16
Rifle in hand, Baress advanced cautiously to the single door leading into the auxiliary bridge and peered out. Consherra, seated at the main computer console, frowned without looking up. Baress was as regular as clockwork; in the last fifty-five minutes he had checked that door exactly fifty-five times.
“Velmeran should be coming in a few minutes,” she remarked. Her four hands were moving over two separate keyboards with lightning speed. “I just told him that I am finishing this up.”
“Right on time,” Baress remarked, consulting the chronometer built into one of the sleeves of his suit. “I wonder what Velmeran has been up to. Whatever he did, every sentry in this end of the ship took off at a run a long time ago and they never came back. For that matter, I wonder where he is.”
“Right behind you.”
Baress was so startled that he spun around and fired two shots from the powerful rifle into the ceiling overheard, and even Consherra nearly fell out of her chair. Velmeran, looking very pale and worn, sat in the Captain’s seat, staring apprehensively at the smoking holes in the ceiling immediately over his head.
“I do not know whether to compliment you for not shooting me, or just be glad you missed,” he remarked, then turned to Consherra. “Close your mouth and get back to work. I want to get out of here.”
Consherra admitted to the logic in that and returned to work.
“But… but how did you get in here?” Baress demanded. “I never left that door.”
“I did not come through the door, I teleported.”
Consherra glanced at him over her shoulder. “I would sooner believe that you put yourself in a box and came through the mail.”
Velmeran shrugged. “Believe what you will. Now that I consider it, I am known for entirely too much wizardry as it is.”
That was the wrong answer, of course. By denying it, he had inadvertently forced Consherra to feel obliged to believe in him. She glared at him. “What have you been doing, anyway? You look about half dead. What happened to your helmet and weapons?”
“Don has them,” he explained. “I have spent the better part of the last hour as his guest.”
“Then you were the grand diversion that brought every sentry on this ship at a run?” Baress asked.
“Only at first. I hinted to Don that there is a bomb in the power core of the ship, and that he had an hour to find it.”
Baress grinned mischievously. “I can imagine how that made them hop!”
“Exactly,” Velmeran agreed. “He was so generally delighted to have me, and so nervous about finding that bomb, that it never occurred to him that there might be other Starwolves on his fine, big ship.”
“That does it,” Consherra announced suddenly. “Now we can go home. What about your weapons and helmet?”
“Nothing I can do about that.”
“Well, you can at least have a gun,” Baress said as he offered a pistol.
“I can do better than that,” Consherra said as she began to removed her belt. “Let me keep one pistol for reassurance and you can have the rest. It will do you more good.”
“Drop those weapons!”
The three Starwolves glanced up to see Commander Trace and two crewmembers standing at the door, rifles aimed to fire, as five additional crewmembers filed in to take up positions surrounding the prisoners. There was no question of escape or fighting back; this could not have come at a worse time. Baress’s rifle stood beside the door, while Consherra’s was lying beside the console. Velmeran had no weapons, Consherra was holding her weapons belt with the pistols clipped in their holsters, and Baress had laid both of his pistols on the console. Consherra looked questioningly at Velmeran, but he indicated for her to comply.
“Damn it all, anyway,” he muttered in disgust. “If I had not been so tired, they never would have been able to sneak up on us.”
“Now, move away from that console,” Trace directed. “Out into the open.”
The three Starwolves did as they were told.
“Might I ask how you managed to find us so quickly?” Velmeran asked.
“That was a very simple matter,” Trace said, lowering his weapons now that the Starwolves were safely surrounded. “The ship reported a partial power loss in that diagnostic room in the sick bay and here at the same time. Whatever the cause, it suggested where to find you.”
Velmeran shrugged indifferently. “I guess that I need to work that out before I try it again.”
“There will be no next time,” Trace said ominously. “I will not risk having you escape a second time. That is why I took that little memento out of your hide, remember. I knew at the time that I would probably have to kill you.”
“Do not be a fool,” Velmeran said sharply. “I am still in control of this situation. If you want to live, then you will get out of here now.”
“Whatever else happens, I will have the pleasure of killing you first,” Trace declared, unimpressed, as he aimed his gun. “Fire!”
The auxiliary bridge was rocked as every gun exploded at almost exactly the same instant. Flames and thick, black smoke enveloped each of the gunners, and pieces of the white-hot metal pelted the nearer half of the bridge like hailstones. The fire alarms rang shrilly as the ventilation to the area shut down to suffocate a possible fire as the single door to the bridge snapped shut; had they possessed a sense of smell, the Starwolves would have been overwhelmed by the odor of burnt flesh. A few seconds later the ventilation came back on at full power, drawing away the thick curtain of smoke to slowly reveal eight blackened, lifeless bodies.
The door reopened a moment later. The Starwolves assumed that it was an automatic function, and so they were caught by surprise when a sentry ambled through at its best pace. Baress dived for Consherra’s gun, while the other two prepared to dodge.
“Sentry, halt!” a voice commanded sharply, and the machine pulled itself to a stop. A moment later a tiny human peered cautiously through the doorway. “Don’t shoot, please. I’m not armed.”
“We will not fire,” Velmeran assured her.
Maeken Kea entered cautiously, glancing apprehensively at the bodies that were still smoking lazily. “So you got him at last. I assume that you have some way of causing guns to explode when fired?”
“On a small scale,” Velmeran answered evasively. “Am I correct in assuming that you are Captain Maeken Kea?”
“I am. I assume as well that you are Velmeran.” She did not make a question of that as she came to a stop three meters away.
“Of course. You do not seem particularly worried about the fate of your late Commander.”
“Bastard!” Maeken spat viciously. “I’ve only just found out about how he liked to play with nuclear weapons. I’ll not apologize for anything I’ve done to try to win this battle, but I am sorry for some of the tricks he pulled. For that, most of all. And for what he did to you. He’s paid for it all, I suppose. I’m just sorry that I had any part of it.”
“I am also sorry that you had any part of this,” Velmeran added. “Any other captain would have given me less trouble. But it is over now.”
Maeken frowned. “That is what I wanted to ask you about. It seems to me that you people have been a great deal busier than anyone first thought. I suppose that there is no question that you have done enough damage to assure the destruction of this ship.”
Velmeran nodded. “You could not stop it at this point even if you knew what to look for.”
“So I had assumed.” She paused a moment to glance at the charred bodies. “If you don’t mind, I would like very much to get my crew away from here. All I have are children with fresh commissions and harmless Feldenneh… technicians, not soldiers.”
“My mercenary common sense tells me that I should eliminate such a capable Commander as yourself,” Velmeran remarked frankly, and paused only a moment to consider the matter. “As soon as I leave this chamber, I
