The three ranking kzinti met for their last time in the command lair of Strong Runner.
"Once more, master, I ask that you reconsider, and take me with you," said Rach-Scientist.
Ghrul-Captain growled negation. "And once more I tell you that you are wanted to oversee what other data collection this expedition can do, and bring the booty safely home, whatever may become of me. You have been less than enthusiastic about my plan. Do you challenge my decision?"
Rach-Scientist slipped his tail briefly between his hocks. "No, master, assuredly not."
Ghrul-Captain relented. "Bear in mind, this is a trial run, the first severe one. Yes, the instruments will peer and snuff, but foremost is to prove that the vessel can run such a course. That ride is for me alone." And for me alone the glory, and the triumph that it will be over the monkeys, he thought; it was as if he tasted fresh blood. "On later flights, yes, perhaps I will let you come too."
"Master, I have not questioned your wisdom, nor do I now," said Shayin-Mate. "However, I venture to ask that you record a summary of your intent. Should anything go awry, against my wishes-"
Then you will be acting captain, who takes the ship back, makes trophy of the prestige that that confers, and contrives to lay the full blame for the debacle with the monkeys on me, thought Ghrul-Captain sardonically. Not altogether against your wishes.
He did not resent it. In the mate's position, he would have done the same. His rage at the humans flared. Because of their contumely, the exploit ahead of him would merely win back the standing Ress-Chiuu had lost for him. No net advancement. Unless, of course, he could do the foe a real injury… "The lords at Kzin will want a quick overview of events," Shayin-Mate went on. "The technical reports can be digested for them later."
Ghrul-Captain's fury smoldered back down. He expanded the ears he had folded and gibed, "Since you feel yourself incapable, I will pace the track for you." "Master, it is simply that your own words will have the most force. I hope with all my entrails you will be on hand to deliver them personally." "So be it." Ghrul-Captain set the intercom scanner to record. Having curtly stated the purpose, he declared:
"I am about to take the sundiver Firehunter on a swing around the sunward side of the giant planet we have come to spy out. The planet has just commenced its death struggle, so this is urgent. How things will go is unpredictable; they may become too violent for another such flight, although I am ready to dare whatever looks possible. For the same reason, unforeseeability, I make the flight piloted rather than robotic." As well as there being no honor in risking a few machines. "I will accelerate inward, cut the drive at a suitable point, and have the planet itself take me around. I will then be moving at high velocity on a hyperbolic orbit which, if allowed to continue, would carry me nearer the human ships than is… desirable. However, well before then, I will reduce the vector and start acceleration on a quartering path to rendezvous with Strong Runner. Available delta vee is ample.
"Perhaps observation of these extreme conditions at that close range will yield data of military value. It is sure that nothing like my mission has ever been attempted before.
"Glory to the race!"
He switched off and looked straight at Shayin-Mate. "Will that do?" he asked: a sarcasm, for it had better.
The other dropped his gaze. "Thanks and honor to our captain."
Rach-Scientist said nothing. En route he had expressed doubts about the utility of the scheme. The passage between star and planet would take less than four hours. What few instruments could endure the environment must be rugged, heavily shielded, basically simple, and therefore of very limited capabilities. His class was necessarily allowed a certain latitude, and Ghrul-Captain had been content to override his objections. But to pursue them, especially now, would be insolence meriting punishment.
And, yes, in the end he wanted to fare along. He too was a kzin. "I go, then," said Ghrul-Captain. To linger when the game was afoot did not become a Hero.
He strode down passageways and sprang down companionways to the portside boat lock. Firehunter waited alongside. A guard made obeisance as he reached the gang tube between. He passed on.
The control den, the only section of the vessel with life support, was a hemispherical space less than five meters across, crammed with equipment and storage lockers, just enough room free for a kzin to curl up on a pad and get a little sleep-hardly a fit prison cell. The air hung chill and stale-smelling. Yet in the viewscreen above the main control panel blazed his goal. He exulted while he settled into the command seat, activated the systems, heard the purr of power and felt the slight tug on him when his craft cast free.
Heavily burdened with her surrounding shell of water, she could not accelerate as fiercely as he would have wished. But her speed did mount, second by second, sunward bound. Ghrul-Captain hissed his satisfaction.