In Earth's Service (Mapped Space Book 2) Read Online Free PDF

your family. Message ends.”
    When the Nisk read that message, as I was sure
they would, they’d have a hard time figuring out what it really meant. Lena
would not. She’d know the mission was blown, that I had something too hot to
risk in diplomatic traffic and no matter what happened, she had to stay in the Paraxos
System where I could find her in a hurry.
    With aleph-null in the message, the entire galaxy
could go to war and she wouldn’t budge.
     
    * * * *
     
    After finishing with Ambassador Singh, I
ventured back into the drizzle and headed for the spaceport. Almost
immediately, my listener detected footsteps behind me, confirming the stride pattern
matched the large humanoid who’d tailed me earlier. I’d assumed he’d been connected
with Trask’s hit squad, perhaps responsible for suppressing the Nisk sensors.
    So why was he still here?
    On the image of Nisport’s street grid floating in
my mind’s eye, a flashing sonic marker indicated he was closing fast, and me
with an empty gun and the Nisk already suspicious. He appeared several blocks
away, lumbering toward me like a freight loader in a hurry, making no effort to
hide his presence. I broke into a run, trying to put distance between us but soon
realized he was faster, not by much, but enough to catch me before I reached
the terminal.
    I cut into a side street, sprinted one block then
turned and drew my P-50, taking aim as he came charging around the corner. He
took one look at my gun, not realizing it was empty, and leapt high into the
air. A soft blue glow appeared beneath his boots, carrying him across the
street to the roof of an octagonal structure, then a moment later, he launched
himself in another tech-assisted jump across the rooftops.
    He might have looked like a large human, but his
speed and tech told me he was anything but. The humanoid was bigger and faster
than me and tech assisted in ways I wasn’t. Tangling with him with an empty gun
was likely to be a one way ticket to the wrong end of a beating. Not wanting to
be flanked, I started running toward the spaceport. Each time he landed on the
roof of a building a sonic marker flashed, warning he was racing to cut me off.
    When he started to pull ahead, I slipped into a
side street, hiding under an awning extending around a long, U-shaped building.
The script on the grimy walls was faded Cor Carolian, a local Orion power. It
looked deserted, then a short rectangular device emerged from above the sealed
door, shimmering from a micro acceleration field enveloping it. It floated down,
scanning me with a laser thin green light.
    “Not now,” I whispered, trying to swat it with the
butt of my gun. The alien scanner dodged and continued drifting toward the ground,
completing its scan as a heavy thud sounded from the roof.
    The alien was directly above me!
    My listener tracked him as he walked to the edge
of the building, searching the street for me. Most alien buildings in Nisport
were sensor hardened to block all the eavesdroppers. I hoped the Carolian structure
was no exception. I hardly dared breath as I realized he didn’t know I was
below him. My listener amplified the click of his metal boots as he prowled the
side of the building while the Carolian scanner approached the ground beside me.
I lifted one foot out of its beam, then as it scanned my other ankle, placed
the heel of my boot on top of it and silently pushed it into the ground, hiding
its green glow. Above, the humanoid waited for me to show myself, then he tech-jumped
across the street. I remained with my back pressed into the entrance alcove as
he searched the road, then thinking I’d eluded him, he leapt away toward the
spaceport.
    The Carolian scanner pushed up against my boot,
trying to free itself. I lifted my heel, letting it shoot back up to its home
above the door. In my mind’s eye, the sonic marker winked out as the humanoid
moved out of range. I waited several minutes, but it didn’t reappear, then I
crept down a