by Chris Reher
She looked around, finding nothing useful in this cabin until a panel beside the door caught her eye. She flipped it open to see if anything interesting might be found in there. Something sharp, perhaps, that she could smuggle back into her prison.
“You Shri-Lan have a firm grip on sheer laziness,” someone said outside in the hall.
Nova picked up one of the bundles, prepared to look busy, and stood by the door. The slightly rasping voice belonged to a Caspian and she was certain it was Sao Lok. He sounded amused.
“I just like watching a bunch of brain surgeons get their delicate hands dirty,” their Centauri guard replied. “Still think we should break some fingers. Teach ‘em a lesson.”
“A lesson in what?” Sao Lok inquired.
Apparently, the Centauri had no answer to that and after a moment’s silence said, “what are you doing down this way, anyway, Arawaj? Your cabin’s by the crew dorm.”
“I’m looking for Rakh. I’m told his room is here somewhere.”
“Yah, that way, go left at the end there. Third door. Probably with his woman, though. You don’t want to be bothering him, believe me.”
Nova ducked aside when Lok’s voice sounded closer. “Let me worry about that,” he said as he passed her.
She peered into the hall once the sound of his talons scraping the floor had faded. It was empty in the direction Lok had gone and to her other side she saw only her fellow captives milling about in disorganized fashion. When a few of them had blocked the sight line between her and where their guard might appear at any moment, she hurried away from the junction and then around the corner.
This area was slightly cleaner and in better repair than what she had seen of the ship so far. She sidled along the wall to the third door and soon made out voices behind it. Male voices, but also a woman who sounded Human. Her voice was strident; clearly she was displeased with something.
Nova noticed a narrow metal door beside this cabin. Something hummed to itself behind there but no sound of movement indicated that someone was breathing on the other side. She touched the key plate and winced when the door moved aside with a tired wheeze. It did not quite open all the way. She peered inside and smiled when she saw a utility room that gave access to some of the ship’s maintenance sub stations.
Just as she slipped into the room, Rakh’s cabin door opened and Nova now heard the woman very clearly. “I must have been crazy to even agree to leave Pelion at all. Just get us the hell home!” She continued to complain to herself as her voice faded away and down the corridor.
Nova moved to the end of the utility room and pressed her ear against the wall, expecting them to be fairly thin between these crew cabins. She was not disappointed.
“I suppose now I’m sleeping alone tonight,” she heard Rakh grumble. His voice was slurred by whatever he had been drinking since the day before. “You better have something interesting for me, Lok.”
“I’ve come to strike a deal with you.”
“What sort of Arawaj deal would interest me? You have nothing to bargain with.”
“I want the girl once we’re back in Trans-Targon.”
“What girl? You mean the officer? The jumper?”
“Yes.”
“Out of the question. We’ve come a long way to get that interface. With or without a Human attached to it.”
“You said yourself that your people were able to grab the other pilot on Dannakor. So you have a copy of the ANI already. Let us have her.”
“I have no intentions of letting the Arawaj have this thing. What good is it to you, anyway? You have no fleet to speak of. I doubt you even have more than a handful of ships capable of spanning without charts.”
“That is true, but we still want the girl. Look, I’m willing to trade you this.”
There was a pause and Nova wished for even a few bits of the surveillance equipment tucked away aboard their Eagle uncounted light years away from here. Cameras disguised as insects, wires of nearly invisible gauge capable of conveying sound, sensors that could penetrate just about any material or distance. And here she was with her ear to the wall!
“Where did you get that?” Rakh said, sounding very alert now.
“From the navigator that got us into this mess to begin with. The one that didn’t make the jump. He didn’t object to giving it up.”
“Is it broken?”
“No, just missing the taps. I am very familiar with this unit, don’t forget. It is intact. You only need to scan the other pilot already in your possession to duplicate the implant.”
“Why do you want the girl so badly, anyway?” Rakh said after another pause. He seemed to be considering the prospect.
“She and her people killed one of our own. Revenge. Nothing more.”
Nova frowned. Was this still about Pe Khoja? Or was this Lok’s way of ensuring that she would not be harmed by the Shri-Lan once her purpose had been fulfilled? Was he really so naive as to trust Rakh?
She ducked down beside the door when she heard heavy footsteps in the hall. Someone cursed at full volume as he stomped past her hiding place. Perhaps it was high time to return to her chain gang. She waited a few moments before she hurried back to where her fellow hostages were still at their slave labor. There was not much time to spare before the rebel assigned to her burst into the room.
“What are you doing down here!” he thundered.
She put her heavy package down and pushed back a few wayward strands of hair with the back of her hand. “Being a good prisoner,” she said.
He grabbed her arm and yanked her into the hall. “You were to get some food, not go for a walk,” he growled.
Nova had to practically jog to keep up with his long strides as he dragged her along. “I just do what I’m told. It says so in the hostage survival manual.”
He stopped in front of her cabin. “That would have been my head rolling if Rakh had found out you were out of your room, you stupid bitch.” Nova cried out when he punched her arm hard enough to numb it. “Get your Delphian and then go to the bridge. Now!”
* * *
Sao Lok had barely looked up when the rebel in the corridor interrupted them with his crude expletives. Things had settled down out there and no immediate emergency seemed to be brewing. He held the small interface module between his thumbs. “What do you say, Rakh?”
“I say you have something else going on in that pointy skull of yours,” Rakh said but his eyes remained on the ANI even as he reclined in his chair and propped his feet onto the edge of the cabin’s unmade bed. “If revenge was all you wanted you’d have had your chance on Dannakor days ago.”
The Caspian sighed, tired of this game. “You’re right. Let’s get on with this.” He flipped the unit into the air and at the surprised Shri-Lan who barely managed to catch it in time. “You’re planning an attack on Union domain, correct?”
Rakh looked up from the interface in his hand, clearly amazed that it had come to him so easily. “What of it?”
“I’m going to guess that you Shri-Lan planned to grab an ANI for the single purpose of jumping to Sidara Ber for a little surprise visit to four of our esteemed Factors currently meeting there.”
Rakh’s eyes narrowed. “How’d you know that? Took hours to beat that location out of the envoy on Delphi.”
“Our methods might be a little more subtle than yours, but no less effective. Of course you must realize that by now the meeting will have been called off, considering that three of the ANI test subjects and their valuable little plugs are missing. Losing four of the top Commonwealth governors isn’t a risk they’d take.”
The Centauri shrugged. “Not if our people moved fast enough. For all we know, Sidara is a pile of dust by now.”
Lok perched on the edge of a garishly-colored storage unit, wanting to sit down. Like those of many Caspians of his age, his callused feet ached by the end of the day. But he realized the value of having the rebel continue to look up at him. “I don’t believe that. And I’m go
ing to propose something far more devastating to our Union. You can launch an attack the entire sector has never seen before.”
“Is that so? Air Command outnumbers us twenty to one.”
“And I say that we can wipe out most of their fleet with one single stroke.”
Rakh’s broad lips twitched in a derisive smile. “How will you manage a feat like that, Arawaj?”
“The girl is the key. Her interface is able to communicate with anyone that is currently listening. Meaning anyone whose interface is also linked to a transmitter, be that on a ship or a station.”
“Yes, that is the point of the ANI,” Rakh said. “So far I’m not excited by your news.”
“Captain Whiteside is a Vanguard officer. Her ANI will have clearance to open a link to anyone operating a Union ship. It’s hard-coded into her neural appliance so all she needs is a processor that can relay her signal.”
“And...?”
“We have developed a new program. The moment Whiteside links her ANI to our processor, a fatal signal is transmitted from there, using her access code, to anyone receptive to that code. Meaning any Union pilot or operator of any interface model.”
Rakh was momentarily speechless. “Any model,” he said finally. “That also means anyone operating a Union relay, communication array, scope or any other equipment with a neural interface.”
“Correct,” Sao Lok said, beaming. “Anyone that would give clearance to a Vanguard officer. This is why she was chosen for the project. Or, rather, that is why we made sure that she was chosen.”
“And your program works only with this thing?” Rakh gestured with the module in his hand.
“Indeed. There is a reason why these things aren’t wireless. They’re designed precisely to prevent outside tampering. That works fine if you’re using it to point a plane or a gun at something. It’s a whole other matter if you’re leaving a closed system. The ANI just forwards information to a transmitter. You can do that much with the data array on your arm. So that is the point where my new code enters the loop. She sends a signal, our program takes over and multiplies the new signal to all receivers it can reach, cranks the amplitude to the point where it’ll blow out the receiver’s brains much in the way that other test subject experienced. To his detriment.”
The Centauri rebel frowned. “That is a beautiful plan, Lok, but you forget that she’s going to have to get us home, first. The odds are good that she’s not going to live through that. None of us might.”
Sao Lok waved that aside. “That was an accident. She’s got more ability than that pilot had. And she has the Delphian. She’ll hold it together. And, frankly, if she doesn’t, none of this will matter to any of us.”
Rakh thought about this for a while. “So how do you plan to use her, should we get back to Trans-Targon?”
Lok strolled to a small window set deep into the ship’s exterior wall. He looked out into nothing but the pinpricks of distant stars. “I went to Dannakor to steal one of the units for ourselves. But then it was decided to remove her from Dannakor and take her to Gramor on an ore transport. All she has to do there is initiate a contact with Air Command using our processor and transmitter and her job is done.” He waved a hand in the air, indicating this ship. “Your unexpected visit changed some of my plans, but perhaps for the better.”
“How so?”
Lok turned his back to the window. “Once Air Command realizes what we have they will simply change Whiteside’s access codes. So this was never meant to be more than a single strike, perhaps two, where we’d cause as much damage as possible. Eventually, they’ll install more fail safes and that’ll be the end of this.”
Rakh nodded. “Still, a good way to take out a number of pilots, perhaps capture their ships. A very expensive strike.”
“Yes, but if we do this together we can do much, much more.”
“I’m listening.”
“Shri-Lan is already planning an attack. Air Command will be on alert. If your people do, indeed, have the other test subject, no one will know where that’s coming from or where you’re going to hit. They’ll be spread thin and they’ll be out in force.”
Rakh grinned. “Damn right. They’ll have every pilot in the air. And plugged into their machines!”
“Exactly. And that’s when we’ll make sure that Captain Whiteside finds herself unguarded and within reach of a transmitter. Her first thought will be to alert Air Command. If we make sure that no relays are available to send a message packet, she’ll have no option but to use the ANI. She won’t even think twice about that.”
Rakh threw his head back and laughed. “And that’ll launch your clever little program and she’ll end up killing every Union pilot and operator that’s also linked to their processors.”
“That’s the plan. So the more hysterical you Shri-Lan can get Air Command, the more planes will be in the air. Appear to send ships to every keyhole reaching to likely targets and make sure they know it. They’ll expect strikes on Feyd, Bellac Tau, Magra Alaric, Zera, Delphi, Aram and maybe Mrak Four, with no idea of where you’ll be coming from. We could wipe out most of the fleet with one single transmission.”
“Oh, you can be sure that we’ll add more noise to the intel the minute we get back.” The Centauri’s eyes returned to the interface module in his hand. He played with it for a moment. “So what’s in this for you? She kills the pilots, Shri-Lan can move in and capture the planes without a single shot being fired to damage them. Even if your plan doesn’t work we stand to bag at least one valuable target. What do the Arawaj want?”
Lok shrugged. “We want the Commonwealth out of this sector. That has always been our goal. We’re not fighting their tyranny out of greed like… like some of the other factions.”
“Like the Shri-Lan, you meant to say?”
“Take it to mean what you wish. Do we have a deal? You have the girl jump us to Gramor Bejo, leave her with me and start rattling sabers.”
Sao Lok watched Rakh’s expression, knowing that he had convinced the Shri-Lan rebel to hand the woman over to the Arawaj. The captain’s face, for the first time since they had been dumped into this situation, had lost its constant scowl and exhibited something akin to hope. And greed, of course. The idea of capturing so much of their enemy’s fleet at no cost to their own lives and equipment was almost too phenomenal to imagine. No doubt he would be handsomely rewarded for this coup as well as for the additional ANI unit held tightly in his fist.
How easy it was to move people, Lok thought. One only needed a key, some sort of inkling of an opponent’s desires to set things in motion. Challenges may appear, conditions may change, events can turn. But, ultimately, things moved in one direction and a few nudges often pushed pieces into place.
He’d have the girl, the girl would help him pull the teeth out of Air Command’s bite and then soon the Union would crumble, much weakened and even defenseless in some sub-sectors.
What Rakh didn’t know was that most of what Lok had told him about Nova’s communications access was nonsense. The truth was that Nova, as a Hunter Class pilot and Vanguard officer, was cleared to operate just about any ship ever built by the Union, including every last fighter plane and every last immigrant tub plying the gates between Centauri and Trans-Targon. Few ships were off limits to her and she had navigational access to some of the mighty battle ships, even if she could not pilot them by herself.
He gave Rakh a friendly smile when the rebel offered him a bottle of something sweet and fermented and not at all objectionable. It was not some exclusive Air Command access code that would allow Captain Whiteside to reach other operators. It was the simple fact that she had the necessary security clearance to access their planes’ processors. And now also, through the new ANI, anyone currently linked to them.
Rakh seemed to have forgotten that nearly every piece of hardware owned by the Shri-Lan had been built through Union contracts. Nova’s signal would not only destroy the Union pilots, but the rebel fleet as well.
And then, Lok thought to himself, the balance would be restored. The three-hundred year old Union fragmented, the Shri-Lan reduced to nothing, other minor rebel groups made powerless, and then the Arawaj would take their rightful place as the rightful rulers of this sector, the way Pe Khoja had intended.
He had been so close! Not so very long ago, Tharron, once a powerful rebel leader, had relied on Pe Khoja’s abilities to consolidate the rebel factions, turn their operations profitable, and present a united and very powerful opposition to the Union’s rule of Trans-Targon. Pe Khoja had been Tharron’s most highly-placed adjutant and only a single assassination away from taking the leader’s place. Until, that is, Tharron’s single-minded obsessions had destroyed it all. His inept sons had taken over and shunted the Caspian Arawaj faction aside with sheer fire power. The fragile alliance of rebel blocs had splintered.
But now this woman, Whiteside, the one who had played a part in Pe Khoja’s end, would be the key to finishing the work. Sao Lok felt a peculiar, nearly spiritual sense of rightness, of pre-destination when he thought about her role in his plans. In time she would come around. He had seen it in her eyes when he proposed to her the possibilities he envisioned. She heard him. She wanted to understand him despite the relentless brainwashing she had endured from an early age. It would take time to undo all that, but after the destruction of the Union fleet and of the Shri-Lan there would be plenty of time. Once she truly understood the wisdom of putting an end to the Commonwealth oppression, she would use her knowledge of what remained of the Union to make the victory complete.
Sao Lok was unaware of the distant smile that played over his narrow face when he thought about the power he would wield with her at his side. Was it possible, he pondered, that she might even join his clan? Not as a breeder, of course, but nevertheless tied to him in ways that would ensure his position as the head of the Arawaj. She was as strong and fearless as any Caspian female and would be a powerful force within the new leadership of Trans-Targon.
Of course, he thought, she was only Human and like all of them guided by irrational motivations and emotions that had long puzzled Caspians. She could well continue to cling to her stubborn loyalties to her Union, her Delphian mate and the half-breed they had made. Unfortunate and disappointing, he thought with a mental shrug, but not all would be lost. If she failed to appreciate the magnificence of his plans for her, she would still annihilate the fleet and he would then hand her over to Pe Khoja’s clan as agreed. It would earn him the gratitude of that group, if nothing else.