Strangers. Part 2

Far away, the dull ring of the station began to light up. In pairs, generators flicked silently to life. The shuttle began to move faster, and Annia felt the shuttle lurch. Suddenly, instead of looking forward into a tunnel, she was hanging in her seat staring down into a pit through which the shuttle was about to drop nose-first. She didn't dare let go of the armrests to check her restraint straps.

The shuttle began to move faster now, and the motion was unnerving without the vibration of engines in the bulkheads. The first set of marker buoys slid past the viewport, then the second. The third set came faster, and the ring was almost too big to fit in the viewport. The fourth ring of markers flicked past the shuttle, and then the shuttle wasn't falling, it was being thrown. The station ring blurred. Annia's stomach churned. She had a confused vision of the ring swallowing her. Then s.p.a.ce twisted again, and she was riding a gravity wave up and out of the tunnel on the other side at near-light speed. The pull of the gravity net ceased, internal gravity was restored, and the final insult to her inner ear made Annia's stomach let go.

Fortunately, she hadn't eaten recently, and she finished in a matter of minutes. She found an emergency kit under the control console and cleaned her face and hands. Mopping up the mess that had spilled down the side of the chair and onto the floor took longer. She was almost afraid to look in on the clones, but they were in their seats. The female looked a little queasy and tense, but didn't attack when Annia opened the door.

The male was pale and shaking. The tidal stresses of their pa.s.sage through the booster station had been too much for his system to absorb. She gave him a synthetic blood pack and a stimulant to counter the shock. When the shaking eased, she went to work patching the projectile wound. She used surgical adhesive to reattach muscles and ligaments. Patches restored damaged blood vessels, and a coat of gel would keep the wound clean until the skin closed over it. The clone would regain full use of the torn muscles and tendons in a few days.

Annia returned to the c.o.c.kpit and watched the viewport for several minutes as the shuttle, engines dead except for the hiss of att.i.tude jets, rode the inertia of the gravity net insystem. She finally fell asleep in the pilot's chair with the faint residue of vomit still in the air.

She woke when the engines grumbled to life. The shuttle had fallen into a low-fuel orbit around a blue and white world with a number of small landma.s.ses. Navigational data told her she was about to land on the United Worlds planet Yetfurther. That puzzled her. She had expected to emerge in Commonwealth s.p.a.ce -- the system from which the attacking sneaks.h.i.+ps had come. This planet was a long way from either Commonwealth or Federation territory.

Communication boards indicated an incoming voice message. Annia opened the com channel. A voice: human, male and only a little abrupt said, "Federated Systems shuttle, this is Cyrion ground control on Yetfurther. Please respond."

Annia answered. "Annia 4424 here. Do you have a flight plan for me?"

"You requested a low-fuel landing. We have a trajectory."

The graphic fuel indicator on Annia's board hovered just above the yellow zone. There might be enough fuel. There might not. "Patch it through my navigator. Ground control, as a Federated Systems indentured citizen, I'm required to request that you notify the nearest FS vessel of my arrival."

The voice replied formally. "Yetfurther is not a Federated Systems planet. We provide a single telefax free of charge to any FS citizen who needs to contact his or her government."

Legally, any government was obliged to return indentured citizens to the Federation, but planets and individuals differed in their enthusiasm for the practice. Probably this was a frontier world, not heavily populated enough to be picky about the origin of its citizens. That solved one very serious problem for Annia. She didn't have to worry about the Federation finding her. "Thank you, ground control. The trajectory is laid in, and my navigator approves it."

"Confirmed."

Annia told the clones to strap in and waited until she was sure they were secure. Finally, she hit execute.

The little vessel dropped into the gravity well. The wing extensions cupped atmosphere, and the s.h.i.+elds closed over the viewport. Annia's stomach churned in protest. It was a long, long drop. Something had gone wrong. The engines should have fired minutes ago and slowed their fall. She'd been given a bad trajectory, or the navigator had been scrambled in their strange null-s.p.a.ce s.h.i.+ft. Annia fought the buck and buffet of the shuttle and tried to override the s.h.i.+elding over the viewplate. She wanted to see the ground. The environmental control adamantly refused to accept her override. Hull temperatures showed ninety-five percent of tolerance.

And then the engines did fire, hard. Annia's chin struck her chest and she bit her tongue. Double human-standard gravity compressed her spine and squeezed her ribs down over her lungs. The engines faltered, sputtered, roared, and the backup rockets kicked from below. Finally, she was no longer falling. The descent was still fast, but more like a controlled glide, and gravity dropped to human-standard range.

The engines fired once more, and the shuttle jerked with a crash that threw Annia against her restraints. The engines rumbled for a moment, then sputtered and died.

Annia sat for a minute while the shuttle groaned and squealed around her. The rough landing had strained its superstructure, but she didn't hear the hiss of cracked bulkheads, so the vessel must have survived the impact. The s.h.i.+elds rolled back. The viewport framed the grey and dun spires of a minor city. The line of a tram ran down the forested mountainside, and beyond the city lay a floodplain runnelled with rivers and oxbow lakes. Further still, blue-grey fog sketched a straight line below the horizon.

Flas.h.i.+ng lights on the communications board attracted her attention. "This is Ground Control. You are cleared to disembark. Payment can be arranged with Administration."

They expected her to pay for her berth. Well, she didn't intend to have the shuttle long on her hands. She'd sell it off planet at the first opportunity.

She left the clones on board with strict instructions to touch nothing and kill no one. The ground staff directed her to the administration building set into the vertical cliff over the landing bay. Black scars from rocket fires streaked the rough stone underfoot. Pale, violet sky overhead gave Annia a sense of vertigo as if she might fall off the ground at any moment. She fixed her eyes on the cliff, granite full of igneous crystals polished and sealed to reflect rocket heat. Its human-constructed angles eased her vertigo. No telling how the clones were going to cope with the open s.p.a.ces and unfamiliar shapes and colors of a planetary surface.

Heat-resistant double doors, configured airlock style, pa.s.sed her through two meters of rock to the inner offices. They'd carved the administration complex right into the mountain which made for some interesting colors and striations in the polished walls. The ground staff wore green uniforms with open-collared s.h.i.+rts. Short trousers buckled at the knee. A young man waved a datapad at her in the hallway. "Ms. 4424?"

"'Annia."

He made a notation on his pad. "I beg your pardon, Ms. Annia. I'm Mr. Dolman. You'll want to arrange payment for your berth. I'll show you to the right department."

She read s.p.a.ceport Administration, on the door. Mr. Dolman used his databoard to ease her through. "Mr. Fosby will be with you in a moment."

Mr. Dolman crossed his legs at the ankle and bobbed with both knees. He left her in the waiting room. Five chairs cut from the same striated granite as the walls stood empty. A man slouched in the sixth. The silver buckles on his shoes matched those on the knees of his black breeches. Over a frilled s.h.i.+rt, he wore an old, brown jacket made from some kind of animal skin. A black cap lay beside him on a stone table.

He evidently used depilatories only irregularly on his face and legs, which he didn't cover with stockings. He crossed his ankles, and Annia wondered if she should return the compliment. She didn't think she'd manage to do the bob gracefully. Instead, she took the chair furthest from the stranger.

The man watched her for several minutes.

She hoped he was not waiting for Mr. Fosby.

He cleared his throat. "Mine's Hollin."

Annia said, "Excuse me?"

"Hollin. My name's Hollin." He placed his cap on his thin hair. "I figure you're the one brought down that FS shuttle out there."

Was he threatening to turn her over to Federated Systems? There were finders' fees for returning indentured citizens.

He wiped his mouth with his fingertips. "If you were, I might be in the market to take it off your hands."

This was far beyond coincidence. "What are you doing here?" Annia asked.

He slouched back in his chair again. "Got a call from a friend who says I might have a shuttle berthed somewhere along here."

He had a pleasant face, lined and softened and square, and he had obviously never been handsome. Annia wondered how many stolen FS shuttles turned up in a tiny port like this one. Probably, he handled a broad range of dubious goods. "I'm not sure mine's for sale." It bang-in-a-well was, but she didn't know what it was worth on the local market, or what the currency was.

He wiped his mouth again. "Could be if you wanted to sell it, I could be of help to you."

"What kind of help?"

"You got lodgings?"

"I can sleep on the shuttle until I find something."

"I can get you a nice piece of real estate near the city, near public transportation, nice neighbors. A little extra credit to tide you over until you find work."

"I don't want to attract attention," Annia said.

He spread his hands and c.o.c.ked her a sideways smile. "Can't I see that just looking at you? What do you say?"

He'd caught her in a bind. She needed to unload that shuttle. She nodded reluctantly.

"Then let's have a word with Mr. Fosby." He strode to the door at the other end of the waiting room and opened it. "Come along in, Ms. 4424."

A thickening, middle-aged man with a round face and an outrageously frilled green blouse crossed his ankles and bobbed at Annia as she entered his office. "Have you made your deal, Mr. Hollin?"

"I have done, Mr. Fosby."

Mr. Fosby clapped his hands together with a wet smack. "Good. Then we'll settle the matter of the berthing fees, and Ms. 4424 can be on her way. I simply need to verify that Mr. Hollin here is in fact the owner of the vessel in question."

She could see how they benefited. Mr. Hollin would have the sale of the shuttle. Mr. Fosby would undoubtedly receive a portion of the proceeds from the sale as well as getting the shuttle's berthing fees paid -- which Annia was in no way able to do anyway. She couldn't see how she could lose by the deal, and that made her nervous.

Mr. Hollin eyed Annia sideways. "If you'll witness, Mr. Fosby, I'm offering a fair-sized plot in Murrayville along with three hundred credits."

Mr. Fosby turned to Annia.

She had the uncomfortable feeling that something was expected of her. "I've accepted."

Mr. Fosby looked alarmed. "Oh no, Ms. Annia, you don't understand. That won't do at all."

Mr. Hollin said, "Maybe you should do the honors, Mr. Fosby."

"Indeed." Mr. Fosby gave Annia a reproachful glance and said, "Mr. Hollin, your offer is entirely unacceptable. What kind of a plot are you offering? Precisely where is it located? One of your swamps, I suppose, swarming with mudrimples and sneakdillies and brewing with fever."

That's why they had been horrified when she accepted the first offer. They used a d.i.c.kering system. He'd opened with a ludicrously low bid and expected her to counter with a high one.

Mr. Hollin protested. "True it's on the lakefront, and there's a bit of a tramp through the mud to get to the lake, but the best part is set up above flood level, and you'd share a boardwalk and fis.h.i.+ng dock with your neighbors. They're nice people, easy to get on with. There's some as would pay big prices for a lot like this."

"In Murrayville?" Mr. Fosby said disdainfully.

"Well, not in Murrayville, but that's why you get it cheap."

"I want the lot number."

Mr. Hollin removed a datapad from inside his animal skin jacket and tapped its board. He pa.s.sed it to Mr. Fosby.

Fosby peered at it. He grunted. "Well, that looks all right. It's a pleasant enough lot, Ms. Annia." He glowered at Mr. Hollin. "She'll take it along with two thousand credits."

"Two thousand? Mother's milk, Mr. Fosby, you'll ruin me."

In the end, Mr. Fosby agreed that Mr. Hollin would pay berthing and refueling fees for the shuttle until he removed it from the s.p.a.ceport. Annia would accept the lot along with eight-hundred credits in a numbered account held by the Bank of Firstep, Yetfurther branch, and an emergency shelter and camp kit for three. Mr. Hollin would escort her in person to her new home.

Mr. Fosby required Annia to put her DNAprint on a datapad and a.s.sured her that she was now the legal owner of a double-size, waterfront property in the village of Murrayville.

Mr. Hollin gave her a deep bob with ankles crossed. "I'll show you to your domain, Ms. Annia."

"I've some personal things in the shuttle."

"We'll stop on our way."

When Annia entered the pa.s.senger compartment, the clones stiffened, and the female dropped into a fighting stance Annia froze. "Stop. At rest."

The female tried to access her data crystal.

"Your crystal was erased, remember?" Clones didn't remember anything for more than ten minutes. That was what conditioning and crystal implants were for.

The male fumbled one-handed with his restraints. "Doctor is lieutenant in C-med." He looked puzzled. "Not in C-med."

"I am a doctor. You protect me. Protect humans."

Clone handlers used simulations and repeated pain/pleasure feedback to get past the chemical blocks that prevented clones from storing long-term memory, but the method was limited to very simple stimulation/response patterns. It didn't adapt. In a strange environment, with no programming to access in the crystals, the clones might identify her as an enemy.

She took care to make no sudden moves. "You know protect humans?"

The female tried to access her crystal.

"Protect humans?" Annia repeated.

The clone nodded. "Protect humans. Protect you."

Annia tried to remember how the simulations worked. "That's good. You get good feelings when you protect humans. You can have good feelings now."

The female looked happier.

Annia thought she could relax.

Mr. Hollin stuck his head into the pa.s.senger compartment and said, "Ms. Annia, how much baggage do you have to collect?"

The female clone stiffened and lunged at the door.

"Mother's milk." Mr. Hollin yanked a tiny stun weapon out of his jacket.

Annia threw out her hands between Mr. Hollin and the clone. "Stop. At rest."

The clone halted, panting and trying to access her crystal.

Mr. Hollin slowly put his weapon out of sight. "Ms. Annia, I had no idea I was dealing with a wealthy woman. Maybe you'd like a husband?"

"Move back from the door. They're unsettled from being in a strange place, and I don't want to have an accident with them."

"I agree. I will be the gentleman hiding behind the forward landing strut."

Which was exactly where she found him when she finally got the clones calm enough to leave the shuttle without killing anyone.

Mr. Hollin took no chances. He peered around the landing strut with his hand tucked into his jacket. "Everybody happy now?"

"At rest. No enemies," Annia reminded the clones. "We're fine, Mr. Hollin. Take your hand out of your jacket. You're making them nervous."

Mr. Hollin raised his hands and joined them with a wary eye on the clones. "See, everybody's friends. What do you want with these fellows? Those are soldier types if I know anything. More trouble than they're worth. You want them off your shoulders? Those two are each worth more than the shuttle in some quarters."

That would be the black market. Unlike the Federated Systems, UW charter made it illegal to own clones from human stock, but that didn't mean it didn't happen. She shook her head. "They're not for sale. Maybe you could help me with something else." She had already entrusted him and the station ground crew with her freedom. "I want a domestic virus. Two of them."

He said, "You're not going to alter them. They'll be worthless."

They were heading toward the tram terminal at the far side of the landing field.

"They're a danger to themselves and everyone around them, and they're no use to me anyway," she said.

"So sell them." Mr. Hollin glanced back at the clones with a covetous expression.

"They're not for sale."