Marque and Reprisal (34 page)

There was a control, if she could just get a boot onto the hull… and the rotation from that one tenuous handhold brought her left heel down long enough to trigger it. She lost the handhold, but her foot was attached now, thanks to the emergency gripper attachment built into the boots. Now to get her other boot down… there.
So fine,
the nasty mental voice went on.
Now you’re stuck to the side of your ship like an old-fashioned bowsprit ornament, and what good does that do?
Ignoring the voice, Ky leaned over slowly and gripped the nearest external mount. The faintly adhesive pads on the glove fingers gave her a good grip. The far more adhesive pads on her boot soles
grritch
ed loose, one at a time, as she lifted one foot carefully, obtained a second handhold, put that foot back down, and then lifted the other.

The whole trick in moving on a hull without safety lines, the instructor had said, is not to do it in the first place. But just in case you’re blown out of your ship and onto an enemy ship, here’s what you can try. Move slowly. Always have three points of contact. Be aware of gravity fluctuations.

That at least she didn’t have to worry about, with her ship’s systems down. Artificial gravity bleed-through faults in the external containment were the least of her problems. Finding the air lock, for instance, was likely to be a harder task. Figuring out what to do when she found it… could wait until she found it.

The flashing beacons of the other ship stung her eyes… and gave, as she moved, intermittent glimpses of her own ship. After months in space,
Gary Tobai
’s hull was no longer as immaculate as it had been, but it still gleamed dully when the light flashed on it.

Except where the dark hole of the air lock gaped, now under her feet, just over two meters away.

Her enemy was in there. Somewhere. Armed with a ship-destroying mine, she was sure, and personal weapons as well. He could blow the ship now, but he would want to be sure she was there to see it happen, and he also wanted her implant. He would wait—at least awhile—to see if she came for him.

Clearly he could handle himself in free fall and hard vacuum, but the change from a lighted passage at one standard g to a dark passage in free fall should have done something. He should be blind, disoriented, his suit com and any electronic suit functions dead. That left his ship-killer. Had he attached it yet? Had he armed it yet?

Her implant, protected from the pulse that disabled her ship, told her the minutes and seconds since she’d left the ship. Plenty of time, if he’d gone in immediately, to attach and arm a mine, to set the delay…

She felt around the hatch edge. As on all external hatches, geometric shapes defined the top and bottom, making it impossible to attach hatches, transfer tubes, or other equipment upside down. She was at what would be the deck side, if gravity were on. Carefully, she worked her way around, keeping the hatch itself between her and whoever was inside. He should have been on the deck when the ship had gravity. What happened when the systems went out would depend on what he was doing, but his mental orientation should still be that the deck was down and the overhead up… whereas in free fall it did not matter.

She eased cautiously into the air lock, as flat against the bulkhead as possible to occlude as little of the starfield… in case his vision had returned. Through her gloves, she felt some vibration, as something collided with the surfaces of the escape passage. She dialed down her own faceplate’s transparency and turned up the implant’s visual display to full bright. Working off the suit’s external monitors, it gave her a ghostly pale sense of a tube with something lumpy moving erratically in it. She couldn’t identify the mine she was sure the enemy had brought aboard, or how far away he was. She needed light.

Her suit light, up to full power, blazed, searing the passage with brilliant white light—she knew that, though her view was blocked by her mirrored visor, by her enemy’s response. She had the one bit of luck she’d prayed for: he’d been facing aft, and the light hit him full in the face, half blinding him before his faceplate could adjust. The arm thrown up across his faceplate, the rotation that gave him, all gave her an instant in which to scan the passage for the… and there it was. At the moment, flat on what would be the deck… but whether already adhered and armed, or just there accidentally, she didn’t have time to find out at the moment.

She pushed off the hinges of the outer hatch, turning her light off, aiming at the spot she wanted with the clean image her exterior vid had picked up and recorded. She bounced off the bulkhead just beyond the inner hatch, flicked the light on and off again quickly, to let the vids pick up enough to refine their image. Though it seemed agonizingly slow, this zigzag approach got her to him before he had controlled his own rotation. Then, her light blazing directly into his faceplate, she struck, the saw-bladed knife ripping into his suit fabric.

He was bigger, heavier, undoubtedly more experienced in space brawls onship and off. He clutched her arms, pushed off the bulkhead, moving them perilously back toward the outside—and worse, toward the mine on the deck. Another kick, off the overhead, and she knew they would hit it if she didn’t change their vector. Twist, curl up to spin faster, stretch to slow… like a grotesque ballet, they rebounded again and again from bulkhead, overhead, deck, missing the mine by centimeters several times and only because Ky had marked it on her implant’s view and instinct drove the maneuvers that avoided it.

She got one hand loose, briefly, and ripped her gun from its holster, remembering as she did the salesman’s comments on zero-g and variable-g gunfights. No matter. Recoil would give her a vector she could not control, but she could not wait for something better.

The first shot shattered on impact, the many fragments each sharp enough to slice through a pressure suit. Her arm jerked back; she fought it into position and fired again, again, again. The helmet would be armored, as hers was; he might wear torso armor… but the legs, the arms…

Even in the created view her monitors gave her, where his blood was shown turquoise—the smaller droplets pale, the large blobs dark—it was grotesque. His grip on her other arm first clutched tighter, then loosened—the force of the impacts moved him away from her, and she was pushed back. Now she was no longer centimeters away, but a meter… another meter. Again. Again. She dialed her faceplate’s protection down, slowly, letting her eyes adjust, seeing finally in true colors what she had done.

It was still shocking, how red the blood looked, how much blood hung in the passage in patches of red mist, blobs, strings. His suit leaked foam sealant from a hundred holes, too many… arms and legs motionless, imprisoned by the suit’s attempt to save his life. The face inside the helmet looked gray now, the eyes wide. But still alive. He blinked. Beyond him was the black maw of the open air lock hatch. The way he was moving, he would rebound from the bulkhead before he floated away. Ky bumped gently into some surface and pushed off in pursuit.

She caught him as he hit the bulkhead; she had a leg locked on either side of the inner air lock hatch. When she pulled the head close, his eyes stared into hers. Osman. Rage greater than before rose in her like a tide of light. His eyes shifted, back to where the mine was positioned. Then he grinned at her, and stuck out his tongue.

“You killed my parents,” Ky said conversationally. He could not hear, but he could no doubt figure out what she might be saying. “You killed my brothers, and my uncle, and far too many people I cared about, including the ones I didn’t know.” She had him braced against the bulkhead now, immobile. “Gerry’s little girl,” she went on, as her utility knife widened holes the frangible rounds had made. “Gerry’s little spoiled bitch, I believe you said. You were going to have fun with me, you thought.” And now the knife had opened the front of his suit, along the seam, and she ran it up under the helmet seal, up through his chin, through his tongue, through the roof of his mouth.

And his eyes went blank. And she was covered with a disgusting mess, and the mine was still there. The surge of exultation, this time mixed with righteous rage, did not diminish so much as she pushed it aside. Later. Later to savor that kill, but now—now for her ship.

She eased slowly back toward the mine, brushing the vacuum-frozen flakes of Osman’s mortality off her suit, and examined the device. A standard, sturdy, inexpensive shaped-charge limpet, one of the several varieties they’d studied. Her EMP had fried its electronics, no doubt—the status telltales that should have indicated attachment and arming status were blank. If it hadn’t been attached, then she could move it—slowly and carefully. If it had, trying to pull it off would trigger the pressure-sensitive override. One standard method of determining attachment involved a short blast of compressed gas, but she had none. Except—she did: the emergency buddy-breather built into all pressure suits to allow partners to share air if necessary.

In this model the auxiliary supply tube had a safety interlock, which took her long seconds to disable, but at last she could direct a stream of air at the base of the mine. It quivered… then slowly slid across the deck. Ky let out her breath. Not yet attached.
Not yet attached
usually meant
not yet armed
—to the military anyway. Who knew what Osman had done? She used the tip of a finger and the slight current of air to tip it up, letting her see the critical undersurface. There, the nonelectronic mechanical switch showed orange. Prearmed, not fully armed. Unless Osman had changed the settings… but she didn’t think so. She could disarm it… but just in case, that would be better done somewhere else, with the charge aimed somewhere other than her ship.

Slowly, she nudged it down the escape passage, its deadly undersurface pointed away, past Osman’s corpse, now bumping on the overhead. She was about to give it a final push when she realized that would take it toward
Fair Kaleen,
now lit up but still tumbling.

It would kill her or it wouldn’t. Ky reached around and flicked the switch to disarm. Nothing happened. The mine was—or should be—inert now. She used the remnant of elastic cord at her waist to secure it to the exterior hatch, facing out, just in case, then pulled the hatch shut, dogged it, put Osman’s body in the air lock, closed and dogged the inner hatch, and at last had a moment’s leisure to consider what she might have done to her crew—her family—and her ship.

Somewhere along the passage—there—was a dataport connection. She attached a suit connector, keyed the implant, and asked for analysis.

AUTOMATIC SYSTEM RESET 92 SECONDS. OVERRIDE? Had the fight taken that long? She chose OVERRIDE. Weight landed on her shoulders and hips, then wavered, then returned. Pink snow fell to the deck. ARTIFICIAL GRAVITY FUNCTIONAL. Lights and life support should come back first. Gravity was nice, but the others were more important. She felt a vibration in her boot soles. LIFE SUPPORT FUNCTIONAL. THIS COMPARTMENT ZERO PRESSURE. REPRESSURIZE? “Pressurization reserves?” DATA UNAVAILABLE. That wasn’t good. If life support was back up, she should have access to the life-support recharge capacity, including air reserves.

She made her way to the forward end of the emergency passage. That compartment division had a window into the passage beyond, with a partial view of the rec space. She doused her light and looked in. Red emergency lights only—and aiming her suit light through the multiple layers of transparent material only gave confusing reflections. A flicker of light, then another flicker. ONBOARD POWER 65%. DEFINE LIGHT PATTERNS. Ky looked at the ship’s plan her display threw up. Bridge: light displays, one overhead light, controls. REMAINING POWER RESERVE 14.3 HOURS. So… the drive was down as well… that was a problem. Rec space: she needed to see something. One overhead light came on, showing two tables, someone slumped over a fallen chair… not good, not good. If they were all hurt… disabled—she would not think
dead,
though she already had—she needed to get where she could do some good.

“Air up emergency passage,” Ky said. The passage filled with vapor; her faceplate fogged, then cleared as its automatic functions dispersed any surface contaminant. “Temperature?”

SHIP AMBIENT TEMPERATURE 299 DEGREES STANDARD. Her implant thoughtfully provided a scale with normal shipboard range marked across the scale. Within reasonable limits.

Her suit eased its grip as the pressure rose, as the vapor slowly cleared… the pink snow now looked like what it was, smears of blood, rehydrated from the inflowing moister air. Finally—it seemed to take forever but was only minutes—PRESSURE EQUALIZED. COMPARTMENT LOCKDOWN?” Reverse,” said Ky. In front of her, the thick compartment seal slid back into its recess; she could now hear the hiss and squeal and imagine as well the power being used.

She left her helmet fastened, her suit light on. The figure in the rec area was Rafe—helmet fastened, eyes closed, but she could see the movement of his breathing. Alive. She would worry about the rest later. Up the passage to the bridge… and as she passed her cabin, she heard the sharp imperative yips of the puppy. She opened the hatch there. Toby, on her bunk, with Stella’s arms wrapped around him—both unconscious. The pup, tail wagging vigorously, yapped and scratched at them, trying to wake them up. He growled at Ky, making dashes for her boots, sniffing, backing away, his back hair raised in a miniature ruff.

She probably did smell like death, and not even warmed over. “It’s just me,” she said to the pup, who continued to wrinkle his lips at her. She backed out, closing the hatch behind her.

On the bridge, Lee was slumped in the pilot’s seat, but stirring, groaning slightly. Ky looked at the boards. Drives: red, no response. Defensive suite: standby. Communications: red, no response. Environmental: yellow, emergency power level only. Personnel: red. Nothing picked up from sensors or implants. But she knew they weren’t all dead…

Drives had to be the first priority—they needed internal power. She tried automatic restart first, without much hope, and wasn’t surprised when nothing happened. Manual restart was a long tedious sequence that led to nothing but the discovery that there was no longer any electrical connection from the bridge engine controls to the drive.

“Power consumption analysis?”

40% ARTIFICIAL GRAVITY GENERATOR.

Of course. How had she forgotten that? “Cut to twenty-five percent, refigure reserve.”

28.6 HOURS.

That was something. Not enough, but something.

“Uhhhh… ow!” That was Lee.

“Lee… talk to me; it’s the captain.”

“Don’ wanna talk… my head…”

“Lee!” She went around in front of him and unsealed her own helmet. The stench from her suit almost made her gag. “Lee, what is it? What hit you?”

His eyes opened, the left one bloodshot, his gaze unfocused. “Captain… when ya ge’ back? Where… we… are?”

She couldn’t see any sign of head trauma but that bloodshot eye. “We’re where we were, Lee. Did something hit you?”

“In… side. Spike in my head.” His gaze wandered past her, then focused again. “Thought you were outside—”

“I was. I’m in, intruders are dead. Ship’s got some problems.”

“Others?”

“Unconscious, the ones I’ve seen. Haven’t been everywhere yet. The drive’s down; I can’t get it started. But we have air and some gravity—don’t try to get up, I had to cut it to conserve power.”

He looked pale and slightly green now, and gulped visibly. His eyes sagged shut. “Feel… lousy. What’s that stench?”