Crooked Stars

by Rock Forsberg

  ‘Do you need a ride?’ the woman shouted behind me.

  ‘A taxi? No way.’

  After an uneventful magnarail ride, I strolled through Spit City Space Port. The port was a massive complex on the other side of the moon city, and the trip took me almost an hour, but it also helped me clear my head.

  I had been wrong thinking I was over Marc Puissance. I wasn’t. He was the biggest cause of pain in my life, and I couldn’t find peace as long as he was alive. Often in my dreams, his men caught me and tortured me. They killed everyone I cared about, but they never killed me, just like in my waking life. But awake I could change things; I could make a move and end it, just like Pereen had done.

  If I found the ghost, it would become a man, and a man I could kill. I had been out of violent activities during my time in Spit City, but still had a few connections I could use. I tried connecting with Reina Wolfe via the Ghostnet, but she was offline without a sign of where in the universe she was. Naido, on the other hand, was close.

  Stepping through to bay 4242, I found him peering into an open hatch under the ship. He wore a wide-brimmed cowboy hat, the one I’d given him in the Ace of Spades casino ages ago.

  When I approached, he turned and smiled. ‘Henk, take over, I want to have a chat with my old pal.’

  We stepped up the clanking ramp to his ship. He grabbed drinks from the galley, and we sat down on the padded chairs on the spacious bridge. I explained to him what had happened and what I feared Marc might do.

  ‘You know, I have heard nothing about the cyborgs,’ he said, ‘but there are whispers on the Ghostnet about things happening in Yedda.’

  ‘What kinds of things?’

  He shrugged. ‘Something about a weapon, but it’s just whispers.’

  ‘Perhaps it’s related to why Marc was there.’

  ‘Or maybe it’s nothing to do with him.’

  I could understand how Naido saw things, but I was sure Marc was at the front and centre of whatever was happening. I told Naido about my dream of Tiana, something I would’ve found difficult to talk about with anyone else.

  He didn’t even flinch. ‘Dreams reveal the things we hide, and the most vivid ones reveal the deepest of them.’

  ‘You’re probably right, but that doesn’t explain what happened in the taxi.’

  ‘Coincidence, or maybe synchronicity.’

  A brawny man in a sleeveless vest entered the bridge.

  ‘Cressor,’ Naido said. ‘Do a quick check on the Ghostnet if we have anything about the whereabouts of Marc Puissance of Runcor.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he grunted in response. ‘Just wanted to tell you the core is fine; got a full A from the diagnostic, and I optimised the power flow.’

  ‘Excellent.’

  ‘Sure thing, Cap’,’ he said, and left us.

  I leaned back and sipped the drink. It was refreshing but had the tang of alcohol.

  ‘You know,’ Naido said, ‘the old Sweeps are not doing well.’

  ‘Yeah, heard that Pereen’s dead.’

  ‘And Terscher has disappeared. There’s someone new at the helm, but they’re losing ground to competition everywhere. The Sweeps are practically out of Spit City.’

  The city had also changed. What once was a battleground of three major and many minor organisations was now almost entirely controlled by FIST. They had won the war over Spit City, but embers of the Sweeps, Kisha Clan, and others glowed beneath the surface.

  ‘It’s a shame,’ Naido said. ‘The Sweeps could’ve been something great.’

  ‘With Runore and the Sweeps together, we could have done big things. We could have run this city, and turned Runcor into a thriving planet instead of the regressive sandpit it has become.’

  ‘You ever think about starting over?’

  ‘Maybe. I don’t know.’

  I was sincere. The best years of my life had been when I was running Runore with the Sweeps. But if there was one thing I’d learned from my life, it was that there’s always someone more powerful than you—and if you are the most powerful one, there’s a thousand just below you with the sole purpose of taking you down. Power was exhilarating, but also destructive.

  ‘I get what you’re saying,’ Naido said. ‘The time with the Sweeps was great, but everything’s changed, and I have seen nothing that would come close to the glory years.’

  I chuckled at his choice of words. I had thought the glory years were just my construction.

  ‘Those days are gone, and we should move on,’ I said, and took a swig of the drink. ‘By the looks of your ship, you’re not doing too bad.’

  ‘No. It’s an enjoyable life for me,’ Naido said, and stared at his drink. ‘But in your eye, I see this glint, the same one that, when we first met, told me you’re no ordinary grunt. You still have it.’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  Before he could respond, the brawny man, Cressor, burst in. ‘He might be here,’ he said, panting. ‘Marc Puissance’s been spotted in Hightower.’

  Naido and I locked eyes. ‘That,’ he said. ‘That gleam in your eyes is what I’m talking about.’

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Marc stayed in the Hightower Hotel on the sly under a fake name, and we had no means of hacking it. So, we took the classic approach—meet him face-to-face. I wanted to move fast to keep him from slipping away, so we made a quick plan with Naido and his crew: I was to lure him away from the crowds, after which we’d knock him out and take him to a secret hideout in the lower levels.

  One of Spit City’s premier hotels, Hightower, stood head and shoulders above the other buildings, and its expansive lounge with its tall ceiling was designed to make people feel small. Naido, Cressor and I sat on neat yellow leather chairs. Henk was ready to go with a fast shuttle to take us up to Naido’s ship—the LPB—if we were to need a quick exit.

  After less than half an hour, Marc stepped out of an elevator. Even after all the years, I immediately recognised that sheepish look. Still, I found it hard to believe he was there, in the same room with me, sauntering by himself towards the lobby where we sat. It was like a dream. I couldn’t move.

  Naido bumped me with his elbow and nodded towards Marc. He had seen him too. It was no dream; it was happening.

  That didn’t help, though, because when I stood up, it was as if in a dreamy haze, and I suddenly stood in front of Marc.

  ‘Daler Tait,’ he said. His voice was calm and composed, as if he had been expecting me. ‘It’s been such a long time.’

  ‘I have my men ready to take you out at my command,’ I said, my rage clouding my thinking and ignoring what I had planned.

  His expression changed. ‘But Daler, we’re old friends—’

  ‘We’ve never been friends!’

  People around us turned to look. Marc smiled.

  I stepped closer to him and lowered my voice. ‘You took everything from me.’

  ‘I took everything away from you?’ Marc said. ‘You have it wrong; it was you who took everything from me when you killed my father and drove me to suicide.’

  ‘What you did to Tiana—’

  ‘I did nothing to your wife.’

  I wasn’t listening to his lies. ‘You will pay for what you’ve done. Here’s what will happen: you will come with me—my men have this place covered, and I have a shuttle waiting.’

  ‘You think you’ve got it all figured out?’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Check your men,’ Marc said.

  I turned around. A cyborg stood behind Naido by the elevators, another one behind Cressor by the doors. The third eyed me from the side by the reception. My heart skipped a beat as I turned back to Marc’s smug face. The dream had just turned into a nightmare.

  ‘I don’t want to make a scene, but will do it if I must,’ Marc said in a gloomy voice. ‘So, I suggest you back off, and you get to fight another day.’

  I didn’t know what to do. I had been so confident I could just corner him by
surprise, but as always, he had been one step ahead of me.

  ‘You’re letting me go?’ I said.

  ‘I’m too civilised to blast your goons’ guts out in such a fine establishment,’ Marc said. ‘And what comes to you is that your time is running out; this is not the time or place, but as surely as the winds blow on Fearanor you will meet your destiny when you least expect it.’

  I gestured to my guys to back off, and they started walking back to the lounge. The cyborgs stood down. From a casual observer’s point of view, it must have seemed as if nothing had happened. Still, my pulse was racing.

  ‘Make sure you don’t do this again,’ Marc whispered as he walked past me to the main exit. The cyborgs followed him.

  I knew I was stupid, trying to get someone like him without proper preparation, whereas it seemed he had prepared for everything. As I stepped over to Naido and Cressor, they looked at me with apologetic expressions.

  ‘Sorry, mate,’ Naido said. ‘Didn’t see them coming.’

  ‘What do we do now?’ Cressor said.

  I was going to suggest we headed out and forgot all about this, but I couldn’t shake off Marc’s words. Your time is running out… you will meet your destiny when you least expect it. Was it a threat? What else could it have been? I thought about my life until then, the past few years, the pain I suffered waiting for the hammer to fall, and the only thing that had changed was that the hammer had become mightier. I glanced at Marc, who was going out, surrounded by the cyborgs. There was still a chance.

  ‘Let’s follow them.’

  ‘You sure about this, boss?’ Naido asked.

  ‘Remember our training with the Sweeps? A talented pilot will outlive a foot soldier.’

  ‘But he’s got the cyborgs,’ Cressor said. ‘It’s hard to beat those guys.’

  He had slipped from my grasp too many times; if I had a chance, I would take it. I said, ‘Hard, but not impossible. Our advantage is surprise; he’s expecting me to yield, but I have a few tricks up my sleeve.’

  Cressor looked at Naido for support.

  Naido said, ‘He’s got this.’

  ‘All right then.’

  We followed Marc and his cyborgs from a distance as they went to the hotel’s shuttle bay and entered a Petals R—a ‘sleeper’ shuttle, which looked everyday but packed the same amount of power as the S model, and with Marc, probably extensive firepower too. Our shuttle was no match, but I couldn’t back off. Not anymore. I was all in.

  ‘Follow them,’ I said, and jumped beside Henk on the co-pilot’s seat.

  As we rolled out of the docking area in an orderly fashion, trailing Marc’s shuttle, I explained to Henk what had happened.

  ‘So what’s the plan?’

  ‘The first chance we get, we’ll shoot them down.’

  He swallowed.

  ‘You never shot a shuttle down?’

  ‘No, it’s not that,’ he said, and tapped the controls. ‘There will be collateral damage, and we’ll have the police after us in no time. We don’t have the means to escape them.’

  ‘We will not attract the police,’ I said.

  ‘How?’

  ‘Give me the flight control, you take the guns, OK?’

  He nodded, and my stick became active with manual control. I boosted our speed up to get onto the tail of the Petals R, to make sure Marc noticed us. And they did, because their ship took a sudden dive.

  I followed as they descended further down from the primary route, gaining speed as the black towers whizzed by. They flew in the right direction. I only had to lead them for a short time.

  ‘Incoming comms from the Petals,’ Naido said from behind us.

  ‘Put it through.’

  I expected to see Marc, but got a cyborg’s solemn face on the comms screen.

  ‘Get off our back, or we’ll shoot you down.’

  This was good.

  ‘Ready the peashooter for a single shot,’ I said.

  ‘Ready.’

  ‘Fire!’

  The effect of the Rapido cannon, aptly referred to as the peashooter by everyone, was a tiny point of light on the surface of the Petals as it streamed around the corner of a massive monolith building.

  ‘No effect on them.’

  ‘As intended,’ I said, and took our shuttle into a steep dive under and past Marc’s ship. I hoped they would take my bait.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Henk said. ‘Now they can shoot at us.’

  ‘That’s what I’m counting on,’ I said. I wanted them to follow us, and if that meant they’d be shooting at us, then so be it. Near to us was the construction yard of Megaplex, the most significant building site ever opened up on the moon. So far, the only thing they had done was to dig a massive hole. There, I wouldn’t have to worry about killing bystanders.

  And just as Henk had expected, a direct shot made our shuttle rumble.

  The cyborg was back on the comms panel. ‘That was a warning; the next one will kill you.’

  ‘You couldn’t kill a sick rhengo,’ I said, then turned the shuttle to maximum roll, and floored the throttle.

  As the scenery changed, several shots whizzed past us, but none of them hit. We had entered the construction yard. Where there had been tall obsidian buildings all around us, we now faced a massive open clearing. If the real estate wasn’t of such stellar value, space like this would have made the city much less intense, I mused, as I continued my manoeuvres to avoid their fire.

  It was time for the next phase.

  ‘Ready the Silencer,’ I said.

  ‘Wha—? Oh…’ Henk said and tapped on the controls.

  I pulled our nose up and turned. The Petals followed—they took the bait. Now I just needed to get them into position. That was tricky because the Petals was an inherently nimbler shuttle, better in every aspect of manoeuvrability. I had to play it against them.

  ‘Silencer ready to engage,’ Henk said, controlling the new blue crosshair on the screen in front of him.

  I turned the shuttle’s nose down and banked left just in time, as blue bolts of plasma whizzed by our right side.

  The bolts would eventually hit unless I got them in front of me.

  I took the craft down, and straight towards the few construction machines, feverishly seeking cover. Massive pipes lay in a pile beside a huge digger. In my estimate, they were just big enough for a craft, and might work as a diversion.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Henk said, as we closed in on the pipes.

  I had to keep my hands steady. The margin for error, the difference between entering a pipe and hitting its side and blowing up our craft, was thin like the moon’s atmosphere.

  The pipes closed in fast. I steadied the craft to fly at a level and adjusted the yaw to align us.

  ‘Take hold of something!’

  We slipped in with the right stub of a wing throwing sparks as it trailed the inner surface of the pipe.

  ‘Whoa!’

  I slammed on the air-brakes.

  And I engaged the throttle again. In a moment, we shot out from the pipe, with the Petals turning in front of us.

  ‘Engage the Silencer!’ I said.

  Henk locked onto the target, and, once the blue crosshairs blinked on the screen, pulled the trigger. There was a subtle distortion in the air between the shuttles before the Petals went dark and dropped its nose. It fell fast and hit the flat area on the construction yard, its emergency systems trying to cope with the inertia as it skidded and tumbled on the ground.

  ‘Gotcha!’ Henk said, striking his fist in the air.

  ‘Nice work…’ Naido said.

  I steered us down as the Petals hit a massive bulldozer like a bird hits a building and stopped still. ‘Let’s get geared up.’

  After landing a few dozen metres from the Petals, I stepped down from the shuttle with Cressor and Naido, each carrying a plasma rifle.

  ‘The Silencer maims the cyborgs by disabling most of their tech, but it doesn’t eliminate them. Nor does it
affect humans. Be ready for anything.’

  Naido and Henk nodded. We took careful steps forward, rifles at the ready, pointing at the shuttle that showed no signs of life.

  A sudden hiss made us jump, and as the shuttle’s door opened, we crouched down, rifles aimed at the doorway. A cyborg stumbled out, trying to shoot at us, but the three of us sent a barrage of shots that made it fall.

  ‘Come out quietly, and no one gets hurt!’ I shouted. The construction yard remained quiet, with the tall buildings and all traffic between them like pearls far away.

  Another cyborg came into the doorway. Shots rang out, and I jumped into cover behind a mound.

  Cressor cried out. ‘I got hit.’

  ‘What’s he firing?’

  ‘Metal,’ Naido said. ‘Metal bullets.’

  Of course, only a mechanical weapon would work. The nozzle of the cyborg’s gun flared again with yellow flames. The bullets spat into the ground before me, throwing dirt all around.

  Naido rose and delivered a series of blasts to the cyborg, but missed, as he had to take cover from the spewing machine gun fire. The cyborg moved fast, considering we had disabled its electronics.

  Something moved behind the ship. I risked a glance and had to duck down, but I saw him. Marc was running out from the back.

  The cyborg stomped out of the door, firing in staccato. Another one stepped out behind him.

  Cressor held on to his shoulder with a grimace. Naido peeked out from the hole, but could not get a chance to shoot.

  The cyborgs had retained too much of their mobility. Even if Cressor were in shape, we’d have a hard time against two. A barrage of metal stuck close by and I pushed my head down.

  ‘Surrender now or die,’ boomed one cyborg.

  Cressor looked at me with a pleading expression. I shook my head.

  We would not surrender. I pulled up my comms device and connected with Henk—we needed everyone on the ground.

  Before I spoke, our shuttle was already lifting from the ground.

  ‘Eat this, trash cans!’ Henk shouted, as the line opened. He peppered the cyborgs with the peashooters. Useless against a bigger ship, but deadly against ground troops with their endless rounds of fast-moving energy projectiles. The cyborgs stumbled backwards as bits of their armour clanked off under fire.