Tangled Webs - Spider and Fly Part Two

2000 short story by Louis Turfrey and Mark Newbold

Under a year after Episode IV – A New Hope

Carlonian Feese examined the crowd.

The assassin had only been hunting Nias Derril for a day, yet he had already tracked down his target. He zoomed in, trying to see who it was that Derril had been talking to seconds ago. His position wouldn't allow him that luxury. He checked his weapon again for the umpteenth time that morning, a habit of professionalism and comfort, and thought of the kudos he would gain with the hit. He checked back towards the small cafe where Derril had been seated and wondered why the starship thief had chosen Chancai as his hiding place. Not the most private location in the sector – if he’d wanted to advertise his whereabouts a neon sign would have sufficed. He noticed two other bounty hunters, across from the cafe. They were surreptitiously examining their data pads and glancing towards Derril. Feese stepped out into plain view. They noticed him and backed off, hands away from their holsters.

Feese would have smiled if he were able.

Nias noticed Feese step out of a side passage and realised that the time had come to put his plan into action. He knew that as soon as Cipple or someone placed a price upon his head, he would be living on borrowed time. He also knew that handing the job to Feese was a quick way for Glann Cipple to eradicate his best starship thief without any questions being asked. Nias didn't mind - it was just part of the great game of life as far as he was concerned, and he was already thinking three moves ahead. He grunted, causing a hidden throat mike to activate. He covered his mouth with his hand and spoke behind the serving cloth.

   "Do you see him?"

There was a second delay until he heard Tarr Ranths voice in his earpiece.

   "Yes.  He likes that gun a lot doesn't he?"

Nias sniggered behind his hand.

   "Be careful. Feese is a dead shot.  He doesn’t lose fights."

Tarr Ranth sighed into Nias's ear.

   "Well even I'm not perfect. Let’s hope that what you're paying me is worth this.   I'd hate to have Feese after me."

Nias was surprised at this last remark. He'd always thought of Ranth as a cold-hearted killer with an iron hard nerve. It made him nervous to know that Ranth had allowed him to see that much of his psych. It either meant he trusted Nias.

Or that he couldn't care less.

Carlonian Feese saw Nias wipe his mouth after the meal and decided to make his move.   He darted forward towards the entrance to the cafe and unholstered his secured weapon. The crowds parted as he moved through them, no one wishing to go near the ominous man with the mask.

He stopped just outside the entrance and moved to one side, silently beckoning Nias out with his patient body language. Nias saw him as Feese moved further away from the doorway, allowing himself a clearer view of the surroundings. Nias didn't run. He stood and walked towards the entrance.

   "So you've come to take me away from all this then?" Feese noticed that Derril seemed cocky, too sure of himself. Feese didn't like this one bit. He'd spent too long in the game and developed too good an instinct for trouble not to recognise it when it sneered at him. And Nias Derril glowed with trouble. He took a swift look around to make certain no one was targeting him. All clear. He motioned for Nias to walk ahead of him. Nias smiled and did as he was asked.

   "Where are you taking me?" Nervousness edged into Nias’s voice. Feese's only answer was to push Nias forward, using the nozzle of his blaster to direct him into a low ceilinged service corridor.

   "I don't like this.  He's thought too far ahead."

Nias heard Tar Ranths voice in his ear.

They walked forward for two hundred metres until they came across a grating in the floor. Feese pushed Nias to one side, keeping him under the fire arc of his blaster rifle, and lifted the grate with his other hand.

   "Inside." He motioned Nias down a short staircase into a badly lit service conduit. They travelled down the winding passage, turning seemingly randomly, for what Nias judged to be about half an hour. Nias guessed that this was Feeses way of dropping off any pursuit. Suddenly he was pulled up short by a hand.

   "Wait here." Feese moved beyond him to a hatch set in the wall and entered an access code into the grimy access pad. There was a hiss of changing pressure and the door opened, sliding back into the wall. The air suddenly cooled. Nias had a bad feeling about this. There was the noise of starship engines and the sound of rushing wind. Feese motioned Nias towards the hatch, halting him near the entrance.

Nias was definitely worried.

   "Raise your hands and place them behind your head." Feese's voice commanded him.

   "I thought you were taking me back to Cipple?" Nias couldn't control his nervousness now.

   "You overestimate your worth Derril." He placed his blaster into the small or Nias's back. "Glann doesn't want any unfortunate mistakes, or loose ends. I have to say thief, I'm not sorry it has to be this way."

Nias was trying to think through the fog of fear as he turned around slowly to face Feese, his hands still raised.

   "What’s the plan - push me or blast me and let the momentum carry me through?" Feese raised his rifle to face Nias's chest.

   "Goodbye Derril." Feese started to squeeze the firing stud.

Nias didn't wait.  He'd spent the last few seconds edging towards the opening hatch and decided he'd stand a better chance if he just jumped of his own volition. So he did. As he leapt backwards, the blaster shot caught him on his shoulder, singing flesh and causing him to spin as he fell. He caught site of the distant sky above as he was falling and suddenly wished that he'd kept Feese talking instead of letting him shoot him.

Tarr Ranth stood on the observation platform, half way up the giant landing shaft that ran through the inner walls of the Chancai Trade Centre. He looked down towards the landing pad that jutted out twenty metres below him and checked for a signal from the tracer that he’d placed on Nias at the beginning of their agreement. A faint response, but nothing definite. Ranth was annoyed. He'd had to stop following Feese.  After all, he couldn't afford to play his hand too soon, but if he couldn’t find Nias then he'd be four thousand credits out of pocket. He guessed that Feese had been heading for his ship and the direction of travel had confirmed this, until the tracer had been masked by the electromagnetic background noise and shielding of Chancai. That had been twenty minutes ago. Ranth had begun to get worried, a sensation he loathed. The tracer signal got stronger.

There was a pinging noise in his earpiece, he activated his comm and heard Nias's voice.

   "... push me or blast me and let the momentum carry me through?"

Ranth took a reading from the tracer and noted that it was on the same level as himself, but six hundred metres to his left. He activated his macros and zeroed in on the location across the shaft and had just enough time to register a blaster shot and a falling body before it dropped out of his field of view. He looked down - the tracer signal followed it.

   "Dammit!" He launched himself over the side and activated his rocket pack as he fell. Sticking his boost on full he soon exceeded the natural velocity of a falling object. He only had a minute before Derril hit the ground, maybe less time if he hit one of the myriad number of transports that were loading or unloading. He spied him about thirty metres below, spinning as he fell.  He readied his grapple line.

Nias was struggling to combat the spin on his fall and knew he had less that a minute until he hit either the power turbines below or the safety nets that covered the vents. Either would kill him at this speed. His useless arm wasn't allowing him to fully correct the spin and the pain was getting intolerable as it whipped around his body. In the haze of pain that surrounded his brain he thought he heard the sound of Tarr Ranths voice, but he knew that was impossible. The building roar of what sounded like a starship engine filled his brain and his pain-wracked body gave up. He passed out.

Tarr Ranth altered the angle of his descent so he was dropping above and slightly behind Nias. He tried to hail him but there was no response. Ignoring the nearing permacrete surface and the giant ventilation fans, he shut off the rocket pack and activated his repulsor belt, using it to stabilise his flight. Turning himself feet first he fired his stun net at Nias. The net wrapped around its target, entangling itself around Nias as he spun. Ranth made sure that the line was tight and brought the repulsors online gradually until the line was taut.  Hitting the boosters on his jet pack, everything became hazy as the vibration took over. At the last second Ranth released the line between himself and Nias.

He was just a second out.

They hit the safety nets at fifty klicks per hour.

Nias bounced high several times and came to rest near the centre of the nets. Tarr Ranth was luckier, the first bounce being counteracted by his repulsor belt. However, he shot up a further twenty metres until he managed to shut off his pack. His ankles ached from the impact and he thanked fortune for the protection his armour gave him. He dropped down next to Nias and checked his vital signs. Not good - he had to get him to a medical facility and quick. There was no question about it, he had to call in some local help. First things first though.

He activated his comm as he started dragging Nias to the edge of the nets and ordered in a med team. Halfway across the netting he heard the whine of repulsors and looked up to see an automated team arrive. The droid at the edge of the repulsor skiff helped him lift Nias onboard. Derril groaned as they secured him on the safety couch. Tarr Ranth jumped up behind him as the skiff pulled up and away, towards the medical complex. Ranth took the time to check his jet pack and weapons. As they got to the appropriate level they headed inwards, the electrostatic force field bending around them as they did so.

Carlonian Feese looked on with a pair of macro binoculars and frowned behind the lenses. As far as he knew, the bounty hunter Tarr Ranth was not a friend of Nias Derril. He must have somehow heard about Cipple sending Feese to apprehend Derril and want to impress Cipple by collecting Derril himself. That made things complicated. Tarr Ranth was well known for bringing his targets in alive with regularity. And it was known within certain circles that he did this so he could catch them again if they escaped. Although no bounty was posted, Glann Cipples intention in sending Feese was that he be brought in dead. Feese had watched Nias's descent with the full intention of collecting the body off the nets and taking the corpse back to Cipple himself. He hadn't counted on anybody being good enough to track them through the tunnels. He stepped back into the access corridor and closed the hatch. He'd have to make his way to the Medical levels and confront Ranth himself.

Nias floated within the Bacta Tank as miniature medical droids continued to replace his smashed bones with alloy and his severed nerves with bioelectric fibre. Tarr Ranth looked on, not willing to leave his target unattended and winced when he saw them remove the damaged areas of the arm and shoulder. It wasn't a full cybernetic replacement, only partial, but it would still cost Nias in excess of four thousand credits.  And he would be sore for days.

Tarr Ranth stepped out of the theatre into the corridor and took up his post alongside the doorway. He’d decided to wait with Nias until such time as he was able to defend himself. Nias had assured him that wouldn’t be necessary and that if Ranth left him then his reputation would not suffer. If he were wrong then Nias himself would certainly suffer. The 2-1-B unit exited the theatre and approached Ranth.

   "Sir, I have an update on the condition of your charge."

Tarr Ranth nodded and motioned for the droid to continue.

   "He has multiple fractures to his right arm, which are being treated as we speak. His shoulder bone was completely fractured and would have been too weak to support the arm without extensive recovery. As you pointed out, the man is a wanted criminal and so Doctor Mello took the liberty of replacing the damaged area with cybernetic webbing, duralloy, bioelectric grafts and synthetic skin. This worked out considerably cheaper than three weeks in a Bacta Tank. Mister Derril also had hairline fractures to his skull, his left leg, three ribs and his left wrist. Most of which were caused by the impact with the webbing. These are being treated as well."

The droid handed a printout to Ranth.

   "The amount of five thousand six hundred credits has been charged to Nias Derril’s account as per your instructions. The prisoner will be ready for transport within two hours." The droid turned and moved back in to the theatre.

Tarr Ranth checked the bill and chuckled to himself.

Carlonian Feese paused outside the service hatch to Medical Theatre 231A4. His webbed fingers twirled the lock pick into position and began picking the lock. After fifteen seconds of work he tried the lock on the door. Punching in the override he heard the satisfying click of a magnetic seal opening. The door slid back slowly, revealing the back of a medical computer mainframe. It was satisfying to know that the service entrance to the theatre was deserted. Checking left and right he moved towards the door leading to the operating theatre and worked his lock-pick magic again.

Tarr Ranth was standing with his back to the door as the robotic trolley bed moved Nias out of the theatre and into the nearby ward complex. The opening door and heavy stun bolt that grazed his hip catapulted him forward into the trolley, the same bolt knocking the droids in the theatre to the floor in a clattering of metal. Ranth ordered the trolley to continue and turned around to face the challenge that he knew would be coming next. Carlonian Feese stepped out of the doorway into full view in front of Tarr Ranth. The metal plate that covered half of the Calamarians face reflected sparks from the damaged droids. He looked straight at Ranth.

   "Where is he?"

Ranth returned Feese's stare, his helmet hiding the cold glint that formed in his eyes when he heard Feese's tone of voice.

   "That’s none of your business. He's my concern now. Drop your weapon." Ranths tone of voice was cold and commanding, but Feese did not move to comply. Instead he moved to go past Ranth into the corridor beyond. Ranth placed a blaster bolt a fraction away from Feeses feet.

   "No further. You’re in a medical complex now. Chancai Security will be here soon to take you into custody."

Feese laughed at this.

   "You’re not known for your sense of humour. Move out of my way or I’ll move you myself." He moved forward again. Ranth heard footsteps behind him and stood back into the corridor as Feese waited. The medical droid that had administered to Nias approached the entranceway with fourteen Chancai Security officers. The droid pointed towards Carlonian Feese.

   "That is the man.  Arrest him."

Tarr Ranth moved out the way as the officers surrounded Feese and disarmed him. Feese looked on as Tarr Ranth moved towards one of the Security Officers. He pointed at a portable holo-cam hovering in the corner of the theatre.

   "There are two more cameras inside that the hospital use for security measures. They should be undamaged by the stun blast."

The Security Captain nodded and looked Tarr Ranth up and down, checking his licenses and permits. Ranth moved towards Feese who was silently being bound.

   "Breaking and entering a medical facility is a crime on Zelon. I hope you can pay the fine."

Feese growled as Ranth walked away, motioning towards the unconscious Derril on the trolley.

   “You’d better patch him up and get him moving. I’ll be back on the street in an hour.”

   “Don’t you worry about us.”

Seconds after turning the corner out of Feeses sight Tarr Ranth staggered in pain. A medical droid hovered over.

   "Can I be of help Sir?"

Ranth looked up towards the droid.

   "Yes.  Get this damn shrapnel out of my back."

Tangled Webs - Spider and Fly Part Two

2000 short story by Louis Turfrey and Mark Newbold

Under a year after Episode IV – A New Hope

Histories – The second part in the Spider and Fly stories shows Nias Derril as he attempts to escape the attentions of Glann Cipple and Carlonian Feese.  Hiring Tarr Ranth to protect him, this Louis Turfrey story shows all three main characters in evasive manoeuvres on Chancai.

Cast of Characters

Nias Derril

Tarr Ranth

Carlonian Feese

Doctor Mello