Their guide had a baffled look, and relayed that fact on his personal electronics: “Gran Sidi’s aboard and wants Captain Graham to take her to quarters immediately.”
There might have been discussion. Or incredulity on the other end.
“They’re in the corridor, sir, and won’t budge.”
“The aiji-dowager has suggested,” Bren added, “that if he fails to appear this would be a major breach of protocol, not auspicious at all for the voyage. Downright unlucky for the ship.”
The worker relayed that, too, as: “The aiji-dowager’s upset, ma’am, and Mr. Cameron’s saying it just has to get done. Something about unlucky for the ship.”
Another silence. And if there was a superstitious streak left among the crew it regarded the ship itself.
“Captain Graham’s in a meeting, sir.”
He could suggest they get Sabin down to the entry corridor if Jase wasn’t at hand; but he didn’t personally want to deal with Sabin, especially Sabin disturbed from her work.
But still—setting a precedent with the dowager demanding Jase, dealing with Jase—it made sense. It was a means of getting hands on Jase at will. So he bit his lip, refused to shiver or to show any discomfort at all. “I’m afraid we’ll stand here until he can find the time.”
The security man relayed that. Meanwhile Cajeiri examined a panel with a mere glance, then an inclination sideways. And received a severe tightening of the dowager’s hand on his arm, if the slight lift of his head was any sign.
“Captain’s on his way,” the man said then, with evident relief. “But he’d like to meet you on fifth level. It’s warmer, Mr. Cameron, if you can persuade her to go on through.”
Nerves twitched. Not polite, that unadorned common pronoun. But it wasn’t time for a lesson in protocols, not here.
“Aiji-ma,” Bren said in a low voice, “there’s a reception arranged in greater warmth on fifth level, and Jase-aij will meet us there, with your kind consent.”
“Very good,” Ilisidi said. And waved her cane forward. “Let this person lead, paidhi.”
“Lead on,” Bren said to their escort. The language had been clipped, moderate, but still touchy. “She says you may go in front of her.”
Their escort gave a misgiving look at their party in general, at very large dark-skinned, black-uniformed atevi bodyguards, who drank up the available light in the forefront of the party, and who had moved closer: the paler colors of the household staffs were much to the rear at the moment. Their escort might not like it, and wouldn’t at all like the weapons in evidence, and certainly wouldn’t like the intransigence in the entry corridor. But there they were, ordered to fifth deck and their escort glided out, using the ladder for a handhold, into the first intersecting corridor and up to a lift.
The lift opened at a button-push and cast a bright, reasonable light into their shadowed steel passage. They boarded the lift and rode either up or down, a slightly startling set of paths and tracks, to a brighter area facing a seal-door.
Their escort opened it and led the way.
The atevi-repaired station corridors were still lighter than this, brightly lit and of felicitously pleasant tones: but here the green and brown paneling of the original station was indisputable, unhappy prophecy of the decor beyond. No one could invent those muddy shades on purpose: it was, Bren suspected what the extrusion medium tended to do with the dyes they injected to better a natural puce. The same kind of switches for lights and section-seals were ubiquitous, as if the master kit that had built the station had been applied here—or vice versa, and that meant their staffs could manage these panels without much confusion. He was sure Banichi and Jago had taken that in instantly.
One wondered if the service accesses also existed here, that network of tunnels that allowed service inside the station’s workings.
Grim, human-style Malguri, it was, at least on this level, with moderate improvements in the plumbing and far worse to endure in simple inconvenience.
Ilisidi was taking it all in, stoically refusing to be appalled.
The aiji-apparent, however, looked around him as if he expected the walls to spew forth marvels—or to implode from age and decrepitude. Cajeiri hadn’t seen the station at its worst— had lived in baroque splendor, among centuries-old porcelains, on hand-worked carpet, under gilt ceilings. He had seen, in fact, nothing in his young life more primitive than the new sections of the space station. He clung to the ladder rungs along the wall to keep from another ignominious drift, and tried not to jump when section door locks banged and moved, letting them through to another area, another corridor.
“Mind,” Cenedi said as they went, “these doors are likely the same as on the station: they close without mercy, in the blink of an eye, to keep all the air from rushing out into the ether of the heavens, young sir. If you see red flashing lights, stand where you are. If yellow, run breakneck for the next section and hope not to be cut in half.”
“Where do they steer the ship, nadi?” Cajeiri asked.
“Elsewhere,” Ilisidi interposed. “Where boys don’t need to be.”
“But I want to see,” Cajeiri said as they glided along.
“There may be supper,” Ilisidi said, “and who knows, I may not wish supper tonight.”
That was a threat. Cajeiri was immediately not happy. He still stared about him, head turning at every new door, every corridor they passed, youthful jaw set and the dowager’s own glint in his eye.
Bet, too, if there was any similarity in the species, that every inquisitive bone in that young body longed for all of those emergency measures to go into effect at once—just the once, of course, just to find out.
Cajeiri had behaved admirably this far. One remembered, seeing the occasional look, that set of the jaw, that this was, in fact, Tabini’s son, and Damiri’s.
One well remembered, too, what it was like to be that young, that active, that under-informed. And on this excursion one was damned glad that no one less than the Assassin’s Guild was in charge of the boy.
They reached a new section under their official guidance: three crewmen turned out to meet them—with a small presentation of cut flowers, no less, to the lady they called Gran ’Sidi.
“Welcome aboard,” the head of the little delegation said in passable Ragi, all solemnity.
Ilisidi took the flowers like a queen, lacking a free hand, what with the cane—drifting slightly sideways at the moment. But she snagged the ubiquitous ladder-rungs with the head of the cane and managed a little nod, which greatly gratified the delegation.
“We are here to occupy our quarters,” she said, of course in Ragi, complete cipher to the crew.
“She is pleased,” Bren translated—it was not dishonest of a translator to meet reasonable social expectations on either side, in his practical and practiced opinion. “And she expects the atevi section is close—with Captain Graham, to be sure.”
“On ahead, sir,” their escort said, “and the baggage is ahead, too, and Captain Graham’s on his way this very moment. Through here, sir, ma’am.”
Very good news. Their escort opened a side door, where Bindanda had stationed himself—welcome sight. Cenedi quietly appropriated the flowers, incongruous but not unaccustomed accouterment for security, and they continued through, into a place not only populated by their own staff, but better lit and much warmer. The ship immediately had a more auspicious feeling, despite the mud-colored walls.
Cenedi had had staff aboard for hours, going over every minute detail of their accommodations, checking for bugs as well as inconveniences, one could be sure.
And Ilisidi’s security had a camera live. As they passed the door, Bren caught the shine of an uncapped lens clipped to a uniformed, leather shoulder.
And what was that for? Bren asked himself in dismay. The lens certainly wasn’t uncommon, but he was sure the lens had been capped during their trip up the lifts, possibly protectively so, during the intense cold—he had no idea of its limitations. He wa
s sure he’d have noticed otherwise.
But if they’d uncapped it, bet that lens was live and they were transmitting. Was that for security review, privately, something relayed ahead to their staff, in the new quarters?
Something sent farther away, back through the hull, to lord Geigi? He wasn’t sure they could do that. Surely not. So there was a security set-up already active within their section— someone receiving.
He was not unhappy to know they had record of the route and the button-pushes that brought them here.
But for all he knew, Cenedi’s men were making a video record for quite different reasons, a record perhaps to go out to Geigi, then to Tabini, who would be interested, to say the least.
Or—knowing Tabini—was it to go out to every household that owned a television?
Confirmation for the dowager’s political allies that she was well and alive and in charge of her own armed security, on this ship, in this mission?
Atevi couldn’t like the structure they saw—though atevi had gotten used to the concept of twos on the station. Everything in the corridors—doors, and window panels in offices, was configured by ship-culture, convenient sets of two, pairs, that anathema to the ’counters, more than vexation to the atevi sense of design: an arrangement of space that hit the atevi nervous system with the same painful reaction nails on a chalkboard caused for humans, and worse, he understood, if one were standing in it, experiencing it in three dimensions.
But some enterprising soul had painted two pastel stripes wandering the corridor, two, branching into five, then felicitous seven, right across the green tile.
Someone had arranged a spray of brightly colored plastic balls—seven—on strands of wire, from wall to wall, like planets and moons against the mud brown of the wall paneling.
The effect was less than elegant… the sort of thing that turned up in crew lounges. But seven. It was a valiant attempt at kabiu.
And colored paint. Where had paint turned up in their baggage? It had been at a low priority in station-building, wasn’t manufactured on-station even yet: it had to be freighted up.
Had Jase had that stripe done? Had the dowager’s staff prepared for the spartan environment? Atevi couldn’t have done something as garish as the orange planets.
Staff drifted out from the offices, the dowager’s, welcome sight on both sides, and the staff who’d brought their baggage turned up from further on.
“Thank you,” Bren said to their escort, with a little bow as automatic as breathing and quite impossible in null-G. “We’ll be very comfortable here.”
“I’m to show you temperature and emergency controls, sir.”
There was a potentially explosive foul-up. “I’m sure you’ve shown the staff,” Bren said, drifting slightly askew—difficult to maintain formality at odd angles—“and deputized them to show security personnel, who will show me and the dowager what’s needful for us personally to do. That’s our protocol, sir. Believe me, Captain Graham will confirm it.”
Trust them, that the ship would not explode from this deck.
“Then is there any need of me further?” their escort asked.
“With thanks, sir, —one trusts Captain Graham is here.”
“He’s in the section, sir. He’s on his way.”
The door behind them opened at that very moment. He heard it, and when he turned, drifting, to look back, Jase was there.
Thank God.
“We’re just fine, then. We’ll all be fine. Thank you, yes, that’s all we need.”
“There will be no walking about,” Ilisidi was telling Cajeiri quite firmly, in this place where, at the moment, walking was a euphemism, “no leaving your quarters without security escort, nadi.”
“But this is all like a house, mani-ji. Surely—”
“Nothing is sure here!” This under her breath, with a hard jerk at Cajeiri’s hand. “Hear me!” Bren tried not to notice the preface, as Ilisidi, disgusted, turned a sweetly benevolent glance toward him, and toward Jase, as Jase sailed to their side, and stopped.
Jase, in a blue uniform jacket, with the Phoenix insignia, the closest to captain’s estate he’d yet come. The emblem looked like one of the wi’itikiin, the flying creatures of Malguri cliffs, rising from solar fires—atevi, having heard the legend, thought it very well-omened.
The inner door shut, making everything private, including Jase with them.
“Jase-aiji. How kind of you to come.”
“Aiji-ma,” Jase said quietly, distantly to Bren’s ears.
The offices inside were all lit up, with atevi staff unpacking their own equipment.
And the stripes braiding their way down the corridor, past the windowed offices immediately in view, branched out to two side corridors in the section.
He’d approved the arrangement the dowager’s staff had provided: numerous staff sleeping rooms, back near the kitchens, and two bedchambers, two office/studies, for himself and for the dowager. They used a vast amount of room—they’d added staff, and only scantly advised the ship, which had, for all he knew, discounted the advisement: certainly there’d been no highlevel reaction. Of room there was no shortage, so instructions said, and their baggage requirements remained negligible to the scale of things.
“I hope everything’s in order,” Jase said. “I hope you’ll be as comfortable as we can provide, aiji-ma.”
“Acceptable, ship-aiji.” This, from the mistress of ancient Malguri, the dowager who slept on bare ground and still outrode two humans. “But association and man’chi. How stands that?”
“Firm,” Jase said. The reassuring answer. “Still within the aiji’s man’chi. And my ship’s.” One could have two man’chiin: the whole aishidi’tat was a web work, and two and three and four associations at once was a benefit, not a detriment.
“Accept this,” Cenedi said, and handed Jase one of the pocket coms, “to keep us in close touch. The dowager relies on you especially, nandi, in this voyage. She will call on you whenever she has a personal question. She wishes to have this clear.”
Jase bowed his head—the rigorous instruction of the court made that act the simplest, most basic reflex. “I’ll endeavor to answer the dowager’s questions.”
“So what will the schedule be, if you please?” Ilisidi asked.
“If the dowager please—” Court expression for a brief stall, a gathering of words. “We’re transient.”
“Moment to moment,” Bren muttered, on autopilot.
“Moment to moment.” Jase scarcely blushed, seized on the apt word, and the omen fell unremarked. “Reliant on the numbers, aiji-ma, as crew boards. We have to have a precise calculation of mass. We’ll leave dock and calculate, we hope, in about four hours. Crew boarding has begun. It can be very fast.”
“Very good. And we will then walk decently on the deck.”
“As soon as we’re underway, aiji-ma.”
“Is this where we stay, mani?” Cajeiri asked, sounding disappointed. “It looks like a warehouse.”
“This is manifestly where we stay,” Ilisidi said sharply, “and one will be grateful, great-grandson, that the facility will soon be operative and that the lights require no lengthy and laborious fire source, not the case everywhere in the world, as you will one day learn to your astonishment, I warn you. Apologize!”
“One regrets, nandiin.” Meek response.
“One accepts,” Jase said.
Ilisidi steered her charge onward, toward her own side corridor. Cenedi attended. Staff bowed, such as they could, adrift.
He and Jase had a moment, then—a solitary moment, after Jase’s quick, confidence-establishing trip to this deck. At times, Bren thought, when he could do his old job, merely translating, correcting Jase’s small lapse, he could sink into flow-through, not paying attention to what he said. At such moments he became a device, not a thinking being.
But he wasn’t merely a recorder. And he knew he was close to panic, in zero-gravity, amid universal reminders they were all but la
unched. His eyes tended now to dart to details, and to miss all of them. Thoughts scattered. What became absolutely necessary eluded him, at the very moment he needed to gather the facts in and make sense and use the brief chance he had— like this one, to talk to Jase, to have things firm—to make requests, demands on Jase that might break an association, break a friendship, see disaster overtake them… he wasn’t at his best. But time and the hope of remedy was slipping away from him.
“Jase.” He got the word out. “Office.” He changed languages. “Need to talk.” Remembering that Ragi was the most secure code they could use, he shifted his mind back into that track. “A moment only, nadi.”
“I haven’t got time,” Jase said urgently in ship-speak. “I left a briefing—”
“Jase-ji.” He snagged Jase by an arm, gripped the ladder with the other, and pulled Jase loose from his handhold, hauled him bodily into the right-hand office, the one Cenedi and his staff weren’t occupying.
Jago attended him in, braked with a gentle toe touch on a cabinet.
He’d kidnapped a ship’s captain. And he was gripping too tightly, too urgently.
Jago made a signal to them. Wired. Meaning Jase.
“In private,” he said to Jase.
Jase hesitated, looked down at the grip on his arm. Bren let go.
Then Jase reached to his collar and pinched a switch.
“Can’t be out of contact long,” Jase said. “Sabin’s not happy with how much time I’ve diverted here. Silence is going to be noticed.”
“The paint down the hall. Your idea?”
“My orders. My sketch. Crew’s execution. Caught hell for it.”
Jase, practicing kabiu. He didn’t ask about the orange plastic planets.
“Damned good,” Bren said. “Excellent move. Impressive.”
“You didn’t hold me here to discuss the paint.”
“Speak Ragi. Jase, I have a question. Not a pleasant question. —Jago-ji. The meeting with Mercheson. I have it keyed up.” He had his computer. He opened the case, sailed it gently to her. “Play it.”