by Paul Brandis
He lay motionless as a curl of smoke rose from his splintered mask. Then his arm jerked to his waistband. Pulling out a signet ring, he gasped, his voice garbled, "Get this to Bazin." His arm fell, and he was silent.
Glancing down at him, Chloe bit her lip, then pointed at the horde of zombies. "Baby, omega terminus," she cried, and threw herself over Phil's body.
The probe did not hesitate. Flying jerkily into the midst the of creatures, she exploded in a white flash of nuclear ignition.
The ground heaved, and an ear-shattering blast sucked up dust and rock, strewing remnants of pasty white bodies and streaks of Ghosts' photons. A mushroom cloud rose over the field, casting an ominous shadow across the hovering dust.
The raft of troops hit the dock, and the warriors charged onto the field with their lasers at high port. They too were heavily augmented, with thick, steel helmets encircling their face shields.
Behind them, flanked by two huge warriors, strode a tall, thin man in a white cape. Long white hair streamed to his shoulders.
Chloe stood. "Quickly," she ordered, "get this man to an infirmary."
The tall man nodded, and his burly charges hefted Phil, and hurried to the raft. The man turned to Chloe. "I am Bazin. Did Phil complete his mission?"
She held up the ring, its face cracked and stained with drying blood. "Yes, but it won't do you any good. The ova inside were destroyed in the fight." She slipped it on. "But save Phil, and maybe we can work something out. First of all I want a corset made of gold."
The aristocrat's eyebrows arched. "Oh? And who might you be?"
She strode after Phil. "I'm Chloe, your new queen."
CHAPTER 10
As the men poled rapidly across the water, Bazin kneeled over Phil's body. "I think we'll be able to get him out in time." Standing, he turned to Chloe Donn. "But more important is to get you under cover. I'm afraid your quarters will have to be in the dungeon."
Suspicion sparked in Chloe's eyes. "Dungeon." She raised her carbine. "Nobody's locking me up."
Bazin raised a hand. "No, no. It's nothing like that. Until we can construct some protective garment, a lead girdle or something, we just can't risk having you exposed."
Her lip turned up with distaste. "A lead girdle?" Then she drew herself up. "You heard what I said, make it gold."
Bazin nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, it would make for better protection."
"That's right. And I'll need some of the same protection for my head, wrists, and fingers."
Bazin's face closed with anger. "Now wait a--"
Chloe jabbed a finger at him. "You wait, old man. Can you produce children? Well, I can. And thanks to this big man here, I have one growing in me right now. He might have been killed once, but his sperm was certainly alive and kicking. Now if you want my children, and their children, to grow up in your city, you make sure that I get the respect I'm due; respect due a queen. Right?"
A grudging admiration grew in the doctor's face. Finally he nodded. "All right.”
She pressed forward. “All right who?”
He bit his lip. “All right, Queen Chloe.”
Her smile was hard. “Try Yes, Your Majesty.”
Their eyes met in a long, contest of will, then he blinked. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
Chloe’s nodded. “Good. Don’t worry, I won’t interfere with your running of the government. Just be open to a few female suggestions, and we’ll get along fine. First thing, I want to see what this man really looks like when he’s not a suit full of gristle.”
* * *
Phil writhed in a nightmare of seething ectoplasm that fired guns, and monstrous insects forging forward to devour him. Slowly he awoke to a mind-searing headache. He groaned in misery, and the sound only increased his pain.
A pretty nurse, her face encircled in soft, blond curls appeared above him.
"How're you feeling?" she asked with concern.
He tried to speak, coughed, winced, and cleared his throat. His voice came out raw edged. "Are you sure Bazin hooked up all the right cables? It feels like my ass is where my head should be."
She smiled. "I can assure you. Everything is working as it should be."
"You sure?"
Her smile widened. "I tested you myself."
"Mm. Yes, well, don't go 'way. Soon as I feel better, I may want to do some testing of my own."
She laughed. "See, you're feeling better already."
Bazin entered. "How're you feeling?"
"Seems to be the question of the day” he groused. “I've got a raging headache, that's how I feel."
The doctor did not seem overly concerned. "It'll pass. Let me know if it doesn't."
"Oh, you'll know, all right. How's the Goddess?"
He looked grave. "It was close. But she seems to be better."
They were quiet for a moment, then Phil asked. "When did her condition improve?"
"It was interesting. I checked on her as soon as I finished your brain transplant, and she seemed calmer from that moment on. I don't know if she's telepathic, but she certainly seems attuned to your thought patterns."
"Yes, I've been thinking about that. But I've never picked up any of her thoughts. Not that I know of. And did Major Donn make it out alive?"
A hint of sarcasm entered the older man's tone. "Oh, she's just fine; has the run of the city. Actually, she really has been a boon to us. The people took to her right away. And when it was announced that she was expecting a child, they were delirious."
"A child? What child?"
"Your child, man. Or, at least Engineer Harris's child. It was his body."
"But my action."
"Yes. It seems you and the major hit it off pretty well for such a short acquaintance."
But Phil was not listening. "A child. How about that."
Bazin smiled. "It really is wonderful news. We've been here over forty years," he hooked a thumb upward, "uh, Serena cycles, and this will be our first child. The news couldn't come at a better time."
"Why's that?"
"We're entering our cold stage, our winter. This enables the Ghosts to forage farther south. We lose several of our people to them each year."
"I see. And how's my ship? Did the nozzles fit?"
Bazin's voice was dry. "They work fine. Why? Are you planning on leaving us so soon?"
Phil snapped back. "Bazin, I never stopped planning on it. Why do you think I went on that run up north, for a dead woman's ova? You know better than that."
"Yes, I know, but--"
Phil raised his hand wearily. "Oh shut up and leave me alone. My brain feels like you left a scalpel in it. Just go away and let me sleep."
Bazin looked about to speak, when the nurse laid a restraining hand on his arm and nodded for him to leave.
His lips tightened at the woman's insubordination, but seeing her determination, he turned and stalked out.
As soon as he was gone, the girl leaned over Phil once more and examined his face. He opened his eyes long enough to give her a wink, then relaxed into wearied sleep.
He awoke to murmured voices. Gingerly turning his head, he saw Chloe conferring with the nurse.
Seeing him turn, Chloe stepped over. "Well, you don't look so bad. Did they leave anything worth having?" She wore a shimmering blue gown, encircled by shiny gold chest armor that shaped her breasts and cupped her pelvis. A headband of gold with tiny spires held back her black hair.
"You don't look so bad yourself. But where are those good looking legs?"
"It seems you saw enough of them already. Has anyone told you yet?"
"About the baby? Yeah, Bazin."
She shook her head angrily. "I told him I wanted to be the first. Well, what do you think?"
"I'm happy if you're happy."
Her face darkened with anger. "Listen, if you want to be my king, you'd better get some enthusiasm," and she spun and stomped out.
Phil turned to the nurse. "What was that all about?"
"Didn't you know?
With the death of Queen Rachelle, we now have Queen Chloe. I guess she wants you to be king."
"Well, what's she so mad about?"
The girl shrugged. "Women sometimes get that way when they're expecting a child." She leaned over him to tuck in his blanket, her full breasts brushing his chest. "Now, you'd never have to worry about that with me." She straightened up and smiled. "But I'll bet you're hungry. I'll see about getting you something to eat."
"And juice too, please. A big glass of juice."
She moved toward the door, her hips undulating. "Well, good. That should do something for you."
Phil crept to his window. A stab of pain sliced from the base of his neck up into his head. He breathed deeply allowing the pain to subside, and peered out into the darkness. A deep chill hung over the night, and nothing moved but wisps of ghostly mist rising from the lake.
Hugging the walls, he light-footed down the stairs to the infirmary. On a cot just inside the door, the grey-haired nurse slept soundly. Phil stole past her to a cabinet, found a narcopatch, and returned. Peeling off the protective backing he dropped it lightly on her arm. She stirred, then turned over and sank into an even deeper sleep.
Phil hurried to Thea's sling, then stopped abruptly. Silently the girl had been watching him. He smiled encouragement. "This won't hurt, Baby." He slipped the tube from her arm, and taped up the vein. "I'm getting out of here, and I couldn't leave without you." He smoothed her long, white hair. "No, I couldn't."
Cradling her in his arms, he snuck through the palace and out the front door. In the alcove of the doorway he paused, and peered down the narrow street. A fire burned brightly at the corner: protection against Ghosts. An augmented guard stood nearby, his head fallen forward in sleep.
Quietly, Phil carried the girl to the corner. As they came into the orange realm of light, he glanced down to Thea and made a tiny shushing sound. She only stared at him with wide, frightened eyes.
As he tiptoed by, he watched the back of the guard, but the man did not move.
The next bonfire they approached blazed even brighter, illuminating the small square inside the gate. Two guards stood side by side in the circle of its light. Phil carried the girl as close as he dared, then whispering assurances, he laid her in the corner of a darkened doorway.
Searching the gutter, he found a fist-sized rock, then crept closer. At the edge of the pool of light, he aimed, and threw the rock as far as he could up the opposite street. Without waiting for the guards' reactions, he raced back to the doorway and scooped up Thea. As the guards stalked up the street searching, Phil hurried around the square and out the gate, hugging the shadows when he could.
The path to the dock offered no cover, so he jogged as fast as possible carrying the big girl, praying no guards from the top of the walls would see them.
As they neared the lake, the mist rose all around them, engulfing them, hiding them.
The ship still sat on its repair cradle. Phil carried the girl up the steps, eased her through the hatch, and lowered her into her bunk.
Before closing the lid, he smiled. "Thanks for not making any noise. Everything's going to be all right. You'll see," and he bent and kissed the pale lips. They were surprising warm and pliant, and she reached for his neck.
He laughed. "Not now. Wait'll we get out of here." He closed the bunk lid, set the controls, and hurried to the console. Quickly checking off ignition procedures, he keyed the closure of the hatch. As it silently dropped into place, a trail of mist seeped in.
Completing the start-up checklist, he was about to hit the ignition key, when a chill of dread struck him. He twisted around, and a shimmering apparition was taking shape in the middle of the cabin. A Ghost.
Phil punched the ignition key. Instantly the engines hissed as a thin stream of molecules hurled into the tiny reactors. The exploding thrust shoved him back into the seat. He strained around and looked over his shoulder.
The acceleration did not affect the Ghost. Now totally coalesced, its face leered with hatred as it slowly glided up the aisle.
Pinned to the chair by the ship's increasing acceleration, Phil could only sit and wait for the ugly specter to reach him. He shivered with fear and cold.
Cold! He had forgotten to turn on the cabin heat. Straining against the pull of the thrusting rockets, he tried to reach the heat switch. A stale stench assailed his nostrils, and his eyes hazed over. The Ghost had seeped through the chair, and was enveloping his body.
Phil lunged forward, and hit the heat key, dragging his finger down the lever for full blower power. A blast of hot, stale air hit him full in the face as the ducts cleared, and fresh air was sucked in.
The Ghost seemed to blur slightly, then fought to reform. Phil pulled himself to one side, and shoved the heat control to its highest temperature. The Ghost vibrated with the lust of hate, and leaned into the blower's onslaught like a ship floundering in the teeth of a storm. Tiny photons streamed back as he crept forward into the chair. Phil sensed the stench once again, and felt his mind seeping away. His listless fingers slipped down the console, caught on a switch, then fell idle in his lap.
A loud whirring sound rang out, and Phil sensed a scream of fear and anguish. His mind cleared, and he twisted around. The Ghost, dismembering into billions of darting lights, was being sucked out the cabin's floor vacuum vents.
Within seconds the vacuum swept the ship clean of everything in the air: the Ghost, dust, and dirt. And as Phil realized as giddiness assailed him, oxygen too. He strained forward and flipped off the vacuum switch, and his head cleared as oxygen pumped into the pod.
Phil's eyes scanned the monitors. Out in space behind the, the Ghost, disintegrated even further by the rocket's superheated blast, struggled to pull its molecules together. Slowly, in the frigid vacuum, it merged into a rigid, shimmering silhouette of a man. Was it still alive? It needed nothing to exist. Neither food nor oxygen.
Suddenly a tiny asteroid, a missile of dust, struck it, and it shattered like a statue of ice, and the pieces, limbs, body, shards of its face, drifted away into space.
Phil turned back to his controls. The small star, like a contracting eye, diminished in the distance behind him. Outside its gravitational influence, it was time to set in the coordinates that would return the ship to the System's freighter lanes. The trip out was recorded in the ship's memory. He could only hope that the splashdown on Serena had not damaged the ship's navigation system.
He paused. The encounter with the Ghost had made him momentarily disoriented. He breathed deeply--his mind reeled from the piercing pain in his neck--and keyed in what he felt had to be the course. He watched as the tiny ship came about and accelerated in the new direction.
As the acceleration abated, he crawled back to his bunk. After a quick check on Thea—in sleep, so lovely—he rolled wearily into his bed. He fell asleep with the vague uneasiness that he had forgotten something. The smallest sliver of degree off course at this far distance, and the ship might end as a burning shower of death falling on some planet, or an icicle flying forever through frozen space.
CHAPTER 11
The old freighter blotted out half the stars in the black sky. Phil moved his craft into the line of ships being swallowed by the great maw of the hulk’s cargo bay. Most of the ships were small cargo carriers sent out from outposts to trade or to ship their wares.
Before giving entrance permission, Docking Control requested his ship's identification number, and his own credit number. He called back the ship and credit number of a company he owned on a small, nearby planet. The company did not exist, but the bank owner on the planet took a small percentage of Phil's deposits, and gave the company an address. Phil had the same arrangement with small banks on several planets.
Dutifully trailing the FOLLOW on the back of a little traffic-director craft, he was led to a compartment where a crew docked him and attached support cables. He checked Thea once more, then pulled himself up through the chute attached to his hatch.
From the corridor next to the landing bay, he rode the escalator to the depot and caught a shuttle out to the edge of the freighter. Avoiding the commercial district with its major chain hotels--too many scans--he grabbed a passing cart to the freighter's slum and pleasure district. Here the scans were often in disrepair, someone always making sure they broke down as quickly as they were fixed.
His worn miner's outfit served him well, allowing him to blend in with the farmhands and freight carriers that hunched along the filthy corridors in front of the saloons and flophouses. Raucous music, shrill laughter, and the stench of sour booze filled the alleys.
As he passed one door, he barely escaped being beaned by a drunken farmer being hurled out. In the light gravity he flew across the narrow street and smashed into a steel pillar.
"And stay out," bellowed a burly Amazon. She brushed off her hands, hitched up the wide belt that girded her vast belly, and with a glare at Phil, swaggered inside.
Phil glanced at the blood trickling from the crack in the crumpled farmer's skull, and concluded that the man would stay out for a long time.
A grin spread over Phil's face—this was his kind of joint, and he pulled a 180, and entered.
A bar ran down one side; gambling devices on the other. And in between, undulating in the music's throb like kelp underwater, the room's drunken inhabitants swayed in the light gravity. Smoke and incense hung over the room like camouflage netting.
At the opposite end, on a low stage with a backboard was the floor show: rawboned, naked girls dodging knives thrown by the drunks. Their scars showed their mistakes.
Phil wove through tables full of drinkers and found an empty one next to the wall. He had not sat long, when several hefty amazons working for the house slid into seats across from him. They eyed him ominously, but he knew the drill. Inserting his card, he ordered a round of doubles. The drinks came up, and the women grabbed them and left. He would not be bothered again.
Then he started to his feet. He recognized the man passing out knives to the men watching the floor show. Jed.