Deathstalker 07 - Deathstalker Return

even sell tickets. But for now, everybody plays nice, or I'll start putting tranquilizers in the protein cubes again."
    "Found it!" Brett said triumphantly, beating a swift paradiddle on the edge of the comm panels with both hands. "Bow down and worship, ye lesser beings! I could have done this for a living, except I had more ambition—and a complete disinclination to work for anyone but myself. I knew the Hereward's main menu was far too squeaky clean to be true. Running alien porn is still a death sentence on some worlds, so there just had to be a hidden menu, and here it is! Oh, just look at all these goodies… We have extrapowerful force shields, illegally powerful stealth options, a really hair trigger self-destruct system that I think we should all stay well clear of, and twelve—count them, twelve—disrupter cannon, complete with computerized tracking systems! Damn… you could take on a starcruiser with firepower like this. All of a sudden, I feel really safe. Let's get down to the surface and kick sand in some monster's face."
    "Ah," said Lewis. "So we have your permission to land now, do we? How very kind. Now get your arse out of my pilot's seat."
    Brett quickly made way for Lewis, who settled into the pilot's chair and glowered at the comm panels before him.
    "Oz, why didn't you tell me about the hidden menu?"
    "Sorry, Lewis," said the ship's AI. "The original captain set things up so the hidden menu could be accessed only via the correct code words. I wasn't even able to mention it until now. You're really very talented with computers, Brett Random."
    The con man leaned casually against the port bulkhead and preened ostentatiously. "I have magic fingers.
    There isn't a computer going that I can't tickle into giving up its secrets. I could make the AIs of Shub giggle and blush like schoolgirls."
    "Boasting is very unattractive," observed Jesamine.
    "Hey, stick to what you're best at, that's what I always say." Brett glanced at the long curve of the planet Shandrakor on the bridge viewscreen. "You know, Deathstalker, we are getting awfully close to the planet. Are you positive there's no quarantine here? No starcruisers on patrol, no orbiting minefields?"
    "For the tenth time, Brett, we're all alone up here," said Lewis. "This ship's sensors could hear a mouse fart from high orbit. And I can tell you for a fact that there's never been any official quarantine around Shandrakor, for the simple reason that this planet doesn't have a single damned thing that anyone wants.
    Or at least, nothing worth the trouble of fighting the jungle, the climate, the monsters and all the other kinds of sudden death from unexpected directions that this planet specializes in. Someone did try running safari parties here, for really jaded big-game hunters, but the company went bust after no one came back from their first ten expeditions. There was a joke going around that the only thing that did come back was a note from the monsters, saying Send more hunters."
    "I'm starting not to feel safe anymore," Brett said warningly.
    "But the old Deathstalker Standing definitely is here?" said Saturday. "The great castle of your ancestors?"
    "Oh, yes," said Lewis. "This is where Jenny Psycho crash-landed it, after it was pretty much blown apart in the last great battle against Shub and the Recreated. The exact coordinates of where it went down were officially suppressed, but my family secretly preserved them as part of our heritage. I can take us right there."
    Brett sniffed loudly. "I still say it takes some swallowing. A stone castle with its own stardrive—I mean, how likely is that?"
    "The original Standing dates from the days of the First Empire," said Lewis. "They did things differently then, with knowledge and tech we can only dream of."
    "You know, I hate to agree with Brett, on principle," said Jesamine. "But it does seem awfully strange to me that there's absolutely no Imperial presence here. Not even a spy satellite. I mean, Finn must know about the Standing. Surely he'd have expected us to turn up here at some point?"
    "You would think so, wouldn't you?" said Lewis. "Maybe he's got problems at home, by now. We can't be the only people opposing him. Can we?"
    "I'm afraid I'm still completely cut off from the Empire," said Oz. "I have to run silent, to maintain full stealth capabilities. I have no information on what is happening elsewhere."
    "Hell," said Brett. "Maybe some kind soul has assassinated Finn bloody Durandal in