The Ninth Circle (60 page)

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Authors: R. M. Meluch

BOOK: The Ninth Circle
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“What hour is it at the target site?” Ram asked.
“Daylight. For another few hours.”
“How many civilians. How many hostiles. What weapons and armor do they have?”
Commander Ryan snapped to Tactical, “Mister Vincent. A layout of the camp for Captain Singh.”
Quietly urgent, Calli said, “Ram, I have people down there. Two officers in the camp. They sleep in this tent.” She showed him the location on the aerial view. “And Jose Maria Cordillera is down there too.”
“Is the Star Racer his?” Ram asked of the sleek ship amid the boxy LEN circle. Then answered himself. “Of course it is. Does
Don
Cordillera sleep in there?”
“The last and only intel I have said the expedition people weren’t confined at all, but they weren’t allowed inside the ships,” Calli said. “I have a squad of Marines moving in from the northwest. Here. But they’re still over sixty miles out.”
Ram’s
Windward Isles
had already spotted the Marine unit on the ground.
By now there were also multiple ships of unverified identity in the Zoen star system. They came at the news of alien DNA.
Merrimack
prohibited any of them from approaching within an astronomical unit of the planet as long as the camp was hostage.
Ram asked, “Is there any chance someone upstairs with us is keeping the pirates informed of where your Marines are?”
“Dammit, Ram, there is every chance. And we can’t set anyone else down without alerting the pirates.”
Ram proposed to put a team down in the Xerxes’ blind spot.
“That would be lovely if there was such a thing,” Calli said. “A Xerxes has a blind spot?”
Ram hesitated. Answered, “May have.” That was a yes.
“Design flaw?” said Calli.
“Failsafe,” said Ram.
“And how did you get it?”
That would be secret information of a kind Italy wouldn’t part with easily, if at all. Ram wasn’t parting with it either.
“My country is on very good terms with Italy,” said Ram. “We are also a member of the Pacific Consortium.”
The Xerxes was properly an Italian-flagged ship. The Pacific Consortium manufactured the Xerxes.
Ram shrugged. “And everyone knows I live to make pirates dead.”
 
It was very late, closer to dawn than to dusk. Patrick couldn’t sleep. Glenn should have turned in by now. Patrick trusted his wife. He didn’t trust the pirate she was keeping time with.
My wife is out with a pirate. A pirate once named Farragut.
Patrick sat at his desk in their tent with a study light on. He reviewed his notes on fox dialects to keep his mind occupied.
The light disappeared.
Something—a hood?—dropped over his head.
Can’t see.
A hand clapped over his hooded mouth. He inhaled through his nose. Fabric of the hood smelled sweet. All conscious thought fell into darkness.
 
Came to. There was a hand over Patrick’s mouth. He could breathe through his nose. The hood wasn’t there anymore. He opened his eyes. He wasn’t in the tent. He wasn’t even in the camp. It was still dark. He saw stars through the trees. Stars meant it was close to morning.
He focused on the insignia of the man holding his mouth shut. He lost colors in the dark but knew this insignia was green. The LEN officer put a finger before his own lips to tell Patrick to be quiet. Patrick recognized the broad dark face of Ram Singh.
Ram withdrew his muffling hand from Patrick’s mouth.
Patrick whispered angrily, “Why are you kidnapping me?”
“It’s a rescue,” Ram whispered.
“Thanks awfully,” Patrick said wryly.
“Where are the pirates?” Ram whispered.
“They have the nice big tent with anemometer on top.”
“They’re not there,” said Ram.
“They were there at sundown.”
Ram helped Patrick stand up.
Ram’s LEN pirate hunters buckled a PF onto Patrick. It wasn’t going to help much. Patrick whispered to Ram, “The pirates don’t shoot. They slice.”
Ram whispered, “So do I.”
The black silhouettes of Ram’s people fanned out shadow silent through the camp, though they were already getting the idea that the pirates were gone.
Patrick looked around him. “Glenn! Where’s Glenn!” he whispered, “Glenn!”
Blood appeared black in the dark. A leopard-spotted pattern was discernible on the wall of a hut.
Patrick darted a zigzag path like a panicked rabbit, trying to see everywhere at once. Could hardly see anything. Whispered, “Glenn!” The pirate hunters tried to hold him, but he wouldn’t be held. He blundered into more leopard spots. These were on the ground. They stuck to his shoe soles. He danced as if he could levitate off the spots. “Glenn!”
Then, in the gap between ships, he sighted the body lying on the ground, like a low mound, outside the energy dome.
He knew the shape of her. The angle of her shoulder, the curve of her hip.
“No. Oh, no.” He crept quickly nearer, his breath all but frozen in his chest. Closer, the shape became more distinct.
No. Please no
. He prayed to divine powers he didn’t believe in.
He put out a trembling hand.
The body stirred. Glenn rolled onto her back. Her eyes opened, focused on Patrick’s face above her, then shifted focus over Patrick’s shoulder where Ram Singh leaned in. She seemed to realize what was happening here. “Ram.” Her voice came out gravelly from sleep. “You got them?”
Ram Singh shook his head. “Where are they? The pirates?”
Glenn’s head turned to her side, to the flat spot on the blanket next to her. “I don’t know. Nox was right here. That was—” She checked her chron. “Two hours ago.”
Patrick saw the pattern in the blanket where someone had been lying next to Glenn.
“He beached me?” said Glenn. She sounded strangely offended. “I thought I had him.” She rolled up. Stood up. Took a dizzy step. Put a hand out to Patrick for balance. “I think I’ve been dosed. He must have seen through me.”
“Did you tip him off?” Patrick heard himself say.
Glenn scowled surprise. “And who was supposed to tip
me
off? Oh. My. Head.” She crouched down before she could fall over.
One of Ram’s men pointed over at the spotted ground. “Whose blood is that?”
“I hope it’s the dog,” said Patrick. “Where’s the dog?”
The expedition members came out of their tents as the pirate hunters took names and searched the grounds. Ram’s men broke the tape seals over the ships and searched inside. They were fairly certain the pirates were gone. That didn’t stop the search.
“The pirates must have run away when
Windward Isles
showed up,” said Patrick.
“But who told them
Windward Isles
was here?” Ram said.
“Their Xerxes has to be keeping watch of who is in orbit,” said Glenn.
“If that were the case,” said Ram, “then why did they not run when
Gladiator
arrived?”
Patrick pulled back in surprise. “
Gladiator
is here?”
“
Gladiator
arrived hours ahead of
Windward
,” said Ram.
Glenn reached up her hand for Patrick to help her stand up again. She told Ram, “Those pirates ran under
Merrimack
’s guns to get down here in the first place. They’re not afraid of anyone.”
That left the questions: Why did the pirates brave the guns of
Merrimack
to come to Zoe in the first place? And why did they run away now?
A shout sounded from the camp perimeter with the alarmed cocking of a lot of guns: “Who goes there!”
It turned out to be a squad of U.S. Fleet Marines approaching the camp from the northwest.
They were old friends.
Ram’s men hailed Colonel TR Steele, “Adamas!”
Steele glowered.
Ram stepped forward smiling broadly. “Adamas, I know you are Superman, but how did you get here!”
The Marines had covered a lot of ground in inhuman time.
“We caught a ride on some—” Steele stopped, fishing for the right term.
“Dinosaurs,” Dak supplied.
“Big animals,” said Steele.
The camp physician, Dr. Cecil, set off on a tangential rant about the Marines not wearing protection.
“Calm down, Cecil,” said Patrick. “They’re equipped with personal fields.”
“They—?” Cecil looked confused, then aghast. “I don’t give a damn about your Marines! What is protecting the
native ecosystem
from your infested Marines?”
“Hey! I am not infested,” said Kerry Blue.
Cecil threw up his hands. “But who am I talking to? You
dared
provoke the pirates while they held us hostage. Get out of here!”
“Geez, Cecil, you sound just like Izzy Benet,” Patrick said. “We don’t need two Izzies. Nobody needs two Izzies.”
“Where
is
Izzy?” said Cecil. “Did the pirates take him?”
Patrick looked up to the hut roofs, which were festooned with he didn’t even want to imagine what. The first glimmer of predawn was showing the color. He spoke unsteadily, “Oh, I think he might be around here.”
 
“Numa, where are your pirates?”
Numa’s expression on the video com was impenetrable rock. He told Captain Carmel, “Caesar does not deal with pirates.”
“You have no idea, have you?” Calli said. “I am talking about the
Roman
recruits whom
Rome
disenfranchised before they hijacked the Xerxes.”
“We are somewhat familiar with the hijack report. It was not a Roman ID that the hijacker flashed at the Italian consulate,” Numa said smoothly.
It had been a United States ID.
“Perhaps if you had advised us, Captain Carmel, you would not now be in the position of misplacing
your
pirates. We can attempt to capture them, if you will share information with us.”
“No. Actually, I’ll find them myself,” said Calli. She cut the connection.
The pirates were back in the vacuum. There would be no finding them.
“Captain,” said Dingo Ryan. “We’re assuming the Xerxes has left the planet. But no one saw them go.”
“No one would,” said Calli.
“The pirates left the expedition camp on foot within the last two hours,” said Commander Ryan. “For all we know the Xerxes is still on the ground. The pirates may still be down here.”
Calli turned to Tactical. “Mister Vincent. Pirates!”
“Sir,” said Marcander Vincent. “The Xerc was designed to protect heads of state. If that ship don’t want to be found, we’re not going to find it.”
“Yes, we will. We have a place to start, and the pirates left camp on foot. They can’t be far.”

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