Mutiny on Outstation Zori by John Hegenberger Page B

hearty."
    Cast threw back his head in the somber light and barked a laugh. "I should have known." He spoke in a reedy voice, his arms folded across his lean frame. "You always had a thing about rescuing people. I'm fine, as you can see. But how did you manage to locate me? I'm supposed to be dead."
    "Yes, and I felt terrible when I got word of the destruction of your freighter. How did you get out?" His tone became sober. "How did you get here?"
    The image on one of the pale blue screens began to roll horizontally. Cast reached over to adjust a control, stabilizing the image. He inspected the screen for a second and then leaned back against a cluttered counter top. "We were attacked," he responded casually. "Raiders came out of nowhere and without warning used high-intensity lasers to rip into The Dancer's hull, splitting the ship apart. I would have gladly given them the cargo, but they were more interested in doing damage than in making a profit. I got away in a lifepod and was later picked up by a passing icespector team. They took me nonstop all the way out to Heaven 7. I stayed with them, because...well, because I'd suffered some neural injuries." He touched his forehead.
    "What?" Jamie said with sudden concern. "Are you all right?"
    Cast shrugged. "Yeah, I'm fine, I guess. The injuries affected my retinal readings and the way I talk, which has pretty much barred me from any ARVAN transactions."
    "I thought you sounded different. But without access to ARVAN, you..."
    "That's right," Cast said. "I couldn't get to my credit. I was broke and as good as dead. I still had my Eldeit Card, but the transactor machines wouldn't recognize me. I was a nobody as far as the market knew. That's when I started getting the idea that I could start life over."
    "Why the hell didn't you contact me? I'd've—"
    "Rescued me? Yeah, I know. But I was feeling constantly confused then. I worked with the icespectors and lucked into a medium-sized claim. That got me enough credit to get off Heaven. Then I realized I could go anywhere I wanted." He turned, again staring at the images on the monitor screens.
    "So you came here. I remembered you being interested in this place, but I never understood the attraction. I still don't."
    Cast's hand went up to the crystal pendant dangling from a thin cord around his neck. "You're not going to understand all of this," he said slowly, "but when a person gets a chance to start over, he goes back to his dreams and tries to use the things he's learned about life to take him where he feels he ought to be."
    "You're right." Jamie rested his weight against a smooth bulkhead. "I don't understand."
    Cast shrugged, gazing at the twelve bluish screens connected to the telescope array. Very carefully, he said, "Do you have any idea who the government has kept in stasis on this station for over four hundred years?"
    Jamie shook his head. Cast answered his own question. "The Messiah of Izar."
    Jamie began to suspect the rationality of his friend's statements. Perhaps Cast's injuries were more serious than either of them knew. "But the Messiah is legend; she's supposed to be dead."
    "If you'll remember," Cast smiled mysteriously, "so was I."
    "Ah, I get it. You're saying that she, like you, was attacked by a raider, picked up by icespectors, and carried away to Heaven—"
    "No, no, no, no. Her story is not nearly as mundane as mine. The point is, she's here, and I need to be here, too. I was called, and they accepted me. That's all that's important."
    "Called?" Jamie didn't like the sound of that. "Who…?
    Cast swallowed, reaching for the jewel that hung around his neck. "This pendant—"
    "My pendant."
    "Your pendant," he amended. "I—I took it because I'd heard that there were thousands of these things made before the Messiah disappeared. They're low-grade scanner crystals designed to pick up and faintly share her aura radiations."
    "But it's just a decoration," Jamie said. "My mother gave it to me; her family gave it