The Honour of the Knights, Stephen J. Sweeney [reading women .txt] 📗

blown to pieces but there isn't one single, tiny little scratch on her ATAF; and now we're being told that these things can cloak? I mean, don't you see? You don't build something like this for no reason. This is a lot more significant than just the next generation of fighter. What the hell is going on?”

Enrique thought about it for a moment, then shrugged. “Dunno, man. We'll probably find out a little later on.”

“I'd rather know sooner. There's something about all this that doesn't feel right.”

The pair stood in silence for a while, watching as Kelly affixed her helmet and the ladder was wheeled away from the side of the craft. Dodds was then called forward to prepare for takeoff, leaving just Chaz and Enrique together on the cargo bay floor.

“You okay?” Enrique asked the big man, as Estelle taxied forward.

“Will be once this is all over,” Chaz replied.

Enrique noted the usual enthusiastic tone in his voice. “Shouldn't be more than a few more hours,” he said. “Let's say, four hours there, one hour to find that spy, four hours back. Then we can relax.”

Chaz said nothing, the air about him somehow deader than ever.

* * *

“So, let me get this straight,” Enrique was saying, his voice coming in through Dodds' intercom. “We have to go and rescue a spy? Shouldn't those guys be able to look after themselves?”

“Agent,” Kelly corrected him.

As ordered by Parks, the Knights had positioned themselves beneath Griffin, the starfighters not a few meters from the underbelly of the vessel. Just ahead of them hung the small, grey, uninspiring planet that was their destination.

Dodds felt an unwelcoming vibe coming from it and thought it not a place that would traditionally be home to a starport. As he had positioned himself underneath the carrier and awaited Enrique and Chaz to join the others already there, he had studied the overview of the Phylent system on his starfighter's computer, discovering it to be home to a number of asteroid belts and planets. For the most part, the system was uninhabited, though it was rich in raw materials, minerals and other elements. It occurred to him that the port would be favoured by those seeking their fortunes, typically frequented by miners and entrepreneurs.

It made him think back to the time before he had joined the Navy, when he had entertained dreams of mining asteroids for their raw content. He had been talked out of it by his father, who had told him horror stories of the incredible hard work, long hours and many terrific accidents that went hand in hand with such a lifestyle. He still sometimes wondered if he may have managed to make enough money to retire after a couple of decades of hard labour. It didn't have to be anywhere fancy, but so long as he had enough cash to buy a bar on a laid back planet and become the proprietor, he would be happy.

“Preparing to engage cloak,” Estelle said, returning Dodds to reality.

“Think it'll work?” Enrique asked before their wing leader activated the system; it was obvious he was leaving Estelle out of this particular conversation.

“I heard about the last time they tried something like this and how it all went horribly wrong,” Kelly answered.

“It did?” said Dodds.

“If it does, then she'll either end up several hundred miles away from here or she'll travel into the future.”

“That doesn't sound too bad,” Enrique said.

“Before coming back a few minutes later having either gone mad or become one with the ship.”

Dodds said nothing and just swallowed hard as Estelle activated the cloak. He found, however, that there was nothing for any of them to fear: the cloak worked just as Parks had described, and Estelle's fighter faded gracefully from view. Whilst his ATAF's radar could still detect and report the presence of an object in place of where Estelle once appeared, he could see nothing else.

After each of them had tested the system for themselves, Estelle confirmed to Parks that they had blanketed themselves from detection. Then, as one, the five invisible ATAFs slipped out from beneath the carrier and set off towards Arlos.

XVIII

— Of Daggers —

Sitting amongst a huddled group of blanket-wrapped men and women, Daniel Sullivan's suspicions that he was being watched and followed had been confirmed. A woman - he assumed it was, by the way she carried herself - also wrapped in a blanket against the small chill of the starport, had been hovering just out of sight for the last hour or so. The blanket rested on the top of her head, the folds enclosing her and hiding her face from sight. He was now aware that she had been tailing him as he walked around the port, whilst he had been attempting to find someone who was interested in his wares; his efforts so far having been met with disinterest and the occasional outburst of anger from those wishing to be left alone.

Usually the massive central hall of the starport was bustling, filled with all kinds of people: miners, resting from their labour; traders and couriers seeking work and contracts; and many, many travellers. Bright, animated signs, and warm inviting lights from coffee shops, pubs, various food bars and trading posts lining the walls created a welcoming ambience. Even in the most backwater star systems, the familiar branding of intergalactic corporations provided the port's guests with a sense of home and comfort.

Laughter and chatter no longer filled the port, the signs of the shops were inanimate, and the doors were locked, never to be reopened. Many of the windows of the stores had been smashed and the contents looted. The central hall had been transformed into a sea of people, settled on the floor, bags and other personal belongings surrounding them. Young children lay asleep, cuddled up to their parents.

Sullivan found that, though the port was not bitterly cold, it could have been warmer. Keeping warm could be achieved either by wrapping up, consuming hot food and drink, or by moving around. The scarred man opted for latter.

Standing up, he began to stride away from his stalker, partly to put distance between the two of them and partly to get away from the place. Though he had only arrived at the port hours earlier, he'd already had enough of Arlos starport. It was time to move on and find another place to sell his spoils. Perhaps he'd have better luck in the inner systems of the Imperium; the frontier systems that he had visited so far had been almost devoid of life.

In the grand scheme of his chosen career he could be considered a petty thief. He found smuggling, weapons trading and gang associations too much like hard work, and there were too many risks involved. The boarding of the vessel within Confederation space had been one of his biggest jobs in recent years, working alongside an ad-hoc group of others he had met in a dingy bar sometime ago. They had been useless, some succeeding in getting themselves killed even before boarding the ship. He had decided to cut his losses there and then, putting a round into the back of the heads of the survivors, before rigging up booby traps and fleeing with what he could.

That had not been a venture he had enjoyed; not something he was used to. Instead he preferred to focus on the things that were easiest to carry and dispose of, mostly stealing to order. The trades were quick, for the most part effortless and low-key. Starports were his greatest outlet, travellers and entrepreneurs being his best customers. Today, however, Arlos had been a waste of time.

He started back toward the docking port he had left his ship in, with the intention of heading to the nearest jumpgate and departing the system for greener and more lucrative pastures. Although, for some reason he was having difficulty making headway deeper into Imperial space. The navigation buoys were oddly reluctant to provide him with the necessary data. He would dig through his ship's databanks and see if the previous owner, from whom he had so violently separated it, could be of any more help.

Glancing over his shoulder, he noticed that his pursuer had also risen and was once again tailing him, although not as subtly this time as before. It was not the first time he had been followed when he was trading, but judging from the way the woman had kept her distance and her profile low, she was not one of the usual suspects. At first, he had thought her to be in the same line of work as he was, himself: some found it easier to let someone like him do all the hard work and then pounce on them in the middle of a transaction, relieving them of their hard-earned goods. Parasites; he hated them.

But this woman was far too cautious for that. He had dismissed the possibility that she was a bounty hunter, chasing the reward money for either his head or something he had stolen from the wrong person. If she had been, then the pursuit would not have been such a slow, quiet affair - more noisy, violent and very quick. No, this was a new one to him and he could make few assumptions; though one thing he knew he could be certain of was that the woman had decided it was time to come out of hiding and was about to move in for the kill.

* * *

Clare Barber swept between the groups of people settled on the floor around her. She watched her step as she did so, though she did not take her eyes off her target, who walked now with a greater purpose than just the wish to sell his haul and leave.

He still had the card, though. She had heard him enquire a couple of times in the past hour as to whether anyone would be interested in buying information. They weren't, of course; these people only wanted to get away.

It seemed to her that the man was either far too ignorant or far too arrogant to appreciate the terrible fate that had befallen the Imperium, and so it had come as little surprise to her that he was having difficulties in offloading his stock here. She thought it likely that he had, until sometime ago, only operated in Confederation and Independent World star systems, returning to Imperial space now after attracting too much attention and needing to disappear for a while. If that was the case, he was not having much luck escaping unwanted attention here, either.

He stopped walking and Barber, anticipating his next move, calmly reached inside the jacket she wore beneath the blanket and removed a pistol from within. Her finger clicked the safety off.

The man turned around, his and Barber's eyes meeting for the first time, his scowl telling her that he was not happy with being followed. Many scars covered his face, showing many permanent reminders of the cost of his chosen lifestyle. His eyes seemed to tell terrible stories of all he had butchered whilst in the pursuit of that path. He presented a look that would have had many hastily reaching for their valuables, rather than incurring the pain and violence promised. Barber was immune: she had seen many more terrible things.

He sighed audibly before speaking. “<You've been following me all day. Did you want to buy anything or is there something else I can do for you?>” His voice was calm and smooth, his eyes still locked on Barber's. He was playing with her, trying to throw her into a false sense of security, pretending that he was not as threatening and dangerous as his looks might suggest, giving her the chance to walk away.

Though the man spoke in an Imperial dialect, Barber knew that he would understand everything she had to say to him. “You are carrying something I want,” she said, with equal calm. The pistol she gripped emerged from between the folds of the blanket that still enclosed her and she pointed it casually at the man's chest. “Hand over the data card. Nothing else, just the card. And do it slowly.” Her other hand slipped the blanket from her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor behind her.

Though she had her pistol in her hand, she was not about to approach and frisk the man herself. Her experience with people such as this raider had taught her that they could be slippery characters, unpredictable and desperate, and either very cunning or very stupid. It mattered little to Barber which of those he might be, since, no matter what, she could be certain he would be very dangerous.

At the sight of the pistol, people close to the pair started shifting, shuffling backward and clamouring to