'That's me. Alex Ryder. And you?'
Alex climbed out of bed and went to stand before the life-sized holoFac.
The old man watched him, and chewed. Then he spat. The gobbet of stained spittle seemed to fly straight towards Alex's shoulder and he winced and jerked slightly to one side, before realising that nothing could travel into real space from the holo.
'You don't remember me,' the old man said. 'That's clear enough. But I remember you.'
'Give me a name.'
'Rafe Zetter. Trader of old. Traded with your father for many years, till we parted company on account of a certain issue which, you might say…caused a difference of opinion between us.'
'Slaves,' Alex said quickly. He remembered Rafe, now. But what had happened to the man? He was old before his time. He was the same age as Jason Ryder would have been, but looked twenty years more.
'Slaves is right,' Rafe said. 'I ran my life on the edge of a Viper's sting…' trader parlance for 'one jump ahead of the law'. 'But by the time I indulged that little whim, my ass was hard iron. I somehow made it to hell 'n back. That's where I am now.'
'In hell?'
'Broke. '
Alex nodded, picking up slowly on the trader slang. An 'iron ass' was a ship that was well enough defended — shields, missiles and lasers — to make a skim run through any system at all, even an anarchist's paradise like Sotiqu. All hell and then some would come at you if you tried to trade in such a chaotic system. 'Hell 'n back' meant that Rafe had tasted the good life, bought with the profits of his illegal trading, but that it had all gone wrong.
It always went wrong.
Rafe said, 'I was damn sorry to hear about Jason. A good man. A good friend of old, and a man I still respect.'
'It didn't happen but eight hours ago,' Alex said coldly. 'How the hell do you get to hear about it.'
Rafe Zetter chuckled, then spat again, and again Alex couldn't help ducking. The spittle vanished at the holoFac's edge, and Alex felt a chill of irritation. 'You got your father's temper, young Alex. Maybe you've even got some of his skills.'
'Answer my question, old man. How do you manage to know about my father?
How did you find me?'
Watching him from the holo, Rafe chewed, smiled and considered. Alex tensed, waiting for the next high velocity spit-transmission.
Rafe said, 'I repeat, Alex. I had great respect for Jason Ryder. For what he was, and what he was doing.'
'He was a good man,' Alex said. 'And an honest trader.'
'He was a damn sight more than that,' Rafe said loudly, and spat. Alex dodged. The ghostly holoFac image shimmered and blurred slightly.
'What does that mean?'
Rafe Zetter leaned forward so that his grizzled features seemed almost able to kiss the younger man. 'He was a combateer, Alex. One of the best. No way should he have died like he did…'
'My father was a trader, not a combateer,' Alex said, startled and disturbed by what Rafe was implying.
'Guess again, sonny.'
'But it sickened him to fire shots in anger.'
'Maybe,' Rafe said drily. 'But it didn't stop him. How else do you think he made it as a trader all those years? Dammit, Alex, even if your cargo is sour-cream and pickles there's someone's going to try and take it from you.
Your father was a combateer of the highest calibre…?'
Alex swallowed heavily, staring at the quizzical features of old Rafe Zetter. 'The highest calibre…?'
Rafe nodded. 'That's right, Alex,' he said softly. 'You can be deadly, you can be dangerous, and you can end up as pet food in orbit around a dog's ass-of-a-world like Isveve. But if you're йlite, and you die, then there's a reason for your death…'
What was this old man saying? Elite? An йlite combateer? Alex's head span.
He knew all about the space pilots who'd earned that title, of course. Few of them did. To be йlite in combat was to be… well, as near invincible as made no odds. A great many pilots were 'dangerous'; you didn't last long as a trader if you weren't. Many more had earned the classification
'deadly'. So had a lot of mercenaries. So had a lot of pirates.
But йlites. Few and far between.
And his father, Jason Ryder, had been йlite, and none of his family had known!
'Jason was one of the very best. You probably never saw his ship, but it was like a fortress. He traded places that most of us would have had nightmares about.' Rafe shook his head admiringly. 'One of the best. A man of the highest calibre…' His gaze hardened on Alex. 'The question is…Can you be the same?'
'What makes you doubt it?'
'Jason never said anything about you. I guess he was trying to protect you.
The trouble is that it gives me nothing to go on: you're going to avenge your father's death — I can tell that from the look of you, and your tone, and your anger — but for all I know, that'll just mean one more Ryder will be stardust before he even manages to target a missile.'
Not liking Rafe Zetter's tone, Alex said bitterly, 'I've done hours of SimCombat. I score highly…'
Rafe laughed and spat voluminously, then became serious.
'Alex, there's something I've got to know. Maybe you're going to end up—'
'Pet food in orbit around Isveve!'
'Yeah. Maybe that. The only person who knew your talents was your father.
Tell me, Alex, and tell me true, now…Did he say anything to you…you know…in the moments before he died? Did he indicate anything, or say anything?'
'He said a lot,' Alex murmured, and felt a strong pang of grief as he remembered the look in his father's eyes, the greyness of his cheeks, and his desperate words, remember me, Alex…'I think he knew he was going to die. The last thing he said was the word Raxxla. I don't know what that is.
An alien, I guess…'
Rafe smiled, shaking his head. Suddenly there was a brilliant sparkle in his eyes: 'Raxxla's no alien, Alex. It's a ghost world. A planet. A legend…' He hesitated, staring quizzically at the younger man through the distant link between them, 'Jason really said that to you?'
Alex nodded. 'Moments before… It was the last thing he said.'