Rebel's Quest, page 12
part #6 of The Long View Series
And just as well. She'd never have lived through it.
When you have to wait, you might as well enjoy it. Tregare made a point of getting all the Earthside Tri-V channels monitored and taped. He had the major news circuit piped into the galley, because he wanted the whole crew to get a good look at what UET said was happening on Earth. And compare that with Underground data.
The latter, Renni was helping him with, readjusting one transceiver pair and its tape-handling accessories to handle the Underground's "wideband burst" method of secret communication, which traded bandwidth for time at an astonishing ratio. The principle was an old one; the Undergrounds trick was that each burst carried the coded key to shift the system's base frequency for the next burst. Without the codes, no one would be apt to intercept more than the occasional burst—and wouldn't know what to do with it, anyway, since each burst carried parts of several different data blocks.
So retrieving the info was tricky, but with Lofall's help Tregare was getting the stuff into coherent order. He didn't much like the results, though: UET had North America in worse shape than ever, and still pushing. If the UG's observations were at all accurate, something like thirty percent of the continents population now existed in Total Welfare Centers. And Bran knew what Total Welfare "clients" really were: government-owned slaves.
The rationale sounded reasonable. If you couldn't support yourself and your family, kindly ol' UET took over all your assets and liabilities, and placed you in a Welfare Center where you were fed, clothed, and housed. And sent out in work gangs hired by private industry or by UET itself. A small amount of your contracted wages went as "credit" into your personal account, and theoretically you could earn enough to buy out of Welfare. But damn few ever managed to reach that goal,
And of course it wasn't only bankrupts who went to Welfare. The Centers now probably contained more dissidents than any other category of client. Everybody knew it, but don't say so out loud!
Bran shut down the readout and turned to Lofall. "What say
- grab some lunch?" So they went down to the galley. As they began eating, somebody turned up the Tri-V news monitor.
"Hey, let's see this, " said Hain Deverel. "Some Welfare kid hit it big in the monthly lottery, and she's being interviewed. "
"It's a replay, " someone said. "Happened last month. The story now is that she's disappeared. " Several people shushed the talker, and the newscaster could be heard.
Busy with his food, Tregare half listened. Several weeks ago, on her sixteenth birthday, which gave her adult status, a young Welfare "client" named Rissa Kerguelen had won the state-run lottery's grand prize, built to its largest-ever size by the drawing of a series of ineligible winners over previous months. Approximately a hundred million Weltmarks, the man said. Or maybe twenty-three million, Bran estimated, after taxes. A hell of a lot, anyway!
Now, it seemed, this record-high winner had disappeared. All possible means were being used to find her, and make sure of her safety. Safety? Oh, sure, Mike! Toward that end, then, her media interview on the day the prize was awarded was being shown again on Tri-V
Tregare leaned forward and to one side, to see better. This could be interesting. The screen showed a drab auditorium; a surprisingly large press turnout half filled the place.
A fattish man with a lot of blond, slicked-down hair led in a young girl who wore a red dress. Somebody else's dress: it was several sizes too large and hung on her like a sack. Just guessing, Tregare bet she had nothing on except the dress.
Under Welfare-stubbled dark hair her face was so blank that Bran couldn't decide if she were pretty or ugly. Well, a Welfare kid—coping with something like this could freeze her.
The fat man took her up onto a small platform, with mikes. He smiled and smiled; Tregare tried to think where he'd seen that smile before. Certainly not on this butterball...
Then he remembered: "Plastic Smile" on the MacArthur, Butcher Korbeiths sadistic bodyguard. But Bran had killed that one....
This one's name was Supervisor Gerard. When he got done talking about himself, he introduced his supervisee: Rissa Kerguelen, age sixteen just today, daughter of David Marchant and Selene Kerguelen, both unfortunately deceased, of a city Bran didn't recall hearing about before and promptly forgot.
As Gerard stepped down and left her standing there alone, the kid started to say something, but stopped when a question came from the floor. "What's your reaction to winning the big prize?"
Pause. Then, "Naturally, I'm delighted. "
Another voice. "How does it feel to grow up in a Welfare Center?"
More quickly this time, Rissa Kerguelen said, "I can't answer that; I've never grown up anywhere else. How does it feel to grow up outside?" Laughter came, and Tregare thought, good on you, kid!
"The last big winner called it an utter miracle. Do you agree?"
Obviously gaining confidence now, the girl shrugged. "No. Why should I? Every month, as long as I can remember, it happens—with the winners announced on Tri-V This time it's me, is all. "
After a moment, "Who will you vote for in the next election?"
Kerguelen shook her head. "I don't understand. "
"Which bidding conglomerate has your support?"
Slowly again, she answered, "I can't say—I don't know enough about any of them. "
"Does that mean you don't favor the present Committee?" Some menace in that question? Maybe..,
She was flustered; on the screen a close-up showed her biting her lip. "It doesn't mean anything yet. Give me time to learn. "
A harsh voice. "You better learn fast, kid. "
The implied threat stalled things, then the camera swung to a grey-haired woman: "What do you intend to do with the money you've won? And with your life, from now on?"
Not hesitating, Rissa Kerguelen said, "Buy my brother out of Welfare—my Uncle Voris, too, if he's still alive—and share with them. That's the money. " Now, for the first time, she smiled, and Tregare decided she was better-looking than he'd thought. "My life? Well, I'm going off Earth and I'm going to grow my hair down to my butt—and the rest of it's my own business. "
While Tregare chuckled at the kid's feisty answer, he heard gasps from the media reps, and one said, "You resent your present hairstyle?"
Again no hesitation. "What's to resent? A few sets of clippers are a lot cheaper than combs and brushes always getting lost and wearing out—anybody can see that. I don't have to like it, though, and I never did. "
She'd slowed them down some, all right. Now someone asked, "What are you going to do, off Earth?"
"I don't know yet. What are you going to do, on Earth?"
Whether or not that reply ended the interview, now the screen cut back to the first newscaster. "... and that's all we have for you on the missing lottery winner Rissa Kerguelen. If anyone has any information leading to—uh, making sure of her safety and well-being, please contact us here at... "
Tregare quit listening; he knew bullshit when he heard it and that 'caster was full of it up to here. The kid, though— wherever she was, he hoped she was all right.
Renni came along to his quarters. Before anything else, she filled him in some about UETs lottery winners. "Those wins are UETs carrot, Bran. So they get lots of publicity. For a time, that is. "
"And then?"
"Then it tapers off and disappears. And the winners, very quietly with no public mention at all, are taken in charge again. "
"What—?"
"Arrested on any flimsy charges UET cares to make. The remaining prize money confiscated. And it's back into Welfare. "
Until she yelped, he didn't realize how hard he was gripping her arm. "You mean, that's how the kid disappeared?"
Rubbing the arm, Renni said, "No. Not this time. Or they wouldn't be doing any of this on Tri-V No, she got away. And I think I know how and where. "
"But didn't you just now first hear of her, same as I did?"
"I'd seen earlier mentions, Bran—brief ones. But they didn't apply here, you see, so—well, anyway, some facts in that case clicked with some equally irrelevant material off the UG circuit. Irrelevant to this ship, I mean. And—"
"Are you going to tell it?"
She sat up straight. "Right. Yes, sir. " Okay; he could put up with a little clowning, until she went on, "Young Kerguelen was taken from the Welfare Center by a reporter who is one of ours. The UG, I mean. Where she was taken is not important. But, from that place, a few weeks later, another of ours put a young woman on a low-level SST to Buenos Aires. "
"And all that means what?"
"Put it together yourself. And add in Erika Hulzeins Establishment, which operates somewhere out of Buenos Aires and is most influential in keeping UETs fingers off that whole country. "
Aunt Erika? Not thinking, Tregare said, "If the kids with that old tiger, UET can go piss up a rope. "
Lofall narrowed her eyes. "What do you know about the Hulzein Establishment?"
Now when Tregare took hold of her, it was gently. "More than I intend to tell you, Renni. Except that we're on the same side but never got along. All right?"
It must have been, because for quite a while there, everything else was.
For the rest of that day, in the back of Tregares mind, the mystery of the Kerguelen youngster's fate nagged him. At one point he even toyed with the idea of trying to route some kind of illicit call through to the Hulzein Establishment in Argentina, and asking about the kid. But such a move would be just plain asking for trouble, and he was already surrounded with enough potential for that. So he didn't.
Instead he kept his ship waiting in line while the Stronghold fleet went, one ship at a time, through the supply feeds. He greeted and hosted two sets of couriers from groundside, who brought him flimsies of info that UET hadn't cared to trust to the airwaves, and in turn he gravely handed over printed (but still coded) readouts of the report that had Admiral Saldeen's slightly-edited signature on it. Groundside had had Tregare rerun that report to them, over tightbeam link, several times. But they couldn't seem to get the glitches out of it. Somehow Tregare wasn't too surprised.
When the second group was ready to leave, someone came running to join them. Panting a little, she said, "Catch a ride groundside with you? I was on the earlier shuttle and missed it going back. Met an old friend, we got to talking. " She turned to Tregare. "Captain, I owe you an apology. May I speak with you a moment?"
Everybody was standing at the main airlocks inside hatch. Tregare motioned the others into the lock and drew Renni Lofall off to one side, out of earshot. "What the hell you think you're doing?"
With bright-colored lapels, epaulets, sleeve and leg stripes affixed to her jumpsuit, she looked the perfect courier: no denying that much. How had she done it? No time to ask. She said. "I told you I might be getting off. This is my move. You won't spoil it?"
He grinned. "Couldn't if I wanted to. Hope it works, is all. " He looked around. "Nobody's watching. Kiss good-bye, Renni. " They did that, and again; then he said, "Groundside, what'll you do? Do you have contacts to help you, once you land?"
"All set, yes. And—" She hugged him. "It's been good, Bran. "
"Yeah. Same here. " What else? "You—" But no more time.
From the airlock someone was beckoning; she had to run.
"Good luck, Lofall. " Then the inner hatch closed, and she was
gone.
* * *
Finally the Alexander was signaled ahead to a supply dock. Tregare sat monitoring Tinheads record of the loading process. As he watched he felt grateful to Renni Lofall for insisting on taking inventory. It wasn't that Inconnu had been short of anything in a way that could endanger the ship—but he'd have felt stupid if, halfway between someplace and no place, he'd run out of soap or something. Now, thanks to Lofall, he wouldn't.
The input of solid supplies was nearing its end. So now was where push came to shove. Because having topped off fuel and water tanks at the Arachne, he couldn't accommodate much more of either item. And when that fact became evident, someone in UET HQ would want to know why. He had his story, of course: the Admiral's orders. But on a hunch he'd held it back, and he wondered if maybe the hunch had been wrong.
Now, as the ship undocked and instructions came for the Alexander to move ahead and take on water, on the forward screen Bran saw a triangle of three ships approaching. What he didn't like was that their path wasn't far from his own intended course for leaving here.
And then Bran really didn't like it. Because on hi-mag, his main screen showed one of the nearing ships to be the MacArthur. And over a monitor came Arger Korbeith's gravel voice. "Alexander, hell! That ship is the Tamurlaine!"
And Korbeiths ships cut abruptly toward intercept.
There wasn't time to tell the supply station anything at all. Cutting his offship-send, Tregare told Gonnelson which way to point Inconnu and said, "Junior Lee. Fire the Drive, redline max. Now!" Slowly at first, Inconnu turned and moved.
It wasn't the comm-tech's fault; lacking other instructions the man obeyed Korbeith's transmitted order for two-way visual. The Butcher hadn't changed; that craggy yellowed face would probably look much the same in its coffin. Tregare could see Korbeith squint and blink at what he saw in Inconnu's control area; then the man nodded and yelled, "Damn it, all ships! You've just resupplied an Escaped ship. And your Captain Dietrich Armiger is the pirate, Bran Tregare. " Glaring, he yelled, "I see you, Tregare, you snot! Once, you got away from this ship alive. Not again, though. " He cut voice-send, but Bran saw him barking orders. To his own crew and to his other ships, they'd be.
So Bran gave a few of his own. "Cut Drive to half-max, Junior Lee—I need some time before this fight. " And, "Gonnelson, head us straight for the center of their triangle. " Tregare moved to another console, one that gave him more tools to work with. On intercom he called, "Anybody in Scout Bay Two, say so fast and get out faster. " He activated the enabling circuits that would let him run that scoutship as a remote-control drone, then as no answer came to his order, opened the bay and fired up the scout's Drive. Only on idle, for the moment, and now he told Junior Lee Beauregard to run ships Drive at redline again. Well, a little under, he wanted, but Junior Lee knew that.
There hadn't been time, what with all the rest of it, to get gunners up to the projector turrets, so Tregare slaved all his projectors to his own console. Hoping the turret controls were sitting on neutral, because from here he had no heterodyne control but only traverse and override capability, he fired three energy bursts straight ahead, just to get his heterodyne up toward peak range. Then, watching Korbeiths delta of killer ships approach, he waited.
Not for long. Korbeiths group opened fire early. This near to Earth, ionization of attenuated gases made coruscating tracer lines where the convergent lasers tracked—glowing streaks that dazzled vision. So under cover of that glare, Bran launched his scoutship from Bay Two. First hesitating, he decided its best use was to go directly between two of Korbeith's ships, the MacArthur and one of the others. When he had it pointed right, time came to use his own projectors— on the third ship.
Everything happened in a hurry. He got the third ship, all right. When the scout was between the other two, Tregare blew its Drive, and one ship blew along with it. Not the MacArthur, though; obviously damaged, it still held course, almost.
But Bran Tregare was past now—past the lot of them, and
away clear.
7. South Forty
When it came to escape routes, what Tregare liked about making a sling turn and cutting Drive was that the pursuit could be expecting it and still couldn't do a damn thing about it. "Here we go, " he said now, some days out from Earth. "We're out of sight behind Saturn—I'm swinging course. When the posse comes past the planet, we're dead-Drive coasting—about as easy to spot as a flea on a sheep dog. " He laughed, then settled down to set course. "How many chased us, anyway? I've been too busy to check. "
"Four, " said Gonnelson. "Nothing fast. " Tregare nodded.
He'd picked Saturn for his pivot because Jupiter was in the wrong direction, while Saturn lay within a radian of his chosen course and gave him leeway for the swing. Prestor thought the rings would be a problem because Inconnus closest approach obviously had to be well inside their spread. Tregare, though, simply went "under" them, below the planets ecliptic. Which meant that the turn gave the ship a slight vector toward zenith. Well, that was all right—he'd be crossing a number of UET's regular shipping routes, and passing "above" them meant he'd be in a skew pattern with any Uties if he chanced to cross paths. Hard to intercept, that was the point of it.
* * *
Once they were back on Drive and well away, Bran held council; in captains quarters he provided drinks and snacks while the group had a chance to look at a star-chart readout.
After a while, when everybody had settled down pretty well, he stood. "Okay, people: here's what I have in mind and I'd like to hear your thinking on it. " He used a pointer at the chart. "Mostly I think we should stop in on Hidden Worlds— gather info, all that. Besides trading, of course. But it wouldn't hurt to raid a UET colony or two, if that option turns up handy by location. "
He spelled it out, and some of the group had comments and some didn't, and the upshot was that Inconnu's next stop should be a Hidden World called South Forty. It was off any major UET route, its settlements were well established, and it was fairly well in line for a considerable choice of second stops.
So, excusing himself with a gesture, Gonnelson went upship and set course.
Bran sat. after the others left, brooding over the tag-end of his drink. The knock startled him; he opened his door to a youngish woman whose jumpsuit bore no indications of rank. "Captain?"
"That's me. " The odd thing was that he didn't recognize her.
Well. maybe the short red hair, frizzed fluffy on top but tapered smooth at sides and back, was a new look for her. "I don't seem to recall your name, " but he gestured her inside and to a seat. "How long have you been on this ship?"
