A Taste Of Despair (The Humal Sequence) (6 page)

Even that hadn’t gone well. The suits told him the ship had been in hyperspace for five years. The engines only just keeping it within that grey realm. Apparently their repairs hadn’t been quite as good as they had hoped.

But he was alive now, that was the main thing. So were all the others, as far as he knew. All he needed to do was to get through this farce of an investigation.

As he finished recounting his fake story once again, the suits sat back, activated their privacy fields and muttered to one another. Hamilton had picked up the odd bit of lip-reading, but was by no means fluent in it. He picked up the odd word or phrase.

Bullshit. Hiding something. Liar.

So they knew it was a lie, or suspected strongly. That wasn’t much of a surprise. Every time Hamilton told the tale it sounded more and more unlikely. The question was what they were going to do about it.

Along with their obvious disbelief, however, was a more curious aspect. After each re-telling of the story, they usually asked him questions. Mostly they were questions concerning his story, but there was also the occasional question concerning the
Morebaeus
that was anything but relevant, to his mind.

How much of the cargo had been disturbed?
Was one of them. At first, Hamilton had assumed they were wondering if the cargo was salvageable, or worth anything.

But then came.
Was there anything unusual on board?

He answered as best he could. There were only one or two of these questions per session, but they were never repeated, unlike earlier, relevant questions. It became clear to him that there was something about the
Morebaeus
’ cargo that they were interested in. Some part of it, or something hidden within the cargo itself. He was able to answer those questions easily, since he had no notion what they were going on about. But it puzzled him, since it almost seemed like they were more interested in the cargo, than in his ridiculous story.

He waited patiently for a good ten minutes whilst they held their discussions. Finally, the chairman leaned forward and, deactivating the privacy field, addressed Hamilton.

“Well, Mr. Hamilton. Thank you again for your continued cooperation with this investigation. I’m sure you can appreciate that we wish to get the facts completely straight before we render a judgment on this situation.”

Hamilton nodded. He’d heard this line before.

“On the other hand, we can see no further purpose in holding you in medical isolation. You are therefore released into the open quarantine section of this station. Some of your fellow crewmembers have already been released. The rest will follow in due course. I’m afraid you won’t be able to leave the quarantine section until our investigation is concluded, but at least you’ll have some company. Once again, thank you for your assistance.”

And, just like that, it was over. A guard escorted him back to the holding cell he’d been occupying for the last three weeks. More of a medical isolation chamber than a cell or a room. He gathered the few possessions they’d allowed him to keep – mostly his clothes – and then he was taken to the quarantine section. He passed many other doors to chambers like the one he’d just vacated. All shut and sealed. He wondered how many of their expedition were still languishing behind those doors and how many had been released.

When the doors to the quarantine section opened to admit he half expected to see Klane or Jones waiting for him. But there was no one. Evidently nobody had called ahead to let them know he was coming. He felt slightly put out by that. Instead, there was just a corridor leading away.

The quarantine, or Q, section was built up against the outside of Tantalus Station’s hull. Along the corridor he’d just entered, a series of large steelglass windows allowed the observer to look out beyond the station’s skin. Hamilton saw that the Q-section was in the upper part of the station. Below, many levels away, he could see the central berthing ring and its attendant ship hangars and docking arms. In fact, from here he could make out the
Morebaeus
. The freighter was at the very end of a docking arm, no doubt quarantined itself and off-limits to all but the forensics teams that were undoubtedly scouring it for evidence. From this distance, Hamilton saw that it seemed quite small, especially compared to the vastness of the station. But a quick look at the other vessels docked nearby showed the optical illusion for what it was. No other ship within his angle of view came near to the freighter’s bulk. One of the seemingly tiny vessels right next to it was almost certainly the
Ulysses
. Rames’ ship. It would have easily fitted inside just one of the bulk freighter’s cargo modules.

Sighing, Hamilton turned away from the windows and continued down the corridor. It was a measure of how enormous Tantalus Station was that, despite the corridor being up against the hull, there was little discernible curve to the corridor. It would even have dwarfed the Humal station they’d discovered.

Hamilton had heard of the station before – it was being built years before he had joined Vogerian’s expedition - so he assumed the structure had been completed within the last few years during his prolonged cryo-stasis. He hadn’t expected it to be so big, though. Clearly the Imperial coffers had far too much money in them. A station a quarter the size would have served just as well.

At the end of the corridor there was another door, which gave onto a kind of reception room. Like the corridor, there were windows that allowed a view outside. An officious looking individual sat behind a curving desk, looking bored. Hamilton ambled over to him, noting the second door in the adjacent wall.

“Good day to you sir!” The man stated. His voice was cheerful enough, but his eyes said “terminally bored”. “How may I help you?”

Hamilton smiled at him. “It appears I have been released from isolation. The name’s Hamilton. James Hamilton.”

The man nodded and consulted a display out of Hamilton’s sight. “Ah yes! Mr. Hamilton. Welcome to Q-section.”

Hamilton nodded. “What’s the drill?”

The man punched some keys, then handed Hamilton a key card. “This is a key to your personal quarters. You’ll also need it to access the section’s facilities and obtain food and so on. The section’s rules are simple. Make no trouble and don’t try and leave the section or enter the rest of the station. If you break any of those rules, you’ll end up back in isolation. Understood?”

Hamilton nodded. “Like crystal.”

“Good. Then I wish you a pleasant stay and I hope you’ll be released completely as soon as possible.”

“Gee! Thanks.” Hamilton said, injecting what he hoped was the right amount of sarcasm into his voice.

“Any questions?” Either the man was used to it, or the sarcasm had gone right over his head.

“I think I can take it from here.” Hamilton told him.

The corner of the man’s mouth twitched.

Got you that time!

“Then by all means, make your way through.” There was no cheerfulness in the man’s tone now.

Hamilton took his new card and went over to the second door. As expected, it had a slot to one side. Hamilton pressed his card into it and the door slid open silently.

The corridor that led off was carpeted, at least, unlike the purely functional ones he’d walked along so far. A four-way intersection was just ahead, so he walked up to it, passing doors on either side labeled
medical
and
gymnasium
. Further signs to the left and right told him that guest quarters and other facilities lay in those directions. He was interested in the straight ahead route, though, for the simple reason that he could hear talking and laughter coming from it. The sign above the corridor read
lounge area
.

There was no door to the lounge area. The corridor just opened straight into it. A variety of tables, chairs, comfortable benches and little alcoves dotted the place. It was designed to be all things to everyone. A utilitarian mess area, a quiet drinking hole, a comfortable relaxing zone. It all depended on where you sat.

The area was well occupied. Hamilton saw most of the dozen or so people he’d gone into cryo with. He also saw a number of the crewmen from the
Ulysses
. Most of them seemed content to keep to themselves, but a handful were sitting amongst Hamilton’s companions, chatting amiably.

Jones spotted him first and raised a shout. Soon, Hamilton found himself surrounded by his companions, each asking what he had said, how the interviews went and so on. All of his former crewmates were there with the exceptions of McDonald, Lewis and the
Morebaeus
survivor, King. Hamilton knew McDonald was dead from his conversation with Rames and King was little more than brain-dead after so long in the old cryo-tubes. It was no surprise that they weren’t there. But Lewis was another matter. The unhinged planetologist had no fondness for Hamilton. It wouldn’t have surprised him to find out she’d squealed on the whole thing and tried to cut a deal.

All of the
Ulysses
crew were present as well, barring Rames and the entire contingent of Marines. It seemed as if the inquest had quickly decided who was in charge of each group and had kept them back for longer questioning. Most of the rest had been interviewed just the once before being released into Q-section. The only exception was Klane, unsurprisingly, who had endured two full interviews and then a question session before she was allowed to rejoin the rest.

The
Ulysses
crew had already filled in Hamilton’s companions on his reanimation and questioning by Rames. None of them knew what had been said between the two men and they had no idea beyond the obvious interception of the freighter what was going on. Rames had told them to cooperate with the investigation fully and not hold anything back. Not that they knew anything to hold back.

That was one of the things that had set alarm bells ringing in Hamilton’s head during his questioning. Despite mentioning it himself, and no doubt the
Ulysses
senior officers saying as much, the interviewers had never asked him about his conversation with Rames in the med-bay. Not once. They were more interested in the cargo than in what the men might have said to one another.

Once exposed to the
Ulysses
crew, Hamilton’s shipmates had spun them the same fake story they had all agreed upon, just in case there were any further question sessions to come. Rames himself had suggested it, but hadn’t been happy about deceiving his own crew. But they all needed to sing from the same hymn sheet, as it were. Rames wanted his crew to be ignorant of the deception, in case it all went pear-shaped.

Once introductions had been concluded, Hamilton took Jones and Klane aside into one of the alcoves. A large number of fake plants had been arranged around alcove, cutting off the sight of anyone who might be watching. As Hamilton had attempted to do in his interviews, lip-reading was a possibility. Unlike Hamilton, however, the software that did it was far more accurate at working out what was being said. The plants precluded that possibility.

Jones produced a small tangle of wires and circuitry from his pocket and set it on the table. He connected up a couple of wires and a steady orange light began to glow from somewhere amid the tangle.

“Where did you get that from?” Hamilton asked. None of them had any possessions on them other than clothing.

Jones shrugged. “I made it.”

“Don’t tell me they have an electronics shop around here.” Hamilton joked.

Jones grinned. “Nah. But it’s amazing what components you can find lying around the place.”

Klane snorted. “They were only lying around after I put my foot through your room’s terminal.”

Jones nodded. “You’re big and scary, but you do have your uses.”

“Gee thanks!” Klane muttered. Despite the comment, she seemed to be pleased by the black man’s assessment.

“I see they did some repairs on your cybernetics.” Hamilton noted to Klane.

Jones groaned. “Oh! Now why did you have to go mentioning that.”

Hamilton frowned at Jones. But his attention was drawn back to Klane, whose expression had darkened towards anger.