A Covenant of Justice

by David Gerrold

  M’bele shook his head in denial. “No, no—I cannot have this. This—this thing has a monstrous quality. I knew my child. I tended her. I kept her safe from fear and harm. I’ve spent nine years paying the price for my mistake. I’ll spend my whole life if I have to.” To their puzzled looks, he explained, “Her . . . handicap. It occurred at birth. I delivered her. I made a mistake. I thought I knew everything. I didn’t know enough. I hurt her. She lost her ability to . . . think like others. She became simple. But at least, with her simpleness, she had peace. It seemed almost a fair enough trade. But, now—this thing has stolen even that from her. She’ll never know peace again.”

  “Father—” Nyota sat up. Her eyes had become focused and clear. “I don’t want peace. Now that I can see farther than ever before, now that I can see the alternative, I choose this destiny. Please don’t rage. Please accept it. Please realize that you have gained the daughter you have always wished for. I’ve seen the look in your eyes. I know how deeply you’ve hated yourself for your long-ago mistake. Father, I forgive you. Please forgive me now for choosing this blessing and give me back your love!” She held out her arms imploringly.

  M’bele tried to resist. He could not. He fell to his knees in front of her and grabbed her tightly and held her close; great weeping sobs racked his body. “I’ve lost my little baby,” he said. “I don’t know who or what I’ve gained in return. Please forgive me for feeling this way, but—I can’t help it.”

  Nyota pulled back and met her father’s gaze. “This will give us both greater happiness and greater pride. I promise you.”

  M’bele’s eyes shrouded. “I hear you. I hear your noble words. But I don’t know if these words come from my little girl or from the TimeBand. Nyota waited like an empty cup. This thing has not only filled her up with strange new words and manners, it has replaced the simple part that spoke to me as a daughter.”

  “No,” said Nyota. “I know it looks that way to you. I know you cannot help but feel a great loss. But please believe me, father—two separate parts have now become one. Neither has replaced the other. Each has taken on the flavor of the other. Please give me the chance to show you.”

  “I have no choice,” said M’bele. “You’ve done something I thought would never happen. You’ve become greater than me. I don’t know how to live with this, but I’ve become unnecessary.”

  Nyota didn’t answer that. She couldn’t deny the fact. They both knew that a TimeBinder existed independently of her family. Despite all her protestations of love and devotion, they both knew that a childish curiosity had irrevocably transformed both their lives.

  M’bele let go of his daughter, and again the anger grew in him. He turned away from her and his gaze fell on Sawyer and Finn. “Why did you two have to come back into my life? Haven’t you done enough damage?” He looked beaten and weary. “I want you off my planet and out of my life. I never want to see the two of you again as long as I live.”

  Sawyer and Finn exchanged a troubled glance. “We never meant to bring you sorrow,” said Finn. “You’ve given me back my life, and we’ve taken away a large part of yours. We’ll go. . . .” He made as if to rise.

  Three-Dollar stepped over and pushed him back down onto the bench. “All of you, shut up!” he said, with as much anger as Sawyer had ever seen him express. “Not a one of you has any understanding at all about what has happened here!” He turned to M’bele. “Speaking of empty cups, your pain has filled yours. Would you rather have your daughter a simpleton again? Would you condemn her to that when she finally has a chance to make a difference for her people? You wallow in your own pain when you should celebrate the fact that your daughter has the strength of soul to wear a TimeBand without dying. Yes, she could have died! I’ve seen that happen too. I carry the memories of seventy deaths that this TimeBand has experienced.”

  The TimeBinder towered over the doctor. “We have a job to do. We have to go to the Gathering and we have to leave now. The First Officer of the freebooter vessel waits for us, even while we stand here yammering at each other. Now, do you want to argue? Or do you want to save your world from further ravages by the Dragons?”

  M’bele hung his head. Not in shame. Not in resignation. He accepted the TimeBinder’s words and he held his fury. Somehow he would bank the fires, leaving the resolution of this moment for another moment yet to come.

  “Good,” said Three-Dollar. “Everybody get your things and let’s go.” He stepped into the other room and returned with a LIX-class bioform following him. Sawyer, Finn, and Lee looked up in surprise as Three-Dollar said, “Ota will give us instructions on how to get to the hiding place of the landing boat that will take us up to The Lady MacBeth.”

  Sawyer looked to Lee. “I seem to remember you had something to say about coincidence?”

  Lee just shook his head in disbelief.

  Away

  M’bele led them to another room, this one with darkened windows. One by one he led them down a hallway, through a narrow door and out into a dark alley where a large covered sled waited. Sawyer brought Finn out in a wheelchair and secured him carefully. Lee came out to help. The two of them looked up at the open sky above and exchanged embarrassed grins.

  “I thought we still lurked safe underground.”

  “I share your embarrassment. Me too.”

  Lee took the wheelchair back in and brought a bound, gagged, and blindfolded Zillabar out next. They placed her next to Finn, who grinned at the Vampire broadly. She couldn’t see him, but her nostrils flared as she sniffed the air. Finn leaned close to her and whispered, “How nice to see you again, Lady.” He patted her on the leg with undue familiarity—just to see her stiffen in anger.

  Azra brought Nyota out next. Three-Dollar and M’bele followed. Ota climbed into the front of the sled, next to the robot driver and said, “Take us away, Jen.”

  The sled pulled away from the back of the House of the Charitable Sisters, and out into the street. Sawyer looked out the back of the truck just long enough to see that for all of their traveling underground, they had ended up exactly across the street from their starting point, the Inn of the Red Flower. He wondered about the size of the nest of tunnels underneath Pig Town and made a mental note to ask M’bele someday—assuming that M’bele would ever speak to him again.

  Shariba-Jen steered the van carefully, always avoiding the main highways. As soon as possible, he struck out overland, lifting the vehicle westward over the Crumble and into the broken fissures of Short Rock Canyon. They traveled without lights, but the lack did not bother the robot. Jen expanded the range of its sensors and navigated across the dark landscape by the heat evaporating off the rocks. That, plus his inertial guidance system, gave him all the information he needed to keep the van from splattering up against a sudden upthrust of stone.

  Abruptly, Shariba-Jen turned the van northward and accelerated rapidly. “Now what?” said Sawyer. He climbed forward to peer between Jen and Ota’s shoulders. The forward window remained impenetrably dark, but the readouts showed the robot taking the van uncomfortably high.

  “I believe a Dragon-boat has caught our scent,” said Jen, politely.

  “Robots don’t believe anything,” Sawyer grunted. “Either we have pursuit or we don’t.”

  “We do.”

  “Great.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Jen. “I’ve already contacted the landing boat—”

  “We’ve got lights behind us!” Lee called forward.

  Sawyer glanced back. Three sets of beams came slicing up through the air. “Aww, shit.” To Jen, he said, “I thought you said one Dragon-boat.”

  “It looked like one, until they split apart. One—three—does it make a difference?”

  “Yes!”

  “Stand by,” said Jen.

  “They’ve started firing at us!” shouted Lee.

  “Warning shots,” said Jen. “They don’t dare—”

  Abruptly, the van shuddered violently as a disruptor beam splatter
ed off the bottom of its antigrav field. Sawyer swore as his head bounced against the roof. “Will you start taking this seriously?”

  “Stand by,” repeated Jen.

  Before he had even finished speaking the words, a flash of light illuminated the night behind them. Sawyer caught a quick glimpse of something coming apart in fast flying fragments.

  “How did you do that?” he demanded.

  “I have friends in high places,” Jen said. The robot struggled to keep the van steady in the air. “Stand by—”

  The second Dragon-boat disintegrated in a fiery blast, this one closer than before. The van bounced in the air as the shockwave overtook them. From behind, Lee started swearing furiously. “Why do you hate me so much, Sawyer? What have I ever done to you?”

  “You forgot my birthday,” Sawyer replied. To Jen, he said, “Can’t you evade the third boat?”

  “I have to hold a steady course to give our friends a chance to target him. Uh-oh, it looks like he figured it out. He turned off. Well, we can’t win them all. But he’ll probably tell all his friends about us. Stand by—” he said.

  “For what?”

  “For immediate pickup—”

  Suddenly, the whole front window of the van lit up. Close above them, Sawyer saw the underside of The Lady MacBeth’s largest landing craft. The van rocked in the downpush of the shuttle’s powerful levitators. Then, as it pulled forward, Sawyer saw the open hatch of the aft cargo bay looming directly ahead.

  “Oh, no—” he said. “You don’t really think—”

  But before he finished the sentence, something large and hard clanged against the van’s roof. “Gotcha!” Jen said triumphantly. The van swung up inside the shuttle, the cargo doors came swinging up beneath it, and the sudden rush of acceleration pushed them all back in their seats—all except for Sawyer, who tumbled backward onto the floor as the shuttle climbed up into the sky.

  Acceleration

  The shuttle pilot obviously had less concern for her passengers than she did for her trajectory. She stood the ship on its tail and boosted at full acceleration. Sawyer heard Finn cry out in pain. Nyota and Azra too. Even Ota, in the forward seat grunted. “I apologize for the inconvenience,” Shariba-Jen said crisply. “This will nullify all attempts at pursuit by ground-based Dragon-boats. It will also make interception by orbital marauders extremely difficult.”

  “And what happens when we reach orbit and try to dock with the starship—?” Sawyer gasped from the back. “The marauders will surely catch us then.”

  He didn’t think the robot had heard him, but Jen answered with efficiency. “Again, not a problem. We have no intention of docking in orbit. The Lady MacBeth will meet us before then.”

  “Say what?”

  “The Lady MacBeth will match our velocity in the upper reaches of the atmosphere and take the shuttle aboard the same way the shuttle picked up the van.”

  This news left Sawyer even more incredulous. “I don’t believe I just heard what you said. Your Captain has either no brains or no sanity. We’ll vaporize!”

  “Logic suggests that I agree with your estimation. However, Star-Captain Neena Linn-Campbell has proven adept in similar tactical situations. This maneuver has proven successful almost every time we’ve needed to use it.”

  “Almost . . . ?”

  “The one time it didn’t work, the blame lay with an inexperienced pilot,” Shariba-Jen acknowledged. “We don’t have that problem today. You may relax with a confidence rating of 73%.”

  “73%, huh?”

  “And rising, even as we do.”

  “Why does this not fill me with excitement?” Sawyer asked of no one in particular. “I met your Captain on Thoska-Roole—” he offered. “A real charmer.”

  “Thank you,” sad Jen, oblivious to the sarcasm. “Stand by.”

  “Now, what?”

  “Free fall.”

  “What—?”

  “The orbiting marauders expect us to achieve escape velocity. On the contrary, we will shortly cease accelerating as if we intend to fall into a ballistic trajectory heading back down to a hiding place somewhere on the surface. This will confuse both ground and space observers.”

  As if on cue, the acceleration cut out abruptly, accompanied by gasps of shock and discomfort from most of the van’s passengers. Sawyer pushed himself up off the floor, bounced off the ceiling, and pulled himself forward again. This time, he strapped himself into a forward seat.

  “Don’t panic,” Jen said. “The Lady MacBeth has already descended into the atmosphere to catch the shuttle just as it approaches the top of its arc. The whole maneuver requires very precise timing. Even as we speak, I continue to monitor the trajectories of both vessels. So far, you have nothing to worry about.”

  “Uh-huh. I don’t have a lot of confidence in this method of escape, you know.”

  “Oh, we’ll get away with it. We did the last two times we had to do this maneuver.”

  “Right. And pretty soon, someone will figure this trick out and prepare for it. Then what will your Captain do?”

  “Statistically, that should happen the next time we try. And I believe the Captain has already figured out how to use that very expectation to fool anyone who thinks to outwit us.”

  Sawyer shuddered. “This woman thinks like I do. How do I get off this ship?” Despite himself, he had to ask. “All right. Tell me the awful rest of it. What happens when The Lady MacBeth grabs the shuttle?”

  “We’ll accelerate straight up again. The orbital marauders will try to match course and intercept us, or at least get close enough to fire missiles or beams, but I don’t think they’ll have either the speed or the maneuverability to close the gap in time. We have the advantage of range. Stand by.” The robot added, “This one may cause some discomfort.”

  “Thanks for the warning—” Sawyer started to say.

  Something CLANKED outside the van, outside the shuttle that had caught them. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen, then they felt themselves turning upward, and a great pressure pushed them all back into their seats. It went on and on and on. Sawyer found it hard to breathe, and after several painful lifetimes, he began to wonder how much longer the crushing acceleration would continue. He might have passed out; when he came to the acceleration still pushed him back into his seat, but nowhere near as fiercely as before.

  “Stand by,” said Shariba-Jen one more time.

  The acceleration stopped abruptly. They hung in free fall for several terrifying seconds. Then the artificial gravity kicked in. Sawyer felt sore and aching all over his body. He felt as if several Dragons had just given him a customized beating.

  Shariba-Jen raised its voice. “Welcome aboard The Lady MacBeth. Please follow me to the salon. We have made every arrangement for a comfortable journey for each of you. Hurry along, please. The Captain would like to have the ship secured as rapidly as possible before the transit to otherspace.”

  Ota picked up Lady Zillabar and tossed her unceremoniously over its shoulder. Shariba-Jen picked up Finn Markham a lot more carefully. Sawyer, Lee, Three-Dollar, M’bele, Ota, and Azra, followed uncertainly. They climbed down out of the van, and then out the now-reopened cargo doors of the landing shuttle and found themselves in the large docking bay at the stern of The Lady MacBeth.

  “Hey?” asked Ota, of Shariba-Jen, pointing back at the shuttle. “We have to return that rental truck before the end of the week.”

  Shariba-Jen shook its head. “We’ll have to do it next trip. I don’t think Captain Campbell will let us take it back now.” He turned around to their passengers. “This way please. Hurry along—”

  Reunions

  For a while, the salon of The Lady MacBeth looked like bedlam as old friends greeted one another.

  Kask, the rebellious Dragon, grabbed Sawyer in both his claws, the closest a Dragon had ever managed to an affectionate hug, and honored him for his adventures in escaping from the Lady’s starship. Ibaka, the dog-child, bounced up and down on
Kask’s great shoulder, demanding a full recounting of the entire tale, excitedly questioning every detail. Robin, the starship’s de facto medico, insisted on taking Finn down to sick bay and installing him in a maintenance tube so she could monitor his condition. Arl-N, the tall spindly man who had escaped from the detainment at MesaPort with Sawyer and Finn and Lee, kept shaking each of their hands in turn; his delight lit up his whole face. Three-Dollar and M’bele tried to confer quietly with Captain Campbell about appropriate accommodations for their hostage, the Lady Zillabar—Captain Campbell demonstrated something less than enthusiasm at the return of the Vampire queen to The Lady MacBeth. Azra and Nyota, both wide-eyed, stood and stared in amazement. Gito, the high-gravity dwarf and chief engineer of the starship, stood apart and grumbled. Beside him, Arbiter Harry Mertz nodded sagely at the bizarre collection of crewmembers and passengers aboard the vessel.

  “I’ve seen a lot of refugee ships,” he remarked. “But never any like this.” He shook his head bemusedly. “I intend to enjoy this journey. I’ll probably get rich from all the fees I will collect hearing arbitrations. I expect to hear the first complaint before the last passenger falls asleep tonight.”

  Gito turned to him and said, “That reminds me. Captain Campbell has postponed the renegotiation of our contract again. Do we have legal recourse?”

  Justice Harry Mertz smiled to himself at the accuracy of his prediction. “Sometimes I just don’t know my own strength.”

  Sawyer managed to pull Captain Campbell aside long enough to ask her, “We’ve got marauders on our tail, don’t we?”

  “We did.” Captain Campbell scratched her ear as she listened to a private report from EDNA, the ship’s A.I. engine. “Two of them blew up mysteriously. The other three won’t get close enough to blow up.” She looked at Sawyer blandly. “Don’t worry. We have at least an hour before the next attempted interception. I’ve got to get all you folks settled and strapped in before then.”

  “What about otherspace? Why haven’t we gone into transit already?”