The Chara Talisman

by Alastair Mayer

  “Damnit, they’re gone.” Carson’s frustration was clear. “There’s not even a sign they were anywhere near here.”

  Jackie had been scanning all around, not just looking at the ground; she didn’t want to be taken by surprise if the other vehicle was in flight. So it was Marten who noticed.

  “Not quite true.” He pointed at the archive. “They cleaned up the rubble around the entrance, where Hopkins tried to trap us.”

  “So they did. Why, I wonder? There’s no native species left here that could use it.”

  “A sense of neatness, perhaps? But where did they go, we never saw them leave.”

  “They may have stayed below the ridgeline,” said Carson. “Or teleported, for all we know. Don’t look at me like that, we don’t know what they’re capable of.”

  Jackie banked the ship to circle the archive. “I’ll do an expanding spiral search pattern to see if we see anything, but just for ten minutes, then we need to head back.”

  Carson banged a fist on the arm of his seat. “Damn it. Opportunity of a lifetime and we missed it.” He took a breath. “All right,” he said, his shoulders slumped, “let’s take a look.” His heart wasn’t in it.

  Chapter 34: The Hawk

  The Landing Area

  Next morning Jackie and Marten ran out the refueling hose at first light. They’d found nothing else the night before, and had returned to their landing spot just after dark. Carson hadn’t said much, although he had moaned about the lack of pictures. “Nobody will believe it,” he muttered. Jackie wasn’t sure if she were relieved or frustrated that the pyramid ship had already gone.

  The Sophie’s tanks were just about full, and Marten was preparing breakfast, when Carson roused from his bunk. “What’s the plan, Captain?”

  Jackie gave him a look, then said “Hopkin’s ship went down in the trees a few kilometers north and a bit east of here. We fly Sophie over the wreckage and check it out. If there are pieces big enough that a warp unit might have survived, we find the nearest place to land and check it out on foot. Otherwise I guess we plot a course for the Mennonite settlement and early retirement.”

  “Could we head up to the archive again?”

  “What for? We can’t land there.”

  “Carson, let it go,” said Marten. “The other ship is gone.”

  “But what if they left something behind?”

  “What would they leave? No, Jackie is right. We can’t land there, and we have to focus on the immediate priority. If there is a good warp unit we don’t want it damaged by rain or wild animals while we’re off on a wild moose chase.”

  “You mean goose chase,” Jackie said. She knew that if there was an undamaged warp generator, rain or animals weren’t likely to bother it much, but she kept that to herself.

  “More likely to find moose around here than geese, there are no lakes,” Marten replied, and grinned at her.

  Carson looked from Marten to Jackie, back to Marten. His shoulders slumped a bit. “Okay, you’re right. Let’s focus on getting out of here. We can always come back.” He paused, straightened a little. “Perhaps we can figure out how to set off the burglar alarm again.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  The wreckage of the Hawk was easy to find. It had plowed a swath through the trees. A few hundred meters to the south of the main impact site, the remains of the portside engine had started a fire when it came down, and there was a considerable blackened area.

  “I’m glad it isn’t any drier, a wildfire would have been all we needed last night.”

  Jackie brought the Sophie in high and they descended slowly, keeping a watchful eye out for any movement on the ground. Sophie already had too many bullet holes in her, if any of Hopkins’ crew had survived they might want to take pot shots.

  She put circled the crash site, keeping the Sophie banked over. The Hawk was a mess, all right. A large chunk of the port side was just gone, and the hull was banged and torn from bow to stern along that side. The other half didn’t look too bad, though, notwithstanding several clear dents and scrapes from where it had hit tree limbs.

  “Okay, the starboard side looks like it’s a big enough piece that it might still have a warp generator intact.”

  “Is it the right kind? What make of ship is that?” said Carson.

  Jackie looked at him. “It’s broken, dented and beat up. Sorry, I don’t recognize the model. Best I can say is that I don’t know it has the wrong kind.” She leveled the ship and climbed for altitude, looking for a clear area to set down. The edge of the treed area was about two kilometers away. Jackie flew out over the plain then circled back and landed close to the edge of the woods.

  “Maybe you should stay with the ship. Marten and I will go reconnoiter,” said Carson as he began pulling gear together.

  “Do you know what a warp generator looks like?”

  “Actually I do, but more to the point I know what a man with a gun looks like. If any of Hopkins’ men are still around and dangerous we want you ready to get out of here. If it’s all clear then you can come and help get the warp generator out.”

  “Okay, fair enough,” said Jackie. “Oh wait a moment.” She went to a storage drawer and rummaged a bit, then came out with a couple of wristbands. “Here,” she said, handing one each to Carson and Marten, “communicators and locator beacons, seeing as Hopkins trashed our omnis.”

  “Ah, thanks.” Carson slipped the commloc over his wrist, then pulled something from a pocket. “Although these days I’ve taken to packing spares.” He held up an omni.

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  The forest was no match for the jungle of Verdigris, Carson was pleased to note, and it seemed to lack the black flies that had plagued him on the hike up to the pyramid, but the going was still tough.

  “No trails through this mess,” observed Carson, stepping over the rotting trunk of a fallen tree. “Obviously there are no moose on this planet.”

  “What are moose, anyway?”

  “What? From your joking earlier, I thought you knew.”

  “I know they’re Earth mammals. I’ve never seen one.”

  “They’re large antlered herbivores. They live in wooded areas, trample trails.”

  “Ah, like prendal,” Marten said, referring to similar creatures from his home planet.

  “If you say so.” Carson raised his wrist, and spoke into the commloc: “Sophie, what’s our bearing?”

  “You’re tracking a bit to the left. Angle to the right a bit,” came Jackie’s reply. She had taken a bearing on Hawk when she landed, and the Sophie’s direction finder was locked on Carson’s signal.

  “All right.” Carson looked through the thicket of trees ahead, looking for signs of broken branches that would indicate they were near the Hawk. “No sign yet, so far everything is quiet.”

  “Roger that.”

  Fifteen minutes later Marten noticed something in the bushes. “Carson, look at that.” There was a meter-long piece of metal, bent and torn, lying on the ground. Looking upward they saw shredded leaves and a recent scar on a thick tree limb. “A piece of the ship, blown off when the missile hit. We’re getting close.”

  “You’re right,” said Carson. He unslung his rifle and checked its readiness. “Let’s take it slow from here, just in case.”

  A dozen meters further on they found more metal scraps, and they could begin to see a clearing in the overhead branches ahead. The air smelled of charred wood and the foul odor of rotten meat.

  “There’s one who didn’t make it,” Marten said, pointing at something wedged in the crook of a tree branch.

  Carson looked where Marten was pointing. A body, or most of one, dangled from the branch, its clothing torn, one arm missing, the body starting to bloat. “Poor bastard He must have fallen out.”

  They held their rifles at the ready and scanned all around them. Survivors aside, the body could have attracted predators.

  “This is not going to be pleasant,” said Marten.

  “I never
expected it would.” They went a little further and the wreckage became obvious. There was debris from the ship and broken branches scattered everywhere. The torn side they’d seen from the air, but the rest of the hull looked intact. Cautiously they drew closer.

  “Let’s do a circle around, check for survivors.”

  They didn’t find any. They did find several other bodies scattered near the wreck, mangled and broken. As they approached the hull, they saw the pilot still strapped into the control chair, a broken tree branch impaling his chest and the seat back. Then they heard a moan.

  Carson scrambled across the torn edges of the hull to get to the pilot, then realized that that poor fellow wasn’t doing the moaning and never would. The moan came again, from somewhere aft in the ship.

  “Marten, I think there’s someone in back.” He made his way down a short corridor from the control area. There was another groan, and was that . . . yes, someone strapped into a seat.

  The man was in bad shape. His face and shirt were dark with dried blood, there was a pool of vomit, also dried, in his lap. There was a gash on his left arm, which is where some of the blood had come from, and the edges were angry red with the beginning of an infection. Despite the mass of bruises and scrapes on his face where it wasn’t obscured by dried blood, Carson recognized him. “Rico.”

  “Wha’? Whozere?” Rico’s voice came tired, slurred. “Help. Need water.” In the dim light and with his eyes crusted with dried blood, there was no way he could see much.

  Carson had mixed feelings about helping Rico, but he pulled a water bottle from his gear and held it to Rico’s mouth.

  Rico took a sip, swished, and spit it out. “Thanks. Mouth tastes like shit. More.” Carson held the bottle up again while Rico drank. After several swallows, Rico spoke again, his voice still slurred but sounding a little less tired. “Who? Wha’ happen?”

  “It’s Carson.”

  “Carson!” Rico’s voice held more surprise than anger or fear.

  “Your ship got hit by one of its own missiles and crashed. We haven’t found any other survivors yet.”

  “Tol’ those idiots not use missiles. Wha’s wrong wi’ me?”

  Carson looked him over. The seat was rear-facing, against a bulkhead, but it was no crash couch. Rico had large cuts on his scalp and arm which had contributed most of the blood, but there was also a large bruise and swelling on the back of his skull. Carson touched it gingerly.

  “Ow! Wha’ fuck are you doin’?”

  “You’ve got a bad bang on your skull, probably concussion. That’d be why you threw up. Can you move your arms and legs?”

  “Strapped in. Buckle won’ release. Can’t reach knife. Can’t see knife, all blurry.” While saying this, Rico had wiggled his legs and right arm. His left moved a little but it seemed limp.

  “You’ve got dried blood in your eyes.” Marten handed Carson a strip of cloth he had pulled from somewhere in the wreckage, and Carson poured water on it and wiped Rico’s face, getting the worst of the blood and vomit off.

  “Thanks Doc. Still blurry, got flashblinded.”

  Marten gestured to Carson, indicating he wanted Carson to come with him. Carson handed Rico the cloth and the water bottle and followed Marten further back into the remains of the ship.

  “What?”

  “What are we going to do with him?”

  “I don’t know yet. He’s badly concussed. He’ll probably die in a few days if we don’t get him help.”

  “He can’t even see anyway, how will he get food and water?”

  “If it’s from the flash, his vision will come back. If it’s brain damage—”

  “Do we care? He’s one of the guys who tried to entomb us in the pyramid, shot at us, and fired missiles at us.”

  Carson was sorely tempted to just leave Rico to his fate, but there was another factor to consider. “He may also know more about who they’re working for and what their plans are. Ducayne could use that information.” Carson looked at Marten, who looked sullen. “Besides, he wasn’t doing the shooting and he says he told them not to launch the missiles.”

  Marten shook his head; his facial muscles couldn’t quite handle a sneer. “Probably because he’s smart enough to know not to wreck the Maguffin. But sure, let’s see what we can get out of him.”

  “That’s not what I meant. We won’t get anything out of him right now, we need to get him back to the Sophie and into the traumapod.”

  “Oh for . . .” Marten turned away, then back. “All right. Maybe we can lock him in there for the trip. If we get a working warp pod and are going anywhere at all.”

  “Okay. I’ll go check on Rico. You look around for other survivors and take a look at the warp modules.”

  There were no other survivors. Marten came back to report that from what he could tell without dismantling the wreckage, at least one warp module should be intact. Carson helped Rico clean up, then finished bandaging the worst of the cuts and cut him free of the seat belts. There wasn’t anything he could do about he fractured skull, though, unless he got Rico into Sophie’s traumapod.

  “You really ought to be on a stretcher or in a mobile, but we don’t have that choice. You’re gonna have to walk, but don’t get any ideas.”

  “No fear, Carson. Was never anything personal, jus’ business. Looks like I’m out of business for now.”

  “It’s the ‘for now’ that concerns me.”

  “I’ll be good.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  They radioed Jackie to have the traumapod standing by. She prepped it and came out to meet them with the pod’s stretcher. By then Rico needed help walking, he was periodically overcome with dizziness and nausea. They got him on the stretcher, which immediately started warning about his low blood pressure. They carried him the rest of the way to the Sophie and slid him into the traumapod. The pod’s half-dozen robotic arms went to work, attaching sensors, cutting off his clothing, swabbing his skin in preparation for any necessary surgery, and inserting IV lines.

  The pod display listed dehydration as well as numerous cuts and contusions, but the most serious injuries were the skull fracture and a corresponding subdural hematoma, a bleeding into the brain. The pod’s medical computer recommended immediate surgery and, not receiving any countermand, got to work.

  “Well, that’s going to be a while,” said Carson, turning away from the pod and moving to sit down at the small galley table where Jackie and Marten were already seated.

  “Right,” said Jackie, “and we’ve only got the one traumapod so nobody break or cut anything until then. Meanwhile,” she continued, changing the subject, “what about the warp modules?”

  “Their starboard side was relatively undamaged,” Marten said. “We’ll have to cut to get it out, though.”

  “Okay, I have tools. What about bringing it here?”

  “The ground is more or less flat,” Carson took up the explanation, “and the underbrush isn’t too bad. There’s the occasional old log but we can probably rig up some kind of travois to drag it. It can double as a stretcher to lift it whenever we need to.”

  “Perhaps Rico can help, although I do like the idea of just keeping him in the pod until we get back to civilization,” said Marten.

  “He’ll be in there a day or two at least. He’s in for a few hours of surgery and then a while to recover. I don’t think he’ll be in any shape to help for a couple of days. I’d just as soon get started now.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Jackie said. “We’ve still got a few hours of light, I’d like to take a look at the wreckage. Marten, can you stay with the Sophie? Just call if anything comes up.”

  “Certainly.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  As they rounded the tree, Jackie saw her first glimpse of the wrecking, with the pilot’s impaled body still strapped in the chair. Flies were buzzing around it. Jackie caught a whiff of the rotten-meat odor and gagged, nearly throwing up. “Geeze, Carson,” she said when she’d recovered, “you could ha
ve warned me.”

  “Sorry, Jackie. It’s bad, isn’t it? I’m surprised. It usually takes longer for the smell to get this bad.”

  “Yeah. Well we’re here now. Let’s check it out. But we bring masks next time.”

  Jackie made her way to the aft starboard side of the wreckage, Carson following close behind her. “The hull is intact on this side, just as Marten said. That’s a good sign.” She walked around the ship, examining its surface.

  “Is there something in particular you’re looking for?” Carson asked.

  “Inspection ports. Inside we’ll have to pull the interior panels to access the module, but there should be inspection hatches on the hull. If I can—Ah, there.” There was a small door outlined on the hull with a smaller circle beside it. Jackie pushed the circle in with her thumb, and the door popped open, revealing a covered data interface port. “This looks like it. Carson, hold this for a moment.” She held out her portable terminal to him. A small hex nut held the cover of the data port secure. She took out her pocket-wrench and unfastened the nut, then took the cover off the data port. From another pocket she pulled out a cable and plugged it in. “Okay, hand me the terminal.” She took it back and connected the cable.

  “Will that work without ship’s power?” Carson asked.

  “It should. The terminal can power the interface and if the warp module is intact it will have reserve power.” Jackie touched a few controls on her terminal. A data display began to update itself. So far so good. Then “Damn!”

  “What? Is the module damaged?”

  Damaged might have been easier to take. “No, the module seems to be in great shape.”

  “Then what?”

  “It’s the wrong freaking model. Same internal design but the power interfaces and mount points are all wrong. We can’t use this.”

  “Could we adapt it somehow?” From the tone in Carson’s voice, he probably knew better.

  Jackie snorted. “Sure, Carson. We’ll use duct tape. So what if it vibrates a little in flight and we end up lost.”

  “Could we use the fabber to make proper mounting brackets?” That was what the fabber was for, to make simple devices or parts for repairs. It was limited in the complexity of the materials or circuits it could fabricate, though.