Crossways: A Psi-Tech Novel

by Jacey Bedford

  *Do I look like the kind of man to take chances?* Max said. *I’m an accountant, remember?*

  Ben and Yan ran for the wall at the corner of the compound. Ben boosted Yan to the top and Yan dropped a line, holding it firm from the other side while Ben climbed.

  Yeowch, it hurt his wrist. He’d been overconfident about it. His lungs, too. His breath rasped in his chest. At the bottom of the wall he stopped, panting.

  *You all right?* Yan sounded concerned.

  *I will be when we get Crowder.*

  The house and gardens were ablaze with light. Figures moved inside. Someone screamed. Definitely not Cara or Hilde. Mrs. Crowder, then. Two figures ran across the manicured pink lawn from the direction of Solar Wind. Ben hit one of them with a smart-dart, Yan felled the other.

  *Cara?* he asked.

  *All secured in here. We’ve got Crowder.*

  *Any other guards?*

  *Not in the house.*

  *By my count, there might be one more watching Solar Wind.*

  *I’ll check.* Yan doubled back.

  Ben let himself in through the garden doors.

  Crowder raised his hands.

  How the hell had they figured out he was here?

  Why hadn’t he had a warning from Jussaro? The man was dead as soon as Crowder got his fingers on that kill switch.

  He didn’t recognize all of them, but he knew he was in trouble when Carlinni followed the thick-necked soldier type into the room. If his heart had been capable of beating any faster than it already was, it would have hammered its way out of his chest as soon as she arrived. Benjamin. Where was Benjamin?

  Danniri had been blindsided at the stadium and Drew Wyndham had been worse than useless here, the first out at the sound of the alarm and not seen since. Crowder had managed a call to Danniri, but it would be four hours before she got here with reinforcements. About three hours and fifty-nine minutes too late. He’d told her to send a squad to the Benjamin farm and to the university where Kai Benjamin was studying, but he doubted they’d find anything. Benjamin wasn’t stupid enough to leave any of his family exposed.

  “Is this him?” A statuesque blonde female jerked the business end of a smart-dart rifle in his direction. Benjamin may not be here, but this had all his hallmarks, a soft operation. He recognized the weapon for what it was, nonlethal, and started to breathe again. This was one of the weapons he’d taken precautions against. You could never be too careful. Building an immunity to the anesthetic had not been particularly pleasant, but suddenly it all seemed worth it.

  “Meet Gabrius Crowder,” Carlinni said. “Would-be mass murderer.”

  “Unsuccessful, if I may remind you,” Crowder said, pleased that his voice hadn’t broken. “I didn’t actually kill anyone.”

  “Don’t tempt me to use this, Crowder. Not before Ben gets here. We’ve got two assassination attempts to add to your butcher’s bill. One of them almost killed Serafin the day we arrived on Crossways and the second one, the Alphabet Gang, killed six station guards trying to take out Ben.”

  “That wasn’t me, honest. I tried once, sure. You can’t blame me for that, but—what did you call them, the Alphabet Gang?—they’re not mine. Never heard of them. Sounds like Alphacorp to me. Alphacorp. Alphabet. Know what I mean?”

  “You’re lying.”

  “What? You think Alphacorp was completely innocent of all van Blaiden’s wrongdoings? Didn’t you know about Akiko Yamada? Of course not, why would you? Ari fucked his way to the top.”

  Stall for time. Benjamin was on his way, good. If he was going down he was damn sure he was going to take Benjamin and Carlinni with him. The implant killers were still in his pocket. Right pocket for Benjamin, left for Carlinni. Pity those were the only two, but if he had to guess who else might be on the team that came after him he might have guessed Vijay Gupta, Gen Marling, and Wenna Phipps, possibly Ronan Wolfe. He’d never have picked Archie Tatum and Lewis Bronsen, and who the hell were the soldiers? Mercenaries. It was written in every line of their body language. Crossways hirelings, perhaps. Oh—his brain caught up with him—the mercs who’d brought in the injured woman. Damn, he’d been suspicious, but he thought they were contained at the burn unit.

  “Check the other rooms,” Carlinni said.

  The big black soldier and the woman left without a word. Within minutes there was a loud scream followed by a faint thud.

  “You found my ex-wife,” Crowder said. “She never could stand me.”

  “A woman of taste,” Carlinni said.

  He shrugged. “Can I put my hands down?”

  “No. Keep them up there until they fall off.”

  “Just one woman,” the tall female said as they came back in. “She’s sleeping off a smart-dart.”

  Carlinni nodded. “Secure the house. Ben’s here.”

  As she spoke, Benjamin stepped over the threshold of the garden door. “Hello, Crowder. What a very fine day it is.”

  Crowder’s guts churned. This might be a soft operation, but Benjamin’s expression was anything but soft.

  “I see you’ve got a new ear. I don’t like the color. It’s still a bit too fresh and it doesn’t quite match the other one.”

  Crowder started to lower his hand to touch his ear, but the muzzle of Carlinni’s rifle reminded him to keep it up.

  “How did you know I was here?”

  “Jussaro. Information goes both ways sometimes. Your Telepath was careless.”

  I’ll have him brain-wiped, Crowder thought. Fucking useless asshole.

  “You’ve heard from the stadium, of course?” Ben asked.

  “Yes, well played.”

  “It wasn’t me.” Ben jerked his head sideways to Carlinni. “These guys orchestrated it. What possessed you to go after my family, Crowder? Surely you knew I’d come for them?”

  Crowder shrugged, trying to appear more in control than he felt. “What are you going to do with me?”

  “Extract information for starters. The whereabouts of thirty thousand settlers.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Arcturus, you said. That was a lie.”

  “I still don’t know.” He truly didn’t. Oh, gods, he wished he did. “I can’t tell you what I don’t know. And why should I tell you? You’ll kill me anyway. Even with that popgun.” He jerked his head toward the rifle in Carlinni’s hands. “One dart won’t kill me for sure, three will. Two might. I’m not as fit as I used to be. Two could do it for me, you know. Not feeling so good right now, in fact.”

  “Nan wanted a word with him,” Carlinni said to Benjamin. “She’s blue blazing mad and she picked up a bolt rifle in the stadium and won’t let go of it.”

  Crowder remembered the look on the terrifying old woman’s face. Benjamin might not murder him in cold blood, but he’d locked up Louisa Benjamin for a month. “Ari van Blaiden,” Crowder said. “Van Blaiden was supposed to find them a planet and dump them.”

  “You’re stalling,” Carlinni said. “Just a few minutes ago you claimed that you hadn’t actually killed anyone yet. Thirty thousand settlers, Crowder. Do you really want them on your conscience? Where did you send them? Don’t give us that Ari van Blaiden crap. You knew him. Handing them over to Ari would be a death sentence.” She turned to Benjamin. “Let me clean him out, Ben. Strip it out of his mind.” She pressed the muzzle of the rifle into Crowder’s belly. Reached up and tore one of the psi-dampers from the collar of his jacket. “Been relying on these, Crowder, to keep you safe from nightmares like me. I can kill you with my mind.”

  “That’s an old joke. You don’t get me with that one.”

  She reached up and ripped off the second damper.

  “Cara, no!”

  The genuine alarm in Benjamin’s voice sparked icy fear in Crowder’s gut. The double damper had kept his implant inviolate since the discove
ry of platinum on Olyanda. It had been inconvenient, but he wasn’t a full psi-tech. Losing the facility to receive messages hadn’t crippled him. He’d seen psi-techs with their implants decommissioned. It wasn’t pretty. He’d had it described to him as like being hit on the head with a spiked club—from the inside.

  Carlinni was inside his head, now, drilling down through layers of consciousness. He felt stripped naked; his thoughts started to unravel. He couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe.

  Through a fog, he heard her say: “He’s telling the truth, damn him.”

  He dropped his arms, fell to his knees and folded over, desperately concentrating on moving his hands, managing to get them into his pockets. He didn’t need to be an ace marksman to make these work.

  Everything was happening in slow motion. As Crowder reached into his pockets and began to clasp the implant killers, Benjamin wrapped his arms around Carlinni. Maybe he was telling her to stop, but Crowder’s ears were filled with a cacophony of bells and buzzers, whoops and whistles. Memories surfaced and sank as if she was rifling through them, keeping some, discarding others.

  He brought the implant killers out and pointed them, his thumb on the triggers. Carlinni’s mind contact snapped off. She flopped like a rag doll in Benjamin’s arms. But Benjamin didn’t fall. The implant killer had no impact whatsoever. He thumbed it again. Still no effect, but Carlinni was down and Benjamin was on his knees, lowering her to the floor, cradling her head, shouting something.

  Tatum and Bronsen both sprang forward. Crowder felt one dart puncture his thigh and a second one pierce his shoulder through his shirt. He’d built up immunity, but he wasn’t invulnerable. Two certainly wouldn’t kill him. He wasn’t so sure about three.

  Benjamin picked up Carlinni’s fallen dart rifle with one hand and fired it directly into the middle of Crowder’s chest.

  He felt the jab. His last thought was that he didn’t even have time to be afraid.

  “Cara, hold on. Hold on!” Ben cradled her head. “Fucking kill switch! Hold on. You’ve survived without an implant before. We’ll get you back to Crossways—get you a new implant.”

  She moaned in his arms and tried to claw at her face.

  “Archie, get the devices.”

  “Crowder?”

  “Leave him, he’ll be dead in minutes. Got to get Cara back to Crossways, to Civility Jamieson.”

  *Ronan, everyone on board Solar Wind, now.* He flashed what had happened.

  He would normally have been able to carry Cara, no problem, but he was so out of condition that Bronsen scooped her up instead and they ran back to Solar Wind, through the gap that Toni Horta had blown in the wall.

  Ronan was close behind with Nan and Ricky.

  *All accounted for?* he broadcast.

  *Except for Fowler and your nephew,* Tengue said.

  Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! In his panic to get Cara back to Crossways, he’d forgotten the hospital pickup. He couldn’t leave Kai, and Tengue wouldn’t want to leave Fowler.

  “Gen, get us back to Arkhad City.”

  “Right away, Boss.”

  “Reska!” Nan’s voice cut across the chaos.

  “Nan, find a cabin and strap in; it’s going to be a bumpy ride. Ricky, stay with Nan.”

  “Cara?” Nan asked.

  “Not good.”

  Ben turned to find Bronsen and Ronan had already taken her to sick bay. He wanted to go straight after her, but everyone was shouting at once. He took a deep breath.

  “Essential crew only on the flight deck. Everyone else, find a cabin. Archie, show Nan and Ricky where my cabin is. If Rion comes to from the goodnight drops, better that he sees them first. Nan, Rion’s going to be as mad as blazes with me. Tell him he can have a piece of me later, but to stay clear of the flight deck and sick bay.”

  “Has he got a right to be mad at you?”

  “He certainly has. Tell him Bunty’s boys are farm-sitting and the dogs are in a crate in the hold for the duration of the flight. They’re fine. That might help.”

  Archie led Nan and Ricky up a level, chatting normally to Ricky, trying to defuse the tension.

  Ben turned. “Tengue, Gwala, are you in touch with Fowler?”

  “Hilde is. She’s the better Telepath.”

  “Hilde, is Kai with Fowler?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell her to tell Kai to get a float chair and take her down to the west side of the hospital building. They’re to wait where they can see the autopark. That’s where we’re putting down.”

  “What about the hoverpods in there?”

  “What about them?”

  Hilde grinned.

  “As soon as the ramp goes down, you three are responsible for getting Kai and Fowler on board safely. Any questions?”

  They all shook their heads.

  “Max, you’re making the place look untidy. Get strapped in.”

  “Only essential crew to the flight deck?”

  “Hell, what a time to start listening to what I say. Get yourself up there with Gen.”

  Max flashed him a grin and turned just as the drives began to power up with an urgent hum.

  Ben turned the other way and headed for sick bay.

  “Ronan, how’s she doing?” He’d expected Cara to be flat out, but instead she was sitting up in a chair, wrapped in a blanket.

  “I’m still here,” she said, and reached out a hand.

  He took it.

  “Has Ronan given you anything for the pain?”

  She shook her head and winced. “He can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because she has to be fully conscious when you hit the Folds so that she can get the dead implant out of her head.” Jussaro’s voice came from behind.

  Ben turned. If a man with purple skin could look pale, Jussaro was pale. Bloodless might be a more accurate description. “I heard the fuss, asked a nice old lady in antigrav leggings what had happened.” Jussaro stepped forward unsteadily. “The moment an implant is killed it begins to shrivel. It doesn’t take long for the pathways to shrivel with it. Sometimes that makes it impossible to replace. I was lucky the first time. But if the implant can be removed, it leaves the pathways open. Reimplantation should be simple.”

  “So you want me to what? Think this ruined thing out of my head?” Cara said.

  “Well, you might need some help,” Jussaro said. “From a void dragon.”

  Ben squeezed her hand. “You had your implant switched off when I met you, trying to hide from Alphacorp. Once, when I asked you how you’d coped, you said it was because you wanted to live more than you wanted to be a Telepath. How about now?” He kissed her fingers. “I want you to live. I need you to live.”

  “Go drive the bus. Get me home.”

  He squeezed her fingers one more time and left.

  The comm gave a small whoop and then crackled into life. “Arkhad City ATC to unknown craft, identify. You are in controlled airspace. Repeat, you are in controlled airspace in the lanes reserved for emergency services.”

  Ben slid into the pilot’s seat and left Gen to monitor comms. “Stall them,” he said.

  “Let me.” Max leaned low over her shoulder, kissed her ear, and reached for the vox. “Hey, hi, Mr. ACT . . . er . . . Mrs. ATC lady. You in charge up there?”

  “Identify yourself.”

  “Hi . . . err . . . yes . . . This is the good ship . . . err . . . Lollipop.”

  “Lollipop?” Ben said quietly.

  Max turned and grinned, his eyes alight. “You don’t watch old movies? Got to do something when the girlfriend dumps you and even the cat goes out on the town.”

  Ben shook his head.

  “When this is all over I need to educate you, my friend. Beer and old movies.” Max turned back to the comm.

  “Lollipop, state yo
ur ident code and your destination.”

  “Ident code? Heading for the hospital. This is an emergency. Got a pregnant lady on board. Keep everything out of our way.”

  “Ident code, please, Lollipop.”

  “Ident code . . . ident code . . . I had one of those somewhere. Is it in this pocket? No. In this one? Uh-huh—”

  “Lollipop, you are in controlled airspace. Ascend to one thousand meters.”

  “Now how am I supposed to get my lady to the hospital from one thousand meters?”

  “Lollipop, who’s in charge there? Do you have an emergency medical situation?”

  “Sure do.”

  Ben blocked Max’s performance out of his mind as they approached the hospital. *Tengue?*

  *In position.*

  Like an overeager horse, Ben reined in Solar Wind above the hospital. The auto park below them was a sea of small hoverpods jostling for space on automatics. It was the largest space without people, and as a bonus was close to the west side of the building. He didn’t even let down the stabilizers, just crunched down onto the roofs of close to a hundred shiny pods, opened the hatch and dropped the ramp.

  On the forward screen he saw Tengue, Gwala, and Hilde run forward. Tengue scooped Fowler from the float chair. Hilde grabbed Kai’s hand and urged him to run while Gwala covered them all with a smart-dart rifle. Though there were people huddling in the lee of the building, no one tried to stop them.

  “Hey, Boss, you might want to see this . . .” Gen flicked a local news broadcast onto the screen.

  There was Solar Wind nestling on top of what had become a scrapyard, filmed from above. One of the hospital’s security cams, he thought.

  “In breaking news, an unidentified craft has landed outside the Centenary Wing of Arkhad City Hospital, crushing private vehicles. Emergency services are rushing to the scene. Bystanders are urged not to get involved. It’s not known yet whether there are any casualties.”

  “They’re on board. Ramp retracted. Hatch secured,” Kitty said from Systems.