Calculated Risk

by K. S. Ferguson

  Roshal panicked and let the cutter go. It tumbled away behind the shipping manager, its bright beam marking its lazy motion. Rafe, seeing the danger, hit his depleted thrusters to no avail. Before it drifted out of range, the cutter sliced a razor thin line up the back of Roshal's suit, his raised arm, and the tip of Rafe's gloved finger. The man convulsed between Rafe's legs. Blood spewed from his mouth and covered the helmet faceplate.

  Rafe released the lifeless miner and grabbed his leaking glove, trying to pinch off the missing tip. The air in the suit thinned, the chill of infinity sliding in to join him. He had no thruster fuel left to return to the tug. In a few minutes, he'd be dead. He wished he'd turned on the suit radio earlier when he'd had an available hand. He wanted to say goodbye to Kama. He'd had so much more he wanted to say to her.

  Chapter 18

  Kama punched buttons to recycle the airlock and open the outer hatch again. She cursed at the bulky space suit as she pulled herself up the tug's companionway to the cockpit, banging damaged air tanks on the ceiling and overhanging cupboards in the weightless environment. She had to shrug out of the suit to fit into the pilot's chair, wasting more precious time. She skipped the safety harness and hooked a foot under the seat to hold her position.

  Somewhere out there, McTavish faced Roshal alone and unarmed. She couldn't see either of them out the tug's front windows. Where the hell were they? She had to help him, but she had no familiarity with the tugs controls.

  Her eyes played over the dash. All she needed were the thrusters. How hard could it be to find thruster controls? None of the switches and buttons were labeled.

  Well, then, trial and error. She flipped a switch and wiggled the joystick in front of her. Nothing happened. She tried another switch and the cabin lights shut down. Moorhk, she cursed herself. Get it right. On her third try, she felt the tug respond with a tiny swing right. Thank Lakshmi.

  As the craft came around, she spotted two suited figures about a hundred meters away. She nudged the tug forward. One of the suits spun spread-eagled. The other drifted, back to her, hands out of sight. She couldn't tell which of them was McTavish. She gave the thrusters another little spurt.

  When she got closer, she could see the rupture up the back of the spread-eagled suit, and her heart seemed to stop beating. The body rotated, and she saw the obscured faceplate, still unable to recognize a face. Then she remembered that McTavish was out of thruster fuel. If the other suit were Roshal, he would have used his thrusters to come to the tug by now, wouldn't he?

  Kama edged the tug sideways toward the second suit. Since McTavish couldn't come to her, she needed to make contact, but if she hit him too hard, she'd just send him spinning farther away. She decided catching him might be the better bet. She maneuvered the tug past him until it was immediately in his path and rushed back the companionway.

  A quiet thump, followed by scrabbling sounds, echoed along the side of the tug. Through the port in the hatch, she saw McTavish pull himself into the airlock, holding both hands together. His motions seemed slow and weak, and when his hands drifted apart, she spotted the hole in his glove. She slapped the controls to start the lock cycling, urging it to hurry. When it finished, she swung open the inner hatch and charged through.

  McTavish looked blue through his faceplate, his eyelids fluttering. She ripped at his helmet seals, her hands shaking, and pulled the helmet loose. He took deep, ragged breaths while she stripped the remainder of the suit off. Their eyes met and his arms wrapped around her, holding her so close she couldn't breathe. She hugged him back, her eyes filling with tears. He was as cold as a snowman. After an eternity, she pushed him to arm's length.

  He beamed at her, and she felt like she stood at the brink of a cliff staring into a bottomless canyon. He was on the verge of saying something, speaking words that could never be taken back, words she wanted to hear with all her heart. She mustn't let him. He was a cop, and she was a thief. Shiva, they'd destroy one another.

  "Okay, McTavish. Why were Goldman's goons after you?" she asked, stopping his next words. The glowing happiness in his expression dimmed, and pain stabbed at her soul.

  "Amaya killed Leon with my dagger. That's why she made up the story about Greg being injured, to lure me back to the ship and pin Leon's murder on me. She intended to kill me and make it look like self-defense, but Gabe intervened. Then she just… fell down and died. I tried to revive her…"

  Kama struggled to take it in, but it all seemed too fantastic. "So she was behind all of this, and when it looked like her plan might fail, she killed Leon instead?"

  "No, that's the crazy part." McTavish shook his head. "She admitted that she lied earlier. She wasn't Leon's blackmailer, didn't know about any of it. I think she hatched the plan to kill Leon while I talked to her. Maybe she was worried that I'd tell him about her takeover plot."

  "But why the pursuit?"

  He avoided her eyes. "I had to get back to help you, and they wouldn't have believed I was innocent, not with my dagger buried in Leon's chest. I left without telling anyone what happened."

  "Leon dead from your weapon, and you fled the scene. They may not listen to Gabe even if he can exonerate you. Let me take you to the Oasis ship until we know how things stand."

  His gaze swung up, fierce. "I won't run away this time. When we get back to the station, I'm turning myself over to Captain Benson."

  She wanted to beat her fists on his chest, tell him what a moorhk he was. Instead she said, "All right, if that's what you want. But first, we search the tug."

  Kama put a hand on a grab bar and pulled herself into the corridor. "You take the back, I'll start up front."

  "Wait a minute," he called, trailing her from the airlock. "What was that business about hydraulic fluid and hydroponic fluid?"

  She anchored a foot on a rail and pointed to the stain on her coveralls. "This is hydraulic fluid. No amount of washing takes it out, believe me. I got this stain the morning after I arrived while working on Todd's prospecting ship. When Roshal came to take me back to the station, I noticed a similar stain on that Aerosaurs shirt of his. He claimed it was a hydraulic fluid stain too, and he'd gotten it the night before while working on his tug."

  McTavish rubbed his temple, frowning. "But there wasn't a stain on his shirt the last time I saw it."

  "Exactly. Miss Patty assures me that hydroponic fluid washes right out."

  "Ah," McTavish said, his expression clearing. "He got hydroponic fluid on his shirt getting Levine into the tank, and then he lied about it."

  She gave him a smug smile. "Elementary."

  McTavish floated down the companionway and disappeared into a compartment at the back of the tug. She heard him opening doors and rifling through things, and went forward to begin her own search, thinking about what might happen to McTavish if she took him back to the station. The man had principles, she'd give him that, but she couldn't turn him over to Benson. His freedom hinged on the testimony of a kid, and who'd listen to a traumatized little boy? She'd alert Samir to expect a passenger.

  Ten minutes later, she'd worked her way back to the airlock again without finding anything. The far end of the tug was suspiciously quiet. She glided along the corridor and found McTavish in a tiny bunk space, his back to the door and a sheaf of filmies in his hands. She floated up behind him undetected and read over his shoulder.

  The top filmie had an Oasis letterhead, the first page of the Oasis contract, all the comments visible in the margins. He flipped through the pages and shook his head in exasperation before moving to the next set of documents in the stack.

  "You found something."

  McTavish jerked and drifted around to face her. He folded the contract in two and held it out.

  "This is yours, I think." He watched her stuff the filmies in her pocket.

  "Thank you," she said in a small voice.

  He grinned and thrust the rest of the bundle at her. "More interesting reading. Bank statements, Levine's, but from a long time ago.
And these look like purchase orders and supply invoices from the same period. Mars Development letterhead, no less. Incriminating evidence that holds Levine partially responsible for the Mars Dev tunnel collapse some years ago, where he also seems to have run an embezzlement racket.

  "But here's the kicker. This" he held up another filmie, "is a confession from Levine stating that he was blackmailed into running the embezzlement here on the station—but not by Roshal. Roshal was just an unknown blackmailer's on-site enforcer. Later Roshal made Levine work the buyout scam, but my guess is his boss didn't know about it. There can't be two blackmailers. Levine and Leon had to be blackmailed by the same person.

  "Then there's this." He hoisted a plastic bag between his thumb and finger, condensation on the sides obscuring the contents.

  Kama took the bag, queasily guessing what it contained.

  "Levine's thumb. Ew," she said after closer examination. She passed it back to him. "That's how he got in to search Levine's quarters. But why try to kill you with a bomb? He could have just waited."

  "As long as we were all chasing a ghost across the galaxy, Roshal didn't have to worry about leaving behind forensic evidence. But when he saw the station schematics on the walls of the infirmary, he must have thought we were at least suspicious that Levine hadn't left the station despite his elaborate false trail. Since he didn't find the cash chip in Levine's quarters, he knew Levine had a storage location that he'd been unable to discover. The last thing he wanted was a search to turn up either the body or the storage cache, which might have contained another copy of Levine's confession." McTavish made for the corridor. "We'd better get back. They'll need the tug for rescue operations."

  Kama led the way to the cockpit. This time she skimmed the operations manual before setting out. When she turned on the radio, it buzzed with rescue chatter.

  McTavish listened, and his face grew grim.

  "I should have thought about how Roshal might respond to a trap."

  "You aren't responsible for the carnage here any more than you're responsible in Leon's and Amaya's deaths."

  She worked out rendezvous coordinates for the Oasis ship. Would he notice they were going the wrong direction to return to the station? Would the cruisers pursue them? McTavish deluded himself if he thought a court would take the word of a child over the evidence of his dagger—undoubtedly with his fingerprints on it—used as the murder weapon. Add his estrangement from his family, and he had no one in his corner. It might be wrong to run, but better that than prison.

  She made a slow turn and started away, moving through darkness, her soul abysmal. He'd be on the run, and she'd never see him again. Or he'd clear his name and return to his company, and she'd still never see him again. So ironic—he didn't even know they both lived in the same city. While they might both call Mumbai home, they would never move in the same circles unless it was him coming to arrest her.

  McTavish, who'd seemed lost in thought, leaned toward the window. "Kama, please don't take this as an insult, but aren't we going the wrong direction? I think the station is over there."

  She stared straight ahead. "I can't take you back there. It's too risky. What if they don't believe Gabe? What if he tells a different story? Leon Goldman's dead. What do you think his father will do, welcome the prime suspect with open arms?"

  McTavish sighed. He took her hand from the controls and held it in his own. His fingers were warm and soft, and he gave her a quiet smile.

  "I appreciate that you're trying to protect me, but unless you intend to keep me prisoner forever, I'm going back. The more you delay my return, the more guilty I look."

  "You did nothing wrong. You shouldn't have to defend yourself," she protested.

  He laughed. "I did plenty wrong; illegal access to bank records, uploading your bot to the EcoMech network, never mind the half-truths and outright lies."

  "So why stop now?" Kama asked, not sure she wanted to hear the answer.

  "I did those things because I couldn't see any other way to save lives, not because I lost faith in the legal system. Running away now doesn't save anyone, not even me. I know; I've been there. You don't believe in the system, but I do. I'm asking you to trust me. It'll be okay."

  Trust him. Not something she would have done three days ago; not a rich corporate playboy from an elite family. But now, those weren't the words that came to mind when she thought of him. She thought of words like self-sacrificing, compassionate, and above all, trustworthy. Sadness swallowed her whole.

  "You'd better be right," she said. She withdrew her hand from his and changed their heading.

  "Call the station. Let them know I'm coming," said McTavish.

  Chapter 19

  Rafe wanted to scream and pound his fists on the control console, frustrated by the pointless and wanton destruction slipping past the window. Undamaged ships crisscrossed the space around the station rescuing survivors. Kama steered clear of the larger debris, but smaller bits pinged off the tug's hull, filling the interior with a sound like temple bells tolling for the dead.

  The EcoMech ship was now docked to the station, along with other smaller ships he guessed were unloading injured. The security cruisers and the EA patrol boat responded to the station's distress calls, reporting they were closing fast.

  As the tug swung around on its own docking approach, he could see broken antennae and hull punctures on the end of the station nearest the blast. Crippled prospecting ships drifted nearby. Even Maltraw's ship, partially shielded from the blast by the bulk of the station, had some of its lights knocked out. It moved steadily away from the station, like a whale leaving a beached mate. He hoped Janice wasn't on it. They'd need her skills.

  Kama opened a transmission and announced their impending arrival. Browning instructed her to dock with the other ships at the far end of the station where the cargo haulers usually arrived.

  Together, they walked to the hatch, and Kama faced him, worry clouding her eyes.

  "It's not too late. I can still get you out of here," she said.

  It occurred to him that if she were right and he ended up in prison or worse, this might be his only chance to kiss her, but that might seem too much like goodbye, and he couldn't face the thought of never seeing her again.

  "I think you still owe me a dinner—a proper dinner, somewhere nice," he said, managing a shy smile and feeling like a fool. To his ears, it sounded like the dumbest pickup line he'd ever heard, and he wondered why he could never say the right thing around her.

  She stared, blinked, and then slapped her forehead. "Moorhk! At a time like this, all you can think of is food?"

  But he thought he saw both amusement and admiration in her face before she turned away to open the hatch. She stepped through and vanished, yanked out of his sight. He heard her string of Hindi invectives and pitied whoever grabbed her.

  He followed, hands in the air. A circle of crewmen ringed the hatch, stunners ready. Men grabbed his arms, wrenched them behind him, and forced him to his knees while they secured his wrists with handcuffs.

  The sights and sounds in the bay pummeled him. Injured men littered the floor. Screams of pain echoed against the crates and boxes pushed aside to make room. Farther down the wall, another ship offloaded more wounded. Janice and the medic moved among them, triaging a holocaust.

  Captain Benson came forward to stand before him. He signaled the guards to get Rafe on his feet. They did it none too gently. He hadn't made any friends by eluding Cookie. He hoped Cookie's assistant had survived.

  "Mr. McTavish, I'm arresting you on suspicion of the murders of Leon Goldman and Amaya Goldman."

  Rafe's eyes swept the room, taking in the suffering. He had to do something. "Captain, the station has no medical supplies. What do you have available?"

  Benson glanced around him and frowned. "These are serious charges. What do you have to say in your defense?"

  "Nothing that can't wait. Maltraw's ship may have additional supplies, but he's pulling away. How qu
ickly can you get a runabout over there? Do you have anyone with medical training on your crew? The station staff are overwhelmed."

  When Benson didn't reply, Rafe continued, "The dead won't get any deader. It's the living who need your help, and they need it now. Throw me in the brig, I don't care, but don't turn your back on these people. They are, after all, EcoMech employees, too."

  The captain surveyed the sea of wounded again. His frown deepened, but he began issuing orders to his crew, sending some of them away to fulfill Rafe's suggestions. Rafe shuffled his feet, trying to suppress the urge to fidget. The guard on his right tightened his grip and gave his arm a jerk that sent a lance of pain through his ribs, making him wince.

  Kama shook off her own guard and leaped forward to stand toe to toe with his keeper.

  "Knock it off," she said. "Or I'll see you're charged with police brutality."

  Her guard grabbed her arm. She whirled on Benson.

  "And I'll have this bozo charged with sexual assault if he doesn't unhand me. Can you afford the lawsuit, Captain? Because Oasis can. They get very unhappy when their employees are mistreated."

  "Kama," Rafe warned. "They're just doing their job. Let it go."

  "Uncle Rafe!" Greg hurried across the bay, Gabe in tow. Both of them threaded their way between the bodies scattered over the area, his nephew's expression displaying shock and dismay at the sight around them. The younger boy seemed oblivious to it all.

  "Mr. Nighthorse, take Gabe away from here immediately. He's not to interact with Mr. McTavish," Benson ordered.

  "Not until you've heard Gabe out," Greg replied.

  "Kama, get them out of here," Rafe said. "Gabe's had enough horror for one day."

  Gabe looked up at him, and he saw a familiar, untouchable calm masking the anguish of pain and loss, the same calm he'd seen in the mirror when he'd first arrived on Earth after Youko's death. Then Gabe approached Captain Benson, head up, but too serene. He's in shock. He ought to be crying his eyes out.