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  "Thanks, AL,” she said hoarsely.

  She allowed herself a few minutes to quell her nerves before punching up the ship's main computer.

  "Vicki,” she said aloud, “where am I?"

  All interstellar ship's central computers were known collectively as “Vicki,” a tradition dating back to the first flights some four hundred earlier. Few remembered that the designation originally stood for VICI, or Voice-Integrated Conn Interface, but the tradition was handed down through each generation of pilots, reinforced by the fact that conns were given feminine voices, the military psyches having shown time and again that was more soothing to the human ear than its masculine counterpart.

  A sweetly feminine, slightly lilting voice answered.

  "The ship is presently on the surface of Ararat, second planet of the Arcturus system."

  Jeena frowned. Arcturus? We shouldn't even be in the same quadrant as that system.

  "Did you change the flight plan?"

  "Negative."

  "Why was the Drive taken offline?"

  "A collision with a large gravitational object was deemed imminent."

  A reference to the planet, Jeena assumed. That was a non-answer. The planet shouldn't have been there because they shouldn't have been here.

  "Our flight plan didn't take us through Arcturus."

  "That is correct."

  "Dammit, just give me a schematic of the hyperspace flight,” Jeena snapped.

  A holographic image appeared on the heads-up, representing the flight plan she had laid out prior to making the jump from Mizar 3. A faint line began there and followed a slightly irregular curved path toward her destination: Earth. This was a Hawking line, and should not intersect any stellar object.

  She studied the line closely. The Arcturus system wasn't even close.

  It made no sense. Her hyperspace flight took her nowhere near Arcturus, yet here she was.

  She gnawed on her lower lip. “Was there a course deviation during flight?"

  "Negative."

  "Any sign of Drive malfunction?"

  "Negative."

  "What about a gravitational anomaly along our flight path?"

  "Negative."

  "Well, did the goddamn planet just jump in our way?” she demanded.

  The machine maintained a dignified silence.

  Jeena sat back in disgust. Her body throbbed, and her head was pounding. And she was hungry—she realized she hadn't eaten since she first lay down on the bunk after taking the ship out of orbit, almost two days ago.

  Well, I may be lost, but at least I won't starve. Whoever the pilot of this cargo ship was, he was also quite obviously a smuggler. She remembered her shock at finding all the contraband goods in the cargo hold.

  Probably had a good deal of his money invested in that hold, she thought. That'll teach him not to keep his ship hot on a prison tarmac. Although losing his ship might have been the best thing for him. If the Coalition discovered he was smuggling, he would have spent the next several years in a pain cell.

  Whoever he was, he was either very brave or very stupid. Didn't he know all interstellar flights were logged? How did he figure on covering up all the extra Drive use?

  Jeena sat up. Wait a minute, how would he cover them up? The CCOMS would document any trips to unapproved sectors. An answer slowly came to her, along with a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach.

  "Vicki, has the central coordinate system of this ship been tampered with?"

  "Affirmative. The CCOMS of this ship does not correspond to the local observable star pattern."

  A shudder went through her. So, that's how he did it.

  Navigation through hyperspace was guided by the CCOMS, or Central Coordinate Mapping System. Using Polaris as the origin, all known stellar bodies were plotted in four vectors—three for spatial position and the fourth for gravitational density. Orbital and linear motions were also recorded.

  In hyperspace, since you were, in effect, skirting the normal dimensions of space, no directional readings were possible. It was only through such a system as CCOMS that interstellar flight had been made practical. It was also why every flight had to be plotted and calculated in advance, for once you were in hyperspace you could never be exactly sure of where you were at any given moment. In fact, the entire concept of “where"—at least in regards to three-dimensional space—lost all meaning entirely, and even gravitational fields could only be detected when you were almost right on top of them. Without a system like CCOMS, any hyperspace ship had a better than average chance of ending up passing through some immovable galactic object—usually with spectacular, if generally fatal, results.

  The pilot of this ship, this smuggler, must have realigned the CCOMS prior to each of his smuggling runs in such a way that they would be recorded as ordinary supply trips in the log. Jeena was impressed. What balls! Even assuming he had a portable unit programmed with the actual CCOMS, it was a combination of guts and insanity she could admire.

  "Vicki, is there a copy of the original CCOMS in ship's memory?"

  "Affirmative."

  "Re-up the original coordinate system and overlay my flight plan."

  There it was. Plotted against the true CCOMS, her flight path took her right through the Arcturus system. She took a closer look. The line passed directly through the system's sun. She sank back into the chair. Good thing this planet was in the way.

  She allowed herself a few more minutes to rest before slowly standing and making her way around the cabin. She needed to dress her wounds, particularly the gash to her thigh, but first she needed to locate the med kit.

  Everything had been thrown about the cabin during the landing, and she had to pick through the debris. She eventually found it wedged under the conn seat and picked it up, limping back to the dayroom.

  Sitting gingerly on the bunk, she placed the med kit next to her and broke the seal. The pain under her left breast was worse now and intensified with each breath—a cracked rib, she guessed. Taking the trans-hypo out of the kit, she loaded it with a cylinder of psuedomorph. Checking the dosage twice, she placed the instrument against her neck and pushed. Instantly, three milligrams of the painkilling drug pulsed through her skin and into her carotid artery, carried on a burst of ultrasonic waves. She waited a moment then attempted a breath—much better. The pain was still there, but much reduced.

  She now examined the laceration to her thigh. It appeared deep, but there was not enough blood to indicate an arterial bleed. Taking a small atomizer from the kit, she sprayed the edges of the wound, instantly anesthetizing it.

  With the wound numb, she could explore it more thoroughly. The edges were straight and clean, and she pulled them slightly apart, gazing into the gash. What bleeding there was, was coming from a small venous plexus—that should not be a problem.

  Although the risk of infection was small, she decided not to take any chances. She took a vial from the kit and broke it open, pouring the bluish liquid into the wound. She watched dispassionately as it foamed and frothed. It contained an antibiotic as well as growth factors that would accelerate the healing process.

  She now removed a pistol-shaped instrument from the kit and pressed the trigger, laying the glowing red tip at the uppermost margin of the wound. Holding the edges of the gash together with her thumb and index finger, she moved the skin welder down the wound, the abutted edges fusing together as she went. There was a slight sickly-sweet smell of burning flesh as she worked. She stopped just before reaching the end of the laceration, leaving a small opening for drainage.

  Her wounds now cared for, she entered the adjoining shower stall, a small, slightly rusted metal cubicle set in the corner of the dayroom. Dialing up a warm spray, she stepped into it, grateful it still worked after the hard landing, and letting the clean water wash over her. She luxuriated in the feel of it, scrubbing away the dirt and filth of sixteen months of confinement and the more recent layer of splattered blood. It was the first real shower she had had since
her crash and capture, the memory of which made her wonder fleetingly if anyone had missed her when she didn't return from the last mission.

  Not the Star Corps brass, certainly. They would have logged her as dead or captured—the distinction being moot—and not given her a second thought. There was no Geneva Convention in this war to ensure the decent treatment of POW's, and no prisoner exchanges. The difference between being killed in battle and being taken prisoner was simply one of time—few prisoners lived long on either side. Soldiers were expendable, like the machinery they used.

  Had any of them missed her, she wondered—the men and women of her unit? She didn't think so. SAG commandos were trained to keep emotionally detached, and no one had been more detached than Jeena Garza.

  She respected her fellow soldiers, but that was where it ended. She would fight with them and drink with them and even make love with them in fast, furious, loveless couplings, but she could never love them, or they her. She was a loner among loners, and had never needed or sought their friendship. No, she would not be missed.

  Tears suddenly appeared and began to flow without warning, washed away by the streaming water. Slowly, she sank to her knees on the cold metal floor, crying in great heaving sobs and pounding her fist impotently against the wall.

  Chapter 2

  If captured, you can expect to be tortured. It is inevitable. Do not worry that you may divulge miltary secrets. You will not be given any. Nothing you may tell your captures will help them in slightest, nor you.

  Excerpt from SAG Survival Manual

  Jeena stepped dripping from the shower, her eyes bloated and red, and dried with a small towel as she crossed to the conn. The long-range scanners were still silent—there was no Union or Coalition communication in the area. She was safe for now.

  "Vicki, what is the local time?"

  "It is now dusk on the planet, equivalent to nineteen hundred hours Greenwich Mean Time."

  It was too late to investigate the planet tonight. She'd wait till morning.

  "Set a wakeup alarm for 0600 Greenwich Mean."

  "Yes, sir."

  She turned toward the day room. “Vicki, is there a music library on board?

  "Yes, sir. I carry an extensive catalogue of musical styles. These include..."

  "Save it."

  The voice stopped abruptly.

  "Classical. Holst. The Planets. Begin.” She lay on the bunk just as the first subtle strings of “Mercury” began.

  Jeena closed her eyes, feeling weak. The months in the prison had taken a heavy toll on her. The episode in the shower had released a cascade of memories and emotions, and she was too worn out to fight them. As the music played, the events leading up to her imprisonment came drifting back to her.

  She had been leading her SAG unit on a retaliatory strike against Cynos 7, one of the most heavily defended Coalition outposts. The laser cannons were firing all around as she swept in, the blasts lighting up the sky as they struck her shields. As usual her unit was the first into battle—they were the Union's elite shock troops, sent in to soften up the enemy before the main army group arrived.

  She had just hit the generator-housing unit and was climbing out of atmosphere when her engines took a full cannon barrage. She could still taste the fear in her mouth as her ship tumbled back to the planet, her engines on fire. She had waited until the last possible moment, but when it came she bailed out.

  Why did I do that? It was a question she had asked herself many times in the prison. She had always sworn she would never bail, would never risk being captured. The stories of the Coalition prison camps were too terrible to contemplate. Better to die quickly than to face that, she had said often.

  Yet bail out she did. A Coalition cruiser found her half-drowned, still floating in the conn chair. They had thrown her in the brig, but at least they had fed her. And they had left her alone. Two days later she was transferred to a stellar transport bound for the prison world of Mizar 3.

  She was in one of the first groups boarded on the transport. They were held in a rusted-out cargo hold that still stank of the livestock it once carried. She stepped through pools of stagnant water that had collected on the ship's floor and made her way to the rear of the hold.

  There was little light, and Jeena could just make out the other prisoners. Their faces were blank, devoid of any emotion save resignation as they paced slowly, their movements creating echoes in the dank, cavernous space. They were all soldiers, and none had any illusions about their chances for survival.

  She passed them in silence. There was nothing to say.

  She found a spot near the far wall next to a bracing beam that ran across the ceiling to the other side. The beam and wall formed a little niche, a definitive space that gave her a tiny sense of security in the open and hostile environment of the hold. It was a completely illogical, yet totally human feeling, she knew; and she stood in her little nook, her feet in several inches of stagnant water, and watched as the hold slowly filled.

  Within the hour the room had become impossibly crowded, with prisoners standing shoulder to shoulder. Ventilation was via a large, creaking, slowly rotating fan situated high on the back wall.

  The cargo hold was never intended for this many living, breathing animals, and soon it was sweltering. Jeena was pressed tight into her little corner, directly behind a young woman in a Star Corps uniform. She was roughly Jeena's age, and the two exchanged whispered hellos. The woman was sweating profusely and seemed to be in pain. Jeena noticed she was holding her hand over her chest, the shirt under it soaked in blood.

  Finally, the last prisoner entered, and the hatch was sealed with a loud clang. The room was still; then from the center of the mass of people a loud voice boomed.

  "Join the service, they said,” he mocked. “See the galaxy. Right. I tell ya, the first thing I'm gonna do when I get home is kill my recruiter."

  There was laughter throughout the hold, and Jeena joined in.

  The morose gloom now broken, conversations broke out, and soon the room came alive with voices. Jeena introduced herself to the injured woman. Her name was Maggie Fletcher, and she was a corporal assigned to the support team for the main army group. She had been part of the ground operations that were overrun following the failure of the Union's air attack on Cynos. Many in the hold were from the same battle.

  At Jeena's insistence, Maggie allowed her to examine her injury. There was a small puncture wound below her right breast. It looked little bigger than a pinhole, but it would not stop bleeding, not even after Jeena applied direct pressure for more than an hour. It was a bad sign—she knew it was an indication of an arterial bleed into the chest, but said nothing to the girl.

  Some of the higher-ranking officers organized the other prisoners into sleeping groups—there was not enough floor space for them all to lie down at the same time so they would sleep in shifts, four hours at a time. Maggie grew progressively weaker as the days passed, and often Jeena shortchanged herself in order to let her rest.

  Sanitation was something their Coalition captors had given no thought to. Perhaps they had not expected so many prisoners, or perhaps they did not realize it would take the ancient freighter three times as long to make the trip as usual. Whatever the reason, they were forced to use two of the deeper pools of standing water in the corners as latrines—this for five thousand people.

  Both of the sites were on the opposite wall from Jeena's corner. It was an arduous task, walking over the scattered bodies and invariably stepping on some, but for a while at least the offending odors were less pungent. As their stay in the hold lengthened, the stench permeated the room.

  Food and water were lowered through a ceiling hatch twice a day. The food consisted of dehydrated military rations, much of it old and contaminated. The water was given out sparingly—one quart per person per day. In the suffocating heat of the hold, this was barely enough to keep one alive, and thirst was a constant companion.

  The poor food and lack of ad
equate sanitation took its toll on the already weak and exhausted prisoners. Many had been injured during their capture, and like Maggie, none had received even cursory medical care. The first death occurred four days out.

  They discovered the body at the morning sleep-shift change and screamed and pleaded at the guards lowering the morning food, but were ignored. They repeated their pleas that evening, but it was apparent their captors had no intention of removing the body. More dead were discovered the following day.

  Jeena had never known such horror. A corner near her was chosen as a makeshift morgue; but as the days passed, the survivors became too weak and disheartened and soon the dead were left where they lay. The stench of the decomposing bodies was overwhelming—more than many could endure. There would be a cry in the dark, and suddenly, someone would be clawing at the bulkhead, screaming hysterically until they were finally subdued, or mercifully knocked unconscious by those near them.

  Jeena knew it would not be long before she became one of them. Maggie had died two days earlier after days of gurgling in her own fluids, and Jeena had not slept in that time. The body of the girl lay at her feet, and she was too weak and too sick to move her. She was near collapse, her legs trembling with effort as she clung to the bracing beam, yet she would not lie down, could not lie down next to the bloated body. She knew that to do so would shatter her sanity, sending her screaming blindly into the night, and that she might never recover.

  She had reached the end of her strength when the ship finally arrived at its destination. Her legs cramped painfully as she shuffled toward the light streaming in through the hatchway. Of the original five thousand captives, more than three hundred did not survive the trip. The survivors were assembled on the tarmac for their first view of Mizar 3.

  It was a bleak, barren world. Huge ore smelters belched black smoke that blanketed the sky and fell back onto the planet in an oily rain. There was a foul, sulfurous odor in the air that burned the lungs. The sun was distant and dim, and the air was bitter cold, yet such was the unimaginable horror of the ship that many wept openly to be there.