narrowing. His curiosity was engaged. Could this lunatic help him?
“You must follow the lines to the feasting,” replied the skald with great sincerity. He nodded to Droad slowly and smiled with relief, as if he had succeeded at an amazing effort of communication and imparted great knowledge. Still smiling vaguely, he began to step slowly from side to side, then to shuffle about in a circle. He hummed tonelessly. Droad thought of a corpse performing a strange flat-footed waltz.
It was clear that the man was utterly insane. Droad sighed, reseating himself. Had he sunk so low that he looked for answers for his problems from the deranged? He put his face back into his hands for a moment’s rest. Quietly, the skald shuffled away.
“We have a contact, sir,” interrupted Jarmo.
Droad’s head snapped up. He reached for the phone, careful not to touch the transmit button. It wouldn’t do for anyone to pinpoint them. He listened only. Unnoticed, the skald’s pallid form slipped away, heading toward the entrance of the aft duct system.
“Sounds like that witch of a senator, Mai Lee,” he commented. “All she’s doing is requesting my response. Can you get me video?”
Jarmo presented another handset with a tiny screen on it. In flat 2D a face flickered into existence. It was a metallic head of some kind. For a moment, Droad believed this to be some new and terrifying variety of alien as yet unencountered. Then he realized it was the stylized helmet of a hi-tech battlesuit.
He pursed his lips and grimaced in annoyance. “Where did she get that thing? Clearly against all Nexus proscriptions. Not that I’m surprised.”
Jarmo looked on impassively. Droad knew he was patiently waiting for him to make his decision. Communicating with the woman could mean a dangerous enemy would pinpoint their positions. Or it could be an opportunity for the last remaining human forces on the ship to rejoin.
Droad rubbed his chin and lips, eyeing the tiny metallic image with distrust. “Just a recording repeating the same message. Have you pinpointed her?”
“Bridge section,” replied Jarmo.
Droad smiled grimly. “So she did fire the laser.”
“Fire control could have been diverted at either the redundant bridge or the manual controls at the laser turret itself.”
Droad frowned. “We need information.”
Jarmo was silent.
“If we make a short transmission, can we be out of here quickly enough to avoid attack?”
“I don’t know the layout of the ship well enough to judge. Let’s consult the Lieutenant.”
Droad agreed. He smiled slightly, noting that Jarmo, unlike everyone else in the group, always referred to the mechs by their ranks, never just as ‘the mech’ as the rest of the humans tended to do. He wondered if his lack of labeling had to do with his own genetic specializations. Although much less of a freak than a mech, some of the same technology, and hence the same stigma from normal humans, applied to Jarmo.
“If we maneuver down two decks using the aft conduit system, then double back into the primary filtration units, it is very unlikely any search party would be able to locate us,” the mech informed them.
“Ready the team, then. In one minute I want everybody on their feet and ready to bolt into the ducts again.”
Jarmo jumped up and everyone hurried after him and the mech. When he had them in position for a fast get away and had trotted back to the Governor’s position, Droad opened a channel to the bridge.
The connection was made and the face of Mai Lee’s battlesuit flickered into view again. This time it was a profile shot, however. The video pickup was limited, but Droad made out movement behind her. Large men in full body-shell passed back and forth with a sense of urgency. The dragon’s head of Mai Lee’s suit swung back to face him. He noted the eerie blue radiance that emanated from the jagged metal mouth.
“What is your status, Senator?” asked Droad. He endeavored to sound light and unconcerned. “Can we be of assistance?”
“You live, Droad!” boomed the hideous dragon’s head. “I suspected as much. You’re as hard to kill as these filthy aliens.”
Droad’s voice hardened. “So you’re behind the slaughter of my forces? Why would you ambush us when we’re coming to aid in keeping the Gladius out of alien hands?”
Mai Lee laughed. The amplified sound was so loud that the receiver’s speakers distorted it into a shrieking squawk of noise at Droad’s end. He adjusted the tiny volume knob in annoyance.
“The ship is in my hands now, Droad. You are only another contender for control of the only means out of this doomed system,” she said. Droad looked surprised, and she snorted derisively. “Don’t try to pretend that the thought of escaping this hell-hole governorship of yours had never crossed your mind, stripling. I won’t believe that.”
She broke off and shouted behind her. There was a commotion out of range of the video pick-up. Droad turned up the volume again and studied the image of the bridge intently, trying to figure out what was going on. She turned back to Droad and her amplified voice again overloaded the tiny handset. Droad twisted the knob downward again, grimacing at the noise.
“-Just to let you know what’s coming: The waste will be spilling down to your deck within minutes. You’ve given me long enough to pinpoint your location. You’re too far from your flitter to make it back in time. This entire conversation, by the way, was just to make sure you would have no opportunity to escape the radiation-” here she broke off again. There was the sound of gunfire behind her on the bridge. The connection fizzled and was cut off abruptly.
Jarmo was on hand, jerking the Governor to his feet and hustling him toward the ducts. The others were already gone.
“You must run faster, sir,” said Jarmo.
Droad’s every hurried step was painful. “The injury to my leg still hasn’t healed completely,” he said apologetically.
Without a word, Jarmo swept him up in his massive arms. Feeling the thick hard surfaces of Jarmo’s biceps against his side, Droad was thinking too desperately to feel the humiliation of being carried like a baby. Jarmo picked up his pace to that of an Olympic sprinter and they vanished into the dark hole of the aft duct system.
“They’re going to dump waste from the reactors, trying to kill us and the aliens, I imagine. Has the mech figured out a place to run to?”
Jarmo grunted as he ducked through a tight bulkhead. The metal opening skimmed by Droad’s head at a dangerous speed, but it didn’t so much as brush his sleeve. The giant had grace as well as speed and power. “The Lieutenant monitored the entire conversation. He has already selected a destination.”
“Could she be bluffing? How could she have attained the security codes required to control the Gladius in every detail so quickly?”
“A problem I’ve been working on for some time now, sir. The only answer is that she must have had the proper override key.”
“Like the one that Steinbach used to switch off the spaceport security and operate the space elevator with?”
“Exactly, sir. In fact, I think it likely that she has Steinbach and his bootleg set of keys in her possession. Such a technological piece of wizardry as those keys would be unlikely to have been duplicated successfully by two separate groups. If this theory is correct, I can only further lament my failure in regards to Steinbach’s escape. If I had been more attentive with Steinbach, she may never have gained control of the laser, and therefore many lives would have been spared.”
“Don’t take it so hard, Jarmo,” said Droad. He smacked the giant’s massive chest. “You’re too quick to judge yourself a failure, and I won’t have that. Your performance is mine to judge, and I say you have done exceedingly well. Besides, your theory about Steinbach’s codekeys has yet to be proven.”
“I see no other logical alternative.”
“Nor do I,” admitted Droad. He sighed.
The conversation lapsed as Jarmo saved his breath for running. Droad attempted unsuccessfully to sit back and enjoy the ride.
