Winds of darkness - Part Eight

  		(c) 2001, Wirewolf
		(Rewritten 2/1/99)

  It didn't seem like very important help to Zanth.  Lying on the carpeted deck watching a 
small portable monitor gave him little satisfaction.  He wanted to growl fiercely, leap 
onto his enemies, sink his claws and teeth in as far as they would go and tear them to 
bloody rags.  Then he would bear Kitress to safety on his back, proudly triumphant.  An 
unrealistic fantasy, he knew, but still...

  "Any change?" came a muffled voice.

  Zanth glanced at the screen next to him.  Still blank.

  "Nothing."

  An exasperated grunt.  They had been at this for twenty minutes with no success.  
Redics was lying on the floor of one of the guest quarters on the upper deck, on his back 
and buried to his knees in an awkwardly narrow maintenance conduit.  Zephanthus 
watched the screen that was temporarily patched into the camera and occasionally passed 
tools.

  "Zanth, I need a different processor interface.  Give me one with an LS82 format."  The 
knees jerked upward, dragging Redics out only as far as his waist.  A spidery, hairless 
hand emerged, palm up.

  Zanth studied the tools and supplies Redics had laid out for him.  The human had told 
him what each was and the best way to pick them up without damaging them.  He saw 
the various computer components, singled out the line of processors.

  "Which one?"

  "The LS82.  It's square with a ridge down the center and a fiberop jack on one end."

  Two fit that description.  He tried to remember which one Redics had called LS82, but 
couldn't.  "Uhhrrr..."

  A quiet sigh.  "The red one."

  "Oh."  He gingerly picked the red square up between his teeth and placed it in the 
waiting hand.  When Redics felt the whiskery warmth of Zanth's muzzle press into his 
palm, he grasped the new processor and pulled it past his hip.  He thrust his heels against 
the carpet to push himself back into the conduit.

  Lying back down, Zanth said, "You're lucky I'm not color blind like my sire was."

  "Mm," was the distracted reply.  "I suppose I'm lucky you're not hungry as well."  One 
booted foot raised up, wiggled a bit, then thumped to the deck.

  Zephanthus gazed disdainfully at the appendage. "Who was it that stuck his hand in my 
mouth?  That was you, wasn't it?"  He batted at his companion's legs.  "It tasted like you."

  "Details, details."  A mechanical click was followed by the faint hum of power coursing 
through the circuits of the camera.  "That should do it.  What do you see?"

  The screen hadn't changed.

  "Nothing."

  Redics was silent except for his breathing.  Moments later, his legs jerked violently as 
he shouted, "Worthless box!"  A dull thump that Zanth knew was a fist against metal 
coincided with a brief flash from the monitor.

  "Redics, whatever you hit, it made the screen light up."

  Silence again.  Finally, "Are you serious?"  This time Zanth snarled quietly and swatted 
Redics' legs.  Hard.

  "Ow!  All right!"  Another thump, soft and hard at the same time.  The picture stayed 
almost a full second, long enough for Zanth to make out stars.

  "It was working, but it didn't stay."

  Redics twisted in the tube, his legs lifting as he shifted onto his side.  "Huh.  Something 
must be loose."  More thumps, lighter and unintentional.  "Got it.  One of the sockets isn't 
secure."

  Stars lit the screen, although they all had an odd pinkish tone.  "It's working," Zanth told 
him.

  "Good.  Tell T'yonnosh."

**************************

  "Nothing yet," Redics mumbled.  "Bring us out a bit farther."

  The Ti Phorus was skimming over the scorched terrain of AGC-2168 II, the planet 
furthest from the sun.  They had brought her around the red giant to the sun-side of the 
nearer planet, then crept over to the night-side, using the cameras to scan the sky for an 
orbiting freighter.  The first planet had yielded nothing.  They were now well into the 
night-side of the outer planet without finding anything.

  None of them said it, but they were all wondering what their options would be if they 
didn't spot the freighter soon.  Zephanthus was pacing the back of the cockpit while 
Redics stayed glued to the main screen and T'yonnosh concentrated on piloting the ship.

  As a new slice of night sky rolled up from the horizon, Redics leaned closer to the 
screen.  There was something a bit odd about one of the stars now showing.  It seemed to 
glow with a different kind of light.  Of course, it was hard to tell with all the stars stained 
a cheerful pink.

  Something was out of adjustment in one of the cameras and nothing they did corrected 
it.  Because of the odd tint, it was hard to distinguish some stellar phenomena from the 
reflected light of a ship's hull.  Redics had already tracked and magnified on a pulsar, two 
distant G type stars, and a few broken pieces of a destroyed moon circling in wobbly 
orbits.

  "Something?" T'yonnosh inquired.  Zanth looked up.

  "Not sure."  Redics brought a filter across the image.  "It might be that nova I found 
earlier."  He ran the enhance routine on the bright speck, then magnified it.  The speck 
turned into another chunk of moon, dusted with craters.

  "Quholtz.  It's just another- hey!"

  Redics' hands flew over the controls as he tried to track a ghostly silhouette that brushed 
past the edge of the moonlet.  Once he had it bracketed and had keyed the computer to 
track the new object's path, he took the time to modify the radiation filters of the 
cameras.  All at once, the image cleared.

  It was the freighter.

  For a moment, no one spoke.  They stared in mute relief at the object of their search, the 
source of their anxiety.

  "Scan?" asked T'yonnosh.

  "Scan," confirmed Redics.  "Full intensity for as long as they last."

  T'yonnosh ran the sensors in a tight sweep over the freighter.  With the lower radiation 
present, the scan provided a reasonable amount of detail.  It also gave the partners a new 
puzzle.

  The remaining sensor array soon weakened and failed, producing nothing more than 
faint, scattered image blips.  As T'yonnosh pointed to the recording of the first moments 
of the sweep, Redics got an uneasy feeling in his stomach.

  "Why can't we read the command module?"

  "It's not the sensors.  They got through all the other sections.  It must be shielded.

  Redics frowned as he studied the scan.  It revealed much of what they expected to find.  
Of the twenty six cargo pods attached to the freighter's hollow frame, all but three were 
empty.  Two contained radioactive material of some kind.  The leakage from them was 
easily distinguished from the background radiation.  The third pod, distressingly 
sandwiched between the other two, held at least thirteen separate life forms.

  The rest of the ship was empty and unoccupied.  There was no sign of the freighter's 
crew, except for the heavily shielded command module.

  "Is it to protect the regular crew against radioactive cargo, or because they knew they'd 
want to hide their numbers from Alliance sensors?"

  Redics turned to the image of the freighter, then back to the sensor data.

  "What does it matter?" Zanth wanted to know.  "We've found them.  Let's go get them."

  "Because one answer means they've prepared for us, and the other means we might have 
the element of surprise," T'yonnosh told him.  He looked at Redics.  "Either way, we 
should plan on them expecting us."

  Redics nodded.  "You're right."  He closed his eyes and took a deep, steadying breath.  
"We've go to do this carefully to keep things from getting bloody."

  T'yonnosh studied Redics, considering his next words.  "We could wait for the 
Alvarado.  More manpower.  A functional ship."  He watched Redics' reaction.  "They 
could even pipe them out, no boarding, no blood."

  Redics opened his eyes.  His flat, mobile face was showing what T'yonnosh recognized 
as suppressed fear.  There was even a shadowy scent of panic coming from his long-time 
friend.  Things he had seen Redics deal with before, but seldom without a price.  When 
the human spoke, he heard as much in his voice as in his words.

  "The Alvarado should have been here hours ago.  With their sensors and engines, they 
should have passed us before we reached the end of the hyperdrive trail.  Something held 
them up, and I don't believe we have the luxury of waiting for them to show up."  Redics 
took another deep breath, his voice steadied.  "We didn't come out here to keep an eye on 
things for someone else.  We came here to get those people off that freighter."

  So Redics was set on rescue, T'yonnosh realized.  He had reached that point where 
obstacles that came between him and his goal would be dealt with forcefully, even 
ruthlessly.  The fear signal led the beginning, the acknowledgment that action, and its 
consequences, were imminent.  Once things were set in motion, the fear would be 
overtaken by Redics' greatest talent: tenacity.  His unwillingness to back down once a job 
was begun had carried him through many times.

  And from the sound of his voice, T'yonnosh knew Redics considered this job officially 
started.

  They began planning.  The size of the command module told them they could be facing 
a maximum of ten people.  Redics was not happy about the possibility of five-to-one 
odds, but he had some ideas of how to use their advantages to even things out.  It was 
while he was discussing his ideas with T'yonnosh that Zanth's tail started twitching.

  "Redics, what do you want me to do?"

  Redics hesitated.  He hated to say what had to be said, but he saw no alternatives.  "I 
need you to stay aboard."

  "What?!"  Zanth's tail progressed from twitching to lashing.

  "I need you to handle the ship."

  Zanth's tail stopped dead.  He stared hard at his companion.  As he feared, there was no 
smile, nothing to tell him this was a joke.

  "That's stupid.  I can't work the controls.  That's T'yonnosh's job."

  "You also can't hold a gun or handle a tacscanner.  I need T'yonnosh with me."

  "Then let's all go.  You don't need anyone on the ship."

  "Zanth," Redics said patiently, "the people who took those hostages are waiting here to 
meet someone.  If that someone shows up while we're all on the freighter, we're finished.  
I need someone with me who can defend themselves against weapons and can shoot 
back.  I also need someone to protect us from any other ships that come along."  Redics 
gestured to the caniform.  "T'yonnosh has hands.  He can hold a gun."

  "And I have paws.  I can't push those little buttons."  Zanth was losing control of his tail 
again.  It whipped back and forth.

  "We're going to set up a control program so you can give orders by voice."  Redics 
pointed to the main Board.  "You'll just tell the computer what you want done, and it will 
do it."

  Zanth's tail was smacking into the wall behind him so hard it hurt.  He curled it around 
in front of him and stepped on it to keep it under control.  "The same computer that got 
its guts burned out four days ago?"

  "We'll also wire in your keyboard.  The one with the big pads."

  Zephanthus was getting angry.  He felt confused and betrayed.  How could Redics do 
this to him?  How could T'yonnosh just sit there without saying anything?

  He felt a sharp pain and hissed.  Looking down, he saw he had unconsciously sunk his 
claws into his own tail.  It was an effort to set those claws.

  What angered him the most was that Redics' argument was reasonable, under the 
circumstances.  The circumstances, though, were partially Redics' fault, so he was still 
mad.

  "Why didn't you take the help Jim tried to give you?  If we had a few more people here, 
we wouldn't even have to talk about this."

  Redics swallowed, and Zanth knew he had him cornered.

  He glanced at T'yonnosh, who remained silent.  He turned back to the tundra cat.  
"Guilt," he said softly.  "Sesh and Kitress are on that ship.  They were abducted while 
they were under my-"

  "Our," T'yonnosh corrected.

  "Sorry.  Our protection.  We were responsible."  Redics found himself staring at the 
carpet like a boy confessing his latest mischief.  "I wanted us to be the ones who rescued 
them, to make up for our failure."

  He looked again to T'yonnosh for concurrence.  His friend's expression told him that his 
explanation was similar, if not identical.

  "So because you feel guilty, I have to stay out of this fight," Zanth protested.

  Redics frowned.  "Why do you want to go?"

  The question threw Zanth a bit.  "What?"

  "Why is it so important you go with us aboard that freighter?  What do you want to do 
there?"

  "I want to get Kitress back," Zanth growled, not entirely certain why he suddenly felt so 
hostile.

  "Why is that so important?" Redics pressed.

  "Because, I was the one guard..."  Zanth stopped.

  "You see?" Redics said gently.  "You have the same motives that T'yonnosh and I have.  
You feel responsible."

  "I don't want to stay behind.  I want to go and get Kitress back."  There was strong 
tension in his voice, a warning growl underlying his words that his friends recognized.

  "Don't you realize what we're asking you to do, Zanth?  We need you to protect us while 
we're on that freighter."  Redics laid a hand on T'yonnosh's arm.   "I need T'yonnosh by 
my side to handle equipment and weapons.  And we need you to protect us, and Kitress, 
and Sesh, and the rest of the hostages if that other ship shows up.  If it does, and your not 
out there to protect us, we'll be as helpless as week-old cubs."

  Zephanthus didn't say anything, but he stopped growling.  He was trying to balance what 
Redics had said against his need to retrieve Kitress personally.  It still felt wrong.  It felt 
like he was letting someone else fix his mistake.  He looked at T'yonnosh.  "You haven't 
said much."

  T'yonnosh's face and ears were perfectly still.  He calmly said, "When we're working on 
the ground, you willingly act as our guide, as an early warning system, and as our 
protector.  Now we need you to do the same thing, from further away.  If you don't, like 
Redics said, we'll be terribly vulnerable."

  Finally, with a half-hearted growl and a slight baring of his fangs, Zanth relented.  "I 
don't like it.  But I'll do it."

  Redics smiled, that ridiculous baring of nearly useless teeth.  "Thanks, Zanth.  I knew 
we could count on you."

  No, Zanth decided.  Not that easily.  He spat angrily at Redics.  "You miserable furless 
shenthsi!"  Turning, he stalked out of the cockpit.

  Redics' smile vanished.

  "Well, I guess I deserved that."  He folded his arms, thinking about what Zanth had said.  
"I should have taken those security teams, shouldn't I?"

  T'yonnosh looked at his human friend.  They had both felt the same about Jim's offer of 
help, and yet somehow Redics was the one responsible in Zanth' s eyes.

  "I could have said something, warned you," T'yonnosh offered.  "I didn't."

  Redics didn't react to T'yonnosh's attempt at sharing the blame.  It was typical behavior 
for him.  He could easily forgive anyone but himself.

  T'yonnosh said, "We're here, they're waiting.  Let's go."

  Redics nodded.  They made preparations.

**************************

Under T'yonnosh's skilled hands, the Ti Phorus streaked toward the freighter using one of 
the larger moonlets as cover until the last few moments.  Redics sat next to him, gripping 
the arms of his seat a bit tighter than was needed.  Without sensors or the video system 
they provided, there would have been no way to make a safe approach.  The two 
remaining solid cameras were giving T'yonnosh just enough basic telemetry to keep him 
from introducing the Ti Phorus to one of the orbiting rocks.

  The final approach and docking would be another matter.

  Redics watched the image of the freighter intently.  They were assuming the crew 
would be waiting for their rendezvous, or for an attack.  So far, they had crossed a third 
of the distance between their last hiding place and the ship.  No reaction yet.  Redics was 
standing by with the tractors.  There was no way the freighter would escape them, but 
announcing themselves too early would put the hostages at increased risk.

  Thirty seconds to go.  T'yonnosh had gotten behind the freighter.  There was no reason 
to believe the target couldn't see them from behind, but even a practically nonexistent 
advantage was better than none.

  At fifteen seconds, Redics glanced down at Zanth.  The tundra cat had finished 
checking the functions of his specialized keyboard.  Its twenty large pads were labeled 
with pictographs of the systems they controlled.  As soon as Redics and T'yonnosh were 
on the freighter, Zanth would switch the controls over.

  The Ti Phorus gracefully lined up beside the freighter and began docking procedures.  If 
those aboard were somehow ignorant of their presence, they wouldn't be the instant the 
two ships touched.

  "Ten seconds to contact," said T'yonnosh.  Redics leapt up and ran to the airlock.  He 
cycled open the inner doors.  Waiting in the lock were the tools and equipment they 
expected to need.  He stood by the outer doors, hand on the controls.  There was a ringing 
thump, the whine of the mechanicals.  "Contact," came T'yonnosh's voice over Redics' 
earpiece.  "Seal extending."

  These were the most critical moments.  They were now committed to boarding and the 
enemy had to be aware of their intentions.  Until they passed through the locks to the 
freighter, there was nothing they could do to help the hostages.

  "Seal confirmed," T'yonnosh said in unison with the all-clear from the lock controls.  
Redics punched the control that had just turned green.

  The seal was nearly perfect.  There was less than half a meter of dead space between the 
hulls of the ships.  Redics threw his arms over his face as the newly introduced air 
washed over him.  He was careful not to inhale.

  The temperature quickly balanced, and as T'yonnosh came into the airlock, Redics 
looked at what they were facing.  The external controls for the freighter's airlock looked 
to be a simple design.  They both withdrew their tacscanners.  They weren't ICCN issue, 
but they were built to the same specifications.

  "An electronic circuit interruption lock," T'yonnosh murmured.  "No mechanicals other 
than fail-safes."  Redics nodded.  To get through the outer doors, they only had to bypass 
the control circuits.  Redics started a scan-and-access program he had put in his 
tacscanner and tried to find the control sequence for opening the doors.

  While Redics worked on the airlock, T'yonnosh stood by.  For these few moments, he 
had nothing to do.  He spent his time concentrating on the minutes that would follow 
boarding the freighter.  It was as much to prepare himself as it was to take his mind off 
how uncomfortable he felt.

  He and Redics were wearing their laser refraction suits.  The dull black material 
couldn't withstand the high energy output of a particle beam pistol, or a `pulser' as they 
were often called, but the lower tech laser weapons the Dheway used could be defeated.  
The sub- micro fiber optic network woven into the material would literally pipe the 
dangerous wavelengths of laser energy to absorption pads along the legs.  The less 
hazardous wavelengths would be channeled to dispersion vents in the arms.

  T'yonnosh hated wearing the suit, especially the helmet that painfully pressed his ears 
and dulled his hearing   He hated smoking holes in his hide more, so he put up with it.  
There was no accommodation for his tail, either.  It wound up tucked down one of his 
legs.  He also wore his heaviest boots.  Freezing decks were one thing, combat was 
another.

  Redics' tacscanner found the control sequence for the doors and, with a warning to 
T'yonnosh, they were opened.

  The two aimed pulsers set to heavy stun into an empty airlock.  Redics moved up to the 
inner doors and scanned the controls.  T'yonnosh picked up their equipment in two laser 
safe packs and moved into the lock.  The Ti Phorus' outer doors closed.  "Prepare for 
separation," he told Zanth over his throat mike.  The freighter's outer doors also closed 
automatically.

  Opening one of the packs, T'yonnosh pulled out a large device.  It was as wide as his 
chest, flat on one side.  Redics called it a 'crab' because of the six short, heavy arms 
radiating from the round center.  It contained some small metallurgical sensors and six 
independent pinwelders, all shielded by a thick duranium alloy housing.

  T'yonnosh placed the crab against the doors, straddling the vertical seam.  The unit 
formed a vacuum seal underneath to cling to its temporary home.  A shielded door over 
the center slid back, revealing a palm scanner.  T'yonnosh placed the pads of his fingers 
against the scanner to activate it.  He heard its onboard sensor run through its cycle.  
After it determined the makeup of the doors, it adjusted the pinwelders accordingly.  
There was a muffled crack as the crab's legs fused to the doors, followed by a confirm 
tone.  The scanner door closed.  The unit was secure.  The airlock doors could not be 
opened by anyone else without physically removing them from their frame.

  "Doors are secure.  Separate."

  Aboard the Ti Phorus, Zanth gave the vocal command for separation.  The computer 
responded, preprogrammed.  The seal was withdrawn, the mechanicals retracted and the 
thrusters fired.  The Ti Phorus moved off to a safe distance to watch over the freighter 
and deter any potential interference.

  In the freighter's airlock, T'yonnosh turned to Redics.  "He's clear."

  Redics nodded.  He took a deep breath and told his tacscanner to open the inner doors.

  Pulsers aimed to cover each other, they were prepared to meet any force that was 
waiting for them.  They weren't prepared for what they saw.

  Their attention was immediately drawn to the four Dheway laying in the corridor 
beyond the airlock.  They visually checked for hidden enemies.  They scanned the 
corridor with their tacscanners.

  They were facing an empty corridor and four dead Dheway.

  "What the hell?" Redics muttered.

  They moved cautiously into the narrow corridor.  The ceiling was Dheway height.  
T'yonnosh's head brushed the threshold as he followed Redics into the ship.  The 
genemorph ran a wide scan with his tacscanner while the human stood over the bodies.

  Redics' tacscanner wasn't set up for medical functions, but it easily told him the cause of 
death.  The radiation coming off the bodies was tremendous.

  "Is there enough radiation present to have done this?" he asked T'yonnosh.  His partner 
swept his tacscanner over the bodies and compared those readings to the ones he had just 
taken.

  "No.  There are lethal levels of radiation in here, but it would take considerably more to 
account for how hot these bodies are."

  "Are we in much danger?"

  "Not yet."  T'yonnosh made an adjustment to his tacscanner.  "At these levels, it would 
take a few days.  We will need a couple of anti-radiation treatments when we get back."

  "A few days?  Then where did they receive enough rads to kill them in the twelve hours 
this ship has been in this system?  And who's running this ship if they aren't?"

  T'yonnosh consulted his tacscanner again.  "It may not have been the star's radiation 
that killed them.  I'm getting extremely high readings from the two loaded cargo pods 
amidships.  I'd guess these Dheway found themselves in one of those pods.  And whoever 
put them there must be in the shielded command module.  Besides us, I still only read 
thirteen other lifesigns in the empty pod."

  Redics took a moment to consider.  "This airlock is between the cargo pods and the 
command module.  Is there another route between the two besides this corridor?"

  "No.  This corridor runs the length of the ship and is the only access available."

  "So we have whoever's in the command module cut off from the hostages."  He looked 
at T'yonnosh.  The situation was better than he had hoped.  "Shall we pay them a visit ?"

  T'yonnosh nodded grimly.  With a final glance at the four Dheway, he followed Redics.

  Moving through the Dheway freighter was not easy.  While the corridor was wide 
enough, the ceiling dropped in places.  So much so that T'yonnosh, the taller of the two, 
often had to hunch forward.  Moreover, the gravity was considerably less than they were 
used to.  They repeatedly banged their heads against the low ceilings and had a tendency 
to overbalance while walking.

  Redics was able to deal with these inconveniences, but the ambient temperature was 
well below his comfort threshold.  Apparently heat was not considered a necessity aboard 
cargo ships run by the Dheway.  Although he wasn't in danger of freezing, he nonetheless 
would have been happier with the environmental controls set about thirty degrees higher.

  They passed what appeared to be the crew's quarters.  They were empty, but looked to 
have been used recently, within the hour.  Two partially eaten meals lay on a central table 
next to what looked suspiciously like gaming dice.

  Just beyond the crew's quarters, the corridor opened into a good sized lounge area, 
complete with couches and holographic entertainment displays.  They moved through it 
to a short connecting corridor that ended with the door to the command module.

  According to their tacscanners, the door was both mechanically locked and shielded.  
Even at such short range, though, they couldn't read what was beyond the door.

  T'yonnosh analyzed the shielding for weaknesses, but couldn't find any they could 
exploit.  "Our pulsers won't have enough power to get past it.  It's actually routed through 
the middle of the doors, instead of in front or behind them."

  "Either they are hiding because they don't have the means to stop us," Redics looked 
significantly at T'yonnosh, "or they're biding their time because they don't see us as a 
serious threat."

  "Regardless of their reason, we can't get at them or the controls."

  Redics agreed.  They left the command module and went back, past the airlock to the 
section seal which separated the cargo area from the rest of the ship.  They had no trouble 
opening the seal.  Once it was open, T'yonnosh located and cut the control circuits to 
keep it from being closed.

  In the empty framework of the cargo area, there was even less heat and gravity.  The 
corridor had become a narrow tunnel crowded with exposed pipes and conduits.  The 
deck was metal grillwork that rang dully under their boots.

  A few meters after they passed the section seal, the overhead lighting was no longer 
active.  T'yonnosh pulled out the two wrist beacons he had brought and handed one to 
Redics.  Their progress was slower from that point, but still steady.

  Redics was reminded of the maintenance tunnels he and Zanth had found themselves 
trapped in not long ago.  His mind drifted through the events that had brought them here.  
Almost immediately he felt his anger rising.  So many lives lost, so many more 
jeopardized.

  He deliberately put that distraction aside and concentrated on his tacscanner readings.  It 
was scanning behind them for any signs of movement from those barricaded in the 
control module.

  He was studying his instrument so intensely he nearly tread on T'yonnosh's heels when 
that one stopped in front of an access hatch.

  "They're in there," he said without looking up from his readings.

  "Radiation?"

  "Borderline."  He worked out a few calculations.  "They should be eighteen hours from 
lethal exposure for most species by now."

  Redics squared his shoulders.  "All right.  Let's secure it."  He diverted his tacscanner 
from shipwide scan to narrow field.  The two of them moved around the hatch, searching.

  "Got it," T'yonnosh announced.  Redics moved closer.  As T'yonnosh opened the 
service panel he'd found, Redics went back to scanning for the crew.  No sign of them 
yet.

  The freighter's systems were unsophisticated and it took only seconds for T'yonnosh to 
disable the locking clamps and the emergency jettison system.  With that done, the 
usurpers in the control room could no longer eject the cargo pod they were about to enter.  
Without knowing who was in that control room or what their agenda was, it was entirely 
possible they might wait until the access hatch was opened to blow the pod.  A 
convenient way to dispose of both the hostages and their rescuers.

  Next, T'yonnosh overrode the controls to the hatch.  He looked back at Redics.  He 
didn't say anything, and neither did his partner.  Redics put his hand on T'yonnosh's 
shoulder and nodded.  T'yonnosh turned back to the panel and closed the connection.  
After a heavy clang of safeties retracting, the hatch swung out and up.  Beyond the hatch 
opening was silent darkness.

  If they had doubted their tacscanner readings for any reason, those doubts were swept 
away by the smell that came from the open hatch.  It was almost a physical assault.  It 
was the smell of captivity.  Sweat and bile, urine and fear, it was an odor Redics had 
been unfortunate enough to experience before.  To T'yonnosh's sensitive nose, there was 
more.  Panic and blood and death, the edges of decomposition.

  It made them hesitate.  They knew what they would find, but they had not yet seen it.  It 
seemed a timeless moment, the final threshold between doubt and certainty.

  T'yonnosh pulled back from these unwanted thoughts to consider another problem of 
circuitry.  He located the controls to the pod's interior lighting.  As he worked, he became 
aware of subtler scents mixing with the powerful ones.  They were the signature spoors 
of individual species.  He counted at least four separate species represented: Pashii, 
Yrboti, Human, and a caniform genemorph.  There were others present, unfamiliar to 
him.

  "Can you bring the lights to half strength?" Redics asked.  "That wouldn't blind them so 
bad.  I think they've been in the dark since they left the station."

  T'yonnosh focused again on the circuits he was holding.  The connections could either 
be open or closed.

  "Uhh, no.  They don't work that way."  He closed the connection.  Light flared up and 
spilled through the open hatch to paint them with vaguely yellowish hues.

  They could see nothing beyond the narrow hatch from their perspective.  There were 
sounds, though.  Low moans and weak cries echoed thinly beyond the opening.

  The time for hesitation was past.  T'yonnosh moved through the open hatch, bending 
low.  Redics followed close behind.

  Once he was in the pod, T'yonnosh stopped.  He couldn't help himself.

  He had done his best to prepare, to psyche himself up to what they expected to find.  
The smells, the sounds, and now the sights; they all combined in a way that was too 
powerful to ignore.  It stopped him in his tracks.

  The floor of the cargo pod was not smooth.  There were dozens of raised rails that ran 
parallel the entire length of the pod.  The rails were for securing large cargo items and 
stood knee high, about one meter apart.  The fourteen hostages, blinking painfully under 
the lights, were all chained to the rails.

  They had been spread out far enough that no two of them could reach each other.  Most 
of them were lying on the grimy metal flooring between the rails.  Some had sat up when 
the door opened or when the lights had come on.  A few of them spoke, but their words 
seemed to circle around T'yonnosh without reaching him.  Hands stretched toward him 
imploringly but he was rooted to the spot, a lean, furred tree.

  A single phrase was pulsing through his head, over and over: how could they do this?

  A gentle push against his back from Redics snapped him out of his shock.  He moved in 
among them, concentrating on their purpose for being there.

  Like T'yonnosh, Redics had been struck motionless by the plight of the captives.  The 
cruelty with which they had been treated was bad enough, but what hurt most was 
knowing two of them were close friends.

  He felt anger burning in him, searching for an outlet.  Reluctantly, he brought it under 
control.  An emotional outburst would accomplish nothing.

  Hard after the anger came a growing nausea.  The two reactions were warring inside 
him; clammy sickness and searing rage.

  An outburst from one of the hostages caught their attention.  A human woman in a soot-
stained ICCN uniform was standing.  She swayed a little as the chain attached to the cuff 
around her left ankle pulled taut.

  "Who are you?" she asked hoarsely.

  Redics opened his mouth to tell her his name, then realized how stupid that would 
sound.  That wasn't the question she had asked.  When he hesitated, T'yonnosh spoke up.  
"We're here to set you free."

  "We're working in connection with the ICCN," Redics added.  That wasn't entirely true, 
but there wasn't any time for explanations.

  It took a moment for their words to sink in.  The woman, an ensign according to her 
sleeve stripe, looked T'yonnosh over, then Redics.

  "Cut us loose then," she demanded.  "Get us out of here."

  Redics moved toward her, pulling his sidearm.  He saw her flinch at that.

  He knelt by the chain to examine it.  Right away he found that the restraint was not 
meant to be used on people.  The cuff had no lock, only a latch that had been fused by an 
energy beam.  The chain and cuff, he decided, must be designed for securing cargo.

  Redics adjusted his pulser for a short burst at its narrowest setting.  "Hold still," he 
warned the ensign.  He steadied his aim, then cleanly cut the latch off.  The cuff fell to 
the floor in two pieces.  The ensign looked relieved, as though she had had doubts about 
Redics' intentions that were now removed along with the cuff.

  Handing his tacscanner to the ensign, Redics said, "Keep an eye out for any activity in 
the rest of the ship.  Let us know if anyone moves."

  Taking the tacscanner, the woman asked, "Where are we?  Who's ship is this?  Who's 
done this?"

  Redics looked appraisingly' at her.  She was true ICCN material, taking the sudden shift 
in her situation with calm.

  "You didn't see who took you?"

  She paused.  "No.  There was smoke and... I was choking.  I... passed out."  There was a 
hint of shame in her voice.  "I woke up here."

  Redics asked, "What's your name?"

  The young woman frowned.   "Ensign Taggard."

  Redics couldn't help smiling just a bit.  "Did they issue you a first name ?"

  She stared at him, surprised by his question.  "Zella."

  "Nice to meet you, Zella," he said.  "I'm Redics, and that's T'yonnosh."  He pointed to 
his friend.  "To answer your questions, we're at a star system about three light years from 
Yrbo.  This is a Dheway freighter.  The Dheway who were running it are dead, dumped 
in a pile by the airlock.  We don't know who's in control of the ship."  Redics pointed to 
the tacscanner.   "I'm serious about keeping a watch for movement.  They let us aboard 
without a fight."  He turned and knelt by the next closest hostage, a haggard looking 
Pashii.  He quickly disposed of the shackle on the reptilian male's ankle.  He received a 
quiet "Thank you."

  When he moved to the next victim, he halted.  Lying dead, its eyes and mouth open in a 
silent, gaping scream, was a Leneonesian.

  Leneones was home to a sexless humanoid race.  They were noted for their love of 
history, anyone's history.  Redics easily distinguished it by the thick padded stumps for 
feet and the short fleshy tail, as well as the extremely heavy jaws.  He also knew of their 
terrible susceptibility to radiation.  Their large brains were structured in such a way that 
radiation, natural or artificial, could damage cell connections, cause random synapse 
firing, and would quickly kill the cells in huge numbers, causing death.

  This is why we only read thirteen lifeforms in here, Redics realized.

  The Pashii saw him standing over the dead Leneonesian.   "It only lived a few hours", he 
said softly.  "It screamed until the end."

  Redics stared at the pitiful, dead creature while his mind howled obscenities.

  T'yonnosh was having an equally difficult time.  At first, he could only look around, 
unsure of where to begin.  He counted three humans: the ensign Redics was talking to, 
and two others, dignitaries from Epsilon Indii.  He saw a Pashii diplomatic aide, a Pashii, 
a Gheswan with her supplemental respiration device.  He saw two Yrboti, as well as three 
other alien species with which he wasn't familiar.

  Then he saw Sesh.

  Demrion's ambassador to the Alliance was lying on his back.  He had one arm draped 
across his eyes.  His other arm was stretched out, as though reaching for something.

  T'yonnosh stepped over to him, using the medical protocols of his tacscanner to check 
for injuries.  The readings showed no serious damage, although there was a considerable 
amount of radiation poisoning.

  Kneeling, T'yonnosh grasped the older man's shoulder.

  "Seshahn.  Fthraa Seshahn."  Not getting any immediate response, he shook the shoulder 
gently.   "Sdthrun'doshc tevfrem kayh?  Miann joth'shef lebd hrrvorith rodomirrivar."

  Sesh's eyes opened fractionally.  His mouth also opened and he spoke in a thin, creaking 
voice.  "Let him go.  I beg you, let him go."

  Leaning closer, T'yonnosh asked, "Let who go?  Kitress?"

  "Kitress." Sesh echoed, his eyes growing wide.  "Is that you, Kitress?"

  He met eyes with T'yonnosh.  His mind seemed to clear.  "T'yonnosh," he croaked.

  "Yes, it's me," T'yonnosh confirmed, smiling a little.

  Sesh's expression became agonized.  "Help him, T'yonnosh.  Please help my son.  He's 
hurt."  He tipped his head back to look in the direction Kitress lay.  "I can't reach him."

  T'yonnosh stood and looked for Kitress.  When he saw the boy, he felt pain in his ears 
as they tried to lay flat within the confines of his helmet.

  "I kept calling for him, but he wouldn't answer," Sesh continued.  The waver in his voice 
told T'yonnosh that the ambassador feared what he himself was now considering.   'Is 
this why there were only thirteen life readings?'

  T'yonnosh moved to check on Kitress, dreading what he would find.  The boy was 
laying against a rail on his stomach.  He didn't move as T'yonnosh approached.

  Kitress' back was burned and there were several shrapnel strikes to his back and legs.  
The fur around the wounds was stiff with dried blood and there was more on the deck 
around him.  Some of the fur on his tail was gone.  His arm was obviously broken.

  T'yonnosh knelt beside the boy and pressed two fingers against his neck.  There was a 
flood of relief when he picked up a pulse.  It was weak and thready, but it was there.  He 
looked the boy over as he brought the tacscanner to bear.  That's when he noticed the cuff 
being used to 'restrain' him.

  The metal cuff around Kitress' right ankle had been too large.  It looked to have been 
pinched tight by some kind of mechanical press.  It cruelly bit into the boy's skin, leaving 
it raw.

  Despite the pain, T'yonnosh could not get his ears back up.  "Even Grimjaws spared 
children," he growled.

  "Kitress," Sesh called weakly.  "How is he?"

  "He's alive," T'yonnosh answered.

  The boy's head was turned to one side.  T'yonnosh gently pulled open his left eye, 
noting the sluggish response of the pupil.  He then ran his thumb between the small lips 
and pushed them back.  The exposed gums were pale, a sign of dangerous blood loss.

  Returning to his tacscanner, he scanned Kitress,.  What he found worried him.  In 
addition to the broken arm, shrapnel hits and low blood pressure, there were signs the 
spun metal fibers from the shrapnel were causing clots to form throughout his body.  On 
top of all that was the radiation poisoning hindering the healing process.

T'yonnosh opened the medikit and brought out the med injector.  The first injection he 
gave Kitress was a blood plasma substitute to help increase blood volume.  Next he 
administered a dose of telkeyozine to deal with the clots in the bloodstream.  He followed 
that with the largest dose of borotrinalyn, an anti-radiation medication, that he could 
safely give.

  Moments later, when Kitress' vital signs began to improve slightly, T'yonnosh scanned 
the shrapnel wounds to see how serious they were.  As he worked, someone moved up 
next to him.  He heard a pulser fire, its rapid burst of high energy particle packets a 
painfully shrill squeal in his ears.  It was followed by a metallic thud.

  "They're all cut loose," he heard Redics say.  "Except for a dead Leneonesian, none of 
them are critically wounded.  Some cuts and bruises, a few hits from flying debris, not 
much else."  Redics moved around to kneel opposite T'yonnosh.  "How is he?"

  "Stable, but only just."  He looked up from his tacscanner.   "We have to get him to a 
sickbay or hospital as soon as possible."

  Redics nodded.  "I'll call Zanth."  As he brought out his communicator, Sesh moved 
over to his son's side.  "Kitress," the ambassador whispered.

  At the same time, there was a warning chirp from the hatch.

  "Movement," called ensign Taggard.

  Distracted, Redics momentarily forgot about his communicator, but only until it 
signaled for attention a few seconds later.  He opened the comm link.

  "Zanth, we-"

  "Redics," the tundra cat interrupted, "there's somebody out here.  I think it's that last ship 
we were talking to."

  T'yonnosh's head snapped up.  In his mind the pieces of the puzzle started coming 
together.  He could see a pattern.  It made sense.

  He realized they were all in far more trouble than they had thought.

  T'yonnosh snatched Redics' communicator.   "Zanth !  Don't let them dock with us!  
They're the ones coming to take the hostages away!"

  When there was no answer, T'yonnosh checked his own communicator.  He got nothing 
over the channel except interference.  "It's being jammed."

**************************

Aboard the Ti Phorus, Zanth continued to watch the Dheway cruiser approach the 
freighter.  Moments ago he had heard T'yonnosh's frantic voice say 'Don't let them dock 
with us!  They're the..."  At that point, a shrill squealing had burst from the speakers.  
When he asked the computer to tell him what had happened, the response was,  'The 
comm link has been broken due to interference being generated by the approaching 
vessel.'

  'Now I can't talk to them', he thought nervously.   'I can't ask them what to do.  They 
can't tell me how to help them.'  His tail was twitching.   'T'yonnosh wants me to keep 
them from docking.  How do I do that?  If I move between them, they'll shoot me.  If I 
shoot them, they'll shoot me.  So what I need... is to warn them.  I need to growl at them!' 
"Computer," he said aloud.  "Send a message to that new ship.  Tell them if they don't 
stop, I'll... I'll have to hurt them."

  "Unable to comply," the computer coolly responded.

  "What?"

  "Unable to comply.  The interference will prevent any signal from reaching the vessel."

  Zephanthus stared unhappily at the cockpit speakers.  "So I can't talk to anybody?"

  "Correct."

  "This is Redics' fault."

  "Please restate command."

  "Shut up."  Zanth decided at that moment that if Redics ever put a hand in his mouth 
again, he would bite it off. 
  
**************************
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