Текст книги "Precursor"

Автор книги: C. J. Cherryh

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Текущая страница: 29 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

“Adjacent,” Jase said. “Same area. If Sabin holds the hatch, they can’t get in, but if she thought human lives were threatened…”

“We’ve got to get down there. Up there. We can’t have Geigi threatening Phoenix, whatever else. The crew will think the worst.”

“His objective is the dockside,” Banichi said calmly. “And the safety of the shuttle.”

“Misunderstanding is all too possible in this situation. Banichi, they mustn’t go yet. Get word to them to hold.”

“We have no reliable contact with them,” Banichi said, “except by Phoenixitself, and we should not, Bren-ji, advise them Geigi is there. We cannot betray Lord Geigi. We will cost atevi lives and endanger the aishidi’tat.”

“We have to get up there,” Bren said. “We have to stop this before it blows up.”

Banichi offered no argument to that. “Cenedi. A potential associate holds the ship, Sabin-aiji; Ogun-aiji cannot be found. Ramirez-aiji is here, wounded and weak. Geigi, if he moves, will possibly create confusion of forces up on the dock.”

“Three quarters of an hour until Geigi moves, unless these humans move against the shuttle.”

“Ten minutes by lift for us to get up there,” Jase said. “Nadiin-ji, we must go, we must go now, to hold the docks open and prevent misunderstanding.” Negotiations were going on among Bobby’s group and Kaplan’s, in jargon and shorthand, a desperate, profane babble of argument. “Kaplan is in contact with Sabin. Shall we advise her we’re coming?”

“Tell her we’recoming, so she expects atevi.” Bren made the critical judgment, a commitment they had to take. “Don’t say a thing about atevi already up there. Don’t mention Lord Geigi.—Ginny. You’re going to have half a dozen security and a few of the atevi in your section, with Ben and Kate to translate. They’ll keep you safe. We’re going upstairs to try to defuse this before it blows.”

“I don’t like this,” Kroger said. “I don’t like this in the least. Let metalk to Sabin.”

“Do, if you can get through. Advise her to just keep that hatch shut. We’re trying to sort it out.”

“You will not go, Bren-ji,” Jago said. “Make no such plans.”

“Someone has to negotiate between the dowager and Sabin,” he said. One grew accustomed to gunfire, and lights going on and off, even to the notion of power cut to the whole station. He experienced no fear of those things; but of the random misunderstanding that could kill the whole enterprise and start another war… of that he was mortally afraid; and it was in his lap.

The dowager, God help them, and Lord Geigi.

And Sabin.

He attached himself to Banichi and Jago, with Jase tagging after him. “Let us go, Nadiin-ji. We have no time to debate this.”

“Go,” Banichi said; Kaplan also joined them, with all but two of the others in security gear, Tad having surrendered his to Andresson and others to Pressman and Johnson. Cenedi detailed ten men from his own force to remain on guard, communicating with them as they were moving out. Ten minutes just for the lift, Jase had said, and Bren walked fast, broke into a jog to keep up with Banichi’s long strides in the lead, and then the rest of the company began to hurry as fast as they could, down to the main corridor, to the lifts.

The buttons of the lift panel proved dead. There were no lights there. Banichi hesitated not the blink of an eye before starting to take the panel apart.

“Sabin’s going to clear it,” Kaplan said, and Bren put out a hand to prevent further disassembly.

The panel lights flashed on; the door responded tamely to a button-push as the car arrived.

“All of us? ”Jago asked.

“Best we arrive with force,” Banichi said. “Suggest, nadi, that Cl contact the shuttle crew and advise them that I am attempting to contact them.”

It seemed a very good idea. Bren relayed it to Kaplan, who called Cl on his suit-com. Meanwhile they crammed inside the car, wedging as tightly as they could.

The car started to move. Jase was looking up at the indicators when Bren looked his way, and they both stood as very short humans amid a crush of very tall, bullet-proofed atevi. Bren drew in his breath, having time now to be scared out of his mind, time to review the choices that had put them here, and all the hazards of their position. The car seemed to move more slowly than before, or his mind was racing faster. They committed themselves increasingly to Sabin and a set of switches all under her control, vulnerable to freezing cold, absolute dark, and a bad, bad situation for them if someone stalled the car in the system.

That Tamun might have access to those switches was not something he wanted to contemplate.

The car thumped, gathering speed. They were packed so tightly the eventual shifts of attitude did little to dislodge anyone, only that their whole mass increasingly acquired buoyancy.

Please God they got there, Bren thought, thinking of Tamun, and buttons. He watched the flashing lights change on the panel, counting. It was so crowded he couldn’t move his arm to draw the gun in his pocket, so crowded he fell into breathing in unison with Jago, whose deep breaths otherwise pressed at wrong times.

Three levels to go.

Two. They had no more gravity.

The car drifted to a stop, everyone floating as the door opened to a cold so intense it gave the illusion of vacuum.

Pellets hit and sparked around them, atevi spilled out of the car left and right, shoving to get clear and sailing off in the lack of gravity. Bren fended for himself, shoved off Tano, who was behind him, and flew free, trying to do what Jago had done and catch the edge of the door to stop herself and reach cover.

He tried. But a hit convulsed his leg with shock and prevented his grip on the door edge. A coruscation of impacts flared and crackled on the metal surfaces near him.

A human voice, Jase’s, shouted, “Ramirez! Ramirez is alive! Tamun’s done!”

He tumbled, instinct telling him doubling up would relieve the pain, intellect telling him it was a way to get killed. He tried for a handhold as he drifted by a pipe.

“Bren-ji!” A hand snagged him, pulled him toward safety.

A second electrical shock blew him aside: he tumbled high above the lift exit handlines, grabbed the icy cold surface of a hose with a bare hand and swung to a stop, or at least a change of view.

He saw Jago drifting loose trying to reach him in this illusion of dizzying height. And he saw a human in concealment with a gun, aiming up at her.

He fired without thinking, jolted himself loose from his grip and hit another solid surface hard. He rebounded, flying free from that, and tumbled, trying to get a view of Jago. He couldn’t see the man he’d fired at. He couldn’t hear anything but the fading echoes of fire.

He caught an elbow about a pipe, this time high above the shuttle exit. He couldn’t see Jago, but he saw that hatch open. He saw a number of atevi exiting on the handlines, all armed, all prepared for trouble, all capable of creating it.

“Lord Geigi!” he called out, twice, and on the second shout, a man paused on the line and looked up, or its apparent equivalent.

“Bren-ji!” Jago called him from somewhere distant. He knew he’d made a target of himself, shouting out; he knew his security disapproved.

“He’s up there!” he heard Jase shout.

It had become altogether embarrassing. His whole company was looking for him. He pocketed the gun, fearful of losing it, the final shame; and tried to hand his way along the pipe to whatever route down he could find. It was as if he hung in scaffolding three and four stories above the docking area, in a cavernous, cold place crossed with conduits and free-drifting hoses, where the physics of gunfire had sent him… predictable for anyone who thought twice. He didn’t know whether the shooting was over; he didn’t know whether those trying to retrieve him were placing themselves in danger.

He had no communications except shouting, and he had made enough racket. He began using the tail of his coat to insulate his hands from his grip on the pipes, and finally his rattled brain informed him that, yes, physics had gotten him up here and physics could get him down far faster than hand-over-handing down frozen pipes. He screwed up his courage, ignored the perspective and simply shoved off, flying free, down and down until he could tumble toward a low-impact landing.

He had come in reach of Jago’s outstretched hand… she snagged him by the sleeve and drew him aside to a safe, warm side. Banichi was there, waiting. Cenedi, too. He was thoroughly embarrassed.

“We shall have to give you a Guild license,” Banichi said. “It was Tamun you shot.”

“Did I shoot him?” He was appalled, utterly dismayed, his personal impartiality in disputes somehow affected. “Is he dead?”

“No,” Jago said, to his very odd relief, “but Jasi-ji has arrestedhim. I believe this is the correct word.”

They hovered, a small floating knot of what, after the far cold reaches of the girders, seemed friendly warmth. Jase was coming over to them, drifting along a handline, amid many more atevi than there had been.

Conspicuous among them, a very stout ateva in a thick winter seaman’s coat sailed along far too fast for safety, free of the handline.

“Lord Geigi,” Bren said. He was shivering too badly to effect the needed rescue, but Cenedi interposed a hand and brought the lord of the seacoast to a gentle halt.

“This is remarkable, Nadiin,” Lord Geigi said, his gold eyes shining, and an uncommon flush to his ebon face. “This is quite remarkable. Have we won? And what are we fighting about?”

“One trusts so,” Bren began to say, and then saw three of the human workers drifting toward him.

With them came a human also in the garish orange of the dock workers, a man with a dark, completely familiar face, a man who was armed, Bren very much suspected; but there was no brandishing of threat, no hesitation in approaching them: this was a man who considered the place his.

“Captain Ogun,” Bren hailed the newcomer, and there was a quiet, tense meeting, Ogun with him.

“Captain Ogun,” Jase said. “Captain Ramirez has set me in the fourth seat. His authority. I’m taking third, until he’s back on line to say otherwise. Tamun’s under guard. Dresh will be, when he comes out.”

Ogun never changed expression. “You have the codes?”

“Since I was with the old man in the tunnels. I can key in,” Jase said with no friendliness in his voice. “ Trustme that I can. I’m not proposing to keep the seat. Only to keep it warm.”

“Good sense,” Ogun said, as if words were gold, and scarce. “Tamun is out. Dresh is out. You have that third seat. You’ll have it until the Council meets. Then we’ll discuss it.”

“I’ll step down at that time,” Jase said. “Damned fast. I’ve no desire to sit on Council, let alone hold a chair.”

“First qualification of the job,” Ogun said. “Is Tamun alive?”

“Alive,” Jase said. “He’s become a Council problem.”

“A hellof a council problem,” Ogun said, and touched a metal collar beneath the gaudy orange suit. “Sabe. We’ve caught Tamun. Jase is third man, Ramirez’s appointment. And mine. We’ve got more atevi aboard, another important one, looks to be. They were waiting… to see what we’d do, apparently. Yes. We gave them a hell of a show, didn’t we? Now we’ve got to find beds for the lot. Sabe, pull all crew onto the ship. Council is going to meet. We need to patch what’s ripped. We need it very badly.”

Sabin must have answered him then.

“Done. You’re clear,” Ogun said, looking out into the vacant recesses of the dock. “Hold where you are. There’s no need for you to come out until this is absolutely stable.”

Then he diverted that flat stare to Bren. “Well, Mr. Cameron.”

“Well, sir. I’m very glad you escaped. I feared you hadn’t. They hit us on the way out of your office.”

“Frank?”

“Could use a hospital. He’s with Dr. Kroger.”

Ogun stared at him a moment with a wry, misgiving expression. “Agreements stand. You’ll have what resources you need. Turn over all prisoners, all casualties to us. Systems you’ve damaged, Mr. Cameron, ultimately, you fix.”

“Those within our reach,” Bren said. “Fortunately not as long a tab as might have been.” His hands were beyond feeling. The leg still hurt and had cramped from the shock, his heart still tending to skip and flutter. He wanted nothing so much as to find a place with air, warmth, and the simple, blessed illusion of gravity and things staying put.

But instead of doubling up to indulge the pain, he had to translate the amenities, the meeting of a Lord of the Association, Lord Geigi, who insisted on trading pleasantries with the acting senior captain of the Pilots’ Guild… very slow, very formal pleasantries, in which, toward the end, his teeth were chattering. Jase was doing no better.

“Tea,” Geigi declared at last. “Do we float about up here like fish? I confess I could do with a hot pot of tea, indeed I could, and maybe a dose of something besides. I trust the dowager has established some sort of comfort. Has she not?”

“Beyond any doubt,” Cenedi said, while Bren found it enough simply to drift unmoving until Jago drew him back toward the lift, and a far less crowded descent.

Banichi provided his coat, warm from his body, and Jago another, for Jase, who was in worse case, and feeling the strain on bruised ribs. Kaplan and his friends had come down. Geigi rode with them, and Geigi’s personal guard had come. Cenedi, however, had stayed above, with Tano, to assure no misunderstandings broke forth.

Tano had suggested they send for Ben Feldman, and Bren thought it a very good idea. Ben would take to the moment he’d waited for all his long education, his one chance to deal with the interface when it meant the most, and Bren reminded himself that he had to talk to Kroger, advise her, get Ramirez to the best care they could find. And Frank. Frank, too. Everyone they could gather up who’d had the worst of this clash of old suspicions and new ambitions. He relayed that to Kaplan, who relayed it all to Cl, and presumably to Sabin and Ogun.

Jase was going down for his own coat, and was going up again when he’d rested. Ramirez had saddled him with responsibilities Jase didn’t particularly want, but wouldn’t shirk. He’d become an acting captain, in Tamun’s place, and didn’t want that, either, but someone had to do it.

And he had to tell his mother he was still alive, against all likelihood to the contrary.

Tea seemed a very good idea, too, meanwhile, a bed even more so, and Bren hoped for both not far from where the lift let them out. Jase had picked the level and the area as they got in.

Their feet met the floor more and more firmly and the very air seemed to grow warmer and warmer… perhaps it was illusion, but he felt it finally gave him enough oxygen by the time they reached their destination and exited into the corridors.

But they were not deserted corridors. Crew were gathering up baggage, leaving rooms… just that fast, the order had come down to them to vacate the station, to take up residence again on the ship.

To mend things, Ogun had said, to heal what was ripped up by conflict.

Not to stay walled in their metal shell while the whole station was rebuilt, Bren was resolved in his own heart. They should not do that. They would mend the interface, supply Kaplan and his friends with enough fruit-sugars to keep them sleepless, teach the wanderers the value of planets, the ultimate, luxurious and rare beauty of the world.

Meanwhile he just wanted to get through the corridors without getting shot by one of Tamun’s resentful cousins. Narani and Bindanda were advised; the dowager was advised. They might arrive with an untidy amount of curiosity at their heels, but the doors would open, their own refuge would swallow them up… they’d get that pot of tea, the hot bath, the bed he was sure Bindanda had ready for him.

An old man, an innocuous old man, stood ahead of them, staring a moment at what had arrived in his vicinity and overturned his orderly if extraordinary life. Many of the crew were old. A few were not. More individuals came out of various rooms along the route, setting baggage out to return to cramped quarters on the ship.

Then a farther section opened, giving up a handful of young people, both male and female, who stood at a distance: curiosity had become a crowd.

“Walk easily, nandiin-ji,” Banichi said calmly in Ragi. “Think of a village, in which the inhabitants have come out to inquire of their lords, and to discover whether the danger is yet past.”

“They say the old lady’s coming,” Kaplan said, being tapped into Cl through his earpiece. “They want to see her. The crew’s heard about the old lady coming out. They want to see you. They want to see her.”

“They wish to see the aiji dowager,” Banichi repeated, as if to be sure he had heard that right.

“The gran” Kaplan said. “The lady.”

And indeed, from the intersection, from their own section, in fact, a small party had opened the doors: a party of atevi, black-clad and glittering with silver of their Guild, had set out toward them, a smallish ateva in the center of it all, walking with her cane.

“That’s her, isn’t it?” Andresson said. “That’s the old woman with them.”

“They intend no disrespect,” Jase said quickly. “It’s like saying, the aiji.The old woman. The grandmother. Tabini sending her… that’s the ultimate negotiator. The old women don’t get into anything until it’s over.”

It was what Jase had always told him. Women were the peacemakers, the ones immune from quarrels, the ones who didn’t fight.

They’d never in their lives met Tabini’s grandmother.

But somehow he thought ‘Sidi-ji would take a very smug delight in the respects of humans.

Among atevi, too, it was the aijiin who came out to gather up the pieces, the survivors, and paste an association back together by their mere presence. When they were there, the fighting had stopped.

It wasn’t necessary they speak the same language, when the results were acceptable on both sides.

Chapter 28

I had a message from Tabini, his mother had written him, amid a surreal stack of messages some of which advertised skiing vacations on Mt. Thomas, and investments in real estate.

He’s quite worried about you. I assured him you were fine.

Barb is awake and asking about you. I told her you were on the space station and she told me not to make jokes like that, but then I told her it isn’t a joke, unfortunately.

The guards are everywhere. They won’t let me in the lounge to watch television so I get no news at all, but they did drive me home, which is the first sleep I’ve gotten with all that’s going on, and I cleaned your room. I found one of your cufflinks. I think it’s probably an expensive one. I’ll keep it for you.

I still haven’t had a call from Toby but I did get a card from the kids, which, would you believe, your security people had to give to me? They’re going through my mail. I don’t know but what Toby’s called and they won’t let him talk to me. I think it’s completely unnecessary. What do they think? That my sons are the problem?

Barb says you should hurry and get back. Paul hasn’t even come to see her. She’s talking about a divorce, finally, which I think is a good idea and long overdue.

It was the first of three letters, all similar. The dam had broken. Cl had sent him all the backed-up mail.

He had numerous communications from various committee members and members of the hasdrawad and the tashrid awaiting his attention… one official letter, too, from the Mospheiran State Department, saying in essence that various personal matters were secured. That was a relief. There was no reasonable threat aimed at his family.

And there was a message from Toby, that said, shortly and simply,

From somewhere off the coast. Curious to think you’re floating over our heads while we’re floating down here. We lie on the deck and watch the clouds and we remind ourselves the world is pretty special.

So are you, brother. We both think so.

Gratifying. A relief to know they were safe. A little bit of jealousy to know they were enjoying themselves. He could see them. In this place of machine-fabricated corridors, he could see that blue sky and feel the pitch of the waves under him.

He and his mission weren’t coming home when the shuttle came down again. Neither, to his slight dismay, was the dowager, who had, in fact, invited up the Astronomer Emeritus, who expected to see stars and nebulae for his pains.

That viewing had to be arranged.

The whole damned court was clamoring to have a view of the heavens… and of their station, while Mospheira was completely wound up in the released archive, and suing one another over broadcast rights.

He let Bindanda slip his coat onto his arms, shrugged it into place and shut down the computer before he fussed with the lace. He missed that cufflink, half of his favorite set, that didn’t muss the pressed lace getting it in.

Formal tea with the dowager, with the paidhiin collectively, andtheir families, which necessarily involved an acting captain.

He had extreme reservations about this event, but hoped for the best.

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