Chapter 10

The shriek of icy wind buffeted the alien shuttle in the moments before it settled onto a white-blue snowy plain in the shadow of a jagged black mountain range.

Dixon and Adelman crouched in round niches built into the bulkhead on either side of the main aisle. These passed for seats among the B'hiri, who could spin silky webbing to protect against such turbulence. The two outversers didn't fare quite so well. As the shuttle jerked to the right, Dixon slid, lost his footing, and rolled out into the main aisle. Another bump, this time to the left, and Adelman flopped out onto Dixon, perpendicular.

“Are we there yet?” the reporter groaned.

Once the shuttle felt as though it had indeed come to a complete stop on the surface of the planet, Adelman pushed himself up, got to one knee, and then worked his way to upright before offering a hand to Dixon. “Yes, sir, we are,” he said.

Dixon accepted the assistance back to his feet, dusting off his pants with a nod. “Good. I guess.” He frowned, looking toward the rear hatch as it clunked and hissed open. They hadn't had any contact with the shuttle's pilot, who presumably worked in the cockpit beyond the forward hatch. When the B'hiri extracted the outversers from the remains of the Unfettered for relocation, all the guards had been wearing special rebreather devices. It seemed that they wanted to protect themselves against potential infection. They didn't know much about where Adelman and Dixon had been. No sense taking any risks.

The temperature in the cabin immediately plunged to near zero as snowflakes swirled through the gap above the ramp as it lowered from the shuttle. Suddenly, the relatively thin fabric of the shirt and slacks Dixon had chosen to wear on the maiden voyage of the Unfettered didn't feel like such a good choice. He hoped that they wouldn't be exposed to the cold for too long before finding shelter again – otherwise, Dixon understood that he would have survived the Minders and certain death aboard the Unfettered just to succumb to the hypothermia. Of course, even assuming he made it somewhere warm now, he still had the Minder toxin coursing through his veins. He'd lost track of how much time he had left, but he thought it might just be a matter of minutes.

Adelman took point descending the ramp, which helped shield Dixon from the worst of the cold for about eight seconds. The reporter threw up his arms to try and protect his eyes from the whirling snow crystals as he reached the ground to find a pair of black-shelled B'hiri waiting for them. It was late afternoon or early evening, with the planet's pale amber sun sinking toward the horizon opposite the great mountain range that reared above the shuttle. A barely discernible path led from the shuttle landing zone to a cluster of jade green domes about thirty yards away. Some kind of outpost, perhaps. Dixon could only hope that they at least kept it warm enough inside those buildings to keep him and Adelman alive.

Soon enough, the alien guards showed them through a hatch into the main dome. It was by no means comfortably warm by Dixon's standards, but they did have the heat up to around sixty degrees Fahrenheit. It would do for now. Inside the central chamber of the dome, Dixon and Adelman were delivered to a group of six B'hiri – all wearing protective breathing gear – who crouched in front of a bank of computer consoles and holographic displays. They all had glittering black compound eyes, purple-black chitinous shells, and spindly legs. Dixon wouldn't be able to tell them apart if they scurried in a frenzied circle and settled in a new formation.

“We have been unable to procure suitable food for your consumption,” one of the aliens said through a translation module. “However, based on the information from your ship's computer data storage, we have concocted a consumable protein paste that should serve your needs.” Another B'hiri skittered forward, clutching two cylinders full of pink-gray ooze, and offered them to Adelman and Dixon.

“I really don't want to know where this crap comes from,” Dixon said. He took the bottle, though, and twisted open the sealed cap. He dipped an index finger into the goo, pulled it out, and gave it a taste. The mixture reminded him of anchovies if they'd been dipped in licorice and then broiled in bacon. His first instinct was to gag on the strange paste, but then he saw Adelman slurping some of the mess down without flinching. So, he winced his way through it.

When they finished – he consumed about half of his, while Adelman polished off his own container – Dixon regarded their hosts with a frown. “Thanks for the snack. Now maybe you can help me with another big problem.”

“Yes?” the B'hiri asked.

“The Minders injected me with poison,” Dixon said. “They told me that it would kill me within six hours. Time's running short.”

“Your physiology is strange to us,” the alien replied. “However, we have scanned both of your circulatory systems and we have determined that you, Leonard Dixon, are accurate in the assertion that your blood has been poisoned. It is a toxin that is known to us. It was created by the Aukami. It is just as potent as the Minders alleged. If left untreated, it will kill you within the next fifteen minutes.”

“Great,” the reporter said. “So how about less talky, more healy?”

The B'hiri bobbed its rounded head. “We will start work on the remedy at once. It should be finished shortly.” Three of the aliens skittered away, possibly to a laboratory to develop an antidote to save Dixon's life, although he couldn't be sure. This whole exercise might just be part of torturing the outsider before killing him.

“While we wait, I've got a question,” Adelman said. The alien regarded the soldier with a tilt of its head and clacking of its mandibles. “Why are the Minders so mad at you? And why do they need people like us to fight their battles?”

“Our ancestors made certain choices regarding their ancestors,” the B'hiri replied. “It would be more accurate to call their ancestors their creators. The Il'Ri'Kamm Hive Mind did not evolve as most creatures do. Instead, they began existence as an artificial intelligence created by the Kamir.”

“Wait,” Dixon said. “What? Those monsters started out as AI? Computer programs? What the hell happened? Did they get tired of turning lights on and off?”

“Something along those lines,” answered the alien. “At a certain point in their evolution, the Minders determined that it would be more efficient to eradicate their creators. The Kamir were nearly destroyed before the B'hiri intervened. We provided them with technology that would allow the Kamir to...transition is perhaps the best word...from this realm of existence to another. The Kamir, in their usual arrogance, referred to this process as 'Ascension.' However, it was much more akin to sidestepping from one universe to another. Either way, the Ri'Kammi – children of the Kamir – could not countenance our actions. They seized control of that vessel they call home, the Harrower, and attempted to bomb our world from orbit. We used our abilities to rebuke the attack. We caused the Minders great discomfort. If they had not retreated, we might have destroyed them.”

“Why didn't you pursue them?” Adelman asked. “Why not destroy the Minders?”

“We are not savages,” the B'hiri said. “So long as they do not imperil our world, we have no interest in eliminating them. They have earned the right to exist.”

Dixon raised a hand. “Look, I'm happy as hell to learn all about the local politics, but really there's just one thing you've talked about that even piques my attention just a little bit. That transitioning technology, the shit the Kamir thought would make them ascend, could you use it to get us back home?”

“Possibly,” the alien said. It turned slowly on spindly legs to watch as the three who had left now returned, one of them bearing a small flask of green liquid. “First, we should see that the antidote is properly administered.”

The reporter grinned, walking toward the alien with the flask. “Damned straight! Let's have it.”

“It is untested,” the B'hiri said as Dixon snatched the antidote. “The cure may have negative side effects.”

“I don't give a shit about the side effects,” Dixon said, twisting the cap off the clear glass flask. “As long as it knocks out the toxin, I'm good with whatever.” He downed the liquid, guzzling every last drop he could manage. It slid down his throat with a sensation that made it seem like he was gargling plastic turf and cat hairballs. He hunched and put a hand to his mouth, afraid he might vomit.

“You okay?” Adelman asked.

“Peachy,” the reporter rasped.

Then the dome shuddered as an explosion erupted in the landing zone. His eyes widened and he looked from Adelman to the B'hiri, who were all now scuttling toward the holographic display. The shuttle that had delivered them to this facility was now a blazing ruin. Next, the communication tower swayed and then toppled over, smashing into the east side of the dome.

“Minders?” Adelman struggled to get a good look at the display, but the bulky alien bodies proved too much of an obstruction.

“No,” the B'hiri replied. “Medlidikke. Hekayti pirates.”

“Pirates?” Dixon laughed, swaying a little as sweat began to bead on his forehead. “So give 'em whatever they want and send 'em on their way!”

“They want us dead,” the alien explained. “They might turn your head into a hat.”

“Not much of a pirate, if you ask me,” Dixon opined before his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he flopped over backward, thumping onto the floor as chaos continued to take hold of the B'hiri compound.

Chapter 9

Leonard Dixon considered himself a scion of a privileged and advanced civilization.

He grew up in the decades before the middle of the 27th Century taking for granted the common access that all middle-income citizens had to the Infomatrix, including the neural implants for instant linking and the fully interactive fictions that he used to lose himself in as a kid.

Human cloning wasn't just possible, it was profitable for companies like Embryonix to create specialized workers, concubines, and warriors. It just wasn't legal anymore, not since the Lunites pitched their tantrum and won their independence.

Most diseases were curable or, at the very least, manageable. People on Earth tended to live to a ripe old age of 125 with rudimentary medical care.

But he'd never seen anything like what the B'hiri had just done to the Unfettered. By all rights, he understood that even if the stress of the sudden stop hadn't torn the ship apart, he and Adelman should have been rendered to a gooey paste. The inertial dampeners hadn't been online. However, the B'hiri technology held it together long enough to rapidly disassemble the craft, suspend the occupants in mid-air, and then build a cell around them out of what used to be the Unfettered.

Now, they impressed him again. A holographic image of a large, spider-like creature materialized in the middle of the cell. The alien appeared in a sickly red haze with glittering black compound eyes, bristly mandibles, and six spindly legs. When it spoke, it did so using a synthesized male voice in what sounded like Terran Standard.

“We have analyzed the information stored in your vessel's memory banks, assimilating as much as we can of your linguistic traits for purposes of translation,” the B'hiri said. “Please respond affirmatively if you understand what I am saying.”

Adelman shuddered at the sight of the alien, but gave a slow nod. “Yeah, I understand.”

“Crystal clear,” Dixon agreed. “Look, now that you can hear what we're saying: We don't have a quarrel with you people. The Hive Minders put us up to it. They pretty much killed everybody else aboard until we agreed to do this.”

“That is a familiar method that we have come to expect from them,” the B'hiri replied. “You have been no more successful than your predecessors in this endeavor.”

The journalist nodded, although he felt a slight sting of wounded pride at the tone of condescension he detected in the alien's statement. “Well, neither of us is much of a pilot. We did the best we could with what we had.” He looked across the hologram at the soldier, shrugging. “Anyway, that's all behind us. We're really sorry for the trouble. We'd like nothing better than to go home now.”

A few moments of silence, and then the B'hiri said: “We have studied your navigational charts. Your origin world is not within our immediate galactic vicinity. Further, some among the B'hiri are unconvinced that you acted under duress. It has been deemed prudent to take you into custody until such time as we are satisfied that you represent no harm to our world.”

“How does holding us solve anything?” Dixon asked, huffing. “We don't want to go back to the Minders, naturally, but if you could give us transport to a neutral outpost of some kind, maybe, where we can find someone who WILL take us to Earth...”

“We will take your request under advisement,” the alien said. “Until then, you will remain guests of the B'hiri.”

“Guests, huh?” the reporter inquired. “Well, how about whipping us up some sandwiches and a toilet cubicle? We haven't eaten since before leaving Citadel and I'm pretty sure you turned the john into a birdbath or something.”

“Food will be provided after you are transferred to more suitable lodgings on the planet,” the holographic B'hiri answered. Then the image flickered before fading out of view.

“That went better than it could have, with you doing the talking,” Adelman said. “I figured they'd kill us on the spot to save themselves all the trouble.”

Dixon nodded, a rueful smile on his face. “I'm just as surprised as you are.”

Chapter 8

The bent nose of the Unfettered punched through another cloud bank just before the starboard stabilizer wrenched off the hull in a spray of sparks and charred wiring.

Len Dixon had managed to strap himself in at a systems console to Adelman's right. He watched as the soldier struggled to bring the spinning ship under control, to no avail. “We're coming apart,” the journalist observed. He wanted it to come out calmly, but it didn't. It came out a bit shrieky, which earned him a grunt and an eyeroll from the novice pilot.

“Maybe you want to take the helm?” Adelman growled.

Dixon shook his head, but didn't apologize for pressuring at all. He didn't know exactly why he cared. In a few hours, the poison injected into him by the aliens would kill him. What difference would it make to die like this? At least it promised to be quick and painless when it came. He felt bad about Adelman, though. Len wanted to ask about friends and family back home. He didn't want to die knowing nothing but the guy's name. But then another stabilizer fin shredded off the Unfettered and he recognized that their existence could now be measured in seconds.

Too bad I'm in the wrong cosmic neighborhood and the implants are offline, he thought. First-person footage of the obliteration of Soltek's faster-than-light prototype ship would be an Infomatrix ratings bonanza for Jack Lambert and the rest of the crew at CBN.

He checked the sensor holodisplay, watched as – now in topographical mode – it showed the ship's rapid intercept course with the peak of a tall mountain on the primary continent. Len Dixon didn't have the audience of billions that he enjoyed just yesterday, but he still had Adelman. Possibly, the soldier was a fan of his work. Perhaps he had watched the neurojournals on a regular basis. If so, Adelman deserved to have proper closure. He deserved to hear last words from a celebrity that didn't come out like a panicky back-seat driver. It ought to be something extraordinary, but not maudlin. Dixon didn't do mopey or sad. Instead, he decided to be as open and honest with his final words as he could possibly be. He wanted to give Adelman an insight into himself as a person, inexplicable and strange like everyone else.

“It kind of turned me on when Captain Panderyn knocked me around,” Dixon said.

Adelman jerked his head around to stare at him, mouth gaping. By the time he did so, however, the journalist was watching the holodisplay again. The Unfettered's white dot was about to slam into the icy mountain top, which was taking up most of the forward window of the cockpit. Good timing, Dixon thought. No awkward moments here! He waited, ready, for the choirs of angels or the army of pitchfork-carrying imps or the simple utter blackness to take him to oblivion.

He didn't expect the sudden arrival of a larger craft, sliding between the Unfettered and the mountain in time to target the Consortium vessel with some kind of blue energy field that arrested their descent and prevented impact.

“Oh, fuck me,” Dixon sighed, rubbing his palm on his forehead. He couldn't bring himself to look over at Adelman, but they were both far more interested in the newcomer that had snared them neatly in the skies above B'hira. The alien fighters moved to flanking positions around the wedge-shaped utility vessel that had captured the Unfettered in some kind of tractor beam. Then, while the occupants of the Consortium starship watched, the Unfettered seemed to start disassembling itself. Hull plates and rivets popped loose, floating free. Spars and bulkhead braces rolled away in all directions. Before long, Dixon and Adelman drifted in a glowing blue field of scattered starship debris, suspended about one hundred feet above the slope of the mountain. Then bits of the Unfettered closed around, under, and above them again, taking on a new shape: A heavily armored cell with a narrow glass window in one bulkhead. Through the window, Dixon watched as their new prison was pulled slowly aboard the towing vessel.

“Now THAT was pretty fucking wild,” the journalist noted, looking at Adelman with a goofy grin on his face.

Adelman wasn't smiling. “Stay on your side of the cell, cupcake.”

Chapter 7

“I don't get it,” Private Adelman said as he adjusted the Unfettered's course, firing the directional thrusters to bring her around into a sublight arc. He nodded his head toward the navigational display. “Sensors aren't finding any familiar landmarks. No Orion. No Big Dipper. No Horsehead Nebula. No Alpha Centauri. No...”

“Yeah, yeah, nothing on the charts, got it,” Dixon replied, looking at the readout as it echoed over and over again: NO RECOGNIZED CELESTIAL BODIES. CURRENT LOCATION INDETERMINATE. “Guess we're a long way from home, then. Makes sense, though, right? I'd never heard of the B'hiri before. Maybe we're on one of the other spiral arms of the Milky Way.”

Adelman shook his head. “No, sir. Even if we were thrown a whole galaxy over, those sensors still ought to be able to detect familiar constellation objects.”

The journalist furrowed his brow. “I'd just as soon not think about what that means, then.”

“It means wherever these Hive Minders took us, it's not the Milky Way galaxy and it might not even be our own universe,” Adelman said.

“Good on you for keeping that to yourself,” Dixon grumped. “How long until we're at B'hira?”

“A few minutes at top speed,” Adelman answered. Fingers of his right hand entered a brief sequence of pad taps. “Shutting off long range sensors since they're obviously no use to us. Focusing short range sensors on the planet. Entering coordinates the Hivers gave us.”

Dixon nodded, stepping around the console and making his way to the port side of the ship's command center. Rectangular portholes provided a glimpse of the alien stars and the massive vessel that had delivered them to this unknown corner of space. Like its interior, the craft appeared to be organic. At least half a mile in length, from egg-shaped exhaust ports to bulbous centerpiece to the odd sinuous tendrils of brownish-gray-green that stretched out like grasping fingers. That vessel dwarfed the Unfettered and surely had more firepower to bring to bear on the B'hiri enemy. Why not crash THAT monstrosity into the middle of the capital city?

“It doesn't make much sense,” Dixon mused. He rubbed at the gauzy material wrapped around his head, which still ached, hollow and shrill, after his collision with the Hiver force field. He looked from the alien ship to the white-gray orb of the planet B'hira, growing ever closer. “Why hijack an ill-equipped starship with an unprepared crew to fight a war for you?” He turned toward Adelman, who was doing his best to stay focused on the task of keeping the Unfettered on course. “Private, I get the feeling our captors aren't as powerful as they want to appear. If they aren't striking at the B'hiri themselves, it must be because they can't get close enough to do so. The Minders can fuck with people's brains – we've seen that, haven't we? So what if the B'hiri are even better at that than the Hive Mind? That certainly might explain why there's a war in the first place and it'd do to put some sense to the premise of stealing weaker help to do the job for them.”

The soldier-turned-kamikaze-pilot nodded as he contemplated Dixon's theory. “Maybe the B'hiri could help us, then.”

“Maybe,” Dixon agreed. “Worth trying, I think. If I'm right, the closer we get to B'hira, the less likely it'll be that the Minders will try to get near us. So, we get within hailing distance, say hello, beg mercy, and demand sanctuary. Maybe moon the Minders before we land?”

Adelman chuckled. “Sounds a great deal like a workable plan, Mr. Dixon.” He peered at the short range sensor display. His smile grew broader. “Close enough to start hailing. Shall I?”

The journalist nodded. “Do it. Maybe the B'hiri can tell us the fastest way back to Earth.”

Tapping a button on the navigation console, Private Adelman activated a multi-frequency general broadcast. The unencrypted message proceeded: “This is Private Jeffrey Adelman of the Consortium experimental starship Unfettered. We are an unarmed vessel brought to your territory against our will. We want nothing more than to seek sanctuary among your people until such time as we can return to our own homeworld in Sol System. We have no quarrel against the B'hiri and want nothing to do with the war that is being waged by the Il'Ri'Kamm Hive Mind.” He thumbed the END TRANSMISSION tab before tapping REPEAT – CYCLE 30 SEC. Then Adelman looked at Dixon and asked, “How's that?”

“I'm sure they're prepping the red carpet even as we speak,” Dixon replied.

Moments later, three red sensor contacts pinged onto the screen – port, starboard, and aft. They had been invisible before, but shimmered into existence either flanking or following the Unfettered. Dart-shaped craft, small and nimble. “Picket fighters,” Adelman said. “Never seen that configuration before.”

He didn't get much time to study the new starfighters on the screen before the aft vessel shot a burst of crimson energy along the port hull of the Unfettered. Warning shot, Dixon knew. “If they're hearing that message, I don't think they're understanding it,” he said.

Over the ship's speakers, Dixon and Adelman heard something like scratchy chattering noises, a cacophany that sounded to the journalist as though all the hens on a farm had been muted but could still clack talons on the wooden planking of the hen house floor.

“Tell them we're friendly!” Dixon shouted.

“Maybe YOU speak B'hiri?” Adelman asked.

The second shot wasn't a warning. It struck the starboard attitude guidance pylon, which had the effect of confusing the Unfettered's equilibrium and sending her into a slow but steady continual correction spin. Adelman struggled with the console, trying to right the ship, but he couldn't regain full control. Now they were in the gravitational pull of the planet B'hira, flanked by two fighters and pursued by another that was liable to shoot to kill on the next blast.

“If Hivers had asses, they'd be laughing them off right about now,” Dixon said.

Chapter 6

Dixon finally stopped seeing two of Dokes about thirty minutes after the medic wrapped a gauzy bandage around the journalist's head and pumped a small blue vial of Clarinox into his right arm.

“Thanks,” Dixon mumbled, sitting on the ramp of the Unfettered, his eyes rarely leaving the main entrance to the Minder vessel. He kept expecting Meghan Falkenberg to step back into view, but it was an expectation dominated largely by dread, fear of what would happen when she returned. The aliens obviously didn't care for Captain Panderyn's poison pill gambit and now they had upped the stakes by grabbing the only other civilian for some nefarious purpose.

At the moment, the captain stood in the open hatchway of the airlock at the top of the ramp, hands on his hips. Clearly consternated by this turn of events, he huffed and asked Adelman, “You're sure Dixon didn't push Ms. Falkenberg across that threshold?”

The private shook his head. “Captain, Mr. Dixon did his best to stop her. I won't say she went of her own volition, but I know for sure that he didn't give her a shove.”

“It's not like their taking her will change your mind about Project Blow-It-All-Up, right?” Dixon asked, looking up the ramp at the captain. “In fact, I'll put good Consortium credits on the bet that you're going to tell Brechtman to speed it up.”

Panderyn offered a curt nod to the journalist. “That makes sense.” A taut smile, then: “Dokes, Adelman, report to Brechtman and see if there's anything you can do to help. Send the other troops out to stand watch over the Unfettered.”

“Aye, sir,” the two soldiers said, saluting before they clomped up the ramp and ducked past the captain, who stepped aside to make room for their passing.

“How's your engineer's hand?” Dixon asked.

The captain shrugged. “He's always up for a challenge.”

“Look, I know I screwed up,” the journalist replied, rubbing the palm of his right hand on the back of his sore neck. Probably somewhere else the Thul went probing earlier, he suspected. “I'm sorry. I've been going through a lot of bullshit lately, none of which has anything to do with you or your team, and getting hijacked by some overcompensating transdimensional alien assholes didn't make things any better. If we were going back home, I'd want to make it up to Brechtman somehow.”

“Yeah, well, he wants to get even with you too,” Panderyn said. “He's too busy working on the reactor to think about what to do about it. So, I'm helping him dream up a suitable response.” Three soldiers moved through the airlock, past the captain, and down the ramp to stand watch in close proximity to the Unfettered. “Babysitting unit's here. I wouldn't worry too much about Ms. Falkenberg, Dixon. We'll blow a nice chunk out of the hull of this behemoth and all our problems will be over.” With that assurance, the captain disappeared back into the starship so that he could go back to looming over Brechtman, contemplating the grand comeuppance he envisioned for the Il'Ri'Kamm Hive Mind. The captain's moral absolutism had a certain quaint charm to it, but it demonstrated a fundamental failure to understand the Minders or their inherent nature.

First encountered during the previous decade by interstellar explorer Eduard Ocartus on a dusty world known as Sagittarius, Minders weren't flesh and blood creatures whose lives could be extinguished by something as mundane as a reactor blast. They existed outside of the familiar framework of space and time. More often than not, they could only be discerned by humans as transient ghost images, like shadows of memories and the occasional sense of deja vu. No, Dixon didn't know much about much thanks to his dependence on the Infomatrix, but he had read several files on these aliens and their discovery by humankind on his way to the Soltek hangar before the launch.

He didn't doubt that when Panderyn finally blew up the Unfettered, it would cause structural damage to the massive Minder vessel. But he was equally certain that the explosion wouldn't do much more than inconvenience the Minders while it killed the prisoners. A noble sacrifice, maybe, but pointless. Unfortunately, Dixon felt his options were limited under the current circumstances. He didn't have any weapons. He didn't have any collateral to leverage against Panderyn. And even if he somehow managed to overwhelm the Vanguard soldiers and put a stop to the captain's suicide plan, Len Dixon had absolutely no experience when it came to piloting a starship.

The rasping multivoice returned: “Help is coming.”

He looked across the platform, beyond the catwalk, and saw Meghan Falkenberg emerging from the shadowy interior of the Minder vessel. The force field flickered back into place behind her. Like she did upon entering that maw, Meghan moved with a shuffling, lifeless gait – the kind one might expect from a puppet moving on loose marionette strings. Something different now, though. Her eyes. They glowed a shimmering blue. The three soldiers standing around the ramp noticed it too. Immediately, they raised their plasma rifles to aim at the Soltek spokeswoman. “Halt!” one of them shouted as she got to their side of the catwalk and stepped onto the landing platform. She obeyed, stopping as ordered. Then she tilted her head to the left and motioned vaguely with her right hand. Startled looks on their faces, two guards turned on each other and fired point blank, right in the face. The third put the barrel under his chin and vaporized his head. Dixon shouted in horror, then rolled off the edge of the ramp and scurried underneath. He doubted it would do him much good, but it might buy him a little time.

Time? Dixon smirked at the futility of the concept. He was a dead man no matter what. If Panderyn blew the reactor: Dead. If Panderyn didn't: Dead. The poison would see to that. So what if this Minder-possessed woman killed him sooner rather than later?

He crawled out from under the ramp to find himself looking at her shoes. He looked up at her vacant face, those empty glowing eyes.

“Follow,” she said with a voice that didn't belong to her.

“Must be crowded in there,” Dixon muttered, getting to his feet. He walked after Meghan as she ascended the ramp toward the airlock. “Look, I tried talking sense into the captain. He's beyond listening.”

“Yes,” the Minder-woman agreed.

In the engineering chamber, the captain and Corporal Brechtman were standing next to the reactor casing, facing each other, while Dokes and Adelman flanked the machinery, facing the hatchway. The guards brought their rifles up to aim at Meghan and Dixon.

“I can't figure it out myself,” Brechtman was saying to Captain Panderyn. His wounded hand was bandaged and splinted. “It should be red-lining, but somehow...” As the rifles raised, the engineer and the captain turned their attention toward the newcomers. Brechtman's mouth fell open as he noticed Meghan's eyes. The captain just seemed too distracted by the journalist's presence to catch the change to the Soltek woman.

“Dixon, I told you...” Panderyn began, but then Meghan did the head-tilt thing again. The captain pulled an energy pistol from a holster at his side, aimed it at the engineer's temple, and pulled the trigger. A flash of green-blue, the scorching of flesh, bone and brain matter, and then Brechtman's corpse thumped onto the deck beside the reactor. Dokes and Adelman watched in uncomprehending horror as their commander turned the pistol on himself, sticking the barrel against the roof of his mouth and pulling the trigger. The gun clattered on the deck before Panderyn's twitching corpse sagged against the reactor and slid to the floor.

“Serve or die,” the alien voice commanded through Meghan Falkenberg as she regarded the surviving soldiers.

They looked toward Dixon. He pointed at the dead men on the deck. “I'd agree if I were you. The Minders aren't going to let us blow them up and they're not going to let us go. We don't have any choice.”

Dokes shook his head, tears welling in his eyes as he leveled the rifle at Meghan. “I can't,” he said. “I won't.”

Her head tilted. Dokes dropped the rifle, then turned and smashed his head against the bulkhead, cracking open his skull. Adelman, rifle lowered, watched blood pooling on the deck around the dead medic's head. “I'll serve,” the private said. “Whatever you want. I...” He looked at Meghan. “Just don't do anything like that to me.”

Dixon stepped around to face Meghan Falkenberg. “So, you've got a ship with no weapons. You've got one soldier and a poisoned neurojournalist for crew. You killed off the engineer and the pilot. I can't fly this fucking thing. What's your big plan now?”

“I made it through basic starship flight training on Citadel,” Adelman said. “I don't think I can manage much that's fancy, but I can get us moving and point in the right direction.”

“That will do,” Meghan replied in the multivoice. “You will launch the Unfettered, elude the B'hiri defenses, and crash this ship into the middle of their capital city. The explosion should destroy several blocks. Casualties will number in the thousands.”

“Oh,” Dixon said. He looked at Adelman, sighing. “Guess there's no point in asking for that antidote, then.”

Chapter 5

As Corporal Brechtman clattered and clanged his way through the manifold casing of the large reactor in the engine room of the Unfettered, Leonard Dixon sat on a metal equipment crate, frustrated by the utter silence.

“Hand me the Jolley wrench, would ya, Dixon?” Brechtman's voice was somewhat muffled, but his hand was poking out of the cavity he had crawled into, flat on his back. Fingers beckoned, palm open to receive the tool.

The neurojournalist tilted his head the way a dog might when confronted by a word it thinks it probably ought to understand but quite obviously doesn't. He didn't know what the engineer was talking about. At the core, Dixon comprehended that it was some kind of wrench. But what was the adjective all about? Was it a happy wrench? Was there some guy named Jolley who made tools just for radical procedures designed to set a starship reactor to redline toward an explosion that would take out a massive alien vessel? If they hadn't deafened his mind, the question would have been easily answered. A quick jaunt out to the Infomatrix, a brief search query, he'd have everything: Definition, uses, origins, images. Then he'd just have to open the crate, look inside, and yank out the tool like a professional. He might even be able to manage a smug look at Brechtman's obvious surprise.

Thanks to the Infomatrix, Leonard Dixon didn't need to know everything to KNOW everything. All that data stored in the virtual landscape did the knowing for him. He just had to know where to go digging and, within moments, he could be an expert on just about any topic. Without it, though, it was becoming more and more obvious to Dixon that he didn't know a damned thing.

He also missed the other noise: The crowd. All the input coming from people following his broadcasts. God help him, he even missed the frantic calls from his mother. With Lani gone, it was relatively easy to subdue his feelings and lose himself in the wash of everything else to occupy his mind: Mindless chatter, celebrity gossip, shiny new gadgets, the latest holovids. The Infomatrix helped create the illusion that he was never alone. Now, loneliness, frustration, and loss gnawed at him. Add to that a sense of hopelessness and futility. Then, for a kicker, apply a generous helping of impending doom thanks to the toxic mechanism planted under his skin.

Dixon stood, turned, and lifted the lid of the crate. Inside, he found what appeared to be more than two dozen variants of wrenches, pliers, screwdrivers, drills, and electronic gadgets.

“Clock's ticking, Dixon,” the engineer groused.

His brow knit and his jaw clenched as Dixon turned to glower in the direction of the engineer's legs and finger-wiggling hand. “Thanks for reminding me.” He snarled, reached into the crate, and grabbed the biggest and heaviest wrench of the bunch. Then he took a few steps toward the reactor, snatched Brechtman's beckoning hand, slammed it up against the machine's manifold.

“DIXON!” Brechtman yelled. He didn't sound quite as condescending to Dixon now.

He didn't need the Infomatrix to tell him how to apply blunt force. The engineer howled in agonized fury after the metal wrench slammed against his fingers, bruising flesh and breaking bones.

The Unfettered wasn't that big, however, and the engine room wasn't sealed off at the moment. Brechtman's scream brought Captain Panderyn and the rest of his Vanguard soldiers thudding down the corridor, rifles at the ready.

“Dixon, what are you doing?” Panderyn asked, face reddening with anger at the sight of the journalist clutching the wrench, stepping back from the reactor while the wounded Brechtman wormed his way back out to favor the smashed hand. “Drop the wrench!”

“Fuck you,” Dixon snapped, waving the wrench at the captain like a scepter. “How hard is it to just do what these Minders want us to do? Who elected you to play moral crossing guard for everybody?”

“Aim,” Panderyn ordered, his voice and demeanor suddenly cooling as he composed himself after the initial shock of seeing what Dixon had done to his engineer. Dokes, Adelman, and the other Vanguard squad members raised their rifle barrels, pointing them at Dixon. The captain continued: “I'm not counting to three. You either drop the wrench or they drop you. Now.”

His eyes locked on Panderyn's, Dixon didn't doubt the captain's threat. Nevertheless, he couldn't help but burst out laughing. Either the poison would kill him or Panderyn would blow them all up within the next six hours. “Don't do me any fucking favors, Captain,” he said, before tossing the wrench onto the deckplate in front of him.

“Brechtman?” Panderyn looked toward the wounded engineer, who stared, furious, at the journalist. “Think you can still pull this together?”

The corporal slowly broke his attention away from his attacker so that he could reply to the commanding officer. “Aye, sir. It'll slow me down, but it's doable if you give me someone competent and less, y'know, apeshit to fetch tools. Maybe some painkillers too.”

“Dokes, see to his hand and get him the tools he needs when he needs them,” Panderyn ordered.

“Aye, Captain,” Dokes answered.

“Dixon.” The captain turned his gaze back toward him.

“I'm not one of your soldiers,” Dixon said.

“No, you're not,” Panderyn agreed. “This ship is government property, authorized personnel only. I'm revoking your press pass. Get off while we do what needs doing.” He looked at Adelman and said, “Be sure he's off this boat in thirty seconds. If he tries anything you don't like, shoot him.”

“Anything?” Adelman asked.

The captain shrugged. “Your discretion.”

Dixon sighed, rubbing the back of his head. “Whatever, Captain. I know the way out.” The soldiers lowered their weapons and parted to allow him to pass through the hatchway into the main corridor of the Unfettered. As ordered, however, Adelman followed.

Before long, they were through the airlock and starting down the ramp. Dixon was staring at his shoes, mulling the insanity of the captain's blow-it-all-up plan, when he heard Adelman mutter: “What's she doing?”

On the other side of the catwalk, Meghan Falkenberg shuffled along as if dazed, walking toward the aperture that led into the heart of the vessel where the Minders and their Thul minions abided.

“Meghan!” Dixon shouted. He loped down the ramp, onto the platform, and across the catwalk. If she heard him at all, though, she ignored him. She was through the opening two steps ahead of him, which was plenty of time for the force field to crackle back into place. The barrier seemed to grab hold of his face and slam it like a wrestler against the ropes of the ring. Dizzy, seeing double, and bleeding from the ears, he staggered back. He might have fallen off into the chasm below the catwalk if Adelman hadn't been there to catch him.

The woman disappeared into the blue-green shadows of the alien vessel.

“What's going on?” Adelman asked. “Why'd she go in there?”

Dixon cradled his forehead in the palms of his hands, trying in vain to silence the unceasing ringing of cathedral bells that seemed to be going on within his mind. “Plan B,” he muttered.

Chapter 4

“So is there anybody you want us to notify?” Captain Panderyn asked. “Next of kin?”

Len didn't know how long he had been in alien custody before he staggered out onto the catwalk and leaned against the railing. He heard the familiar hum of the force field crackling back into place over the aperture in the bulkhead. Then he felt a gauntleted hand – one of the Vanguard soldiers – pressing on his shoulder. His thoughts were still scattered as the soldier guided him across the platform to the waiting ramp of the Unfettered. He felt sore where the alien probes and knives had poked and sliced, but he could find no signs of scars when he lifted his shirt to inspect his flesh.

A few minutes later, with a steaming cup of black coffee on the tray in front of him in the passenger compartment, he explained to his fellow prisoners that the captors had injected him with a toxin that would kill him in six hours if they refused to help the Hivers – the Minders, as they fashioned themselves – in their war against another alien race. Naturally, he expected that the others aboard the Unfettered would do everything in their power to save the famous Leonard Dixon. Unfortunately, it seemed, he was wrong.

“It's not that we don't sympathize with your situation,” the Vanguard officer continued. He was a middle-aged man with dark hair streaked silver at the temples. He had maybe a decade on Len. “However, we've got some things working against support for that ultimatum. First, the Stellar Consortium doesn't have a dog in this fight. We're not under orders to strike against the – B'hiri, you called them? Second -”

Dixon didn't wait for the second. He snapped: “Fuck your orders! We're a long way from home, Captain! I know my life might not mean shit to you, but do you REALLY think the Minders are going to stop making this demand after I die? Are you willing to sacrifice everybody else on this ship? Even yourself?”

Panderyn shrugged. “We're all expendable. Look, Dixon, we don't know who we're up against. That's number two on the list of reasons why we don't agree to their terms. The B'hiri might outnumber us mightily. Think about it. This ship that captured us, it's huge. Bigger than anything we've ever seen. The technology is far beyond our expertise. And if THESE guys need help to take on the B'hiri, well, I think they might need to keep looking. Hell, the Unfettered isn't even kitted out for weapons. All we've got are the portable guns that the soldiers keep in the lockers.”

“So that's it, then? I'm a dead man?”

Meghan Falkenberg sighed, placing a hand on Len's wrist. “If there was some other way, the captain would do it.”

The commanding officer knit his brow, then motioned for Falkenberg to step aside so he could move into position beside the neurojournalist. “We might be able to do something about the poison pellet.” He looked past Adelman to another soldier, the one who had met Dixon on the catwalk. His lapel bore a gleaming red metal pin in the shape of a cross, above the name patch. “Dokes,” the captain said. “Fetch a medscanner and a No. 3 laser scalpel.”

“Aye, sir,” Dokes responded. He then vanished beyond Dixon's field of view into a utility hatch that led back to a small infirmary.

“I don't know what you've got in mind,” Len told Panderyn, “but it's just liable to kill me faster.”

“Maybe,” the captain agreed. “So what's the point of waiting?”

Dixon scowled. “What's the point of rushing?”

The public relations worker frowned, looking from Dixon to Panderyn. “Captain, something to keep in mind: even if you manage to disable the poison pellet inside Mr. Dixon, the Minders will still have us as captives. They won't just give up on using this ship – or your soldiers – in this war they're waging.”

“In which case,” Dixon added, “you might as well let the poison pill kill me first. I don't want to see what the Minders come up with as Plan B.”

Dokes returned, a black plastic cylinder in one hand and a scanner in the other. He offered the scanner to Panderyn, who switched it on and immediately swept the device over Dixon's arms, down his legs, and then over the back of his neck. The captain shoved the scanner into Dixon's field of view so that he could see the information on the display. “Small pellet, just a couple of millimeters across, right under the skin behind your left ear. Are you certain that you don't want it removed?”

“What if they tamper-proofed it?” Falkenberg asked.

“That's definitely a risk,” Panderyn agreed. He turned to regard the journalist again, raising the laser scalpel. “Last chance, Dixon. Leave it in or take it out?”

Dixon opened his mouth to reply, but Dokes interjected: “Captain, there might be another option.” The captain looked to Dokes. “Time's the problem, so let's stop time. At least for Mr. Dixon. The infirmary has one stasis unit and it appears functional.”

The journalist shook his head, sighing. “Not much point in delaying the inevitable, Dokes. It's not like you'd be buying time to get me to a state-of-the art medlab on Mars. In six hours, whether I'm in the cooler or not, the pellet's still going to be a problem and the Minders are still going to want to throw us into that war of theirs.” He scratched his chin, then looked toward Meghan. “If we want to carry this through to the logical premise that Captain Panderyn is suggesting, then someone oughta fucking give me a gun. I can put a blast in each of you and then the pellet can kill me.”

Meghan gaped, astonished at the suggestion. “Murder-suicide. Really, Mr. Dixon?”

He shrugged. “If we're all dead, well, I guess that shows the Minders that they can't boss us around, right?”

“No one's giving you a gun, Dixon,” the captain said. “But I like the direction that thought's going.” He looked toward a man behind him, to the left – a squat, crewcut man in his early thirties with smudges of grease on his hands and cheeks. The name patch on his Vanguard uniform read “BRECHTMAN.” “Corporal, get to work rigging the reactor to blow. Let's see how the Minders like having their own poison pill to worry about.”