Where the Ships Die

Contents

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

 

For those who work with primitive tools—

for whom survival is nearly always in doubt—

and still care about others.

Our hope lies in them.

 

My eternal thanks to Marjorie, Allison, and Jessica.

You make everything possible.

1

It is said the warrior's is the twofold way of pen and sword, and he should have a taste for both ways....

Miyamoto Musashi
 

A Book of Five Rings
 

Standard year 1643

The Planet New Hope

The Milford Academy for Young Men was more notable for its location on the fashionable side of First Hill than for the quality of its architecture. Still, the cream-colored columns and reddish-black bricks
were
reminiscent of the universities the students hoped to attend, and made the institution seem more dignified.

A series of long, hill-hugging terraces had been carved out of the slope below the academy. Dorn Voss followed a flight of stairs down past the field where a soccer game swirled, past the pavilion where first-formers thrashed around the swimming pool and into the overgrown jungle that he regarded as his own private domain. The garden had been an orderly place once, rich with green foliage, colorful flowers, exotic scents, and the sound of steadily dripping water. The microhabitats, some twenty-five in all, had been designed by Mr. Halworthy and maintained by his students.

Dorn knew he'd never forget the fringe of gray-white hair, the black X where Halworthy's suspenders crossed the vast expanse of white shirt, and the old man's barely heard voice as he delivered the lecture to the plants rather than his students.

Many of the boys had disliked Halworthy, and found his subject dry and boring, but Dorn was the exception. He liked anything connected with space travel, and the scientist had been a member of a survey team in his younger days. Hal-worthy had explored virgin planets, cataloged alien life forms, and lived to tell about it. All of which added depth to his lectures, or so it seemed to Dorn, who had looked up to the older man as a surrogate father. Halworthy was gone now, killed by a plague variant with a number instead of a name, and his almost daily contacts with the slum people. How many gardens produced more vegetables because of the old man? How many children went to bed with full stomachs because of his advice? Hundreds ... maybe thousands.

That was a year ago now, a year in which two-thirds of the alien microhabs had died, and local plants had moved in to take their places. Plants that brushed Dorn's shoulders as he made his way between them and threatened to obliterate all that Halworthy had built. The hand-lettered signs were difficult to read now, and the black irrigation tubing was hard to follow as it snaked its way through the garden. There had been talk of a new botanist at first, but it seemed as if no one wanted the job, and Dorn couldn't blame them. Of the Confederacy's more than 500 worlds, New Hope was one of the most backward.

Dorn followed a path that skirted the greenhouse and made its way out onto a weed-encircled terrace. The city of Oro shimmered in the afternoon sun and stretched for as far as the eye could see. The slums, more than 300 square miles of them, started beyond the electrified fence that circled the hill, and spread out from there. Most of the buildings were one or two stories high. A lack of steel reinforcing rods made it impossible to build anything taller. What little bit of iron ore New Hope had was notoriously hard to mine, and the cost of importing finished metal was prohibitively high.

So, with the exception of a small group of extremely wealthy families, most citizens lived in grinding poverty— poverty that stemmed from a lack of natural resources, a highly stratified society, and systemic overpopulation.

Dorn knew those things as he looked out over the endless concrete hovels, the smoke that spiraled up toward a polluted sky, and the rivers of filth that flowed toward the sea. He saw the conditions but didn't
feel
them. And why should he? Especially since he'd been born on another planet and sent to New Hope for an education, or as a way to get rid of him, he wasn't sure which. New Hope was little more than a prison, so far as he was concerned, having nothing to do with him or his future.

The teenager looked around, verified that he was alone, and lit a stim stick. The smoke bit into his lungs, chemicals found their way into his bloodstream, and he felt better. The voice was unexpected and caused him to jump. "Mr. Voss? Are you there, Mr. Voss?"

The title "Mr." combined with the high, piping voice was a dead giveaway. A first- or second-year student had been sent to find him. Dorn considered extinguishing the stim stick and decided against it. An underclassman wouldn't dare report him, and the news that he'd been smoking would enhance his already seedy reputation, a reputation that kept both students and faculty at bay.

The "rat," as the younger boys were known, was about ten years old. He burst out of the undergrowth as if shot from a cannon. His hair was wet from the pool, his swimsuit was at least one size too large, and blood oozed from scratches on his arms and legs. His name was Wiley or some such, and he looked scared. "Mr. Voss! Come quick! The uppers grabbed Mr. Mundulo, and they're killing him!"

Dorn was seventeen years old and towered over the little boy. He took a drag from his stim stick and released the smoke the same way his favorite holo hero always did. He didn't like the way the younger students were treated but saw no reason to get involved. “Mr. Mundulo gets the crap beat out of him every day, so what's the big deal?"

"The blood," the little boy said earnestly. "It's all over the place and they keep hitting him."

Dorn sighed, tried to convince himself to let the matter drop, and failed. He could have asked, "Why me?" but he already knew the answer. Wiley and his fellow rodents couldn't go to the faculty, not with a hundred years' worth of tradition staring them in the face, so, since Dorn had been nice to them, well, not
nice,
exactly, but not mean either, they hoped he'd intervene.

The senior added the stim stick to the collection of butts already scattered around the terrace and gestured toward the bushes. "Lead the way, rat, and you'd better be right."

The little boy dashed away, and Dorn followed at a more dignified pace. What if the little shit was exaggerating the way rats tended to do? Appearances were important, and he had an image to protect. His peers wouldn't appreciate meddling and could make his life miserable if they chose to.

It took the better part of five minutes for Dorn to climb the stairs and make his way into the swim pavilion. He heard the beating before he saw it. The voice was loud and echoed off interior walls. “Hey, rat, take it like a man ... What, you think I'm stupid? Faking won't work."

Dorn smelled chlorine and noted the water-slicked tiles as he passed through a gauntlet of frightened faces. The room had locker-lined walls and a bench that ran down the middle. Mist thickened the air. The rats came in all colors, shapes, and sizes. They stood in front of their lockers and shivered when the outside air hit them.

Dora took them in with a single glance, along with the pitiful, nearly unrecognizable creature who occupied the center of the room. Mundulo had been tied to a pillar, beaten senseless, and beaten again. His eyes were swollen shut, his lips were pulped, and contusions covered his torso. Dorn saw blood bubble as air passed between the boy's lips and gave thanks that he was alive. A pool of vomit mixed with urine surrounded the rat's feet and added to the room's already funky smell.

The boy's tormentors, a group of uppers that the rats referred to as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, turned toward Dorn. Confident smirks confirmed what Dorn had surmised. The coach was away and wouldn't return soon. Their leader, a sallow-faced youth named Cramer, waved a bloodstained hand. "Well, this is a surprise, the Voss-man himself. What's up, Dorn? Come to join the fun?"

Dorn shook his head. "No, a few laps, that's all. Are you finished here? I'd like to change."

Cramer looked skeptical. "You? Work out? Since when? No, I think it was something else that brought you here, something that looks and smells like a rat." The upperclassman's hand shot out and grabbed Wiley's hair. The little boy twisted free and started to run. An upper named Havlick grabbed the youth and held him off the floor.

Dorn frowned. "That's enough. Put him down."

"So," Cramer said softly, "the rumors
are
true. The Voss-man
is
a rat lover. Well, come on, rat lover, show the rodents how you love them."

Havlick looked doubtful. "I don't know, Cramer..."

"You don't know what?" Cramer demanded sarcastically. "Who your father was? Get real, Havlick ... You don't believe that crap, do you? Have you ever seen Voss fight? No? Well, neither have I. Voss invented that martial arts crap to scare idiots like you."

Havlick licked thick, meaty lips and shrugged. "Sure, Cramer, whatever you say."

Dorn looked at the others, saw the hunger in their eyes, and knew there was no escape. None of the Horsemen had been present during the single fight that marked his first year at the academy. He remembered the long hours spent with his sister and the sound of her voice. "No, your other left, dummy ... Start face forward, feet apart, arms hanging at your sides. Now, move your right foot back and out at a forty-five-degree angle. Okay ... not bad for a geek. All right, bend your knees a little, rotate your hips to the right, and try to look scary. No, I said 'scary,' not 'stupid.' Good. Now, bend your left arm, keep your elbow low, and raise your fist. See? That protects your face and chest. In the meantime, you need to pull your right hand back to your hip, and hold your palm up. Perfect, or as perfect as a little turd like you is likely to get."

The stance came naturally, as did the three commandments that went with it: Strike the target, snap back, and hit hard. The Horsemen came all at once, the way bullies tend to do, hoping to overwhelm Dorn with brute force. Dorn hit Cramer with the heel of his right hand. The boy fell and skidded. Havlick tripped on the body. The rats cheered as he went down.

The third upper, a weight lifter known as Malo, blocked a throat chop, threw a right, and connected with Dorn's chin. Dorn staggered, reset his stance, and threw a spin kick. Something crunched and Malo fell. He started to cry.

Cramer was back, as was Havlick, cautious now—but determined to hurt him. Dorn felt angry. Angry about what the uppers had done, angry about the way his parents dumped him on a piece-of-shit planet, and angry that he couldn't do anything about it.

He lashed out, felt his fists connect with flesh, and gloried in the contact. He took blows, channeled the pain into his anger, and fought even harder. It became a dance, a whirling, ducking, kicking, twisting dervish in which each move seemed to have been choreographed in advance and he knew exactly what to do. Blood spurted from Cramer's nose, vomit erupted from Havlick's mouth, and Malo rolled on the floor. But wait ... where was—?

No sooner had he formulated the question than the fourth Horseman, a zit-faced troublemaker generally known as Pestilence, or the Pest, slipped a belt over Dorn's head, and pulled the ends in opposite directions.

Dorn's next move was completely unexpected, and he could almost hear his sister laughing as he threw a reverse elbow strike. It connected, and the Pest coughed, but hung on. Dorn pulled at the belt, struggled to breathe, and stomped on his opponent's foot. It made no difference. His vision blurred, the light started to fade, and darkness beckoned.