Dark Vengeance (5 page)

I opened my mouth to thank her but was knocked rudely aside by an attractive middle-aged woman with long red hair, Spock ears protruding. The side profile of her face looked childlike with glossy white skin and well-defined features. Her lips were painted a bright red. She ignored me completely and spoke with a demanding tone.

“We will not accept these repeated delays. You are attempting to deprive us of our property and are endangering us with your shameful politics.”

Fantasia remained admirably calm. “Ms. Purser, our policies are expressly for the safety of our guests.”

“We demand the return of our property immediately. Do you or do you not intend to comply?”

“Ms. Purser, the Captain has explained to you on two separate occasions that no weapons are allowed aboard Star-Seven except those under the control of Star Seven security. Your items will be returned as soon as we dock at Enuro.”

“Where are you keeping our property? We demand to know.”

“Ms. Purser, please advise Ambassador Sulik that your property is being kept in the weapons locker in security headquarters. That locker has multiple locking systems and has been sealed by the Captain and head of security. Your property is perfectly safe and will be returned to you in due course.”

Ms. Purser did not appear satisfied. She gave Fantasia a look that would have frightened a superhero, then turned and stomped away.

Fantasia looked at me and shook her head. I smiled back at her and nodded. “Fantasia, you are remarkable. The patience of a saint.”

“She is Ambassador Sulik’s aid. Unfortunately, I think that one may be back,” she replied.

I patted her arm on the counter then remembered R.J.’s warning about spontaneous pregnancy and pulled my hand back too quickly.

Fantasia laughed out loud.

On my way to explore the ship aft, R.J. caught me as he was leaving his stateroom. He was dressed in tennis shoes, jeans, and a light blue knit sweater. He had on sunglasses with red-tinted lenses. Before I could question him about them, he cut me off. “Ah! A man about town. I like the sports coat. Nice touch.”

“Not sure I’d call this a town. Zoo might be more fitting.”

“Where are we going?”

“To explore aft.”

“Not much to see. Big doors to engineering. Aft security headquarters, and some documentation offices. There’s also an elevator down to an aft airlock. Did you check up front?”

“I did,”

“Did you notice sick bay? The doctors are of the four-foot type.”

“They were making a special supplement for the Ancient while I was there.”

“Oh yeah, I got another peek at her last night.”

“Were you wanting one?”

“They were bringing a med cart into her stateroom. Through the open door I watched her rotate her antigravity Segway to the horizontal so they could do tests on her.”

We slowly started off aft. Two determined female guests were headed our way. It was Ambassador Sulik, who I recognized because she was being closely followed by a still very irate Ms. Purser. The two could have been twin sisters except Purser was shorter and the Ambassador was dressed in all the sparkling glamour of a star celebrity. They swished by us without so much as a glance.

“Poor Fantasia,” I whispered.

“They looked like they were lacking only assault weapons,” replied R.J.

“Good guess. That’s exactly what they’re lacking.”

At the very end of the main concourse, we stopped outside the doors to engineering and looked around.

“Fort Knox,” remarked R.J.

“No tours allowed,” I added.

“But look at that. That’s aft security headquarters next door and it’s wide open.”

We crossed over and peered inside. There were several walk-in safes built into the walls. A rather low neatly arranged desk sat in the middle of the room. No one was on guard.

“Look at the size of that weapons locker,” said R.J. and he pointed to the right. There was a heavy metal cabinet that ran the length of the wall with a group of formidable locks at various points along it. There were signs in alien here and there.

“How do you know it’s really a weapons locker?” I asked.

R.J. peeled off his red glasses and handed them to me. I stood in doubt for a moment then put them on. Immediately every sign on the wall appeared in English. They described weapons categories.

“Where did you get these?”

“Fantasia,” replied R.J. “Where else.”

“Did you get me a pair?”

“Left them in your stateroom. We can pick them up on our way to lunch. Why would they leave this room open with no one around?”

“Probably in case they need to get in here fast. Plus, I’d bet we’re on candid camera at the moment, probably three or four different angles.”

“Let us go to lunch before we make them uncomfortable.”

As we started back, the main engineering door slid open and a four-foot Star Seven crewman with a silver collar emerged.

I grabbed at the chance. “Excuse me. Would there be any way a Captain and Commander could get a tour of engineering?”

He was distracted and had to pause for a moment to process the request. “I’m sorry, Sir. Guests are not allowed in engineering under any circumstances. My apologies, Sir.”

“Well, you can’t blame us for trying. We’re both impressed by Star Seven’s design. Thank you anyway. By the way, there haven’t been any more intruder alert warnings. I guess you’ve fixed that.”

The subject sparked his interest. “Actually, Sir, we’ve had to temporarily shut down the system. It’s an intermittent in the sensor network but we’ve been unable to isolate it yet. Such is the way with problems that suddenly arise but disappear just as quickly.”

“Yes, we’ve had a few of those ourselves. Can I ask your name, engineer?”

“I’m Enu, sir. Glad to be of service to you.”

He turned away and headed briskly forward. R.J. and I followed at a casual pace. As we neared the dining room, a new guest came into view ahead of us.

R.J. leaned over and whispered, “It’s Ambassador Beltran.”

At first my mind could not understand the form. The figure was almost pyramid shaped, supported by two legs the size of tree trunks. There was a small head atop the mass, the facial features sunken and small. The waist was twice as long as the shoulders and below the waist the sagging mass drooped down over the legs. As he swayed side to side and marched closer, I could see the chin hanging down against the massive sweatshirt that covered most of him except for the small portion of tubular kaki-styled pant legs. The pant legs covered the feet and shoes. His arms hung down at 45 degree angles along his sides and did not swing as he plodded along. He had gray stubble atop his small head. He passed by us as we entered the eatery and turned his head to give us a friendly smile which was actually just less of a downturn of the mouth. We both nodded in acknowledgment and chose to let the moment pass without comment.

After lunch, I escaped to my stateroom, sat back with my feet up in front of a roaring fire in a fireplace that produced no heat, sipping Star Seven’s version of bourbon on the rocks, feeling that maybe Bernard Porre might not be such a bad guy after all. Having gained enough familiarity with the ship layout, and a reasonable amount of exposure with the crew and guests, the cruise was beginning to feel comfortable, at least to a degree.

Both R.J. and I began to settle in to a routine of sorts, catching up on reading and study, daily workouts, and even use of some of the entertainment facilities. It began to be a vacation in The Twilight Zone. Most guests seemed intent on keeping to themselves which burdened the atmosphere with a certain social monotony. We had a running joke we began to use that R.J. was Sherlock Holmes in search of the ship’s lost social life.

Late in the afternoon on day five I met him in the lounge talking to a staff member bartender.

“So have you figured out where the excitement is aboard this boat, Sherlock, or is there just no excitement to be found?”

“A solution is at hand, my dear Watson. Having spoken to enough guests and staff I’ve come to realize is vessel is simply full of friendly sheep, and only lacking a good border collie or two.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Stone soup poker.”

R.J. has always had an uncanny ability to accumulate people. The superficial ones find him amusing and interesting, the intellects recognized a kindred spirit in disguise, and the perpetual arguers are so entertained by his counterpoint that they secretly feel he understands them. We headed back to my stateroom where he borrowed the deck of cards I had brought along. He added that to his own deck, then dragged me out to the grand gallery where we sat by a lukewarm but blazing fire in the fireplace, dealing each other hands of seven card poker.

After only a few minutes, Elachia came out from behind her counter to offer support. “Gentlemen, we have playing coins of several different denominations if you would like to use them.”

“Elachia, that would be marvelous,” replied R.J. “But only if you will join us.”

“Perhaps just for a time, if you will teach me, and I may need to interrupt to assist guests,” she answered.

We set up the bank, bought in with a credit sheet, and found ourselves alarmed by how quickly Elachia understood the game. A small crowd of short staff members in colorful off-duty attire began forming around the table.

As R.J. and I struggled to keep up with Elachia’s raising, the Golian I had seen in the gym appeared behind her holding a large curved bottle watching the game intently.

R.J. smiled up at him. “Sir, that’s an intriguing bottle of something you have there. You really must cash in and save us. She’s killing us.”

The Golian’s tone was cordial. “If no one minds. I was watching on the monitor from my stateroom. I believe I understand the game. This particular beverage is renowned for its ability to make any game of chance more pleasurable, if you would all join me in a drink, as well.”

The Golian introduced himself in the informal as Ian. Glasses seemed to appear out of nowhere. Conversations around the table were picking up. The Crystal sisters showed up and quickly became interested.

“Can anyone play?” one asked.

“Anyone must play, my dear. It’s a moral imperative,” replied R.J.

The two sisters exchanged a few whispers and turned back to R.J. “We don’t know what that means, but we’d like to join you.”

In less than two hours, an all out social convention spontaneously materialized; R.J.’s version of stone soup. It was a mixture of crew and guests coming and going, never less than seven players at the table, never less than a dozen others watching. Various liquid refreshments continuously appearing within the crowd and tasting too good. I had to keep reminding myself not to hold eye contact with Elachia for too long.

There were several periods where both R.J. and I took breaks from the game and stood off to the side with our drinks, watching our all night poker game continue without a single human player. And, it may have been the drinks or not, but if you closed your eyes, from the sounds of it you couldn’t tell these people were not human.

It may be that if you remove the prejudice, guilt, and anger from any gathering of almost any variety of humanoid species, they suddenly become children of the same spiritual parentage; brothers and sisters scattered among the stars by the evolution of a galaxy. It is a burdensome concept to consider given the wars that result from the simplest of anatomical differences, an irony once well represented by the story of two men pursuing each other across the galaxy in a fight to the death all because their black and white skin colorations were arranged on opposite sides of their bodies. It is even more a pointless tragedy when you consider most races know the physical body is but a temporary habitat.

When I finally escaped R.J.’s stone soup merriment, my stateroom had finally become a welcome retreat. Fortunately the wide expanse of bed was too large to miss as I do not remember making contact with it.

It seemed like only a moment later when an unwelcome shaking interrupted my dreamless sleep.               The intrusion was persistent. No amount of turning away resolved it. I offered half-opened eyes with a groan and was rewarded by R.J.’s demanding voice. “Adrian, you better get out there. Somebody’s dead.”

Chapter 4

I pushed up on one elbow, squinting from the artificial morning light coming from my artificial window. “What?”

“Somebody died last night. You don’t think they’ll blame us because of the card game, do you?”

“What time is it?”

“It’s 07:00. They just found the body.”

“Seven! No wonder I feel like I only slept and hour or two. I only slept an hour or two.”

“We’d better get out there and get involved, don’t you think?”

“Who died?”

“I don’t know.”

“How’d they die?”

“Don’t know.”

I swung around to a sitting position. Things were foggy. “So security’s on top of this? You sure they want guests barging in?”