Where the Ships Die (27 page)

Dorn had refilled the wineglasses, and was headed toward the kitchen, when a voice turned his head. The girl was his age or close to it and was very, very pretty. Not only that, but he'd seen her once before, riding in the back seat of the family limo. "Oh, waiter! Yes, you. Mr. Lott needs more butter."

It wasn't Dorn's table, but he knew how the request would be handled in a fine restaurant and acted accordingly. "Yes, ma'am. Right away, ma'am."

It took but a moment to swing by one of the back tables, grab a bowl of iced butter, and return to the young woman's table. He delivered it to her rather than Mr. Lott. "Your butter, ma'am." She looked and Dorn smiled. "It's nice to see you again."

Seleen frowned. It hardly wrinkled her skin. "We've met?"

Dorn smiled. "In a manner of speaking. You were in the back of your father's limousine and I was marching along the side of the road."

The frown became more pronounced. "You are extremely impertinent."

Dorn delivered what he hoped was a courtly bow. "And you are beautiful. You'll have to excuse me now... Chef Fimbre will be most upset if the soup arrives cold."

Dorn left, but her eyes followed him, and he cursed himself for a fool. What was he playing at, anyway? The whole idea had been to see Myra, fill his eternally empty stomach, and earn an extra bit of metal.

He decided to avoid the girl like the plague, like
all
the plagues, and entered the kitchen. Fimbre ordered him to hurry; he nodded obediently, and carried his tray back toward the water. It was heavy, but not as heavy as steel hull plates, so the youth had no difficulty hoisting it to his shoulder. He put it down and was in the process of serving the soup course when someone shouted, "Look!" A rumble was heard.

Everyone looked for the source of the noise, and Dorn was no exception. He saw the ship at the same moment that he heard the blare of recorded trumpets. The fanfare was followed by Mr. Sharma's voice. It boomed over the speakers.

"Gentlebeings! This is the the moment you've been waiting for. Prepare yourselves for a rare spectacle, as an enormous spaceship races toward you at more than two hundred miles per hour, and runs aground before your very eyes. Here it comes!"

A collective gasp was heard and the sound grew louder.

The ship was a long way off but grew larger with every passing second. Dorn squinted into the sun and bit his lip. There was something familiar about the vessel. Very familiar indeed. Form follows function, so many vessels look alike, but this one had the slightly droopy nose, raised brow, and side bulges typical of long-haul data liners. Especially those manufactured by the Drood Yards high above Langley II. More than that, this particular ship was huge, and reminiscent of the flagships his parents had commissioned. They'd been named after his mother and sister and were the pride of the Voss Lines fleet.

Just as his suspicions started to jell, Sharma took the microphone. "That's correct my friends, hold onto your chairs, because one hundred thousand tons worth of metal is headed straight for you!

"This ship, formerly known as the
Mary Voss,
will be cut into pieces, sold to you, and reshaped into tools, buildings, bridges, and thousands of other useful things, bringing jobs and prosperity to our planet. Remember this moment, because you won't see anything like it again!"

Dorn stood stunned as the very heart of everything his parents had worked to build hurtled toward the beach. Someone yelled, "I can't see!" and hands pulled him away. Obedient, but unwilling to take his eyes off the liner, Dorn tripped, recovered, and watched from outside the pavilion.

The
Mary Voss
was coming fast, much faster than was necessary or prudent, and the youth was reminded of the runaway ship and the destruction it had wrought. Would the same thing happen again? He almost hoped so, even if it meant that Sharma and all of his guests would almost certainly die. The fact that he would go with them was regrettable but worth it.

The
Mary Voss
was big now,
very
big, and the air displaced by her massive hull had created a miniature tidal wave that rolled in front of her. The sound of her mighty engines was so deep, so powerful, that the ground shook and cups rattled.

The sun was gone, eclipsed by the huge machine that had been mined from alien soil, steered through gaps in the space-time continuum, and condemned to serve out her final moments as mealtime entertainment. A memory surfaced briefly and was swept away. It had something to do with the ship and his seldom seen father, but Dorn couldn't focus on it. Not with tears streaming down his cheeks. Not for the ship, but for his parents, who were surely dead, for nothing less than their deaths could explain the sight before him.

The vessel slowed, hit the water with a gigantic splash, and sent waves in every direction. They broke against the older wrecks, swept haulers off their feet, and rushed toward land. Then, like a sea monster exhaling its last breath, the liner groaned and slid to a halt.

As Dorn wiped the tears off his cheeks, he felt something small and warm nestle in his hand, and knew Myra had joined him. "I'm sorry, Dorn, really sorry."

Dorn swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat. "Thanks, Myra, that helps."

Myra's reply was interrupted by one of the guests. "Excuse me ... could we have some service over here?"

Myra withdrew her hand. "Fimbre will be furious if he sees us standing around. We'll meet during the fireworks, remember?"

Dorn nodded soberly, returned to the busing station, grabbed a tray, and collected the empty soup bowls. Sharma offered the first of what turned about to be an endless round of toasts. The ceremony kept the guests busy, and made Dorn's job that much easier.

The hours passed, courses came and went, and the sun dropped below the data liner's massive hull. Finally, as the dessert goblets were cleared away, and the after-dinner drinks were served, a steady stream of aircraft started to arrive. Then, as the most important guests were escorted to the pads, the less fortunate were treated to a carefully programmed fireworks display, complete with lasers and three-dimensional holographs. These included twenty-foot-high portraits of the Sharmas, plus each guest in attendance, all captured during the afternoon's festivities.

Dorn searched for Myra and found her in the shadow cast by the house itself. They came together with the sureness of lovers. Her body, soft yet firm, melted against his. Lips met and met again. Light strobed as a holo lit the sky, and the guests clapped. Neither saw Seleen leave the house and stop to watch them.

18

Greed makes man blind, foolish and ... an easy prey for death.

Rumi

Persian Sufi poet

Circa 1250

The Place of Wandering Waters, the Planet Mechnos, and Aboard a Traa Survey Ship in Deep Space

The rain fell in sheets, splattered across the spaceship's deck, and cascaded down her flanks. Natalie, who was soaked to the skin, and had given up all hope of ever being dry again, looked up and flinched as the raindrops hit her face. She pointed toward the lead-gray sky and held her hand aloft. The launch rocked gently and was dwarfed by the spacegoing leviathan above.

Captain Jord stood silhouetted against the dark gray sky. He wore foul-weather gear, and it was impossible to see his face. He remained motionless, as if to extend his third officer's misery. The entire crew knew their commanding officer held Natalie responsible for what he regarded as a bad run. Never mind the fact that the government would reimburse the owners as though the
Will of God's
holds had been fully loaded, never mind the fact that they would pocket the difference between what fuel costs
would
have been with a full load of cargo and the lesser amount actually used, and never mind the fact that Jord would receive a bonus. The
Will of God
had been built to haul freight, and that's what she was supposed to do. Unscheduled side trips, no matter how profitable, were aberrations. Finally, after what seemed like forever, he gave the necessary nod.

Natalie gave a sigh of relief, checked to make sure the area was clear, and dropped her hand. The crane operator, who thought the whole thing was extremely entertaining, pulled a lever. A motor whined, the cable went taut, and water jumped away. The specially fabricated harness creaked under the strain, and Rollo felt heavier as the lake fell away. A sudden gust of wind caused him to spin one half-turn to the left. He felt helpless and awkward.

Though normally proud of his physique, especially when mingling with members of his own species, the Dromo felt momentarily envious of the smaller and therefore more agile races. Why couldn't he be like Torx, who had no need of cranes and the like? Such was the price he paid to venture off-planet, however, a necessity that had presented itself all too frequently of late. Still, the other choice, which would involve the sacrifice of his work, was too painful to consider. No, he was fortunate that the government indulged him to the extent that it did. Not that they could exclude his race and expect them to adhere to the Confederacy's laws. Still, the body that graced the rivers and swamps was a trial sometimes, which left him frustrated.

The crane operator, who was good at what he did, brought Rollo aboard with one smooth motion. Torx had supervised the creation of what amounted to a well-appointed stall. It was ready when Rollo's feet hit the deck. He felt better as the Treeth tapped a greeting into his receptor pad and freed him from the cable.

Rollo's freedom was short-lived, however, since only thirty minutes had elapsed before two members of the crew returned to rope his harness to the deck, and secure the hold. The announcement and matter-of-fact countdown seemed overly melodramatic.

The activity, combined with stress, served to stimulate his appetite. A bale of pond-marinated weed had been placed in front of him. Rollo attacked it hungrily. Chewing had always had a meritorious effect on the law officer's cognitive functions, so, by the time the
Will of God
had powered free of the lake, the Dromo was lost in thought. So much so that he barely noticed the additional gees or heard the announcements that were meant to reassure him.

The problem, as he saw it, had two dimensions. The first and most obvious thing to do was to locate the perps and take them into custody, a matter that had been made easier to some extent by the fact that a high-speed, eyes-only data torp had dropped into orbit the evening before and been accessed by Torx. It seemed that the head of Orr's security force had landed on New Hope, murdered a government agent, and appeared at Dorn Voss's school. It was a troubling development, but one that simplified the situation, heartless though that might seem. By focusing on the murder, the co-marshals had an airtight reason for investigating matters that their superiors might prefer to ignore. Which explained why they had commandeered the
Will of God
and were presently headed for New Hope, a locale sure to attract the Traa, and, with a little bit of luck, Orr himself. The problem was to arrive on the scene quickly enough to save the Voss boy
and
the coordinates. Assuming the youngster knew where they were.

The second and more puzzling part of the case stemmed from the triune nature of Traa society, and the fact that it had suffered the cultural equivalent of a nervous breakdown. Assuming Torx and he were able to intercept Carnaby Orr and apprehend the Traa, what then? The rest of the race would still be out of whack, and the same sort of nonsense would happen again. It was a depressing thought, and depressing thoughts made Rollo hungry. The second bale tasted even better than the first.

Carnaby Orr's eyes opened. His mind, normally fuzzy following a full night's sleep, was crystal clear. He took one look at the tubes, cables, and monitors connected to his body and knew exactly where he was. He also knew why.

Someone, and he would eventually learn who, had told his wife about Jason. And Melanie, god bless her medicated little heart, had emerged from a drug-induced haze. Then, having suborned his staff, and saved her son from what she saw as a fate worse than death, the woman he had loved had gone one step farther by having the symbiote transferred to him.

The knowledge that it was there, snuggled in between his organs, had terrified him at first. Not any more, though. No, Melanie had done him a favor. He had undergone major surgery, conked out for a few hours, and felt like a million credits. No, make that a
billion
credits, since that would be little more than pocket change once his plans were implemented. All because the symbiote was taking care of him. How long would he live, anyway? A hundred years? Two hundred? Life was good. Or would be, the moment he left the hospital.

Orr sat up in bed, jerked the IV out of his left arm, ripped the contacts off his skin, and threw them aside. Buzzers buzzed, lights flashed, and people started to run. A nurse and an orderly arrived first. Both happened to be male. They saw Orr and assumed the worst. It had happened before. A patient awakes, doesn't know where he or she is, and becomes hysterical. They smiled reassuringly and moved forward.

Orr waited with the confidence of someone who knows what he can do, opened his arms in a gesture of welcome, then grabbed the backs of their heads and slammed them together. They crumpled to the floor. Orr loved power, and had accumulated quite a bit of it. But not like this. Never like this. Not
physical
power of the sort that allowed him to impose his will on people directly. It felt good, damned good, in spite of the fact that it flowed from chemicals produced by something alien living inside of him. But so what? Results are what count. Ask the bozos on the floor.

Having found no clothes of his own, Orr slipped into the hospital-issue robe and tied the belt around his waist. He left the room and was twenty feet down the hall when the next wave of medical personnel ran past. The industrialist smiled. The previous Orr would have stopped at the desk, apologized for what he'd done, and released himself from the hospital. His lawyers, armed with blank checks, would have handled the rest.