Transcript

Chapter VI · Blood on My Jets

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Chapter six of Blood on My Jets by Algus Boutras the LibriVox recordings in the
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public domain read by Ben Tucker. Chapter six. Titan lay ahead of me,
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pursuing its track around Saturn. My ship drove toward it, flaming out
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fuel and reckless amounts as I poured on the acceleration. I had to get
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there fast. We'd already missed our rendezvous time with Thorston by two days.
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He was going to figure out what happened, must have done so already and
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would be hot behind us. I had to land, get the engines installed,
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load supplies, and take off into hyperspace before he hit. It was
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a race against time. I built up velocity to a point. No sane
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skipper whatever, dream of leaving just enough fuel to break with, knowing I
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wouldn't need it to get back. Part of me sat in the control room
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plotting curves, charting fuel consumption figures on a graph, watching the black line
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rise hour by hour to the red crayon slash. That meant I had done
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all I could, and part of me was down in the cabin with Pat.
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But if I'd let the two parts mix, no ship in the system
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had ever hit the speed. I begged out of my ship's heaving engines.
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No human being had ever traveled as fast before, tracing his track across the
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white stars and the blue fire of his jets. If I made it to
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Titan in time to get into hyperspace, I would have pat with me.
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There'd be stars to look at in the worlds that circled them, star on
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star marching past. The ship whirled after spinning world fair against the stars,
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and a million things to see. A thousand lifetimes to live out there where
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other beings lived. Was adventure enough for both of us, and enough of
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dreaming. Maybe she'd forget Thorston. Maybe some of the things she had said
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had been lies. Maybe the whisperings and darkness were true. If I could
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get to Titan in time, I might as well have walked. I knew
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there was no hope. Before I finished landing. Titan was an empty moon.
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Where the project bubble had been was a circle of fused concrete around a
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mess of melted alloys. A corpse in a TSN spacesuit lay on its back
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and stared at Saturn. I looked down at it, cursing, my shoulders
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slumping under the weight of my helmet, and I heard the voice on the
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command frequency. Hey you you down by the bubble. The voice was weak
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and getting weaker. Yeah, I shouted into my mic. Welcome. Yeah,
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for Christ's sake, where are you? You're right about a hundred yards.
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Start walking over here. I'll talk you in. I started off at
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a lope, kicking my way over the rough ground. That voice was pitifully
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weak. I found him curled around a rock, his head and arms supported
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on a rifle that was leaned against stone. Welcome. Yeah. He couldn't
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even turn his head to look at me. I'm Foster, Lou Foster,
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commanding Marine Guard Detail. I remembered him, the one who filled a practice
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football with water. Yeah, Lou, how's it? No damn good at
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all, Ash, I've been waiting for you. Thorston. Yeah, old
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class mate, Harry the horse about thirty four hours back. You been in
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that thing all this time? Sure? Snap, If you breeze shallow and
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don't drink anything. Helps to have a couple of spare tanks. He can
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still try to chuckle, well, hell guy, let's get you over to
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my ship. No, can't do rush, no sense to it. I
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was training to hear the words now, Even with his set right next to
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mine, I knelt down and touched helmets with him. Listen, Ash,
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he's got the stuff, the diagrams, the charts, the figures, everything.
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He's even got the tech detail to put it together for him. All
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right, Lou, it figured, But can the act come on? Boy?
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Over my shoulder, you go and down to the can with you.
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Let me lay God, damn it, we try to move me. I
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didn't walk over here. I got flung when the dome let go. He
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was screaming. Sorry, Lou, it's all right. He bubbled a chuckle.
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I see, by my infallible little tears and inch truments, I'm going
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to run out of breathing material in a couple of minutes. Sorry by me.
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Luck to Yash. Yeah, but he didn't strangle. He didn't choke
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in his helmet. There was still air in his tanks when he died.
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I went back to my ship and sat behind the control board, smoking a
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cigarette. I rubbed a hand across my tired eyes and wondered what I was
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going to do next. Thorston had thought of everything. He couldn't have found
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technicians to assemble to drive anywhere else, so he'd come out here and kidnap
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them. I was an elementary move, obviously planned far in advance. I'd
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been running a useless race. I would have realized it long ago if I
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hadn't been half crazy about Pat. She laughed at me when I told her
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about it, But she laughed in a peculiar way. I could have told
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you, she said, laughing. Ash Hulcombe, the big undercover agent heading
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like mad for Titan, and what does he find? I found, lou
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Foster, Pat, I said, feeling the steel in my voice, slicing
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upward in my throat. That wasn't any boy's fault, she said quickly.
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He happened to get in Harry's way. Go tell Andrea Foster, I said,
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stop it, Ash. You can keep bringing up horrible examples, but
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it still doesn't mean anything compared to travel to the Stars. What was wrong
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with the way it was going to be done? I asked, But she
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was pulling her protective shell of mockery around her again. Oh stop it,
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Ash, You're licked, and now you're trying to justify it by claiming foul
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the way losers always have. But the last thing she said, as I
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slammed out of the cabin. Was this time you got the spanking ash?
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Now stop crying about it? But somehow she didn't sound as happy as she'd
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probably expected. I took the ship back out into space, finally heading sunward.
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All I could do was hope i'd get within radio range of a t
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SN ship before Thorston found me. But that didn't happen. I wasn't anywhere
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near the belt when I had to sit and watch Thorston's fleet come flaming at
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me out of space and surround my ship sliding into tight courses that held me
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on a deadly and invisible leash, and I could feel things crumbling inside me.
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All the principles the Academy had built in and love and fear, remorse,
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friendship, bravery, none of it meant anything. They were things that
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human hearts and minds were capable of. But when yesterday's love is to day's
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revulsion, when friends are deadly enemies, when all the world thinks of you
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as just another space bomb? What then? I had the destiny of the
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system riding in the holds behind me, and nobody really knew or cared that
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I'd break my heart to keep it safe. They were my eyes, but
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they weren't altogether normal. As I stared out of the control room screens at
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the waiting fleet, they kept their distances. They all had their launchers pointed
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at me, and on a few of the old T class rack mounts,
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I could see the homing torps lying in wait on the flat upper decks.
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I went back to Pat's cabin. She was sitting up in her bunk,
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staring at me. Fire lay buried deep in her eyes, but she kept
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her face smooth. Okay, Pat, I said, Thorston's got his crew
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and a globe around me. He wants this ship. Should I give it
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to him? What I was saying didn't match my voice. I was tired
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and mad, and I couldn't look at her. I could feel my lower
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teeth sliding back and forth against my upper ones. No, I know you
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too well, Ash, she said, not the way you'd give it to
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him. She pushed herself up and stood in front of me. Her eyes
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kept getting wider and wider. Ash, you're crazy if you think you can
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fight your way out of this, Her voice broke. You know you don't
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have a chance. I've seen Harry's fleet in action. This is one ship
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ash one ship. Her entire body was radiating urgency. She was standing stiff
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legged, every muscle quivering, trying to get her words through the desperate red
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haze that was building up in front of my eyes. I couldn't see her
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very clearly, but I could see her well enough to laugh at her.
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Fight. I said, fight, I've had fighting, all the fighting I'm
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ever gonna do. I've been fighting too much, too often. I had
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a name and a friend once, and I had a girl once too.
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Now all I've got is a job and some orders and a conscience. Maybe
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no, I'm not gonna fight. I threw my head back and laughed again.
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I reached out and grabbed her arm. Come on, you're gonna have
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a grand stand seat. I pulled her up the companionway and into the control
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room and threw her into the co pilot's seat. I pulled out my gun,
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reach for those controls, I said, and I will blow your hand
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off. She sat in the chair, her face gray, staring out at
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Thorston's fleet. I reached over and switched the radio to Thorston's frequency. Thorston,
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Yes, holcome his two wasn't quite the same voice it had been.
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It was even clipped used to commanding a crew that didn't enjoy being commanded.
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I've got Pat, I said, keeping my gun on her. Let's stick
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irrelevant, say HULKMB how much for the ship he'd given himself away? I
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could have laughed, No, Thorston, let's keep it where I wanted.
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How much for Pat? There was a pause on the other transmitter. I
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was playing my cards right. Thorston had me and the ship, but I
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had his wife, and I was swinging the scales my way. Why should
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he offer to pay me now a bluff? No, he had a better
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one in the ships with their launchers ready. Why should he be willing to
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dick her for the ship? Because she was in it? That was why.
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If I refused to give up, he could always blow me out of
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space, or take the ticklish chance of trying to disable the ship without wrecking
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the engines. But he wasn't going to do that. Pat was worth too
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much to him. Thorston, you heard me? How much for your wife?
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He cursed me. His voice was a lot lower than it had been.
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I've got a gun on her, Thorston. Suddenly he sighed, all
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right, Holcombe, you win but not as much as you'd think I'll make
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a deal. I laughed at him, still keeping my gun, pointed at
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Pat with a rock's steady hand. What am I supposed to think you've been
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doing? Thorston? It was getting to be too much for me. I
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could feel all the pressure that had built up in the last ten days starting
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to come to a head, ready to explode. And to hell with who
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the piece is hit? Oh no, Thorston, No deals, no bargains,
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no sellouts, no compromises. I'm up to hear on double crossing and
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criss crossing. I hired out to you and Transoler, and before that,
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I hired out to anybody who had money or a chance for me to get
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some, and all the time I was hired out to earth government. I've
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had too many jobs, Thorston. My gun's been on the line too long.
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There are too many oaths and too many loyalties. Too much of my
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honor's been spread from one end to the system to the other. Now I'm
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quitting. The towel's going in, and from now on it's me that I
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fight for. I had the mic up against my mouth and I was yelling
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into it. I know what you're going to offer me, Thorston, you
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know what I'd offer. You want the girl and the ship. You want
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one as bad as the other, but you won't settle for half. So
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you're offering me my life and a free ride to Earth. Well you're can
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take that deal and shove it Earth. Who the hell would want to live
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on the Earth? You'd leave after you and your marty friends got through with
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it. No, Thorston, it's no bargain. It's the heads you win
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tails. I lose proposition no matter how you slice it. I laughed again,
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enjoying it because it was going to be my last laugh. Holcome.
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He must have guessed what I was working myself up to do, because there
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was sheer desperation in his voice. But I cut him off. Shut up,
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Harry, I told you I was quitting. You know the racket I'm
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in. You don't just quit it. You go out with your hand on
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the wheel and your jets full on. And here I come. I fed
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flame into my port side jets, throwing the mic away from me. As
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I grabbed the controls. The ship arked over, singing her death song and
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snapping stanchions and straining plates in the angry howl of the converters in the drum
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fire of jets that coughed and choked his fuel poured into them, but which
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opened their throats and bellowed just the same ash. That was pat Holcumb,
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that was Thorston. But I was pure metal jacketed fire borne death, howling
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silently toward the sleek cruiser that was Thorston's flagship, the best known and most
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feared silhouette in space. The gates of hell opened in space. Every ship
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in the hemisphere ahead of me vomited fire. As the ones behind me and
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beside me lanced out of the way of the arrowing missiles. There was no
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way for Thorston to avoid me. Fire blossomed at the throats of his jets,
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and the flagship shot forward. I snarled, twisted the wheel, and
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kept my nose pointed for his bridge. Proximity torps began exploding all around me.
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They weren't doing Thorston a bit of good either they hit me or without
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air to carry the shock, they were as good as not there at all.
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Here's your hyperspatial drive, Harry, I howled, Here it comes,
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compliments of ash Hoholcomb hired gun. Suddenly a missile exploded under my bow.
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It was a clean hit. The ship screamed, escaping air and shuddered bucking
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upward. It wasn't just stanchions ripping loose now or buckling plates. It was
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snapping girders and metals, spewing out into space like teeth from a broken mouth.
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The trouble board winked solid fire at me. I didn't care about that.
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The ship was unhurt, and the only place that counted her engine room,
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and the stern jets kept firing. But I was bent over the wheel,
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sobbing in pure white hot, frustrated rage because I was going to miss.
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I'd been slammed up off my trajectory high enough to miss, and Thorston's
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ship was firing every tube had to drive herself down and away behind a protective
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screen of other ships. I could hear the hysterical relief in Thorston's laugh over
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the radio. I could hear something else too. It hadn't mattered what pat
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did. Once I'd swung the ship into line, I couldn't have pulled it
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out of the collision course myself. It had taken an atomic rocket to blast
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me out of the way. But it was different now. I was folded
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over the wheel, blood running down my chin from my bitten lip, my
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knuckles aching as I tied my fists. Pat said, ash, I'm sorry,
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there was a sob in her voice. But you won't give up,
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she stumbled on, You'll never give up until you inherit. You're both dead,
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and I couldn't stand losing both of you. I never knew what she
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hit me with, but the back of my skull seemed to explode inward,
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and I slid out of the seat to the deck. I started crawling toward
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her. She sobbed, but she hit me again. End of chapter six