Downbelow Station tau-3

by Caroline J. Cherryh

  “My memory,” Josh said, “is full of holes.”

  “Think of one.”

  “Use my name,” Josh said. “And Gabriel’s.”

  She ordered it, looked long and thoughtfully on the pair of them. “Let them go,” she said finally to the troopers who guarded them. “Let them loose.”

  It was done. She half turned the cushion, averted her eyes momentarily to the screens and glanced back again, at the incredible presence of a Unioner and a stationer loose on her deck. “Find yourselves a secure spot,” she said. “We’re bending an arc in a moment… and maybe worse ahead.”

  ii

  Pell: blue sector one, number 0475; 0100 hrs, md.; 1300 hrs. a.

  The flying-feeling hit them from time to time. They huddled together, and some hisa outside in the corridor moaned in fear, but not those near Sun-her-friend. They held to her, so she should not fall, so that she at least should be safe. Even great Sun was shaken, and staggered in his course. The stars shook, in the darkness round about the white bed and the Dreamer.

  “Be not ’fraid,” old Lily whispered, stroking the Dreamer’s brow. “Be not ’fraid. Dream we safe, safe.”

  “Turn up the sound, Lily,” the Dreamer whispered, her eyes tranquil as ever. “Where’s Satin?”

  “I here,” Satin said, easing her way through the others to Lily’s place. The sound increased, the human voices which shrieked and wailed over the com and tried to call out instructions.

  “It’s central,” the Dreamer said. “Satin, Satin, all of you — listen. They’ve killed Jon… harmed central. They’re coming… the Union men, more men-with-guns, you understand?”

  “Not come here,” Lily insisted, rejoining them.

  “Satin,” the Dreamer said, staring at the quaking stars. “I will tell you the way… each turn, each step; and you have to remember… can you remember so long a thing?”

  “I Storyteller” she declared “I ’member good, Sun-she-friend.”

  The Dreamer told her, step by step; and the thing itself frightened her, but her mind was set on the remembering, each move, each turn, each small instruction.

  “Go,” the Dreamer bade her.

  She rose and hurried, called Bluetooth, called others, every hisa within the sound of her voice.

  iii

  Norway; 0130 hrs. md.; 1330 hrs. a.

  Com sputtered; vacant longscan suddenly erupted in solid blips. Norway veered tighter into her curve. Signy caught at the console and the cushion with the taste of blood in her mouth. They red-lighted, stress alarms ringing. Josh and Konstantin were clinging desperately to a hold halfway down the aisle, lost it, slid. “Norway, Norway speaking, Unioners. Hold fire. Hold fire. You want a way in, follow me.”

  There was the obligatory silence while com traveled and caught up to them.

  “Say further.”

  Words, not shots.

  “This is Mallory of Norway. I’m going over, you hear me? Run with me a space and I’ll fill you in. Mazian’s in the process of blowing Pell and running for Sol. It’s already started. I’ve got your agent Joshua Talley and the younger Konstantin aboard. You’re going to lose yourself a station if you hold off. You don’t listen to me and you’re going to have yourself an Earth-based war.”

  There was a moment of dead silence from the other side. The armscomp board was lit and tracking.

  “This is Azov of Unity. What’s your proposal, Norway? And how do we trust you?”

  “We ran; you’ve got that signal. I’ll lead back in. You run tail guard, Unity, the whole lot of you. Mazian won’t stand to fight here or anywhere in the neighborhood. He can’t afford it, you understand me?”

  The silence was longer this time. “They’re tracking with us,” scan advised her.

  “Hard as we can, Mr. Graff.”

  Norway skimmed the edge of disaster, red-lighting in little flickers of stress that flesh protested, heart pounding, hands trembling in maintaining necessary control, experienced crew holding up together in sustained agony while combat synch and inertia warred. Calm and steady, hold it together on the long, long curve, keep the velocity they had gathered as much as possible, headed for Pell… They had a tail guard for certain, Union headed right at their backside all at max… to blow them as readily as they meant to blow Mazian.

  “Come on,” she muttered to Graff, “keep our way, hold onto it. We need all we’ve got.”

  “Scan caution,” a calm voice advised her and Graff; long-scan flickered with hazed green and gold… obstacles in their path, still in comp’s memory and shown to be right where comp remembered them, give or take a freighter’s slow progress. Short-haul freighters. They were getting their chatter, as-received, a squeal of conversation and panic that deepened as they came in on it

  Graff threaded them. Norway shot through the interstices on a computer-aimed straight course and red-lighted to home again on Pell. The Unioners came after and all missed with a rush that would stop hearts on the dead-slow freighters. A deep howl of terror had reached them, vanished again.

  Norway… Norway… Norway… their own comp was sending frantically, and if their riderships survived, they would rally to that summons.

  Blips flashed red and solid ahead of them, too fast for freighters. Comp howled warnings. Mazian was loose. Europe, India, Atlantic, Africa, Pacific.

  “Where’s Australia?” she snapped at Graff. That recognition code had not come through with the others. “’Ware of them!”

  Graff must have heard. There was no time for chat. The Fleet was massed and collision-coursed for them. Their rider-ships were locked to, all home to mothers, readied for jump, that grace at least.

  “Mallory,” she heard Mazian’s voice over com. Graff heard too and dropped them in a sickening maneuver that comp transferred into armscomp’s aim: they ripped a pattern of fire at Europe as fire came back at them and the hull sang. G slammed at them fighting contrary stresses, and of a sudden fire erupted aft. Union had plowed in, disregarding their safety, not savvy of their comp signals, and hungry for targets. “Out!” she ordered helm, and Norway maneuvered with all bearable angle, finding no precentage in this fight. Alarms rang. Pell and Downbelow lay ahead, minutes ahead at near-C.

  They kept veering, comp calculating and recalculating that marginal curve.

  A carrier blip exploded onto them, underside. Norway held to its necessary course, boards flaring red, alarms ringing, collision with a world imminent and too much speed to dump in time.

  And of a sudden there were other blips, small and coming hard in a ring nose on to them.

  Norway… Norway… Norway… their comp flashed.

  Their own riders.

  “Keep on!” she yelled at Graff over a cheer from the bridge. Comp took the maneuver as hard as the ship could bear, a move that tore at human bodies and made nightmare of half a dozen seconds. They started dumping speed hard, with Australia coming dead at them through the needle’s eye of their riders, riderless itself or with none deployed.

  “Barrage,” she said, swallowing the taste of blood. The screens flashed terror: it was collision imminent fore and aft, a C-approximate ship bearing right down their tail and equally locked in escape curve from Pell. Fifty-fifty what maneuver would impact them, up, down, or straight on.

  Graff dropped: topside fired and Australia whipped over as fields sent instruments into chaos. The hull moaned and the whole ship jolted.

  Maneuver continued; suddenly there was breakup on scan, dust screaming over their hull. “Where are they?” Graff yelled at the scan tech. Signy bit through her lip and winced, sucked at the blood. Australia could have dumped chaff; could have blown; they kept dumping speed, her order unchanged.

  “… cleared Pell,” a rider voice came to them, what their own scan was beginning to show as they cleared the danger themselves. “And lost a vane… think Edger’s lost a vane.”

  There was no way they could see; Australia was on long-scan: it was the nature of the chaff they reckoned. “Form up
,” she ordered her riders, feeling more secure with them about Norway like four extra arms. Edger could not risk further damage now, not if a vane was gone; not for any revenge.

  “They’re going for jump,” she heard. It was a Union voice, none that she knew — a foreign accent. Suddenly there was a vast coldness in her gut, a knowledge that it was all beyond recall.

  Be thorough, Mazian had taught her, teaching her most that she knew. No half-measures.

  She leaned back in the cushion. All over Norway there was silence.

  iv

  Pell: sector blue one, number 0475

  Lily at least remained. Alicia Lukas-Konstantin let her eyes move about the walls, last of all to the small module, part of the molded white of the bed itself, two lights, one on, one off, one green, one red. Red now. They were on internal systems.

  Power was threatened. Lily did not know, perhaps; she managed the machines, but what powered them was likely to be mysterious to her. And the Downer’s eyes remained calm, her hand remained gentle, stroking her hair, a remaining contact with the living.

  Angelo’s gifts, the structures about her, had proven as stubborn as her own brain. The screens kept changing, the machines kept pumping life through her veins, and Lily stayed.

  There was an off switch. If she asked Lily, Lily, ignorant, would push it. But that was cruel, to one who believed in her.

  She did not.

  v

  Norway

  Carefully, Damon left his place, felt his way dizzily past the banks of instruments and the techs to reach Mallory. He hurt; an arm was torn, his neck ached in its joints. There could not be a soul on Norway spared such misery, the techs, Mallory herself. She turned bleak eyes on him from her place at the main boards, powered her cushion about to look at him, nodded slightly.

  “So you’ve got your wish,” she said. “Union’s in. They don’t need to track Mazian now. They know for certain where he’s gone. I’m betting they’ll find a base at Pell valuable; they’ll save your station, Mr. Konstantin, no question now. And it’s high time we got ourselves out of here.”

  “You said,” he reminded her quietly, “you’d let me off.”

  Her eyes darkened. “Don’t press your luck. So maybe I’ll dump you and your Unioner friend on some merchanter when it suits me. If it suits me. Ever.”

  “My home,” he said. He had gathered his arguments; but his voice shook, destroying logic. “My station… I belong back there.”

  “You belong nowhere now, Mr. Konstantin.”

  “Let me talk to them. If I can get a truce from Union to get close enough… I know the systems. I can handle the central systems; the techs… may be dead. They are dead, aren’t they?”

  She turned her face away, turned the cushion, returning to her own business. He reckoned his danger, leaned forward and set a hand on the arm of the cushion so that she could not ignore him; a trooper moved, but waited orders. “Captain. You’ve gone this far. I’m asking you… you’re a Company officer. You were. One last time… one last time, captain. Get me back to Pell. I’ll talk you out again, free. I swear I will.”

  She sat still a very long moment.

  “You going to run from here beaten?” he asked her, “Or leave at your own pace?”

  She turned, and it was not a good thing to look into her eyes. “You looking to take a walk?”

  “Take me back,” he said. “Now. While it matters. Or never. Because later won’t matter. There’ll be nothing I can do and I had as soon be dead.”

  Her lips tightened. For several moments she sat dead still, staring at him. “I’ll do what I can. Up to a limit. If they make of your truce what I think I will…” She brought her hand down on the cushioned arm. “This is mine. This ship. You understand that. These people… I was Company. We all were. And Union doesn’t want me loose. You’re asking for what could turn into a firefight right next to your precious station. Union wants Norway. They want us badly… because they know what we’ll do. There’s no way I can live, stationer, because I’ve got no port I’ll dare go to. I’ll not come in. I never will. None of us will. Graff. Set us a quiet course for Pell.”

  Damon drew back, reckoned that the wisest move at the moment. He listened to the one-sided com he had accessible, Norway advising the Union fleet that they were moving in. There seemed to be some dispute. Norway argued back.

  A hand touched his shoulder. He looked around, found Josh there. “I’m sorry,” Josh said. He nodded, holding no grudge. Josh… had had few choices given him.

  “They want you, all right,” Mallory said. “Handed over to them.”

  “I’ll go.”

  “Ignorant,” Mallory spat. “They’ll mindwipe you. You know that?”

  He thought about it. Remembered Josh, sitting across from him at a desk and asking for the papers, end of a process Russell’s had started. Men came out of it. Josh had. “I’ll go,” he said again.

  Mallory frowned at him. “It’s your mind,” she said. “Till they get their hands on you, at least.” And into com: “This is Mallory. We’ve got ourselves a standoff, captain. I don’t like your terms.”

  There was a long delay. Silence from the other end.

  On scan, Pell showed, with Union ships hovering about it like birds about carrion. One looked to have docked. Long-scan showed a scattering of red-dotted gold out by the mines, the short-haulers, and the lonely position of one other ship, indicated by a blinking light at the edge of the scope, offscan but in comp’s memory. Nothing moved, save for four blips very near Norway, closing into tighter formation.

  They had come to a relative halt, drifting in time with everything else in the system.

  “This is Azov of Unity,” a voice came to them. “Captain Mallory, you have leave to dock with your passenger to let him off. Your approach to Pell is accepted, with thanks from the people of Union for your invaluable assistance. We’re willing to accept you within the Union Fleet as you are, armed and with your present crew. Over.”

  “This is Mallory. What assurances has my passenger got?”

  Graff leaned closer to her. Held up a finger. Norway resounded to the clang of something against her hull, a lock closing. Damon looked distractedly at scan.

  “Fighter just docked,” Josh said at his shoulder. “They’re gathering the riders in. They can run for jump — ”

  “Captain Mallory,” Azov’s voice returned, “I have a Company representative aboard who will order you to take that action — ”

  “Ayres can shove it,” she said. “I’ll tell you what I want for what I’ve got. Docking privileges at Union ports and clear paper. Or maybe I let my valuable passenger take a walk.”

  “These matters can be discussed later in detail. We have a crisis on Pell. Lives are in jeopardy.”

  “You have comp experts. Can it be you can’t figure the system?”

  There was another silence. “Captain. You’ll get what you want. Kindly dock under our safeconduct if you want that paper. There’s a situation on this station regarding native workers. They’re asking for Konstantin.”

  “The Downers,” Damon breathed. He had a sudden and terrible vision of Downers facing Union troops.

  “You clear your ships back from that station, Captain Azov. Unity can stay docked. I’ll come in on the opposite side and you see to it your ships don’t get out of synch with your position. Anything crosses my tail I’ll fire with no questions asked.”

  “Granted,” Azov answered.

  “Insane,” Graff said. “Now where’s our profit? They won’t come across with that paper.”

  Mallory said nothing.

  Chapter Five

  i

  Pell: White Dock; 1/9/53; 0400 hrs. md.; 1600 hrs. a.

  The dockworkers were Union troops, fatigue-clad, but in green, surreal sight on Pell. Damon walked down the ramp toward the armored backs of Norway troops who held the margin and guarded the access. Far across the deserted dock other troopers stood in armor… Unioners. He passed the safe pe
rimeter, passed through the Norway troops, headed out that lonely crossing of the wide debris-littered decking. Heard disturbance behind him, heard someone coming, and looked back.

  Josh.

  “Mallory sent me,” Josh said, overtaking him. “You mind?”

  He shook his head, mortally glad of his company where he was going. Josh reached into his pocket and handed him a spool of tape. “Mallory sent it. Josh said. ”She set up the comp keys. Says this might help.“

  He took it, stuffed it into the pocket of his brown Company fatigues. The Union escort waited for them with the troops, black-clad and silver-medaled. He started walking again, appalled as they came closer at the sameness, the beauty of them. Perfect humans, all of a size, all of a type.

  “What are they?” he asked of Josh.

  “My kind,” Josh said. “Less specialized.”

  He swallowed heavily and kept going. The Union troops fell in about them, wordlessly escorted them along the dock. Pell citizens stood, a handful here and there, stared at them as they walked. Konstantin, he heard murmured. Konstantin. He saw hope in some eyes, and flinched from it, knowing how little there was to be had. There was chaos in some areas they passed, whole sections with the lights out, with fans dead, with the stench of fire and bodies lying. G surged a marginal amount, minor instability. No knowing what had happened in the core, in life-support. There was a time beyond which the systems began to deteriorate beyond recovery, when balances were too far gone. Mindless, with central out, Pell had gone to its local ganglia, nerve centers which were not interconnected, automatic systems that fought for its life. Without regulation and balance they would pass out of phase… like a body dying.

  They walked blue nine, where other Union forces stood, entered the emergency ramp… dead here too, bodies they and their escort filed past in their ascent; a long climb, from nine upward, to an area where armored troopers operated, where they stood facing upward, shoulder to shoulder. They could go no higher; the escort leader turned aside and took them through the door into two, into the hall lined with financial offices. Another knot of troops and officers stood there. One, silvered with rejuv and bearing a great deal of rank on his chest, turned toward them. With a dull shock Damon recognized those immediately behind him. Ayres, from Earth.