“See you there.”
Behind her, Catherine heard shouts and running boots. Soon, air cars and ground cars would join the chase. But she was two hundred meters ahead of them and pursuit just made her run faster.
She had to get two blocks over, so she started jagging and jigging through side streets, always keeping count of how far north she had gone. She could shift farther north than the park, but that would mean having to come back south to reach it and possibly running into her pursuit. So she headed east more than she travelled north, dodging and ducking all the way.
When the air cars came overhead, using spotlights, she turned into a doorway and leaned against the closed door, catching her breath. It was a residential building, but no one came to see who had entered. Perhaps the man of the building had been at the meeting. In this patriarchal world, no one would think to come and check for themselves if the man wasn’t there.
She pressed her ear against the door, listening, then checked in with Bedivere. “I should hire myself out to a Federation cruiser,” she said. “Good food, decent entertainment and all you have to do is make sure the passengers are having a good time. None of this running and dodging people with weapons.”
“The Federation would take you in a heartbeat.”
“Yeah, but not to give me a job on their luxury liners,” she said dryly. “Where now?”
“If you can get through the building, there is no one on the street south of you. They’re anticipating your direction and everyone is moving north east.” He paused. “You could always dump the tech.”
She pushed herself off the door and headed along the dim corridor. It was late at night by Shantan standards. Everyone would have been asleep, although she doubted anyone was still asleep after all the commotion and noise outside.
“I spent two years saving to buy this stupid thing. I’m not dumping it now,” she told Bedivere. “Besides, I’m not leaving you.”
“I’m the one flying the ship. Wouldn’t I have to leave you?” He sounded amused. “I’m three minutes away. You’re about five minutes away, if you keep to the same pace.”
“Easier said than done,” Catherine said dryly, moving through the corridor, looking for the back door. Or the front door, maybe. She couldn’t linger long enough to figure out Shanta domestic arrangements. But a window would work just as well. “All that Soward champagne is starting to tell.”
“I’ll wait,” he assured her.
“You’ll scare the locals into next month.” A jump-ship hovering over land was very loud, very bright and tended to stir up weather that included small tornados and localized hail and rain storms, all from irritating the atmosphere to the point where it had to scratch and sneeze.
“I can live with people being afraid of me.”
“Liar.” She found the window she needed and used the butt of the knife she pulled out of her boot to tap out the glass. It looked and behaved like straight glass, with no embedded energy collectors or thermostats, so she climbed out the window very carefully.
The street was as deserted as advertised.
“Straight ahead, now,” Bedivere told her. “There’s almost nothing in front of you.”
“Almost,” she repeated, thrilled. She began to run again. Ahead, she could hear the air throbbing and the sound of the ship’s engines. There was a bright glow in the sky, pinpointing Bedivere’s location. He was up very high, sparing the locals as much disruption as possible. He was such a good pilot, he could bring the ship down to touch land at the moment she reached the park.
It gave her a fresh spurt of energy. Catherine surged down the long street, heading for the bent and misshapen native trees she could see outlined by the glow from the ship. As she drew closer, the ship came lower. Bedivere was tracking her closely.
“Two to your left,” he said.
Adrenaline was giving her extra power and she dropped the two Shantans easily, then picked up the case and hurried on. She was so close.
She broke out in to the park. The curly brown ground cover that Shanta used for lawn was thick underfoot, absorbing the sound of her running steps, although the shriek and throbbing of the ship so close overhead was muffling all sound.
Trees bent and a few of the taller, older and more rigid ones cracked close to the ground and fell over, their trunks shattered by the pressure of the ship lowering down to ground level. As Catherine ran toward it, the ship spun slowly, until the cargo ramp was facing her. The ramp was already down, the inside of the cargo bay with its battered walls and bent securing struts looking very homelike and comforting.
Something plucked at her sleeve and she felt heat. Fire and sparks lit up the side of the ship, close to the ramp door, then disappeared, whipped away by the wind and air pressure billowing up from the ground. Someone had fired a laser pistol and had just barely missed her.
Catherine ran harder and leapt for the end of the ramp, which was a meter from the ground. She was moving too fast and fell forward on her knees, the case skidding up the no-slip surface of the ramp. “Go!” she screamed.
The ship immediately lifted upward, the surge and power pushing her down onto the ramp and pinning her with motion-induced gravity. The ground dropped away beneath her and she looked out at the Shantans as they ran into their flattened park, staring up at the ship.
Then Bedivere rolled the ship. The end of the ramp lifted up, until the whole ramp was horizontal, letting Catherine get to her feet, pick up the case and walk wearily up to the end of the ramp. Once she was off the ramp, Bedivere closed it up completely, the upper door coming down to meet the edge of the ramp and seal the loading dock.
She clutched at the swinging strapping as the ship tilted and accelerated. He was heading for space. They had electronically disabled the orbital sentries on their way in. They were clear.
Two minutes later, Catherine dropped into the navigator chair that Bedivere usually used and let out a long heavy breath. She put the hard case on the console and patted it.
Bedivere, who was sitting in the pilot’s chair, looked up from the instrumentation and grinned. The laugh lines around his warm brown eyes crinkled. “So...it went about exactly the way we expected. We’ll be in clear space in three minutes, by the way.” His brown-gold hair glowed in the light emitted from the overhead console. The warm color was nothing like the muddy color of native Shantans.
Catherine leaned back so her head was resting on the headrest and blew out another breath. “Nothing ever comes easy,” she muttered.
“You wouldn’t like it if it did.”
She rolled her head to the side and looked at him. She was too tired to smile. “Despite the rhetoric that surrounds my much-maligned past, I happen to like the quiet life.”
Bedivere sat back as she was. “Liar. If you liked it that much, you would live quietly. I don’t remember the last time you stopped to smell the roses.”
“Too much to do,” she muttered, glancing at the case.
The silence stretched and she looked at him. Bedivere was studying the case, too. He caught her gaze and looked back at the case again. “Next stop is Federation space,” he pointed out. “If you really do want a quiet life, Cat, this is the time to shut down the engines and go mute. There won’t be any going back after this.”
“Of course we’re going,” she said sharply. “I haven’t spent seventeen years scraping together every last centavo the fringes could cough up just to go live on some ball somewhere and get even older.”
“We don’t have to do this. All we’ve lost right now is time and that’s an infinite resource. If we head into Federation space, then much more than time is at stake.”
Catherine sat up. “Getting cold feet, Bedivere?”
He shook his head. “I’m worried.” His voice was very quiet. “Everything you’re doing, everything you’ve done. It’s too much.”
“Just shut up right there,” she said sharply and spun the chair to face him properly. “Look,” she added, reaching for a reasonable voi
ce and tone. Reason would always win out with Bedivere. Logic was the supreme argument. “I have to go back to the Federation, anyway.” She touched her hair, which was liberally streaked with grey. The red that had been a rich, deep color was now faded. “You understand the therapy even better than I do. You’ve read even more widely and you never forget anything. You know that rejuvenation revives more than the cellular structure. I’ll feel young again. I won’t be this cranky old woman who has seen too much, has wrinkles on her neck and aches in the morning when she gets out of bed. After, I’ll be sweet and reasonable and even more determined to see this through.”
He looked doubtful.
Catherine grimaced. “Besides, it’s already too late.”
“It is?”
“If we stay in the fringes, the Shantans will come after us with everything they’ve got. But they won’t pursue us into Federation space and risk their membership on the Board. So we have to go there. It’s the Federation or bust.”
Bedivere considered that, then nodded. “As long as you’re not doing this for me.”
“Don’t be stupid,” she said and turned the chair back to face the console, to prep for the gate jump. “Of course I’m doing this for you. What else are partners for?”
He didn’t argue anymore, because the ship was technically a four-man crew ship, so jump prep took all their combined attention and effort. But the little smile at the corner of his mouth didn’t go away.
Chapter Two
The Ivory City, Cathain City, Cathain III. FY 10.068
The walls of the Ivory City were high and wide, but the sounds of celebration on the streets of Cathain reached Kare Sarkisian anyway. As he stood in the dark, leaning against the cold stone railing, he heard the distant pop of fireworks, indistinct voices raised loudly and laughter—a lot of laughter.
One of the guards who had been forced to step out into the cold with him when Kare had escaped the ballroom shifted on his feet, dirt scraping beneath his boots. The dirt was unusual, even for a balcony on the outer wall of the alcazar. But staff had been overwhelmed, preparing for the party.
“The people out there seem to be having more fun than we in here, do they not?” Kare’s voice, honed from years of public speaking, came out deep and demanding. He couldn’t tell who it was behind the face cloth, but the eyes made him think it was one of the new ones whose names he hadn’t learned yet.
There were always new guards.
“Sir,” the man said stiffly. He didn’t say anything else, which was proper.
Kare sighed. Silently. It wouldn’t do for anyone to catch him being glum on a MapMaker day.
The door spun and his aide stepped through, just far enough to hold the door open. “Sir, Governor Vinicius would like a word with you.” From behind him, through the wide, elegant corridor and doorway, floated the sound of a far more elegant and restrained enjoyment than the raw fun the citizens of Cathain were enjoying.
Kare was pleased the aide didn’t try to make him feel guilty for deserting his own party. There was always a tussle with new aides, while they tried to assert their personal power, but this one didn’t seem to have an agenda. That was impossible, of course, but for now, Kare didn’t mind reaping the benefits of the man’s undivided efforts. “Governor Vinicius wants to dispute his planetary dividends,” Kare assured the aide. “He can line up with the others tomorrow.”
The customary day of comradeship that took place the day after any MapMaker day rarely lived up to its name. Kare usually spent the day negotiating with every Board member over issues as petty as docking privileges on Stationary Station, all the way up to the most contentious issues of the day, all under the guise of good sport, good food and fellowship.
Vinicius had taken control of Barros about two hundred years after the Barros system had its own MapMaker day. He had steered the planet to Board membership barely a hundred years later, a record that was yet to be beaten. But such drive and ambition require parsimony and single-mindedness. Vinicius squeezed credits any way he could and the annual dividends never failed to evoke his protests.
Kare glanced at the aide, who was just opening his mouth to respond. “Give the governor my regrets. He can attend me tomorrow.”
The aide didn’t quite frown. “Sir, the Governor explicitly stated that the matter he wishes speak to you about has nothing to do with the Board and everything to do with Barros’ location in the Aibosian Cluster.”
Kare’s attention was caught. Barros was a relatively young member of the Federation and therefore closer to the unregulated fringes of known space. That was the governor’s meaning—that Barros was in a position to hear first about news from that quarter of the fringes.
Kare nodded. “My office,” he said shortly. “Have someone bring me a pot of coffee and a stim-tab.”
“Sir,” the aide said, ducking his head. He withdrew and Kare heard his quick steps on the speck-free, shining and cold floor inside.
Kare gave another silent sigh and moved back into the warmth inside. If Vinicius was wasting his time, Kare would ensure he’d have even more to complain about next year.
His public office was two floors down and at the far end of the administrative section, behind several layers of security, some of them visible and most of them not. The invisible systems were the deadly ones, but they were all keyed to Kare’s DNA. If he had not known they were there, he would have presumed the corridors were deserted and dimmed and his passage was unnoticed. But someone, somewhere, would be monitoring.
The lights came up as he entered the office. The air felt fresh and had been recently ionized to his preferred level, giving it an outdoor feel.
Kare didn’t sit behind the big desk. He found himself moving over to the window, instead. It was showing scenes from the streets of Cathain, where ordinary citizens were still celebrating.
As the aide almost silently parked a tray of coffee and the requested stim-tabs on the desk behind him, Kare noticed a line of people waiting along the edge of the street. He thanked the aide then manipulated the window controls, bringing the line-up closer for his inspection.
There was bunting hanging on the building they were queued to enter. Cathain Pioneer Station #12, it said. Underneath, in smaller script was written, Be the first on Tordis, our new sister planet! Bonus Federation pay scale!
“Governor Vinicius, sir,” the aide announced.
Kare gave a grunt of acknowledgement, studying the people in the line.
Movement at the corner of his vision made him glance to his left. The governor was looking out the window, too.
“It’s only been a week since the announcement, but already the colonization begins,” Vinicius observed. “Once, long ago, I might even have envied them the freedom to homestead on a new world.”
“Anyone has that right,” Kare reminded him.
“The right, most certainly, Your Honor. In practice, most of us are so entrenched in our current lives, leaving them is impossible.”
Kare shrugged. “Not impossible. There’s always a choice.” That was what he reminded himself every time stray notions of escape momentarily eclipsed his thought processes. But Vinicius was correct, too—leaving his current role and commitments might be his right, but it came with overwhelming complications that grew more complex with each passing year.
“You wanted to speak to me,” Kare reminded Vinicius.
Vinicius pulled at the hem of his jacket, straightening it. He was dressed in the formal uniform of Cathain’s military, of which he was the nominal head. There was braid, buttons and ribbons across his shoulder. His boots were gleaming with high polish.
His face was red from drink and food and possibly from dancing, too. The trimmed beard was showing a little grey, which surprised Kare. Had it really been that long since Vinicius had regenerated? Kare could remember the last time he spotted grey in Vinicius’ hair and beard, but that had only been…nearly thirty years ago, Kare realized, with a start.
Vinicius undid two of t
he genuine working buttons on his jacket and reached inside.
Kare didn’t brace himself, for part of the security in this wing included body scans, keyed to find weapons of any sort, including biologicals. Whatever Vinicius was about to pull out of his jacket, it would be benign.
“Starting nearly two years ago, I began to hear rumors that Shahrazad had returned to the core systems.” Vinicius pulled a data crystal from his jacket, placed it on the dark wood surface of the desk and tapped it.
Kare almost smiled, but didn’t because Vinicius’ expression was so serious. “Catherine Shahrazad?” Kare clarified. “The scion of Glave himself? The last time anyone heard about her was nearly a hundred years ago—if the woman who claimed to be her really was her. No one was able to confirm that at the time because there isn’t so much as a single image pixel of her anywhere.”
“Oh, she exists,” Vinicius said and opened the case the data crystal was in and held up the crystal delicately between thick finger and thumb. “May I?”
Kare shrugged and picked up the coffee. “If you must.” He stepped out of the way of the desk controls and watched Vinicius insert the crystal and tried to hide his amusement. Catherine Shahrazad—the Shahrazad—was more legend than anything else. There had been imposters claiming to be the descendant of Glave of Summanus—all of them had failed DNA testing—but that had happened only after the name alone had stirred up more than one civil riot.
The window turned milky white, then a standard therapeutic deconstruction arrayed itself.
“What is this?” Kare asked, only mildly curious.
“We’re a small world, Barros is,” Vinicius said and Kare’s gut tightened. Most of Vinicius’ complaints about lack of dividends centered on how poor and struggling Barros was and that consideration should be given to that fact.
But Vinicius was still speaking. “We barely qualified for Federation status and it is a struggle every year to meet the requirements.” Then he smiled. “But you know this as well as I do. My point, however, is that civil unrest, religious rioting, questions about the nature of life and human rights…these are all dangerous events in a world as small as Barros. When I heard the first of the rumors that the great Catherine Shahrazad might have returned to Federation space, I decided that preventive steps might be prudent. I had investigators track down the rumors and try to verify them.”
Faring Soul - Science Fiction Romance Page 2