by Patty Jansen
One camera showed a man crouching behind a maintenance trolley, the white flank of the Aurelian in the background. Sullivan, Cory thought. Another screen gave an overview of the docks area. Someone lay sprawled on the floor. A couple of people in security uniform huddled behind a conveyor belt. A high-pitched whine blasted from the sound system. One of the guards in the control room yelled, 'Sir, they've got the Aurelian's engines started up.' A line of light blinked on the panel underneath the screens. In the docks, a strip of dark grew on the wall facing the Aurelian.
Someone else at the back of the room shouted, 'They're opening the air lock!'
Cory's father crossed to the control area in a few steps. He slammed his hand down on a red button. A high-pitched alarm drowned out all other sounds. Half the panel flashed with orange lights.
Cory clamped his hands over his ears.
His father sank in the seat facing the panels. Quickly, his hands went over the buttons. The alarm stopped wailing, but half the security screens had gone dark.
'What'd you do, Sir?' A man in security uniform came up.
'Cut the power to the inner ring. The air lock won't open any further without my intervention.' He pressed more buttons, and fuzzy black and white images returned to the screens. Lights moving, people fighting. The loudspeakers emitted a blast of noise.
His father spoke into his headset. 'Sullivan, where are you?'
A voice replied over the loudspeakers, panting. 'We've got the bastards cornered in the docks, Sir.'
'Do you need reinforcements?'
There was an almighty crash, followed by banging, as if a number of large objects bounced over the floor.
'Sullivan?'
Some incoherent shouts and a lot of crackling.
'Sullivan?' Cory's father swivelled his chair and pushed himself up. His face sheened with sweat. 'Everyone in this room who has a weapons licence, go with Whitehead now!'
The guard named Whitehead saluted. 'Excuse me Sir?'
'Yes, Whitehead?'
'Can you make sure the lifts are operational?'
'Yes, I—'
Some very bad language drifted out the loudspeakers.
Cory's father turned back to the screen. 'Sullivan?'
More swearing. 'The idiots nearly dropped a crate on me.'
A group of men and women filed out the door of the control room. The last one out was Harvey MacIntosh.
Cory's father gave them the thumbs up and spoke into his microphone. 'Sullivan, I'm sending some help.'
'Thank you, Sir—'
A white flash crossed the screen. Screams wailed from the loudspeakers.
Sullivan cursed. 'What the—'
Figures ran across the hall by the light of a fuzzy beam. Everything on screen looked like it was filmed in a snowstorm.
'Sullivan, what's going on?'
'Don't know, Sir. It seems like someone—'
Another white flash lit up the screen. There were crashes and shouts and movement in the hall - the screen was too dark and fuzzy to show anything recognisable. Then a slender figure emerged from the gloom, pointing something held in two hands. A clear woman's voice yelled, 'Anyone who moves a finger is dead! This thing shoots through strike-proof glass.'
Cory stared.
His father's eyes were wide; his mouth fell open. 'Erith.'
Sullivan yelled, 'Your wife is here, Sir. She has charge gun.'
Erith's voice again sounded. 'Anyone in there put your hands on your heads and come out.' There was a commotion near the gangplank of the Aurelian. Another white flash blinded the area, showing a couple of people on their knees, their hands up. Other people ran to them, pointing guns, kicking them until they shuffled into a group. Another group of guards ran in through the ship's open door. Erith still stood in the middle of the hall, pointing the gun.
Cory gasped. 'Where did she get that?'
His father shook his head. 'Don't ask, Cory, don't ask. With all these people here, I don't want to know.'
Erith laughed. 'I heard that. Don't worry, I've only borrowed it from the ship. By the way John, you can turn the light back on.'
Sullivan said, 'Yes, Sir. I'm in the cockpit of the Aurelian. I've got them.'
Cory's father whispered, 'Erith, I love you.' He slowly moved his hand to the red button on his right. When he pressed it, the black and white screens flickered briefly, and then returned to their normal colour display.
A group of people walked down the gangplank of the Aurelian, their hands on their heads. Miss Rosier came last, dressed in black and with her hair in a bun, followed by Sullivan poking a gun at her back.
At that moment, the reinforcements flooded the docks, led by the blond mop of hair of Harvey MacIntosh.
Cory threw his arms around his father. 'We did it, Dad. We did it.'
Chapter 25
Cory closed the door of the hospital room behind him, cutting out the soft beeps of a heartbeat monitor.
Seated on the bench across the corridor, Alma looked over the top of her reader. 'How is he?'
Cory shrugged. 'Still unconscious. The nurse said someone hit him on the head and he needs surgery. They're keeping Rocky and the other guy Chiu unconscious until they can be transported to Taurus.'
Alma clamped her arms around her knees. 'I hope Rocky doesn't go to jail. I mean—I know he put something in the Aurelian's engine so it would have to come back, but he was pushed, wasn't he? He was desperate. He seems a nice guy.'
'Yeah.' Cory let a short silence lapse. 'You know what bothers me, Alma?'
She raised her eyebrows.
'For the past two days, while the talks have been going on, a few of the Union people have almost stripped their ship. They've found nothing.'
'But that's good, isn't it?'
'I don't know. You know how in all the versions of Doomland we've seen, the good guys were always blowing up the bad guys' ships? I just can't believe that there wouldn't be anything. I mean—it doesn't make any sense, doesn't it? The Terran League choosing just this time to leave, without blowing up the Union's ship first.'
'Maybe they're planting something that only goes off long after the Union delegation has left. Like a disease or something.'
Cory shuddered.
'Oh, I was joking. Don't worry about it, Cory. I'm sure your father is looking into it.'
Cory blew out a heavy sigh. 'If something happened . . . if . . . You know Alma, that woman gives me the creeps. It's like she sees right through you. Dad says that she started interrupting Theariki's father's translation on the second day of the conference—in English.'
'English? Oh come on Cory, you can't learn a language in two days.'
'It seems she can. Apparently she often knows what people are thinking before they speak. Harvey MacIntosh told me that she's one hundred and fifteen years old.'
Alma gaped. 'Is your—your father's wife like that, too?'
Cory grimaced. A blush came to his cheeks. 'It's OK to say stepmother. No, she's not like that. She says the Union Secretary frightens her, too. You know, and she's been saying this for a long time, there are such a lot of different people in the Union and the differences between them are much bigger than between the races on Earth..'
'Bet there's a lot of racism, too.'
'Yes, according to Erith. Apparently the race that the Union Secretary belongs to was once badly discriminated against. She says that now they're in control of many powerful positions.'
'So maybe the Terran League has a point, that there is a threat from the Union.'
'Yes.' Cory fiddled with the hem of his shirt. 'I still believe we should learn about the Union, though—'
A shrill voice sounded in the corridor and a group of children ran around the corner. One of them yelled, 'There they are.'
Leon and Marnix were first to reach them, holding Theariki between them. 'Hey, where were you? We've been looking for you all over the place.'
'Can't have been looking too well.'
All areas outsid
e the residential quarters were strictly off limits, and with nowhere to go, not even school, the corridors and the central hall had become their stomping ground.
'I was checking on Rocky.'
'Oh.' Marnix glanced at the door of the hospital room.
Leon said, 'Hey, I heard your father has found a new teacher. What's he like?'
'A teacher?' Alma frowned at Cory. 'You didn't say anything about that.'
'Oh I forgot to say—Harvey MacIntosh is staying behind to teach us until a replacement arrives.'
'Harvey MacIntosh? One of the delegates? But that's like—totally wozy!' Her eyes shone.
Cory grinned. He agreed with her. School would be very different. For one, there would be no more An Eventful Life.
At that moment, his father's voice came through the loudspeakers. 'All Midway staff and residents are required to come to the large auditorium within fifteen minutes.'
Alma frowned.
Cory had heard his father talk of this. 'Oh, that's the end of the conference. If everyone is in one place, it's easier to arrest people who are not where they're supposed to be.'
'Come on, let's go.'
Cory looked around. He felt he was missing a clue, but didn't know what.
* * *
In the large hall of the auditorium, seated between Erith and Alma, Cory watched the large screen at the far end of the hall. The group had left the control room to allow the delegates to get their luggage. Other views of the station showed empty corridors and armed guards.
The Union Secretary and her group were just coming out of their accommodation, one of the group wheeling a trolley. On the top, Cory recognised the case he had seen a few days ago on Rocky's desk: the one with the leather bag, and something occurred to him.
His mouth trembling, he asked Erith, 'Is it true that some kinds of transmitters used by the Union are really small?'
Erith nodded.
Alma stared at him, then her mouth fell open, like the same thought had just occurred to her. She gasped, 'The clasps on the bag. Rocky even said the parcel Wagnell gave him contained clasps.' Both of them scrambled to their feet at the same time.
People shouted at them to sit down, but Cory pushed between the backs of seats and people's knees towards the stage area of the auditorium. If he was right, the delegation would come out of the lift opposite the side entrance, and go into the other lift to the inner ring.
A mass of Midway-uniform-clad backs barred their way, blocking even their view of the Union delegation. Theariki followed behind, as well as Leon, Marnix and Joseph.
Cory pushed into the crowd. 'Please, let me through. I want to talk to my father.'
The lift doors rumbled open and the delegation walked into the hall.
Cory called out, 'Stop. The case! The gift. It's in the leather bag!' But no one heard him and he couldn't see his father in the forest of security guards.
'Stand back there, boy. Go into the auditorium and you'll get a much better view on the screen.'
'My father! I need to talk to my father!'
Past the wall of men, the Union delegates were now talking to the Nations of Earth delegates and walking towards the door of the other lift. If they went in those lifts, he would never be able to tell them.
Cory cast around for an idea--any idea--that might make them stop. Then he spied Joseph and his large jumper.
In a few steps, he had jostled Joseph, and had his hands full of kicking, wrestling rabbittooh.
Under Joseph's cries of 'Flopsy!' he tossed the animal between the legs of the security guards. It sat dazed for a second or so, then hopped away, straight into the path of the Union Secretary.
She stopped, frowned. A tender, motherly look came over her face.
Blue silk rustled when she bent down, the gold embroidery on the sleeves glittering. A pair of long-fingered, white-skinned arms scooped up the rabbittooh.
Here was his chance.
Cory jumped forward. 'My rabbittooh!'
This time, the guards let him through, probably through sheer astonishment. He stumbled into the cleared area, facing the most powerful woman in the universe cradling a baby rabbittooh against her chest.
Silence.
White showed in the animal's eyes as ears lay flat against its back. A pink nose wriggled. Cory walked forward, under his father's vicious glare. He crossed to the delegation, bowed before the Union Secretary and held out his hands. 'Please excuse me. I lost my rabbittooh.'
He bowed as Theariki had shown him: left hand on right shoulder and face directed at the floor. Theariki had told him it was rude to look a superior in the eye so no matter how much he would like to lift his head and see those strange-coloured eyes, he did not.
Her slender hands passed him the animal. Her skin touched his briefly, sending a shiver of excitement through him. With one hand, Cory clamped the rabbitooh against his chest and pointed at the leather bag, on the top of the trolley pushed by her assistant. 'I'd . . . like to look in there.'
She paused for what felt like an eternity, spoke some words to a small figure next to her, which had to be Theariki's father. Cory still didn't dare look up.
There was a tone of surprise in Theariki's father's voice. 'The present from the director, boy. You want to see it?'
Cory nodded. 'Yes.'
Theariki's father passed the bag to him. With trembling hands, he turned it over. The clasp was oddly heavy, and when he undid it, something glinted on the underside. Electronics.
Almost dizzy with anxiety, he met the eyes of Sullivan, whose mouth hung open, and gave him the bag. 'It's in the clasp.'
Sullivan took the bag. His face white, his voice hoarse, he said, 'I believe the boy is right.'
* * *
Cory thudded down the stairs, clutching his bag with his reader.
A thrill of excitement went through him. Last night, Erith had given him more pictures of her home town, which Harvey had said he would be happy to show to the class and use them to talk about the Union, its different people and their customs.
Here was a generation of young spacefarers, he said, who should embrace the opportunities offered to them.
At least for the next three months, school promised to be much fun.
A small figure waited outside the classroom, clad in a faded blue shirt and shorts. Spiky red hair stood up in roughly hacked tufts.
Cory stopped, unsure of what surprised him most. 'Theariki, what are you doing here? What have you done to your hair?'
She smiled, rubbing a hand over her head. 'My father says I should be with miking.'
Coming to school looking like that? 'But—'
'My father also said I will start the choosing soon. I'll be boy, so you can be a friend.'
Cory stared at her, a horrified feeling creeping up inside him. Had he ever said that girls were worth less, that only boys could be true friends? Shame crept up in him. He had.
He shook his head. 'No, I don't want you to be a boy anymore. You can be a girl if you like. It doesn't matter.'
Theariki looked at him, a smile creeping over her face. He knew, as he had always known, she would prefer to be female. 'You sure?'
He nodded. 'Boy or girl, we can all be friends.'
At that, a dry voice came from behind, where Alma had also arrived for school. 'You know you're actually pretty smart—for a boy.'
###
Acknowledgements
This book would not have seen the light of day without the tireless comments from my writing group mates at SF-OWW, and especially Stelios Touchtidis and Marlene Dotterer. I would also like to thank Tom Edwards for making the cover, and Simon Petrie for proofreading.
About the Author
Patty Jansen lives in Sydney, Australia, where she spends most of her time writing Science Fiction. Her story This Peaceful State of War placed first in the second quarter of the Writers of the Future contest. She has sold fiction to genre magazines such as Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Redstone SF and Aurealis.
Patty is a member of the cooperative that makes up Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, and she has also written non-fiction.
Patty is on Twitter (@pattyjansen), Facebook and blogs at http://pattyjansen.com