Pirates of the Outrigger Rift (19 page)

Glenn smiled. “I want this organization to be a bit more
ambitious, more professional. I want to make sure that everyone is pulling
their weight. I can’t always do that from the
Naglfar
. Listen, Brock, I
have been getting good reports about you. I need men who have intelligence, not
just ruthlessness. From what I’ve been hearing you have both.”

“I dance a mean rumba too,” Brock said.

Glenn laughed. “I’ll be calling you up to the admin section
tomorrow when we get back to base. I may have an opening for a commander and I
think you’ll do. I can make it worth your while. You’re better than this and
you know it.”

Brock nodded. “Sounds good to me. I ain’t in this for the
adventure. I’m in it for the cash.”

Glenn smiled. “See? A man after my own heart.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

H
ank had followed Randol’s security ship to Mordi and
landed. This time they were welcomed. After cleaning up a bit, they were herded
into the library to meet Randol and Chandler.

Hank had never seen such a thing in all his life. Randol’s
library was loaded with real paper books, true antiques, not reproductions. How
the hell did he find them all?

Randol’s chair also fascinated him. He wondered if there was
a toilet built into the seat. The old guy never seemed to leave it to take a
leak. It had so many other gadgets built in that it would be a crying shame to
leave out the handiest.

Sai had given the old man the sealed pouch with the
datastore. Randol had the password and was able to unseal it, leaving the data
intact. He had at first attempted to pore over the information himself, but it
soon became obvious that he needed Sai’s assistance. Since Casey trusted her,
Randol reasoned that he should do so as well. Sai jumped into the task with
vigor.

Hank was completely out of his league. But he didn’t mind,
since the little guy in the monkey suit kept bringing him beers.

Chandler stood in the corner watching him with a disgusted
expression plastered on his face. Hank figured he was pissed because the guy in
the monkey suit didn’t bring any for him. He wasn’t a guest; he was hired help.

Sai had three holos up, displaying columns of figures and
bank account numbers, and she was explaining them to Randol.

“Well, this data explains a lot,” Randol said. “Casey had
been tracking correlations between bank asset fluctuations and pirate activity.
Essentially, where money seemed to show up after pirate raids.”

“And I actually recognize some of this data as what Casey
had me pulling from the Grid,” Sai said. “I didn’t know what it related to at
the time, but put in context it makes sense. It looks like every event of
piracy was followed by a series of transactions. I have a list of related
account numbers, hundreds of them, where money has been transferred.”

“Unfortunately, they’re drawn on the Galactic Bank. There is
no way to determine who holds the accounts, and no way to access them.”

“Can’t you just order them to tell you? After all, you are a
lord,” Hank said as he swilled his beer.

“No one orders the Galactic Bank to do anything. They are
immune. Not even the Confed can regulate them. A necessary evil to encourage
commerce,” Randol said.

Hank grinned. “I always hear that, and I wonder—where is the
necessary good? Don’t you think there would have to be necessary good to
counter the necessary evil? I mean yin and yang and matter and anti-matter and
…” As his logic drifted away from him, Hank was beginning to realize that he
had possibly had a few more beers than was wise. In fact, he didn’t have any
idea how many beers he had consumed—he’d lost count after the first eight—and the
butler refused to allow him to continue building the pyramid he had started in
the corner. He tried to be responsible, but without a pyramid to keep track how
could anyone know when they’d had enough?

“Excuse me, but is there a bathroom in this place? Or should
I use your chair?”

Randol stared at Hank for a moment before answering. “It’s
down the hall.”

“Fine. I suppose I wouldn’t share if it were my chair,
either.” Hank then began to stagger out of the room.

“Does anyone have a clue what he was referring to?”

No one spoke.

While Hank was gone, Sai delved more deeply into the files.
There was a mass of raw data but no final report or conclusions listed. Casey
had been stopped before he had the chance to put it all together.

It was obvious that Thorne was being fed critical
information. Not a single protected shipment had been molested, but fully
twenty percent of shipments worth more than ten billion credits had been
seized. Now she had the list of accounts that had benefitted from the
corporation’s loss. The next step was obvious to her.

“I need something I can take to the Council, something I can
show them that will dispel the allegations made against me,” Randol said.

Sai spoke up. “I have an idea, but I’m not sure you’ll like
it.”

“Spit it out, young woman,” Randol said. “I’m willing to try
almost anything at this point.”

“If you can connect me with the Galactic Bank computer grid,
I may be able to come up with something for you.”

“What are you saying?”

“I have a talent—a gift. I’m not just a datalifter, I’m a
cyber-psi. I think I could get past the safeguards.”

“I don’t believe I’ve ever met a cyber-psi. However, young
woman, you are suggesting that I, a lord, engage in illegal activities. My
reputation would be destroyed if I allowed myself to become involved in such an
endeavor.”

Sai lowered her eyes, unsure of herself. “No offense, but from
what I’ve been hearing, your reputation’s already in pretty bad shape. This is
an opportunity to repair it. The Randol in that painting in the foyer looks
like he’s squeezing the universe by the balls. Are you related to him or not?”

Randol’s chin dropped. His eyes shifted from anger to
consideration. He finally nodded. “Are you reasonably certain of your ability
to remain anonymous?”

“It’s what I do.”

Chandler cleared his throat. “I’ve done some security work
for them. The Galactic Bank has more than the usual safeguards. Many of them
are specifically aimed against cyber-psi abilities. If you go in, you might
come out damaged. They’ve got stuff that’ll burn out your mind.”

“But if I succeed, we might be able to end this nightmare
and I could get my life back. I’ll take that risk.”

Hank staggered back into the room. “Almost didn’t make it,”
he said. “Damn hallway’s longer than I thought. What’s this risk you’re talking
about?”

“Nothing, Hank,” Sai said quickly. She didn’t want to have
to deal with justifying the risk to him.

Chandler shook his head. “She wants to use her cyber-psi
abilities to break into the Galactic Bank.”

“Great,” Hank said. “Set me up an account.”

Sai smiled. Maybe it was a good thing that he’d had so many
beers. It simplified things.

Hank fell asleep, which was a blessing because Sai didn’t
want him worrying about what she planned to attempt. They adjourned to the
mansion’s communication center where the staff had set up a reclining chair
before a terminal.

Sai paced the floor, taking long, deep breaths as Randol’s
staff prepared the Grid link. The viewscreen displayed the bank’s logo and the
general public interface screen. She wanted to shake out the stress and warm up
her body prior to diving into the Grid. For a time her body would be inert. The
more she loosened up, the better she would feel upon returning to it. It was
always painful, but it didn’t have to be unbearable.

“I believe we’re ready,” Randol said.

Sai nodded. “Okay,” she said. Sai sat in the chair, placed
both hands on the terminal before her, and exhaled slowly. “Here we go.”

Sai lay back in the chair and relaxed completely. She had
trained her mind to enter a trance state immediately, using a mental trigger. Her
consciousness spread outward like a wave, delicately touching the outskirts of
the electronic pathways that composed the Grid.

Her senses transcended the terminal, moving deeper into the
Grid. She began to concentrate on accessing the accounts. She sifted through
the maze of numbers, analyzing, decoding, and sorting. Sai translated data into
imagery and sound for her human mind to comprehend. It was a cacophony of
sensation, but slowly she filtered out the background noise, then began to
separate the pathways and follow them to their source.

Sai moved forward, the account numbers from the file
foremost in her mind. The digits clicked off in twists and turns, like
following a map to an address in a strange city.

She was almost there; she could feel it. But when she turned
the last corner something waited for her. It was dark, hungry, and artificial,
a silicon predator of binary logic. It recognized her as prey.

Randol watched Sai’s progress on the viewscreen. The logo
screen dissolved as the terminal moved past checkpoint after checkpoint. Passwords
were requested and appeared almost like magic. She seemed unstoppable.

But then, just as the final screen appeared, the image
froze. Sai’s body convulsed on the recliner.

Hank woke up and saw Sai shaking. “What’s happening?” he
asked.

Randol’s communications officer shook his head, bewildered.

“She’s fighting the anti-psi routine,” Chandler said, his
voice grave.

“Then we’ve got to get her out of there. Wake her up!” Hank
said.

“No!” Chandler said. “Leave her alone. Her consciousness is
locked in the system. If you break her state, she’ll lose herself in the Grid. She’s
fighting the devil for her soul right now, and there isn’t anything we can do
but wait.”

They didn’t have to wait long. Ten minutes into the battle
the screen went blank. Sai’s head lolled to one side and the convulsions
stopped.

She was gone.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

H
ank woke up to bad news. “Why in the hell did you let her
try it?”

Everybody looked anywhere except at Hank.

Chandler shrugged. “She volunteered. She knew the risks. I
tried to warn her.”

“Damn it, no one told
me
about the risks. I had no
idea this could happen!” Hank walked up to Chandler. “You didn’t try too hard
to talk her out of it, did you?”

Chandler poked a beefy finger into Hank’s chest. “Listen,
pal, I’m not the one who drank myself into oblivion while my girlfriend got
herself into trouble. If you want to piss and moan and try to lay the blame on
someone, why don’t you take a look in the mirror first? Maybe you could have
talked her out of it, but I doubt it. She was a pretty stubborn woman. I don’t
think she wanted you to know how dangerous it was.”

“Sai
is
a stubborn woman. We’re going to get her
back.” The fact that the man was right infuriated Hank. He looked at Sai’s
comatose form. If he didn’t know better, he would think she was merely sleeping.

He reached out to touch her forehead. She was warm, and there
was a light sheen of sweat on her brow. He brushed the hair out of her face and
cupped her cheek.

Her chest slowly rose and fell. Her body lived, but there
was no one home. Her mind was trapped in the Galactic Bank computer system.

“There has to be a way,” Hank said to the men in the room.
They still refused to meet his eyes. “Doesn’t anyone know how to fix this? What
about you?” Hank singled out Randol’s communications officer. “You’re the
expert. How can we retrieve her?”

The man shook his head. “Actually, Mr. Chandler knows more
about it than I do. He’s the expert on security.”

Chandler put his hand on Hank’s shoulder. “None of us can go
in after her. None of us has the skill. Even if we could go in, I have no idea
how we could find her or bring her back. You’re just going to have to accept
things the way they are.”

Hank slammed his fist down on a tabletop. “I have never caved
in the face of long odds and I’m damn sure not going to start now! I know one
person with rarefied knowledge of computer systems. Maybe she’ll have an idea.
Chandler, you stay here and look after Sai. Call me if she changes. We aren’t
giving up.”

Hank left the com center and walked down the long series of
mansion hallways toward the hangar. The echo of his boots rattled down the
corridors. He cursed under his breath as he trudged on. This was not going to
happen. Not on his watch. No way.

Hank approached the
Elsa
and keyed open the small
cargo door on the side, then walked up the ramp to the cockpit and collapsed
into his pilot's chair. He leaned over and hung his head in his hands.

“She’s in trouble,” he said.

Elsa’s voice softly answered. “I know.”

“I don’t know why I do this, Elsa. I’m just a child
sometimes. I latch onto things and they always get taken away.”

“You don’t care about
things.
You latch onto
people
and you love them well.”

“And I lose them,” Hank said.

“Hank, I wish I could hold you and stroke your head and tell
you everything was going to be okay, but I can’t. We both know the universe is
a big meat grinder. All we have are those moments of life and love and
pleasure. That’s all the happiness we get—moments. We have to seize them or we’ll
never have any joy. Don’t kick yourself for being willing to go for a moment of
love. It’s worth any price.”

“Do you have any joy anymore, Elsa? I know I’ve asked
before, but are you happy?”

“I’ll tell you what makes me happy, Hank. It’s a big
universe and I get to play in it. I get to help my best friend find his
happiness, and that makes me one satisfied metal woman. I know what to do to
get her.”

“Excellent. I was hoping you’d say that.”

“I’ll just go in after her and drag her skinny butt out,”
Elsa said.

Hank shook his head. “No, there has to be another way. You’ve
got to think of something else.”

“There isn’t any other way, and I want to do it.”

“Elsa, I can’t lose you, too. I just can’t. It’s too great a
risk.”

“I’m her only hope. We don’t have time to search for
alternatives. We can’t just let her rot in there with her mind slowly dissipating.
That’s the most horrible death I can imagine.”

“Yes, but—”

“Besides, I’ve seen the way you look at her. I couldn’t
stand to see you grieve and I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t try.”

“You’d be risking the same slow death.”

“Nah, I eat plasma and crap fusion fire, and I can see to
the end of the galaxy. I can do this, Hank. Let me bring her back for you.”

It took almost an hour to get everything set up. A com relay
connecting Elsa with the Grid sat on a low table next to Sai. While Elsa could
access the Grid directly through her communications array, proximity to Sai was
important. Elsa had to be able to bridge the gap from the terminal connection
to Sai’s body if there was any hope of restoring her.

When the technicians finished, they stepped back to stand
with Randol and Chandler. Hank moved to the relay and checked the connections
for himself.

“I’m ready, Hank,” Elsa said, her voice emanating from the
relay.

“Are you sure about this?”

“You’ve asked me that a hundred times. The answer is still
yes.”

“Elsa, if we never—”

“I know, Hank.”

“No, it’s important that I say it. I love you, Elsa. I
always have. You’ve always been there for me, and the thought of losing you
tears me apart.”

“Don’t worry, Hank. I’ll come back, and I’ll bring her along
with me. I know you love her, too. I can’t be what she is, or do for you what
she can, but
this
I can do.”

“Be careful.”

“As always, my love.”

Then there was silence, and the viewscreen came to life
again. Hank hoped this time things would be different.

Brock entered the command section of the base for the first
time. Very few people were allowed there, just Glenn and his staff. Brock had
been working in the detention area when Hayes, one of Glenn’s staff, came to
fetch him.

He tried to memorize the layout as best he could. There were
only a few guard positions. Security was lax at best, mostly guys wearing
blasters standing around drinking coffee and lying about women. There were a
few women among the pirates. They, too, stood around drinking coffee and lying
about women. It seemed to be one of the base’s major pastimes, that and
avoiding janitorial duties whenever possible. The biggest difference Brock
noticed in the command section was that it stank somewhat less than the rest of
the base.

Hayes led Brock to Glenn’s quarters and left him alone with
the pirate lord. Brock hadn’t really known what to expect. Perhaps a posh,
overstated room heaped with chests overflowing with loot and a big gilded
throne in the center. In actuality, the room consisted of a seating area, an
entertainment holo unit, and a few landscape paintings displayed on the walls.
A desk sat on one side with a com unit displaying accounting figures.

Glenn walked up to him and shook his hand. “Good to see you,
Brock. Can I get you something to drink? Coffee, or maybe a beer?”

“I’ve had enough coffee to last me a lifetime. A beer would
be great.”

Glenn retrieved a couple of beers from a cooler in the
galley. He handed one to Brock and sat on the couch, motioning for Brock to sit
across from him.

They both opened the brews and took a sip. Brock nodded with
appreciation. It was pretty good stuff, with a dark, caramel finish. Not the
swill the rest of the base slammed down by the liter. Rank had its privileges.

“So Brock, tell me, what the hell are you doing here?”

Brock cocked his head to one side. “What do you mean?” He
tried to maintain a calm demeanor and kept his shoulders loose. He also thought
about the weapons he had hidden on his person and how to get to them quickly.
He was sure that Hayes was still close by and ready to respond if needed.

“Come on. I looked you up. It didn’t take much to get
through that bogus ID you signed on with. You’re a decorated soldier. An
educated man. What logical reason would a man like you have to join up with a
bunch of pirates with dubious hygiene?”

“Well, sir—”

“Glenn. I don’t like formality,” Glenn said, taking a sip.

“Okay, Glenn, let me answer by asking, why the hell did you?
You aren’t Thorne. You may be ruthless when you need to be, but you aren’t a
brute, and you aren’t an idiot. You’re obviously cut from a different cloth.”

“True enough.”

Brock shrugged. “If you can be a pirate, why can’t I?”

Glenn smiled and nodded. “Excellent answer. Why indeed?” He
sat back and put his feet up on the coffee table. “I’m currently in charge of a
multitude of treacherous idiots. They can’t keep the latrines clean, much less
carry out strategic actions and tactical strikes. The one and only thing that
has kept this operation going has been inside information. You know it, the
Confed knows it, the corporation knows it. Sooner or later that information is
going to dry up.”

“In that case, how do you plan on surviving afterwards? I’ve
seen some pathetic excuses for soldiers in the ranks. Although I must say,
Nebulaco isn’t much ahead of you when it comes to security personnel.”

“Yeah, and I get their rejects,” Glenn said. “I need to
assemble a team of leaders around me. I think you have the right qualifications
to help me turn this into a more disciplined organization.”

“That would take a lot of work.”

“I can make it profitable for you.”

Brock nodded. “I like the sound of that. But you realize
that this organization is only going to be as good as those you recruit to fill
the lower ranks. Some may have potential, but they’ve never been given the
opportunity, the training, or the leadership to bring it out. Some of the
others are completely worthless and always will be.”

Glenn smiled. “Every army has cannon fodder, Brock. If we
work to replace those we lose by attrition with men and women of your caliber,
and if we instill some discipline and spirit in these troops, in short order we
will be a force to be reckoned with.”

Brock nodded and finished his beer. “So what’s your ultimate
goal? Pirating usually isn’t a long-term commitment. Either you get killed in
battle, or you save enough to retire, or—as in the case of your promotion—you
get retired by a subordinate’s blaster. No offense.”

“None taken. I have a bit more vision than that. I want to
collect enough resources to expand into legitimate enterprises … well,
more
legitimate. Shipping, import/export, gambling houses, perhaps even tourism.
Amusement parks, entertainment holos. You have to have a huge load of capital
to compete with the megacorporations. I intend to create my own empire and
maybe even become a corporate lord. Glennco, perhaps?”