by John Bowers
Trimmer Plain – Alpha Centaur 2
Officer Kevin Dougherty gripped the control yoke with both hands as his city police car sped down a dirt road several miles south of Trimmer Springs. He was out of his jurisdiction, but that hardly mattered. Kristina had called him on his pocket phone and, though she sounded calm, he was pretty sure she was in trouble.
Dougherty had only been on one date with Kristina, but had been smitten much longer than that. He had noticed her incredible, exquisite beauty the first time he saw her, before her husband was killed. He had secretly admired her from the very first moment, fully aware that he was years too late to court her. Then, just days later, tragedy struck and Nathan Green was killed. Shortly after that, Kristina moved to Vega 3.
A year ago, he was stunned to discover that she had returned. She was still in mourning, so he made no attempt to approach her, but did check her door twice a day, both at work and at home. On those occasions when he spoke to her, she was distant but friendly. Which led him to stop in at her shop several times a week to say hello.
She seemed to appreciate that.
Then, out of the blue, she asked him to dinner.
It might be premature to say that Kevin was in love, but he was certainly interested. Falling in love with Kristina probably wouldn’t be difficult.
But now she needed his help.
His surface car was doing seventy, sliding all over the sandy road. From the time he took her call, it took him nearly fifteen minutes to reach the destination she had given him. A hovercar could make the trip in five or six minutes, but—it was okay. He was here.
It was an abandoned farm in cult territory. The barn was sagging and in poor repair, the house didn’t look much better. Kevin skidded to a stop and leaped out of the car, his gun drawn.
He stopped. The front door opened and Kristina stepped out, also holding a gun. Walking in front of her was a ragged, very pregnant girl who looked like her world had just come to an end. Kristina nudged her forward with the gun, and smiled at Kevin.
“Hi. Thanks for coming.”
“Your call sounded like it was an emergency.”
“It was, but it’s under control now.”
“What happened? Who’s this?”
Kristina shoved the pregnant girl toward him.
“This is Heather. Or April. I’m not sure. She and her boyfriend kidnapped me.”
“Kidnapped!”
Kristina handed him the gun and took a deep, relieved breath.
“Yeah. There’s another one in the house. He’s been wounded.”
“Wounded?”
“I shot him in the foot.”
“Why?”
“He pissed me off.”
Dougherty holstered his weapon and E-cuffed the girl, then placed her in the back of the patrol car. He hurried into the house and found Malcolm sitting in a pool of blood with both hands clutching his left ankle. A towel was wrapped around the foot, but Malcolm was grimacing in pain.
Dougherty activated his collar communicator to call for an ambulance. That done, he checked the injury and determined that it wasn’t life-threatening. Malcolm looked up at him with pain and rage in his eyes.
“You’ve got to arrest that Vegan bitch, man. She shot me in cold blood!”
“Yeah? Why did she do that?”
“Because she’s crazy, man!”
“I don’t suppose it had anything to do with the fact that you kidnapped her?”
“Aw, is that what she told you? That’s just a lie, man!”
“Yeah, I kind of figured out who’s lying here, and it isn’t her. You’re under arrest.”
“What for!”
“I told you. Kidnapping. We can figure out some more charges later.”
“Aw, man, Walker said he wouldn’t do that!”
“Walker? Walker who?”
“That Federation pig, Nick Walker. He said he wouldn’t come after me.”
Dougherty rolled Malcolm onto his side and pulled his arms behind him, then attached a second set of E-cuffs to immobilize him.
“When did you talk to Walker?”
“Just a little while ago, by subspace. He said if I let the girl go, I could walk away.”
Dougherty stood up and stared down at him with an amused glint in his eye.
“Nick Walker can do whatever he wants, but I never made you any such promise. You’re looking at twenty years at least, maybe more.”
“Aw, man, this is just wrong!”
Malcolm pressed his cheek against the floor and began muttering curses. Dougherty turned for the door, then looked back.
“Don’t go anywhere.”
Outside, he saw Kristina standing by the police car. The pregnant girl was crying, but Kristina didn’t seem very sympathetic.
“I called an ambulance for your friend inside. While we wait, tell me what happened.”
Kristina had already told Dougherty that Nick was off-planet searching for Suzanne’s killer. Now she explained about the subspace conference and being used as leverage.
“They were going to kill me if he didn’t let Saracen go.” She closed her eyes and shivered as the gravity of the situation washed over her. “I think they were going to kill me either way.”
“Why didn’t they?”
“I think Nick scared the shit out of Malcolm. He promised to kill him if he didn’t let me go. Malcolm was more afraid of Nick than he was of Saracen.”
“So why did you shoot him?”
“Because he deserved it. Kevin, you can arrest me if you want to, but he’s part of the crowd that murdered my mother, so I think I had one shot coming.” She pinned him with a direct gaze. “I took it, and I’m not sorry.”
Dougherty nodded slowly. He stood in thought for a moment.
“I tell you what—“
“I’m not going to lie. I was in no immediate danger when I shot him. But I was mad as hell, and I still am. If I have to face charges for that, then I don’t care.”
“I was going to say…this is a U.F. Marshal matter. We won’t volunteer anything unless they ask. In view of what happened to your mother, I have a feeling that Mr. Fraites in Lucaston won’t be inclined to file charges against you.”
Kristina stood there a moment, just breathing. She seemed to relax, and smiled at him.
“Thanks for coming to get me, Kevin. I had a feeling I could count on you.”
He nodded.
“Always. Always and forever.”
Lago District – Tau Ceti 4
In spite of the warning whistle, it was clear that no one had time to move the police car off the track, and anyone who tried would probably get shot by the rifleman in the southeast tower. Nick watched in dismay as, with a grinding crash and rending of metal, the locomotive plowed into the rear of the car and spun it off the tracks. Sparks flew. As fossil fuel spilled from a ruptured gas tank, he saw flame. The people hiding behind the car had scattered, and barely in time—the gas tank exploded in a flash and flaming fuel spread in every direction.
The locomotive kept going.
Nick’s heart hammered in his throat as several things ran through his mind at once:
He had left Trevor E-cuffed in the passenger coach;
The passenger coach was no longer attached to the locomotive, so Trevor was safe;
Though he couldn’t recognize him, only one person was visible in the loco cab;
Saracen was trying to get away, so he must be driving the train himself.
Nick took aim.
His first two shots went into the oil car. If he wasn’t able to stop Saracen here, at least he wouldn’t get far without fuel for his boiler. He saw thick black liquid spray from two punctures in the oil car; the train was still moving, now only a hundred yards from the highway.
Now, for the first time, he saw a third police car parked across the access road leading from the highway to the castle. He couldn’t make out any detail, but it looked as if someone was crouched behind the hood of the car. Nick k
new what was likely to happen if he fired at the locomotive, and realized he was out of time. He had to do it n—
WHANG!!
Stone chips stung his cheek as a bullet ricocheted off the ledge just inches from his face. He turned and saw the rifleman in the other tower aiming at him. He ducked just as a second bullet split the air an inch above his head. He stayed down for a few seconds, waiting for a third bullet, but it didn’t come. He jacked another round into the rifle and moved a few feet to his right, as close to the support pillar as he could get, and raised his head.
The gunman was looking for him, but in the rain and gloom, didn’t locate him right away. Nick aimed and fired in a single swift motion, and saw the gunman fly backward, his rifle spinning over the side of the tower. He had no time to worry whether the man had backup—he leaped to the front of the tower and spotted the locomotive again.
It was fifty yards from the third police car, now hitting twenty knots. The whistle sounded again.
Nick levered the rifle and took aim. He held his breath. The loco was almost end-on to him now, offering only a shot through the rear of the cab. He took it…
He fired at the engineer, but couldn’t tell if he hit him. For just a second all he saw was a billow of steam that flooded the cab, and thought he heard a scream. He prepared to fire again—
The locomotive exploded.
High-pressure steam, driving rain, near-freezing temperatures, and a .32 calibre high-velocity bullet—the locomotive went up like an ammo dump. Flaming oil mushroomed into the air; fragments of red-hot iron flew in every direction. The blast radius wasn’t large, but those near the police cars had to dive for cover to avoid the shrapnel. Nick let his breath out in a gasp, hardly able to believe it was over. Nobody could have survived that, with the steam, the boiling water, the flaming oil…
Nobody.
Then, unbelievably, he witnessed the impossible. Saracen stumbled out of the wrecked loco cab, fell to the ground, and tried to pick himself up. His clothing was in rags, his exposed body as red as a lobster. His mouth looked like a black hole in the front of his face, but if he was screaming, the wind carried it away. Saracen was on his feet again, hands out to his sides, barely moving. For all intents and purposes he was dead, he just didn’t know it. For an instant Nick was tempted to let him roast, to suffer, but whatever slender thread of humanity he still possessed decided it was better to put him out of his misery.
He chambered another round…
…took aim—
The oil car exploded. The gushing black liquid finally made contact with flame, and the car went up like a volcano. Saracen was only six feet from the train when the flaming oil washed over him, and he fell for the final time. Nick lowered the rifle and watched, his entire body throbbing with emotion. Saracen still kicked, twitched, and tried to crawl. But he only managed a few feet before his head finally dropped to the ground and he lay still.
The oil continued to burn.
Chapter 36
Nick hung his head over the edge of the parapet for a moment, watching, making sure that Saracen would never get up again. Icy rain pelted the back of his head, soaked his jacket, ran down his neck—he barely felt it.
He slid to the stone floor and leaned his head back against the parapet wall. He could hardly believe it was over, that Saracen was dead. He had lived with “the Chairman” for more than two years. Of all the fugitives he’d pursued, Saracen was the only one who got away, and had done it with the greatest impunity, the greatest arrogance, the greatest insult. He had killed Suzanne, he had killed Nathan—not in person, but he was the man responsible. And those were only two of the more than three thousand lives for whose destruction he was also responsible.
Kenneth Saracen was possibly the most despicable criminal in recent Federation history, and he had finally met his end.
Burned to death.
Fitting.
Nick laid the rifle down and placed both hands over his face, massaging his eyes, his cheeks, his forehead. He swiped his hair back with both hands, lifted his chin to the elements, and closed his eyes. He should feel something right now, an exaltation, a sense of victory. He should bare his teeth and bellow some kind of celebratory message to the clouds, or the gods, like the warriors in ancient legends.
He couldn’t think of a single thing to bellow.
He didn’t feel anything.
But now he could put Saracen behind him. He could go home to Alpha Centauri, to Kristina, maybe even to his old job.
It was finally over…
…only it wasn’t, not yet. He sat up with a start. He had left Victoria in Saracen’s office, bleeding.
He leapt to his feet, grabbed the rifle, and ran for the circular stairwell. He picked up his hat as he trotted down the stairs in the absolute darkness.
Just as he reached the ground floor, the massive wooden door at the front of the castle burst open. He stopped and dropped into a crouch, a .44 in his hand, but the first person through the door was Hugo Barnes. The second was Connie Ventura.
“Walker! Are you all right?” Barnes actually sounded concerned.
“I’m okay, but call an ambulance. Victoria’s been shot.”
“What? What hap—”
Nick didn’t wait around to explain. Ignoring Barnes, he turned and raced down the long corridor toward Saracen’s office.
It took him nearly two minutes to get there. He had to climb stairs, step over the sprawled corpse of Bodie Buchanan, and try to keep an eye out for any of Saracen’s people who might still be around. He wasn’t positive, but he was pretty sure at least one had survived—the shadowy figure he’d seen in the north tower.
He reached the end of the corridor and dropped down the stairwell to Saracen’s office.
Victoria was still there, slumped against the wall beside the shattered window. Wind and rain gusted through the room. Nick approached quickly but carefully, and looked down at her.
Her eyes were closed, her face as pale as death. Her head was slumped to one side and her pistol now lay on the floor next to her lifeless fingers. The bloody handkerchief lay near her left hand, congealed blood caked her forehead and the front of her blouse. Nick stared at her in horror, a flood of memories smashing through his brain.
“No!” he whispered. “No! No, no, no, no-no-no-no!! Victoria!”
He dropped to his knees in front of her, panic in his heart. Blood pounded in his temples and his breathing became short. He tossed his hat to one side and bent over her, trying to decide what to do, how to help her. He reached for her neck with two fingers, searching for a pulse, but didn’t find one.
“No. Oh, God, please, no!”
He grabbed the hanky off the floor and pressed it to the wound, but far too much blood had already escaped for it to make a difference. He took her head in both hands and lifted her chin, opened an eyelid to check her pupils. They were not fixed or dilated, which gave him hope.
“Victoria! Talk to me, honey. Vic! Vic!”
Her head rolled to the side and her weight shifted. Nick caught her before she fell sideways, stretched her out on her back, and began giving her mouth to mouth. For nearly a minute he continued, until he heard footsteps approaching. He grabbed for his .44 and spun around, but the only other person in the room was Connie Ventura. She hurried forward with concern in her dark eyes. She knelt next to Victoria.
“Is she alive?”
“I don’t know. I can’t wake her! Connie, I can’t wake her!”
Connie put a hand on his shoulder.
“They called for an ambulance. It should be here any second.”
Nick bent over Victoria again and resumed mouth to mouth, but at that moment Victoria’s hand twitched. He hovered over her, searching her face for signs of life. He saw an eyelid flicker, then she tried to cough—but the pain was too great and she groaned instead.
“Oh, thank God! Victoria! Vic! Talk to me, honey! Talk to me!”
Blue eyes fluttered open, unfocused, and her brow cr
eased in a frown.
“Nnnnck…”
“I shouldn’t have left you. Vic, I’m so sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking, I’ll never do it again I swear please forgive me please talk to me say something honey please please please—” He caught his breath. “Please don’t leave me. I can’t lose you too, I can’t, please, please! Vic, I—oh, Jesus!”
He lowered his head and two years of pent-up emotion exploded out of him. He tried to fight it—this was not the time or place—but it flooded up and out, above and beyond his control. His tears streamed freely, his chest felt like it would explode. Hot tears and cold raindrops from his hair fell on Victoria’s face. Connie Ventura pushed him gently to one side and bent over Victoria, rubbing a soft hand over her face, her cheeks, her hair.
“Hang in there just a few more minutes,” she said in a quiet, steady voice. “Help is on the way.”
Victoria’s eyes narrowed as the strange face hovered over her, then flickered back toward Nick. Her left hand twitched, trying to reach in his direction. Connie slid out of the way and pulled Nick close enough that Victoria could touch him.
“Put a sock in it, Walker. She needs you to be strong now.”
Nick felt Victoria’s hand on his wrist, weak fingers trying to grip him. He seized it with both hands and bent to kiss her knuckles. He sucked air to fight back his emotion, wiped his eyes with his forearm, and scrubbed a sleeve across his nose. He blinked tears out of his eyes and bent close to her.
Victoria was staring at him.
“Did you…get him?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I got him. But I should have let him go. You were right, he couldn’t have run very far. It wasn’t right to leave you here like this. I didn’t know you were hit this bad, but that’s no excuse.” He clutched her hand and kissed it again. “Please forgive me. I’ll never leave you again, I swear.”
“Nick…”
She closed her eyes and he felt the faintest attempt to squeeze his hands. She turned her head to the side, as if weary beyond human endurance. Her breath escaped in a long sigh, and Nick’s heart froze as he stared at her. His blood turned to ice and his lungs seized.
“Vic! Vic!”