The translator saw the director inside and the door raised, whisked gtst rainbow self around to gtst own side.
The car hummed to life, opaqued its windows, and hummed a quick u-turn, off down the docks.
"Aunt—" Hilfy said.
She turned, expecting one of the crew had come outside.
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She saw instead a kif between them and the lock, and her hand twitched toward her pocket— prudently stopped with a mere twitch. She stood stiff-legged, hearing Hilfy sotto voce beside her, the belt-com doubtless thumbed: "Haral, for the gods' sakes— Haral— there's a kif out here—"
The kif flourished a hand among its robes, billowing the hem like the edge of some dark wing. It sauntered forward with the ease of an old, old friend.
"That you, Sikkukkut?"
"Strange. I can tell hani apart."
"Get off my dockside."
"I came to follow up my message. The ring. How did your passenger receive it?"
"I forgot. Frankly, I forgot."
"Can it be he couldn't receive it? Damaged in shipment, might he be? That would distress me."
"I'm sure it would. Get out of my way."
"Your crewwoman's calling help, is she?"
"You won't want to stay around to see."
The thin wrinkled snout acquired a chain of wrinkles. "So you're putting out. Beware of Kita Point."
"Thanks."
More wrinkles. "Of course. There are such limited ways out of Meetpoint.
Except for those the stsho permit. Except for us— who go where we like. I wonder where Mahijiru is."
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"Don't know, then? Good."
"Your sfik will kill you."
" My ego, is it? Come on, Hilfy." She started forward, picking a course to The Pride just out of kifish long-armed reach. But he moved to intercept them.
"We are both hunter-kinds, hunter Pyanfar." And with a twitch of that long hairless nose: "Kif are better."
"Hani are smarter." She had stopped, hand in pocket. " I have a gun."
Sikkukkut's long black nose gained wrinkles and lost them. "But being hani— you dare not use it unless I prove armed. This is the burden of a species its hosts fear not."
"It's called civilization, you earless bastard."
A dry kifish sniffing, like laughter. "The stsho are grass to us. You will not join with me."
"In a mahen hell."
He lifted both hands, palm outward. "I do not challenge, hunter Pyanfar."
Her hand tensed on the gun, to be quick; but the tall kif turned his black-cloaked back and walked off with that peculiar stalking gait.
"Sfik," Hilfy muttered, who was the linguist among them. "Means like pride, like honor, if the kif had any."
"If," Pyanfar said, staring after the kif and not forgetting a sweep about to see if there were confederates lurking: there were not. "That mouth may speak hani; that brain's pure kif. Move it. Get out of here."
"I have a gun," Hilfy said, backing away as she was told. "Come on, aunt.
Let's both get out of here."
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"Huh." She backed, turned, grabbed Hilfy by the arm and both of them hastened up the rampway into the access, head-on into Tirun and Chur who were coming out.
"Good gods," she said when her heart had restarted.
"Sounded like you had trouble," Tirun said.
"It walked off," she said, and gathered them all up, marched them ahead of her past the safety of the airlock. Chur shut the door.
"Kif?" asked Tirun then.
"Kif," she said, and looked around sharply at movement to her left, where Geran stood, with Tully.
"Got talk," he said.
"Geran, for the gods' sakes I said settle him."
"It's urgent, captain."
"Everything's urgent. Get in line."
"Aunt," Hilfy said, with that kind of look Hilfy could get when something was utterly out of joint.
"Got paper," Tully said, breathless. "Got—" The translator garbled over mangled hani words.
"Get me a plug, will you?" One materialized out of Hilfy's pocket, and she put the audio into her ear. "Tully, what are those papers?"
"Got paper say human come fight kif ## need hani."
"Rot that translator. I'm losing that."
"Human come fight kif."
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A very cold lump settled to her stomach. "Why, Tully?"
"Make kif #. Friend, Pyanfar. Bring lot human come fight kif."
The cold grew colder still.
"Sounds like," said Tirun, "more than one ship involved."
"They want help," said Hilfy. " That's why he came. That's what I think he's saying. It's nothing to do with trade."
"Gods," she muttered, and looked up, at an earnest human face, at four crewwomen with faces taut with the same kind of thoughts. "Kif know this, Tully?"
"Maybe know," he said. He drew a great breath and let it go, held out his hands as if appeal could get past the translator. "Come long way find you.
Kif— kif make trouble # one time fight Goldtooth friend."
"Goldtooth," she said. The name was a bad taste in her mouth. "What am I supposed to do with you? Huh?"
"Go Maing Tol. Go Anuurn."
"Gods rot it, Tully, we got kif up to our noses!"
His pale eyes locked on hers, desperate. "Fight," he said. "Got make fight, Py-an-far."
She lowered her ears and brought them up again, glancing round at her crew. Scared faces. Looking to her for answers.
"Ought to give him to Vigilance, " she muttered, "and advertise it to the kif."
No one said anything. She imagined the consequences for herself if she did that. The fragile Compact broken wide open, kif chasing a han deputy ship.
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Or Ehrran leaving him on a stsho station, where not a hand would be raised to prevent kif from walking in and doing what they liked.
Kif would do anything, if profit in doing it outweighed the profit in restraint.
"Where we taking him?" Tirun asked.
"Maing Tol, Goldtooth says."
"Captain— we do that and that blackbreeches'll have our ears. Begging the captain's pardon."
More questions of her orders. She stared at Tirun, at a cousin, an old comrade; at another Chanur whose life was at risk.
"You want to turn him over to Ehrran, Tirun?"
Tirun stood there with her ears down, with rapid thinking going on behind her eyes. "We could send another can to Vigilance, " she said. "Let that kif bastard wonder."
The idea struck her fancy. But: "No," she said, thinking of those same consequences. "Can't risk it. Come on." She seized Tully by the arm and dragged him into motion, then abandoned the grip as she headed for the lift. "Get Tully settled. Get his drugs for him and get up to the bridge."
"Go?" Tully asked, close at her heels. "Pyanfar— go Hoas?"
"Urtur," she said, reaching the lift. She looked back as Chur and Hilfy took him by the arms. Tirun punched the door and held it. "Going to Urtur.
Going fast. Take the drugs. Stay out of the way. Understand?"
"Got," he said, and let them pull him off down the hall. She stepped into the lift and Tirun got in and pushed the buttons.
One worried look from Tirun. That was all.
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"I know," she said, which summed it up. She pulled the presentation case from the pocket where she had put it, opened it as the car shot upward.
A note. Beware Ismehanan-min, it said.
Meaning Goldtooth.
She handed it to Tirun.
The door opened on the upper corridor.
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Chapter 5
There was quiet on the bridge, a great deal of calm and quiet, considering the situation, Khym
brimming with questions, and a handful of exhausted crew. No one said a word. Six pairs of eyes were on her, expecting her to come up with something remarkably clever.
1.2 billion credits. Hilfy still looked to be in shock.
"Got a few problems," Pyanfar said, sinking into her chair, which was turned to face the bridge at large. "I think we'd better take that docking clearance the stsho promised and get ourselves our of here before they change their minds. Chur, Hilfy, you sure Tully's set, got his drugs, knows to stay put."
"Aye," Chur said.
"I don't promise we get a calm ride out of here. And we're going to push it hard. We're headed for Urtur. We're stripped. We can one-jump it. When we come in there we keep our ears pricked and get the news. Gods send it isn't kif. Questions?"
Dead quiet.
She picked up a courier cylinder from the document pocket on the side of the chair. "Chur."
"Aye."
"Get one of the docking crew to shoot that through the pneumat. Fast."
Chur took it, whirled and headed out of the bridge with a scrape of claws.
So that was seen to. If Stle stles stlen did not have all their messages intercepted, rot his pearly hide.
"Crew to stations. Khym—" She stood up and in the general mill of crew taking seats she took Khym's arm and took him into the small nook of quiet in the corridor outside.
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"For this one I recommend the tranquilizer," she said. "Tully takes it.
Topside med kit still has it."
"I don't need it," he muttered, his ears gone down. "I don't need—"
"Listen to me. Old hands lose their stomachs in this kind of thing. G like planetary lift; we'll be cycling the vanes—"
"I'm not going to my cabin. Look, you wanted me on the bridge, work, you said—"
"You're not staying on the bridge."
"There's the observers' seats."
"No."
"Please, Py." His voice sank to its lowest pitch. His amber eyes were quick and large. " Captain. Win a ring, you said. In front of them, for the gods'
sake, Py. I won't make trouble. Won't."
Her ears fell; her heart went over. "Gods rot it, this isn't a simple hop from port to port."
"Part of the crew. Isn't that what you meant?"
"This isn't a question—"
"Pride's pride, Py. You put me there; you by the gods leave me there. Or do you think the crew won't have it?"
Soft-headed, that was what.
"You take number one observer," she said. "You watch Geran watch scan and if you get sick in the cycles you by the gods reach the bags undercabinet, I don't care what else is going on. If you haven't ridden through a high-v vector change with someone heaving up you haven't seen 95
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a mess. Got it?" She jabbed him with one sharp claw, saw him go tight around the nose. "Besides, it fogs the screens."
Without a word he ducked back into the bridge.
She went back behind him, while he set himself into the first of the three observer posts, at Geran's elbow: Geran gave him a look, betraying no dismay, but a look all the same. He fumbled after belts and began fastening them— not nervous, no. He only missed the insert twice.
She slipped into her own place, snapped the restraint one-handed and powered the chair about all in one smooth sequence, because she could, and failed to realize why she did it until she had.
She argued him onto the bridge for one reason and turned surly when he put himself there. And knew it.
Gods.
"Ready to disengage the probe," Haral said.
"Chur's still down there. Hilfy, advise Vigilance they've got a message coming."
"Aye." A small delay. "They acknowledge. That's all."
She gave Rhif Ehrran that, she was not prone to destructive chatter.
Advise you, that couriered message said, kif on our trail. Stop at nothing, even attack on han deputy. Do not attract interest. Station at hazard. Ours more. We take evasive measures, best possible. No explanation possible.
Well to be out of port when that hit Ehrran's lap.
A series of thumps rang up from the bow, The Pride's own language of clangs and bumps, reliable as her telltales: docking probes had retracted; vents were sealed. Outside the station hull, the grapples disengaged.
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"Gantry's clear," Haral said, busy with the prep sequences.
"Where's Chur? She make it?"
Com relayed. "She's coming," Tirun said. "All clear."
"Give me out-schedule."
"Up," Tirun said, and: "Huh."
Banny Ayhar's Prosperity was on the list, outbound for Urtur via Hoas Point. So was Marrar's Golden Sun.
There went gossip on its way to Anuurn, fast as a loaded merchant ship could travel and carry an Ehrran message.
Likewise a stsho ship had gone outbound half an hour ago, one E
Mnestsist, Rhus flisth'ess commanding. Hoas-bound for Urtur.
So every ship bound from Meetpoint to mahen-hani space had to go to Urtur via Hoas. Unless they were doing it cargo-stripped, to make Urtur in a single jump. The Pride's own course showed Urtur-via-Hoas, which was a lie.
There were other possibilities from Meetpoint: Nsthen in stsho space, where only stsho and methane-breathers were allowed. The tc'a borderport of V'n'n'u; the tc'a port of Tt'a'va'o: methane-breather/stsho again. The kif port of Kefk, the one kifish corridor to Meetpoint; Kshshti in the Disputed Territories. Messages could go a great many ways from Meetpoint, that being the nature of Meetpoint in its conception.
And a tight-beamed lightspeed message could get to an outbound ship like E Mnestsist before it had time to jump. It could still do a vector change...
if one Stle stles stlen had something gtst wanted relayed.
Conniving bastard.
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The Pride of Chanur was listed departure — — — , without a time. They had been bumped up ahead of Prosperity and Golden Sun.
That would not sweeten Banny Ayhar's mood, no question at all.
And there was not a single kif listed.
"No telling what's been delayed off that list," she muttered. "Could have a raft of kif leaving ten minutes behind us. Station that can't keep its registry boards running dockside, gods know what it does with out-schedules when money changes hands— power up, Haral: keep us null for outbound."
"Up," Haral said; she heard the distant sound of the pumps delivering their load; the electric whump! of startup normally followed by the louder crash of cylinder-lock going off; but it stayed locked. They would have no g but afterthrust on this system transit. Safer that way. It made sudden moves safer.
She heard the sound of running feet scramble into the bridge at her back; heard a body hit a seat.
"Chur's in."
"Message went," Chur said over the com, above the noise. "Saw it go into the slot."
"Helm to one." Helm to her own board. She pushed buttons, let the auto-interlock stay in during the undock, the computer reckoning their mass and how hard to push to stay inside legal parameters. The holds were empty.
The thrust-indicator was way down. The ordinary mark would have hit The Pride like a hard kick at an empty can.
"Aunt." That was Hilfy at com one. "Question."
"Ask it."
"That bill—"
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"What about that bill?"
"Mahendo'sat paying that?"
"Huh. Yes."
"They know it?"
"Tell you something, imp. There's two strong reasons for one-jumping this. One of them's the kif."
"Gods, aunt—"
"Tirun, you teaching the kid to swear?"
"How do we pay it?"
"It's paid. Goldtooth paid it. He just doesn't know it yet. Stand by the vector shift. We're not going out of here like last time. By the book, at least
till we get running room."
They reached the l-zone limit, two-vectored as they were with station's spin and their own bow-thrust, headed tailfirst across the invisible mark.
She gave the port thrust a ten-second burn that slewed the bow about in the same line as spin and gave comp its heading.
"But, aunt—"
The comp did the next burn, trueing up.
"Put it this way. All of you listening? There's a little matter with the mahendo'sat. They're paying the bar bill. Hear? Put her zero two on mark, Haral. Get the cameras working portside."
"Want a look at that kif?"
"Number one right, cousin. Geran, handle that."
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"Got it. Image to your four."
The image came to fourth screen on her board, clear, fine color, the outside of Meetpoint Station, a portion of its torus shape, the huge painted dock numbers obscured here and there by ships nose-on to station. "Main that," she said. The drifting image went to all stations, the strange shape of a stsho trader, the sleek, wicked silhouette of kif, leaner than they had to be; and one, one with uncommonly large vanes and a series of tanks about the waist.
"Those tanks will blow off real easy," she said. "Take a good look, Hilfy, Khym. A real good look."
"Hunter-ship," Hilfy said.
"No trader. That's for sure. Gods-rotted kif hunter. That's Harukk, no need to look for numbers." She keyed the safety systems to ADVISE ONLY
and pushed the mains in hard.
G hit, pressed her elbow into the brace and triggered the over-arm lock that held her hand within reach of the board. New system. It worked. She had rigged The Pride with what protections they could afford, since Gaohn; handholds, line-rigs, braces at all boards. A few extra firearms, quietly acquired.
"That's the kif reason," she said against the g. "And the other one for putting a little hurry on— I'd like to beat a certain check to the bank."
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