On approach, the rogue port Blacknest looked vaguely intestinal, like the digestive tract of some huge, grotesque monster. Within spidering meshes of metal frameworks, silver, grey and blue flexitube corridors spread in coils and undulations, connecting polyhedral modules of various sizes that were embedded in the mazy tangles like geometric tumours. The blocks and cylinders of the original station were still visible beneath the improvised accretion of past newcomers, and it was from the largest conglomeration that a substantial docking hub protruded on a squat tower.
‘Is that where we’re going?’ Kao Chih said, studying the hub’s busy traffic on the long-range imager, comparing it to the Roug orbital, Agmedra’a.
Tumakri, his Roug companion, peered closely at the multicoloured symbols on his small console screen, hesitantly touching a few with one dark, spindly finger. ‘It seems not, Pilot Kao,’ he said in his dry, papery voice. ‘At first we were, but now we have been redirected to a secondary landing stage. Our syncsystem is already plotting a new guide-path.’
He looked round at Kao Chih, who smiled and nodded. ‘That sounds reasonable – the main docking hub looks pretty busy,’ he said, trying to sound both relaxed and businesslike. Soon after exiting hyperspace in the Blacknest vicinity, Tumakri had given him a linguistic enabler, a package of Human-configured nanobio receptors in the form of a translucent golden pill. In half an hour he was able to understand and respond in the Roug tongue, and by the time the illegal port was in visual range he was bordering on the fluent, with the result that Tumakri’s erratic mental state became even more apparent.
‘So tell me, noble Tumakri, who is the intermediary we are supposed to contact here?’
‘One Rup Avriqui, a Voth procurer – I have since determined from our notes that in addition to providing the course data for the next stage of our journey, he will also be accompanying us. I have already sent three advice requests on the frequency tag shown in the itinerary, but thus far no response. This does not seem normal to me…’
Kao Chih shrugged. ‘Perhaps their protocols are different in these matters, or custom…’
He was interrupted by a brief staccato chime from the comm panel, then a string of syllables whose intonation varied between flat, nasal and flutelike. There was a momentary jarring sensation in his mind, like sounds and symbols colliding, then suddenly he was hearing the Voth’s words and understanding them. Most of them.
‘… again to present my egremini apologies for this lapse in finsterral communications. Disturbance between rabble factions is the cause but our mezgurid business remains viable. If this addresses to the noble Tumagri and Gowshee, please to respond.’
Kao Chih and Tumakri looked at each other for a second before the latter spoke.
‘Have we the honour of speaking with Rup Avriqui?’
‘This is so, exalted clients-of-unrivalled-lineage.’
‘Do you have the…’
The Voth cut him off. ‘Forgiveness I beg, exalted one, but it is not wise to speak of important matters over an unsecured channel. Once you disembark, my lugosivator will bear you both safely to my hold, where we shall continue our dialogue. I bid you the short and temporary farewell.’
The channel abruptly switched to the ready-cycle’s bland, atonal warbling, and Tumakri blinked.
‘It seems that he is expecting to meet both of us, Pilot Kao.’
‘Indeed, friend Tumakri,’ he said. ‘But the truth is that my appearance is distinctly un-Rouglike, and we cannot take the risk of my being recognised as Human in a place like this.’
‘Yes,’ said Tumakri, slumping down into his couch. ‘I was hoping to persuade you to undertake the encounter by yourself, somehow…’
Kao Chih leaned forward, amused. ‘In that case, we shall have to be creative, perhaps even inspired. What did you bring in the way of spare clothing?’
‘A standard long-excursion miscellany,’ the Roug said. ‘But almost none of it will fit you…’
‘Not to worry,’ Kao Chih said, getting up. ‘It’s the details that matter, so we’ll have to have a good rummage through the storage lockers…’
Nearly an hour later grapple-nets were hauling the fast-courier Castellan in beside two larger vessels that were moored to a gimballed docking duct. A flexitube concertinaed out to fasten its mouthlike seal around the smaller craft’s hatch. On opening the hatch they found a prismoid dock ID tied by a length of finefibre to an eye-hook, drifting in zero-gee. After a weightless clamber through the grubby, much-patched transfer tube, then along the docking duct, squeezing by all kinds of passengers coming and going from other ships, Kao Chih and Tumakri finally emerged in some kind of lobby. The Roug wore an ankle-length, sleeved cloak of a thin, grey material that clung from neck to waist, while Kao Chih had opted to don the emergency environmental suit but without the helmet. Around his head he had wrapped bandages from the medikit, being careful not to obscure the dark, faceted goggles he had put on beforehand.
And since Tumakri’s itinerary notes had warned of Blacknest’s imperfect eco-cleanliness they were both wearing small breathing masks. For Kao Chih, heavy gloves and boots completed the hopefully convincing non-Human picture.
There were three turnstile gates at the lobby exit, each with a queue of arriving sophonts, most of whom were bi-, tri- or quadrupedal: did swimmers, crawlers and fliers have their own docking areas, he wondered. A buzz of conversation enveloped them, voices conversing in all manner of whoops, whistles and words, while the air was a swirl of odours. In a hubbub like this, Kao Chih’s linguisitic enabler tended to lie partially dormant, only translating when he focused on a particular voice or when someone spoke clearly and from close by.
He had prepared himself for a long wait, based on his observations of similar entry procedures on Agmedra’a. But it soon became clear that new arrivals were being processed with haste by three anxious Henkayans in dimpled blue uniforms. Each was using one pair of stubby arms to pass a fan-snouted sensor over each life-form while the other pair dealt with forms and charges.
Then it was their turn. As the gate attendant began waving his handheld sensor at Tumakri, he took one look at the prismoid dock ID and said:
‘Smallboat berthnetted, minimum fee seventy keddro.’
Tumakri produced a slender black credit stem, banded in gold.
‘You may deduct from this,’ he said.
‘Nogood, nogood,’ said the Henkayan, jerkily shaking his head. ‘Creditransfer network offline, you mustpay keddro now or returnship.’
‘But this…’
‘Nogood, nogood! Yellowfists here soon – pay now or leave!’
Tumakri swayed on his feet and Kao Chih steadied him with an outstretched hand.
‘What’s wrong?’ he said. ‘Don’t tell me you didn’t bring hard currency.’
‘I do have such, but it is supposed to be for later in our journey.’
‘If you don’t pay the man, we won’t be able to meet Avriqui and there won’t be any more journey.’
Clearly unhappy, Tumakri dug into a waistpouch and surrendered four glittering black triangles, three inlaid with gold, one with crimson. Their dock ID was imprinted with a strange curlicue pattern and they were each presented with a blue plastic tag embossed with a string of symbols before being hurried out into Blacknest Station itself.
The corridor floor was covered in a dingy grey ridged matting, as was the ceiling, which was also a floor. A variety of sentient creatures was bustling along the gravplate pathway that ran the length of the ceiling, most of them, Kao Chih noticed, hurrying in the same direction. Then as he watched, several yellow-garbed figures leaped out from the overhead pedestrian flow, as if taking a collective nosedive towards the floor. Fearful cries went up from the gate attendants – ‘Yellowfists! Yellowfists!’ – and Kao Chih then saw the tethered lines on which the newcomers swung through the air to land clumsily before the transit lobby entrance. Regaining their feet/paws/hoofs, they pulled out slot-nosed sidearms and gestured threateningly at the attendants.
‘Time we were elsewhere,’ Kao Chih said, grabbing a near-paralysed Tumakri and dragging him along the half-deserted corridor. They had just reached the next corner when an odd, jingling voice spoke:
‘Masters Gowchee and Tumagri?… up here, good sirs.’
Kao Chih looked up and saw a boxy, yellow cart with six fat wheels and a telescopic pole tipped with a cluster of glittering lenses which were angled down at him.
‘Indeed we are,’ Kao Chih said cautiously. ‘You are…?’
‘I am Master Avriqui’s number 2 lugosivator – I am to take you to his hold straight away. If you step onto the sidepath and join me, we can be quickly under way.’
The lens arm pointed to a strip of grey matting that curved off the main corridor into a recess and up the wall, joining the one directly above. Without delay, Kao Chih stepped onto the branch path, feeling his stomach bounce a little as he adjusted to walking up the wall then stepping onto the ceiling strip. Behind him, Tumakri groaned, holding on to the sides of the recess as he followed. The yellow cart had seating within a curved, transparent carapace. Flexible doors popped on either side and moments later they were strapped into sideways-facing bucket seats as the vehicle sped away from the chaotic scenes further back.
‘Apologies are tendered for the lack of proprieties,’ said the lugosivator. ‘Master Avriqui had intended to greet you in person but reports of incipient violence caused him to remain at home.’
‘Are such incidents considered normal here?’ said Tumakri.
‘No, Master Tumagri, but unfortunately Blacknest is experiencing one of its periodic outbursts of interclan rivalry in which revenue sources, such as the embarkation gates, become strategic prizes to be defended or captured by force.’
‘Fascinating,’ Kao Chih said. ‘What about ships in dock? Are they also considered prizes?’
‘Docked vessels are inviolable, Master Gowchee,’ said the cart. ‘Certain categories of passenger, however, are seen as legitimate quarry at times like this.’
Kao Chih and Tumakri exchanged a worried look.
‘Would we fall into that category?’ he said.
‘Yes – you arrived in your own craft with no personal bodyguard and no protection brevet. Data spotters will have already sent your profiles out to several gang bosses…’
Tumakri hunched down in his seat, staring this way and that through the cart’s transparent hull.
‘… which is why I have brevets here to give to you, signed by Master Avriqui.’ A thin tray slid out from a black panel below the windscreen – on it were two documents, folded sheets of light blue textured plas imprinted with lines of text in Tralesk, a trading language. Underneath was a swirling character written with a double-nib, which Kao Chih took to be Avriqui’s signature.
‘How long till we reach Master Avriqui’s hold?’ he said.
‘We shall be arriving shortly,’ said the cart. ‘From the next junction we follow a vascule out to the tubeworks and our destination is not far beyond that.’
Kao Chih nodded and glanced out at the busy corridor. Away from the contested arrivals lobby, the station took on the kind of appearance he had been expecting, archway and doors along the corridors revealing markets, kiosks and tiny workshops enveloped in a hum of activity, a jostling flow of creatures and sentients from every corner of the galaxy. A red-and-black-furred hexa-pedal Bargalil gestured with a small forearm to a Gomedran selling light-splines and bubbles, while nearby a reptilian biped Kiskashin garbed in hooded leathers tended a stall where clusters of tarnished pipes smoked amid gauzy veils and glittering trinkets. A muscular Henkayan was raking through boxes of hardware with all four arms, examining finds with a headband scope. On the other side of the stall, an old battered mech shaped like an upright dumb-bell was doing the same thing with microfields while floating on its suspensors.
Relaxing a little, he smiled, enjoying the view which he was seeing from above as Avriqui’s lugosivator trundled along the tall corridor’s ceiling path. The shops and stalls went on and he wondered if most of Blacknest was like this. He saw a pair of Gomedrans haggling with a half-shelled Naszbur arms dealer; an octopoidal Makhori coldly eyeing passers-by from the opacity of its tank; a long-bodied Vusark propped up on a metal frame, its many sets of legs flexing rhythmically…
And a pair of beady eyes in a small, snouted face that stared straight up at him for an instant then broke away. Kao Chih had the merest glimpse of a cowl around the observer’s head before it vanished into a side turning. He was about to mention this but the cart’s sentience spoke.
‘Sirs, my master wishes to communicate with you.’
A translucent panel appeared in the cart’s forward windscreen and darkened into a display showing their adviser and prospective travel companion, Rup Avriqui, sitting in a high-backed wood-and-leather armchair. Behind him were the glows and shadows of a low-lit room. Rup Avriqui was a Voth, a squat bipedal race which bore a superficial similarity to a presentient Earth species called orangutans. The Voth certainly had long arms but also had broader torsos and shorter legs, larger ears and flatter faces. They also had a liking for bulky, concealing garments – Avriqui was wrapped in layers of clothing, some finely woven and intricately patterned, others coarse and plain, while on his head he wore a strange cap comprising beads and tiny mirrors over padded cloth.
‘Ah, most viable our business, noble visitors, and most efficient my preparations. Soon we shall be discoursing upon the urgent matter of your task and my part in its workings.’
‘Please accept our thanks for the brevets,’ Tumakri said. ‘Reassurance is a gift which lights our way.’
‘I am gratified to be able to confound the misfortunes of the current unrest,’ the Voth said. ‘I must confess, however, that I had to nominate Master Gowchee’s species profile as being Roug in order to dispatch the brevets with my lugosivator. Now I see by the evidence of my own eyes, as well as the profiles obtained just moments ago, that Master Gowchee is not of the exalted and ancient Roug.’ The hooded eyes regarded Kao Chih. ‘Humans are not popular, you see, thus there is danger for you at every turn. Fortunately, you will both soon be within my hold and I shall have the brevets modified… what is that noise?’
A faint knocking sound had suddenly become a loud banging. Muttering angrily, the Voth levered himself out of his seat and moved out of sight, shuffling footsteps receding. For a moment all was quiet onscreen, then there was a shout followed by the sound of running feet. Rup Avriqui abruptly rushed into view, his headgear askew, his eyes bulging as he lunged at the controls near the vidcam.
‘Exigency nine, exigency nine!’ he shrieked, stubby fingers scrabbling at the panel as a pair of hands, one metal, one flesh, grabbed his shoulder and dragged him screaming away. Then the screen went opaque for a second before melting into transparency. Kao Chih and Tumakri stared at each other in horror, then grabbed the edges of their seats as the cart jerked to a sudden stop halfway down the corridor wall.
‘Passengers must evacuate at once,’ said the vehicle as its sides sprang open. ‘Deepest apologies for unforgivable treatment, masters, but the Avriqui hold has been compromised, therefore this unit can no longer guarantee your safety.’
‘But… but what must we do?’ said Tumakri, voice quivering with shock.
‘Return to your ship is the safest course – the safest course – safesafesafesafe… please return to your seats there is no danger we will soon arrive at residential unit stem nine radial twelve…’
Fighting a surge of panic, Kao Chih jumped up from his seat and dragged Tumakri away from the suborned lugosivator.
‘It was right,’ he said. ‘We have to get back to the ship!’
‘… yes,’ said the Roug. ‘Yes, we must!’
Then he shrugged off the Human’s support and leaped into a headlong sprint back the way they had come. Amazed, Kao Chih took after him, but with his longer legs Tumakri soon opened up a good lead. The Roug wove between stalls and knots of sentients, ignoring Kao Chih’s shouts to slow down. So intent on his destination was he that he never noticed the gang of fur-snouted Gomedra rushing out at him from a side passage until it was too late.
Kao Chih saw the ambush, shouted Tumakri’s name… and in the next instant felt something tangle his legs, causing him to dive forward and land with jarring force.
‘Bind him!’ said a guttural voice.
Half-dazed, he fought against rough hands that tied his wrists and fixed a gag to his mouth.
‘The Blacktooth vermin are escaping with the other one,’ came another nasal, rasping voice.
‘Then render him worthless,’ said the first.
Fearful, Kao Chih tried to yell around the gag and struggled against his captors. Instead, he was hauled upright in time to see an armour-clad Bargalil raise a hexabow and fire off three bolts. There was a brief, high shriek and Kao Chih knew with horrible certainty that Tumakri was dead.
‘Sack this one and bring him to our new nest!’
A cloth hood stinking of machine oil enfolded his head and, grasped lengthways, he was carried off, friendless, soundless and wrapped in darkness.