Chapter 2
A reddish, squirrel-like creature was moving across the desert sand. Waves of heat radiating from the blue sand distorted its outline. One of its six legs, center-right, was wounded and oozing a purplish-colored blood. It looked around for predators and shade. If it could find shelter from the blue double suns, it would survive.
If a predator didn’t get it first. At that moment it was attacked.
A spider, half a meter in diameter, leapt onto the sand squirrel’s back. The spider was coated in a permanent layer of light blue sand, providing it with perfect camouflage. Its two front legs had evolved a mechanism for spraying powerful digestive acids, which it used to spray in the face of its prey. It held on tight as the sand squirrel bucked in pain and terror. Finally the spider’s meal shuddered one last time and died, its head a sticky goo of partially digested protein.
The spider moved off its prey and circled around to the head. Suddenly, a narrow red laser beam sliced the spider in half. Its digestive fluids spilled over the sand and foamed on contact. A moment later, another laser beam sliced off the mass of protein goo and acid that had been the sand squirrel's head. A gloved hand grabbed it by the tail and carried it away, purple blood dripping to the sand.
Two heavy feminine hands held a bone stripped of flesh, then casually tossed it into a small pile of bones. The owner of the hands was an average looking woman with a stocky build and long, black hair. She was clean and neat in appearance and had soft white skin unused to the harsh sunlight on this planet. Sitting in a camouflage tent as she waited, she amused herself by thinking of what she would be able to buy and where she would travel to when this job was done. A two year vacation sounded awfully good.
Her thoughts drifted to what she had done the night before. The screams of dying women and men, the snapping sound of bones breaking. They, too, had paid the price of her upcoming wealth. Pangs of guilt began to surface.
Her thoughts shifted. Those people mean nothing to me. Human life means nothing to me. I hate them for being the small, pathetic people they were. They had to be eliminated. It was the only way to steal the corbinite. Their deaths were nothing more than their own bad luck. The thoughts were foreign to her, and though they were helpful as rationalizations to explain away any responsibility, they were not her own and felt uncomfortable.
As she pulled herself back from the ego and anger in those thoughts, she heard a low mechanical humming noise in the background and knew her ride had arrived. Stepping through the tent flap, she raised her hand to her brow in an effort to block the bright blue light from the double suns. The interstellar pickup she spotted matched the description she had been given. She began tearing off the camouflage from the truck she had stolen to haul the pressurized containers of corbinite.
The pickup landed and its driver got out. Loading hatches and large armatures unfolded in the background as he walked toward the campsite.
“Hello, Martha,” he said as he approached the woman. “How did it go?”
Martha didn’t respond to his greeting, continuing to remove the camouflage.
Frank was a small, emaciated man, whose dry, blotchy, slightly greenish skin suggested an addiction to paintel, an hallucinogenic narcotic. He was nervous and tense, and wishing he had some paintel to calm himself down with. He was also aware his boss would have him killed if he was caught using paintel while on an assignment. His beady eyes darted back and forth nervously.
Frank thought about his craving for paintel, as he often did. Only when it was flowing through his system did he feel truly alive. Life without paintel was empty and without pleasure. When he was high on paintel he confined himself to what he called his “pleasure room.” It was a safe place.
The walls of his pleasure room could be programmed to create any environment he desired, ranging from a desert island, with lazy lapping waves against the shore, to the inside of the great Caprian cathedral, Esofan, with its awe inspiring walls, ceilings, and art. If it were possible, he would have spent the rest of his life in his room, high on paintel. His only regret was the paintel was destroying his liver and his kidneys.
Paintel was a powerful drug. Regular use of it, two or three times a week, would kill a human being within a year. The doctor was going to regenerate his liver and kidneys for him as partial payment for his help in delivering the corbinite. Frank didn’t really trust the doctor.
“Hello, Frank. You’re late,” Martha finally replied, turning to face him.
“Yeah,” he said with feigned casualness and began climbing into the truck to position it correctly for the armatures to transfer the corbinite aboard. “They surprised me with two new security satellites. I had to take them out before they began firing at me.”
It was Martha’s turn for surprise. In her accounting position she should have seen vouchers for two new satellites. This is not a good time for questions and conversation, she thought. “Let’s start loading up.”
As they loaded, Frank wondered about Martha. She didn’t look like the kind of person who would be involved in this sort of operation. Yet, every once in a while her face and body posture would shift, and she would suddenly take on the characteristics of someone cold and hard. Initially he had thought of having sex with her on the trip back, perhaps forcing her if necessary, but as he watched her during the loading procedure, he had changed his mind.
She frightened him. She was much too strong for her stocky little frame and during those shifts of hers, she looked completely evil. Better just to leave her alone, accomplish the mission, and get his payment.
The two moved quickly and efficiently, as experienced cargo haulers would. Frank actually was experienced with cargo transfers. Martha’s experience came from transferred memories. Within half an hour, the three tons of corbinite were transferred from the truck to the shuttle pickup. Martha decided to leave the tent and any remaining equipment in an effort to get back on schedule.
The last of the corbinite was loaded and the armatures folded back into the pickup.
Frank sealed the pickup’s hatches and gave the navigational computer its instructions. The antigrav boosters lifted the pickup, and the thrusters quickly pushed it into the upper atmosphere. As they were about to leave the planet’s mesosphere another satellite appeared, causing alarms to sound.
“Damn,” said Frank. “We’ll have to try to outrun it.”
“Can we activate the force field?”
“We’re still within the planet’s primary gravmagnetic field. We’d short out the system,” Frank answered. “See if you can get a bead on it with a missile. I’ll take evasive maneuvers.”
Martha worked swiftly at the control panels. “Got it.”
She saw a flash of light from Frank’s direction, just as she launched the missile. Looking over, Martha saw Frank twitching and shaking. There was a hole where his left eye used to be. You could see right through it to the wall beyond. The satellite had gotten off a laser shot before Martha had fired the missile. It had gone right through Frank’s head cauterizing the tissue and blood flow as it went.
The explosion on the viewscreen, of what had been the satellite, distracted her momentarily. She recovered her focus and pushed Frank out of his seat, taking over the controls. As they left the planet’s primary gravmagnetic field she brought the force field on line and accelerated, shifting to fatal speeds.
The pickup traveled without problems for almost ten minutes at standard fatal speed and then gave a lurch and dropped to less then two hundred kilometers an hour.
The laser must have done some serious damage, Martha thought. I’m a couple of light years away from Corbin III. Safe for the moment.
She looked at Frank. He had stopped twitching and she assumed he was dead. An odd desire to giggle came over her, so strong a desire she gave in to it.
Let’s make some soup, a foreign thought suggested.
“No!” she told herself firmly and, using the pickup’s computer, began to investigate the damage.
The satellite had fired multiple laser shots simultaneously. The ship hull’s various breaches had sealed with a thin membrane, designed for emergencies like this. Nanites were making permanent hull repairs. Diagnostic sensors showed damage to one of the plasma feeds for the antigrav thrusters. The ship’s computer had automatically reduced its speed as soon as it had sensed problems.
With the exceptions of Frank and the damage to the antigrav feeds, she had been quite lucky and sustained minimal damage.
Why didn’t I know about those new satellites? she wondered.
Because they knew about you. You’ve been betrayed, the foreign thought pattern cautioned her.
Martha shook her head trying to clear it of the thoughts not her own. She had been warned that the more she used the memories that had been transferred into her brain, the more likely personality bleed over would take place. She had also been cautioned stressful situations would make the memories more intense and increase the bleed over.
Staring at the viewscreen, Martha thought about what had been done to her. The steps taken to ensure she could steal three tons of corbinite. The cells of her muscles had been permanently altered giving her the strength of two men and increasing her reaction time by 50 percent. Medications had made her bone structure denser. Her body felt quite different, as did her mind, exaggerating the concern she had lost her identity. Not exactly what she had in mind at the beginning of her vacation three months ago.
On the first day of her two week vacation from Intergalactic Mining, she had met an attractive man and had enthusiastically allowed him to seduce her. She remembered how he had told her of a place more beautiful and romantic than anything she had ever experienced and convinced her to go with him to “paradise”, as he referred to it.
Martha was sunning herself by the pool at the Harrison Hotel which was located inside the Devoe Satellite orbiting Earth. She was looking forward to the view seen at night. She had been told by the desk clerk both the Earth and a full moon would be in the satellites night sky at the time and she didn’t want to miss it.
A tall, muscular man had settled into the recliner next hers and she gave him a quick once over from behind her sunglasses. He’s quite a hunk, she thought as she felt a warmth in her loins. He may not have any interest in me, but I can dream.
Martha was startled when he spoke to her.
“Have you been at the hotel long?” he asked.
“No, I just arrived this morning.”
“Really. So did I. I’ve been looking forward to this vacation for a long time. The night view is supposed to be spectacular.”
He spoke with an accent Martha couldn’t place, but found very attractive. “Yes,” she said. “Tonight, both the Earth and the full moon are supposed to be in the sky. At about 11:00 PM. I’m on vacation, too. I’m going to be here for the next ten days.”
“Really! What a coincidence. I’m here for ten days also. My name is Richard,” he introduced himself, looking into her eyes.
“My name is Martha.”
There was silence for a few moments. Martha was nervous. She wasn’t experienced at picking up men and she certainly didn’t want to start off her vacation with a rejection. But she knew if she didn’t try she would never get laid.
And then he spoke. “Forgive me for being so forward, but if you’re available, would you like to have dinner with me this evening?”
Martha paused, and found herself about to say ‘no’ out of fear and shyness. “Yes, I’d enjoy having dinner with you,” she finally answered.
They talked all afternoon. He listened to her and asked questions about her work and her friends. Richard told her about himself. He was an engineer returning to Earth, after having been on Pluto for the last six months. He told her he didn’t want to talk about Pluto or the last six months. He said he never wanted to see, or even think about that icebox of a planet, ever again.
They separated just after a glorious sunset as the Devoe Satellite rotated into evening. After changing into her sexiest dress, Martha met him for dinner. They ate and talked and danced. Martha felt weak in the knees. At eleven they walked out of the hotel to the pool area and held hands as they watched a huge full moon to the right and the glory of Earth on the left of their night sky. The moment was right and they kissed passionately.
She drummed up her courage and asked him up for drinks.
After making love, Martha rested her head on Richard’s shoulder.
“I’d like to take you to a favorite place of mine,” he told her softly.
“Where?” she whispered, entranced by his voice and stunned by her incredible luck in finding such a wonderful man to share her vacation with. These were the kinds of experiences that made life worth living.
“It’s a secret,” he had said. “But I will tell you it’s like no place you’ve ever been. It’s paradise. I have my own ship. I’ll take you there in the morning.”
Paradise hadn’t existed. It had been a ruse to get her alone on his ship. Once there, she had been knocked out with some sort of gas. When she awoke, her mind was fuzzy and she was frightened. Dr. Liechter, a total stranger, explained what had happened to her.
“Welcome back to the world of the living,” Liechter said. “How are you feeling?”
“Where am I ? Who are you?” Martha asked, frightened.
“I’m your doctor, and you’re on Cavanaugh Space Station.”
“My doctor? Where’s Richard? What’s happened? Is he alright?”
“Richard’s fine,” Liechter answered soothingly. And you’ll be fine, too. Just as soon as we get you adjusted to the changes we’ve made.
“Changes? What kind of changes? What has happened to me?”
“Well, to put it bluntly, you’ve been kidnapped, and with the help of a combination of drugs and hypnotic techniques, a small program has been installed in your mind. The program is fairly simple and straightforward, and will be the highest priority in your life. You are to steal three tons of corbinite and return to this station with it.”
Liechter went on to explain the physical changes forced on her while she was unconscious, and the plans for stealing the corbinite.
He described how they had also implanted memories from both a trained killer and a skilled pilot. She was assured they could remove the memories when she returned with the corbinite.
Martha Apela had at first been angry by what had been done to her, but drugs and hypnosis made it difficult to sustain the anger, and she had eventually given in to the inevitable, even to the point of looking forward to the day it would all be over and she would have her reward.
Shrugging off her thoughts of the past, she checked the computer for the repair requirements, ignoring any concerns about dragging up transferred memories from the pilot. These circumstances were a perfect example of why the memories had been implanted. Prior to the implants, Martha had known next to nothing about piloting a ship, let alone repairing one.
She had been warned not to explore the memories casually, but to use them only when necessary. She took the warnings seriously, afraid of bleed-over from the donor’s personality. The memories were not “pure”, but contaminated with echos from the personalities of the donors. Each time a memory was used, characteristics of the donor’s personality fused deeper and deeper with the recipient’s personality. And Martha had two separate memory implants to draw from.
According to the computer, one of the laser beams had ruptured a plasma conduit, which had in turn sprayed the circuitry of one of the thruster’s control panels. She would have to shut down the thrusters to repair the control panel. Martha decided she would continue putting distance between herself and Corbin III by letting the ship coast while she made repairs.
Leaving the ship’s autopilot in standby mode, Martha went back to the engine room, and began dismantling the control panel. As an afterthought, she instructed the computer to keep on guard for any approaching ships and to alert her immediately. She glanced admiringly at the pressurized containers holding the corbinite.
Corbinite had become the most valuable material in the modern human economy. After Sir Arthur Corbin had created it synthetically, at huge expense to himself and his backers, he had theorized what kind of planets might foster the natural development of corbinite. Planets ideal for the natural development of corbinite were desert worlds which had once been abundant in both water and life. The loss of water (and most, if not all, forms of life) set the stage for the creation of corbinite
Corbinite was a very complex compound. When it wasn't extremely cold and under intense pressure it became radioactive, expelling protons and neutrons, which in turn disintegrated to produce intense heat. The EM frequencies generated by corbinite molecules broke down the protons and neutrons. The entire process was considered an expansion of space at the subatomic level. Gravity was now considered the contraction of space. The corbinite's antigravity energy supplied space ships with both thrusting power and the huge amounts of energy necessary for force field containment. There were a few alien races using alternative energy sources, many superior to corbinite in a variety ways. The majority of ships, both alien and human, however, used corbinite because it was cheap and efficient.
Corbinite had also become an ideal energy source for planets. The radioactivity was easy to contain, and there were no leftover contaminants to dispose of. It did require some beta radiation shielding, but nothing compared to that of atomic power plants.
Mars had been one of the lucky planets to have corbinite as a natural resource. Its discovery provided a way to pay for the extensive terraforming used on Mars. Corbinite had given the human Martians a means of paying for the six large gravity wells and their backups. These surrounded the core of the planet and provided a one-G gravity field. It also paid for transporting gigantic ice comets to the surface of Mars, where they were melted or broken down into oxygen and hydrogen for the atmosphere. The corbinite also fuel a forcefield filtering out ultraviolet and reflecting heat back to the planet.
Intergalactic Mining Enterprises was originally established by the backers of Sir Arthur Corbin. With the exceptions of corbinite from Mars, and a few alien traders, Intergalactic Mining would have had a monopoly on the mining and production of this element. The corbinite from Mars, and recently a few others, provided competition. This competition kept corbinite prices from becoming exorbitant and consequently slowing down the exploration of space and the expansion of the human race.
Because of the stresses placed on the coils of corbinite when they were in use, they eventually wore out and had to be replaced. There was a continuing demand for the substance, both for new ships and for older ones. It was generally believed as long as there was space travel, there would be a demand for corbinite.