Mindship (v1.0), page 14
“You nearly broke again that time.” Kilgarin said. “If I hadn’t done that, you would have. You’ve got to relax, J’kar. For your own good, you’ve got to force Ty’ger out of your mind. He’s changed; he won’t hurt you. I wish I could make that clear to you, but I’ve got some things of my own T have to do. Relax now. I’ll speak to you later.”
“Kilgarin, please—”
The Cork stopped. He was already several meters down-corridor from the Centaurian, but he could still hear J’kar’s ragged breathing, still feel the fear running out of the man. He shook his head. “I’m sorry, J’kar. It’s something you’ll have to handle yourself.” He started walking again, “rve got other things to do.”
J’kar cried out once more, but the Cork had ceased to hear.
Like most ship libraries the room was small, scarcely large enough for Kilgarin to move about in. The walls were bare except for the console and the stool protruding from the base of the machine. Kilgarin sat down and punched out the identity code of his Contract as a ship officer, which would open the ship’s entire memory bank to his scrutiny. As a Sensitive he’d never thought he’d need to resort to the Library records—but so many minds were closed to him he knew he’d have to gain the information he needed by any means possible. The code light came on. The Library was activated. He punched out the call letters for the personnel files, feeling oddly unclean and uneasy. The file codes and names appeared on the display screen and he ran through them until he found the file he wanted.
The Captain’s.
DATE OF BIRTH: SEVENTH MONTH,
TWELFTH DAY, ANNO DOMINI 3117
PLACE OF BIRTH: OREGON, BARSWELL’S PLANET (PROCYON III)
SPECIAL NOTE: IN 3121 OREGON COLONY DESTROYED BY DISEASE, BACTERIA SINCE IDENTIFIED AS MUTANT BACILLUS MEGATERIUM. SUBJECT AND SIX OTHER SURVIVORS SINCE INOCULATED, NO LONGER CARRIERS.
EDUCATION: EDUCATED COMPANY
SCHOOL ON ROSHARCH. UNHANSSEN (PROCYON TV) FROM 3121 TO 3133. GRADUATED ADMINISTRATIVE SCHOOL, MAXIMUM HONORS. ALL SENSITIVE PROBES NEGATIVE: PSYCHIC OUTPUT MINIMAL.
SERVICE RECORD: FROM 3133 TO 3134, SUBJECT ACTIVE ON COMPANY PSI CHARTING VESSEL, “LADY,” OUT OF NOVA SCOTIA
PORT, VAN DRAM (SIRIUS II). 3133 TO 3137 SERVED AS ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT. RECEIVED COMMISSION TO SECOND MATE 3138. RECEIVED COMMISSION FIRST MATE 3142. IN 3143 TRANSFERRED TO NEWLY COMMISSIONED VESSEL OUT OF CENTAURI PORT (ALPHA CENTAURI V): “CHARTER.” 3146, ASSUMED COMMAND “CHARTER” FOLLOWING DEATH OF PREVIOUS CAPTAIN.
PHYSICAL STATISTICS: SUBJECT HEIGHT: 187.96 CENTIMETERS. SUBJECT WEIGHT: 81.648 KILOGRAMS. SUBJECT DIMEN—
The rest was useless to Kilgarin. Most of it was a record of the Captain’s physical health, which was good, and his mental stability, which, as far as Kilgarin could tell from the official records, had never come into question. There was a brief record of the investigation that followed Marc Kilgarin’s death. It was pretty much as the Captain had told Kilgarin during their first meeting.
—ACTED IN ACCORDANCE WITH HTS UNDERSTANDING OF COMPANY REGULATIONS. AND IN CONSIDERATION OF THIS [the transcript of the investigation went] THE COMMITTEE WISHES TO DROP ALL CHARGES AGAINST HIM, TO COMMEND HIM FOR HIS INTENTION, AND TO CENSURE HIM FOR A LACK OF SUFFICIENT INQUIRY INTO THE BACKGROUND AND EXPERIENCE OF CONTRACTED CORK MARC KILGARIN—
There was more, but Kilgarin didn’t read it.
He turned to the file on Wells.
DATE OF BIRTH: NINTH MONTH, TENTH DAY, ANNO DOMINI 3109
PLACE OF BIRTH: CRISPIN, WELLINGTON (FARRIN IV)
EDUCATION: COLONY SCHOOL; 3114-3124. SENSITIVE PROBES POSITIVE.
SERVICE RECORD: ENTERED COMPANY MILITIA ON WELLINGTON 3125. TRANSFERRED OFF—PLANET 3127. TO COMPANY BARRACKS WORLD IN CENTAURI SYSTEM (ALPHA CENTAURI III). PROMOTED TO CORPS ENGINEER EARLY 3128. SECOND MONTH, THIRTEENTH DAY. ACTED IN BEHALF OF COMPANY DURING CENTAUR! POLICE ACTION, FOURTH MONTH, TWENTY-SECOND DAY. 3128, TO SEVENTH MONTH, THIRTIETH DAY, 3128. TOOK SERVICE CONTRACT FOR TRADE AND CHARTING VESSELS ON EIGHTH MONTH, FIRST DAY, 3128, TO SEVENTH MONTH, THIRTY-FIRST DAY, 3134. RENEWED TERM CONTRACT TWICE, EIGHTH MONTH, FIRST DAY, 3134, TO SEVENTH MONTH, THIRTY-FIRST DAY, 3135, AND EIGHTH MONTH, FIRST DAY, 3135, TO SIXTH MONTH, TWELFTH DAY, 3136. RENEWED FULL CONTRACT FOURTH MONTH, EIGHTH DAY, 3141. SHIPS SERVED: “BLACK FIRE” (3128 TO 3130), “WALKABOUT” (3130 TO 3134), “YEARLING” (3134 TO 3136), “LADY” (3141 TO 3143), AND “CHARTER” (3143-)
PHYSICAL STATISTICS: SUBJECT HEIGHT: 195.58 CENTIMETERS. SUBJECT WEIGHT: 113.4 KILOGRAMS. SUBJE—
Kilgarin slummed Wells’s file. He looked for some contact with the Captain previous to the Lady, found nothing. Wells’s file was more detailed than the Captain’s, obviously because the man had lived longer. Both the Captain and the Engineer had lived lives almost devoid of major incidents, apart from the Captain’s early loss and the Engineer’s involvement in the CPA—and even these things were not unusual in a colonial society. Kilgarin’s own life had been spiced with moments that pained him. They meant nothing, though, because they’d happened to everyone, and would happen to him again. He studied the screen, thinking. His hand drifted to the console, dropped, and keyed out the code for Marka Oberon.
DATE OF BIRTH: ELEVENTH MONTH, SEVENTEENTH DAY, ANNO DOMINI 3121
PLACE OF BIRTH: OLD ROME, EARTH (SOL III)
EDUCATION: NO FORMAL EDUCATION. ALL SENSITIVE PROBES NEGATIVE.
SERVICE RECORD: PHYSICAL CONTRACT SIGNED EIGHTH MONTH, SIXTEENTH DAY, 3137, IN LONDON, EARTH (SOL III). SHIPPED
ABOARD “WALKABOUT” FROM EIGHTH MONTH, SIXTEENTH DAY, 3137, TO SECOND MONTH, FOURTH DAY, 3142, WHEN CRIPPLED DURING PLANETARY EXPEDITION. PENSIONED ON ENDRIM, ENDRIM (SB3487 IV). CONTRACT RENEWED “CHARTER” EIGHTH MONTH, SEVENTH DAY, 3146.
PHYSICAL STATISTICS: SUBJECT HEIGHT: 177.8. C.M. SUBJECT WEIGHT: 53.52 KILOGRA—
Kilgarin shut oS the console and got to his feet. He knew little more than he’d known when he’d entered the Library, and the little he’d learned was next to useless. The files weren’t designed to answer questions about motivation; they were simply required to list the crew member’s vital Company statistics. He’d have to look elsewhere for his answers, he knew.
The trouble was…he couldn’t decide where.
“Killy, did you hear what I asked you? I wanted to know if we’d be going down to Elysson together.”
“I don’t think that’d be a very good idea, Marka. Considering what happened last time.”
“That wouldn’t happen again…would it?”
“I’d rather not find out. We’re going to have a hard enough time down there without adding problems. I can’t take the chance.”
“I told you I’m sorry.”
“That doesn’t make any difference, Marka. It’s not a matter of being sorry.”
“You don’t want to have to worry about me, is that it?”
“Marka…”
“Killy, do you know what you’re doing to me?”
“You’re not making any sense.”
“I’m not making sense? I thought you wanted me, I let you take me, 1 trusted you…and you’re not willing to take a chance. And you don’t understand why I—” She turned away from him, sitting up on the edge of his bunk. “You’re making me feel the way I felt when I waited for you at the port three years ago. I wanted to explain, but you never gave roe a chance. The way you’d treated me, I wanted to get back at you. So I brought a customer in and waited until I knew you’d be coming back to the apartment—I wanted to hurt you, because you—” She broke off again. “I knew it was a mistake to start with you again, from the first, I knew it was a mistake.”
“Listen.”
“Don’t touch me. Not just now. Let me alone, a minute.”
“All right.”
She fumbled in the pocket of her jump suit, pulled out a rectangular palm-sized box, opened it. She sat cross-legged on the edge of the bed; Kilgarin could see tbe twisted hump of her ankle and arch where it rested on her thigh. She managed to pull a cigarette free of the box and twisted the end to light it. Smoke hovered near her face a moment, drifted away.
Watching her, Kilgarin waited for her to speak.
She didn’t.
The main port of Elysson was on the outskirt of the central city, Krysta. The shuttle settled down with a minimum of fuss, the snow on the pad evaporating into steam as the rockets’ heat preceded the vessel onto the field. A moment passed, the steam faded, swirled away on the heels of the wind that swayed the stubby ship, and the hatch cycled open. Leading his men, the Captain swung out and down the ladder, dropping to the surface several meters from the scorched plastisteel directly under the ship.
The field was empty, the buildings that made up the port seemingly deserted. Kilgarin dropped down beside the Captain, followed by Raymond and then Wells. Ty’ger and Luanne brought up the rear.
Together they entered the main port building, a tower that looked as though it’d been cut from a single slab of stone. Windows opened onto the field, each window several meters high, four or five meters wide. The light from outside was the only light available inside the port building, and it leaked across the wide empty floor in pale yellow rectangles. There were shadows everywhere, behind every column and post, and behind each of the six crew members. Kilgarin listened to their footsteps; they were the only sound in the port.
They came to an exit, stepped out into the street.
Alleys and sidewalks; cobbled streets; the facades for a dozen different architectural styles. It was a port like any port, but in one major feature it was different. It was empty.
“Well, Captain?” Kilgarin asked. “What now?”
Casting about, the Captain indicated a direction. His breath came in white vapor as he spoke. “Gunyon’s office is that way, according to our information. We’ll find him there, if anywhere.”
The street curved ahead of them, swinging down toward the center of the city and a plaza that was visible beyond the roofs of the buildings, which were farther away. As he strode beside the Captain, careful to avoid the patches of ice that spotted the street, Kilgarin let his mind roam the buildings on either side of the cobbled road. He could sense the presence of many minds, men and women standing behind the curtains and shades of the windowed buildings, children crouched in corners, all listening to the passage of the Charter’s landing team. Kilgarin read a mixture of emotions, most of it ingrown and self-directed. Fear was present, and anger, and a slow, corroding resentment that was vaguely directed at the men striding down the street. Kilgarin pulled away; he didn’t like what he’d seen. He glanced at Raymond beside him; the Physical kept stumbling over cobbles and bumping into Kilgarin. The Cork wondered if he’d made an error in bringing Raymond along. He thought not—but he’d have to wait and see.
The Captain halted at an intersection. The others waited as he examined the buildings that met at the crossing. Finally he nodded and gestured at a structure that was set between two older, smaller buildings. The Company office and quarters. Kilgarin recognized its utilitarian form.
“Kiigarin and Velacorte, around the side. Ty’ger, Luanne’s…the rear. You and I will take the front. Wells.”
The teams split and went to their posts. Raymond clutched Kilgarin’s sleeve to stop himself from falling as the two men took their position outside the alley door. “Sorry,” he said, mumbling. “Do you think we’ll have any trouble?”
“What do you think?” Kilgarin answered. Raymond didn’t bother to reply.
A sound came to them from the front of the building. Something splintered and crashed inward. Glass rained musically inside the building, followed by a shout and the dull whut! of air pistols. Kilgarin tensed, feeling the wave of emotions sweeping toward him as someone clattered down a flight of stairs, running for the alley door.
They’re coming, Kilgarin thought.
Where? I don’t see them.
Wait, Kilgarin told the Physical. Wait.
Abruptly the door over them bulged and flew open.
Two figures slammed out, stumbling over the shipmates crouched below them. Kilgarin straightened, grabbing one of the two men by the collar of a furred vest, lifting the man and throwing him back through the door into the building. He felt Raymond’s disorientation and calmed the Physical, guiding the younger man into a smooth kick that shattered the second man’s jaw. Without speaking, Kilgarin and Raymond lunged over the doorsill and into the hallway beyond.
Down there, Kilgarin thought. I'll go this way.
They parted, Raymond half-stumbling down the steps into the basement, Kilgarin proceeding onto the main floor.
Brushing back the hair from his eyes, Kilgarin surveyed the scene. On his right and left, Ty'ger and Luanne were struggling with three or four men each; the movements of the two were graceful in their lack of wasted effort, neither making a motion that seemed out of place or forced. They drifted from posture to posture, ducking and dodging, Luanne twisting to throw an attacker off balance, Ty’ger ramming his weight into a man’s chest, the two halves of the mindlink moving in a give and take dance. It was a perfect lock.
Directly before Kilgarin, however, was the Captain; Wells was nowhere around. A man dressed in a loose-fitting tunic and baggy shorts had his arms around the Captain’s neck, and was tightening his grip as Kilgarin watched, paralyzed. Somehow the Captain got his legs under him, managed to bring his weight to bear, and thrust. The former First Mate snapped forward, dragging his attacker off the ground, swinging him with startling speed until the Elyssonian was thrown from the older man’s shoulders like a length of rag. The tunic wearer struck the near wall, fell.
The Captain straightened and saw Kilgarin standing in the doorway. “Come with me, Kilgarin.” Without waiting for a reply, the older man sprinted for the archway that opened into an oval chamber dominated by a dusty conference table. Kilgarin ran after him, his heart pounding with a mixture of excitement and fear, a delicious feeling of confidence and vulnerability.
Another arch broke the wall ahead of him. He ducked through, saw the Captain’s vanishing form as the man went up a flight of steps three at a time. There were sounds of a scuffle overhead. Kilgarin took the stairs in three bounds.
Darkness greeted him when he reached the landing. To his left a dim light glowed, barely enough to affect the gloom. Kilgarin glanced around. The Captain was gone, the hallway was empty, but one of the doors at the end of the passage was half-open. The Cork started toward it, and as he did he saw something move in the opening, a splash of soft light on metal.
He hit the ground as the energy bolt lashed the wall above him, burning a scar deep into the plastisteel. In a single motion he came to his feet and slammed shoulder first against the partly open door, crashing into a room filled with struggling figures. Kilgarin didn’t wait to identify who was fighting whom; he drove into the colonist holding the weapon he’d seen glinting through the door. The man doubled as Kilgarin’s fist whipped into his stomach; he fell as Kilgarin cracked the side of his skull with the edge of his hand.
It was a computer room, Kilgarin realized. The tall machines ranged along three of the walls, the consoles hulking in the center of the chamber. Between the consoles men were moving in a rapidly paced ballet. One of the men was the Captain; another was Wells. The others were strangers to Kigarin.
“Over here, young man—” Against one of the machines a shadow moved. “Over here, please, “I’m here—”
Kilgarin went quickly to the agent’s side. The Company man was lying in an uncomfortable-looking heap, legs twisted at an odd angle under him, his head moving weakly, gray-bearded face turning to stare at Kilgarin as the Cork squatted. “It’s my legs, you see.” Company agent Gunyon said apologetically. “They’re broken.”
Kilgarin saw. After a moment, he nodded. “We’ll get you out of here. Fellow Gunyon. Don’t worry.”
“I’m not worried,” the old man said. “Just hurry, young man. Will you do that, please?” The agent’s pale cheeks trembled. “I’m afraid there’s a great deal of pain…”
Swinging around, Kilgarin picked out a colonist and hurt him.
Badly.
“Is he all right?” Marka asked as she and Kilgarin watched two Physicals maneuver Gunyon into the corridor of the mindship. Both Kilgarin and the Captain, who supervised the operation from a few meters away, were bare chested; their tunics had been sacrificed to the construction of the makeshift stretcher that now bore the Company’s former Elyssonian representative. The stretcher was a foot short for the old man, but Gunyon didn’t seem to mind, though the arrangement must have been causing him considerable agony. Kilgarin avoided looking at Gunyon below the waist. He’d also avoided looking at the colonists the landing team had left behind in the Company Office on the planet far below.
“He’ll live,” Kilgarin said. Marka’s head came around; her gaze pinned him.
“You don’t sound concerned,” she said.
“I’m not. Now.” he added. “In fact, I’m a little bit ashamed of myself.”
“For god’s sake, Kilgarin—why?”
“I don’t think it’s something you’d understand,” he told her. He ignored the look she gave him, turned and left her with the men preparing to bring Gunyon to the medical room on the inner level. He felt her staring after him, but he didn’t really care.
Mind-drive:
