Phys Scouts #1 at risk

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PsiScouts #1:

At Risk

Phil Meade

PSI SCOUTS #1: AT RISK

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events

portrayed in this book are fictitious, and any resemblence to

real people or events is purely coincidental.

Published by

Speed-of-C Productions

PO Box 265

Linthicum, MD 21090-0265

ISBN: 0-9716147-3-3

First edition September 2003

Scanning and distributing books on the Internet without

permission is piracy, and deprives authors of income.

Authorized electronic texts of this book are available at

www.scatteredworlds.com

COASTLINE

SF Writers Consortium

The CoastLine SF Writers Consortium is an organization of

professional writers and editors devoted to excellence in

sf/fantasty publishing. Publications bearing the CoastLine

logo are assured to meet professional standards.

Dedicated To:

Eando Binder, John W. Campbell, Jr.,

Edmond Hamilton, Paul Levitz,

Jim Shooter, Jerry Siegel,

E.E. “Doc” Smith, Mort Weisinger,

Jack Williamson,

and all the rest of

the original Scouts.

PsiScouts: At Risk

Part One:

The Case of the

Mega-Billionaire Target

PsiScouts: At Risk

April AD 2574

The cargo robot was right on his heels. Royd Kar

scrambled up a stack of crates, hoping the ’bot couldn’t

follow. The slick duraplast surface of the crates didn’t offer

much purchase, and the ’bot didn’t look like a climber.

He was right — the robot stopped, whirring and clicking,

at the foot of the stack. One long, jointed manipulator arm

reached upward, touching Royd’s right foot; he kicked it

away and pulled himself to the top crate.

There, five meters up, Royd thumbed his nose at the ’bot.

Then, curious, he stretched out on his stomach and watched

the machine. What would it do?

After a few minutes the ’bot seemed to lose interest. It

rolled away, feelers waving in the air before it. Perhaps, Royd

reflected, it had thought he was loose cargo and only wanted

to secure him. After he’d stopped moving, the dimwitted

thing concluded that he was safely stowed.

Great, he thought. Am I supposed to stay here for three

days without moving?

Stowing away aboard the

Terran Queen

had seemed such a

good idea when Royd had first thought of it, a week ago and

safe home on Taarla. Now, after thirty hours with only

catnaps and with hunger gnawing at his stomach, he began to

wonder if he’d made a mistake.

Maybe, Royd thought as he huddled down on his perch,

maybe he should turn himself in. After all, what would the

authorities do to the 14-year-old runaway? Even though he’d

passed his preliminary adulthood tests, and was considered a

full citizen on Taarla, surely Earth cops wouldn’t be too harsh

on a kid?

But would they let him stay on Earth? Or even get off the

ship there? Hardly likely. They’d bundle him up and ship

him back to his parents. Back to the leaky, one-room shack

they called home. Back to the government dole that paid three

people only enough for one, back to the mines that were the

PsiScouts: At Risk

only work opportunity on the whole burnt-out cinder of a

planet.

Royd’s family hadn’t always been poor. He had dim

memories of new clothes and a spacious home with a

beautiful garden, of household robots and tri-di and enough

to eat every day. His father had been an ironball champ,

famous throughout the sector; his mother had parlayed

Papa’s earnings into a winning portfolio that got her a

powerful position at a major investment firm.

But then Papa was injured, and the Crash turned all

Mama’s stocks and bonds into meaningless bits in worthless

computers. Royd hadn’t known at the time that the

Depression affected everyone in the world; for years he’d

thought it was his fault that the family had left their

wonderful home and moved into a succession of shacks, each

worse than the one before.

Papa, injured, couldn’t work in the mines — and Mama, a

native Earthwoman, wasn’t qualified. So the family went on

the dole, and Royd sat with his Papa in the town square as the

old man shook a begging bowl at passing strangers.

Royd blinked back hot tears and wiped his nose with the

back of his hand. No, he couldn’t turn himself in; going back

home would be more than defeat, more than humiliation. It

would be the end of all his dreams. Six days in the mines had

convinced him that he wouldn’t last a year without turning

into the same kind of dull-witted, prematurely-aged drone

who staffed the work crews around him.

No, Royd’s only hope — his

family’s

only hope — was for

him to get off-planet, find some place where honest work was

available and he could make enough to send some home.

Royd’s dream was to go to Earth and get a good job, work

hard, and eventually bring Papa and Mama to live with him.

For a moment he was lost in the vision of their faces suffused

with delight when the one-way ticket to Earth arrived.

Royd sniffed and shook his head. Unless he got to Earth,

he could kiss the rest of his dream goodbye. Stowing away

PsiScouts: At Risk

had been the only way to get offplanet, and he’d jumped at

his chance when the

Terran Queen

set down. But he hadn’t

planned for a three-day journey through hyperspace. The vast

cargo hold, fortunately, had a rest room facility — but there

was no food, and now with the cargo ’bot after him he didn’t

dare go in search of any. For that matter, he didn’t dare use

the bathroom, either.

Royd felt movement behind him and turned sharply.

Another robot, a meter-high spiderlike affair, was creeping

toward him across piled boxes, its eight legs moving gingerly

from perch to perch. Sensors waved before it like antennae,

and a pair of strong waldoes opened and closed with the

repeated click of metal against metal.

“Damn it,” he shouted, “What do I have to do around

here? Can’t you give me a fair chance?” The larger ’bot had

obviously not lost interest in Royd; it had simply gone off to

call this climber.

For the barest instant, Royd considered letting the ’bot grab

him, no matter what the Earth police would do. Then he

clenched his fists and set his jaw. “You’re not going to get me

without a fight,” he said to the approaching monstrosity.

Royd closed his eyes and raised his hands, spreading his

fingers. The robot’s skin was made of duraplast, but there

were steel parts within — Royd could feel the metal skeleton,

the battery, the tangle of wires inside the robot….

Taarla was an unstable world whose magnetic field was in

constant flux, a world where even the smallest predators

could generate electrical charges that put Earth’s electric eel

to shame. The early colonists had been genetically engineered

for sensitivity to magnetic fields; some few even gained a

rudimentary psi ability to manipulate the lines of magnetic

flux.

Over the centuries, these magnetic talents served Taarla’s

people well. Following invisible patterns, the people located

the purest veins of precious metals and rare earths; the vast

fortunes lost in the Crash had all grown from the early mines.

PsiScouts: At Risk

Royd had a Taarlan’s sense of magnetic fields, but he had

something else, inherited from his father: when it suited him,

Royd could gather those intangible magnetic lines and play

them as a puppeteer plays his strings. In childhood, he had

played with balls and rods and sheets of steel the way other

children played with balloons and sticks and paper. Before

the Crash ruined everything, Royd had hoped to become an

ironball player like Papa, perhaps even greater.

Hungry, angry, and afraid, Royd reached out to the

approaching ’bot…and pulled.

The ’bot hung for an instant, its splayed legs frantically

twitching. Then, helpless, it rocketed past Royd and shot

across the cargo hold. The poor thing was still gaining speed

when it hit the far wall with a sickening screech, then

plummeted to become an ungainly, quivering lump on the

deck below.

Now he’d done it. The broken robot would surely bring

one of the crew to investigate. And if they came, they would

find Royd.

He shrugged. So now there was nothing to lose.

Grinning, Royd scrambled down the stack of boxes and

dropped to the deck. He strode confidently to the nearest

hatchway. Beyond it were the passenger levels — and

somewhere in them, there was food, and showers, and soft

beds with fresh white sheets.

The hatch was sealed with a simple magnetic lock. Royd

gestured, the hatch opened, and he stepped through.

It didn’t take Royd long to find food.

The

Terran Queen

kept Earth Standard Time, so it was the

middle of the evening when Royd stepped out of the cargo

hold. He walked down the spotless white corridor, glancing

back over his shoulder every few seconds, until he came to a

computer display, bright lines in the corridor wall.

PsiScouts: At Risk

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摘要：

PsiScouts#1:AtRiskPhilMeadePSISCOUTS#1:ATRISKcopyright©2003,Speed-of-CProductionsAllrightsreservedThisisaworkoffiction.Allthecharactersandeventsportrayedinthisbookarefictitious,andanyresemblencetorealpeopleoreventsispurelycoincidental.PublishedbySpeed-of-CProductionsPOBox265Linthicum,MD21090-0265ISB...

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