“I want those gods-be ID’s,” Hilfy said. “Hallan! Acknowledge, rot you!”
“I’m watching, captain.”
“ Ha’domaren’sdelivered an ultimatum to station. They get the lines shut down or they let them fall…” Fala was back on the job. With her whole brain, hope to the gods.
Vectors were shaping up. Tiraskhti for Kefk, no question. Ha’domaren . . , Ha’domaren was going askew from that.
Meetpoint, Hilfy thought, about the time Tiar said it and Tarras swore.
“What’s he up to?”
“I don’t know.” They could do it, unladed as they were. They could burn off v and go the other direction, as Ha’domaren was headed. They could arrive at Meetpoint with their contract unfilled, in debt for money part of which they’d spent, and have No’shto-shti-stlen suing them, along with Kshshti and Urtur. Or they could go to Kefk, alone with the kif.
“Fala. I want to talk to that son Haisi.”
“Aye,” Fala said. And made the try. It took a while. They were not cooperative.
Then Fala said, “They say he’s not available. He’s asleep.”
“And I’m the Personage of Iji. Tell his crew I had a message for him, but it’s not available either.”
Fala did that. Of course they offered to take it.
“They—“ Fala said.
“No. I’ll talk to him.”
There was a delay. And they were still headed for Kefk.
Then Haisi came through, loud and clear. “You damn fool, hani. What message?”
“What’s the matter? Tired of our company?”
“You not learn lesson? Go kif? Good luck. Have nice funeral. What message ?”
“What message? Regards from gtst excellency. What was it you wanted to know?”
“You chief number one bastard, youknow!”
“By the gods right I know, mahe! I know you didn’t level with me. So I know and you don’t. Good luck yourself.”
What followed was mahen dialect, and the gist of it was not polite. It was Haisi who broke off the contact, with: “/ don’t tell you go hell, Chanur. You already got course set.”
“Not happy,” Tiar said.
Out of Vikktakkht’s ship, Tiraskhti, not a word.
“Tc’a!” Fala said, and matrix-corn shaped up on the number 4 screen.
Tc’a tc’a tc’a chi hani hani birth chi rescue birth go go danger danger danger danger danger danger see join make divide danger danger
“What’s this ‘birth’ business?” Tarras muttered. “I don’t like that.”
Neither did she, all considered. “Urtur,” she said, of the inbound tc’a. “That son’s from Urtur.”
“Mama,” Tiar said. “Not son. That’s mama. “
The hours ran on, and the tc’a sent the same message, over and over, an accusing presence on the number four screen persistent as the presence on the scan display. No one said any more about it, but they didn’t have to. It was in the tail of Hallan’s vision, and the scan display showed the tc’a moving on their heading, not accelerating, but definitely tending toward a meeting of the incomer and the two local ships, and all three tc’a vessels transmitting that same message again and again.
It’s my fault, he thought. They blame us.
He had heard how the methane-breathers would attach themselves to a ship, and how they could change vector in jump, which physicists couldn’t explain, but tc’a and knnn could do; and chi, who always traveled with the tc’a, aboard their ships, but no one knew whether they were allies or pets…
The captain had warned him. The captain had said he was a fool and the ship could be in danger. Now it was in danger, from the methane-breathers, in addition to everything else, and the tc’a might follow them into hyperspace, where the gods only knew what might happen—if they could change directions, they could do things in hyperspace, and having them attack the ship there, he didn’t want to think about…
Besides which there was the station back there with a hole in it; and Fala was upset with him, he could see it in every move she made … not that he’d done anything or promised anything. But she thought he’d insulted her—which he hadn’t meant to do. And the crew was feuding with each other, just the way they said would happen with men on ships.