Homesick

“Captain!” Ian’s voice boomed from Sally’s headset. She’d taken the earpiece halfway off when the yelling started, and now could hear him clearly even at arm’s length.

“Ian, what the hell are you doing?”

“He’s gone berserk!” he said through groans and gasps. “Scott’s attacking me!”

Daaarrm smiled in amusement. “He’ll defend us to the death, you know! Would your crew do the same?”

Sally ignored his taunting. She had no time to make this personal. Instead, she simply reached into her pocket for the hidden box. Without taking it out, she pried the lid open with her thumbnail and felt the rubbery buttons on the bottom row. Starting from the left, first, second, third . . . Press!

On the headset she could hear Scott’s surprised grunt as consciousness left him. The struggling stopped and she could just make out the whispering rustle of Scott’s body skidding onto one of the walls and coming to rest.

“OKAY YOU BEAST! NOW YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN! SEE THAT? YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT THAT FEELS LIKE? YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW THAT FEELS?” She could hear the woman scream in fright and stumble, her feet scrambling in disorganized thumps.

“Ian!” Sally yelled, “What’s going on? Don’t do anything, Ian! Don’t do it!”

But a brief crackle from the earpiece told her Ian had shut off his microphone.

“Ian!”

Daaarrm’s smile suddenly turned into a sneer, or rather the sneer that had been twisted into a smile reverted to its normal shape. “You people are useless! I can’t believe we wasted our time with you!” He looked upon her with a haughty, superior face, like that of a gang leader ridiculing a weaker rival. “You’re idealistic fools! Well, fine! If you won’t work with us, others on your planet will!”

“That’s it, Darm!” Sally straightened back into her fighting stance. “You’re leaving now!”

His smile oozed back as he sized her up again. “You’ll make good sport! I was hoping to get a second chance at you!” Lust resurfaced in his eyes like the stirred dregs of a pond. “I won’t be so easy on you this time!” He lunged at her, kicking off the end of the table to build momentum.

The athame made a glaring flash and a slicing sound as Sally whisked it out of its sheath. Then, with lightning speed, she ducked down, rotating with the floor of the ship, reoriented herself, and kicked him in the stomach with both feet. He was heavier, which meant she would be unlikely to null out all his momentum, but this also meant he would absorb more of the blow. His lungs deflated in a frustrated grunt that ended in a cough. Sally had expected him to grab her legs, but he didn’t. At the conclusion of the skirmish they were both off the floor, rotating around each other, and floating in the rough direction he had started in. But Sally knew the ship. She gripped the edge of the window, perfectly anticipating when they would arrive at it, and kicked him again, this time propelling his body into the console next to the door. Then she advanced on him with the knife, pointing it squarely in the center of his throat. The tip sank in almost a quarter inch, freeing a trickle of blood.

“Did you know I’m a doctor, Darm?” she asked with an excited grin of her own. “I wasted almost half my life in school.” Her breathing came in short, rhythmic spurts as her primitive brain prepared for the next battle. Her hand was secure on the knife handle and all her senses heightened to their maximum, watching for any movement Daaarrm might make. “My favorite subject was anatomy. Heart, lungs, that sort of thing. I see you have carotid arteries just like we do. They’re located on either side of this blade!” Her grin broadened. “I’m pretty good, you know! I could open both of them at the same time by moving my hand less than an inch! You’d bleed out within two minutes!”

Daaarrm’s eyes widened with genuine fear. He made a move to slip away, but Sally quickly repositioned herself to match. “I should also warn you that it doesn’t have to be me that moves that inch I was talking about. I could just stand here and let you do all the work! What do you say?”

In the mess hall Obiiilion was standing now, backing away from Ian and looking longingly at Scott.

“Cannibal bastards!” Ian said, waving his gun. “So you like the Nazis, do you? You think people are yours to do with as you like, do you? Is that what you wanted with us? TALK, YOU SWINE!”

“No,” she said, trembling. “We just wanted to make a deal with you! We wanted to help!” A trickle of urine escaped her as she backed away from him.

“Oh, that’s beautiful, that is! As if you don’t stink enough as it is now! So you wanted to help us?” He grabbed the skin pouch from the table and shook it in her face. “Is this the bloody help you’d give us?”

She cowered, her face rippling with fear.

“Well, we want no part of you and your death camps!” He pushed the gun deep into her chin and gripped her jaw, forcing her to meet his eyes. “There’s only one way you can help me. You tell me how to fix Scott here. How do we get him back?”

Her eyes widened in a different kind of fear, and her face took on a cast that Ian could only interpret as the beginnings of panic.

“Well go on! Tell me! That bastard said there was a way, but he didn’t tell the Captain, did he? So you tell me!”

“There is no way,” she said with tears forming in her eyes. “He lied if he said there was!”

“And what if your life depended on it?” he asked, pushing the gun in deeper.

She trembled, gasping several times. Ian feared she’d hyperventilate, so he made an effort to soften his tone. “Come along now, beast! What would it hurt if we got Scott back? Just one bloody slave from the bunch! Not too big a price for your life, is it?”

“It’s never been done!” she said through her sobs. “We don’t know how!”

“Well, isn’t that just too bad for you!” he said with deadly earnestness. He then pointed the gun at the bridge of her nose and drew the hammer back. There was an uncomfortable silence as Ian stared at the pathetic face with a hatred he didn’t know he was capable of. He imagined how the face would look with the hole he could put in it with a mere half-press of his finger. He thought of his grandfather, Scott, and Builders he’d shot. He thought of what she’d planned to do to Scott. It would be easy to shoot. It would feel good! He could even pretend it was in self-defense and easily get away with it. But, even as he felt the metal of the trigger against the pad of his finger, something stopped him from drawing it back. At first he struggled with it, but to no avail. It was the gentle tug of an old man’s hand. He could see his granddad’s face in his mind. In some fashion beyond the physical, the old man, or some part of him, had reached beneath his finger and was carefully blocking his progress with the trigger. He couldn’t stop Ian. The choice was still his. But he could offer him one more moment to consider. The force was real, but not physical. He didn’t feel it so much in his hand but in his heart. Then he understood. He could pull the trigger, but not without shooting granddad, too. Not without losing the part of him that lived on in him. Even in the old photograph, taken after he’d been through a man-made hell on Earth, his eyes had remained kind and honest. They had not made him one of them. His conscience was clear. Granddad was never driven by hate. Obiiilion was evil and cruel, and she probably deserved a hundred grisly deaths. But now she was unarmed and defenseless. And, though it seemed a trivial technicality, she hadn’t been condemned. There had been no court, no judge, and no jury. Therefore, in the civilized world, Ian had no right to kill her. In his heart he always knew this. He imagined Granddad giving him a gentle but admonishing look, as if he were on the verge of being disappointed in his grandson. Ian felt his finger begin to relax. He stepped back from her slowly, letting out a frustrated sigh. But he stepped back clean. Then, in a final backlash of rage, he brought the gun across her face with a vicious slap! He jerked the barrel towards the door. “Out!”

Sally’s standstill with Daaarrm had lasted over a minute now. The blood had trickled below his collar and he breathed hard with both fear and anger.

“Captain!” Ian’s voice returned over the sound of Obiiilion whimpering in the background. “Captain, I’ve had enough of this swine! I’m putting her off the ship before I shoot her! This bloody toe rag was going to eat Scott, do you hear me? She was going to eat Scott! I’m taking her to the departure deck!”

Sally drew a sigh of relief. “Two minds with but a single thought,” she said, more to Daaarrm than Ian. She smiled triumphantly at Daaarrm’s obvious resentment. “Okay, Darm, this is what’s going to happen: I’m going to back up about three feet. That’ll be your cue to put your hands on top of your head, turn around, and walk out that door and back down the hall to your pod. Let’s see if we can get it right in one shot!”

As promised, Sally backed away and waited.

But then, in a snorting roar of rage, Daaarrm advanced again, his arms reaching for her wildly.

Slice! The blade flashed through the air, cutting a neat line through the sleeve of Daaarrm’s jacket and into his forearm, creating a long trickling trench as he tumbled past her to the floor. Daaarrm stared in surprise and fear, looking back and forth between her and his injury.

“Nice one!” Sally said with critical nod. “Another inch to the left and you might have lost the use of your hand. A few inches lower and you’d be bleeding to death right now!” She chuckled, as if drawing animal strength from the sight of his blood. “But, then I don’t really know your anatomy all that well. I’m just guessing where your plumbing actually is. I don’t really know how not to kill you. It’s like Russian roulette. I guess you got lucky this round! Why don’t we go again? Maybe I’ll hit the jackpot this time! I always thought this room could use a little color!”

Daaarrm breathed harder, still looking from his arm to Sally’s taunting face, as if he were about to cry.

“What’s the matter, Darm? Don’t you like a little sport? Or maybe you just like a rigged game, is that it? You only like to play against the defenseless. You’d rape a poor little girl who couldn’t hurt you if she wanted to! You’d capture some starving person wandering the woods! Or you’d jump an unsuspecting and unarmed astronaut like Scott Anderson! He came in peace, you know! We all came in peace!”

Daaarrm continued to tremble, fixing his eyes on the flashing blade.

“What’s the matter, too much fire for you?” She stared into his amazed eyes. “So, what’s it to be? Do you still want to play? I’ll go again! I’m beginning to like this ‘sport’ of yours!”

As if in answer, he slowly raised his hands to his head.

“Well, well!” she remarked in mock amazement. “I didn’t think you were capable of such a smart move! Now march! Five feet in front of me, out the door.”

He stumbled forward.

Once in the hallway they could see Obiiilion squeezing herself into the hatch to the departure deck. Ian hovered behind her, his gun hand trained on her and trembling violently. “Get on, you!” he shouted, kicking her hard in her exposed buttocks.

“He’s mad!” Daaarrm shouted. “Stop him!”

At that, Ian whirled around, bringing the barrel in line with Daaarrm’s head, not even looking for his marks on the wall.

Daaarrm yelped in fear, backing away. He forgot about Sally’s knife, which came within inches of him before she pulled back.

Sally looked at Ian with concern, trying to size up what was happening in his head. His face was still beat red and tear streaks cut down his cheeks. She could see that the hammer of the gun was pulled back and his finger was poised on the trigger.

“Ian, no!” she said.

He looked at her as if asking a question. Then he whirled around to check on Obiiilion’s progress, as if unsure which particular threat was most important.

“Ian, come this way,” Sally said with forced calm. “You, move ahead!” she told Daaarrm.

Ian lowered the gun slightly, as if in a daze. He started towards Sally, eyeing Daaarrm with an expression that resembled only mild annoyance. Daaarrm hugged the wall as they passed and then backed away frantically when he cleared Ian.

“Give me the gun, Ian,” Sally said.

“But . . .”

“Now!” She snapped her fingers, glancing at Daaarrm.

Still trembling, Ian unclenched his fingers. He grasped the hammer and let it down gently before dangling the gun in front of Sally by its trigger guard.

Sally took the gun and sheathed her athame. The pistol felt hot in her hand and slippery with sweat. “Stay with me, Ian!” she whispered. “I need you!”

He grunted agreement and followed behind her. His breathing slowed slightly, as if he were drawing strength from her confidence.

“Vlad!” She called into the headset. “Where are you?”

“In Bay One,” he said as if he were in an awkward position.

“Is the ship ready?”

“Ready? Ah . . . yes! I’m just clearing away __”

“Listen carefully! Get out of the bay. Our guests are leaving. As soon as Obilion is clear of the hatch I want you to go down the rod into the cone. Don’t take the hallway. Get ready to launch as soon as I tell you.”

She could hear Vlad grunt and struggle with something, but she wasn’t sure what it could be. She heard the rustle of fabric. “Vlad, I mean it! What are you doing in there?”

“I’m on the way out! Don’t bring them yet!”

“Vlad, we’re at the hatch and Obillion’s stuffing herself through it! Once she’s through, you have to make your way to the cone!”

“Is she stuck in the door? Can you get her back out first?”

Sally sighed. “Vlad, our guests are leaving, not coming! Understand? Do as you’re told!”

“Captain, we needn’t be enemies!” Daaarrm pleaded. “You can still reconsider! We need each other! You could still be called ‘Mistress Buds!’”

“I have reconsidered,” she said, pointing the gun at him with both hands. “Now move!”

Daaarrm followed Obiiilion into the departure deck, noting Vlad as he flew by down the tunnel. Sally followed, gun raised.

As they entered the deck they could see that Obiiilion, red-faced, wheezing, and teary-eyed, had already started making her way through the hatch to the shuttle bay, kneading her belly through the opening with frantic haste. And then, with a final gasp of effort she may not have exerted in years, she disappeared into the darkness below.

Daaarrm stood over the open hatch looking down, but then he confronted Sally. “You don’t expect me to step into that thing without any assurance of our safety, do you?”

“No,” Sally agreed, “I guess not.” She then twisted her body without warning, kicking Daaarrm’s feet over the edge of the hole and sending him tumbling downward. “More sport!” she shouted down at him. “Now get into the ship! Both of you!”

Sally then jumped down the seventeen-foot ladder way, landing on her feet directly below the hatch. She watched Daaarrm push at Obiiilion as she climbed the open ramp into the ship. He turned and stared at her.

“You’re going to kill us, aren’t you? That’s your way, isn’t it? We’re not the barbarians, you are!”

Sally laughed. “Daaarrm, I can’t begin to count the times I could have killed you! But I never did, and neither did Ian!”

He faced her with some of his cunning returning. “Then why do we part the same way we did before? Why do we leave with your weapon raised against us? How do we know this ship will really take us home?”

“If I were going to kill you, don’t you think I’d come up with something more satisfying than that?” She smirked. “Don’t you think I wanted to cut you to ribbons? I could have, you know! But this gun would be easier and less messy! About four pounds of pressure is all it would take. Now get in the ship before I use it!”

“You aren’t like us! You have no idea what you’ve given up. You’re not fit to join us!”

“Thank you! Now get in!”

Sally held the gun high until the outer door clamped shut. But, immediately after that an alarm klaxon sounded, indicating that the depressurization sequence was beginning. The floor jerked sideways as the gyro stopped, sending Sally reeling against the ladder, shrieking in sudden panic. The red light began to flash on the frame of the door above!

Without taking time to think, Sally leaped upward, passing the bay hatch as it began to close, catching her toe on it momentarily as she flew. She broke her fall by gripping the gyro rod and wrapping herself around it like a gymnast.

Ian had been at the panel, working feverishly to override the launch sequence. He followed her up with his eyes, staring in sudden wonder.

“Vlad, you idiot!” Sally shouted.

Bouncing back to the door, she stared through the tiny window as the ship was guided out of the bay by the great mooring claws. A series of fire bursts jetted it away from the bay then, and the planet below disappeared through the closing metal door.

“Good riddance to bad rubbish,” Ian said with a sigh.

Sally patted his shoulder as she leaped back to the gyro rod and thrust herself towards the front of the ship.

Chapter Fifty-Two

The Keeping of Her Word

Sally appeared behind Vlad, who was engrossed in the shuttlepod remote navigation screens, clearly eager to drive the small ship away from them as swiftly as possible. She was surprised to see he was wearing the better part of a space suit, its accessories spilling over the pilot station couch.

“Got a little ahead of yourself, didn’t you?” she asked with a hint of sarcasm.

He looked back at her.

“I was in that bay when you began depressurizing, you idiot!” She grabbed him by the collar. “I told you to wait for my order!”

Looking genuinely mortified, he was speechless.

“Forget it!” she said, focusing on the controls. “Let me do this. I want to be the one to take them down.”

Vlad got out of her way, taking a seat at the adjacent console while Sally scrolled through the menus on one of the screens. “The chutes check out, fuel more than adequate, air supply positive. And I can see from the computer’s self-analysis that absolutely no onboard systems work beyond remote navigation.” She looked to Vlad with masked surprise. “Good work.”

“I followed your orders, Captain. Did you think I would sabotage the ship?”

“Forgive my skepticism, Vlad. I just had to be sure. My reputation on that wretched planet is at stake, after all.” She checked the room for Ian and then turned to Vlad with a more serious expression. “You’ve honored our agreement, Vladimir. I’ll keep up my end as well. There’ll be nothing said about what happened before.”

Vlad fidgeted, as if half insulted by her gesture. “Thank you, Captain,” he said, looking away.

Sally then glanced at the camera monitor. The view inside the shuttlepod wasn’t much different than it had been on the way up. She’d checked it only to verify that they were onboard. Satisfied now, she turned it off.

“Captain, the explosive . . .” Vlad began.

She turned sharply. “It’s ready, isn’t it?”

“Yes, just as Ian planned. I want you to know it can be triggered any time. I added manual control to the main display.” He pointed to a small, red menu on the edge of the console. Two squares glowed. They were marked “arm” and “detonate” respectively.

“You think of everything, don’t you, Vlad?” She smiled but did not look at him.

“I have something else to report, Captain. It may not be my business, but I feel you should know.”

“Another miracle! Vladimir Coronov volunteering information. Go ahead.”

“The VR chip specifications Dr. Poole gave me to make. She said to do Anderson’s last.”

“Did you do it?”

“Before they arrived.”

“And?”

“Captain, I thought you should know the adjustments I was told to make are forbidden by international law. You could be held liable.”

Sally turned to him. “What are you talking about?”

“Don’t trust Poole too much. She may be making trouble for you.”

“What did she ask you to do?”

“She wanted the pain safety guards disabled,” he said, almost whispering. “And she locked out his override control.”

Sally gasped. “Are you sure that’s what she meant?”

“You may look for yourself.”

“I would, but I wouldn’t know what I was looking at. It’s not my field.” She pinched her lip. “Are you sure she said to disable the override?”

“Absolutely. Anderson will have no way of stopping a VR transmission.”

“And you made those modifications?”

He nodded. “I was ordered to.”

Sally’s face stiffened, resigned to the idea. “I’ll talk to Poole about it,” she said, turning back to the controls. “Thank you for telling me.” She looked at the displays silently for a moment, but could feel Vlad’s eyes on her back, watching the console over her shoulder. She tried to ignore him but finally grew tired. “I’ll bring the ship down from here, Vlad. You and Ian tend to Scott. Then you can go off duty for a while if you’d like. You also may want to get out of that suit. No wonder it took you so long down there.”

He nodded and turned to leave. But for a moment he hesitated, as if wanting to say something else. He walked away instead.