The Off-Worlders

by George Willson

  Pingrit immediately started opening doors as Perry walked to the far end of the room to do the same Blake walked over to Michelle, but instead of checking files, he pulled out his scanner. Michelle looked over his shoulder as she pretended to look at the files. Blake turned the scanner to look towards the wall of freezers and found one distinct heat source.

  “He’s in number seventeen,” Blake said to Michelle as he put the scanner away.

  “Why didn’t you just do that before?” Michelle asked. “And why the act over the keys? You don’t need them.”

  “Pingrit isn’t what he says he is,” Blake said. “I’ll explain later. Suffice to say, for now, I don’t want him to know about my tools.”

  Michelle nodded and suddenly exclaimed, “I found it! Number seventeen.” She noticed that when she said this, the man in the chair snapped his head up, and though she could not see his eyes behind the gauze blindfold, she felt like he appeared confused by her revelation. She got the idea that perhaps the information was not even in the room to be found, and that he was biding his time.

  Pingrit went to freezer seventeen and opened it. The man was removed from his body bag and lay, still fully clothed, on a sliding metal shelf. Pingrit searched through the dead man’s pockets briefly until he came out with something that looked like a rectangular starburst on a lanyard. It had a circle in the center but lines extended from that circle forming a series of four sided shapes where the side closest to the center formed along the circle’s edge. Two lines spread apart slightly as they approached the edge, and once the edge was reached, one line stopped before the other so that the final edge formed a pointed 45-degree angle. There were a couple dozen of these shapes all around the central circle which made it look a bit like a starburst.

  “This is it,” Pingrit said as he slipped the lanyard around his neck.

  “Fine,” Blake said. “Let’s get out of here.”

  The four of them exited the room and called the elevator. It still waited on the basement level, so it opened right up. A brief ride to the first floor and the doors opened once more to a deserted lobby area. They crossed the area to the automatic doors but noticed red and blue lights flashing through them. They immediately stopped.

  “That’s a problem,” Perry said.

  “Down the hall,” Blake said.

  They bypassed the doors sparing only a glance as they passed to find three security vehicles had parked right outside. The doors opened just as they disappeared into the hallway. The hall was white, featureless, and bright with unadorned walls and nowhere to hide. Their only hope was that their instructions involved heading to the morgue first, and they would not check the crossover hall until later.

  The corridor felt like it never ended. They ran as softly as possible so that their shoes would not be clattering loudly and drawing attention to them. They reached the end of the hall finally and crossed into another darkened corridor whose lights snapped on as soon as they entered. They turned to the right in the hopes of finding an exit that would lead them out to their car which they were grateful they had parked in an adjacent lot.

  The current hall had several branches leading further into the campus on their left, but on their right was just a row of windows looking out toward the parking lot and the coroner’s building beyond a finely landscaped courtyard that was intended to be the focal point of the window. With the lights in the hall illuminating them, they ducked just below the bottom of the window as they ran so they would not attract attention in case anyone were to see them. An occasional glance out the window showed they were still in the clear.

  They glanced outside and found that two other cars had since arrived. The man they had detained was walking out with them, explaining the situation. It would not be long until they were discovered as the detail sent would inevitably head straight down that hallway.

  “Here’s a door,” Pingrit said.

  “Good enough for me,” Blake said.

  They exited the hall and padded across the courtyard. Their vehicle still looked like it was miles away even though they could see it from where they hid behind some hedges on a walkway in the little courtyard. Between the edge of the yard and the parking lot, however, was a vast stretch of open parking lot. Nothing would shield them from the eyes of security.

  The door behind them opened. “I found them!” a guard yelled.

  “Run,” Blake said.

  The four of them broke into a sprint across the courtyard and into the parking lot as security converged on them from two directions. Several men poured from the door behind them as others ran from the coroner’s parking lot. Pingrit dug into in pocket for the vehicle’s key fob. He desperately pressed the button to start the car and unlock the doors.

  Michelle felt someone snag the waistband of her jeans and pull. She fell backward and hit the asphalt with a thud. Blake paused in his run to see Michelle had been taken down as a security guard rested his knee in the middle of her chest against her neck. Perry had nearly reached the car and had not noticed Michelle’s situation.

  Blake ran towards those who were making their way towards Pingrit’s car to block their pursuit. Pingrit was able to reach the vehicle successfully as Perry reached a rear door and flung it open. He jumped inside and finally looked back just as Blake hit the ground. He moved to get back out, but not before Pingrit peeled out of the parking lot without so much as a glance behind throwing Perry back in the seat and allowing physics to slam the back door.

  Blake and Michelle were handcuffed and dragged across the parking lot to the man they had previously tied to a chair in the morgue.

  “So should we call your friend, Dr. Jason Smith, now,” the man said sarcastically, “or wait until after you’ve talked to the police?”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Blake and Michelle sat in an office in the security area of the hospital. It was a simple enough room with a desk in its center and some filing cabinets along the side. They sat on the visitor side of the desk while another chair rested empty on the business side. For having just been tackled during an attempt to escape after looting a corpse, they were relatively relaxed. Michelle was more anxious than the other two as they waited for someone to come in. She noticed how relaxed Blake appeared and had to say something.

  “So you don’t get nervous when you get arrested?” Michelle asked.

  “In the grand scheme of things, how long do you think we’ll be here?” Blake asked.

  “So there’s no chance of getting locked away and having The Maze forget about us?” Michelle asked.

  “I can’t say definitively one way or the other,” Blake said, “but I know we’re always here for a reason, and wherever we end up is where we’re supposed to be. We don’t have a ship to get back to, and we have nowhere to be while we’re here. There is no point in fretting over what’s coming. We can be entirely truthful if we want, and it won’t make a difference.”

  “Do you think we control our fate then?” Michelle asked.

  “I think that we have the free will to do whatever we want to do in the moments we have available to us,” Blake said. “I also think someone in our future knows what we already chose to do. That’s a head scratcher more than anything else.”

  “So you think that we were sent here to fulfill the thing that someone knows we already did even though we don’t know we did it yet, but whatever choices we will make are the ones we already made?” Michelle said before considering what she had just said. “Wait, that didn’t make sense.”

  “Welcome to my reality,” Blake said. “It’s a joy to stumble through world after world and find out whatever you did made some kind of difference.”

  “Perry warned me about trying to make sense of you,” Michelle said. “Do you think he’ll be all right?”

  “I hope so,” Blake said. “Pingrit is not as trustworthy as he lead us to believe.”

  The door opened, and Detective Turner walked in. He shook his head.

  “You know,” he said, “whe
n I heard about a call concerning our John Doe and there being some people in custody who robbed him, my mind went right to you three although you appear to be missing one. The tourists who made no sense.”

  “That sounds like us,” Blake said cheerfully.

  Turner sighed and turned to someone just outside the door. “I’ll be out in a moment. Just stand by.” He closed the door and walked to the opposite side of the desk and sat down. He looked between each of them in turn. Michelle noticed she was wringing her hands nervously and abruptly stopped.

  “You haven’t been around as long as he has, have you?” Turner asked Michelle with a nod to Blake. “Bit new to the whole tourist gig.”

  “You could say that, yes,” Michelle said.

  “What kind of tourist gig is this anyway?” Turner asked. “I find you leaning over a body, and then a few hours later, you’re at the morgue stealing something off the same body. Did we interrupt you before you were done with it the first time?”

  “No, what we told you before about just stumbling on it was completely right,” Blake said.

  “How about I direct all my questions to your lady friend here,” Turner said. “I think I’d be the most interested in her answers instead of your clearly well-rehearsed explanations, Mr. Blake Williams. How about Michelle here tells me how she really knows you and your missing companion?”

  Michelle looked at Blake nervously and then back to Turner. “We’re tourists, and he’s our guide,” she stuttered.

  “Do not toy with me,” Turner barked slamming his hand down on the desk. “I will send the three of you to prison so quick it will make your head spin if you don’t answer me honestly. At this point, I don’t care if you killed that man or not; you don’t tell me what I need to know, and you’ll hang for it. Are we clear?”

  “He is our guide,” Michelle said slowly. Turner only watched her dispassionately. “That is the truth.”

  “What else is the truth?” Turner asked.

  “We just arrived here,” Michelle said. “We’ve only been here a few hours. We had arrived moments before you picked us up. We found the body by accident. We are not responsible for his death.”

  “All right,” Turner said never taking his eyes from any of them. “I believe you so far. Why did you come to the morgue? And where is your third companion and the fourth person who was with you? The ones who spun out of here in that car, abandoning you.”

  “Our third person was in the backseat,” Michelle said, “and from what I saw, he wasn’t aware we had been caught until the other guy was driving off. Perry didn’t even get the door shut. The fourth person is actually your murderer.”

  “And you were helping him?” Turner asked in surprise. “You realize that not reporting this makes you an accomplice to the crime.”

  “His explanation for what happened led us to see what help we could give,” Michelle said. “He said he was a policeman chasing a criminal, and in order to complete his investigation, he needed something from the criminal’s … vehicle. He didn’t have the key though, so we had to help him get it.”

  “His vehicle?” Turner asked. “Why not just break the window? Or pop the lock? Or call a locksmith? What kind of vehicle could he have that you would need to take the keys off the body?”

  “I don’t really know,” Michelle said.

  Turner sat back and looked at them again. He appeared to have much going through his head that he was considering. He closed his eyes and sighed.

  “I’m going to say one word,” Turner offered. “I’m hoping that it will loosen some tongues at this table. Torgets.”

  “Interesting word choice,” Blake said. “Why did you choose that word?”

  “I’m wondering if it is a location you’re aware of,” Turner said.

  “It was printed in the victim’s shirt, wasn’t it?” Blake asked.

  “It was,” Turner said.

  “Is it a place you’re aware of?” Blake asked.

  “I have been there, yes,” Turner said.

  “Then maybe I can offer a touch of insight on some of this,” Blake said. “This attempt at getting the key Michelle mentioned is actually our second one tonight. During the first one, I did a little recon of my own.”

  “You did?” Michelle asked. “While we were fussing with the van? I thought you were just listening to them talk.”

  “Oh, please,’ Blake said. “Like I would be that pedantic. Here’s what I really did…”

  * * * * * * *

  Blake had watched Perry and Michelle leave with Pingrit to intercept the coroner’s van, which remained unmoved before him. He had plenty of time. His conversation with Pingrit over the location of the dead man’s ship was just a formality to make sure what he had already seen on his scanner was what he thought it was. There was technology foreign to Earth in the woods behind the warehouse, and he only wanted to confirm that this tech was what he needed.

  Blake immediately went through the woods to find the ship that the warehouse victim had come to Earth in. A short distance through the undeveloped area, the trees opened up into a small clearing where a vehicle rested on the ground. It was about twelve feet in length and about six feet at its tallest with a distinct cockpit set into a nose that went to a point at the front and opened to a cargo hold in the back. Long flat extensions tucked into the sides of the vessel possibly extended to wings, and some dark, lifeless engines appeared to be at the back. It was not the sort of craft one would live in, but fly to various places and find a place to stay there.

  Blake had to think for a moment since this was 500 years before his time, but it looked like a police vessel. The cargo hold at the back was originally used for transporting single prisoners, and upon its decommission, it was snapped up by bounty hunters to bring back their captives alive. Before this came out, the hunters would take advantage of the “dead or alive” part, and simply strap their prey to the outside of the ship. They got returned, but quite obviously very dead.

  Blake did not need the badge to open the ship, and he knew it. The security of the ship was ancient compared to the Maze, so opening it would be child’s play. He only took advantage of the distraction that attempting to retrieve the badge would provide. He used his electronic lock pick and pressed it against the cockpit. The door opened immediately.

  Inside, he turned the information systems on and looked through the database. As they already knew, the owner of the ship was the victim they had seen. He was a former police officer called Thorwin Bystins who was stationed on Torlets, which Blake found interesting since Pingrit was also from Torlets. He had retired from the force and moved into hunting criminals for money.

  Blake looked through the mission log, but there was no mention of Pingrit Talkisan. In fact, if Blake read this correctly, the reason the man was on Earth was to hunt out an Aquafirn called Rºå..0bºp. He never could read the Aquafirn language, and computers always rendered it poorly - even in his time. The notes on the task indicated that Thorwin had probably come to Terra due to its salt-based oceans since that was the environment the Aquafirns had on their home planet. He had likely hoped to find a way to capture this one and bring him back alive; the bounty for it was quite impressive.

  So how did Pingrit get involved in all of this? Knowing that both he and this former policeman were on the same planet at some point, had he thought that he had been recognized? Or if Pingrit had genuinely tracked the ship here, it might be simpler than that.

  He knew he was running out of time, and he had to think of something. Pingrit apparently wanted the badge to enter the ship, and his story over there being was item was a lie. There was nothing of value in the ship that Blake could see. He suspected that Pingrit just wanted the ship itself and needed to get the key to it.

  Blake jumped out of the cockpit and closed it behind him. He went to the engines at the back and reached behind them to find the starter links. He used to do this to people in his former life to mess with them. The starter links kicked the engines on, but t
hey could be removed very easily if you knew where to look. Even without the Guide, he knew where to look. After Earth technology had reached the point to where the Federation accepted them, Earth was given access to all the old tech as well, and these starter links solved a problem in Earth ships with their engines.

  The little ship had three main engines, and as such, three starter links. Everything related to interstellar movement and propulsion was connected to these, so lift and maneuvering thrusters would not work either unless the main engines were on. It effectively grounded a ship until someone could replace them.

  Blake took them and placed them on the ground beside a tree beyond the ship’s landing clearing and then ran back to the warehouse so he could be sure to be relaxed by the time everyone else got back. If they had all returned here after finding the badge, he knew Pingrit would be angry, but since he would not have the links on him, he was not worried about it. He had intended just to let it all play out.

  * * * * * * *

  “Thorwin Bystins,” Turner said thoughtfully as if trying to drag up a memory before looking Blake in the eye. “And that’s the truth this time.”

  “Absolutely,” Blake said. “Did you know Mr. Bystins?”

  “If he’s who I think he is, or was,” Turner said, “then we crossed paths very briefly when I was a patrolman near Kilyof. Nice guy at the time. We’ll find out more when I can look him up in the Federation database. Do you think the ship is still out there?”

  “No way of knowing,” Blake said, “other than going back out there. We definitely need to follow him to see if we can get Perry back.”

  “Pingrit was probably going in that direction,” Michelle said. “He might still be there.”

  “Pingrit?” Turner asked.

  “Pingrit Talkisan is the name of the fourth person,” Blake said. Turner appeared to be considering the name as if he remembered it, but he finally shook his head.

  He stepped outside the door and explained briefly that he would be taking the prisoners himself and required no assistance. The pair left the office with Turner and proceeded through the hospital to his car outside. As with Pingrit, Blake got in the front, and Michelle climbed in the back.