"Do that. But keep it quiet."
"Affirmative,"
"If this is a yacht we're coming up on, she could have some nimble moves in her pocket. Be prepared for that."
"No problem," Cyro said.
"Roger," Snapshot seconded.
And then they were over the limb of the planet. Not wanting to take a chance, Coeur threw the ship into evasive maneuvers even before she signaled Deep Six to open communications, though she didn't yet engage her active sensors; the Hiver satellite was providing enough of a fix to give a target for a radio signal.
"Unidentified vessel, this is RCS Hornet. Transmit your transponder code immediately."
If there were humans controlling that ship, Coeur knew, they would probably be confused for a moment as they searched for the origin of the message. Consistent with that analysis, the yacht switched to active sensors, but did not answer the hail, "Unidentified vessel, this is RCS Hornet. I say again, transmit your transponder code immediately, or stand to for boarding."
Whoever was commanding the yacht clearly wasn't in a talkative move. Probably unable to spot Hornet through the outer fringe of Ra's atmosphere, the yacht turned around and flared its engines.
"Full active sensors," Coeur said. "Paint the target and transmit data to Alpha."
"Understood."
Yes, sir, Mr. Yacht Captain. You picked the wrong planet to play around with.
The chase evolved just about the way Coeur thought it would. Roaring away from Ra with the ploddingly slow Hornet at her rear, the yacht veered toward the distant gas giant Guldan IV—probably expecting more than enough time to scoop fuel before Hornet could catch her—then cut her thrust completely as a nuclear missile exploded off her bow. Asp Alpha had set itself up for a completely silent ambush directly in the yacht's path.
"What is with these SDB crews and nuclear weapons?" Snapshot said. "The ones at Kruyter blew up a ship they were intercepting, and these almost did the same thing."
"It's all that time cooped up in a tin can," Crowbar sent. "Makes 'em stir crazy."
That, Coeur knew, was just an old hand joshing a young one. Most of the Coalition SDBs were manned by elite crews comfortable with the weighty responsibility of preventing the spread of Virus and piracy. Kruyter's private crews were an exception—and had probably since been replaced.
"Time to intercept?" Coeur asked.
"Theyacht has executed braking thrust. Asp Alpha will be in position to board in 30 minutes, and we will make the position in four hours."
"That won't take us too far from Ra, I'll continue on course until we hear something definite from Alpha."
Something definite came from Deadeye, skipper of Asp Alpha, a half an hour later.
"Hornet, this is Asp Alpha. We hit the bull's-eye."
"Clarify, Alpha."
"This yacht is Lord Ryan, Delpero's ship."
Delpero?
"Have you boarded?"
"Oh, yes. And boy, is Delpero pissed."
"I'll bet. Do you want us to come out there?"
"Negative, no need. Ryan's drives are still in order, so I've transferred a prize crew over to fly her back to Ra. Her crew I've got under guard in the galley."
"Understood, Alpha. Want to take them in to Port Adrian?" "Thought we would. The yacht's hull isn't streamlined though, so we'll have to leave it in orbit."
"Mind if we inspect her while you're on the surface?"
"Be our guest, Hornet. You're the top dog."
"Thank you, Alpha. Advise Lord Ryan we'll meet her in orbit."
Physic was a taking a late afternoon break at a table in her lab when the call came, routed to her pocket communicator through Dina's computer.
"Hornet to Seabridge Nest, come in please. Doc, this is urgent."
Physic set down the coffee and packaged nuts she was holding to lift her radio off its belt hook.
"Physic here, Red Sun. What's the emergency?"
A four-second-delay told Physic something right by itself—Hornet must have left orbit.
"I hope you're sitting down. Physic. One of our SDBs has just intercepted Lord Ryan, and your husband was on board."
"Oh, fikken!"
"Physic, are you all right?"
"Sorry, I just spilled my coffee on myself. Now what was that—you said August is here?"
"Affirmative, Physic. Asp Alpho is taking him into Port Adrian, and a prize crew is taking his yacht into orbit."
"Lord Ryan wasn't armed, the last I knew. Was anyone hurt out there?"
"Negative, no shots were exchanged. I do think he came here to meet someone, though."
"Are you asking who I think that might be?" "Roger, Physic. You did live with him for two years."
"Thanks, skipper, I remember that. No, I can't imagine who he'd have any business with out here. Legitimate business, anyway."
"Had to ask. How's progress in the lab?"
"Oh, good actually. Florence and Scissor are out taking blood samples so we can see if our antibody test works."
"I'm sure it will."
"Hey, I'm the best disease pathologist you've got."
"You're the only one I've got, doctor."
"Like I said,"
"Physic, we're going to intercept Lord Ryan here in about four hours. I'd like you up here to help us check her out."
"To tell the truth, skipper, I didn't spend that much time on the yacht. I'll be standing by, though."
"Good. We'll call ahead when we're ready to pick you up off the tarmac."
"I'll be there."
"One more thing. I'll try to get a copy of the grilling they give August later, but it's possible we'll stiil have questions for him. Will you be all right if we have to go question him?"
"Captain, I'm working in an open grave here. I don't think meeting my husband can be any worse than that."
"Roger, Seabridge Nest. Hornet, out."
Since both of lord Ryan's air locks were set in her rakishly sloped bow, docking required Hornet to maneuver around her front. When a docking couple was finally in place between Hornet's port air lock and Ryan, the two ships formed a giant L, connected at their bows 350 kilometers above Ra.
Blackball, one of Deadeye's engineers, was in charge of the prize crew of three, and greeted Coeur, Drop Kick, and Crowbar when they came aboard.
"Nice fittings," she said, shaking their hands, "don't you think?"
Surrounded by gold fittings and real oak panels- belonging to a man from a water world—Coeur had to admit she was impressed.
"A little ostentatious," she said. "Have you had much of a chance to inspect her?"
"Our initial boarding party did a pretty thorough search, yes. Looks like they bugged the hell out of Aubaine in a hurry, cause there isn't much cargo aboard, just rare gems and crystals in the safe, and about 10 tonnes of gold bullion and electronic components in the hold."
"Portable wealth," Crowbar said.
"He must've known the law was after him," Drop Kick speculated "But why run here?" Crowbar asked. "I'm no navigator, but I know a lot of other places I'd run for first if I had a jump-4 yacht,"
"As I recall," Blackball said, "somebody asked them that, but they weren't talking."
"Pity," Coeur said, "The way the governor sounded the last time I talked to him, he doesn't take kindly to people invading the sanctity of his system."
'Think they'll rough Delpero up?" Drop Kick asked.
"Let me put it this way," Coeur said. "Civil liberties aren't a real strong point in the local constitution."
"Sounds like my kind of government," the Marine said.
"Well, regardless of what they get out of him, I'd like to have Physic up here before we start probing around the ship too much. Blackball, is there a functioning ship's boat on this thing?"
"Yes, sir, A 10-ton launch in good working order."
"A 10-ton launch?" Crowbar said. "Say, we could use one of those."
"I'm sure we could," Coeur said, "but technically this ship and everything i
n it is Delpero's property—at least until he's found guilty of something. Even if we commandeer his property with a necessary-use voucher, it'll still be his property."
"A technicality," Drop Kick said. "He'll be dead before he sees the outside of a prison."
"Be that as it may, he hasn't been found guilty of anything yet, so let's just remember that. Now, assuming Blackball and her crew don't need the launch, I'll take it down to the surface and pick up Physic. Will that be acceptable, Blackball?"
The woman nodded.
"Good," Coeur said, "In the meantime, you guys can stay here and study the reports from Alpha's inspection. And, of course, you can help Blackball and her crew if they need anything."
The Marine and engineer nodded.
"Yes, sir."
"It might be nice," Crowbar added, "if we could arrange to keep the launch permanently. Do you think your SD8 force will want it. Blackball?"
"Hell, no," Blackball answered "The only small craft we've got room for are missiles."
In overall volume, Hornet was almost Identical to Lord Ryan, but the ships made substantially different use of their space. Where the freighter gave over prodigious space to cargo, the yacht consumed volume with vast and powerful maneuver and jump drives. The area left over for habitation in Lord Ryan was relatively small, certainly less than that aboard Hornet, and it was only its clever arrangement that made it appear tremendous.
"This main lounge is probably where he spent most of the trip," Physic said to Coeur, standing beside her in the middle of a vast but comfortable room whose walls were high-tech holograms presently depicting an illusory rain forest. "Here and the master's stateroom just ahead."
"The use of space is kind of odd," Coeur said. "If it were my ship, I'd rather give the crew below decks some sort of recreation area."
"Yes, but you're used to treating people like human beings. August wasn't."
"All right, let's go over what we know. We don't have a densitometer, but you've looked in every secret hiding place you know of, Crowbar's crawled around every part of the drive section, and Sixer's gone back and forward through all of the computer navigation logs, but there isn't a scrap of evidence to indicate where he was going."
"We do know something, though. With the value of his cargo, he was probably planning to pay somebody for something when he got there."
"But who? And was it somebody here, at Ra?"
Physic shrugged.
"Weil, the prize crew is going to stay aboard for a while and keep poking around. I say we go down to Port Adrian and talk to August ourselves."
"I agree."
On the way to the forward hatch with Physic, though, Coeur paused, remembering something she'd wanted to ask the doctor, "I forgot to ask you something. Do these walls always show the same hologram?"
"Oh, no," Physic said, walking over to the bar in the corner and reaching over its counter. There she pressed a hidden control panel and changed the forest to a startling spacescape of stars.
"It's probably programmed to respond to August's voice, but this is the override panel. Here's the other choices."
Though she'd seen such holographic theaters before, on Terra, Coeur was impressed by the selection of images: a lightning storm inside the atmosphere of a gas giant, an island surrounded by crashing waves, double stars over a jungle at dusk.
"That's odd," Physic said, cycling through the five images again and coming back to the binary and jungle, "I don't remember seeing this one before."
Coeur walked closer to Physic.
"So?"
"It's probably nothing," Physic said, "but these programs are really expensive and rare. August was very happy when he received them."
"You mean they didn't come with the ship?"
"Oh, heavens no, only the forest came with the ship. All the other ones were given to Delpero by a woman named Vega Zorn,"
"Who's that?"
"Actually, Zorn was one of the first of the Dawn League captains. Or at least she was for a few months...for some reason she left the service in '98 and took up collecting relic artifacts in the frontier..."
Physic paused.
"...and she was a slut, who slept with August every chance she got,"
"I see. Well, wherever she got them, these must be TL- 14 or 15 programs. Did you ever meet Zorn?"
"A few times, yeah. Nasty-tempered like you would not believe."
"Toward life in general?"
"Actually, no, come to think of it. The last time I caught her and August together, she was complaining about..."
"What?"
"Oh my God."
"Physic, what? What was she complaining about?"
"Hivers, Red. Hivers, and the politicians who were selling out to them."
Coeur gave the doctor a steely look.
"And you just remembered that now?"
"Red, August and I knew all kinds of people. It's not like I remember everything that happened every day—Florence could maybe, but—"
"Sorry, Physic. I didn't mean to snap at you "
"Do you think it might be important?"
"I guess we'll find out when we talk to August," Coeur said. "Is there any label on these holograph programs? Like, where they came from?"
"I'll check," Physic said, hurrying to get around the bar. Coeur joined her and saw that she was punching up program data from the central computers.
"He hasn't changed the code," Physic said with a smug grin. "Let's see...holographic menu...notes...nope, not a damn thing."
"Let me try," Coeur said, moving into place in front of the keyboard. She only verified what Physic said, though— the programs were stored without any information at all about their point of origin.
"That is odd," Physic had to admit.
"Yeah, well, there's another place where we can look for this data."
"August?"
"You got it," Coeur said, shutting off the computer. "Let's go."
Port Adrian sat on the south end of the Straits of Rickett, an 800-kilometer gap between the south coast of Seabridge Peninsula and North Bannon continent. Given its latitude 30 degrees above the equator, Coeur suspected the climate was temperate year-round—probably a contributing factor in its choice as the world's capital. Without the technology for weather control, a choice based on whimsy was probably not an option.
After the Collapse, Ra had accepted refugees from all over the surrounding subsector—an infusion of culture that had built a sleepy hamlet into a city of 60,000 citizens. Now, steam-driven freighters—some I 50 meters long—dominated the harbor, proof how far people had come who'd arrived with little more than the rags on their backs.
"They're holding him in the central jail," Coeur said, steering Lord Ryan's launch across the waterfront warehouses. "Conveniently close to the starport."
"It doesn't look like they have a starport," Physic said from the co-pilot's seat, "Oh, sure they do," Coeur answered, pointing out a fenced-off section of heliport ahead.
"That's a starport?"
"Just having a safe place to land gets you a class E
rating."
"What about fuel or repair facilities?"
"No. But they are nice enough to let visitors ocean refuel without charge."
"Generous."
After final clearance to land from Port Adrian Control, Coeur set down on the edge of the fenced-off area, avoiding a pair of air rafts that were already parked there. Those belonged to the SDB support base, whose voluminous hangar presently stood empty.
"I'm Deputy Marshal Holton," a uniformed man said to Coeur and Physic, meeting them at their lowered boarding ramp, "director of the Port Adrian jail. I understand you're here to visit prisoner Delpero."
'That's correct," Coeur said, "Follow me."
Holton, wearing hard body armor, a night stick, and riot gun, was evidence of the serious weight given law enforcement on Ra—a weight further evidenced in the blockish three-story jail adjacent to the tarmac.
In deference to t
heir position as representatives of the Coalition, Coeur and Physic were not subjected to a rigorous search and X-ray scan, but they did have to sign two sets of log books and produce legitimate IDs before they were let through to the central holding area.
"He looks awful," Physic said, approaching the oneway mirror behind which sat Delpero, slumped in a stiff chair at a bare table. His tie was gone, together with the top buttons of his shirt, and a bruise was shining purple on his high left cheekbone.
"We didn't hurt him much," Holton said to Physic, aware that she was Delpero's wife, "if that's what you're thinking. Like to, though—pompous creep."
"Still, it looks like you gave him a good grilling."
"Oh, yes, we did that. He claims to have no knowledge of the investigation against him and Novastar, but he did say he left Aubaine to avoid some woman named Serene who'd come looking for him,"
"I can believe that," Coeur said. "He was probably afraid she'd deep-probe his mind."
"So that's why he was afraid of her," Holton said, nodding. "We were wondering about that since he didn't explain why he was afraid of her. Didn't explain what he was doing at Ra, either."
"I don't see a lawyer around," Physic said. "Did he waive his right to counsel?"
"excuse me?"
"When he was questioned, did he have a lawyer?"
"No, ma'am," the deputy said. "Although his request for one is being processed,"
Poor sap, Coeur thought. He really picked the wrong planet to get caught on.
"Do you suppose that'll affect any future prosecution?" Physic asked Coeur.
"I don't know. Every member of the Coalition has its own laws, though, and they're pretty much sovereign."
"It just makes me uncomfortable, I wouldn't want to be held without counsel myself."
Coeur refrained from pointing out that the fellow and his mates had certainly failed to observe Coalition space traffic laws, were circumstantially linked to a smuggling operation, and quite possibly linked to the murder of 300 Hivers. Delpero was still Physic's husband, regardless of the degenerate creature he had become.
"No," Coeur said, "I don't suppose I would, either. Deputy, what do you plan to do with him next?" "He'll be held for arraignment on the local transponder violation, then released to the custody of the next Coalition vessel bound for Aubaine."
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