by Jason Kent
"Pretty simple really," Stampf declared. "You set the direction of your destination and then let her run. My babies will lead you in the right direction no matter how many twists and turns you take. Excellent for navigation on strange stations or ships. Two modes; coordinate and directional. You enter the coordinates on the numbered dials and the mechanism figures out direction and distance from your starting point, that's the second line of numbers in the read-out. Or, you just set the direction, aft for instance, and let it point the way. Power-springs are my specialty so they will run your gyronav for more than ten hours. Good as I am, I still must warn you not to overwind. Best way to kill a clockwork device, you know." He looked from Kate to Merrick and his Marine-special sniper rifle and all its electronic attachments. Merrick glowered back at the shopkeeper. "Or maybe you don't."
"We need your services," Georges stated.
"Of course," Stampf replied. "Anything you need. As you are well aware, I'm good for weapons and transport pods with shielding compartments," he looked at Kate, "for sending heirlooms home, of course." Stampf started to tick off his alternate product menu on his fingers. "Medical supplies, the good stuff mind you, blades, got a mech in the back, hard to come by, information—"
"A ship," Georges interrupted, "with a jump drive."
"A ship," Stampf sputtered. He rubbed his chin and looked thoughtful. "Not my usual thing, but I might know someone. Maybe if you gave me a few days..."
"Now," Georges demanded. He tapped his gun on the battered counter for emphasis. The Colonel added in a low, dangerous tone, "As in...now."
Stampf's eye twitched before he managed to regain his composure. Finally, he pasted the smile back on his face and exclaimed, "For such an excellent customer as yourself, I'm sure we can find something...at the right price." The shopkeeper squinted at Georges. "And how might we be paying for this, ah, merchandise?"
"Store credit."
For once Stampf was speechless. He opened his mouth then closed it tight.
Georges just eyed the man.
"Look," Stampf explained slowly as he recovered his demeanor, "I'm a businessman—"
"Double later. Ship today."
Stampf was speechless again. Even Kate realized making this deal would be lucrative if he could produce the ship. The clockwork shopkeeper put his hands up. "Okay, I surrender. I think I may have just the thing for you. But I must say—" Stampf eyed the front door.
Kate saw Georges' eyes narrow. He spun to face the door and gestured. Merrick and Garrett did not need to be told what to do. Garrett popped his crossbow up and covered Stampf. He knocked several bins off the shelf in the process. Half a dozen alarm clocks and a handful of spare gear assembles flew through the air.
"You break it, you buy it," Stampf announced automatically as he put his hands up.
"Not today," Garrett replied coolly.
Merrick pushed off and sailed the short distance to the door jamb. He braced his rifle against the chipped paint of the frame and peered around the busy market with his optical scope. Georges was at the other side of the doorway. "Mechs?"
"Yup. Bonus, got some armored troopers, too."
"Nice," Georges growled. He turned to Stampf. "Back door?"
"Not unless you've got a pressure suit," Stampf remarked with a thin smile.
"You're a real piece of tral, Stampf," Georges declared.
"Well, it was your store credit and dubious promise of payment weighed against the station mech masters paying me nearly as much. Cash on delivery, bird in the hand... You get the picture."
Sparrow ducked behind the counter, sure to keep out of Garrett's line of fire and confirmed what Kate just pieced together. "Silent alarm. Some sort of pneumatic interface, couldn't catch it." The link sprite ripped the alarm button and its associated tubing out from under the counter.
Sparrow eyed Stampf then the entrance to the back room.
In a flash, Kate knew there was a second entrance through the workshop in the rear. She still did not know how she knew, but she was beginning to trust the insight. She thought back to Blade Redeemed from their earlier encounter. We definitely need her now, Kate thought. Aloud, she announced, "There's a secret door between this shop and the next. Behind the safe."
"Figures," Sparrow snorted and ducked into the back.
Kate went to join her. Might as well save everyone the trouble of searching. Apparently Knowl felt like sharing this particular piece of information.
As she passed near Stampf, she stopped and held out the gyronav to the store keeper.
"Keep it," Stampf offered. "Don't forget the carrying case. Hand-made."
"Got it!" Sparrow called.
"Can't blame a guy for trying to make his way, eh?" Stampf remarked nonchalantly to Kate.
Sparrow appeared beside Stampf. Before he could react, she smashed the butt of her handgun against his temple. Stampf crumpled back from the impact. The force of the blow knocked his feet loose from the mag flooring. More bins of goods were upturned as he made contact with an overflowing shelf. She addressed his still form.
"Actually, I can," Sparrow sniffed. To Kate she admitted, "I never did like him."
"Less than a minute," Merrick called out, still eyeing the Tallinn mechs and troopers as they jostled their way through the market.
"I suggest we vacate, ladies and gentleman," Georges said with one last glance out the door. "I don't think any of you really want to be the subjects of a mech-assisted interrogation session."
"Seconded!" Garrett stated.
"Mech-assisted..." Kate remarked and chewed her lip, "sounds gruesome."
"Motion passes," Sparrow announced. She dove back into the rear of the store.
Kate grabbed a bag from a wall hook and shoved the gyronav inside. Merrick was at her side.
"Might be handy," Merrick remarked and nodded his approval.
"Get your own souvenir," Kate teased. "This one's mine." Kate turned and entered the back room. Sparrow was already through the small door. She caught up with Georges as he waited for Garrett to pass through the door ahead of him. "So, that went well."
Georges grunted. "I've had better luck with him in the past."
"Come here often?" Kate probed.
"Once or twice."
"Ever see that woman I ran into before?"
"No," Georges replied. "Get in there before we all become mech-bait."
Kate ducked down and followed Garrett through a small tunnel next to Stampf's safe, now pushed to one side. She popped out in the back of another store. The backroom was filled with packing crates and piles of worn out equipment. She scrambled through the door to the front of the shop.
"Stay down!" Sparrow hissed.
Kate carefully raised her head over the sill and saw two mechs approaching on the clanking sidewalk plates. Four Tallinns in mech-assisted gear were close behind and trailed puffs of steam. Despite the steam-powered nature of their gear, they looked terrifying and deadly.
"Well, this is not good," Garrett grunted.
"On a station with no ride," Sparrow said and clucked her tongue. "Not sure where the Colonel expects to go now."
Georges joined them on cue. "You should know better than to doubt me."
"I do know you," Sparrow replied. "And I don't doubt you, I was merely saying I don't think you have a Plan B. Yet."
Georges took in the Tallinns arrayed outside the clockwork store. He blew out his breath and announced, "Okay, Plan B. Find a ship. Steal it."
"Simple," Garrett remarked. "Just got to get by these guys. You good Merrick?"
"I got soft spots," Merrick pronounced smoothly. He took up a position in the far window, giving him a better angle at the closer mech and troops and their vulnerable joints the sniper proved to be so good at exploiting back on the Tallinn ironclad.
"On my mark," Georges stated.
"Wait!" Kate interjected.
"Not the time," Georges declared.
"Plan C. Find the woman with red hair. Use her ship."<
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"How do you know she has a ship?" Georges asked.
"She does."
One of the armored Tallinns entered the store. The sound of crashing merchandise and breaking glass was joined by Stampf's curses as he regained consciousness.
"Outta time, boss!" Garrett exclaimed.
Georges looked at Kate, his eyes narrowed. Kate hoped he would weigh his options and trust her. He did.
"Plan C," Georges agreed quickly, "Get clear. Find Ross and the woman. Hope she has a ship."
"She does," Kate repeated. In her mind, she heard 'Blade Redeemed' echo as if carried on a morning breeze.
Georges looked from Sparrow to Merrick. Sparrow grinned back like a cat with a secret. Merrick steadied his aim. The command was simple.
"Go."
Merrick fired two shots in quick succession. The first blew out the plexi-clear in the store window. The second blew out the hydraulic stabilizer on the mech sitting outside.
Garrett kicked open the thin door, planted his feet on the solid walkway outside, and took careful aim with his crossbow. His first shot glanced off the helmet of one of the Tallinn armored troopers. The trooper turned to face Garrett and took a bolt right between the eyes for his trouble. He pin-wheeled away into the market, the end of Garrett's bolt sticking out from his visor.
Kate peered over the shattered windowsill. The mech was dragging itself around to face them with its good leg. Kate hoped the hissing and clanking coming from the machine, meant it was really broken and not just repairing itself. It opened fire in her direction. "Not broken, enough," Kate shouted as she dropped to the floor and threw an arm over her head to ward off the pieces of broken window raining down on her.
Merrick fired three more shots before the menacing mech went silent with a scream of venting high pressure steam.
Garrett took out another trooper and chanced a quick look over the edge of the walkway.
"There are grav plates running by just under the sidewalk!" Garrett called out as he crouched behind a support pillar to change out his autoloader pack.
"Head into the market," Georges shouted. "Find Sergeant Ross,"
It took a moment for Kate to realize Georges was talking to her.
"Your plan. Remember?" Georges prompted. "Move!"
"Come on!" Sparrow grabbed Kate's hand and pulled her through the doorway. "Ladies first!"
The armored Tallinns fired again as Kate and Sparrow dove through the door, took one quick step across the sidewalk and then launched themselves into the air. They were moving so fast, Kate's mind barely kept up. Even in low gee, it was an unnatural act to jump out into thin air.
Sparrow held Kate's hand but still managed to use her free hand to fire at the Tallinns still clustered around Stampf's store entrance. The recoil was enough to push both Sparrow and Kate down below the level of the walkway and out of the Mech's line of fire.
"Turn!" Sparrow shouted.
Kate spent enough time on stations to know she did not want to hit anything with her back. She managed a twist in mid-air just in time to orient herself toward a floating line of grav plates. The plates clanked along on a chain and gear mechanism like the moving sidewalks from earlier. Unlike the fixed plates, these could detach and were meant to be used to move around the station, especially low-grav open areas like the marketplace.
Sparrow took the plate next to Kate and immediately tipped her body forward. The grav plate responded by snapping free of the chain pulley and sailed toward the floating market stalls.
Bullets stitched a rough pattern in the plate in front of Kate.
"Tral!" Kate shouted. She leaned forward into a crouch and sent her grav plate off after the link sprite. She chanced a glance back. The chain, apparently weakened by the shots from the Tallinns, snapped. Kate braked and spun the plate around in place, ready to go back for the others.
Merrick landed on a grav plate as the chain began to drift apart. He managed to fire a clean hit at a newly arrived mech and lean forward with his knees to break his plate away from the crumpling line.
Garrett was right behind him. His arms flailed and his legs pumped the air as he hit a drifting plate. One foot took hold while the other missed the plate completely. He ended up on one knee, lost his grip and was forced to lunge after his crossbow before it fell out of reach.
Georges experienced better luck. He shot a gaggle of plates free then summersaulted off the sidewalk and snagged a spinning plate out of the air. He tucked his knee up under himself and managed to flip the plate neatly under his feet as a shield against incoming Tallinn shots. He turned to face the remaining Tallinns and started firing his pistols, one from each hand.
Sparrow sailed close to Kate and remarked, "Trust me, they'll be fine."
Kate crouched and started to turn just as an explosion blew out both the storefronts next to Stampf's Emporium. The blast blew Kate sideways straight into Merrick's grav plate.
"Sorry!" Kate shouted. She looked back to see the remaining Tallinn armored troopers as they were blasted toward the center of the market. In front of what was left of Stampf's store, a mech emerged out onto the sidewalk. Fiery debris clung to its brass fittings. As Kate watched, the flames suddenly wafted away from them and were extinguished. The smoke from the smoldering stores began to pour back into the ruined structures as if caught in a mighty wind. A mech staggered unsteadily for a moment. Just as it managed to take aim on Kate, the machine was pulled backward as if by an invisible hand.
"Uh-oh," Garrett shouted as he drifted close to Kate and Merrick.
"Might have used too much C-4," Sparrow noted.
"Might?" Garrett remarked.
"Hull breach," Merrick stated. He turned Kate around and tipped her away from the shops and into the market. "Need an airlock! Fast!"
"Agreed!" Kate replied. She took the lead for once and pushed her plate to its max velocity. She led the group to the first line of floating stalls before she started to feel the rush of air escaping out the hull. She dipped around the first stall, hoping it would clog the hole between her and deep space. Merrick was right behind her. She turned and shouted, "We should have put some more thought into Plan C!"
Chapter 8
Blade Redeemed
Kate leaned into the roaring gale of air escaping from the bazaar. She swerved to avoid the flying jetsam heading toward the breach and shouted to Sparrow as she soared close by on her grav plate, "Still think no one noticed our arrival?"
"Maybe it's all a coincidence," Sparrow shouted back. "Do you see your new friend? We need to get off Transom Station," Sparrow ducked to avoid a tumbling piece of deck plate, "before we destroy the whole thing!"
Merrick swooped under Kate, his rifle held at the ready. He cut in front of Kate and she was forced to swerve hard to avoid a collision.
"Tral," Kate grunted and righted her plate. Merrick's rifle cracked and a Mech tumbled backward off a suspended walkway directly in front of her. Kate jumped from her grav plate. She saw her ride slam into the mech before someone grabbed her by the waist.
"Gotcha!" Ross shouted as he struggled to straighten his wobbling plate. Ross managed to keep his grav plate more or less level. Kate got her feet under her and attached to the metal surface. As she looked up, she found another plate and rider right in front of her and Ross.
"Geesh Princess," the woman with red hair snarled. She leaned into the board to keep it moving against the blowing wind, "watch where you're going." She eyed Ross then looked around at Garrett and the others as they circled. With a flick of her wrists two knives slipped into her hands from a concealed mechanism under the jacket.
"Thought you looked familiar. You've been following me since I bumped into her, haven't you?"
"Busted," Ross admitted.
"You'd better be here to tell me I've inherited some cash or you want to hire a ship," the woman declared. "Otherwise, this is about to end painfully for you."
"The ship," Kate breathed. She could hardly believe their good luck at finding
the woman amid all this chaos. Not luck, Kate corrected, destiny.
"Good," the woman gestured at the building maelstrom, "Because cash is about to become useless around here."
Georges looked from Kate to the newcomer. He shook his head and waved away Kate when she started to explain her vision.
"Later!" Georges shouted. "We need to leave! Now!"
"I noticed. Amanda Rodgers," the pilot said by way of introduction. "Call me Dagger."
Kate gasped. Blade Redeemed.
Dagger jerked a thumb in Kate's direction. "Something wrong with her."
"We've been through a lot recently," Georges explained and shrugged. "The station collapsing around her and threat of imminent death have her a little upset. Speaking of which..." He caught Garrett's eye as he fought to keep his grav plate steady. "How's it look?"
"We got Mech's at all the entrances," Garrett reported. "The Tallinn troopers are busy evac'ing civvies but by the time this place blows down, they'll be the only ones with air."
"Follow me," Dagger instructed. She did not wait for any of the others to follow her. She tipped her grav plate ninety degrees and plunged straight down.
"Tral!" Sparrow hissed. She tipped her plate and gave pursuit.
"Nothing ventured," Garrett shouted and gave chase, "nothing gained!"
"Odds of actually getting to a ship?" Georges asked Kate.
"Better than they were two minutes ago," Kate replied. She closed her eyes and held onto Ross as they changed course to follow Dagger.
Merrick fired two quick shots. In the distance, Kate could hear an explosion of compressed gas and the grinding of gears as the sniper found another mech soft spot. He turned, nodded, and followed Georges, Kate and Ross, all the while riding his grav plate backwards as he scanned for additional targets.
They did not have to wait long.
Georges raised his handguns, spun his plate sideways and fired at a Tallinn trooper who popped out from behind a tumbling stall. Georges' bullets bounced off the heavy armor.