by Nick Cole
A sheen of perspiration broke out on his forehead. He wiped his brow with four fingers, half expecting to see them covered with his own blood when holding them before his eyes. He mumbled a self-instruction. “Grab hold of yourself, Aldo…”
Irrational. That was what Kimer knew he was being. The coder bringing up Maydoon—of all people, Maydoon—was probably just coincidence. The Maydoons were obscenely wealthy. They treated their contractors as if they were foreign dignitaries. Who wouldn’t want another job like that? The captain, Keel, was a man of the galaxy, but he didn’t seem to have any reaction when Garret gave the name. But then again, Kimer had been so entirely overtaken with fear at the speaking of that cursed name that he hadn’t thought to look for anyone else’s reaction until several seconds had passed.
No. It wasn’t worth it. He had barely escaped with his life the last time those black-and-red armored… monstrosities showed up looking for Maydoon. He wouldn’t risk more of the same trouble. Besides, Trident had outgrown Corsica years ago. Rent would be higher on a core planet, but with the reputation he’d built, he could afford it. His clientele might actually appreciate him being located on a core planet. Even if it was only the lower core.
He moved to his desk to check the status of a drive-scrub, though he knew it had already finished erasing itself while he was looking out of his office window. Looking for monsters. For killers. He was sure that the visitors were portents of his own demise. He was going to die, tortured for more information, though he’d already yielded everything he knew to soldiers so hard and cruel that—on reflection—he had never stopped worrying about them. That’s what was really on his mind. He was anxiously waiting for them to return and tie up him, the loose end.
No.
He shook his head. He was being silly. Jumping at shadows in his own mind, like a frightened child.
A ring of sweat dampened his silk collar. Kimer moved past silvene-and gold-accented furniture to the private fresher adjoining his office. He splashed cool water around his face and neck, then stared at his reflection in the mirror. The room around him seemed to darken, as if every light but those around the mirror turned off. Kimer stared intently at his own face, watching with morbid fascination as beads of sweat formed from his pores, the cooling effect of the water no longer active. In his mind flashed a dark memory of the armored men in black and red who marched into his office only a few weeks earlier. Men who looked like legionnaires—but not. More menacing, if that were possible. His heart raced as his mind recalled the shadowy figure who’d entered behind the soldiers—and the dark, oppressive feeling that had sprung up in his chest as a result. The figure who had spoken without speaking, who’d had Kimer breaking his cardinal rule: Never roll over on customers.
But Kimer spoke that day. He told the man things he wasn’t even asked—anything to appease. Anything to get the unnatural visitor and his wicked entourage to leave him. Leave him and never come back. He remembered telling them—with an attention to detail his customers always complimented him on—how to find Maydoon. How to circumvent the security system that he’d set up in exchange for hundreds of thousands of Maydoon’s credits. He spoke freely, knowing that in so doing, he was issuing a death warrant for Maydoon… and his entire family.
And now they were coming back. Coming back not in force, but subtle. Like serpents. Posing as a freighter crew. Seeking to catch him unawares. Seeking to hurt him. To kill him. Punish him.
“Sentrella!” he gasped, trusting his secretary was still at her desk to hear the comm.
“Yes, Mr. Kimer?” The receptionist’s voice was calm. “Are you all right?”
“I need you to accelerate my departure. Have a ship come for me now. We can transfer the rest of the data remotely.” Kimer looked at his reflection. He could see his pulse in the veins of his neck. “And… and I don’t want to set up in the core. Not yet. I want you to find me somewhere remote. Something at galaxy’s edge. I don’t want to be found, Sentrella.”
Sentrella’s answer was slow in coming. “As you wish, Mr. Kimer.”
Kimer turned the water back on and brought it up in violent splashes, rubbing his face vigorously, not caring about the way the water was ruining his expensive shirt and suit jacket. Unconcerned with how the sopping clothing wrecked the smuggled cigars in his breast pocket. His knees threatened to buckle as he left the fresher and moved past his desk to an amply stocked wet bar. His hands went up to the top shelf and pulled down a bottle—it didn’t matter what it contained. Anything would do.
Through the bar’s mirrored backsplash, Kimer watched himself pour. His hands shook, and the neck of the bottle jiggled and clinked against the glass as Kimer attempted to hold both still. He was a nervous wreck.
The glass filled almost to capacity, Kimer set down the bottle and again watched his shaking hands in the backsplash. He saw a glimpse of movement, shadows drifting through shadows that caused him to drop his drink into the bar’s sink. The glass shattered on impact, and Kimer sliced his finger in a reflexive attempt to save it.
“Damn!” Kimer cried out, venting a frustration that went well beyond a simple cut. He squeezed tightly around the slice, causing blood to swell from the wound.
The broker reached for a bar towel—and froze. In the mirror, he saw an armored humanoid almost hidden in the shadows behind him. Keeping his body pressed against the bar, he turned to face the intruder. “Who are you?”
The figure moved forward. The color was different, a ghostly sort of gray instead of black and red, but the armor was nearly the same. A bullpup blaster rifle rested in the mercenary’s arms, and Kimer could see his reflection in the black visor of the specter’s helmet.
This was Wraith. They’d sent Wraith to kill him.
“Sentrella!” Kimer screamed, knowing his receptionist would hear the call and burst into the room.
Wraith took two steps toward him when the door to Kimer’s office whooshed open.
Sentrella leapt into the air, screaming “Kaiyee!” as she sought to deliver a flying kick.
The mercenary sidestepped the attack and sent an open palm square into Sentrella’s chest. Her momentum was redirected downward. Kimer could hear the air escape from her as her back slammed onto the floor.
Wraith took another step toward Kimer. Kimer called out to the woman on the floor. “Sentrella! Stop him! I hired you to stop this from happening again!”
Before Kimer’s bodyguard/receptionist could come fully to her feet, Wraith half-turned and sent a blazing blue energy blast into her. Sentrella convulsed, the paralytic stun bolt shutting down her voluntary motor functions, then dropped once more to the floor.
The blaster rifle now aimed at him, Kimer pushed himself back against the bar, knocking over a snifter of priceless port wine, which poured out blood red on the polished hardwood floor. “Hey, whoa.” Kimer held out his hands, palms up. “Wraith… look… Wraith. Please. I can work with you.”
The mercenary stopped several paces away from Kimer, but kept his blaster rifle leveled. Why did he pause? Did this mean Wraith wasn’t here to kill him? He did use only a stun blast on Sentrella, after all. Kimer clutched at hope. “I… I wanted to work with you for a long time. Never had a way of reaching you. My clients… some of them heard about you. From Republic friends. Always asked if you could be hired. Bump off a husband. Run down an embezzler. Take out a rival crime syndicate…”
The spectral mercenary said nothing, and Kimer felt as though he was looking past him. Into his very soul. “Just, rich people problems,” Kimer offered weakly. “You know… you know.”
“Tell me,” Wraith said, his voice harsh and cold from behind the audio filter of his legionnaire-like helmet.
“T-tell you what?”
Wraith adjusted something on the side of his blaster rife. A knob? A kill switch?
Oba—is he going to kill me now? Did he change his mind?
“No, no!” Kimer shook his outstretched hand as if waving away the danger. “Don’t shoot!
Please. Yes. Maydoon. Yes. I’ll tell you. It’s not like he can come after me now.”
Wraith stood silently.
“Maydoon hired me for a job. He had me reprogram a war bot for domestic use. To protect his kid. The kind of thing that’ll get someone stripped of their office. I hired a savant, who got the job done. We all got paid. That was it.”
Wraith seemed to bore a hole in Kimer’s center from behind the mask. He gave no indication. No reaction.
Kimer looked around his office helplessly. The puddle of port wine was a mess. Sentralla was breathing, but her shoulder looked out of socket. “I… I don’t… There was—I had another code-slicer. Not as good as the kid, but good enough. I had him put something—a tracker—in the bot. Insurance, you know?” Kimer shook his head rapidly. “These wealthy types. The core dwellers. They’ll sell you out if you don’t—”
“The tracker,” commanded Wraith.
“How to track it? I—it’s technical. You have to deconstruct the archaic Republic internal comm code. Not hard to do if you know the language. Fewer people do now, those bots are ancient, but yeah. It’s always announcing its location. Always. Until its power supply is completely depleted.”
Wraith brought up his bullpup blaster rifle, aiming for Kimer’s head.
“No—no!” Kimer shouted, cringing as he curled into a standing fetal position. “I told you! I told you!”
“The rest,” insisted Wraith.
Tears welled in Kimer’s eyes. “I’m not— He…he’s evil. I know that sounds crazy coming from a guy like me. He’s evil, though. He came in here with legionnaires. Only they weren’t. They looked like you only black and red instead of gray. I didn’t want to give up Maydoon. He had a family—a daughter. I didn’t want her to die. I didn’t want to tell.” Kimer slid down the bar and sat in the spilled wine. He looked up at Wraith, tears in his eyes. “I had to.”
***
The Obsidian Crow shot past a hammer-headed Republican ground assault corvette and dove down along the larger ship’s spine, passing open docking bays and tiny legionnaires scuttling for assault shuttles.
“Tenku no chobba Tenku!” cried the wobanki as Rechs slid into the captain’s seat and scanned the star field through the metal lattice of the flight deck.
Still in his armor, Rechs smelled of burnt ozone from all the blaster fire down in Junga’s junk fortress. He dialed in the master deflector array and booted up the jump computer. “You better not have scratched my ship, kitty kat!” he muttered in reply as he took over the flight controls.
They had three Republican fighters on their tail, screaming in hard and firing warning shots. Rechs eyed the tactical targeting computer. Lancer-class fighters. Pilot and a gunner. Two big jump nacelles for engines behind the jutting canopies for the pilots. Standard gold-and-white Repub Navy.
He pulled off his helmet. There was an audible whoosh of air as it disconnected from the suit. A dull clang as he tossed it into the navigator’s seat behind him.
“Hachoo obbi tonada?” asked the wobanki.
Rechs had forgotten all about the small girl and her war bot.
“Tell ’em to strap in. This is gonna get tricky.”
He yanked the Obsidian Crow into a twirl to avoid the pursing fighter’s now targeting-to-disable blaster fire, and cut across the hull of the Repub assault corvette. Rechs scanned the swirling purple clouds of Ackabar and the glittering city below. Turret fire from the corvettes was now starting to track and lead his flight path. They had yet to find their range though. He needed options…
“Ship.”
“Here, Captain,” she purred.
“We need a jump solution from low-Earth orbit in the next two minutes, or we’ve had it.”
“Captain, you know the average jump solution takes ten to twenty minutes to compute for safety,” the ship announced. “But I’ll do the best I possibly can despite your use of arcane navigational terms. Low-Earth orbit indeed.”
Rechs ignored the AI’s snark. He was too busy trying not to smash into the main port hub of Ackabar while dodging fire from the assault corvettes. Never mind those fighter pilots all over his six.
The Crow circled the giant monolith of a star port once, staying close to the mushroom-shaped hub and docking bays. The Lancers were trying to line up for a clear shot, but there were too many Republican corvettes attempting to continue the planetary tax interdiction assault—never mind the departing star craft full of civilians attempting to flee said tax interdiction.
Young Repub Navy pilots might have mistaken the Crow for an old light freighter, with its standard pancake configuration and pilot’s metal-laced cupola peeking out just aft of the two leading edges. But in truth it had only recently become an old light freighter. It had been a brand new Terran navy bomber back in the day, as they used to say.
“Whatever it takes, Lyra,” Rechs shouted over a defector overload relay alarm that suddenly began to ululate. “Because we won’t be around ten minutes.”
As if on cue, blaster fire smashed into the Obsidian Crow’s dorsal thrusters.
“Why aren’t the deflectors reorienting, you addle-brained cat!” Rechs growled at the wobanki as he sent the ship spinning down toward the city floor. But the wobanki had gone aft to take care of the passengers.
“He didn’t set them properly,” the ship replied.
Rechs shook his head once at the obviousness of this statement. He snapped a series of contacts in place that angled the deflector shields into the standard dogfight configuration.
Now the assault corvettes were shooting at him. But their pulsed energy fire was slow-moving, and he could easily avoid it. That the shots slammed into the civilian populace below didn’t seem to be of much concern to the Repub gunners or their superiors.
The Lancers were all over the Crow as Rechs throttled back and took the ship into a series of mammoth gas-refining catacombs beyond the dockyards. The ship’s shields shook at the powerful impacts from the Republican fighters’ blaster fire. If he trusted Lyra—or if Lyra even trusted itself slightly—Rechs could’ve turned over the helm and run back to the defensive omni-cannon.
Alas, the ship had no confidence in its ability to fly itself.
And it was fat and slow compared to the Repub fighters that trailed it into the cyclopean gasworks, jockeying for a freighter kill.
Rechs followed the twisting maze of pipeworks and found the main exhaust vent network. One wrong move and they’d end up all over the walls. He executed a tight turn and slipped the Crow into the mammoth exhaust housing channels of the sprawling gas refinery. The Lancers broke attack formation and scattered.
“If the shut-off gate is closed, this is going to be a real bad idea,” he said to no one as the dorsal thruster overheat warning sensors lit up like a fireworks display.
“Lyra… lock those down. I’ll use ventral.”
“By your command, Captain.”
Rechs switched on the running lights, because the carbon-blasted gas-refining furnace was as dark as the night sky at midnight beyond the galaxy’s edge. It was like flying beneath the murky water of some swampy river. The ship streaked past blackened mausoleums of infernal despair, or so it seemed for a moment to the old bounty hunter. Like some Ancients’ ruins he couldn’t remember fully, but that haunted his dreams nonetheless. A place he had once been long ago. He’d seen such places… but he couldn’t remember where. Or when.
“Stow that!” he muttered to himself as his hands swam across the controls. He checked the jump computer. The ship was still loading in the solution.
“Tarravil?” he barked.
“It’s the only safe jump I can compute under these circumstances, Captain,” replied Lyra.
“Tarravil it is,” Rechs sighed.
The wobanki slid into the copilot’s chair next to Rechs.
“Any good with an omni-cannon?” Rechs asked.
The wobanki purred and shook his head.
Never mind then, thought Rechs.
; “All right. Let’s find a way out of here.”
He picked a gas relay channel he hoped would lead to the refining gate, then throttled up.
The Republican fighters were already swarming into the massive chamber behind him, unloading bright blaster fire across the walls and the ship’s rear deflectors. Shots reflected off the pipeworks and careened into the swallowing darkness, illuminating the blackened machinery as they went. One of the fighter pilots misjudged his speed and the turn he’d need to make to follow Rechs into the vent tubing. A moment later there was a deafening explosion as the Lancer kissed the sides of the pipe housing and disintegrated. The tube was lit up by the explosion as debris outraced the speeding freighter.
“Chabu o’bong bong!” the wobanki cried.
Rechs held course down the tunnel. The vent gate was either open, or it was closed. They’d find out in seconds.
A moment later they shot through the titanic opening and out over the main refinery.
A Republican superfreighter was lowering into position to confiscate all the product it deemed untaxed—which would probably be everything it could get its hands on. Rechs spun the Crow over onto its belly and dove away from the gargantuan ship. Emergency proximity alert warning lights flared across the freighter’s length as collision alarms bellowed ominously throughout the factory.
But the storm-tossed skies above were clear.
The remaining Lancer was too late in turning, and moving at too high a speed to do anything other than spend itself all across the underside of the superfreighter with little damage or effect.
“Get us ready for departure,” Rechs ordered the wobanki as he opened up the nav computer. A moment later he pointed the Crow toward the barely visible stars and pushed all engine throttles forward.
The Obsidian Crow shot skyward at incredible speed, disappearing into the neon atmosphere swirl above as more Republican assault ships swam downward toward Ackabar.