number-three car door slid down and three Ehrran crew got out in haste.
“Hold it,” the senior said. “Hold it there.”
Pyanfar shrugged and faced them. She had let go Hilfy’s arm, and everyone had
stopped — the mahe trying to get Tully into the car, the Ehrran who had bailed
out of their vehicle.
“Go on,” Pyanfar said to Hilfy, and moved the hand at her side. “Chur, Hilfy.
It’s all right. Sorry, Ehrran. You’ve been preempted. Station-master’s
intervened.”
“You,” the foremost Ehrran said, gesturing at the mahendo’sat. “Where’s the
authorization?” The mahe officer said something in one of Iji’s manifold
languages, waved a hand. The rest pulled Tully into the car and Chur and Hilfy
piled in after. Doors began to close. “Chanur,” the Ehrran said. Pyanfar gave a
second shrug, displayed empty hands. “Out of my control.”
“That’s your personnel,”
“Just to keep him quiet on the way. You’ll have to take it up with station
offices.”
There were limits. Cursing a captain to her face was one; calling her a liar was
another. The Ehrran did neither, but it was in her eyes, that were lambent
brass. The mahen vehicles snugged up the doors and began to move. Ehrran cast a
wild look that way, waved an arm at her crewmates and they dived back into their
own car.
“Evidently the Ehrran haven’t got a com in there,” Pyanfar observed to Geran,
who had stood fast by her left. “Gods be!”
The hani vehicle swerved wildly about and cut close to the mahendo’sat, dropped
back as the mahendo’sat refused to be passed on the narrow dock.
“Cheeky lot,” Geran said.
“Won’t go well out here. Gods-rotted black-breeches thinks it’s Anuurn. Ought to
be interesting when they get news to their captain, oughtn’t it?”
Geran turned a quizzical look her way
“I rather imagine they had trouble getting a car,” Pyanfar said. “For some
reason.” Up the row there was another swerve, visible as the cars went up the
curving deck, headed for the curtaining tangle of lines that would cut off the
view. “Gods rot–”
“They’re crazy,” Geran said.
“Come on,” she said, spun on her heel and headed up the ramp, with quickening
long strides.
“Put me through to Vigilance,” she said when she hit the bridge, not out of
breath, not quite, but blowing through her nostrils. Geran was still with her,
equally disarranged.
“Got that on vid,” Haral said with quiet satisfaction, the while Khym stared in
confusion and Tirun moved past his seat to reach com. “That maneuver going out.”
“Sharp,” she said. Haral smiled and powered her chair back round to business
with the damage check.
“They don’t answer,” Tirun said, half turning in her seat. “No response.”
“Log that. Call the station office and file a protest.”
“Hazard to our personnel?”
“That’ll do.” She drew a quieter breath, hands on hips. Looked at Khym and saw a
gleam in his eye she had not seen since Mahn. She stood a breath taller, walked
over to lean over Haral’s shoulder. “Next thing’s that repair crew. Any sign
yet?”
Kshshti docks passed in a blur of gray and brown, of dingy fronts obscured by
the shielding of the car windows as the vehicle hummed along, buzz-thump-thump
as the soft tires hit the joints of unshielded deck plating with manic speed in
time to Hilfy Chanur’s heart. She leaned to look back again as far as the
shield-dimmed car window afforded: the Ehrran vehicle had fallen in behind them,
no longer attempting to pass, but staying close on their tail. Tully’s leg
pressed hers on the left, the three of them occupying the back seat with Chur on
the far side. Two of the mahen guards sat in front with the driver. The escort
car filled much of the forward view, they ran so close to its tail: the strobe
atop that lead car limned objects and the three mahendo’sat in front in
unreality and blocked out the outside so that it had no color. Beside them
office fronts and gantry machinery passed in a blur.
“Easy.” She felt a shiver from Tully and patted his leg as she straightened
around to look his way. “Safe, Tully. It’s all right.” The translator had