Eternity's End

by Jeffrey Carver

  "Work? More likely, they'll lock me away for life. If they don't mindwipe me instead."

  Jakus shrugged. "Whatever."

  Legroeder glared into the oppressive gloom of the hangar, his thoughts burning. "So that's it? You're going to let them frame me?"

  Jakus shrugged. "If you want to put it that way. Now, like I told you, I gotta get back to work."

  "Yeah." Legroeder made no attempt to hide his disgust. "You get back to work. See you around, Jake." He turned away.

  "You don't know what the truth is!" Jakus called after him. His words were punctuated by a loud metallic slam.

  Legroeder glanced back; Jakus had climbed back into the sim and slammed the door shut. Legroeder angrily strode away, alongside the half-assembled spaceships. What the hell was going on here? Why was it so important to someone that he take the fall for the L.A.? It was obvious this wasn't just Jakus's doing. It seemed to be coming from somewhere in the Spacing Authority. But what conceivable connection could there be between the Spacing Authority and a lowlife like Jakus?

  As he made his way back toward the front of the hangar, he also began wondering what sort of a shipping firm would use the services of a place like this. He couldn't imagine a respectable company letting a contract here. He stared at the ships for a moment, then realized what was bothering him. They looked... armored. A glint of light from a single overhead lamp reflected off the hull plates with a greenish sheen, almost the color of oxidized copper. It wasn't obvious, and he might not have noticed if he hadn't just spent seven years around raider warships. But that looked like arnidium hull armor, very hard and resistant to radiation. With a surreptitious glance around, Legroeder crouched to peer beneath the nearest ship.

  Not much to see—a number of closed bays on the underbelly of the craft. He looked beyond, to the next vessel; he could see the feet of a worker moving around with a work light. With a mechanical hiss, a bay door opened beneath the far ship. Legroeder squatted lower, trying to get a good look. The feet moved left, then right. The light flickered. For an instant, he caught a glimpse into the just-opened bay. A weapons compartment. He caught sight of three slim shapes—dark, sleek and oily-looking. Then the light moved away, leaving darkness. He heard the hiss of the bay door closing.

  Legroeder rocked back on his haunches, letting his breath out slowly. Those were flux-torpedoes, he was nearly certain. Now, what the hell was a ship like that, in a place like this, doing with flux-torpedoes? The vessel bore no markings of police or navy. So what was it? Undercover? Criminal? Right here at the main spaceport? How could the Spacing Authority let that kind of thing slip by their security... unless they knew?

  Legroeder rose silently from his crouch. The sooner he got out of here the better. As he started walking again, he saw the worker with the photonic torch moving between the two ships; that must have been the man who'd opened and shut the weapons bay. The man looked at him without friendliness, and stared as Legroeder walked on, heart pounding, toward the front exit.

  As he paused near the office door, Legroeder heard footsteps, then a bang of metal. An unfamiliar voice shouted Jakus's name; Jakus shouted back. Legroeder stood in the darkness, listening. As the voices rose in heated argument, he bit his lip. What have I done? Without quite knowing why, he started edging back the way he had just come. Moving alongside the nearer ship, he tried to make out the conversation. He caught his own name—then Jakus yelling, "—didn't tell him anything!" The voices became more muffled. He strained to hear the rest of the argument, thought he heard the word Impris. The anger in the voices was unmistakable, and made the speech hard to understand. Then... there was a bone-jarring thump and a prolonged moan. That was followed by a third voice in a language Legroeder didn't understand—Veti Alphan, maybe. There was another thump, and the cry of pain cut off. Then footsteps, moving away. What the hell was going on?

  Stay out of it, Legroeder.

  But he couldn't just walk away, could he? Someone had obviously overheard his argument with Jakus.

  God damn it. He looked around for something, anything, that he might use to defend himself. Nothing. Cursing silently, he crept back toward the simulator pods. The door to the third sim was open, light pouring out. He pressed his lips together. Maybe he could act as if he'd come back for something he forgot. "Jakus, you still there?" he called softly. No answer; but a door slammed shut way in the back of the hangar.

  "Jakus?" He peered into the sim pod. It was empty, but the controls were still on, the screens flickering with a simulation in progress. On the floor was Jakus's hat, its brim bent. Legroeder picked it up and examined it in the light of the sim chamber. There was a dark, wet stain along the headband. Blood, it looked like.

  Legroeder looked around nervously. The hangar seemed completely deserted now. He bent to peer under the ships. No one. Now he heard distant doors and vehicles outside. Someone leaving? With Jakus, maybe? Legroeder circled around the stern of the third ship, toward the rear of the hangar. There were spacecraft maintenance tools scattered all over, and the smell of ozone and vacuum-grade lubricants. In the far corner, a dim hallway led away from the hangar area. He hesitated, before moving toward it. The hallway was short. A dim emergency light glowered, revealing two doors on the right side, and one at the end.

  Legroeder drew an uneasy breath. This was stupid. What would he do if he found someone? Still... he'd come this far. He stepped into the hallway. What were these—storerooms? Offices? Armories? One of the two doors bore a dirt-encrusted warning sign: CAUTION—STAIRS. He tested it cautiously: locked. He exhaled softly. Beyond the end door, he heard traffic sounds. It was a steel door with a push-release, and a security panel beside it. With a nervous glance at the security panel, he pushed the door open.

  Cool night air greeted him, along with the sound of a truck whirring past. He stood at the top of a short flight of steps: early evening darkness, some empty loading docks; not much else. Spaceport lights glowed in the distance. If Jakus had walked or been carried out, he was gone now. Legroeder started to turn back through the door.

  "Far enough, chump—"

  He saw only a blur. Then the club slammed into the side of his head, and he tumbled backward down the steps. His head hit hard on the tarmac, and he rolled, as he heard the words, "Come back again and we kill you." Then the sound of the door slamming. He raised an arm dizzily to ward off further blows, but none came.

  When he managed at last to push himself up to a sitting position, he saw that he was quite alone in the night, outside the locked building.

  Chapter 5

  Harriet's Way

  "You're lucky they didn't kill you," Harriet said, examining the wound on the side of his head. "They probably just didn't want to have to deal with your body. For Heaven's sake, will you hold still?"

  Legroeder grunted as Harriet used an antiseptic cloth to clean the dirt out of the scrape on the side of his cheekbone. She shook her head, spraying the area with a bandage mist. "I'm a lawyer, not a doctor," she muttered. "There, I hope that holds."

  "Thanks," Legroeder managed, testing the spot with a fingertip. "I can tell you were a mother once."

  "I still am," Harriet said, tossing the sprayer back into her office first-aid kit. "A lousy one."

  "Oh—well—"

  She went back around behind her desk and snapped open her compad. "Now, do you want to tell me why you did such a damn fool thing? It wasn't bad enough you had to go talk to Jakus. You thought you had to snoop around in the dark, too?" Harriet rocked back in her chair, eyeing him. "I suppose, since you did go back in an effort to prevent mayhem, I will refrain from remarking about fools I've had for clients."

  Legroeder sighed. He felt like a fool. Worse, he didn't know what to do next. "There's still the question of what they did with Jakus. I wouldn't be surprised if they killed him." It was obvious Jakus had been lying on someone's orders. And if he'd been overheard arguing about it...

  Legroeder was mad as hell at the guy, but he didn't want him
dead. For one thing, there was always the chance that he might recant and exonerate Legroeder. A dwindling chance, to be sure.

  "I wouldn't be surprised if he was killed, either. If you still had the bloody cap, we'd have more to go on," Harriet pointed out.

  Legroeder grunted. He wasn't sure if he'd dropped the cap where he'd found it, or lost it when he'd gotten clubbed. The bash in the head seemed to have clouded his memories.

  "Of course, now it has your finger oils on it as well as Jakus's blood," Harriet said. "So I suppose it's not something we necessarily want turning up right away."

  "Look, I'm sorry. But isn't there something we should do? Call the police, at least? What if they've got his body in there or dumped it nearby?"

  Harriet sighed. "Given the circumstances, and the frame-up that you yourself are experiencing, I'm not entirely sure who I trust. That hangar is probably under Spacing Authority jurisdiction."

  "But—"

  "Still, I suppose I could contact my PI and ask him to phone in an anonymous report. He could say he heard reports of a fight. Hang on a moment." She touched her throat com and swiveled her chair away. "Peter? Harriet Mahoney. I need you to do something..."

  When she was finished, she swiveled back to Legroeder. "Don't get your hopes up," she cautioned. "And don't expect them to find armed ships, even if they look. If you know what I mean."

  Legroeder raised his hands and dropped them. "All right. So we've done our duty. What next?"

  "I'll ask Peter to keep his ear to the ground, to see what he can find out about possible covert military, or paramilitary, operations. Or who knows what—there could be a dozen explanations for those ships you saw. And yes—given Jakus's involvement, it's probably something we should find out about. But that's Peter's job, not yours. As for what we will do next..." Harriet lowered her glasses on their chain and studied him again. "Are you ready to take the advice of your attorney?"

  He sank back in defeat. "I promised I would, didn't I?"

  "I'm glad you remember." Harriet smiled faintly. "Then I think it's time we learned all there is to learn in this city about starship Impris."

  He spread his hands in question. "Where are we going to do that? The RiggerGuild and Spacing Authority libraries had nothing."

  Harriet snapped her compad shut. "We're going to start by getting some sleep. I've got a place where you can stay. Unless you've got someplace else in mind—? Good. Then first thing tomorrow, we're going to pay a visit to the public library."

  "The public library?"

  "Believe it or not, Legroeder, riggers are not the only people interested in knowledge..."

  * * *

  An orange-tinged sun woke Legroeder before the knock on the door. He was up on one elbow in bed, staring out the window at rooftops, when a velvety voice purred, "You wanted to be up at six, Mr. Legroeder-r-r?" It was Harriet's housekeeper, Vegas.

  "I'm up," he called back. He dressed and stepped out of the guest quarters. It was actually a small cottage, set back twenty meters or so from Harriet's house. By the time he'd crossed the garden to the back door of the main house, Vegas was there to open it for him. Vegas was a Faber aborigine who looked like a cross between a swan and a very slender, very white-skinned humanoid woman with small vestigial wings. She led the way to the dining room.

  Harriet was seated at the table with a cup of tea, studying her compad. "Good morning. Did you sleep well?"

  Clearly Harriet was a morning person. Legroeder was not. And he had not slept well; he'd awoken constantly during the night. "Couldn't have been better. Have you already gotten started?"

  "I checked the Guild library files on Impris, and as you said, there's not much. So I thought I'd try the main files at the public library. I must say, they don't have a lot, either." Harriet fiddled with the compad screen. "Just a summary about the similarity of legend between Impris and the old stories of the Flying Dutchman. Judging from this, you wouldn't think that anyone took it seriously."

  "Even here in its home port? You'd think they'd have more information here than anywhere in the galaxy." Legroeder pulled out a chair to sit, and looked gratefully at Vegas, who had just appeared with a tray bearing a thermal coffee pot and cup.

  "Well, it's been a hundred and twenty-four years since she was lost, during the war. And after the war, a lot of the early records disappeared." Harriet turned the compad around. "Here, take a look."

  Legroeder poured a cup of coffee and stirred in some yellow-tinged cream. He sipped it as he read the entry.

  Impris. Interstellar passenger liner operating out of Faber Eridani during the years of the War of a Thousand Suns. Impris reportedly disappeared during a routine flight in the final year of the war. No official explanation was ever provided for the ship's loss; however, unofficial and highly controversial reports attributed the loss to surprise hostile actions on the part of the Narseil, theretofore considered allies of the Centrist human worlds. (For a historical overview, see NARSEIL: PARTNERSHIP WITH CENTRIST WORLDS: BREAKDOWN IN RELATIONS.)

  Legroeder grunted. He hadn't associated the Narseil with Impris. The amphibious Narseil were relatively rare—and not always welcome—guests in human society. But their riggers were among the best in the known galaxy, and the Narseil RiggingInstitute was without peer in the study of rigging science and technology. Legroeder had always suspected that the Narseil could teach the human rigging community a thing or two, if they were given a chance. He didn't know much about the historical relationship of the human and Narseil worlds—history had never been his strong suit—but he couldn't imagine why the Narseil would have destroyed Impris.

  He drank more coffee and read on.

  Accurate information concerning Impris disappeared, along with a host of other records, during post-war turmoil on Impris's homeworld of Faber Eridani. She might well have been forgotten by history were it not for the lasting political repercussions against the Narseil, which among other consequences, served to delay continued exploration of deeper space (see also GALACTIC EXPLORATION: COLLABORATIVE EFFORTS: LOSS OF WILL IN THE POST-WAR ERA). In addition, curious legends arose in the rigging community during the following decades, referring to Impris as "the Flying Dutchman of the Spacelanes"—a ship and crew doomed to sail the Flux forever, haunted and immortal.

  No objective evidence has ever been found to support these legends. Nevertheless, myth has it that the ship, in the more than one hundred years since her loss, has reappeared on numerous occasions to riggers during routine passages through the Flux. Typical reports have the Ghost Rigger sighted only fleetingly, sometimes transmitting a distress call, but never responding to any attempts at contact. Variations on the legend attribute the loss of other ships to unexplained, deadly encounters with Impris; but such claims similarly lack substantiation.

  Though the legends are considered meaningless for purposes of rigger navigation, a significant body of folklore has grown up over the years regarding not only Impris but also other ships of similar reputation, notably Devonhol and Totauri. (See PURPORTED GHOST SHIPS: SPACE and FLYING DUTCHMAN LEGEND: LITERATURE AND HOLO: FACT VS FICTION.)

  Legroeder swiveled the compad back to Harriet. "This doesn't help much."

  Harriet shook her head. "I said this was just a beginning, remember?" She buttered a scone from a tray Vegas had set between them. "Have something to eat, and then we'll go down and see what we can find."

  "Go down?" Legroeder asked. "What's the point?"

  Harriet smiled and took a bite of her scone.

  * * *

  The Elmira Public Library was a tall-towered affair, originally designed as a mayoral office building and later converted to its more prosaic (in some views) role as library. As they walked from the hoverbus, Harriet told Legroeder that she loved the place, not for its auto-retrieval capabilities (she could do just as well from home or from a coffee bar) but for its collection of hard-copy books. Paper, mylar, parchment... she didn't care what they were printed on. "I like the permanence, the texture,
the smell of old books—"

  "The dust, the dust-mites—"

  "Heavens, don't be so dreary." Harriet led the way up the steps and into the central hall of the library. "My dear Legroeder, sometimes you find information in hard-copy, or even from people, that you just don't find on the net."

  Legroeder grunted.

  "Well, you may turn out to be right. We'll see." She stepped forward briskly. They walked through the main reading room, past a small gallery of pastels on paper—aboriginal artwork. They came to a solid wood door at the back of the reading room, which let them into a hallway lined with offices and special study spaces. Harriet knocked on the door of the third room on the right. A Fabri aborigine female looked up from the desk. To Legroeder's eye, she looked identical to Vegas.

  "Quoya, Mrs. Mahoney," the woman said, with a musical chuckle. "Nice to see you."

  "Good morning, Adaria," said Harriet. "I wonder if you could help us with a problem today."

  "Ha, but I always tr-r-ry, do I not? What will it be today? Exotic cuisines frrom the Gar-r-rssen mountains? Animals from the cirrrcuses of the known galaxy? Architectural drawings from Old Earth?"

  Harriet smiled. "Not today, thank you. My friend Legroeder and I are looking for some old information that has passed out of circulation, and I thought perhaps if we searched some of the original paper records, we might find something."

  "Of course," chuckled Adaria, with a toothless smile; the Fabri had a pair of curved plates, not teeth, in their mouths. "What can I help you find?"

  "Well... we were hoping you might have some in-depth information on Impris, the legendary starship. Faber Eridani was its home port, you know. But I'm having trouble coming up with much."

  Adaria rocked back slightly. "Ffff. There was nothing in the main records?"