by Rolf Nelson
“How many out there now?” Helton asks Cooper.
“Couple dozen at the ramp, a few more heading this way.”
The screens in front of Bipasha and Quiritis, showing diagrams of the local area, explode with numerous colored dots. “Whoa!” Bipasha jerks her hands away from the controls. “All kinds of stuff showing up. Movement everywhere.”
“Computer, show all people on main screen,” Cooper says tersely. Images pop up on several small smaller screens in front of each person showing a 5 kilometer map of the area, the refugees represented by thousands of dots: clusters and singles, so many it looks like static. “I said Main Screen!” All the images disappear except the one in front of Quiritis. “Crap. Useless computer. We ALL need to see what’s going on.” The map appears in front of everyone but Cooper.
Helton scans the screens rapidly. “That’s a lot. But … that’s everything in 5K. That can’t be right. Limit range to one kilometer.” The screen adjusts, still showing hundreds of dots converging on them. Cooper leans over to look at Bipasha’s screen, but the map disappears before he can get more than a brief glance. “If that’s not a glitch, we don’t have room, let alone air when we button up. That many would need several trips.”
“Don’t care about that, as long as they pay us for every trip,” Cooper says. Then, petulantly, “Come on ‘puter, show it on my screen! Damn thing’s as useless as the boss crashing a crew party.”
A new image appears on the main screen, the cockpit of a small private flier with three people inside: a pilot wearing a helmet and flight suit, Penger Trask, and Trask’s frightened wife, Lucretia. The signal is weak and staticky, the pilot’s voice on the edge of panic. For a moment it comes in sharp and clear. “This is Trask Flier 61, calling anyone at the field. We are damaged and losing altitude. Get emergency vehicles ready. We were hit by ground fire and will be coming in hard. Please respond.”
“This is Tajemnica, we see you,” Bipasha answers. “The tower is abandoned. Land near us if you can, we’ll try to help.”
“Thank God there’s someone there!”
Trask leans forward to look over the pilot’s shoulder. “Abandoned?”
“Just land,” Helton says. “Talk when you’re down.” The pilot nods and the screen clears.
On the ground around the boarding ramp, the scene is growing increasingly chaotic. A surge of people is coming around the corner of a port building, heading toward the ship. Refugees near Tajemnica notice the incoming flier, headed their way. It is closing fast, at too steep an angle, trailing flame and smoke. They point and yell warnings and scream and start to run away.
The flier hits hard, breaking off landing struts and sending debris flying. It slides to a stop barely ten meters from the closed boarding hatch on Tajemnica’s side. People gawk, but keep well back from the flames. Tajemnica’s side door drops rapidly. Lag, in light armor with a carbine, sprints to the side of the flier and pops the hatch. He helps the shaken and bleeding Trask, then his wife, handing her off as soon as she’s out. He glances over the growing crowd and points to Tajemnica’s side hatch. “GET ABOARD!”
Trask looks him firmly in the eyes. “The pilot! And the cases in back! Get the attaché cases!”
Lag shifts his carbine to his back and charges into the cabin of the flier. The pilot is slumped in the cockpit with part of the craft’s side crumpled into him, impaling his chest. Lag checks for a pulse briefly with a finger to the throat while scanning the cockpit for anything of importance, then heads for the back. He emerges with two large attaché cases and runs to the side hatch.
Penger and Lucretia Trask are still limping up the stairs while watching the flier. Lag throws the attaché cases aboard ahead of them, shakes his head about the pilot, and turns back to the flier. Lucretia starts crying, and Trask helps her up the rest of the stairs and into the ship.
Lag exits moments later with one more attaché case and runs for the hatch just as the flier explodes in flames. He glances down the side of the ship, sees people running his way, leaps up the stairs and tosses the last attaché case inside. With a well-practiced movement he swings his rifle back around to the front and brings it up to a low ready, clearly willing to use it to prevent unauthorized boarding, then hits the button to close the hatch. The refugees headed for the side entry stop, yelling and angry as it closes in front of them.
Trask emerges into the cargo bay from the side hatch passageway, supporting his crying and slightly bloodied wife and carrying one of the large attaché cases. Lag is right behind them, carrying the other two. A cluster of refugees huddle by the opposite door, corralled by Allonia and Kwon’s son John, both in camo with light armor, carrying carbines.
“That poor pilot!” Tears streak Lucretia’s face.
“Worry about yourself right now, ma’am. Get up to sick bay,” Lag orders. Quinn peeks out from a far stairwell. “QUINN!” Lag snaps. “Show these two to sick bay! On the double, soldier!”
“What are you doing here?” Trask says to Lag. “I thought–”
“What’s in the boxes?”
“Very important paperwork. But what–”
“We can talk later. How important?”
“Very.”
Lag looks at Trask acutely. Then he opens a hatch next to the airlock entry; it’s a small storeroom, mostly full. He tosses the boxes in and shuts the hatch with a thud. “Tajemnica, lock and secure, sensitive materials.” Then, to Trask: “You can get ‘em later. Follow Quinn to sick bay. Quinn, show ’em up, then back to your post in case we need you again.”
“Why are you–” Trask tries again.
“Just go, we’re kinda busy.”
Quinn pulls gently on Trask’s tunic. “Come ON, sir.” A mix of uncertainty, fear, and bemusement on their faces, the older couple follows Quinn to the stairs. Lag strides across to the huddled group of refugees, looking them over. There are about twenty of them, appearing to be mostly family groups with kids.
“Any adults here without small children?” Two raise their hands, a man and a woman. “You stay here! We’ll find a place for you later. The rest of you, follow me.” Lag leads the group to the stairs opposite where Quinn was heading. “Can anyone tell me what’s been happening?” Several of the refugees speak at once, animatedly and incomprehensibly. “One at a time, please!” Pointing to a neatly-dressed young man with a boy in his arms, he directs them crisply. “You first. Walk and talk! Keep moving! Go ahead now.”
The crowd of refugees around the cargo bay ramp swells as the morning passes, and it soon becomes clear that there will not be room for everyone. They get louder, more mob-like.
Kaminski scans the young, sketchy-looking man standing nervously in front of him, who speaks haltingly, anxiously, addressing Kaminski with averted and darting eyes. “John Smith, I work in security.” The scanner blinks red: “ID FAIL: Homney, Jonah — unemployed convict, no known residence.”
Kaminski looks at him sharply. Kaushik raises his rifle to low ready. “Clear out!” Kaminski orders.
“You can’t leave me here! They’re coming! If you leave me here I’ll be conscripted! You can’t do this!”
Kaushik raises his rifle and points it at Homney’s chest. “Clear out! NOW!” Homney backs up, still protesting and waving his arms around. The crowd murmurs louder.
“Shit,” mutters Kaminski, eyeing the crowd. “Not good.”
From behind the soldiers the jointed mechanical arm snakes from its side hatch. Attached to the end is the machine gun taken from the APC. Homney runs for cover and plunges into the crowd as the gun appears and casts its muzzle about. The gun aims down near the crowd, in front of the boarding ramp. It rips out a dozen rounds in an arc on the ground around the ramp. From above a harsh metallic voice, sounding vaguely like Helton, roars out on the loudspeakers.
“NOBODY AND NOTHING CROSSES THAT LINE!”
The unruly crowd cringes back.
“Status?” Lag asks over Kaushik and Kaminski’s personal coms.
&n
bsp; Kaushik thumbs his throat mic. “Warning shots to keep ‘em back.”
“Okay. Keep loading as long as it’s safe. Tell Cooper if it’s time to bounce. Stay frosty.” Kaushik nods automatically, even though Lag can’t see him, and gets both hands back on his rifle.
A good-looking young woman steps from the crowd, embracing and rocking a swaddled bundle. She is well-dressed and indignant. “You can’t do that! We have a right to leave!” She steps defiantly across the line of bullet marks on the ground.
The gun on the mechanical arm swings crisply and precisely around and fires a burst of six shots in a line across her body from hip to shoulder, including two through her bundle. Blood splashes from the four that hit her, and she collapses backwards lifelessly, hitting the ground with all the self-control of a sandbag.
“NO ONE AND NOTHING!” says the voice on the loudspeaker, even more harshly.
Gasps and stifled screams, and everyone stands silently for a second, shocked. Folks near the line and the body back away, holding up their hands, licking their lips, trying not to look anyone in the eyes. The machine gun on the mechanical arm looks almost alive, waving jerkily back and forth, keeping an eye on everyone, daring them to make a wrong move. Kaminski holds his rifle at low ready, too.
Sergeant Kaushik speaks clearly and professionally. “Keep calm, and we’ll process and take who we can for this trip! Anyone gets outta line, they ain’t goin’!” He nods toward the woman’s body. “Clear?” The soldiers look around at the crowd, rifles shouldered and ready. Kaushik motions with his rifle to the front of the line. “You two next! Come on, ain’t got all day!”
The couple move timidly forward, inching past the bullet line, glancing at the dead woman, holding their breath. As they pass her and the gun on the mechanical arm ignores them, they sigh in relief. Kaminski lowers his rifle and takes up the scanner as they walk up the ramp. “Name and occupation!”
The dead woman lies at an awkward angle on the dusty ground, blood dribbling from her mouth. Refugees passing by give her body a wide berth, the wounds and the metallic smell of blood a stark warning of the harsh reality they face. Barely exposed under the rumpled and bullet-riddled swaddling, but obscured to anyone standing nearby or aboard the ship, are a com antenna and the barrel of a gun.
Setup
Lag, Helton, Bipasha, and Cooper stand in a middeck passageway, looking through a closed window at the growing crowd of refugees, now up to several hundred.
Lag: I think we are being set up.
Bipasha’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise.
Bipasha (argumentatively): But I checked the contract source, it was good, the payment bond posted!
Cooper: Well, it damn sure ain’t what I was expecting.
Helton: Why, Colonel?
Lag: Everyone said they were being driven toward here; other routes closed, and posters and broadcasts saying this was the place to go. Led to believe there were a lot of ships here to fly them to safety. A regular campaign for the last five days, but always anonymous and unsourced.
Bipasha (shaking her head in denial): That’s not what the news was saying.
Helton: But why?
Cooper: Doesn’t make a difference.
Helton (after thinking for a moment): Maybe it does.
Lag: Knowing why would shed light on what to do. How many?
Cooper: More than we can take, for sure.
Bipasha: How many can we take? If we put some on A-Deck, we could–
Helton: No. Can’t let them get into crew areas and engineering. We don’t have anywhere close to enough security for that. Maybe a few more families with children on B-deck.
Lag: Right. With that many, any sort of panic would be impossible to control if they are on all decks. We keep them on the cargo deck, secure the side doors; not comfy for them, but safe for us. If we stack ’em standing like spoons there … maybe 3000?
Bipasha: Then we take 3000.
Helton: Can’t.
Bipasha: He just said–
Cooper (snidely): We don’t have the oh-two capacity right now for that many people breathing for more than maybe thirty minutes.
Helton: How long to the refugee center?
Cooper: An hour minimum, if nothing goes wrong. And if we are being set up–
Bipasha: Fly low, keep the aft ramp down.
Helton: Piled with beans, remember? Besides, if we are low enough to not freeze or depressurize people, we’re an easy target for ground fire. We don’t know what they have or where it is. At that altitude we’ll have to go slow, so it’ll take closer to twelve hours. That solves the air problem, assuming we don’t get one good hit that makes us all dead, but then we have water and sanitation problems. Packed that tight they’ll just have to sweat, shit, stay thirsty and hungry where they stand. Many are already in rough shape, so a riot and crush is likely. Medical problems will just have to suck it up and stand there. It might get us targeted as profiteering war criminals even if we don’t get shot.
Lag nods. Bipasha looks aghast.
Cooper (puzzled): Isn’t this thing armored?
Helton: It’s great armor, but I’m not betting my life on it against heavy ground fire if I don’t have to. Impact from a ship is one thing, high explosives and hardened penetrators are another. And with the cargo doors open it may not do a lot of good.
Bipasha: Why not 1500?
Lag: Still have to go low and slow, or high and fast and just let ‘em pass out. They’ll be stacked like dropped toys, half could get crushed and suffocate on the bottom of the heap anyway, especially if we try to take more women, children, or injured.
Cooper: Oh, fer fuck’s sake, how about a thousand, and make several fast trips?
Helton: If we have been set up, every trip increases our chance of being shot. You saw what they did to Trask’s flier.
Bipasha: So we might have to just leave most of them standing?
Lag (nods slowly): Yes. And we can’t tell the last one in line that we’re coming back or we raise the risks even higher as word spreads. When Helton or I say “lift”, we go right then. No countdown or warning. The drives are still hot, right?
Cooper nods.
Helton: Back to square one: how many, and what course?
Lag: If we knew who and why…
Helton: Piss anyone off lately?
Lag: Lately? (snorts) You?
Helton: Right. Dumb question. So, who gains from a refugee problem and us dying so much they’d pay us to come?
Bipasha (tentatively): We only get paid on return.
Lag: A politician might use it to push an agenda.
Bipasha: Seymore and Darch Industries handle most of the local transport contracts–
Lag: And Councilman Darch just lost a son–
Bipasha: So getting us killed in revenge, he doesn’t pay out and it jacks up the rates, and he takes a cut through insuring the ships he knows won’t get shot. With us packed full it would make for huge news. People would demand that they do something. Revenge, political leverage, and profits. So, now what?
Lag: The contract was quite specific on the refugee center, and we have to lift from here. So we take the non-obvious approach to get there. He can’t set an ambush on every route. They’ll likely try to hit us soon after lifting here, expecting us to head directly for the RC. Maybe have a backup on the normal approach to the center.
Helton: Okay. A thousand. With scrubbers and Allonia’s plants, we can make enough oh-two for that many buttoned up, for a while. Not fun, but somewhere this side of hell. Anyone watching will think we still have room. Cooper, head low and fast south as soon as we lift. About 60 kilometers out, go straight up and make a big circle around to the far side of things, then drop in and come in hot and low.
Cooper (sarcastically): Hot and low?
Helton: Well, as hot as we can go.
Lag: I’ll contact Kat and Harbin to get the intel guys up to speed. They can keep us updated on what’s moving unexpectedly. If we know where the amb
ushers are we can just go around them, and if they go where they aren’t supposed to while trying to take us out, I can sell the intel to local forces for a good price, dealing with our immediate problem–
Helton: Fill the contract–
Bipasha: Get paid–
Cooper: And piss off Seymore and Darch!
Helton: Sounds like a plan. Time to get inside their OODA loop!
On a quiet third story balcony with a view of the spaceport, two men in paramilitary uniform observe the loading operation. One has binoculars, the other a hand radio. Tajemnica is almost directly end-on to them, so they can see into the cargo bay where the refugees are all standing, packed into the far end. Binocular Guy answers an unspoken question, “Going for a full load, looks like. Still checking everyone.”
“Haven’t heard from Lindsey saying she got denied boarding,” Radio Guy says. “Should hear from her soon.”
“Ah, a couple more being turned away. Gonna be a while.” He lowers the binoculars, letting them hang from the strap around his neck. He turns and faces inside. “Hey, can you bring a cup of that out here!” Radio Guy echoes his request. “Make it two!”
Moments later a curtain parts and a man comes out with steaming mugs of coffee. He hands one to each of them, then freezes. “Here you … why didn’t you tell me they left?”
The other two spin with a jerk, spilling scalding coffee all over each other. Howling in pain and surprise, they try simultaneously to shake it off their clothes and see what’s happening. The crowd of refugees mill about yelling, audible even in the distance, but the ship is nowhere to be seen.
“WHAT THE HELL? WHERE?” Radio Guy grabs his com unit.
Binocular Guy rapidly scans the sky. “Where– where– where– THERE! SOUTH!”
Radio Guy follows his gaze in surprise. “SOUTH? What the fuck?!” Then into the radio: “SHIP LIFTED, heading south!”
The voice on the other side is incredulous. “South? Are you sure?”
“YES I’m BLIPPIN’ SURE! I’m watching them fly south RIGHT GODDAMN NOW!”
A long pause, and then a skeptical reply: “Got nothing on the scope.”