Kumadai Run

by Jaleta Clegg

  Clark was still in his chair. He swiveled it around and gave me a look.

  “It’s my ship; I don’t see why I have to leave it,” I said.

  “I think they just want to talk to us, not arrest you,” Clark said.

  “Then they can talk to me here.”

  “I think they are,” Hovart said.

  I glanced at the viewscreen. A full delegation headed for the ship. The uniforms I saw had enough gold and decorations to ground any ship smaller than a battlecruiser.

  “I’m guessing that’s Commander Nyles,” Clark said, pointing at the man in the front of the procession. A gust of wind tugged his hat free and rolled it along the ground. The weather on Parrus was windy and wet, typical spring, they’d said over the com. One of his aides went running after his hat. He kept coming.

  “Can we shut the hatch? Tell him we’re contagious with something,” I said.

  “Hey, Dace,” Darus’ voice came to us from near the hatch. “You got company.”

  I rubbed a hand through my grimy, matted hair and wanted a shower. Anything to avoid facing Commander Nyles.

  “She’s got an authority phobia,” Clark said to Hovart.

  “Shut up, Clark,” I said automatically.

  Commander Hovart went out to meet Commander Nyles. I wondered frantically who outranked who. Or was that whom? Anything to avoid the questions I knew Nyles was going to ask.

  Clark pulled me up by my arm. “You’ve got to face it sometime, Dace. This time at least, you’re the hero.”

  “I don’t want to be,” I muttered.

  “Too bad.” He pushed me out of the cockpit.

  “Captain Dace,” Commander Nyles greeted me. “An interesting pleasure, I must say. I’ve heard the wildest stories. Would you like to give me your version?”

  “Can I shower first? It’s been days.”

  “We have plenty of space in the barracks, and medical services, if you need them.”

  “I’d rather stay here. There’s nothing wrong with the ship. Now that we’re back under specs for crew.”

  “Tomorrow morning, then? Say ten, local time, in my office?”

  “That would be fine.”

  “Then we’ll leave you and your crew. Please let my aide know if there is anything you need.” He paused, watching me. “You’ve done us a tremendous service, whether you realize it or not. We owe you a debt, captain. The Patrol is at your service.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. I stared, probably looking stupid, while Commander Nyles left, with his entourage and Commander Hovart.

  Darus came back through the hatch after they left. “You want me to spy on them for you?”

  “I doubt it would do any good,” I said, sinking down onto the cushioned bench behind the cockpit. I stood back up quickly. The smell was more noticeable since the filters could function again.

  “I’ll do it anyway. I’ll keep in touch,” he added, watching me. He looked like a child hoping for candy but expecting a beating.

  “Come see me before you leave,” I said. “Or before I do. Thank you, Darus.”

  “Dace, you’re everything I could have wanted. And more.” He stuck out his hand, awkward and uncertain. I took it just as uncertainly. He looked at our hands, mouth twisted in a wry smile. And then he pulled me into a hug. “Take care of yourself, Dace.”

  He left before I found the words to reply.

  That left me, Jasyn, and Clark standing around looking at each other. The hatch was still open. The fresh air blowing in smelled of rain.

  “Well,” Jasyn said. “This place needs cleaned.”

  “Aired out, definitely,” Clark agreed.

  “I should call the Guild,” I said. “But not until I smell better.”

  I saw the way Clark and Jasyn were looking at each other. I left them in the lounge and shut myself in my cabin.

  The smell was overpowering. I stripped the bunks and tossed the blankets in a pile near the door. I added my dirty clothes to the blankets and took a long shower. I ran it through ten cycles, wasting water and not caring. It didn’t matter. The whole system needed dumped and refilled.

  I got out when I finally felt clean. My skin was pink and wrinkled. But it smelled a lot better. I pulled on clean clothes, a loose robe of dark red that Jasyn had talked me into buying some time back. Then I got busy doing laundry and scrubbing the ship. I started in my cabin.

  They were gone from the lounge when I came out. The door to their cabin was shut and locked. I gave them all the privacy I could. I stood in the open hatch, watching rain fall as more of the ships from the planet landed. I wondered if any of them had trouble, or if they’d all flown as well as my ship had. I’d have to ask Commander Nyles in the morning.

  Which sent me back to the cockpit to check on local times. It was late afternoon, local time. I set an alarm for the next morning. Then I started cleaning the lounge and the galley. Our stores were almost completely gone. I rearranged the cabinets, putting things back where Jasyn liked to keep them. I ate the last freeze dried dinner that wasn’t chicken noodle. It was almost as bad. But it was better than facing the very helpful Patrol aide that Commander Nyles had assigned to take care of us.

  I put another armful of bedding through the cleaner. I made my bunk with clean blankets. I wasn’t tired, so I kept cleaning. I aired out the cushions on the bench, moving them off and spraying them with a deodorizer I’d found in the galley. I cleaned the extra cabins, piling their blankets next to the cleaner to wait their turn.

  I checked through all the storage bins, making notes of what we needed to replace. I did an inventory check on what was left of our cargo. The items I’d stored in the small cargo bay, mostly speculation items we were holding until the situation seemed right, were in good shape. The medical equipment in the larger cargo bays was mostly junk. The crates that had survived the crash had been opened and searched. All of the seals were broken. Definite breach of contract, I thought bleakly. The Guild would have every right to revoke my membership. And I’d have to pay for the damaged and lost cargo. It would push us back deep into the red. I didn’t think Commander Nyles could do much about it. The Guild kept an enormous distance from the Patrol. The Patrol had no influence whatever with the Guild. And extenuating circumstances wouldn’t forgive a cargo as badly mishandled as this one.

  I gave up on the cargo, we could clean it out later, and went back to the lounge. It smelled a lot better. I changed the cleaner again, putting the clean blankets away. I went to the engine room next. There wasn’t anything I needed to do there. The engineers had left it in better shape than I had. They’d polished everything, recalibrated anything that could be, and reset all the specs to better than standard. I guessed they missed working on ships. I puttered around the engine anyway. I'd missed it, too.

  Jasyn and Clark were still locked in their cabin when I came back up sometime later. I yawned as I looked out the hatch at the night beyond.

  Rain fell, a slow dripping that left the air clean and the ground slick with rainbows. The lights of the port, now far to my right where still more ships landed, glittered in the drizzle. Raindrops looked like a golden curtain around them. I left the hatch open and went to bed.

  Chapter 34

  Commander Nyles’s office was only slightly pompous, much like the man himself. Jasyn and Clark had already left when the alarm woke me. I’d found an escort waiting for me outside the ship. They’d brought me here, to this office, with the thick carpet starting to show wear in the middle and paint that was chipped, but only in the corners where it didn’t show much. The whole room had a comfortable kind of luxury. The color scheme was what made it feel pompous. The walls were pale cream with deep burgundy trim and fretwork stenciled near the top. The carpet was burgundy on burgundy with hints of tarnished gold. The furniture was heavy wood, a local product that exuded an aura of age and dignity. I was looking everywhere except at Commander Nyles. I didn’t want to think about the planet. I didn’t want to answer his question
s. I didn’t want to know what suspicions Hovart had planted.

  I wandered across the room to look out the huge windows. They overlooked what could generously be called a garden. It consisted of a wide plaza with several pots of dead plants and some healthy looking weeds. The night’s rain had left puddles.

  Commander Nyles was busy with a call, as he had been when I first arrived. He looked tired, not surprising since he’d probably been up all night. The landing field where the Phoenix sat looked like a junkyard. Most of the ships showed damage of one sort or another. I’d heard that four were still missing. The thunder of Patrol ships launching had woken me briefly in the middle of the night. I hoped those four ships were still coming. Three others had limped in with major damage from the ion storm. There hadn’t been casualties. I prayed that there wouldn’t be any.

  “Captain Dace, sorry to keep you waiting,” Commander Nyles said graciously. He waved at the chairs pulled up to his desk. “Have a seat. Do you need anything? A drink?”

  I shook my head and sat in one of the chairs.

  Commander Nyles leaned back in his chair and studied me. “I heard some interesting things last night. Your name kept coming up.”

  “And?”

  “So tell me what happened.” He swiveled his chair, waiting.

  “Aren’t you recording this? Don’t you want psych techs to verify it?”

  “Do I need them?” He looked surprised.

  “Am I being charged with anything?”

  “Should I file charges against you?”

  “Standard Patrol procedure.”

  He frowned, spinning a stylus between his fingers. “Do you want to explain that remark?” His tone was definitely less friendly than it had been.

  “I take it you haven’t looked at my file yet, or talked to Commander Hovart.”

  The stylus kept twirling between his fingers.

  “I just thought I’d get that out of the way first,” I said.

  “Now you’ve made me curious.” Commander Nyles set the stylus down then tapped on his desk. A screen lit up. He tapped more, calling up information.

  I could have kicked myself. Why couldn’t I have just cooperated and played dumb? Because it wouldn’t have worked and I would have found myself in deeper trouble. I still felt stupid.

  “A most interesting file, yes,” Commander Nyles said after a few minutes. “What charges should I file? If I wanted to, I have grounds for trespassing, tampering with Patrol property, confiscation of said property, disregard of a Patrol officer’s orders in a dangerous situation, unauthorized first contact although that point is probably moot, endangerment of personnel, reckless overloading of your ship, and half a dozen others. And those are just the ones the Patrol can level. I won’t speak for the Guild but I know of several violations there as well.” He eyed me. “If I wanted to,” he repeated, emphasis on the if.

  “So what do you want?”

  “A complete account, a true one, because every single one of the charges can be excused without argument in light of what you managed to accomplish.”

  I’d left yet another planet in flames, figuratively speaking. I seemed to drag chaos with me wherever I went. I didn’t say that out loud.

  “Well? I am recording this interview, by the way.” He cracked a smile. Maybe things weren’t going to be that bad. Maybe I wasn’t going to end up behind bars. And maybe sand cats would learn to like water.

  I gave up and started talking.

  I told him about the emergency beacon and our decision to investigate. I told him about crashing on the planet, about seeing Jasyn and Clark captured. I told him honestly about breaking into the ships and helping myself. I explained why. I didn’t tell him about stealing Darus’ ring and the picture of my mother. That was personal. I didn't think Darus was going to press charges against me for it, either.

  I told him what I’d seen and guessed about the golden men. I told him the whole messy escape plan and everywhere it went wrong. I told him about getting lost in the gigantic colony ship. I told him how brave and wonderful everyone around me had been. I tried to convince him that I’d had little to do with the actual escape. He wasn’t buying that part of the story.

  “I’d give you a commendation,” he said when I finished, “except you don’t work for the Patrol. Not officially. So instead, let me offer you our thanks, officially, from the Patrol, for what you did.” He stood and extended his hand. I stood and let him shake mine. “You’re free to go. Your ship can stay docked on the Patrol field as long as you need. Without charge,” he added with a grin.

  “Thank you, I think” It was not what I’d expected.

  “Let me know if we can be of service to you,” he added. His desk com beeped. He sat back down and answered it.

  I was dismissed. I still couldn’t quite believe I’d gotten off so easy. I left his office before he could change his mind.

  Outside the building the sun was shining and the air was soft and warm. A playful breeze rippled the surface of puddles that were rapidly shrinking. The Patrol base was busy. People moved everywhere. It almost had a festival air. Most of them waved to me as I walked by.

  I crossed the wide plaza in front of the main building to the gates that separated the Patrol base from the rest of the port city. A big crowd gathered at the gates. I didn’t think anything about it until I got close to the gates. The officer on duty saluted me.

  “There she is,” someone in the crowd shouted. “That’s her!”

  They surged forward, cameras waving. I stepped back in surprise. I looked behind me to see who they were looking at. There wasn’t anyone there. They were taking pictures of me. I stared at them in shock.

  “Captain Dace,” one man shouted as he elbowed his way forward. “Tell us about the alien giants. Is it true they have four eyes?”

  “Is their technology more advanced than ours?” A woman in a blue dress clawed her way to the front.

  “Do they have a highly evolved ray gun?”

  “What are their ships like?”

  “How many of them are there?”

  “When is the invasion?”

  The questions peppered me. I wasn’t prepared. I turned away, almost running to escape.

  One of the Patrol guards took pity on me. He hurried up to me. “Would you like an escort back to your ship?”

  I heard the other guard telling the crowd that they would arrange some kind of interview in a day or two. I never thought it would involve me.

  “Why are they waiting?” I asked, shooting a glance at the mob milling around the gates. “Why me?”

  “It’s big news,” the Patrol officer said, looking surprised that I didn’t understand. “Ships landing since yesterday, all of them listed as missing. And people everyone thought dead suddenly coming back.”

  “But why me?”

  “You’re the one who did it.”

  “No, I didn’t. I bungled it up. Everyone else made it happen.”

  “I doubt that, captain. Will you need an escort farther?” We were out of sight of the gates.

  “No, I’ll be fine now. Unless the Patrol are going to start mobbing me.”

  “We have too much dignity for that.” He saluted me before returning to his post.

  I went back to the Phoenix, still shaken by the encounter with the press. I had a lot of things to do. I needed to deal with what was left of my cargo, which meant I had to call the Guild offices and plead extenuating circumstances.

  The Guild secretary who answered my call refused to forward it. “You must be present, in person, to file such claims,” she told me in a prickly voice. “And I can’t release that information over public lines. You must come in person to review your record.”

  “I can’t come right now. There’s a media mob ready to eat me alive.”

  The look she gave me said it was most definitely my problem, not hers. She broke the connection.

  I called Durnago Medical Services next. They were the ones expecting my ruined cargo. I
was passed up the line, from secretary to secretary, until I finally connected with the purchasing manager.

  “Ah, the Phoenix Rising,” he said as soon as he saw my shipsuit. I had routed the call to the viewscreen as a courtesy. His face loomed over me. “You’re a month late.”

  “That’s why I called.”

  He pursed his lips. “Don’t give me your excuses, I watch the news. You’re still a month late. Fees and penalties will apply. When can we expect delivery?”

  “That’s a bit of a problem.” He wasn’t going to like what I had to tell him. “Most of the cargo was damaged and is undeliverable.”

  He narrowed his eyes. I wondered if he had snake genes somewhere in his ancestry.

  “Clause forty three, paragraph seven, sub heading five,” he said. “You pay for cargo lost or damaged in shipment, full replacement value, as well as a handling fee, and you refund the entire advance payment. What of the rest of the cargo?”

  “It was opened, to check for damage.” I wasn’t about to admit that it was opened to raid it for supplies.

  “If seals are broken on the crates, the cargo is unacceptable. We refuse shipment of all goods. You will receive a bill from us, for the full value of the cargo, all fines and fees, and a return of your advance, complete with interest. I will also be filing charges against you with the Guild. Gross mishandling of cargo, breach of contract—”

  “Wait just one minute. I have an explanation.”

  “Tell it to the media,” he said crisply. Then cut me off.

  I fumed in my chair. I made sure the switch was off before I launched into a detailed and highly imaginative description of his ancestry. It included a lot of gruesome creatures like snakes and slime molds and lawyers.

  “Just what is going on, Dace?” Jasyn asked from behind me.

  I jumped, I hadn’t heard her come in to the cockpit.

  “Where did you go?” It came out an accusation. “I’m sorry. I was trying to take care of what’s left of our cargo.”

  “Didn’t go well, I assume,” she said. “The Patrol wanted to ask us some questions. It took forever.”