by Bill Baldwin
Things had become terribly foggy. He traced a thick wave guide from the oblong device through … Yes. That was the modulator, and beside it the phase latch he was looking for. He could tell by the big rectifier mounted on its side. All so easy once he knew where to look!
He sniffed the air anxiously, looked up. The hatch was glowing cherry red. Bastards were burning through. Desperately, he raised his pike toward the generator — Universe, how he was shaking. The hammering commenced again. He blurred, squeezed his eyes clear. The latch was in his sights. He fired .. and missed.
With a sharp ripping noise, a bolt of energy cut through the hatch and sent sparks all over a nearby bulkhead. Gritting his teeth, Brim wrestled the weapon to his shoulder again, aimed. This was his last chance. If he missed, he'd go for the regulator and a quick, painless death. He willed himself to steady the sights, counted backward. Three... two … one. Then he fired. This time, he was rewarded with a satisfying flash of light as the phase latch shattered in a wobbling ball of violet radiance. Immediately, the noise of the generator began to fade with a great, almost-human sigh.
Presently, his eyes began to fog over again. By now, Brim had no strength to counter it. He felt himself falling. The last thing he heard was the hatch grating open on its ruined hinges … Guttural shouts he no longer understood. Then he heard nothing.
* * * *
He noticed the glare forcing itself through his closed eyelids at about the same time his cheek told him he was lying face-down on something cold and very hard. Groggily, he caught himself before he opened his eyes, voices on every side, all speaking Vertrucht. Where was he? So hard to remember.... But with all the Vertrucht being spoken, it couldn't be very healthy for him, wherever it was.
“Try it again,” a gruff voice commanded, clearly under some sort of strain.
“I already did,” a nasal voice answered. “And I'm telling you, the whole damned thing's dead. What's the big rush anyway? They've already sent a ship out to help.”
“You know the Prefect as well as I do,” the gruff voice said. “And he's not going to be happy taking anybody's help. So try it.”
“Yes, sir. Shunt's in place. Inverters on. Grav housing closed.”
Other voices stopped, listening.
“Hit it!” the gruff voice commanded. “Now.”
Silence. Brim's shoulder throbbed painfully. He was cold, shivered in spite of himself.
“That's all?”
“That's all,” the nasal voice confirmed. “Bastard really cocked up the phase latch, didn't he?”
The gruff voice swore an unintelligible oath. “Whole damned generator's dead as an xchort, then,” it said.
The generator! It all came back to Brim in a rush. But where had they taken him? Was he still in the chamber? Somehow he didn't think so. This sounded more like the bridge.
“How long before you can get us going again?” a new, deeper voice demanded.
“None will say as yet, Placeman,” the gruff voice answered. “When that one on the deck over there murdered Overmann Zotreb, he did more damage then he knew.”
“Well?”
“Zotreb's assistants are a good deal slower, it seems.”
“Curse all of them — especially him,” the deep voice growled. Brim's side exploded with a blow that knocked the wind from his lungs and opened both eyes wide with pain. It took only a moment to determine he was indeed on the corvette's bridge.
“Look out! He's awake,” someone yelled. This was followed by a second vicious kick. Brim shut his eyes and clenched his teeth, waiting for the next one.
“Placeman Zimmermann!” another voice squealed. “Would you kill him before we search his mind?”
“Putrid spawn of Greyffin's scum!” the deep voice growled. “You can be sure I shall kill him — but not before we extract certain information, fool.
“Oh, ah … no, sir, Placeman Zimmermann!” another voice stumbled. “Certainly not before.”
“One must be subtle,” Zimmermann’s gruff voice interrupted, as though the other had never spoken. “Like this...”
Brim opened his eyes wide in renewed agony as a scuffed jackboot ground the fingers of his left hand into the metal decking. He gasped in pain, trying to pull his hand away, but the arm didn't seem to work anymore. Blinking angry tears from his eyes, he looked up into the flushed, angry face of another Controller. Greasy haired, stubble-jawed, and hard-featured, the man was outfitted in wrinkled black breeches, an open tunic with yellow Placeman’s patches on its collars, a dirty-gray sweater, and a shapeless peaked hat with the tarnished decoration of a Controller.
“Keep your eyes open and attend my questions, slime of slime,” Zimmermann commanded in broken Avalonian. He sneered as he removed his heel from Brim's bleeding fingers. “You clearly understand you will die soon,” he said matter-of-factly, “therefore it should be of little concern to you what we do with your body.” His face wrinkled in cruel laughter. “How quickly and painlessly you die depends upon your answers. I reward truthfulness even for your kind.”
“Hab'thall,” Brim spat defiantly, picking the most insulting malediction he could dredge from his store of gutter Vertrucht, then grunted in pain as the jackboot smashed into his mouth, snapping teeth and throwing his head back against his shoulder.
“That should teach you better use of Vertrucht.”
Brim willed the pain away and glared up in silence.
“Good,” Zimmermann said at length, studying his fingernails. “Now, what is your ship? Name and home port, if you please.”
Brim continued his silence as blood seeped from the corner of his ruined lips and ran warm along his lower cheek to puddle silently along the deck.
“My, my,” the officer said with an innocent mien, “others in your crew have shared that secret with me. And much more, too. Now...” He stepped on Brim's helpless fingers again. “Won't you?”
Brim threw up on Zimmermann’s boot.
The Controller roared in anger, jumped back, and kicked Brim full in the stomach.
By this time, Brim hardly noticed.
“I'll show you, cretin son of a capcloth,” the enraged Controller shouted, pulling a blaster from a black, shiny holster on his hip. He pointed it in the direction of Brim's stomach. “You will die slowly, Avalonian scum. As I promised.”
Morbidly fascinated, Brim watched Zimmermann’s finger curl over the trigger. Then, suddenly, the man lowered his blaster as an angry voice shouted, “Idiot, what in the name of korzol do you think you are doing?”
Glancing to the left, Brim saw for the first time what could only be the calm face of the corvette's commanding officer. Blond, square-jawed, young, and strikingly handsome, even from a deck-level view, the man called Valentin was the very opposite of his underling. Outfitted in immaculate black breeches, a tight, form-fitting tunic with crimson Prefect's patches on his collars, and a peaked hat with a highly-polished Controller’s insignia, he was the perfect embodiment of Triannic's officer corps — clearly a man on his way up someone's ladder of success. The look of anger on his reddened face gave clear signal he was also a man who brooked no mistakes from his subordinates.
“A, n-nothing, Praefect Valentin, Zimmermann stumbled, “…ah, I w-was merely questioning the…”
“And pray how do you plan to question the prisoner after he is dead, Placeman?” Valentin interrupted, his teeth drawn back in a snarl.
Th-the prisoner is n-not dead, Praefect. He is... “
“Go to your cabin, Zimmermann,” Valentin ordered. “I will deal with you later — painfully, you may be certain. Now go!
As Zimmermann slunk from the bridge, a rating suddenly shouted in panic. “Prefect Valentin, sir!”
Valentin growled and turned. “Well?” he demanded furiously. What now?”
“Another sh-ship, Prefect,” the voice stammered.
“Drat!” Valentin swore. “They got here much sooner than I expected.” He glared at the generator console. “Now I suppose I shall ha
ve to accept their help.”
“It … it's the w-wrong kind of ship, Prefect Valentin,” the rating declared.
“Well, what kind of ship, fool? How does it answer the challenge?”
“It does not answer, Prefect.”
“What?”
“See for yourself, Prefect.”
“Silence, fool! Where is it coming from?”
Brim couldn't see where the man pointed, but watched Valentin's boots spin round.
“Train the guns,” the officer bellowed. “And …” He stopped in mid-sentence. “Sweet hok'kling Pokknor,” he swore through his teeth. “Belay that last order. It's one of their T-class destroyers. Our 99s don't stand a chance.”
Brim laughed through his cut and bleeding lips, though it came out as more of a bubbling noise. He mouthed the next words slowly and carefully. “What number, hab'thall?” This time, he spoke entirely in Vertrucht, then waited for the foot. It didn't come.
“You sneaking slime,” Valentin snarled. “Vertrucht, eh?”
“What number hab’thall?” Brim bubbled, this time with a smile worth twice the pain it caused his lips.
Valentin narrowed his eyes, peered through the Hyperscreens. “T.83,” he snapped furiously, then biting his lip in concentration, he stepped to one of the empty Helmsman’s consoles. “Get this ordure into the seat here. Perhaps he can be of further value after all.”
Rough hands hauled Brim from the deck into the recliner. He almost passed out from the pain; new blood was trickling along his chest again. His eyes fogged over and he felt himself slump toward the console. “I think you're too late, Prefect, old cock,” he mumbled as a tiny popping noise exploded on his right arm.
“There, that'll bring him around for a while,” another voice said.
Warmth spread rapidly from Brim’s right arm, and his eyes abruptly cleared. A rope under his arms secured him to the back of the recliner; he could see the Hyperscreens now. He focused his eyes, grinned as well as he could. I.F.S. Truculent, all right. Never had a “pick and shovel” starship looked so beautiful. Bow on, she was standing about a thousand irals off the corvette's port quarter, all seven of her powerful 144—mmi disruptors pointed, it seemed, directly at his head. Even while he watched, they flashed in unison, accompanied by great coruscating eruptions of flame and glittering clouds of radiation. Outside, the Universe went mad in a paroxysm of erupting, runaway energy. The corvette bucketed violently, seams creaking and groaning as her spaceframe twisted in the backwash of space falling back in on itself. Screams of terror filled the bridge. The lights flickered out, then re-lighted, much dimmer this time.
Too near the onset of death to care, Brim turned to the young Prefect. The hypodermic that cleared his eyes also seemed to have stemmed the pain — at least most of it. He smiled crookedly. “She's about to blow all of us to subatomics, Valentin,” he bubbled happily. “I'm sure the others won't mind.”
“She?”
“Captain Collingswood,” Brim said, reverting to Avalonian.
“By Pokknor's beard,” Valentin whispered. “Perhaps there's a chance yet,” he whispered to himself. “Universe …”
“Not 'Universe,' 'Collingswood,'“ Brim corrected gleefully.
“Silence, fool!”
“As you wish, Prefect.”
Valentin shivered, peered through the Hyperscreens at Truculent's seven 144—mmi's. “I shall talk to her,” he said almost to himself, then turned to a rating at a nearby console. “Make me a connection to that ship,” he ordered, smoothing his wavy blond hair. “Immediately!”
“Aye, Prefect,” a rating with a bald head and large ears answered, bending over his console. Within scant clicks, a blank globe appeared on the console nearest the black-suited officer. “Not yet to me!” he bellowed. “Him!” He pointed to Brim. “Quickly. “
A second blast from Truculent, this time much closer, sent every loose article on the bridge crashing wildly to the deck. The ship's gravity pulsed and the Hyperscreens flashed wildly.
“Hurry, fool!” Valentin wailed, nervously shooting his cuffs “Hurry!”
“Aye, Prefect,” the rating answered. 'They're listening now, I think.” A new globe appeared on Brim's console, flashing once … twice. Then it filled with a Blue Cape rating, bald with fat cheeks. It was Applewood.
“Connection's made, Prefect,” the League rating reported. Applewood's image peered out from the globe, talking with someone off the display. “We've got a connection to them, Captain,” he said hesitantly. “I seem to be looking into the bridge.” His eyes came to rest on Brim's ruined face. He stopped, a look of horror on his face. “Oh, sweet thraggling Universe,” he groaned. “It looks like Lieutenant Brim.”
Brim nodded, raised his good hand. He felt hot and weak. The hypodermic was rapidly wearing off and his vision was starting to fog again. Blood still trickled onto his chest.
“There's blood all over him,” Applewood exclaimed. He was suddenly thrust aside, replaced by Collingswood in the globe.
“Lieutenant Brim,” she said, clearly struggling to keep herself under control. “What has happened to … ?” She paused. She seemed to know the answer to that. “To the rest of the crew?” she asked.
Smiling toothsomely and fairly dripping masculinity, Valentin moved beside Brim and spoke into the globe. “They are safe, Captain Collingswood,” he said with the earnest look of a schoolboy. “I am Praefect Kirsh Valentin, Captain of this ship, and you have my word as an officer of the League.”
“Oh?” Collingswood answered. “Lieutenant Brim certainly doesn't look particularly safe to me.”
“As you can see from his dress, Captain,” Valentin said smoothly, “Lieutenant Brim is a special case. Disguised, mind you, in the uniform of my beloved homeland — against all established conventions. Further, he ruthlessly murdered two of my officers in cold blood.” He shrugged. “We were forced to question him.”
“I see,” Collingswood said slowly, a look of disgust in her eyes. “And you have, ah, 'questioned' my other crewmen in the same manner?”
“You can believe me when I say the remainder of your crewmen are, shall we say, safe for the moment.” Valentin's eyes hardened theatrically the length of a well-measured instant, then the boyish smile returned.
“'For the moment,'“ Collingswood repeated evenly. “Perhaps you had better tell me what that means.” The corvette's bridge was deathly still by now, every officer and rating watching breathlessly as if life itself depended on the next few words.
“Simply this, Captain Collingswood,” Valentin said, his voice growing oilier by the moment. “Should something untoward happen to my ship, your men would surely be affected also. And I am sure a lovely woman of your stature would never want something like that.”
“Silence!” Collingswood snapped, her eyes blazing with anger. “I have no more patience with your game — and it is now clear to me you cannot move under your own power. Therefore, listen to me well,” she continued, “for I am about to destroy your ship.”
Valentin's eyes opened wide in surprise. “With eleven — twelve of your men aboard?” he demanded. “Would you kill them, too?”
“Absolutely,” Collingswood assured him.
“She means it, Valentin,” Brim laughed weakly. “I'm ready; look at me. And I imagine the others are, too.” Blackness was sweeping over him and he had no strength left to fight. He closed his eyes, felt his head lolling as he collapsed against the rope that held him in place. He heard Collingswood gasp, then abruptly her voice hardened.
“Despite my own wishes to the contrary, Prefect,” she said through clenched teeth, “it is not necessary that anyone die with your ship — if my orders are followed accurately. Do you understand? No deviations. Your fate is entirely up to you.”
“Wh-What can I do?” Valentin asked in a shaky voice. His part in the game was clearly over before it began.
“You have only ten cycles to carry out my orders,” Collingswood said, the sound of her voice fa
st fading in Brim's ears. He strained to hear the next words, too, but they were drowned by a sudden thundering roar having nothing to do with starships or disruptors either: he was dying and he knew it. Strange it didn't matter now the time had come. He even managed to relax as the last light faded from his eyes and the Universe ceased to exist. He'd done the best he could…
* * * *
This time, light filtering through his closed eyes was gentle — and wherever he was now come to, things were blessedly quiet, even warm. Comfortable. A definite improvement, he thought. Even the pain was gone, replaced by a wild tingling in his shoulder.