Nearspace Trilogy

by Sherry D. Ramsey

  I hobbled over to him, wincing at the pain in my knee. I put my face close to his ear, speaking barely above a breath. “Maybe a way out. Jury-rig the datapads to short out the force field controllers.”

  He quirked a half-grin. “Good one. Seems like it would depend a lot on things we don’t control, but I guess it’s worth a try.”

  “At this point, anything’s worth a try.”

  “What’s with the limp?” he asked in a normal voice. “They hurt you?”

  “Naw. Went a round with the wall when they first woke me up. The wall won.”

  He nodded, then lowered his voice again. “You saw them try to wake the captain?”

  “They used the same device on her. It just didn’t take.”

  The engineer’s lips pressed down into a tight, thin line. “First priority if we get out of here has to be finding her.”

  “I agree.”

  He looked surprised at that, so I added with a grin, “She’s got my datapad.”

  “Pfft.” He blew out an inarticulate noise of disgust and turned away from me, crossing the cell to talk to Rei, on the other side.

  I didn’t mind. I let my thoughts shift to the datapads. I had work to do.

  Chapter 31 – Jahelia

  Out of the Proverbial Frying Pan

  THEY LEFT US to sleep, not returning to pick up the dirty dishes. I don’t think anyone actually slept very much. Everyone was too keyed up to rest, pacing their cells, holding low-voiced conversations with their neighbours, or openly worrying about Paixon and the Lobor. Baden and I held quiet discussions, filtered slowly and painstakingly—sometimes almost painfully, since my academy cant vocabulary was limited—through Yuskeya, on how to cannibalize the datapads for parts and repurpose them.

  After a lot of mental arguing with myself, I’d passed my multi-tool to Viss, who’d sent it on down the line to cells to Baden, to help with the job. I hated like hell to give it up, but if it would help—I sighed. If I was in with these people, I might as well be all in. We needed all the help we could get.

  It wouldn’t be easy to make an interruptor work—someone would have to get close enough to a Chron to actually touch the controller with it, since we didn’t know what kind of tech it involved. We could only take our best guess, and hope that the two power sources from the datapads would have enough juice to power the interrupt. I thought, having been close enough to see it in action, that the controller itself wasn’t inside the field—the field radiated out from it, all around the edges. So that meant there was an area about an inch in diameter that we’d have to get inside. And would it even work?

  But we couldn’t simply sit around and wait.

  Finally Baden declared it finished. What he’d taken out of the two datapads and rigged together was small enough to fit in the palm of a hand.

  “Pass it up to me, I’ll do it,” I offered, but Yuskeya disagreed.

  “They’re going to be more cautious around you now, since you pulled that last stunt,” she said to me in academy cant. Or something to that effect. My translation was still rusty.

  “Yeah, you’re probably right,” I said. The crew wouldn’t trust me to be the one to actually get free first, anyway. Not that I’d leave the rest of them here. Unless there was no choice. “In that case, I think it should be Maja.”

  She glanced up, frowning, at the sound of her name.

  “Why Maja?”

  “They won’t be as suspicious of her. Especially if she makes out that she’s really broken up about the captain, like, sick with worry.”

  “She is sick with worry,” Yuskeya said. It sounded like she was talking through clenched teeth.

  “So she’ll be all the more convincing. And I hear she’s trained in warrior chi. Not so helpless as she might appear.”

  The Protectorate officer was quiet for a minute, then said grudgingly, “You do have a point. Not that I’d say she looks helpless. One problem, though. The interruptor is on this side of the corridor.”

  “The hallway’s not that wide. We could get it across to her.”

  “Pfft. Or get it stuck in the middle. Wouldn’t that be not suspicious at all the next time the aliens come in here.”

  “Kristos, this whole thing’s a gamble, Protectorate,” I told her. “If you’re in, you might as well be all in. If you think Maja’s got the best chance to use it, then figure out a way to get it to her.”

  Maja came to the door of her cell. “What are you saying? I keep hearing my name.”

  “Explain it to her, Gerazan,” Yuskeya told the Protectorate Lieutenant. He and Maja met at the bars that joined their cells, and he whispered quickly in her ear.

  Her face hardened, and then she smiled. It wasn’t the kind of smile I’d associated with her before. “I can do that,” was all she said.

  “Get the interruptor to Viss,” I told Yuskeya. “He’s directly across the hall from Maja. It’s not that wide—they might even be able to pass it across.”

  “What if there are cameras in here?” Gerazan Soto asked. “Maybe they’re watching us, as well as listening.”

  “Well, if they’re watching us, they saw Baden build the damn thing,” I said. My cant grew more fluent the more I used it, I thought with a grim smile. “I don’t think passing it across the corridor is going to give anything away if they already know about it.”

  Gerazan told Maja the plan, and I told Viss. They each moved to the door of their cells, directly across from one another, and stretched an arm out through the bars as far as they could. Perhaps three inches still separated their straining fingertips. Too far. The interruptor was too small to bridge the gap.

  “I could slide it across the floor,” Viss muttered to me. I relayed the suggestion to Baden via Yuskeya.

  “I don’t know, it’s pretty delicate,” he said. “If it hit the bars it might knock something loose. I figure it’s good for one impact, so that should be against the force field controller.”

  “Okay,” Viss said when Yuskeya had translated that to me and I’d whispered it through the bars to him.

  He reached up and ripped away the sleeve of his blue shipsuit, pulling the stitches free of the body. It came away trailing broken threads. He laid the piece of fabric on his cot. “I’ll wrap it up in this and slide it across,” he whispered.

  “Yeah, no-one’s going to notice that you’ve suddenly got only one sleeve now,” I told him. “That’s not suspicious at all.”

  Without a word he tore off the other sleeve and pushed it under the mattress on his cot. “Happy now?”

  “Much better.” I switched to cant and said to Yuskeya, “Okej, send it on up. Viss will protect it and get it across the hallway.” Gerazan translated for Maja.

  “Hurry up,” Maja hissed. “Now that we’re doing this, I feel like they’re going to show up any minute.”

  The interruptor passed from hand to hand up the line of cells, from Baden to Yuskeya to Rei and finally to Viss. He placed the delicate bundle of electronics on the detached sleeve of his shipsuit and wrapped it carefully. Then he pushed it through the bars of the cell, set it on the floor, and shoved it toward Maja’s cell. It slid unerringly across the smooth floor.

  I blew my breath out slowly as the bundle fetched up against the bars. Maja pulled it through quickly and crossed to the cot in her own cell, unwrapping it and shoving the sleeve under her mattress as Viss had done with the other one. She set the interruptor on the cot and sat beside it, covering the makeshift gadget with her hand.

  “And now we wait,” Yuskeya said.

  The words were barely out of her mouth when the door at the end of the hallway clicked open.

  AGAIN, TWO CHRON had come with a cart. They wore the same plain, androgynous uniforms as all the others we’d seen. I studied the facial plating and bone crests of this pair. I thought they were the same ones who’d been here before.

  Sure enough, one stopped outside the door of my cell, pointed to the tray of dirty dishes, and whistle-chattered something. T
hen it pointed at the floor inside the door. The meaning was clear enough: bring the tray and put it here.

  I grinned and complied. Hey, I wanted them at ease so that Maja could work her magic, right? I hoped they wouldn’t try the same thing with her, but as soon as the door at the end of the corridor had opened, she’d crumpled in on herself. She sat with her head hanging down, shoulders hunched, her demeanour emanating defeat. Her blonde hair hung around her face like a veil. I left the tray where they’d indicated and returned to my cot. I put my hands up in an “I surrender” gesture.

  “Don’t mind me, folks, I’ve decided to be harmless from now on.”

  I’m sure they didn’t understand me, and they kept eyes on me the whole time they opened the door, slid the tray out, and shut the door again. They stowed the tray, then crossed to Maja’s cell and gave her what I assumed to be the same instruction.

  She ignored them.

  One tried again, raising its voice and knocking the knuckles of a chitin-covered hand against the bars in an attempt to get her attention. She merely hunched over further. It issued the instruction again, and she very deliberately turned away from the aliens, rolling into a fetal position on the cot with her back to them.

  I didn’t see how she’d know when to launch her attack from there, but I had to assume she knew what she was doing. One of the Chron made a sound that meant exasperation in any language, opened the door, and entered the cell. Maja had left her tray next to the bars adjoining Gerazan’s cell, and I knew what was about to happen a split second before it did.

  Gerazan had been standing at the front of his own cell, ostensibly watching the aliens make their progress down the corridor. As soon as the Chron in Maja’s cell leaned down to retrieve the tray, however, the cryptographer leapt toward it. One arm flashed through the bars, clutching for the bony protuberances at the back of the alien’s head. The impact pulled the alien forward, off-balance. It crashed into the cell bars and then tumbled onto Maja’s tray with a clatter of dishes.

  Of course the force field repelled Gerazan, and he staggered away from the bars, shaking his jolted arm. I knew what that felt like and cringed involuntarily. But the distraction gave Maja enough time to move. She dropped off the cot like a cat and sprang toward the Chron. Ducking in under its arm as it scrabbled to regain its feet, she slapped the interruptor into the crook of its elbow. Yellow light flashed hotly around them. I couldn’t tell if it was the force field activating against Maja or flaring as it shorted out.

  But Maja wasn’t jolted back. Without a pause she grasped the Chron’s right arm, threw her own up across its chest and neck, and pivoted, rocking her weight forward and pulling the Chron with her. Stunned and off-balance, it had nothing to brace against her with. In one smooth motion she flipped the alien over her shoulder to land with a thump, supine against the unforgiving cell floor. Letting momentum carry her, she rolled over the alien, continuing to pull it with her until it had flipped onto its stomach. She put one knee on its back, scooped one arm around its throat, and with the other hand grasped its bone crest and pulled, forcing its head up.

  The other Chron had been slow to react, and was only two steps inside Maja’s cell by the time she stopped and met its eyes. “You want me to break your friend’s neck, take another step,” she said, jerking lightly on the bone crest to emphasize her point.

  Even with little or no understanding of Esper, the message was hard to miss. The second Chron stopped and put its hands up, motioning for her to desist. In all probability it could have reached her before she seriously harmed the other one, and used its force field as a weapon by simply throwing itself on her. But either it didn’t think of that or it wasn’t certain enough to risk the other’s life. After what I’d just seen, I wouldn’t bet against Maja being able to break someone’s neck this way—and fast. I was impressed.

  Maja motioned with her head toward the rear of her cell. “Over there,” she said.

  “I guess we’re not worrying about whether they’re listening in anymore?” I said to no-one in particular.

  “Oops,” Maja said. “Oh well, I don’t hear any alarms.”

  The Chron complied with Maja’s instructions—which surprised me. I kept waiting for it to break for the cell door, push the alarm button on the cart, take off running—something. But it merely backed up against the wall where she’d told it.

  Not taking her eyes off the second Chron, she managed to get the first one to stand and walk over to the cell door. She kept a close grip on its bone crest and her other arm tight around its neck as she pulled the door shut with her foot. Not that the one inside wouldn’t be able to open it with a touch of its palm to the grey band, but for now at least, it stayed against the rear wall, well away from everyone. I wondered if it was actually scared of us, or plotting something. I resolved to keep an eye on it.

  They crossed the hallway and stopped outside Viss’s door. “Open it,” Maja said, and Viss tapped a finger on the dark grey band that controlled the door. The Chron reached up a hand and pressed it to the band.

  Nothing happened.

  Maja gave the Chron a little shake. “Come on, open the door. You did it a minute ago. Don’t mess around now.”

  The Chron chattered something and pointed to the force field controller on its arm. The round button was blackened and pitted.

  “Merde, that’s how it works,” I breathed. “You’re wearing the field generator, the controller listens to you.”

  “Do you think it will work if a human’s wearing it?” Viss asked.

  “Only one way to find out,” I said. “Maja, you’ve got to get that thing—the good one—from the other Chron, and put it on.”

  “Oh, for—” Maja’s voice disappeared into a litany of whispered swears. “How am I supposed to get that one and still hang onto this one?”

  “Bring him here,” Viss said, and put his arms out through the bars of his cell. Maja pulled the Chron closer until Viss was able to wrap his not inconsiderably burly arms around the alien’s neck. It seemed quite as effective—and threatening—as the hold Maja had had on it.

  She straightened up and stretched, then crossed to her old cell door, snapping her fingers to get the attention of the Chron inside. Once she had eye contact, she gestured to the crook of her elbow, then put her hand out and waggled her fingers in a “give it here” kind of way. She pointed to the floor outside the cell bars.

  The Chron hesitated, obviously debating. Viss tightened his grip on the Chron he held, and the alien made a little squeaking noise.

  That seemed to decide the one in Maja’s cell. It held up a long-fingered hand, then released the controller from its sleeve. It moved cautiously to the front of the cell and set it on the floor, then backpedaled to the wall again.

  Maja bent down, hesitated only a moment, then picked up the controller. She slipped it onto her sleeve and stepped over to Hirin’s door, then reached up and touched the grey band.

  The door swung open.

  Hirin brought the sheet off his cot, and ripped long strips from one edge. He quickly bound the first Chron’s arms in front of its body. Another strip went around its legs at knee level, so it could walk, but not quickly. Viss released his hold on the alien, and together Maja and Hirin trundled it into the cell with its mate. With a third and fourth strip, Hirin tightly bound the bars of Maja’s cell door shut. It wouldn’t necessarily hold the Chron inside for long, but it would slow them down if they decided they wanted out.

  Maja made the rounds of all the cells, opening each door in turn. She let me out last. I tried not to resent it. A few strips of Hirin’s sheet had puddled on the floor outside the cells. I took one and tied it across my shoulder and chest like a bandolier, then tucked a couple more inside it. They could come in handy if we needed to tie up anyone else.

  Once everyone was free, Maja returned to the cell where Luta Paixon had been held. She pointed inside and said, “Where is she?”

  One of the Chron said something and mimed a ges
ture I couldn’t decipher.

  “Gerazan, I don’t suppose you got any of that, did you?” Maja asked the Protectorate cryptographer. Apparently she didn’t understand the meaning either.

  He shook his head. “I don’t know the spoken language at all. My job was supposed to be to record any symbols or writings different from what we knew already from the ships we’d captured. See if I could extrapolate any further on the language as a whole. Cerevare might recognize some, but you have to remember we really never had much to go on. And certainly not enough to guess at how it sounded.”

  Viss held up his resin-sheathed arm. “I’d like to get this damn thing off. Wonder if they know how?”

  Maja mimed the question to the Chron in the cell, but they both shook their heads. They’d been pretty compliant so far, but maybe this was asking too much of them. And our leverage was diluted now, since they were both in the cell together.

  “Want to rough one of them up again?” I asked.

  Hirin regarded me with chilly disapproval. “I think we’ve threatened them enough for now. And I don’t want anyone going into that cell with them. No unnecessary risks.”

  “Suit yourself, Gramps. You’re the boss, apparently.”

  He ignored me. “Baden, Viss, check the cart. See if there’s anything there we might use as a weapon.”

  “We all had a fork,” I reminded them. “I’m taking that, if nothing else.”

  Rei laughed out loud, but it wasn’t a mean laugh. “Good thinking, Sord,” she said. “I’d rather have a fork than nothing at all.” And she actually ducked into her cell to get it.

  “Nothing on the cart that looks at all dangerous,” Baden said.

  “So we’ve got one force field generator and a bunch of forks?” Hirin said. “I’m not sure I like these odds.”

  “We still have hostages,” Yuskeya reminded him.

  “I think they might be more of a liability,” Viss said. “Without them, we’ll move faster and possibly quieter.”

  “Yes, we’ll leave them here,” Hirin said. “Now, which door?”