Trade Secret

by Sharon Lee

  Zam and Mel must have split their time between the feeds—Grig reported their observations in brief, condensed lumps. They’d managed to get a stereo effect and an estimated mass on the ship, just for fun. He even reported, “Zam and Mel suggest a more fashionable font and color for the Market nameplate and numbers, and I promised to pass that on,” and later, “Zam thinks the shipyard left some graffiti behind!”

  “Hey, Vernon,” Khat eventually said to her counterpart, “I’m not seeing much from our side. Looks like all your rear and ventral reaction jets are clear. As close as we can get, I’d trust that you don’t have bends in that old dinged section. My radar’s not showing any holes you’re not supposed to have, I think, and we’re not seeing any signs of outgassing. Beyond that—”

  “Pilot Khat, I’m seeing the same pictures you are. Let me poll the crew . . . we can likely call it good both ways.”

  While that was going on, Cris and Grig were on another channel, and Khat could hear Cris saying “Zam’s got a good eye you know. Maybe a rescan . . . At close power?”

  Khat looked in Cris’s direction, about to ask what the discussion was about when Pilot Thuy came back on the link.

  “Cris?”

  She looked up at him to smile, but saw him grim-faced about something, and sounding grim-voiced. “Let’s make sure we’ve swapped all the data both ways—highest data density. Then we stand by at a distance while they test, still swapping vids and sensors and then watch us,” Thuy said.

  Iza’s, “The Captain concurs,” was immediate, and, “Assigning observers now,” came across the all-call from Grig.

  Grig sounded as grim as Cris, and a glance at Cris showed him touching keys to send information somewhere—information that wasn’t showing up on her screens.

  Khat patched through to Grig, on a private connection, asking, “Assigning observers to what, Grig?”

  “Zam’s got good eyes, Khat, and so does Mel. There’s an anomaly we’re checking.”

  “And it is so worrisome that you can’t tell their pilot about it?”

  There was a pause, which Khat imagined was a sigh, or maybe it was a sigh because she heard Seeli talking quietly in the distance, something about spec sheets . . .

  “Won’t mean a thing to her, Khat. Just that it looks like something’s odd about the externals of the Struven Unit on the right screen. Our Struven Unit.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Port Chavvy

  Port Chavvy was noisy with the hum of people and equipment, the storefront videos full of improbable promises. There were people of many appetites and necessities, and potential trouble to make someone fresh off the flight deck of a two-man ship jumpy without the added burden of anticipation. He wanted to see Freza and he wanted to get what he needed to retrieve his book. . . .

  The truth was, Terran ports feel different to a spacer than Liaden ports. Liaden ports are all business all the time, with the practical and utilitarian overriding the constant mercantile appetite of Terran ports, the Terran appetite including shopping stalls, walking vendors, and sensualists offering to do or to have done just what the working pilot had been dreaming of, cooped up in that lonely spaceship for all those days . . .

  Jethri tried to take all that into account as he worked his way through passageways joining the crowded multilevel commercial port’s shopping arcades with the working side, the real port. His credentials on dock were trader and pilot—on this side his credentials were a willingness to pay and an ability to keep what was his.

  They’d come down to this side to check the dropboxes for incoming news from home, from Vincza, from wherever, and whatever news the Scout was running with was keeping him on high-frets, too.

  From his left, then, a nearly bare chest and slim arms with tiny wrists, waving a package, the move tending to push him to the side, out of the flow of traffic . . .

  “Genuine vya, in concentrate, good Pilots. The best, and only a quarter bit. Want to try it out, ten bits for the quick.”

  Truth told, Jethri’d seen less clothes on people, but rarely revealing quite that much nor even so close . . . and the mystic scent of vya was thick enough to override the generic smell of fried this-and-that hanging heavy in the air.

  He moved a hand toward a potential hidden knife as Pen Rel had instructed and sure enough the seller backed away, with a huffy, “Don’t get that short-fused with me, hon, I’ve been on this port for three whole years, and got all my papers!”

  Jethri kept his mouth shut, aiming toward the actual docks, and toward Balrog, the Scout a half pace to his left and almost a half-pace behind, letting Jethri’s newfound urgency take the lead, as melant’i would have it.

  The Scout’s “packages waiting” news had been messages eventually downloaded into hardcopy direct into a sealpack as they waited, the clerk being stone-faced about dealing with a Liaden, his third in as many days, as he’d let on. Jethri’s Combine key had calmed the ether somewhat but the news that there were enough Liadens on port to make a storekeeper take note was disturbing at best.

  It was during their rather lengthy wait for the Scout’s info that Jethri’s portable comm connections finally propagated through the local nets and a message from Freza was bounced to him—promising him an audience today, if he’d like, in fact the sooner the better since they did have a shipment for him—and they’d had inquiries from two different Liaden ships asking about the same item. He’d spent considerable thought on the reply, wishing not to overconcern her. . . .

  “Two Liaden ships, asking outright on the availability of a book hardly known among Terrans,” he said to the Scout, “and she’s put them off, saying that it isn’t on any of their invoices and she doubts there are any on ship.”

  The Scout’s bow had shown his concern, and so Jethri’s reply was succinct.

  Arriving shortly in person, with backup pilot, for my shipment.

  The day was already longer than they’d planned, for the mailbox forwarder used local hours, and they’d stopped in the trade bar while waiting for it to open, that being early in the local day, to find that they were noticed and somewhat artificially ignored, though Jethri’s ordering two near beers in good Terran seemed to hearten the barkeep.

  Crowds seemed the rule.

  They’d seen only two exceptions to that rule—the low docks themselves and the contiguous warehouse zone which was but casually separated from those docks by intermittent fencing, painted lines, and message walls. These housed as well an impromptu open market where those not satisfied with retail bargains could barter, trade, or finagle.

  Jethri longed to visit the market—he often did well in such places—but the pressure of his appointment weighed on him as they crossed into the dock zone itself.

  Liaden docks—he was trying to concentrate on his environment and not his mission so he let his thought backtrack—Liaden docks tended to be sized smaller for Liadens and bigger for their ships and equipment, so that the walks on a Liaden dock might not be quite as wide, but the room for mechanisms and locks and connectors tended to be larger. The equipment itself might not be bigger—but Liadens left more room for it. By what Jethri’d seen, Terrans tended to overbuild some things, after all, as if they recognized that they were less delicate and more argumentative than Liadens.

  Liaden docks tended, too, to be newer—but then he realized that might be a function of Elthoria’s routes as compared to the Market’s—in fact all of his impressions of Liaden docks were of the docks being capable of handling large ships and not just in-system and planetary ships.

  This segment of dock might have handled Elthoria at either of the two far-end berths, where it would have taken up all three levels’ worth of height and more, but in the section he strode through now, the ships were much smaller than Elthoria, and much less grand in many other ways. In fact, the crew members standing or sitting about in the marked areas just aside the gangways and hatches was something one saw more often on Terran docks and Terran worlds—Terrans were more g
regarious than Liadens at dockside, more likely to act as if the dock was an extended shift room or a sun porch open to neighbors.

  They’d had salutes and hand waves in passing, even with his focused stride, and he realized that he’d fallen back into that Terran habit easily. He doubted he’d ever spoken to any of these docksiders before in his life, but like most Terran docksides, the fact that one was seen twice meant he’d be recognized . . . there was a level of community there that Liadens reserved for allies, or clan, or even line.

  Balrog’s location he had from the bar’s diagrams, and third level meant they’d have to take a lift, which he wasn’t in favor of, or take the catwalk-and-stairs edifice to that level, which was probably a good idea, given his adrenaline spring.

  He made no mention of his plan to the Scout, merely angling to the open-railed stairs that enclosed the lift stack for Section 3B, his stride barely changing as his footsteps rang out. He deplored the noise of these boots, but they’d been the fancies, as specified by Norn ven’Deelin at the start of this trip, which seemed at the moment like years ago. The Scout might as well be a cat as much sound as he made in Jethri’s wake, and he was barely in Jethri’s vision at each turn of the stairs.

  Arriving on the third level, the light gravity having impeded him not at all in his rush, Jethri turned hard to the right, a slight and probably purposeful scuff behind him letting him know the Scout was with him. On this level there were a third more gangways since they served even smaller ships and the neighborly spotting of knots of crew was even more in evidence—except something was wrong.

  Jethri saw the looks he was getting on this level, and the wary set of some of the standees as they sipped at beverages or leaned on tool carts. The buzz of conversation was lower even if the echoes were more insistent.

  “Jethri, my Second,” came the low voice suddenly close to his side, “may I suggest . . .”

  Jethri slowed, paused, scanning the hanging signs for Balrog’s spot, looking now for people who really might know him by face and by name and by ship history and . . .

  He turned to the Scout, who was being as inconspicuous as he could.

  “I see they’re expecting something and wondering if I’m it.”

  “Yes. I shall have to tell Pen Rel that you’re able to do more than basic risk assessment . . .”

  Despite his mood Jethri managed to laugh, which was a good thing for he’d realized he’d let the tension build in him, something Pen Rel would surely have been unpleased with. Probably, in fact, he’d been stalking these last few steps, which wouldn’t do at all.

  “No need to look immediately, but there is a woman approaching from our direction of travel, Terran, carrying, but not openly, and who must know you, for her tension is not for you. Behind her some distance, standing with a small group, there is a Terran crew member, acting backup for her, as I read it.”

  Jethri closed his eyes and opened them. “She wears a blue ear cuff, perhaps?”

  “She does, in fact. Along with a blue face decoration or tattoo which matches it.”

  “Then we’re closing into the alert zone, Pilot,” he said. “You have your opportunity to step back and be aside of this problem of mine . . .”

  “Surely,” ter’Astin’s bow was of the most elaborate, so elaborate that Jethri smiled, for it was a bow of extreme irony, reading the hand motions, a bow to one most wise . . .

  A nod then, and Jethri turned in time to see the skip-step that took Freza’s rapid walk into a trot.

  In spite of it all, he was glad to see her, and reached his arms in her direction despite the distance until they nearly collided.

  “Jeth, I have your note, and see you have mine,” Freza said simply, leaning forward to take his hand in what started off as a shake and turned into a wrist hug and then a real hug, to brush her lips close toward his right ear, saying quickly and quietly, “Glad you’re here.”

  She didn’t have the makeup on this time, but now he saw that she had a misty blue tattoo, all fine lines and quiet shades—an image of a spiral galaxy it was, running from her hairline and even maybe into the hair in front of her ear, parallel to the ear—where her make-up had been heaviest when last he’d seen her—and the blue ear cuff shone out all the more against her pale skin and close-cropped hair. The make-up she’d worn made the cuff less obvious, he realized. She’d do that if it was a comm instead of decoration, he decided.

  She moved close to his face, whispered in his other ear, saying, “Sorry we had to leave so soon last time,” and finished her words with the self-same kind of nip and then she was nodding at the same time toward the little man in plain pilot clothes who walked behind with a smile. It was just polite social for her to take Jeth’s hand and smile, but it was pointed social news for her to show a public tendre this way, saying to all witnesses that Freza DeNobli of Balrog knew and welcomed this dandy-dressed trader.

  The witnesses were no less alert, Jethri could see that just by looking over Freza’s shoulder, but some of the immediate tension had gone out of those closest to Balrog’s gangway sign, which meant something . . .

  Freza waved the pair of them toward her ship’s flag, hanging over the breezeless gangway, saying in a serious voice that belied her public smile, “There’s been four passes, up here. Four that we noticed, in a group. They just walk on by, if you know what I mean, slow and comfortable. Except they’re all carrying weapons and they’re all on alert. Looks like a patrol, but they aren’t authorized, and they don’t talk—at least not to anyone but themselves.”

  “And the port proctors?” That was the Scout’s question, in a somewhat accented Terran, as she’d not bothered with Trade. “What have they told you?”

  “And how would we ask them without calling for trouble? They walk about like they do and the proctors can say it’s just shipfolks walking about. Would you call proctors?” There was a proper indecision there, Jethri thought.

  “A show of force,” the scout allowed, “is still a show of force, no matter how small. Are they the same people in each walk? It may be that a call to the security office will—”

  “Will be met with a yawn,” suggested Jethri, breaking into the exchange. “According to the news sheets, this isn’t always a calm port, and until there is trouble making noise somewhere, there’s trouble enough that could be happening, and places enough, that local security glances at their cameras and eats with their guns on their belts.”

  Freza looked to Jethri, candidly asking, “Are you sure this is the best time for this? We can deliver, if we have to. We’ve still got a day plus on port—”

  “No reason to risk any of Balrog’s people on this, Freza, if it is a risk. This is all on me, especially if the reason they’re walking your door like this is me. Might as well do this now and—”

  “This discussion will take place undercover, perhaps?” The Scout’s voice was low but penetrating, and Jethri cast a quick glance to the already assenting Freza.

  “Two minutes, then in,” she said, hand leaving the ear cuff as if she’d untangled it. “Got to clear a spot.”

  “Thanks,” he offered, pointing beyond Balrog’s flag. “What’s in the neighborhood?”

  “Not too much. Two empty slots, and then poor Dulcimer, trying to do some get-by work inside. Word is they had a couple bad supply canisters burst during a fifteen day Jump from Fort Cavanaugh. Whatever it was—fine food flour or something—got everywhere. They’ve been on round the clock since they got in but don’t want to talk to no one or have help in, so they’re likely a little out of true. About the only thing we know is that they rented that rack of tools and have been cleaning like mad people.”

  He could see tools, a portable wall full of them sitting on the walkside as far away from the occupied slots as could be, where some other ships had deck chairs and tables. A kid sat there on a stool, back to the walkway.

  Out of true.

  He nodded, sighed. A ship was out of true when it might not pass a customs inspection, or
when it might have an extra, undeclared person or two on board, or when . . . yeah, and if recalled right, the Dulcimer never had been a rich ship, and always close. With them up here on top rack and away, it wasn’t like they were looking for attention. So it might have been a crew problem they didn’t want to share.

  There you go, he thought, not my concern. He felt for the kid sitting out there by his lonesome, and hoped he hadn’t caused the problem. Been times enough growing up that Jethri Gobelyn had been the one doing wait-work just because he didn’t know enough, or do good enough, or was the problem himself, and was close enough to being out of true, too.

  * * *

  Balrog was cramped, even more so than Gobelyn’s Market, and by the looks of it, older by at least a generation, too. Jethri couldn’t recall having been in the ship more than once, and that had been in his strap-seat days well before he knew by looking the age of a ship, back when he, Freza, and a dozen other youngsters were unleashed in the care of an august older and very skinny crewman named Brabham, with three fingers on one hand and a set of glass goggles on his face, while the rest of the older adults went elsewhere to talk or do adult topics while they waited for some delay in pod transfers.

  The always cheerful Brabham had let them talk and play, sometimes interjecting a song or helping with the drawing of a picture or the selection of a game, and sometimes telling stories that couldn’t possibly be true about secret pirate ports and creatures who’d make you feel good sitting on your lap or even just being in the same room with you. He’d also overseen lunch on the big table and snacks for them all, and asked them to “keep the riot down to beat-cop level” when the room had reverberated with the energetic get-together of children used to near isolation.

  Jethri’d still shared his cabin in the market with some of Arin’s in-progress frames in those days and remembered distinctly being told by his father, “Don’t talk about these with anyone else, Jeth—and if someone asks you about them, why, you think they got sold to the scavengers on Triplepoint.”