Drifter's Run

by William C. Dietz

  Cap nodded his agreement.

  "Once that's accomplished," Willer continued, "my ship will take the lead, with Junk pushing from behind. Questions?"

  "Yeah," Lando answered. "Who's in charge of linking the barges together?"

  Light reflected off Willer's teeth. "I'll ask Captain Sorenson to handle that little chore."

  Cap swallowed but kept his voice steady. "I'll be glad to."

  "Excellent," Willer replied. "Let me know when you're in position." And with that the screen faded to black.

  Cap stood and turned to go. Lando touched his arm.

  "Don't do it, Cap. The bastard's up to something."

  Sorenson pulled his arm away. "Give it a rest, Lando. You heard him. We have a job to do. If we do our part he'll do his. I'll call you from the lock." And with that he walked away.

  Lando turned back to his screens. Chances were the other man was right. Chances were everything was fine. And chances were that pigs could fly.

  Dee waited five long minutes and heaved a sigh of relief. Maybe the landing was quieter than she thought, or maybe no one had heard, but whatever the case it seemed she was in the clear. Checking to make sure that the sled was securely clamped to the ship's hull, Dee made a place for herself among the extra 02 tanks, and settled down to wait. The suit hummed around her.

  "Okay, Lando, I'm on barge one."

  Lando could just barely see Cap on high mag. He was standing on what momentarily passed for the top surface of barge one, right next to one of the huge docking clamps.

  "That's a rog, Cap. I have you on visual. Junk to Hercules. Captain Sorenson is in place."

  "We copy," Willer's voice came back. "Lock some beams on barge two. Your job is to hold it steady while we push barge one into place."

  Lando was soon lost in the task at hand. First there was the need to place Junk in the proper position. That required precise use of the big side thrusters and smaller steering jets.

  Once the ship was in place the tractor and pressor beams came into play. Lando pushed them out, made contact, and locked on. He was fine-tuning them when Cap's voice came over the comset.

  "Lando, watch out! Barge one's coming your way!"

  Lando looked up at the starboard vid screen and was horrified. Barge one had come adrift somehow and was moving toward him. It already filled the screen and would hit sometime within the next sixty seconds. The barge was huge, and even though it didn't have much weight, it still packed a lot of inertia. It could crush the tug and keep right on going.

  Lando's fingers darted here and there. Beams were severed, thrusters were fired, and Junk lurched upward. The ship shuddered and metal groaned as hulls made momentary contact. Then the barge was gone and they were clear.

  Now that he had a moment to think, Lando understood Willer's plan. With the ships working so close together the cyborg knew Lando would defeat the collision alarms, knew he'd be lost in the task before him, and thought the plan would work.

  So with Cap riding on top, the cyborg had pushed barge one toward Junk, and sat back to watch. If things went well, Cap would not only see the destruction, he'd be part of it, and still survive to help find the Star of Empire.

  Thank Sol that Cap had been sober and paying attention. The plan had come close to working.

  The com screen lit up. It was Willer. His face bore an expression of mock concern. "Nice work, Lando. Sorry about that. One of my people lost control for a moment. No harm done I hope?"

  Lando grabbed the armrests to keep his hands from shaking. Cap tried to say something on the suit-to-suit freq but the pilot cut him off.

  "Cut the crap, Willer. You tried and failed. Now you pay."

  "Oh, really?" Willer sneered. "And what will you do? Shoot at us with one of your popguns? The Hercules can match you weapon for weapon and then some."

  "True as far as it goes," Lando answered tightly. "But we've got a little surprise for you. Della, give him a demo."

  This was the signal Dee had been waiting for. A chance to even the score if only a little. She brought the blast rifle up to her shoulder. A large vid cam filled the sights. She pressed the FIRE button and watched the lance of bright blue energy slice through the camera's flat-black housing.

  Two things happened in quick succession. The screen that provided Willer with coverage of the tug's port side went black, and as it did, he activated the ship's protective force field.

  Lando laughed. "Nice try, chrome dome, but you've got a flea on your mangy hide, and all the force fields in the world won't help you."

  Della dialed the rifle to wide beam and cooked a VHF antenna. It turned cherry-red and drooped like an overcooked noodle.

  A buzzer went off and a light flashed red on Willer's control console. He swore a blue streak. Lando had someone on the hull! Someone inside the force field and therefore too close to hit with the tug's armament. Not only that, they were systematically blinding his ship!

  Another vid screen dumped to black and Willer smashed his metal hand down and through the surface of the control board.

  Sparks flew, something started to burn, and smoke poured into the control room.

  Willer's pilot, a somewhat slovenly looking woman with a dope stick dangling from her lower lip, shook her head, but kept her own counsel. She'd never seen the borg this angry before.

  "You'll pay for this, Lando! I'll kill her and come for you!"

  Lando nodded sympathetically. "Good thinking, space head. Go ahead and suit-up. Della would like that. She's a bounty hunter by profession. You know, the one you shot in the chest, and she wants you real bad. Isn't that right, Della?"

  Della answered by cooking another vid cam.

  Willer screamed his rage and ordered his crew into their suits. "Get out there! Kill her! Do it now!"

  No one answered. Willer turned to his pilot and found she wasn't there. The crew had no intention of going one on one with a bounty hunter, especially when she could wait right outside the lock and nail them as they left.

  This made the cyborg even more furious. He went on a rampage smashing anything that got in his way and adding to the already extensive damage.

  And finally, when fatigue had overcome his rage, Willer found that his ship was blind. Dee had systematically located and destroyed every vid cam, every sensor, and every antenna she could find, leaving nothing but one short-range ship-to-ship com link. The humiliation was almost more than the cyborg could bear. It took him the better part of an hour to make contact.

  "You made your point, Lando. This round goes to you. But I'll find you, and when I do, you're dead!"

  "I love you too," Lando said easily. "Now listen up. We're going to finish the tow. Kill your force field, place your control systems on standby, and slave your NAVCOMP to ours. We'll take it from there."

  And they did. It took longer, and was damned awkward at times, but they did it. With Junk performing all the close-quarters maneuvering, and Hercules providing brute strength, the cylinders were linked and towed into orbit around Pylax.

  In order to keep Willer and his crew from making repairs Dee was forced to ride the ship's hull for most of the trip. It was nerve-wracking sleepless duty, and she was completely exhausted by the time the trip was over, but it was worth it.

  Not only had Dee achieved some measure of revenge, she had also proved her worth as a member of Junk's crew, and earned Lando's respect on top of that. Something the bounty hunter didn't even know she wanted until she had it.

  By unspoken agreement Cap and Lando never discussed why Dee had taken up a position on the other ship's hull or who was right about Willer.

  Both shared a concern that Willer might file charges against them, charges they could refute using tapes of what had transpired, but charges that would immobilize Junk for weeks or even months.

  Maybe Willer knew he couldn't win a legal battle, or maybe he preferred to have his revenge in other more direct ways, but whatever the reason charges were never filed.

  And they never d
id learn what sort of story Willer concocted for his company. But it didn't matter. What mattered was that the company paid them off, Junk was momentarily in the black, and her crew had a reason to party. With that in mind they were gathered on the bridge.

  Cap held up his glass of fruit juice. Melissa did likewise, as did Lando and Dee, while Cy prepared to release a tiny amount of alcohol into the nutrient solution around his brain. "To a motley crew, a ship named Junk, and the luck that holds them all together!"

  They looked at each other, laughed, and repeated in unison: "To a motley crew, a ship named Junk, and the luck that holds them all together!"

  14

  The Princess Claudia was one of the largest, most luxurious liners in existence. Rivaled only by her sister ship, the Prince Alexander, she had one and only one purpose: to transport the empire's wealthiest passengers from one place to another in absolute luxury. And she was equipped to do the job.

  The Claudia's huge drives could take her from one end of the empire to the other at incredible speed. She had backup systems for her backup systems, an empire-class galley, hundreds of luxurious staterooms, and the best crew money could buy.

  It was not surprising therefore that her main banquet room was both large and opulent. The room was circular in shape, which echoed the ship's globular design, and allowed for a unique seating arrangement.

  The tables were arranged in a series of concentric rings, with the less affluent passengers on the outside, and the downright rich toward the center. There were fifty tables in all, each seated eight bejeweled guests, and was served by two sentient waiters. The centermost table, the one located directly under the enormous chandelier of pink Edon rock crystal, belonged to Claudia's commanding officer.

  Captain Naomi Neubeck pushed herself away from the linen-covered table. She'd done it again, eaten way more than she should've, and Bones would give her hell. With her annual physical just two months away Neubeck needed to drop some weight but had put it off. Even in the low shipboard gravity she could feel the fat weighing her down. She'd work on it tomorrow.

  Neubeck smiled at the men and women who lined her table. All had the rosy glow that comes with a mega-credit income, a twelve-course dinner, and some extremely good wine.

  "Thank you for joining my table. Please enjoy the rest of the cruise and let me know if there's anything we can do to make the trip more pleasant."

  Neubeck waved off the chorus of "thank you's," and headed for her day cabin. It was a comfortable ritual and rarely varied.

  Have dinner with some of her rich passengers, make a final entry in her log, and call the bridge. Utter some sympathetic noises as Second Officer Rubashkin slandered the engineering staff, check the ship's position, and leave some orders for the next watch. Then it was down the hall to her sleeping cabin for a full nine hours of sleep. She couldn't wait.

  Hu was a small man, with straight black hair and intelligent brown eyes. He knew Rubashkin was on duty, knew the second officer hated engineering, and knew how the conversation would go.

  "Bridge… Rubashkin speaking."

  "This is Hu. We have a problem."

  "That's for sure. Tell me something I didn't already know."

  Hu bit his lower lip and tried to keep his temper. "Our computer shows abnormal wear on field projector three. It's going to fail sometime during the next four or five hours. We can replace it now or wait for the projector to go belly up."

  Rubashkin was silent while he thought it over. At the moment they were looping around Durna preparatory to entering hyper-space on the other side. The engineers would be forced to shut down the ship's protective force field in order to replace projector three.

  Running the force field full-time sucked up a lot of energy, and added to operating expense, but provided an extra margin of safety in the unlikely event of a pirate attack or collision. Just one of the many things that put the Empire Line a cut above all the rest.

  Still, the way Hu explained the situation, there was no way to win. Lose the field now, or lose it later. Not much of a choice with a hyperspace jump coming up and an irritable captain asleep below. The whole crew would celebrate when Neubeck passed her physical.

  For one brief moment Rubashkin considered waking Neubeck to ask her opinion but quickly put the thought aside. No, she wouldn't appreciate being woken up, plus she'd give him the promotion lecture.

  "How will you make first officer if you pass the buck? Show some backbone, Rubashkin… make a decision."

  He hated that lecture almost as much as the one Bones gave on sexual hygiene.

  "Go ahead and take the field down," Rubashkin said. "But work fast… otherwise I'll have your ass for breakfast!"

  "Yes, sir," Hu replied sweetly, "and I hope you'll feel free to kiss it in the meantime." The engineer broke the connection before Rubashkin could reply.

  The meteor was round but not perfectly so. It consisted of iron, nickel, and traces of other minerals. The meteor had been traveling around Durna for millions of years. During its lifetime planets had hardened, ecosystems had been born, and entire species had been plunged into extinction. It neither knew nor cared.

  The odds against the meteor and the Princess Claudia trying to occupy the same space at the same time were unbelievably huge. And the odds of this happening during the brief period in which the liner's force field was down and the ship was in close proximity to the system's sun were even larger, but that's what happened.

  The meteor was traveling at about twenty-six miles per second when it hit the Princess Claudia and sliced through the liner's durasteel hull like a knife through warm butter.

  As luck would have it, the meteor followed the line of the ship's axis, holing both in-line drives and seventeen previously airtight compartments in the process.

  Fifty-six men, women, and children died instantly. Twelve of them were engineers and one of those was Hu. During the next few hours another fourteen would die of wounds suffered during those few seconds.

  The effect was almost instantaneous. Acting on the information provided by thousands of on-board sensors the ship's computer closed airtight doors, shunted all remaining power to essential systems, and set off a cacophony of alarms. One of these was right next to Neubeck's head. She rolled over and stabbed a button.

  "Neubeck here… what's the problem?"

  Second Officer Rubashkin's voice was tight. "We've been holed, Captain, reamed is more like it. damned near the whole length of the ship. Early reports suggest a meteor."

  "It went right through the force field?"

  Rubashkin felt his throat constrict. Poor Hu. He wanted to throw up. "It was my fault, Captain. The number three force field projector was on its way out. I authorized repairs."

  Neubeck was struggling into her uniform. "Don't blame yourself, Andre. I would've made the same decision. Casualties?"

  "Heavy I'm afraid," Rubashkin answered. "Hold one. Tell 'em to seal it off! We'll get a damage control party down there as soon as we can!

  "Sorry, Captain, we've got a fire in the Purser's Office, electrical probably. We'll dump power to that location, pump the air out, and deal with it later."

  Neubeck ran a brush through her hair. "Do you see an immediate need to abandon?"

  Rubashkin paused for a second as if thinking it over. "Nah, it's not that bad. Captain, at least not yet."

  Neubeck let out her breath. "Thank Sol. Good work, Andre. I'm on my way."

  "Authority rests partly on appearance," that's what they teach you at the Imperial Maritime Academy, and it's definitely true.

  Neubeck looked in the mirror. A rather plump middle-aged woman with prematurely gray hair looked back. Where had the extra chin come from? Damn. She'd start the diet tomorrow, but for the moment this body would have to do.

  Neubeck stepped out of the cabin and into chaos. The emergency lights provided just enough illumination to see by, a recorded announcement insisted that passengers stay right where they were, and the air smelled faintly of smoke. Thank
Sol the argrav was still operational. The passengers were frightened enough without floating around in zero G.

  A cadet ran toward her, one of six young men and women in training to become officers, and not a day over sixteen. He held something in his arms and wore a look of wide-eyed desperation. Neubeck grabbed his arm and forced him to stop.

  "Tolan."

  "Yes, ma'am?"

  "Walk, don't run. Remember, the passengers and crew are looking to you for an example. Understand?"

  Tolan stood a little taller. "Yes, ma'am!"

  "Good. Carry on."

  Neubeck forced herself to follow her own advice as she strolled down the corridor.

  "Citizen Tanaka, good to see you. Yes, everything's okay, please return to your stateroom."

  "Lady Carolyn, what a stunning robe! Why don't you step back inside? I wouldn't want it damaged."

  "Technician Quigley… you're supposed to be on C deck standing by the emergency fusion plant, are you not? Kindly go there without further delay. Walk don't run, Quigley… this is an Empire liner after all."

  And so it went until Neubeck reached the bridge. It was huge and, given the ship's considerable status, appropriately impressive. No less than twenty-six large screens covered the curved bulkheads. Some were ominously blank.

  Three of them showed a ragged hole in the Claudia's hull, surprisingly small for all the damage it had done, and leaking a column of whitish vapor.

  Below the screens, control panels glowed, each containing hundreds of green, red, and amber buttons, each controlling and monitoring an important part of the ship.

  You could almost tell where the problems were by the number of people gathered around each station. Hydroponics was unmanned, while a small army was clustered around the engineering station, and damage control was double teamed.

  Neubeck climbed the two steps to her thronelike command chair and dropped in. It sank slightly and adjusted to her form.

  Due to the emergency there were more rather than less people on the bridge. Officers and technicians from all three watches had shown up and were trying to help. It was interesting to see how each reacted to stress.