Starpilot's Grave: Book Two of Mageworlds

by Doyle, Debra; Macdonald, James D.

  He listened, curious. In the old days, even friendly contacts this soon would have been reason for serious alarm; nobody back then had good reasons for waiting around so close to a known drop point.

  Plenty of bad ones, though … I remember the points just beyond Ophel, where the big Magebuilt cargo ships used to halt and top off on fuel and stores before the long push home. On a good day you could pick off the escorts one at a time as they came through, and after that it was easy pickings … .

  Bandur shrugged. Times changed; no one knew that better than he did. He turned to his duties, supervising the junior crew members as they secured the hyperspace engines preparatory to opening them for inspection. A few minutes later he was surprised to see the chief engineer walking over to him.

  “Secure, Mister Bandur. Skipper wants to see you in his cabin, instantly.”

  Now, what the hell …? “On my way.”

  Bandur spoke to the leading petty officer in his party—“Carry on smartly”—and left Main Control by the vacuum-tight door leading forward. He strode through the passageways to senior officer country without any hesitations or false turnings, and found his way to the captain’s cabin. Once there he knocked, then palmed the lockplate. As soon as the door slid open, he took a step forward and came to a careful attention, his thumbs aligned with the seams of his uniform trousers.

  “Warrant Officer Bandur, reporting as ordered.”

  “Very well, Bandur,” said the CO—the longest speech that he’d made to the warrant so far. “Stand easy. Captain Tyche here has a couple of things for you.”

  Bandur relaxed and looked around the captain’s cabin for the first time, just as another officer, this one in Infantry uniform, entered the space.

  “Mister Bandur,” the newcomer said, “I have orders that you accompany me.”

  I don’t know what they’ve got waiting back on Galcen, Bandur thought, but if it isn’t something really good I’ll have Perrin Ochemet’s guts for garters.

  “Yes, sir,” he said aloud. “Shall I collect my gear?”

  The Infantry captain shook his head. “That won’t be necessary. Your gear is being collected for you right now.”

  One of the comm links on the desk beeped. The CO picked it up—it was a hush-circuit, mostly earpiece with a small vocal pickup attached—and kept an eye on Tyche and Bandur as he talked: “The devil you say! … Retransmit … . All circuits? … Are you sure? … Well, keep trying.”

  Bandur glanced over at Captain Tyche. “Mind if I ask what’s happening?”

  Something about the Infantry captain, possibly the way his appearance managed to combine wholesome square-jawed blandness with an impression of knife-edged efficiency, suggested to Bandur that there was more to Tyche than met the eye. One of the Intel boys, the warrant officer conjectured. Perrin must be seriously worried. He wasn’t surprised when Tyche said only, “There’s been a modification to your orders. You’re to come with me.”

  The quick pinging of a portable comm link sounded from Tyche’s belt. The Infantry captain pulled the device free and thumbed it on.

  “I have a party from that long-range recon craft we spotted earlier,” a tinny voice said. “They request permission to board and inspect.”

  “Permission denied,” Tyche said into the link. “I say again, denied.” He nodded to the Selsyn’s CO, who was still on the hush-link and all but ignoring the two men. “Sir, I’m taking this man with me in accordance with my orders.”

  The CO waved a hand to signify that he understood. Tyche palmed the lockplate for the outer door and gestured at Bandur to precede him through it.

  Just as the warrant officer stepped forward to cross the threshold into the corridor beyond, a movement in the cabin behind him caught his eye. Two more men in uniform had entered the space through the inner door. They didn’t look like any of the regular crew, though, and they carried sidearms—definitely not standard operating procedure on board the Selsyn.

  This is starting to smell like genuine trouble.

  The years had provided Warrant Officer Bandur with a well-developed set of protective instincts. He kept on moving, with Tyche close on his heels. Behind them, the first of the new arrivals was saying to the CO, “Captain, you’re under arrest.”

  The Selsyn’s captain started to his feet. “The hell—!”

  “By order of Admiral Vallant … .”

  Vallant, thought Bandur with perverse satisfaction as the door closed behind him and Tyche. I thought there was something going on in Infabede!

  Outside, the bulkhead speaker began an announcement. “All officers please assemble in the forward wardroom. All officers please assemble in the forward wardroom. All officers …”

  “If you ask me,” said Bandur, “that sound like a damned unhealthy order to be obeying right now.”

  Tyche just looked at him. “You know your way around the ship a lot better than I do. What’s the quickest route to the docking bays?”

  Bandur consulted his mental map. “This corridor, up a level, then starboard.”

  Tyche nodded. “You lead, I’ll follow.”

  Beka seated herself in the pilot’s chair and belted on the safety webbing. “Places, everyone.”

  “The shuttle’s cast adrift with a beacon on it,” came LeSoit’s voice over the intraship comm link.

  “Good. If the Space Force wants it, they can come get it. Now we find out if our repairs are going to hold.”

  “Let’s not push it,” Jessan said. “There’s no point in blowing ourselves up before we get there.”

  “There’s a time to be cautious,” Beka said without looking at him, “and this isn’t it.” She pushed the realspace engines to full forward. “Navicomp data check, confirm. Near approach Galcen, check, confirm. Stand by, jump.”

  She pushed the throttles forward the last bit needed for jump speed, and flicked on the hyperspace engines. The stars winked out and the substance of space went to opalescent grey. She heard a sigh of relief from Jessan in the copilot’s seat as the music of the hyperdrive hit its proper note and held true.

  “Engines normal,” he said. “Run true, dropout calculated on time, twenty minutes real time running.”

  “Roger. Let’s see how things look when we get to Galcen.”

  “You’re expecting trouble on dropout?”

  She looked at him. “You saw what was going on at the Net. Where the hell else could an armada like that be headed except for Galcen? The Mageworlds can’t have built enough ships to take on the entire Space Force at once—they’ll have to break our fleet up into portions small enough to defeat one by one. And that means hitting Galcen first thing after they bring down the Net, so that even if we get our communications back together there’s no central command.”

  Jessan nodded. “‘Cut off the head first, then deal with the body piece by piece.’ … Have you read Chelysi’s Poetics of Armed Strife?”

  In spite of herself, she smiled. “Sorry. The finishing school I went to left it right out of the Galactic Literature in Translation course.”

  “Well, Chelysi calls that strategy a classic method of dealing with a superior force. But it’s still tricky, especially the first strike against enemy HQ. Any little thing can mess up your timetable and lose you the element of surprise.”

  “Exactly what I want to do,” she said. “As soon as we hit Galcen nearspace.”

  “You don’t trust our friend back there to have alerted everybody?”

  “I don’t trust anyone. Besides, he might have classified the information—especially after all the galactic superspy noises you had to make to get his attention.”

  “And you intend to break security?”

  “That’s right,” she said. “Wide-beam, in the clear. I’m tired of sneaking around.”

  “Coming up on time for dropout,” Beka said a few minutes later. “Dropping out … now.”

  The shifting not-greyness outside the cockpit stretched and darkened and blazed up into a field of stars. A
quick series of beeps told Beka that the ship’s sensors had gone into their automatic data-collection routine for the navicomps, pulling in beacon signals, star patterns, and anything else that might help them identify one point out of a vast galaxy.

  The navicomps went to work digesting and collating the information. Beka turned to Jessan. “Check to see if we’re getting anything on lightspeed comms.”

  “Nothing so far,” he said after a moment. “I think we beat the Mages in.”

  “That was the whole idea … . Do you have any Space Force activity?”

  “Negative. I don’t see any.”

  Beka straightened suddenly in the pilot’s seat.

  “Hit the guns,” she said, as the sensor readouts lit up and alarms began shrieking all over Warhammer’s cockpit. “Assume that anything not squawking Space Force identifiers is hostile. We’ve got company.”

  In the viewscreen ahead, the fabric of reality was rippling and trembling, shaking back and forth between the starfield and the grey pseudosubstance of hyperspace as ship after ship came through. The Mageworlds warfleet had come to Galcen.

  Warrant Officer Bandur found himself lying on the deck against the bulkhead, with the hidden sleeve gun he always carried held unconcealed and ready in his hand. It took him a moment to figure out why he was there.

  Ah, yes—I heard a blaster.

  He looked around and found Tyche also prone on the deck and pressed tight against the opposite bulkhead—and for all that he hadn’t been armed a moment ago, the Infantry captain was holding a blaster as well.

  The two men looked at each other. “Well,” said Bandur. “Now we know who we are. We’re the good guys.”

  Tyche ignored him and switched on his comm link. “Status?”

  “Under attack with small arms,” said the voice on the other end. “Maintaining.”

  “Roger.” Tyche hit a second button on his comm link. “Status on Party Two?”

  Another voice spoke up. “We’re pinned down in compartment two-twelveforty-lima.”

  “Roger,” said Tyche. “Do you have the package?”

  “Affirmative. Instructions?”

  “Stand fast. Wait for relief.” The Infantry captain glanced over at Bandur. “Get us to two-twelveforty-lima please.”

  Perrin’s being damned thorough, thought Bandur. I’m a bit surprised he didn’t just grab me and leave Quetaya in place for later. But if Vallant’s trying something funny in this sector, we’ll both be safer off the ship anyway. Maybe somebody slipped Galcen a warning ahead of time … .

  He stood up and pointed down the corridor. “This way.”

  They headed out at a quick walk. Tyche spoke again into his comm link: “I’m en route to Party Two’s location. Send a relief party as soon as tactically feasible.”

  The bulkhead speaker came to life again. “Security alert, security alert. All hands stand fast.”

  “One of the roving patrols must have failed to return on schedule,” Bandur guessed.

  “That’s what I figure,” agreed Tyche. “It also means that whoever’s attacking doesn’t have the entire ship secured yet.” He nodded at the warrant officer’s miniature hand blaster. “You have a stun setting on that weapon?”

  Bandur shook his head. “Never saw the need.”

  Tyche’s eyebrows went up a fraction of an inch. “I don’t know who you really are, and I’ll probably never know … doesn’t matter. In the meantime, keep in mind that right now we don’t know for certain who the friendlies are.”

  “I’ll try to remember,” said Bandur. He glanced from his blaster over to Captain Tyche. “I suppose you’re a friendly?”

  “Make it your working hypothesis,” Tyche said. “Those sure as hell weren’t my guys back in the CO’s cabin, I can promise you that much.”

  “Right,” Bandur said. “Compartment two-twelveforty-lima is on the far side of this bulkhead. Two entrances: one through the docking bay and another from one level up in Operations berthing.”

  Two nervous-looking crew members with Space Force standard-issue blasters came through the vacuum-tight door at the end of the corridor, blocking the route Bandur had just indicated.

  “Ours or theirs?” muttered Tyche.

  “Ours, I think,” said Bandur. “Security alert team.” He raised his voice enough to carry. “Yo, Raveneau!”

  “Mr. Bandur,” one of the crew members replied. “What in the hell is going on here?”

  “We’ve got hostiles dressed as Space Force on board,” Bandur replied. He kept on walking toward the vacuum-tight door, not looking back to see if Tyche followed. “I’m heading out to relieve some good guys. Either come with me or get out of my way.”

  The crew member Bandur had addressed as Raveneau shifted his weight uncertainly from one foot to the other, his forehead wrinkled in a puzzled frown. “You’re not supposed to do that, sir. During a security alert you’re supposed to stand fast.”

  “Then go ahead and shoot me right now,” Bandur said, “because I’m coming on through.”

  “You know I can’t do that, Mr. Bandur.”

  “I don’t have time to argue.” He’d reached the security alert team by now, and was relieved but not actually surprised when Raveneau and his partner stepped aside to let him pass. “Follow me.”

  On the other side of the vacuum-tight door, a ladder led upward to an overhead hatch—mechanically operated, which meant it opened onto one of the emergency accessways. Bandur climbed the ladder. A quick glance downward before he started working the opening mechanism showed the warrant officer that Tyche had come on after him, along with both members of the security alert team.

  Raveneau still looked worried. “You sure we won’t get into trouble, Mr. Bandur?”

  “No trouble,” Bandur assured him. “You might get killed, maybe, but not into trouble.”

  Raveneau’s brow cleared. “Okay.”

  The hatch clicked open. Bandur pushed the hatch cover up until it locked, then scrambled through with Tyche and the two crewmen close behind him.

  “This particular pair of spacers won’t get into trouble,” he commented under his breath to Tyche as the Infantry captain joined him in the darkened compartment above, “but if the skipper makes it, he’s going to wish he’d trained his troops better.”

  Tyche shook his head. “Unless I miss my guess about what was going on back in his cabin,” he replied, also under his breath, “your CO isn’t wishing anything anymore. Fill me in on what you know.”

  “Normal transit, normal dropout,” said Bandur. “I was at my assigned location when word came to go to the skipper’s quarters. Now you fill me in.”

  By now they were making their way through another vacuum-tight door into what was labeled as COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT ENLISTED BERTHING (FEMALE). Captain Tyche ignored the indignant exclamations and occasional rude comments from the occupants and said to Bandur, “My orders are to make contact with you.”

  Bandur grunted. “Mind telling me who you are?”

  “Natanel Tyche, Captain, SFPI.” The captain’s tone made it clear that Bandur wasn’t going to learn anything else.

  They left the berthing compartment behind them, with the two crew members from the security alert team still following, and continued on forward. From around the corner ahead came the high whining sound of a blaster discharge.

  “All right, people,” Tyche said. “We’re coming in from behind. Don’t fire unless fired upon.”

  They rounded the corner in a rush, weapons at the ready. “All right, you sons of bitches,” said Bandur to the group on the other side. “Freeze.”

  “Hey!” protested Raveneau. “Those are some of our guys!”

  “Another security alert team,” said Bandur. “At least someone aboard this tub is doing their job.”

  “Not that it helps us a lot,” Tyche said. “Mr. Bandur, secure their weapons.”

  A voice called up the ladder from the compartment below. “Captain, is that you?”

 
“Yeah,” Tyche called back. “What’s the status?”

  “No problems.”

  “Good. Hold your fire. We’re all coming down.”

  The six of them—Bandur, Tyche, the two security alert team members whom they’d caught, and the two who had joined them earlier—climbed down the ladder into 2-1240-L. CC1 Ennys Pardu was already inside, in the custody of what looked like one of Tyche’s Infantry troopers, wearing an armored p-suit with the faceplate unsealed. The trooper looked harried; Pardu looked more like somebody who’d managed to tuck the crucial datachips into her regulation undergarments, and who was now content to wait on events.

  “About time you showed up, Captain,” the trooper said to Tyche. “I was beginning to get worried.”

  “No need,” Tyche said. “How are things down here?”

  “Confusing,” said the trooper. “I got to the lower docking bay, and I found that it was occupied by armed personnel who had the bad manners to shoot at us. So we headed back here, where these gentlemen had the bad manners to shoot at us.” He shook his head. “Violence in the holovids causes all this, you know.”

  “Right, then,” Tyche said. “I suspect we’ll have a good deal of sorting-out to do later, but the first order of business is still to make it back to the ship. Is the lower bay on the far side of that door?”

  The trooper nodded. “Yes.”

  “Good.” Tyche punched one of the buttons on his comm link and spoke into it. “As soon as convenient, using the minimum amount of force required, take tactical control of the upper and lower docking bays.”

  “Roger,” said the voice on the other end. “Out.”

  Bandur couldn’t see or hear the rest of Tyche’s troopers, but they worked fast. Within five minutes, he heard a knock at the vacuum-tight door on the docking-bay side. The door opened to show a grinning staff sergeant.

  “Captain, welcome back.”

  “Good to be back,” said Tyche. “I’m going to the ship. In the meantime, at your convenience, there is a second vessel in the upper bay. Capture it.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  The sergeant gave Tyche a flashy salute, then turned and trotted off, making hand signals to the troopers spread out around the bay. Tyche turned to Bandur and Pardu.