A Taste Of Despair (The Humal Sequence) (7 page)

“Look at this!” She complained, lifting a leg up onto the table and pulling the leg of her trousers up.

“Looks like a leg to me. What’s the issue?” Hamilton asked. He could already see, but Klane would vent no matter what he said. He might as well help her along with it.

“Exactly!” She exclaimed. “It looks like a leg. That’s the whole problem!”

“I don’t get it.” Hamilton said innocently.

She scowled at him. “Sure you do. It looks like a leg. It acts like a leg. It even feels like a leg! That’s the issue!”

“At least you don’t have to have Carl lug you around anymore.” Hamilton observed.

Klane gritted her teeth. “It’s just a normal leg! Cybernetic, sure, but with no enhancements! I couldn’t kick my way out of a wet paper bag with this thing!” She backhanded it with her cybernetic arm, knocking the limb off the table.

“Shit!” She cursed. “It also has skin sensors built in. It hurts like a bitch whenever I give it any kind of punishment!”

“So now you feel pain just like the rest of us?” Hamilton asked.

She nodded angrily. “It’s less than useless.”

“You know,” Jones pointed out. “I did offer to adjust the settings. How hard can it be?”

“I doubt the servos can be cranked up to my requirements. Plus the myomer bundles are not mil-spec. They’d probably snap if you did that. And anyway, the access port, as I told you before, is on the inside of the thigh. You ain’t going anywhere near that!”

“Just as well,” Jones muttered. “One twitch from you and I’d end up with a broken neck!”

“Can it, you two!” Hamilton ordered. “We have more important things to discuss.”

Klane subsided, glaring at Jones, who scowled back at her.

“So what have you learned?” Hamilton inquired.

Jones sighed. “We all told the story we agreed upon, even to these guys.” He jerked a thumb at the
Ulysses
crewmen. “They – the officers, anyway – say you know their Captain?”

Hamilton nodded. “I met him years ago. Did a little job for Internal Affairs that turned into a major job. A lot of heads rolled. Unfortunately, in the aftermath, certain people were deemed to know too much and got shafted. Rames is one of them.”

“So he’s not too fond of you, then?” Klane observed.

Hamilton shrugged. “He doesn’t blame me. He blames the current top brass. You remember what it was like? Anything embarrassing gets swept under the carpet. Individuals mean nothing compared to showing a squeaky clean image. Rames is pissed at them, even after all these years. That’s partly why he agreed to help us on this.”

“Won’t he get in trouble if they find out?” Jones asked.

Hamilton nodded. “Court-martialed, almost certainly. Lose his commission and end up in a prison someplace. The rest of us the same.”

“No pressure, then.” Jones muttered.

“What are you worried about?” Klane grumbled. “You were a criminal, anyway!”

“An un-caught criminal!” Jones added. “I’d like to keep it that way!”

“Look.” Hamilton said. “If we stick to our story, they can’t prove anything.”

“Seems like a poor choice, to me.” Jones argued. “Either Walsh turns up and tries to kill us! Or he doesn’t and we get released and spend the rest of our lives looking over our shoulders.”

“I doubt we’ll get the second option.” Hamilton noted.

“You really think he’ll try and get to us in here?” Klane frowned.

“I don’t know what he might do.” Hamilton replied. “All I am certain of is that he looks upon humans as a child race. He doesn’t respect anything we’ve done, or what we are. I wouldn’t put it past him to waltz in here and try to gun us all down personally. He has that much arrogance.”

“Well, we’re poorly equipped to defend ourselves if he does.” Klane observed.

“Five years is a long time for him to be around. There’s no telling how many people his kind have infected, or what systems he’s compromised.” Hamilton said, gloomily.

“What’s the worst case scenario?” Klane asked.

Hamilton mulled it over. He’d given it significant thought already.

“Worst case is he built a new ship and went back to that Humal world and freed his fellows. Worst case is that thousands of Walsh’s are walking around, in positions of power, each with god knows how many other humans slaved to them like Vogerian was slaved to Walsh. Worst case is that his kind are into all the major computer networks across human space. Worst case is, he can bring the Empire to its knees almost at will. Worst case is that we’ll all be dead in a few days.”

The pair were silent for a long time.

Jones blew out his cheeks. “So, why hasn’t he done that already? Brought the Empire down, I mean.”

Hamilton shrugged. “Maybe he’s changed his plans. Maybe the role of puppet-master appeals to him. Maybe he wants humans as hosts for more of his kind. Who knows?”

“Maybe he didn’t get back here at all?” Klane said, optimistically. Her face said she didn’t believe it though.

“So what’s our next step?” Jones asked.

“We wait.” Hamilton told them. “That’s all we can do right now. Rames and I have some plans in place, depending on what happens in the next few days. Until, and unless, Walsh shows his hand, all we can do is wait.”

*****

Rames showed up a few hours later, looking irritated and tired. He went and spoke to Grimes and Anderton, then the three of them joined up with Hamilton, Klane and Jones and retired to the ‘quiet’ alcove. Outside, the crew began to make more noise than usual to help cover any sounds of talking the six made in the booth.

Hamilton introduced Klane and Jones. Typically, Klane’s red prosthetic eye gained concerned looks.

Jones, seeing the reaction, leaned across to the other two and whispered. “Don’t stare at her eye…it drives her crazy!” He got an elbow in the ribs from Klane as he sat back. Clearly she had heard him.

The other two were introduced by Rames as his Executive Officer Grimes and Chief Medical Officer Anderton.

“You can trust them.” Rames told them.

Hamilton had met both men, but Rames had kept everyone else away from him. Other than doing typical medical tests, Anderton had said little during the trip back to Tantalus Station. He seemed content to let his Captain call the shots.

Hamilton reminded everyone, in brief, of what was going on.

There were questions from Rames and his two men, of course. That was inevitable. Hamilton had already filled them in as best he could, but there was too much that he didn’t know about Walsh to be of much help in answering their questions. The hardest part for any of them to get their heads around seemed to be the fact that they couldn’t do anything until Walsh showed his hand. Waiting around for the enemy to attack was not in their nature as military men.

Anderton frowned at them. “There must be some way we can use to detect who is one of these ‘possessed’ people, and who isn’t? Some sort of brain scan, perhaps?”

Hamilton nodded. “Probably. I doubt these aliens would give off the same sorts of results as a human would. The problem is, they aren’t going to line up to be scanned.”

Anderton nodded. “Hmmm. We’d need some sort of passive, quick scan. Something that could be attached to a fixed point and scan people as they passed by, without their knowledge.”

“Maybe something that could be built into existing weapon scanners at ports?” Grimes offered.

“Perhaps.” Hamilton allowed. “But that would require cooperation from the authorities. If we go public on this, Walsh and his allies will probably go into a sterilization mode, destroying everything and everyone they come across. At the moment, for whatever reason, he hasn’t done that. If we show ourselves as a threat, he’ll have to act.”

“It’s a big risk, just sitting here like this.” Rames stated. “There’s nothing to stop him simply flying a ship past the station and blowing the hell out of Q-section.”

Grimes scowled. “But that would mean his death, too. Any aggressive act towards the station would result in overwhelming retaliation by the Tantalus’ defenses.”

“It wouldn’t be him, as such.” Hamilton pointed out. “Remember, he controlled Vogerian through some sort of implant. If he decided to go down that route, the ship would be crewed by such people. But don’t worry, he won’t do that.”

“How can you be so sure?” Rames asked. “It’s what I’d do, if I were him. Didn’t you say he threatened to nuke you from orbit on that planet?”

“That was different. He pulls a stunt like that here and all kinds of people are going to get suspicious. Questions will be asked, people will start poking around. As I already said, for some reason he wants his presence to go unnoticed.”

“So you think he’s going to just walk in here for a face-to-face?” Grimes looked skeptical.

“No. But he’ll want to talk. It’s part of his arrogance. He’ll hack into the comms network, or send a slaved human in to talk. Something like that.” Hamilton replied.

“All we can do is wait?” Grimes didn’t look happy.

Hamilton nodded. “All we can do is wait.”

CHAPTER FOUR

The waiting lasted two more days. During the wait, the automated systems kept them supplied with food and drink and the facilities kept them occupied. But two days waiting for the hammer to fall wore on them.

Lewis did not appear, leading to further speculation that she had sold them down the river and worked a deal of her own with the authorities. Whatever the reason for her absence, it was too late for them to worry about it now.

Eventually, however, Walsh made his move. It came not as any of them had expected. As they sat around, discussing the situation at hand, or old times, a computerized voice warned them all to stand clear of the entryway.

Seconds later, a man in a protective biohazard suit entered, looked around and, seeing nothing untoward, lay a small package down on the ground. The speaker in his suit announced that there was a “delivery for a Mr. Hamilton, from a Mr. Walsh.” Then the man turned and stepped back through the Q-section door into the decontamination corridor beyond and was gone before they could ask any questions.

Hamilton and the others approached the package warily.

“Do you think it’s a bomb of some sort?” Jones asked.

Rames shook his head. “Explosives wouldn’t get past the port scanners.”

“No explosives we know about.” Klane added.

“No.” Hamilton frowned. “It’s not his style. Not right now, anyhow.”

“Why let us know it was from him?” Grimes inquired.

Hamilton shrugged. “He has a sense of theater, or drama. It seems to be the way he does things.”

“We could just ignore it.” Jones suggested.

“No, that’s exactly what we can’t do.” Hamilton said. He bent down and picked up the box. It was a standard transport carton, in use all across the Empire. The difference was that it had no transit markings of any sort. Whatever it contained, the box had originated on the station. Which meant that the deliverer probably had something to do with Walsh.

Or he could just be some patsy paid a few credits to deliver it
. Hamilton thought. He walked back over to the comfortable lounge area with the box and sat down. The transit seals were still in place on the box.

The rest of the two ship’s crews followed and sat around him, eager to know what it was. Rames had told his crew a little more over the last two days. Not the truth about Walsh, but just that he was a dangerous individual that they were trying to catch.

Hamilton snapped the seals and lifted the carton’s lid, revealing a small, dark gray box several inches square. Hamilton reached in and removed it, then cleared the carton from the table he sat at and placed the box in front of him. There was an obvious button on the top of it.

Hamilton hovered a finger over it. “Just in case, you might want to stand back a bit.” He advised the rest. They moved away a little, but not that much. Hamilton prodded the button with a finger.

The box began to change shape then. Parts slid aside and flipped. Other areas rotated. Some pieces even folded over onto themselves via some manner. It quickly became apparent what the device was turning into.

“It’s a communicator of some sort.” Klane observed.

The box was becoming a communicator. The sort that was frequently used by anyone in human space. Essentially a box-like base with a few controls and a flip-up screen. Quite why the box was making such a meal of the opening procedure was beyond Hamilton.

“It’s a little ostentatious.” Rames scowled.

“I did say he liked drama, didn’t I?” Hamilton muttered.

After what seemed like minutes the device finally stopped moving and the communicator sat ready. Unlike the units everyone was familiar with, this one had only a single button, marked “communicate”.

Hamilton looked around at everyone, then shrugged and pressed the button.

Almost at once a man’s image appeared on the little screen. Hamilton had never seen him before, but there was no mistaking the smug look that he gave Hamilton.

“Hamilton! Dear boy! I’m so glad to see you again!” The Walsh-that-did-not-look-like-Walsh said.

Hamilton scowled. “Walsh. I see you made it to human space in one piece.”

Walsh smiled. “No thanks to you! I don’t know what you did to my ship, but it caused no end of problems.”

“Glad I could help out.” Hamilton muttered.

“Ultimately, your exploits caused delays, nothing more.” Walsh explained. “As you people say, ‘the fly in the ointment’. An annoyance, but nothing more. Once you pick it out of the ointment and flick it away, it might as well have never existed at all!”

Rames, Klane, Grimes and Jones made their way to where they could see the screen.

“If I’m such a minor nuisance,” Hamilton asked. “How come you went to all this trouble to talk to me?”

“Honestly? Curiosity, mostly. I just wondered what you were trying to accomplish with this quarantine nonsense of yours? I’d have thought simply flying off into obscurity to plot and plan against me was the more likely outcome.”

“That was the plan.” Hamilton admitted. “But circumstances altered that.”

“And now here you are.” Walsh grinned. “Trapped in the quarantine section of a space station on the edge of nowhere. Not just you, but all of the crew of the Hope’s Breath. And you’ve found some replacements for those you managed to get killed last time out. How nice!”

Rames muttered. “I can see why you hate this guy. But he doesn’t seem all that dangerous. Wacko, maybe.”

Walsh wore a look of tolerant amusement. “Ah yes! Captain Rames, of the
Ulysses
. So good to meet you! I see from the sealed military records of your career that you’ve worked with Hamilton here before. I also see that working with him cost you any real career advancement options. How is life out there on the frontier? Enjoying it?”

“Don’t let him get to you.” Hamilton advised. “He likes to needle people.”

Walsh pouted. “Now Hamilton! Is that any way to talk about a friend?”

“What do you want this time Walsh? I see you’ve singularly managed to fail to destroy humanity, as you promised last time.”

Walsh’s smile returned. “That was then. I was young, impressionable. Turns out when I got here I didn’t have half the numbers of my kind that I hoped for. I wonder who could be responsible for that, eh? Anyway, I quickly outfitted another ship and returned to gather up my abandoned comrades.”

“Shame I didn’t hang around then. I could have finished what I started with the Hope’s Breath.” Hamilton scowled.

Walsh nodded. “Yes, it was a shame. I was so looking forward to finding out what happened and meeting you again. You can imagine my disappointment when you weren’t there. Of course, I expected some sort of sabotage, so I brought a ship equipped with large amounts of data storage for my kind to occupy. It’s a very common type of memory array, I believe you call them people!”

“Sonuva…” Klane muttered.

“So I wasn’t there. A shame for both of us.” Hamilton said. “So you just loaded up your programs into the people and headed back?”

“Essentially.” Walsh admitted. “But, you know, whilst I was having the second ship built I did my best with the units I had to try and learn a little about what had happened during the war between the Humals and my kind. It was difficult. Your ignorant species knows next to nothing of the Humals. All you seem to be interested in is the technological gains you can make from them. Suffice to say I had to send my own ‘experts’ to look into the matter. Their findings convinced me that I should consider keeping your species around for a while.”

“Why was that?”

Walsh shrugged. “It’s not very clear what happened. We were winning in that war. The Humals were on the ropes, so to speak. Then…nothing. It’s as if everyone just vanished. Humal and Jada-Ko-Vari alike. Very perplexing, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Well, I’m sad the Humals vanished…” Hamilton smiled.

“Ah, Hamilton. Now who’s trying to needle who?”

“Anyway,” Hamilton continued. “So you got your people back here. Then what?”

“Always fishing for information. Children are always so inquisitive.”

“Just tell us what you’re doing, why you sent this communicator here, what you intend doing with us. The whole nine yards!” Hamilton growled.

“I’m getting to it!” Walsh shook his head. “Very child-like, getting upset so easily. You should maybe seek some sort of counseling for that. I hear they have very good programs for that sort of thing where you’re going.”

“And where might that be?” Hamilton sighed. He was tired of playing with Walsh already.

Walsh grinned. “In a moment. Allow me to have my fun, first! As I was saying, I collected my people from that world where I abandoned you. Then we went on to gather more of my kind from other worlds I knew about. Then we came back here to begin our preparations. As I mentioned, I had already decided it might be prudent to hang onto your species for a while, until I discovered what had happened in the war. So we did other things. We insinuated ourselves into your computer systems and took over your people – the important ones anyway – as a precaution. Occupied your capital ships, your system communications nets. In fact, we’re pretty much everywhere now. There isn’t much that happens anywhere now that we are not made almost immediately aware of.”

“Great. I’m very happy for you.” Hamilton sighed.

“Thank you!” Walsh continued, ignoring the sarcasm. “In fact, the minute the
Ulysses
log transmissions made it to Tantalus Station I was aware of your return. I must say it sent a warm glow through me when I realized you were still alive. I thought of all the fun we’d had aboard the Hope’s Breath. I hoped we might enjoy some more such moments. But I assumed you’d simply tell the local authorities what had happened and then there’d be a problem.”

“I figured as much.” Hamilton admitted.

“To my surprise, however, you decided to lie and hide the truth. I assume you didn’t trust your own kind not to meddle. Very wise of you. Of course, they’d have found nothing at the Humal world we went to. I’d already cleaned it out and obliterated the evidence. However, that obliteration would have been evidence that something had gone on. As you no doubt surmised, questions would be asked, people and systems would be examined and so on. Eventually your species would have discovered us, or one of our slaved humans. Then it would mean all out war which, you appreciated, wouldn’t go at all well for your species.”

“You might be surprised at how well we fight!” Rames said angrily.

Walsh shrugged. “Oh you’d fight! I know that. But you’d die anyway. I and my nearly ten thousand cohorts, have had five years to prepare, after all!”

There was a silence that greeted his numbers.

“Yes. Ten thousand. As I said, we’re everywhere now. Shall I tell you how it would go? First we’d kill that StellarNet of yours. All your systems become isolated. You’d send ships to act as messengers. Those we controlled would simply vent their compartments to space and become flying missiles under our command. Those ships we didn’t control would meet untimely ends at the hands of our own ships, of which we have a large number now. All very much advanced compared to anything you have. Your worlds would die a horrible death at the hands of various bio-warfare agents we’ve hidden on all of them. Stations would have power core overloads, outposts would be systematically eliminated. Those who fled in ships would be hunted down methodically and exterminated. Our best projections indicate effective extinction of your species in as little as ten days.”