Aaron Conners - Tex Murphy 02 (31 page)

As I raised Voorman’s shuttle-cruiser off the floor, the cargo-bay door was fully open and holding. I accelerated and steered toward the opening. Pinging sounds told me that the guards were firing their guns at the ship, but that wouldn’t do any good. The only thing that could stop me was the door, which gradually started to close.

The freighter was slow to accelerate…and I was about three hundred yards from the door. If I didn’t get there in time, something told me I’d hit the door and crumple like a pop can. The ship was gaining speed, but not quickly enough - it was going to be tight. I angled toward the right side of the opening, my knuckles white on the steering handle.

Fifty yards away, I realized I wasn’t going to make it. At least not horizontally. I raised the elevation, then grabbed the balance-control stick and wrenched it hard to the left.

Immediately, the ship rolled. I heard and felt metal scraping along the floor. I tried to adjust the elevation, but the ship only veered slightly to the left, away from the opening.

I was seconds away from hitting the door. Using both hands, I threw the balance-control stick hard in the opposite direction. The ship rolled wildly to the right and veered in the same direction. The cockpit slammed into the opening. The force of the entry carried the freighter through the door, but the loud sounds of metal being snapped off and crushed told me that the ship had sustained considerable damage.

I looked out the window and saw that both sides of the freighter had been raked. Even worse, the rudder mechanism had been ripped off the back. The cockpit was untouched, but the freighter wasn’t in good shape. It was probably still capable of propulsion, but I wouldn’t be able to steer it.

As I was assessing the situation, I felt a giant shudder as the door behind me closed and sealed. Up ahead, the outer door cracked and began to slide open. I pushed the accelerator and felt the engine rev up, but the freighter didn’t move. I tried again, but it was no use - the ship might as well have been in neutral.

Helplessly, I watched as the gap in the outer door widened, the blackness of space seeping in like an oil spill. I was trapped, a scant few yards from freedom. Desperately, I began manipulating the controls. I tried everything, but could do no more than rock the freighter and raise the back end slightly. The outer door was now completely open. As my eyes searched the instrumentation frantically, I spotted a small panel marked Emergency. I tore it open and found a T-shaped handle. A sticked beneath it read Eject Capsule.

My speeder didn’t have an eject button, and I’d never used one before, but now seemed like a good time for a new experience. It wasn’t like I had anything to lose. I was about to pull the lever when it occurred to me that I might just be making a big mistake. I had to assume that the cockpit capsule would eject straight-off, which would send me into the ceiling of the vacuum tunnel.

But I had to do something. I glanced up and saw that the outer door had begun to close.

One of the things still working on the freighter were the rear elevation thrusters. I cranked them up as far as they would go, until the cockpit was almost face down on the tunnel floor. In front of me, the opening was half the size it had been a moment ago. I pushed the thrusters as far as they would go, then grabbed the T-shaped ejection handle and pulled.

What followed was a sensation I hadn’t felt since the final time I rode the Hammer at the state fair. In a blur, the cockpit jettisoned from the freighter and slammed into the roof chamber, just in front of the closing door. The force of the impact caused the capsule to careen toward and through the opening. The g-force had me pinned painfully against my seat, and the spinning motion blanketed me in a wave of nausea.

It took several minutes for me to regain control of my equilibrium. The capsule continued to spin out into the darkness. I checked the air pressure, and it was holding steady. Apparently, the capsule had survived the collision inside the tunnel. I searched for a set of capsule navigation controls, but there didn’t seem to be any. There were only two useful mechanisms on the console. The first was an oxygen-level display, which showed I had enough to last for at least as long as it would take me to die of thirst. The other was an SOS emitter, which I flipped on.

I leaned back in my chair and relaxed for the first time in days. Outside the window, the Moon Child was dark and dead. Minutes earlier, it had been the greatest threat ever known to mankind. Now it was a slain dragon, a massive, metal graveyard floating in the great abyss.

Lowell Percival had said he wanted to create a perfect world. Well, so do most people, but Percival tried to play God, and it wasn’t his call to make. A lot of people had died on the Moon Child. Their fate proved only one thing: There’s no easy path to Utopia. Hell, maybe it doesn’t even exist…but it made me feel good to know that Louie would be telling stories and slinging hash for years to come. Louie - and Chelsee and even Rook -

all have as much right as anyone else to live long, happy lives. Even if they were Mutants.

As the gigantic satellite spun slowly out of my view, my eyes wandered down to a recessed handle on the underside of the console, which I hadn’t noticed before. I reached down and pulled the handle. It turned out to be nothing more than a glove compartment.

Sitting on top of an owner’s manual and a pile of receipts were a mangled pack of Lucky Strikes and a book of matches.

There were four cigarettes left. I took one out and molded it gently back into shape.

After wetting the end, I placed it gently in my mouth and lit it. God, it was good to be alive.

UAKM - chapter twenty-six

I was picked up by a passing mining transport twenty-two hours after being thrown clear of the Moon Child. I used the radio onboard to contact Interpol. Within hours, dozens of interplanetary vehicles were closing in on the galaxy’s largest piece of man-made debris.

I slept most of the way home. When the mining transport arrived in New Jersey, my two Interpol pals, Agents McCovey and Andrews, were there to meet me. I was debriefed in a Greek deli over gyros and dolmas, and the agents informed me that Percival and several others had been located and taken into custody. I asked if they knew what happened to Eva, but they didn’t. I found out later that she didn’t make it.

As a final order of business, the Interpol agents told me that a reward had been offered for the capture of the Chameleon. I hadn’t exactly captured him, but it was close enough.

They took me to Interpol headquarters in Manhattan and gave me a check for ten thousand dollars, as well as a hearty congratulations for my efforts toward making the world a safer place to live.

With my wallet now as full as my tummy, Interpol stuck me on one of its private aircraft and gave me a lift home. Agent McCovey went along for the ride. On the way, we discussed what had happened. Having shown myself to be a man of no mean talent, I fullt expected him to offer me a job in the agency, but for some reason, the subject never came up. Not that I would’ve accepted. Regular paychecks and medical benefits just weren’t my style.

As we arrived in New San Francisco, Agent McCovey made one last request - that I keep the events of the past few days to myself. He explained that it would be in the public’s best interest not to know how close it had come to complete and utter destruction. I agreed to keep a lid on it, not because I endorsed the suppression of truth of the manipulation of the masses, but because no one would’ve believed me anyway.

An hour after we landed, I was planted on a bar stool at the Brew & Stew, looking and listening and soaking up the atmosphere. I was showered and clean-shaven and wearing my good tie. It was a little after 7 P.M., and the crowd was converting from diners to drunkards. Louie was bouncing all over the joint, red-faced and grinning from ear to ear.

All the regulars were there, sipping cold beer from chilled mugs, or toasting each other with tumblers full of strong spirits. Rook was in a heated debate at the other end of the bar. For once, his high-pitched, abrasive voice sounded good and familiar to me.

Chelsee was seated on the lucky bar stool beside me, nursing a vodka and tonic and smelling good enough to eat. I had five hundred dollars in my pocket, and the rest was stashed away in my secret hiding place back at the office. The thought of paying off my tab to Louie made me feel almost as good as being close enough to hear Chelsee’s soft breathing. I took a sip of twelve-year-old scotch and held it on my tongue for a few moments before letting it flow warmly down my throat. Behind me, a slurring voice requested a “slippery nipple.” Chelsee set her drink down and turned to me with one eyebrow raised. “What in the world is a slippery nipple?”

An uncontrollable shiver went through me, but I managed to shrug casually. “I don’t know. But it probably has egg in it.”

Chelsee smiled and gave me a chastizing look, then returned to her drink. I lit a cigarette and carefully blew the smoke away from my lovely bar mate. “You know, Chelsee, I think we should meet later. Maybe up in my office. I’ll show you something I learned to do with my hands.”

Chelsee looked at me out of the corner of her eye and stirred the vodka and tonic with her finger. “You know, Tex, I’ve always been enchanted by a lack of breeding.”

“I know. That’s exactly what I’m counting on.”

“Oh really?”

I flicked an ash off the end of my cigarette and grinned disarmingly. “Yeah. I’ve got a theory. I think you’re secretly attracted to me. You only hold back because the intensity of your passion frightens you. I don’t blame you for that.”

Chelsee took a drink, then turned to face me. “That’s quite a theory. You have a wonderful imagination.” She smiled sweetly. “Don’t get me wrong, Tex. I like you, just not that way.”

I took a resigned drag. “Well, no need to give up on a good theory just because it isn’t true.”

I lifted my glass and glanced at the television behind the bar as I took a sip. A shot of the Moon Child was on-screen. Louie appeared and emptied my ashtray.

“Louie, could you turn up the volume?”

The big Mutant reached under the counter for a remote and aimed it at the television.

” - when disaster struck yesterday. No official comment has been released, but it is believed that as many as five thousand people were aboard. Indications are that the satellite resort experienced a massive systems failure. Initial reports state that there were no survivors. If so, this would qualify as the greatest off-planet disaster in history. In other news - “

Chelsee shook her head. “That’s horrible. All those people.”

I set down my drink and drew in on my Lucky Strike. The cafe was alive with the clinking of glasses, snippets of conversations, laughter. It was a beautiful sound. I drained the last of my scotch and set the glass on the counter. Louie asked if I wanted another. I shook my head and smiled, then laid three large bills on the bar. I could tell Louie was about to protest, and I cut him off. :Thanks for the drink. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I leaned down and kissed Chelsee on the cheek. She didn’t seem to mind. Then I slung my brand-new trench coat over my shoulder, set the matching fedora on my head, and walked to the door. I’d gotten half way across the room when I noticed a stunning brunette in a black dress sitting alone in the booth next to the door. She was a dame. The kind of dame that could make a bishop kick out a stained-glass window. As I

approached, she looked up and smiled. “Are you Tex Murphy?”

Feeling pleasantly confused, I doffed my hat. “Have we met?”

The woman looked up at me with large, hazel eyes. “No. I have something I’d like to show you.”

She motioned for me to sit down, then opened her purse and handed me a -

Well, that’s another story…