The Oilman's Daughter (10 page)

He’d met the man back in 1895, when Tesla was just shy of forty and Jonathan a gangly lad of fifteen. The inventor spent a week visiting with Jonathan’s father and grandfather, expressing keen interest in the design of the Circumferential Rail and trying to convince them to operate it on electricity instead of steam. He wound up investing in the construction of McKinley Tower and Roosevelt Station, and in turn the Orbitals shipped a tremendous amount of material into space where Tesla built this beast.

Tesla had promised never again to return to the world that spurned his genius, and from the look of the Sargasso, Jonathan judged the man might never need to. Clumps of debris spun in slow, graceful revolutions, bound together by thick cables. Warm gaslights flickered within some of them. Others sported the steady glow of electric lighting, and instead of spinning, they sprouted turreted cannons and rocket tubes, ready to foist death upon any who trespassed there. Amid all of it was the hulking beast of the
Albatross,
which stayed steady with the telltale yellow glow of electricity. He could only see a few schooners docked along her flanks, but stovepipes jetted back and forth on whatever errands the Sargassians required.

“Now is time for code,
Gospodin
Linc,” said Gusarov. He’d shed as much velocity as he could from the maneuver around the moon and the
Condor
coasted toward the giant ship in the distance. “We will be within range of outermost guns in only few minutes. Surely bastards already have sighted us.”

Linc moved to the semaphore cabinet, selected a series of colored plates, and attached them to the spring line. A minute later, the flags unfurled outside of the
Condor
and the men waited in breathless silence.

“How will we know if it’s the right code?” Jonathan whispered, as if his voice might somehow carry to the gun platforms and encourage the crews to fire.

Gusarov looked at him with a cocked eyebrow. “We will not be shot out of space.”

They drifted past the first gun platforms and continued on unchallenged. Gusarov issued regular puffs of steam from the vents, goosing the stovepipe to put a little more distance between it and the turrets. None of them spun to follow their progress.

Jonathan blew out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “I don’t mind saying I was nervous as hell about this part.”

“This is the easy part, sir,” said Linc. “Wait until we get inside.”

Gusarov handled the docking procedure with smooth grace. Those few random items no longer tied down started to drift in the absence of thrust. “No gravity here, comrades. Look to your boots if you cannot live without floor.”

Linc spun open the airlock door. Their ears popped as their air equalized with the under-pressured station atmosphere.

The miasma of human waste, stale lubricants, and acrid chemicals hit Jonathan like a blow to the chest. He winced and wiped his nose, which started running within seconds of the door opening.

“My God, how do people stand it?” He wished he had a handkerchief soaked in cologne like upper-class fops were supposed to carry. He was shocked Nikola Tesla would allow his greatest creation to become a cesspit of filth.

Linc laughed. “Life’s different in deep space, sir. You get used to it after a while. Just watch yourself blowing your nose, because snot don’t always fly where you aim it up here.”

Jonathan turned up the collar of his coat and buttoned it tight to ward off the chill in the air as well as the questing fingers of beggars and pickpockets. He pulled his goggles down to ride about his throat instead of his forehead, hoping they’d be a little more difficult to steal. During the voyage, he and the others had discussed the best way to proceed, and Linc had offered to take them to a spacers’ bar he knew of where shady people worked their dirty deals. If anyone could tell them where to find the pirates who’d kidnapped Cecilie, it would be someone there, provided they weren’t shot on site for asking.

They entered the
Albatross
in a tight-knit group. Linc took the lead along with his brother, while Gusarov drifted along beside Jonathan, resting one hand on his shoulder to keep from floating too far away. The giant chamber was cold enough that they could see their breath in the dim lighting from naked electric bulbs mounted along wall and ceiling. Cables strung from point to point formed an aerial path for pedestrians to follow. Longtime and born spacers cruised along them like spiders, brushing them with fingertips and toes to keep on course. Radiators vented heat into the chamber at regular intervals and people clustered around them for warmth. Overhead, great panes of leaded glass were held by an iron and brass lattice, allowing some flickering starlight to add to the dim glow within the enormous vessel.

“Where’s the sun from here?” asked Jonathan.

“Below your feet and astern,” said Gusarov. “At this angle,
Albatross
does not get sunlight, moonlight, or—”

Gusarov’s hand left Jonathan’s shoulder. Jonathan turned to see where he’d gone and something hard hit him in the side of the head. His consciousness fled.

Sometime later, Jonathan awakened to Gusarov’s boozy breath in his face. His head throbbed where he’d been struck. He wondered how many more hits to the head a man could take before his brains became permanently scrambled. Someone had crammed him and the legless pilot into a rough burlap sack that stank of sour apples. He couldn’t feel a surface anywhere around him and suspected they’d been set adrift.

“Mr. Gusarov. Mikhail. Wake up,” whispered Jonathan.

Gusarov muttered something unintelligible and shifted his position.

“Wake up!”

The Russian jerked awake. “Whuzz . . .
Moya golova bolit
. Some
ublyudok
mugged us. Where are we?”

“I don’t know. Can you move?”

“A bit. I am checking pockets to see what they left me.” Gusarov’s arms brushed against Jonathan’s crotch as he shifted around. “Bastards did not take belt. I have blade stuck in it. Hang on while I dig it out. Not move, unless you fancy singing soprano in Vienna Boys’ Choir.”

Jonathan forced himself to remain still. “Where do you suppose we are?”

“No idea,
Gospodin
Orbital, but we are still breathing air, so I would say we are in good shape. Ah, there she is. I will reach past to cut sack behind you. Less wiggling I do with this beauty in hand, the better.”

“Just be careful.”

Gusarov reached his arms around Jonathan as if embracing him. “We might want to leave this part out when we are telling everyone about dashing escape,
da
?”

“My lips are sealed.”

The fabric behind Jonathan parted and split across his back. A few more cuts from Gusarov’s blade, and Jonathan got his shoulders through the slit. From then, it was only a few moments before both men kicked their way from the sack. They were adrift in a chamber filled with debris, broken equipment, and other sacks.

Jonathan shivered as he wondered how many might hold victims who didn’t get out, and he hoped the Porters weren’t among them. He would never forgive himself if the two men got hurt on his account. “What is this place?”

“Junk storage. Spacers never throw anything away. You toss it out for good and then find you need it week later, with no supply delivery for months. Better to hang onto it all.”

Jonathan took inventory of what he had lost to the muggers. They’d taken his checkbook, of course, and several hundred dollars in cash he’d kept in another pocket. They’d also taken his expensive brass goggles and his magnetic boots. At least, they’d left his coat, so he wouldn’t freeze. He didn’t have high hopes for his stocking feet, which were already throbbing from the cold. “How are we going to get out of here?”

Gusarov looked around the room. “We can climb walls if we push off each other.”

The two men clasped hands and Jonathan worked himself into the position described by Gusarov: feet against his legs, bent into a crouching position, clasping hands.

“All right, now what?”

“On three, push off hard as you can. Mind your head, though. One, two, three!”

Jonathan pushed off from Gusarov, and the two men flew apart. Jonathan tried to twist in mid-air, but still wound up smashing his shoulder against a bulkhead before his fingers found a conduit to grab. Despite the pain in his arm and his throbbing head, he felt better about having something solid within reach. Gusarov’s brief lesson aboard Pinnacle Station would have to serve him to move through the
Albatross
.

“What is next move?” Gusarov had fetched up against a bulkhead support.

“We need to find the Porter brothers,” said Jonathan. “And then continue with the original plan. I don’t suppose there’s any law to report the robbery to.”

Gusarov laughed. “Only law here is that of Nikola Tesla, and he never leaves his quarters. They say he is crazy as brickbat out here. You are on your own.”

The subtle change from
we
to
you
wasn’t lost on Jonathan. “So we’ll be parting ways then, comrade Gusarov?”

The legless man shrugged. “You paid me to bring you here, nothing more. I will not even charge extra for knock in head. I wish you best of luck,
Gospodin
Orbital, but I am anxious to get
Condor
out of here and back into—”

The room shook and a low ringing sound echoed throughout the
Albatross
. The conduit Jonathan clutched threatened to shake itself out of his grasp, and his ears popped. “What was that?”

Gusarov’s eyes widened in fear. “
Bozhe moy
! A collision! We are venting air! Move your ass, or you are going to be permanent fixture.”

He sprang from the bulkhead and flew across the room to land beside Jonathan. “Hatch is straight above us. Quick!”

The two men jumped to the hatch, but Jonathan threw his hands against the wheel to keep Gusarov from spinning it open. “Wait, listen!”

From beyond the door, both men heard the pops of gunfire, clangs of ricochets, and screams of victims.

“Sounds like war out there,” said Gusarov. “Space Guard might have finally had enough of these bastards.”

“We’ve got to find the Porters.” Jonathan struggled to keep his panic at bay. This was all going horribly wrong.

“Sorry, my friend. If they are alive and they get back to
Condor
before me, I will gladly take them aboard, but I am not going to stick neck out and die in depressurizing hull. Now move it or move aside.”

“I’ll come with you.” Despite all his reservations, he knew dying aboard the
Albatross
wouldn’t help anyone.

“Stick close, because I’m not going to stop and wait if you fall behind.”

They opened the hatch and saw a Fulton had crashed into the leaded glass windows at the top of the huge bay and forced itself partway into the chamber. The panes held except where the ship came through, but Jonathan feared they might explode out into space at any moment. Air whistled out past the edges, and debris swirled up toward the cracks, in some cases blocking them shut but in others, enlarging them.

The Fulton’s nose had opened, not from collision damage but by design, and men in armor-plated suits with rifles spewed from the hole. They shot at every denizen they saw without discrimination. Bodies living and dead spun through the air, some leaking globules of dark blood, others screaming as they were pushed toward the vacuum by the air currents. The unnatural breeze stank of blood, kerosene, and cordite.

“Where’s the
Condor
?” Jonathan wheezed and coughed. The soldiers were firing faster than the air leaks could clear the gun smoke, and the air was hazy and difficult to breathe.

Gusarov looked around to get his bearings. “There, across bay. We must go right under that monster’s open mouth.”

Jonathan shook his head. “Edges will be safer and darker. Maybe that’ll keep us from getting shot.”

“
Da
.”

The two men began a zig-zag route around the perimeter of the great bay. Smoke and steam from ruptured pipes made the air thick and hot, and the perpetual whistle of escaping air punctuated by gunshots made a constant reminder that they were in terrible danger. The
Albatross
shuddered again and the deck rushed up at Jonathan and Gusarov.

“
Khristos
, I think damn thing is about to come apart around us,” shouted the legless man over the din. One of the bulkhead support beams snapped in two, ringing like a church bell. Razor sharp shards of iron whistled past the men to embed themselves in the stained wooden paneling beside them.

A soldier in his battle garb emerged from the smoke, rifle held in both hands across his waist. He spotted Gusarov and raised the weapon.

“Look out!” cried Jonathan.

Gusarov whirled around and threw something shiny at the soldier. It hit him in the face and the man fell backward, his feet still stuck to the floor by his heavy magnetic boots. His rifle spun away. Jonathan dove at the soldier, ready to fight, but stopped short. The hilt of Gusarov’s knife jutted out from inside the man’s mouth. Blood burbled outward from the man’s eyes, which had already gone glassy.