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“You can’t,” she said simply.
“Jesus, Doc, this is no time for principles. Don’t you understand? We have no other way out. None. That weapon is the only advantage we’ve got left. If we don’t kill them, they’ll get you, and Peter.”
“This is not a question of principle, Captain. It’s not physically possible to deploy the Alchemist against starships.”
“Jesus.” He couldn’t believe it. But the doc looked frightened enough. Intuition convinced him she was telling the truth. The navigation program was still producing flight vectors. Dumb forced-calculation, trying out every conceivable probability to find one which would let them escape. The plots flickered in and out of existence at a subliminal speed, miniature purple lightning bolts crackling around the inside of his head. Throw in wild card manoeuvres, lunar slingshots, Lagrange points. Pray! It didn’t make the slightest difference. The Organization frigates had thoroughly outmanoeuvred him. His one hope had been the Alchemist, a super-doomsday machine, a nuke to kill a couple of ants.
I have come so far I can actually see the ship it’s stored in. I can’t lose now, not with these stakes.
“Okay, Doc, I want to know exactly what your Alchemist does, and how it does it.” He clicked his fingers at Monica and Samuel. “You two, I’ll stay in Tranquillity if we survive this, but I have to know.”
“God, Calvert, I’ll stay there with you if that’s what it takes,” Monica told him. “Just get us out of this.”
“Joshua,” Sarha said. “You can’t.”
“Give me an alternative. It gets Liol’s vote. He’ll be captain then.”
“I’m crew, Josh. This is your ship.”
“Now he tells me. Datavise the file, Doc. Now, please.” Information leapt into his mind as the files came over. Theory, application, construction, deployment, operational parameters. All neatly indexed with helpful cross-referencing. The blueprints of how to slay a star; in fact, build enough and you could slay an entire galaxy; or even just . . . Joshua flicked instantaneously back to the operational aspects. Pumped a few figures of his own into Mzu’s coldly simple equations.
“Jesus, Doc, it wasn’t a rumour. You really are dangerous, aren’t you?”
“Can you do it?” Monica asked. She wanted to shout the question at him, jolt him out of that infuriating complacency.
Joshua winked at her. “Absolutely. Look, we came off badly down in that ironberg yard because that’s not my territory. This is. In space, we win.”
“Is he serious?” Monica appealed to the rest of the bridge.
“Oh, yes,” Sarha said. “If anyone gets hostile with Lady Mac , they just crash straight into his ego.”
High York posed a difficult problem of interpretation for Louise. The AV pillar in the Jamrana ’s lounge shone its image down her optic nerve throughout the entire approach phase. There was no colour, space was so black she couldn’t even see the stars. The asteroid was different to Phobos’s chiselled cylinder, a grizzled irregular lump which the ship’s sensors seemed incapable of bringing into proper focus. Mechanical artefacts were shunting out of its puckered surface at all angles, though she wasn’t quite sure if she had the scale right. If she had, then they were bigger than the largest ship ever to ply Norfolk’s seas.
Fletcher was in the lounge with her. From the few comments he made he understood even less of the image than she did.
Genevieve, of course, was in her tiny cabin playing games on her processor block. She’d found a soul mate in one of Pieri’s younger cousins; the pair of them had taken to locking themselves away for hours at a time to tackle battalions of Trafalgar Greenjackets or skate through puzzles of five-dimensional topology. Louise wasn’t entirely happy with her sister’s new hobby, but on the other hand she was grateful she didn’t have the duty of keeping her amused during the flight.
High York’s disk-shaped spaceport traversed the AV image, eclipsing the asteroid itself. A high-pitched whine vibrated out of the lounge walls, and the Jamrana drifted forwards. And still there was no glimpse of Earth. Louise had really been looking forwards to that. Pieri would align a sensor on the planet for her if she asked, she was sure; but right now the whole Bushay family was involved in the docking procedure.
Louise asked her processor block for an update on their approach, and studied the display which appeared on its screen while it accessed the ship’s flight computer. “Four minutes until we dock,” she said. Assuming she was reading the tables of figures and coloured lines correctly.
She’d spent a large portion of the flight working through the block’s tutorial programs until she could manage the unit’s more basic display and operation modes. She didn’t need to ask anyone’s help to manage her medical nanonic packages, and she could monitor the baby’s health continually. It gave her a good feeling. So much of Confederation life was centred around the casual use of electronics.
“Why so nervous, my lady?” Fletcher asked. “Our voyage ends. With Our Lord’s mercy we have prevailed once more against the most inopportune circumstances. We have returned to the good Earth, the cradle of humanity. Though I fear that which has befallen me, I can do naught but rejoice at our homecoming.”
“I’m not nervous,” she protested unconvincingly.
“Come now, lady.”
“All right. Look, it’s not getting here; I’m really delighted we’ve made it. I suppose it’s silly of me, but something about being on Earth is very reassuring. It’s old and it’s very strong, and if people are going to be safe anywhere, then it’ll be here. That’s the problem. Something Endron said about it keeps bothering me.”
“You know that if I can assist you, I will.”
“No. It’s nothing you can help with. That’s the point. Endron told me we wouldn’t get through High York’s spaceport; that there would be inspections and examinations, awfully strict ones. It’ll be nothing like arriving at Phobos. And everything I’ve heard from Pieri just confirms that. I’m sorry, Fletcher, I don’t think we’re going to make it, I really don’t.”
“And yet we must,” he said softly. “That fiend Dexter cannot prevail. Should the necessity become apparent, I will surrender myself and warn Earth’s rulers.”
“Oh, no, Fletcher, you can’t do that. I don’t want you to be hurt.”
“Yet still you doubt me, Lady Louise. I see your heart crying in pain. That is a source of grief for me.”
“I don’t doubt you, Fletcher. It’s just that . . . If we can’t get through, then Quinn Dexter won’t manage it either. That would mean your whole journey is for nothing. I hate that.”
“Dexter is stronger than I, lady. I hold that bitter memory quite plainly. He is also more cunning and ruthless. If there is but a single chink in the armour of Earth’s valiant harbourmasters he will find it.”
“Heavens, I hope not. Quinn Dexter loose on Earth is too horrible to think about.”
“Aye, my lady.” His fingers clasped hers to emphasise his determination. Something he rarely did, shying away from physical contact with people. It was almost as if he feared contamination.
“That is why you must swear faithfully to me that should I stumble in my task you must pick up the torch and carry on. The world must be warned of Quinn Dexter’s devilish intent. And if possible you must also seek out this Banneth of whom he spoke with such animosity. Alert her to his presence, emphasise the danger she will face.”
“I’ll try, Fletcher, really I will. I promise.” Fletcher was prepared to sacrifice his new life and eternal sanity to save others. Her own goal of reaching Joshua seemed so petty and selfish in comparison. “Be careful when we disembark,” she urged.
“I place my trust in God, my lady. And if they catch me—”
“They won’t!”
“Ah, now who has adopted a frail bravado? As I recall, ’twas you who warned me of what lies crouched beside the road ahead.”
“I know.”
“Forgive me, lady. I see that once again my tact is left wanting.”
“Don’t worry about me, Fletcher. I’m not the one they’ll put into zero-tau.”
“Aye, lady, I confess that prospect is one I shrink from. I know in my heart I will not last long in such black confinement.”
“I’ll get you out,” she vowed. “If they put you in zero-tau I’ll get it switched off, or something. There will be lawyers I can hire.” She patted her ship-suit’s breast pocket, feeling the outline of the Jovian Bank credit disk. “I have money.”
“Let us hope it proves sufficient, my lady.”
She gave him what she hoped was a bright smile, making out that everything was settled. So that’s that.
The Jamrana trembled, shaking loose small flocks of jumble. Clangs rumbled down the central ladder shaft as the spaceport docking latches engaged.