by Jaleta Clegg
“Tebros Main, we’ve got a problem,” Jerimon said, his voice unnaturally calm.
I wrestled with the steering while he talked. Ships dotted the viewscreen, extremely close on our tail. I tried the standard maneuvers again without result, the sublights still wouldn’t respond. It was time for something drastic. Jerimon’s hands danced over the controls as he talked with Tebros control. I caught his hand in mine.
“Hands off a minute,” I said. Our eyes met briefly. He nodded, his gaze sliding away.
I punched buttons across both sides of the board. The maneuver was risky, but I couldn’t think of anything else. Slamming into a planet at hyper velocities was a sure way to die. I flipped the row of manual bypass switches over my head. The lights on the board glowed steady red. The alarms shrilled until I hit the cutoff switch. Dead silence filled the cockpit. Not even the whisper of air ducts broke the sudden stillness.
“Dace?”
I held up my hand. “Get ready on the sublights.”
“You’re going to kill us,” Leon cried.
I silently counted to five.
Jerimon watched me, hands poised over the controls. His face was dead white.
I hit five and slammed all the switches back to automatic. The engine gave a slight hiccup and started running. The lights flickered yellow, as if unsure, before most of them faded back to green. I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. The controls were sluggish and responded slowly, but at least they responded. Jerimon’s hands shook as he booted the sublight engine controls. I dumped speed as fast as I could.
“Twinkle, this is Tebros Control. What is your status?” a voice crackled over the headsets.
It didn’t sound even close to snickering. The voice sounded very, very worried.
I flipped my headset through the stations while Jerimon talked to Tebros Control. Judging from the chatter of the other ships, we’d disrupted a lot of travel plans. No major damage reported, though, which made me feel a bit better.
Jerimon adjusted the engine controls. “Coordinates should be coming through.”
I glanced at the screen by my left elbow. Numbers scrolled across the tiny square, feeding into the computer.
“Did you tell them the autopilot isn’t functional?”
“Yes. It’s a fairly simple flight pattern. They’ll call if we wander too much.” I checked our position against their numbers and made some adjustments to the flight vector. The engine whined briefly.
Jerimon flinched.
“Is that a standard method of dealing with problems?” he finally asked after the engine readings settled down.
“The instructors called it certain death,” I admitted. “Because even if you get the ship down in one piece, ground control is sure to murder you. Or so they claimed.”
“Great.” Jerimon still looked a bit pale. “As if we don’t have enough people and creatures trying to do it already.”
“Would you rather be splattered all over the planet?”
Jerimon reached for a switch. His hands shook.
“It worked, Jerimon. Isn’t that good enough? What’s Leon up to?”
Jerimon looked behind us. “He’s passed out on the floor.”
Chapter Six
Sector Commander Tayvis cut an imposing figure as he stepped off his ship onto Viya Station. His flawlessly pressed black uniform drank in light. The muted sparkle of gold at his throat only underscored the air of authority he radiated. His boots, polished to a high gloss, clicked across the docking bay to where the station master, Gervon Tiyl, and his assistants waited nervously. Malcolm Tayvis had arrived in style.
Master Tiyl rubbed his hands up and down his thighs, his eyes darting around the dock like tiny fish around a shark. Dock workers scurried about their tasks, not lingering in any one place. Patrol uniforms prowled through the muted chaos.
Tayvis stopped a pace away from the shorter master. Frown lines bracketed his mouth.
The station master waited, twitching at every sound.
Tayvis let the silence stretch, deliberately baiting the other man. Nervous men said things they didn’t intend, and Tiyl was very nervous.
Tiyl wiped sweaty hands down his thighs. “We put them in the guest suites, under guard of course. Their ship is being repaired. We aren’t quite sure what to do. You came awfully quickly.”
“Who?” Tayvis asked, confused.
“The Sessimoniss,” Tiyl replied. “You were sent to deal with the situation, weren’t you?”
Tayvis studied the man for a long moment. “I’m here in pursuit of a suspected smuggler.”
Tiyl swallowed. “But the Sessimoniss. I don’t know what to do with them. I sent messages to the Patrol base at Tebros. You didn’t get them?”
Tayvis forced a smile. “I’ll see what I can do for you. May we discuss this in your office?”
“Of course,” Tiyl said with obvious relief. “Right this way, Commander.”
The dock workers watched with unconcealed interest. Tayvis left quiet orders for his assistant. He needed information; Tiyl didn’t look like he’d provide much.
“Everything was normal yesterday morning,” Tiyl began after escorting Tayvis to his personal quarters.
Tiyl’s secretary scrounged through the kitchen, searching for something suitable to offer a high-ranking Patrol officer.
“Mostly,” Tiyl added thoughtfully.
“Explain,” Tayvis prompted when the man paused.
“It’s difficult, so much has happened. Viya is normally the most peaceful, quiet post in the Empire. It was just all so sudden.” Tiyl’s anxious look begged Tayvis to understand that Tiyl was not at fault for any of it.
Tayvis nodded, pasting a look of sympathy on his face to mask his growing irritation. “Yesterday? What happened?”
“I knew about the raid on Belliff’s offices, of course. Admiral Shoonis came a week ago, warning me about it. Someone tipped off the Patrol that Belliff was behind smuggling in Praxi Sector. They apparently had more connections with the underworld network than just that. I heard Belliff’s owners were part of the Targon crime family and that’s how they got into the smuggling. I was shocked to learn that they were actually using Viya as part of their route. We were suspicious of them all along, of course. I had station security watch their offices very closely. Admiral Shoonis was most grateful.
“It’s absolutely awful what those crime families get up to. The sector governments do nothing about them because most of them are on the family payroll. Admiral Shoonis assured me all of them will answer to the Emperor before too long, it’s just a matter of collecting the incriminating evidence until they can’t possibly buy their way out of the charges. That’s exactly what happened when Captain Fenris was arrested. He just bought off the government and they dropped all charges of piracy even though he was guilty. It is a crime, don’t you think?”
Master Tiyl paused only because his secretary proffered tiny sandwiches and drinks.
“What happened yesterday?” Tayvis ignored the refreshments.
“Yesterday?” Tiyl gulped his drink then handed it back to the secretary for a refill. “Oh, yes, yesterday.” He picked a sandwich into tiny crumbs. “Well, the Patrol was moving in for the raid when one of Belliff’s couriers arrived. We put our whole operation on hold so we could net the courier as well, or possibly put a trace on the ship. They can do that, but of course you would already know that, wouldn’t you?”
“The raid?” The courier could only have been Dace.
“Yes, the raid.” Tiyl popped the sandwich crumbs in his mouth, chewing noisily.
Tayvis tapped his fingers impatiently on the arm of the chair.
“It seems someone tipped off the courier. There was some garbled transmission from the ship, something about the ship being hijacked. It sounded awful. There is a tape of the whole thing if you want to listen to it.” Tiyl gave Tayvis a pained smile, which made him look like a constipated rabbit.
“Later. Tell me what e
lse happened. The ship was hijacked?”
“It sounded dreadful. The ship engines started up while it was still docked. We tried to get them to shut back down, but for some reason, they couldn’t. It isn’t very clear. So I had them dump the ship, emergency undocking procedures, just like we’re supposed to. We could have lost the entire docking bay if we hadn’t. Well, they just flew away, ignoring the Patrol orders to stop. Then the Sessimoniss showed up, demanding we return some kind of stone.” Tiyl swallowed again, his fingers squeezing sandwiches to pulp seemingly by themselves. “The courier was your smuggler, wasn’t it?”
Tayvis nodded. The ship had to have been Dace’s. No one else could start so much trouble in so little time.
“Someone started shooting. The Sessimoniss ship was disabled. We had to tow them to the station and then lock them up. They were really being quite appalling about the whole mixup. I couldn’t let them hurt anyone. We had to arrest them.” His voice trailed off into miserable guilty silence. He cleared his throat twice before resuming his story. “They had guns. They were shouting. We tried to treat them nicely. I know how difficult relations with other sapients can be. But I really didn’t have much of a choice. The Patrol commander, the one with the fleet out there, he wouldn’t do anything. He told me it was my responsibility.”
“Someone will be here soon to deal with them,” Tayvis promised, mentally crossing his fingers and hoping he was telling the truth. “What happened to the courier?”
“Oh, it slipped away during the fight. It’s gone.” Tiyl folded in on himself. “Did you come to relieve me of my post? I messed everything up.”
“You did just fine. If I could see the records, I can mention in my report how well you handled the Sessimoniss.” He pasted a smile on his face and projected calm, even though he didn’t feel it.
“Would you? Do you really think I did all right? I just couldn’t think what to do with the Sessimoniss so I locked them away where no one could get hurt. We’ve tried to keep them comfortable.”
“You did just the right thing. I don’t have much time, so if I could see those records soon?”
Tiyl picked at his fingernails with one hand. “I’ll get Darl to pull them for you.”
The secretary set the plate of food in front of Tiyl. “If you would follow me.” Her voice was quiet, efficient.
Tayvis shook his head as he joined the secretary at the door. He suspected the station ran mostly on her quiet efficiency.
She led him through the station to a hushed office behind the busy controller’s area. She turned on a monitor with a touch and used a combination of voice commands and typed passwords to access files. “All of yesterday’s records are here. I removed the locking passwords. If you need anything else, call me.” She gave him her access code. The door slid shut behind her.
Tayvis quickly scanned the list of recordings. Most of them were the usual docking procedures and course corrections. He found the file for an emergency undocking, clicking the command to play the recording.
Dace’s voice filled the small room, shrill with panic. Tayvis listened intently until the transmission abruptly cut off. He stared at the monitor, his mind conjuring horrible scenes to accompany the voice recordings of Dace, locked in a tiny ship with a murderous maniac. Tayvis replayed the recording, wincing at the screams and shots. He played it over a third time, listening more closely. Why would Dace panic, telling the controller she was scared of a man with a gun? It didn’t fit the Dace he’d known on Dadilan.
Tayvis tapped his fingers on the screen, thinking. There had to be more clues. He accessed files, sifting through the entire mess of complicated records. Lowell had left him with a wide-open account. He was going to use all of it trying to track her down, if she left this kind of chaos in her wake everywhere she went. He couldn’t wait for problems to multiply, though. He had to find her.
“Where did you go, Dace?” he muttered as he started once more on the files.
Chapter Seven
The ship shook so badly as we descended to Tebros we could barely see the gauges. The engines threatened to quit, choking off just long enough to send me into a panic before kicking back in. Jerimon’s chair slammed him into me more than once as the ship bucked atmosphere.
We finally touched ground, rather abruptly. I shut the engines down then just sat, relishing being alive and somewhat safe for a moment. Jerimon peeled his white-knuckled hands away from the edge of the console.
“I never want to do that again,” he said.
“Neither do I.” I shook cramps from my fingers. “Time to start moving on our plan.” With a few hours and a few hundred credits, I could fix the engines. “How much cash do we have on board?”
“Less than fifty credits.”
I swore. Fifty credits just might pay our landing fees, if we hadn’t upset the government too badly with our wild entrance. We needed cash, lots of it, and quickly. Belliff had given us boxes of gems. They weren’t in a position to complain if I appropriated a few.
“What?” Jerimon said. “I get nervous when you smile like that.”
“Belliff is going to pay us.”
“They are?”
“They just don’t know it yet. How much do you think those gems are worth? Say one packet?”
“You aren’t going to steal them.” His deep blue eyes studied my face. “You are.”
“Why shouldn’t I, Jerimon? They owe us. How is anyone going to ever know unless you tell them?”
“Which Academy did you graduate from? The one for the criminally insane?”
“I’m not the one who started an interspecies war.” He glared for a long moment before shrugging. “I didn’t see you take them. I know nothing about it.”
“No, you won’t, because you’re going to turn Leon and the rest of the evidence over to the Patrol and convince them we’re innocent victims. I’ll take care of getting us cash.”
“You’re coming with me, aren’t you?”
I shook my head. I wasn’t going anywhere near a Patrol office if I could avoid it. Once they got my ID and pulled up my files, I would be stuck for a long while. Half of my file for the last year was inaccessible unless the person looking had a security clearance of at least a seven, possibly even higher. It all had to do with the situation on Dadilan.
“I’m going to get the engine fixed then find a navigator to bribe. And I’m going to make sure there’s something more than chicken soup on board.”
He heaved a big sigh, dropping his headset on the chair when he stood. The light for the airlock blinked red briefly before fading back to green.
I frowned, tapping the dial but it remained green. “Jerimon? Is the airlock working?”
Jerimon stomped back into the cockpit. He was even more attractive angry. “Leon’s gone.”
“How much do you think he heard?” I told my body to quit thinking about kissing. It didn’t listen.
Jerimon shrugged.
“After we were so nice to him. Or I should say you were nice to him. You’d better leave. If he gets to the Patrol first, who knows what story he’ll tell them.”
“I’m gone,” Jerimon said. “And if I catch him first, I’m going to remove a few body parts.” He yanked open the door to the cargo bay, grabbing the nearest stack of thin cartons.
I stopped him long enough to empty three of the packets. The gems glimmered in my hands.
“The outer door does lock, doesn’t it?” Jerimon nodded at the crates of blasters.
I nodded. It was keyed only for me. I’d never gotten around to authorizing Jerimon. “It’s keyed for my voice and thumb.”
“Then I’ll wait if I get back before you do.”
“Knock three times and wait. I’m keeping it locked even if I get back first. This is starting to sound like one of those bad spy vids.”
He laughed; it sounded strained but it broke some of the tension. He punched the button for the airlock to open.
“Jerimon.”
He looked over hi
s shoulder. Lines of worry and fatigue marked his handsome face.
I decided I could like Jerimon but I still wasn’t sure I wanted him kissing me despite the fluttering in my belly every time he looked my way. “What planet is your sister on?”
“Nevira.”
I nodded, suddenly nervous and shy for no good reason. “Good luck,” I said lamely.
“And you.”
The door slid shut, leaving me alone in the tiny ship.
I hefted the gems in my hand and tried to smile. All of my nervous panic surfaced. If Jerimon pulled off the impossible and convinced the Patrol to let us go, we still had to deal with the Sessimoniss. I wasn’t sure giving back the Eggstone would satisfy them, if we could even find it. I looked at the glittering pile in my hand and wondered where to find the nearest semi-honest dealer in stolen goods. I had to be confident. I had to be tough.
“I am Dace,” I muttered. “I am tough, I can do this. I have to do this.” I used to repeat it as my personal mantra. It got me through the orphanage on Tivor. It got me through the Academy. It hadn’t worked very well on Dadilan. “It’s going to work here, now. It has to.” I punched the airlock controls.
It took me most of the afternoon to find someone I could trust enough to give me fair price on the gems. I walked through every seedy bar on the bad side of the port before I got the tip I wanted. The shop was in a back alley that was home to men that made me nervous just walking past in broad daylight. The dealer was nice enough, a little man with a bush of white hair and thick glasses and a shy smile. He sorted through my pile of gems and gave me a number that didn’t leave me breathless but was more than enough. I dickered partly for show and partly because I missed it. Bargaining was an art that I loved. I hadn’t had much chance to practice. We settled on a price just slightly higher than his first offer. He reduced it somewhat when I insisted on cash immediately. It was still more than enough.
I hit it lucky at the repair shop. With five minutes before closing, I found the two modules I needed. I stopped by the port services to make arrangements for refueling. The lady behind the desk was not a lady when she discovered what ship I was from. She used some very creative cussing as she filled out my paperwork. Her vocabulary was impressive.