Outland (24 page)

Ballard squinted into the darkness and harsh reflections from the buildings beyond, unable to tell whether O'Niel was down because he'd been hit or because he'd dodged in time. He started toward the nearest solar collector. They offered the only escape route and cover, and O'Niel was sure to head in that direction if he could still move.

O'Niel couldn't see his pursuer yet, but he knew from the angle of the tracers that he was somewhere below. He also knew that whoever it was he wouldn't stay in one place for long. Keeping low he headed for one of the enormous panels, wishing desperately for a weapon.

Ballard reached a point below the catwalk and hesitated. There was a ladder nearby but if O'Niel planned any kind of ambush he'd be expecting his pursuers to ascend that way. Each solar collector had a maintenance ridge running along its upper surface. Ballard chose one and started climbing upward. The sight of the ruined Greenhouse made him doubly cautious. Unlike the two presumably dead hired guns, he knew O'Niel well enough to know he was capable of anything.

The Marshal stayed on the catwalk, crawling past the point where the ladder intersected it from below and continued on. He could sense the nearness of the transformers below. His hair tingled inside the helmet. Blue arcs rippled across the surface of the collectors as energy was transferred from the sun to special cells to the collector conduits.

Ballard continued to climb the maintenance ridge on the panel below the catwalk, assuming the Marshal was still somewhere on the catwalk behind him. He was half right.

Over a short distance a frightened man can crawl almost as fast as he can walk. O'Niel was just above Ballard. The catwalk, barely four feet wide, provided little room to hide, but O'Neil had to risk a look over the side. Ballard's helmet indicated he was still searching the section of catwalk at which he'd first fired.

O'Niel waited until the other man was directly below. Then he swung himself over the catwalk railing and fell straight down, kicking violently in the low gravity. Ballard was just starting to turn when O'Niel's foot caught the side of his helmet.

The deputy reeled forward, propelled by the force of the kick. The riot gun flew out of his hands and the impact stunned him. It also sent O'Niel drifting backward. He cursed himself for kicking too hard as he flailed for a grip. There was nothing within reach and he tumbled lazily over the side of the collector.

The gun preceded both bodies downward, striking the side of the tilted panel. It intersected the highly charged field and sparks flared violently in the emptiness, but faded quickly. So did the gun as it spun off the panel and down into the darkness.

Desperately O'Niel clawed for the ridge running along the edge of the panel, twisting to keep his legs from contacting the charged side. Ballard had fallen down the ridge, now climbed to his feet.

Turning, he saw O'Niel struggling for a foot hold on the ridge. Recognition passed between them.

Then Ballard lunged forward, trying to kink O'Niel's faceplate in. O'Niel grabbed the man's suit leg. The kicks were slowed by the light gravity. The two men fought silently. Below them lay the power station terminals and the rest of the mine.

Ballard kept lashing out with hands and feet while O'Niel clung to him and the edge of the ridge with equal determination. Finally he gave a desperate yank on the ankle he held and let go with his other hand, using his weight to pull at the deputy.

Ballard overbalanced and went over the side. Both men drifted just past the dangerously crackling panel. They clawed at the vacuum, trying to find something to latch onto besides the charged upper surface of the collector.

O'Niel's swinging hands contacted something solid. His fingers locked around it. He knew it couldn't be part of the charged panel because he'd already be dead. As he stopped falling he saw that it was one of the struts supporting the upper row of collectors.

Ballard had grabbed onto the same strut. They fought each other as they climbed onto the narrow support.

O'Niel's damaged shoulder was finally beginning to claim its due. He couldn't hold on with both arms anymore. Ballard leaned at him, started to pry the one remaining hand from the strut. O'Niel didn't have the strength both to continue fighting and to hold on.

He felt his fingers being inexorably pried loose. Using his free hand he reached around toward Ballard's back.

The deputy was concentrating on keeping his legs locked around the strut while using both hands to pull O'Niel's fingers away from the metal. He'd almost succeeded when O'Niel's free hand contacted what it had been groping for, which was not another saving grip on Ballard's body but the manual shut-off valve on the man's air regulator. O'Niel gave it a violent twist.

Ballard drew a breath, only it wasn't there. He started to choke. Letting go of O'Niel he fumbled at his back for the closed valve.

As O'Niel regained his grasp on the strut with both hands he kicked up and out. Both of Ballard's hands were working at his back and the kick was unopposed. The blow wasn't as forceful as O'Niel would have liked, but it was sufficient to send the disconcerted, gasping deputy back and sideways. He fell.

His right foot struck the surface of the lower collector panel. There was a geyser of blue-white sparks, silent fireworks in the dark sky. Ballard's body contorted as the charge passed through him. Then his back contacted the panel and there was a storm of energy that made the first look insignificant.

Within the power station terminal far below a readout suddenly dropped a number of ergs. The drop was so brief the technician on duty never noticed it.

Ballard slid slowly down the sloping panel, shimmering with the power that was surging through him, already dead from that first slight contact.

Then he tumbled over the edge and started the long fall. There was a pause until he reached the transformers. A brief flash of flame showed where his stiff body struck, where channeled energy was detoured long enough to reduce it to ashes.

O'Niel stared downward, his arms draped tightly around the strut. The fire below faded quickly as the last of the combustible material that had been Ballard was reduced to cinders. The Marshal didn't care if yet another unexpected assassin might be prowling somewhere overhead. He was dead tired.

Which was, he reflected as he closed his eyes, much better than being dead, period . . .

Lazarus moped around the Club. It was a place she rarely visited, more alien to her than the surface of lo. On the occasions when she chose to get drunk she did so in the privacy of the hospital. She drew curious stares and muffled comments from those who recognized her. Otherwise no one paid her the least attention. The usual hectic, noisy crowd jostled her as it swirled around the bar. The booths near the back were filled and the suspended dancers stomped sweatily to the blare of the music pouring from the concealed speakers.

A figure appeared in the front entrance. Its shoulder was heavily bandaged and the cloth was stained black. The man's face was bruised and dirty. He just stood there in the doorway, watching, searching.

It was several seconds before the patrons milling around the entrance noticed O'Niel. They stopped talking, drinks halted halfway to mouths. The silence spread like a wave across the room, rolling over tables and dancers to finally crest against the bar. The professional dancers stopped moving in their cylinders, breathing hard, sweat pouring down their nearly nude bodies as they stared at the entrance.

Lazarus had turned with the others. When she saw who had struck the silence, she smiled.

Sheppard was sitting in his usual chair, at his usual table. He frowned at the sudden absence of sound. It was never, never completely quiet in the Club.

He stood and followed the other looks. When he recognized the Marshal his mouth opened as wide as his eyes.

O'Niel started across the room toward the General Manager, moving with obvious pain, his progress slow. He passed the silent workers at the bar and seated at their tables without looking anywhere but straight ahead.

It took a long time but eventually he was standing in front of Sheppard. The Manager said nothing, for once, speechless.

"Sheppard . . ." O'Niel hesitated. He shook his head at nothing in particular. "Oh . . . fuck it."

The punch knocked the General Manager across the table and back into the curtains shielding a booth. They came down under his weight, burying him.

O'Niel sighed, his expression unreadable, and turned. He strode out of the Club with half a thousand eyes fastened to his back. He didn't notice them because they didn't exist.

Gradually conversation resumed, subdued and self-conscious.

Lazarus turned to one of the dazed bartenders. "Bourbon and soda, fatso, and snap it up. I've got some catching up to do."

O'Niel walked into the squad room. The next shift was waiting there, wondering what had happened to Ballard. There was some whispering when they saw O'Niel. He ignored them utterly. None had the temerity to speak. After awhile, they slowly filed out of the room and left him alone.

The keyboard was waiting. He stared thoughtfully at the activated screens, then typed briskly.

MESSAGE TO O'NIEL, CAROL G.—STATION GREEN. FROM O'NIEL, W.T.—IO.

ARRIVING IN TIME FOR FLIGHT. KEEP TICKET WARM. JOB DONE. KISS PAUL FOR ME. LOOKING FORWARD TO SLEEPING WITH YOU FOR A YEAR.

O'NIEL, W.T.—END TRANSMISSION.

He spent another hour alone in the office, programming a chip. When he was through he deposited it in a receiving slot in the front of the console.

Then he rose and walked out of the office for the last time . . .

The chip entered a security transmitter. The transmitter broke down the contents of the chip into a regularized pattern of electrical impulses which were metamorphosed into a stream of photons and shipped out across the vacuum.

Relay stations picked up the stream, powerful lasers at each, regenerating the message and casting it onward through the void. Eventually the stream arrived at a security receiver, was sucked in and rearranged as electrical impulses.

The impulses were automatically fed into a computer which decoded them. It was quite a long message, very explicit, and detailed. People arrived to study the re-integrated patterns. They began to move in response, slower than the impulses but quickly nonetheless.

Circuitry flashed. New patterns were shunted to and fro around the solar system. Many people became aware of them. Those so apprised reacted excitedly, but for very different reasons.

The Outland Transport was cutting the orbit of the asteroids when it was passed in space by a succession of tight-beam transmissions jumping from one booster station to the next.

Eventually this fresh stream of information arrived at the central Security Depot on Station Green, the center for Trans-Jovian operations.

The receiver there performed the magic of turning light into electric pulses which activated a computer, which activated a screen printer, which informed the uniformed people gazing at it of certain interesting facts.

ANALYSIS OF DATA PROVIDED BY O’NIEL, W.T., MARSHAL RETIRED. LAST DUTY POST IO, CON-AMALGAMATED MINE.

RESULTS

1) RECOMMEND TRANSFER LAZARUS, MARIAN L. DR. IO INFIRMARY TO STAFF, COPERNICUS GENERAL, LUNA.

2) INDICTMENT OF FOLLOWING, MULTIPLE CHARGES, WARRANTS ISSUED FOR:

SHEPPARD, MARK B—IO

APUNRA, KURAT—GANYMEDE

VELAR, GWEN L.—STATION GREEN

JURGENSON, KNUT S.—COPENHAGEN, NORTH EUROPE, EARTH

MENDOZA, JORGE X . . .

It was a very long list, and almost as satisfying to the men and women who watched it unfold on Station Green as was the warmth of the woman O’Niel held tightly next to him in the bed on board the transport . . .