Starrigger

sharp things in the soil prick my soles. I ducked behind another tree and waited, watching the hard circle of light sweep the ground. The breath of the flitter was warm on my skin, conjuring dust devils around me. There was more than one craft. Constellations of red and green running lights plied the night sky, hovering, darting, pouncing. Spotlight beams waved through the brush on all sides of the house.

Another bolt crackled near me, exploding a barrel-shaped plant into a plume of steaming pulp.

A flickering thought: They have night-sight equipment. Why the searchlights?

Sam's key was in my pocket. I took it out and called. I hadn't tried it before because I thought we were well out of range, but it was worth a try.

'Jake?… [crackle]… that you?'

'Sam? Can you copy?'

'[sputter].. Jake? Come in… [pop!]'

'Sam, if you can copy me, I'm about to be nabbed by the Colonial Authority. Colonial Authority. Copy? I'll be at the Militia station in town. Acknowledge, Sam.'

The key spat static and not much else.

Another bolt sizzled to my rear. I ran again, this time doubling back toward the house, but as I got into the open a bolt touched down not a meter in front of me. I slid to a stop in the dirt. They had me. Obviously the shots had been deliberate misses. I got to my feet and the searchlight hit me full.

'Jake!' Darla's voice from behind.

'Darla! Stay there!'

'Hey! Over here!' She hadn't heard me over the whoosh of the flitter.

'Darla, stay where you are! They have me covered.'

Out in the mesa, shafts of light converged on the others. I could see John waving surrender, Susan huddling near. I looked to my left. Roland, the only one fully clothed, was shuffling back toward the house with his arms raised, spotlighted like a headline act on New Vegas.

A loudspeaker growled. 'JACOB MCGRAW?'

'Me! Over here!' I waved. 'I'm the one you want!'

'COLONIAL MILITIA. YOU'RE UNDER ARREST.'

'I gathered as much,' I said, addressing the dead shards of Wurlitzer pipe at my feet. The flitter swooped to land. I raised my hands and dropped my gun.

From behind, Darla opened up on the descending craft, the bolt hitting the left front impeller. Sparks rose from the metal and static discharges played over the surface like furious dancing fingers.

Answering fire was swift and accurate. A gout of flame and wispy smoke roiled from the spot where Darla's shot had come from. The Walther did not answer. Sailing flinders of brush fell at my feet.

Frozen in body and spirit, I gaped at the dwindling flames

where Darla's body surely lay, and remembered my dream just then, strangely, fragments of it, wishing the Hand would appear again to take me by the collar and yank me out of this metadream I knew as life.

8

Cops are the same everywhere, everywhen.

I stood before the desk at the Militia station, bare-assed and wearing a leather jacket.

Some joker walking by stopped to mock-whisper in my ear:

'Did you get a new tailor?'

The cop at the desk showed big yellow horseteeth. He thought it was a scream. The cops who brought me in from the flitter found it the soul of wit.

The joker walked down the hall looking back over his shoulder. 'Huh?' he said, milking the gag, smirking. He ducked into an office, not waiting for my reply. Truly, I had one for him.

'Place of residence?' The desk cop is all business, all of a sudden.

'221-B Baker Street, London, England.'

'Planet?' It dawns on him. 'Look, McGraw,' he said, showing me world-weary eyes. 'I asked you for your address. When they come back from searching your hideout, I'll get it from your ID. So, let's do it the easy way. All right?' He squared himself at the console. 'Now… place of residence.'

'Emerald City, Land of Oz.'

'Name of plan?' Again, he was slow on the uptake. He snarled at me. 'Listen, you filthy piece of merte, I'm gonna ask you for your punkin' place of residence one more time, then you're in for trouble.'

'Punkata teys familos proximos.' It was an Intersystem phrase which suggested that he run along now and have sexual intercourse with various members of his immediate family, in so many words.

That got me a hairy back-of-the-hand smartly across the mouth. It was worth it. The rusty taste of blood seeped through my teeth onto my tongue.

A little too late, one of the other cops grabbed his arm. 'Don't want him roughed up. We have orders.'

The desk cop jerked his arm free savagely. 'Don't do that again, Frazer,' he warned. 'Keep your hands off me.'

'Fred, I'm sorry. We got orders. We're to keep him here until the Colonel arrives. I don't even think we should be entering him on the blotter. You better clear that entry.'

'What the hell is he standing here for?'

'I don't know. Habit, I guess. They said to?'

'Then get him out of my sight!'

Grumbling, Frazer shoved me over to a chair. The seat was metal and very cold.

There I waited for about ten minutes until somebody very big and very important strode down the hall toward the desk, leaving a wake of underlings snapped to attention en route. He was a huge man, all bulk and no bulge, enough fabric in his sky-blue-with-white-piping uniform to shelter tent-cities of refugees. A red mustache thrived in whorls under a ramrod-straight nose. The eyes were caged, iced blue with determination and cold reserve. He marched past me, briefcase in hand, swagger stick tucked smartly under an arm, and the seminude man he passed just wasn't there.

As he went by the desk, three words:

'In ley amenata.' Bring him in to me.

After a minute or two, I was led back through a maze of corridors to an office. I was surprised at the size of the station. Goliath was a frontier planet, from what I had seen, sparsely settled. But the planet was smack between two interchange worlds, a strategic location.

The sign on the door read bilingually: Tenentu-Inspekta Lieutenant-Inspector Elmo L. Reilly. I had the feeling I was not about to meet a man named Elmo. It was a small, windowless office with a metal desk, metal shelves, a few maps and plaques on the wall, picture of the family on the bookshelf, clean and uncluttered. Chemical light from the overhead fixture softened it a bit, but it was a cold, steely place. The big man sat at the desk, swaggerstick squared to his right, briefcase to his left. He still wore his white hard hat with its visorful of gold scrambled eggs.

'Colonel-Inspector Petrovsky will interrogate you,' Frazer told me, and plopped me down in a small metal chair.

'This is not an interrogation,' Petrovsky corrected him. Frazer slunk out the door. Petrovsky's Intersystem was weighted with Slavic ponderousness.

'What is it, then?' I asked in the best 'System I could manage.

'That depends. You may or may not be a material witness to a crime. You may or may not be a suspect. That also depends.' 1

'Upon what, may I ask?'

Blue eyes bored through me. 'Upon what you tell me and what I take to be truth.'

'Then this is an interrogation,' I concluded.