STARDANCER

by Ed Howdershelt

  It was T'Var's turn to laugh. "Just see what you can come up with, without doing either of those things," he said. "Drop the field and let me have a word with T'Lek."

  L'Tan snapped the field off and took a seat. T'Mar went to stand near the door's vid plate. T'Var's face appeared next to T'Lek's in a split-screen view.

  T'Var said, "T'Lek, I can't promise you wealth or even a quick ride to Saxet, but if you have a minute, I'd like to ask you something."

  T'Lek grinningly said, "Oh, I think I can spare the time, Captain."

  "Good. Would your deep, dark secret have to do with a virus attack?"

  T'Lek's face froze, then his grin disappeared in a mask of confusion.

  "You know about that? How..?"

  "You're a little late in getting that information to us, T'Lek. Our people already know all about it. What else can you trade for all that money?"

  For a long moment, T'Lek seemed to be overcoming his startlement and gathering his thoughts, then he paled and said, "You wouldn't have known about the virus, Captain. Maybe the top people in the Confederation would know, but not a ship's captain. They've already used it, haven't they?"

  T'Var nodded gravely. "They've used it."

  T'Lek paled further and seemed to stagger slightly. Another face appeared in the vid screen; one of the women.

  "I'm L'Fen. I was one of the teachers at the consulate. You're saying that the Eiranians attacked the Confederation with a virus?"

  T'Var nodded again and said, "Yes. About the same time they attacked the consulate, we think."

  "How bad... I mean..."

  T'Var cleared his throat and said, "It appears that they were very successful, I'm afraid. I can't give you more information than that at the moment."

  "What? Why?"

  "Because I don't know more than that, ma'am. I don't have information to give you."

  "That's why we're locked in here, isn't it? You think we could be infected."

  "That's right. We couldn't leave you down there, but we're being careful."

  After a moment, L'Fen nodded.

  "I understand and the others will, too, even if they don't at the moment. Thank you for coming for us. How long will we be quarantined?"

  "Two weeks at least. We think that's the life span of the virus."

  A woman off-screen asked, "What's being done about the Eiranians?"

  T'Var said, "I can't tell you anything over an open comm link. Is T'Lek available?"

  "I'm here," said T'Lek in a tired voice from somewhere off-screen.

  He gently displaced L'Fen and asked, "What about Saxet?"

  T'Var wiped his face with a hand and sighed.

  "I'm not at liberty to discuss... As I said, this is an open comm link."

  "To hell with that, Captain. What possible difference could it make if you tell me about Saxet?"

  "Whether it would make a difference or not, I can't discuss the matter. I do, however, need to know if you have any other information that would benefit the Confederation at a time like this, T'Lek."

  "No," said T'Lek. "Nothing."

  "You're sure? You gave us the impression earlier..."

  T'Lek's hand slammed against the wall below the vid panel.

  "I said no. Nothing. I'm through talking for now, Captain."

  "I see. All right, then. Let us know if you think of anything. Out."

  T'Var severed his link to the door's vid screen, but not the one to L'Tan's console.

  "L'Tan. T'Mar. He knows something. I'll pass a copy of our conversation to T'Bar's people and ask if they know anything we can use to pry the info out of him. See if you can fish up some idea of what he's hiding from us. T'Var out."

  "Great," said L'Tan. "Got any ideas, T'Mar?"

  "Nothing civilized. Nothing that wouldn't involve opening that door."

  L'Tan shook her head. "Then things are as they are for now."

  The fighters stationed around the transport peeled away as they neared the Alliance. L'Tan synched the transport's orbit of Eirania with Alliance's at a distance of one hundred yards and then cut the engines.

  From the control room door came a light, metallic tapping.

  L'Tan said, "You want to get that?"

  "I thought it was your turn to get the door."

  L'Tan stretched out, leaned her seat back, and smilingly said, "But I'm terribly busy at the moment."

  The tapping came again. T'Mar shook his head and pushed the vid button. L'Fen's face appeared.

  He asked, "Yes?"

  "Uh, well, we were looking through the other cabins and found... Things. We don't know what to do with them. And we need a few things, ourselves."

  "You mean you found personal effects from the previous crew?"

  "Yes."

  "Pile everything up somewhere out of the way. Use a utility closet. We'll let someone else worry about the stuff later. Make yourselves at home."

  "Uh, okay. But we need things for the children and ourselves that don't seem to be aboard, or that there aren't enough of to go around."

  "Toothbrushes, bedding, stuff like that? They'll get some over to us from the Alliance. Make a list and call it in. I'll leave the intership vid system on for you."

  L'Fen's face brightened a bit and she almost smiled.

  "Oh. Okay, then. Thank you. Uh, should I say 'out' now?"

  "Out, goodbye, or whatever you like."

  "Uh, well, goodbye for now, then."

  T'Mar smiled at her and said, "Bye, L'Fen. Things'll be fine," then he closed the comm link. L'Tan was grinning at him.

  "What?" he asked.

  "She's kind of cute for a refugee, don't you think? I mean, in a lost, helpless-victim sort of way?"

  "Oh, definitely. Someone will think she was made for him."

  "But not you?"

  "Nope. She's not my favorite flavor."

  L'Tan laughed. "Flavor? And me? Am I the right flavor?"

  "You've certainly seemed to be so far. Too bad there's no shower in here, or I'd confirm that for you."

  "What?" L'Tan looked around the control room and spotted only the toilet cabinet. "Oh, damn. You're right. How are we going..? T'Mar, we're going to have to do something. I am not going two weeks without a bath."

  "...And I thank you for that wholeheartedly, ma'am. We'll work out something, L'Tan. Maybe what we need is a small ship of our own. Want to go back and steal another one?"

  "It might be easier to explain the situation and see if T'Var has something else we could use. This thing won't need a pilot if we slave the controls to the Alliance."

  "Well, damn. Where's your sense of adventure, all of a sudden?"

  L'Tan grinningly suggested where he could put his sense of adventure and signaled the Alliance. Tac answered the call, and after hearing the problem, he said they'd have a look in the inventory and see what might be available for duty as an orbital bathtub.

  L'Fen opened a vid link while they were waiting and L'Tan relayed the refugees' list of necessities to the Alliance.

  When Tac called back a few minutes later, he offered them a ten-man shuttle that had been destined for decommissioning before the incident on Eirania.

  "I can have it at your doorstep in another hour or so. There's a catch, though."

  "A catch?" asked L'Tan.

  "Just a small one. You get to put your lifesuits on and transfer supplies for the others before you jump ship. We're loading them now."

  T'Mar said, "No problem. Just park it by the middle airlock. I don't want to do an actual docking."

  "That's understandable."

  "By the way, Tac, there are probably other lifesuits in the back of this bus, and at least one of our passengers could probably figure out your hatch locking codes."

  "Good thinking, T'Mar, but all of our hatches have had extra security since before you parked out there, and one of the big guns is pointed right at you."

  "How comforting," said L'Tan.

  "Sorry, L'Tan. We can't afford..."

  "Yeah,
I know. Don't worry, I'd have done the same thing."

  When Tac signed off, L'Tan called L'Fen and told her to have people ready to move supplies out of the airlock. As she turned around, L'Tan saw T'Mar put their E-rifles by the hatch and load their pistols and remaining grenades into a mesh bag.

  "Are you planning to attack someone?" she asked.

  "I want this stuff with us," he said. "I also think Tac would feel better if we disable the gun on this transport, but I don't know how."

  L'Tan tapped the console and asked, "Tac, how can we spike the cannon on this thing?"

  "Let me look it up. Hold one... Got it. This is a code that will eject the focusing array for service. Take it out and hang onto it for a while."

  L'Tan entered the code. A crystal tube gently levered away from the firing console. T'Mar put it in the mesh bag with the weapons.

  "That's it?" he asked.

  "That's it. The gun can't fire without it. Look out your front window."

  Chapter Seventeen

  The smaller vessel launched from bay one seemed to be heading directly at the nose of their transport until it stopped a few yards away. The computer that was remotely flying the craft brought it alongside the transport made it rotate until the loading hatch was lined up with the transport's left-side airlock, then signaled completion of the task.

  L'Tan accepted control of the new craft and ordered it to open its airlock, then she and T'Mar suited up and slithered out the escape hatch, using the suits' directionals to approach and enter the smaller vessel's cargo airlock.

  Seemingly above the two ships, the Alliance hung motionless in space, obscuring the sun. Below them, Eirania was a multicolored ball of whites, blues, and browns, her details clear in the middle and hazy toward the horizons.

  As the airlock was closing, L'Tan said, "Damn. Whoever owned this suit last never had it cleaned and never bathed. Let's get this job done."

  When pressure had equalized and the inner door opened, they found two stacks of supply containers in the cargo bay, one large and one small. On top of the smaller stack was a note taped to a container. It read: 'Heard about your trip. Open this box someplace private. Best wishes, L'Sil.'

  L'Tan laughed and asked, "Someplace private? This tub doesn't qualify?"

  "She didn't address it to you or me, so it must be for us, right?"

  "I guess we'll find out when we open it."

  T'Mar tapped the vid screen on and called the transport. When T'Lek answered, he said, "I'm going to use a tether to string the containers together and attach it to your hull ring, just outside the lock. All you have to do is haul in the tether, take the containers off, and leave the line hanging outside when you close the lock."

  T'Lek said that L'Fen and two other women were already in lifesuits and ready to go to work. T'Mar didn't ask why T'Lek wouldn't be hauling containers with the others, but T'Lek answered the unasked question, anyway, with a sigh.

  "None of the suits would fit me. They're all mediums. All four of them. I've always wanted to suit up and hang in space, just for the hell of it. Now, here I am, but the damned suits don't fit."

  T'Mar laughed and said, "I'll look up front. If I find a large, I'll send it over."

  "He can have this one," said L'Tan, quickly stripping out of her suit. "It's a large, and I won't be needing it. I'll be in the control room."

  T'Mar laughed again. "She says the previous owner never cleaned it, T'Lek. Hope you can enjoy using it."

  "If I have to, I'll wash it out later. Thanks."

  T'Mar threaded a tether through as many containers as possible, then linked another tether to the first so he could hook the load on the transport's ring. L'Tan stuffed her suit into the first box, then went into the control room.

  "L'Tan, let's do this in one-quarter gravity. That's a lot of containers to pull."

  "One-quarter, it is. I'll advise the others... No, I won't. They can't get into the control room and Alliance is running their ship. Alliance, come in."

  Tac said, "Alliance, here."

  "Tac, we're going to one-quarter grav. Would you warn the others and put the transport at one-quarter while we shove boxes around?"

  "Will do. Give me a minute, then proceed."

  T'Mar cycled the airlock and leaped at the transport. Once there, he gathered up the tether's slack in a few loops, pulled the load out of the smaller vessel's bay and into space, then shoved off the transport's hull to return to the smaller ship.

  "L'Tek," he said, "You have a delivery. About three more to go, I think."

  "Thank you. L'Fen would like you to keep an eye on them. None of them has ever been outside a ship."

  L'Fen said, "I'm in my suit. I can hear you. Can you hear me?"

  "We hear you," said T'Mar. "None of you needs to go outside the airlock, and make sure you're all tethered inside the lock. Just grab the line and pull the stuff aboard."

  "Okay."

  He heard L'Fen ask the others if they could hear her and heard their replies, then the transport's airlock door opened and he heard the collective gaspings and a small, soft shriek as the ladies got their first view of open space.

  T'Mar could see that none of the three women was moving so much as a hair; they were stunned by the view and frozen, clutching each other and their tethers.

  "Ladies, you aren't standing on a ledge. You can't fall. You can drift, but that's why you're tethered. Can any of you answer me?"

  L'Fen made an effort. In a high-pitched, gasping voice, she said, "Ah... Ah... I... I hear you."

  "Good, good. Take a long look, then turn around and give your tethers a hard yank, okay? Everybody check everybody's hookups."

  "...A what..? A hard yank?"

  "Yup. A hard yank. Make sure they're secured. Do it now. Everybody do it."

  He watched as they stiffly, haltingly milled around, yanking at their tethers. After a few moments, they again stood staring across at him.

  "Okay," said L'Fen. "We've checked our tethers. Now what?"

  "Well, I guess you could kind of ease yourselves over to the door and pull that stuff in. Yeah. That would be real good, I think. What do you think?"

  A moment passed before she said, "I think you can be a real smartass, T'Mar."

  L'Tan laughed. "That's the way to tell him, L'Fen."

  As she moved to the door, L'Fen asked, "Does he talk to you like that, L'Tan?"

  "Never. I'd fire him and replace him with the next pretty face on the list."

  "You keep a list?" asked T'Mar. "I should have known."

  "Damned right I keep a list. You know how flighty men are."

  People have to learn some things the hard way in quarter-G. L'Fen pulled the tether too hard and wound up floating between the cargo and the door. She screamed and thrashed gaspingly for a moment, then found her tether and began pulling herself back to the airlock.

  T'Mar asked, "Uhm, do you have everything under control, now, L'Fen?"

  In a tense voice, she answered, "Let's just say that I'm new to this. Do you suppose you could watch without commenting?"

  "Oh. Well. Yes, ma'am. Damned sorry I let myself be concerned, y'know?"

  L'Fen giggled and said, "Oh, shut up, please. I have enough to think about."

  "L'Tan, why are women always telling me to shut up?"

  L'Tan laughed and said, "I'm sure I have no idea, T'Mar."

  When the other women had helped L'Fen back into the lock, they managed to organize themselves into a team of sorts and pulled together to haul in the load. As the lock door slid shut, T'Mar activated his own airlock's cycle.

  During the next transfer of supplies there were four lifesuits in the transport's airlock. One was a head taller than the others, and that one went to stand in the lock's door for some time, maintaining a two-handed grip on his tether while staring at his surroundings.

  L'Tan finally said, "Hey, tourist. Give the ladies a hand pulling that load in."

  "Oh. Yes. I completely forgot why I was out here. Sorry. Isn't it m
arvelous?"

  "Sure it is, T'Lek. I just prefer to marvel from inside a ship. Ever hear of micrometeorites?"

  "What? Yes, certainly. But they're rather rare, aren't they?"

  "Not rare enough to suit me. I've seen what they can do to unshielded hulls. There's less of that crap in a high orbit, but you still might want to get a move on."

  "Oh. Yes. Of course."

  He slip-stepped over to help the others, got a grip on the tether, and promptly pulled himself out of the airlock, just as L'Fen had, with a small yell of startlement and much thrashing about until he hit the end of the tether.

  The giggling laughter didn't completely die down until he was back aboard. He irritatedly pushed the ladies aside, then hauled on the tether by himself to get the load moving toward the door.

  T'Mar asked, "T'Lek, weren't you watching when L'Fen did that?"

  T'Lek answered tersely, "Yes. I was listening when L'Fen asked you to watch without commenting, too."

  "Oh, hey, I'm just trying to be fair, you know. I teased L'Fen, so I had to tease you, too. Especially since you watched her do it before you did it yourself. Heh."

  Someone snickered. T'Lek looked around, but couldn't spot the offender. He stayed turned too long, and the load of containers bulled past him into the lock, shoving him to one side. There were more snickers and one outright laugh as the cluster of containers entered the gravity field and slid to a halt on the deck.

  T'Lek picked himself up and wordlessly unhooked the outside tether from the load, then tossed it out the door. He then punched the lock's cycle button and stood stiffly in the doorway as the lock closed.

  Two more transfers finished the job. T'Mar floated across and disconnected the exterior tether from the transport, then jumped back and cycled the lock. L'Tan was standing outside the inner door to help him skin out of his lifesuit.

  "Fields are up," she said. "Tac turned them on for us as soon as you were back inside. I've moved us a hundred yards away from the transport, too, on general principles. I've adjusted the grav field to one-third because my back's starting to hurt. Is there anything else we need to do in here?"

  "Nope. Finished," he said. "Now we can see about that shower, if you want."