13 Degrees of Separation (63 page)

“I said
rest,” she said more firmly.

“But
um...”

“Stay!”
she said pointing a finger at him. His ears went flat.

“I'm
not a dog doc,” he growled. She smiled slightly. He noted she was visibly
trying to cover her teeth when she smiled. Good for her, at least she knew some
Neo etiquette. “Doc...”

“Yes?”
she asked with a hint of exasperation in her voice.

“Seriously,
I need to get up. I gotta um...” he indicated his privates. She looked down and
then snorted. “Oh.” She turned from left to right and then found a bed pan on a
shelf nearby. Beside it was one designed for male needs. She took it down and
handed it to him and turned her back.

“Um...”

“I'll
go check your chart. I must admit, I'd love to study your arm and implants,
they are quite fascinating,” she said. “But, I think I'll check with Hank.”

“He
probably has the specs ma'am. He's the best on the planet,” he said, lifting
the sheet up.

“Fine,”
she glanced back, saw what he was doing and then coughed delicately. “I'll, um,
be doing my rounds. Don't harass my nurses or they'll shave you.”

“I'll
behave doc,” he said.

“That'd
be a first,” Helen said from the hall as she exited. Nohar snorted and did his
rather urgent business. When he was relieved he put the rather full jug onto
the table next to his bed and then laid back, now tired. “Now, it'd be nice for
a couple feline nurses,” he murmured, feeling sleepy. He let himself slip into
a doze.

...*...*...*...*...

“So, do
you have any ideas what brought this on? This killing spree?” Bullet asked him
as he sat in the wheel chair. He'd tried to get up and walk on the new leg, but
it chafed at the still healing flesh. The doctor had told him to take it easy
and let the swelling go down before he tried again. He'd had enough of hospital
food and smells. He'd been in hospitals far too often in his life. A week here
and he was ready to climb the walls... or at least claw the curtains to shreds.

“Um...”

“Come
on, you the expert and all,” Bullet teased. Nohar looked up at him and then to
the white Neowolf. He snorted.

“Just
because I'm from a different time,” he sighed. He was going to have a hell of a
time getting any more creds out of Solaximara. The damn red cat was balking
already, lovingly pointing out he'd dropped the contract before Nohar had taken
himself off to Crater city.

“The
humans would have you think it's our primitive minds, that the lions killed
cubs to bring the females into heat. That may have been how it started, but it
wasn't the only driving force here.”

“True.”

“I
think, if the people in Ring City, the Neo's I mean, had they been honest and
not closed ranks, we might of seen this. I'm betting the hopelessness of their
situation, and the possibility that their mother was a prostitute. That can
scar a cub.”

“Possible.”

“I'm
fairly certain the twins did an act. I didn't get much from the Neo's in Ring
City, they didn't want to talk about it, but I'm wondering if the two played a
swap game. Where one would be in the public, then swap places.”

“Possible.”

“It
would explain how effective they were in the kill. That otter incident for
example one drew us off as a distraction while the other cut the otters apart.”

Phantom
nodded. “You hit em high, I'll hit em low,” he murmured.

“Exactly,”
Bullet replied.

“The
twins probably got into killing. Hunting rats and other animals to eat. A lack
of empathy towards them and towards themselves,” Nohar murmured softly.

“Possibly,”
Phantom replied, equally subdued. “You get what you put into a child. If the
mother was like you said...”

“We may
never know that for sure,” Bullet warned.

“I've
seen enough in my life to see the signs. But unfortunately some turn a blind
eye to it until it's too late. But then...” he scowled, ears flat. He took a
deep breath and turned to the Neo dog and wolf.

 “But
some are just bad. In the wild usually it's due to injury, these two just liked
the killing too much, they got off on it. The blood lust, I think it came to
that. And when it kept going and no one stopped them they thought they were
invincible. They recognized that the community was turning a blind eye to the
problem, that some didn't care. So they used that.”

“I
don't think we'll ever know all the reasons,” Bullet murmured.

“No,
but some can learn from it. Learn to see the signs, to put in preventive
measures. I don't ever want this to happen again,” Nohar vowed, thinking of
young Rajar. He owed the kit his time. Perhaps that was a part of it, a part of
the prevention, giving the kits time. We're all so busy, caught up in our own
lives, we just don't seem to care, he thought. Not about the little things, he
thought, turning away.

“Well,
Magnum's red air car has been repo'd by the rental agency. Since it's one of 3
on the planet they'd kept track of it. My boss tried to hang onto it, but that
didn't work out.”

“It
figures,” Phantom grumbled. “My boss could use the thing too,” he said.

“Yeah
well, I think with so many people trying to take it someone got cute and
boosted it. Bribed the damn impound yard guard. Or so the sheriff was saying,”
Bullet said flicking his ears in amusement.

“Probably,”
Nohar replied with equal amusement.

“I
found your hand cannon by the way.”

“Matilda??”
Nohar asked, eyes wide. “You found her?” he asked.

“Matilda?”
Bullet asked in amusement.

“No one
wants to waltz with the big girl,” Nohar replied. Bullet nodded.

“She's
a bit worse for wear, but I cleaned her up. She's not as shiny as before, but I
think I got most of the rust off. You'll be able to clean her up properly
later.”

“Thanks,”
Nohar said with a rough edge in his voice.

“Going
to be here much longer?”

“Whether
the doctors like it or not no, I'm headed to Hazard. I need to have Hank take a
look at this,” Nohar tried to lift his battered prosthetic arm but couldn't.
Bullet glanced at the arm and nodded.

“You
see Deputy Rogers, tell him we both said hey,” Phantom said, pointing from
himself to his buddy. “We grew up together. He's a straight arrow, which is
rare in Hazard these days. If you need a hand, let him know.”

“I
will,” Nohar said, shaking each of their hand paws with his good left one.

“You
hear there is a ship in? Two of them. One's small though, ship called the Phoenix
of all things...” Bullet said slapping Phantom on the chest. “And get this, a
sleeper is the only one on board! Can you believe it? Well him and an AI they
said...”

“Yeah
well... takes all kinds...” Phantom said splitting up with his partner. Nohar
watched them go and then looked up to the sky above. He could just make out a
ship up there.

“Right,”
he said, flicking his ears in disdain. He chuffed, turning and wheeling himself
back inside. He had a train to catch to Hazard.

The
end.... for now.

But you'll see more
of Nohar and some of the others in Plague Planet!

Timeline
note: Midpoint of Plague Planet.

The
Prinz Zir, a small Mirilax class freighter broke through the B448c jump point
in a blinding flash of light and static energy bleed off. Her shields glittered
with the energy discharge and then she settled down into a quiet drift.
“Sensors?”

“We're
on the mark Captain, Epsilon Triangula on bearing 1 by 4.3. No long range
sensor feeds yet, the bleed off hasn't finished,” the ops officer said, looking
at his controls.

The
Captain grunted. “Keep me posted,” he growled.

“Aye
sir. Long range sensors coming on line now. Passive scanners are running a
sweep now, first return on data... now. We have a lock on the planet, it's
where it's supposed to be compared to our files. So far so good sir. All seems
quiet Captain.”

“Good,”
the Captain replied with a nod. “Course?”

“Plotted
sir,” the helmsman said smartly. He knew better than to be caught unprepared.
He didn't want to ever get on the Captain's bad side again, once was enough in
one lifetime. “The computer is keeping a running update now sir,” he said.

“We're
getting glitter on the camera's Captain,” the ops officer said looking over his
shoulder. “The glitter is a metal reflection of something in orbit Captain,
there isn't much there, some gold which is odd.”

“Ship?”
the Captain asked, looking at the back of the ops officer.

“She's
small, smaller than us sir. A yacht maybe. She's mostly dark though sir, I
caught sight of her when she went between the planet and us. For some reason
she's trimmed in gold.”

The
Captain thought about that, black with gold and then shrugged the thought
aside. “So she's in orbit?”

“Yes
sir. Do we abort?” the ops officer asked nervously.

The
Captain sat back in the chair. “We do not. Set course for the planet helm,
engage when ready,” he growled flicking a hand in command and then resting it
on the arms rest. The extra ship just added a bit more spice to the game.
Perhaps they'd be gone by the time they arrived.

“Course
locked in, sublight engines engaging. Transitional speed was .05 light, ion
engines have engaged. Inertial dampeners are nominal.”

“Excellent,”
the Captain said with a nod. One of the things a spacer feared the most was a
failure in the ship's inertial dampeners. If it happened they would never know
it, they'd be turned to gruel by the change in acceleration. “Rig wedge.”

“Rig
wedge aye sir.”

A few
minutes later the helmsman nodded. “Wedge is up, wedge is at ten percent. We
are picking up speed,  we will hit .1 light speed in five one minutes. ETA to
planet 74.5 hours.”

“They
should pick us up in 12 hours Captain, when the light of our arrival reaches
them,” the ops officer volunteered.

“Very
well. As you were,” the Captain said with a nod. He got up and paced a moment.
“I'll be in my quarters. Number two you have the bridge,” he said to the ops
officer and left.

“Aye, I
have the bridge,” the ops officer said by rote.

*****

“This
is Epsilon Triangula orbital control to incoming vessel, state your name and
intentions, over,” a voice said over the radio 14 hours later. The Captain was
a bit annoyed, he'd just gone to bed when the call had been received.

“They
seem a little testy,” the exec said, crossing his arms. He looked over to the
Captain but the Captain didn't say anything. “Took them long enough,” he
observed.

“Yes,”
the Captain said, still brooding.

“Are we
still on?” the exec asked.

“Yes,”
the Captain said, a note of annoyance creeping into that one word answer.

“Aye
sir. Reply?” he asked.

“It
took them long enough,” the Captain repeated softly. He cleared his throat.
“Standard reply, name and that we're stopping in for fuel.”

“Aye
sir,” the exec said, sitting in his chair. He pulled out a hush mike. “This is
the Prinz Zir, freighter, coming in for fuel and resupply,” the exec said and
then listened to the message repeat. When he was satisfied he nodded once more.
“Clean copy sir,” he said.

“Then
send it number one. Time to reply is 10 hours?” He frowned. “No, twenty, I keep
forgetting that.”

“You're
tired sir,” the exec said shrugging it off. The Captain hadn't put his usual
turtleneck sweater on when he came to the bridge, but he had brought his usual
professionalism. He shot a wary look at the exec and then looked away.

“No
excuses number one, for me or for anyone else.”

“Aye
sir.”

“Well,
since we've got time, I'm going back to bed,” the Captain grumbled, getting up.

The
exec looked up and nodded. “Aye sir.”

“You
have the bridge number one.”

“Aye
sir,” the exec said again as the Captain left.

“Someone
woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” the helmsman muttered.

The
exec's eyes snapped to the errant pilot. “As you were,” he growled.

The
helmsman hunched his shoulders and then nodded.

Twenty
hours later they got a rather testy reply. The Captain was paged to hear it.
The exec had been in main engineering, working with the chief to repair a
frozen generator. He heard the page and arrived on the bridge a moment after
the Captain, still drying his hands.

“Get
your hands dirty number one?” the Captain asked, looking back to the exec. The
ship was almost to turn over, when it would stop accelerating to the planet and
coast before flipping and using its engines to brake it's acceleration to match
orbit. If the engines didn't reignite they'd continue sailing off into the
outer dark past the planet. He had a decision to make. On the one hand he was
eager to drop the package, on the other hand morally he didn't like what was
going to come. They could still abort, they could still adjust their heading,
not bother with turnover and head to the Gaston jump point. That had been the
plan, but no, he wanted this thing off his ship.

“Still
having trouble with the number one generator. She locked up good sir, the
chief's doing a tear down but it doesn't look good.”

The number
one generator was a hydrogen turbine engine attached to a series of scavenged
alternators. She served as a backup in case the one and only fusion plant they
had on board died. She used the same hydrogen mix as the reactor, though she
was a great deal less efficient compared to the fusion reactor. The reactor
fused the hydrogen into helium, neutrons, and electrons, the turbine burned the
hydrogen and in so doing turned a series of turbines which then turned a shaft
that then turned more gears, that led to other shafts that were attached to the
alternators. In other words it used mechanical energy to generate electricity,
a highly inefficient process. One that had a lot of waste heat... which led to
eventual point failure.

They
didn't need the generator, if the fusion reactor went down that was that, they
were screwed. There was no way they could restart the reactor... even with the
energy from the backup generators. No one could. But the reactors could give
them a little bit of juice needed to keep the life support running and maybe a
little extra to limp into port.

In
hyper both the reactor and the backup generators were stood down, to twenty
percent power. The hyper collectors drew in enough energy from hyperspace to
power the drive and most of the ship systems normally. But the Captain liked to
keep everything ship shape, so the generator had to be test run periodically,
and sometimes that uncovered problems.

“Perfect.
I wanted that damn thing fixed before we head back out,” the Captain growled.

The
exec shrugged. “She's buried in the hull sir. From the sound of the chief’s
cussing the turbine had some inferior metals in her when she was cast. The
turbine blade cracked and  chewed up the works,” he said. The chief engineer
was turning the air rather blue in his cussing. His female assistant was doing
her best to get the situation under control despite her boss's volcanic temper
tantrum.

“Perfect,”
the Captain said and turned. He was reading the reply on a tablet. The exec
grunted. Apparently the return reply was a bit more than just a simple hey, hi,
how are you. “It says here they have a list of orbital fees. Funny, how taking
up space in the sky isn't free anymore,” he grumbled.

“Yeah
well, we've got ways to pay the fees,” the exec said.

“Yeah
well, I'm not happy about the prices,” the Captain grumbled. “They uploaded the
cost of fuel and food too. We're going to get cleaned out,” he sighed.

“Price
of doing business sir,” the exec shrugged. “Anything on their planetary defense
grid?” he asked, glancing at ops.

“No,
mores the pity. She's canny, bounced the signal through a series of
transmitters in the mountains on the main continent.”

“So
plan B?” the exec asked. He wasn't comfortable with it, he'd rather stick to
their original plan, but sometimes one had to adapt to survive.

The
Captain of course had the last word. He nodded, passing the tablet to the exec.
“Plan B. Prep em,” he said. “I'll call it in,” he said.

“Aye
sir,” the exec said, trying hard to keep his voice even and calm. This part he
didn't like, not at all. Suddenly tearing into a back up turbine was far more
appealing.

*****

The
Captain rolled his eyes as he listened to the headset in his hand pressed to
his ear.

“Are
they still at it sir?” the exec asked. The exec smiled crookedly.

The
Captain snorted. “Just a tad bit excited. Apparently some ships have come by
recently and really given them a leg up. They have had a Major uptick in
industry and education,” he said. “From the sound of it they could be beyond
Antigua. They are working on electronics manufacturing now. I've had three
requests from companies in Gotham and Metropolis asking if we'd be interested
in bartering for their goods.”

“Really,”
the exec said, nodding to the ops officer. That changed things, no one was
exporting electronics except Pyrax. “How high are they saying their tech is?”

“They
recently repaired one of their planetary defense battery's fusion reactors sir,
we're getting increased neutrino's now,” the ops officer reported.

“More
than before? How far back?”

“Last
visit was two standard years ago, the Buckingham sir,” the ops officer
reported.

“That
is news,” the Captain mused. “I didn't think anyone could repair a fusion
reactor. Other than Pyrax.”

“We're
not certain if it was home grown or in one of the trades sir,” the ops officer
replied, looking over his shoulder. “It could be a parts trade. We picked up a
corroborating news report that said the Io 11 has been through recently.”

“Them,”
the exec said with a snort. “They are a 2 bit freighter on their last legs. How
could they pull that one off? Salvage you suppose?”

“Possibly.
They tie into the Irons rumors though sir. Something about how they found him
and he repaired their ship,” the ops officer replied.

“As you
were,” the exec said nodding to the Captain. The ops officer turned and went
back to studying his read outs. “Are we getting a rough assessment of their
tech sir?”

“Yes,
and I don't like it. Getting even one of those damn PDC's back online is a
headache for anyone who comes in after us.”

“Yes,”
the exec nodded. “Tech level has jumped I take it?”

“They've
gotten to circuit boards and semiconductors,” the Captain replied, sounding
thoughtful. “Beyond diodes I mean. Antigua was supposedly making some vacuum
tubes but this...”

“Is
more interesting,” the exec replied with a nod. They didn't need the
competition. “So are we on sir?” he asked.

“We'll
see. I think a little brier rabbit in the negotiations might work, but I don't
want to seem too eager,” the Captain replied. “We'll see what intel we can get
out of them, if anything.”

“Do you
want me to handle it sir?” the exec asked.

The
Captain shook his head. He ran a hand through his short iron gray hair. “No,
I've got it.”

“Well,
in the meantime, we're ready to make turn over on your order sir,” the helmsman
said, turning in his seat to look at the Captain.

The
Captain nodded, still listening to the recording and occasionally jotting notes
down on the pad of paper in his lap. “Proceed,” he said without looking up.

“Making
turn over now sir. All engines back full. Engines report standby. Flipping the
ship... Pitch 10, 30, 60, 90, 120, 169, slowing... 180.  Pitch maneuver
complete,” the helmsman reported. “Initiating engine restart, completed. Burn
read.”

“Go for
burn,” the exec ordered, glancing at his Captain. The Captain tapped his pen
against his chin but just nodded slightly. The exec turned to the helmsman.