Ships of My Fathers (31 page)

Very few pipes rose up to this level. From the looks of it, it was a single sink. He was not sure if it was part of the captain’s quarters, or if it was perhaps the officers’ wardroom. Either way, he was very careful to move slowly and quietly. The last thing he wanted was to slip and bang against the captain’s bedroom wall.

Only air ducts and electrical conduits went up to deck one. That made sense. After all, the quartermaster’s storage room had no sink. He carefully wedged himself higher up between the wall frames, unbolted the grating above him, and slid it aside. The access space above him was different, but he was still able to climb up into it.

When he got there, he saw just how different. The walls to the aft were the standard partition walls he had been dealing with all along. The forward wall, however, was solid metal. Whatever that nasty Mr. Bishop had been guarding was put together more securely than the rest of the ship. He wondered what it could be but did not let it distract him long. The aft wall was the wall to quartermaster’s storage, and that was his goal.

He popped out a section of the wall from the floor to his chest and slid it to the side. It was dark on the other side, and he considered that good news. No one should be staffing the storage closet at night. When he had enough room to move through, he stooped down and through.

It would have been nice, of course, to have the survival bags on a shelf right next to him, but he was happy to spend his luck elsewhere. As it was, he came out behind a stack of pillows, and when one went crashing to the floor, it barely made any noise at all. Taking advantage of the opening, he slid through the gap on the shelf and stepped into the room proper.

He moved past the bedding and uniforms over to where the environment suits were. He did not see many. In fact, mostly it was only parts of the suits, and they looked very odd to him. While most environment suits are fairly light and supple, the chest piece he saw was heavy and bulky. Even for a thruster suit, it looked over-engineered. His curiosity called to him, but he pushed it away. He needed the survival bag, and with another minute of searching, he found it.

Here he counted himself lucky. Survival bags are packed in one of two ways. More often than not, they come in a box, about half a meter cubed. It had a pull cord that began an inflation of structural members. The idea was that it would turn itself into a nice sphere for you to step into through the open seam and then seal it up behind you, using the rest of the oxygen tank to keep you breathing. He had been worried about only finding those, because he was not so sure he would have been able to fit them through the gaps between the decks.

Fortunately, all of the
Jaguar
’s bags were of the other variety. They were packaged in longer tubes, about a meter and a half, with a carrying strap as well as a couple of hooks. The idea behind these was that a suited rescuer could carry several of these strapped to himself to give to any trapped survivors he found. They did not have as long of an air supply, but they would easily fit through the space he had to move through tonight. He took one, moved back to the open wall, put the pillows back in place, and slipped quietly back into the wall, closing it up behind him.

Moving down was much easier, even with a load, but he forced himself to go as slow as before. Josie had warned him that day they had gone climbing the mountains. “Going down is much more dangerous than going up. It feels so easy, you get sloppy, and the next thing you know you’ve busted your pretty little ankle.”

So he was lowering himself into the access space on deck two very carefully when he heard the thump of the water slamming into the air gap in the pipes above the sink. Someone had just used it. He froze, knowing that someone was close by on the other side of the partition. After several seconds, he dared to shift into a more comfortable position, still halfway down to the floor.

And that was when he heard Jimmy Anders laugh.

Cautiously, he pressed his ear to the wall and listened.

“It’s not funny,” Elsa said. “There are warrants out for that name.”

Anders shrugged. “Yeah, old warrants, from back in the war. I don’t see why they scare you so much.”

She shook her head. She was amazed someone as careless as Anders had survived this long. “Some of Elsa’s so-called crimes have no statute of limitations. War or not, few judges would be lenient. So hear me on this. Elsa Watkins died in the war, and if you don’t want to end up in her empty grave, you’ll leave that name alone from here on out.”

He frowned but nodded. “I guess Malcolm’s not the only one with secrets.”

“Yes, but hopefully Malcolm’s secrets will die with him. Or at least they’ll die with his computer.”

“Die?” He looked her cautiously. “I thought we were going to extract the data.”

“Sure, I’m going to make a copy, but once I get it out of there, I’m wiping that core, wiping it again, and then slagging the whole thing before blasting it apart.” She slammed back her vodka, and slid the empty glass back towards Anders. “And after, if I’m feeling generous, I’ll let you have portions of it.”

“If you feel generous? Aren’t you forgetting that I’m the one who brought you this little deal?”

“This deal? This headache, you mean.”

“What headache? He’s asking a few questions, that’s all.”

She pointed to the bottle, and Anders poured her another vodka. She sipped it more slowly this time. “It’s not the questions. He’s an unchecked security risk on my ship. My ship, my business, does not like security risks.”

“But you said he’s staying in his quarters.”

“That’s not the point. Maya’s getting a bad vibe off him. The kid’s suspicious, and that makes him a risk. Bishop agrees.” She shook her head. “I wanted to see how much of his father he had in him. Well, he’s got too much for my taste, and now we’re heading into Arvin with him.”

“Keeping him on board again?”

“Damn straight,” she replied. “This is the last place I’d want to let him loose. We’ll see how he handles another restricted liberty, but I lay you odds that he’ll be in Mr. Bishop’s brig before we’re done.” She took another sip.

“Hell, El-, er, Jana, if you’re that worried, why are we even going to Arvin?”

She shook her head. “Believe me, if I had a choice, I wouldn’t be, but orders are orders.”

“Orders? Ha! Who in the universe does the Winged Lady take orders from?”

She chuckled. “If you can believe it, Father Chessman.”

He leaned in against the table. “You’re kidding. You know Father Chessman?”

“Of course not,” she replied. “No one knows Father Chessman.” She saw him open his mouth, but she cut him off. “No one knows him. That’s what they say. Supposedly it’s all dead drops and encoded orders, but when you get an order from him, you follow it or you start looking over your shoulder for the rest of your very short life.”

“Okay, I get it,” he said. “He’s not interested in the boy, is he?”

She shook her head and took another sip. “I doubt he ever knew Malcolm even had a son. No, this is about cargo, plain and simple. He’s got something special for me to pick up and deliver.”

“What is it?”

She finished off her vodka and set the glass down on the table between them. “Now you’re starting to ask too many questions, Jimmy. Do I need to put you in your quarters for the rest of the trip?”

“No, Captain. That won’t be necessary.”

Michael lay stretched out on the floor of his quarters, the survival bag beside him. The final climb had done him in. At least that was what he told himself. The climb was what was making his heart race.

It had nothing to do with the talk of security risks, of slagging computers, or of a brig. He thought about the hard metal wall next to the quartermaster storage, Mr. Bishop, and his ominous brig.

He had to get off the ship, and it had to be at Arvin. There was no question about that.

No, the only question he had was this: Who the hell was Father Chessman?

Chapter 23

“They say that a prisoner’s first obligation is to escape, and I suppose they’re right. But if it’s at all practical, do try to piss in the jailer’s coffee on the way out.” — Malcolm Fletcher

M
ICHAEL DID HIS BEST TO
look surprised by the news. “Again? Just how long am I supposed to stay cooped up in my cabin?” He pushed his lunch back in unfeigned anger.

Anders glanced around the galley, but no one else was sitting that close to them. “Look, Michael, I understand. For that matter, I’m not that keen on staying on board either. It’s Arvin, after all, and I could do a little business here, touch base with a few friends... maybe even check in on a lady friend or two,” he said with a wink. “But each captain has her own way of doing things, and Lewis runs a tight schedule.”

“Yeah, I bet her schedule isn’t the only thing that’s tight.”

“Come on, Michael, show a little respect,” came Anders’ rebuke, but Michael noticed hints of a grin.

Ultimately, he shrugged it off. “Whatever. All I know is that this isn’t how I’m going to run things when I’m back on
Sophie
.”

Anders nodded. “Well, it’ll be your choice then. For now…”

“Yeah, for now I’ll be a good little boy and wait it out.”

“I could come by for a visit, maybe teach you a new card game?”

Michael shook his head with feigned sulkiness. “Maybe tomorrow. I’m gonna grab a sandwich or two for my dinner. I won’t be good company tonight.”

He took his tray back to the counter and fished through the sandwich bin for some turkey or ham. On his way out, he grabbed a water bottle and nodded to Maya who followed him from a discreet distance. She at least let him get back into his quarters without watching him the entire way, but once he was into his own corridor, he knew he was on Mr. Bishop’s monitors.

He still had about two hours before they dropped from tach, so he packed methodically, then unpacked and packed it again, trying to squeeze in a little more. He could not take much, and the truth of the matter was, very little mattered. He had Malcolm’s old utility knife, some food, a bottle of water, and every scrap of cash he had down to the last half-credit.

His timing was little more than an estimate, but he figured his best chance to get into the cargo bay was in the minutes after the down-tach, during the pre-docking maneuvers. It was a hectic time, and while the artificial gravity did a good job at compensating for their various thrust changes, most crew sat out the jerkier moments belted into a locked chair.

“Prepare for down-tach,” came the announcement over the speakers. “Stage one in ninety.”

That was his signal. He tossed together some dirty laundry and a pillow to simulate a body under the covers. He did not know how much time that would actually buy him if they came looking for him, but that was what they always did in the movies. He figured it could not hurt.

He was popping the panel out from the under the sink when the first down-tach hit. It was smooth, but he could hear it, a subtle change in the background hum of the
Jaguar
. He pushed his bag through and laid it next to the survival bag. He had stored that in there almost from the beginning. After all, how would he explain it if someone saw it in his closet?

He was halfway through the wall himself when the next announcement came. “Down-tach, stage two in sixty.”

He squirmed his legs through and pulled the panel back snug against the brackets. He was not going back through, and he wanted to leave no trace of how he escaped. Then he went to work on the floor grate. He had refastened it with only two of the nuts, so it was quick work. He had finished setting it aside when he felt the next down-tach. This one had a bit of a thump that rocked him back and forth in the tiny access space, but he did not care. He was probably as secure as he would be belted into a chair.

The
Jaguar
had only a three stage down-tach, so he knew the next one would be the last. He stood and balanced himself over the missing grate, one foot on either side. He held his bag and the survival gear dangling in front of him, ready to drop them down onto the top of the algae tank below.