“That’s what those cans were, at Viking.”
“Old, old cans, from the War. Salvage, legitimate salvage, if it didn’t come from the Fleet. And ordinarily another ship comes to this old hulk and gets the cans we leave in trade, and takes our cans to somewhere else. But this isn’t ordinary. Patrick’s not our breed. You want to say Mazianni, Patrick’s Mazianni, no question, not Fleet, Tommy. Not our friend. He’s a damn pirate, he’ll have found our old hulk before we’re done, he’s armed a helluva lot heavier than he looks, and there’s one way out of this thing—put a certain key in that old wreck and give it the right code and she’ll let you aboard and credit your offload. Give her another one and she remembers things she’s otherwise forgot. Got to have that card in the slot and that message input, Tommy. If Patrick comes at us, and he will, got to have that message input. Then that old hulk’s our friend. Then she’ll give us authorizations we got to have, bottom line, got to have to survive. There’s a port we can go to, trust me on this.”
What other port? he asked himself. Out of Tripoint there was Mariner, or Viking, cheapest vector out, or there was Pell, priciest, fuel-wise.
But he was following most of it. At least… the cargo part. The mass they had to get rid of before they came in at Viking velocity-high and fuel-short, aimed at the sun.
And he believed there was something out there dogging them in hyperspace: he felt something he couldn’t explain.
But moral argument and promises of deliverance from a person he didn’t half trust himself? Not so easy.
He felt Capella straighten his collar.
“Tommy-person. If I say on com, we got to move, we got to move. Tell Austin—if I was against him—I’d have switched keys on him. You know I could’ve, if he doesn’t. I can open any door on this ship, pick any pocket right now. He’s got that key I’m talking about. I’ll give him the code that answers that son of a bitch out there, the way I said. If everything goes wrong—he’s got to use it. Tell him so. Understand?”
“Chance this Patrick does know… where we’re going?”
“We see in the dark, lover. But not that well. Even figuring that old hulk’s on the Pell reach and the Tripoint perimeter… that’s a lot of space to search, for a quiet object. No. Odds are absolutely on him not knowing, especially the way he’s riding us. He doesn’t want to lose track of us. And if he’s any appreciable distance past us, hard-ordnance is impossible for him. Not impossible for us. We’ll fire right down his tail. That’s what I’ll try to do, position us where we got that chance. But Austin’s going to come out with everything screwed. Cargo screwed. Extra ship in the soup. Man’s going to be real damn mad at me.”
“Not your fault.”
“Yeah. But, you got to understand, I’m on real short credit with him.”
“Don’t understand.”
“Since Chrissy’s stunt at Pell? Both of us are on Austin’s shit-list. I want you to know this one more detail: this little card Austin’s got? Austin’s got to offload that mass, that’s one, because we’re loaded, and Patrick isn’t; and he’s got to feed the old wreck that keycard real fast, close as I’m dropping us. Austin doesn’t know that. It’s not a detail he’s ever needed to know. Keeps the suppliers honest, you understand. Now he has to know. That key-card gets the hold to open, in the lock slot. But in the cargo console slot, with the right code, that old wreck can write to that key-card—and he’s got to get me that authorization, he’s got to use that codeword before we get out of here. But if happens he doesn’t believe me—Tommy, if he won’t input or if he takes me off that nav board, we are screwed. I’ve got to be on the bridge. Beatrice has got to take the next figures I give her. If the captain orders me off the bridge, I tell you, I’m locking-down the navigation computers.”