“This is planet patrol agent Delta Five,” a deadpan voice responded. “We cannot confirm the identity of your ship, Captain.”
“I just told you its identity,” Alisa said brightly. Planet patrol. She didn’t know if that was better or worse than the Alliance. Both entities could have seen bulletins demanding the Star Nomad’s detainment. “But you should be able to read its ident chip to verify,” she added.
“I am not able to read your identification chip.”
“It’s possible it was damaged,” Alisa said. “We were attacked by a bunch of thugs claiming they were tax collectors while dropping off cargo on Cleon Moon.” That much was true, at least.
“Smugglers often remove the identification chips on their ships,” Delta Five informed her blandly.
That sounded like an android. Alisa frowned at the idea of Leonidas having to battle another one. And dare they even fight planet patrol? It was one thing to keep competing treasure hunters from boarding their ship out in unclaimed space, but this was an enforcer of the law. Alliance law. Her law.
“If I were a prosperous smuggler, wouldn’t I have a nicer ship than this old relic?” Alisa asked.
“Perhaps you are an unprosperous smuggler.”
Great, she’d found the one android with a sense of humor. Or maybe he was merely being logical.
“If you wish to continue to Arkadius or one of the orbital space stations, your ship must be searched,” Delta Five said. “This is in accordance with Arkadius Planetary Customs and Border Enforcement Regulation Number Thirty-Seven.”
“You’re welcome to search my ship if you wish,” Alisa said, hoping that compliance would imply that she had nothing to hide and there was no reason for Delta Five to take the time out of his busy day to come for an inspection. “We don’t have any cargo right now, just a patient who needs medical attention after that battle. That’s all you’ll see if you come over.” Not that he needed to come over, or question her further at all. She pretended she was a Starseer and could plant that idea into Delta Five’s mind. Too bad Abelardus’s techniques did not seem to work on androids.
“We will dock with you and send a team promptly,” Delta Five said. “Any resistance will be considered grounds for arrest.”
“Goody.” Alisa considered fleeing, but the Nomad could not outrun a ship that had been designed to catch smugglers.
As Alisa closed the comm, Leonidas appeared in the hatchway again, now wearing his armor and a couple of extra rifles.
“No grenades this time?” she asked.
“Will I need them?” He sounded more intrigued than alarmed at the possibility.
“I hope not. It’s planet patrol, not the Alliance. I’m hoping we might yet slip past them, especially since we don’t technically have anything illegal.” Except perhaps some of Yumi’s drugs. Those might have to be stashed. “Your face is all over wanted posters, though. I want you to hide in the cubby.”
“Cyborgs don’t hide.”
“What if instead of hiding, we call it squatting in a tactically advantageous position, cheerfully preparing to launch a ferocious ambush at anyone who sticks a head in? Would a cyborg do that?”
“Not cheerfully, no.”
“Grumpily?”
His eyebrows twitched upward again. She didn’t care what he said—they were definitely riotous.
Chapter 2
Alisa left NavCom with the Nomad drifting in space, the planet patrol ship in the process of clamping on so it could extend its airlock tube. She jogged to Yumi’s cabin, wrinkling her nose at a burning scent drifting up from the mess hall. Beck hadn’t left something on the grill or stovetop while he’d been out on his spacewalk, had he? She would check on her way through to the cargo hold. Burned sauces were unlikely to be illegal. The contents of Yumi’s cabin were another matter.
The hatch was open, so she popped her head in, looking toward the lab counter set up between the bunk and the built-in cabinets on the opposite wall. “Yumi? Did you hear that we’re about to have visitors?”
Yumi was on a floor mat in a contorted position with her head hanging upside down and her legs and arms twisted about each other. It looked about as comfortable as being in some mafia lord’s torture chamber—the unpleasantness of which Beck could attest to. Alisa almost commented on that, but a netdisc rested on the floor, and Yumi was talking to someone while she stretched—or contorted.
“Thank you, Young-hee,” she said, holding out a finger toward Alisa. “I appreciate the information and will inform my captain.”
Oh, her sister? Alisa almost interrupted, since they didn’t have much time before the patrollers finished affixing their airlock tube, but this sounded like something important.
“Yes, she’s doing well,” Yumi said in response to a comment that Alisa could not fully hear. “I don’t believe she’s drugged anyone’s food lately, but we’ve been busy. I have given her a delightful substance which she may enjoy trying herself one day. Yes, goodbye.”
Yumi untwisted herself from the pretzel and stood up.
“Something I need to know about?” Alisa waved to the netdisc as Yumi bent to pick it up.
“I decided to get in contact with my sister, since we’re close to Arkadius, to make sure the temple survived its run-in with the Alliance. It did. It’s been largely repaired and relocated to another remote part of the planet. I also wondered if we might be permitted to visit—I thought Starseer healers might have insight into Durant’s problem—but Young-hee didn’t sound optimistic about that. She wasn’t able to check for certain, however, because an encoded message came in last night, and Lady Naidoo, my mother, and the council members have been locked in a private meeting since then.”
“Something to do with the Staff of Lore?”
Alejandro had seemed to think it might be brought back to Arkadius. It had been his main reason for choosing to visit a hospital on this planet instead of a station or world less heavily guarded by Alliance ships. With the planet patrol ship clamped onto the Nomad, Alisa now wished she had objected to that choice and tried to find a state-of-the-art hospital on one of the Aldrin moons. Alisa had agreed to help Abelardus find that staff once again, but not until after she found Jelena. She wondered if it was uncharitable to hope that the planet patrol agent would find Abelardus suspicious and cart him off for interrogation.
“My sister doesn’t know what the message or meeting are about, nor does she know anything about any recently discovered artifacts,” Yumi said. “I found a subtle way to ask. But yes, I do believe it’s possible that the Staff of Lore, or contact from the chasadski Starseers, is the reason for the meeting.”
“I’ll let Abelardus know—or he’ll let himself know.” Alisa touched her temple. “But we have a more immediate problem. We’re about to be searched by the law. Is anything in here illegal? We should hide it in the cubby along with Leonidas.”
“You’re hiding Leonidas?” Yumi walked to her lab counter and poked into boxes stacked beside a confusing tangle of borrowed and jury-rigged equipment.
“Essentially, but we’re calling it not-cheerfully lying in wait since cyborgs don’t hide.”
“Then the Bliss should lie in wait as well.” Yumi handed Alisa a box. “And the puhee puhee.” Another box followed. “Oh, and the dehydrated moshaka leaf. Definitely the Zen-finder. And the pushka tail.” Yumi shifted to a cabinet above the bed, opening the door to reveal stacks of tins wedged in, taking every inch of space.
Alisa frowned as boxes and bags were added to those already in her arms. “Are all of these illegal?”
“Unfortunately, yes. Out of curiosity, I looked up the list of substances banned in Alliance space. All they had done was change the header on the sys-net page and repost the precise list the empire had most recently issued. I’m quite disappointed, Captain.” Yumi pursed her lips in Alisa’s direction, as if she were responsible. “I had hoped for more leniency from the Alliance. What a woman ingests should be up to her own beliefs and wisdom, not
dictated by a totalitarian government.”
“The Alliance isn’t totalitarian. If you want different drug policies, I’m sure there’s somewhere you can vote or speak to make your mind heard.”
“Is there? I haven’t been invited to vote since this new government took charge. Have you?”
“Er.” Alisa hadn’t thought much about voting since she had woken up in that hospital on Dustor. There had been weightier matters on her mind. “No, but I’m not sure what my citizenship status is at the moment.”
Fugitive, she feared.
Yumi plopped another box on the top of the pile.
Alisa hooked her chin over it so it wouldn’t fall. “Are any of these plants or mushrooms or other… things illegal?” Since she couldn’t move her chin, Alisa used her eyes to indicate the various pots, planters, and mushroom logs sitting, hanging, or mounted around the cabin.
“Not in their vegetative form.”
“So, they’re not illegal until they wither up, die, and get pulverized with a mortar and pestle?” Alisa backed into the corridor, fearing that the patrollers would arrive any second.
“The government makes up these silly laws, not me.”
“When I took you aboard, I didn’t know you were an anarchist, Yumi.”
“I’m merely an opinionated science teacher.” Yumi grabbed a few more boxes and followed Alisa into the corridor. “Did you know that was the Myers-Donald 9 comet that we were following earlier? It’s projected to travel through, and perhaps crash in, the Kir Asteroid Belt later in the year, the debris field that’s all that remains of the planet Kir. Do you find that auspicious? Or foreboding? I don’t put much stock in astrology or portents, but it is an interesting coincidence that the Staff of Alcyone has come out of hiding at the same time. That was one of the first comets mapped when humans first arrived in the Tri-Sun System.”
“Are you talking this much because you’re trying to prove to me that you’re a science teacher and not an anarchist?” Alisa asked, wrinkling her nose and turning off a burner with her foot—her arms were full—as they passed through the mess hall. “Or because you’re nervous about having planet patrol come aboard?”
“Let’s just say that I’m thinking about hiding in the cubby with Leonidas,” Yumi said as they stepped out onto the walkway overlooking the cargo hold.
“I’m sure he’ll appreciate being educated on portentous comets.”
“Do you think so?”
“Of course.”
Leonidas stood near the airlock entrance with Beck and Abelardus, not in the cubby. He frowned up at Alisa and Yumi.
Alisa would have elbowed Yumi, but her arms were too full. “Remember,” she said, “it’s not hiding. It’s preparing an ambush.”
“Yes, of course.”
Alisa’s step faltered when she took a second look at Leonidas. He had something on his chin. A… beard? And a mustache. He had done something to the rest of his face, too. Applied some makeup or costume contouring to change the shadows and make him appear like someone else. He had also changed out of his armor and wore dark trousers, boots, and a black snagor-hide jacket over a gray T-shirt. A bulge under the jacket might have been the big destroyer he’d wielded when Alisa had first met him. Alisa had her Etcher holstered under her own jacket, but hoped she would not need it.
She walked down the stairs, pausing to open the secret door to the cubby, so she and Yumi could insert the boxes and bags. Then she joined the men, not bothering to hide a puzzled expression.
“You’re not in the cubby,” Alisa observed, glancing toward Beck and Abelardus too.
“I am not,” Leonidas agreed.
Beck had not changed out of his combat armor, though he had removed his helmet and wasn’t carrying as many weapons as he sometimes did. Abelardus wore his fitted hide trousers and vest. He must have left his black Starseer robe and staff in his cabin.
“Are we all incognito today?” Alisa asked.
A chicken squawked, one of twenty-one that now resided in the coop. Yumi promised there were no roosters and all of the eggs had been sterile, but somehow the Nomad kept acquiring more chickens.
“Not me,” Beck said. “I’m a good and noble Alliance citizen with no reason to worry about the planet patrollers.”
“Did you know you left sauce burning, noble citizen?”
“Asteroid sucking—I forgot!” Beck sprinted for the stairs, the rest of his cursing lost in the thunder of his footsteps.
“Would you recognize me?” Leonidas rubbed the hair of the short beard. “I anticipated needing to wear a disguise to move about freely if we returned to Alliance space, so I picked this up before we left Cleon Moon.”
“You’re still cyborgy looking.” Alisa demonstrated by wrapping both hands around one of his upper arms.
“You’re supposed to sound more disapproving when you say that,” Abelardus said, leaning his shoulder against the bulkhead, his arms crossed over his chest. His long braids were artfully arranged over his pectoral muscles. The vest accented them noticeably. Maybe he hoped to impress the android.
“I’m not a Starseer,” Alisa said.
“Your pappy is, and your daughter is. It’s a family crime for you to fondle a cyborg arm.”
Before Alisa could retort, a clang sounded from outside the airlock. Not only had the planet patrol team attached their airlock tube, but one of them was already knocking at her hatch.
“Has everyone hidden everything that might be considered illegal or suspicious?” Alisa asked quietly, reaching for the button to open the outer hatch.
“I’ve nothing to hide,” Abelardus said.
Leonidas lifted his chin, silently saying he was not going in the cubby.
Alisa sighed. A man with bland, forgettable features entered the Nomad’s airlock chamber and peered through the inner hatch window at them.
“Is having a Starseer unconscious in sickbay suspicious or illegal?” Mica asked, leaning out of the hatchway to engineering.
“No, just inconvenient.” Alisa shooed Mica back into engineering and asked Abelardus, “Is Ostberg out of the way somewhere?”
She had almost forgotten about their young Starseer tagalong. He had kept out from underfoot on the voyage to Arkadius, mostly watching over Durant and helping Yumi with the chicken tending when asked.
“He’s with the doctor and my brother in sickbay,” Abelardus said.
Not exactly out of the way…
“Is he also robeless and inconspicuous?”
“You find me inconspicuous? Usually, I stand out in a crowd. People notice my superior attributes.” Abelardus wriggled his eyebrows and flicked a few braids behind his shoulder.
Judging by the look Leonidas gave him, Leonidas was thinking of wrapping those braids around his neck and throttling him.
Alisa ignored Abelardus and slapped her palm to the control panel.
The inner hatch unlocked with a thunk, and she reached for the handle, but Leonidas got there first and blocked the way while opening it. He stepped back without reaching for a weapon or doing anything threatening, but he pointedly stood in front of Alisa in a bodyguard-like manner.
An android in a white uniform that Alisa did not recognize walked in, followed by two men and a woman in similar attire, each carrying various inspection tools. One man also held a triangular drone bedecked in sensing equipment. The patrollers appeared less intimidating than soldiers, with the men possessing potbellies and unshaven jaws. The woman’s hair was down in a loose braid. Definitely not regulation, at least for the Alliance army, but Alisa did not know the rules for the planet patrol. All four of the agents wore recent-model white earstars.
“Your uniforms have changed since the last time I saw them,” Alisa said by way of greeting, assuming the leader was the bland-faced Delta Five.
The android was looking Leonidas over. Alisa wished he had done as she asked and hidden. She tried not to fidget, but she couldn’t help but worry that Delta Five had already seen through his dis
guise and identified him. An android would have a brain full of storage drives and databases rather than measly cells capable of forgetting things. And since Leonidas had changed out of his combat armor, he would have a harder time battling one, if it came to that.
“The Arkadius Planet Patrol has been outsourced to a civilian security corporation,” Delta Five informed her, taking in Abelardus without comment, then finally facing Alisa. “You are the captain? Captain… Stokes?”
“I am,” Alisa said, trying to decide if that pause indicated disbelief. Did androids pause for dramatic effect? “You have my permission to begin your search.”
“Ah,” the android said, and she doubted he had been worried about receiving her permission.
Delta Five waved for the team to spread out. The woman strode toward engineering with some kind of detector on a telescoping stick. One man walked around the cargo hold and the other headed toward the steps. Before he reached them, he tapped a button on the drone and tossed it into the air. It hovered for a moment, then buzzed off, zipping from strut to post to bulkhead like a sugar-filled toddler on a playground.
Alisa avoided glancing toward the cubby. The space was designed to look like there wasn’t anything there, and the door had elements in it that were supposed to interfere with sensors, but it had also been created back when her mother had captained the ship, perhaps long before. Who knew how well it held up to modern equipment?
“Abelardus,” Alisa murmured once the android walked up the stairs to join his other man and ought to be out of earshot, even enhanced earshot. “Why don’t you follow the woman with the detector and see if you can convince her that her readouts are extremely boring?”
“What if she finds me fascinating?” He wriggled his eyebrows, as if Alisa might be bothered by the idea of some other woman being interested in him.
“So long as she’s not paying attention to those readouts,” she said. Having him use his abilities to mentally coerce people to do things bothered her, but it seemed wise in this case.
As Abelardus turned toward engineering, a new idea popped into Alisa’s head.