“Couple days.” Flandry busied himself checking the spacesuits he had removed from the boat before she was cast adrift.
“I don’t know if I can stand it.”
“Sorry, but we’ve burned our britches. Myself, I stick by my claim that we lucked out.”
“You have the strangest idea of luck,” she sighed. “Oh, well, matters can’t get any worse.”
They could.
Fifteen hours later, Flandry and Persis were in the saloon. Coveralled against the chill but nonetheless shivering, mucous membranes aching from the dryness, they tried to pass time with a game of rummy. They weren’t succeeding very well.
Brummelmann’s voice boomed hoarse from the intercom: “You! Ensign Flandry! To the bridge!”
“Huh?” He sprang up. Persis followed his dash, down halls and through a companionway. Stars glared from the viewports. Because the optical compensator was out of adjustment, they had strange colors and were packed fore and aft, as if the ship moved through another reality.
Brummelmann held a wrench. Beside him, his first mate aimed a laser torch, a crude substitute for a gun but lethal enough at short range. “Hands high!” the captain shrilled.
Flandry’s arms lifted. Sickness caught at his gullet. “What is this?”
“Read.” Brummelmann thrust a printout at him. “You liar, you traitor, thought you could fool me? Look what came.”
It was a standard form, transcribed from a hypercast that must have originated in one of several automatic transmitters around Saxo. Office of Vice Admiral Juan Enriques, commanding Imperial Terrestrial Naval forces in region—Flandry’s glance flew to the text.
General directive issued under martial law: By statement of his Excellency Lord Markus Hauksberg, Viscount of Ny Kalmar on Terra, special Imperial delegate to the Roidhunate of Merseia … Ensign Dominic Flandry, an officer of his Majesty’s Navy attached to the delegation … mutinied and stole a spaceboat belonging to the realm of Ny Kalmar; description as follows … charged with high treason … Pursuant to interstellar law and Imperial policy, Ensign Flandry is to be apprehended and returned to his superiors on Merseia … All ships, including Terran, will be boarded by Merseian inspectors before proceeding to Starkad … Terrans who may apprehend this criminal are to deliver him promptly, in their own persons, to the nearest Merseian authority … secrets of state—
Persis closed her eyes and strained fingers together. The blood had left her face.
“Well?” Brummelmann growled. “Well, what have you to say for yourself?”
Flandry leaned against the bulkhead. He didn’t know if his legs would upbear him. “I … can say … that bastard Brechdan thinks of everything.”
“You expected you could fool me? You thought I would do your traitor’s work? No, no!”
Flandry looked from him, to the mate, to Persis. Weakness vanished in rage. But his brain stayed machine precise. He lowered the hand which held the flimsy. “I’d better tell you the whole truth,” he husked.
“No, I don’t want to hear, I want no secrets.”
Flandry let his knees go. As he fell, he yanked out his blaster. The torch flame boomed blue where he had been. His own snap shot flared off that tool. The mate yowled and dropped the red-hot thing. Flandry regained his feet. “Get rid of your wrench,” he said.
It clattered on the deck. Brummelmann backed off, past his mate who crouched and keened in pain. “You cannot get away,” he croaked. “We are detected by now. Surely we are. You make us turn around, a warship comes after.”
“I know,” Flandry said. His mind leaped as if across ice floes. “Listen. This is a misunderstanding. Lord Hauksberg’s been fooled. I do have information, and it does have to reach Admiral Enriques. I want nothing from you but transportation to Highport. I’ll surrender to the Terrans. Not to the Merseians. The Terrans. What’s wrong with that? They’ll do what the Emperor really wants. If need be, they can turn me over to the enemy. But not before they’ve heard what I have to tell. Are you a man, Captain? Then behave like one!”
“But we will be boarded,” Brummelmann wailed. “You can hide me. A thousand possible places on a ship. If they have no reason to suspect you, the Merseians won’t search everywhere. That could take days. Your crew won’t blab. They’re as alien to the Merseians as they are to us. No common language, gestures, interests, anything. Let the greenskins come aboard. I’ll be down in the cargo or somewhere. You act natural. Doesn’t matter if you show a bit of strain. I’m certain everybody they’ve checked has done so. Pass me on to the Terrans. A year from now you could have a knighthood.”