Bastion Saturn (17 page)

“I hate to lose another ship, but yes, we can shoot him down.”

Henry Lo moved his tongue against his teeth as though scraping off a bad taste. “Let the refugee ship he’s talking about land and unload, then shoot him down. We can space the others at our leisure.” He uncovered the mic. “Very well, Officer Day. Tell your friends they may land.”

“Uh, roger that. But, I see anything remotely hostile, and I fucking lay waste to this place. Got it? And it’s Mister Day. I’m not one of your police scum.

“You made yourself quite clear… Mister Day. Wang out.”

Caleb stared at his monitors and squirmed with unconscious discomfort. Way too easy. But then again, maybe he did hold the trump card. He voice-texted Spruck:

You get all that?

Got it. I don’t trust him any farther than I could chuck him on earth grav.

Yeah. I have this thing’s defense on auto. Hair trigger. Send me your ship’s ID so I don’t blast you when you land.

Roger that.

ETA?

Eleven. I’m ground skimming. Using the momentum from a short burst on the far side. The other cop ships are looking hard.

Yeah. I see them. my DI is screaming radar, laser, and heat lock from five different sources.

Bert wants to know what’s keeping them from blasting you once we land and are inside?

There was a long beat, then Caleb wrote back,
Shit.

Bert had entered the
Belle
’s cabin to report on the wounded situation, the nature of which was under control. He noticed with distaste that he still wore a bit of vomit on his jumpsuit and then had a moment of astonishment that he would have any feelings of distaste at all, which led to another moment of astonishment as he contemplated having feelings period. Was that what this was?

“Bert, buddy? You were saying?” asked Spruck.

Bert snapped out of his reverie only to fall back in as he struggled with the feeling of being referred to as a friend. The feeling was of joy.
What is going on?

“Bert, you okay?”

“Forgive me,” said the robot. “I seem to be experiencing a minor malfunction. Nothing significant . . . I hope.”

“Alright. So what’s your advice?”

“It’s simple really. We just need the shuttle.”

“That’s nothing new, baby,” said Natalie.

Jennifer said, “Thanks, Bert. I’m sure Saanvi can use more help.”

“You misunderstand me,” said Bert. Though in his head he was saying shut up and let me finish, which got him zoning out again over what had gone wrong with his programming.

Spruck said, “Yeah, okay. So what’re we missing?”

Bert smiled. “Per the original plan, we steal the shuttle and make a hasty escape. As noted, Hanson Shuttles are equipped with ship-to-ship docking systems. Nothing requires us to make this transfer on Albiorix. We can transfer the people off this ship at a safe rendezvous far away from here. Mr. Day, sir, will have to commit to a significant assault and we will have to peel off a large number of the enemy before using this ship’s cloaking device to disappear. Three ships going three different directions, with two of them armed and attacking will significantly reduce Wang Fat’s ability to corral us. The odds are against success, but they are far greater than the one hundred percent odds of failure with the current plan. We have one advantage: Given Mr. Day, sir’s ultimatum, it can be reasonably calculated that under the circumstances, it is highly unlikely that the enemy are guarding against another breach on our part in an attempt to steal the shuttle.”

Spruck couldn’t hold back the admiration. “Since when do robots think like generals?”

Bert had the same thought. All he could do was smile and shrug.

When they explained it to Caleb, he texted back immediately:

So if I had just nabbed the shuttle instead of this cop ship?

Pretty much
, texted Spruck.

Jennifer couldn’t believe that she was actually climbing into the Bell’s other exosuit. The thing reeked of Ken’s fear-laced-sweat. The man, only hours before, had been hanging out in space using a rock cutter as a laser weapon. She couldn’t believe that out of all of the people on Spruck’s ship, she was the only one with pilot skills or make that, the willingness to interface her brain with the shuttle. Minutes before, she’d sounded like an airline attendant in a pilotless plane calling out to the passengers: “Excuse me. Is there anyone on board who can pilot a shuttle? Oh, and who doesn’t mind climbing into an exosuit and jumping off the ship?” Her queries had been met with definitive silence. She wasn’t much of a pilot, but as Saanvi reminded her, she had the fundamentals.

They had agreed that the only way to make this work involved one of them getting inside without being noticed. A deeply reluctant volunteer, Jennifer would have to also enter via the walkabout route. Once she’d accomplished that, Caleb would announce the new plan to the Wang Fat fuckers.

As usual, the one-size-fits-all exosuit was a bullshit hope. Yes, the thing shrank down on her body, but her feet and hands felt clumsy and foreign, and she could feel the material obstructively bunching behind her knees and inside her elbows. God, Ken had left the thing clammy. A common expired warranty issue , the dehumidifying element must have been on the fritz. She closed the hatch behind her and was satisfied at least that the seal indicator lit up as green. To maintain radio silence, she voice-texted.
I’m good to go, I guess.

Spruck texted back.
Roger that. Stand by to open the cover in ten, nine, eight—

She looked up and murmured, “Oh Lord Jesus, tell me you’re not just an Earthbound god and that you’re out here, too.” She grabbed the release switch.

Four, three, two, one. Open.

She opened the hatch and nearly leaped out of the suit in surprise at how close the ground was and how fast they were moving.

Spruck texted,
Release exosuit lock and jump in five, four—

Jennifer took a deep breath and unlocked the suit from the ship. She felt a distinct thump through her feet and lower back. Her body unexpectedly shifted and she felt her groin muscles tighten. The
Belle
slowed like a train coming into the station as it passed over the lip of a crater.

Two, one, jump!

She jumped. “
Sheeeeeeiiiiiiiittttt!
”

At the same moment, Caleb threw his ship into erratic maneuvers to create a diversion. His defense computer flashed warnings of imminent death, and he righted the ship while jumping onto the channel that they had all agreed to monitor, yelling, “Hold fire! Hold fire! I fell asleep. The ship was reacting to a dream, uh, nightmare. All good. I’m awake.” It had been distracting enough so that the killers that surrounded him hadn’t noticed the Princess Belle’s maneuver and Jennifer’s jump into the same crater that he had leaped down into.

Jennifer had intended to roll, but tripped and splayed out in a spread-eagle belly flop that had her bouncing like a Raggedy Ann, knocking the wind out of her, the glass of her helmet plowing across the ground.

She hadn’t had the wind knocked from her since she had been a kid while training with her merciless mother. Her chest felt tight and empty, cramping with the effort to restart, her mouth agape, feeling like a fish dropped on a dock. Finally, she sucked in a huge gulp only to cough violently with the effort. She pulled herself into a clumsy fetal position, the exosuit too bulky. When she lifted her head, her view was obscured by fine dust and grit. She could just make out the shadow of the crater getting longer fast. In minutes it would be dark. That was her window.
Gotta move.

As she struggled to sit up, a hand landed on her shoulder. She screamed and twisted away, rolling onto her back and kicking wildly in the direction of the touch. A man’s voice using the local area suit channel said, “Hey, man. You’re a crab. Wow. A freakin’ space crab.”

“Don’t touch me!”

Jook held up his hands in supplication. “A talking freakin space crab? I won’t touch you, space crab.”

Jennifer gathered her wits and took in the man in the dirty exosuit. “Are you high?”

“Sooo freakin’ high, space crab. On walkabout till the air runs out. Didn’t expect to meet no freakin’ space crabs though.”

“So you can’t tell that I am a human woman?”

“Sure, crab. I can see that.”

“OK, why not? I’m a crab. I’m a little turned around. I’m guessing you came out from where I want to go in.”

“Oh. You don’t want to go in there, crab. Place full of assholes.”

“That’s true. Can you point out which way to the walkabout door?”

Jook pointed over the lip of the crater. “Hansel and Gretel crumbs is what I call it. Previous asshole who ran this place put UV reflectors on the ground. Just follow them to the door. But beware the witch.” He started to giggle, which turned into a full-blown belly laugh and Jennifer watched him fall over on the ground.

“Are you . . . are you going to be all right?”

“Go away now, space crab human. You’re bumming my high.”

When she reached the top of the lip, Jennifer turned on the UV helmet light . . . and saw nothing. The light wouldn’t be picked up by her own eyes, but they should have highlighted the reflectors. She took some tentative steps in the dark, scanned around, and still saw nothing. She voice-texted Caleb:

I’m not seeing crap out here. Ran into a stoner who pointed the way. My night vision shows the base. No reflectors.

I met that guy. Run a diagnostic on the helmet.

She sat in the dark and let the helmet check itself out. A fault flashed an error in the UV and full light spectrum torches. “Damn.” She told the helmet to reboot and continued to sit in the dark while the thing shut down everything but life support and started up again. The sun would be coming up again soon, and Saturn was rising as well. Her dark window was almost gone. The helmet rebooted, and another diagnostic told the same tale. Something must have jarred loose when her helmet smashed across the surface.

It was Jook’s turn to be startled when Jennifer laid a hand on his shoulder. “Shit, man! Why would you do a brother like that?”

“I need you to show me how to get through the walkabout entrance.”

“Not going back there, high-bummer.”

“Just show me the way. Please. I’m not asking you to go in.”

“You don’t even look like a crab anymore.”

“Sorry.”

“Lady, you suck. I came out here to commune with everything. I was having a perfectly pleasant time speaking with a bunch of angels who are waiting on my shit. I got to laugh at a fallen space crab, and you’re focusing my beam on your narrow little ass.”

“Sorry. Can you just show me to the door? I’m not asking you to go inside. On the other hand, I’m hoping to blast off this rock and you can come too if you help . . . Though, why I would want help from a tripped out blinker like you—”

“You have a ship?”

“I will.”

“Well, come on. I’m on fumes here, man. My CO2 light is screaming like a broken Vegas-hooker-bot.”

Just as Bert had predicted, nobody was watching the back door. The long tunnel to the central nexus was empty. Jennifer and Jook lifted their faceplates up to breathe in the dry base air and to hear better.

Jook said, “Bozos.”

“Huh?”

“Bozos. Clowns.”

“I know what a Bozo is.”

“Their security is for shit. They’ve got the cops working for them even.”

Jennifer gave him a look that asked,
And?

“I was head of security here.”

“You’re one to talk, then.”

“I wasn’t the one to fake everyone into bailing out. That was all Larry. You can see the debris still coming down outside from all the folks here getting blasted. God, Larry was an asshole.”

A voice came over a loudspeaker in the ceiling. “Halt! Stay right where you are.”

Jook said, “See. Bozos.” He started to run. Only with the light gravity it was more of a leaping bound. “Come on, man!”

Jennifer bounded, too. Jook had long legs, and she lost her footing and glanced off the walls as she tried to keep up. As they entered the landing nexus, they careened into a guy wearing full antilaser kit. Jennifer bounced away, skidding across the floor. She watched in surprise as Jook snatched at the guy. In one fluid motion, Jook flipped the man’s faceplate up, jammed a pair of fingers into the flailing and screaming fellow’s eyes, and cut off the scream with a vicious punch to the throat. As Jennifer picked herself up off the floor, she saw what looked like a whole platoon of guys in antilaser gear efficiently bounding toward them from an adjacent hall.

Jook heaved the decimated guy up and used him as a shield as a half a dozen laser blasts came his way. He yelled, “Central! Protocol 65LN!”

A male computer voice reminiscent of a 1968 hippie came through the PA. “Yes, my brother.” The doors surrounding the nexus came slamming down, one chopping the lead Wang Fat guy in half, sending a grisly spray of bodily fluid and entrails into the room.

Jennifer just stared at Jook wide-eyed.

Jook wiped some spatter from his face and grinned. “Emergency protocol. Seals off the landing nexus in the event of an undetected airlock breach. Shit, I’m still stoned. The blood on the walls isn’t really forming into words, right?”

Jennifer looked around. “It’s not, but what do you see?”

“It says,
She prefers to be naked
.”

Jennifer gave him a double take and chalked it up to extreme coincidence. “Can we get to the shuttle with all of the doors shut?”

“Of course. Why couldn’t we do that?”

Jennifer decided to leave it alone. Instead she lowered her visor and voice-texted Caleb.

You won’t believe it, but I’m in, and the stoner I met outside is helping me.

Are you in the shuttle?

Almost.

Getting hairball out here. One of the cops just landed and—

A bright red warning flashed across her heads-up.
Signal jam.
She tried sending another text but got the same warning. She lifted her visor and said to Jook, “So gotta go.”