Wanted

Forty-eight hours passed without any remarkable discoveries. The life support in Naca stabilized and Cherry explored the alien spaceship. Josh worked at trying to get into the corrupted database.

  At the end of their work period, Cherry and Josh sat in the galley eating. Josh said, "I'll never understand why you need to eat. You're an android."

  "It provides fuel for my brain and other systems just like it does for you."

  "Wouldn't it have been simpler to put in some sort of nuclear or fusion power?"

  "No. I'd need shielding and a special power unit. This way, I can eat any protein or carbohydrates and have all the power I need. I weigh at least two hundred pounds less without all the shielding."

  "Well, I hope you can eat some rocks or something from out there. We only have enough food for six weeks. Water can be recycled and we should do fine with it."

  "What about air? Have you sucked that stuff outside back in?"

  "Yeah, I think we're alright but I'd like to have another hundred cubic feet to make sure. We'll just have to be extra careful."

  "If we could find some water or ice, we could make more oxygen."

  "For now, I'd rather concentrate on getting off this rock. Any luck figuring out how to get that ship over there flying?"

  "Not really. There are some interesting things over there. I've barely scratched the surface of what's in that ship. So what do we do? It's been forty-eight hours."

  "I guess we need to send a distress signal. I'd still like to hide Naca first. I know that's not Avayal out there, but thinking about pirates or our other enemies catching us like this gives me the willies."

  Cherry's eyes glazed slightly as he computed. He said, "Then I suggest that we try to move Naca under the land bridge tomorrow. Once she's under cover, you can start sending messages."

  "How long do you think it'll be to get a response?"

  "Not enough data. How far is the nearest spaceship? Are they the type to perform rescues? We still don't know where we are."

  "Yeah, I know. I try not to think about that. It gives me a headache and tunnel vision."

  Cherry looked at his friend with concern, "Josh, I would suggest that you finish eating and try to get some rest. I'm fine, so I'll do some prep work to get us ready to move tomorrow. It will be a two man job, so you need to be up to peak performance."

  "Ha, a little tough to do with these." Josh pointed at his legs.

  "You won't need those tomorrow. Just your brain."

  They finished eating in silence, both lost in their thoughts for the future. Josh went to his quarters and soon settled into a restless sleep. Flashes of scenes from his past flitted through his dreams, but never enough to fill in the missing gaps.

  The next morning at breakfast, Cherry said, "Did you sleep at all? You look terrible. Bags under your bloodshot eyes, I'm surprised your lids even stay open. I told you I need you at peak performance."

  "This is as peak as you get. I kept getting flashes of scenes from my memory. It made my dreams completely crazy."

  "Do you want to put this off another day?"

  "No, we can't waste any time. If anything happens, we don't have any surpluses of many things."

  "Then let's get Naca moved underground so to speak."

  The two worked their way to the cockpit. Cherry had reattached the chairs and tried to restore some semblance of normalcy to it. As they settled into the chairs, Cherry switched on the outside view. Josh tested the controls for moving them.

  When both had run through their checks, Josh looked at his spacesuit on the floor. Cherry's breathing apparatus lay beside it. Josh asked, "Do you think we should put those on?"

  "No, I have confidence in you. Let's get underneath and then send the distress signal."

  Josh grabbed the joy stick in his clammy hand. He eased it into a reverse movement. A screech of metal greeted his motion. He stopped and looked at Cherry. Cherry nodded at him to continue so he increased the thrust. Naca backed out with a shriek of tortured metal. Josh gritted his teeth and kept her moving.

  Silence came. Josh jumped worse than when the noise started. He said, "Are we clear?"

  "Yes, move to the left. Keep her about ten feet off the ground."

  As Josh moved to the left, Naca dipped to the ground with a thump. More sounds of metal scraping came. He adjusted and the ship leaped higher in the air. He muttered, "These controls are super sensitive. Don't want to fly off into space. Come on, Naca, you can do it."

  Cherry's lips twitched, but he didn't say anything. Josh finally cleared the land bridge and flew the spaceship under it. When they were in far enough, Cherry said, "Try to swing her around. I'd like to have some teeth pointed in that direction if we have unwanted guests poking around."

  "Will our weapons work?"

  "Enough. I wouldn't want to fight a battle, but I can hurt someone if they don't expect it."

  Josh got the spaceship turned until it faced back the way they had come. Faint sunlight from the distant sun lit the rock outside. Josh stared at it a second before he lowered Naca back to the surface. He landed with a smack.

  Cherry remarked, "Any landing you walk away from is a good one."

  "This must not have been very good then. I can't walk."

  The two chuckled then started moving. Cherry said, "Before you send the signal, let me check to make sure we're hidden. I'd like to see if we left any – ah, footprints out there to be seen."

  As Cherry moved a remote sensor to look from outside, Josh ran a check of the systems in Naca. The spaceship had made the move with only minor changes. Josh sighed in relief. Cherry said, "We're clear. Send out the signal. Later, I'll go out there and smooth out some of that imprint, but unless someone's looking for it, it'll pass."

  Josh sent the message he had dictated yesterday. The remote detector returned an acknowledgement and started broadcasting. Josh asked, "Now what? Do we just sit here?"

  "No, I want to explore more of that other ship. You could check out that hole into the asteroid. You did set both remote detectors to automatically warn us of visitors, didn't you?"

  "Yes. Speaking of exploring, before you go outside, take a look at this. I found it when I looked for radiation. It looks familiar but I just can't place it."

  Josh brought up the view from the first detector. He put the analysis of the asteroid on another screen. Cherry glanced at it and started to turn to the view. His head snapped back. Josh saw his eyes flick through the data.

  When the android started to tremble, Josh pulled himself toward him. Cherry let out a yell and grabbed Josh. Cherry's skin looked like a revolving rainbow with the colors chasing each other.

  As Cherry danced around the cockpit, Josh tried to get his arms free so he could open the little door on Cherry's back. He got one hand free and the door popped open. As Josh reached for the switch to shut him off, Cherry said, "You don't know what that is? Really? Come on, Josh, you can't be that ignorant."

  "I've got memory issues, remember? Put me down."

  Cherry released him, leaving Josh floating in the air. Cherry bounced around the cockpit some more. Josh loudly said, "Cherry, what is it? Are you alright? Look at your skin."

  Cherry held out his arm and stared at it. The moving colors slowed some but didn't stop. He said, "Josh, you're looking at a very rich man. Of course you are, too. That lump out there is almost all rare earth minerals."

  "So?"

  "So! Don't you remember anything? The last I remember, those minerals were worth about 5467.89 credits per ounce."

  "About, huh? How much does that translate into?"

  "Only about 700 trillion credits. That's more than the Emperor has. More than most planets make. Josh…"

  Cherry looked at his friend. His mouth hung open and he had stopped breathing. Cherry waved a hand in front of his face. Josh gave no reaction. Cherry touched him to start him breathing.

  Josh stammered
, "How, are you, did you —"

  "Yes, I did calculate the numbers. There may be even more. I'm only guessing there's forty thousand tons there. We'll have to check the other pieces around there. How many did you check?"

  "Just those close to the detector. Are you sure about it being rare earth minerals? Sure about the money?"

  "I know for sure that reading is rare earth minerals. The value is just a number I remember. It could be more or it could be less, but I'd say not much less. 700 trillion credits. We can each buy a spaceship. Live like kings on our own planet."

  "Wow. I don't know what to say. When can we start mining and selling that stuff?"

  "We need to get off this rock first. We'll have to stake a claim – "

  Cherry went on to list all the things they needed to do. Both of them were swirling around off the deck in the cockpit laughing and carrying on like they'd lost their minds. At last, they calmed down. Cherry said, "I have to go do something. I'll burn my circuits out if I sit here waiting on an answer to our distress signal. I'm going into that ship to see what I can learn."

  "Be careful. I'll set a sensor to follow you. Maybe I can explore inside this rock or maybe I should see if I can find any more of those minerals."

  They gave each other a big grin before starting their tasks. Josh searched, but didn't find any of the minerals near the detector. Giving up, he checked for any messages. Finding none, he launched a remote sensor and flew it into the opening under the land bridge.

  Inside, the inky darkness foiled even the infrared and ultraviolet cameras on the sensor. Josh turned a small light on it to illuminate the path. The feeble beam still didn't penetrate far. Turning on the radar, Josh found a large cavern. The alien spaceship would have fit in here but only with a skilled pilot.

  Stepping up the intensity of the light, Josh spotted three archways. He flew the sensor to the one on his right. It led into another cavern. The light from the sensor bounced back from millions of tiny reflectors. Josh moved forward cautiously.

  The little mirrors turned out to be frozen vapor or water. The radar wouldn't penetrate very far so Josh had no idea how much lay in there. He checked his readings to see that it was heavy with oxygen.

  Muttering to himself, he backed the sensor out, "At least one of our problems is solved. I don't know how much is in there, but it will keep us a lot longer than the food."

  Flying the sensor to the middle arch, he eased into it. This cavern appeared much larger. Josh looked down to see a gently sloping ramp leading into it. The ramp continued for almost a mile. Using the radar, he saw that the room stretched ahead for twenty miles and to each side for five miles. The roof arched a mile overhead, slanting down to about a half mile on the sides.

  The immensity of the room surprised him. The light on the sensor did little to penetrate it. The radar showed uneven lumps on the floor but no details. One of the lumps sat on the floor to the right. Josh steered the sensor along the wall toward the lump.

  As he drew closer, he saw the object on the floor of the cavern was much bigger than he had thought. The sensor picked it up in the light. Josh's attention wavered and the sensor shot upwards. He brought it back down until the thing on the floor came back into view.

  Cherry's voice interrupted his reach for the microphone. Cherry said, "Josh, are you there? You should see this. It's like an ancient museum in here. Can you see it?"

  "I haven't been following you. I sent a sensor into the cavern. There's another ship in there. It looks in even worse shape than the one you're on. Cherry, what have we found?"

  "I don't know. Send me pictures."

  Cherry studied Josh's video for a few minutes. He finally said, "That ship came from a different manufacturer. Things on the outside are just too different."

  Josh said, "Do you think we could use parts from this one and the one you're in to get Naca in shape to fly?"

  "No, there's no way. These things are too different. Maybe we could use parts off of your ship in the cavern to get this one flying, but…"

  "Not enough data, right?"

  "Yes. I'd have to look closer to see if they are close to the same technology. I'm not even sure what's wrong with this one."

  Josh stared at the video. This ship looked in far worse shape than the one under the land bridge. He said, "I'll fly around it and look a little closer. You keep exploring to see what it would take to get that thing flying. It may be all we have if Naca won't fly again."

  "We've got money in savings and we can borrow the rest."

  "I'm not borrowing anything. With what we have, we could only get a piece of junk."

  "If you're wanting to fly this, it will be the same thing. Did you look at any of the videos? This thing is older than your grandma."

  Josh snorted, "Leave my grandma out of it. That thing looks wicked. If we could get it painted and polished up, it would scare any bad guys into surrendering to us without a fight."

  Cherry snorted now, "In your dreams. Those people know what happens when we take them in – mind altering or being sent to some penal colony. They won't give up without a fight. If you'd let us take on less violent fugitives —"

  "Forget it. Now is not the time to get into that. If I'm going to bounty hunt, I'm going for the big bucks and rid the universe of garbage at the same time."

  "Alright, I'll keep exploring here. You keep exploring. Hopefully, someone will come rescue us soon."

  Both muttered to themselves as they went back to exploring.

  A week passed with no answer to their distress signal. Neither noticed the time slipping by. They were immersed in their explorations of the asteroid and the ancient ship. Each night at supper, they both had exciting things to share with each other.

  Josh found five more non-flyable hulks in the cavern. Most had gaping holes in the fuselage as well as in the racks where computers, sensors and other equipment should have been. Along the walls were tools and piles of spaceship parts. He had no idea if any of them would fit the hulks or the ship that Cherry was examining.

  Three days later, tired of the relics, Josh decided to explore the other cavern. He had only reached the half-way point in the large cavern, but the radar didn't show any more of the spaceship sized lumps. He muttered, "If I have time, I can come back to this and go all the way to the end. So far, I haven't seen anything that will get us off this rock or put any credits in our pockets. Who'd want old junk like this?"

  He turned the sensor around and flew out of the large room. As the sensor flew into the next one, red warning lights flashed on the view screen. Use of the lights had caused the sensor to use more than the usual amount of fuel.

  Josh directed the sensor back to Naca. After he parked it, he checked Naca's fuel. He saw the gauge sitting at three quarters full. That would normally be more than enough to get him to the next fueling stop. The question now became how long it would have to last on this rock.

  Thinking about the fuel brought a flash of how they had come to this predicament. He remembered the wanted poster. A group of pirates had been disrupting traffic to – suddenly, he couldn't recall the planet. The picture of the poster came vividly to his mind. The image of the chief of pirates hung there in his mind, but he couldn't remember the planet.

  As he struggled, his head began to ache. His vision soon narrowed down to a tunnel. Determined to fight it down, he stopped thinking about the planet and concentrated on asking the computer how many credits they had in their account.

  Before he could look at the results, his headache became more severe. Holding his head in his hands, he lay back in the chair. Closing his eyes, he tried not to move a muscle. As he relaxed, the severe pain receded.

  Josh tried to regulate his breathing to help ease the pounding in his head. Before he knew it, he drifted off to sleep. In his dreams, the wanted poster flashed. The face leered at him, daring him to try to get him. Josh reached out to gr
ab the pirate. An explosion from behind rocked him.

  With a gasp, Josh's eyes snapped open. His hand searched for his blaster as he looked from side to side to see where the pirate had gone. Nothing. A noise from behind caused him to swivel and bring the barrel of the blaster in that direction.

  Cherry held his hands up, the right forearm like a tilted rainbow to the side of his head. He said, "Whoa, partner. I know I've been spending a lot of time in that old wreck, but I thought you wanted me to."

  Josh lowered the weapon and wiped the back of his left hand across his eyes. He said, "Sorry, Cherry. Just a bad dream. I had a flash of memory and it triggered a headache. I could see the pirate we were after. His name is Lebois and he's a real piece of work. Just as I grabbed him, I felt an explosion…"

  Cherry looked at his friend's confusion. He said, "That's more than I remember. Any idea what happened to Lebois or where the explosion came from?"

  "No, and I'm not going to try to remember. I just had one terrific headache and I don't want another."

  "What's that on the view screen?"

  Josh turned to look. He stared blankly for a few seconds then said, "Oh, that's the credit balance we have. Fifty-nine thousand credits. Not bad, huh?"

  "I guess. How much was that pirate worth?"

  "Twenty-five thousand, but I think there might have been more."

  Cherry calculated, "If we received that twenty-five and used most of the fifty-nine, we could get a pretty decent spaceship, but that wouldn't leave much for operating."

  Josh laughed, "You forget. We are the universe's richest partners. Remember all those rare earth minerals? We can buy any spaceship we want."

  "We don't have that money in our pocket. We have to get the minerals to market and get off this rock first. Hopefully, not in the brig of some pirate ship."

  The two friends looked at each other soberly.

  Chapter 5