that time with him and never asked him some basic questions."
"Are you psychoanalyzing me now?"
Donovan shrugged. "I just know I would be as pissed as you in the same position. But then I'd think to myself 'why would he do it?' You're talking about a mechanic, on a nothing planet, who, completely by chance, stumbles across whatever destroyed that Comb. Then he makes a conscious decision to catch a ride with you. He doesn't kill you on the ride to the station, but he tries to kill you on the station. When he fails at that, he rides with you for weeks without killing you. Along the way, he helps you at the Guppy. Then, you drop him off here, and he walks off into the sunset like nothing ever happened."
Lind just stared at his feet.
She continued. "You're right, we should talk to this guy. He probably knows something. But we should learn something about him first. We also need to go through that list of people who knew about the shipment and see if there's any reason to suspect any of them."
Lind cracked his knuckles and stretched his neck. It took him several series of deep breaths before he trusted himself to speak. When he did, he stared at her, but without making eye contact. "Okay, lady, what do you think happened?"
She brushed off the form of his question. "Probably some kind of corporate espionage. It wouldn't be the first time. Gunnow was right. That's a very expensive, very proprietary piece of equipment that could make someone else an enormous amount of money. Someone found out about the opportunity and probably sold it to a competitor."
Lind wouldn't admit it, but her hypothesis was reasonable. Ephemeris held a tight monopoly on ship- and station-building, but several companies had crept into the equipment manufacturing business in recent years. "Okay, whatever it is, we need to start looking. I've wasted all this time. I'll look into Parker. You go look into everyone else's records."
She didn't nod immediately, but she nodded. "That sounds like a plan."
*****
Donovan found them a room of empty cubicles, reserved for the administrative workers that surged through the facility at key production times, and hooked them up with access to the company's security databases. Alone, in the near dark except for their glowing screens, they tapped through dozens of screens and files. The not-so-soundproof half-walls that separated provided just enough cover so that neither could see precisely what the other worked on.
Lind began innocently enough, dutifully working through the history of Liam Parker. The story was boring enough to be true, just another contractor trying to make some extra money, and generally followed the bits and pieces he had told Lind over their time together.
Somewhere buried in the man's file, his identification photo smiling in the top right corner of the screen, Lind's anger rose back to the surface. He glanced over the divider, making sure that Donovan remained completely engrossed in her work. Using the security code she had acquired, he entered the station's tracking network. With all of Parker's biographic and biometric information, he easily turned the security systems to his own purposes. Within seconds, he found him.
The Hitchhiker was still trying to get a ride. A video camera showed a live feed of the man standing in a crowded passenger terminal. The logs showed he tried to catch a flight heading further in-system, but someone with a higher priority jumped ahead of him in line. Nothing else came close to departing for another twelve hours.
Lind took another look at his new partner, then quickly closed all the windows on his screen.
"Look, I'm starving." He broke the silence so suddenly she jumped. "I've eaten nothing but ship food for the last two weeks. Do you mind if I go grab something? I'm not really able to focus right now."
Donovan wrinkled her brow. They hadn't been at work very long. "I guess."
"Do you want me to bring you anything?"
She shook her head, her hair swinging in front of her face. "Nope, I'm good. Thanks."
Lind stepped out of the cubical farm and headed towards a more public part of Ephemeris Station. Being a station of executive suites, the station had a shuttle that ran from the wing of administrative offices to the production side. The trip took five minutes even with the provided transportation. Lind hopped off at the station hub. Unlike the spacious and nearly empty welcoming area at which they had arrived earlier, a mass of people, nearly shoulder to shoulder, crammed around a central bank of terminals. It was rush hour. Many of the employees lived in quarters not attached to the facility and commuted. Giant screens, nearly ten feet tall, hovered over the populace, listing ships and their cargo passing through. Lind confirmed that every listed departure in the next few hours would be local. The next flight sunward would be a slow Guppy heading towards Ceres with a stop along the way. The Hitchhiker would remain stranded for the time being unless something came around. The list of waiting passengers showed his name halfway down the list, a precarious spot when most ships could only afford one or two fellow travelers at a time.
Lind found him, his bags piled up against a support column, staring at the screens waiting for something to change. "Parker!" He called out, grabbing the man's attention.
The Hitchhiker looked perplexed and took an involuntary step backwards. Lind took it as a defensive gesture. "I thought I'd find you here." Lind forced a calm smile, the first he'd offered to the man, which, alone, should have been enough to set off alarms.
"Agent Michaels," Parker said, far more wary than the easygoing attitude he'd projected during the transit. "Is everything all right?"
"Sure!" Lind replied, a little too loudly and confidently to convince anyone. "Look, it turns out I've gotten everything I need here. I have to head to Ceres station next, and I thought I'd offer you a ride."
"Um. . . really?" Lind noted the Hitchhiker's surprising lack of enthusiasm given they way he forced himself into Lind's company not once but twice.
"Sure. I could use the company."
"What about your new partner?"
Lind dismissed the thought with a wave. "She's got shit to do here. She's going to follow in her own ship in a day or so."
Timidly, the Hitchhiker followed Lind through the station, backtracking along the route through which he had just carried his luggage only hours before. Lind, unable to force friendliness for the entire journey, remained mostly silent, exchanging only a few overtures and no substantive explanation for his change of heart. He had little idea of what to expect from himself so early in his evolving plan. Once they reached the atrium, Lind stopped leading and started herding Parker towards the Mako. It terrified him that the Hitchhiker would ask to use the restroom, or stop for a snack, or any of the other tasks a traveler might undertake moments before departing on a flight of several weeks. No matter what, he his involuntary guest would not fall out of his sight again, even if it meant making a scene. Lind just hoped that Donovan remained far enough behind that she would remain ignorant of any struggle should it occur.
As soon as they stepped through the airlock, Lind told the Hitchhiker to make himself at home before taking the steps to the upper deck two at a time in his rush to the cockpit. He remained calm while he requested departure clearance. His voice could carry throughout the ship, and it wasn't too late for his query to escape.
The clearance took too long. The Mako continued to warm up while Lind tripped his way through the preflight checklist. Twice, he restarted the departure sequence as he unsuccessfully balanced communications with control and flying the ship. The traffic controller finally gave him permission to leave, and he shoved the throttle forward a little too quickly. The ship shuddered, rousing the Hitchhiker from Kay's room.
"Is everything okay?" He asked, shuffling towards the cockpit
.
"Yeah, sure." Lind managed, entering the traffic pattern around the Ephemeris facility. "Just hit the gas a little hard."
He searched for a place suitable to his needs. He couldn't come to a complete halt in the middle of a shipping lane, or wait for the solitude of empty space outside the planet's system. The Hitchhiker continued to look over his shoulder, so he punched in the coordinates for Ceres Station into the navigation system. A standard flight path would put them in one of the beltways around Jupiter, adding as much as a day to their travel time. Deviating from those lanes in such a densely populated system was considered dangerous and would raise consternation amongst the traffic controllers.
Lind banked the Mako towards the gas giant. Almost instantly, his radio crackled.
"Mako Three-Two-Two-Zero, return to established flight paths."
"Thirty-Two." Lind answered without further explanation or received challenge.
With the swirling planet almost filling the view port, he set the autopilot.
"What was in the box?" He asked, not taking his eyes of the instruments.
"What box?" The quiver in the Hitchhiker's voice gave him away.
"The one you loaded onto Rykov's ship."
"I . . . I don't know."
Lind wasn't convinced. Slowly, deliberately, he stood. He and Kay once had a symbiotic relationship. His partner, the rational thinker, worked through the toughest investigatory challenges. Kay had been the brains of their operation. Lind, on the other hand, adopted an entirely different persona when questioning suspects. The emotional tension he kept pent up on a daily basis seeped through. The depressed, weak man who curled on his bunk staring at the wall would straighten his spine and let the contempt he felt for the world bleed into his hard, brown eyes. That man, the unmitigated arrogant asshole his ex-wife used to complain about, was the one who stood up from the copilot's seat. He'd been fighting to get out since Lind's discovery in Gunnow's office.
"Yes you do." Even the tone of his voice shifted. "You're the one who found whatever the fuck was stuck inside that Comb. You arranged to have it shipped back to Ephemeris."
As he strode, swaggered, really, towards the Hitchhiker, he forced the subject further away from the cockpit.
"L-l-look, yeah, I found the thing, okay? I have no idea what it is."
"Bullshit."
"I'm telling you, all I know is that I'd never seen anything like before. I called it in to Ephemeris and they told me to set everything up."
"Does that include setting me up?"
The Hitchhiker's eyes got even wider. He put his hands out in front of him, but that didn't stop Lind's approach. "What?"
"You tried to blow me up."
At this, the Hitchhiker tripped over his own feet, collapsing to the floor in the doorway to the forensic lab. Lind didn't let him stand. "You're a mechanic. You used your Ephemeris credentials to get into the maintenance bay and placed the bomb on the ship."
The Hitchhiker held up his hands defensively. They shook. "I didn't know what was going to happen. He just told me to let someone know you were on your way."
"Who the fuck is 'he?'" Lind shouted, hovering over the Hitchhiker. "Vannin?"
From behind him, the radio crackled loudly. "Agent Michaels, this is Agent Donovan. Respond." Lind turned towards the cockpit like he was afraid she was actually on his ship.
The Hitchhiker took advantage of the distraction, not to fight back, but to escape. He scrambled to his feet and into forensic airlock, tossing one of the environmental suits on the ground as a temporary barrier. Lind kicked it aside, unconcerned he would resort to violence at any minute. Before he could put his hands on the Hitchhiker, the terrified suspect punched the switch that slammed shut the internal door. He was trapped in the airlock, but safe from Lind.
The investigator pounded on the door, staring and screaming at his prey through the small window. "You've got no way out."
"I've got no way out if I tell you anything. You saw what that man does. You saw the Guppy. He won't just go after me. He'll go after my family."
Lind saw an opportunity. "We can protect you. Tell me what you know and we can protect you."
"Bullshit." The Hitchhiker spat out. "You didn't even know he fucking existed! This guy has hands in everywhere. You think I'm the only one? There're guys like me everywhere. He finds us on our way out, sticks us wherever the fuck he wants, and tell us there's something in it for us if we keep our ear to the ground."
The radio called out again. "Michaels, this is Donovan. I'm only five hundred meters behind you. Come to a stop and let's work this out."
Lind ignored it. "There are others out there?"
Parker barked a nervous laugh. "Fuck, man. This isn't even my first time. The last bonus from Vannin paid for my wife's house." He got quiet, taking a step back from the door. "Oh, man. He bought the house. I didn't even think about that. He knows where they live." His wide eyes started to tear. "He can't know I said anything."
Lind ignored the signs. "You said the bonus. He works for Ephemeris?"
The Hitchhiker answered, but distracted. "He works for everyone." Suddenly he shook his head, cleared his throat, and set his jaw. "He can't get to them, man. I'm not going to let my family starve to death in some lifeboat in the middle of nowhere. He can't think I talked. I can't do it. I just can't."
"What are you talking about?" Lind asked, genuinely perplexed.
Their eyes locked with his through the thick glass. Fear was there, as was determination. "I just can't." The words were spoken to softly to be carried through the door. Before Lind recognized it, the Hitchhiker punched the wall next to him. The door, the outer door opening to empty space, raised. The gust of decompression struck the Hitchhiker, yanking his feet from under him. His head cracked on the back of the door, hopefully killing him before momentum flung him out into the void.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Lind awoke. The perfect dark told him nothing. His eyes could have been open. They could have been closed. Why was it so dark? He wondered in his groggy state. He felt around for the light switch, found it, and hit it. Nothing happened. Even though he couldn't see it, he knew his breath released a cloud of condensation. He next targeted the small data pad by his bed. He touched the screen, and the dull glow cast shadows across his quarters. Lind sat up.
The cold hit his skin, somehow covered with sweat, and goose pimples ran along his arm. If the power were completely off, he would have frozen to death already. He pulled on a sweatshirt that had been mercifully warmed between his body and the bulkhead while he slept. He rubbed his eyes until they stung. The data pad screen turned off from disuse, and he once again sat in the black.
Then he remembered. The Hitchhiker flying out of the airlock. The call of the other Thirty Two, Donovan, as she watched the body spin away from his ship. Donovan who, wanted him to turn himself in so they could "talk about it" when Lind protested that he didn't eject Liam Parker into space.
He remembered the chase into the atmosphere of the gas giant. The ship powered down because he powered it down. He figured she wouldn't find him if the ship gave off no signature but the residual heat the life support system insisted it circulate throughout the living quarters. Since he remained out-of-custody, he must have figured correctly.
Lind hit the screen again and stood. Shuffling out of his cabin, he stubbed his foot on the threshold. The curses rattled through the Mako. Even staring forward through the ship, he could only catch pinpricks of light in the viewport. Sunlight reflecting off of debris and dust orbiting the planet. Bracing himself against the wall, with his data pad shedding light on the other bulkhead, Lind forced himself towards the cockpit. When he collapsed into his chair, he first thought to pull over himself the thin blanket he kept under the seat. Then he searched for the iridescent glow of the backup power switch and pressed it.
The lights burst on inside, blinding him. His eyes squeezed shut until he was certain they could handle the sudden flood from the handful of
emergency lights. At any other time, the lights' dimness would have annoyed him. But, in their adjustment to the dark, his eyes protested the slightest illumination. His squinting eyes made out enough for his hands to begin a cold start of the engines. It took four tries before he got the sequence right from memory. The lights flickered and the whine of the starter motor picked up somewhere below deck.
The clock glowed on the panel. Nine hours. He slept for nine hours, but not a restful sleep. Donovan, Lind hoped, had given up her search. His strategy of diving into the atmosphere obscured his path long enough that she would have too many variables to search. No doubt, others would look for him, too. He could slip away, but he couldn't go anywhere. The Mako would have to disappear. His ID would have to disappear. Neither of which he could do without, but the ship was unique, recognizable. Everyone knew when a Thirty-Two arrived. The ID would set off alarms across the system within minutes of his refueling, booking a ticket, or buying dinner, all of which he needed to do.
The engine finished warming and the systems check told him all he needed to know. Earth lay too far beyond reach. The buffeting in the planet's atmosphere left the ship structurally sound, but had sapped enough energy, air, and fuel to keep the Mako from returning home. The air would run out somewhere just sun-side of Mars, which was fine because there would not be enough power left to slow the Mako's descent into the dense atmosphere. It would either smash into the surface or break apart like a meteorite.
He needed to ditch the ship. Where, became the question. The obvious answer put him as close to Earth as possible. But the obvious answer for him was also the obvious answer for his now-former employers, if they'd bothered to fire him when Donovan broadcasted the "be-on-the-lookout" notice. Besides, once he crossed the asteroid belt, scrutiny would be much higher. No, he needed to become someone else before he ventured into the inner system.