Too Good To Be True: Chapter 6

The Crimson Lien shook as its shield ate a large blaster bolt that would otherwise have sliced the ship in two. Six alarms flared up on Chuck's console, and the most pressing one seemed to be that the shield was at 80%. It could take about 4 more hits before failing.

He had just returned from the cargo hold, where he and Quincy had given the Bollians an unceremonious burial in space through the airlock. The good part of killing someone with a blaster - he had sardonically admitted to himself - was that the superheated plasma cauterized the wound it made, and therefore there was no blood.

Quincy was trying to wash the nonexistent blood from his hands in the main washroom when the the ship shuddered. He leaned out into the kitchen and called forward toward the cockpit, "What in space was that?"

That's enough stealth, Chuck thought as he fired the maneuvering thrusters in a random direction, hoping to dodge any further blaster fire. Controls flared to life as all navigation systems - which they had left off in hopes to maintain a stealthy retreat - came online.

As Quincy skidded into the room, Chuck explained, "They found us. I'm winding up the rel drive. Get me a red line ASAP."

Quincy took the beacon from the Gibber jump point and started his line. Chuck kept firing the thrusters.

Quincy spoke as he worked, "We're an hour from the jump point at our current speed. At full rel that's thirty minutes. Can you keep this up for a half hour?"

"No, but we're not doing full rel. I want a line at a hundred and twenty percent, and I want the line at that speed all the way to the jump point."

Quincy paused his work for a second. "You want to hit the jump point at 1.2 rel?"

"Suicidal, actually. I believe they call it a Slip. At 1.2 rel we're only about twenty minutes away and it'll be harder to follow us."

The rel drive hit 100% readiness, and Quincy's line displayed on the screen. Chuck punched the rel and accelerated away from their pursuers.

Quincy tried to sound hopeful. "Maybe at 1.2 rel they won't follow us," he said.

The ship shuddered again. Quincy frowned and corrected the end of his sentence, "...as much."

They sat in silence as the ship climbed to - and past - full rel. Quincy scanned charts of all known comets orbits and compared it to the scanner data that was coming in. At more than full rel, going the dust left behind from a comet could be catastrophic. They wouldn't have time to dodge anything once they saw it in the scanner, but they could at least tilt the odds in their favor and avoid the high-probability areas. He modified the red line to a slightly wavy course through the dust lanes on his chart, and Chuck steered the ship accordingly.

Quincy leaned back, happy with his course, and realized another problem. "You know, just going through the jump point's not enough. They could follow us."

"I don't know what Gibber's stance in this war is. And they could report that we bombed their planet. We'll have the whole system after us."

Chuck thought, his eyes darting from the front window to the controls, to the scanner output. "We'll have to take out the jump point."

Another bolt connected, knocking the shield down another large notch. Their pursuers were apparently not going to be daunted. Chuck winced and started the random course changes again. "I do have an idea, but you're not going to like it."

"It can't be any worse than what we're looking at now. Go ahead, I'm all ears," said Quincy.

AutoLog

Date: October 23rd, 523 AG

Location: Halfnor, The Outliers

Time: 19:48GT

Caution: Relative speed 120% accepted safe speed.

Caution: Shields at 38%

END LOG

Quincy hadn't used a space suit since college, and he'd never put one on alone. In fact, it went against everything he had been taught in school. It was one of the cardinal sins of space travel to suit up alone. Only in the most dire of emergencies - such as dying anyway if you did not put the suit on - should someone attempt it.

But Chuck was not available, seeing as he was busily dodging blaster fire, and if Quincy didn't get the suit on he would likely die anyway.

His heart raced as he thought of each little thing that could go wrong because he had to verify his suit integrity by himself. The cargo bay depressurized, but his suit did not. "Small wonders," he said quietly.

The large front cargo bay door opened to space. Quincy detached one of the half-containers from its rigging. Half-full of lead, the container had over 5 tons of mass. There was no way he'd lift it, but they had accounted for that.

Out the door, Quincy watched the stars seem to fall downward. With the inertial dampener and ship's grav on, it looked like it was raining. But he knew in his mind what was happening: Chuck was flipping the ship around so the cargo bay door was facing backward.

The stars stopped suddenly, and just as suddenly he was weightless. He pulled the container from its rigging and held it to his chest with both hands, his back to the other cargo containers that were still secured. He faced the void with the half container floating in front of his chest.

"We're ready," said Chuck over the radio. "Just shove it out. Hard. And then get back up here."

Quincy shoved the container with both arms, as if he was passing a large ball in some zero-g sport. It was heavy and therefore he was not able to get it moving very quickly, but it flew true. It slowly floated in the 0-G environment out the door and through the shield into open space.

"It's out. Give me grav and shut the door," Quincy said. "And then give me pressure."

Chuck did so, and Quincy worked his way back to the lift before the bulkhead door was even ready to open.

Meanwhile, Chuck flipped the ship around. He didn't need it to face forward but he wanted it to. It made him feel better. More in control. And if you can't actually have control, he thought, you may as well FEEL like you're in control.

The cargo bay reached full pressure and the door between the decks opened. Quincy leaped up through it, his suit still on.

"You know we only have one chance at this," Quincy said as he crossed the length of the room.

Quincy reached the turret and pulled the tube down over him. "You realize that you're going twelve times faster than you were last time."

Grav ceased in the turret tube and a chair folded up under him, pulling him upward into the turret itself. As he grabbed the controls Quincy suddenly wished that in the four days since they bought the ship, he'd tried firing the turret.

The key to the plan was in the timing. It all had to be done in the final 30 seconds, or it could all be for naught. Too late and they'd not get it done. Too early and their pursuers would have time to act.

When an escaping vessel is heading for a jump point at full rel, there are generally three possibilities: First, the ship can slow down to enter the jump point at a reasonable speed at which point it would be vulnerable to attack or capture. Second, it could try to go through the jump point at full rel - a Suicide Slip - which would likely fail. If it did fail, the ship would simply fly past the jump point and would likewise be easy to capture. Third and finally, the Suicide Slip could be successful and the pursuers ships could simply follow the target through the jump point. This is the worst possibility for the pursuers, but even a Suicide Slip can't guarantee escape, if the pursuers have enough ships. The Halfnor Navy - from what Chuck could see on his scanner - had enough ships.

The important part of this for Chuck's plan was that none of these three possibilities justified shutting down the jump point, especially in a time of war. Jump points cannot simply be turned back on at a whim, after all. If they shut the jump point down it could be down for weeks. Months, even.

If the Halfnors knew Chuck was planning to take out the jump point, they could radio ahead and have it shut down, which would ensure that the Crimson Lien could not escape.

And so there was timing. The pursuers would have to - until the last possible moment - think that they had the upper hand.

Quincy moved the turret around, figuring out the controls. "You sure you can do this?" asked Chuck.

"Not at all. I never at any point even implied that I was sure about any of this."

And the complications of the plan got worse. Not only would Chuck have to pilot the ship perfectly into the jump point at 0.12c, he also had to rotate the ship well enough to give Quincy a good shot at the cargo container - and he couldn't maneuver the ship - either to dodge blaster fire or modify their course to the jump point - until the container was destroyed. If he did, they would quickly get too far from the container and Quincy would have no chance to shoot it.

And Quincy had to hit the container to cause it to explode within 30 seconds of entering the jump point.

And then Chuck had to radio out a warning so their pursuers had a chance to break off pursuit but not enough time to shut down the jump point.

And of course, Chuck had only those last few seconds to make any course corrections and then shut down all power on the ship.

Chuck's hands shook in anticipation. He was ready to perform every maneuver. He just couldn't. Not yet. "Quince... 20 seconds."

The Crimson Lien's turret threw bolts of plasma into space. He missed high. He corrected and missed low. "The damn thing's a meter across!"

Finally he connected. A tiny explosion lit up behind them. It actually didn't look that impressive. "Got it!" yelled Quincy.

With 12 seconds on the clock, Chuck checked the red line one more time, and hit a maneuvering thruster with as deft a hand as he could. The line centered perfectly. He stared at it, using up valuable time looking for any indication that she ship was deviating in any way. It wasn't. At least he hoped it wasn't, and in any case he was out of time.

"Pursuing ships!" he said into the radio as the timer reached 5 seconds. "That explosion is antimatter! Veer off or be destroyed!"

He hit the master power switch, killing all power in the ship. The yoke went dead in his hands. Weightlessness engulfed him.

He stared out the front window in anticipation as if - at one eighth the speed of light - he'd be able to make out a 10-kilometer long unlit bit of scaffolding. The stars mockingly sat in perfect stillness.

AutoLog

Date: January 1st, 0AG

Location: Default

Time: 00:00 (0:00am Local Time)

Startup Self Test completed.

All systems online.

END LOG

The pain seared through Chuck's head like it was being delivered by a flaming syringe of acid. He could not keep his eyes, which were instantly filled with tears, from closing. The pain had a color even, though he could not identify it. It was simply the color of pain. All sounds ceased and all he could hear was the pain. He could even taste the pain. And smell it. He was engulfed in pain and he could not tell where it stopped and he began.

Slowly, in throbbing fits and starts, the pain subsided. With each of his heartbeats the pain rose, and then fell to a slightly lower level of agony than it had been.

He didn't know exactly when it happened, but his hearing returned. He could hear his own breathing, and a strange sound that took him a few seconds to identify as that of his hands grasping the plastic of his pilot chair's arms in a death grip. There were no other sounds, though, and he couldn't get his brain to figure out why.

His sight returned next, but it took him a few moments to realize it. The lights were off. Out of the front window he could see stars, but all else was darkness.

The power was off because he had turned it off. Because they were going through a jump.

He hit he main power switch with a hand that had not yet regained its sense of touch, and the controls exploded with light. Chuck closed his eyes to the glare and allowed the ship to take care of itself. Grav returned and he had never felt heavier. His tongue tingled as his sense of taste returned.

He squinted through pursed eyelids at the searing light. It was getting better. Not much, but it was.

He thought, could this be what Quincy goes through every time we jump? No. This has to be worse.

Chuck undid his lap belt and stumbled from the cockpit into the kitchen. Quincy was passed out on the floor under the turret. His head was bleeding where Sultia's blaster rifle had hit him. The fall seemed to have reopened the wound.

Chuck laughed, softly so as not to reawaken the pain. "Yes. As much as you may not want to be. We made it."

They worked their way back into the cockpit, and Quincy flopped into his chair. Chuck sat down gingerly. "Does it feel like a hangover?" he asked.

Chuck shook his head, and instantly regretted it. "No. I mean normally. For you. In a normal jump."

"A bit. Like if you had a hangover and then someone jabbed a hot poker in your eye."

"I don't know. It was so bad I passed out. Okay, there's the jump point. It's about one and a half AU away."

"It takes light about 12 minutes to travel one and a half AU. So we have a couple minutes before we know if it worked or not."

"Actually," said Quincy, "if you don't mind... I'd... like to talk about what happened."

Chuck blinked, and looked at his friend. Quincy was disheveled. The blood from the cut on his face had dried on his cheek. His eyes were an odd mixture of wild and calm. His right ear, which he'd spent so much time in therapy to straighten, was bent in the middle and drooping. He was panting, open mouthed.

Chuck wondered if he looked, to Quincy, the way Quincy did to him. He suspected it was possible. Is this shock? Traumatic stress?

"I never..." Quincy began. He swallowed, considering the words he was about to utter. "I've never killed anyone... before."

"I know, but still. I shot someone. Sultia is not alive any more because I shot him."

"If we hadn't shot Sultia and Prialla, they'd be dead right now anyway. Along with us."

Chuck continued this line of thinking. "So really, we didn't kill them so much as... change the way they died."

"Damn straight I'm rationalizing. But that doesn't make it any less true. We didn't end any lives that wouldn't have ended anyway. And we saved the lives of a BILLION people, ourselves included. I'm putting this one in the 'good deed' column."

Quincy thought about it, then nodded. "Okay. Me too. I just don't..." He faltered, trying to choose his words.

"I don't want this to become a thing. You know? A thing we do. On a regular basis. I don't like it."

Quincy nodded, and looked at the console. "It's been almost 5 minutes. If the antimatter took out the jump point, it should be turning off any minute now."

The beacon signal went out. Quincy realized that he'd been holding his breath, and he let it out in a long, relieved sigh. "We're safe. Let's get out of here."

Pilot's Log

Date: October 25th, 523 AG

Location: Ignot, The Outliers

Time: 14:46GT

We went through Sultia and Prialla's things and didn't find much. We kept their blasters. They're new and powerful and we should really be more prepared next time. If there is a next time.

They didn't have any more money and we probably couldn't have taken it anyway. It's bad enough that there's a money trail between them and us for the first 10 grand. Hopefully, because it happened on the other side of the Bubble and they had fake identities set up, nobody will ever make a connection.

We got out of Gibber without being seen. We never turned on the active navigation equipment and were far enough from the jump point when it went down that it was easy to sneak away.

On the news the explosion at Halfnor - and the gate going down - is being called a terrorist attack and everybody suspects that the Fallons had something to do with it. Any good will that the neighboring systems had for Fallon is gone, and I guess the war's going to be over soon. The 8 half-crates that hit the planet did so - thankfully - in an underpopulated area. Still, the explosion killed about ten thousand people and they say the environment of the planet will be affected for decades to come. The King of Halfnor said he couldn't imagine a more terrible act.

I can. I can imagine it 19 times more terrible.

Quincy says the antimatter containers are nearly priceless. In the right market we could probably get a billion credits for the batch. Or we could get our throats slit. If we don't mind being screwed over, a safer bet would be to try to sell it cheaply to someone we know. For example, the loan shark we owe for the Crimson Lien.

We could probably offer the cargo in exchange for our loan, plus enough to pay off the bank loan, plus a nice bit extra to make sure we don't have to take any fares like this ever again. We'd be free and clear. I can think of worse ways to be.

PAUSE LOG

Quincy called up to Chuck in the cockpit. "Okay, they're all out of the cargo bay. We're on target?"

Chuck checked the HUD, squinting into the bright sun ahead. "Yes," he said. "Cut 'em loose."

Below, floating in space between the Crimson Lien and the mass of cargo containers of antimatter lead, Quincy cut the guy line that connected them to the ship. Hand over hand he pulled himself back up that guy line to the cargo bay. He floated through the open front door and landed on the floor as the ship's grav grabbed him. He hit the door control and watched through his suit visor as the door closed on the view ahead. The star Ignot - bright and orange and large - framed the tied-together cargo containers that floated in front of the Crimson Lien.

Chuck spun the ship around, aiming not quite directly back from the star, and hit the engines. The rel drive accelerated them away, leaving the cargo containers behind.

All things in space - unless they are accelerating like the Crimson Lien was doing now - appear to be at rest to anything going the same direction and speed. From the perspective of the Crimson Lien, the cargo containers had been at rest, floating calmly in space.

From the perspective of the star Ignot, however, the cargo containers were not at rest. They were traveling quite quickly, actually. And in a very straight line.

CONTINUE LOG

So we just unloaded the containers. Dozens of priceless containers of antimatter lead that can pretty much only be used for one thing: Blowing stuff up.

I saw what they can do on a small scale, and neither Quincy nor I are willing to be responsible for what they could do on a large scale.

So in under an hour they will plunge into Ignot Prime. The star will have a flare - no bigger than a typical solar flare - and the planet buster we've been carrying for the past two days will be no more.

Good riddance.

END LOG