The Kif Strike Back by CJ Cherryh

“Prefer the kif instead, huh?”

A small shiver in the air.

“Gods-rotted safer,” Tirun said. “Temporarily.”

Silence then.

“Niece,” said Pyanfar. “We don’t forget either.”

Silence still.

“What after Kefk?” Hilfy asked then, finally, in a normal voice. “Where do we go? You got an idea-captain?” Respectfully. “Have I been left out of briefings?”

Pyanfar flexed her fingers on controls, worked her elbow

in the stress-brace. Drew a whole breath. “Some. You want it in a capsule? That engine-pack back there, this fancy new rig-nothing’s free, is it? We’re in hock, Hilfy Chanur. Nothing money pays for. And that Ehrran business-”

Lines trued up. They were on, headed for their mark. The tc’a was out in front of them now, having gotten up to its speed: no more turns now, even for it. Nothing but a knnn played games with physics.

“Gods-rotted tc’a’s going to be in front all the way,” Pyanfar said. “Gods only know where it’ll be after jump. I can tell you this. Jik’s got an idea he’s going to fake an ID signal at Kefk-break through there a shade ahead of the rest and get that scan for us before it shuts down.”

“Gods,” Tirun said. “How much ahead?”

“He didn’t say. No schema. Nothing. I tell you this, if he doesn’t make it, we got trouble. Real trouble. We got a nest of kif for one thing. We got some other things too. What are we getting on com? We got some quiet out there?”

“Nothing worth listening to,” Haral said. “Lot of kif stuff.”

“Vigilance has stopped transmitting,” Geran said.

“So’s Aja Jin,” Hilfy said.

“All right. Geran, I want you com backup right now; take number one scan after jump.”

“Got it.”

“Hilfy.”

“Aunt?”

“You asked about Ehrran. I’ll tell you what I’ve guessed so far in this business. Our troubles aren’t just bad luck. They’ve been coordinated.”

“Ehrran?”

“Oh, higher than that, imp. We settled that dustup at Gaohn, we busted our hani enemies out of Kohan’s way, drove Tahar clan into near collapse,-pushed Moon Rising into exile-We brought mahendo’sat to the homeworld, we brought humans and we brought knnn, which sets off the isolationists back home right proper, doesn’t it? Naur. Her bunch. Llun clan got chewed up helping us at Gaohn; so’d others of our friends. Tahar, enemy that they were-we broke them and broke their power over their allies; and that left vacuum, and that let some other clans move up in the han.”

“Naur and Jimun and Schunan,” Haral muttered. “Ehrran’s precious patrons.”

“That’s precisely the shape of it. We were better off with Tahar for enemies. They were bastards, but they were spacing bastards. What we got left is the worldbound old eggsuckers like Naur; and those fat old women’d just as soon see us all back in kilts and sofhyn.”

“It’s me,” Khym said. ”

Swallow it, Khym.”

“Look, if I’d stayed downworld-”

“If not that, some other thing. We brought outworlders into Anuurn system-”

“-and got a male offworld.”

“So we got every bigot in the han stirred up. The spacing clans got chewed up bad at Gaohn; among the Immunes, our Llun friends lost too gods-rotted many good women; and Ehrran’s been itching after a piece of their rumps for years. Sure, Ehrran’ll kiss-foot for the Naur; they got themselves that shiny ship, got themselves big ears and notebooks, and the stsho-those fluttering bastards have got their fingers in the stew. The mahendo’sat leaned on the stsho to get our papers reinstated because Goldtooth suddenly wanted our help-wanted spacing hani on his side. So the stsho bent, they always will-but straightway they ran and got Ehrran’s ear and sucked that fool right in. Ehrran was out at Meetpoint hunting down Tahar and doing any other bit of business the han wanted with the stsho-like secret negotiations, maybe, for a whole lot of things-and then the stsho up and offered them our hides for a bonus.” “Stle stles stlen,” said Hilfy.

“Stsho got humanity coming in at their backs. They waffled on Goldtooth at Meetpoint. Gods know what they spilled to Ehrran; and I think if Stle stles stlen were less corrupt and less scared of Goldtooth the old bastard would have sold Tully to the kif right off. But we were there, and Ehrran didn’t bribe them, iron-spined fool that she is. Rotted stsho xenophobes are climbing all over each other, thinking about humans coming in at their backs and straight up against stsho territory. But Ehrran played politics and got outbid-I’m guessing. Stle sties stlen lost his nerve about doublecrossing Goldtooth when we turned up with a virtual blank check and high-level mahen authorizations. But I wouldn’t be surprised if old Stle stles stlen worries a lot nowadays about the mahen guards at his door at night. And I’ve got to tell you something else. Something you’d better hear. Haral-you got that tape from down in the corridor?”