Dragonback 01 Dragon and Thief (8 page)

For a moment Draycos lay as unmoving as a statue. Then, the tip of
his tail twitched again. "Very well," he said. "Let us trade secrets."

His tongue flicked out between his teeth. "You may start, Jack
Morgan. Tell me why you pretend there is another human aboard this
ship."

Jack felt his throat tighten. "What are you talking about?" he
asked, the automatic caution of long habit kicking in. "I already
explained that Uncle Virge is an invalid and can't leave his cabin."

"Do not lie to me," Draycos warned. "All beings, whether K'da or
Shontine or human, leave traces of their scent in the air. There is no
second human here."

"Oh, really?" Uncle Virge said huffily. "Let me tell you, my
gold-scaled friend. You have a lot to learn about us humans—"

"No," Jack cut him off. After a year of deception, he was suddenly
tired of the lies. Tired of
all
the lies. "No, it's all right.
He's got us. I mean, he's got me."

"Jack, lad—"

"No," Jack said firmly. "He saved my life. He deserves to know."

He turned to Draycos. "Uncle Virge is a computer program," he told
the dragon. "It's the standard ship's computer interface; only before
he died, my Uncle Virgil imprinted it with his own voice and speech
mannerisms."

"Interesting," Draycos murmured. "Is it alive?"

"Not like us, no," Jack said. "He can mimic a person when he
talks, and he can think and reason a little. But not very much, and not
outside his programming."

"I see." Draycos was silent a moment. "How long have you lived
this way?"

"About a year," Jack said. "Uncle Virgil died in a . . . well, it
was sort of an accident."

"And you have been alone ever since?" Jack shrugged. "It's not so
bad. I don't get lonely much. Anyway, it wasn't like he had a lot of
time for me even before that."

Draycos's ears twitched. "And why is it important that this be
kept a secret?"

"Because I'm only fourteen years old," Jack said, hearing the old
bitterness creeping into his voice. "According to the all-wise,
all-knowing Internes fusspots, that's too young for someone to be
flying alone out here. If they found out, they'd take the
Essenay
away from me and put me in some group home somewhere."

"Would that not be better for you?"

"I don't want it," Jack snapped. "And I don't need it. I'm
fourteen—practically an adult. I don't want some governmental group
home leader on my back ordering me around."

"You do not like being told what to do?"

Jack bit down hard. "I can take care of myself."

Draycos cocked his head once, as if studying him, then
straightened up again. "How do you survive?" he asked. "Surely you
cannot simply take what you need from others."

"Yeah, well, I could," Jack muttered. "Matter of fact, that's
mostly what Uncle Virgil and I used to do."

"Pardon?"

Jack hesitated. But as long as he'd gone this far, he might as
well lay out the whole ugly story. "Uncle Virgil was a safe-cracker and
con man," he said.

"I do not know those terms."

"A safecracker breaks into safes and vaults and takes the things
people have stored there," Jack explained, a twinge of conscience
poking like a thorn into his side. "A con man uses words and schemes to
talk people out of their money."

Draycos's green eyes were gazing at him with an uncomfortable
intensity. "You were thieves."

"That's putting it a bit unkindly, sir," Uncle Virge protested.

"Shut up, Uncle Virge," Jack said tiredly. "Yes. We were thieves."

"And your society permits this?"

"Our society tries very hard to stop it," Jack conceded. "But
Uncle Virgil was good at what he did, especially the safe-cracker part.
One of the real experts in the field. The cops knew all about him, but
they never caught him in the act or had enough evidence to arrest him."

"What was your part in his activities?"

"I was his helper," Jack said. "I distracted people, or played
foil or backstop. He had me crack some simple safes, too, and he was
starting to teach me some of the fancier tricks when he died. I think
he was training me to follow in his footsteps."

"Cops," Draycos said thoughtfully, as if finally finding a jigsaw
puzzle piece he'd been looking for. "That was the word. You said our
attacker on the
Havenseeker
might be a cop. Are the authorities
still seeking Uncle Virgil?"

"Actually, they're more likely seeking me," Jack said. "The funny
part is that, for once, I didn't do anything."

"Explain."

"I don't steal or con anymore," Jack said. "I never really liked
it, and I quit after Uncle Virgil died. But like you said, I have to
eat. So I do odd jobs or hire the
Essenay
out for short-range
transport work."

"There cannot be very much cargo space aboard this spacecraft,"
Draycos pointed out.

"There's enough for small jobs," Jack said. "Anyway, I was on the
Vagran Colony when I heard that Braxton Universis was moving its
assembly plant there to Cordolane and needed extra freighters for
one-time transport jobs. I applied, they gave me ten sealed crates, and
off I went."

"Who is Braxton Universis?"

"It's a what, not a who," Jack told him. "Braxton Universis is one
of the biggest megacorporations in the Orion Arm. You know what a
megacorporation is?"

"No."

"The
Essenay
is like a normal business," Jack said, waving
a hand around him. "That ship of yours, the
Havenseeker? That
was like a megacorporation."

"I see," Draycos said. "It is a matter of size."

"Size and power both," Jack said. "Anyway, I spent the next four
days on ECHO traveling to Cordolane."

"What is this ECHO?" Draycos asked. "You have mentioned it before."

" 'ECHO' stands for Extra-C Holologic Overdrive," Jack told him,
"where 'C' is the symbol for the speed of light. It's the system
everyone in the Orion Arm uses to get back and forth between the stars."

"I see," Draycos said. "So you traveled to Cordolane?"

"Right," Jack said. "And when I got there—" he grimaced "—one of
the boxes was empty."

The tip of Draycos's tail was making slow circles in the air. "Did
you stop along the way?"

Jack shook his head. "I went straight from Vagran to the delivery
point on Cordolane."

"Then there are only three possibilities," Draycos said. "The
first is that an error has taken place."

"Not a chance," Jack said. "They weighed the crates right beside
the
Essenay
, and I stood there and watched them load 'em
aboard."

"I see," Draycos said. "Then the second possibility is that this
was deliberately arranged to implicate you in theft."

"I'd sure like to know how," Jack said glumly. "I'd also like to
know why."

"You said you and Uncle Virgil had cheated others," Draycos
reminded him. "Could one of them be seeking revenge?"

"I suppose so," Jack conceded. "But then why not just have me
arrested?"

"Maybe they think you still have something valuable stashed away,"
Uncle Virge put in. "Getting you arrested wouldn't get that back for
them."

"But framing me might?" Jack shrugged. "Maybe. I don't know how
any of Uncle Virgil's pigeons could have gotten access to sealed
Braxton Universis cargo, though. Or how they could pull off this
vanishing act, for that matter."

"You are certain the cargo disappeared?" Draycos asked.

"On Vagran, the crate weighed a hundred pounds," Jack said. "On
Cordolane, it weighed ten. You said there were three possibilities?"

"Yes," Draycos said. "The third is that you are lying to me."

His long neck seemed to stretch, and even though he was still
lying on the dayroom floor he suddenly seemed a lot taller. "You would
not lie to me, would you, Jack Morgan?"

Jack swallowed. "This is the truth, Draycos. I swear it."

"That's why the lad can't go shouting your story from the
rooftops," Uncle Virge said. "By now, Braxton Universis will have a
warrant out for his arrest. With his, shall we say, somewhat checkered
history, no one will believe his story about disappearing cargo."

"Ducking local cops isn't that much of a problem," Jack added.
"They're usually overworked, and I know how to play them. But Braxton
has their own security unit, and they're way better than everything out
there except maybe Internes Police."

"What is Internes Police?" Draycos asked.

"That's the overall law enforcement unit of the Internes," Uncle
Virge explained. "The Internes itself is the confederation of Earth and
the various human colonies. There's also the Orion Trade Association,
which includes humans and the thirty-two other intelligent alien
species in the Orion Arm. And, of course, each colony and nation has
its own government. Makes for quite a patchwork of laws and
regulations."

"We can fill him in on local politics later," Jack said. "The
point is that even if the local cops don't have time to look for me,
Braxton Security does. I barely got off Cordolane ahead of them, and
nearly got nailed when I tried to sneak onto Sakklif."

"That's why we were sitting on Iota Klestis when you were
attacked," Uncle Virge said. "We wanted some place away from
civilization where we could sit back and try to think this out."

"For which I owe you my life," Draycos said, ducking his head in
an odd sort of bowing motion. "I thank you."

"Yesterday's thanks are tomorrow's cold porridge," Uncle Virge
said with a sniff. "If you really want to show your thanks, you'll help
us figure out what happened to the cargo."

"Of course," Draycos said, as if there had never been any doubt.
"I intend to do exactly that."

Jack blinked. It was about the last thing he would have expected
the dragon to say. "You what?" he asked, just to make sure he'd heard
it right.

"I need your assistance to find my attackers, Jack Morgan,"
Draycos said. "For you to move freely, we must first erase the false
accusation against you. Does this not make sense?"

"It makes wonderful sense," Uncle Virge said. "And just how, may I
ask, do you propose to do that?"

"We will start at the scene of the crime," Draycos said. "How long
will it take to return to the Vagran Colony?"

"Not very," Jack said, touching a switch on the underside of the
narrow dayroom table his fizzy-soda was sitting on. Beneath the glass,
the surface changed from wood grain to a set of displays and status
monitors. "Let's see . . ."

Uncle Virge, naturally, got there first. "At standard cruising
speed we can be there in five days," he said. "If we kick up to full
power, we can cut that to twenty hours. Very expensive on fuel, though."

"And it's already been over two weeks," Jack added. "Seems to me
that if there were any clues there, they're long gone by now."

"Perhaps," Draycos said. "Perhaps not. All the more reason why we
should return as quickly as we can."

"What
won't
be gone is Braxton Security," Uncle Virge
pointed out. "If you walk in there, you might have trouble walking out
again."

"You said they were moving that operation," Draycos reminded him.
"Will they not all be gone?"

"There are bound to be a few still around tying up loose ends,"
Uncle Virge said.

"Anyway, the cargo was fine when I left there," Jack pointed out.

"It is still the place to start," Draycos said.

"Jack?" Uncle Virge prompted. "It's your decision."

Jack chewed his lower lip. He honestly couldn't see what good it
would do them. Still, they had to start somewhere, and Vagran was
probably the last place anyone would expect him to show up. "Sure, why
not?" he said with a sigh.

"Then it is decided," Draycos said firmly. "We must change course
immediately."

"Not so fast, friend," Uncle Virge said. "I seem to remember you
saying something about trading secrets; but so far Jack and I have been
doing all the talking. It's your turn now."

The tail tip was making slow circles again. A sign of the dragon
thinking? "Very well," Draycos said at last. "You know that our ships
were attacked and destroyed. What you do not know is that we were only
an advance team."

The skin at the back of Jack's neck prickled. "Advance team for
what?" he asked carefully.

"For the K'da and Shontine peoples," Draycos said. "Refugees from
our war with the Valahgua."

It took Jack three tries to get any words out. "Did anyone know
about this?" he asked, trying to sound casual. "I mean, anyone
official?"

"In
any
Orion Arm government, Internes or otherwise?"
Uncle Virge added.

"We dealt with representatives of a people called the Chitac
Nomads," Draycos said. "They assured us that world was not being used,
and would be available for purchase."

"Uh-huh," Jack muttered under his breath. "Uncle Virge?"

"I don't know, lad," the other said hesitantly. "On official
records, Iota Klestis belongs to the Triost Mining Group. Still, they
don't seem to have done anything with it for thirty years or more. I'm
afraid I'm not up on current land-use law, so I can't tell you when a
claim like that lapses."

"Either way, I doubt the Chitac Nomads had the rights to sell it,"
Jack concluded. "Typical Chitac stunt."

Draycos had gone rigid, his green eyes shimmering. "Do you say we
were cheated?" he demanded, his voice suddenly an octave lower.

"Easy, easy," Jack cautioned, holding out a calming hand as he
pushed himself further back in his chair. He hadn't yet seen the dragon
get really mad, and he didn't want to start in a cramped dayroom. "The
Chitac aren't swindlers, really. They're just a bit . . . uh . . ."

"A bit casual concerning matters of law and regulation?" Uncle
Virge offered.

"Yeah, that's it," Jack agreed. "They probably knew about the
planet, knew it wasn't being developed, and figured no one wanted it
anymore. I'm sure it was all in good faith."