The Rift Rider (5 page)

Bei raised his
eyebrow, and turned away. He had clearly had enough of this crap and had no
intention of listening to any more of it.

"It's
true," Charlie said, a plea in his voice. "The only thing I do know
is that I'm a fighter in the resistance and that on arriving in Seenthee, I
have to travel to Jajag city and meet a man called Brother Yojim."

Bei stiffened at
the mention of the robundee. He looked around to see if anyone was listening,
and then returned to the bench.

"Do you
know him?" Charlie asked.

"I'd keep
it down about the robundee, unless you want to find yourself back in the
interrogation frame."

"So you do
know him."

The blue man
leaned close. "I've heard of him. He was the resistance's primo pathfinder
back in the day. But he's been off the radar for the last two decades."

Charlie felt the
pang of relief. The blue man knew this Brother Yojim. I'm not going crazy, Charlie
thought. This guy really exists. And then the thought dawned on him. And if I
find him, I can get home.

Bei's amber eyes
studied Charlie. "So Mister Resistance Fighter, do you have any idea why
you have to meet him, or what your mission was? Or has that all been blanked too?"

 
Charlie shook his head. "All I have
is the name and the place. Not that either will do me much good. That silver
woman wants me dead. I know it."

"So you've
had a run in with Executive Ko?"

"If you
mean that plastic-faced silver woman, then yes, I've had the pleasure."

Bei gestured
towards Charlie's nose. "You must have pissed her off plenty. The
interrogators rarely get physical days. Not since the Corporation came up with
the pain juice." He patted Charlie firmly on the shoulder. Charlie almost
slid off the bench. "Good for you kid."

Then the blue
man reached down and pulled up his trouser legs, revealing a pair of weathered,
tan boots that clashed harshly with the rest of his attire. Charlie wondered
how such a smoothly dressed customer ended up with such of shoddy footwear. Bei
then proceeded to stick his hand deep inside the boot. When the hand came back,
the fingertips were coated with a translucent jelly.

"Here,"
Bei said and smeared the sticky substance onto Charlie's broken nose.

It smelt like
the contents of his house's toilet the morning after a curry night. He went to wipe
it away. But then abruptly stopped. A pleasant coolness enveloped the centre of
his face, clearing his sinuses and washing away the pain.
 

A minute later
he was breathing through his nose, all pain gone. He reached up and touched the
bridge if his nose. The smashed skin had healed and besides a slight bump it
seemed fine. Though he would have to inspect it later to be sure.

"Wow,"
Charlie said. "That's good stuff."

"You're
welcome."
 

Charlie scooped
the rest of the jelly off his nose and wiped his fingers against his wetsuit
bottoms. "Why are you helping me?"

"What can I
say? I'm a friendly guy."

"No,
really. Why? Are you in the resistance too?"

Bei's eyes
flashed angrily. "Watch that tongue, kid. Or I might have to smash that
nose back to its former state."

The quick change
in temperament startled Charlie. "Sorry."

"Let's
leave the questions about what I am and why I'm here to a later date. It
doesn't pay to be too open with strangers." He scanned the room. "The
Corporation often plants a couple of spies inside these cells. What tells me
you're not one of them?"

Charlie
shrugged. "I don't know."

Bei looked at
him. Charlie wilted under the man's icy stare.

After a long
silence, the blue man said, "You know you look them?"
  

"Who?"

"The
silvers. You have the same hair and eyes as them." He reached out and
prodded Charlie's cheek. "And your skin is as thin as reed paper. Like
theirs."

Again, Charlie
shrugged. He had no idea how the conversation had taken such a turn in the
wrong direction. He needed to convince this guy he could be trusted.

Bei calmed a
little and the smile returned to his face. "You know you'd be very popular
with a lady I know."

"Really?"
Charlie said, shooting a glance in the direction of Bork. The beastly lady now
sat with her back against the bars, eyeing him from afar. She looked upset.

Bei laughed.
"Not her. I mean someone on Seenthee."

"Well, I
guess she'll have to miss out. Unless she's willing to visit me in the
morgue."

"Don't be
so negative, kid. A lot can happen on a spaceflight." Bei huddled closer
to Charlie. "Say I do somehow manage to get you off this ship, would you
be willing to help me out with this lady?"

"What would
I have to do?"

"I can't go
into that now. But I promise that you'd have to do nothing I wouldn't be more
than willing to do myself."

Charlie looked
around. Bork was still staring his way. He held out his hand for an alien
handshake. "I'll do it."

"Great,"
Bei said. And, ignoring the outstretched hand, he slammed Charlie hard on the
back. "I can tell you and me are going to have a hell of time working
together."

"But how
are we going to get out of here?"

Before Bei could
answer, the clang of metal against metal signalled the arrival of more
Corporation guards.

"Which one
of you lucky fucks is Bei Lowaiki?" called one of the guards.

"It's
interrogation time," his skin-headed partner chimed in. "So get your
miserable terrorist arse over here."

Bei stood up and
looking down at Charlie said, "Don't worry about Bork. She'll keep her hairy
hands to herself for now."

And then he was
up moving through the cage, scything his way through the inmates, a hammerhead
shark dissecting a school of barracuda.

Charlie spent
the next hour examining the intricate plainness of the cell floor, keeping his
eyes well away from Bork's. He had looked towards her once, and found himself
locked into a beastly lover's stare that set his heart racing for all the wrong
reasons.

He knew if he
looked over, she would still be staring. And a glance, no matter how brief,
would surely send out the wrong signals. His track record with the opposite sex
was not good. He had a unique ability to repel the girls he fancied, while at
the same time attract the others.

Making this kind
of mistake with Bork would be disastrous. Charlie stared hard at the floor. Why
the hell did she pick me? he asked himself. There were plenty of other male
targets in the cage.

The guard's tube
clanged against the bars. The noise sent a shiver of nervous energy pulsing
through the cell.

Almost
immediately, the prisoners shuffled around Charlie, huddling well out of reach
of the guards' energy sticks. Nobody, Charlie figured, fancies another
demonstration of electricity-assisted break dancing.

A fringed
solider approached the guards, leading a prisoner, blocked from view by a
rotund, butterscotch-skinned man in an ill-fitting leotard blocked. To get a
better look, Charlie got up and pushed his way past the spherical fellow,
grimacing as he brushed against the sweat-drenched clothes.

The returning
prisoner was Bei.

The blue man had
his arms pinned behind him, his wrists placed in silver restraints. His head
drooped on his chest. A trail of saliva dribbled down his chin and onto his
torn shirtfront. Charlie swallowed. His only hope of escape looked utterly
defeated.

The escorting
fringe told the skinhead to open the cage. She was female and had skin the
colour of pink jelly beans. She wore the same gaudy uniform and ridiculous
hairstyle, and yet she seemed somehow different to the other soldiers Charlie
had seen.

 
Her turquoise eyes lacked the emotionless
determination he had observed in the eyes of the others. And instead of
revealing a flat chested, athletic frame, her tight uniform wrapped itself
around a body that had more curves than a Curly Wurly factory.

Charlie stared
at her open mouthed, his eyes straining to take her all in. Then he remembered
how Bork had looked at him, and looked away, ashamed at himself.

The two
skin-headed guards reacted in much the same way Charlie had. They stood there
goggling the pink-skinned soldier as if at any moment her uniform would
evaporate and reveal what lay beneath it.

"What are
you staring at?" She said. "You heard the orders. Open the
cage."

The harsh tone
shook the guards out of their drooling stances. Their faces blanched and they
snapped to attention. While one guard stepped behind Bei, the other rushed to
the cage and activated its lock.

The cell door
opened, but instead of stepping out of the way to let the guard push Bei inside,
the pink-skinned fringe dropped to her knees. She whipped out a triangular
chunk of metal from her belt and slid it at the open cell door. A light flashed
within it and the metal slice shot towards the base of the door. The two
skinheads followed its path, looks of confusion etched across their pale faces.

The metal piece wedged
itself tightly underneath the door, locking it in place. The guard by the lock
finally figured something was wrong, and spun around, only to find himself
staring into the end of a rifle.

"Drop your
weapons and get on your knees," the pink woman said in the same commanding
tone.

The guard behind
Bei, however, had other ideas. He went for his gun. But the fringe reacted with
lightening speed. She swung out with her rifle, smashing its butt into the
skinhead's throat. He dropped to the floor, clutching his neck.

Then with the
poise and finesse of a test cricketer she swung the rifle in an easy swing that
ended against the man's left temple. The light in his eyes extinguished and he dropped,
unconscious, at Bei's feet.

"Nice
work," Bei said, kicking the skinhead's rifle away.

The other guard,
stood frozen by the open cell door. He glanced down at his felled colleague.
When he raised his head, the pink-skinned soldier pressed her rifle barrel
firmly against his pale nostrils. "Drop your weapons and get to your
knees."

The skinhead,
his eyes brimming with malignancy, did as he was told.

The inmates
roared in approval, punching the air with their fists and whooping heartily.
Charlie couldn't resist joining in. The sight of the open door and kneeling
guards had brought a smile to his lips.

Outside the
cell, the pink-skinned soldier had her rifle trained on the guard. Without
removing him from her sights, she stepped behind Bei, and with her free hand
undid his restraints, attaching them to her belt.

The blue man
massaged his hands. He turned his amber eyes to the inmates, to the skinhead on
the floor and then back to the prisoners. Charlie followed Bei's glance and
looked around him at the faces of the prisoners. They looked hungry for blood.

"So,"
Bei said, smiling, his eyebrows raised. "What shall I do with these
two?"

All around
Charlie, the inmates burst into life, surging forward to the open door. But out
of respect, or fear, for Bei they stopped just short of it.

"Kill
them," one screamed.

"Rip their
fucking heads off," called another.

"Shove
those tubes up their Corporation arseholes." This last scream, Charlie
noticed, came from the Lucozade woman. Two turen males were supporting her, so
that she could get a look at the retribution about to take place.

Bei looked at
the woman, and said, smiling, "So be it." Then he stepped forward,
and picked up the electric tube that lay at his feet.

The skinhead's
eyes doubled in size, when he realised he was about to get a taste of his own
medicine. He sprang off the deck, throwing all his weight at Bei.

To the watching
Charlie, it all seemed to take place in slow motion.

Bei saw the skinhead
charge and twisted to take the impact. As he turned, something slick and shiny,
the length and width of a child's ruler, shot out of the back of his right
hand. The blue man swung it at the guard, and sliced a cut through his face
from ear to ear.

The skinhead
dropped dead. A gash ran under his eyes, dissecting his face in a ghastly,
second smile. Charlie took one look at the guard and turned away.

Charlie reminded
himself, that the guard had it coming. But still he wondered if anyone really
deserved to die such a grisly death.
 

Bei clearly
thought so. When Charlie turned, the blue man stood over the guard, smiling, as
the blood pooled at his feet. The object protruding from his hand, Charlie now
saw, was a razor sharp, square-tipped blade. Charlie wondered if it hurt Bei to
use it.
 

The blue man,
however, was in excellent spirits. He called over to the Lucozade woman. In his
left hand he still held the electric stick. He activated it and waved its
flashing end towards her, and said, "I'm sorry, you'll have to make do
with just the one electrocuted guard."

Beneath him the
second guard stirred. The poor bastard, thought Charlie, coming into
consciousness just at the wrong time.

The guard,
groggy and confused, propped himself up onto his elbows. He looked around him.
When he saw the open cell door, his mutilated partner and Bei standing over him
swinging the electric tube, his face became so white Charlie would have sworn
it glowed.

Bei looked the
skinhead dead in the eyes, and said, smiling "Welcome to the party."
And then he rammed the tube's sparkling end into the skinhead's crotch.

It took less
than a minute for the skinhead to die, but to Charlie and no doubt the skinhead,
it seemed considerably longer.

Charlie forced
himself to watch. He could not afford to look weak. He needed to appear worth
Bei's attempts to help him escape. But when the skinhead's testicles set
alight, he decided enough was enough and turned away. Unfortunately, he had no
way of turning his ears away from the man's screams or his nostrils away from
the stench of burnt sex organs.

When the screaming
ended, Charlie turned to see what was left of the poor sadistic skinhead. He
wished he had not. If the devil ever needed a picture to go with his barbeque
invitations, he could not have chosen a better image.

Bei stood over
the melted corpse, his amber eyes lost in thought. Then he coughed, scratched
his backside and looked up at the inmates silently watching him. A look of
impatience flashed across his face. "What are you waiting for?"

For a second,
the inmates stood looking around at each other. And then, as one kaleidoscopic
swarm, they poured out of the cell, parting for their two saviours like a river
rushing past two boulders, before reforming and flowing down the corridor.

Charlie watched
them go. The blue man had made a deal to help him escape and against all odds
he looked like keeping up his end of the bargain. For now, Charlie's fate lay
firmly in the alien's hands.

When the last of
the inmates had fled, Bei stepped, his limp gone, into the cell. He held his
bladed fist up to Charlie. Then he unclenched it, flattening it out. The blade
slid into the back of his hand, hidden once more under the blue flesh. The hand
looked as good as new. No scars gave any clue to the blade tucked inside.

Bei nodded towards
the pink-skinned fringe. "Charlie meet Awani. Awani meet Charlie. He's
coming with us."

She frowned, and
said, "We don't need a passenger, especially a weakling that turns his
face from death. "

Shit, thought
Charlie. She saw me.

"And what's
going on with his trousers. He's not a sex freak is he?"

Bei laughed. "Believe
me. The kid will come in useful."

"How?"

"This isn't
the time and place for discussions."

She folded her
arms, rooted to the spot.

Bei shook his
head. "Fine. The data you have needs unencrypting, right? Well, this kid
can help us with that."

"Bullshit. I
know every hacker inside the resistance and he isn't one of them."

Charlie stood in
the cage, his heart racing, a silent bystander in his own survival.

"No,"
Bei said. "But trust me, Awani. He'll help us with the data. Now enough
arguing. The last I heard I was in charge here."

She shrugged and,
looking at Charlie, said, "Just make sure you don't get us killed."

"I'll
try," Charlie said, sounding a lot meeker than he had meant to.

A scream echoed
down the corridor. Fifty metres away, the escaping prisoners huddled around one
large, furry figure. Bork. Above her head, a male fringe thrashed and bucked,
trying to free himself from her grip.

But Bork had him
held tight, an ankle in one hand and a wrist in the other. And she was pulling
hard. The soldier squealed, his face twisted and grotesque beneath his
dishevelled fringe.

All around the
massive female, prisoners fisted the air, chanting "Kill, kill,
kill."

Bork looked over
the heads of the inmates, caught Charlie's eye and smiled.

The pebble stare
turned his insides to water. Yet, somehow he managed to force a smile onto his
horrified face. At least he hoped it resembled a smile. He had no desire to further
hurt this woman's feelings. Who knew how long Bei would be alive to fend her
off?

The soldier's
screaming reached a terrible crescendo. Finally, his body could bear the
stretching no more. There was the noise of ripping flesh, a gurgled scream, and
then the soldier came apart, pouring thick blood onto the mob below.

With a look of
satisfaction spread across her mottled face, Bork threw the torn carcass onto
the floor. Then she raised her hand towards Charlie, waved, and pushed herself
through the bloody crowd, passing out of sight down the corridor.

A hand slapped
Charlie's back. "You've got a hell of taste in women," Bei said,
laughing.

"If that's
her idea of foreplay," Charlie said, "then I owe you my life."

"Quit your
jabbering you two," Awani said. "We'll be overrun with soldiers once
they work out what's happened."

They sprinted in
single file, Awani leading the way and Bei protecting the rear. Charlie,
unarmed and feeling as useful as a fudge condom, covered the middle.

After a minute's
running, Awani held up a hand and they stopped. She scanned the corridor, and
satisfied the coast was clear, knelt down beside the turquoise wall. She
retrieved a piece of metal from her belt. Charlie was surprised to see it
almost perfectly resembled a fifty pence piece. When she pressed it against the
wall, it clung to it like a magnet.

She backed away
and signalled for the others to follow suite.

A few seconds
later, the alien fifty p exploded, blowing a hole a metre wide in the wall. The
explosion sent thick chunks of corridor wall scattering across the floor.

Awani slipped
through the smoking hole, rifle at her shoulder.

Charlie leant
down and picked up a piece of the turquoise material. It had the look, feel and
smell of epoxy, the resin used to coat new surfboards.

"Get a move
on, passenger, " Awani called from the other side of the hole.

Charlie looked
at Bei. "Is she always this bossy?"

The blue man
smiled. "She bites worse than she barks. So I'd shift it if I were
you."