In Earth's Service (Mapped Space Book 2) (32 page)

When I finished reviewing the
Merak Star’s
log, I returned to the flight deck where the timer was down to twenty minutes.
The shackle drone was drifting away from the ship and Izin’s hull crawlers were
patching the hole in our hull.

“Izin is almost done,” Jase said.

“Just in time,” I said, activating my console’s
nav-mode and selecting the Paraxos System from our TC astrographics database,
unnoticed by Jase who was watching for Drake ships. After a minute, I reset the
autonav for Duranis-A, just as Izin arrived on the flight deck and climbed onto
the third couch behind the two piloting positions.

“If a Drake ship appears, Captain,” he said, “you can
engage the superluminal drive. We’ll lose the hull crawlers, but the ship is
safe to fly.”

“The crawlers have time,” I said, more concerned
that Gern Vrate got a good read of our destination than I was for a couple of
replaceable hullbots.

Izin glanced at the destination visible on the
autonav display in front of me. “There’s no Society Exchange in the Duranis
System, Captain, only the Merak Star’s customers.”

“That’s right.”

“Are we continuing a vendetta we cannot hope to
resolve?” he asked. “Perhaps we should drop it now and wait for a better
opportunity to deal with Domar Trask.”

Jase gave me a furtive look, clearly having been thinking
the same thing. If I was just settling a personal score, they’d be right.

“If you’re looking for a paying job, the Orie
mercs all have prices on their heads.” It wasn’t true, but Lena would ante up
to preserve my cover, making it true. The Society ran a bounty board for Earth
Navy and for private security contractors, some of which were EIS kill missions
in disguise. I steered clear of them all, even the EIS hits, because I was deep
cover, not assassination. That didn’t mean I couldn’t pretend to be dishing out
vigilante justice, if it convinced them to go along with it.

“Are we bounty hunters now?” Izin asked. “Or is
this a Captain Ahab obsession?”

And Trask was my Moby Dick? Izin must be thinking
I’d lost my mind taking such risks simply for revenge.

Jase brightened, declaring with bravado, “I always
thought I’d make a good bounty hunter!”

“It’s neither,” I said, deciding to give them part
of the truth. “It’s my brother.”

“Your brother? I thought he was dead.”

“He’s Rix, Captain of the Cyclops.” And a Mataron
collaborator!

“He’s a Drake!” Jase exclaimed incredulously.

“Not just any Drake. He’s a leader, maybe
the
leader of the Drakes.”

“Damn!”

“There’s more,” I said. “The Mataron, Hazrik
a’Gitor – you remember him? He’s behind this. It’s why Gern Vrate was after me,
to hand me over to the Matarons, except I made a deal with Vrate. He doesn’t
give me to the snakeheads and I track down the three Kesarn he’s looking for.
The only way to do that is to find my brother and he’s on his way to Duranis
right now.” I turned to Izin. “It’s beyond revenge, beyond obsession, it’s
family.”

Izin’s bulging eyes blinked horizontally, a long
slow sweep he only did when his prodigious intellect was overloaded with
indecision. “A spawn matter is a heavy burden, Captain.”

“Especially when you only have one brother, not
twenty thousand,” I added meaningfully.

Izin pondered the differences between our two
species, then said, “I understand.”

I gave Jase a quizzical look.

He grinned. “I was charging weapons as soon as you
said there was a price on their heads!”

I made a mental note not to have Lena pay too many
credits for the Orie mercs. I didn’t want Jase getting a taste for bounty
hunting.

Type 1A Supernova Progenitor Companion

Red Giant Star, Duranis Binary

Evacuation Zone, Outer Draco

802 light years from Sol

Transient population

Duranis-A was a red giant, a doomed star
slowly expanding as it consumed the last of its fuel. It had already swallowed three
terrestrial planets and was threatening to do the same to the inner most gas
giant, but time was against it. Duranis-B, its tiny white dwarf companion, was now
pulling vast quantities of super heated gas from the red giant’s surface, creating
a glowing river of light arcing through the blackness of space between the two
stars. The red-orange gas spiraled down into a radiant disk surrounding the
white dwarf before falling onto the tiny white star’s surface, dramatically increasing
its mass and core temperature.

It made little Duranis-B a cosmic time bomb.

The white dwarf had entered the supernova convection
phase three centuries ago, which in cosmic terms placed it a mere heartbeat
from catastrophe. In human terms, Duranis-B would not explode for another seven
hundred years, but when it blew, its few weeks of glory would produce more
energy than the entire Milky Way galaxy would in a year.

Five thousand years ago, the Forum had ordered
every inhabited world within thirty light years to begin evacuating, within eighty
if they were aligned with the white dwarf’s axis. It was a ban on settlement
Earth Council had endorsed, which was why there were no human settlements
within forty light years and why I’d never been near the Duranis Systems.

“No ships close,” Jase reported.

“The Cyclops is out there somewhere,” I warned,
raising our battle shield.

Jase studied the transponder signals, then shook
his head doubtfully. “I don’t think so, Skipper.”

Dozens of contact markers began appearing on
screen, none of which were combat vessels. They were all civilian ships parked halfway
across the system above a yellow-brown gas giant orbiting Duranis-A twenty five
degrees from the river of gas dissecting the heavens. Far from immediate
danger, the gas giant provided an ideal vantage point for one of the most
spectacular panoramas in Mapped Space.

“No shields up, no weapons charging on any ships,”
Jase confirmed with growing confusion.

“They’re all lit up like they don’t care who sees
them,” I said, surprised.

“Wait a minute!” Jase said as he oriented our
optics toward the civilian flotilla. “I’ve got four hot spots, big ones, no
transponders. There! At the edges!”

Four dark, prolate ellipsoids turned slowly on
their axes, silently guarding the flotilla. They were Nortin Armory’s defense
platforms, the kind used for the planetary defense of Core System worlds. Bristling
with heavy weapons and loaded with shields and armor, they were reason enough for
the civilian flotilla to have no safety concerns.

At the flotilla’s center was an enormous starliner
with two rows of small ships docked along each side and dozens more in synchronized
orbits nearby. The small ships were mostly luxury yachts, executive transports and
commercial vessels while the whale in their midst was the super starliner
Aphrodite
,
an eight hundred thousand tonne palace that had no place being outside Core
System space. She was lit by thousands of lights and by her neutrino signature which
dwarfed the energy emissions of all the other ships combined. If she was a
secret raider base, she was a very conspicuous one.

“Open a channel,” I said.

“Which one?” Jase asked perplexed as his eyes
scanned all the designated commlinks. “They’re all in use.” He patched them
into the flight deck’s sound system, surfing through one channel after another.

“I want to confirm dinner reservations for a party
of ten at Pharaoh’s ...”

“... promised me an exclusive interview!”

“What do you mean KXN have the ball room?”

“... OK, ten thousand credits, but I have to be
near Vice-Chancellor Liang.”

“... our Denedus hub has twelve distribution ships
on standby, but it’ll take five months to get the datacast back there from here!”

Jase silenced the chatter. “They’re all like
that.”

“I guess we should crash the party,” I said. “Switch
on the transponder.”

“If the Drakes are out there–”

“They know enough not to tangle with those Nortin
platforms, and I don’t want them blasting us when we jump in.”

Confident we weren’t going to put Nortin Armory’s
fabled auto targeting systems to the test, we performed a sub-second
superluminal leap across the Duranis-A system to join the insects swarming
around the majestic
Aphrodite
. No one even noticed our arrival. We tried
contacting the starliner and were politely transferred from one department to
another until we were finally put in contact with a tired young woman in a
smart blue hotel uniform.

“I’m sorry, sir, but all permanent ship berths are
taken and I have a waiting list,” she said in a courteous, mildly bored tone.
“Your chauffeur can drop you at a boarding station if you wish to use the ship’s
facilities, but docking is limited to fifteen minutes per twelve hour rotation.
One thousand credits per docking cycle.”

Jase gave me an incredulous look, silently
mouthing the word ‘chauffeur’?

“What if I book a cabin?”

“Paying guests are permitted one free docking per
twenty four hours, sir. Starburst Cabins start at ten thousand credits per
twenty four hours, ranging up to one million credits per day for our Grand
Galaxy Suites. This includes full access to all facilities and complimentary
drinks in any of our casinos.”

Jase eyes widened at the exorbitant prices. “We’re
in the wrong business!”

“I’ll take the cheapest cabin,” I said.

“Unfortunately sir, the Starburst Cabins are fully
booked. The first vacancy is in four days.”

“Are you always this full?”

“Not usually. It’s because we’re hosting the Core
Systems Trade and Development Congress. If you wish to purchase Congress admission,
we have individual, corporate and sponsor level packages, however, the Opening
Night Gala Dinner is sold out.”

“Isn’t Duranis kind of remote for something like that?”

“They wanted somewhere with a spectacular view,
sir, for the networks.”

“What networks?”

“There are thirty four data streamers and over a
hundred sim-casters here, sir, including the six all-band majors from Earth.
Not all are hotel guests, of course. If you’d like the full list, I could
connect you with traffic control. This is reservations.”

“No thanks. Just give me one of your fifteen
minute, thousand credit docking slots so my chauffeur can drop me off.” I gave
Jase a wink.

He scowled, unimpressed at his ignominious demotion
from starship pilot to chauffeur.

* * * *

The
Silver
Lining
docked at an
airlock adjoining one of
Aphrodite’s
many hanger decks. The hanger was
crammed full of small craft: ferries, sub-light transports, pleasure yachts and
a row of the liner’s own white hulled, gold trimmed launches. A huge space door
dominated the hull-side bulkhead while the aft facing wall opened into a
sophisticated engineering workshop filled with white clad engineers and state of
the art repair bots.

As soon as I set foot inside the hanger, a ship security
officer in a dark uniform pointed me to a vending panel on the inboard
bulkhead, located beside a transparent pressure door. Beyond the door was a carpeted
corridor lavishly decorated with holosculptures and lightboards advertising the
Aphrodite’s
many diversions.

“Purchase your all-day
Pleasure Pass here, sir,” the vending panel announced as I approached. A
glowing red arrow pointed to an Earth Bank reader which scanned my vault key
and quickly relieved me of a thousand credits for docking the
Silver Lining
and another two thousand for unlimited access to the ship’s amenities. In
return, I received a digitized rectangular tag that opened public doors and
allowed the ship to track my movements.

“Please familiarize
yourself with the immersion code before entering. The Aphrodite’s captain and
crew thank you for your purchase and hope you enjoy your stay.”

The transparent door
slid open as a lightboard illuminated, explaining what the immersion code was.
In terse language it advised me that no stims, pressure suits, predatory
creatures, toxic organisms or weapons of any kind were permitted beyond that
point, and that scanners throughout the ship ensured the code was obeyed at all
times. While it didn’t say what the penalty for breaching the code was, I was
glad I’d followed the pre-docking advisory and left my gun on the ship.

I started down the
corridor, holding a small communicator to my lips, “Jase, can you hear me?”

“Loud and clear,
Skipper.”

The signal was
encrypted, nothing fancy, just enough to give me a few hours of anonymity.

“I’m in. Stay close in
case I have to get out fast.”

The corridor opened into
a small area bordered by an arc of translucent infopanes, beyond which was a
huge tropical pool and garden area hundreds of meters across.

“Trade congress,” I said
to one of the rectangular infopanes.

A ship’s schematic
appeared showing my present location relative to a ten thousand seat theater
called Constellation Hall, the center piece of the congress. It was flanked by
smaller auditoriums and a media center that coordinated coverage of the
proceedings.

“What’s happening at
Constellation Hall?”

“The Plenary Session is
in progress, sir. Official delegates only,” it replied, obviously aware the pass
I carried didn’t give me access. “If you would like to purchase a Congress
Package, I am authorized to–”

“No thanks.” Buying a
package would let the
Aphrodite
know where I was headed. I was already
acutely aware my all-day Pleasure Pass would tell the Nortin Armory’s robot
guns outside which ship to shoot at if I got into trouble, which was why I
needed to get my hands on a replacement.

I stepped between the infopanes
and headed toward a towering fountain spraying water over white nymph statues standing
in a shallow pool. Beyond the fountain were swimming pools, wave simulators,
diving platforms, sandy beaches and inflatables. Hundreds of people lay baking themselves
on artificial beaches beneath a blue sim-sky and radiant emitters soaking them
in tropical heat. I’d never seen so much open water on a ship before and shuddered
to think what would happen if the starliner lost power. Without artificial
gravity, thousands of metric tonnes of water would be free to float through the
ship playing havoc with sensitive electrical systems – unless the entire
chamber was engineered for such an eventuality? Sealing ships from radiation
was one thing, that was essential for survival, but making them waterproof in
case fountains and pools leaked was ridiculously extravagant.

I strolled casually
through crowds of sim-sun worshippers while my DNA sniffer area-scanned them
all. Surprisingly, I didn’t get a single hit from my encyclopedia of mankind’s
most wanted. Either the starliner’s wealthy clientele were remarkably law
abiding – unusual in itself – or someone had gone to a lot of trouble to ensure
only clean skins were aboard the
Aphrodite
for this cruise.

Once past the tropical
beach, I followed a broad spiral walkway up through the ship, slowly circling a
stand of giant photonic trees. Flocks of colorful lightbirds soared through the
open air, occasionally vanishing as they flew out of the photonorama, only to appear
at a different location as they ‘dived’ back into the enormous simulated aviary.
The flawless imagery was perfectly complemented by directional sounds and a
misty humidity that added a deceptive realism to the tropical forest.

The busy spiral walkway
wound up through nine levels of shops, beauty salons, body sculptors, casinos,
theme parks and restaurants, all overflowing with tourists unaware they were
part of a lavish deception. The
Aphrodite
might have been one of the most
extravagant starliners ever built, but it wasn’t here for the view of a cosmic
cataclysm in the making. It was hiding something else, something in plain sight
even I couldn’t see.

At the Aurora Level, I
stepped off the spiral boulevard and headed past bars and cafes toward a stun
barrier barring access to Constellation Hall. A wall of five glowing beams
crossed the avenue through a series of silver bollards, broken only by an arch
scanner in the center which verified every entrant’s credentials. Four uniformed
ship security men stood beside the arch ensuring only the anointed were allowed
to enter.

Knowing my all-day
Pleasure Pass would get me no further, I took a seat at an open air bar in
sight of the checkpoint and ordered a non-intoxicating drink. Everyone who
passed through the arch wore access chips pinned to their shirts identifying
which areas they could enter. The security guards had the broadest clearance,
but without a uniform, I wouldn’t get far with one of their chips, so I waited
for a media type, expecting they had the next best access. After twenty minutes,
a tall man carrying a short data staff and wearing a media chip came out through
the checkpoint.

I followed him to a bar
overlooking the photonorama. He took a seat and ordered from the table top
selector while I found a table from where I could watch him without being
noticed. Once settled, he ran his fingers through the holographic image projected
up from his staff, splicing together scenes for his datacast and occasionally recording
a voice over. After two drinks, his report was stream-ready for couriers to
distribute to audiences across Mapped Space. The reporter paid his tab and headed
for the men’s room. I followed a few seconds later. Inside the sparkling clean
washroom, only one sanitation booth was sealed. When he stepped out, I struck
him in the stomach, finished him with an elbow strike to the head as he doubled
over, then dragged his limp body back into the booth.