The Horseshoe Nail (The Donn Book 1)

by S Thomson-Hillis

  Earlier he’d been mysteriously called away, and then spent quite some time with Boole and the boss in the bridge briefing room known as Krystie’s office before returning to the terminals with a face like distant thunder. Since then he hadn’t had much time for Kent, nor, it seemed for his normal workload. His profile was craggy and forbidding as he concentrated and his incoming pile was mounting high, higher and highest.

  War Games were imminent. Backlogs were bad news so, diffidently, she began.

  Timmis looked up sharply. “No.”

  “All right,” huffed Kent, throwing up her hands. “I was trying to be helpful.”

  “Don’t,” he advised, hit save on a strange data-dot, unclipped and palmed it, stood and swung away. “Believe me, Kent, if we can use you on this, you will be used.”

  He strode up to the dais and parked at Krystie’s elbow.

  Kent blinked angrily fit to incinerate the files. No secrets, she muttered to herself, hah, stuff that, and began to comb the encrypted data that had so engrossed him. She surfaced a bit later to see Timmis and Krystie head-to-head over the boss’ board, with Commodore Stanson looking as if he was weathering a tornado. Her mouth twisted, there’d be more of that.

  When Timmis returned he dropped her a curt smile and said nothing.

  Kent didn’t care, Kent was a genius. “That’s ok,” she said. “That’s absolutely ok, Lieutenant, but perhaps you’d like to tell me what’s going on in the diplomatic suites that’s such high priority. That message was dripping with their encrypted muddies. See?”

  A triumphant flourish demonstrated. Timmis’ brows rose.

  “Correct,” he nodded eventually, coming to a decision. It was hard to see whether he was pleased or angry, at times he was frustratingly unreadable. “Check this.” With a quick stroke he released the security tags. “The underlying signature on this data is called scrambles and it’s unique to the Autocracy. Their coding was tough and we need it broken. We were going to put you on tracking down Carolli, but you just volunteered for the big one.”

  Over by the View, engineers suddenly bobbed up and down faster. Krystie stopped talking and spun to the View, hauling Stanson. Kent couldn’t make out words but the heated AE commentary rose as the air-waves jived. On the View the problem was plain to spot.

  Without warning a Glo-white hiccupped, flung swiftly away from the formation and plunged in a screaming corkscrew dive towards the planet. The kickback sizzled. AE identified the craft as Red-3, projected a course, confirming a massive systems failure.

  Krystie watched, flatly expressionless. “Let it go.”

  Chapter Thirty-five

  The number of guards had just about quadrupled. Everywhere Sam turned a patrol lurked and each time he ducked down a passage he ended up eyeballing another. And another. The longed-for galley had turned out to be an optical illusion that didn’t exist, or at least not where it should have been. Then a patrol had marched down that corridor and almost boxed him in, and when he avoided that one there was another and they’d nearly spotted him and then, in a flat panic, he’d had to hide for ages while fear punched his throat and shovelled the clotted brown and pinkish gunk from his nostrils across his lips. It oozed lumpily. Cowering, he’d ached as the pounding of armoured feet receded, and tried not to snuffle.

  After that he’d decided to go home and that was easier said than done.

  Somehow he’d taken a wrong turn, another, and another, tripped into a useful looking ventilation shaft, panicked, shot out of the other end and suddenly there was no shaft left underneath him. Flailing like a pinwheel, bouncing and thumping, gravity toppled him here.

  And once here, he’d stuck.

  It was the empty socket part of a ball-and-socket joint. He’d landed in a hollow basin, a cradle like the inside of a globe, primed to catch a travel-pod. Whatever fitted it would have to be a sphere armed with lots of exterior fixtures and fittings, because there were plenty of dangling connections and hollow niches. He was caught on the lowest lip to the power-core below and peering over the rim made him reel. To fall was death. Stretching till his spine snapped, Sam snatched the edge of the nearest alcove above and hauled himself into its shallow niche. There he lay, panting, unable to move, trying not to imagine what could have happened if... His lungs pumped against his hammering heart – boom, pip, boom, pip-pip boom. Somehow the worst terror didn’t stem from his falling, or radiation, or being discovered, it was the fear of being trapped in the dish and not being able to find his way out.

  The connection interfaces tickled his cheek and he sniffed.

  His sinus blocked and he honked greeny-pink mucus.

  It was some time before he was able to twist and see what it was.

  It was a socket, an empty plughole with a thick cable extruding from the middle, with a secondary port for a counterpart just below. Several similar alcoves and sockets stepped up the basin’s curve, looking a bit like an indented climbing gym. The thick flex looked sturdy, and peering up he believed he could see a dark vent above them. If he could clamber up to the vent it might mean escape. It wasn’t much but something is always better than nothing. It struck him that he should check if the cables were live first, though he figured, dubiously, it should be ok to clutch the insulated cover. He poked at the nearest. It was a clumsy lunge and the flex recoiled and scraped the metal frame about it. Fzzzpt. The dim internal light flickered and went out, the socket spat a connector valve that hopped over Sam’s shoulder and rattled down the shiny surface until it hit the shields above the core. There it rested, a black pinprick, before it suddenly went fzzzpt again, and vanished in a puff of black smoke. Everything stopped for a heartbeat, even the power core stopped hissing. It went very dark. Only the sockets glowed. Most of the diffused light came from the growling power core.

  Thoughts collided in Sam’s head. Not many survived the impact.

  He had to get away before he fell into the core.

  No one could ever know he’d been here. It wasn’t his fault.

  No alarms were blaring, yet, but that wouldn’t last forever.

  Panicking he seized a coil protruding from another interface, yanked and rammed the glowing end into the empty socket creating a loop. The flex stretched without breaking, even though it moaned dramatically. Pressing it down, he counted to ten. The light had come on by the time he reached three and stayed on by eight. Sam was so relieved he was boneless.

  For a second he hung, limp with reaction.

  Sam Nevus, the boy Soren wouldn’t let hold a spanner in case he broke it, had just patched up a very complex mechanism. It wouldn’t last, it was a rotten bodge job, and someone was bound to come and investigate soon but he’d done enough to hold it.

  Now all he had to do was get away, go back to his pod and wait for Mark.

  Then he was spidering up the basin, all four frenzied paws clawing at footholds, sockets, cables, plugs and wires as well as firmer fittings, until, at last, he flung himself headlong into the vent. There he paused, wheezing, and took stock. It was a ventilation shaft and there was light and a grill a long way ahead. Without a second’s hesitation, he slithered down it towards freedom. The feverish thuds of his frantic escape eventually faded.

  In the massive bowl there was no noise but the muted roar of the core.

  Half an hour later the alien wire Sam’d shoved in the socket drooped and began to sweat. Orange/blue sparks fizzled and eventually, it gave a sad little fzzzpt and dribbled molten solder into the complex drills of its socket. Integral components fused and locked, irrevocably combined. The outlet was clogged and the link to the interface broken. Sam had caused a block. The critical fault had nowhere to go to report and was not detected. It was doomed to chase its own ruined tail round and round and round forever and a day.

  No alarms were triggered.

  Nobody came. Nobody investigated.

  Nobody ever knew.

  * * *

  Pre-dawn on Harth Norn was darker than any dog-end of night had a r
ight to be, the drizzle was so thick you need a chainsaw to cut it. Dandy Minon and three of his gang were fanned out in a rough circle around the ZR-3, lying flat on the dunes, dug into the sand and shingle, hidden by scuff-grass and jagged rocks. The ship was well concealed but uncloaked, though some fancy security-cordons were rigged up. A scan turned up no life signs, and it was the crew Dandy needed. He set up image-trackers to catch anybody approaching, positioned his men and settled down to wait. As he cuddled his streamer Dandy guessed the crew would return before dawn, it was far too risky to leave the ZR exposed in daylight. This time Minon was taking no chances and no prisoners, he’d had his orders.

  Nothing was going to get past him. He needed that key.

  Time passed. The drizzle curtain lifted slightly.

  Dawn cracked a hoary line against the dunes, small animals rustled and the wind sighed, chilly and pernicious. Nothing happened except that a distant insect hummed angrily.

  Then another, until it sounded like an entire swarm of enraged marsh-bugs.

  Humming turned into whining, and whining dopplered into distressed throbbing.

  Minon’s jerked up, with a grunt he knelt, then, unwarily, stood.

  A ship? Where?

  The engine shrilled in tortured scales. His fake Shiny Ear vibrated, joining the chorus and banging blunt needles into his head. He clapped both hands to his temples to stop them exploding. At last he saw it, a smoky arrow trailing ripped clouds over the sky.

  “It’s those bloody War Games!” he hollered. “They’ve lost a fighter! Get down!”

  The Glo-white swooped.

  The world screamed. Dandy screamed.

  The ship streaked past towards the Dome.

  Slipstream scorched. The after burn was blue.

  There was a moment of petrified silence.

  The crash exploded with a hollow boom. The world belched, marshes jumped, ripples rippled and dunes gulped sand. The air went deadly quiet. Minon swivelled to stare at the plume of smoke. It was too close to home. Literally. Their base? He spat, deafened and grabbed his ear-piece; it came away in his hand, peeling skin like crackling with a sick slurp.

  “Should we check that out?” demanded a voice. “It came down close to the shack.”

  “What about the pilot?” gasped a more humane soul.

  “Yeah. Later,” responded Dandy automatically.

  If it had gone down near their base then it was too close to the Dome and the Dome was on a tight countdown. If that ship had inflicted any damage, if crucial mechanisms were jammed or entrances obstructed it would not go well for Minon. And here was he, his fried ear sizzling, no communications, and the crew of the ZR-3, including the girl with key, due back at any minute. He stamped the dead head-set into the dirt, scrubbing it furiously with his heel. It was then, entirely by accident, he got his first glimpse of the ZR and life suddenly bloomed beautiful roses. The shock had tipped the ship sideways, burying the hatch completely. They’d have to dig that out before they got inside, let alone took-off.

  Just for once the odds were on his side.

  “You come with me, we’ll check out the crash,” he instructed. “You two, you stay here till we get back. Stay sharp, use image trackers. If they come back before us, don’t waste time, shoot the girl first. Got that? Just get that key and make sure she’s dead.”

  * * *

  Since Mark Macluan had met HStJ Jenson during the assessment and induction part of their first year at the Academy, the running joke had been H and his rotten landings. From now on it was official, joke over. Plan was simple. Sneak down, get Sam; warn Tam and H to get Ellis and the key off Harth Norn and go home. Sam was a priority. He was a witness to Belthan’s fate and those ships had to be a serious threat. With Mark’s data the boss might have enough proof to hold Carolli, but with Sam’s help surely even Carolli couldn’t duck.

  He had planned get the boy to Imperious in the Glo-white.

  Newsflash: it hadn’t worked. Someone should tell the C-AE his badass targeting device worked like a dream but bypassing it (all right, fair play, Mark’d fiddled it to make it swerve and force a phony crash) prompted a whopping systems overload, during which even a Donn pilot could not force it to switch to manual. He tore off his helmet and mask, slamming them down, spitting language that would’ve made Tam Harris blush.

  A second later, white and spiteful, he was back in control.

  But this ship wouldn’t lift again.

  Rapidly unbuckling his webbing he abandoned the craft. While he was at it, he engaged security functions, using a red-red tag and a pilot-is-safe code. The Glo-white’s motivators were smoking, her nose half-buried and the fuselage was wrinkled like a prune, but the tag meant that only salvage teams from Imperious could approach. She was safe enough. Trekking dispiritedly off across the dunes, he glanced behind, and swore again. His tracks stood out as clear as daylight. Shutting his eyes, he concentrated, taking out his temper out on them with the help of the dawn wind. They vanished. Something had gone right.

  The only plan he had right then was to lose the flight suit and melt into the scenery.

  Priorities swam. Sam was waiting for Mark’s signal and needed to escape before those wheels engaged the fleet. It looked like Tam was now duty-rescue-driver and he’d have to get Sam and the others back to Imperious while Mark worked. Oh how Mark prayed Krystie was on Carolli’s case and that the Baron, with his key, was not on his way down.

  Because the Dome was Carolli’s target, Mark was pretty certain of that.

  He was going to release the thing in the Dome.

  Mark stomped on, revising his plans. It was always Sam first, then Tam.

  Perhaps he was too used to working alone.

  Even teamed with Jenson, they worked alone, together but separately.

  It never struck him to call Ellis, warn her and see if she could come up with anything.

  It might have been something to do with the self-control he needed to keep going.

  Or it might have been that Ritual bomb-thing Barsnip had been worried about.

  At any rate, by the time Dandy Minon turned up, he was a long, long time gone.

  * * *

  Dandy Minon vanished over the windswept dune.

  Nothing happened. The dunes held their breath and waited. Lying flat on their stomachs, hidden, or so they fondly believed, by sand-drifts, so did Dandy’s lookouts, who’d’ve been far better off using their eyes and ears rather than relying on image trackers.

  Image trackers were easy meat to a Donn, especially one nursing a grievance.

  Everything happened at once. The trackers simultaneously distorted, showing sickening kaleidoscopic blobs, and then blanked out with a serial screech. At the same time the first man got a foot between shoulder blades, and a warning shot zipped past his ear. He froze. The second was less lucky, knees dropped like twin blocks onto either side of his spine, flattening his lungs while the cold nozzle of some kind of gun poked his neck.

  “Did you hear that? He said to shoot me,” a woman’s voice demanded indignantly.

  “I expect it’s your girlish charm,” comforted heavy knees. “They streamered Mark.”

  “What do we do with these?” asked the deep-toned owner of the sharp-shooting foot.

  The woman sighed. “Well, I think they’re about to offer to help us dig her out, then go to sleep for a while. That ok by you, Tam? Why shoot the only hired help that applied?”

  “Conduct the interview, Ellis,” ordered Tam. “Be gentle.” Without much hope.

  Jenson didn’t understand. “Gentle? Why?”

  * * *

  There’d been four more wheel sightings logged, each closer than the last. Every time she looked up Kent saw Krystie and Stanson outlined against the giant View, heads jammed together, discussing strategy with WuVane. Surely he should’ve left hours ago? Half his team were already down, together with most of the on-planet Communications squad. Harth Norn occupied the entire bottom portion of the View and sometimes th
e arc of soaring Glo-whites vanished against the atmospheric dazzle. The planet loomed. It lurked. It was waiting.

  Timmis was starting to sweat over the scrambled Autocracy messages; the content-codes were still intact. Despite the suspicious signal-directions they still had no grounds to arrest a representative of the High Council, because for all they knew Carolli could have been ordering an official take-out. Autocracy enigma codes were called scrambles because of their random nature, and these had been coated with esoteric encryptions, muddies, and some with mumbles too. During the wars vast teams of experts had been gathered to crack scrambles and though he’d worked with those teams for a long while, Timmis was stumped. Kent sensed that every minute counted. She’d shoved her last potential string into the pool some time ago but it wasn’t quite integrating yet. A sideways glance showed her that her mentor was gaunt, probably with worry and frustration, yet the occasional command he gave was cool as ice. If he got any calmer Kent reckoned he was going to have a coronary.

  And nobody could raise Baron Carolli.

  Her control board blared. The wheels were near enough for a distance scan.

  It brought the boss and Commander Boole up behind her in a heartbeat.

  “Where?” asked the Admiral.

  Her stomach started to pinch again as she focused on the location.

  “Send visual and co-ordinates to Ju-juras with relevant alerts.” With a brisk nod to Commander Boole, the Admiral swung to face the Vista-View. “Here we go. Miss Kent, when you’re ready modify the View, let’s see what the fuss is all about.”

  Stanson looked up expectantly, the towering WuVane followed suit.

  “Magnification ten,” murmured Krystie. Numb, Kent complied.