IX
The following day word came from the Great Father ordering Simla and Elfi back to Old Earth. With the passenger lines disrupted the only transport available was Elfi's tiny star skipper, which was intended for only one person.
"It'll be a tight squeeze, but we can put Shap in the hold," Simla said.
"The Bullet doesn't have a hold," Elfi explained, "It has a cabin with a pilot's seat and that's it. It's the floor for you, Princess."
"I am not sitting on a floor for a week," Simla protested.
"We'll take cushions," Elfi placated, "for that sweet tushy of yours."
Yaf, of course, was needed on his own world, though he did try to make a case for accompanying the girls back to Old Earth to his President. He was quickly rebuffed. The attack on the Helvans had changed the situation and Pendor's First Minister could not be spared. The parting scene between Simla and Yaf would have been comical if so much emotion had not been involved. With Shap at hand they dared not hug each other too closely.
"This will end, Yaf," Simla said, "and when it does we shall be together."
"We'll still have his metal majesty to contend with."
"Elfi will fix him. I fully intend marrying you and condemning you to a life of sexual bliss. This I swear as a Princess of Old Earth."
"We haven't had the Great Father's blessing yet."
"God, you're so negative. Anyway, I could always twist the old man round my little finger, so don't worry."
"You're the greatest thing that's ever happened to me, Simla. I'd resigned myself to marrying a farmer's daughter. Strong, dependable, but uninspiring, and now I find myself in love with a princess. Not only one by rank, but by personality."
s"Yuck," she replied, "you politicians, never with a straight, simple compliment. Can't you just say I'm wondrous to behold?"
"I don't do understatement."
"That's better."
They dared a brief peck of a kiss before Elfi hustled Simla into the Bullet's tiny cabin. Yaf lingered at the hatch. "Careful out there," he warned, "your flight plan takes you awful close to Riaz space, especially if that warship is dawdling on the way home."
"No problems, we can always outrun him. Nothing that big could hit the speeds the Bullet can. But, hey, take care of yourself, big guy."
"Sure. Look after my Princess, and get that android fixed!"
Elfi gave him an understanding grin and slammed the hatch shut.
The Bullet swung round the Pendoran sun and Elfi engaged the Star Skipper drive which shot them out in the long arc that would take them back to Old Earth. They had a week-long voyage to look forward to in the cramped vessel but were close enough to know that it wouldn't faze them. Indeed, they treasured the girl-time they had together and the confidences they could share.
"So, the orgy thing didn't do it for you?" Simla asked as it was the first time she'd managed to get her friend alone since the Fertility Festival.
"Not as refined as I'd expected," Elfi answered from the pilot's chair, her feet up on the control console. "Yaf said people wouldn't intrude but that guy was far too forward far too quickly."
Simla, wedged in a corner on a pile of cushions wasn't buying it. "He had you howling by the time he was finished with you."
"I do not howl, young lady, I make dainty little trills of pleasure. But he was too quick for me."
"You can't really blame him, things were bound to get a little heated in that atmosphere."
Elfi shrugged acceptance of Simla's argument. "Whatever, but it's not really for me. The best part of it was the first one, the priest guy."
"Really? I thought orgies would be right down your street."
"Which just shows you how well you really know little Elfi. I am a very private person, Simla, and that experience has just confirmed it for me. I'll take my pleasures in private and one partner at a time in future." Simla pouted disappointment. "Oh boo, I was looking forward to a repeat performance."
Elfi turned to her dramatic gifts. "I'm afraid it cannot be, dear girl, I have played my last role and must leave my public distraught."
"Luckily I filmed your entire show on my holo phone and I'll upload it to the Old Earth database once we get home."
Elfi's eyes went wide. "You did not!"
"Don't see why it should faze you, everybody knows you're a slut."
"Admitted, but a private one and I don't want to go public."
"But it could make your career. Forget all your professorships and doctorates, a future as a holo porn actress beckons. I've even thought up a stage name for you, Dr Do-It."
"Dr Do-It? That's pathetic. I refuse to even consider it. Call my agent."
Simla dropped it. "I was very impressed that you let that big woman feel you up."
"The wife? That was a shock too. When her husband asked me to dance I didn't realise she was included in the package."
"I think she had the hots for you more than he did."
"Oh no, she was hot for her hubby, she was just using me as an aphrodisiac to get him fired up."
Simla made a face. "That's pathetic."
"You think so? Lust fades, honey."
"But if they really loved each other ..."
"Uh uh, after you've screwed each other three thousand times over ten years even love isn't gong to keep the juices flowing."
"How come you know so much, you've never been in a relationship more than ten minutes."
Elfi smiled wisely. "Shows how much you know. I still see boys I was with when I was eighteen. I've never left a lover who wasn't happy to see me again, even years later. Keep it fresh, baby, keep it exciting."
"I couldn't do that, Elfi, I'm a one-man woman."
"No, you're a no-man woman at the moment."
Simla thumped the bulkhead of the little ship. "Your fault!"
"That's a good thing, Princess, because you've got some things you need to learn. Getting a man is easy, keeping him is hard. You have to wake up every morning with your partner's total satisfaction on your mind, or you lose."
"What did I do to deserve that?" Simla asked, bewildered.
"You're too naïve, Simla, with your mad, romantic notions about true love and eternal happiness."
"And you're just a grouchy, old bitch who doesn't want to see anybody happy."
"Wrong, a grouchy, old bitch that doesn't want her young friend hurt."
"Yaf wouldn't hurt me."
"Not Yaf. Not you. Life! Life kills love, Simla."
Simla smiled and rearranged her cushions so she could stretch out to sleep. "Not Simla's love, it won't."
They were three days out of Pendor when the Bullet's long range sensors shrieked an alarm.
Simla was being allowed the luxury of a nap on Elfi's reclining pilot's chair and jumped up, bumping her head on the overhead console. "Ouch! What the hell is that?"
Elfi leapt up from the cabin floor, where she'd been squatting, reading a book, and almost shoved Simla from her position.
"There's something ahead of us," she said, scanning her monitors, "and it's big."
"It can't be the Riaz ship, they'd be home by now."
"Let me get it on visual."
An image appeared dimly on the holo monitor. "Oh God, it is the Riaz ship," Simla groaned, "or one just like it."
Elfi's fingers danced over her sensor controls. "And look, that's why they're dawdling, their drive's malfunctioning and they're spewing gamma radiation."
It was double Dutch to Simla. "What does that mean?"
"They've blown their containment field. Damn, it doesn't matter, what's important is that they're disabled, almost dead in the water."
"So we can escape."
"To hell with escape, I'm going to stalk them."
Simla looked at her with wide eyes. "Are you entirely crazy? This is a small, speedster and that is a fully armed warship, over 1,000 times our mass. Its engines may be down but it has guns that brought down a fleet."
"We have to study them, Simla, or we're never going to be able to beat them. .And we may never get a better opportunity."
"They'll shoot us out of the heavens the minute they spot us."
"No, they won't, that's where our size works in our favour. We're too small to be significant, so we'll be ignored if we don't get too close."
"So what are you going to do?"
"Keep my distance and run sensor sweeps. If we can stick with them for a few hours I'll get a mountain of information."
But Simla's mind was already racing. Elfi saw the insane sparkle in her eyes and immediately worried.
"Why don't we just capture it, then you could pick over it at your leisure," the Princess said nonchalantly.
Elfi swallowed hard. "You're just after accusing me of being crazy! There are no weapons aboard this ship and there are thousands of soldiers aboard that one I imagine."
"There is a weapon ... Shap."
"You're mad!" Elfi shrieked.
"Shap would eat those asshole Riaz up and spit them out," Simla insisted.
"He's not a combat android," Elfi tried to explain "he's a guardian, designed to protect you."
"And what would happen if I was on that ship and the Riaz threatened me?"
"Shap would kill them dead," Elfi admitted, "but you're not on the Riaz ship, you're here safe with your aunty Elfi."
Simla gave her a steely look. "Shap could get me over there, he has thrusters."
"No. No way. Too dangerous."
"You wanted information and I'm showing you how to get it," Simla said adamantly.
"You're showing me how you could get yourself killed. We don't know anything about what's aboard that monster's nest."
"Nothing Shap couldn't handle."
"No."
"I could order you," Simla said regally.
"No you couldn't. I'm the master of this ship and your Princess rank means nothing. I will not send you on a suicide mission."
Simla put a conciliatory arm around her smaller friend. "I don't want to play the petulant Princess, but with Shap at my side I can do exactly what I like and nobody can stop me. Anyway, you're just worried you'll get blamed if something goes wrong. But you built Shap and know what he's capable of Do you think he could handle those Riaz or not?"
Elfi slumped in her chair. "Yes he could, unless they have technologies so far advanced that I can't even imagine them. But to send you ..." Her heart chilled at the thought.
"I'm the only one Shap will fight for. You made him that way." She changed her tone. "Imagine the sheer amount of knowledge about the Riaz aboard that ship. Is one little Princess too great a risk for what we could learn? I can't ask a soldier to go into battle if I'm not prepared to face death myself for what I believe in."
Elfi lifted her head and looked toward Shap, who had been standing in a corner of the cramped cabin. "You've heard what we've said, Shap. Could you do this thing?"
"If the Princess is threatened, I will respond. My programming demands it."
"There may be thousands over there."
"Numbers are unimportant," the android said gravely.
"That's my boy," Simla said proudly.
They faced another problem. The Bullet had no airlock, so Elfi had to don a spacesuit before opening the hatch and letting Shap and Simla drift out into the void. Once she'd re-pressurised the cabin she watched her friends jet off towards the enemy and still her heart was in her mouth.
Simla, on the other hand, was calmness itself. She felt totally at ease in Shap's hands. He was programmed to defend her and if, for now, there was only the vast openness of space to face, she knew she need fear nothing. If she ran out of oxygen Shap would somehow manufacture it from his own body parts. He was that resourceful, and it was a distinct possibility. Elfi had brought them as close to the Riaz ship as safety allowed but there was still a considerable distance to traverse. They'd had to dive into an asteroid belt to give the illusion that Shap and she were merely casualties of an accidental collision of space debris and no threat. It meant that the trip across open space would take the best part of a day, but Simla didn't mind. She'd always enjoyed open space and it held no terrors for her. To some it was boring, but to Simla the universe was a wonderland and she could quite happily stare into space for an eternity. Despite that, for part of the trip, she merely closed her eyes and slept.
But as they approached the alien ship she felt a growing unease. It was the sheer size of the thing, so much larger than human ships which she'd previously regarded as giants. But this was of a different order all together. Still miles from it, its sheer, enormous, bulk filled the faceplate of her spacesuit.
"Are you sure you can do this, Shap?" she asked the android through their intercom.
"All calculations have been made and remain positive. I have extrapolated nine different contact scenarios and none cause conflict in my programme. But be aware that I cannot take action until you are directly threatened. I would therefore advise that you switch on your translation matrix and invite the occupants of the ship to obey your will to avoid conflict."
Surrender to her? She didn't think so.
Soon, they were up against the metal hull of the alien ship and seeking an opening. There were several sections that might have been airlocks but there seemed to be no means of opening them till Shap took charge of the situation. He scanned the areas around the airlocks till he found the electronic locking mechanisms and then transmitted a signal which allowed the huge doors to slide open. They stepped inside the alien ship and the doors closed behind them. Air hissed into the compartment and Simla, low on oxygen, quickly unsnapped her helmet and removed it. With the air came sound and the vibrations she'd been feeling through her feet wee joined by what could only be warning klaxons. So, not exactly surprise visitors, she thought.
As the lock equalised pressure the inner doors swung open and a unit of Riaz, eighteen strong and carrying weapons, faced them. They were, indeed man's worst nightmare, their fangs springing from a coal black mouth and their narrow eyes cruel and venomous. Simla regretted removing her helmet now, because the aliens smelled foul, like the worst kind of rotting waste. There was a crackle in Simla's earpiece as her suit's computer adjusted its translator matrix and she heard the end of what was being said.
" .. a being of the primitives we have destroyed and a mechanical, both unarmed."
"I am Princess Simla of Old Earth," she said, her voice croaking.
"Designation irrelevant."
"You have attacked and destroyed a fleet of human ships in an act of war."
"We are Riaz, you will obey command."
The moment had arrived, she stepped forward. "I will not."
"Defiance not be accepted. We kill."
"You may try."
They lifted their weapons and were aiming them at Simla when Shap moved. His actions were a blur to Simla, who only saw his arms and legs fly out as he worked his way down the rank of aliens disarming and dismembering them. Their claws tried to grab at him but he twisted from one encounter to the next, rending them limb from limb. He moved so fast that only a few of the aliens managed to get a shot off and these whistled harmlessly to the ceiling. Shap was indeed carrying no weapons, but he needed none. He grabbed aliens and snapped necks, drove his metal fists into their heads and torsos as if to prove the mastery of metal and plastic over flesh and bone. It was over in seconds and Shap returned to Simla's side as if he'd been picking daisies. Simla took a long, deep, breath taking in the aliens as they lay in mangled heaps, their purplish blood staining the walls and floor of the corridor.
"Good job, Shap," she whispered.
"Programmed response, mistress," the mechanical killer replied, "Threat removed."
"I'm going to find the bridge of this ship now, Shap, and I'm sure we'll encounter more resistance. Please be alert."
"No threat within fifty metres, mistress. Please indicate direction and I will precede you."
That baffled her as she had no idea of which direction their bridge, if they had one, would lie. Shap seemed to sense her problem and turned on his scanners.
"Information from their sensors flows in that direction," he said, pointing to the right, "which would indicate that their central command area lies there."
"Seems reasonable, lead on."
They walked for what seemed like hours through mostly empty corridors. They encountered the occasional Riaz who normally charged at them with murderous intent. Shap made short work of these heroes. A few, less brave, attempted a hasty retreat when encountering the human and her guardian, but Shap loped after them and despatched them with ease.
'Looks like we did catch them by surprise,' Simla thought, 'or maybe they just can't come to terms with the fact that their ship's been boarded by only two invaders.'
The bridge, when they reached it, was comparatively small for a ship of such enormous dimensions. One sole Riaz, in a brightly coloured uniform of some plastic material, sat in a high chair before a single monitor screen which showed butchered Riaz lying in the corridors. He turned to face them as they entered but made no other hostile move.
"You have killed my crew all," he said, his tusks quivering.
"All?" Simla asked. Shap had tackled only a few dozen. The Riaz captain seemed to understand her disquiet.
"Crew only. Ship for carry army. No army on raid."
"You destroyed our fleet."
"We are Riaz."
"You are scum."
"We are Riaz," and he boomed it out proudly this time.
"You are my prisoner. Submit or my android will kill you. You will take this ship to Old Earth and surrender it there."
"Prisoner? Surrender? These are not words of Riaz. I kill." He pulled a weapon from somewhere and Shap leapt at him, grabbing his wrists and thrusting them upwards. The gun went flying and the alien tried to match Shap for sheer strength He was big, but no match for Shap's mechanical power. He slowly forced the alien to his knees and then brought a knee up between the protruding tusks, into the Riaz's chin, and snapped his neck.
Simla walked hesitantly over to him, as Shap knelt down and confirmed that he was dead.
"I gave you the option, you murderous shit?" Simla spat out. She looked at the controls of the alien ship and realised that they meant absolutely nothing to her.
"Shap, can you contact Elfi?"
"Affirmative."
"Tell her to come on over, I'll put a pot of coffee on."
When the Doctor joined them she was at as much of a loss as the Princess. "Given time, instruments, I could work this out, but I just don't have the equipment here."
"I want to get this death ship back to Old Earth."
"Pendor's still closer."
"Could the Bullet tow her?" Simla asked.
"She's a speedster, not a tug."
"Oh well, let's get back over to her so I can call my beloved."
"Oh God, she captures an alien warship just so she's got a reason to phone her lover boy."
They giggled their way back to the Bullet where Elfi made the connection to Pendor and Yaf.
"Yaf," Simla said sweetly, "Can you send Captain Thrane and the Robin out to get us?"
"I knew Elfi's little toy starship would break down. Give me your position."
"Uh, it's not the Bullet that needs towing and could you ask the Captain to bring very heavy duty cables. Very, very heavy duty cables, those hawser things."
Yaf looked puzzled. "What kind of trouble have you got yourself into?"
Simla dropped her eyes in mock shame. "We've got a big, huge Riaz warship and no way to get it back to you."
Yaf looked closely at her "What? Have you and that crazy doctor been drinking?"
But Simla flashed up pictures of the warship and piles of dead Riaz and Yafs voice trailed away. Finally he came back to her. "My God, you said you'd avenge Halven and you have."
"Well, Shap did it really," Simla said proudly.
Elfi, at her shoulder, pushed herself into the picture. "She's insane. Spacewalked across to the Riaz ship and just walked in."
A slideshow of emotions played over Yafs face. "A victory!"
"Because we caught them off-guard," Simla explained, almost apologetically.
"That doesn't matter for now. It tells our people that those scum are not invincible and that we're not all doomed. I'm proud of you, my Princess."
"So you'll send the Robin? We've captured this damn thing and we don't know how to drive it."
"I don't know if Captain Thrane will appreciate you expecting tug-boat duties of his fine ship. I may have to accompany him to make sure he obeys orders."
Simla warmed with pleasure and then slumped as she realised that, though seeing Yaf would be good, it wasn't really all she wanted.