Dreamspinner Read online

  Without changing position, Tovis examined his immediate environment, which reminded him of a bedroom in a swanky hotel. It was definitely not the type of place in which he was used to spending the night, not in his line of work. Most of the time, he found himself having to sleep out in the open, in dirty alleyways surrounded by garbage and piss. Sometimes he bedded down in the rusting hulks of ancient discarded hover vehicles left to rot on vacant building lots. Once, he spent a night in a hole in the ground in a rocky valley on Serkulon 4. The open air was his usual bedding place, he was used to torrential rain, snow, howling gales, and burning sun. On several occasions, wild animals chased him, bugs ate him alive, and he once got soaked to the skin after spending three days and nights up to his waist in sewage. He long ago stopped counting the number of times various law enforcers, military guards, all sorts of personal bodyguards and hired muscle tried to chase him down. His chosen profession had made all of those things familiar and comfortable. Waking up in a high end hotel room was right out of his experience and put him immediately on his guard.

  In one swift movement, Tovis sat up and swung his legs to the floor. His head swam sickeningly and he closed his eyes as he waited for the room to cease its swaying. Although unable to see the movement, he felt it inside his head and his stomach. When he felt brave enough, he opened his eyes and noticed a jug of water and a glass on the nightstand by the bed. He drank two full glasses straight down and felt immediately better. With his head clearing, he was able to think more about his immediate situation and instinct drove his hand to where he knew his gun should be. He was dressed in nothing but his underwear and panic rose up as he realised he was also unarmed. Leaping up, he frantically searched the bed, ripping the sheets from the mattress and tossing them aside in a vain attempt to locate the weapon that had become an extension of his own body. That gun was now ingrained into his personal body image, so much so that he felt lost and disorientated without it. For the past twenty-two years he had worked, carried, ate, and slept with at least one gun. To find himself suddenly without one was akin to having cut off a limb.

  Thinking he was obviously in custody of some sort, he did a circuit of the room, taking in as much detail as possible. The bed was a quality piece of furniture, as was everything else. It was crafted rather than simply assembled. Running his fingers across the sheet, the texture told him it had been woven thread by thread, rather than extruded as a pulp and freeze dried as was usual with domestic linens. A person had made this item, not a robotic manufacturing plant. Tovis realised that whoever this room belonged to was seriously wealthy and powerful. Woven sheets cost not only money but someone’s time, which itself requires influence on the part of the buyer. Someone with the influence to make a skilled craftsman take the time to weave bed linen by hand was someone with frightening power. People with that level of power are few and far between, and seldom needed the services of someone like Tovis Kerral. A man with that level of power did not need to pay a hired gun to sort out his problems.

  Tovis thought back to everyone with whom he had come into contact during his career, but knew of no more than three men with that sort of money, power, and influence. One of them was definitely dead, the killing being witnessed by Tovis himself. Another was in Laksmay Penitentiary for fraud and conspiracy to commit mass murder, his trial having been broadcast over the media galaxy wide. The third was alleged to have died when the luxury inter-galactic liner he was holidaying aboard, crashed after a bomb ripped a hole in its belly. He then tried to think back to who he may have pissed off sufficiently to warrant imprisonment in such luxury and again hit the same problem. Although the list of people who might have cause to want him in custody was a long one, those that would have access to custody of this level of luxury were not only few, they were non existent.

  Tovis wandered around the room, opened cupboards, pulled out draws and examined everything closely. The closets and drawers were filled with clothes that he guessed would fit him perfectly. After picking out pants, shirt and boots, he dressed and went through to the small bathroom. It was compact but the highest quality and offered him a shower, basin and toilet. Men’s washing necessities were artfully arranged on a shelf and thick towels and robe hung from hooks on the wall. Zipping himself up after taking a pee, he wandered back through to the bedroom, angry that his search had yielded no weapons, and realised something important. There was no window. This was odd and he frowned.

  “No window. That’s weird. What kind of hotel room has no window?” His mind dwelt on the question and a few possible answers came. “An underground one won’t have windows. A room they don’t want me escaping from won’t have them either. They might not want me to be able to identify where I am. Maybe it’s built into a mountain like the homes on Driminos 7; they don’t have any windows. Perhaps it’s on a space ship. If this were a high end liner, it might explain the luxury in the room.” Another door stood to his right and he approached it, looking for the locking mechanism. A touchpad was fixed to the left of the door, about half way up. On a small shelf by the door lay a key card on a cord and he stuffed it into his pocket. He stood for long moments, the furrows across his brow deepening as he tried to work out what was going on. With a shrug, he shook his head and approached the door. “I guess I’m expected to at least try and escape,” he muttered as he slapped his hand to the pad.

  With a swish, the door opened, taking Tovis by surprise and he stepped back in alarm. Expecting to be set upon by something with huge muscles and an angry sneer, he readied himself but nothing happened.

  “What the fuck’s going on, is this some kind of test or something?” he half whispered, half muttered aloud as he crept toward the still open door. The number ten was painted on the door in bright yellow letters, and corridors swept away in both directions, gently curving away out of sight and telling him that wherever he was, it was a curved structure. Deciding that his first priority was to know who was keeping him here and why, he called out and announced his presence.

  “Hello, anybody here? I’m awake and hungry. Nice sheets by the way, classy pad. Hello?” He listened for over a minute before repeating the procedure, and after three minutes spent calling out and receiving no reply, he looked both ways and decided to go to the right. Thirty minutes later, his tour ended, having partially solved the mystery of his location. The view from the large observation lounge window gave him chills, but not because he was worried about being in space. It was the fact that he had not seen evidence of anyone else being aboard that worried him. The size of what he learned from the map on the wall was deck two, indicated a large crew, but he had neither met nor seen evidence of anyone. A full search of the ship was obviously his first job, so he headed back to the first set of stairs he came across and climbed to the top.

  An hour later, Tovis sat down in the dining room on deck five and sipped his drink. A quick reconnoitre of the entire ship proved he was alone. He also discovered that apart from the life support systems, nothing on the ship was functioning. He could eat, drink, enjoy hot showers, and be warm but he was not allowed to watch a movie or start the ship’s engine. Music was available, as were the gaming tables, and the medical bay, but he could not use the navigation station or call for help on the comms. Although seemingly trivial, the non-functioning vidicom screen intrigued him and he found his mind unable to let it go.

  “Why can I listen to music but not watch a vidicom movie? Neither of them would help me escape, learn where I am, who has captured me, or why. Why are movies out of bounds but not music?” The more he thought about it, the more strange this point seemed but he knew deep in his gut that it was a relevant point. “It’s not right. There’s something about it that might be the key to all this.” The vidicom screen hung suspended from the ceiling by a system of pneumatic cables. Press a button on the remote control and it descended. Press another button and it retracted again. A separate computerised unit held the movie library data, and was programmed to respond only to its dedicated screen an
d no other. Tovis wandered over and picked up the movie library console.

  It took an hour and a half, with three trips to the engineering storeroom for tools, before Tovis sat back and scratched his head. Before him, carefully laid out on the table, were the constituent parts of the movie library console and in his hand, the tiny digital component with the broken wire that he knew prevented the unit from sending any signal to its dedicated screen. Peering through the high magnification goggles, he frowned. During his years as a gun for hire, there were times when part of his job entailed information gathering, and he had gleaned considerable electrical engineering skill. He had a natural skill for taking apart and cannibalising almost anything that was not purely mechanical and he was able to put it back together in a totally different way from its intended function. He grinned to himself as he remembered the time when he managed to make a working comms unit from a hover bike engine, a standard Unicom headset, and a stolen law enforcer’s personal data recording device. He could cobble together anything from a pile of what most other people would call junk, and although it would not be pretty, it would function reasonably well. These skills had saved his own neck on several occasions and he was glad of them. The intense blue eyes gazed through the goggles at the component in his hands, and his experience made him frown.

  “This wire’s been cut,” he muttered as he took off the goggles and rubbed his eyes. “But why?”

  There was not a shred of doubt in his mind that the wire had been deliberately cut, his knowledge and skill was without question. Why would someone wish to prevent him from watching a few movies? Where was the harm? Shaking his head in frustration, he went back to the engineering storeroom for a replacement component. After two hours of rummaging through crates and boxes and a trip down to the main cargo hangar, he lost patience and ripped the engineering storeroom computer apart. Twenty minutes later he was watching ancient creatures wreak havoc after being accidentally released from a research facility and felt justly proud of his accomplishment. Two-thirds the way through the movie, the hero was caught with the beautiful heroine and needed to summon help from his band of brave cohorts. The comms on their shuttle was damaged so the hero was forced to scavenge for parts with which to repair it. Tovis sat bolt upright, the smile falling from his lips. “Of course, that’s it. I can try repairing the ship’s comms and call for help. Thanks, man,” he grinned at the blue eyed muscle bound hero on the screen.

  It took him seconds to rip the panelling from the side of the comms station on the bridge of the ship and he swallowed hard when he saw what lay behind. This was unlike anything he had encountered before; he had never attempted to fix a space ship’s comms unit and he almost changed his mind. “All comms units work on the same principle. All I need to do is transmit a signal that can move through space and be picked up by a receiver. I need a transmitter with an antenna, that’s all. It’s not complicated. Keep it simple.” Tovis always talked to himself when focussing on something important, he found it helped him concentrate in times of high stress. Now he hoped it would help him ignore the blinding array of wires and components that lay behind the panelling. Bit by bit, he slowly worked his way into the body of the comms station, taking it apart piece by piece and laying them aside carefully so he would be able to put it all back together again. Once he began to recognise components and make educated guesses as to their function, he could formulate ideas as to what the rest was for. After what seemed like the entire day buried head and shoulders into the body of the comms station, he finally found what he needed. Like a road map, now he knew exactly where he was in relation to where he needed to be, he could work out the best route to get there.

  Now he knew where to begin, he extricated himself from the comms station and rolled his neck around. Having banged his head several times and now with a stiff neck and tight shoulders, he decided to have a rest and something to eat. On his way down to deck five and the kitchen, he stopped at deck three and remembered having discovered the security room, onto whose door a message had been scrawled in marker pen.

  ‘Inter-Galactic Elite Command, Unit 389C4 Headquarters. T Lindo Commanding Officer.’

  That message gave Tovis valuable information that told him something about this new and strange situation. Despite having once been the main security room on board, it had been taken over by someone called Lindo and used for his own purpose. The scrawling of names and designations onto a door was something he had seen done many times, but always by forces who had overthrown their current authority figures. If that room were designed to be used by Lindo, it would have been painted on in the same bright yellow lettering as the word, ‘Security.’ This Lindo was obviously not one of the original members of the crew and Tovis wondered if he was part of the cause of whatever had happened to the ship. Another thing his deck-by-deck inspection brought to light was that he was not the only person alive. Lindo was another, as was an Engineer called Mykus Romin and a Doctor named Soval Arma. These last two were possibly useful and Tovis decided to try to locate them before finding T Lindo, whom he was unsure of. He had seen the names scrawled onto the wall in the briefing room on deck four and listened to the messages on the recording device. Whatever it was T Lindo thought he had found out about the ship intrigued him.

  He toyed with the idea of adding his own message, but hesitated. Experience taught him the benefit of remaining unseen for as long as possible, and he was not about to abandon what life taught him, at least until he was able to re-arm himself. Guessing that the security room now claimed by this T Lindo would contain arms, he wondered how to gain entry. The laser pipe connector felt comfortably heavy in his grasp as he hefted it and tested its weight. A jab to any exposed skin would be agonisingly painful and in close combat was a formidable weapon. Deciding to front it out and approach unarmed in the hope of engendering trust, he walked up to the security room door and knocked.

  After several knocks and shouts received no reply, he wondered whether to go in uninvited. On a whim, he retrieved his own key card from his pocket and slammed it into the slot. The door opened with a swish and Tovis hefted the laser pipe connector, holding it in front of himself in a defensive gesture. Leaning forward, he peered through the open door before stepping through.

  “Tearan Lindo? Hello, anyone home? I came to introduce myself to a fellow survivor. Hello?” After assuring himself that no one could possibly have failed to hear his calls, he lowered the pipe connecter a little and entered further into the room. Walking into each area of the security section, it was obvious that someone was using the rooms as a base and living quarters and Tovis assumed it was T Lindo as per the message on the outside of the door. He frowned as he thought of that message; he had never heard of the Inter-Galactic Elite Command before. If he did not know of them, they must be extremely secret. “Probably blacker than black ops,” he muttered as he opened a locker and gazed upon an array of guns and ammunition. “Whoa, no wonder Lindo set up home in here. I’m sure he’s not going to mind if I borrow a couple of these and if he does, tough break.”

  Once armed, Tovis felt much more secure and able to think straight. He wandered through a door and found himself in a firing range and was tempted to spend a few minutes with his new acquisitions, but did not want Lindo to come back and find him not only having helped himself but enjoying what he had stolen. That would not be a pleasant meeting, he decided so he left. As he walked to the door, something caught his attention in the corner of his eye. It was no more than a slight movement of shadow in the already gloomy room. With practiced ease, he swung around, drawing both guns and prepared to fire but found himself alone. Blood pulsed in his ears with the adrenaline that coursed through his body but Tovis remained in operation mode, years of experience and practice making him an expert in his field. Reminding himself that this was not yet a situation like the ones that earned him a good living over the years, he relaxed slightly.

  “Who’s there? Lindo, is that you?” he called again but got no reply. There was
nowhere in the room for anyone to hide, so he headed towards the door back into the main security area. Twenty feet from the door, the sound of boot steps in the room beyond, a slight squeak of leather boot and tap of heel, together with two shadow feet that walked past the gap at the bottom of the door. His heart leapt in his breast and he had to acknowledge that he felt spooked at the weird way this person was evading him. It was almost as if he was being played with and that was annoying. Experience told him it was probably not a good idea to go through the door without announcing himself, especially as this was not his own territory, so he called out again before heading towards the door and stepping through boldly, a smile ready and waiting.

  Two minutes later, another search of the security section revealed he was alone and he frowned. “There was someone here. There was a shadow under the door and I heard footsteps. So where the fuck are they?” The main door was shut and made an audible swishing noise when opening and closing, so he also knew whoever his mysterious prowler was did not leave the room that way. Deciding that there must be a secret panel or doorway somewhere, Tovis thought it would probably be best if he left. His pockets loaded down with spare cells for the pair of stolen guns, he left and headed back to the stairs.