Forever Shores

by Peter McNamara

  ‘They have laser. Your hull, your platform—’

  ‘Want you alive, I’m figuring. They’ll take our canopy and roll us to a stop first. Help Jell swing those photonics manually, eh?’

  Tom did so, crowding Jell at the boss override to shift the two port lines by main force. Not much of a strategy but, with the bouquet harvested, there was ample room now. Tom rammed the handles to new lock-points in the slot; the crew used their booms to assist, extending then drawing back the lines so the kites made irregular arcs instead of riding steady.

  ‘Land anchors? Hedgehogs?’ Tom asked.

  ‘Used ’em getting to you,’ Jell said at his shoulder. ‘Supply modules, furniture, all we had. Not a fighting ship. No spares. We’re leaner than we were, Captain.’

  ‘Rynosseros can owe.’ Tom had to grin again.

  ‘She can,’ Jell said.

  Three more photonics went, strike, strike, strike. The Order’s gun comps were good, and legal nowhere but on those sacred decks. The Haldanians commanded the sats too. Only Tom’s presence prevented sky-strike, that much was clear. The dust wires trailing from Sycorax’s travel platform were partly to keep the air above untidy and make sat-scan difficult, but everyone knew that random strikes from orbit would soon get Sycorax if their attackers decided to.

  ‘Seventy k’s!’ Sallander called.

  Tom couldn’t help himself. ‘Abandon at forty! Lock helm and jump!’

  ‘Phase up twenty,’ Sallander said, as if he hadn’t heard.

  Jell touched the underside of the boss rig. ‘They’ll know,’ he reminded his captain, mere formality.

  Sallander didn’t hesitate. ‘Risk it!’

  Jell activated something, and Tom understood the talk for what it was. ‘You’re powered!’

  ‘Juggling, Tom. They’ve got sat-scan and laser. We need more time.’

  ‘But powered!’

  Four kites left, yet Sycorax stayed at seventy.

  Tom worked his handles in the slots, kept his two parafoils shifting. The crew toiled at their booms.

  They had to know. Four kites and such a speed! The fleet strategists had to figure it out.

  But what with the rooster tail and the dust wires trailing to dirty the air, perhaps those strategists weren’t sure what they were getting.

  ‘Thirty count to white-out!’ Sallander called, then: ‘Lose power!’

  Again Jell touched the underside of the boss override. Sycorax began slowing, and just in time. Tom’s two parafoils went.

  ‘Nearly, nearly,’ Sallander said. ‘Smokescreen on!’ He anticipated Tom’s question. ‘No point till now. Too little fluid in the cans.’

  Sycorax began fouling its own trail, sent black smoke boiling out along the Road behind.

  ‘Now!’ Sallander called, and Jell freed the last two lines, added power again.

  ‘You’re shielded!’ Tom accepted it all. This had to be something John Coyote and Dusein had arranged. They’d feigned otherwise, but—

  ‘Hold fast!’ Jell shouted over the roar of their roadsong. Everyone responded.

  Sycorax moved to starboard, began leaving the Road. It was level terrain for the most part but for a clustering of low hills a kilometre away, crowned with a scattering of boulders and dross like Tom’s intended shelter earlier.

  The fleet was following, fitted with state of the art hydraulics, easily capable of any crossing Sycorax could manage.

  And as the last of the smokescreen trailed away, Sycorax rolled to within a hundred metres of those hills with their crowns of rounded stones, slowly drawing to a complete stop. The fleet was nearly on them, Red Wheels straining, death-lamps and laser-batts spinning and glinting, terrifying to see.

  No time now. No time even to abandon ship and reach the token shelter of those rocks. It was like his earlier predicament before Sycorax arrived.

  The fleet deployed on approach, six ships taking up stationary positions in a wide circle so they had all-points vantage, two turned in, one out, two in, one out, the remaining three coming to within fifty metres before braking.

  Sudden stillness then, the sense of it, just dust tails billowing and settling around them, quickly falling away, then the ticking of hull plates, even the creaking of lines and straining canopies on the Haldanian ships, clearly audible across the distance. The Red Wheel captains left full mantles aloft but reined in, not simply as a quick-escape precaution—those ships were powered—but to provide shade for the officers and crews on their decks. Death lamps flashed and spun at full extension, gorging on sunlight; laser-batts shifted in the bright air like the heads of poisonous poppies.

  Silence and stillness enough.

  Then a voice through a hailer, determined and uncompromising.

  ‘Attention, Sycorax! You will leave your ship immediately and proceed to Charkenter, the vessel closest to you. In exactly three minutes, your ship will be destroyed. There is no negotiation. This order will not be repeated.’

  The Sycorax crew stole quick glances at their captain on the quarterdeck but remained at their posts. When Tom turned to Sallander, the tall sandsman raised a hand.

  ‘Do nothing, Tom! Say nothing, please.’

  ‘They mean what they say, Pat. They can bring down your ship and still have me.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Then let me—’

  ‘Tom, you know they can hear what we say now we’ve stopped running. Watch the day.’

  Tom did that, made himself study the shift of the dark canopies, the Red Wheels lifting and falling, listened to the sigh of breeze about the lines and transoms, to the ticking of hull plates and decking. Then he heard a new sound, a deep far-off droning, muffled but constant—no, building! Like engines, yes. Engines powering up! Not the laser-batts, though that was where he first looked.

  Then the land beyond the perimeter burst open. Tom saw camouflage tarps flung aside, lids on makeshift frames, saw ships lift out of the land itself, appearing from ramps and hidden bunkers in the earth like demons, two, four, at least six charvis rising up like magic. Eight now, nine at least!

  Not charvis. Not charvolants at all. Atabanques! Armed pirate ships without conventional canopies. Small, lean, raiders, plated, powered and, best of all, invisible to scan. They lofted death-lamps as they came, firing again and again, targeting the canopies of the Haldanian ships, the laser-batts first, enemy lamps second.

  And from the other side of Sycorax, from the old round stones on the hills, came streaks of light, dazzling to see, accompanied by the scream of laser as they hit the travel platforms of the Order’s ships.

  No hulls struck yet. No sacrilege. Kites and platforms only. But a promise made. Surrender now! Save your ships!

  Tom stared in amazement. Such a plan!

  And knew who was behind it. The bringing down of the Gerias Kite, everything.

  Tamis Hamm! Captain Ha-Ha himself, the great pirate. Funded by unnamed foreign conglomerates, governments, provocateurs, interested parties, using the same shielding tech he had used at Quaelitz, the same careful planning and deception. Had to be. Could only be. Tamas Hamm and the Restante Lady Say.

  ‘Ha-Ha!’ Tom cried, ridiculous to hear, wonderful to shout into the day.

  Sallander nodded. ‘Aye!’

  ‘But it’s the Order, Pat!’

  ‘If not now, when?’

  Tom didn’t try to answer. If this were truly Captain Ha-Ha, then the Restante Lady Say would be with him, no doubt behind this too, the antique creop cylinder bearing all that remained of the ancient tribal dowager, Serenya Say. Only now could Tom grasp the sense of it, the scale and commitment, all that John Coyote had dared not reveal, may not—in true cell fashion—even have known of in all its detail.

  Two veering atabanques went down to deck laser from two of the perimeter ships, but those Order ships were immediately struck by the laser points hidden in the rocks. Simple message. Strike our ships, we strike at yours!

  Every Red Wheel canopy was burning now, fragmenting,
falling, lines fouling then collapsing to the desert as the kite-heads burned away. All nine travel platforms smouldered. Two Haldanian hulls burned where hi-tech had hit them. Others sagged where supporting tech systems in their platforms had exploded upwards and maimed the ships they carried.

  As for Ha-Ha’s losses, one of the laser-struck atabanques had rolled and tumbled over itself; serious losses there. The other trailed dark smoke, but had righted itself using emergency hydraulics and now limped after the other seven raiders as they darted in and out of the crippled Haldanian fleet, striking at any resisting deck targets with death-lamps and laser.

  Within three minutes of the camouflage lids flinging back, Charkenter sent up a single yellow kite: the official Stat Prevarican. We surrender.

  The atabanques ceased firing at once and slipped away into the smoke and heat shimmer, knowing that the blinded sats would be responding, lowering, tethering, sorting options, doing all they could to find their missing ships.

  Still, three minutes and such a difference. The fleet was crippled. The laser points in the rocks ceased firing.

  And now new pirate forces appeared, men and women in dark fighting leathers wearing fabulous inconnu masks that gave them heads like living jewels. They came from the hills, from the hidden bunkers, bearing their prized Nagamitsu swords and Matsumoto parrot guns. Moved quickly, these jewel-heads, knowing there was little time before new decisions were made and the yellow kite disregarded. They broke into teams and went from travel platform to travel platform, checking that all were truly crippled. Several explosions broke the silence as jewel-head crews made sure of their earlier work.

  Tom turned to Sallander. ‘Where is Almagest? Laughing Man? Where’s Ha-Ha’s ship?’

  ‘Close, Captain. You’ll see them soon.’

  Them.

  Yes, them. The Restante Lady Say. Who would have thought? Now, like this, ending the Line? But then, all life was the journey made, with or without purpose. Better with, knowing, accepting, choosing to choose or let be. But choosing. Obvious to say, but all life was that, filled with whatever came, whatever was served up. It was how you made sense of it, self from it that mattered.

  Tom felt it then like part of his ranging thoughts—ghost footsteps in the mindline, coming near, probing, seeking. At last, here it was! He’d expected it, the Order’s Clever Men seeking him out. Part of him had hoped for it, wanting to test it all again, needing to. And here it was, the distinctive prickling, tingling, expanding in that other part of him, other self, something softly stepping in the underline. Footsteps. Voice steps. Are you there? Are you there?

  Gently, subtly, so subtly done. Nothing forced, nothing sudden, nothing like the mind-shock of facing the Chialis Clever Men on the Air that terrible time, the all-engulfing bludgeoning rush of mind-war. There was a softness to this, a caress, a delicate breeze through an open window at night. Nothing harmful or intrusive. Just an asking. Are you there? You, is it you?

  But prelude to taking him all the same, Tom knew. Having him, crippling him at least. Shutting him down somehow and emptying him out. Had to be. And something important for them to try this now knowing he’d know. Perhaps to see if he’d know. To see how far his talent had developed. His greater knowing.

  Tom turned to Sallander at the rail. ‘Pat, tell those jewel-heads! Tell Ha-Ha! Incapacitate their Clever Men now! It’s urgent! They’re trying to get me using the mindline. Tell—’

  But the softness, the caress, the gentling breeze was everything in the instant. In one immense snuffing of the candle, he was gone.

  He fought in that other place, though they did not want him to. Did not want him conscious. Wanted nothing from him then. Wanted their rogue lulled, sightless, mindless, selfless in limbo, a thing to trade back later for the physical Tom. Or else.

  But he fought. The part of him they’d used to bring him and trap him there was made for fighting and he flailed at their fiercely gentling dark. Kept self. Kept something of the same core that he’d found small and hard and so determined in Khoumy, that was so bravely and resolutely there in the haunted, self-haunting mind of Green Glaive, that had risen up as a whispering, stripped nugget of being in the Ship’s Eye of Rynosseros on that worst of days, that was in the essence of Sajanna Marron Best and the creop Lady Say and others, others. Things of the heart. Things of the dance and the living. Things turning in the light he fought to bring to this enfolding sleep now darkness. He spun in the tender grip of their minds, remembering. Became the remembering. Like Khoumy, like Glaive and the rest. Telling what was. Simply yet never simply was.

  Rose up to lights running, pouring down, coloured lights flashing and flickering, woke to glinting brass and blue in a different darkness, less blue than he liked or wanted, and sharply edged, framed. But a good dark this. With faces. Faces and lights.

  Woke to it, knew it, tried to rise to it, swimming up, plunging forward.

  ‘Steady, Tom,’ Tamas Hamm said, cancelling a year or more by being there. Captain Ha-Ha, trickster of Quaelitz, creature of another time. ‘We flash-stunned every Clever Man we could find. They had to let you go.’

  ‘Go,’ Tom said, marvelling. Tamas Hamm! And the lights! The lights and glinting brass. ‘Serenya!’

  ‘Hello, dear Tom,’ the antique Lady said, and the lights of her Israel Board flickered like jewels across the face of the life-support column positioned by his bed.

  They were all there. Mylo. Starman Guy. Tom was in a cabin, aboard Almagest, that lean lizard of a ship, a true pirate ship. Laughing Man itself. That was sky through the ports and these were friends.

  ‘Where …?’

  ‘At the engagement point,’ Hamm said. ‘Still cloaked.’

  ‘You brought down the Kite. Had hangars dug. Underground ambush points—’

  ‘More this time, Tom,’ Serenya said. ‘Tamas arranged for a decommissioned comsat and some other volatile space junk to collide with the tribal sat tracking this operation.’

  ‘You can do that?’

  Hamm smiled. ‘My helpers and associates occasionally can. Only once in the greatest while. Contingency, though not just for this. But this was worth it. This is the sort of thing it was for.’

  Tom sat up, swung his legs over the side of the bunk and steadied himself.

  ‘Tamas—I’m honoured. All of you.’

  ‘You honour us, Tom. You opened it all up again, you and the other Captains. Things were so fixed. A few of us, myself, others, felt we needed to act. The tribes know so much, do so much, control so much. But they have left openings, weaknesses, chinks in their armour. Forgotten that others were using the old tech as well—against them, and because of them. They grew complacent with their prescriptions and tribal feuds. Did not see that every other status quo is a going backwards. This will chasten them, sober them.’

  ‘Unite them.’

  ‘If you can believe it. But no toner like adversity.’

  ‘We’ve been called to the Air.’

  ‘You have. The Princes are gathering. It’s Convocation. Djuringa business. They say you face five hundred ships now. Can you imagine it? One from every tribe, every State. A thousand more watching, running perimeter. We dare not risk it. Not there. But here we can. They did not want you reaching the other Captains. They wanted you back, wanted you alive if they could manage it.’

  ‘Tartalen is at Azira.’

  ‘And has things to tell you. Officially. We know. That’s what did it. Once back on Rynosseros, you can declare official summons and go to him. Make it known. The Order dare not stop you then. But there is so little time and you are here, not with your ship. The Captains are due at the Air in two days. The Order means to delay you. You will never reach Azira.’

  ‘Unless I can learn something here. Find something to trade so I can reach Rynosseros.’

  ‘The way to play it, I agree. Which is why we are still here. Why we have twenty-three Clever Men and as many ships’ officers waiting to be questioned. But it has to be soon. The Madupan
, San-Mar and Chansallarangi sats have been commandeered. The Emmened grid has released too on tether. We can’t stay hidden long.’

  ‘Show me the Clever Men.’

  Hamm turned to his officers. ‘Mylo, Guy, take Tom to see our guests.’

  It was a dazzling display on the commons of Almagest: the Clever Men in their suits of lights seated in three lines, the jewel-heads standing about them in their glittering distortion masks, brandishing their parrot guns. A second group—the ships’ officers—sat as quietly close by. Almagest had kites lofted, both for shade and in case of a quick departure: photonic parafoils mostly, but with six death-lamps, as many laser-batts salvaged from the stores of the tribal ships, and two stranger kites shaped like trefoils—likely cloaking assists provided by Tosi-Go or one of the other sponsors.

  Tom put on desert shades against the glare and crossed to the seated Clever Men and officers. He stood so he could address both groups.

  ‘Fleet commander, please stand and declare.’

  An older Ab’O among the officers rose to his feet, a fine imposing figure in unmarked fighting leathers, clearly angry but determined to keep his dignity at all costs. ‘Senna Gen Tradu,’ he said.

  ‘Mission commander, Senna?’

  ‘Fleet.’

  ‘The mission commander, please.’

  A Clever Man stood this time, slightly younger than Tradu, equally controlled, dazzling to look upon. ‘Akidy Jan Tullus,’ he said.

  ‘Other mission command officers, Akidy, Senna? Think carefully.’

  ‘We all serve the Order,’ Akidy Jan Tullus said. ‘Everyone here can be activated to command. But Senna and I lead this operation. We assign.’

  ‘Good. Then you are responsible.’

  Nothing from the older man. A quick nod from the younger.

  ‘Your mission brief, Akidy, Senna?’

  ‘We will say no more,’ the older Ab’O answered.

  ‘Then you will all go with Almagest.’

  ‘To what possible end, Captain?’ Senna asked.

  ‘None of your concern. You have struck at a Coloured Captain.’

  Senna’s anger showed at last. ‘You are a pirate because of Caerdria! You consort with pirates serving outside enemies! You kidnapped the Lady Dusein. Stole a Gerias Kite. We are the legal response to that.’