by Richard Dee
Promise Me
Dave Travise Book Three
Richard Dee
All Rights Reserved
This Edition published in 2020 by 4Star Scifi
4Star Scifi, Brixham, Devon, England
www.richarddeescifi.co.uk/4Star
Copyright © Richard Dee 2020
No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Under no circumstances may any part of this book be photocopied for resale.
This is a work of fiction. Any similarity between the characters and situations within its pages and places or persons, living or dead, is unintentional and coincidental.
Cover by It’s a wrap
Author Photograph by Tim Kendall.
Chapter One
“Promise me you’ll make Rixon pay.”
Ria had said that to me, back in the aftermath of the madness on Jintao. At the time, I was still in shock from the sudden and violent death of Elana, her friend and mine. Though Rixon hadn’t fired the shot himself, it had been done on his orders. At that moment, I could understand what she meant, even though she didn’t have the full picture. To make matters worse, she had ended the call, before I had the chance to talk to her, to explain what had just happened.
She hadn’t even let me agree that I would do what she wished. Not that I would have anyway. It was more complicated than she knew, not least because Rixon had vanished and I had no idea where he would be.
With everything that had happened since that day, I had never got around to talking about what she had said. Not with Irin, who had been standing next to me when Ria spoke, nor with Griff or Ria herself. Irin told me that she had been upset by what Ria had said, like me she wanted the chance to explain. As it had all been because of her I guess that she felt somehow responsible, although as far as I was concerned it was just Elana’s bad luck. At the time, Irin was just relieved that her family were safe, now it felt wrong to drag it all up.
Besides, it wasn’t as if Elana had been unaware of what she was getting herself into. Her last words to me, which nobody else had heard, had not been ones of anger, or regret. I needed to speak properly to Ria, try to make her understand. Before I did any of that, I needed to try and convince Irin that it wasn’t her fault. As far as I knew, it might be a long while before I saw Ria again. Why not let time heal things?
Irin might not even be with me the next time I met Ria. This whole thing could never need sorting out. Why bother stirring things up if there was a way that I could avoid it.
My old habit of putting things off had won the day. I had found an excuse to avoid doing what I had to. Irin and I had gone to a new world to start again, we had been happy and as time passed, I felt less and less inclined to bring the subject up.
Then my past, in the shape of the Truth Movement and Federation Security had caught up with me. For a while, there had been far too much going on to give it any thought. After some hair-raising adventures on Prairie seven, we had ended up on Qister-Alu, presumed dead after finding out the biggest secret in the galaxy.
But now, as we prepared to take off from Mee-ling University on Callo, I realised that it was time to face up to everything. My role in the plans of the Truth Movement was at an end. There was nothing else left for me to hide behind. I was going to have to make a decision.
It had been just over a month since the events on Qister-Alu. Unfortunately, we had been unable to salvage any of the alien machinery from the caves, everything had been buried in the explosion and collapse of the tunnels. At least we still had the things we had salvaged from Prairie onboard Freefall.
Paoul had a fake identification chip for Freefall, changing our ID to one of the university’s craft. It was enough to get us permission to land on Callo and depart again. Once we had arrived in the university grounds, we were safe from Federation search. We unloaded everything and stashed it securely with all the other artefacts that Paoul and his team had collected from the quarantine worlds. It was an impressive collection, far too much to be easily dismissed by the government. The students working under Paoul would have a much easier job of examining it all now that the Khayan’s technology had somehow recalibrated everything to speak our language.
Freefall had been stocked with food and water. Paoul and Sal were too busy sorting out what they intended to do next. We had no official function; we were in the way. The sooner we could leave Callo, the less chance there was of us being spotted by anyone who might have wondered how we could still be alive. So we had said our goodbyes, just after sunrise on a cold, bright morning.
“Thank you for everything.” Paoul was his usual, unemotional self, although I detected a trace of a break in his voice. “We couldn’t have done it without you.”
“Please keep quiet, and stay out of trouble,” added Sal. “I’ve hacked into the Federation database and taken every mention of Freefall and your names out of Miro’s files. You should be safe. We will study all the information we have and prepare a press release. When the time is right, we’ll tell every world at once.”
Then the fun would really start. If enough memories were jogged by that, we would reappear on the radar somewhere, no matter what had been deleted. With handshakes, they left us and I prepared Freefall for departure.
“The ramp’s shut, Dave,” said Myra and I heard the engines start. I called traffic and got clearance and a flight path.
Irin came into the wheelhouse and stood beside me, draping one arm over my shoulder. “Are you ready?” she said.
“As I’ll ever be,” I answered as I put the power on. Freefall lifted into the cloudless sky.
“Where are we going from here?” she whispered.
I liked the way that Irin said ‘we’. It felt good that she still wanted to be involved in my future; perhaps with her help, I would finally be able to accept that Myra was gone.
“We can do whatever we want now, go anywhere,” I said.
“Could we go back to Jintao, I’d like to spend some time with my mother and son,” she asked.
“Of course we can,” I answered. As I said it, I had a sudden thought. Once we got to Jintao, Irin might decide to stay with her family. It was the perfect chance to leave me, which wasn’t what I wanted.
As the sky turned black, I spun the chair to face her. The blue eyes gave me no clue to what she was thinking.
“Or perhaps we could see if we can’t get our jobs back on that Villiars start-up world,” I said quickly. I thought I’d mention it, see if I could get an idea of her intentions. Without realising it, I had done what I always did, the thought had come into my head almost automatically; any excuse not to go straight back to New Devon and face Ria.
“Oh Dave, I loved it there,” she said, “apart from cleaning up after the cows. It would be great to go to Jintao before we decide.”
“We’ll see your family first,” I said. “You never had much time with them, after so long away. We can talk to Villiars while we’re there, see how the land lies; before we try to make our peace with Kal Rivers.”
Rivers was a Villiars company manager, our boss on that new world. We had carried stores and done all sorts of jobs, helping Villiars develop an unnamed frontier world into a civilised planet. I
t had been fun, but he and Irin had not always seen eye to eye. If we were to go back, there would be plenty of opportunities for us to pick up where we had left off.
“He did give us leave for a couple of weeks,” I added. “I guess we’ve been quite a bit longer though; it depends on him. There should still be plenty of work. It could be worth it for a chance at normality.”
“If we go to Jintao first, we can talk to Costa,” Irin suggested. “He got us the job, he may have some influence on Rivers; if he makes a fuss. We’ll see him on Jintao, as long as he’s still with my mother.”
I nodded, it was certainly worth a try, Costa was a senior man in the Villiars set-up, he could put in another good word for us. Maybe we could persuade Costa and Irin’s mother, Sanja, to come with us. And then I could put off talking to Ria for a bit longer. It sounded like a good plan.
Chapter Two
“We’re clear of controlled space,” Myra announced, as Freefall moved further away from Callo. “Where do you want to go?”
“Take us to Jintao, please, Myra.” I had stopped feeling self-conscious about Myra a long time ago. Irin had accepted her as part of my past.
“Will do, Dave,” the computer replied. The voice was all I had left of Myra, but I didn’t miss her as much now. Not that Irin had completely replaced her but our adventures had shaken me out of the rut that I had got into and made me realise that I had to get on without her. “I have the route programmed,” Myra continued, “shall I execute it?”
“Go ahead,” I said, the automation could handle the trip from here, move us far enough away from the star’s gravity to enable the trans-light engine to work its magic. “And while you’re about it, Myra, we can resume our proper identity, now that we’re clear.”
“Will do Dave,” she replied.
“We can leave Myra to it and eat,” Irin suggested. Despite her slight frame, Irin was always enthusiastic about food and together we headed for the galley. “We can see what sort of stores Paoul has given us,” she added.
There was plenty of fresh food, more than enough to get us to Jintao, or even back to New Devon. Faced with the bulging refrigerator, Irin did her best to reduce its contents in one meal. I was slightly more restrained but still made sure that there would be little left to spoil because we hadn’t eaten it. We had been forced to eat so much concentrated food lately, it was great to feast on the high-quality supplies that we had been given.
“I’ve been thinking,” Irin said, talking with her mouth full. “It’s all very well deciding that we want to go back to working for Villiars, but is it the right thing? I’m not sure; for one thing, Rivers and everyone on the planet know our names.”
I chewed for a moment as I thought about it. Until she had said ‘us’ I had been waiting for her to say that she was leaving me; staying with her family when we got back to Jintao. I didn’t want her to leave, but I could hardly blame her if she did. Life around me was never dull; there was always a good chance that one of my unexpected adventures would go badly wrong.
She, unlike me, had family and a chance to be with them. And while I hadn’t thought beyond getting back to work, the trouble was, we were potentially too visible working for Villiars.
“You’re right,” I told her. “I don’t really see how we can go back to working for Villiars, not after we had to leave in a hurry.” I ate some more fruit. “Mind you, Miro was after Sal, not us. Even without his hacking the Federation database, they must think that we’re dead.”
We almost had been, both in the skies above Prairie and in the caves of Qister-Alu. Most of the people around us in the caves had not made it out. And the security services would be keen to put a lid on it all, by claiming that what had happened was all a terrible accident from which there had been no survivors. Everyone who knew our names, that we were on the planet, had died. With luck, they wouldn’t have noticed that we’d got away.
“That’s true,” Irin nodded, “but if we go back, Villiars will report us as working there and someone might put two and two together. We can’t be dead and working for Villiars. There’s always someone watching, you know.”
She was right, we couldn’t just change our identities; people on the Villiars world knew us as Dave Travise and Irin. If we were staying together, it only left one place to go after Jintao. With a sinking feeling, I realised that time was up.
“In that case, we should go back to New Devon and see what work Griff can find us.” Then I had another idea. It could be a way of keeping Irin. I could offer to take her mother and son along with us to New Devon. I owned a house on the cliffs that I didn’t need or use, it was meant to have been mine and Myra’s forever house. It was big enough for us all, it could be Sanja’s house if she wanted it. Although I hadn’t been there for a while, it was rented and kept in good condition. I could get the tenant to move out, with notice, if I needed to. I should mention it, at the right time.
“It’s a shame about Villiars though,” she said. “I would have loved to carry on with the colonising work, could we not get another job with them somewhere else?”
“We should keep away from any contract work; it’s too visible,” I said. “We know that when Paoul releases the news, anybody remotely connected with the events on Qister will be at the top of every wanted list in the Federation. If we’re working for a major company, it won’t be hard to find us, despite whatever Sal can do with the police database. I think we should go back to doing what I was before, it’s a lot more anonymous, Griff can hide us.”
“But if Paoul does what he says, and tells everyone at the same time, on dozens of worlds, there’s no way they can cover it all up, there will be far too many people to arrest.”
That was true, but even so, I would rather stay under the radar, give myself as much room to manoeuvre as possible.
“OK, let’s go to see your family. After that, I want to see Griff and Ria. Then we can sort out what to do next, it’s not as if Villiars are the only people we can work for.”
She digested that for a while, as a reformed criminal herself, she was almost certainly able to see my point of view.
“As long as I see my son, I can work with that, the thing I couldn’t bear is never seeing him again.”
“Ready for trans-light in five minutes,” said Myra. “It’s a five-day trip to Jintao, Dave.”
“Thanks, Myra, execute when you’re ready.”
I had a sudden thought. “Do you want to stop on the way, Irin, maybe get a gift for your mother or your son?” She shook her head.
“No, I’d rather take them somewhere for a break, I can stay with them while you go and see your friends on New Devon. Then you can come back and get me later.”
That threw me, I wasn’t expecting her not to want to go to New Devon. “Don’t you want to come and meet them?”
“I might not be too popular with Ria,” she said, a worried look on her face. “You remember what she said; she thinks that I was the reason that Elana was killed. And she’s right, in a way. If you hadn’t come to Jintao for me, Elana would still be alive. I don’t want to turn up at Elana’s old friends with you, especially as they were Myra’s friends as well and now we’re an item.” She looked at me. “We are an item, aren’t we?”
We certainly were, and I for one didn’t see it like that. “Elana had had a choice,” I said. “It was unfortunate but once we’ve had a chance to explain, I’m sure that Ria won’t hold a grudge against you. I know that Griff won’t.” I didn’t add that Myra was so long ago; both Ria and Griff had been urging me to move on, so they could hardly complain if I did.
“I’m going for a shower,” she announced. That meant I wouldn’t see her for a while, I could relax, start to try and process the events of the last few months and what it would all mean when it came out.
I was settled in the chair with a bottle of beer when the call came in. “I have an Ultraband call from Griff on New Devon, voice only,” Myra announced. We had spoken on leaving Qister for Callo, that wasn
’t so long ago, what could he want?
“Put it on the speaker,” I instructed. There was a click. “Hi Griff,” I said.
“Hello, boy,” he answered. “I heard that you left Callo. I want you to give me the whole story. Can you talk?”
“Sure I can, Griff,” I said. “Irin’s in the shower.”
Not for the first time I wondered how he knew things like that. We had barely cleared the system and gone trans-light, on a fake I.D. Yet Griff had still found us, almost as soon as we had reverted to our Freefall designation. He must have been looking out for us, with all his contacts it was impossible to evade him. At least he wasn’t working for the Federation.
Irin would be in the shower for a while, it kept the water recycler working flat out, trying to clean all the shampoo and other substances out and make it drinkable again. I was always changing the filters. Not that I minded her listening, I just wasn’t sure what the reaction from Griff and Ria would be to the news that she was still around and that things were getting serious between us. And that I might be heading their way with her.
“Are you coming back?” Ria asked, she must have been standing beside him, I could imagine them, in the office, him bulky, bearded and one-armed; her tall and graceful, with shells or other objects woven into her hair.
“We haven’t decided yet, we’ve been busy,” I said. There was a snort and a muttered ‘shut up’ from Griff. Ria must have noticed that I said ‘we’ and taken offence.
“I know,” Griff laughed. “I’ve been keeping an eye on events on Qister since the cave collapse and all that. There’s nothing official except that it was an accident, I assume you found something interesting, it’s certainly what the rumours say.”
“We did, but I’ll tell you more about that bit when I see you.” Did he know everything? I didn’t want to talk about that part of the story over the radio though; my transmission might be encrypted but Irin was right, you never knew who was listening. Miro had gone but he wouldn’t be the only one who had an interest in us.