“Forward shields are at eighty percent, Captain. That’s the best they’ll be able to do until we can conduct major repairs. Amidships shields are at full.”
Rob Geary nodded, his eyes on the display before his command seat on the bridge of Saber. “I’m seeing pulse particle beam projectors two and three online again as well as grapeshot launcher two.”
“Yes, sir. Estimated time to repair grapeshot launcher one is another thirty minutes.”
“Shark is under way,” Lieutenant Cameron added.
“So I see.” Rob called Shark, seeing the image of Commander Derian appear. Derian looked happier than Rob had seen him so far, but his words and movements still reflected accumulated tension wrapped tight inside him. “How are my Marines, Commander?” Rob asked.
Derian shook his head. “Still on the facility. I asked them to withdraw to my ship, but your Captain Darcy said it would be too risky, that she and the surviving militia were better off remaining in place until we could come back for them.”
Rob tried not to let his disappointment and unhappiness at that news show. “That was Captain Darcy’s judgment?”
“Yes, Commander,” Derian said, looking as if waiting for a broadside from Rob. “I told her I’d wait. She said she’d lose too many people trying to reach my ship.”
“Okay,” Rob finally said, knowing it would be unfair to blame Derian for Mele’s decision. “She’s better at that particular problem than you and I are. Is Shark ready to hit that invasion fleet?”
“Shark is proceeding on a vector to do just that. I understand that you’re concerned about attack runs through their formation? Because of the possibility of more surprises? I’ve had more time than I wanted to have to think about how to handle that,” Derian said. “I recommend we approach slowly and take out the ships one by one from outside the formation. We’ll work our way in like cracking open a nut. If that damaged destroyer of theirs stays in close to the passenger ship, we’ll be able to eventually hit him together. If he decides to come out and fight, we can both hit him then.”
Rob thought about the idea and didn’t find any reason to object. “I concur. Saber will accompany Shark to hit the first two freighters.”
They came in slowly, maintaining their own orbit of the planet below, closing on the invasion fleet. Rob wondered what sort of debates were raging among the captains of those ships. The freighters had no chance of outrunning the two destroyers. They were sitting ducks, and even if they scattered could be run down by the two warships before any could reach a jump point out of Kosatka Star System. The passenger ship could accelerate better than the freighters but would still be easy pickings once the outer “shell” of freighters in the formation had been peeled away. The obstacles posed by the freighters were, in fact, the primary protection the passenger ship had left. The enemy destroyer had rebuilt most of its shields, but there were no signs its thruster damage had been repaired, and it still had less than half its own weapons in working condition. Saber was battered as well, but when it came to shields and weaponry, Shark was at maximum strength. The next encounter with the enemy destroyer wouldn’t be a long fight.
Derian took the initiative in calling for surrender. “Hostile shipping in orbit around this planet, you are to immediately surrender or face destruction. Each ship must drop its shields, its commanding officer must transmit his or her surrender, and all weapons must be powered down. Once you’ve surrendered you’ll be directed to new orbital positions.”
No answer. Rob took Saber toward one freighter while Shark targeted another.
This wasn’t combat. It was more like target practice, Rob thought, as Saber’s weapons began hitting the freighter.
The freighter broke formation, its main propulsion pushing it away, thrusters firing to direct it down toward the planet.
“What’s he trying?” Rob asked his bridge crew.
“Maybe trying to get far enough into atmosphere that we can’t risk chasing him at high velocity?” Lieutenant Cameron suggested.
“That’s his only chance,” Chief Quinton agreed. “Make it a little difficult for us to chase him in the hopes we’ll pick another target.”
“He’s getting down into atmosphere, and his main propulsion is still firing,” Cameron said, puzzled. “Captain, he’s exceeding safe speed.”
“We must have hit his controls,” Ensign Reichert suggested. “He can’t stop accelerating, and he’s too far into atmosphere to climb out in time.”
The freighter’s hull was already glowing as air friction created more and more heat. The ship’s vector altered, the freighter sliding sideways as some of its thrusters failed and others kept firing, dipping deeper into atmosphere.
“Do you think they’re already dead?” Cameron suggested.
The freighter traced a flaming path through the sky of the planet, pieces breaking free as parts of the structure failed, the death of the freighter and its crew making an oddly beautiful spectacle.
“That’s one,” Rob said, not feeling any particular joy, just satisfaction that any supplies left on that freighter wouldn’t go to help the invasion force on the surface. “Let’s get another.”
“Shark’s target is showing power core fluctuations,” Chief Quinton reported. “Estimate overload or shutdown within the next few seconds.”
The freighter being pummeled by Shark exploded moments later, the shock wave from its death rattling the remainder of the invasion fleet.
An urgent alert appeared on Rob’s display. “The enemy destroyer is coming around,” Lieutenant Cameron said. “His movements confirm he still has serious thruster damage. His main propulsion is lighting off . . . system is analyzing vector . . . Captain, he’s running for the jump point for Kappa.”
Was the enemy commander fleeing, abandoning the ships he was supposed to protect? Or had he been ordered to save his destroyer since it had no chance of survival otherwise? “Lieutenant Cameron—,” Rob began.
“Captain,” Chief Quinton interrupted, “we’re low on fuel cells. If we try to chase that ship, we’ll run dry by the time we catch him.”
“He’s lower on fuel than we are,” Rob argued, frustrated.
“Yes, sir, but he just has to stay ahead of us. We’d have to accelerate long enough to catch him. Sir, we can’t do it.”
“Damn!” Rob hit his comm control with far more force than necessary. “Shark, Saber is too low on fuel to pursue and catch the enemy warship. Request you take him.”
Derian shook his head, looking as unhappy as Rob. “We’ve only been able to do basic safety checks on our propulsion repairs. Ramping up to full power quickly on my main propulsion would be dangerous. Maintaining full power might be disastrous. I can’t risk it.”
“We have to let him go?”
“I’m afraid so. Hopefully, his masters will give him a warm welcome when he returns with news of this disaster he didn’t prevent,” Derian said.
Another alert sounded as the enemy destroyer kept accelerating away.
“Captain, shuttles are launching from the passenger ship,” Reichert said. “Five . . . six total. And the surviving warbird is coming out, too.”
Commander Derian had his eyes on his own display as he spoke to Rob. “Saber, you’re in the best position to take those shuttles. If you would do me the favor of shooting them down, Shark will take care of that warbird for you.”
“Agreed,” Rob said.
Saber accelerated down toward the planet, angling under the survivors of the invasion fleet, as the shuttles dove down into atmosphere at the highest speed they could risk, the single remaining enemy warbird coming at Saber. “Don’t engage him when he goes past,” Rob said, knowing that a single aerospace craft couldn’t knock down his ship’s shields on a single pass even when those shields were weakened. And with Shark coming in fast, that warbird would only get a single pass at Saber. “All weapons concentrate on those shuttles.”
“Maybe they were hoping we’d chase that destroyer so they’d be able to get safely down to the surface,” Cameron suggested in a low voice, as depressed as the others at having to let the enemy warship escape.
“Maybe,” Rob agreed.
“Or,” Chief Quinton said, “maybe the real high brass transferred to that destroyer while it’s been tucked in near that passenger ship, and they’re sending their staffs down to get shot at to divert us from chasing the warship so the big bosses can get away.”
That, Rob thought, sounded entirely too plausible.
Saber rocked twice as the warbird tore past, firing.
As the trailing shuttle came into maximum range, Saber’s working grapeshot launcher fired.
The warbird tried to whip around for another pass at Saber but went into an uncontrolled spin as a shot from Shark took out the thrusters on one side. The pilot ejected as the warbird spun away, beginning to break up under the stress of the uncontrolled maneuver.
The trailing shuttle exploded as some of Saber’s grapeshot tore into it.
Saber grazed the upper atmosphere of the planet, her particle beams shooting downward at the five remaining shuttles as they dove for the surface. The particle beams moved at nearly the speed of light, but in atmosphere the shuttles had to limit their velocity to avoid suffering the same fate as the freighter that had burned up. “Not quite sitting ducks,” Ensign Reichert said, her focus on her display. “But close. Engaging farthest shuttle first.”
Saber fired, spearing the shuttle leading the others down. Something critical hit, the shuttle’s descent changed from a controlled series of evasive maneuvers during its dive to an erratic spin as it fell.
The pulse particle beams kept firing, occasionally missing as an evading shuttle made a lucky jog at just the right moment but taking out the second shuttle in line, then the third . . .
“Pulse particle beam projector beam two is overheating,” Lieutenant Cameron warned. “Projector three is hot and heading for overheat.”
“Got it,” Reichert said, her gaze locked on her display.
A fourth shuttle twisted suddenly in flight and began falling.
“One to go,” Rob said. “Can you nail it, Ensign Reichert?”
Instead of answering him, she fired again.
The last shuttle began a death spiral toward the planet below it.
Ensign Reichert sat back, grinning, a slight sheen of sweat on her face. “Nailed it, Captain.”
“Well done,” Rob said. His gaze went back to his display, where Saber’s visual sensors had zoomed in to show the falling shuttles.
They impacted the surface in a ragged series of crashes that left an irregular new constellation of craters in the plains outside the Kosatkan city of Ani.
“Thank you, Saber,” Commander Derian said as he called in again. “That was probably the invasion force’s high command fleeing for safety before we took out their flagship.”
“One of my people suggested that the overall commanders of the operation may have fled on the destroyer and deliberately sacrificed the command staff to save themselves,” Rob said.
Derian frowned. “I’ve met people who would do that. Maybe when we recover that warbird pilot they can sing a tune about that for us.”
Only one more freighter died under fire from the destroyers before the others began surrendering, which seemed to confirm that whatever authority had held them in thrall had either fled or died.
“We’ve got a call from the passenger ship,” Rob’s comm watch announced.
The captain of the passenger ship didn’t look military. He looked like a civilian who was extremely unhappy to be in the middle of a war. Rob wondered under what conditions that captain and his crew had been hired. “The last of the joint Apulu/Turan command staff have left this ship. I surrender it. Do not fire on us. Please. We’ll comply with your demands.”
“They’re surrendering to us,” Lieutenant Cameron pointed out. “Not to Shark.”
“They probably expect Shark to be a lot angrier with them,” Rob said. “We’ll work out who gets what prizes later. For now, keep an eye on that enemy destroyer. I want to know if he turns.”
“Sir, he can’t,” Chief Quinton said. “If he tries to alter vector that much, tries to slow down to come back at us, he’ll be out of power in no time.”
“Keep an eye on him anyway,” Rob said, unable to believe that as far as the situation in space was concerned the fight was over. “Captain Darcy, this is Saber. How’s your situation?”
Mele sounded as exhausted as he’d ever heard her, but under that Rob could sense that she’d still fight if pushed. “We could use some beer. And we’re a little low on ammo and other supplies. But there’s no beer at all.”
“I’ll see what we can do about that,” Rob said. “Kosatka should have some surviving shuttles hidden on the surface. They can bring up fresh troops to relieve you.”
“Don’t forget the beer. We’re going to have some prisoners, too,” Mele advised. “Is the invasion fleet a done deal?”
“Destroyed or surrendered,” Rob said.
“I’ll pass that on to my opponents.”
“How are your people?” Rob asked.
Mele took a moment to answer. “I’ve still got Yoshida with me. Gamba and Buckland died. Giddings and Lamar were badly wounded.”
“Damn . . . Giddings is all right on Shark.”
“So I heard. Lamar should be okay, too.”
“Mele . . .”
“Yeah.”
They understood each other. There wasn’t anything else to say.
Carmen huddled next to a blown-out window on the top floor of the Central Coordination Building, exposing just enough of herself to gaze out into the streets below as the sun began to rise. The occasional sound of a shot or an explosion echoed across the city. Both sides seemed to be running short of chaff rounds, but smoke from fires and the remnants of earlier chaff clouds drifted through those streets and among the buildings. Tinted red by dawn’s early light, they looked like the clouds of fine dust that had often billowed among the cities of Mars, sifting through any available crack or crevice to eventually form a layer of reddish drift like old blood coating everything inside.
She’d hated that dust.
But the dawn created the illusion that it had followed her here, across the many light years from where Mars orbited about the star Sol. As if Mars itself had followed her here.
Fine. She’d beaten it once. She’d beat it again.
Carmen leveled her rifle, peering through the scope as she slowly traversed her view across the streets and buildings held by the invading forces. The scope itself was a thing of wonder, capable of not only magnifying the view but also automatically compensating for range and environmental factors like wind and air temperature. Even if Carmen hadn’t gotten a lot of practice with the weapon in the last year, she’d still be able to hit far-off targets thanks to that scope.
Someone came into view as her scope swept slowly across a courtyard. A small group of soldiers in partial battle armor, their helmets off in such a “safe” spot. Another small group came to meet them, standing there while the men and women in the first group gestured about and spoke to a man standing in front of the second group.
Carmen knew a briefing when she saw one. Someone of higher rank getting a rundown on what was happening. Maybe a top commander who’d come down in one of the surviving enemy shuttles that had dropped in during the night.
She aimed as carefully as she could, the scope image helpfully shifting the aim point to compensate for everything that might send the bullet awry, waiting as a drift of red mist temporarily obscured her target, squeezing the trigger slowly. The buck of the weapon against her shoulder surprised her as the shot fired.
She kept her eye on the scope, waiting.
The high-ranking enemy officer fell sideways.
Two of those in the second group grabbed their fallen leader and carried him into the nearest building. Most of the others in the courtyard scattered, either running inside as well or looking about for the source of the shot.
But then they all started looking upward, pointing. Carmen lowered her weapon and gazed up into the sky turning from black to blue as dawn triumphed.
Something moved across the sky, something large, moving too fast, atmosphere heating it so it left a fiery trail. As Carmen watched, pieces broke off, forming small bright streaks that accompanied the larger streak of fire.
The wreck of something, dying spectacularly in the atmosphere of this world. But what? That was too large to be a destroyer, wasn’t it?
She tried to get a signal through the waves of jamming that filled the city, finally picking up part of the net. A freighter. The spaceship dying in fire was a freighter. Which meant it was an enemy.
A sudden chatter on the net, interrupted by agile jamming that broke it off. Carmen looked up again, seeing far off the blossom of an explosion like a new star suddenly appearing high in the morning sky. Another ship?
She focused her scope back on the enemy soldiers she’d seen earlier. They were still staring upward, and if she was any judge of body language they weren’t happy with what they were seeing.
Carmen slid away from the window, careful not to expose herself to sight through it, searching for a landline she could link in to. She wouldn’t let herself hope. Not yet.
“Hey, want to go somewhere private?”
Lochan looked in surprise at the woman standing in the doorway to his cabin on the Oarai Miho. The same one who had talked to him about backup plans and his previous experience against pirates. “That . . . depends.”
She smiled. “We haven’t really talked much. I’m Freya Morgan.”
“Lochan Nakamura. What’s your reason for being aboard?”
“I’m a trade negotiator.”
He nodded, thinking something didn’t fit in that description of her. “And what is it you want to negotiate with me?”
Freya smiled again and winked at him. “You know.”
Lochan hesitated. But why the hell not? It wasn’t like he and Brigit Kelly had any relationship yet. Certainly, they hadn’t made commitments to each other. And with that pirate heading for an intercept with this ship, it seemed all too likely that he might not get another chance with any partner. Having spent far too many hours already sitting alone in this cabin watching the pirate grow steadily closer to the Oarai Miho, Lochan welcomed the chance for something else to do. Especially with someone like Freya Morgan. “Okay.”
“Come on. I know a place.”
He followed Freya through the passageway outside their cabins and through a smaller cross passage. At the end of that, Freya opened a sealed hatch about a meter in diameter. “In here. It’ll be a little tight with both of us inside. I hope you won’t mind.”
He didn’t think that’d be a problem. Lochan, still a little wary, let her go through first, then crouched to come through the hatch.
It was tight. She reached past him to pull the hatch shut. “Whew. Now we can talk.”
“Talk?” Lochan wondered if he’d sounded as lame as he thought he just had.
“I’m sorry,” Freya said, smiling apologetically. Her body pressed lightly against him in the small compartment but without any hint of passion. “Lochan, your cabin is probably bugged. I know mine is.”
“Bugged? The captain has the cabins bugged?”
“No.” Freya shook her head. “One of our fellow passengers. I don’t know which one for certain. There might be more than one. Listen, I am sorry for misleading you, but I needed a way to get you here without anyone’s suspecting I had any other motive.”
Lochan’s sense of humor came to his rescue. “I certainly didn’t suspect it.”
“I hope you understand—”
“Ever since I came down and out I’ve been meeting women younger than me who want to know me for reasons that have nothing to do with physical attraction,” Lochan said dryly. “This is part of the pattern. Why exactly are we in here?”
“The pirates.”
“You think we can hide in here when they board the ship?”
“Of course not. Even if the captain didn’t rat us out, which I’m pretty certain she would, they’d check the passenger manifest and search the ship until they found us. No, I have an idea for dealing with that pirate ship,” Freya said.
“An idea involving what?” Lochan asked.
“A bomb.”
He paused, studying her again. “Exactly who are you?”
“I told you. Freya Morgan. Trade negotiator. For Catalan.”
“Trade negotiator.” Lochan waited a moment longer, but she said nothing else. “All right. Just what does a trade negotiator know about bombs?”
“A girl has to have a hobby,” she explained in a low voice. “Lochan, I need backup on this. One person can’t handle the physical aspects of it. It has to be someone I trust, and on this ship that’s you.”
“Why? You don’t know me.”
“No. But I know people who do know you, and I talked to them when you came aboard at Kosatka. They said if I needed help, you could be counted on.”
“Thanks.” Her reasons made sense to him, as did the need to do something. “If this plan could help stop the pirates, why aren’t you asking the captain for help?”
Freya shook her head. “Because that’d be a bad idea. One, because so far the captain is playing the old game of going along with demands in the hopes of minimizing her losses, and two, because it’s possible the captain has been paid off to not cause any trouble when the pirates showed up. Taking that kind of bribe can just be good business, you know. And three, this freighter is owned by a company that operates out of Hesta that is now effectively controlled by executives from Scatha.”
“So they’re supposedly neutral, and maybe still thinking of themselves that way, but to all intents and purposes they’re the enemy because they know they’re answering to bosses who work for Scatha. But what makes you think I can be trusted to help you with a bomb?” Lochan pressed.
“Self-interest,” she replied. “I don’t want to end up in the hands of those so-called pirates, and neither do you, right? More than that, though, I’ve done my research. I know your merit.”
“So you think I’m the sort of guy to help you build a bomb.” Lochan gazed at her, wondering what Freya Morgan was like and realizing that he’d spent too much time researching information about his mission and too little time learning more about his fellow passengers. “Why do I trust you?”
“Because I’m being honest with you on what I want to do and what I want you to help with. And, it’s probably our only chance to avoid a sudden detour to a secret prison at Apulu or Scatha.”
“Or Turan.” Lochan looked at her again, wondering why parts of Freya reminded him of Mele Darcy and parts of Carmen Ochoa. But did the reasons for that matter as much as the fact that she was reminding him of women who had proven their right to be trusted? On top of that, Freya’s arguments were solid. There wasn’t any other option that Lochan knew of that offered any chance of escaping those pirates. “All right. I’m in.”
Freya smiled. “Brigit told me I could count on you.”
“Brigit? Brigit Kelly?” Lochan was abruptly glad that he hadn’t made any effort to collect on Freya’s implied promise that had lured him here. “You know her?”
“Let’s say that she and I share some history and similar goals. And from what she told me while this ship was at Kosatka, I think you share those goals as well.”
“I’m working for Kosatka,” Lochan said, remembering that Brigit had suggested he might find a friend on the ship if he needed one. He suddenly understood that hadn’t been about hooking up but a guarded reference to Freya Morgan if problems like a pirate showed up.
Freya shook her head again. “You’re working for us all, aren’t you?”
He considered those words before nodding in reply. “I guess I am.”
“Good. I’ll need to set some things up. When it’s ready I’ll stop by your cabin. We need to pretend that you and I are having a sudden and intense interest in playing reindeer games with each other. Trying to keep that quiet, sneaking about a little, will look totally natural to anyone who notices.” Freya smiled again, ruefully. “I’m sorry, I know it’s tight, but we should stay in here a little while longer. Just in case someone watched us. We want it to look like . . . what it looks like.”
“I promise to be smiling when we leave.”
She laughed. “You are a fine one. It’s too bad you’ve got a thing with Brigit.”
“I don’t actually have a thing with Brigit yet,” Lochan protested.
“Yeah, you do. You and Brigit just actually haven’t figured it out yet.”
Dinner that night didn’t vary on the surface from the usual during the trip so far. Like most other freighters, the Oarai Miho tended to favor cheap, bulk food with long shelf life and simple preparation requirements. Like most such foods, the heat packs were labeled with colorful pictures and grand names such as Beef Teppanyaki Multi or Chicken Grande Ulti, and also like most such foods the contents bore little resemblance to the labels and tasted primarily like mush with slabs of cardboard mixed in. Usually, several of the twelve total passengers would eat in the mess/rec room, the others taking the food back to their cabins.
Lochan usually ate in the rec room to avoid having the off-putting smell of the food linger in his room, but he’d rarely interacted much with his fellow passengers, the majority of whom seemed equally uninterested in socializing. He didn’t change that, though he stole some glances at Freya as she ate, noticing that she didn’t look his way. Lochan did spot a couple of the other passengers giving him a look, followed by glances at Freya and a whispered conversation that provoked knowing smiles from the two.
The tall, thin man who was certain that piracy wasn’t a thing, an actual pirate on intercept vector for this ship apparently not shaking his certainty in the least, spent his meal talking in a low voice to a shorter woman. They seemed to be in agreement on just about everything, though the bits of conversation that Lochan caught made it difficult for him to not jump in with some contrary opinions and actual facts.
When the freighter’s first officer passed by, one of the passengers called out a question. “How long until that other ship reaches us?”
The first mate paused, shrugged, and gave the shortest possible answer. “Twenty-six hours.”
Lochan kept his eyes on his unappetizing food to avoid looking toward Freya again. He had a feeling whatever she was planning would go down during the coming ship’s “night,” when the passengers and most of the crew were asleep.
Sure enough, late that evening he was roused from a light slumber by the door to his cabin opening. “Come on,” Freya whispered. “I need you now.”
The careful use of a phrase with a double meaning to confuse whoever had likely bugged his cabin made Lochan smile despite his nervousness. But even if the bug had vid capability, a smile would be natural enough, he thought.
This time they headed back toward where Lochan knew engineering lay, though he knew that only because he and the other passengers had been warned so many times not to ever go into that part of the ship. “How many are awake?” he whispered in Freya’s ear.
She rolled her eyes contemptuously. “One’s supposed to be awake on the bridge, but that one always sleeps. There’s also supposed to be an engineering watch awake, but every time I checked they were asleep, too. In the crew compartment, not even bothering to stay in engineering while they sleep. They depend on the ship’s systems to warn them if anything is going wrong and wake them with alerts.”
“No one is awake at night? Is that . . . legal?”
“No,” Freya replied in a matter-of-fact voice. “But, in addition to all of the other things humanity left behind at the Old Colonies and Old Earth, we also left the kind of people and organizations who enforce safety regulations on ships like this.”
They reached a large, wide hatch with a smaller hatch set into it. Freya looked around the darkened, quiet passageway carefully before pointing to something above the hatch. “Security and safety camera. This one is broken and hasn’t been repaired, which is handy for us.”
“What if it had been working?”
“I’d have broken it. They just saved me the trouble of doing that.” She opened the smaller hatch, going through and waiting for Lochan to follow before closing it.
He looked around the engineering section, which was also dimly lighted at this hour of the ship’s day. Several equipment consoles and displays, another hatch labeled with a variety of warnings as well as the words Power Core Access, and a wide, short passage at the back.
Freya went straight to that passage. By the time Lochan caught up with her, she’d found a powered multiwheeled device with grabber arms and was using the handle controls to back it out and toward another wide hatch that was latched open.
Inside was a sort of storage shelf with rectangular objects bearing rounded sides and corners lined up along it, each one strapped in securely to some sort of heavy-duty mechanism. Each of the objects was over a meter in height and a little wider in diameter.
“What are those?” Lochan asked, as Freya unlatched the straps holding the last in line of the objects.
“Fuel cells,” she said absentmindedly as she got the last one free of its holder.
“Fuel cells?” Lochan didn’t think he’d sounded as calm as Freya had. “Aren’t those really dangerous?”
She paused to look at him. “Yes and no. What do you know about fuel cells?”
“They’re what’s used to keep power cores going.”
“Right. The fuel cells used by warships are bigger because of the differing power requirements, but they all work basically the same way. There’s a lot of stuff in each of these that contains a lot of energy. The power core releases that energy in a controlled fashion. When one fuel cell is nearly expended, this feeder shelf loads in a new one. They’ve got all kinds of protection built into their construction to keep them from going unstable or releasing energy outside the power core, which is why the idiots running this ship haven’t even bothered to keep that hatch locked as it should be to prevent unauthorized access to these fuel cells.”
Lochan frowned at her. “And we’re going to . . . ?”
“Use this heavy cargo lifter to haul this fuel cell to the freighter’s lifeboat, load it aboard the lifeboat, and rig it to explode when the pirates recover the lifeboat.”
“Oh.” Lochan nodded, trying to think through the plan. “And why will the pirates bother recovering the lifeboat?”
“Because you and I will be aboard the lifeboat, trying to escape.”
“Yeah. Okay. Freya, I see a problem with this plan.”
She grinned. “We won’t really be aboard it. They’ll think we are. Lochan, we don’t have much time to work with. I can’t muscle this thing onto the lifter without your help. Trust me?”
“Sure.” He moved close to the fuel cell rack, feeling worried at getting closer even though from what he knew of fuel cells if one went unstable now there wouldn’t be any safe place on the whole ship. But humans had a natural aversion to getting close to really dangerous things even if those things seemed safe at the moment.
It took all his and Freya’s strength combined to manhandle the fuel cell far enough out of the rack to fit into the lifter’s grasp. Once that was done, Lochan took the lifter’s handle and slowly, cautiously backed it through engineering.
While he was doing that, Freya went to a bank of cabinets and sealed shelves, selecting pieces of equipment that she stuffed into an expandable carryall. “Don’t open the big hatch out of engineering yet,” she warned. “There’s an alarm on it.”
Lochan waited as Freya went to the hatch panel and entered some commands to disable the alarm. Once satisfied, she touched a control and the big hatch slid back, making enough noise to cause Lochan to cringe.
They maneuvered the lifter out of engineering and a short distance down a different passageway to another hatch, this one labeled Lifeboat—Emergency Access Only. Once again Freya went to work. “I need to bypass another alarm,” she explained. “I’m also diverting the video feed from that safety cam above the hatch. That one does work, which will be good for us later on. There. The alarm’s off, and right now the camera is only showing a continuous loop of the empty corridor here.”
This hatch resisted their efforts, but Lochan helped Freya throw the handle so it finally cracked open.
The lifeboat, big enough to carry the crew and a few others under tight conditions and keep them alive for a couple of weeks (“longer if they eat each other” Mele Darcy had once joked to Lochan), tightly filled the space beyond.
Freya opened the lifeboat’s hatch, wide to allow rapid access, and helped Lochan maneuver the lifter in far enough to deposit the fuel cell in the center of the lifeboat. Once he’d backed out the lifter, Lochan found Freya frowning at the fuel cell. “What’s the matter?”
“It’s heavy enough it shouldn’t shift when the lifeboat boosts away,” Freya explained, “but I’d like to fasten it somehow just to be certain.”
“No problem,” Lochan said, happy to know something useful in this matter that Freya apparently didn’t. He went to the emergency repair locker near the front of the lifeboat and opened it, immediately finding what he was looking for. “This’ll do it.”
Freya smiled at what he held. “Duct tape.”
“Two rolls. Required as part of the emergency supplies on every shuttle, lifeboat, and escape pod,” Lochan said. “A friend of mine told me that while we were, uh, killing time aboard a shuttle hoping to be rescued.” He went to work wrapping duct tape around the fuel cell and fastening it to the frames of the nearest seats while Freya assembled the other items she’d taken from engineering.
“Is that a tool universal power pack?” Lochan asked.
“Yes,” Freya answered, nodding toward the small, squarish object. “They can be found anywhere people use tools. And, unlike fuel cells, they’re a lot easier to mess with. Someone who knows what they’re doing, or someone who’s an idiot, can rig them to explode.”
Lochan saw her fastening the power pack to a place on the fuel cell where Freya had removed protective covers. “So that’s the, uh, detonator?”
“Right,” Freya said, working as she talked. “When it goes off here without any protection for this area it’ll rupture some important things inside the fuel cell. I’ve already disabled other safety features that might still limit the failure of the fuel cell so it’ll be certain to blow. And now I’m linking this receiver to the proximity alarm on the lifeboat. When the lifeboat comes in contact with another object, such as a ship owned by pirates, it should explode.”
“Should?”
“It’s always good to have backup, right?” Freya was laying out wires on the deck of the lifeboat, working as quickly as possible in the confined space. “Go on out. I’ll be right behind you.”
Lochan left the lifeboat, waiting outside the boat’s hatch as Freya backed out, laying wire as she went, swinging the hatch closed most of the way before making some final touches and sealing it. “A nice, simple, manual backup. If the proximity alarm fails to set off the power pack, opening this hatch will cross some wires, complete a circuit, and make sure the job’s done.”
“Uh-huh,” Lochan said, eyeing her in the dim light. “Catalan certainly gives its trade negotiators interesting skill sets.”
“You have to admit they came in handy.” With Lochan’s help, they carefully resealed the hatch to the lifeboat compartment, Freya examining it closely to ensure nothing looked amiss. “All right. I’ve gimmicked the video cam so I can feed it more signals later remotely. Let’s get this lifter back to engineering, then get back to our cabins before anyone spots us.”
The trip back felt more tense to Lochan than earlier as he worried about how much time it had taken to get this far. But they maneuvered the lifter back into place, Freya closed the latches on the now-empty fuel cell holder at the end of the rack to avoid making it obvious that one had been taken, and got the big hatch closed.
They were in the passageway where their cabins were, within a few meters of safety, when Lochan heard the scuff of a footstep from around the corner.
Before he could react, Freya pinned him against the nearest bulkhead and pressed her mouth against his.
Startled, Lochan kept his eyes open and saw a drowsy-looking crew member walk past. The crew member glanced at them, paused as if deciding whether to stop and watch for a while, then went onward.
“Sorry,” Freya gasped in a whisper as she stood back from Lochan. “We had to make sure that guy thought we were out at this hour for fun and games.”
“You don’t have to apologize. It’s been awhile since I was kissed like that.”
“I couldn’t tell,” Freya said with a wink. “Be prepared at any moment with your stuff ready to go. I’ll come by, and we’ll pretend to escape.”
“How long?” Lochan asked.
“It’s . . . sixteen hours until those pirates catch this ship. We’ll make our escape when they’re close, like we’re panicking. All right?”
“All right. How are we going to launch it?”
“I rigged the flight controls so I can activate the launch sequence remotely. See you in about fifteen hours, Lochan.”
“Shouldn’t we be seen plotting together before then?” Lochan asked. “So when this happens, the others can put two and two together and come up with the wrong sum?”
“Right. Good thinking. I’ll see you at breakfast, then.”
Lochan went back to his cabin and lay down but couldn’t sleep. Finally, he got up and carefully packed his small travel bag. Just like someone planning on going somewhere soon.