by Alex Kings
“Why did you come back, Mero?” asked Rurthk.
Mero tried to shrug.
Rurthk shook his head. “I don't care. I want you off my ship. Next habitable planet we pass, you're gone. And count yourself damned lucky I'm not kicking you out right here.” He threw Mero to the floor.
Mero grunted as he landed. Pain flared through his back. He choked out a muzzleful of blood and tried to get up. His vision wavered, he fell back against the deck plates, and he passed out.
*
“Concussion,” said Dr. Wolff. “He's only a couple of minutes away from brain damage.” He hurried across the sickbay, and busied himself connecting a band of smart matter to Mero's skull and attaching a needle to it. Only when he was done did he look up at Rurthk. “Good God, man, what did you do to him?”
“Less than he deserved,” said Rurthk.
Wolff looked down at the unconscious Mero, frowning, then up at Eloise, as if expecting her to voice her disapproval.
“I'm with Rur on this one,” she said. “And believe me, if he didn't have the situation under control, I'd have done the same thing.”
Wolff sighed, and checked the output of the console. “I don't care for him,” he said, “but this …” He shook his head, took a sterile wipe, and began cleaning the blood off Mero's face in a business-like manner. “For better or worse, he's going to survive,” he said.
“Good,” said Rurthk. “Keep him sedated for the next couple of jumps, will you? Then we're dropping him off.” Without another word, he turned and strode out the room.
*
Yilva was dozing in her chair with a tablet on her lap when she had a faint noise in the house. She lay there silently with her eyes closed, listening. At last, she said, “Hello, Revnan.”
She opened her eyes and saw him standing on the far side of the room, facing her. His ears were tilted back slightly. He'd been caught off guard. She smiled.
It took him a fraction of a second to regain his composure and bring up his pistol to aim at her.
“Hello, Mom,” he said. He looked away briefly and grimaced. “No one calls me that. It's Mr. Hand.”
“This is the first time I have seen you in years, and probably the last time I will ever see you,” said Yilva, “and you expect me to call you by that silly little moniker instead of the name I gave you? I don't think so.”
Yilva picked up her tablet and gestured at it a few times. Nothing happened.
“Sorry,” he said. “I disabled those systems.”
“I thought you would,” said Yilva. “Oh well. It was worth a try. To what do I owe this unexpected visit?”
“After they found us the second time, I knew it had to be you.”
Yilva shrugged her thin shoulders.
“Why?” he said. “Why did you have to get involved? I didn't want to have to do this.”
“Then don't,” said Yilva lightly.
She sat up slightly and looked about. He lifted his pistol when she reached out, but all she did was pick up a glass of water and take a sip.
“We've exhausted the moral arguments by this point,” said Yilva. “I do what I think I have to. So do you.”
“But you knew what the consequences would be,” he said. His voice wavered momentarily.
“Yes. And that almost stopped me.” She put her glass down and stared off into the distance. “But I decided it was worth it. If it destroyed Vihan Yvredi.”
His face hardened. “Very well.”
She turned back to face him. “So how are you going to do it? With that?” She nodded at the gun.
“I'd rather not,” he said. He held up his free hand and splayed his fingers. “Poison,” he said. “Painless.”
“How thoughtful,” she said. She looked around, then pointed. “Could you give me that.”
He picked up the tray of candied fruit cautiously, examined it, then handed it to her.
“Thank you,” she said. She ate the last few pieces without offering him any, then put the tray down beside her “Okay,” she said. “I'm ready. Let's do it.”
He stared at her few a few seconds. Then he walked forwards to her chair. The pistol was still trained on her. Slowly, almost delicately, he reached forward with his free hand. He hesitated, then put his hand on the back of hers. It was impossible to feel the dermal injection system hidden in his fingertips, even as it released its poison.
She reached up grabbed his arm. “Goodbye, Revnan,” she said.
“I'm sorry,” he said. They released each other and he stepped back.
“Well,” she said, settling back in her chair and closing her eyes, “I think that's enough excitement for today.”
Mr. Hand looked around the room, then back at her. He watched her breathing until she stopped, then turned and left.
Chapter 60: No Tricks, No Fakery
The Outsider made a small detour on a small human colony world called Aria to drop off Mero. For once, he didn't complain, even when Rurthk refused to give him the shuttle. He just stepped out of the airlock, looked around at the dusty spaceport and the tiny township in the distance, then hefted his bag and trotted down the steps. He didn't look back.
Rurthk took off as soon as Mero was away.
It would take them a little longer to get to Cantor. Rurthk wasn't as good at making the jump calculations. But they would get there.
A while after the third jump, Eloise came running into the cockpit. “You'll want to see this,” she said.
The tone in her voice made Rurthk drop the calculation he was working on and look up. “What?”
She gestured at the console and called up a newscast on the main screen. It was from Cantor. She pulled up the Isk version and played it.
The clip began with an aerial view of a mansion Rurthk recognised. His veins went cold.
“The Petaur hero of the War of the Ancients and founder of the Free Petaur Nation, Yilva Vissin Avanni, has been found dead in her home,” said a voice. “The discovery occurred at point eight hours Cantor Standard Time, after Ms. Avanni failed to check in at her usual time to the Technological Council Forum.”
“Oh, bloodline,” murmured Rurthk. He spoke more clearly at the console: “Cause of death.”
The console picked up the phrase and the newscast skipped forward to another part of the recording.
“The cause of death,” it said, “is as yet unknown, but preliminary scans suggest sudden lung failure arising from Laik's Parabronchia Syndrome, a common condition in older Petaurs due to inadequate Albascene medical techniques. Further studies – ”
Rurthk swiped the screen to silence it and looked at Eloise. “Want to bet this isn't just a coincidence?” He looked at the screen, frowning.
Eloise nodded. “She said she couldn't act without consequences.”
“I suppose,” said Rurthk, “it's too much to ask that she's managed to fake her own death?”
“You know,” said Eloise. “I wouldn't put it past her. She's certainly smart enough.”
They looked at each, trying to find a glimmer of hope.
“I suppose we have to wait to see if she gets in touch,” Rurthk said. He went back to the jump calculations. “We stay on course to Cantor.”
Eloise nodded. “I'll make sure everyone else sees the news,” she said, standing up.
*
It was only one jump later when the transmission came through. It was from an anonymous, untraceable source, was addressed directly to Rurthk, and contained rather more data than he expected. But the first thing was a video file. It was definitely from Yilva.
While the computer was chewing over his awkward calculations, he had the crew gather in the observation lounge, and set up a tablet on the table where they could all see it.
He had a second tablet affixed to the wall, doing nothing but playing noise to muffle their conversation.
When they were all ready, he played the recording for them..
Yilva appeared on the screen, sitting in her soft green chair. “Hello,
Rurthk,” she said. “I assume the rest of your crew are there too.”
“All the ones that matter,” Rurthk whispered to himself.
Yilva went on, “The first thing to tell you is that, if you're seeing this, I am almost certainly dead.” She gave a tiny shrug. “No tricks, no fakery, just dead.”
Rurthk and Eloise glanced at each other.
“I knew it was a possibility from the moment I decided to help you,” said Yilva. “So I've been taking precautions. This transmission contains everything I've been working on that might help you stop Vihan Yvredi. That information exists nowhere else, so they won't be able to find it. I've also included everything I know about the organisation. Personnel files, the early history of the organisation, and so forth. If you want to expose them, that might help.”
She sat back. Then the image changed: It was still of Yilva in her chair, but a separate recording.
“You've recently rescued the scientists and struck Vihan Yvredi a large blow,” Yilva said. “So here's a quick update. I've completed Singer's tracking system. It's not perfect, but it should tell you at least some locations where Vihan Yvredi have a base. But there's more than that. I also managed to use Singer's work to complete my own tracking system.” She gave a small smile. “I was inspired by Olivia. Nanotech in the blood, remember? You should be able to find … I'm pretty sure it's Mr. Hand. There are these dermal injection systems you can put on your fingertips. They can inject when you're touching skin – the subject doesn't feel a thing. Now … I can't have it transmitting constantly, otherwise he'd notice the signal. But whenever he sets up shop and uses a computer terminal, the nanotech will activate and send a signal through the terminal, using its network connection. It's not perfect, it's not in real time, but it should help.”
She sighed and took a sip of water.
“Good luck, Rurthk,” she said.
And then she vanished.
For a while they were all silent.
“Shit,” muttered Rurthk at last. “Looks like we're on our own, then.”
Olivia moved forward and gestured at the tablet to bring up the contents of the transmission. “It's all here,” she said. “Personnel files, a history … and two tracking systems.”
“Connect them,” said Rurthk. “Let's see what they have to offer”
*
The plains of Aria were a rusty orange, desolate, featureless except for clouds of dust in the distance being swept along by winds.
Mero sat on the tiny case of his belongings watched them. The little town was to his back, the spaceport where he'd just come from off to his right. He glanced over at it as a small, dodecahedral Albascene freighter took to the sky, then went back to looking at the plains.
His back and his neck flashed with pain whenever he moved them. The bruised muscles and fracture bones were still healing. And the front half of his skull still felt like it was packed with fluff.
“Well,” he said to himself. “This is a bit of a blow.”
Truth be told, he wasn't too cut up about it, which was as much of a surprise to him as anyone else. On top of nearly killing him, Rurthk had effectively stolen his very expensive and beautiful shuttle. He would've thought he'd be raging right now, kicking everything he could and cursing the crew of the Outsider to the Ancestral Abyss and back.
Instead, he felt nothing.
In a way, he'd been waiting for this to happen. As much as he'd enjoyed being on the Outsider again, he knew he didn't belong there, really.
The real problem was that he had no idea where to go from here. He'd already achieved his life's goal and found it lacking. He'd gone back to the Outsider to try and make amends and been kicked off. What came next?
He was left out here with nothing but this tiny case of his belongings.
And millions of credits.
His ears perked up. And suddenly, he knew exactly what to do next.
Mero stood up, grabbed his case, and turned to walk towards the town, making a plan in his head.
First, get to the planet's capital city. Then find the most expensive hotel room he could. Then find a good quantity of sweet alcohol, a collection of Petaur incense sticks, and, if possible, two Petaur prostitutes.
Yes, that was a great plan for the next week or so.
Chapter 61: Tracker
The tablet, now extended to cover the full width the table, showed a wealth of information. On one side it was thick with text and code and output numbers running from latitude and longitude to the probability of false positives. On the other was a series of maps, one in 3D interstellar, the other planetary.
Yilva had been kind enough to include a user guide to the interface, a text box in the corner which Olivia was now reading. She paused every so often to gesture at the tablet.
“Question, for those of us more competent at shooting things than understanding them,” Eloise said. “How, exactly, does this thing work?”
Olivia frowned at the user guide, searched through a menu of options, made some change. Then she looked up at the others, most of whom were waiting expectantly.
“Right,” she said. “This is Singer's system. There are trawlers in the various planetary and system nets, which take in loads of information. They look for the pattern of signals Vihan Yvredi use, bulkwave echoes, and ordinary conversations on the net – people mentioning the term Information Brokers, for example – and even facial recognition from cameras where available. Then they bundle all that up, run it through some super complex neural network, and come up with a best guess approximation of where Vihan Yvredi are.”
“So it can miss them if they're staying quiet?” said Eloise.
“Or if they're doing something unexpected,” Olivia said, nodding. “And it can't always pin them down exactly – it might give us four or five blocks to look at instead of a building. It's more of a clever educated guess machine than a foolproof tracker.”
“I guess we have to take what we can get,” said Eloise.
“So, what's it telling us?” said Rurthk.
“I'm just about to find out,” said Olivia. She called up another menu and selected an option.
The maps shifted suddenly.
“It's found … six groups,” said Olivia. “Two on Cantor, one each on Earth, Atlantis, Ghroga, and Nereus.”
“Six,” said Rurthk. “That's all?”
“That's all,” said Olivia.
“Either they're much small than we thought they were … or we still can't find most of them.” Rurthk growled. “And I guess we have no way of finding out which is true.”
“If it helps, probably the second one,” said Olivia, shrugging.
“Hm, look at that,” said Eloise, peering at the map. “The second location on Cantor. It's the ice base we found. Looks like they're using it again. And it's the only large facility they have.”
“Unless they're the ones we can't see,” said Rurthk. “Which they probably are, considering this system is barely working.”
“Well, it's certainly better than nothing!” Dr. Wolff said. “Now, Miss Finch, I believe there is a second tracker?”
Olivia nodded. “There's also Yilva's tracking system.” She searched through the menu again. “I can add it to the same display.”
A third point appeared on the map of Cantor, with a little label.
“And that's Mr. Hand?” said Rurthk.
“According to Yilva, yes,” said Olivia. She checked the label. “Or that's where he was four hours ago.”
“Four hours ago …” said Rurthk.
“It should update next time he uses his computer,” Olivia said hopefully.
“He's not with either of the other groups Singer's system is telling us about,” said Rurthk. “I suppose that means he's with a group Singer's system doesn't see.” He leant back against the cupboards on the other side of the observation lounge and grimaced. “So, we've got one tracking system that gives us the location of a few Vihan Yvredi groups, most of whom are lightyears away, and one trac
king system that can tell us where a single Petaur was several hours ago.” He sighed. “I suppose it's better than nothing. But if we're going to make this work, we're going to need a very good plan.”
They spent an hour discussing options. At last, Rurthk's tablet told him he had a private call. The caller was anonymous. That was becoming a common theme.
Perhaps Vihan Yvredi had some devastating piece of news they were about to unleash, he thought as he walked to his quarters.
He stuck his tablet to the wall, extended it to an appropriate size, and accepted the call.
A grimacing human Rurthk didn't recognise appeared on the screen and looked him over. “Captain Rurthk?” he said.
“That's me,” said Rurthk.
The human nodded. “Wait,” he said, and gestured at some out-of-sight interface.
The screen changed to show the leader of Sweetblade, Albert Wells.
“Captain,” he said. “It's good to see you again.”
Chapter 62: Justice and Vengeance
The two men eyed each other tensely over a hundred lightyears.
Rurthk spoke first. “I was not expecting to see you again,” he said. “What do you want?”
“First, let me ask you something,” said Wells. “What do you know of Vihan Yvredi?”
“I've heard of them,” said Rurthk. He didn't want to give too much away at this stage.
“And do you know what role they had in the current war?” said Wells.
Rurthk studied Wells' face, looking for some hint of what lay behind this line of questioning. But he was met with a wall of coldly formal politeness. “A big one,” he said at last.
Wells nodded. He seemed satisfied. “One could say that. Very well, Captain, let us stop dancing around the matter at hand. According to my sources, you're behind a recent attack on Vihan Yvredi.”
Rurthk said nothing.
“In which case, I count you as an ally,” said Albert Wells. “I wish to be rid of them. They are a threat to Sweetblade.”