But these were familiar occurrences now, whereas the laser still commanded the awe which a nearby thunderbolt would receive in the legion’s Campanian homes. The order provided an excuse to get away from something that even brave men would prefer to shun.
Clodius Afer had no visible qualms. He strolled back to the tribune and Niger, flexing the numbness out of his empty right hand. The Pilot, who was trying to hug his injured right shoulder, had no more control of his movements than would a dufflebag in the centurion’s grip.
“Now,” said Clodius to his captive in a tone of catlike menace, “why don’t you tell us how to make this work?”
The two crewmen looked at one another with mirroring expressions of blank-eyed terror. The faces of the Romans around them ranged from expectant to ravening, with Niger’s features the worst for their demonic calm. The junior centurion pointed the laser at the Medic’s chest. His hands began to prod the bumps and knurlings on the weapon’s surface.
“Don’t!” shrieked the Pilot. “If you fire it here, you may strand us in normal —”
The pilus prior slapped his prisoner. His calloused palm cracked like a ballista firing, and the Pilot flopped stunned against the grip on his chest.
“I’ll tell you just how to do it,” said the Medic in a voice of manic calm. He spread both his hands, vaguely purple where they extended beyond his suit, toward the laser. It was the gesture of an adult placating a raging child — or of a suppliant before his god. “But please, don’t touch the controls until I show you.”
“Give the laser to Quartilla,” Vibulenus decided aloud.
Clodius looked surprised, while Niger looked as if nothing could surprise him. With no more hesitation than if he had been asked to deliver it to the tribune or one of the other men, he handed the woman the tube with excrescences molded into it instead of being welded on. An article of plumbing, a length of foundry scrap . . . except that it burned like the heart of Phlegethon, and that made it useful.
“Please. . . ,” said the Medic in a voice that was quiet though not calm, the way a cat in ambush is quiet. “If you will point the other end — yes, like that, goodlady — toward the wall, the door.”
Groggy, stunned enough that immediate consequences did not terrify him, the Pilot said, “You know what happens if she hits the navigation bank. Is this where you want to spend eternity?”
Clodius slapped him into a daze again.
The Medic made a swallowing motion higher in his throat than a Roman would have, then continued, “Now, goodlady, slide the piece just above the trigger — where your index ringer is — back.”
“Which piece?”
“Either side — yes, that’s fine, it slides, yes, goodlady. Now —”
Vibulenus was wondering why the Pilot had spoken in Latin to his fellow. Stunned, yes; but under the circumstances, probably because they had no other common language.
The guild could achieve wonders, miracles — but it had a cheeseparing attitude that reminded the tribune of wealthy men at home who served fine wine to their immediate companions at dinner, but sent lees and vinegar to the lower tables. The Commander’s duties required universal fluency, but those of the crewmen did not.
Quartilla spoke all the ship’s languages.
The laser’s pale beam struck the door in a dazzle that could have been the tribune’s sudden anger.
Startlement lifted the woman’s finger from the trigger instead of clamping it there. Even so, the microsecond pulses had blasted cup-sized depressions in an ascending line across the face of what had been a blank wall. The material which had shrugged off a ram and a steel point slumped at the touch of coherent light. Bits which sprayed from the surface left sooty trails behind them as they sputtered through the air.
“Don’t!” shrilled a voice. “Don’t do that!”
Vibulenus spun around, keeping his grip on the Medic only by reflex. The words had come from —
The words had come from just beside the tribune’s ears. The Commander had spoken, rather than someone in the immediate vicinity.