Weird Space 2: Satan's Reach (11 page)

Harper whispered, “Have they looked our way yet?”

Zeela shook her head. “They’re too busy bickering.”

“Are they facing us?”

“The ugly alien is. The woman has her back to us.”

Harper considered possible escape scenarios. The favourite, he decided, was to sit tight and wait until the pair had finished their meal and left. On the other hand, the longer he and Zeela remained here, the more chance there would be of Janaker recognising him.

Zeela pulled a disgusted face.

“What?” Harper asked, alarmed.

“Their orders have arrived,” she said, “and the alien is eating... You should see it!”

“I’d rather not,” he said.

“It’s sucking a sandwich up its nose tubes!” Zeela hissed. “Oh, my...”

“Will you please be quiet and let me think?”

“I’m sorry.” She looked suitably contrite.

A minute later he said, “Okay, this is what I want you to do. Pay our bill, then go back to the Endolon on Phreak Street.”

“And then?”

“When you find the Endolon, tell him that the woman called Janaker is a bounty hunter out for my blood. He’ll understand. Tell him – and this is important – tell him that if this pair returns asking after me, he’s to tell them that the word on the street is that I left aboard my ship this morning bound for... for Beckett’s World. That’s vitally important. Beckett’s World. It’s in the opposite direction to where I’ll be heading.”

She nodded. “Beckett’s World.” She gripped his hand. “And then?”

“Then make your way to Cradle Seven on Macarthur Street. I’ll meet you back there in thirty minutes or so. Got that?”

She nodded, again, determined. She stared into his eyes, then said, “You won’t leave me, will you? You won’t just take a cab back to your ship and leave without me?”

He returned her gaze, surprised that the idea hadn’t crossed his mind. “No,” he said. “No, I’ve come to a decision.”

“Yes?”

“We’re heading in the opposite direction to Beckett’s World...”

“We?” she asked, wide eyed.

“Of course,
we
. In a few days, a week at the most, we should reach Kallasta if luck is on our side.”

She almost leapt off her seat with delight. “Oh, Den!” she cried.

“Quiet!” he hissed. “We’ll be going nowhere if the ugly twins laser my lights. Right, off you go.”

“I think you should give me a kiss, for the sake of reality.”

She leaned forward and puckered her lips. Harper kissed her chastely on the forehead. “Now go!”

With a smile she slipped from the table and entered the restaurant.

Oddly, Harper felt suddenly more vulnerable on his own. He played with the empty tea-cup, wondering if the pair behind him would be more likely to notice his presence now that he was alone.

He glanced down at the boulevard. He saw Zeela’s slight figure emerge from beneath the red and white awning and merge with the surging crowd. She turned once, waved up at him, and then was lost to sight.

Harper swallowed his fear and listened in to the pair’s conversation. They seemed to be discussing the relative merits of various firearms. “You get a cleaner kill with a Sholokov,” the Vetch was saying, “even if its range isn’t up to the Hoeneker.”

“Give me the Hoeneker any day,” Janaker said. “It’s deadly
and
silent.”

By the sound of it they had finished their sandwiches. With luck they would soon pay their bill and depart. But he should have known that that would just be too easy...

Janaker said, “I don’t know about you, but I rather fancy another beer.”

“You and your beer,” the Vetch growled.

“Waitress!” Janaker called.

Harper braced himself to get up, turn around, and stroll casually from the balcony. He’d wait until the waitress arrived and the pair were distracted, then make his move.

Seconds later he heard the waitress approach their table. “And what can I get for you?”

He stood up and turned. The waitress was blocking access between the tables. He would be forced either to squeeze past the girl or politely ask her to make way... either of which would draw attention to himself.

He found himself striding across the balcony towards the waitress just as she nodded and moved back into the tea room. Luck, it seemed, was on his side. Breathing with relief, he slipped past the table occupied by the human and the Vetch. He sensed Janaker look up at him, and he could not stop himself from meeting her glance.

For the briefest moment their eyes locked.

He hurried from the balcony, his pulse racing. He strode across the tea room towards the spiral staircase, and for a second he thought his luck was holding and the bounty hunter had failed to recognise him.

Then a cry from the balcony indicated otherwise.

He dived for the staircase and, instead of using the steps, braced his elbows on the helical rail and launched himself, helter-skelter fashion to the ground floor.

He landed at speed and made a split-second decision. The option was left or right – out onto the boulevard, or through the kitchen...

Instinct told him
left
, onto the boulevard and the protective custody of the busy thoroughfare. He sprinted from the restaurant and slipped into the crowd, almost colliding with a rolling Ooom. He dodged around the sulphur-filled atmospheric ball, with its fish-like inhabitant staring out at him in pop-eyed alarm, then had the bright idea of using the sphere as cover. Beyond, Janaker and the Vetch burst from the tea room and looked right and left in desperation.

He ducked, grabbed the sphere and rolled it along the boulevard at speed, keeping himself between the bauble and his pursuers. The Ooom emitted a series of shrill squeaks, signalling its alarm, and Harper wondered if his actions would result in a diplomatic incident. Ahead and to his right, an alleyway gave access to the spaceport precincts. Harper released the sphere as he came alongside the alley, then launched himself through a throng of startled Glaydian blue-men. He sprinted down the alley, hoping he’d given Janaker and the Vetch the slip. A hoarse Vetchian cry, seconds later, informed him otherwise. He wanted to look over his shoulder and assess how close they might be, but elected to keep running. He expected a shot to skewer his spine at any second, and wondered whether that would be courtesy of a Hoeneker or a Sholokov...

The alley turned left and he rounded the bend with relief. He sprinted through a mass of pedestrians heading towards the spaceport. The problem with headlong flight, of course, was that it attracted unwanted attention. Citizens would turn and comment, creating a visible dynamic in the crowd... The difficulty was how to tell when he’d put sufficient distance between himself and his pursuers so that he could slow to a casual stroll. He judged that, at the moment, his pursuers were too close for him to do that with any confidence.

At least he was leading them towards the spaceport, which had a couple of advantages. One was that his pursuers might assume, naturally enough, that he was attempting to make for the ’port in order to flee aboard a departing starship. The other, more prosaically, was that from the precincts of the ’port a dozen exits issued to all parts of the city. Once he’d reached the crowded underground plaza he would be able to merge with the travellers and select his escape route at leisure.

That was the idea, at any rate.

He took a subway to the plaza. He glanced over his shoulder. There was no sign of Janaker or the Vetch. He allowed himself a relieved breath and slowed to a fast walk as he came to the plaza and merged with the crowd. This was not the first time in his life he regretted being so tall. He stood head and shoulders above the average citizen, and it would take an eagle-eyed bounty hunter only brief seconds to pick him out of the crowd. He stooped and headed for the nearest exit, a ramp leading to the old quarter of the city.

Just as he gained the exit, he chanced a look back. He saw the towering Vetch arrive at speed at the foot of the ramp, come to a halt and scan the crowd. Its monstrous head turned in his direction and, before he could move, the Vetch saw him and gave chase.

Harper turned and ran.

A minute later he emerged into the ancient street that ran parallel with Phreak Street. He turned right, heading towards Macarthur Street and the vehicle cradle. If he could lose his pursuers before reaching the cradle...

He dodged into an alley and seconds later came out on Phreak Street. He looked behind him. There was no sign of Janaker or the Vetch. He turned right and zigzagged through the crowds, keeping low. If he could make it to his car without being apprehended, then he was as good as free. A short drive up the coast and he would be off-planet within the hour, especially if he informed
Judi
he was on his way and ordered her to power up.

He took a circuitous route to Macarthur Street, confident now that he’d shaken off the bounty hunters. He hoped Zeela had managed to tell the Endolon of his ostensible plan to head for Beckett’s World, and made it back to the vehicle cradle. If the bounty hunters approached the alien again, and then headed off to Beckett’s World, then his way would be free to cross the Reach to Kallasta.

But, he reminded himself, Janaker and the Vetch had caught up with him years after he’d dealt with the last bounty hunter, when he’d assumed his trail would be cold. What were the chances that, first, they would believe the Endolon and, second, decide to hare off to Beckett’s World solely on the alien’s say so?

He decided it was fruitless to speculate, and that worrying over the minutiae of all eventualities would only increase his paranoia.

He came to Macarthur Street and hurried towards the towering, skeletal structure of the cradle.

Zeela was pacing back and forth in the tiny foyer before the elevator. The look of relief on her face when she saw him was almost comical. She ran to him and pressed herself to his chest, murmuring something he didn’t catch. He clutched her hand and dragged her into the elevator.

“Did they see you?” she asked as they were whisked up to the fifth level.

He nodded. “As I left the balcony. I had to run.”

“And they fired at you?”

“I kept to the crowds, so they didn’t take the risk. How about you? You told the Endolon?”

She nodded. “And he said that if they did not return, then he would contact them at the Old Rose and tell them he’d heard you were heading for Beckett’s World.”

“Well done.”

She sagged against the wall of the elevator. “Must admit, Den, that I’m not feeling too good.”

“It’s almost over. We’ll soon be heading away from here.”

She nodded and smiled weakly.

They came to level five and hurried along the catwalk to his ground-effect vehicle. Once inside he darkened the windows for privacy and felt a measure of relief as he drove down the ramp and along the crowded street towards the flyover. Five minutes later they were heading away from DeVries.

He activated his wrist-com and got through to
Judi
, ordering her to power up the maindrive for phase out within forty-five minutes.

Zeela lodged her head against the head-rest and smiled at him. “Just a week ago, if I’d looked ahead and seen myself running away from bounty hunters and heading for Kallasta...”

“You’d’ve thought you were dreaming?”

“It would have been beyond even my wildest dreams! I had no hope. None at all. And then you walked into the Rat and Corpse.”

“Thank Krier Rasnic for that.”

She frowned. “Odd how fate plays itself out, isn’t it? He wanted to see you dead and steal your ship... and from that came my salvation.”

“What did your parents say, Zeela? ‘Life is mysterious’...”

He glanced at her hands. They were shaking in her lap. Aware of his glance, she clasped them together.

Thirty minutes later they rounded the headland above Port Morris and
Judi
came into sight, squat and silver on the emerald greensward. He drove up the ramp and assisted Zeela, weak on her feet now, towards the upchute.

“Are you sure you’re going to be okay?”

She nodded. “I’ll... I’ll just go to my cabin, sleep a little...”

He led her along the corridor, told her to use the com beside her bunk if she needed anything, and hurried to the flight-deck.

He slipped into the sling and ordered
Judi
to phase out, and minutes later the idyllic scene of the bay and Port Morris vanished from sight. He stared into the shifting grey veils of void-space, and for the first time in an hour allowed himself to believe that they would get away from Tarrasay without being apprehended.

He called up a starscape of the Reach, and seconds later the grey void was replaced with a three-dimensional representation of this sector of space. He ordered the point of view to pull out, so that fully half the Reach was in view, a gaseous drift of stars shaped like a stylised arrowhead. Some said that this was how the Reach had got its name, as the arrowhead resembled a devil’s tail.

He plotted a route to Kallasta. He would be forced to stop at a few worlds on the way to refuel and take on provisions. He would call in at Clemency first, where he might be able to sell the steamboat engine and fund his onward journey to the far side of the Reach. The rain-forested planet was twenty light years from Tarrasay. And from Clemency...

His thoughts were interrupted by the com channel bleeping in the arm of his sling.

“Zeela?”

“I’m sick, Den... Will you please come?”

The communication ceased, and he pushed himself from his sling and hurried from the flight-deck.

He ran along the corridor and slapped the sensor beside the sliding door to her cabin. It opened to reveal Zeela sprawled across her bunk, blood dribbling from the side of her mouth.

He dashed across the cabin. Her skin was slick with sweat, the front of her shirt soaked with a thick bib of blood.

She tried to focus on him and smiled weakly. “Didn’t think it would be this bad,” she managed.

“Shhh,” he ordered, scooping her up and hurrying into the corridor.

He carried her to the sick-bay and laid her on the slide-bed of the med-pod. He eased the slide into the machine, sat down and stared through the viewplate in the door as probes like miniature tarantulas inserted needles into her skin.