Starbridge (17 page)

"Aunt Joan!" Mahree called, trying to distract her aunt.
Don't laugh! Don't
show your teeth! And don't stare!
she cried silently. Both she and Dhurrrkk'

started toward the enraged chess players.

Khrekk' pushed himself up until he and Joan were nearly nose-to-nose--then he snarled, jaws opening wide, lips pulling back to reveal his enormous fighting fangs. "You dare to challenge me?" he roared.

Suddenly confronted by those gleaming ivory canines, Joan yelped and flinched back.
"Shit!
Get
away
from me!"

"Aunt Joan." Mahree grabbed the terrified woman's elbow, steadying her.

"Just take it eas--"

105

A heavy body slammed into Mahree from behind, sending both women staggering. The girl tripped and fell, landing hard in the higher gravity. "It's Simon!
Grab him!"
she heard Rob yelling frantically.

Viorst stumbled over Mahree as the Bio Officer flung himself forward, grabbing Joan, clawing at her hip. The First Mate struggled, trying to push the berserk crewman away. "Stop it! Simon, that's an order!"

"They're going to kill us all!" Viorst shrieked at her. "I'm the only one who can see them--I have to stop them!"

"Watch out!" Paul Monteleon yelled. "He's got her gun!"

"Stop him!" "Oh, my God!" Humans milled in panic. Many broke and ran for the airlock.

Mahree gasped, trying to get her wind back. Ray Drummond made a grab for the Bio Officer's arm, but Simon lashed out with a hard left, sending the Assistant Engineer staggering back. Dhurrrkk' flung himself forward, only to have Viorst kick him in the shoulder.

Growling, Khrekk' leaped into the melee, and he, the First Mate, and the Bio Officer slammed into the table, overturning it and the chairs. Then they all went down in a thrashing welter of clothed and furred arms and legs. Mahree heard a sound like dry wood snapping, then Joan's agonized screams.

As Mahree rose, wavering, Simon rolled away and was on his feet, Joan's sidearm in his hand. Khrekk' and Dhurrrkk', not realizing the significance of the weapon, advanced on him steadily. "I'll kill you, I swear! You'll never get me!" Simon panted, backing away. Mahree watched, horrified, as the Bio Officer deliberately released the safety and thumbed the gun's intensity level all the way up.

Joan's screams dwindled into gasping moans.

"Simon, no! Stop!" Raoul ordered, waving Jerry and Paul back. "We're in the
tube,
for God's sake! Fire that thing and you'll breach the wall! We'll all be killed!" He glanced around at his crew. "Stay back, everybody! Don't move!"

Dhurrrkk' and Khrekk' continued to glide forward on all fours.

Simon bumped into the wall of the tube, waving the gun wildly. "Stop! I'll shoot, I will! Stay back, Ray! Don't try it, Jerry! I can't let you stop me! You can't see them, but I can!" He was deadly pale, his eyes glittering feverishly, as the nose of

106

the gun moved back and forth between the Simiu and Drummond, who was closest. Poised to leap, Ray, Jerry and Paul hesitated, restrained by Raoul's order.

Waving Dhurrrkk' back, Mahree walked around one of the overturned chairs, and came at Simon from the side. "Simon, it's Mahree," she said softly, moving with slow, unhurried steps. She held out her hand. "Give me the gun.

They don't even know what it
is.
You don't want to make a terrible mistake!"

"They'll kill us," he insisted. "I have to stop them!" But for a moment he wavered, uncertain.

"Why is he behaving like this?" Dhurrrkk' asked, in Simiu.

Hearing the soft, slurred growl of the alien's words, words that he could not understand, Simon screamed, "No!" His finger tightened inexorably on the trigger.

"Simon!"
Mahree flung herself at Viorst's arm, shoving it just as he fired. The bolt of ionized power whined over Khrekk's shoulder, then swung wildly past Mahree and into the wall. There was a thunderous
shump
as the tube material was breached, then the shrill, maniacal screaming of air being sucked into vacuum.

As the weapon's bolt nearly grazed Mahree's head, she felt as though each individual cell in her brain had been wrenched and twisted. Gasping, she collapsed.

In the following seconds, she was dimly aware of a rush of panicky bodies, and terrified screaming. Mahree would have screamed, too, but she couldn't muster the strength. Pain seared through her head, blurring her vision.

Dazed and sick, she fought to stay conscious as the force of the atmosphere rushing into the vacuum outside through the fist-sized hole began pulling her helpless body along the floor. The air was filled with a wild barrage of debris: computer flimsies, Joan's gun, chessmen, and chair cushions. The hole grew larger as objects were sucked through it. Soon the tube was bound to give way altogether.

The artificial gale tore at Mahree's lungs, hurting her as she struggled to breathe. She made a grab for one of the chairs as she was pulled past it, but it was not heavy enough to anchor her; she let it go.

As Ray Drummond skidded by on hands and knees, Mahree saw him snatch up something, then he let himself be pulled forward again. When he reached the wall, the Assistant Engineer

107

107

struggled to his feet and manhandled the stiff, flat object against the unbreached side of the tube. Fighting with all his strength to keep from being sucked through, he slid the square shape over the now head-sized hole. The screeching wail abruptly ceased, reduced to a muffled hissing.

Mahree blinked, finally focusing her eyes. The object covering the hole was Joan's treasured marble chessboard.

She heard her aunt moan. Joan was sprawled close by, her arm at a sickening angle, something moist and red protruding from a joint that shouldn't have been there. Blood spurted into the air in a sanguine jet.

"Get my medical kit! There's arterial bleeding!" Rob yelled, scrambling to the injured woman's side. "Yoki, see if Mahree got hit!"

Simon lay buried beneath Yoki, Paul, Raoul, Ray, and Azam Quitubi. The Cargo Chief began wriggling out of the pile at Rob's order, leaving the men to guard Viorst. The Bio Officer whimpered and sobbed as they pulled him into a sitting position and held him, twisting his arms behind his back. Raoul abruptly let go of him and sank down onto the floor, dazed. He began cursing softly in a mixture of French and English.

"FriendMahree? Are you hurt?" Furred hands gently rolled her onto her back, and she saw Dhurrrkk' peering anxiously at her. At first Mahree didn't understand what he'd said, then she realized that, for the first time, he had addressed her using the "familiar" form, reserved for family and the closest of friends.

"Honey, are you okay?" a voice asked. Mahree slowly turned her head, seeing Yoki kneeling beside her. She managed to nod.

"Oh, Mahree . . . thank God! I thought that bastard had killed you!"

"I'm all right," Mahree mumbled, wondering if it were true. She felt very odd--

as though her head simultaneously weighed a ton and was about to float off her shoulders. Every breath hurt. Feebly, she reached out to pat Dhurrrkk's arm. "Go see how Khrekk' is doing," she said. "Please ..."

The alien nodded. "I will do so. You displayed great courage, FriendMahree.

Unlike some of your people"--he shot a vicious glance at Simon--"you have behaved with honor this day."

Then Dhurrrkk' was gone.

"He said that you were very brave, honey. He said that you 108

behaved with honor," Yoki said, unaware, of course, that the girl had understood the Simiu words without her voder.

Mahree nodded, biting her lip to hold back a moan. An inner voice was shrieking that Simon had actually
shot
Khrekk' with a
weapon,
in full sight of a score of Simiu. The voice wailed that it was all ruined, but Mahree refused to listen; refused to let the tears she could feel behind her eyelids begin to fall--she was afraid that if she gave in, even for a second, she'd never be able to stop crying.

Instead, she sat up, shutting her eyes as the tube spun around in a dizzy blur of white splotched with red. "What about Khrekk'? Did Simon kill him?"

"I don't think so. He was moaning, so he's breathing. They've helped him up.

He's walking."

Mahree opened her eyes and slowly her surroundings steadied. She saw that the Simiu contingent, supporting a staggering, furred shape, was just disappearing into the station's airlock. "Oh, God," she whispered. "This can't be happening."

"Raoul?" Both women turned to see Paul Monteleon carefully pushing aside overturned furniture. Someone was lying there, nearly buried beneath computer flimsies, a Simiu lounge, and a human table and chair. The Chief Engineer's face blanched. '
'Mon Dieu!''

Lamont scrambled toward Monteleon, calling "Doc!
Doc!"

"One second," Rob said tightly, working over his now- unconscious patient.

Droplets of blood had spattered his face in a ghastly parody of freckles. "I've almost got this bleeder fused."

A heartbeat later he snapped, "Yoki! Stay with Joan!" Grabbing his bag, the doctor darted over to Paul and Raoul. Mahree saw his back stiffen. "Oh, God," he muttered. "It's too late. He's dead."

Raoul looked up incredulously. "Doc, you've got to help him! Begin resuscitation!"

"It's no good, Captain," Rob said softly. "There's nothing I can do." Fishing in his bag, he took out a sensor patch, pressed it into place. "No brain activity, see? He's dead ... his neck's broken."

"For the love of God, who is it?" Yoki cried.

Rob swallowed. "It's Jerry."

Raoul put his palms over his eyes, grinding them viciously

109

against the sockets. His voice dropped to a broken mutter.
"Mon Dieu, il est
mart . . . Seigneur . . . il est mort
..."

Tears flooded Mahree's eyes.
Jerry! Oh, God, not
Jerry!
Please, not Jerry.

Memories of the Communications Chief flashed through her mind. In the weeks since they'd received the Simiu signal, they had become friends, and knowing that he was gone hurt worse than the disruptor bolt.

"How?" Yoki said, raising her voice. "Did anyone see how it happened?"

"I caught a glimpse of him," Azam Quitubi said. "When the tube went and we were all flailing around. He and one of the Simiu seemed to be struggling to hold onto each other. But ..." he hesitated, then said reluctantly, "but they could have been fighting, too. Things were moving so fast, I couldn't ..."

"Don't make this worse than it is." Rob's voice was tight as he examined the body. "In this gravity, simple falls can be disastrous ... yes, that's what happened. He slammed into this overturned chair. Death was . . . was . . .

instantaneous." His voice cracked, and he fought to steady it. "He never felt a thing."

The doctor climbed unsteadily to his feet, then went back to Joan. "We need stretchers," he called to several of
Desiree's
crew who had emerged from the shelter of the airlock.

Mahree began to weep.

"Cherie
..." Raoul said, coming over to gather her into his arms, "are you sure you're not hurt? From where I was standing, it looked as though Viorst couldn't have missed blowing half your head off."

"I'm all right." Mahree said dully, wiping her eyes. "Honest I am."

"Raoul," Rob said, "take Mahree to the infirmary. I want to examine her as soon as I finish with Joan."

Rob's words seemed to galvanize Raoul, because the Captain wavered to his feet and stood looking down at his wife.

"She'll be okay, Raoul," Rob said. He finished inflating a temporary cast.

"Compound fracture of the radius and ulna, but she'll be all right." Rob activated the emergency stretcher, and he and Raoul lifted Joan onto it. Only then did the doctor take out a sheet and gently cover Jerry Greendeer's body. He knelt beside his dead friend for a moment, head bowed.

Raoul turned away from the doctor. His gaze fell on Simon,

110

still sobbing in the grip of his captors. The Captain's face darkened with a terrible rage. Grabbing the Bio Officer by the collar of his coverall, Lamont jerked him to his feet.
"Debout, espece d'enfant de salaud! Look
at what you did! You sorry sonofabitch! Jerry's
dead,
and it's
your
fault!"

Viorst took one glance at the shrouded corpse and the pool of blood congealing on the floor of the tube, then vomited.

Mahree turned her head away, but not quickly enough. The smell hit her, and she, too, was wretchedly sick, tears of pain, grief, and embarrassment streaming down her face as she heaved. She felt hands holding her head, and heard Yoki's voice: "You poor thing ..."

" 'm sorry--" she gasped, gagging. "Can't help--"

"Of course you can't," Yoki soothed, supporting her through another spasm.

"You've been so brave, honey . . . you're a hero ... if it weren't for you, that Simiu would've been killed ..."

Finally, the girl collapsed onto the floor of the tube. Dimly, she was aware that crew members were carrying Joan's stretcher and Jerry's body into the airlock. Her head whirled and she felt faint.

Strong arms scooped her up, lifting and cradling her against a broad chest.

Mahree opened her eyes to see her uncle's face. "I'm taking you to the infirmary," he said.

"I can walk," she protested.

"No, you can't," he said, striding toward the airlock. "Just lie still,
cherie."

"Raoul!" Yoki's voice reached them.

Lamont stopped and turned around, facing back down the tube. Mahree raised her head to see two Simiu males in vacuum suits emerging from the aliens' airlock. One of them carried a plate large enough to repair the tube.

As Mahree watched, they walked over to where Paul Monteleon and Ray Drummond still stood, keeping watch over the chessboard-patched hole.

The pull of the vacuum outside was enough to hold the marble square against the wall, but the engineers weren't taking any chances.

"I--we--are very sorry," Paul said brokenly, as the aliens approached. "We deeply regret what happened."