NASTRAGULL: Pirates (23 page)

After inspecting it for a bit longer, he headed back toward the cockpit. On his way back, he noticed a clipcomp hanging on the wall. He took it down and activated it, punching up the single file in memory. It turned out to be a cargo manifest; and as he read it, Alec began to laugh.

Nikko Behl was busily studying star charts on a monitor when a clipcomp was suddenly thrust in front of his face. He jumped and scowled; but then, as he realized what was on the electronic screen, he grinned and started laughing; it wasn't long before Alec joined him. And if their laughter seemed to have a hysterical edge, no one could have blamed them, after all they'd been through.

At the moment, they were traveling with a fortune large enough to buy several planets outright. And not just dinky little pioneer worlds, either.

When their laughter died down, Behl wiped his eyes and looked abruptly at Alec. "Thank you, son. Thank you for saving my life and putting your own on the line."

"Please don't mention it, sir. It's what a soldier does."

Behl nodded sharply. "And did you have friends on the
Bright Star
with you, Mr. Horn?"

"Yessir, my entire squad. Eleven other cadets, six women and five men. And Major Nesbit, of course."

"I remember the Major. Had him at my table a couple of times. A very handsome and correct individual."

"Yessir. He's always correct. Never does anything wrong."

"A gentleman never criticizes his superior officers," Behl snapped.

"Um, aye aye, sir," Alec said formally.

Behl relented. "It sounds like you have some resentment towards him."

"No sir! Well, it's just that he always smiles, and I know from experience that he isn't as perfect as he tries to make it seem."

"No one is perfect. Are you, Mr. Horn?"

"Um, no sir."

Behl looked at Alec with interest. "Something more there. Tell me."

"Aye aye, sir." Alec took a deep breath. "Well, sir, it's like this. Mr. Nesbit and I are related, so I know him fairly well. When I was young and started in a private school, Nesbit was there...his last year. I always got into trouble for certain strange things that happened, and somehow Nesbit always seemed to be linked to the trouble. But..."

"But you could never prove anything?"

"Right, sir. How did you know?"

"Oh, that's easy. That type of character exists everywhere. They're convinced they're nice people, and they get everyone else believing it too. But underneath it all, they're sadists and tyrants. When they get a little power they can't help but wield it, because they love inflicting pain for their own pleasure and material gain. They're pure malice. Nesbit's like that?"

"Maybe, sir," Alec said hesitantly. "He's...Nesbit is smart. First in his class when he graduated. Normally he'd be second lieutenant, but when he graduated he was already a major."

"Ah, so you're a little envious, then."

"Not really, sir. I'm a general."

Behl grinned, shaking his head...but his laughter died a-borning as he looked into Alec's guileless dark blue eyes. Alec continued, "Well, um, officially I haven't received my rank or
training, and of course I don't have the experience, but I earned the rank in battle. Actually, it was our graduating battle against forces from Florencia, on one of our newer colony worlds."

"So actually it's only a brevet rank," Behl said, staring fixedly at the nearest monitor.

"Yessir, that's right."

Behl muttered, "Then perhaps the major envies you?"

Alec shrugged. "Doesn't really matter much, except it makes most of my friends envy me, and perhaps my parents proud. I was to be rewarded my new rank at the annual graduation festival on Tallas, upon our arrival. That's long past now. After that, I was to receive the higher level of schooling necessary at the capitol."

"I take it you want to return to Tallas ASAP?"

"Well, yessir, but not right now. First I need to rescue my friends."

Behl shook his head, and after a short silence adopted a more serious and fatherly tone. "You can't save them or rescue them, son. Some of them will be dead by now. You could buy the survivors if you ever found them...and by then, most of them wouldn't be the same people you used to know. But you can never really save them. If they come from important or wealthy families, then there's a small chance they'll be traded or bartered back. Or sometimes the government will buy them back, as long as they've got a lot of money invested in their educations and training."

"You do what you have to do, and I'll do what I have to do, sir," Alec said stoutly.

The Captain smiled. "My debt to you is for life, Mr. Horn, no matter how you see it. If you want to go back right now and take on those pirates head on, you just give me the word. This little bird has a shitload of heavy weapons we can throw at them. But if you want an old man's advice—for what it's worth, General—then we might want to regroup and reorganize ourselves, find some allies, choose our own battleground." There was no disrespect in Behl's voice, only grim resolution. 

Alec looked at the old man in silence. "Thank you, Captain Behl. Would you like to hear my plan so far?"

"Does it include action?"

"Yessir, plenty."

"Then I'm in." Behl signed deeply. "Ya know, I was getting pretty bored hauling cargo and transporting civilians anyway. This brings back old memories that I'd love to share with you sometime. But in the meantime, let's hear your plan. I'll let you know what I think as you move along."

Nervously, Alec trotted out his plan, or what he had of it at least. Behl listened with some skepticism at first, occasionally putting in a word or two; but after some time he appeared to become engrossed, and by the time the young officer was done he was looking at Alec with undisguised respect.

Once Alec had finished laying out his proposal, a half-hour later, Nikko Behl spent a full hour picking it apart, telling him what was wrong with every detail. By the time he was done, Alec looked shell-shocked—and all the more so when Behl concluded with, "...but apart from that, it's a pretty good plan."

Alec nodded, swallowing hard. "Thank you sir, but it's obviously not good enough. Do you have any suggestions?"

The grizzled captain scratched his bearded chin. "Think about what I've said. Sleep on it, and present an amended plan to me tomorrow. We need to take the time to get this just right."

"Aye aye, sir."

In the coming days, Nikko Behl and his new protégé spent innumerable hours shaping their plan to rescue the cadet squad and, if possible, the crew and passengers of
Bright Star
from slavery. Over time, they formed a simple plan that seemed it might be effective, at least for retrieving the cadets. Privately, Behl thought it was the absurd to chase down Zuzack and try to find Alec's lost friends—especially after what Alec had done to Zuzack before vacating the premises—but he kept his reservations to himself. He owed the kid his life and his sanity, which had been on the ragged edge of breaking after weeks of intermittent torture. And besides, he too had lost friends and mates, and he craved some payback.

And even if the plan never turned into reality, it was a good way of passing time in the confined spaces he had to share with Alec. They'd ended up in home space, more or less, but many days from a port, jumpgate, or inhabited world, so it was important to keep their minds and hands busy. When they weren't talking about the plan, Behl taught Alec everything he knew about space travel, from jump navigation to EVA. Alec did many things he'd never experienced at the Academy.

They took turn resting and eating in the small compartment behind the cockpit, and Alec used some of his off time to prowl the cargo hold, checking the contents against the manifest he'd found. Everything seemed to match up. One evening as he was rummaging through the loot, looking for the chocolate the manifest said was there somewhere, he called out to Behl, "Sir, why is it you seem to have no interest in the cargo, aside from that Tallasian caviar and such? You realize there's all kinds of loot in there, right?"

"That's right, skipper, and it's all yours. I've nothing to do with it, nor any right to make a claim."

When he heard that, Alec stood up suddenly—too suddenly, as it turned out, because he staggered and cracked his head on the cargo hatchway. Cursing up a storm, he made his way toward the cockpit, wondering aloud why they had to have gravity on anyway. Micrograv had been just fine for the first day or so.

"I heard that," Behl called from the helm as Alec approached, looking at the blood on his fingers.

"If we were at a full gravity I would have brained myself just now," Alec groused.

"Good thing we ain't, then. I told you why I've got it set at a quarter-g, and I know some of your instructors did too. If you're in micrograv too long, your bone chemistry and cell structure will change, and your muscles will turn to jelly...let's just say you wouldn't be able to walk or jerk off for a long time when you got back home."

"Yessir, I know, I was just bellyaching. So, um, what did do you mean about the loot, sir?"

"You captured the ship from a pirate, son, so she's all yours. And even though an intergalactic court might consider me a crew member, or even a Captain with the right to claim a small part of the share, you're still the owner."

"But all this is stolen stuff, sir! I mean, I might have a claim on the tritonium silver that I took from Zuzack, since it clearly falls under the treasure statutes, but I couldn't imagine they'd let me keep all this stuff."

"Hah. For most of that stuff, the provenance is lost, son. And even if we
could
return it to the rightful owners, you'd still get a huge cut and keep this flying tin can. Must say it looks like shit from the outside, but that pirate must know something about engines and avionics, because it's in mint condition otherwise. No worries, Alec. You're young, wealthy, and your life has just begun. I just want to repay my life debt to you."

"Don't you worry, you old geezer, you'll have some of the spoil."

Behl snapped off a precise salute. "Aye aye, sir! Whatever you say, General!"

"Please don't call me that, sir."

Behl smiled as Alec retired to the cabin to sleep.

They also spent a good deal of time learning the weapons systems. The ship carried an ample supply of rocket-propelled targets, which enlivened the long, boring hours. They turned it into a sort of game, a competition that kept them sharp and their minds active. Occasionally, and often without warning, one of them would release a target from its launch bay, and the other would skewer it with one of the forward laser cannons.

Alec was grateful that he'd had the opportunity to spend this journey with an expert spacer. No matter how tough the last eight years had been, and no matter how well he had done, he was still a rank beginner compared to Nikko Behl. He couldn't have had a better tutor in the ways of handling a spacecraft, either. Whenever Alec sat in the comfortable pilot's seat and wore the helmet linking him to the ship's systems, he felt that he was in control over his own destiny for the first time he could remember.

Behl's voice from the copilot's seat, criticizing, complaining and on rare occasions congratulating Alec on his flying techniques, was like a second part of his own mind.

After the first month in space and several jumps later, Behl informed Alec that he was flying like a professional. Frankly, he was astonished that the kid had come so far so quickly; then again, he'd never had the opportunity to drill someone as much and as intently as he had Alec. The bond between them grew, and rarely did they get on each other's nerves. Behl had long since realized that it was because Alec loved to learn, and because he himself loved to teach.

One day Alec lightly said something that would change Behl's thoughts about Alec forever: "A true Master will always remain a student." 

"Who told you that?" Behl asked sharply.

"Not sure, sir," Alec admitted. "Just something that stuck with me."

The captain said no more; he just leaned back and enjoyed the ride.

After that, Nikko Behl had never had any second thoughts about whether or not Alec deserved to be a general. He might be young, but he was a natural-born leader.

Chapter 14

It had been over two weeks since the mysterious young prisoner had escaped the
Bitch
, after killing seven crewmen, injuring 13, raping two others, and mutilating the ship's captain. The pirates were in collective shock; they'd though he was a frightened pretty-boy coward, but clearly that had been an act—an act so profoundly convincing that even his own squad mates had fallen for it. Clearly, his Silver Guard ancestry had come to the surface, with all the sly cunning that suggested. Bold defiance hadn't worked for his friends; so he'd acted frightened, submissive, craven. By now, most of the officers and crew had revised their opinions of Alec Hornet significantly upward. Those who hadn't had learned to keep their opinions to themselves; so far, Zuzack had killed four crewmen and one officer who had been too forthright in disagreeing with the Captain.