Fallen Empire 1: Star Nomad (7 page)

“Mica, are you trying to squash my optimism with your pessimism again?”

“Just stating the facts.”

“That was a yes, right?”

Mica’s nose wrinkled again.

A commotion arose among the people passing along the promenade near the base of the
Nomad’s
ramp. Alisa’s first thought was that Yumi was returning with her chickens, but she didn’t see the woman. She did, however, see two men in gleaming silver suits of combat armor, the square panels on their arms signaling weapons ports that could be lifted for firing. As if that wasn’t enough, they both carried massive assault rifles. One also wore a bandolier of grenades. Thanks to their helmets being tucked under their arms, Alisa had no trouble seeing the thick girths of their necks and their I-can-break-granite-with-my-teeth jaws. She would have believed they were cyborgs, but they might just have been gym enthusiasts. Either way, she hoped they continued past her ship.

They stopped at the base of the ramp and looked up at her.

“Any chance they’re here to apply for the security gig?” Alisa murmured.

“They’re late if they are,” Mica said.

Judging by their matching suits, suits that had likely been issued by some wealthy employer, Alisa doubted they were looking for a job. She thought about hitting the button that would withdraw the ramp and close the hatch, but the men were already halfway up. They would probably tumble inside, exactly where she did not want them.

“You fellows looking for someone?” Alisa asked.

She remembered the nervous glance that Yumi had sent over her shoulder and her desire to leave town quickly. She wasn’t a thief in trouble, was she?

“Yup,” one of the brawny men said.

They stopped a few feet lower than Alisa on the ramp, but even so, they were tall enough to look down at her. The speaker produced a palm-sized netdisc. A holographic display popped into the air above it, and a familiar face with brown skin and blond hair rotated to face Alisa. Tommy Beck.

“We’re looking for this man. You seen him?”

“No,” Alisa said without hesitating. She did not look to the side to see if Mica wrinkled her nose this time. Maybe it wasn’t wise to hide someone that she knew nothing about, but Beck had bowled into Draper on her behalf, and he seemed like a decent fellow. These men seemed like they pummeled sabertooth
rawangas
to relax, when they weren’t busy ripping people’s heads off and shooting them.

“Boss figures he’s heading off-world,” the speaker said, his gaze scouring the cargo hold behind Alisa. His buddy drummed a beat against the double barrels of his assault rifle. “There are only three ships that have filed flight plans with the dock master that say they’re going to break atmo in the next twenty-four hours.”

The flight plans for the ships docked here shouldn’t have been public information. These men did not look like police, so it made Alisa uneasy to know they had gotten that data somehow.

“Haven’t seen him,” she said with a shrug, refusing to show her unease. “Who do you work for? I can let them know if he comes by before we leave.”

“The White Dragon,” the man said, his tone challenging.

Alisa wished she could say that she hadn’t heard of them, but the mafia organization was large enough—and cruel enough—that it often made the news. She kept her face from showing any expression, but doubts danced in her head. She wouldn’t have pegged Beck as someone who would poke his nose into hornets’ nests, but if he had, then she would be a fool to keep him on her ship. Just because he’d stood up for her wasn’t a reason to position herself in the crosshairs of the mafia.

“Got a contact number?” she asked nonchalantly.

The man poked something in his holodisplay, and the image of Beck disappeared. A laser beam shot out of the disc and burned into the wall next to the hatch controls. Alisa jumped and opened her mouth to protest, but the device finished quickly, leaving a name and comm code etched into her hull.

“Contact number,” the man said dryly. “We’ll be checking the cameras. If we see that he did, indeed, board your ship, we’ll be back.”

The silent man smirked and tapped one of his grenades.

“Great,” Alisa said, “maybe next time, you can etch a Banakka board on my wall, and we can play a few rounds.”

Neither of them smiled. Nobody on this planet appreciated her humor.

“If you’re lying, you’ll regret it,” the speaker said. “Lying isn’t healthy, you know.”

“Yeah, I hear it hardens your arteries and gives you cavities.”

He scowled at her. “You looking for trouble, girl?”

“No. Look, I told you, I’ll let you know if I see the man. I’m helpful.”

After a long glower, the thugs stalked back down the ramp and strode to the next ship docked along the promenade. People skittered out of their way as they passed. If they didn’t, the men shoved them out of the way with enough force to knock them over.

“Why does our trip to Perun keep getting more complicated?” Mica asked.

“I don’t know, but I really don’t want to play Banakka with those two.” Alisa thumped a fist on her thigh. She’d wanted more passengers, but lingering here wouldn’t be a good idea, not now. Besides, the passengers and crew she had already taken on were looking to be trouble enough already. “I’m going to run my preflight checklist. As soon as Yumi gets back with her feathered cargo, let me know. We’re shoving off.” She would have to electronically transfer the funds she owed the storeowner once she had an account set up again.

“No arguments here.”

As Alisa headed for the steps, she spotted the cyborg up on the walkway again, looking down on the cargo hold. Yet another exchange that he had probably witnessed. She supposed it would be pointless to fantasize about him smashing the hells out of those two thugs in their sardine cans. No, he had disliked Beck instantly, so he wouldn’t defend him. The cyborg was probably thinking about tossing him out the airlock at the first opportunity.

Alisa grumbled to herself, taking the steps three at a time. The sooner they got off this dustball, the better.

Chapter 5

The
Star Nomad’s
compact NavCom cabin would have been deemed small in comparison to the bridge of a dreadnought or other warship, but it felt large after the cockpits of the one-man Strikers that Alisa had flown in the Alliance army. There were seats for the pilot and the co-pilot, and a fold-down seat behind them at the sensor station. The monitoring station for the cargo hold, life support, and fuel management was also back there. Displays and controls were hardwired into the consoles—no fancy holo-nav systems on this old ship.

Memories of her childhood and learning to fly washed over Alisa as she sat in the pilot’s seat, guiding the
Nomad
toward the clouds. It was comforting that the navigation and thruster controls were so familiar.

As they gained altitude, her thoughts shifted from her memories and into the present. She worried that she had dug her own grave by not tossing Tommy Beck into his armor case and dumping him out on the promenade before taking off. On the way up to NavCom, she
had
stopped outside of his cabin for a long moment and considered telling him to get out. But who else would stand up to the cyborg if she needed it? A fifty-year-old doctor turned monk? A chicken wrangler? The engineer who’d told her she was spaced if she took the cyborg on to start with?

Besides, Alisa couldn’t get past the fact that Beck had defended her against Draper and his intrusive paws. Handing him over to the mafia would be a poor way to thank him for that. She would take him to Perun and drop him off there. There were billions of people on that planet. He could get lost, disappear. And if the White Dragon mafia caught up with her later and had revenge in mind, she would tell them that he had stowed away. Any camera footage those thugs got ahold of would only show the promenade and possibly her ramp. Even if they’d had spy boxes or other aerial cameras, she doubted they would have been able to record much of what went on inside her ship.

As the
Nomad
gained altitude, Alisa waited for a communication from the dock master that would clear her to leave the planet. Maybe she wouldn’t get one. Dustor wasn’t that populous, with few ships coming and going, so the likelihood of a crash was small. Still, she spun in her seat enough to check the sensor display, to make sure there wasn’t anyone else intruding upon her flight path. Igniting the thrusters to break out of the atmosphere used a lot of fuel, and she didn’t want to have to abort in the middle of the burn.

Her heart lurched when her eyes locked onto the sensor display. There weren’t any ships ahead of her, but there was one behind her.
Directly
behind her.

She bit her lip, thinking of the White Dragon thugs. They couldn’t have already checked those cameras, could they have? It had been less than a half hour since they had walked away from her ramp.

Alisa flicked on the ship’s intercom. “Beck, come join me in NavCom, please. Mica, you’ll want to camp out in engineering if you aren’t already there.”

“Where else would I be?” came her immediate response. “Petting the chickens?”

“They are kind of cute,” Alisa said, glad Mica was already at her station.

The ship following them might be nothing, just someone else using her same flight path, intending to head out. But she remembered what the mafia thugs had said, that only three ships were taking off in the next twenty-four hours, and that she was one of them. What were the odds that one of the other two had left minutes after she had? Would the dock master have approved that? Usually they kept a window, to avoid accidents.

“If I find feathers or fertilizer in my engine room,” Mica said, “they’re going in a stew pot.”

Alisa did not respond. The intercom system broadcast ship-wide, and their chicken-loving passenger might not care for the conversation. She glanced at the sensor display again. The other ship had picked up speed and was closing the gap. If it had weapons, it would be within range to use them soon.

She drummed her fingers on the console. If she kept going up, there was nothing but a whole lot of empty space out there. Nowhere to hide.

She shut off all of the autopilot assists and took the flight stick.

“We’re going to take the scenic route,” she mumbled to herself, or maybe to the plush stuffed spider that dangled from a wire above the co-pilot’s seat. It had been her mother’s good luck charm. Alisa had almost torn it down when she had been recovering the body and deciding what to do with the
Nomad
. Ultimately, she had left it there, taking it to the junkyard along with the ship. It was a testament to the thing’s hideousness that Finnegan had not removed it when he had been selling the spacesuits and other valuables.

“You called for me, Captain?” Beck asked from the hatch.

“Come in. Have a seat.” Alisa did not look at him. She had steered the ship almost straight down, heading for a network of canyons that scoured the beige, sandy landscape south of the city, and she would need her concentration. “Know anything about the White Dragon mafia?”

“Shit.”

“I’ll take that for a yes.”

Alisa checked the sensor display again. The white dot that represented the other ship had changed course. It was following them. No mistake.

She raised the shields and banked, diving for one of the larger canyons. The freighter handled sluggishly compared to her military Striker-18. She reminded herself she was flying a big box, not a small, sleek combat vessel. She also did not have weapons, so there would be no dogfights between the walls of the canyon. The best she could hope for was to find a hiding spot—if they found a ledge they could slip under and turned off all of their power, they might disappear from the enemy’s sensors. Maybe. It depended on how good those sensors were. Some of the high-tech imperial stuff could find a tindark coin dropped on the opposite side of a moon.

“Care to explain?” Alisa asked as they dipped below the rim of the canyon, the pale sandstone walls to either side jagged and dangerous. Whatever river had carved out the terrain feature was dried up now. Unlike on the featureless sandy surface of the planet, an area scoured by wind too often to support plant life, all manner of cactuses rose from the bottom of the canyon. Too bad a fifty-meter long freighter couldn’t hide behind a cactus.

“You want to hear about it
now
?” Beck asked as he strapped himself into the co-pilot’s seat. He gripped the armrests as he frowned at the striated walls streaking past on the view screen. Here and there, arches and pillars created obstacles for Alisa to weave through.

“Better now than after we crash and die,” she said.

Beck shot her an alarmed look.

She thought about pointing out that she wasn’t doing much yet, just following the contours of the canyon and checking the sensors. Not surprisingly, their pursuer was tracking them from above, flying over the arches instead of dipping under them. Alisa tapped a button and tied into the planet’s satellites to get an idea of the terrain ahead, hoping to find a cave or ledge large enough to hide her ship. She also hoped that the White Dragon pilot wasn’t a native of the planet who knew every nook and cranny by heart.

An alarm flashed on the co-pilot’s station. Weapons locking onto them.

Alisa dipped the craft lower as a sizzling bolt of energy streaked over them. It slammed into a canyon wall, and rock exploded, pelting their shields. Pulverized dust clouded the air until they passed the area.

“I’m sorry,” Beck said. “I didn’t think they’d catch up with me so quickly. I didn’t mean to endanger you.”

“Story,” Alisa said, zigzagging them over the dried riverbed below, trying to make a difficult target.

“The war ended and didn’t leave me bursting with cash,” Beck said. “You know how it was. Fighting for freedom, not coin.”

Alisa knew all too well. She nodded for him to continue. Up ahead, a small canyon converged with their bigger one.

“Well, I’ve been a fighter for a long time,” Beck went on, “but it’s not my passion, not like food.”

“Food?”

“Cooking—grilling especially. I told you I make some fine flavors. It had long been a dream of mine to go commercial with some of my sauces, get them in the groceries on all the main planets, sell enough to retire from fighting.”