The Skinner s-1

by Neal Asher

  ‘All the equipment we brought along, we also brought a spare for,’ said Svan, keeping her expression blank. ‘So we brought a spare biomech detector — to replace the one you trashed.’

  Frisk considered killing her right then, but decided that would be wasteful. Anyway, she could later do the job at her leisure, when Svan was no longer of any use to her. Perhaps just an injury for now…? Then she comprehended what Svan was telling her.

  ‘What have you detected?’ she asked.

  ‘Somebody is using cyber-joint motors about two hundred kilometres north-west of here. We had an intermittent signal for some time, but we couldn’t pin it down. It has since become constant.’

  ‘Show me,’ said Frisk, tempted to berate Svan for not informing her earlier.

  Svan pulled from her pocket the twin of the detector Frisk had smashed and flipped out its screen. She turned it round to show to Frisk. On the screen was a definite trace, with slowly drifting coordinates. Their source was not a ship under sail then, and if they were quick, they could reach it today. Frisk swivelled to face Drum’s back.

  ‘Turn the ship to the north-east and increase speed,’ she ordered.

  Drum swung the helm and pushed forward the throttle lever. The ship began to drone as the newly installed motor opened up. It left a foaming wake behind it and the wind pushed the sail back against the spars, belling rearwards.

  ‘Is this as fast as it can go?’ Frisk demanded. When Svan did not answer right away, Frisk turned to glare at her.

  Quickly Svan said, ‘This is about half speed, but go any faster and the ship might break up. It’s not made for this kind of treatment.’

  ‘Might?’ asked Frisk.

  ‘There’s no way to—’

  ‘Full speed ahead!’ Frisk yelled.

  There was no action from Drum, so she pulled her pulse-gun and put a shot in his back. He lurched forwards then straightened back up into position.

  ‘I said “Full speed”,’ Frisk hissed viciously.

  Svan stepped up beside Drum and pushed the lever all the way forward. She cast Drum a speculative look before leaving the cabin-deck and going to find something to occupy herself with, preferably something well away from Frisk. Drum continued staring ahead, seemingly unaware of the recent damage done to him. Frisk walked round to look him in the face.

  ‘I know it hurts,’ she said with relish. She nodded towards the mercenaries below. ‘They think it was a full coring, but you and I know better, don’t we? How is it, I wonder, to be utterly under the control of that nasty little spider thrall, yet able to see, hear, and feel everything? How much does that hurt?’

  She stared at him for a long moment as she tried to discern a reaction in his expression. But nothing — just like the blank on Ebulan’s ship. Pressing her gun against his side, she fired off another pulse. Drum whoomphed, moved sideways, but just straightened up yet again. Something that time? No, still nothing. Frisk shook her head, suddenly bored with this game, and strode to the ladder. Behind her, Drum’s eyes tracked her progress for a second, before flicking back to the fore as she turned to climb down. His wounds wept for a while, before slowly closing.

  * * * *

  Janer stopped by the hatch to help Erlin out. She gave him an annoyed glance, before the two of them rushed to the forecabin, trailing behind Forlam and Ron.

  ‘I thought you had the key,’ said Ron.

  Forlam searched his pockets, then gave Ron an apologetic look. Inside the cabin, they could hear Keech yelling, and then there was a crash. Ron swore as he straight-armed the door. This was the first chance Janer had to observe how strong the Old Captain really was, for Ron’s hand went straight through the door, rather than bursting it open — as had been his intention. He swore again, and reached inside to tear the door off its hinges, then stood for a moment with the door hanging from his arm before shaking it to the deck.

  Forlam ducked into the cabin ahead of him, but quickly backed out again. Janer stepped up behind Ron and peered around him.

  ‘What the fuck is that?’ he asked, turning to Erlin. She was backing away, shaking her head — her eyes fixed on the thing on the cabin floor.

  In his struggles Keech had tipped his chair over. The Skinner creature turned like a bull terrier from savaging his arm and hissed at the spectators. Ron tore a length of wood from the doorjamb on his way in, swinging at the creature and striking it hard. The monstrosity slammed back against the cabin wall, then dropped to the floor while Ron discarded his now shattered club. But the creature merely rolled back on to its feet, shook itself, spat out a couple of teeth, then shot between Ron’s legs and out of the door. Janer aimed a kick at it, but it darted out of his way before pausing to snarl at him.

  ‘Skinner’s out!’ Forlam yelled.

  Crewmen converged from every part of the ship. Goss threw a harpoon head that opened a wound on the Skinner before it ran again. Janer was only thankful it did run.

  ‘Skinner?’ he queried, but everyone was too busy to reply.

  Next the Skinner aimed itself at Peck who yelled and threw a bait box at it. The lid flew off the box, and the bait leapt out and scuttled away in every direction to make its escape. One of the trumpet creatures came at Janer who, remembering Erlin’s warning, stamped on it before it sought refuge in his trouser leg. It let out a pitiful squeaking as he ground it into the deck.

  ‘Get the bugger!’ Peck shrieked.

  A gun went off with a staccato cracking. Janer glanced round to see Anne opening up on the Skinner with an ancient automatic pistol. Her first shot knocked it over. The next two shots splintered the deck — as it got upright again and scuttled towards the mast. A junior swiped at it with a panga but missed, then it stumbled over backwards, reared up and hissed at him. Someone else threw a club and knocked it tumbling. The Skinner again landed on its feet and glared from side to side as the whole crew closed in. Abruptly it turned and leapt for the mast, where it started scrabbling its way up. A knife thudded into the woodwork below it and it accelerated. The crew dispersed to lockers and cabins in search of further weapons, as the evil creature climbed outwards along one of the spars. The spar it chose was a movable one, and turned when it was halfway out so the Skinner ended hanging upside-down like a dislodged caterpillar, its spatulate legs detatching, one after another, from the wood. The crew closed in below, eager to take it apart once it hit the deck.

  Just then the Skinner lost its grip and plummeted. There was a sudden soggy snapping sound as it opened out ears grown into stunted wings. It glided out over the sea, jerking each time Anne managed to hit it with her automatic. When Boris opened up with the deck cannon, bits of the Skinner fell away, and the thing dropped ten metres before correcting. But it glided on, in a steadily descending course, and penetrated the surface of the sea a hundred metres from the ship. The crew silently watched the place where it had gone under.

  It did not resurface.

  * * * *

  Janer no longer knew how he felt about Keech, now he had seen him try to kill someone. It gave one a very different perspective when you saw someone behave like that. You realized how, on an emotional level, they amounted to more than the sum of what you had previously seen, that they had connections and commitments to a life of their own in which you played just a bit part. As for the monitor, Erlin was tending to him: sealing up his arm with a portable cell-welder, closing a wound that reached right down to the bone.

  ‘Janer, my boy.’ Ron came up to stand at the rail beside him.

  Janer eyed him, this jolly hey-ho bit seeming a bit contrived. ‘Not the happy ending we were aiming for,’ he commented.

  ‘No,’ said Ron, ‘we’ve just discovered some endings long overdue.’

  Janer studied him more closely. ‘You mean Ambel?’

  Ron shook his head. ‘I don’t mean endings in the terminal sense — at least not for him, but for the Skinner, yes.’ He paused, studying Janer’s puzzled expression, then continued, ‘It’s not dead, you know, and w
e know where it’ll go.’

  Janer pursed his lips to keep his immediate retort reined in. He’d just seen a disembodied head sprout wings and fly right into the sea, so he wasn’t going to argue about its likelihood of being alive.

  Ambel had now come out on deck and was looking about himself with a guarded expression. Janer noted that some of the crew were deliberately facing away from the Old Captain, and the cold way that Keech was staring at the man.

  ‘So what now?’ Janer asked, as Ambel approached them.

  ‘We go to the Skinner’s Island,’ said Ambel.

  ‘And there we hold Convocation too,’ Ron said.

  Ambel nodded slowly. ‘I’ll be wanting to sail there as a captain, not as a prisoner. Might be the last journey I make.’

  Ron nodded. ‘I’ll leave any who don’t want to come with us on the Ahab, and I’ll send the sail across here.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Ambel, then, ‘How you going to call it… the Convocation?’

  Ron turned to Janer. ‘Your link? Through it you can communicate with the Warden?’

  ‘You getting this?’ Janer asked the Hive mind.

  After a brief buzz the mind replied, ‘All of it — and very interesting it is.’

  ‘Will you contact the Warden?’

  ‘I can, but nothing is for free,’ said the mind, which puzzled Janer until it went on.

  ‘OK, I’ll consider it,’ he said, once the mind had finished. He turned to Ron and Ambel. ‘What do you want of the Warden?’

  ‘The Warden can call the Convocation for us,’ said Ron. ‘Some of the Captains possess transceivers, so word can be spread quickly enough.’

  Janer nodded, and again listened to the dull flat buzzing, which went on for a little while before being interrupted by another voice. ‘A Convocation has already been called on another matter,’ said the Warden. ‘It is little enough trouble to have them relocate it. I will inform Sprage immediately. The Captains should be with you at the Skinner’s Island within days.’

  Janer informed the two Old Captains of this latest news, then watched them exchange a look before turning back to him.

  ‘Why was this first one called?’ asked Ron.

  Janer waited for an explanation, but all he got from his link was the flat buzzing. He shrugged. ‘Didn’t say.’

  Ron sighed. ‘Best we get things moving.’

  * * * *

  There were ten ships now moored beyond the reefs, with two more coming over the horizon, and yet another sweeping round from the other side of the island. Tay climbed aboard, then turned her attention to the creaking winch being used to haul up her precious cargo. That Sprage had even agreed to let her bring aboard this empty coffin-case was indicative of the fact that he had been one of Hoop’s original captives. For all such men agreed that no punishment was excessive when it concerned the Eight. Sprage moved to her side as the case swung over and was lowered. It was too big to drop through into the hold, so some crewmen worked to secure it to the main deck with straps and rope.

  ‘Old Cojan was an imaginative fella,’ observed Sprage.

  ‘He was that, and I think it was imagination that finished him in the end. He could never forget, and that’s why he committed suicide,’ said Tay.

  ‘He didn’t kill himself,’ argued Sprage.

  ‘No, he did not. He did suicide though, by allowing himself to be killed. It’s the same way a lot of people in the Polity go. When they’re very old they look for more and more danger, thinking this is intended to relieve them of boredom, when in truth it is to relieve them of life.’

  Sprage only grunted noncommittally. Tay noticed the Old Captain was peering beyond her towards the forecabin. Turning her attention in that direction, she saw Lember carrying the Captain’s rocker down to the main deck. The crewman positioned the chair by the mast, directly facing Windcheater’s crocodilian head.

  ‘I take it you’ve yet to cut a deal with the sail?’ she asked.

  ‘Thought I’d wait for you,’ said Sprage. ‘It’s history.’

  As Tay stared at Windcheater, she wondered if having to hold its head in that position — its neck curving back on itself — was a physical strain for the sail. She grimaced at the thought of its discomfort. Sprage’s crew were now gathering round the mast. These Hoopers wore bemused expressions, but there was almost a party air about the gathering. This was something different; few of them had ever before encountered a sail like this.

  Tay pulled out her holocorder unit, tapped instructions into it, then detached the holocorder itself and tossed it into the air. It stabilized immediately, then panned around, before Tay had it focusing in on the mast area as Sprage moved to his rocker and sat down.

  ‘So,’ said the Captain, taking out his pipe and starting to fill it. ‘You told me that you do the work of five crewmen and a fabric mainsail, so should earn an equivalent percentage of the ship’s profits.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Windcheater.

  ‘Let me see then… Most captains, being the owners, take the first twenty per cent, and the rest is equally divided — in the case of this ship, amongst ten crew. So you consider yourself worth five of my crew. By my calculation that’s the remaining eighty per cent divided into fifteen, of which you take five shares, one-third. Am I right?’

  ‘Yes, I get five shares,’ said Windcheater, but the sail now sounded a little less sure of itself.

  ‘So you are telling me you deserve twenty-six and two-thirds per cent, which is even more than a captain’s percentage? I don’t think so. The sail you scared off earlier was quite prepared to work just for the meat we provided. Why should we deal with you?’

  ‘Because you have to — just as all captains will have to deal with other sails in the future.’

  ‘Ah, so you speak for all sails now?’ said Sprage. He put his pipe in his mouth, flicked at his lighter for a while, then swore quietly and gave up. Taking his pipe from his mouth he studied Windcheater.

  The sail went slightly cross-eyed for a moment. ‘Yes… I will be speaking for all sails,’ he explained.

  Sprage frowned and shot a look at some of his crewmen.

  ‘In that case,’ he said, ‘it’d be best we get the bargain struck now, though it’ll have to be ratified at this coming Convocation. But I’m prepared to offer any sail the same amount as is given to crew. Eight per cent of the journey’s net take, and the same contractual obligations apply.’

  ‘What obligations?’ asked Windcheater.

  ‘Well, I think the one that mostly applies here is that if you go AWOL you forfeit your percentage. Too often we’ve been left without a sail, because the one we had got bored and flew off.’

  ‘Twenty-five per cent, and I want to see the contract.’

  Sprage turned to Lember. ‘In my desk — you’ll find a sheaf of them,’ he said.

  A dark-skinned and lanky individual clad in canvas trousers and a sleeveless leather shirt, Lember shook his head in amazement and moved off.

  ‘I guess I could go as high as twelve per cent,’ continued Sprage.

  ‘You’re a robber and a thief!’ said Windcheater, and this statement seemed to dispel some of the crew’s bemusement, as they now felt back on familiar ground. ‘I’ll not go below twenty, and you know you’re getting a good deal.’

  ‘Twenty — are you mad?’ Sprage asked. He flicked hard at his lighter, but still had no luck. Tay took pity on him and reached into her belt pouch, removed a burnished metal cylinder and passed it to him. He took the object, studied it for a moment, then held it over the bowl of his pipe. When he pressed the button on one end, red light flickered and his tobacco was soon glowing. He puffed out a cloud of smoke and grinned with delight, and then, holding up the cylinder, he looked questioningly at Tay. She waved for him to keep it.

  With satisfaction, he dropped the laser igniter into his top pocket and returned his attention to the sail. ‘Perhaps I can go as high as fifteen per cent,’ he suggested.

  ‘How would all your ships
fare if not a single sail came in to land on them?’ asked Windcheater.

  Sprage eyed him, but since getting his pipe lit, seemed less inclined to argue.

  ‘All right, seventeen per cent.’

  ‘Eighteen and we have a deal,’ said Windcheater.

  Sprage was silent for a moment. Then he nodded.

  Just then, Lember returned with a printed contract and a pen. He held these out midway between Sprage and the sail, then seemed at a loss as to what to do next. Sprage grabbed both pen and contract and scribbled in his signature and the percentage.

  ‘You have an aug, so I presume you can read. But can you write, Sail?’ said the Captain.

  In reply, Windcheater reared up in the spars and turned himself so that his foot claws came down to rest on one of them. He then stooped down, extending one long wing, and wriggling the two spider claws at its last joint.

  Sprage handed the contract and the pen to Lember, who then handed these two items up to Windcheater. The sail raised the contract up to his demonic eyes and squinted at it.

  Tay almost burst out laughing when it held the cap of the pen in its mouth and chewed on it gently. Sprage turned to regard her. ‘History in the making,’ he said.

  ‘It is that,’ she replied distractedly — another two ships had appeared on the horizon. Returning her attention to the sail, she watched it signing the contract. Once that was done, the sail put contract and pen in its mouth, then up-ended itself on the mast, spread huge its wings, and reassumed its normal working position before depositing pen and contract in Sprage’s lap. The sail had signed its name in block capitals so neat they were almost indistinguishable from the print of the contract.

  ‘But of course,’ said Sprage, ‘that percentage is of the trip you happen to have signed on for.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Windcheater. ‘And I do realize this trip is without profit. I am just establishing a precedent.’

  Sprage folded the contract and dropped it into his top pocket. He nodded slowly. ‘You’re a wise sail.’

  Windcheater tilted his head for a moment and his eyes crossed. When they uncrossed, he said, ‘The Warden tells me that this trip is not yet over.’