“Can I help you?” she asked when he didn’t say anything.
“I decided to stay.”
“I can see that.”
“But I still have some concerns.”
“Go on.”
“Why would an Augment go on the run?” Elvis asked.
“That’s been bothering me too,” Biddy said. She tapped a nail against the arm of her chair. “He’s a God. Or, as good as anyway. So what does he have to run away from?”
“Something… really bad?”
“I guess so.” Biddy felt a gnawing anxiety in her stomach that meant she’d be popping antacids all night. “But our main question for the moment is not what is he running from, but where is he running to? If we can’t work that out we’ll be one step behind him the whole time.”
“And he’s heading to the Fuller system?”
“According to the plastic man.”
“We can get there in a week. Five days if we push the engines.”
Biddy shook her head. “We’ll take the full week. He’s been gone for a month already. I’d rather get there in good shape than risk a big repair job.”
“Right.”
She looked over at two silent, burly men that looked like they were half asleep. “Lee and Ali, you’re happy with all this from a systems point of view?”
One of the twins looked up at her from under a dark mop of hair. “Sure.”
That was about as communicative as the systems guys ever got, so Biddy had to assume that was okay. They had only been on the ship for six months, and she had yet to hear either of them offer a full sentence. They worked hard though, and that was all that mattered.
“All right then, I’m going to get an hour’s rest,” Biddy said, raising her voice so everyone could hear. “Let me know when we go interstellar.”
Chapter 4
Lu Tang – or Systems Engineer Tang as he was now known – settled into his sleeping pod for the move into Fast Light.
Faster than light travel. The age of Fast Light, the humans called it. Lu Tang had never quite come to terms with the concept. When he had been born the whole idea of breaking the light speed barrier was still thought to be impossible. Then someone had invented the first neutron drive and all of a sudden it was not only possible, but easy. But no one had ever quite managed to explain the physics to him, and Lu Tang was used to being the cleverest man in the room. This made him suspect that even the engineers themselves didn’t really understand why their spaceships worked. And that was what made him nervous.
Of course, being an Augment a case of nerves was easily dealt with by upping his levels of testosterone and lowering adrenaline. But still, he could feel the unease festering below the chemical balance.
Since the Westward Ho! trip had come to an abrupt end, he had been forced to recalibrate his journey. What should have been a simple trip around one section of the galaxy was turning out to be a lot more complicated. And he was spending half the time looking over his shoulder.
It was only a matter of time before someone caught up with him. He wasn’t even sure who it was that had imprisoned him. Governments changed so frequently, and he often found himself ten years out of date where politics were concerned. It was probably something to do with the trade alliances that had been set up around the Fuller system, but that was about all he knew. Of course there were other, worse possibilities, but Lu Tang ruled them out on the grounds that those sorts of people would simply have killed him immediately.
Lu Tang massaged the scars on his neck. He was running out of time. He couldn’t afford to remain ignorant of the diplomatic situation around his imprisonment, yet he simply didn’t have the hours required to investigate it. He would need to call on his network, and half of them were probably already dead. Except for the other Augments, of course. They could be counted on to be alive at least.
The base rumble of the engines increased to a steady whine. Lu Tang shifted in his tiny pod. It sounded like the engines could do with a recalibration, but these starfreighters were not exactly known for being luxury travel. Cheap and cheerful, and the sort of travel experience that was kinder on cargo than it was on human beings. Or Gods, for that matter.
Lu Tang closed his eyes. Augments didn’t need to sleep. One of the ways that their creators had made them better than humans all those centuries ago. But there was still just enough humanity in them that all but the oddest of his kind closed their eyes at some point in the night. Dreaming was out of the question, but thought was important. His brain was his greatest asset. At present it was his only one.
That had to change, Lu Tang thought. For the last few weeks his primary aim had been escape. But now that was no longer enough. His next move would be to switch from defense, to attack.
And to do that he would need some more live assets. Well, he was on his way to retrieve something that would help in that way, but he needed to up his game. The next important thing was intel. What were his enemies up to, and why? And who the hell were they. That was the heart of it. And when he found out just who was responsible for the current screwed up mayhem of his life? Then
