“Yes, sera,” said the squad leader, who had seen service before. The crew stayed frozen. She gathered up Merry and squad one and rode the overcrowded lift down to the lock, where the other squads and the Warriors stood guard over the Outsiders.
They were free of restraint, Tallen and his folk, huddled in a corner with the guns of eighty-odd azi to advise them against rashness. Raen beckoned them to her and they came, cautiously, across the dark cavern of the hold. One of their own men had Mundy in hand, had him calmed, had restored him to a fragile human dignity, and Mundy glared at her with hate: no matter to her. He was neither help nor harm.
“We’re going out,” she said to Tallen. “Ser, there’s one of your ships beside us and its hatch is open. We’ve warned them. When you’re aboard, take my advice and pull all Outsider ships from station as quickly as you can undock. Run for it.”
Tallen’s seamed face betrayed disturbance, as it betrayed little. “That far, is it?”
“I’ve risked considerable to get you here. I’ve given you free what you spent men to learn. Believe me, ser, because from the agents the Reach has swallowed you’ll never hear. If it’s clear they’re not azi, they’ll perish as assassins, one by one. It’s our natural assumption. I’ll give you as much time as I can to get clear of station. But don’t expect too much, ser.”
Merry was by the switch. She signalled. He opened up to the ramp.
It was as she remembered the dock, vast and shadowy and cold, an ugly place. Security agents and armoured ISPAK police ringed the area. She walked out, her own azi about her, rifles slung hip-level from the shoulder. She wore no Colour, but plain beige, no sleeve-armour. It was likely that they knew with whom they had to deal, all the same, for all the terseness of the messages she had returned their anxious inquiries.
Next to them, the Outsider ship waited. “Go,” she told Tallen, whose group followed. “Get over there, before something breaks loose here.”
He delayed. She saw in surprise that he offered his hand, publicly. “Kont’ Raen,” he said, “can we help you?”
“No,” she said, shaken by the realisation of finality. Her eyes went to the Outsider’s ramp, the lighted interior.
To go with them, to see, to know—
Their duty forbade. And so did something she vaguely conceived as her own. She found tears starting from her eyes, that were utterly unaccustomed.
“Just get out of here,” she said, breaking the grip. “And believe me.”
He apparently did, for he walked away quickly then, and his people with him, as quickly as could not be called a run. They leached the ramp, rode it up. The hatch sealed after.
Raen folded her arms within her cloak, the one hand still holding her gun, and stared at the ISPAK security force, which her own azi faced with lowered weapons. Breath frosted in the icy air.
“Sera,” one called to her. “ISPAK board has asked to see you. Please. We will escort you.”
“I will see them here,” she said, “on the dock.”
There was consternation among them. Several in civilian dress consulted with each other and one made a call on his belt unit. Raen stood still, shivering with the chill and the lack of sleep, while they proposed debate.
She was too tired. She could not bear the standing any longer. Her legs were shaking under her. “Stand your ground,” she bade the azi. “Fire only if fired upon. Tell them I’ll come down when the board arrives. Watch them carefully.”
And quietly she withdrew, leaving Merry in charge on the dock, trusting his sense and experience. In the new azi she had little confidence; they would not break, perhaps, if it came to a fire fight, but they would die in their tracks quite as uselessly.
She touched the Warriors who hovered in the hatchway, calming them. “We wait,” she said, and went on to the lift, to the bridge, to the security of the unit which guarded the crew and the comfort of a place to sit.