Double Helix 03_ Red Sector - Diane Carey [42]
Orsova clapped a wide hand to Stiles’s chest and said, “Stand still or I’ll be happy to take you back to your cell.” ‘“Fake me back, then! Fine!” “Stand still.”
There was no chance to run, even if he could. The landing field was dotted with Pojjana soldiers, their red-and-brown jackets flashing in the landing lights, their coppery faces flinching at the approach of the unwelcome craft. Alien spacecraft hardly ever landed on the planet anymore. They just weren’t welcome. This was a bizarre occasion and Stiles still didn’t know what he was watching.
His head swimming with regrets, fears, and rough-edged anguish, Stiles begged the stars to put things back the way they’d been this morning, but no miracle came his way. The clanky-looking merchant trader, bulbous and utilitarian, with its exhaust hatches flapping and its hull plates chattering, continued its inartistic approach.
“If that’s a Federation ship, it’s second-hand,” he commented. “No Federation spaceport ever built anything like that.”
Unable to wrestle Orsova or the other guard, Stiles condemned himself to watch the landing. Port fin was high… too much pitch… not squared on the strip markings… lateral thrusters going too long.
Ah, the echoes ‘almost hurt, echoes of another landing, not so far from here. He’d come to this planet an outclassed hotfoot who let haste get the better of him, overwhelmed by proximity to greatness, the approval of his hero, whose face he’d seen in the back of his mind all these many, many months, urging him to rise above the mangled messes he’d made. His life had imploded, his preconceptions defoliated, his internal fortitude hammered to a fine edge by circumstances he’d never anticipated, and he’d been preparing himself for a long time to die. Now living was a lot more scary than dying of whatever was eating his muscles. Strange… he and Zevon didn’t really even know what illness Stiles had. The Pojjana doctors hadn’t been able to identify it. Of course, since the patient was a prisoner and an alien, they hadn’t tried all that hard.
So Stiles had gotten ready, over the months, to pass away. Now he was suddenly afraid not to go. Today, once again, the universe turned on its edge for him. He stood now at the municipal landing field, barely an echo of that reckless and slapdash boy, but he was still trembling like a kid, so fiercely that Orsova and the other guard had to hold him up. Would Ambassador Spock himself step down the black ramp of the unfamiliar vessel landing out there? “I don’t want to go,” he muttered in his throat.
Beside him, Orsova watched the ship settle. “I’ll miss you, too.”
This time there was no Zevon to talk sense into him. Zevon was back in the prison. For him, nothing had changed. Except, now, he would be alone.
Terrible guilt racked Stiles’s chest. All the words of sense and reason from the lab suddenly seemed to leak like cheesecloth. How could he leave Zevon like this? Here in this dump, alien and hated, alone, powerless, with another Constrictor coming mid nobody to Believe him about it? Before this, they’d at least always had each other.
“Who’s doing this?” he demanded as the ship settled and its thrusters shut down with a wheeze. “Who’re you giving me to, Orsova? This is your doing, isn’t it? You weren’t getting anything out of watching Zevon while you tortured me anymore, so now you’re up to something else, aren’t you?”
“You’re going home” Orsova drably said. “I would enjoy keeping you, but you’re going.”
“Why?” Stiles glared at him. “Why would you let anybody shove you around? Who are you afraid of?.”
“You’re an alien. Your own filthy kind have come to get you. Shut your mouth and go with them.” “what about Zevon?” “He’s mine from now on”
Summoning his last threads of energy, Stiles raised his elbow and rammed it laterally into Orsova’s round face. The big guard staggered, but never let go of Stiles’ arm. Before even regaining his balance, Orsova shoved Stiles viciously sideways, into the rocky substance