REBOOTS

by Mercedes Lackey

  It was virtually identical to “The Library,” which made him think it had the same owners. Same sports memorabilia from some obscure teams and sports (high-grav soccer, zero-gee handball), same layout, even the same slightly oddball colors in the decoration (Morocco red and chestnut brown). Some different faces, which made him decide to go for one more boilermaker and hang around and listen. He changed his face to accommodate the change in venue, as well.

  He saw one person he actually knew from The Library and from working on a crew with him. Josh Stills, a tough little electrician who had a bit of a gambling addiction. The guys at The Library all knew this, and would cut him off before he lost the rent. But it appeared that the big bruiser he was going head-to-head with in a game of Texas Hold ’Em wasn’t being so accommodating, because he was sweating. His normally fine mouse-blonde hair was plastered to his skull.

  The big guy was new; head like a bucket, bald, no neck, and the sort of build a Norm could only get when he was from a plus-gee world. He had deft hands, though…too deft…

  The Boggart watched him closely. There it is, you slick bastard. The man was dealing from the bottom of the deck, and using a few other dirty tricks when he thought he could. The end result was that he was going to clean poor Josh out…and from the look on his face, he seemed to be expecting to use more than a friendly word to exact his winnings from the electrician. For a moment, the Boggart figured he’d just turn around and get back to his room at the hostel…save for that little niggling voice in the back of his head. That inconvenient thing that passed for a conscience, that said “you know Josh, and you know this guy is cheating, how can you walk away?” Last thing I need is another complication. “Sure,” said his conscience. “And then what do you do when Josh gets thrown out of his bunk, or goes without food, or both?” His conscience won. What the hell, let’s go for it. The Boggart sat down at the table, making sure that the tool belt that he was wearing cleared the seat. Both players looked up at the same time, but the bruiser was the first one to speak. “Closed game, and almost finished. Find another table, chump.”

  The Boggart shrugged, leaning forward. “Naw, I’m fine here. Just want to enjoy the spectacle. Still a free galaxy, right?” A few of the other patrons had begun to take notice; the big guy didn’t have any choice but to accept him.

  “Fine, whatever.” The Boggart watched the rest of the game intently, ordering a drink but never so much as touching it. Finally, the game came to a close; Josh was out for everything he had, and it was the final hand. “You know what’s going to happen to you if you can’t pay up, right?” The stevedore leaned in, grinning with huge horsey teeth. “No one likes dumb bastards that renege on a fairly wagered bet.” Josh was close to breaking down, at that point; he knew just how screwed he was.

  The big moose was dealing out the final hand when the Boggart suddenly snatched a wrench—the largest he had—from where it hung on his tool belt, and brought it down with a sharp crack on top of the bruiser’s dealing hand. The man screamed, but the Boggart shut him up quickly enough by splashing his drink in the man’s face. As he was blubbering, the wrench came up to catch him on the point of his chin, sending him backwards and out of his seat.

  “Check the security vid footage, Josh,” the Boggart said, hoarsely. “He was dealing from the bottom of the deck, holding an ace and a king in his left, stacking the deck, and I am pretty damn sure marking cards with a pin on the inside of his ring.” He looked at the man on the floor, weakly cradling his shattered hand. Won’t be using that hand to beat a debt out of Josh, or cheating anytime soon. “That’s three kinds of cheating. Seems to me you won these games.”

  Josh smiled weakly, and was quick-witted enough to scoop up the pot before answering—meanwhile the barkeep was calling security and a good selection of the barflies were surrounding the bruiser so he couldn’t run. “Uh…do I know you?”

  The Boggart had just enough time to shout over his shoulder as he made his escape. “Nope.” He was out the door and had just finished changing his glamor when the security came bustling past him, crowding into the bar. All right, that’s your good deed done for this century, Boggart. Get back on the case, now.

  The Boggart found his usual spot among the three old-timers the next day after he had finished his shift at a new job. They’re the oldest workers here…but I’m not exactly sure I’ve ever seen them do any work other than gossiping and eating, come to think of it.

  “…I tell you, there’s a ghost on this station. No lie!” Jeff was pretty vehement about it. The others exchanged looks.

  “Another ghost, Jeff? You sure that this one isn’t the same one that turned off the air conditioning in your pod last month and flickered the lights?” Monty snickered.

  “I heard it straight from Margie, and she heard it from what’s his face down at The Laundry, the skinny bartender. He said he saw the whole thing with Josh. Dude came in, busted up one of the new hires that was cheating, and then vanished.” He nodded up and down vigorously. “Big as life on the vid footage in the bar, and gone on the vid footage from the corridors outside. Creepy, right?”

  “It’s a big station, it’s not like it’s that hard to disappear, Jeff.” This time it was Jack, rolling his eyes in exasperation.

  “Exactly! Big station…but not that many people here, either. Someone no one has seen before or since, comes in and bops a guy with a wrench? Things have been strange around here, I swear it. All the new guys coming in, it’s something with one of them—” Jeff looked guilty, then glanced towards the Boggart.

  “Don’t mind him; he doesn’t usually mean to be an asshole, Skip.” Monty cuffed Jeff on the back of his head. “Do ya, jerk?”

  Jeff was rubbing his head, putting his other hand up in defense. “Aw, come on, you know I didn’t mean it like that! I’m just saying, is all. Things are getting creepy around here. There was that fresh gremlin outbreak right when those new labcoats were supposed to be doing a critical test in their section. Those pilgrims in the hallways, that new weird guy down in engineering who never talks to anyone and keeps sniffing all the time, and now this ‘invisible man’!” The Boggart’s ears pricked up suddenly, and he tried to subtly lean in closer to listen.

  It was Jack’s turn to reproach Jeff. “I swear to god, if you keep up with that pilgrim crap again, I’m never going to buy you another drink, Jeff.”

  “Okay, okay, fine. But you can’t deny the rest of it is pretty creepy—”

  The Boggart held up a hand to interrupt Jeff. “What were you saying about that guy down in engineering?” He shrugged as everyone looked at him. “Only curious; I’ve got a job coming up down there in a day or two. I want to keep an eye out for all of Jeff’s ghosts.” He smiled, looking to Jack and Monty, who both started to chuckle, but Jeff didn’t seem to notice.

  “Yeah, man. That guy…he’s definitely a weird one. There’s not a lot to tell, though. I think he got here a few weeks ago? Don’t know, really. He doesn’t hit any of the bars, doesn’t eat here, and doesn’t really talk to anyone. Mostly works alone down in engineering, doing odd jobs I think.”

  Monty interjected. “Maybe he just likes to work alone. Or he’s avoiding you, Jeff.”

  Jeff blinked. “Why would he avoid me?”

  “No reason whatsoever, Jeff, none at all.” Monty grinned. “Maybe he thinks you’re creepy. Maybe he thinks you’re a ghost.”

  Jeff blinked again, then shook his head. “Anyways, like I was saying about those pilgrims—” A collective groan sounded from everyone else at the table, but the Boggart’s mind was somewhere else already. Works alone, stays down in engineering, does odd jobs and doesn’t talk with anyone…could that be our long lost wolf? After a week and a half working around the station and digging for even the tiniest nugget of information about Fred, the Boggart had turned up nothing. This was the first thing to come his way that had even the faintest smell of a clue.

  It was time for the Boggart to get a job in the engineering section.
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  What was it about engineering that it always involved lifting large and heavy objects? Even when you were supposedly working on software, firmware, midware…sooner or later, large and heavy objects needed lifting.

  The Boggart’s Union Card did it again. He was in a powered exo…lifting large and heavy objects. He had no idea what they were for, only that they were expensive, and you couldn’t replace them easily this far out. So, he was careful, and put the grey metal boxes and components wherever the senior engineers and team leaders told him to, moving just as slowly and exactly as they wanted. None of the ones that he’d worked with resembled Fred, however, nor had he seen the errant Fur anywhere else on the level he was working on. Caution won out against his impatience; he decided not to ask after him among any of the others working down here, for fear that they might alert Fred. The Boggart had spent two days down here, with nothing to show for it so far. He hadn’t been everywhere in the section—not in the special docks for instance. Engineering had its very own docks; kept clear most of the time, because when they needed a component, they needed it now, and it was probably critical. Ships with their components got priority. But he’d been on most of the levels, and still no sign of a quiet loner who sniffed. Maybe that’s all this is: another dead end. Might be the engineer that Jeff was so creeped out by wasn’t Fred, just a guy with a case of the sniffles. But still… The Boggart had a gut feeling that he ought to stay for just a little while longer, let it play out. Like any other being worth a damn in his profession, he knew from experience that it paid off to trust your instincts. And from the look of things, he wasn’t going to run out of things to move anytime soon. All the engineers he worked with were very happy with how careful he was. Really, it was easy; all he had to do was tell himself there was a vial of old fashioned nitroglycerine inside everything he had to lift, and his instincts did the rest. For all he knew, there could have been far more volatile substances inside every box and crate, from how some of the engineers fussed over them.

  Wearing the exo was hard, though; it might magnify your lifting power, but inside that skeleton, you were still the one doing the lifting. It took a lot of endurance instead of bursts of strength, which is why you usually saw wiry guys that had the higher classifications. When he was done with his shift, he usually felt as if he’d been doing three or four rounds in a sparring ring with a bear. Or one with that blasted, dead Wendigo. Today was certainly no exception. He’d been on his shift for ten hours straight, and it had taken a toll. The Boggart was marching back to the locker room to punch out and change before drinks with Jeff, Monty, and Jack when he was struck with a sudden impulse to do a little exploring. He let his feet carry him through the section, just making sure to look he was moving somewhere with a purpose as opposed to just wandering; if anyone stopped him, he’d say he was lost and hope that it was left at that. The engineers could be touchy about their turf.

  The Boggart was just about sick of his little expedition when he came to a long hallway. It was filled with access panels, pipes, valves, and all of the usual clutter one could expect for a station this large. The one unusual thing in the hallway was the other person walking towards the Boggart. The man was the stereotypical dweeb; his height, maybe an inch or two shorter than the Boggart, say five foot four. Spectacularly average physique and a plain face that looked like it was made to sweat over math problems and the outcomes of baseball games. He looked as if he should have been wearing glasses. Thick, black-rimmed ones. He had all his hair, but it was a mousy brown, and cut military-short.

  His face was a perfect match for the portrait of Fred Stewart. And he was a Fur. The Boggart could see that primal aura from yards away. The Boggart did his absolute best to not allow his expression to betray anything. A plan was already forming in his head as they closed the distance between them. I’ll pass by, get around the corner, wait a heartbeat, and then follow him. When I’ve got him a little further from here, I’ll corner him. Maybe wait until he gets back to wherever he sleeps, stop him there—

  A feeling like a static shock swept over the Boggart just then, stopping him in his tracks. Fred immediately stopped as well, still a good thirty feet away; his eyes narrowed and his nostrils flared, and he was staring directly at the Boggart. The Boggart reached a hand up gingerly towards his face—and found it to be his face, his real one, not one of his glamors.

  Oh, shit.

  Fred immediately turned and ran back in the direction he came from, and the Boggart stutter-started for a second before giving chase. Goddamnit! I forgot about the anti-gremlin deterrents down here; I must have strayed too close to one, tripped it and it shut down my glamor. Shitfire! It was hard to keep up with Fred; there were many connecting hallways, all of them dimly lit and filled with turns. If I let him get away now, I’ll never find him again. I barely found him this time, and it was mostly an accident. How could I get so damned careless?

  Fred was running for the engineering docks; he probably knew the layout pretty well, and it was probably the fastest way for him to get off of this station. There were miles of Jeffries Tubes, access hatches a small guy could easily get into, in case he couldn’t find a ship that he could stow away on. The Boggart knew that no matter what, he didn’t dare lose sight or at least sense of him.

  He was so intent on keeping track of Fred that at first the alarm klaxons didn’t even register. And when they did, he just ignored them, figuring it was part of the anti-gremlin system or some routine emergency.

  It was only when he saw Fred dashing down one of the docking arms and followed him—and saw a vision out of his own worst nightmare—that he realized that what he was hearing was an alarm for an armed boarding party.

  Fred had stopped, turned towards the Boggart, and had half-wolfed out—the most he could do without a moon. He was easily a foot and a half taller, and leaner; fur had sprouted out from under his engineer’s jumpsuit.

  “I’m tired of running from the goddamned H.S. I’m tired of living like a rat down in this maze. I’m not going to do any of it anymore. I’m not sorry for what happened.” He growled low and menacingly, his snout lowered and his eyes fixed on the Boggart.

  “That’s good, Stewart. I’m tired of chasing you. There’s just one problem, though.” the Boggart said, a little unsteadily. “Look behind you.”

  “You really don’t think I’m going to fall for that old—” but Fred did turn around, and slowly backed away from the thing that had been standing behind him.

  “Hi, honey,” slurred Captain Runner. “I’m home.” The cold fire was back in his eyes, though he still had all of his grisly wounds from his fight with the Boggart. Somehow he looked bigger.

  “How in the nine hells did you find me?” The Boggart was backing away, sparing a single glance over his shoulder to make sure there weren’t any threats behind him.

  “Seems there was a piece of rough beef jerky back on my boat, the one you slagged. Think his name was Pete.” The Boggart noticed that the pirate captain was picking his teeth with a bone; a femur, by the looks of it. “He sang a little about where I might find my next meal. Have to say, he was a bit rough for an appetizer.” He spit the bone onto the floor. “Thanks much for sending that Home Service boat to pick us up, though; a fine first course, and a new ride! I ought to have ya over for dinner more often.” The monster leered. “Every time I eat, I get stronger. And ya led me to an all-you-can-eat-buffet. When I’m done here, I won’t need no stinking ship. I can just sit here, an’ let the take-away come t’me. An’ I must say it’s been a little lonely, bein’ the only one of me. But my boys here, they got their first taste o’ man-flesh, an’ pretty soon there’ll be five of us. Right boys?”

  The four pirates with him just stared. And their eyes looked…all wrong. There was a strange dark magic aura around them too—not nearly as dense or nasty as the Captain’s, but it was there. And—They look hungry.

  Okay. Run now, just runrunrun.

  If there was one place that the entire station w
ould rush to defend, it would be engineering. And if there was one place that was tough enough to survive being the site of a fight, it was probably engineering. Not intact…but there wouldn’t be any bulkhead breaches or other immediately fatal damage…probably.…

  Fred was the first to turn and run, and the Boggart followed on his heels. Fred was running for deep in engineering territory and away from the engineering docks. In that funny way the mind has when you are in panic mode, the Boggart realized that Runner must have taken the H.S. ship he had hijacked straight to the engineering docks, knowing that was the fastest way to the beating heart of the station, and that it was highly likely most of those docks would be clear. The klaxons must have started when the pirates ignored traffic control and headed there.

  The problem was…he didn’t know this part of the ship all that well. Two, maybe three skidding turns…and he found himself standing next to Fred at a dead end. From the other side of the wall came the steady roar of a furnace. And incinerator, probably; engineering produced a fair amount of waste, and most of it needed to be reduced to ash before it was processed.

  They both put their backs to the wall. Runner and his crew…there were only four of them, but Runner really didn’t need them…stopped pelting after him. Instead they stood stock-still. Waiting.

  “And you, puppy. You just run on back to yer kennel. Mebbe when I’m done here, I’ll let ya grab a skiff and skedaddle.” The Wendigo leered. The other pirates laughed. Well, it sort of sounded like a laugh. Like someone had stuck a pissed-off rattlesnake in their chests.