Authors: Steve Wheeler
Marko was still pondering about
Blackjack
when Nail sauntered in.
‘Marko?’
‘Yes, Nail.’
The cat swished his tail. ‘Am I allowed to bite Sirius? Stephine really does not like her, you know.’
Marko laughed. ‘Bite her? Well, if she pisses you off that much, then a wee nip would not be out of the question. Would also allow you to analyse her blood, eh? Yeah, I would not object. Be interesting to see what she looks like at a base level now. Tux, give my regards to
Blackjack
and say that I look forward to speaking with him one day.’
Tux answered. ‘She says that she finds you a most interesting sentient and also looks forward to that day.’
Marko shook his head and smiled. ‘She? Why does that not surprise me?’
Nail added, astounded, ‘What? You have only just worked out that
Blackjack
is sentient? We sometimes worry about your level of conscious intelligence, Marko.’
They found Sirius still talking with Harry when they made their way up to the main hangar deck. She had grown in height a fair amount and as soon as she turned to look at Marko he could see the hardwiring which was now part of her. Her eyes were a startling iridescent blue, her ears elegantly enlarged and subtly reshaped, with the skin on her arms now covered with the latest fashionable bio-wetware as well. Sirius looked human, but she was Games Board through and through, and Marko decided he did not trust her one little bit. She assessed him briefly, her eyes lingering over his crotch for a few seconds longer than necessary. Marko glanced across at Harry and saw his slight nod, acknowledging that Sirius was still very much a hunter.
Nail looked up at her appraisingly. ‘So you are still Sirius. As in mostly flesh and blood. Interesting tech you have there. I note that you are broadcasting a signal continuously as well. Why are you doing that?’
Sirius turned to look at Nail. ‘So you are the now-famous Nail. Well, Nail, it is my job. Just like when you first knew me, though now I am much more efficient. I have an arrangement with the Games Board. I look after you and sell everything I can about this and a number of other interesting crews and ships to the Games Board, and they allow me to keep this beautiful human body of mine. The only thing that I cannot do is have children; they removed that ability from me as part of the deal. I do this work to stay alive. Do you object to that, Nail?’
Nail took a few seconds, examining his extended claws on one paw before slowly replying. ‘I shall consider my response, Madam Sirius.’
Behind them, Glint virtually hissed out, ‘As will I, Sirius of the Games Board.’
Marco almost gasped out loud and had to restrain himself from spinning around to look at the ACEs, as he had never heard a response like that from them before.
Sirius just laughed. ‘Oh my, you are beautiful, Glint. I saw you when you were being made but I have not had the pleasure of knowing you. I have seen you in action and I consider you to be a wonderful sentient creature.’
Glint, standing tall on his rear legs, said, ‘Thank you, Sirius. But believe me when I say that having observed humans for some time now I would consider their sentience overrated.’
Marko looked at Glint carefully and mused about Sirius. Certainly she was very good for
Basalt
and crew and had padded their monetary worth, but he could not decide what to make of her and he had often questioned why the Games Board allowed her to go back to them. He wondered if she actually had their interests at heart, but doubted that very much, because she was a player in the Games Board’s manipulations. Looking at the ACEs once again, he hoped that Sirius understood they were lethal, and that they had made the decision that she would be watched very carefully. Sadly, he also realised that the mood of the whole ship changed when she was on board, with everyone careful of what they did and said around her.
An announcement from the major broke through his reverie. ‘All crew,
Basalt
is back under our control. Check everything as per normal protocols so handover can be made official. Check in with me as you sort out your departments.’
‘Excuse me, please, Sirius.’ Marko said. ‘I had better go do that then I need some fruit. Can I get anything for anyone? No. See you soon. I’m on dinner tonight, and seeing that everyone is back, I had better get moving.’
Lilly and Jasmine were tending the gardens and gleefully scolded Marko for letting a couple of things slip while they had been away. Jan was also with them, tending the potatoes, and asked what he needed for the meal. They passed a few notes between themselves in regard to Sirius, that she needed to be watched.
A few hours after dinner the major called the shipyards to advise that the final checks had been made so handover could take place, and that they needed a tug to lift them away from the hangar. While that was happening the crew sat at their consoles, caught up on everyone’s news and sent farewell messages to their friends below.
The major finally announced: ‘Crew, we are on our own again. Harry, please take us within hailing distance of Number Five Orbital Station. Has everyone decided on and logged their intentions while planetside? Right, thanks, I now have them all here onscreen. I see that you want individual interviews with us, Sirius. You have certainly helped our bank balances, so that’s a reasonable request, but it’s up to individuals to accept your invitation or not.’
The Orbital was huge, discus-shaped, and had three pairs of space elevators connecting it to the planet far below. Everyone was pretty much going in opposite directions to explore the planet and rest and relax in their own ways. There were also several plans afoot for avoiding Sirius.
Jan and Marko had decided to hire a house-craft and spend most of the time exploring a large chain of islands south of the planet’s equator. In that area it was effectively early autumn, so they had packed in anticipation of lots of time on the various beaches. The package they had brought included dive gear and, most importantly, fishing equipment. They would also be visiting Jake’s friends and hopefully flying ancient aircraft from a field halfway down the island chain, so they decided to take their ship suits. And, of course, Nail and Glint would be with them.
Just before they left
Basalt,
Jan lined everyone up and gave them bioware boosters covering the current influenza bugs, colds, et cetera, and, more importantly, gave them the necessary gut augments so that they could digest the local food types easily. As a very young soldier, Marko had once skipped that step and paid for it dearly. Being on a break with violent diarrhoea and vomiting put a damper on things.
The major would be spending time with Patrick, reviewing his astronomical research and other work for a presentation he was giving to the Haulers’ Astronomical Guild in a few weeks’ time, which was a big deal for him. He had gently asked them all to view it via links and everyone was quite happy to leave him to it, as he did not need them arriving at the venue and stealing his thunder. So they dropped the crew off and then took
Basalt
into a lower orbit above the planet, sufficiently far away from the Orbitals to be left in peace.
Marko loved the elevators. They had spent time in the Orbital after transferring directly off
Basalt
and had been pretty much mobbed, with every man and his dog wanting a piece of them, so he, for one, was very happy to be shown to his and Jan’s cabin in the elevator, with its large panoramic window, as the two-day journey to the planet began. It was like a miniature cruise ship, and Marko and Jan even met one old lady at breakfast the next morning who had been riding elevators for many, many years. She said that as soon as she became totally familiar with one planet and its elevators she would move on to the next one. When Jan asked if this was her first ride on an elevator down to this planet, the old lady had replied that, no, she had already ridden on the other two, which were only hundreds of metres away. Jan mused later that it took all types to make the universe interesting.
~ * ~
The terminal at the elevator’s base was built into an equatorial island’s mountain, so it was a superb view coming down through the atmosphere. The place was so big and so full of people, equipment, cargo and shops that Jan and Marko did not see any other members of the crew leaving.
They quickly marched into the first tourist shop they could find and bought large sunglasses, larger hats and voluminous shirts, which they were relieved to note were favoured by the locals, and hired a small carryall on which they piled their luggage — including the two suit containers — among which they hid Nail and Glint. They bought some additional local clothing, which was garish to say the least, changed into it and set about blending in with the crowd.
It was going very well as they quietly moved towards the exits when a young man, walking past the carryall, nonchalantly picked up one of the smaller carrier bags without breaking stride and started to walk away from them. He would have easily got away scot-free had it not been for Glint, who had had his head under the bag, peeking out at the passing throngs of people. He erupted from the carryall, yelling at the thief, who looked back to see a fearsome vision of Glint with extended cooling frills for effect, accompanied by Nail, in hot pursuit. He screamed, then sprinted for the nearest exit still clutching the bag, forcing his way through the crowd as Glint and Nail slid through at knee level and easily caught up with him.
Glint leapt high into the air to pounce and knock him down while Nail clutched at the young man’s head before he hit the floor. The thief pulled a short-bladed knife and slashed at Nail, but Glint, with demonic speed, seized the thief’s wrist with both of his hands, plucked the knife from him then passed it to his hind feet cum hands and snapped the knife in two, dropping the parts on the floor. Glint, who appeared really angry, rolled the young man over onto his back, sitting on his chest as Nail decided that a little impromptu interrogation was in order.
‘Hold him still, Glint. I want to see how far I can get a claw up his nose before I touch his brain. We really need Flint here. He is better equipped for interrogation.’
The red-faced blubbering male started shaking and calling on the rapidly gathering crowd for assistance. Several of them taunted the thief, saying that he should know who had caught him and that he was getting everything he deserved. He looked up into Nail’s face, blubbering, ‘Who ... who ... who is Flint?’
Nail hissed, then yawned widely centimetres away from the thief’s face. ‘So, you have a voice. I am Nail and my colleague here, who loves breaking crappy knives, is Glint. Flint is another of our family. He is a mechanical spider. Should I call him over? He enjoys forcing his arms into human’s ears to see what is inside. Tell you what, you tell us about your mates here in the arrivals lounge and I won’t pull out your eyes.’
The man tried bravado. ‘Go fuck yourself, you creepy cat!’
Glint leant close and yelled in his ear. ‘Bad, bad human!’
Nail, in spite of his size, was very strong. He pressed his paws against the thief’s head and bent down to lick his tongue across the tightly closed eyes of the human. Marko was starting to feel almost sorry for the young man. Looking around, he noted that every one was recording the scene and looking over the top of the very large crowd he could see station security trying to force their way in to see what was happening for themselves. The man was screaming for Nail to stop, although Nail was not actually harming him, and started to blubber the names of the rest of his gang. The security and local police finally made it through the clapping, cheering crowd to find both Nail and Glint still sitting on the man, posing for photographs. Marko and Jan just leant against each other and laughed.
Fifty minutes later, as they were leaving the local police station, being bid a fond farewell by the station’s chief, the gang’s lawyer approached them to say that she was going to have Marko and Jan charged with possession of dangerous animals. Jan was about to speak with the woman when Glint told her that they would handle it. The hybridised fossa and Jesus lizard ACE lifted Nail up until he was level with the woman’s face. They then took turns in telling her exactly what her lineage was, and explained that they were ranking military entities within the Administration, and that they had the right of certified sentient citizens under local law to do what they had done. At that stage, she started rapidly backing off but not before something was quietly said to her. The pompous, obviously badly educated woman went completely white, apologised profusely, started shaking, and actually ran away.
Jan was giggling and asked, ‘Hey, Nail, what did you say to her?’
Nail preened himself a little. ‘Not much, but she will steer well clear of every cat she ever sees again.’
Jan looked closely at him. ‘Yeah, but you have not answered my question.’
The cat shrugged. ‘I told her I was going to fuck every female cat I came across and that in every kitten I fathered I would imprint her DNA and that of each of her clients as enemies of my species. I then gave her a little scratch. Think she got the message. So, when are Glint and I going to be given the ability to breed?’
Jan roared with laughter while Marko looked, and felt, shocked, wondering what kind of creatures he had let loose upon the universe. ‘Not today. Right, OK, enough of this subject. Let’s get the hell out of here before you pair get us into real trouble. How about I grab us a transport to take us out to the house-craft depot?’
On the way, they gathered up a few extra food supplies because the local meats, cheeses and wines were highly recommended by their driver. At one excellent shop called Gipsy Kitchen, Marko pulled out his money card and when his name came up the whole staff arrived to see them. Before they knew it the transport had been locked down and they, along with Sam, the driver, were treated to a hilarious few hours of impromptu entertainment, together with sampling the very best of the local foods and beverages.