Short Fiction Complete

by Fred Saberhagen

  In a few minutes they were all back in the lounge of the Golden Hind, where Wirral again took notice of Skorba’s media machine.

  “It looks like it might be a weapon,” said the goodlife intruder suspiciously. “A communications device at the very least.”

  “It is certainly a communications device,” said Skorba. “Does your master therefore forbid me to bring it to Damaturu?”

  Both men turned to look at the metal guardian that had returned with them to the lounge, where it continued to dominate the scene. The thing’s lenses stared back at them implacably. It made no comment.

  “All right, then,” Wirral conceded. “Bring your gadget along. But you know better than to use it when you’re planetside, don’t you, laddie?”

  “Once planetside, I’ll be surrounded by communications devices anyway, and free to use them if I wish. But I’ll have no need of them. As I told you, I’ll come back to this vessel willingly. It’s just that I’ll be a more convincing escort for the Lady on the planet if I’m carrying some hardware.”

  Wirral made an indecisive gesture. “Aye, then, take the damned thing along. You’re right, to play the role of her bodyguard, you’d best not go altogether emptyhanded. To my mind you don’t look the part.”

  A few minutes later, Lady Blanqui and her youthful, rather pudgy companion were on their way. Skorba was wearing a very thoughtful expression as he bade Tanya a terse goodbye. The Lady, elegantly dressed to see her banker, was carrying an empty attaché case.

  Tanya watched the pair of them disappear, following Wirral down through the deck of the lounge; someone closed the carpeted hatch from above. Moments later, everyone heard the sounds of the launch separating. The machine stood silent sentry.

  Only then did Tanya turn to confront the Lady’s now-leaderless people: Yero, Stanhill, the captain, the flight engineer, the female servant. Some of them did not meet her eyes at all. Others glanced at her reluctantly, and then looked away.

  It seemed to Tanya that she and the Lady’s folk were never going to have anything to say to each other.

  Tanya returned to her cabin briefly, then roamed restlessly about the ship, feeling almost that she had to assert her right to be aboard. The Lady’s absence made little if any difference in the attitude of her crew and servants toward Tanya. They continued to avoid eye contact as much as possible, and never spoke with her unless she confronted them directly. A certain inexplicable hostility seemed to be hanging in the air—as if the disastrous captivity that had befallen them had been in some way Tanya’s fault.

  Yero alone occasionally glowered at her as if he were on the verge of angry speech; but then, he glowered at everything and everyone except his mistress. The captain was incommunicative as always, but no worse than that.

  Well, let them sulk and glower if they wished. Tanya soon found herself too busy thinking to pay them much attention. A small uncertain seed of hope had recently been planted in her mind. And the more she thought about it. . . . But the aura of antagonism among her present shipmates was so palpable mat she made no attempt to communicate her thoughts.

  Aboard the launch, submerged in subspace and well on its way to Damaturu, Carl Skorba and his elderly companion had the small passenger compartment all to themselves. Before they had been allowed aboard, Wirral had locked and sealed himself away forward in the control cabin.

  When a quarter of a standard hour had passed in silence for the passengers, Skorba suddenly asked his fellow traveler: “Do you think the machine always trusts them?”

  The Lady Blanqui had seated herself, eyes closed, arms folded, beside a port, its cover now closed. She opened her eyes now to stare at her questioner, seated beside her. “The goodlife? I shouldn’t think so. But I suppose it must have reason to trust the one it sends as pilot on such a mission as this.”

  “I suppose.”

  After a moment the Lady voiced a question of her own: “Are you growing curious about goodlife? Now that we are, at least nominally, about to join their ranks?”

  “Yeah, I’m curious as to what the real ones are like,” Skorba admitted. “Aren’t you?”

  The Lady sighed, and seemed to suppress a shudder. “Not really.”

  “Do you know,” the young man pursued, “what I wonder most about them?” Perhaps doubting that his companion was going to reply, he pressed on without granting her much time to do so. “Do they ever decide that becoming goodlife was all a mistake, and want to quit? Who could choose to live with a berserker?”

  The Lady’s thin lips set in a sharp line. “I very much doubt it. Why? Were you thinking of trying to bribe our pilot, possibly? Persuade him to defect?”

  “No. . . .”

  “Such a detestable little man. And even if he were bribable, what could he do to help us?”

  “No—no, really, nothing like that. I meant what I said back on the yacht, I’m going along with the machine’s plan, I’m in this for the whole ride. I was just wondering about them. How their minds work.”

  Again there was an interval of silence. By now their former shipmates of the Golden Hind, along with Hinna and her dark masters, had fallen an astronomical distance behind the speeding launch. Skorba and the Lady were virtually alone in subspace—except of course for the uncommunicative pilot, who might possibly be listening to everything they said. And of course some machine component might be listening as well.

  The next time Carl spoke, it was to assure Lady Blanqui that her beloved Yero was doubtless still in good health. But if his remarks were meant to be comforting, the effort backfired. The Lady suddenly looked ill-at-ease.

  “Perhaps I shouldn’t have reminded you of Yero’s difficult situation.”

  She scowled at the young man in silence. Then she suddenly demanded: “You are really not planning an attempt to escape when we land?”

  He shook his head patiently. “I’ll say it again. What I announced to everyone, back there on your yacht, I meant. I’ve spent a good part of my life working and struggling to get a chance like this. Now I’ve got it, I’ll bet my life on it.”

  Lady Blanqui’s thin lips curved in a wicked smile. “A chance to blackmail someone as rich as I am? You’d be putting your own neck in a noose, don’t forget, if you were to reveal your part in this.”

  He gave her a glittering smile in return. “Look at it that way if you want. I’ll take the chance, if I have to, of being accused as goodlife myself.”

  “So will I,” murmured the Lady.

  “Ah. But you have someone you want to protect, and that gives me a certain advantage.”

  “And you have no one.”

  “Not any more. I won’t be piggish, understand, you’ll profit too. But I don’t intend to let my opportunity slip away. You and I are going to do business. Wait’ll you hear my sales pitch.”

  What had seemed a zestful readiness for combat on the Lady’s part now faded into uncertainty. “Once Yero is safe, I’ll hear you out.”

  “All right. I can wait until he’s safe—from the berserker. When we’ve concluded our deal with the machine, and he’s out of danger—for the time being—you’ll be better able to concentrate on business.”

  “Thank you. I imagine we’ll be able to do business as you say. I’ll make you a wealthy man.” The Lady sounded abstracted.

  The next time she spoke, her voice had grown somewhat querulous. Suddenly her age was showing, in terms of fatigue. “Then you can believe that a berserker will honor its pledges?” The question came out somewhere between a rough demand for the truth, and a plea for reassurance.

  Skorba frowned judicially. “You know, I really believe this one will, this time. I think the machine was just laying out the facts logically when it told us what it planned to do. With the pile of jewels you’re going to hand over to it, it can buy the chance to exterminate a great many more human lives than the little handful we represent.”

  “And that doesn’t bother you? Such a mass extermination?” She watched him warily.

&nbs
p; “Lady, it’s that kind of a galaxy.” The pudgy one now seemed to be considering her almost with amusement. “You understand that, and I understand that. The idea of people you don’t know, strangers, being exterminated doesn’t bother you all that much, does it? Those same people would sell us out in a moment, if the positions were reversed.”

  “All those thousands, perhaps millions, who will be slain?” The old woman seemed unable to let go of the subject. Her eyes probed at the young man. “Perhaps the attack will be launched against some world where you have relatives. Loved ones. Do you know what it is to love someone?”

  The young man shook his head, dismissing all such concerns. “Come off it, Your Ladyship. You didn’t make your money by worrying all that much about the ants in an anthill somewhere. You and I have a business deal going now, right? Or we very soon will, when we can sit down somewhere and start to work out the details.” Suddenly he yawned. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve been awake a long time. I’m going to get some sleep.” He adjusted his reclining seat, lay back, and closed his eyes.

  The Lady registered a very slow, very faint change of expression. It was a smile again, but this time not a challenge. Then she toasted her companion, with a cup of water—that was the only beverage provided passengers by the meagre facilities on the launch. She said, in a soft voice that did not appear to disturb the sleeping man: “I think we may be able to do business.”

  Meanwhile, back on the yacht, Tanya slept for a few hours also. When she awoke she lay quietly for a time, staring at the overhead. Her thinking had brought her to a certain conclusion. Hopeful, yes. Risky, though—if only she dared to trust her own deductions!

  At the same time, the continued rudeness, the barely muffled hostility of the Lady’s people, cemented her determination to reveal nothing she had discovered until Skorba and the Lady returned—assuming that they did.

  Planet fall and landing on Damaturu were uneventful. Skorba, noting the overall smoothness of the approach, decided that Wirral was allowing the autopilot to handle almost everything. Nothing out of the ordinary in that, for goodlife or bad.

  The business of traversing the atmosphere was, as always, time-consuming. The Lady and Skorba agreed that if all went smoothly they were going to spend hardly more than a standard hour actually on the surface of the planet.

  The formalities of clearing the port were minimal, and promptly concluded without the pilot ever having to leave his sealed cabin, or confront directly any of the local officials.

  Ground transport on this world was cheap and efficient. While Wirral remained out of sight in the ship, Skorba accompanied the Lady into the nearby city. This city, which Skorba could remember visiting once, years earlier, was somewhat larger than the spaceport town on Malawi. Once in the city, they went directly to the bank of Lady Blanqui’s choice, exchanging a minimum of conversation on the way.

  This bank, the largest financial establishment on the planet, occupied an imposing building on the south side of the city’s central plaza. The only local structure rivalling it in height was the planet’s Templar headquarters, a white tower crowned with conspicuous antennas on the north side of the plaza. The numerous antennas, besides serving practical communication functions, symbolized the Templars’ sworn vigilance against the Galactic peril of the berserkers.

  Just inside the bank’s outer lobby, Skorba’s elderly companion turned to him and said: “Wait here. My private banker here is a suspicious man—no, I’m not quite such a stranger on Damaturu as the one who sent us here believed.”

  “Ah?”

  “Trust me, I know this man, this banker, and he will have fewer misgivings if I do not appear in his office accompanied by a stranger.”

  Skorba looked at her. “I trust you, Lady Blanqui,” he said, seriously, after a moment. She nodded a crisp acknowledgment and turned away.

  Skorba watched her out of sight. She was carrying her empty attaché case under one arm as she vanished through a dramatically tall archway. According to a discreet sign, that way led to me executive offices on the upper floors.

  The young man settled himself mentally to wait. Physically he kept moving restlessly about, passing in and out of the building several times. Very briefly he left the lobby to breathe the open air, to look at the grass and trees of the square, to gaze thoughtfully upon all the unsuspecting people. None of his absences from the lobby were long enough to make it possible that he should miss the Lady, at whatever moment she might reappear.

  When at last Lady Blanqui did emerge from the dramatic archway, she was carrying the attaché case in such a way that Carl Skorba could see that it was notably heavier than before.

  But the Lady’s spirits were definitely lighter; and she appeared relieved to find her escort waiting for her patiently, like a tourist or an unobtrusive, authentic bodyguard. He was still carrying, tucked under his arm, the machine that might have been a recorder or a weapon, or both.

  He asked her: “Everything go all right?”

  Silently the Lady indicated her satisfaction.

  In a matter of minutes the pair were back at the spaceport, where their little borrowed ship was waiting, Wirral still locked into its control cabin. Nothing in the dull inconspicuousness of the small craft gave any indication of who—or what—controlled it.

  As soon as they were aboard, Wirral repeated Skorba’s question over the intercom; when the pilot’s query had been answered in the affirmative the outer hatch closed and sealed itself behind the two passengers. Presently the artificial gravity came on, and the passengers could hear the shriek of thinning atmosphere, falling rapidly behind and below the hurtling launch.

  * * *

  In a few hours the launch had brought them back to their approximate point of departure.

  In the hours since the launch had departed, the configuration of the waiting ships had changed. The Golden Hind still hung, as before, in normal space on the fringe of the rocky, undoubtedly lifeless minisystem. And the larger berserker craft remained disconnected from the yacht; but now it was several kilometers farther away. The brown dwarf at the system’s center was visible only as a dull distant glow of infrared, and only if you looked for it with instruments.

  Wirral, giving no explanation and making no comment over intercom, steered clear of the yacht and jockeyed the launch into a preliminary docking configuration with the berserker; then he let the autopilot take over, to complete the maneuver smoothly.

  Skorba drew breath, as if he were about to launch a protest against not being taken back to the yacht—but then he sighed, shrugged helplessly, and said nothing.

  As soon as docking had been accomplished, a man-sized machine—whether it was the same one that had been on the yacht or not, neither human passenger could tell— entered the launch.

  Lady Blanqui was clinging more tightly than ever to her attaché case.

  The machine said, in its metallic voice: “Give it to me.” And with a snap of metal it thrust a gripper forward.

  The Lady protested in a high thin voice: “I demand, first, to see that Yero is unharmed.”

  “Give it to me. Resistance will entail punishment.”

  Making a helpless little sound, she allowed the case to be pulled from her stiffened fingers.

  With the attaché case firmly in its control, the machine turned to me other passenger. “Life-unit Skorba.”

  “Huh?” The man sounded surprised.

  “You will now come aboard my craft. You are to serve, temporarily, as hostage for the good behavior of the other badlife. If all goes well, you will be released unharmed in a few days.”

  The young man, looking surprised and miserable, began a protest, which he abandoned after a few words.

  “Remember,” the Lady chided him, “you said that you believed in the machine’s plan.”

  “I did say that, didn’t I?” He brightened minimally. “Logically, I still think so.” On his way out of the launch, following the machine, he paused, gazing earnestly at his fell
ow captive. “Give my regards to Tanya. Tell her to keep her chin up. Maybe she’ll be surprised and I’ll see her again sometime. And I’ll see you as soon as possible.”

  “I shall tell her.”

  In a moment Wirral, coming grimly through the compartment from the forward control cabin, looked at Lady Blanqui without a word, and went on into the mother ship. Presently the sounds of undocking came, and she listened to them hopefully.

  Her hopes were realized; in less than a minute the launch, now running entirely on autopilot, delivered her back to her yacht.

  As soon as she had climbed back up into the familiar lounge, she stood up straight and looked around. Most of her own people were present in the room, and her young female passenger was at the table, being served food by the robotic steward. One of the crudely man-shaped boarding machines, practically indistinguishable from the one that had just robbed the Lady, was standing guard close by the hatch. Otherwise there was no immediate enemy presence.

  “Yero? Where is he?” the Lady demanded.

  “Where are the gems?” Tanya asked her in the same instant, pushing back her chair and getting to her feet. “And what about Skorba?”

  A moment later Yero appeared in the background, on the other side of the octagonal table.

  “He’s not been harmed,” said Tanya. “None of us have. Now, what happened to—”

  Yero came hurrying to Lady Blanqui, and they embraced delicately.

  The launch that had just delivered Lady Blanqui was already undocking again; the familiar sounds came drifting through the hull.

  Freeing herself from Yero’s embrace, the Lady turned to Tanya. “The machine told me that it was taking Skorba hostage; it said that he would be released in a few days. I wouldn’t worry about him, dear; I think you’ll see him before you’ve had a chance to miss him.”

  “Perhaps I will—did you bring back the santana stones? You’re not carrying your attaché case.”

  “It has already been taken from me. Taken aboard the other ship.”