12

 

Haas smiled. "Come in. Have a seat." The blaster described an arc next to Wendy's head.

Lando did as he was told. He moved slowly, trying to close the distance without seeming to do so. The vinyl seat made a squeaking sound as he sat down. He put his hands on top of the table. The mini-launcher in his sleeve was aimed toward the man, but would kill Wendy too.

Sweat glistened on the man's forehead. He wiped it with a sleeve. "I hope you won't do anything stupid, Pik. I'd hate to mess up the upholstery."

Lando looked at Wendy. Her mouth was a hard straight line. "He was hiding in my cabin," she said.

Haas smiled. "You've got some fancy security aboard this tub… but not fancy enough."

Lando forced himself to remain calm. This man was dangerous as hell. It showed in his eyes and the sweat that had already reappeared on his forehead. One wrong word, one wrong move, and he'd put a hole through Wendy's head. There was little doubt that Lando would die a fraction of a second later.

Haas nodded as if reading Lando's thoughts and endorsing them. "Good. Now, using your left hand, reach over and remove that nasty-looking slug gun from its holster."

Lando did as he was told. He held the handgun between thumb and forefinger.

"Excellent. Let's check to make sure the safety's on. It is? Good. Now, put the weapon down and slide it towards me."

Lando obeyed. The slug gun made a scraping sound as it slid across the table. Haas intercepted the weapon and picked it up. Light glinted off the barrel. He nodded approvingly.

"Nice choice. Reactive grips, high-capacity magazine, moderate recoil." Haas stuck the gun into the inside pocket of his jacket.

"My name's Haas. I work for Mega-Metals. They're sending a ship to pick you up. Nice comset by the way. A little too nice for a ship that's falling apart."

Lando forced a smile. "Glad you approve. How much are they paying you? I'll double it."

Haas chuckled. "I like your style. Right to the point. I think I'll pass, though. Dead people don't need money. Which brings us back to you. What kind of cargo did you load?"

Lando ignored the corpo's question. "You plan to kill us, don't you?"

The shake of Haas's head said "no" but his eyes said "yes."

Wendy saw it too. She felt an almost overwhelming sense of anger and frustration. Where was God? Why didn't She intervene? Would the strongest always rule?

Something hit the ship. A cacophony of alarms went off. Haas swayed, the blaster drifted to one side, and Wendy grabbed it. The corpo tried to jerk the weapon away but Wendy hung on. This was wrong, violence is always wrong, she told herself, but she'd acted automatically. Something hot sizzled past her ear. The energy beam hit the bulkhead and she felt little bits of red-hot metal sting the back of her neck.

Then Lando was there, pulling Haas away, fighting for the blaster. The corpo's hand hit the durasteel bulkhead. The weapon spun away. It hit a cushion and bounced. Wendy grabbed and missed. The blaster clattered to the deck. She dived after it.

Haas was strong, and mean as hell. Lando found himself on the defensive, as fists, elbows, and knees slammed into his still sore body. Not only that, but his larger frame was a real disadvantage. There wasn't much room down on the deck, and Lando made the bigger target.

The corpo was on top. He wrapped wiry fingers around the smuggler's neck. Lando made a gurgling sound as Haas choked him. The smuggler tried for the other man's groin and failed to connect. His vision started to blur.

Wendy was crouched only inches away. She wanted to stand but the tabletop blocked her way. The blaster felt warm and slick in her hand. She aimed it at the back of the corpo's head.

What should she do? To pull the trigger would be to violate everything she believed in… yet the alternative was completely unacceptable. Lando was losing, and so were her people. Mega-Metals would capture the ecosystem, destroy it, and drive her people off-planet.

Wendy swallowed, closed her eyes, and squeezed the trigger. A thin beam of blue energy burned its way through the corpo's brain and scorched the bulkhead beyond. Haas collapsed on top of Lando. The odor of singed hair filled the air.

It took Lando a moment to suck in some oxygen and clear his head. He pushed Haas up and away. The body fell over sideways. The corpo's eyes were rolled upwards as if trying to see the exit wound at the center of his forehead.

Lando looked at Wendy, saw the blaster, and knew what she'd done. Her eyes were shut tight, as if that would delay the unpleasant reality of what lay before her.

Lando wanted to thank her, to tell her that it was okay, but the steady bleat of alarms pulled him towards the control room. Something had hit the ship and hit her hard. What was it?

He made his way forward and dropped into the command chair. The buzzers and Klaxons died away as his hands moved over the board. The NAVCOMP sensed Lando's presence and activated its voice synthesizer.

"A Jupiter-Class in-system freighter hailed this ship twelve minutes and forty-three seconds ago. Would you like a playback?"

"No," Lando replied. "Continue with your report."

"Affirmative," the NAVCOMP answered. "Shortly after the attempt to communicate, a pair of Force Nine tractor beams were locked onto the hull."

That explained the impact. Someone had nudged them with a tractor beam. It was easy to do. All it took was one little mistake, one little uncontrolled twitch of the joy stick, and whammo. A Force Nine tractor beam could knock a ship like The Tink into the next solar system. Lando almost wished that it had.

The NAVCOMP continued: "I made two attempts to break free of the tractor beams. Both failed. The freighter continues to pull us in. Estimated time of arrival: three minutes and fourteen seconds from now."

Lando looked at the main viewscreen. The other ship was visible now, black on black, blotting out a section of stars. He could see the white rectangle of the ship's huge landing bay. It grew larger with each passing second.

This was the time to call for help. The emperor lived on Terra. There should be navy ships all over the place. "Send the following message. 'All standard freqs. Ithro-registered ship Tinker's Damn under attack by unknown forces. Request assistance.' Add our present position."

The NAVCOMP replied three seconds later. "I am unable to comply with your last order. The freighter is jamming all standard freqs."

Wendy looked at Lando as she dropped into the co-pilot's position. She still felt the horror of what she'd done, but was determined to make the death count for something. "I've been listening. What now?"

Lando leaned backwards and tried to look casual. "We wait."

Wendy looked at the viewscreen and then back to Lando. She forced a smile. "Don't tell me; let me guess. Your father has a saying for this situation."

"Why, yes, he does," Lando replied thoughtfully. "My father would say, 'Son, people who eat spicy food deserve indigestion.'"

Wendy frowned. "I don't get it."

Lando up at the viewscreen. The freighter was huge. Large enough to swallow a hundred Tinks with space left over. The smuggler smiled grimly. "You will. You will."

Captain Orlow was a middle-aged woman with a utilitarian haircut and a stocky frame. She stood in the middle of the control room, with her arms folded and feet spread wide apart. Orlow had a ship to run, cargo to move, and no time for this sort of nonsense. The expression on her plain, bulldog face was anything but happy.

She turned to the tall, thin man on her right. He was vice-president of morale, or something equally stupid, and was hitching a ride back from the roids. Sol only knew why,

but he outranked her, and had insisted on responding to the company's "all ships" message.

"Listen, Tawson, I don't have time for this kind of crap. How the hell can we stay on schedule if we diddle around with this kind of stuff?"

Tawson didn't even look her way. His hard blue eyes were locked on the main viewscreen. The Tinker's Damn was larger now.

"Captain Orlow, I would remind you that the corporation cares more about 'this kind of stuff,' as you call it, than whether your load of ore reaches the refinery on time."

Tawson gestured towards the com screen. "You saw the holo. These people are criminals. They deactivated a Mega-Metals security team on Weller's World, and tried to neutralize the manager on a planet called Angel. It should've ended there, but some idiot allowed them to escape. What would you have us do? Ignore their crimes? Let them go?"

Orlow wanted to say "yes," but shook her head instead.

"Besides," Tawson said smugly, "if all goes well, you and your crew will receive a bonus."

Money didn't mean much to Orlow. She loved the process of running her ship. Had it been up to her, Orlow would've said, "To hell with the bonus, let's stay on schedule."

But Tawson was an exec, the kind that gets ahead more on politics than profit, and wouldn't understand. And neither would Orlow's crew. They liked money, and the ones near enough to hear were grinning with anticipation, eager to grab an easy bonus.

The captain sighed. She had very little choice but to see it through. She issued a stream of orders.

Lando's hands were damp. He wiped them on his thighs. The freighter was close now, so close that its huge landing bay filled the main screen and flooded the control room with light.

He saw acres of scarred deck, worn traffic decals, and a double row of beat-up shuttles. They were short, stubby ships, equipped with in-system drives, and used for bringing ore out of the asteroids. Each vessel had a large white number painted along its flank.

Wendy licked dry lips and looked at Lando. What would he do? The edges of the hatch slid by and she felt something heavy land in the pit of her stomach. They had arrived in the monster's belly.

Lando fired the ship's repellors as The Tink came under the influence of the larger vessel's powerful argrav generators.

There was movement over to the right, and Wendy saw some space-armored figures spill out of a lock and take up positions along the right side of the bay.

Lando lifted an eyebrow in surprise. Either the vessel's captain had stripped the crew or called out the shuttle pilots. The second possibility seemed most likely.

A voice came over the comset. "This is Dulo Tawson, Executive Vice President Employee Utilization, Sector One. Put Lester Haas on-screen."

Lando looked at Wendy, and she shrugged. Lando replied voice only. "Haas here. Sorry about the video, sir. Most of the gear aboard this ship is little more than junk."

There was silence for a moment as Tawson thought that over. Given the circumstances, there wasn't much he could do but go along with it. "I understand. You're in control?"

Lando smiled. "Yes, sir. No problems here."

"Good. We're releasing the tractor beams. Follow the yellow robo-guide and land as indicated."

"Yes, sir."

Lando felt The Tink jerk slightly as the tractor beams were released. This was the moment that he'd been waiting for. He ignored the hovering robo-guide, activated the ship's weapons systems, and started to turn.

Tawson sounded angry. "Haas? What the hell are you doing? Turn that…" Lando killed the comset.

Blue light flared as the freighter's crew opened fire with blast rifles. The energy beams didn't even register on The Tink's force field.

The smuggler spun the ship on its axis. The hatch was straight ahead. Safety beacons strobed bright red as the massive black- and yellow-striped doors started to close. The bastards were trying to trap him inside the bay!

Lando thumbed a protective cover out of the way and touched a button. The Tink shuddered as a pair of missiles raced for the doors.

"Hang on!"

The words and the explosions came together. Wendy was pressed back into her seat as Lando applied full emergency power and blasted towards the hatch. She closed her eyes and waited for the impact. It never came.

She opened her eyes. Man-made lightning probed the darkness around them as it tried to find and destroy their ship.

Lando smiled and started to speak. Something hit The Tink and sent her spinning out of control. Most likely a missile, since energy beams don't pack any mass.

Alarms began to hoot, bleat, and wail. The NAVCOMP spoke in its usual measured sentences:

"This ship has sustained major damage. I repeat, this ship has sustained major damage. The hyperdrive is inoperable, the in-system drive is seventy-percent effective, the life-support system is ninety-one percent and falling…"

Lando decided to ignore the rest and concentrate on controlling the ship. Some of the ship's main steering jets had been destroyed and others damaged. Gradually, bit by bit, the smuggler found ways to balance the ones that still worked against those that were damaged but still operable.

Control was reestablished seventy-four seconds later. Lando activated the tac tank and took a look. The freighter was still there, a blinking red blob, and made no attempt to follow. Lando knew that might change, and change fast, once they realized that The Tink was something more than a drifting hulk.

Lando scanned both the systems readouts and the tac tank, looking for options. There weren't any. He couldn't jump to another system as long as the hyperdrive remained belly-up, and he couldn't outrun them with a damaged in-system drive. And, just to keep things interesting, the life-support systems were heading south as well. They'd be wearing space armor in another fifteen or twenty minutes. He had to hide, but where?

Wendy bit her lip as Lando looked at the tac tank. It was a tossup between Terra and Mars in terms of distance, but while the red planet was still a little bit wild and woolly, Earth was the province of government and the large corporations. Not a place where smugglers spent much time. Lando touched some keys. Mars it would be.

The freighter was not a warship, so the com officer doubled on weapons. "They have the ship under control, Captain. They're heading for Mars."

"So what?" Captain Orlow said sourly. "We have a landing bay that can't be pressurized, plus damage to the Number Four power feed. Why did they route the damn thing past the hatch anyway?"

"Never mind that," Tawson said tersely. "Get this bucket going. I want those people, and I want them now."

Orlow turned towards the executive and placed her hands on her meaty hips. "Oh, you do, do you? Well, guess what? We're done playing cops and robbers. This ship's damaged and I'm taking her in."

Tawson's face grew dark with anger. "You forget yourself, Captain! I'm an executive and you'll do what I say!"

Orlow's mouth turned downwards. "What you say doesn't pull any G's out here, mister. I'm the master of this ship. Besides, it will take about a quarter-million to repair the damage to this ship, and we'll see how the home office likes that."

Tawson swallowed. Orlow had a point. What had seemed like a sure-fire opportunity to impress his boss had turned into a full-scale disaster.

It wasn't clear what had transpired aboard the other ship, but it seemed likely that Haas was dead, or being held prisoner.

Although Tawson didn't really care what happened to the ex-bounty hunter, he did care about his reputation in the company, and couldn't afford to back off. No, he'd have to see the whole thing through. Headquarters would ignore the quarter-million if he succeeded, but Sol help him if he failed.

Tawson cleared his throat. "I'm sorry about the damage, Captain Orlow, but if they get away it will reflect poorly on both of us, and we should do our best to stop them. Surely you can see that?"

Orlow was somewhat mollified by the executive's more reasonable tone, and knew that he was right. Right or wrong, the incident would reflect on her as well, and given the shortage of commands, she couldn't afford to ignore politics altogether. Still, Orlow had to think about the safety of the ship, and any further risk was completely unacceptable. A compromise was in order and the Captain had an idea that might work.

Orlow forced a smile. "You have a point, Executive Tawson. And, although I can't go along with any plan that would place this ship in further peril, I can still offer some assistance."

Orlow explained her plan to Tawson, and his face lit up with grim excitement. He nodded enthusiastically. "Captain, I like the way you think. We make a good team. We'll find those vermin and stamp them out. The credit will be shared equally."