Out Through the Attic (23 page)

Kurlock exhaled deeply. He could sense the ship around him, feel the nameless demon that now possessed
Chimera
. Standing slowly, he stepped back from the still-glowing circle on the deck and settled into the command chair like a god upon its throne.

“Tell the men to go about their business,” he ordered Raspa. “We’ll leave you at
Lyrra Station
after we’re through gutting it. When the Confederacy arrives, you can claim to be a visitor and go wherever you like.” Kurlock dropped the bloody towel upon black deck-plates beside the chair, its red and white patterns setting a stark contrast against midnight flooring. Raspa bowed and set off to calm the crew, his work with Kurlock complete.

Chimera
came about in the vacuum of space much faster than was possible for a warship her size, and it bore down upon the Confederacy ships like a shark heading into a school of fat, helpless fish.

Kurlock queried that which possessed
Chimera,
“Which one shall we destroy first?”

O O O

Jacob Reece waited outside the bridge of
Chimera
while its first officer, an ex-Confederacy Marine named Clarke, relayed the message. The deckplates under his feet hummed with the energy of engines running through nonspace. He ran a finger over the smooth, black door before him and contemplated his future. He’d spent four years making a name for himself as a security hacker on several pirate ships based out of
Hell’s Gate
, a hidden starport unknown to the Confederacy. The port was carved from a 300-kilometer asteroid circling Epsilon Eridani. It was there he’d watched and waited for
Chimera
, which had finally docked to buy supplies and replenish fallen crewmembers. Under Captain Kurlock no ship or fleet had ever withstood the onslaught of the legendary
Chimera
, but people protected their homes and families ferociously.
Chimera’s
crew—the arms and legs that carried stolen wealth from plundered colonies aboard
Chimera
—suffered from attrition that had to be occasionally replenished.

The door before Reece cycled, exposing a short hall that opened onto the shadowy bridge.

“Come,” a deep voice almost devoid of humanity commanded. Reece strode in just as Clarke walked past him and out into the hallway. The door cycled behind them both, sealing Reece in with Captain Kurlock while Clarke headed below deck. Reece stared around at the black consoles, obsidian walls and ebon floor, surprised to see Captain Kurlock alone. The only color in the room was the swirling rainbow of nonspace on the viewscreen in front of the Captain. A black-gloved hand pointed at the glowing, rune-carved circle etched into the floor before the command chair. “Stand
there
,” Kurlock commanded, his fierce eyes piercing the younger man. Reece complied, and from within the circle faced Kurlock, taking in the long, white hair and beard, the gaunt cheeks and sunken eyes that seemed to be more shadow than man. Kurlock’s face was almost skeletal and without emotion. The two faced each other for long seconds, sizing each other up.

Kurlock’s eyes narrowed. “Do I know you?” he asked with just a hint of puzzled curiosity. “You seem somehow familiar to me.”

“No Captain, we’ve never met,” Reece replied with undeniable certainty. Kurlock’s eyes narrowed impossibly further. He fruitlessly dredged through a graveyard of memory.

“And you’re a hacker? Specializing in security systems?”

“Yes, sir.”

Kurlock suddenly realized something. The corner of his mouth crimped up a millimeter in perfect syncopation with his eyebrow. “Most men are uncomfortable standing where you are.” He paused and examined Reece closely. “You don’t fear me … or
it
.” His eyes drifted to the circle.

Reece put his hands behind his back and stood straight, chest thrust forward. “I’ve waited a long time to meet you, Captain Kurlock, Sir. All I’ve ever wanted to do was serve my purpose … on
Chimera
.”

“Really? And what is that purpose?”

“To gain immortality, Sir.”

“Immortality?” Kurlock’s face split into a disbelieving smile, but it was devoid of even a trace of happiness or joy. “Impossible.”

Reece leaned his head forward, as if he were sharing a lover’s secret. “Several years ago I hacked a mainframe archive where old, Lyrran data had been downloaded and apparently forgotten. I found a secret, one they don’t even know exists.” Kurlock’s mouth went flat, but his eyebrow rose further, and Reece thought he saw Kurlock lean in. “As you know, Lyrra’s wealth afforded them a great deal of scientific research. Apparently there was a man there who was secretly working on a compound that could extend life … perhaps indefinitely.”

“And why didn’t you go get it all for yourself. It would bring a king’s ransom.”

“You know as well as I that the Confederacy blockade around the
Lyrran Station Memorial
crushes everyone who comes searching for even scraps of any wealth you might have left behind.”

“True. I left some of those people alive to spread just that rumor. It pleased me to do so.” Kurlock reminisced about his first raid aboard the
Chimera
. He had crushed the insipid ships that had chased him from
Gypsy
Station
so many years ago.
Chimera
had then gone on to
Lyrra
, smashed through their paltry defenses and slaughtered most of the station’s inhabitants.

“
Chimera
is the only ship capable of getting in there and back out again, Captain. You’re my only chance.”

Kurlock calculated possibilities as he thoughtfully ran fingers over his white beard. He had felt death nipping at his heels for years, and the constant reminder of his bargain with Abaddon, etched in blood on the deckplates before him, promised an eternity in Hell when his payment came due. Reece felt the hum of the deckplates go quiet under his feet, and the screen behind him phased into a view of distant stars. “If you are lying to me,” Kurlock’s voice was as menacing as a beast, “it will take me months to kill you. And death, when it finally comes, will be a blessing you will thank me for.”

Reece felt minor gravitational surges as the ship changed course. He suddenly realized that Kurlock had not moved, nor had any command been given. Yet the ship moved. A flicker of doubt danced through his thoughts, but he was committed now. “Believe me, Sir, immortality is there for the taking. I only want my little piece of it. The rest is all for you. Do we have an agreement?”

“Go back to your quarters. I will summon you when we enter the system. It will take just over eight hours, so get your rest,” Kurlock’s voice carried neither concern nor generosity.

“Eight hours?” Jacob knew it would take a standard cruiser almost sixteen to reach
Lyrra Station
from
Hell’s Gate
. “She’s fast,” he said with a touch of awe.

“
It
is. Now leave me.”

O O O

Reece woke in his bunk to a klaxon howling in darkness. The door to his quarters opened, and Clarke’s silhouette cast in light from the passageway barked an order. “Get to the bridge. The Captain wants you to see this.”

Reece rose from his bunk and made his way to the bridge. The door opened as he approached, so he walked in without word or pause. Captain Kurlock was just as before, sitting in his command chair, but this time the viewscreen was full of a dozen targets highlighted in red hexagons.

“Watch,” was all Kurlock said. Reece stepped up beside the captain and stared as a dozen medium cruisers approached
Chimera
. It was another slaughter in a long line of slaughters. No orders were barked out, no courses corrected. Confederacy ships closed with
Chimera
, but the ebon ship swerved and dodged like a living creature. Reece stole his eyes away from the viewscreen and observed Kurlock. The Captain’s eyes were closed, his hands resting gently on the arms of the chair. In the viewscreen the stars and ships surrounding
Chimera
swerved and swayed impossibly fast.

Confederacy missiles flew wide, and their plasma cannons, when they occasionally hit home, only reflected off the black surface of
Chimera
with a light shudder that vibrated through deckplates with each blast. Confederacy ships fell one by one to
Chimera’s
turrets in an endless torrent of red, streaking death. Finally
Chimera
wove its way through the wreckage and accelerated towards
Lyrra Station
. The viewscreen changed to a scan of the entire system. It picked out another dozen ships on the far side of the sun, and they were angling in towards
Lyrra Station
.

“Come with me,” Kurlock ordered. He stood up and walked past Reece who fell in stride behind the tall captain. They exited the bridge and made their way down to the main docking hatch where a dozen grim looking men and women in combat armor waited silently. Each held a pulse-rifle, and some, including Clarke, had a modern saber at the hip. Only Reece and Kurlock were unarmed and unarmored.

Reece looked at the captain with disbelief and confusion. “But what about those inbound Confederacy ships? Won’t they get
Chimera
while we’re inside?”

“It can take care of itself while we attend to our business,” Kurlock soothed.

Reece saw vicious smiles decorate the faces inside each and every pirate’s helmet. A few minutes later they felt the ship slow and adjust its trajectory. They all heard a thump-hiss as
Chimera
latched onto a Lyrran airlock. The pirates raced in as the lock opened, taking up guard positions inside. Kurlock, Clarke and Reece strode into the darkened station. The lock closed behind them, and they heard
Chimera
detach.
Lyrra Station
was as silent as a mausoleum, with the only light coming from an access terminal just inside the airlock.

“You’re a hacker. Bring up the lights,” Kurlock commanded and pointed to the terminal. Reece pulled a cable from his pocket, plugged one end into the socket behind his ear and the other into the terminal. It took him only sixty seconds to bring up the lights, but he already knew where he was going despite twenty years. He removed the cable, put it back in his pocket and looked at Kurlock.

“After you, Reece,” Kurlock ordered. “And quickly.”

Reece nodded and started jogging through the station, Kurlock and his men following close behind. They traversed several long hallways stained with an occasional, brownish rash of decades-old blood on wall or floor, then climbed three flights of stairs. Reece wove his way through a warren of hallways, finally stopping at a single, gray door with a numeric pad beside it.

“This is it.” He tapped in a code, and the door slid open revealing a darkened hallway. Two pirates ran in, gun-mounted lights flashing around. Kurlock raised an eyebrow, surprised that Reece didn’t hack in.

“Clear!” one of them inside shouted. Two more pirates ran in with Clarke, Kurlock and Reece a few feet behind. The rest followed, but Reece paused briefly at another pad several paces inside and keyed in a sequence. The lights came on and the door locked quietly behind them.

Most of the pirates disappeared into chambers deeper within the large, affluent-looking domicile. Kurlock stood at the far side of a large living room, staring at a photograph on the wall that had caught his attention and stirred his memory. Reece strode to the middle of the room.

“Hey, Kurlock,” Reece picked up a small framed photo off of the coffee table. “When did you last see Raspa? Was it that day? Here on this station?” Kurlock turned, eyes wide with realization. Reece threw the frame into Kurlock’s hands. “Me too. Raspa found me. I was seven, and he promised me vengeance. He said I just had to be patient. My family-” Reece choked off the rest as he stared at the photo in Kurlock’s hands. Kurlock saw Reece’s face in the features of the father within the photo and remembered the man’s plea for mercy before Kurlock had cut him down.

Kurlock returned to the present and gave a pre-arranged nod to Clarke. Clarke pulled his saber free, slashing twice into Reece’s back with a smooth motion that left a great, bloody cross in the young man’s back. Reece screamed and fell to the floor, blood pouring out. The slashed fabric of Reece’s shirt fell wide open, revealing a deep, decades-old scar carved between his shoulder blades. Cut into his flesh just above the bloody cross was a pattern all-too-familiar to Kurlock—Raspa’s summoning circle.

Reece whispered the words Raspa had burned into his seven-year-old mind. “
Abaddon, Chapthan thal-Fozza. Imla dan il-basthiment bil-qawwa thiegħech. I mifthuħa ruħi li girċievu inthi!
”

“NO!” Kurlock screamed in terror.

“What did he say?” Clarke’s asked, confused. The scar flashed with purple brilliance, and ebony smoke coiled around Reece’s body as the rest of the pirates stormed back in to the room, responding to Kurlock’s shout.

Kurlock was placid as he spoke, but his men saw fear in his eyes for the first time as he stared down at Clarke. “He said, ‘
Abaddon, Master of the Pit. Fill this vessel with your power. I open myself to receive you
.’” Kurlock shouted as his men. “Kill that thing while you still can!”

The pirates emptied their pulse-rifles into the howling shroud of black energy. They hacked at it with their blades and cursed it, but their hatred seemed to only fill and fuel the swirling mass at their feet. Purple energy encased Reece, and then a thunderclap sent pirates crashing against the walls in every direction.”

The thing stood up just as the dazed pirates, including Kurlock, hit the ground. Its flesh, as black as night, soaked in light, and a red glow from its eyes cast Kurlock in a tint of blood. Black talons extended from its hands, and it grinned at Kurlock with a mouth full of fangs.

“You gave Abaddon’s gift to the ship, making it invulnerable, Kurlock,” it growled in a voice made of thunder and darkness and death straight from The Pit. “Reece gave a similar gift to this body … and with the same effect.”

“Reece?” Kurlock croaked.

The voice that spoke was deep, dark, and seething with malice. “Jacob Reece is gone, buried deep within me now, but that name will serve as well as any. Like you, he served his purpose.” The demon glared at Kurlock in disgust. “You squandered your gift on piracy,
fool
! Have you no ambition? Abaddon wants the very stars to run with blood! And through me His will shall now be fulfilled.”