“Look at this rag.” They heard the voice before they reached the doorway. “What do they know about it? They don’t know a damn thing.”
“No, Esrom.”
Betha brushed aside the flaps and they went in, wearing smiles rigid with tension.
“I could do better myself. That’s what we ought to do, do it ourselves. We ought to hire some mediamen and put out our own paper—”
“Yes, Esrom.”
“—tell them our side. Look here, Sia, ‘monopolistic’…”
The golden-skinned, ethereally beautiful woman behind the counter looked up at them; her arching eyebrows rose. The golden-skinned, strikingly handsome man with the printout turned. Brother and sister, Betha thought, and…impeccable. They wore soft greens, colors flowing into a background of sea-green light, the woman in a long embroidered gown, the man in an embroidered jacket, lace at his sleeves. She pictured what they saw in return, brushed at her stringy hair.
But the man said, “Sia, did you ever see anything like that? Look at that skin, and hair, together…” His dark eyes moved down her suit, identified it, looked back at her face. “But she’s been in space.” Interest faded to regret.
The woman tapped his arm. “Esrom, please!” She charmed them with a smile. “And what can we do for you?” She smoothed her sinuously drifting, raven-black hair along her back, tucked strands under her lacy cap.
“We’d like to buy a load of hydrogen from you.” Betha felt herself blushing crimson while they watched in fascination. She tried to hide her annoyance. “One thousand tons.”
“I see.” The man nodded slowly, or bowed, looking vaguely surprised. He reached for a clipboard on a chain. “Do you want it shipped?”
“No, we can move it ourselves.”
“Where are you coming from?” The woman’s voice was as fragile as her face, but with no hint of softness.
“Lansing.” Shadow Jack smiled, tall and thin and genuine, with one blue eye and one green.
“The Main Belt!” Brother and sister looked at them again; silent, this time, with a morbid awe. A newscast appeared on the screen behind them, flashing pictures between lines of print. “That’s quite a trip,” the man said quietly. “How long’d it take you?”
“A long time.” Betha gestured up at worn, dirty faces, not needing to force the grating weariness into her voice. “And it’ll be even longer going home. We’d like to get this settled as soon as we can.”
“Of course.” He hesitated. “What—er, what did you want to offer in trade? We’re limited in what we can take, you understand…”
Charity begins at home. She saw Shadow Jack’s rigid smile twitch, as she pulled off her gloves. But who am I to blame them for that? She balanced Rusty’s carrying case against the metal counter top and unsealed the lid, hearing the hiss as the pressure equalized. Rusty’s mottled head rose over the edge, her dilated pupils black with excitement, flashing green in the light. Her nose quivered and she wriggled free, rising up into the air like a piece of windborne down. Betha heard the small gasp of the woman, and let the case drift away. “Will you take a cat?”
“An animal,” the woman whispered. “I never thought I’d ever see one…” Shyly she put out a hand. Betha stroked Rusty, reassuring, pushed her toward them. Rusty butted softly up against the woman’s palms, sniffing daintily, sidling in pleasure along the fine satin cloth of her sleeve.
“I think you’ve come to the right place.” The man’s slender hands quivered. “Dad would give you the whole distillery for that animal.” He laughed. “But he’d make you pay shipping to the Main Belt.”
“Are there many animals left on Lansing?”
“No.” Betha smiled, felt it pull. “A load of hydrogen will be fine.”
“We have gardens,” Shadow Jack said. “Lansing’s the only tent rock. We were the capital of all Heaven Belt, once.” He lifted his head.
“Sure,” the man said. “That’s right, it was. I’ve seen pictures. Beautiful…”
Rusty slipped away from the woman, began to jab a paw through the holes of a mesh container for papers. The papers danced and she began to purr, smugly content at the center of the world’s attention. Betha’s eyes were drawn away to the newscast on the wall; she froze as she saw her own face projected on the screen, realized it was not coverage of their arrival on Mecca. With all her will she glanced casually away, reaching out to scratch Rusty under the chin.
The man caught her motion, turned to look up at the screen. Her eyes leaped after him, saw her image vanish into lines of print. The man looked back at her, puzzled; shook his head, grimacing politely. “Don’t mind the screen. We like to get the news from all over, to see what the competition’s up to. It’s all static anyhow—mediamen’ll say anythin’ they’re paid for.” He gestured at the printout settling gradually into a heap on the counter. Rusty pounced, overshooting, and swept it out into the air.
“Here, little thing, don’t hurt yourself,” the woman murmured, her hands tightening with indecision.
“She’ll be all right,” Betha said, irritable in her relief.
A small disapproval showed on the woman’s face.
“Do you mind if we take a look at your ship?”
Betha looked back at the man. “No…but it’s at the other end of the ast—of the rock.”
He nodded. “Easy to do.” There was a small control panel under the wall screen; he moved away toward it. “What’s your designation?”
“Lansing 04.”
He changed settings, and the news report vanished. “Lansing 04…” Betha saw their ship appear, an image in blinding contrasts on the sunbleached field. “I guess it’s possible for you to move a thousand tons with a ship that size. How much does it mass?”
“Twenty tons without reaction mass or cargo.”
“We like to be sure, you know.” He looked up. “It’s goin’ to take you a lot of megasecs, though, to get back to Lansing.”
She watched his face for unease, saw only his easy solicitude. “We’ll manage; we have to.”
“Sure.” His eyes moved from her to Shadow Jack, touching them, she saw, with a kind of admiration. “We’ll start processing your shipment.”
Rusty crashed against the counter edge in a snarl of printouts and sneezed loudly.
“Hey, now.” The man turned away, reaching for Rusty almost desperately. “Dad would kill us if somethin’ happened to—” His voice faded, he let her go, catching up a sheet. Betha saw her own face on the page between his hands, not disappearing this time. “…alien starship…” She heard Shadow Jack’s soft curse of defeat. She drifted, clutching the counter edge until her fingers reddened.
The Tirikis turned back to her. “It’s you,” the man said, staring. “You’re from the starship.”
“And you’ve come to us,” the woman whispered.
An unconscious smile spread over their faces, the look of guileless greed Betha had seen on the woman in the shuttle. “I don’t understand,” she said stubbornly. “You’ve seen our ship; we’ve come from the Main Belt. There were a lot of people taking our pictures on the field—”
“Not that picture.” The woman shook her head, her black hair rippling. Betha watched them remembering, reassessing. “We’ve heard about you ever since you came into the system over a megasec ago.”
“And you didn’t get from there to here in a megasec in the ship we saw.” The man looked at Shadow Jack again. “You are from the Belt; maybe it’s your ship. What are you, a snow pirate?”
“We’re not pirating anything.” Betha caught Rusty, pinned her against her suit. “We offered you a deal, this cat for a load of hydrogen. We’ve got nothing else that would interest you, wherever we’re from. Just let us make the deal and go—”
“I’m sorry.” The man looked down at the spiral of paper. “I’m afraid we are interested in a ship that can go from Discus…to the Main Belt…to the Demarchy…” Betha saw his mind work out the parameters, “…in one and a half megasecon
ds.”
She wondered bleakly what he would think if he knew it had only taken a third of that. “What is it you want from us, then?” Knowing the answer, she knew now that she had failed, because there had never been a way to enter Mecca undetected.
“They want your ship! Let’s get out of here.” Shadow Jack pushed away toward the door, pulled aside the flaps, froze. Betha turned. Facing him, in a wine-red jacket flawlessly embroidered, was the man who worked for the government. Impeccable…The man’s eyes fixed on her in return, and on Shadow Jack. He stared, incredulous, and she knew that this time he was staring at wild, filthy hair and streaked faces. Not at her paleness—she knew from his eyes that her face held no surprises for him. “Captain Torgussen,” he nodded. “And not from Lansing—obviously.”
“You have the advantage of me,” Betha said. “I’m afraid I’ve forgotten your name.”
He smiled. It hardened as he turned to the Tirikis, making a bow. “And just what does Tiriki Distillates want with the starship?” His hand found the front of Shadow Jack’s suit, pushed him back into the room. “I guess you weren’t kidding, boy, when you told us what you do for a living.”
“Who are you?” the woman asked, indignant.
“Wadie Abdhiamal, representing the Demarchy government.”
“Government?” The man made a face. “Then this is none of your business, Abdhiamal. Butt out before you get into trouble.”
“That’s monopolist talk, Tiriki. And I think you’ve got the ideas to go with it. I’m here on business—these people and their ship are what I came to Mecca to find. The government has claimed the ship in the name of all the people of the Demarchy.”
“Your government claims don’t hold air, Abdhiamal.” The man glanced down at his reflection on the counter top, readjusting his soft beret. “You know you’ve got nothin’ to back them up. We found these two first, and we’re keeping them.”
“Public opinion will back me up. Nobody’s goin’ to let Tiriki have total control of that ship. I’ll call a public hearing—”
“Use my screen.” The man pointed. “When we tell the people how the government has been goin’ behind the Demarchy’s back looking for the starship, they’re not goin’ to hear a word you say. You’ll be out before you know what happened, and I mean out of everything.”
“But you’ll be out one starship—and that’s all that matters to me. Set up a hearing.”
The woman moved toward the wall screen.
“Just a damn minute!” Betha turned desperately, caught them all in a look. “Sixty seconds—one minute, where I come from—to mention some things you seem to have forgotten about my ship. One, it is my ship. And two, only I know where it is. And three, if you think you’ll get it without my full cooperation, you’re wrong. My crew will destroy it before they’ll let it be taken—and that will destroy any ship that gets within three thousand kilometers of it.” Shadow Jack came back to her side, his face questioning. The others were silent, waiting, their frustration and greed sucking at her like flames. “Now, then. You seem to have reached an impasse. But I came here to make a deal, and I’m still willing to make a deal—since I don’t think I have any other choice. I doubt if you’ll let us leave, in any case.
“So…suppose each of you tell me why you want my ship so much, and then I’ll tell you who gets it. And it wouldn’t hurt if you mention what’s in it for me—” Rusty began to struggle, clawing for a foothold on her slick suiting. She saw Abdhiamal watch the cat, smile with irrelevant fascination before he met her gaze in turn. He didn’t answer; waiting for the opposition, she thought. “Well?” She turned away, afraid of him, afraid of herself, afraid to let him see it.
The Tirikis spoke softly together. They faced her finally, beautiful and determined. “Your ship would build up our business—and revolutionize the Demarchy’s trade. The way things stand we don’t have all the snow we need where it’s easy to get at; we have to go to the Rings, and it’s a hard trip with nuclear-electric rockets. And the Ringers make it even harder, because they know we can’t do anythin’ that would threaten our allotments of gases. If we had your ship we wouldn’t have to depend on them. Your ship would make the Demarchy a better place to live…You could continue to captain it, work for us. We’ll pay you well. You’ll be part of the richest, most powerful company in the Demarchy—”
“And when the Demarchy objects, that company will make your ship into a superweapon and take over.” Abdhiamal held her eyes.
She felt her eyelids flicker; he slipped out of focus as she shook her head, denying. “No one will use my ship as a weapon. Not even you, Abdhiamal, if that’s why you want it.”
“The government wants it so it won’t become a weapon and bring on a new civil war. God knows, the old one’s still killin’ us. Somebody’s got to see that the ship is used for the good of the whole Demarchy, and not turned against us. It could be the stimulus we need to revive the whole Belt, the technology you have on board. We might be able to duplicate your ramscoop, build our own, reestablish some kind of regular communication outside the Demarchy. You could help us—”
“Don’t listen to him!” the woman said. “We’re the government, we, the people. He’s got no authority to do anythin’. You’d be torn apart by everybody who wants your ship. He can’t protect you. Stay with us. We’ll take care of you.” She lifted her hands. “You’ve got nowhere else to turn.” Betha recognized the threat behind it.
“They’ll take care of you, all right,” Shadow Jack whispered. His gloved hand caught Betha’s wrist, squeezing until it bruised, “Don’t do it, Betha! They’re all liars. You can’t trust any of ’em.”
“Shadow Jack.” She turned slowly, her hand still locked in his, and touched him with her eyes. He let go; she saw the anger drain out of him, leaving his face empty. “What about the hydrogen—for Lansing?”
“We’ll send them a shipment; whatever they need.”
“And you?” She faced Abdhiamal again. “Is it true that your promises are worthless?”
“The government only does the Demarchy’s pleasure. Why don’t we ask the Demarchy? We’ll call a general meeting, and let you tell them all about your ship. Tell everyone the location—but warn ’em too, to keep away—tell them what you told us. Then nobody will be at an advantage. I’ll tell them what your ship could mean to all of them, to the whole Belt. Everybody will have a hand in decidin’ how to make the best use of the opportunity, the way things were designed to be done…The Demarchy means you no harm, Captain. But we need your help. Give it to us, and you can name your own reward.”
“Anything but a ticket home.” Shadow Jack searched her face; she averted her eyes.
“All right.” She reached down for Rusty’s carrying case, forced herself to look at Abdhiamal again. “Abdhiamal, I’ll try it your way…”
He smiled, and she couldn’t see behind it; she fought the desire to trust him. “Thanks.” He turned to the Tirikis. “Set up a meeting.”
“No. Wait.” Betha shook her head. “Not here. I want to be on my ship when I make the announcement. If everyone has to know where it is, some lunatic will try to take it no matter what I say. I have to be there, to countermand my orders; I don’t want to lose my ship now. I’m sure you don’t, either?” She looked back at him. “We’ll take you to the ship; we can broadcast from there…After all, it’s not going to get away from you without fuel, is it?”
“I suppose not. And I suppose you’re right.” He nodded once, watching the Tirikis. “Okay, I’ll accept your terms.”
“Go with ’em, Abdhiamal.” Esrom Tiriki’s voice mocked him. “That’ll give us plenty of time to spread the news of this; the mediamen will tear you apart. By the time you call a meetin’ you’ll be public enemy number one. Nobody will listen to you then. You can count on it.” His hand jerked at the counter’s edge, chopping down.
She saw Abdhiamal’s smile tighten. “Let’s get goin’, then.”
She pushed Rusty, protesting, into
the case and sealed the lid. She felt a small joy at a sacrifice refused, and felt the Tirikis’ eyes change enviously behind her. She smiled faintly.
“How can you smile now, after that’s happened?” Shadow Jack muttered. He picked up his helmet.
Softly she said, “Didn’t I tell you there was always a reason to keep smiling?”
LANSING 04 AND RANGER (DEMARCHY SPACE)
+ 1.73 MEGASECONDS
Wadie watched the starship grow on the screen in the cramped, stinking cabin of the Lansing 04. His admiration grew with it—and his heartfelt gratitude. This was the Ship from Outside, a ship to cross interstellar space at interstellar speeds, with a body streamlined to silken grace as a protection against the corroding particulate wind. It had none of the ugly angularity of the spacecraft he had always seen; it was pragmatic perfection, and there hadn’t been a ship like it in the Heaven system in generations. The prewar starships of the Heaven Belt had been converted into the deadliest of warships during the war—and had been destroyed, every one, just as the access to the basic requirements for life, the delicate balance of survival, had been destroyed. In the end the Main Belt had become a vast mausoleum, and now the isolated survivors were disappearing, like patches of melting snow…
He looked down at the back of Shadow Jack’s head. His own head ached insufferably. He looked back at the screen again, counting the seconds until they reached the ship. Even if it hadn’t been all he imagined, still it would have been a haven, an escape from the past two hundred kilosecs of suffocating indignity in the foulness of this scrap-metal coffin. And an escape from the sullen, hostile boy and the small, blunt woman who might as well have been a man, like all the other women who pushed their way out into space. He watched her as she soothed the cat above the humming control board, the rings shining on her hands. He looked down at the gold-and-ruby ring on his own thumb, the gift of that other spacing woman and her man, and wondered wearily why this one bothered to wear so many rings, when she obviously wasn’t interested in her appearance.
Outcasts of Heaven Belt Page 20