Lawrence Watt-Evans - Out of This World

Arthur Smith and Bill Mervyn sat beside their captain, exchanging silent glances.

Stoddard stood against one wall, arms folded across his chest. He wore only a sort of fur loincloth and open black felt vest-Pel wondered how he had come by such a costume. It seemed to suit him. His sword and armor were gone, but even half-naked he still looked dangerous enough; he had no bruises or welts, and his hair had been cut short, where the others, including Pel himself, had gotten rather shaggy. Pel wondered what could have happened to Stoddard while he was a slave to leave him thus. His expression gave no clue.

Elmer Soorn arrived just a few moments after Pel, back in uniform, and he seemed cheerful and healthy-but then, as Pel knew, life in the mines had not been all that harsh, really. Soorn greeted the others, grinning broadly, then got a look at Cahn.

The grin vanished.

“What the hell happened to the captain?” he asked.

Cahn closed his eyes.

Smith explained. “He tried to lead a revolt. Two days ago. Thorpe had told him help was coming, and he wanted to hurry things along a little. Didn’t work. In the fighting someone threw him off a building.”

Soorn dropped into a seat. “Shit,” he said. “He couldn’t have just laid low and waited?”

Smith shrugged; Cahn turned his head away.

Embarrassed, Soorn scanned the room. “Hey, Pel Brown,” he called. “Saw you at the mine-I’d hoped we’d be on the same bus, so we could talk.”

Pel just shrugged.

“Looks like we’ll get you home this time,” Soorn said. “We must have half the Imperial Fleet here!”

“I hope so,” Pel muttered.

“Don’t everybody cheer at once, or I’ll go deaf,” Soorn said. “Hey, we’ve all just been rescued; why are you people so miserable?”

“Well,” Mervyn said sourly, “we don’t know how bad the captain’s hurt, for starters. Pete Cartwright is dead. Jim Peabody is dead. Lieutenant Godwin is dead. Ben Lampert and Lieutenant Drummond are still missing. Nancy Brown’s dead. Rachel Brown and Susan Nguyen are missing. That twit who called himself Squire Donald is dead-hanged, I heard. What’s-her-name, Elani, is missing, and the lady gnome. Will that do?”

“You’re sure Nancy’s dead?” Pel asked.

Mervyn glanced at Prossie Thorpe, who nodded. “She’s dead,” Prossie said. “I’m sorry, Mr. Brown. They’ll try to recover the body, so you can arrange a decent… burial, is it? Yes, you bury your dead.” She winced at the pain her clumsy phrasing caused, and wished she could read the future, as well as minds-just a few seconds of precognition would let her avoid such awkward moments.

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, Soorn tried to change the subject. “What happened to him ?” he said, pointing a thumb at Stoddard.

“I don’t know,” Prossie said. “I try not to snoop, you know. Sometimes I can’t help it, but I do try.”

“’Twill bother me none that you read my thoughts,” Stoddard said, startling everyone. He had looked so motionless that it was hard to remember he was alive and able to talk. “Doubtless you’d speak better than I on what befell.”

Prossie smiled wryly. “I’d be none too sure of that,” she said. She blinked, as if startled by her own words, then continued. “He was a wrestler,” she said. “The woman who bought him challenged all comers to beat him, best two falls of three, in fair fight. She made that costume for him, called him the Space Barbarian, said he came from a lost colony somewhere. He was undefeated in twenty-three matches.”

Stoddard nodded an acknowledgment.

Prossie started to say something else, then stopped, hesitated, and announced, “Latest reports are in. They’ve found Lieutenant Drummond and Susan Nguyen, both alive and well, but Alella is definitely dead-they’ve found her body, pickled in alcohol.”

The men exchanged uneasy glances.

“What about the others?” Pel asked. “What about Rachel?”

Prossie shook her head. “Still no word on Rachel or Elani or Spaceman Lampert.”

“What about the others?” Soorn asked. “That guy Raven, and the wizard, Valdakrul, or whatever it is. And the other Earth people?”

“Amy Jewell, Lord Raven, and the wizard Valadrakul are all alive and on their way here,” Prossie said. “Miss Jewell will be coming aboard in just a few minutes-she may already be aboard, in fact. And Ted Deranian definitely is on board now, but he’s in the ship’s infirmary.”

“They found Amy? Rachel isn’t with her?” Pel demanded angrily.

“No,” Prossie said, uncomfortably. “They were separated at the auction. I saw it happen, but there wasn’t anything we could do.”

“Damn it!” Pel growled. Then something else struck him. “You said Ted was in the infirmary,” he said. “Why?”

Prossie sighed.

“Two reasons,” she said. “First off, he got the crap beaten out of him several times when he just stopped what he was doing and refused to move, so they’re setting broken bones, checking him over for internal damage, and so forth. Second, he did that because he’s convinced himself that this entire universe isn’t real, that he’s still at home in bed, dreaming all this-either that, or that he’s gone mad and is imagining it all. The alienists are trying to find some way to cure him of this delusion.”

That led to another uncomfortable silence.

“What about the people from the Princess ?” Mervyn asked at last.

“Well, they aren’t really my department,” Prossie said, “but last I heard there were three dead, a fourth probably dead, and eight still unaccounted for. But they aren’t our problem any more, the Empire’s taking care of them.”

“So,” Soorn asked, “what happens when we’re all present and accounted for here?”

“This group, you mean? We go to Base One,” Prossie replied. “At full boost. About four days. In fact, we’ll be leaving in a few hours even if the others aren’t found. The Earth people, and Shadow people, are a top priority right now.”

As she spoke, Amy Jewell stepped into the room. Pel looked up.

She looked older; her hair was partly grown out straight and a shade darker. One eye was spectacularly blackened. She wore a military-issue white blouse and purple slacks, but instead of the shiny black boots that went with the uniform she had ragged bedroom slippers on her feet. She stood by the doorway, looking the room over and listening.

She wasn’t his problem, though. “What if they haven’t found Rachel?” Pel asked.

“Then we’ll leave anyway,” Prossie said. “And when someone finds her they’ll send her on another ship, as quickly as possible. We don’t have the time to wait around; the search might take awhile. It’s a big… well, no, it isn’t really that big a planet, but any planet is a big place.”

“Who’s going to take care of her?” Pel demanded. “Listen, if she isn’t found, I’m not going-she’s my daughter. I need to stay here until she’s found.”

Prossie shook her head. “I don’t think they’ll allow that,” she said. “You people are absolutely a top priority; they want you at Base One as fast as possible.”

Amy made an unpleasant noise, and all eyes turned toward her.

“We’re a top priority?” she asked, her voice a trifle unsteady. “They want us there fast?”

Prossie nodded. “That’s right.”

Pel could see that Amy was angry-in fact, furious, and trying hard to restrain herself, to calm herself down. He thought at first it was because of Rachel, but then caught himself. Rachel wasn’t that important to Amy.

She wasn’t that important to anyone, it seemed, anyone but him.

“If we’re so damned important,” Amy said through her teeth, “then why didn’t they rescue us sooner ? I’ve been through three weeks of hell out there-I’d given up! I could have killed myself before these idiots bothered to come save us!” She lost control, and began shouting wildly, “I could have died out there! I was beaten and raped and abused, and they could have stopped it!”