by Dan Schiro
Others had ideas of their own, and Commander Vanlith stood waiting in the Star Sentry’s vast hangar bay when he returned. A half-dozen armed SpaceCorps officers in navy-and-white uniforms joined her, and their drawn pulse pistols said all that needed to be said about her intentions.
“Bully, be cool,” Orion said, leading them down the aft ramp of his stingray-shaped ship. “You too, Kangor,” he added with a glance up at the bristling vycart. “We knew this would happen.”
“Orion Grimslade III,” Commander Vanlith said from the bottom of the ramp. “You are under arrest for treason against the Galactic Union of Sovereign Planetary Systems.” Her eyes struck out at him sharp as cobalt-dusted swords, and though she wore the high-collared dress version of her SpaceCorps command uniform, she too carried a pulse pistol on her hip. “By the power vested in me as the commanding officer of this SpaceCorps vessel, I remand you to the brig until the Star Sentry reaches the nearest processing facility.”
“That seems extreme.” Orion walked slowly down the ramp to meet her on level footing. “For the Union to place a dead-or-alive bounty on the Kalifa of Light and then arrest a man for pursuing it looks an awful lot like entrapment.”
She peeked past him sarcastically. “And where is the Kalifa of Light? Perhaps he’s one of the briophyte, and he’s in your pocket?”
“We’re still chasing him,” Orion conceded, “but we’re close. We did get a dozen of his men for you. Whenever you’re ready to go collect the bodies, they’re on Ray Runn—”
“Arrest him,” she said to her dour soldiers. “Arrest the vycart as well, and find a kennel for the dog.”
“Really,” Orion blurted, “wouldn’t it be better if we talked this out?”
“Arrest him,” Vanlith repeated.
The guards flowed around Commander Vanlith and started for Orion’s gang, but a growl from Bully and a hungry grin from Kangor gave them pause. The soldiers took aim with their pulse pistols, but Orion raised his empty hands in surrender. “No need for violence. Let’s all relax.” He hissed down at Bully. “Go easy boy, easy. It’s okay.” Then he looked up at Kangor and delivered more or less the same message. “Let it happen. This will never stick.”
Bully flopped down with a whine, 200 pounds of wrinkly dead weight. As the soldiers slapped a pair of cuffs on Orion’s wrists and struggled to fit two extra-large pairs over Kangor’s, a voice rang out through the hangar.
“Take those cuffs off, now!”
Orion swiveled his head to see Zovaco striding across the thruster-scorched floor, still wearing the suit that had been splattered with Dark Spacer blood. His three eyes beamed with righteous fury as he approached. “I demand that you release them immediately,” he shouted, pointing at the guards.
“Excuse me?” scoffed Commander Vanlith. “You have no power here, politician.”
“Debatable, Commander,” Zovaco said as they squared off, “since I am the chairman of the star cluster in which your ship serves. But what’s not debatable is the power of the Union Writ of Sentient Liberties.”
“Don’t wave your dusty parchment around on my ship,” she spat as she poked at his thin chest. “He knowingly withheld critical intelligence from—”
“Your commission,” Zovaco said simply.
Vanlith’s icy eyes narrowed to a squint. “My what?”
He grew very calm. “Orion Grimslade III and his associates are an accredited security task force,” he said with his hypnotic slow-to-fast cadence. “They are certified for extra-legal activities including neutralizing threats declared terroristic or anti-Union. In addition to that,” he said, lacing his fingers, “they are granted further latitude while in the employ of a Galactic Representative, in accordance with Amendment 12 of the Anti-assassination Act. Add to that the special security provisions that apply to candidates for Union Parliament…” He shrugged.
“Lawyer.” Vanlith shook her head. “Will you please get to the point?”
“The AlphaOmega team has done nothing beyond their legal scope.” He folded his four-fingered hands behind his back and raised his chin an inch, his three eyes locked on Commander Vanlith’s. “He has offended you, I understand that. But is it worth your commission?”
Katherine Vanlith held his gaze for a moment with a defiant scowl. “Release them,” she said to her soldiers.
A grimacing durok officer unlocked the cuffs, and Orion rubbed at his wrists, smirking. “Great. Now, how about we go get this guy?” he said to Vanlith. “Come on, if we take down the head of a major terrorist network, SpaceCorps will bury you in medals.”
Vanlith stepped toward Orion with a snarl curling her lips. “Go around me again,” she said quietly, “and a mountain of petty legalities won’t stop me from putting you in a cell.” She turned and stalked off through the hangar bay, her officers following in formation.
“Thanks for the assist,” Orion said with a nod at Zovaco. “I knew you’d come through.”
“Medals?” said Zovaco, his incredulous eyes half-lidded. “Do you really think a woman like that cares about medals?”
“I doubt it,” Kangor grunted in agreement. “Though she may take your still-beating heart as a trophy, little friend.”
Orion grinned, his thoughts lingering on Vanlith. How could it be that berating him and handcuffing him had only made her more attractive? “How’s Mervyn?” he asked Zovaco.
“Recovering, thanks to your quick thinking.” The inky-skinned trislav heaved a relieved sigh. “They caught the poison before it could do any real damage. He’ll be under observation for the next day or so, but he’s already working from his sick bay cot.”
“Of course he is,” Orion said with a nod. “And the Dark Spacers? What of the Kasia Tal?”
“A true disaster, thousands dead.” Zovaco’s chin fell to his chest. “Early analysis suggests it was an old ‘cold ship’ like Aurelia said. Four of the six Admirals escaped, and the Union called in the Legionnaires. After an entire company of our best was slaughtered trying to take back the ship, they decided to vent a quarter of the vessel rather than lose the whole thing. Nothing to be done about it now, but at least the void will finish off the Dark Spacers.” He took a deep breath and shook his head, moving on with the speed of someone accustomed to tough decisions. “What happened with the sleeper cell? Was the Kalifa truly there?”
“We think so,” Orion said with a nod. He described the assault on Ray Runner 12 the best he could, leaving out the Eternal Demon to simplify things a bit. “And he used that blood magic to… to teleport away from us, if you will,” Orion concluded, throwing open his hands. “But Aurelia thinks she can peek through the afterimage of the portal — or whatever — and figure out where he went.”
Zovaco seemed to consider it, his three eyes searching the floor. “Can she really do that?” he asked after a moment.
Orion raised an eyebrow. “I’d never put anything out of reach for the Green.”
“Wise. How much time does she need?”
“Not sure,” Orion admitted. “It felt like she was talking hours, not days.”
“One can never be sure with the Green,” Kangor added. “They see time differently than the rest of us ‘lesser carbons.’”
“Quite so,” Zovaco chuckled. “I expect we would too if we lived some five thousand years.” He tapped his thick fingers together thoughtfully. “My business with the Fleet was meant to last several more days, but everything has been thrown into flux by the attack. Still, I’ll need to make my presence known in the cleanup and recovery.” He glanced around to make sure no one was listening and leaned in. “Make the right showing here, and the Collective Fleet’s votes will fall to me in a landslide.”
“Smart.” If a bit callous, Orion thought. “I think the Fleet should be safe enough for now. The Union will send Legionnaires in force, and I’ll bet any remaining Dawnstar contingent will be long gone be
fore they start searching ships.” Orion glanced at Kangor and slapped the big vycart on his thick shoulder. “All the same, meet your new shadow. Kangor will watch your back during any meetings or appearances you need to make.”
“What?” said Kangor. “You can’t be serious.”
“I like it,” Zovaco said, smiling broadly. “A vycart warrior will be a fine symbol of strength juxtaposed with my reedy frame.”
“You want me,” Kangor growled at Orion, “sipping tea while diplomats fill the air with their voices? Me?”
Zovaco laughed. “Imagine it, Mr. Kash. The datasphere will love it.”
“Brawn and brains, a perfect match.” Orion clapped his hands. “I’ll contact you guys as soon as I get an update from AD. Bully, come.”
Orion and his dog took a gravity lift up from the hangar bay and made their way to his quarters. He met a few Union officers in the hallways who avoided his mismatched eyes or made a quick turn to steer clear of him completely. Inside his spartan suite, Orion found that Zagzebski had returned his smartcloak. The blue-gray nanofiber had already shed the blood of the sacrificed girl as if it had never wrapped her limp body.
With a groan, Orion set about unstrapping and peeling away his kinetic bodysuit. The spot where the pulse bolt had melted the bodysuit to his hip tore painfully, his skin weeping with slow, thin tears of blood. Bully furrowed his brow at Orion’s pained gasps and came to sit at his master’s feet.
“I’m okay, boy,” Orion assured the huge dog as he stroked his head. “Poor guy, you must be hungry as two horses. I know I am.”
Still wincing, Orion went to the cargo crate stored in a closet of the officer’s suite and hauled out a 50-pound bag of dog food. After tearing it open with his teeth, Orion dumped it on the carpeted floor of his small study. While the dog feasted, Orion stripped down to his compression shorts and dug a tube of consulin out of his smartcloak. After dabbing his wound with the pale orange ointment, he went to the kitchen nook. He found an Ogga Food instameal in the fridge, pulled the ripcords to start the heating element, tossed it on the counter and padded back to his closet. He retrieved a fat bottle of Mars-made Olympus Mons vodka and poured himself a four-finger glass.
Minutes later, Orion tore into the instameal. The steak was rubbery, the potatoes were dry and the vegetable medley was a medley of too hot and too cold, but Orion didn’t care. While the old durok’s training let him push his body past normal limits, this required calories by the boat. When his appetite was sated and his glass of vodka was empty, Orion entered the shower stall and let the hot water scour the sweat and blood off his body. He finally found himself ready for sleep, only to emerge from the shower and see Bully sprawled in the middle of his bed. A small puddle of drool darkened the navy-and-white bedspread beneath the dog’s thick jowls.
Orion turned down the glowglobes, stretched out on the stiff couch and, for a while, slept fitfully. Some hours later, he awoke to the choking stench of Bully’s slow gas leak and checked his datacube for a message. Still nothing from Aurelia. Orion cursed softly in the near-dark, knowing that he would get no more sleep for now. After dressing in some gray mesh pants, white cross-trainers and a black Synthetic Symphony tour t-shirt from his luggage, he headed for the Star Sentry’s nearest workout facility.
It was the middle of the night by SpaceCorps-standard time, and as Orion expected, the gravity gym was almost empty. Almost, but for Commander Katherine Vanlith. She didn’t see Orion when he first entered the large, mirrored room, and for a moment he observed her. She stood in a 1.5x gravity field pounding a punching bag, her black hair stringy with sweat. She wore a sheer black bodysuit, sleeveless to expose her toned arms, with tape wrapped around her wrists and speeding fists. After a merciless volley of punches, she relented and saw Orion across the gym.
“Really?” she said, breathing hard.
“I swear, you won’t even know I’m here.” He hooked a thumb at the nearest gravity press. “Okay if I do my thing?”
“I can’t arrest you for it.” She hit the bag with a quick one-two-three. “Unfortunately.”
Suppressing a grin, Orion went to the weight bench and started to workout. As he pumped out reps, his addiction to the chase threw his scheming id into overdrive. What did a woman like her want? She was the first human promoted to the rank of commander in the Union armada, a staggering accomplishment. She was a climber. She was a striver. She pursued what retreated. But he needed a chance to interact with her outside of rank and politics and life-or-death situations.
His opportunity came minutes later when Commander Vanlith went to the control panel next to the door to the tarzzak court. With a few strokes of her finger, she programmed a holographic opponent. “Hey,” Orion called from a leg-press machine, “you want some flesh-and-blood competition in there?”
She glanced up from the touchscreen and met his gaze with her icy eyes. “Are you any good?”
“I can hold my own.” Orion locked the gravity rig and hopped up. “Once upon a time, I won the academy championship at the Institute.”
“The Mars Military Institute?” Vanlith glared daggers at him. “You?”
“Granted, I washed out in about four months.” Orion shrugged. “It just wasn’t a good fit, you know?”
Her bow-shaped lips locked in a frown. “Come on, then.”
Orion met her at the round hatch that led to the tarzzak court. “Where do we grab helmets?” he asked with a glance around the gravity gym.
“Helmets?” she scoffed as she turned the wheel on the door. “I don’t know how the little boys at MMI play, but at Alpha Cen Academy, cadets don’t wear helmets. Three-time tourney champ, by the way.”
Orion drew his usual uneven smirk. “Well, I’ll just have to look out for my pretty face, I guess.”
Commander Vanlith rolled her eyes and stepped through the hatch, and Orion followed her into the zero-gravity field. After a queasy moment of shifting organs as his body adjusted, he pushed off the doorframe and floated across the spacious chamber. A quick glance around told him it was a standard version of the popular galactic game, not a freyan variation or another offshoot. A blue-lit goal sat at each end of the ovoid-shaped room, and the octagonal panels on the walls lit with gentle white light in a slowly changing pattern. In the long space between the goals, an armada of cylindrical gray bumpers floated in stationary positions. Orion drifted up toward one of the rubbery bumpers and, like a swimmer executing a kick-turn, propelled himself toward the goal at one end of the room.
Commander Vanlith did the same, and they waited a few moments while their goal-panels scanned their bodies with electric-blue rays of light. Then, with a crackle of static, gaming gear appeared on their bodies, the translucent-blue holograms made solid by projected force fields. Both of them had flipper-like extensions on their feet, blade-like fins on the backs of their arms, and long scoops attached to their hands. After a moment more, a dozen red energy orbs appeared floating amongst the bumpers.
The game began. Orion and Vanlith kicked with their long flippers and cut the air with their hard-light wings, sprinting to reach the tarzzak balls before the other. They began scooping and slinging as fast as they could, ricocheting the red-orange orbs off the floating bumpers and octagonal panels of the walls. Vanlith scored eight and Orion four in the initial flourish, and as it always happened in tarzzak games, the competitors kicked furiously toward their own goals where the scored orbs would materialize after a short delay.
Vanlith locked eyes with him across the space. “I don’t know how you won anything with a slow first salvo like that.”
“Just getting my legs under me,” Orion said, flapping his arms to give himself a bit of lift. “It’s been a while.”
That was the truth. He hadn’t played tarzzak since before he became the “Runaway Rich Boy.” But there was another truth, one he had suspected when he challenged Vanlith to the game. Thanks to the
old durok’s arcane training, Orion’s body had reached its ultimate potential. His reflexes, agility and coordination had been refined beyond what should have been humanly possible. His fine-tuned mind could anticipate the patterns of the light-up acceleration panels flowing along the walls with perfect timing. And his lanky body was faster and stronger than appearances suggested. Orion grinned but tried to restrain himself — it would be best if he just barely beat her. Or at least, that was what the hungry voice of his scheming id told him.
The tarzzak balls appeared in the order they had been scored, and now Orion had a distinct advantage with eight orbs to her four. Vanlith fired a quick, one-bounce shot meant to take him off guard. While Orion let this one whoosh by him for another score, he scooped two orbs and flung them on a complicated ricocheting course through the bumpers and off the lit wall panels that multiplied their velocity. Vanlith hemmed and hawed and missed both as they hit her goal, and Orion hurled the next orb of hard light straight at her face. She dodged it narrowly to Orion’s relief, but it didn’t stop him from firing two more orbs into her unguarded goal.
Snarling and soaring with fluid grace, Vanlith scooped orbs and fired them at Orion. “You want to play like that?”
“You’re the one who didn’t want helmets.” Orion caught a careening red streak and flung it back.
Back and forth they went until droplets of their sweat floated around them like weightless rain. Even with the advantage of Orion’s training, Vanlith gave him a closely contested game. Halfway through the hour-long slugfest, she used a crafty bounce off an accelerator panel to hit him in the ribs with an energy orb that felt like a blow from a hammer. While he crumpled and groaned, she rushed out to a lead with a half-dozen straight scores, and it was 10 minutes before Orion had the game well in hand again. Their holographic flippers, fins and scoops disappeared with a twinkle after Orion scored the final goal to win 100 to 94. Panting and streaming sweat, they made for the door with languid kicks.