A Hop, Skip and a Jump (Family Law Book 4)

by Mackey Chandler

  Heather looked thoughtful.

  "I can almost hear the gears whirring," Jeff accused. "What are you thinking?"

  "If you're buying that much intelligence, surely you could resell some of it," Heather said.

  "That will require new people too. It has to be checked not to be self-damaging foremost, matched to its market, rebundled, and the serial numbers filed off, but I think you are right. We could recoup some expenses. I'll direct Chen to make a plan to do that," Jeff conceded.

  "After lunch," Heather insisted. Jeff could neglect himself over work.

  "After lunch," Jeff agreed.

  Heather said nothing further, keeping her own counsel, and being careful of her face for Jeff. Heather hadn't told him everything she was thinking. The progression they saw the Derfhome team following convinced her it was just a matter of time before they had to deal with them having just as good a drive as Central had.

  * * *

  "I've never lifted in a private shuttle," Sally noted from beside Lee. The acceleration was a moderate three Gs, so it wasn't that difficult to talk. Lee had briefly worried even that much would be a problem for the elderly lady, but she didn't seem bothered at all. Being rail thin might be a big help with that.

  Lee had the crew chatter in one ear, turned low so she wasn't really following everything, but if their tone changed she'd know immediately. Talker hadn't been offended when she said she wanted to sit beside Sally. Ha-bob-bob-brie was aboard and she had no idea why, but it wasn't a good time to go ask Gordon.

  "We took a commercial shuttle down at Fargone recently," Lee said. "It was much nicer, luxurious actually. They finish off the interior with panels and hid anything functional like cables and conduits. The seats were even softer, but that kind of put me off for some reason."

  That seemed to amuse Sally. "The luxury is in having it at your beck and call. Also, it didn't pass my attention this is a combat shuttle. That's another sort of luxury. I assume it wasn't stripped out for civilian use?"

  "No this is a captured shuttle. In fact it's still mildly radioactive. Not enough to worry about, even if you accumulate some hours in it, but still detectable. It not only came intact, with medium range missiles and auto-cannon, but we've upgraded some of the systems to Fargoer standards. The combat software and defensive missile systems are much better, almost up to New Japan standards. The missiles were all conventional and now we carry two with serious warheads that can deal with a real ship, if one is silly enough to come within range. Plain fusion weapons, not X-heads, but get one in close and they'll ruin your day."

  "Or make it as the case may be," Sally said with a feral smile.

  Gordon, on the other side of the aisle, was sitting with his seat set vertical, three G's not even inhibiting him from continuing to enjoy his mug of coffee. He was looking over, taking in their conversation and not trying to appear disinterested in it at all.

  "The flight deck is modified to seat a Derf on one side now, just like where I'm sitting used to be two Human seats," Gordon explained. "The hatch had to be switched out for a bigger one, but the lock works for one Derf at a time."

  "I had my doubts watching you," Sally admitted. "I thought you might need to be greased up to be forced through."

  "I'll have you know, we tried it, and we can get a small Derf through the lock with a suit on," Gordon claimed.

  "But what if you need to get a large Derf back out the lock with a suit on?" Sally asked.

  "He goes last, and makes his own expedient opening," Gordon said, stroking the ax head sticking up from his belt by way of explanation.

  "Believe it or not, I saw an old video of a Human doing the same thing," Sally remembered.

  "With an ax?" Gordon wondered, interested.

  "No, no. This was before I left Earth, some years ago, and it made the rounds of the net for awhile and then would reappear periodically when somebody would find it that hadn't seen it before. Supposedly some fool locked this Home fellow in a cabin as a holding cell and he took serious exception to it. He ripped the bunk rails out that were welded to the deck and made his own hatch in the bulkhead."

  The acceleration finally made her pause to breathe a little extra.

  "People argued over whether it was fake, because it opened with him snapping the chain on a pair of old fashioned hand cuffs. A lot of people didn't believe that was possible. A common belief expressed was it was just a propaganda film to depict the Spacers as super-human and dishearten the Earthies. When we're on the Moon I'll do a net search and show it to you. It should be easy to find in historic – videos – humor. It's a classic."

  "Video? I want to meet this guy and recruit him," Gordon said.

  Sally laughed. "It's been so long, he'd probably breach the bulkhead with his walker now."

  Gordon and Lee thought the same thing and looked at each other knowingly across her. Neither wanted to ruin a light-hearted moment by harping on how much she was going to have to alter her assumptions about age and aging the same as they had.

  Chapter 21

  The XO made the extraordinary sacrifice of his tiny cabin for Sally. He bunked with crew and extra accommodations were created with temporary fixtures in the largest hold that had environmental service. Lee and Gordon shared space because they found it easy. Lee was surprised to find out Talker was sharing space with Ha-bob-bob-brie.

  "Why is Ha-bob-bob-brie along?" Lee asked of Gordon when she saw the Hin.

  Gordon very briefly flashed a look of embarrassment and then recovered, hiding it, but Lee knew him too well and saw it.

  "He simply insisted he be allowed to come along," Gordon said, and then uncomfortably added, "for you."

  "For me? Since when does Ha-bob-bob-brie insist on anything to you? He works for you," Lee reminded Gordon. "You could fire him for insubordination."

  "I wouldn't have had the pleasure, he was prepared to quit if he couldn't come along as your body guard. He made it clear his rejection would be damaging far beyond such trivial matters as his employment. He said it would do damage between the Hinth and our races."

  "I could have asked for Garrett to come and stand behind me," Lee said. "I bet the Mothers would have sent him, and he'd have been impressive in all that fancy ceremonial armor. Maybe I should have asked for him. It might have given me status and some pomp with these folks who like their royalty."

  "Impressive yes, but I suspect Ha-b0b-bob-brie is faster and more lethal," Gordon said,

  "The other Hinth think he's crazy," Lee reminded him. "I can't imagine he has any racial authority to be speaking for them. I'm amazed you are even admitting this. Why didn't you just tell me you decided I needed a bodyguard and assigned him?"

  "I don't lie to you," Gordon objected.

  "No, but if there is a choice of several truths you could pick the one that puts you in the most favorable light," Lee said.

  "It's too complicated to play those sort of games," Gordon said. "That truth is so far off center it would feel deceptive to me. Yeah, I agreed and gave the order, but under duress, not of my own originality. You might find out. Ha-bob-bob-brie himself might say something. He may be crazy by Hinth standards but the Hinth do things differently than Derf or Humans. He said that for better or for worse once he 'removed the mask' with you and shared his name you became a concern of the Hinth."

  "Oh sweet screaming little goddesses, I'm having trouble sorting that word out in three different languages," Lee complained.

  Gordon cleared his throat and blinked. "On the whole, I'd say it's much better to be a concern of three races than suffer their mass indifference."

  "You were such a concern to the Fargoers they kicked you out of their system," Lee reminded him. "You were notorious with them."

  "I'm pretty sure you've escaped that sort of negative scrutiny," Gordon insisted. "Even there, my reputation with the Fargoers eventually worked to my benefit. If I weren't known to them I doubt they would have found reason to allow me to get Fargoer citizenship."

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p; "Yeah," Lee agreed reluctantly, "I'm pretty sure there was some, 'Far better to have him on our side than not.' in their decision." Lee scowled thinking about something. "But why now? From what you are saying I've been a concern of the Hinth since we met Ha-bob-bob-brie in that Derfhome station bar. We had no idea when we walked out of there we'd ever see him again. The Hinth on the Moon did know me when I was running from Earth, and helped me. I never asked how they knew me. It seems kind of stupid now to have ignored that. But all the time we worked together in the Little Fleet he didn't try to stay near me. Why, all of a sudden, does he want to be my bodyguard?" Lee demanded.

  Gordon didn't try to hide his embarrassment this time, he let it play on his face, even deliberately projected his chagrin. "He told me he had a dream."

  "You have to be joking," Lee looked astonished.

  "As I said, the Hinth are different. They take dreams very seriously. Probably because they claim to dream very infrequently."

  "Did he describe this dream to you?" Lee asked. "I hate it when people go on and on about their dream like they really mean something."

  Gordon looked thoughtful. "No, he didn't volunteer anything about it, and I suppose I didn't ask, because I have the same cultural assumption as you that it's simple superstition."

  "Do you suddenly feel differently about it now?" Lee asked.

  "No, but what does it hurt? You had security before. Maybe it's a good idea," Gordon said.

  "But we'll be inside Central's security perimeter," Lee reminded him.

  "So close to Earth that gives me small comfort. We had private security and I still got shot in the head visiting the Apollo site," Gordon stroked the top of his head thinking about it, although he never complained of any lingering problems.

  "Very well," Lee agreed. "I actually like having Ha-bob-bob-brie around, so it's no burden."

  * * *

  There were two jump seats on the flight deck. Sally occupied one after expressing an interest in seeing how flight operations actually worked. Lee came along and occupied the other to watch Sally more than the flight crew. Nothing they did would be new to Lee, but if Sally had questions she could answer them instead of imposing on crew. To Lee's surprise Sally sat the entire shift alert and interested but silent. She took a couple bathroom breaks and went aft and brought a sandwich back once, but otherwise just observed.

  The second day Lee saw no point in accompanying her. She had things to read and could be more comfortable in her cabin or mess. If Sally had no questions the first day why would she the second? When Sally joined her for breakfast the third morning, and lingered, it appeared curiosity had been sated, so Lee asked what she thought about how a star ship was flown.

  "I had no idea how little crew spoke to each other. The second shift I sat through there was a two hour period nobody said a word. I rather imagined they'd talk about this and that to pass the time, but they sat staring at their screens. Nobody split their screen to read a book or watch a video. I don't think any of them listened to music. The only time anybody spoke to me was when Captain Frost very awkwardly said I was the oldest Human he's met and asked if he should try to limit unnecessary acceleration for my safety."

  "What did you tell him?" Lee asked. She'd have liked to ask the same thing, but didn't.

  "I told him I still hold a flyer license and pass the annual. I'm not delicate. The second system we entered had a system scan feed and they didn't put it on speaker. The XO reported no conflicting traffic or significant events off the scan. I could tell he routed it to a text display. He mentioned another ship was insystem on run to jump and would be gone before they were aware we entered.

  "The captain ordered the fellow running coms to report we were passing through and their intended exit vector and time to jump. Then about five hours later the com watch reported the station should have just received their transit report. A few times somebody reported a systems check and when we'd made all our vector changes and were on a straight line to jump that was mentioned."

  Sally scowled, but Lee had no idea why. It just sounded like a normal and uneventful transit. That was good.

  "Why the exasperated look there at the end?" Lee asked, perplexed.

  "I'd go nuts if I had to work like that!" Sally said. "How can you stand hours with nothing happening? At the bank I will go in my office and immerse myself in a project, but I get tired of it and get up and go out to the public area. Anybody that's not sequestered in their office I can chat with them a bit and have a cup of tea. Maybe go out to lunch somewhere or order something from our kitchen. Take a walk-in if I want for change of pace or just go out for a short walk if it's pleasant out. Even when I'm working at my screen I usually have some music playing. This was like torture by sensory deprivation!"

  "Oh." Lee had to pause and switch gears mentally to explain it. It was rather like a fish being asked how they tolerated water. "It isn't always like that. When we were exploring sometimes there was a lot of chatter on the flight deck. Even extended conversation on the command channel between ships. Things were happening and there was a lot of discussion trying to figure things out. We didn't maintain military discipline. Gordon feels allowing some discussion is useful to tap more views when facing the unknown. But it's just impossible to have a lot of pointless chatter on the critical channels and be safe. The captain should never have to talk over somebody to issue a command. Gordon was actually pretty liberal about it, but if somebody kept telling stories or making wise cracks so there was always background noise he'd speak privately to them about it.

  "When somebody starts talking on the command channel your brain should kick into gear and you should hear the first word and not have to wonder – What was he saying? – because three or four words in you realize he isn't just rambling on again about the supper last night or stuff about his last vacation he's been sharing. Now Captain Frost runs a very tight bridge pretty much like a military ship. I can't say that isn't appropriate, after all he is commanding an armed ship, and that's an awesome responsibility. Everybody I know, including Gordon, thinks Frost is an excellent commander, or Gordon wouldn't be sitting reading a book and sipping coffee trusting Frost to handle things.

  "You've never been on the deck when things go bad and every word and every second count. Let me share a recording with you from when Gordon was leaving Fargone in the Retribution, while I was on Earth, to show you how it can go. Three different people urged me to watch this, unaware the others had shown it to me, and I understand the Fargoers use it and other material about Gordon for naval training. I'll fast forward through the silent parts so it goes faster, but watch the clock in the corner. I'll take me a second to find it, hang on."

  Lee nodded in satisfaction shortly, and turned the pad to Sally, keying it. The view was from the front of the flight deck looking down, so the consoles didn't hide the crew.

  "Entry radiation, near dead ahead, range indeterminate," a Derf said. It was Brownie, although Sally wouldn't know him.

  "Fargone Control this is the USNA Deep Space Destroyer Phoenix inbound for Fargone orbit. May we have a traffic plot for the previous forty-eight hours please?"

  Lee forwarded the first pause.

  "Plot to follow," Fargone Control said. "Traffic advisory. You are head on with traffic for jump. Running parallel with separation, but anything under twenty thousand kilometers requires notification." Examine recent plot for details," Fargone Control instructed them.

  Lee eliminated a shorter pause. She wouldn't bother again.

  "Scan updated," Brownie said "Phoenix is six minutes ahead by the lag. They will be aware of us in three hundred seconds from – mark."

  "Battle stations," Gordon said. "Missile crews at controls in four minutes. I don't care if you are in your skivvies with ketchup on your chin. Move it. We are doing business here and got hospitality in an armed ship. Nobody asked us to stand off, or put our weapons under seal. Let's not ruin it by shooting first. If there was a lurker in the Paradise system maybe we were neve
r named to them. Straight station plot doesn't show our cross section or length, but it would say we are Derf. Think that will be enough to make him shoot?"

  "Phoenix response visible in two hundred fifty seconds from – mark"

  "Drone released after thirty second delay," Brownie said. "Not bad."

  "Any chance of picking off the drone before it can jump?" Gordon asked.

  "Not a chance in hell at this range," Thor assured him. "Don't waste the missile."

  "Alternate jump paths for any other system?" Gordon asked.

  "Ninety-eight percent jump probability for Survey System 2109 at two G within five minutes," Thor said. "Exponentially decreasing jump success after that. Near unity jump luck with extreme over run and bleed off excess velocity in target system."

  "Change course for alternate and jump deep. Advise Fargone Control of emergency change com." Gordon ordered Brownie.

  "Our burn takes us cross-ways to the Phoenix. They are burning directly away at about four G. That's about all they can do without time to prep for hard acceleration. Likely somebody will get hurt even at that level on short notice."

  "I predict course change and weapons release, as soon as they hear our jump change," Thor reasoned. "They will see us escaping whatever ship or ships they are sending that drone."

  "Hyper missiles two tubes, one conventional straight in to blind her. Delay the hypers with a dogleg course. Track the Phoenix, but shoot only on my word. Defensive controllers fire on your own discretion if you have targets," Gordon allowed.

  "Phoenix maneuvering, two away," Thor said.

  "Fire," Gordon ordered, then immediately. "Now fire four conventional in coast and sprint mode, aimed at the Phoenix's emergent point," Gordon said, "and hope the bastards come through soon to see why we don't emerge." Four faint sounds could be heard.

  "No more fire from Phoenix," noted Thor.

  "If she is like Twelve Palms she only carries six hypervelocity and two tubes. If two don't take us once it probably won't twice. They hate to shoot themselves empty," Gordon explained. "Beam weapons stand by for close in fire."