Cholak's Demon
Chapter 6
“How are you holding up?” Aeryn asked Crichton. He was moving better with every passing microt, which meant
that they weren’t exerting as much effort to keep him upright, but he continued to stagger badly whether his
eyes were open or closed.
“Okay. Doin’ a little better,” he mumbled. “Are we in a hurry?”
It was the third time he’d asked the question and he was breathing hard, leading her to suspect that he wanted
to stop and rest. “Yes. Not much further, John. Keep moving.” But they’d only traveled half the distance to
the hangar, and the worst of the journey was ahead of them. More of his weight fell on her shoulders and she
braced herself to catch him, but he was only pushing himself up straighter. He was walking more steadily
although he still had his eyes closed.
“Boosters,” suggested Gallenn as the trio accelerated.
“They’re taking effect,” she agreed. They pulled on John, slowing him as they approached a junction of several
main corridors. “Hold still,” she ordered. John clung to her as Gallenn walked forward on his own to see if
there was a security station in any of the branches.
“We’re okay,” he reported, coming back to help. They’d managed to get through two checkpoints without
getting scanned simply by barging through, acting like a security detail dragging an unwilling officer somewhere
in a hurry. The uniforms had done their job and they’d drawn little more than a glance. “They must not have
the lock down in place yet.”
Aeryn nodded, momentarily surprised by his comment before she remembered that he’d been a Peacekeeper
and would be familiar with how long it took to implement the excessive security measures. “This can’t hold up.
We’ve been too lucky.”
“That means there’s some deep dren ahead of us,” John concluded. It was his first unprompted contribution to
the conversation since leaving his cell.
“We haven’t been in deep dren so far?” Gallenn asked incredulously. “What do you do for fun?”
“Be quiet. You don’t sound like officers,” Aeryn warned. They walked along silently for several microts.
“I thought I told you not to come back with the Peacekeepers on your ass,” Gallenn broke the silence. He
grunted as John lost his balance. They pulled him up and kept moving.
“Didn’t come back,” John panted, struggling to move faster. “And they were on … your butt, not … mine.”
“Would you two like to sit down and discuss this?” Aeryn broke in, “or could you shut up and concentrate on
getting out of here?”
“Sorry,” they chimed together.
They all went quiet as a group of six officers came the other way, glaring at the apparently drunk officer being
dragged along by his friends. One of them, a captain, stepped in front of the trio, frowning at Crichton’s lolling
head. “You’re a disgrace!” he barked at the staggering man.
“Buy you a raslak … sir?” John offered, straightening up. He smiled at the scowling superior and belched. “Or
two? Whoops.” He staggered and would have fallen except for his two side-supports.
“Sir!” Aeryn snapped to attention as the focus turned her way. “His behavior has already been reported to his
commanding officer, sir. He wants him sober before his punishment begins.” Beside her John pulled himself
erect, managing a swaying facsimile of standing at attention. The combination of the stimulants and the food
replacement tablets had to be restoring his awareness and some of his energy. He hadn’t been able to stand
up on his own until that moment.
“Sorry, sir,” John offered, squinting to keep the captain in focus.
The captain looked the three of them over, then shook his head and pushed Gallenn aside, hurrying to catch
up with his companions.
“Whoops,” John said, starting to collapse. Gallenn caught his arm, and they set out again.
“Can you move faster?” Aeryn asked. The detail assigned to take John to the Aurora Chair might arrive at the
cellblock any microt, after which their chances of getting to the ship would diminish rapidly.
“Think so,” he answered tiredly. “Give it a try.” The three lurched into a shambling run, slowing only when they
encountered other personnel or had to change directions at an intersection.
“Almost there,” she encouraged him. “Keep going.” John nodded, gasping for breath, and managed to move
faster. They approached the last corner, and she pulled them to a walk. “Checkpoint,” she said to Gallenn
over John’s head. “What do you think? Will they buy that he’s drunk?”
“Any other choices?” He steadied John as he stumbled to one side. “Stick with us, Crichton.” The bowed head
nodded as he fought to catch his breath. “How about he forgot something in the hangar? Helmet or rifle?”
“It’s weak,” she said. “But it’s the best we can do. Let’s go. Be ready to run.”
They turned the corner, and headed for the entrance to the hangar. She could see the prototype ship waiting
for them, parked to one side. The stairs to the cockpit were down, and there was no one working anywhere
around the craft. The open hatch beckoned to her, promising safety and escape, and an end to the constant
fear that John would get killed. They were so close. “Best effort right now, John,” she whispered.
He straightened up, blinking several times to clear his vision. “With you. I’m still drunk?”
“Yes. You forgot your helmet inside the hangar.” He was walking on his own now, although they were keeping
him aligned, catching his stumbles. “We’re helping you get it, and then you’re going back to your quarters to
sleep it off.”
“Drunker would be better, wouldn’t it?” he asked quietly.
“Yes. They’re doing genetic verification scans. We have to get you past them without getting checked.” She
finished briefing him in a whisper as they approached the guards.
“Okey dokey.” He crossed the last of the distance in two lunging steps and tripped, landing face down in front
of the security detail. “Sorry. Sorry,” he apologized to them, pulling himself back up by grabbing on to the
scanning machinery. He made to his feet, grinned crookedly at one of the frowning guards and toppled to the
side, stumbling into Gallenn.
“Ident chip,” one of the men demanded of Aeryn while the two men staggered to one side. She handed it over
willingly, waited for the indicator to change, then placed her hands in the depressions without being asked.
“You pass,” he chanted, handing the chip back.
“Catch this guy,” Gallenn requested, handing John’s wildly staggering form off to her while he took his tag off.
“Sorry about him,” he apologized to the detail as he handed it over. “A little too much to drink.”
“A little?” The guards laughed as Aeryn and John went down together in a tangle of arms and legs. “Is he
trying to report for duty?”
“No, left his helmet in the hangar somewhere. We just want to get in to find … watch it!” Gallenn yelled his
warning as John got to his feet but overbalanced. He snatched his hands back from where he’d been about to
insert them in the genetic scanner in order to catch him. “You need to forget about your helmet, my friend.
Let’s head back to quarters.”
“Nope,” John slurred. “Need my lid or I’ll be in big trouble.” He nodded seriously toward the guards. “Big
trouble. Uh oh, chip.” He began patting his chest, then peered into the collar of his shirt, looking for the non-
existent item. “Frell me. Oh, gonna get disciplined this time.” He leaned against the console while continuing
to search through his shirt and jacket.
“You lost that too?” Aeryn played along. “You idiot! You’ll be lucky if you just get a punishment assignment.”
“Yup, I’m definitely frelled.” John was still peering inside his jacket, fumbling about for the supposedly missing
ident chip. “Uh oh!” he said suddenly, grabbing at his stomach with one hand. “Don’t feel good. Gonna be
sick. ‘Scuse me.” He tried to shove one of the guards aside, acting as though he was trying to get to a corner
behind their post.
“Get him out of here!” One of the security guards pushed him away, panicked by Crichton’s series of gagging
lurches. “Just find the frelling helmet and get him out of here. We’ve had to put up with horrible odors the
entire day! Don’t add to it!”
They bolstered Crichton up, and headed into the hangar without delay. “Nice acting,” Gallenn whispered.
“What acting?” John returned. “I feel like crap. I think I’m gonna blow chunks here in a microt.”
Aeryn pushed him along, recognizing the first sign that his body was refusing to produce any more energy,
even with added influence of the drugs. The stimulants could goad an exhausted body only so far, putting a
nearly intolerable strain on someone who’d gone without sleep for as long as John. She suspected that he had
an arn or two of usefulness left at best; after that he’d be in danger of a complete physical collapse. But in
another arn, they’d either be free or dead, and it wouldn’t matter.
She took him by the elbow, steering him toward the ship. “Not much further. Can the rhotarri drive jump from
inside the hangar, or do we have to blast our way out of here somehow?”
“Inside the hangar, although the damage isn’t going to please these folks.” He was looking around, taking
notice of his surroundings, and walking more steadily. Gallenn was three motras to their left, pretending to look
for the missing helmet for the benefit of the security personnel.
“Will it cause an implosion?” she asked hopefully. They were a third of the way to the ship, nearly to safety.
“No, just tear things up a bit. We’ll probably take some of the interior with us when we go.” He was sweating
from the effort of walking. “If we’re really lucky, the hangar door might come with us.”
There was an enormous crashing and banging behind them. Aeryn turned in time to see several squads of
troops race through three of the entrances, all carrying weapons. “Frell!” she yelled, “Run!”
“Your scan got detected!” Gallenn yelled as the troops behind them opened fire.
Aeryn pulled John to the right, the pair stumbling and falling behind the cover of a refueling station. She
watched Gallenn scramble for cover in the other direction, moving closer to the prototype ship as the pulse
blasts increased in intensity.
“Bad place to be, Aeryn,” John yelled against the increasing din. They were hiding behind the rectangular
housing that protected the pumps and valves, but the top was open, the fueling nozzles exposed. “Froonium.”
She unholstered her pistol and jammed it into his hands, retaining the pulse rifle for herself, and glanced
around the edge of the squat rectangular base of the station. “They’re spreading out. We have to move fast.”
She fired several shots at the furthest of the flankers, driving them back, then checked on John. He was on his
back, firing hand signals at Gallenn who was behind a stack of containers five or six motras away.
“Keep firing for a bit, get them disorganized,” he relayed for her. He flipped onto his stomach, edged forward
and started shooting.
“Get THEM disorganized?” she yelled back. She spotted a receptacle marked as carrying radioactive sludge
and put several shots into it. “Wrong stuff,” she observed as it blew up to the howls of dismay from the troops
crouched behind it. Somewhere on the other side of the hangar an ammunition pod exploded with spectacular
results, taking several troops with it. Gallenn grinned at them, and went back to firing.
“Reinforcements are going to arrive quick,” John warned. He sat up and fired past her, watching in satisfaction
as one of the doors into the hangar slid closed.
“Oh good, you’re telling me something I don’t know,” she snapped. She looked where he’d fired and added
another shot to destroy the door mechanism. She swung back toward the thickest concentration of black
uniforms, and her next shot hit a rack of solvents, setting off multicolored flaming fireworks. Troops scattered in
all directions and four went down under their combined fire. “Are they disorganized enough for you yet?” She
snapped off a shot over the top of the block, hitting a running trooper squarely in the chest.
“Nice shot.” John flicked a series of hand signals toward Gallenn. “Get ready to run. We’ll cover, and
I’ll come next.”
“You have a hand signal for that?” she asked, scattering a group of men trying to flank them again.
“If you have to know, I said, ‘Rush order, move components to back wall, quick, more to follow.’ Does that make
you feel better?” John fired toward Gallenn, the pulse blast sailing past his friend to hit a figure who had snuck
around the perimeter of the hangar. The sebacean waved a thanks and kept firing.
“No. It makes me wonder if I’m going to get covering fire or spare parts. You go first. I’ll be faster, and you’ll
have cover from two angles.” The fueling station came under heavier fire and she huddled next to him. “Don’t
argue, just get ready to run. Give it everything you’ve got, John.”
He looked up at her from where he lay on his back, starting to argue, then closed his mouth. “Okay. But you
prove to me that you’re faster. Don’t make me come back here and get you.”
“I promise,” she agreed.
He rolled to his feet, the pulse pistol in one hand, and crouched on his toes, waiting. Gallenn glanced over and
shifted to the other side of his cover. “One, two, three --”
“Go!” Aeryn yelled, and stood up, firing as fast as she could at anything that moved. Another trooper went
down, a second spun out of sight, certainly injured, and her last shot managed to hit a door activator, closing
another entrance. She ducked behind cover, took a breath and popped up again, destroying the lock
mechanism with two fast shots, sealing that doorway. She ducked down and checked on Crichton.
John had made it across. He was slithering on his stomach to the far side of Gallenn’s stack of barrels, working
to get a second angle to fire from. Aeryn slung the rifle behind her where it wouldn’t get in the way, and took up
the crouching stance, ready to run. John’s left hand came up with one finger extended, then two, then three.
She bolted from behind the station, head down and accelerating as the firing picked up from both sides.
She saw the smiling profile as she got closer, John’s grin waiting for her even as he stayed focused and kept
shooting. There were only three more long, fast steps to the spot behind the barrels and she got ready for the
diving slide that would be the most effective way of transitioning the last motra.
The heat and impact tore into her side, smashing her sideways in a searing explosion of pain and surprise.
The hangar spun for a microt, the walls wheeling in strange patterns, then she hit the floor and slid, feeling the
warm liquid trailing behind her, and regretted that she wasn’t going to keep her promise.
* * * * *
A trooper ran through the smoke from the burning solvents, trying to work around to the side where he could
get a shot at the fugitives. John snapped a shot at a wheeled bin with bright markings on the side and it began
to burn. The trooper tried to reverse direction, feet scrambling wildly to get away from the smoking container,
so he put another shot into it. The entire hangar shook with the force of the explosion. “Wow!” he yelled, and
began searching for another container like the last one. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Aeryn
running toward him, head down, moving far faster than he could have. She’d been right to make him go first.
He snapped another shot, missed the man he’d been aiming for but hit the yelling officer next to him instead.
Sometimes being a lousy shot paid off. He grinned, and spared a moment to check on Aeryn. She looked into
his eyes, started to smile, and a pulse blast ripped into the center of her body, flinging her out of sight.
“AEERRYYYYNNN!” he screamed. Gallenn grabbed at him as he scrambled on all fours in her direction,
hauling him down. “Let me go!” he screamed at him, beating at his friend with both hands, the pistol lost in his
frenzy.
“No, she took it square in the midsection. Stay down, Crichton!” Gallenn tried to get on top of him, but he
thrust his friend off and tried again, vaguely registering that the firing from the other side of their barricade had
ceased not that they’d stopped shooting. “She’s got to be dead, John! She’s dead!” the voice bellowed in his
ear.
“No, no, no, no!” He hammered at the hand gripping the edge of his jacket and pulled loose. He burst out from
behind the cover to find a soldier there, the remaining men fanned out behind him as he forayed toward the still
body lying in the middle of the floor.
This was the one who had killed her, the one responsible … it had to be this man. Crichton changed direction,
barreling into him and they went down in a tangle. They came up separately, the black clad murderer swinging
his weapon up, lining it up with his own body.
Then
someone
did
something
odd.
Time slowed, everything in the hangar moving at a crawl except him.
There was a singeing burn across the side of his neck, heat tasting sour and sharp just before he tackled the
leather-clad figure. His hand scrabbled at the man’s waist to find the hilt of the weapon he knew would be
there, cold weight coming loose, fingers sliding into depressions that cradled each digit, welcoming them there,
a familiar but hated sensation. Warm flood, a cry silenced; he turned and there was another. Energy flowed
easily, lacking thought, a slash, a gouge, ripping upwards, turn and move on. Crichton spun around the nose
of a Prowler, or perhaps the carrier spun around him; it was so hard to tell with the high-pitched whine inside his
ears. Someone yelled, a cry of surprise, another fast impact, down, arm jerking fast and with exuberance,
move on, another leather-clad figure, move on, move on.
The universe sucked in a breath and spat him spinning across the hangar, a new odor to add to the miasma of
chakan oil, burnt paint, blasted circuits, and the underlying scent of copper and salt air that he always
associated with blood. He thought he had gotten to his feet, but the metal deck was under his cheek. A new
scent of cooking meat was making him nauseous, too closely associated with the grinding and pain in his
shoulder. The muzzle of a pulse rifle swept across the hangar just ahead, and the smells and sensations were
ignored as he slithered closer on his belly, making the lunge across the last gap without care for the shrieking
coming from his body. Move on, another was aiming at a spot where Aeryn might be concealed, move on,
someone turned shouting a warning, a tearing through leather, warm wetness, move on, move on.
“Crichton!” He whirled around, crouching, the long blade held out in front of him, of little use if this next man
held a rifle on him. “Aeryn’s on the ship! Come on, we have to get out of here!”
John squinted at the gesturing figure, seeing only the black uniform of the enemy, the mark of the killers. He
took a deep breath, preparing himself for the lunge across the intervening space, uncaring if he lived or died.
They’d killed Aeryn … he would make sure they paid for that before he went to join her.
“Aeryn’s on board, waiting for us. Come on.” The person waved at him frantically.
“Aeryn.” He’d been sure something had happened to her. John looked at the object in his left hand, wondering
why it wasn’t in his right, watched as someone else’s hands pried the fingers open one by one and let it clatter
to the deck.
“That’s right,” the other person encouraged him. “You have to fly this thing. I don’t know how.” John moved
forward, thinking that perhaps this person knew him. He was talking about Aeryn, telling him he had to go
where she had gone.
He stumbled as he was shoved into the cockpit, suddenly down on his hands and knees, his right arm giving
out so that he crashed awkwardly onto the cold metal deck plates. He remembered waking up here one
morning, Aeryn squatting near his ankles with her hair flowing down over one shoulder, her hand shaking his
foot. He pressed his lips to the surface, paying reverence to the spot where she’d once knelt. The metal
decking was cool against his cheek, urging him to give in to a rapidly increasing fatigue.
“Easy,” the man’s voice said in his ear. “You’ve been hit. Stay with me a bit longer, Crichton.” The walls
turned ninety degrees, and he thought he was falling, but it turned out that he was being dragged back to his
feet. Being settled into a padded chair helped to slow the crazed whirling of the walls around him. “Engines are
started, see?” A hand appeared over his shoulder, pointing to several indicators. “Fuel cells are fully
charged. I reattached the power lines to the rhotarri engines. Aeryn told me to do it. Now you have to put the
correct coordinates in, Crichton. Come on, don’t sit there like a dead drannit.”
John looked at the man for several microts, watching with mild interest as the anxious face slid in and out of
focus. “Gallenn?”
“Yes. Focus for a microt. Enter the coordinates, Crichton. Hurry.” Gallenn turned him toward the pilot’s
console. “I sealed the last of the hangar doors, but they’ll break through soon.”
“Where?” he asked at last, trying to remember where they were supposed to be headed.
“Aeryn says to take us to the second place where the leviathan promised to meet you. She says you remember
where that is.” John stared at the panel, dumbfounded. If Aeryn said he knew where it was, then he must know
where it was, but he couldn’t remember.
“I can’t. My hand won’t work,” he complained, discovering that his right hand wouldn’t make the transition from
his side to the console. His jacket had disappeared and the pain in his shoulder increased abruptly, clearing
some of the fog from his brain.
“For frell’s sake, we’re in a hurry, Crichton. Use your left hand. Hurry. They’ll have reinforcements in here in a
matter of microts. Take us anywhere. Anywhere, Crichton.” Gallenn’s voice continued to batter him, forcing
him to consider the console’s glowing lights and what they meant.
John tapped the keyboard tentatively with his left index finger, watching as a set of coordinates appeared as if
by magic. The string of numbers grew until every available spot on the display was taken. He searched for a
moment, found several switches and flipped them one by one, his fingers following a specific order on their
own. A low roar from the back of the ship mounted into a high-pitched shriek and then disappeared from his
hearing, leaving an itching sensation behind his ears. “That,” he ordered, pointing to a large button too far to
his right to hit with his left hand.
Gallenn reached over his shoulder and slapped the activation switch. The view of the hangar disappeared
from sight, and a microt later a view of the stars shimmered into view and stabilized.
“Where are we?” Gallenn demanded. John stared out the view screen, trying to remember what set of
coordinates he had entered. Something tickled at his fingers. He looked down at the thin ribbon of blood
curling around his wrist, fascinated by the growing puddle of crimson on the floor. “Where did you take us?”
was demanded in his ear. Gallenn pressed harder on the misery eating into the back of his shoulder, trying to
stem the bleeding. “Where are we, John?”
“No more questions,” he declared, and passed out.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
Chapter 6
“How are you holding up?” Aeryn asked Crichton. He was moving better with every passing microt, which meant
that they weren’t exerting as much effort to keep him upright, but he continued to stagger badly whether his
eyes were open or closed.
“Okay. Doin’ a little better,” he mumbled. “Are we in a hurry?”
It was the third time he’d asked the question and he was breathing hard, leading her to suspect that he wanted
to stop and rest. “Yes. Not much further, John. Keep moving.” But they’d only traveled half the distance to
the hangar, and the worst of the journey was ahead of them. More of his weight fell on her shoulders and she
braced herself to catch him, but he was only pushing himself up straighter. He was walking more steadily
although he still had his eyes closed.
“Boosters,” suggested Gallenn as the trio accelerated.
“They’re taking effect,” she agreed. They pulled on John, slowing him as they approached a junction of several
main corridors. “Hold still,” she ordered. John clung to her as Gallenn walked forward on his own to see if
there was a security station in any of the branches.
“We’re okay,” he reported, coming back to help. They’d managed to get through two checkpoints without
getting scanned simply by barging through, acting like a security detail dragging an unwilling officer somewhere
in a hurry. The uniforms had done their job and they’d drawn little more than a glance. “They must not have
the lock down in place yet.”
Aeryn nodded, momentarily surprised by his comment before she remembered that he’d been a Peacekeeper
and would be familiar with how long it took to implement the excessive security measures. “This can’t hold up.
We’ve been too lucky.”
“That means there’s some deep dren ahead of us,” John concluded. It was his first unprompted contribution to
the conversation since leaving his cell.
“We haven’t been in deep dren so far?” Gallenn asked incredulously. “What do you do for fun?”
“Be quiet. You don’t sound like officers,” Aeryn warned. They walked along silently for several microts.
“I thought I told you not to come back with the Peacekeepers on your ass,” Gallenn broke the silence. He
grunted as John lost his balance. They pulled him up and kept moving.
“Didn’t come back,” John panted, struggling to move faster. “And they were on … your butt, not … mine.”
“Would you two like to sit down and discuss this?” Aeryn broke in, “or could you shut up and concentrate on
getting out of here?”
“Sorry,” they chimed together.
They all went quiet as a group of six officers came the other way, glaring at the apparently drunk officer being
dragged along by his friends. One of them, a captain, stepped in front of the trio, frowning at Crichton’s lolling
head. “You’re a disgrace!” he barked at the staggering man.
“Buy you a raslak … sir?” John offered, straightening up. He smiled at the scowling superior and belched. “Or
two? Whoops.” He staggered and would have fallen except for his two side-supports.
“Sir!” Aeryn snapped to attention as the focus turned her way. “His behavior has already been reported to his
commanding officer, sir. He wants him sober before his punishment begins.” Beside her John pulled himself
erect, managing a swaying facsimile of standing at attention. The combination of the stimulants and the food
replacement tablets had to be restoring his awareness and some of his energy. He hadn’t been able to stand
up on his own until that moment.
“Sorry, sir,” John offered, squinting to keep the captain in focus.
The captain looked the three of them over, then shook his head and pushed Gallenn aside, hurrying to catch
up with his companions.
“Whoops,” John said, starting to collapse. Gallenn caught his arm, and they set out again.
“Can you move faster?” Aeryn asked. The detail assigned to take John to the Aurora Chair might arrive at the
cellblock any microt, after which their chances of getting to the ship would diminish rapidly.
“Think so,” he answered tiredly. “Give it a try.” The three lurched into a shambling run, slowing only when they
encountered other personnel or had to change directions at an intersection.
“Almost there,” she encouraged him. “Keep going.” John nodded, gasping for breath, and managed to move
faster. They approached the last corner, and she pulled them to a walk. “Checkpoint,” she said to Gallenn
over John’s head. “What do you think? Will they buy that he’s drunk?”
“Any other choices?” He steadied John as he stumbled to one side. “Stick with us, Crichton.” The bowed head
nodded as he fought to catch his breath. “How about he forgot something in the hangar? Helmet or rifle?”
“It’s weak,” she said. “But it’s the best we can do. Let’s go. Be ready to run.”
They turned the corner, and headed for the entrance to the hangar. She could see the prototype ship waiting
for them, parked to one side. The stairs to the cockpit were down, and there was no one working anywhere
around the craft. The open hatch beckoned to her, promising safety and escape, and an end to the constant
fear that John would get killed. They were so close. “Best effort right now, John,” she whispered.
He straightened up, blinking several times to clear his vision. “With you. I’m still drunk?”
“Yes. You forgot your helmet inside the hangar.” He was walking on his own now, although they were keeping
him aligned, catching his stumbles. “We’re helping you get it, and then you’re going back to your quarters to
sleep it off.”
“Drunker would be better, wouldn’t it?” he asked quietly.
“Yes. They’re doing genetic verification scans. We have to get you past them without getting checked.” She
finished briefing him in a whisper as they approached the guards.
“Okey dokey.” He crossed the last of the distance in two lunging steps and tripped, landing face down in front
of the security detail. “Sorry. Sorry,” he apologized to them, pulling himself back up by grabbing on to the
scanning machinery. He made to his feet, grinned crookedly at one of the frowning guards and toppled to the
side, stumbling into Gallenn.
“Ident chip,” one of the men demanded of Aeryn while the two men staggered to one side. She handed it over
willingly, waited for the indicator to change, then placed her hands in the depressions without being asked.
“You pass,” he chanted, handing the chip back.
“Catch this guy,” Gallenn requested, handing John’s wildly staggering form off to her while he took his tag off.
“Sorry about him,” he apologized to the detail as he handed it over. “A little too much to drink.”
“A little?” The guards laughed as Aeryn and John went down together in a tangle of arms and legs. “Is he
trying to report for duty?”
“No, left his helmet in the hangar somewhere. We just want to get in to find … watch it!” Gallenn yelled his
warning as John got to his feet but overbalanced. He snatched his hands back from where he’d been about to
insert them in the genetic scanner in order to catch him. “You need to forget about your helmet, my friend.
Let’s head back to quarters.”
“Nope,” John slurred. “Need my lid or I’ll be in big trouble.” He nodded seriously toward the guards. “Big
trouble. Uh oh, chip.” He began patting his chest, then peered into the collar of his shirt, looking for the non-
existent item. “Frell me. Oh, gonna get disciplined this time.” He leaned against the console while continuing
to search through his shirt and jacket.
“You lost that too?” Aeryn played along. “You idiot! You’ll be lucky if you just get a punishment assignment.”
“Yup, I’m definitely frelled.” John was still peering inside his jacket, fumbling about for the supposedly missing
ident chip. “Uh oh!” he said suddenly, grabbing at his stomach with one hand. “Don’t feel good. Gonna be
sick. ‘Scuse me.” He tried to shove one of the guards aside, acting as though he was trying to get to a corner
behind their post.
“Get him out of here!” One of the security guards pushed him away, panicked by Crichton’s series of gagging
lurches. “Just find the frelling helmet and get him out of here. We’ve had to put up with horrible odors the
entire day! Don’t add to it!”
They bolstered Crichton up, and headed into the hangar without delay. “Nice acting,” Gallenn whispered.
“What acting?” John returned. “I feel like crap. I think I’m gonna blow chunks here in a microt.”
Aeryn pushed him along, recognizing the first sign that his body was refusing to produce any more energy,
even with added influence of the drugs. The stimulants could goad an exhausted body only so far, putting a
nearly intolerable strain on someone who’d gone without sleep for as long as John. She suspected that he had
an arn or two of usefulness left at best; after that he’d be in danger of a complete physical collapse. But in
another arn, they’d either be free or dead, and it wouldn’t matter.
She took him by the elbow, steering him toward the ship. “Not much further. Can the rhotarri drive jump from
inside the hangar, or do we have to blast our way out of here somehow?”
“Inside the hangar, although the damage isn’t going to please these folks.” He was looking around, taking
notice of his surroundings, and walking more steadily. Gallenn was three motras to their left, pretending to look
for the missing helmet for the benefit of the security personnel.
“Will it cause an implosion?” she asked hopefully. They were a third of the way to the ship, nearly to safety.
“No, just tear things up a bit. We’ll probably take some of the interior with us when we go.” He was sweating
from the effort of walking. “If we’re really lucky, the hangar door might come with us.”
There was an enormous crashing and banging behind them. Aeryn turned in time to see several squads of
troops race through three of the entrances, all carrying weapons. “Frell!” she yelled, “Run!”
“Your scan got detected!” Gallenn yelled as the troops behind them opened fire.
Aeryn pulled John to the right, the pair stumbling and falling behind the cover of a refueling station. She
watched Gallenn scramble for cover in the other direction, moving closer to the prototype ship as the pulse
blasts increased in intensity.
“Bad place to be, Aeryn,” John yelled against the increasing din. They were hiding behind the rectangular
housing that protected the pumps and valves, but the top was open, the fueling nozzles exposed. “Froonium.”
She unholstered her pistol and jammed it into his hands, retaining the pulse rifle for herself, and glanced
around the edge of the squat rectangular base of the station. “They’re spreading out. We have to move fast.”
She fired several shots at the furthest of the flankers, driving them back, then checked on John. He was on his
back, firing hand signals at Gallenn who was behind a stack of containers five or six motras away.
“Keep firing for a bit, get them disorganized,” he relayed for her. He flipped onto his stomach, edged forward
and started shooting.
“Get THEM disorganized?” she yelled back. She spotted a receptacle marked as carrying radioactive sludge
and put several shots into it. “Wrong stuff,” she observed as it blew up to the howls of dismay from the troops
crouched behind it. Somewhere on the other side of the hangar an ammunition pod exploded with spectacular
results, taking several troops with it. Gallenn grinned at them, and went back to firing.
“Reinforcements are going to arrive quick,” John warned. He sat up and fired past her, watching in satisfaction
as one of the doors into the hangar slid closed.
“Oh good, you’re telling me something I don’t know,” she snapped. She looked where he’d fired and added
another shot to destroy the door mechanism. She swung back toward the thickest concentration of black
uniforms, and her next shot hit a rack of solvents, setting off multicolored flaming fireworks. Troops scattered in
all directions and four went down under their combined fire. “Are they disorganized enough for you yet?” She
snapped off a shot over the top of the block, hitting a running trooper squarely in the chest.
“Nice shot.” John flicked a series of hand signals toward Gallenn. “Get ready to run. We’ll cover, and
I’ll come next.”
“You have a hand signal for that?” she asked, scattering a group of men trying to flank them again.
“If you have to know, I said, ‘Rush order, move components to back wall, quick, more to follow.’ Does that make
you feel better?” John fired toward Gallenn, the pulse blast sailing past his friend to hit a figure who had snuck
around the perimeter of the hangar. The sebacean waved a thanks and kept firing.
“No. It makes me wonder if I’m going to get covering fire or spare parts. You go first. I’ll be faster, and you’ll
have cover from two angles.” The fueling station came under heavier fire and she huddled next to him. “Don’t
argue, just get ready to run. Give it everything you’ve got, John.”
He looked up at her from where he lay on his back, starting to argue, then closed his mouth. “Okay. But you
prove to me that you’re faster. Don’t make me come back here and get you.”
“I promise,” she agreed.
He rolled to his feet, the pulse pistol in one hand, and crouched on his toes, waiting. Gallenn glanced over and
shifted to the other side of his cover. “One, two, three --”
“Go!” Aeryn yelled, and stood up, firing as fast as she could at anything that moved. Another trooper went
down, a second spun out of sight, certainly injured, and her last shot managed to hit a door activator, closing
another entrance. She ducked behind cover, took a breath and popped up again, destroying the lock
mechanism with two fast shots, sealing that doorway. She ducked down and checked on Crichton.
John had made it across. He was slithering on his stomach to the far side of Gallenn’s stack of barrels, working
to get a second angle to fire from. Aeryn slung the rifle behind her where it wouldn’t get in the way, and took up
the crouching stance, ready to run. John’s left hand came up with one finger extended, then two, then three.
She bolted from behind the station, head down and accelerating as the firing picked up from both sides.
She saw the smiling profile as she got closer, John’s grin waiting for her even as he stayed focused and kept
shooting. There were only three more long, fast steps to the spot behind the barrels and she got ready for the
diving slide that would be the most effective way of transitioning the last motra.
The heat and impact tore into her side, smashing her sideways in a searing explosion of pain and surprise.
The hangar spun for a microt, the walls wheeling in strange patterns, then she hit the floor and slid, feeling the
warm liquid trailing behind her, and regretted that she wasn’t going to keep her promise.
* * * * *
A trooper ran through the smoke from the burning solvents, trying to work around to the side where he could
get a shot at the fugitives. John snapped a shot at a wheeled bin with bright markings on the side and it began
to burn. The trooper tried to reverse direction, feet scrambling wildly to get away from the smoking container,
so he put another shot into it. The entire hangar shook with the force of the explosion. “Wow!” he yelled, and
began searching for another container like the last one. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Aeryn
running toward him, head down, moving far faster than he could have. She’d been right to make him go first.
He snapped another shot, missed the man he’d been aiming for but hit the yelling officer next to him instead.
Sometimes being a lousy shot paid off. He grinned, and spared a moment to check on Aeryn. She looked into
his eyes, started to smile, and a pulse blast ripped into the center of her body, flinging her out of sight.
“AEERRYYYYNNN!” he screamed. Gallenn grabbed at him as he scrambled on all fours in her direction,
hauling him down. “Let me go!” he screamed at him, beating at his friend with both hands, the pistol lost in his
frenzy.
“No, she took it square in the midsection. Stay down, Crichton!” Gallenn tried to get on top of him, but he
thrust his friend off and tried again, vaguely registering that the firing from the other side of their barricade had
ceased not that they’d stopped shooting. “She’s got to be dead, John! She’s dead!” the voice bellowed in his
ear.
“No, no, no, no!” He hammered at the hand gripping the edge of his jacket and pulled loose. He burst out from
behind the cover to find a soldier there, the remaining men fanned out behind him as he forayed toward the still
body lying in the middle of the floor.
This was the one who had killed her, the one responsible … it had to be this man. Crichton changed direction,
barreling into him and they went down in a tangle. They came up separately, the black clad murderer swinging
his weapon up, lining it up with his own body.
Then
someone
did
something
odd.
Time slowed, everything in the hangar moving at a crawl except him.
There was a singeing burn across the side of his neck, heat tasting sour and sharp just before he tackled the
leather-clad figure. His hand scrabbled at the man’s waist to find the hilt of the weapon he knew would be
there, cold weight coming loose, fingers sliding into depressions that cradled each digit, welcoming them there,
a familiar but hated sensation. Warm flood, a cry silenced; he turned and there was another. Energy flowed
easily, lacking thought, a slash, a gouge, ripping upwards, turn and move on. Crichton spun around the nose
of a Prowler, or perhaps the carrier spun around him; it was so hard to tell with the high-pitched whine inside his
ears. Someone yelled, a cry of surprise, another fast impact, down, arm jerking fast and with exuberance,
move on, another leather-clad figure, move on, move on.
The universe sucked in a breath and spat him spinning across the hangar, a new odor to add to the miasma of
chakan oil, burnt paint, blasted circuits, and the underlying scent of copper and salt air that he always
associated with blood. He thought he had gotten to his feet, but the metal deck was under his cheek. A new
scent of cooking meat was making him nauseous, too closely associated with the grinding and pain in his
shoulder. The muzzle of a pulse rifle swept across the hangar just ahead, and the smells and sensations were
ignored as he slithered closer on his belly, making the lunge across the last gap without care for the shrieking
coming from his body. Move on, another was aiming at a spot where Aeryn might be concealed, move on,
someone turned shouting a warning, a tearing through leather, warm wetness, move on, move on.
“Crichton!” He whirled around, crouching, the long blade held out in front of him, of little use if this next man
held a rifle on him. “Aeryn’s on the ship! Come on, we have to get out of here!”
John squinted at the gesturing figure, seeing only the black uniform of the enemy, the mark of the killers. He
took a deep breath, preparing himself for the lunge across the intervening space, uncaring if he lived or died.
They’d killed Aeryn … he would make sure they paid for that before he went to join her.
“Aeryn’s on board, waiting for us. Come on.” The person waved at him frantically.
“Aeryn.” He’d been sure something had happened to her. John looked at the object in his left hand, wondering
why it wasn’t in his right, watched as someone else’s hands pried the fingers open one by one and let it clatter
to the deck.
“That’s right,” the other person encouraged him. “You have to fly this thing. I don’t know how.” John moved
forward, thinking that perhaps this person knew him. He was talking about Aeryn, telling him he had to go
where she had gone.
He stumbled as he was shoved into the cockpit, suddenly down on his hands and knees, his right arm giving
out so that he crashed awkwardly onto the cold metal deck plates. He remembered waking up here one
morning, Aeryn squatting near his ankles with her hair flowing down over one shoulder, her hand shaking his
foot. He pressed his lips to the surface, paying reverence to the spot where she’d once knelt. The metal
decking was cool against his cheek, urging him to give in to a rapidly increasing fatigue.
“Easy,” the man’s voice said in his ear. “You’ve been hit. Stay with me a bit longer, Crichton.” The walls
turned ninety degrees, and he thought he was falling, but it turned out that he was being dragged back to his
feet. Being settled into a padded chair helped to slow the crazed whirling of the walls around him. “Engines are
started, see?” A hand appeared over his shoulder, pointing to several indicators. “Fuel cells are fully
charged. I reattached the power lines to the rhotarri engines. Aeryn told me to do it. Now you have to put the
correct coordinates in, Crichton. Come on, don’t sit there like a dead drannit.”
John looked at the man for several microts, watching with mild interest as the anxious face slid in and out of
focus. “Gallenn?”
“Yes. Focus for a microt. Enter the coordinates, Crichton. Hurry.” Gallenn turned him toward the pilot’s
console. “I sealed the last of the hangar doors, but they’ll break through soon.”
“Where?” he asked at last, trying to remember where they were supposed to be headed.
“Aeryn says to take us to the second place where the leviathan promised to meet you. She says you remember
where that is.” John stared at the panel, dumbfounded. If Aeryn said he knew where it was, then he must know
where it was, but he couldn’t remember.
“I can’t. My hand won’t work,” he complained, discovering that his right hand wouldn’t make the transition from
his side to the console. His jacket had disappeared and the pain in his shoulder increased abruptly, clearing
some of the fog from his brain.
“For frell’s sake, we’re in a hurry, Crichton. Use your left hand. Hurry. They’ll have reinforcements in here in a
matter of microts. Take us anywhere. Anywhere, Crichton.” Gallenn’s voice continued to batter him, forcing
him to consider the console’s glowing lights and what they meant.
John tapped the keyboard tentatively with his left index finger, watching as a set of coordinates appeared as if
by magic. The string of numbers grew until every available spot on the display was taken. He searched for a
moment, found several switches and flipped them one by one, his fingers following a specific order on their
own. A low roar from the back of the ship mounted into a high-pitched shriek and then disappeared from his
hearing, leaving an itching sensation behind his ears. “That,” he ordered, pointing to a large button too far to
his right to hit with his left hand.
Gallenn reached over his shoulder and slapped the activation switch. The view of the hangar disappeared
from sight, and a microt later a view of the stars shimmered into view and stabilized.
“Where are we?” Gallenn demanded. John stared out the view screen, trying to remember what set of
coordinates he had entered. Something tickled at his fingers. He looked down at the thin ribbon of blood
curling around his wrist, fascinated by the growing puddle of crimson on the floor. “Where did you take us?”
was demanded in his ear. Gallenn pressed harder on the misery eating into the back of his shoulder, trying to
stem the bleeding. “Where are we, John?”
“No more questions,” he declared, and passed out.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
