Pirates of the Thunder (23 page)

The Val was clearly in trouble and had focused most of its attention on getting away fast, but it managed to shift shields to deflect both the two missiles coming in on its engines and the one coming directly for its side. It might well have seen, or suspected, the fourth missile if its sensors were still intact, but it was having real power problems.

There was a tremendous bright flash, and when it cleared, the Val ship had a gaping hole in it, with pieces of ship flying off and forming an eerie escort on
Lightning’s
sensors. The shields wavered, then collapsed aft as connections were severed; only the nose area was still guarded or intact, probably containing the still very much alive but powerless Val.

Sabatini let Nagy take them to the best broadside and then began pouring all he had into the dead ship, literally blowing it apart. “Hah! Who says you can’t beat a Val!” he shouted with enthusiasm. Then, suddenly, he sobered. “What the—?”

A small section of the still-shielded nose suddenly flared into life and detached itself from the mainship; Sabatini immediately shifted half his guns to it, not willing to take them all away in case it was some kind of trick. He missed —the thing flew away from them at increasing speed and with the hardest shields either of the two space veterans had ever seen. Nagy was still trying to decide whether or not to chase it when his instruments showed a tiny punch and it was gone.

“What was
that?”
Sabatini asked in wonder.

“The brain of the Val, I’d guess” came the reply. “I never knew anybody who beat one of these bastards before, so we might be among the first to see that. Get cracking—I need that hulk broken up into pieces small enough to get us back on the charts. Remember, there’s a second Val around here someplace and if that little thing that just got away is anything at all it’s speeding someplace to report on all this and call in the big guns. Let’s move it! Besides, if we don’t get somewhere where we can link with Star Eagle in a little while, I’m afraid I’m gonna die.”

They laid out Nagy’s body on the deck, but kept him connected to the interface. Sabatini disengaged and checked Nagy’s condition. “He’s in deep shock,” he told the others. “If he’s moved or if he disengages, he’s dead. I can’t even guarantee anything if he stays hooked up, but at least there won’t be any pain.”

Raven shook his head sadly. “Anything that could help him? Anything we could do, I mean?”

Sabatini chuckled dryly. “I think even the medical kit went overboard, for all the good it would do. Short of a really good medical center with all its support stuff, the only hope he’s got is a transmitter big enough and independent enough to do the job. The only one we got is on the
Thunder.”

Raven sighed. “Yeah, and that’s a couple of days away at the minimum. He’s not gonna last that long.”

“I can’t tell you how this conversation is cheering me up,” Nagy said through the intercom; his own throat was no longer capable of speech. The voice startled Raven and Warlock; they had forgotten that the man in bad shape in front of them was also interfaced with the ship.

“Yeah, well, I’d want it straight and I guess you would, too,” Raven replied. “Hell, I think you know your condition.”

“Better than you. I’m pretty torn up inside and I got a punctured lung. I don’t need it spelled out for me. About the only hope I got, let’s face it, is if Star Eagle got the emergency message we sent out just before punching into the middle of nowhere and is coming to the chart position we were in when we sent it on the off chance we’ll double back. According to my calculations, even if Star Eagle did that and started off immediately, the ship wouldn’t be there until about a half hour after we get back.”

Raven’s eyebrows went up. “Then you
are
doubling back. What if that other Val is backing up the one we blew to hell back there? We got lucky this once, but I ain’t sure we could pull that twice.”

Sabatini stared at him. “You had the bright idea of doubling back in the first place.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t think it all the way through. It was the best I could come up with, all things considerin’.”

“Well, we had no choice anyway,” Nagy told him. “We got as much of the Val ship’s remains as we could, but we’re still running pretty low, and it’s not easy to get back on the chart for home from where we wound up. If the Val’s still there, then it is and we’ll deal with it, kill or be killed. If it’s not, maybe Star Eagle will come with the
Thunder.
If nobody’s home or showing up, there’s nothing else to do but follow the routine.”

Sabatini thought a moment. “Nagy, if it’s not there... you don’t have to die—exactly. Not
exactly.”

Nagy was silent a moment, then realized the nature of the offer. “I’m not too sure I want to be absorbed. The one thing I got left is my own mind, my independence. You’re not Sabatini—you’re an imitation who could mimic Sabatini exactly if you wanted to but you aren’t Sabatini much at all right now and you wouldn’t really be Arnold Nagy, either. You’d have my looks and my memories, but I’d kinda like to keep my memories. There are some things a man would rather let die than tell. No, when I go,
if I
go, just stick me in the lock and set me adrift. It’s kinda fitting that way.”

“Don’t talk that way yet!” Raven snapped. “We should all be dead right now according to all the fancy computers and brains around. If we can’t find what we need, maybe we can figure an angle. You just don’t give up, you hear?”

“I
never
give up,” Arnold Nagy responded. “Isn’t that obvious by now?”

They hadn’t punched very long the last time because of their limited fuel supply, and even though they had to retrace their path exactly in order to find the destination once again, it was a matter of long hours, not days. They were getting used to the process now.

“Kinda funny how this muddles your brain,” Raven noted as they waited.

“Huh?” Sabatini was half asleep and looked up, startled. “What?”

“This ridin’ in a metal coffin. Hour after hour, day after day sometimes, with nothin’ at all to say or do. Not that I mind the company, but you get talked out in a day or two and that’s that. When you’re in the wilderness, out in the mountains or on the prairies, there’s always something. Maybe it’s not conversation, maybe not even real thinkin’—something inside you reacts and you’re at peace even in dangerous territory. Even our damned little island has some of that. You can always go off into the mountains or sit and look at the water and feel the breeze on your face. This—this is death. Worse than death. It’s my people’s vision of hell. Hawks’ nation, now, they have a real strange theology but out here is supposed to live the Lords of the Middle Dark, whose domain is defined as a great nothingness. Maybe they’re right.”

“You could try sleeping,” Sabatini grumbled. “Even I must sleep. Only you of all the people I have ever heard of is immune from that necessity.”

“I can sleep on a prairie filled with buffalo, or by the side of a raging river. It’s this kind of thing that gets to me.”

“This is hardly the normal trip. Usually there are books, tapes, learning programs, computers, and much else to occupy your time or divert your mind. Some of us like being in space more than we like being with other people.”

“Not me. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it.”

Nagy’s inert body suddenly shook with spasms and he began to cough long and hard, bringing up blood. They rushed to his side, but there was nothing they could do, and the attack finally subsided. Nagy wasn’t all of it, but he as part of it, Raven knew. To die here, alone, in this sterile junkheap, and be cast out into the darkness... it was
wrong.
All human beings died, the great and small alike, but he had always envisioned his own death out in the free, clean air, his body either cremated and scattered or simply allowed to feed the Earth and return to it. Either was a noble way to die.

I’ve been kidding myself,
he thought sourly.
This sort of thing is not for the likes of me. Nagy and Sabatini or whatever it is—this is their element. I’d take on a Val if I had to, but on my turf, not its. Damn you, Lazlo Chen! If we ever get away with this you ain’t gonna depend on old Raven for support. Not with you sitting back there fat and lazy in your desert domain. I’ll do your damned dirty work, but this is too much.

“Raven—Warlock—Sabatini” came Nagy’s electronic voice through the speakers. “I don’t think I’m gonna make it. I want you to know a few things just in case.”

“You go into shutdown and don’t think. You can’t afford the energy,” Sabatini cautioned.

“Forget it. Listen, I’m gonna tell you a few things. All of you. First, I already showed you a Val can be taken in space if you’re crazy enough and unpredictable enough. They have a weakness and it’s called conceit. They think they understand human beings perfectly, and maybe they do, but they don’t think like human beings. They’re machines. Logical devices. When they see a predetermined course of action, and the sequence is logical, they tend to assume the conclusion will be the obvious. That’s why we nailed the Val. On the ground they’re just as vulnerable, but they have a lot more tricks. Don’t let one get too close to you or you’ll never know what hit you. They can be had, though, even on the ground. Use high-intensity lasers that’ll carve through walls. That won’t stop ‘em, but it penetrates. The head’s a dummy. Ignore it. Their brains are in their asses—about seven to eight centimeters above the crotch. Just imagine that they have a navel and aim for it. Crisscross.
X
patterns. The hind is more vulnerable than the front, though. Try to ambush it and don’t stop until it’s down. Don’t get within four meters until you’re sure it’s totally dead.”

This way interesting. Raven felt torn between telling Nagy to shut up and take it easy, and learning what he could from a dying man. He said nothing.

“Don’t assume, too, that all your dangerous enemies are machines. There are times when machines just can’t do the job, and the supply of Vals is small,” Nagy continued. “Master System has human troops, as well, out here, on several bases. Mindprinted, genetically bred, as devoted and loyal and singleminded as Vals. You can even argue with a Val—it’s just doing its job. You can’t argue with these troops, and not all of them are human.”

Raven looked at Sabatini. “You know about them?”

Sabatini nodded. “I heard about them. Never saw ‘em —that is, none of my people ever did.”

“When you take the first ring,” Nagy went on, “everything else will stop except for you. Vals and troopers and everything else will be pulled out for the hunt. There’s help out there—I’ve started you on your way—but the odds are still way against you. You’ll need more people and you’ll need for everyone to be willing to make the ultimate sacrifice. Except for Sabatini here, none of the rest of you can even get in to scout around and case an area. None of them are Earth-human—except for Chen.”

“What the hell do you mean by ‘ultimate sacrifice’?” Raven wanted to know. “Death? You know we are prepared for that.”

“Not death. Life. You can’t just put on a mask and stick up a Center, particularly when you are the one who looks and acts alien. Out here, you are the monsters. Dying is one thing. Could you, for the chance at a ring and action, become a monster to yourself? You better ask that. You better have Hawks ask that of everyone. The only way you’re gonna steal those rings under the noses of chief administrators and Master System on worlds that aren’t really human is to become one of them. You better face that fact and also face the fact that Chen’s counting on just mat. Nobody left who’s Earth-human. Nobody who can come for
his
ring without being pretty damned obvious.”

“For one who came unexpectedly along for the ride he seems to know a great deal about this,” Warlock whispered.

Raven nodded. “You not tellin’ us something we ought’a know, son?”

“I’m telling you all you ought to know, Raven. You can trust Savaphoong within limits. He won’t betray you to Master System, but if you had four out of five rings he’s clever enough to figure out where the fifth one is and take those four from you. Build your contacts with the other freebooters, as well. Don’t depend on a single source. The same goes for Clayben. He’ll be a real team player until you win. He really is terrified of you, Sabatini—use that, but watch your back. He created you, but he’s also the one who figured out how to capture and hold you. Being hard to kill isn’t the same thing as being immortal. You would have died with us back there no matter what.”

“I’ll remember. Clayben took me by surprise when I was immature. I will not allow that to happen again.”

“Look, I’m running out of time here. Go for Janipur first. It’s no pushover, but if you can’t take
that
ring you can’t take any of them. Oops! We’re punching out in just a minute. Stand by. Sabatini, get back on the console. We want to make sure that somebody here can drive this thing no matter what.”

Sabatini did as instructed and was quickly back under the ship’s interface. Neither Raven nor Warlock bothered to do more than slightly brace themselves; after what they’d been through, punches were getting routine.

“Looks to be all clear right now,” Sabatini told them. “No sensor readings of anything that shouldn’t be here in the immediate neighborhood. Let’s give it a wide sweep.”

The sensors gave information on practically everything within line of sight for a 360-degree radius, but they weren’t good enough, particularly in wide scan, to identify all objects accurately. What they could detect was the all-important murylium that would mean a ship.

“Vals can do what we can’t,” Nagy warned them. “They can power down completely. So long as their engines aren’t on and they’re just using storage power for instrumentation, they can escape detection with the shields around the murylium core, so we aren’t out of the woods yet. Still, we ought to be able to get several minutes’ warning if it powers up from nothing, unless it’s right next to us.”

“Seems to me we did pretty good from a standing start,” Raven noted.