by Eric Thomson
“Are you trying to stare a hole through the bulkhead, Zack?”
“What?” Decker broke out of his deep thoughts and turned his head towards her. Then, he grinned. She looked magnificent, like a marble statue, the muscles beneath her dusky skin rippling, her small breasts rising with every breath she took. Before his reaction could become too visible, he turned over on his stomach.
“Just reviewing the attack, seeing what else I could have done. Guess I'm too keyed up to sleep yet.” And you aren't helping one bit, lady. Now either jump me or go away.
To his disappointment, she vanished into the small lavatory. When she returned, Zack's eyes were drilling through the bulkhead again, and she didn't interrupt him.
Without a word, Nihao shut the lights and went to bed. Her conscience must have been clear because she fell asleep at once. Not Zack. For him, sleep wouldn't come, and he rose to take his regular day watch still as pensive as he had been hours earlier.
*
The coordinates Fourth Officer Gareth had fixed after the micro jump were good and Shokoten reached the more densely traveled space lanes without further problems.
Either the pirates had given up, or they could not track them. There was no way for anyone aboard the freighter to tell which. Sensors were limited in hyperspace and completely useless aft where the 'wake' of the hyperdrive scrambled everything.
In due course, Shokoten reached Itrul and dropped out of hyperspace unmolested. She swung into orbit and waited for the primitive spacecon to assign them a landing corridor.
Itrul was close to Earth norm but much drier and warmer. Its oceans were small, and its landmasses broad. The seven major continents, one of which spanned a quarter of the surface of the planet, were arid, especially so in the center where the moisture from the seas never reached. Cloud cover was sparse, revealing a mottled globe, tan or light brown in color, broken by irregular patches of dark blue or black. Very little green showed from high orbit.
“Looks like a charming place,” Zack muttered as his sensors gave him a running commentary on the world below. “Sand, lots of it, and sentient reptiles who'd just as soon kill you as look at you.”
“Now, now, Gunner. Don't be so prejudiced,” Darhad murmured from the captain's chair. “You know Itrulans only from your bloody encounters with them. They are, on the whole, interesting people. Fierce, yes, warlike too. But they have a strong sense of honor, and they're very, very tough. Evolving on an arid world like this takes good genes.”
“Didn't evolve very far until we found 'em, and more's the pity. We should've left the bastards to continue in their old ways. Might have wiped each other out.”
“Maybe, maybe not, Gunner. When we land, visit. We will have plenty of time for you to explore. It's not as bad as you may think.”
“Not too quick on the cargo handling, are they?”
“They lack the technology, Mister Decker. Everything on Itrul is still done by hand or with animal power. They have only one spaceport, Tanira. The rest of the planet is roughly at Earth's fourteenth-century levels.”
“Huh,” Zack grunted. “Means that someone's keeping all the goodies to himself.”
“Quite correct.” Yes, Diego was right, she thought. Our former Marine sergeant was a lot smarter than we gave him credit. “The Akmin of Tanira, the title I believe can be loosely translated as Sultan, is the most powerful of the many feudal rulers on Itrul, and he is the nominal overlord of the main continent. He keeps most of the technology for himself and his household, preferring to give only dribs and drabs to the lesser lords and nothing at all to the people.”
“I'll bet he's slowly getting full control of the planet, thanks to the advanced tech we nice spacers sell him. Plus, of course, any Itrulan merc who makes it home in one piece after a few years with high-tech outfits is one hell of an addition to his household troops.”
Armed with the marvelous contraband weapons down in the cargo hold, the Akmin was about expand his empire very quickly.
“I always figured there were regulations against fucking up an alien civilization by giving them stuff they aren't ready to have for another couple of centuries.”
“Only where the writ of the Commonwealth, or more precisely, the power of the Navy runs. In the Protectorate, there are no rules.” Darhad didn't sound sorry. To her, it was just business, a way to make a living and let the hindmost take care of the moral issues.
“Yeah and look where it got us. Same as with the fucking Shield Cluster at the other end of the Commonwealth: sword carrying barbarian pirates in cobbled-together starships preying on anything that moves. Sort of screws up their planet's economy after a while when the bastards think of piracy as a major industry. Once it gets to that point, it becomes impossible to stop short of bombing them back to their version of the Stone Age.”
“You have a point, Mister Decker.” Darhad nodded thoughtfully, eyes on the dun-colored planet.
“Sir,” the signalman's mate called out, “we have a message from Tanira ground control. We may begin our descent.”
“Thank you. Nav, check your course and lay in.”
“Checked and laid in, sir.”
“Helm, engage.” She tapped a key on the chair's armrest. “Captain, we are descending to Tanira spaceport.”
“Acknowledged. On my way.”
*
“They make us land early, then let us wait for days before they unload the cargo. It raises the landing fees considerably.” Second Officer Bowdoin's deep, somber voice sounded mournful as he accompanied Decker on his security inspection around the ship. “The Itrulans are not very subtle, but they're greedy. It might be days before we see the stevedores.”
“I guess you've been here before?”
“Four times. Repeated visits don't make the place more congenial. I will be glad when we lift.”
They stopped at the main airlock and Decker, using his handheld sensor, swept the area.
“That's it then, sir. The ship's as secure as I can make it. There'll be two people on guard here, armed of course, and the other airlocks are hard-wired into the security system. It'll be a different kettle of antimatter when we unload, but with a full security complement.”
Bosun Kader would provide the bodies, no questions asked. Just then, footsteps sounded in the passageway and two brawny bosun's mates with plasma carbines of an obsolete but nonetheless lethal model, appeared.
“Morning, Gunner,” the elder of the two, a red-faced blonde from Farhaven Colony nodded with politeness. Farhaveners had a special place in their hearts just to hate Commonwealth Marines, but Harris didn't seem to mind Decker, or at least she didn't show it.
“Morning, Harris, Yassa. You know the sentry procedures?”
“Aye, sir.” Both nodded and Harris enumerated the rules before Zack even asked. Another of Kader's changes. She liked to have a taut crew and made sure they did everything by the numbers which was something Decker could appreciate. And did.
“Right. The duty roster's on the computer. Enjoy.”
“Thank you, sir.”
When Bowdoin and Decker had walked out of earshot of the guards, the second officer glanced at Zack.
“Do you intend to visit, Mister Decker?”
“I guess so. The first officer tells me there are a few things to see and learn, and I'm never averse to a bit of liberty. I have to maintain the tradition.”
“Ah yes, First Officer Darhad has an open mind about other cultures and civilizations.” Bowdoin's voice was carefully neutral, ensuring that his listener did not think he was criticizing his alien supervisor. But Decker's trained ear detected a hint of well-hidden dislike. Perhaps Bowdoin was xenophobic. Many humans had a hard time dealing with nonhuman sentients.
“If she recommended you visit, then go, and make up your own mind. But always watch your back. More than one spacer vanished forever in Tanira's darker alleys, though I believe you are used to rougher ways.”
Zack grinned ruefully.
“In t
he Corps, you learn to take care of yourself real fast, sir.”
“Yes, so I understand.” Bowdoin nodded, “so I understand. Well, as you told your sentries, enjoy.”
“Thank you, sir.”
*
Nihao Kiani was off on business somewhere in town when Zack returned to his cabin after reporting the ship secure. Probably a human ship chandler’s business here too. Pursers had an easy life in space, but when the ship landed they sweated their butts off. At least that’s what Zack figured.
He stripped off his battledress and took a quick shower, barely soaking his skin. Then, when he had dried off, he put on his one set of civvies. After a moment’s thought, he also slipped on his leather jacket.
It would be too warm, but the tough synth leather would protect him from any ‘accidental’ knife thrusts, and it would hide his own arsenal. He strapped his fighting knife to his right forearm and, after a moment’s hesitation, slipped his blaster in a specially designed inner pocket under his left arm. The ship’s data banks on Itrul had mentioned no strict laws or taboos against personal weapons. That didn’t mean there weren’t any, but Zack’s experiences with Itrulan mercs were enough to call for heavy ordnance.
He thrust his hands in the jacket pockets to settle it on his broad shoulders and unexpectedly, his right hand encountered something hard and metallic, about the size of a dress uniform insignia, and he pulled it out, mystified. He opened his hand and looked at the object in his palm, eyebrows shooting up in surprise. It was a metallic, gold colored Marine Corps Master Gunner insignia: a stylized representation of an antique, muzzle-loading field gun with spoked wheels.
How the hell did that get in there?
Zack opened his locker and pulled out his black Marine undress tunic, to pin the badge back on. He couldn’t repress a grunt of surprise. The Master Gunner’s badge was still there, pinned to the right breast pocket. Last time he checked, he only had one of these little beauties, the one the CO gave him on parade when he qualified. Where did the second one come from?
He turned it around in his fingers, thinking. The last time he’d worn the leather jacket had been on Pradyn. Since the evening he and Darhad had been attacked, he’d had no liberty. Personal closets on the ship had coded locks, so it was unlikely someone broke into his without leaving a trace, to slip the badge into the jacket’s pocket. It wasn’t impossible. Very few things involving humans were. But why?
And if on Pradyn, when? He would have noticed anyone drop it into his pocket because he hadn’t become all that dull yet. The trainees at the Pathfinder School Battalion hadn’t called him The Cat for nothing. He bet the stupid pickpocket who tried him out in New Aberdeen still didn’t have full use of his right arm.
Zack sat down at his desk and shook his head in puzzlement. He examined the badge again but couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. It looked just like the one on his tunic. He pulled his sensor out of the desk’s lower drawer and scanned the badge. His first scans showed precisely... nothing. It was solid alloy, even if it didn’t read like the same alloy as his real one. Then, he ran a visual check and scrutinized every bit of the badge’s surface.
Bingo!
On the back of the insignia, someone had etched a few lines of writing so small they wouldn’t show up under the naked eye. A real precision job that could only have been done by a computer-controlled micro laser. After reading the words, Zack sat back in his chair and took a deep breath, struggling to set his thoughts in order.
Why would someone give him a Master Gunner’s badge with the motto of the 902nd Pathfinders and the words Duty, Honor, Loyalty etched in letters so small you needed a sensor to read them? And what were ‘they’ trying to tell him? The Fleet had kicked him out, pensioned him off like a bad bargain.
A knock on the door broke Zack’s train of thought.
“Come.”
With a soft sigh, the panel vanished into the wall, revealing a black-clad, smiling Raisa Darhad. She wore a skin-tight sleeveless sweater that outlined her high, firm breasts like a second skin, a calf length pleated skirt and high, black boots.
Unless she hid it under her dress, there was nowhere for her to carry a weapon. Of course, she didn’t need a gun. Her built-in defenses were enough, as he had witnessed.
Zack barely restrained an appreciative whistle at her appearance, but let his eyes run admiringly over her, not caring whether she noticed. Darhad smiled at him, lips slightly parted and cocked her head. She didn’t need her empathic talents to read his attraction.
“I thought you would need a guide in town and since the captain decreed that personnel should go in pairs, and I had no one...” Her voice was inviting, almost seductive, and Decker immediately forgot all about the mystery badge.
“I would be honored, sir,” he finally stammered out.
She stepped into the cabin and noticed the shiny little object in his hand.
“What is that?”
“Oh,” Decker’s rising excitement was pushed aside as he remembered the mysterious inscription. This was not something he wanted to share. “Just my old Master Gunner’s insignia. I guess I was getting sentimental.” He opened the top drawer of his desk and dropped the badge into a small tray.
“If you have nothing else to do, why not go now?”
“Avec plaisir,” he replied, grinning.
*
The dry, flinty Itrulan air caught Zack's throat by surprise, and he coughed once, blinking his eyes against the bright, white sun.
“If this is one of their more temperate areas, I'd hate to wander into this place's version of the tropics.”
Darhad laughed.
“You get used to it, Zack. It gets better in town.”
Decker noticed she'd used his first name, the signal to drop all shipboard formality.
“I sure as hell hope so. If not, I’ll blow my pay on cold beer.”
“Come.” She touched his arm and walked into the sunshine towards the terminal building, her skirts swirling around her long legs.
Itrul had no customs to speak of; they didn't need any.
All off worlders had to sell their merchandise through the Akmin's agents, on pain of death. The lone Itrulan guard in the terminal didn't even deign to notice the human and his Arkanna companion.
As they strode through, Zack caught his first glimpse of the local architecture. Raisa had been right to say this place was still mired in their equivalent of Earth's middle ages.
The terminal building was built of cut stone, and judging by the roughness, the Itrulans had done their cutting with tools considerably more primitive than lasers. Wood beams, blackened with age, supported a slate roof. The windows were glazed, but the quality of the glass was such that it distorted everything beyond recognition. A few technological artefacts appeared here and there, looking like highly uncomfortable grafts on a primitive body. Whatever modern space traffic control and communications gear they had, wasn't displayed for all to see.
They walked along a dusty cobblestone road towards the towering ramparts of Tanira, admiring the barbarous splendor of the city. The heat was oppressive, and Zack sweated beneath his leather jacket. He began to wonder whether being armed was all that necessary if it meant melting to death.
They met a few carts, drawn by thickset, four-legged reptiles with leathery, dun-colored hide. The carters ignored the off worlders, just as they ignored the other pedestrians, Itrulan or otherwise. Covered merchandise filled the awkward wooden wagons, weighing them down enough to make the wooden axles creak in distress.
Other off worlders walked along the road, many of them from races that Zack had never encountered. They either glanced at the tall human with frank curiosity or pretended to ignore him, the latter being the typical reaction of the few Shrehari they met. Raisa Darhad though drew her share of admiring or alarmed looks.
The two spacers stopped at the foot of the giant ramparts, a few meters short of the massive, open gate. Tanira's defenses were massive. The walls, reddish cl
iffs almost fifty meters high, had been built with blocks of stone as large as a shuttlecraft. Watchtowers, rising even higher, anchored the wall every few hundred meters.
The outer defenses seemed in good repair, and Itrulan soldiers with halberds patrolled the walls, cutting barbarous silhouettes against the bright blue sky. The gate itself was large enough to admit a column of tanks three wide and higher than a battleship's hyperdrives. Metallic, studded doors, nearly a meter thick, lay open before them, recessed into the passage walls on either side.
They stepped into the shadows and merged with the flow of beings entering the city, carried into the depths of the thick walls, past soldiers wearing leather harnesses and carrying spears with strangely forged blades. When they finally emerged on the other side, they entered a fantastic metropolis redolent of an era that lay far in Earth's or Arkanna's past.
Three and four story houses built of multicolor stone were piled against each other on either side of the thoroughfare. Most sported garish signs in a script Decker couldn't decipher, advertising wares he wasn't sure he wanted to identify. Loud Itrulan merchants bellowed across the street, boasting of their wares and trying to attract customers. Exotic smells and unmistakable stenches assailed Zack's nostrils, washing away the dry flint of the open plain.
Here too, members of a dozen or more species moved among the reptilian natives, and for the first time, Zack saw a pair of humans idly haggling with an Itrulan merchant.
An open sewer ran through the middle of the cobblestone street, and Decker quickly averted his eyes from the putrefying mess that filled it. The natives seemed to ignore the stone gulley, deftly stepping over it or using the small bridges built at regular intervals.
He felt long, warm fingers grasp him as Raisa took his hand. Startled he glanced at her.
“Come,” she smiled at him, her voice cutting through the buzz of the crowd, “I will show you the Akmin's palace in Tanira's center. It merits seeing.”