Abbott closed his eyes and leaned against the metal of the main hatch. “I doubt we’ll get the combination. Unless it’s somewhere in the mission database. Why’d they have to lock everything up?”
“Some cat burglars you two would make,” snorted Rafa. “Come on.”
After exchanging dull glances, the others fell in unsteady step behind him. In a minute Rafa had descended into the hollow formed in the lee of the cargo hold, and was worming gingerly through the gaping rent in the thick steel of the hull. The others followed without a word.
* * *
The module was still filled with sounds of snoring when Rafa opened his eyes to stare at the struts along the bulkhead above his bunk. For an instant he was confused. This was not his bunk in H block.
Then recollection flooded back, and he rolled to a sitting position with his toes on the floor. Across the tilted room, Chen was curled up in a classic fetus position, her braid circling under her chin in a loose, disheveled tangle. She’d stripped off the outer layer of her biosuit and left it in a muddy heap at her side; even dry, her underwear was hardly a triumph of modesty.
Abbott stirred fitfully in the bunk above her. His boots had smeared muddy streaks along the cushion at his feet, and he looked gaunt and filthy.
In the center of the floor, ripped envelopes and ration boxes were scattered in a careless heap. Wherever the rest of the crew had gone, they’d taken most of the supplies. He and Abbott had nearly given up on eating when Chen crowed in triumph and hauled out the boxes from a dented locker in the hold last night.
They’d dragged everything up to the commons and had a feast. His stomach still felt bloated, his hands and lips sticky from shoveling peaches and mashed potatoes and something that vaguely resembled rubbery ham into his mouth. It had all tasted good—exquisite, even—after two days of hard march with only monotonous dried survival bars that did little for their empty stomachs.
Rafa stumbled down to the bathroom, his mind on the inverted shower. To be clean again! But he stopped quickly inside the door, his nose wrinkling. The drain now clinging so futilely to the ceiling had not been able to dissipate run-off from several days of visits by the crew; this left the stall enclosure full of stagnant, sweaty, hip-deep water. Where the partition around the shower turned to doorway, soapy liquid had spilled over the floor in an enormous puddle. The place smelled like a locker room ripe with mold and slime and fungus.
Gritting his teeth, he squelched gingerly across the floor and peeked in the stall. The shower head wasn’t quite submerged, but the murky water turned his stomach. Better to forego the shower entirely, no matter how dirty he felt.
On a sudden inspiration, he looked back at the sink. The rubber membrane over the basin had been removed, and the floor beneath it was slick where a slow drip plopped monotonously. Upside down, it was probably a disaster for washing hands, but maybe it would service another way.
He returned to the hallway to doff his boots, biosuit and skivvies, careful to leave the fresh change from his locker in a separate pile, then crouched under the sink with a barefoot grimace, trying hard to ignore the odor. The splash of lukewarm water across his neck and shoulders was ample reward for the cramped squat and cockeyed use of plumbing. The accumulated perspiration and filth washed away.
As he dressed afterward, his mind was filled with questions. Where was everyone? The state of the bathroom proved that people had been here recently. So why pick up and leave? He remembered the Halifax colonists, devoured alive by alien locusts, and shivered. Surely nothing like that had happened; he’d been out in the biosphere, totally unprotected, for multiple days, with plenty of hair-raising encounters but nothing quite that ugly.
Why couldn’t they get any signal on their implants? It was like the broadcasts from the others had simply ceased to exist during the stampede—yet Chen and Abbott were confident they’d seen a functional skimmer zoom by overhead, a few minutes after the dust began to settle. Had it come here?
He walked purposefully back to the cargo hold. Judging from the light streaming through the jagged corner, it was full day outside. Maybe it was even afternoon; by the time he had finally stretched out last night, he’d felt like he could sleep forever. Yawning, he squirmed up into the sun, his shoulders bunching with the effort to lift without brushing against the serrated edges. The new cast on his forearm felt strange and awkward. Chen had found enough supplies to do that, though there had been no antibiotics for Abbott.
The day was still and only moderately hot—nothing like the dry bake they’d battled down on the prairie. He shielded his eyes against the orb overhead and scanned the surroundings for clues he’d missed at their arrival. Almost immediately he noticed a rutted trail from the cargo doors beneath his feet to a high spot that had been deeply pitted with the skids of a skimmer.
They’d loaded the equipment and flown it away, then. It must have taken several trips; no way could a skimmer handle the weight and bulk of the mining probe and the backhoe and the rest, plus all the crew at the same time. Obviously they’d found something interesting enough to abandon headquarters.
Frowning, he considered the communications equipment that he and Abbott had installed on the hillside. At the time, he’d been too busy worrying about a downpour and pufferbellies to notice much on its configuration menus. Would it help diagnose the problems with their implants, or possibly even let him signal to the missing crew?
He trudged uphill, his thighs stiff from yesterday’s brutal march, but the small, level shelf of rock where they’d anchored the fission battery and broadcasting setup was empty. He stared at the piton scars in mute frustration. As a rule he rarely voiced feelings, but this was one of those times he wished his inventory of vulgar adjectives was a bit deeper. A full minute crept by while his shoulders grew warm in the sun and the breeze fretted through his half-clenched fingers.
“I wondered if you might have come up here,” said Abbott’s voice behind him.
Rafa pivoted, a wry resignation on his face. “They even took the com unit.”
“I imagine they’d have to, if they wanted to transplant the camp.”
“That means they’re not coming back.”
Abbott shrugged. “So we say good riddance and stick it out on our own.”
Rafa’s eye met Abbott’s, and an understanding flickered between them. But he spoke anyway. “How long do you suppose we could survive here, by ourselves?”
“A while. They didn’t leave us much in the way of tools or supplies, but at least we’re protected from attack and from the weather. I suppose we could hunt.”
“With what?”
“Bow, maybe. At least we could make a spear.”
The pair began to walk back downhill. “You want to take on a pack of crabbies with a sharpened stick?”
“Good point.” Abbott grimaced at his own word play.
“Even supposing we had the means, how would we know what was edible? They took the bio kits along. And we don’t have any medicine or water purification tablets.”
“I hadn’t thought about water. Doesn’t the module have some?”
“Some. Supposedly it can recycle for ages. But with the plumbing turned on its head, I’d be surprised if those systems work right.”
Silence fell as they scrambled over a particularly mucky jumble. Abbott looked troubled. Rafa’s eyes flickered over the terrain, but his focus was elsewhere. His face wore a look of calm concentration. As they approached the module, he snapped his fingers.
“The emergency transponder.”
Abbott looked confused. “Huh?”
“The mission manual talked about an emergency beacon or some such on the module itself. It was supposed to help earthside locate us in the event of disaster, and tell them we were alive if normal communication got disrupted. The computers ought to be able to tell us how to turn the signal on.”
Abbott gave him a sidelong glance. “You sure you want to find the crew? As bad as it might be to go it solo, getting back with that lot
could be worse. I wasn’t real impressed with their search and rescue or the way they handled the stampede.”
In other words, Rafa thought, you’re wondering whether it’s safe to be with the group. Did someone try to kill us, or are we the victims of ordinary stupidity and indifference? Outwardly he shrugged. “At least the sorts of dangers we might face with the crew are relatively familiar. I’d rather see a cobra than step on one blind.”
Abbott nodded, looking unconvinced. Rafa pursed his lips for a moment, then shrugged. “Besides, we’ve got to get Chen back.”
“Chen?”
Rafa stopped walking, the crows feet near his eyes deepening in the sharp alien shadows. His voice sounded strangely quiet. “You’ve never seen video of a joaker dying, have you?”
33
Heward wiped the sweat from his forehead with one muscular arm, careful not to disturb the focus of the cutting laser he was wielding with the other. The rock continued to emit broiling waves of heat as it reluctantly gave way. Two more minutes and he’d have an opening—though it would be longer before it was cool enough to pass through.
Without warning, the disembodied voice in his ear spoke. “You feel fried. Why don’t you take a break? No point in killing you with heat exhaustion.”
Heward looked around, careful to strip the surprise from his expression. “You don’t have to ask twice. Mind if I go to the can while I’m at it?”
“That’s fine. I’ll give you five minutes.” There was a tiny clicking sound, like a mic being switched off, but the online status indicator on his wrist only glowed red for a second. As he powered down the laser and turned toward the nearest stand of trees, the voice returned.
“We’ve got a problem.”
Heward spoke quietly, minimizing the movement of his lips. Compton was watching him enviously over the deck of the skimmer, where she had been loading and unloading bulky equipment all morning. “What’s up?”
“It seems you’re not quite as efficient a killer as I thought. Orosco’s alive, and so are Chen and Abbott.”
There was a flicker of movement to Heward’s eyebrows, but he continued to march toward the trees without a break in step.
“How do you know?”
“Somehow they must have made it back to the module. The emergency transponder was reactivated about an hour ago.”
“Just a quirk. Poltergeist in the wiring.”
“No dice. The transponder is keyed to automatically acquire the identifying signal of each person on the crew, and beam out a head count. It’s them, all right.”
“But how? I might believe Abbott or Chen made it; they were out a ways. But Orosco was practically within spitting distance of that herd. You saw. He should have been flat as a pancake.”
“Montaño probably is, since it’s just the three. But Orosco’s not.”
“I don’t get it.”
Now the voice was edgy with sarcasm. “Obviously.”
Heward stepped through some spiny knee-high bushes that smelled of acetone and swatted at a thumb-sized centipede clinging to his thigh. It squished like a brittle grape and left a black smear on his glove as it fell away. The waiting trees closed around him, hiding the rest of the crew. His voice rose perceptibly. “Even if he did make it, you can’t just do a sixty kilometer stroll through untracked wilderness.”
“They did.”
Heward cursed softly, then leaned against the rough surface of a towering trunk. “So let them rot.”
“I’d like to. But the transponder signal is part of the official mission log, and anybody who audits us will see it right away and wonder why we didn’t go pick up part of our crew.”
“So what?”
“You know what we’re sitting on here. When this breaks they’ll be looking for any excuse to throw the book at me. As long as I’m marginally compliant with regulations, I’ll get off with a few fines and some finger wagging, but they’ll be too interested in the site to worry about minor issues. It’s worth the cost a hundred times over, even when they carve a hole in our claim. We’ll build a spaceport and sell entry visas at fifty thousand a head. But let them sniff out attempted murder or your nocturnal activities and my goose is seriously cooked. I’ve got to act reasonably normal, and normally we would want Orosco back.”
“I suppose you want a guarantee that he won’t actually get here.”
The voice in his ear rasped hoarsely. “Of course.”
“Well, I can’t just fly down there and blow him away. The other two would probably be witnesses, and besides, you might have to produce the recording from my implants. Unless I went during off-shift.”
“No way. You know I need you busy on our side project. Besides, waiting till nightfall would look suspicious just by itself. Maybe if you picked a fight, like on Morga Prime...”
Heward was shaking his head. “Orosco wouldn’t go for it. He’s not the type. And anyway, I’m not too hip on another adventure with the self-defense plea.” He spat for emphasis and folded his arms to hide a slight shudder. Much as he wanted to deny it, Orosco scared him. Some subconscious warning bell had sounded the night of the pistol whipping—a nagging unease about the lethal casualness of Rafa’s stance, the absolute lack of concern in his eyes as he stood to be bullied. Heward had never had a man face him that way, and he had no desire to repeat the experience.
After a pregnant pause, his invisible companion tried again. “I hear you almost had a mid-air collision with some of those balloon-things the other day.”
“Yeah.”
“I guess it got a bit slippery on the deck. One of the vikings filed a grievance.”
The beginnings of a thin smile returned to Heward’s lips as he anticipated the suggestion that was coming. “It was a close call. If it hadn’t been for the straps, he’d have fallen to his death.”
“How many seats up front in the skimmer?”
“Eight.”
“The small one?”
“Oh. It’s got three. But it’s been running really rough. Supposedly Latimer and his control are trying to fix it.”
“Hope it gets those poor vikings back here in one piece.”
Heward snorted at the mock concern. “I’m glad I’ll be doing the acting. You couldn’t fool anybody.” He rocked forward and began to push farther into the underbrush.
“Where are you going? The skimmer’s the other way, and you can leave right now, as soon as I break the happy news that three missing souls are miraculously alive.”
“Go check on Latimer. I wasn’t kidding about that potty break.”
34
Agent Oristano studied her gleaming fingernails as she waited for a connection. Brilliant colors suited her, but this particular shade of pink was a bit too neon to pull off. Too bad the bureau frowned on tanners; a medium cherry wash on her arms and neck would alter her complexion just enough.
If she weren’t in so bad with Geire right now, she’d do it anyway.
What a relief that Orosco’s signal had turned up again! Besides getting her off the hot seat, it resurrected her entrepreneurial prospects just when she needed to make an anonymous but hefty patch to Bruce’s bank account.
There was a click as her call finally went through. Bezovnik’s voice sounded even more crabby than normal. “Yeah?”
“Me again.”
“Yeah.”
“You moved the base.”
“So?”
“Come on, Bezovnik. Fess up.”
No answer.
“That stampede was your salvation. When the dust cleared and days went by and I didn’t call back with more nasty demands, you put two and two together and figured out I was working through a viking who’d been trampled. I bet it was a liberating feeling.”
“You have no idea.”
“Well guess what, Sherlock?”
“What?”
“You were right. I admit it. For a while there, I was afraid I’d have to go into maintenance mode, and just threaten you periodically with what I could docu
ment up to the time of the accident. A boring career for a blackmailer, with no prospect for pay raises.”
“You bled me for plenty.” Bezovnik growled.
Oristano laughed. “I did, didn’t I?”
“Is there a point to all this banter?”
“The point is that I’m back, and now I’m not after small potatoes. As soon as your hands were free, you dropped all pretenses and moved right to that mineral deposit you’re so excited about. If that’s really what it is. And you played right into my hands.”
“How?”
“I knew about those three survivors as soon as you did. Isn’t modern communication wonderful?”
“So what?”
“So you’re in checkmate. My informant’s alive and soon to be gratefully reunited with the crew. That gives you heartburn, I bet; I know you’re pretty desperate not to let the cat out of the bag about whatever you’re up to at the new headquarters. And it’ll cost you a pretty penny to keep me quiet.”
“You’re assuming this informant will make it back to the crew alive.”
Again Oristano laughed. “Oh, Bezovnik, I really should call you more often. It does such wonders to my smile and my pocketbook.” She paused, half-expecting a rejoinder, but when none came she pressed on. “Don’t be so naïve. Even a child could predict you’ll bump off the spy somehow. That’s the beauty of the situation.”
“It is?”
Oristano rolled her eyes. “Think about it. People open themselves up to blackmail when they skulk around doing naughty things like that. Maybe you think this spy has to run to the closet or the bathroom to make a secret report, and you’ll catch him in a dark corner before he can call for help. Of course not. I tapped his implants. And if you kill him I’ll be recording the whole thing in every bloody detail. Or maybe I’ll be watching it live at local FBI headquarters, even. I bet they’d be really interested.”
“Not all murders look deliberate.”
“They do when I have a recording of what you just said. There’s no distorter on your voice, Bezovnik. I’ve checked. A voice print will ID you in a flash, even if you did make this connection untraceable.”
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