Penumbra

21

Klien had been waiting for this day for almost fourteen years, and when it came he was seized by a sensation of disbelief. He had marshalled his faculties and asked Control to corroborate what he was reading on his com-screen, and they had confirmed that a Mackendrick Foundation Cobra-class ship was indeed heading to Calcutta port from the Rim sector of G5.

Which meant that Mackendrick had at last discovered Homefall, and, for whatever reasons, the Council of Elders had allowed the ship to return. That, or the ship had been commandeered by the elders themselves. Klien knew that such speculation was useless. He had been away for many years. Anything might have happened in that time to change the situation on Homefall.

He had scrambled his top security team and had them ready and waiting when the Cobra made landfall. He wanted the ship searched from top to bottom, its flight system and programs analysed as fast as possible and relayed to his monitor. He had contacted Control and requested that, as the ship was making an unscheduled landing, it should be berthed within the secure compound beside the security tower itself. They had deferred to his seniority and experience.

Thirty minutes later he was waiting at the foot of the ramp. Control had informed him that the pilot’s name was Bennett, an employee of the Mackendrick Foundation. When the hatch had cracked, revealing a tall, long-haired figure, unshaven and dishevelled in a black flight-suit, Klien had gestured for his team to get to work, and greeted the pilot.

He had taken Bennett into the interrogation room, requesting that he answer a few routine questions. Klien thought he had been informal and amicable, despite the thudding of his heart and a sweat he had no way of controlling, but Bennett was tired after four months in suspension, uncommunicative and unforthcoming, suspicion manifest in his brooding eyes. He’d claimed that he had explored the G5/13 system on the Rim, and had discovered no habitable planets. Klien knew that he had to be lying.

It was Klien’s one regret of the interrogation that he had been unable to ascertain whether the Mackendrick Foundation had possession of the softscreen.

As he was interviewing Bennett, a preliminary report came in from his team aboard the Cobra. The ship was pre-programmed for a return flight to the Rim and the G5/13 sector, departure indefinite.

Klien felt as if his innards had suddenly liquefied. So… Bennett was returning to G5/13. But what was he doing here on Earth?

There was, of course, one way to find out.

He passed Bennett an authorisation card, explained that he should keep it upon his person at all times, and watched the pilot stride from the room.

Klien smiled to himself. It had gone as well as could be expected, so far.

He seated himself behind his desk and inserted an earpiece. Seconds later he heard Bennett pass through customs, leave the terminal and board a taxi to a local hotel. Two hours later he took another taxi to the city centre. The sound quality was slightly muffled, as the card was in Bennett’s breast pocket, but his ear-piece managed to filter out most of the background interference.

Thirty minutes later Bennett left the taxi and walked through bustling streets. The noise of downtown Calcutta filled Klien’s head. He mopped the sweat from his face and neck.

Fifteen minutes later he heard Bennett order a chai and drink it noisily. Two minutes later the street noises diminished: he had evidently entered a building.

“Excuse me,” Bennett said in his American drawl. “I’d like to report the theft of a softscreen.”

Klien sat up, galvanised by the word softscreen. Report the theft of a softscreen? Where was Bennett—in a police station?

He missed what someone replied. There was a period of silence lasting a good five minutes. Klien waited, his heart thudding with apprehension.

Then: “I am Lieutenant Rao,” a familiar voice said.

Klien smiled to himself. Was the softscreen lodged at the police headquarters?

“Can I ask why you are here, Mr Bennett?”

“I… I’m an employee of the Mackendrick Foundation, Lieutenant. A pilot.”

“The Mackendrick Foundation?” She sounded surprised.

“I work directly for Charles Mackendrick himself,” Bennett was saying. “Years ago an item of property belonging to Mackendrick was stolen from him. A softscreen. It’s vital that the screen is returned.”

Klien leaned forward, listening intently.

“You… you’re in contact with him?” A brief silence, then: “How do you know the softscreen is here?”

Klien clenched his fist on the table top and almost wept. He listened to the conversation unfold, learned that Charles Mackendrick himself was on Homefall, terminally ill and wanting the softscreen.

He sat back and listened, his heartbeat loud, and knew that soon his mission would be over.

As Rana Rao’s high, precise voice filled the room, he wondered if she realised how lucky she had been. The first he had realised that he had not killed Sita Mackendrick—or Rana Rao, as she liked to call herself now—was when Commissioner Singh dropped by to see him at the port. He had taken some time to come to the point, perhaps finding the matter a cause of embarrassment. The simple fact of the matter, he had said, is that one of my officers was shot recently, lasered in the chest and almost killed, and she claims—this is absurd—she claims that you were responsible. Of course the matter is outrageous, but there are formal lines of enquiry that protocol dictates I follow.

Klien had gone out of his way to accommodate the investigations of Singh and his team. He had nothing to fear. He might have killed the ten victims, but he had ensured that the crimes could not be traced back to him. He told Singh that he understood fully, and if he could help in any way, any way at all…

So Rao had managed to survive, and was obviously trying to persuade Singh that he, Klien, was responsible for the attack, and the so-called crucifix killings.

Klien swore to himself that she would not survive a second encounter with him.

Singh’s investigations, as he had known they would, came to nothing. He had alibis for all the murders, friends in high places willing to vouch for him. The commissioner had been almost servile with his apologies.

Now Klien listened as the dialogue between Bennett and Sita Mackendrick wound up. He clapped his hands and laughed out loud. How perfect that they would be travelling together! He would soon kill two birds with one stone. He would make the woman regret that she had ever denied him, and Bennett that he had high-tailed it back to Earth on Mackendrick’s errands.

And then, he would have the softscreen.

He listened as they made arrangements to gather a few of Rao’s belongings and take a taxi to the port, then switched off the ear-piece.

He estimated that he had about one hour.

He set up his hologram projectors in the interview room, timed to start up in ten minutes and shut off in three hours, and gave instructions to Frazer that he was not to be disturbed until he called again. He contacted his team and ordered them to leave the Cobra and check another ship way across the port. Then he left the interview room and locked the door behind him. He took the elevator to the basement and unlocked the door to the armoury. He selected a pair of laser pistols from the rack on the wall, slipped spare charges into his pocket, and left.

Klien crossed the tarmac towards the Cobra, and paused to glance back at the tower. Through the window of the interrogation room he could see the holographic projection. For all the world it was himself, diligently working away at his com-screen. It was a foolproof method of providing him with an alibi. He had used it often in the past. Now, it would keep Frazer and his team from bothering him while he boarded the Cobra.

Ahead, the sleek silver ship squatted on the tarmac while the blue-uniformed resupply team ferried sealed containers up the ramp. Klien followed them into the hold and supervised them as they worked, relishing their palpable unease. He ordered them to leave a container on the tarmac to be checked over by his security team—it was, he judged, approximately his own body weight. He was probably being paranoid, but if Bennett checked the payload before taking off and discovered that he had a stow-away…

When the last of the resupply team exited the ship, Klien hurried to the storeroom behind the flight-deck, excitement coursing through him. He could hardly bring himself to believe that his time on Earth was coming to a close, at last.

He collected food-trays and canisters of water sufficient to last him four months, and then moved through the Cobra seeking a suitable hiding place in which to secrete himself when Bennett and the girl were not in suspension. He decided on the starboard engine compartment, a cramped space beneath the ion-drive booster. Unless something drastic happened during the flight, he judged that Bennett would not be using the compartment. He sat on the floor and switched on his ear-piece.

Ten minutes later Bennett and the girl arrived at the port and passed through security. They made their way across the tarmac towards the waiting Cobra. Seconds later Klien heard the hatch slide open and their footsteps moving through the ship.

He held his breath as they made their way along the main corridor to the flight-deck. Bennett was giving Sita Mackendrick a guided tour. The Indian girl could offer only monosyllables of wonder in response.

One hour later the ship was tugged across the port to a blast-pad. Klien braced himself in the cramped confines of the engine compartment and waited tensely as Bennett ran through the systems checks. The period of waiting seemed to last an age, and Klien closed his eyes as he considered the possibility that Bennett might find him. He told himself that he had nothing to worry about.

One hour after that he was deafened as the main drive engaged. The Cobra lifted, and Klien grimaced as he was forced against the floor. He experienced intense pain throughout his body as the ship vibrated, shaking him as he attempted to hold himself in place between two narrow metal spars. He felt as if a giant fist was squeezing his torso, and his lungs protested as he gasped for air. His vision swam and he cried out in pain.

He was wondering how much more he could take when the G-force abated. He opened his eyes and managed to fill his bruised lungs. Little by little the pain diminished, and he knew that the brief trauma had been worth the reward of escape.

Klien sat up and smiled at the thought of what Commissioner Singh might make of his disappearance, so soon after his questioning over the crucifix killings. The mystery would cause quite a stir among his former colleagues. He considered everything he was leaving behind on Earth, which was not, all things considered, that much: a house, a few possessions, his paintings and music collection. He considered the sacrifice with little regret. He had made no friends during his time in Calcutta, deliberately avoiding intimacy of any kind. He was leaving behind his old way of life, his old identity, after fifteen long and difficult years, and he had no regrets at all. At last, against all expectations, he had succeeded.

Minutes later the ship phased into the void and the roar of the engines was replaced with a strange and silent calm. He heard Bennett escort the girl from the flight-deck and explain the process of suspension. “I’ll be waking up halfway through the journey to run a few checks,” Bennett told her. “See you in four months.”

Klien heard a suspension unit sigh open, and then close as the girl gave herself to the long sleep. Minutes later another unit opened and Bennett climbed in and laid himself out. He heard Bennett exhale as he lost consciousness, and then the hum of machinery go to work on the pilot.

Klien waited a further ten minutes, and then let himself out of the engine compartment. He moved to the suspension chamber, chastising himself for being so furtive. He had the ship to himself, and there was no way that Bennett or the girl might detect his presence.

He stood between the suspension units and stared through the clear covers at the sleepers. The corner of the folded softscreen projected from the pouch of Bennett’s flight-suit. The girl lay frozen, as still and perfect in her beauty as some fairytale princess. Klien smiled to himself. They seemed so content, little realising that their mission would end in failure.

He considered killing Bennett and the girl while they slept, but decided against that course of action. He had examined the complex control systems of the ship. If he killed Bennett now he would effectively be signing his own death warrant, as there was no way he could pilot the Cobra safely through the turbulent atmosphere of Homefall. He would call a temporary stay of execution for the pilot and the girl. He would kill them later, when they had delivered him safely to the planet of his birth.

He made himself at home in the berth opposite the suspension chamber. During the following weeks he ate well and kept himself fit with regular exercise. He even found to his delight that the ship possessed an excellent library of classical music discs.

For long hours he sat in the pilot’s seat as stirring symphonies swelled round him, staring out at the star-streaked void and contemplating his triumphal return to Homefall.