Where the Ships Die (12 page)

Natalie climbed over the rail and knelt on the narrow strip of duracrete. Then, having secured a grip on the lower part of the rail, she dangled over the edge.

In the meantime, the man named Shank, still carrying the head named Johnson, stood on what had been
her
balcony and hurled obscenities in her direction.

Natalie, determined to escape, forced herself to ignore them. Concrete pressed on the inner surface of her arm. It hurt. Natalie swung out, in, and out again. Then, as the outward motion completed itself, and the inward motion began, she let go. The balcony rushed upward, smacked the soles of her feet, and threw her off balance. She backpedaled into the railing, caught herself, and reversed the motion. Four steps carried her to the door. It was unlocked and slid out of the way.

Natalie entered as a naked man left the bathroom. He saw her, covered his genitals, and backed away. She waved cheerfully and left through the hallway door.

Natalie opened a fire door and ran down what seemed like interminable flights of stairs to the ground floor. She considered the rental car, assumed it was covered, and took a side exit instead. It opened onto a large courtyard. A walkway led her past the swimming pool and the cabanas, and into an alley. From there it was a short sprint to a side street and an autocab.

Most people would have called the authorities, but Natalie was a spacer, and like most spacers placed little trust in local police, even on Mechnos. So she headed for Freeport. Spacers, especially
free
spacers, take care of their own. The only problem was that it would be relatively easy for her pursuers to guess her destination and arrive there first, especially since the autocab was programmed to obey the legal limit, and ignored her orders to the contrary.

The cab crawled through traffic as its meter displayed an ever-ascending fare and the onboard computer obeyed each and every one of the city's multitudinous traffic laws. Natalie ground her teeth in frustration as she scanned the surrounding cars and prayed that the thugs were behind rather than in front of her.

Freeport, with its seedy demeanor, and even seedier residents, had begun to stir; Later, in three or four hours, things would start to hum. Still, a sprinkling of spacers, most dressed in their ship's colors, had already filtered up from the harbor and were wandering the streets.

Good. A call would bring five or six crew-beings to her side, most if not all of whom would be tougher than the dirt-siders at her hotel room.

Determined to walk the last few blocks and see what, if anything, lay in wait for her, Natalie ordered the cab to stop. She ran her card through the scanner, wondered if Orr Enterprises had the means to monitor citywide credit card transactions, and decided it didn't matter. Such information would only confirm what common sense had probably already told them.

The autocab whirred away as Natalie walked the rest of the block, took a right at the Blue Moon tavern, and headed toward the harbor. The odor of briny water, deep-fried food, and recently released ozone filled her nostrils. She took a deep breath, nodded to an engineer she'd met somewhere, and smiled. This was home. For her, at least.

The street sloped down toward Discovery Bay, providing a good view of the harbor. At least fifty or sixty ships were bellied up to the docks, Most were loading or unloading cargo. And not symbolic cargo either, but the
real
thing, like variform cattle, critical machine parts, desperately needed antibiotics, weapons and ammunition, and much, much more.

All of which meant that the track-mounted cranes were hard at work, lifting cargo modules in and out of holds. Tractors, their beepers beeping, pulled lines of trailers along finger-shaped wharves while exoskeletons minced this way and that, their arms loaded with boxes.

Natalie paused at the bottom of the slope, searched the area for signs of pursuit, and heaved a sigh of relief when none was visible. She hurried across the maglev track, waved her pass in front of a bored-looking guard, and made for the terminal building. It crouched low as if seeking to avoid attention. The structure, and its single largest office, served as headquarters for Logenny MacAllister III, a notoriously crotchety man who carried the title of dock master, and served as Freeport's unofficial mayor, marshal, and magistrate.

She found MacAllister, as most people did, sitting in his office, monitoring his kingdom via sixty carefully placed vid cams, and smoking a pipe. A wreath of blue smoke encircled his head and drifted away from the incoming air. He was old, exactly how old no one knew for sure. He had a full head of white hair, and laser-bright eyes. He greeted Natalie the moment she entered. "So, lass ... how were the hearings? Did they find a cause?"

Natalie shook her head and dropped into one of the dock master's mismatched guest chairs. They were arranged in a semicircle and fronted his beat-up desk. "Some say yes, some say no."

The dock master scowled, examined the bowl of his pipe, and emptied it into a much abused servo cover. "Talk, talk, talk, that's all they ever do. Here, have a cup of coffee."

Natalie couldn't remember seeing MacAllister without a cup of coffee, not in all the years she'd known him. He seemed to live on the stuff, and used it not only as a beverage, but also like some sort of universal balm, pouring great dollops of the brew on winches that refused to work, dogs that peed on the garden patch below his window, or anything else that annoyed him, including people. Natalie accepted the mug, took a sip, and looked through the steam. "I need help, Mac, and some advice."

The dock master shrugged and sat on the edge of his desk. "Of course. It's been a long time since pretty young ladies came knockin' for anything else. What can I do for you?"

It took Natalie the better part of fifteen minutes to tell her story, starting with the missing coordinates and ending with Orr's goons. Once she was finished, MacAllister nodded thoughtfully and said, "Well, lass, that's quite a story, and an interestin' one too, especially in light o' the hearin's and the lack o' cause. Starships don't explode very often, not in atmosphere anyway, and it makes ya wonder. Especially with the likes o' Mr. Orr pokin' around."

Natalie felt something heavy hit the bottom of her stomach. The idea had been there for a long time, lurking in the back of her mind. But it seemed too paranoid to be true. Until now. Maybe, just maybe, her parents had been murdered. A host of emotions fought for dominance. A sort of cold anger won. "So, what should I do?"

"Well," the dock master said thoughtfully, "first things first. Sounds like some real unpleasant people might be comin' ta visit... and I don't allow no riffraff on my docks."

So saying, the old man pulled a boom mike down in front of his mouth, gave some orders, and pushed it up again. "That should cover it, lass... ain't no one takin' you where you don't want to go. Now, as for the coordinates you're lookin' for, how 'bout a peek inside that safe?"

Natalie felt a momentary pang of suspicion, decided that she had to trust somebody, and handed it over. The dock master nodded thoughtfully, motioned for her to follow, and led Natalie outside. Docks, not to mention the ships they serve, require endless maintenance, and the port authority's shops were second to none.

MacAllister led her to the machine shop. Metal screamed on metal, sparks fanned the air, and robots stalked through the gloom. The dock master handed the safe to one of the workers, yelled some instructions, and watched as they went to work. It took a minute to slice through the casing, three to let it cool, and part of a fifth for Natalie to peer inside. Nothing. The cube was empty!

Natalie struggled to hide her disappointment as she followed MacAllister out into the fading light. He shrugged. "Sorry, lass ... keep lookin'. You'll find 'em."

Natalie smiled and gave MacAllister a hug. The dock master scowled and said he'd do the same for any other spacer, and knew he lied. Because there were plenty of spacers he wouldn't lift a finger for, and the truth was that he liked Natalie
in spite
of her parents, not because of them, especially in light of the fact that they had forgotten their roots and used the Gap to suppress free trade. That was transgression beyond all understanding. But their daughter, well, she represented what her parents
could have
been but never were.

They returned to the office together, and Natalie was just about to leave when the dock master touched his earplug and raised a hand. He listened for a moment, said something in reply, and pointed to one of the wall monitors. "Look ... your friends have arrived."

Natalie bit her lower lip as she saw the woman and her goons get out of a limo and approach the security shack. The security guards, with automatic weapons slung across their chests, stepped out to meet them. Then, as if by chance, a pair of heavy-duty exoskeletons entered the area and assumed positions next to the gate. The display of strength must have worked, because the visitors reentered their vehicle and were gone moments later.

Natalie had allowed herself to hope that Orr and his minions would give up, would leave her alone, but the confrontation at the gate made it clear that they wouldn't. That, plus her failure to locate the coordinates, made her depressed.

She thanked MacAllister for his help, left the dock master's office, and walked toward the other end of the building. The guild hall occupied space leased from the port authority and served as an important gathering place, though not in the afternoon. Natalie followed another spacer through the beat-up green doors and into a large, rather undistinguished room.

The chairs were sturdy affairs, chosen more for strength and durability than for looks, and sat as they had the night before. Natalie could imagine the scene. A game, it didn't matter which one, playing on the wall screen, as bartenders dispensed endless quantities of beer, and spacers traded lies. But the party had been over for a long time, and with the exception of a med tech who lay unconscious across three carefully arranged chairs, the hall was empty.

Natalie's deck shoes squeaked as she made her way across the floor to the reception desk. It remained open around the clock and provided access to a variety of services. She waited her turn, rolled a thumb on the reader, and watched the clerk depart for her mail.

While he was gone she checked the desk term, confirmed that the
Sunbird
had lifted two days before, and wished her ex-shipmates, a profitable run. She had hated to sacrifice her slot, not to mention the hard-won seniority that went with it, but hadn't been able to identify an alternative. The Voss Line might be dead, and badly in need of interment, and someone had to bury the poor thing.

That became even more apparent when the clerk returned with a box full of official-looking mail, dumped it on the counter, and hit her with a storage fee. He had a long, thin face, no chin to speak of, and a music implant. His head bobbed to an inaudible rhythm. "Here ya go... anything else?"

"Are the reading rooms open?"

The boy's head bobbed a little faster. "Five cees an hour ... same as always. Take what ya want."

Natalie thanked the clerk, took her box, and headed for the reading rooms. Many spacers chose to live rent-free aboard their ships while in port, and used the little cubicles to handle their correspondence, or anything else that required privacy, including the sort of hanky-panky most COs forbade aboard ship.

Natalie checked to make sure the first cubicle was unoccupied, wrinkled her nose at the smell of disinfectant, and threw her bag on the well-worn couch. It was a simple matter to pull the plastic chair away from the beat-up desk and activate the computer. It was voice-capable and, like most of its kind, overly polite. "Hello ... how may I help you?"

Natalie broke the seal on a data disk and dropped it into the appropriate slot. "Play the disk, please."

The computer played the disk, plus twenty-seven more, including nine interactive ads, a dissertation by the family lawyers, any number of hard luck stories from ex-employees, and a request for funds from the Milford Academy. She ran that one twice.

It seemed a man named Tull had attempted to contact her parents, failed, and hoped to hear from her. He went on to explain that while the school had kept Dorn on after his funds had expired, they wouldn't be able to do so for very much longer, and feared what might happen if he were out on his own.

Natalie frowned. Maybe she should head for New Hope, pull Dorn out of school, and bring him home. But to what purpose? There was nothing her brother could do, not until he finished school anyway, and that was a year away. No, the smart thing to do was leave Dorn where he was and find the missing coordinates. With that taken care of, she'd attend his graduation, pack his bags, and bring him home.

Natalie bit her lip, checked the balance in her savings account, and saw she had enough to cover the bill plus a tiny bit more. It took less than ten minutes to compose a reply, authorize the transfer of funds, and send the money on the first leg of a long journey.

The second message, the one in which she described to Dorn how their parents died, took the better part of an hour. Her words wouldn't help much, she knew that, but they had to be said. She sent that, plus her last hundred credits, and wished there was a speedier means of communication. Both letters would take weeks if not months to reach their destination.

With her brother's needs taken care of, for the moment anyway, Natalie continued to read her mail. There was a request for donations from an organization called the Free Traders Benefit fund, a political tract from the planet's governor, and a package protected by a governmental holo seal.

Natalie dropped this disk into the reader and watched two beings appear. The first was huge, and would have been reminiscent of an Earth-normal hippopotamus had it not been for the wicked horn that protruded from its forehead, and a beanie-shaped hat. She recognized the XT as a Dromo, a somewhat obscure race, known for their scholarly ways and inherent honesty. The other alien was small enough to ride on the first creature's neck. It had a pointed muzzle, leaf-shaped ears, and busy little hands. It was the larger creature that spoke. He, she, or it had a basso voice that rumbled like thunder.