Crooked Stars

by Rock Forsberg

  Thinking about the loss of life made my chest tight. Dr Darius had not only been a vital expert on our team, he had been a long-time family friend. I never missed him when he was alive, but now his death brought me down.

  In ten years, I had taken Runore from a struggling local miner to an intergalactic force. With the former Sweeps BTL at our backs, we never had any trouble with violent action, or if we did, if someone was stupid enough to try, it disappeared quickly. Now, the cyborg had eluded all our security set-ups, and it bothered me.

  The message worried me the most. I could have dealt with a random local attack. But the note had an ominous ring to it, and it reminded me of Puissance.

  But Puissance was dead. He had died at my hand, and I had watched his body burn.

  I took a deep breath and swallowed another sip of my tea. More and more small ships exited the venue and docked with bigger ones, some of which were already blasting forth in preparation to pinch away.

  I pulled the Sweeper’s radar screen up on my terminal but didn’t see Tiana’s Petals yet. She was most likely socialising and having fun—as she should.

  Lying down on the recliner, I watched the mesmerising view of the station emitting crafts. We would solve Sander’s troubles and find the cyborg; the difficulties were but temporary. Now I just wanted to hold Tiana in my arms, and everything would be all right.

  I must have dozed off, and woke up to my terminal beeping.

  The stream of ships had vanished from view, and as I saw the time, I thought Tiana must have docked already.

  I opened the comms and found two people staring at me: a stocky Andron security guard and a blue Baar doctor.

  The security guard spoke, ‘Mr Tait, we regret to inform you that your wife was assaulted—’

  ‘WHAT?’ My heart skipped a beat. ‘Tiana, is she all right?’

  Both of the men on the screen gulped. The doctor said, ‘She will be all right.’

  ‘What happened?’

  The security guard gazed around as if searching for something. ‘We are not sure—’

  ‘Why?’ I said, and stood up. ‘You must know what’s going on.’

  ‘Sir, someone attacked her in in one of the corridors.’

  ‘How can something like that happen?’ I shouted at the screen.

  The guard backed up and tugged at his uniform. He stuttered.

  I stared at him and clenched my jaws as he tried to explain, but I wasn’t listening. ‘I’m coming over right now.’

  I closed the connection and called Naido to grab a pilot and ready a shuttle.

  Roona Intergalactic Event Space had quieted after the guests had left, and the robots and organisers were busy cleaning up.

  The security personnel greeted us on arrival, and when I told them our business, they hurried us to the emergency room. Tiana was lucky that the venue had a proper facility, not even the Sweeper’s infirmary compared to what they had.

  As I saw her, I ran to her side. ‘Tiana!’

  Her left eye was swollen shut, her cheek bloodied, blood still dripping from her nose, into which she had some pipes threaded, and her lower lip had a plaster on it. She lay restful on her back, everything but her face covered by a white blanket. Wires went in below the pillow.

  Who would have done this to her? Everyone loves her. She wants only the best for everyone.

  I grabbed the doctor at her side, and shouted, ‘You said she would be all right!’

  ‘She will be,’ the doctor said in a voice that remained calm despite my rage, ‘but she will need to rest and let the medicine…’

  His words faded in my mind as I watched my love lying broken on the bed. While I was relieved she would survive, a wave of heat flushed through my body. Who did this to her? Why? I would find the perpetrator and make them regret the day they thought about attacking my wife.

  I stepped past the doctor, ignoring his explanation, and stomped over to the security guard sitting slumped on a chair in the corner. ‘Did you capture the assailant?’

  He shook his head and stood up, head below mine. I wondered if this guy could ever catch anyone.

  ‘Where did they go? What do you know?’ I spat questions down on him.

  He winced like he was in pain, but hurt he wasn’t. ‘We have nothing. So far. We’re following up on several leads—’

  ‘Surely you have them on camera?’

  He winced again. ‘No, the cameras in that corridor were inactive.’

  I hit the guard’s chest hard enough for him to fall back on the chair, and bellowed, ‘WHY WERE THEY INACTIVE? WHAT—’

  The doctor lay his blue hand on my shoulder. ‘Please, not here.’

  I grunted. The guard stared at me with his mouth open. I lowered my voice and pushed my face in front of his. ‘You head out of this room now, and follow all the leads like it’s your life on the line… and if I’m not seeing any progress, the next time, you’ll be the one lying in a hospital bed. Do you understand?’ The last words hissed through my gritted teeth.

  He gulped and nodded.

  ‘Go already,’ I said, and straightened up.

  He scrambled up, and went running towards the door, stumbled to get it open, and sprinted into the corridor. If I had known that guys like that were in charge, I would have provided Tiana with Sweeps bodyguards.

  It was another occasion I had failed to prepare for on the same day. Things had been perfect, but now I needed to sort out two attacks. It was unbelievable. We were respected and revered—either the attackers were stupid enough not to know, or worse, they were powerful and knew precisely what they had done. The message from Sander echoed in my mind. I took a deep breath and turned back to the doc beside Tiana.

  ‘Will I be able to take her with me now? We have a medical bay on our ship.’

  The doctor’s face didn’t flinch. He seemed the epitome of calm, where I had broken out in a fury. ‘I would recommend she stays for twenty hours, to let her sleep, and so we can operate.’

  ‘Operate? You said she would heal with the meds.’

  ‘She is,’ the doctor said, stone-faced. ‘But as I was trying to explain, she was pregnant, and—’

  I gasped. ‘Was?’

  ‘The child didn’t make it. I’m sorry.’

  I stared at the doctor’s long blue face, unable to say anything.

  My child had died.

  ‘We have to operate,’ said the doctor. ‘She is unlikely to carry after this.’

  My knees became soft as tears welled in my eyes. I fell down, crying, and slammed my fists against the floor. It was as if someone had torn out a part of me. Biting my tongue brought up the metallic taste of blood. There would be more blood before I was done with whoever had done this.

  I stayed with Tiana until she woke up, messaged the crew on Transit that our schedule had changed, and brought in a few more guys to help Naido work with the station security personnel.

  Sitting by her bedside, just the two of us, I thought about the life that had started within her. It had been a life I had created with Tiana, a life that had ended before it even started. It led me to wonder about all the possibilities of what he or she could have become. I pictured him as a youthful man, like me but taller and smarter—just like Tiana, but with my ambition and determination. He would have been the one to take over the family business. It was all fantasy. He was gone. Someone else would be there in his place, but no one would be there to inherit those characteristics that only me and Tiana could have provided. I didn’t know what to do. I could not comprehend the notion that we might never have a child.

  Tiana moved her arm and emitted a quiet whine. She opened her better eye.

  I lay my hand on her arm. ‘Hush…’

  Her breathing quickened, and she turned her head towards me. ‘The baby. Is the baby all right? Is the baby all right?’

  I held her hand, looked her in the eye, and cried. She broke down in tears, too.

  After Tiana’s release, I walked her to the Petals, where the
pilot was already waiting to take us back up to the Sweeper.

  I had pushed for Naido and his team to find anything that would help us understand who had attacked her. I asked her, too, but never wanted to press it—she had suffered enough; my lively wife was turning into a timid victim.

  Just as we stepped in through the airlock, Tiana said, ‘He was no man.’

  I stopped. ‘What do you remember?’

  ‘I needed to visit the toilet,’ she said, as the airlock closed behind us, ‘and went looking for one. The sign led me to a long corridor. In the corridor, a man leaned against the wall, whistling. As I approached, he stopped and turned to face me.’

  ‘What did he look like?’ I asked, and took her hand.

  ‘One side of his face was black metal, as were his arms. Suddenly he appeared right in front of me. I yelled for help, but he pushed his gloved hand in my mouth and stared at me with his human and machine eyes.’ She took a deep breath. ‘He had a message for you.’

  My heartbeat quickened. ‘What message?’

  ‘Revenge proves its own executioner,’ she said, and wept. She whimpered. ‘Before I could say anything, he hit me, dropped me, kicked me…’

  I pulled her close and held her tight. ‘It’s all right, you’ve gone through a traumatic experience.’

  ‘No, it’s not all right,’ she sniffled. ‘We lost our baby—we’ve lost all of our babies—and the message, what does it mean?’ She started shaking hysterically.

  ‘I don’t know.’ I held on to her, trying to calm her down—without success. ‘I know people who can and will find out.’

  I led her inside. She trembled, and so did I. The message was the same as the one Sander had gotten. My throat tightened just thinking about it, even if I did my best to push it aside. It was about Puissance. It couldn’t have been him—I had witnessed him die—but it definitely was to do with him.

  I would not tell Tiana about Sander. She had already been through enough. I had to stay calm and put the feelers out to find the one behind this.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Tiana complained endlessly about how her stomach hurt now that the painkillers had worn off, and she didn’t want to take them anymore.

  We had returned to Runcor and were lounging in our home, and even while it was a sunny day outside, we had blackout curtains to block the light of Reuna in favour of dim, artificial light. Tiana wanted to stay indoors and avoid seeing people.

  I sat by the kitchen table, the fancy designer lamp above me the only light in the apartment. She entered the kitchen like a ghost, her black nightgown fluttering as she floated across the room. Her gaze was unfocused, as if she was sleepwalking.

  ‘Want some tea?’ I asked.

  She stopped and shook her head.

  ‘Not even a sweet cup of Berdunamian?’

  ‘No!’ she cried out, with a face of pain. ‘It tastes like Jindalar sweat. Leave me alone!’

  She turned on her heels and stomped back towards the dark bedroom. I watched her go, unable to do anything to relieve her pain. I told myself that time would heal her. I was hurting, too, but she had it worse. She had felt a child inside her; now she felt only hurt, only half of it physical.

  I had several BTL guys watching our building, in case the cyborg was around. I wondered about the man behind the mask, and how he had struck down our new base in Jezenera and then pinched back to the gala venue in Roona. In theory, it was possible, but the site had no record of the man arriving on the night of the gala. Then again, sneaking into the event venue wasn’t much of a challenge for an experienced operator.

  I left Tiana at home—she wanted to be alone, so I let her—and flew out to the Sweeps BTL base, to meet with Usher, Sander, Pereen, and our lawyer Prudencia Terscher, the whole board of directors, to align on the situation and to agree actions.

  One benefit of owning a mining company was that we had the means to dig deep, and that had helped us establish the headquarters of the BTL operations about a kilometre down, well below any line, as a hidden nexus of our power. The new president and mayor were entirely under our control, and for a good reason. The planet’s fortunes were tied to Runore’s success. Unless we succeeded, there would be little wealth in Runcor. We brought over three-quarters of exports and an even more significant share of taxes.

  To start our meeting, Pereen reported that Naido and his team on-site at the venue had discovered that while the man hadn’t been on the guest list, they’d caught him on the surveillance videos in multiple locations around the premises. The first instance was him emerging from a hatch in one corridor. He could have come in through anywhere, and they had no trails of him leaving, either.

  They said he had been like a ghost. I hadn’t wanted to hear that; it made my stomach roll. After I had taken care of the president of Runcor, everything had gone well, but now things were unravelling. Did I not kill the man? There was no doubt about it, but now I started to wonder. Ten years had passed. If he were alive, why only now?

  I wanted to mobilise everything we’d got, but Usher and Pereen disagreed.

  ‘I understand how you feel,’ Pereen said, ‘but you have our best men protecting you and your family.’

  ‘I don’t want reactive protection,’ I said. ‘I want proactive removal of the threat.’

  ‘But you don’t know what you’re looking for… these events could be unrelated.’

  ‘Unrelated? Both of them sent me the same message; can’t be much more related than that!’

  ‘I agree with Daler,’ Sander said. ‘The only question I have is: why didn’t he kill Tiana or me? He could have sent the same message.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘But I have an idea…’

  They all leaned forward, waiting on me to continue.

  I took a long breath and said, ‘Puissance.’

  Everyone straightened up.

  ‘The former president of Runcor? Isn’t he dead?’ Prudencia Terscher said. She had been Pereen’s legal go-to person for years. She mostly listened, but when she spoke, she had a commanding presence. One part of it was from her Dresnean heritage—she was over two metres tall and her grey skin looked tough as a rock—and the other part from her experience in negotiating explosive situations across the galaxy.

  ‘He truly is,’ Sander said, nodding.

  ‘Don’t you think I know that?’ I snapped. ‘He died in my arms. But there is something about this ghost. For what it’s worth, it could be someone working for him, his son, his lover… who knows?’

  Pereen said, ‘None of the information we’ve gathered about the perpetrator points to any organisation, or anyone we could connect with Puissance. From what we can see from the surveillance videos, the same man attacked both locations. The suit originates from Dawn Alliance Navy Cyborg Corps, but this one is no navy operation. Our BTL operatives confirmed that the navy lost these suits not too long ago. Also, by the looks of it, the cyborg is not navy, but something hacked together from stolen parts.’

  ‘So, if this is a lone wolf,’ I said. ‘It should be easy to take him down.’

  ‘Not so in Zalda,’ Sander said. ‘He’s a top-notch professional and most likely has a team backing him up.’

  ‘What do you suggest?’

  Pereen said, ‘There’s a whole industry with the sole purpose of engaging in these kinds of situations: intergalactic bounty hunters. I suggest we connect with a select group and let them do what they do best. It should solve this minor problem of ours in a matter of days.’

  ‘Let’s do it,’ I said.

  ‘We must be discreet in connecting with bounty hunters,’ Terscher said.

  ‘I don’t want them to know Runore has any part in this,’ Usher said, ‘or we risk blowing our cover.’

  ‘I will make sure we keep it strictly under BTL,’ Pereen said.

  Everyone nodded.

  ‘Let’s do it,’ I said again and hit my fist on the table. ‘I want to mobilise everyone in the BTL to seek the cyborg, and to wield the
means to face him on the field. Next time he tries to deliver a message, I want him to hear mine. I want him to know I am after him.’

  We continued discussing the plan and other ongoing BTL business well into the night. It was already past midnight when I took my craft over grey sands and above the gleaming neon lights of Luzasand to my penthouse.

  Tiana lay in the bed in an unlit room. She was so quiet, she might have been sleeping or awake, but she made no sound, and I let her rest.

  Just before I lay down, my terminal pinged. Our chief of research, Nestor Alegua, had been found dead at his home.

  Chapter Eighteen

  My immediate thought about the note from Usher was that the cyborg had killed Nestor, but there had been no signs of a fight. With Nestor living alone, the cleaner had found him lying on the floor and had called for medical help. Within moments, they had declared Nestor dead.

  A master physicist, Nestor Alegua ran the research group in Runore and many would miss him. For me, his death confirmed that we must halt the process of expansion. Usher wanted to do it already, after what we called the Zalda massacre, but I had insisted we move forward to send out a message that terrorism would not stop Runore. Now, however, I had to agree. We had to halt everything else and focus on stopping the bleeding before we could start healing.

  The coroner’s report left open questions. Nestor’s death was recorded as heart failure, but nothing in the autopsy showed he had been suffering from a heart problem. Nestor was old, but not that old. His heart had just stopped. Pereen told me there were ways to poison a man and make his heart stop without leaving a trace. Hearing that didn’t help me, and my mind continued weaving a web of conspiracies, cyborgs, and ghosts.

  The cyborg attacks, and now Nestor’s death both bothered me deeply, and in a moment of weakness, I did something inexplicably stupid.

  That morning, Tiana was sitting by the kitchen counter, in the gleaming light of her terminal, and sipping coffee. Outside, Reuna would have been climbing up the sky, but within our blackout curtains, it was the same dim lighting that matched my mood. On her terminal screen flashed pictures of beautiful women wearing ordinary clothes.