Drifter's Run

by William C. Dietz

  Dee ached all over. She checked for injuries. There were none as far as she could tell. Neuro-stims were incredibly painful but left no bone or tissue damage. Unless you broke something while thrashing around, that is.

  Dee felt dizzy. It took a while to stand up. Finally she made it. Staggering past the sculptures, past the electro-sculpture, she made it to the door. It slid aside.

  Outside it was bright and sunny. The warmth felt good on Dee's face.

  The tender had been back for an hour now. Cy was puttering around the drive room, Melissa was tucked into bed, and Cap had passed out. It was amazing that he could even walk much less fly the tender.

  There was a tap on the door frame. Lando didn't turn. He continued to stuff clothes into a duffel bag. "Yes?"

  "I wondered where you were."

  Dee's voice was level but he sensed the tension. He knew what she really meant but refused to acknowledge it. How could he? How could he do anything with a price on his head?

  "Just gathering up some odds and ends. It's amazing how much baggage you can collect in a short period of time."

  Dee lounged in his doorway. "Yes, and how easily you can leave it all behind."

  Lando turned. "That's not fair, Della. I don't want to run. But I haven't got much choice. I've got some money now, enough to get a long ways away, far enough to start over."

  Her red hair shimmered as Della shook her head. "It won't work, Pik. I found you, and others will too. There's thousands of bounty hunters out there. How many can you kill before they kill you? Very few will give up a rich bounty for your questionable charms."

  There, it was out in the open, for better or worse. There was a long silence as each searched the other's eyes. It was a turning point, a critical moment in both lives, and each of them knew it.

  Dee had considered telling Lando about Willer, about the neuro-stim, but decided to wait. It was something he needed to know, but not here, not now.

  Now she wanted a decision based on emotions other than anger at what Willer had done to her, and fear of what he might do to Cap and Melissa.

  Lando spoke first. "I wondered if you'd come with me… but didn't dare ask. I don't have much to offer."

  Dee smiled softly. "You have yourself. You're worth money. That's more than most men can say."

  Lando laughed. "All right then, come with me! We'll find something out along the rim, a little freight line maybe, or a farm."

  Dee shook her head. "It won't work, Pik, not until you get the price off your head."

  "So what's the alternative?"

  "Stay aboard, save your money, hire a good lawyer."

  "And in the meantime?"

  "And in the meantime we'll see. Good things take time."

  Lando walked over to the hatch. Dee stepped into his arms.

  "How much time?"

  "As much as it takes."

  "You're beautiful, but frustrating."

  She smiled. "I'm glad you noticed."

  Dee started to say something else but Lando's lips covered hers and the words were forever lost.

  17

  With every sensor on max, and Lando's nerves stretched tight, Junk approached Gate Twenty-one. If he'd learned anything during his first trip to Durna's asteroid belt, Lando had learned that gates were dangerous as hell. First there were the pirates, and then there was Willer, either one of whom could be waiting in ambush.

  Lando was furious over the cyborg's attack on Dee and only her stubborn resistance had kept him from tracking Willer down.

  Dee wanted revenge too, but said it was stupid to attack someone on their ground, and smart to wait for a better opportunity. Lando had reluctantly agreed.

  But forewarned is forearmed and after leaving Pylax, Lando detected a tail. The other vessel was too far away for positive identification but there was little doubt as to the snip's identity. Willer was following them. He knew where Junk was headed and intended to share in anything the tug found.

  Lando responded with a trick learned from his smuggler father. Although hyperspace jumps are normally reserved for long distances, they can be used in-system, and a series of quick hops is almost impossible to follow. And because they are carefully calculated within a volume of known space, they're reasonably safe.

  So Lando set up the NAVCOMP, turned it loose, and tried to keep his lunch down while Junk made a series of stutter jumps. His stomach never had approved of hyperspace jumps and six in a row was about five too many.

  The crew meanwhile was on full alert. Cap had strapped himself into the top weapons turret with Cy to starboard and Dee to port. The addition of Dee to Junk's, crew had strengthened their defensive capabilities considerably.

  Lando checked his sensors one last time. Nothing.

  "See anything?"

  The voice belonged to Cap. The combination of tension and an ugly hangover had coarsened his voice.

  "Nothing so far," Lando answered. "Nothing but a zillion asteroids, any one of which could hide a pirate ship."

  "Or be a pirate ship," Melissa said, remembering their last run-in with the roid pirates.

  "I heard they nailed that bunch some weeks back," Cy put in. "The leader was a Finthian."

  "I hope you're right," Lando said tersely. "'Cause here we go!"

  It was impossible to put on much speed without running the risk of a collision, but Lando crossed his fingers and punched up fifty percent power.

  A few seconds later they were inside the belt and working their way through the maze of slowly tumbling rock. There was no attack. The crew let out a collective sigh of relief.

  Lando tapped some keys and watched Cap's coordinates appear on the nav screen. A roid miner's lie? A way to turn a fast credit? Or Sol's own truth?

  There was, as Cap put it, "only one way to find out."

  It wouldn't be easy. Lando made a face at the screen. In order to reach those coordinates he'd have to pick his way through the worst part of the belt. The part that was only superficially charted, the part where the asteroids were thicker than Ip Mites on a Zerk Monkey's tail, the part where smart people didn't go.

  "Well, that explains why I'm here," Lando mumbled to himself, and began the long torturous process of finding his way through the belt.

  It took the better part of two standard days to reach the correct quadrant and ease their way in toward the point specified by the coordinates. Long hard days of unrelenting concentration, tension, and hard work.

  The asteroids were thick, so thick that most showed signs of multiple collisions, a fact that didn't bode well for their mission. After all, if the asteroids bumped into each other that frequently, how 'bout a ship? Wouldn't it be hit as well? And a single collision would destroy even the largest vessel.

  Cy put the odds of finding the ship at just about zero and Lando agreed. That's why he came a half foot out of his chair when the alarms went off.

  The sensors thought they'd located another ship but that couldn't be! For one thing they were still a half day out from the roid miner's coordinates, and for another the readouts didn't make sense.

  Lando scanned the board. What the hell was going on? The sensors claimed there was metal up ahead, lots of it, and a substantial amount of heat as well. But how could that be?

  "What've you got?" Lando turned to find Cap at his shoulder. The other man had whiskey breath, shiny skin, and unnaturally bright eyes.

  "I'm not sure, Cap. Something that's made of metal and generates lots of heat."

  Cap's face dropped. "Generates heat?" Like Lando, Cap knew that the liner's drives would be stone-cold. That left two possibilities. Some sort of mining rig or a pirate.

  Cap turned away. "I'll man my weapon."

  Lando nodded. "An excellent idea." He punched the intercom. "Battle stations, everybody… there's something strange up ahead. All weapons are armed."

  "That's a roger," Dee answered. "The port blister is on-line and ready to go."

  "Ditto the starboard," Cy answered.

  "Th
e top turret is on-line," Cap added tensely. "Tell us what you see."

  Lando didn't bother to answer. He was too busy sliding around a rather large asteroid. Lando kept it between Junk and the metallic object for as long as he could. But the moment finally came when he couldn't hide any longer and the tug was forced out into the open.

  Lando couldn't believe his eyes! Beyond the asteroid there was an open space, and in the middle of the open space there was a ship! A long, thick ovoid and, as far as Lando could tell, largely undamaged.

  That was strange enough, but the vessel also gave off a greenish glow as if lit from within, and was flooding his sensors with interference.

  Lando touched a button and shunted video to the top weapons turret. "We've got something, Cap. Is that the Star of Empire?"

  There was a moment of silence as Cap studied the video, then a long drawn-out sigh. Lando could almost hear the hope flowing out of him.

  But to Cap's credit he kept his composure. "Nope, I don't know what that is, but it's not the Star. That greenish glow is very strange. Try for a contact."

  Lando turned to the com screen. "Unknown vessel, this is the salvage vessel Junk, do you read me?"

  The response was sudden and completely unexpected. Dee saw it coming, tried to give warning, but couldn't speak the words fast enough. "Watch out, Pik… it launched some sort of…"

  Then Lando saw it for himself. A green blob that raced toward them and hit the ship's hull.

  Much to Lando's surprise the blob passed right through Junk's protective force field without setting off a single alarm. A hallucination? No, it hit Junk with enough force to rock the entire ship and snap his head back.

  Suddenly every one of Lando's screens were filled with snow and his instruments produced impossible readings.

  Parallel lines of blue light stuttered out toward the other ship as Cap fired his weapon. His voice was tinged with panic. "Fire! Fire! Fire!"

  Lando cut power to Cap's weapons turret with the flip of a switch. "Hold it, Cap. This thing's weird, but not necessarily hostile."

  The control room was suddenly full of greenish light. "What the hell?"

  The external vid cams were flickering on and off but Lando could still see enough to understand what was going on. The blob was directly overhead and sliding the length of Junk's hull. As it moved, the greenish light moved with it, and passed through solid durasteel as if it weren't even there. Two seconds later and it was gone.

  "Very interesting," Cy said calmly. "I don't know about the rest of the ship, but at present the drive room is full of greenish light. I have the feeling we're being scanned."

  The engineer's calm appraisal helped Lando understand what his eyes had already seen. "I think Cy's right, and not only that, but did you see those energy beams? They didn't even scratch that ship! It's as if they were neutralized somehow."

  "Or simply absorbed," Cy added calmly. "The green light just disappeared."

  "Look! The bloblike thing is connected to some sort of tether!" The voice was Dee's.

  Lando looked and sure enough, the protoplasm was connected to some sort of a long green tether, which was pulling it toward the ship. He noticed that as the blob moved farther away his instruments began to clear.

  Lando flipped the center bow cam to high mag and scanned the other ship's hull. He gave the others a running narration of what he saw.

  "I'm using high mag. I see a weird hull. There's no surface installations like you'd see on one of our ships. Lots of blobs though, each fastened to the ship with a green tether, and all of 'em green."

  "Still no contact?" Cap inquired, his voice a bit shaky.

  Dee gave a snort of derision. "Still no contact? Come on, Cap, you've gotta be kidding! Lando gives 'em a call and they send a green blob to ram your ship? How much contact do you want?"

  "I think Dee's right," Cy said thoughtfully. "The blob was a response to Pik's attempt at communication. Now it's waiting to see what we'll do next."

  "It? Why 'it'? Why not 'them'?" The question was Dee's but Lando wondered too.

  "Maybe it is 'them,'" the cyborg responded, "but I don't think so. That's a very advanced construct. It has already demonstrated a level of technological sophistication beyond anything I've ever seen or heard of. If the owners were aboard they'd be telling us what to do… or simply swatting us like flies."

  "Maybe," Dee said doubtfully. "That's what we'd do. But they might react in a completely different manner."

  There was a long period of silence while everyone took it in. Cy was at least partially right. Regardless of whether the owners were aboard or not, the ship represented an unheard of level of scientific achievement, and that could have implications for the entire human race.

  That was their first thought. Their second was less altruistic. Given that the drifter was loaded with advanced technology, and given that the owners might be somewhere else, what was the ship worth?

  "I'm going aboard." The voice belonged to Cy and carried so much conviction that no one even thought to argue with him.

  "Me too." Sorenson's voice seemed to gain strength as he spoke.

  "First we'll find out if anyone's aboard, then assuming they aren't, we'll take control of the ship. I'll take a look at the controls while Cy checks the power plant. Just think! That power plant's been running for who knows how long! Maybe hundreds of years!"

  "Maybe thousands," Cy added, but Cap ignored him.

  "Whatever. The main thing is to take control, establish full salvage rights, and get the ship out of here in one piece."

  "I wanta go too," Melissa said. "Can I, Daddy? Can I please?"

  "No you can't," Cap replied sternly. "You'll stay here. Watch her, Lando, and depressurize the bay. Who knows what kind of atmosphere we'll find aboard that ship. I'll suit-up and meet Cy at the tender."

  There was an angry click as Melissa dropped off the intercom. Lando was sympathetic, but knew Cap was right, and in her heart of hearts Melissa knew it too. He touched a button. "Hey, Della."

  "Yeah?"

  "Take Cap's position in the top turret. I'll delegate sensor control to you. Ignore the drifter and keep your eyes peeled for bad guys. What with the tender outside, and a major tow to deal with, our buns are hanging in the breeze."

  "Speak for yourself," Dee replied primly. "My buns are right where they belong. Besides, the only breeze around here comes off the intercom."

  Lando grinned and leaned back in his chair. His eyes went to the alien drifter. The halo of greenish light seemed to fluctuate slightly, as though the ship were alive, and breathing ever so slightly.

  The alien ship filled Cy with a sense of wonder. As they came closer it filled the tender's view screens with luminescent light. Strangely enough the electronic interference they'd experienced farther out had largely disappeared. The drifter was long, longer than the Star of Empire had been, and twice as big around.

  The big green blobs clung to its hull like fungi feeding on a dead log. Every now and then one would suddenly expand and soar outward trailing a tendril of greenish light. Meanwhile others returned and took their places along the ship's outer surface.

  At first Cy assumed the greenish tethers were used to reel the blobs in, but then he realized he was wrong, and that the tendrils became shorter. It seemed as though the connective stuff was reabsorbed into the ship's hull when it wasn't needed.

  Plastic hull material? Some sort of new force field? The possibilities made Cy's brain spin.

  For his part Cap was less concerned about the how and why of the drifter's operation and more occupied with the pragmatics of taking possession. The rest could wait till later.

  Sorenson licked dry lips. God what he wouldn't give for a drink right now. He usually kept a bottle stashed inside the first-aid kit but someone had found and removed it. Melissa probably. Never mind, the bottle was gone, and he'd have to get along without it.

  The first problem was already behind them. For better or worse the drifter and/or its occupant
s had allowed them to approach. Sorenson had half expected to die, but not seeing a way around it, he had forced himself to take the chance. Now they were only a thousand feet away and still alive.

  Okay, time to tackle the second problem, getting aboard. Cap put the tender into a tight turn and slid down the vessel's-port side.

  Well, he assumed it was the port side, but come to think of it there was no way to tell bow from stern. Maybe its owners didn't think in terms of "front" and "back," maybe they went everywhere sideways, or who knows? But surely they had a way to enter and leave the ship.

  They completed another entire length of the ship without sign of a hatch or other opening. Cap made another tight turn. It had to be there.

  "Keep your pickups peeled, Cy, we need a way to get aboard."

  Cy was silent for a moment. "Try telling it that." He'd debated whether to say "them" or "it" and settled on the latter. Cy wasn't sure why, but the engineer in him felt they were dealing with complicated machinery rather than sentient minds.

  Cap gave him a "what the hell are you thinking" look, but stabbed a button and spoke into the comset anyway. "This is Captain Sorenson of the vessel Junk, requesting permission to come aboard."

  The response was immediate and frightening. One of the green blobs burst up from the drifter's hull to enclose the tender and pull it down. Cap started to apply more power but Cy stopped him.

  "Hold it, Cap! You asked for permission to come aboard, and that's what you got!"

  Cap put the drive on standby and forced his hands away from the controls. Cy was right. Somehow the alien ship had understood and obeyed him.

  Greenish light flooded the cabin. Cap looked at Cy. "What is it? Some sort of telepathy?"

  Cy spun left and right as if shaking his head. "No, not in the normal sense anyhow, because the only time it reacts is when you use the comset. Unless you put your words into electronic form it can't understand."

  Cap looked at the now blank view screens and shook his head in amazement. "Really? But how could it understand Terran?"