Free Outriders by Jay Posey Page A

a quick verbal exchange with Gus in Russian that Piper couldn’t follow. A few moments later, his expression darkened.
    “OK, so yeah, something’s definitely not right,” he said. He pointed at a data field on the display that read NULL. “That’s all right, if there’s nothing there.” He moved his finger to a jagged line, which Piper took to be some representation of sensor data. “But that form’s a little too regular for my liking.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean it looks manufactured to me.”
    “That doesn’t help, chief.”
    Without looking at it, Gennady traced over the line with irritated haste. “No random spikes or dots. No outliers. No stuff that looks out of place. That doesn’t look random, it looks like someone wanted it to look random. Manufactured .”
    That opened more questions than it answered, but the way he’d said it had been enough to frighten Piper into silence. Gennady was former Russian Navy. It was a rare occasion that he ever mentioned anything about that past life, but whenever he did, his voice took on a particular tone and his vowels got a little sharper. Just like when he said that form looked manufactured . He obviously meant more by it than she understood, but she understood enough. Bad things. Piper had a thousand more questions; fortunately she had sense enough not to ask any of them while Gennady was staring at the display with such intensity.
    After a couple of minutes of strained silence, Gennady’s brow suddenly smoothed, his face relaxed. But not in any kind of relief. Some thought, dawning on him.
    “That hauler,” he said, looking at her. “We did a sync with it?”
    “I think so, yeah,” Piper answered. “Came in on Annie’s shift, though. I could check.”
    “Anybody talked to the captain?”
    “Sure, a few times.”
    He looked back at the console, said something in Russian to Gus, and then started working some figures again. “Anybody confirm he’s actually on that ship?”
    Piper didn’t understand the question.
    “Where else would he be?”
    Gennady shook his head.
    “What is it, chief?”
    “You checked the pod lately?”
    “Every shift,” Piper said. “Why?”
    “I want you to get in it.”
    She blinked at him. He might as well have said it in Russian.
    “Get in the pod,” he repeated, still not looking at her. He was too focused on the data streams flooding his console. “Now.”
    “Why? What’s going on?”
    “I don’t know, Pip, but I got a bad feeling. I think that hauler slipped us something.”
    Piper looked at the console, then at the projection. She raised her hands from her sides and then dropped them again, feeling lost and momentarily useless.
    “I’m about to do something here,” Gennady said. Finally, he looked up at her. “And I’m not sure what’s going to happen when I do it. So I don’t want you standing here.”
    “You’re scaring me, chief.”
    “It’s because I’m a little scared myself, kid.” He stared at her for a few moments, long enough for her to see he wasn’t lying. She’d never seen his eyes like that before. “Look, just hop in and button up. For me. I’d feel better if you were sitting in there. If I’m wrong, no harm done.”
    “I’m more worried about if you’re right,” Piper said.
    “Get in the pod, Piper. Please.”
    Piper couldn’t remember Gennady ever saying please to her. She nodded and moved to the hatch that led to the emergency lifepod. It was a small affair, just a two-man pod, intended for the usually single inhabitant of the bubble. Someone at Veryn-Hakakuri probably thought they were being extra cautious by putting a two-man pod up here. All the big ones were below. Piper typed in a code and both the inner and outer hatches eased open. She glanced back at Gennady; he was hunched over the console, fingers flying, muttering in Russian to Gus, who was chattering right back. If he noticed her looking at him, he didn’t make any sign of it.
    With a deep breath,