A truth of Valor

FIVE

"I are not hanging around here indefinitely. I are having more important things to be doing than to be watching her breathe, so for the last time before you are suddenly being part of your own not very complimentary vid about medical personnel who are being deliberately obstructive to the media, you are needing to be telling me when she are waking up."

Imperious, demanding, and self-righteous with an order of scrambled syntax on the side; Torin knew that voice. Couldn't figure out how Presit a Tur durValintrisy, ace reporter for Sector Central News, had managed to push her way into Med-op but figured the duty noncom would have her furry little ass out of there so fast it wasn't worth worrying about.

Torin couldn't hear the response to Presit's demands, but she did hear the reporter's reply.

"Fine. But I are not going anywhere until you are telling me where Civilian Salvage Operator Craig Ryder are being. His ship are here, and his ship are being damaged, and he are not with his ship. Or with her."

And it all came back to Torin in a rush of sound and light and pain.

She'd punched up the Susumi engines, hoping that the panel she'd spot welded to the hole in the control room wouldn't throw off the equation too badly. As the patch's sole purpose was to bring Promise's external variables back to the dimensions in the default equations, it was a long way from airtight. Torin would have to remain suited up during the short fold back to the station and help. She had water and could easily go a day and a half on her emergency rations.

Not pleasantly, but easily.

The military had done tests on the protection an HE suit offered against Susumi radiation by strapping a suit filled with sensors to the outside of a ship during a fold. After twenty-seven hours, the suit had begun to fail. After thirty hours, levels were fatal for di'Taykan. After thirty-two hours, for Humans. After thirty-seven hours for Krai. Torin's fold would take thirty-four hours, but she figured she had two things going for her. First, the military had never performed testing on live subjects and while thirty-two hours might be fatal for a Human, that didn't necessarily mean it was fatal for this Human. Second, the patch would block a portion of the radiation, buying her time.

That was the last thought she could remember. The silent hope that the patch would buy her enough time had segued right into Presit's less than dulcet tones.

Torin had messaged the reporter back on Salvage Station 24. If Presit had time to both find her and get to her out on the edge, then how long had she been out?

Fuk!

Craig had been taken by the pirates. She had no time to lie around.

Her eyelids felt like they weighed a hundred kilos each. Forcing them open, she dragged her tongue over dry lips, and asked, "How long?"

A startled med tech spun around toward her, feathers ruffled, pale green crest rising. "You're awake!"

"She are obviously awake!" Presit snapped, moving closer to the bed and gripping the railing with a small hand that looked like a black latex glove emerging from the cuff of a thick fur coat. "You are being unconscious in this medical facility for seven hours. I are being here for three of them."

"The pirates have Craig." Teeth clenched, Torin sat up.

"You are having proof of that?" Presit demanded. Behind her, the tech spoke into her slate.

Torin stared at her reflection in the reporter's mirrored glasses. Even taking the curve of the lens into account, she looked like hell. Fuk it; she'd given sitreps in worse condition. Her brain was still too scrambled to separate out time spent sideways of reality in Susumi space and apply it to time passed, so she settled on listing the events that had brought her here in order of occurrence. "Recently, two Civilian Salvage Operators were killed attempting to keep their salvage from pirates." Her voice sounded like she'd been swallowing glass. Her throat agreed that was a valid observation. "This is not standard operating procedure; salvage operators drop and run, but these two found something worth dying to protect. A short time later, another CSO was tortured to death. The only thing a living CSO would have that a pirate might want is information. His death suggests they didn't get it."

"And you are knowing these two things are connected because…?"

"I don't believe in coincidence."

"Oh, well, that are all I need to be knowing."

Torin ignored the sarcasm and continued. "Approximately thirteen hours ago, pirates captured another CSO-Craig-in what is most likely a second attempt to get the information they did not get from Rogelio Page. I was left for dead."

"They are leaving you for dead? They are being fools for not being sure. And all that," Presit added, tapping one metallic-blue claw against the railing for emphasis, "are being a theory, not proof. Word around this station are being that you were attacked by the Primacy. You were being in a debris field very close to the edge, were you not?"

"I saw the ship," Torin said tersely, forcing the railing down and Presit back. The bright pink skin on her hand startled her and startled her again when she swung her bare legs out of bed. Right. The foam. The color would fade in time, but time was what she didn't have. "It wasn't a Primacy ship."

"And your word are being good enough because you are being Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr."

The floor beside the bed was freezing. "The Promise's computer wasn't damaged. There may be a record of the attacking ship in her data stores, but it doesn't matter if there isn't. I know the ship. It was docked here, at the station, repairing damage from Susumi radiation at the same time we were here selling salvage. Our sensors picked up residual Susumi radiation when we first arrived at the debris field. The debris field one of the crew of the attacking ship suggested we check out."

"That are perhaps being a few too many coincidences."

Torin grinned; she knew that tone. Presit sensed a story. "No shit."

The room spun when she stood and she sat back down considerably faster than she'd risen.

"Speaking of damage from Susumi radiation," Presit added, "they are telling me you are having been damaged yourself when you are arriving. If you are having to be in Susumi space much longer, they are not being able to fix things. As it is, you are being mostly fine. Oh, and they say you are smelling terrible when they are peeling you out of the suit," she added with a toothy grin as the doctor fluttered into the room and came to a sudden stop.

Katrien were omnivores, but Presit had an impressive mouthful of sharp, white teeth, and Torin didn't blame the doctor for not moving any closer.

"You…" A slender finger pointed at Torin. "… shouldn't be out of bed." He snapped the halves of his residual beak together in irritation.

"Will it kill me?" Torin asked.

"Being out of bed? No, but…"

"Presit, that pile on the chair looks like my clothing. Pass it over."

"What are your last slave dying of?" She trilled something to a slightly larger Katrien, bringing him out of the far corner of the room and into Torin's field of vision. "I are lending you Ceelin a Tar guPolinstarta…

Confirmation of gender; a Tar was the male designation. Secondary sexual characteristics were hard to read on a species with fur a minimum of ten centimeters deep.

"… but you are understanding he are being my assistant, not yours."

"I just want my clothes," Torin pointed out, taking them from Ceelin with a nod of thanks. "I don't need…" The pile slid out of her hands as her thumbs refused to work properly.

Ceelin caught the clothes before they hit the floor and set them beside her on the bed. "I are not minding helping you," he said quietly, muzzle crinkling in a tentative smile. "If I are handing you one thing at a time, it are maybe being easier." The darker fur on his brow folded into a deeper vee, dipping down behind the top edge of his dark glasses, as he frowned at her bra. "But I are not knowing what this is."

"It's a place to start," Torin told him, peeling off the medical shift.

"Excuse me!" The doctor snapped his beak again, the dark green feathers of his crest now at full extension. "This one just said you shouldn't be out of bed! If you'd been in Susumi space for any longer, you would have taken irreparable damage."

"I are having told her that already," Presit murmured.

The doctor ignored her, continuing to glare at Torin. "This one has only just been able to clear the radiation from your system and repair the effects."

Torin nodded once in his general direction. "Thank you."

He blinked, translucent inner eyelid sliding across, then back. "There may still be small amounts of damage at the cellular level."

"Small enough amounts for me to survive them?"

"Yes, but…"

"See any sign of molecular gray plastic aliens while you were in there?"

"No, but…"

"Then again, thank you." Pushing head and arms through the correct holes of her sweater took longer than it should have, but eventually Torin managed it.

"You seem to be deliberately misunderstanding me. You're not completely recovered. You need rest."

"Or else?" she asked as Ceelin guided her feet into the leg holes in her underwear. Time spent in the close quarters of the Corps conquered nudity taboos; not that either Katrien or Rakva, with fur and feathers, would have cared had any lingered.

"Or else you will recover more slowly."

"I can live with that." One hand on Ceelin's shoulder, she stood and used the other to drag her trousers up over her hips.

"This one cannot allow you to leave until the Wardens arrive." He turned to the med tech, who checked her slate and shrugged.

"This one has no ETA."

"I don't have time to wait." Slate on her belt, boots fastened, Torin took a careful step, didn't fall flat on her face, and counted it a win.

"The Wardens will want to take your statement."

"Presit can record it and send it back to the station." One bright pink hand on the bulkhead and one on Ceelin's shoulder, she could walk at almost a normal speed.

"Where are you going?" Presit demanded, scrambling to catch up.

"Do you have a ship?" She touched the top curve of the plastic chair as she passed by.

"Yes, I are having a ship, but…"

"Then that's where we're going."

Crest still up, the doctor stepped between her and the hatch. "This one objects," he began but stopped at the expression on Torin's face.

"Did the Wardens tell you to detain me?"

"No, but…"

"Do I owe you for my treatment?"

If he'd had a lip, he'd have curled it. "Health care is a basic right for citizens of the Confederacy."

"That's what I thought. Move."

He'd never been in the Corps, or he'd have moved a lot faster, but he still moved.

"This one needs your statement that you are released from this facility without this one's approval," he grumbled, slate held out.

"I understand that I am released from this facility without my attending physician's approval," Torin said as clearly as possible as she passed him.

"You are best letting her go," she heard Presit say behind her. "She are not being a very nice person even on her good days. Ceelin!"

His shoulder tensed under Torin's hand.

"I are hoping you are planning to come back for the camera?"

"Go on, kid." Torin nudged him back toward the room, wondering just how much of her regaining consciousness he'd recorded. "I can manage."

The long hall leading toward an open hatch with a red exit light above it seemed to be tilted forty-five degrees. Torin took a deep breath, got the hall straightened out about twenty degrees and figured fuk it, close enough. The series of open hatches along both sides of the bulkhead nearly defeated her, but her arms were just long enough to bridge the gaps.

Most of the facility's other patients watched with interest as she lurched past their rooms. One shrieked. Torin ignored them all.

"The only reason the Wardens are not asking the medical facility to be detaining you," Presit told her matter-of-factly, "are because they are assuming any reasonable being are planning on staying right where they are until the Wardens arrive."

"Waste of time," Torin grunted, swayed slightly, and found Presit's shoulder suddenly under her flailing hand. She looked down to find the reporter looking up at her, teeth showing.

"You are assuming, in turn, that I are allowing you to use my ship."

"I'm giving you one hell of a story."

"Your opinion…" Her muzzle wrinkled. "It are not buying me hurinca."

Torin neither knew nor cared what hurinca was. "Your biggest stories have all involved me in some way." And the polynumerous polyhydroxide alcoholyde shape-shifting molecular hive mind. There was a chance that the pirates were another one of their social experiments but, bottom line, who the fuk cared. The pirates had Craig. "This story is about the pirates, and it'll be huge."

"I are not seeing how."

Torin pulled her lips back off her teeth in an expression that, in no way, resembled a smile. "I'm going to destroy them."

Presit reached up to pat the hand on her shoulder. "Of course you are."

She didn't sound condescending-or no more condescending than usual. She sounded pleased.

Stumbling toward the docking ring, Torin learned that her patch had affected the equations and Promise had emerged from Susumi space close enough to the station to set off the proximity alarms.

"It are being a good thing, too," Presit said, steering them around a corner and along the outside curve of the central hub. "They are finding you fast, before you are being dead. Ex-Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr are dead are being a story, sure, but not enough of a story for me to have been dragging my ass out to the edge. Ex-Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr are removing the pirate scourge from known space, now that are being a story. A better story than merely an observational piece about pirates are being bad," she added, turned, and waved off two people hurrying across the concourse toward them. "Yes, this are ex-Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr who are helping to discover the little gray aliens and are helping to be ending the war. Yes, she are smaller in real life. No, her hands are not usually being pink. Yes, she are being in a hurry right now, but my assistant are giving you my burst and you are watching Sector Central News for what she are up to next. Presit a Tur durValintrisy are having the whole story. Ceelin!"

Torin concentrated on walking and taking the slate off her belt at the same time. After three tries to input the codes, she finally managed to access the Promise's data storage. Requested as evidence by the Wardens, the ship had been tethered to a buoy just off station.

"What are you doing?"

Actual Federate syntax out of Presit's mouth sounded wrong. "I'm copying everything from the last three tendays to my slate."

"What are you going to be doing with Craig Ryder's ship?"

"Nothing. It'll be here, waiting, when I get him back."

"You are being sure about that?"

"Given the speed the Wardens work at? Yes." If she couldn't free Craig any faster, if wouldn't matter what she did with the ship; he'd never be returning to it.

"He are not going to be happy about the hole," Presit said thoughtfully.

Torin would kill to hear Craig be unhappy about the hole. Literally.

Presit's pilot was also Katrien, his fur paler than both Presit and Ceelin, the markings around his eyes extending down into his ruff. He was sitting outside the air lock chewing a stim stick when they arrived.

"Merik a Tar konDelasinskin are being at your service." He tapped his index fingers together, a gesture Torin had never seen before. "I are being a big fan. I are watching your vids a hundred, no, two hundred times."

"It are being my vids," Presit snarled, pushing past him and into the air lock. "She are just being on them!"

The ship had been configured for Katrien. Torin couldn't stand erect in any of the three compartments. Fine with her. Sitting was also good. Torin had nothing against floors.

"Hey!" Presit's eyes were level with hers, the light levels low enough she'd removed her glasses. Had they not been narrowed so dramatically, Torin could have still seen her reflection in the gleaming black. "Where to now? The pirates who are having Craig Ryder could be being anywhere. Space are big."

"No." She decided against shaking her head when she felt her brain wobble. "They have treasure. They've gone to ground."

"Again, could be being anywhere."

"True. So we do this one step at a time. The salvage operators are taking the damage. They'll have the most information. We need to go to Salvage Station 24; the coordinates are on my slate." She couldn't get her slate off her belt. "Fuk."

"Ceelin!"

Small fingers snapped it free and pushed it into her hands. Torin frowned at the screen.

"If you are not able to find the equation, I are taking you back to the doctor who are no doubt going to be unbearably smug."

Torin refused to rise to the challenge in Presit's voice. "I don't need to find it." Activating the DNA reader by pressing her thumb twice in the lower right corner, she unlocked the memory. When she held the slate toward Presit, the reporter actually took a step back.

"You are being sure? This are giving me access to… everything."

"I don't have time to be unsure. Get us to the station. They'll give us the pirates. I'm…" Katrien feet-the same matte black as their hands-had long, prehensile toes. They didn't look as dexterous as Krai feet, but they were close. Presit's toenails were also metallic blue.

"Hey!" A small finger poked her shoulder. Hard. "Torin?"

She couldn't remember her eyelids ever being so heavy. The doctor had been right about her needing to rest. "Just get us there," she murmured, watching the light show on the inside of her lids. "I'm sleeping now."

Twelve hours and thirty-seven minutes later, Torin woke up enough to crawl to the head-easier than standing given the ceiling height. Easy was good given the complex maneuvers needed to urinate in a Katrien toilet. After crawling back to the control room, she sat cross-legged, braced against the wall, and worked both thumbs over the screen of her slate.

"You are listing what you are doing to the pirates when you are catching them?"

"Fuk, Merik!" The pilot was nearly the same shade as the pilot's chair. The low lighting made him remarkably hard to see. Torin had thought she was alone and that thought was a good indication of just how fried she still was. In the Corps, that kind of oversight could be fatal. "No, I'm not listing what I'm going to do to the pirates because that would be a very short list."

Find them.

Destroy them.

"I'm calling in reinforcements," she continued, saved the file, and crawled over to the board. "I need to hook in so the packets go as soon as we emerge."

"Presit are going to want approval," Merik pointed out as the comm screens lit up. "But Presit aren't being here. Be laying your slate down there and I are hooking you in."

"Because Presit shouldn't always get what she wants?"

He smiled, pointed white teeth gleaming. "That is what I are thinking, yes. Are there being anything else I can do for you?"

Torin's stomach growled as she placed her slate on the control panel. "I could eat." "I thought the point of the exercise was to get Ryder to join us," Cho pointed out. "Why the fuk would the crew take a vote about him joining if he's already agreed?"

Doc shrugged, eyes locked on the monitor. "If he thinks we don't want him, he'll want us more."

"But we do want him!" Cho snapped. He glanced down at the screen. Beyond the labored rise and fall of his chest, their captive hadn't moved in the last ten minutes.

"No, we don't. We want his codes and, like you said, we can get those from anyone."

"But we have him. And we have an armory we can't get into. And I've waited long enough." He'd waited long enough eight years ago when those fukking Marines had taken their own sweet time hooking their packets up to the ship. He'd been the one taking the crap when they weren't ready on the captain's schedule, so he'd had every right to hit the all clear. It hadn't been his Goddamned fault their seals weren't locked.

"Don't think of it as waiting, think of it as amusing yourself by fukking with his head. Ryder can't start on the armory until we're back to Vrijheid," Doc pointed out calmly. "Not unless you want to give him a chance to kill us all."

"You said no one chooses to die."

"He'd be choosing to kill. There's a difference."

"Between dying and killing? No shit." Still, Cho had to admit getting the armory the hell off his ship before Nadayki began his hack had a certain appeal. Except… "If that thing blows, we'd need to be in the next system."

Doc shrugged again. "Big Bill said he had an explosives locker. That should contain most of the blast."

When he said nothing else, Cho shook his head, muttered, "Should. Most. That's very reassuring."

Craig had no idea how long they'd left him alone, but his erection had gone down and the ache to get off had eased by the time the hatch opened again, so they must've been waiting for the air scrubbers to clear out the Taykan pheromones. Made sense. He'd never met anyone who'd actually enjoyed wearing a filter. Then again, he'd never met anyone who tortured people to death before, so what did he know.

Same guy who'd made him the offer came back in and stood by the hatch. Craig tested his restraints. Still no give and the bruising under and around the straps hurt like hell. Seemed like the guy was just being careful.

"Have you thought about my proposal?"

This was a way to stay alive until Torin came for him, but Craig knew he couldn't seem too eager. He swallowed, trying to get a little moisture down to the abraded tissue of his throat. The screaming had done some damage. "Your proposal to join up and become a murdering, thieving pimple on the ass of known space? So fukking tempting, how could I think of anything else?"

Dark brows drew down. "I don't remember phrasing it exactly that way, but yes, that proposal. Join." He held out his left hand, palm up, and then his right. "Or die."

"Great choice there, mate."

"It's a choice. And as I said, the offer is on the table for a limited time."

Craig let his head slump forward, then raised it again, figuring the damage from the Taykan's fists as well as the sudden spike of pain the motion had caused would add a certain realism to his despairing expression. "It's not like you've left me anything to go back to. Fine. I'm in."

"Not quite. Now, we take a vote to see if the crew wants you."

"The fuk? I thought you wanted my codes!"

"I want codes." The dark-haired man twitched a nonexistent crease out of his tunic. "Not necessarily yours. You've made your choice. Now it's the crew's turn. It should be an interesting vote, I suspect Almon will be all for stuffing your ass out an air lock. You nearly took his thytrin's leg off."

"I nearly…" Craig couldn't believe this was happening. "You blew up my ship! You killed my partner! You fukking kidnapped me!"

"And you might be more trouble than you're worth." Smiling slightly, he turned his head to the side and yelled, "Doc! Come and help our potential crewmate out of this chair."

When the hatch opened again, Craig recognized the man who came into the room. Hair tied back, muscles straining against the fabric of his gray sweater, fukking freaky thousand-meter stare-he'd been with Nat at the poker game. He hadn't played; he'd just leaned up against the bar and watched. "You set me up!"

"You were convenient, and Nat showed some initiative. It was nothing personal."

"It is from where I'm sitting."

"Yes, and speaking of where you're sitting…" Standing directly in front of the chair, Doc pulled out his slate. "… how much damage did Almon do?"

He sounded like he actually cared. A little confused, Craig took stock. "Nothing's broken."

"Are you sure? Your nose is distinctly crooked."

"Did that six years ago."

"Well, all right, then." Doc tapped the screen, and the straps holding Craig to the chair fell away.

There were only two of them, and neither of them was armed. Torin wouldn't thank him for sitting around on his ass, waiting for her to arrive.

Craig surged up onto his feet and would have fallen flat on his face had Doc not caught him as his right knee gave out. The pain in his leg caused the pain in his head to spike, and if he'd had anything left in his stomach, he would have spewed all over the other man.

His grip surprisingly gentle, Doc lowered him back into the chair. "I can't help if you don't tell me where it hurts." He sounded annoyed.

"Forgot I did… that." It hurt to breathe. First time Craig ever knew his knees were connected to his lungs.

"You did that? Ah!" Doc nodded before Craig had a chance to answer. "Fighting to get free. You can't get free. No one can."

Just for an instant there was enough crazy under the concern that Craig, in spite of being a good six to eight centimeters taller and just as heavily built, flinched away from his touch.

The cabin they locked him in had a bunk, facilities that folded up into the wall, a blank vid screen, and a good-sized locker. It smelled like disinfectant, but that might have just been the lingering fragrance of what they'd sloshed him off with. Ship this size would have been designed to give everyone a bit of privacy, so Craig had no way of telling if the cabin had belonged to officer or enlisted.

Half the secondhand ships in known space were decommissioned Navy ships; weapons removed.

Of course where weapons had been, weapons could be again. Promise hadn't been… wasn't armed-wasn't because he would get back to her and his injured lady would fly again. Not that a salvaged weapon had done Jan and Sirin any good. Probably got them killed. If they hadn't had the weapon, they'd have cut and run.

Survived.

Let the Navy and the Corps play silly bugger with their lives.

Civilians were supposed to be smarter than that.

Stretched out on the bunk, Craig shifted his bad leg and noted with fuzzy appreciation that nothing hurt.

"I'm not going to bother with a healing sleeve until we know we're keeping you, but there's no reason you have to be in pain."

Something in Doc's voice gave Craig the impression that, should there be a reason, Doc had no problem at all with pain.

The bunk was surprisingly comfortable. Or he was remarkably stoned.

Either/or. Both.

He woke when the hatch slammed open. The thrum of the engines hadn't changed; they were still traveling through Susumi space.

"Thought you'd like to know…" Nat grinned at him from the open hatch; her expression lecherous enough that he realized he was still naked, "… we've decided to keep you. Welcome aboard, gorgeous."

But she relocked the hatch when she closed it. It hadn't occurred to Torin that the salvage station might not give a ship from Sector Central News permission to dock.

"Oh, for fuksake!" Her head still throbbed, but sleeping through most of the fold had done her good. "Are we within a hundred kilometers?"

"Yes." Merik glanced down at his board. "But we are being…"

Torin cut the pilot off. "Keep heading in. I've got this. My codes are on file." She tongued her implant. This was the station's business whether they wanted it to be or not.

Pedro met her at the air lock, arms open, cheeks wet. As soon as the docking beacon had locked, she'd contacted him directly and told him the story. No point in wasting travel time. "Chica, I'm so sorry!"

Because Torin had been afraid, in the pause before he'd answered her, that it had been his ship the pirates had destroyed at the debris field, she went into his arms and hugged him hard enough to feel his heart beating. Hard enough to feel he was alive. Then she pulled away and said, "I need everything you know about the pirates."

"Madre Deos, why are you pink?" He lifted her hand to eye level.

"Suit sealant." She twisted free. "Focus. I need a list of every pirate attack; I need sightings, rumors, hearsay. I need it all."

"Torin…"

"And we need to get everyone on this station together in the market. I'll need access to the internal comm. No…" She shook her head, editing as she headed for the center of the station,"… better you do it. They know you.

Pedro fell into step beside her. "Torin, what…"

"We're going after Craig."

"What?"

Before Torin could expand on her plan, a small hand grabbed the back of her tunic and yanked her to a stop. She turned far enough to see Presit glaring up at her.

When she saw she had Torin's attention, Presit shifted her gaze to Pedro. "You are probably knowing me, Presit a Tur durValintrisy of Sector Central News. Torin are not exactly having manners. Mind you, I are not exactly happy about leaving my assistant behind, so things are balancing out."

The salvage operators had agreed to Presit's presence but had refused to allow her to record within the station. As the law stated recording devices had to be visible to most species at ten meters, regardless of the actual size of the device, Ceelin's absence was considered a gesture of good faith.

Pedro frowned, scrubbing a hand over damp cheeks. "Torin, why is she here?"

Torin opened her mouth to say something about the story but realized that wasn't actually the reason. Wouldn't have been the reason even had Ceelin and the equipment been with them "Craig was her friend."

Presit snorted. "For all he are having a patchy pelt and a dubious love life."

"Dubious?"

"… and we know he's on the Heart of Stone. The image Promise recorded matched on all points the ship docked at the station at the same time we were. The pirates have what they need now, so they'll have gone to ground somewhere they feel safe. We find the Heart of Stone, we find Craig."

"They're fukking pirates!" someone yelled from the concourse. "They feel safe with other pirates."

"That's my point," Torin told him. "You need to band together and create an opposing fleet. We not only rescue Craig but eliminate a good portion of the pirate threat."

One of the overhead fans had a loose bearing and made a metal on metal burr with every rotation. The people on the concourse were silent. Faces that had been turned toward her turned toward the deck.

"Torin. Craig's dead." Over against the bulkhead, Alia waved her hands as though she thought she needed movement to attract Torin's attention. As if her name and the declaration weren't enough.

"We can't know that."

"They've had him…" Her voice broke. "They've had him for hours."

It had taken roughly four and a half hours for Torin to get back to the Promise. Seven hours spent unconscious. Forty minutes to walk from the medical facilities to Presit's ship. Ninety minutes to get far enough away from the station to fold. Ninety minutes to get from the point where they'd emerged to the salvage station. Thirty-three minutes to gather the salvage operators and their families in the concourse. Torin had been up on the stage in the corner, talking for half an hour. Craig had been with the pirates for sixteen hours. Roughly.

Except…

She'd been used to living her life like time spent in Susumi didn't count-ships emerged seconds after they folded regardless of how long they spent inside. Time in the Corps, time spent being ferried from battle to battle and home again, had probably aged her another five to seven years. Med-op kept records. She'd never checked.

But time in Susumi counted when time in Susumi was spent at the mercy of people who'd already killed three innocents. Torin hung onto the certain knowledge that they'd killed Rogelio Page very slowly. Craig was younger. Stronger.

"He's not dead."

"Torin…"

She wasn't sure who'd said her name, but she thought it was Jenn. Craig had been the next thing to a part of their family and they wanted to mourn. Torin wasn't going to let them.

"Two reasons he's not dead. One…" She resisted the urge to raise a specific finger. They were wasting her time. Craig's time. "The pirates need him alive, and they'll have learned from their handling of Page." Handling. A neutral way of saying tortured to death. Torin squared her shoulders and swept her gaze over the crowd. Craig had been well liked-they were listening, but she needed them to do more than that. "Taking salvage is one thing, but taking the salvage operators is something else entirely. Too much of that will get the Wardens moving and they won't risk it."

"You don't even know it's the same pirates!" shouted a di'Taykan, dark orange hair in constant movement.

"In the Corps, we called those kind of coincidences a reason for artillery."

A woman in the front row shook her head. "You aren't in the Corps now."

"And we don't have artillery," added the man beside her.

Torin stared at him, brow up.

"Much artillery," he amended, rubbing the back of his neck.

"You said there were two reasons." One arm around Kevin's waist, the other across Jenn's shoulders, Pedro stared at her over Alia's head. "What's the second reason?"

Torin met his gaze. "He'll do everything he can to stay alive because he knows I'm coming for him."

"You also said there was an explosion. He probably thinks you're dead."

"He are not being so stupid," Presit snorted, moving forward and answering before Torin could. "I was being with Craig Ryder the last time Torin was being thought dead and even when he are being told she are dead by the Commandant of the Corps, he are not believing it. When he are standing on the glass that are having been a battalion of Confederation Marines, he are still not believing it." She stroked her claws through the silver fringe of her ruff and glanced up at Torin. "As it are happening, he are right."

"And what are being your part in this?" a Katrien perched up on one of the kiosks called out, sounding suspicious. The reporter was a stranger. Even more than Torin.

Presit's ears flicked, the Katrien equivalent of a shrug. "I are being brought in to expose the pirates so the Wardens will be getting the Navy involved. It are being for your benefit."

"Oh, yeah, like you are doing us a favor!"

"I are benefiting you," Presit responded dryly. "It are not the same thing. I are also planning to be benefiting from the story."

"There is no story." Pedro's voice cracked. He swallowed and continued. "Craig is dead-just like Jan and Sirin. Just like Page. If we band together and go after him, if we go after the pirates, more of us will die."

"Let the Navy do their job!" spat a dark-haired woman.

"The Navy has to be called in by the Wardens," Torin snapped.

"So let it!" someone yelled from the back.

"Some of you have military experience…"

"And we got the fuk out, didn't we?" snarled a di'Taykan. Torin had met her at Sirin and Jan's funeral. Kiku; served one contract in the Corps as a comm tech. She'd told a few "war" stories then. When it became obvious Torin wasn't interested, they'd talked together about one of the guys in the band. "You think you can just waltz in here," Kiku continued, "all I'm Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr and I survived a prison planet and I found the little gray aliens, and now we have to march in straight lines and do what you say? Fuk that. We don't fight. We prefer to survive."

"We have families," Pedro added before Torin could respond.

They weren't going to help, she realized. Her business was none of their business.

"You are losing them," Presit murmured as people began to shuffle from the shuttle bay.

"I never had them," Torin admitted, cutting her loses. She didn't have time to convince them of the obvious. She raised her voice until it filled all the empty spaces. "I need to buy a ship. And I need it now."

That got their attention. Every face turned back toward her. To her surprise, the first question was, "Why?"

"The Promise is damaged, and pirates aren't likely to welcome reporters."

"Everyone are playing to a camera," Presit snorted quietly.

"You're going after Craig alone?" Kiku again. When no one laughed with her, she flushed, her hair flattening, but she didn't look away. "You don't even know where the Heart of Stone is, do you?"

"I'll find it."

"Because you're Gunnery Sergeant Torin Kerr?"

"Because they have Craig." At least some of those in the room who were ex-military had served with combat troops in a time of war. Pulled a trigger and saw a distant body fall. Torin had killed up close and personal. People near the stage backed up as they heard that in her voice.

"How," asked a narrow-eyed woman with three black lines tattooed down the center of her forehead, "are you planning on paying for this ship?"

Given the audience, that was the question Torin had expected to hear first. "I'll cede my military pension."

"How much of it?"

"All of it."

"Oh, yeah. That's just great." A mocking voice rose above the murmur as the man with the ginger mustache who'd confronted her at the funeral moved to the front of the crowd. "You take that ship off to play hero against the pirates, and we'll get sweet fuk all because you'll be dead, and they don't pay pensions to the dead."

"I don't plan on dying."

"No one plans on dying."

"You'd be surprised."

He had his mouth open again, and Torin was seconds from putting her fist in it when Pedro called out. "You can have our small ship."

He didn't mean have as have it to save Craig, he meant have as in he'd take the pension. She could hear it in his voice. "I need a ship with a weapon mounted."

"The Second Star has a recessed BN-344. We use it to cut debris apart."

The BN-344 was the big half sister of the BN-4, the cellular disrupter /tight band laser the Corps carried in those places a projectile weapon would be unwise. Without the cellular disrupter attached, the big laser could also be used as a cutting tool. Her lip curled, but she nodded. His small ship was almost the same base model as the Promise. She could get it from point A to point B. "Deal."

The crowd parted as she jumped off the stage. For a moment she wished they hadn't-laying hands on even one of them would have helped her mood-then she ignored them. Their business wasn't her business. The crowd stayed parted behind her, and she could hear Presit following. The reporter had sharp claws and no compunction about using them.

"If you come back, chica…" Pedro closed a hand on Torin's shoulder. "We'll do another deal."

Words that would wound rose to her tongue. She could see the damage stitching across his chest, spraying blood. Teeth clenched, she settled for shrugging out from under his touch and saying, "I'll arrange for the transfer on the way to the ship." She pulled out her slate. "Let's go."

"I are still coming with you," Presit announced before Torin could move. "As much as I are hating to admit it, you are being right. This are going to be an amazing story." She closed her hand on Torin's wrist-claws dimpling the skin, fingers barely making it halfway around-and held her in place as she turned a sneer on the listening crowd. "And besides, as are having been mentioned before, Craig Ryder are being my friend."

"There's information on the pirates coming in from all over the station-I've directed it straight to the ship." Pedro stood by the air lock, arms folded. "People want to help."

Torin ignored him. She knew defensive when she heard it. *Merik, what the hell is taking Presit and Ceelin so long?* *They are being on their way. Presit are making sure she are having full remote access to Sector Central.*

Of course she was.

"You've got supplies on board for a tenday-there's ice in the converter, you shouldn't have to capture more. Torin…"

Torin was fully capable of looking out over a platoon of Marines and keeping her opinion of the situation-of any situation, good or bad-from showing. Here and now, she didn't bother.

Pedro winced. "It's your life to throw away, but you're delusional if you think he's alive. Craig's dead."

"No, he isn't!" Helena pushed past her parents-the other three had gathered at the far edge of the cargo bay, unwilling to be contaminated by hope. She ran across to the air lock as they shouted her name and followed. Instead of her usual station overalls and soft shoes, she wore scuffed boots and a jacket that was just a little too big for her. A small green duffel bag hung over one shoulder. "I'm going with you. I'm probably a better pilot than you are," she added quickly, "and I know what to do if the Star gets weird."

"I'm sorry, Helena," Torin stepped forward, physically cutting off whatever Pedro had been about to say. "But you're too young."

"I'm not!"

She closed her hands on the girl's shoulders, met her gaze, and held it. "Thank you for offering. I don't doubt your courage or your commitment, but I can tell you right now, that in order to get Craig back, I'm going to do things no fourteen year old should have to deal with. Even if you survived the experience, parts of you would die. I won't be responsible for that, and you're three years away from taking responsibility for yourself."

"But I want…"

"I know." And she did. She'd seen it a hundred times. Kids who'd lost friends or family in the war-a station destroyed, a colony attacked, a ship lost-and had joined up because hitting back was the only way they could make sense of what had happened. It wasn't as simple as just taking revenge-although she'd seen plenty of those kids, too-they didn't join because they hated the enemy, they joined because they'd loved something and lost it.

Helena searched her face for mockery and finally nodded, eyes glistening. "You'll bring him back?"

"I'll bring him back."

Leaning in a little closer, she peered into Torin's eyes. Torin knew what the girl was searching for and she let her look. Finally Helena nodded, one corner of her mouth twisting up, and she said, "They don't know what they're in for, do they?"

Torin gave her back the smile she'd been attempting. "No, they don't."

"The child are not going with us, right?" Presit's voice carried.

"No, she isn't." Torin gave Helena's shoulders a final squeeze and released her, the space where her hands had been almost immediately taken by Alia, who clutched her daughter to her protectively. Helena shook her mother off, eyes rolling.

"Good. It are an old vid adage never to be appearing with the young of any species. One way or another, they are always going to be making you look bad." Presit patted Helena's arm approvingly as she passed. The girl looked startled but pleased. "Ceelin, you are being careful with the camera. It are being the conscience of the cowardly."

The Elder Races may have brought Human, diTaykan, and Krai into the Confederation to fight their war, too pacifist to take up weapons and keep themselves from slaughter, but some of the Mid Races were clearly willing to draw blood.

"He agreed to come?" Torin asked quietly as Ceelin crossed the cargo bay all but buried under an impossible amount of gear.

Presit snorted. "Please, I are practically having to lock Merik in the ship to keep him from coming."

"Merik has his…" She closed her teeth on orders. "… part to play before he meets us at Val Doron Station. But Ceelin…"

"Ceelin are knowing the odds. He are also knowing you and I are where the career-building stories are being. He are ambitious. Also…" She fluffed her ruff. "… I think he are having jurnifa for me."

"You honestly don't think they'll be any help," Pedro muttered as Presit disappeared into the ship. "And don't give me that bullshit about her being Craig's friend."

Torin thought about flattening him. Didn't. But it was close. "You'd be amazed at how few people shoot at the media, all things considered." She nodded again at Helena-good-bye and thank you and don't worry, we'll bring him back all layered onto the movement-then paused, just inside the Second Star's air lock. "You went out after Jan and Sirin."

Alia had the grace to look embarrassed. "To find out what happened. We know what happened to Craig."

Torin laid her palm against the control pad, one finger bent to touch the plastic trim. "No," she said quietly, "you don't. Craig told me once that you took care of your own. He was wrong. All you're willing to do is throw parties for the dead."

Pedro's small ship was the same basic model as the Promise-rectangular cabin with the control panel and two chairs across one narrow end, bunk and the hatch into the head across the other. The air lock and suit storage took up the majority of one long wall while across from it were general storage, cooking facilities, and a half-oval table with two chairs that snapped out from recesses in the wall. Because the Second Star had an additional three-by-three module, some of the storage space had been replaced by another hatch across from the air lock. Presit claimed this space as hers and graciously permitted Ceelin and their equipment to share it.

"I are willing to support you in front of fools and cowards," Presit announced, climbing up into the second control chair and tucking her feet under the thick fringe of her fur, "but now it are just you and me, I are wanting to be assured you are knowing what you are doing."

"The station's docking computer is in control until we clear the panel array," Torin told her without looking up from the board. She'd been surprised to learn the station had a docking computer and wondered if they hadn't trusted her to leave on her own without causing deliberate damage. Fair enough. She didn't trust herself.

"Not what I are asking. You are having a plan?"

A call from the station pinged the ship before Torin could answer. Unlike the steady stream of data still being downloaded through Pedro's personal comm to the Second Star, this message was addressed specifically to her.

"Kerr, go."

The Krai on the screen looked nervous, his nose ridges opening and closing so quickly they seemed to be fluttering. "Gunnery Sergeant Kerr, this is Kenersk. We uh, spoke, back at the funeral."

"I remember you." An ex-Marine who'd done two contracts, Kenersk had fought with the Four Three, holding the line during the evacuation of the Denar Colony, so she let the form of address stand. Turned out, he'd also been the Krai who'd allowed Winkler to get his hands on the cup of sah-which was why she remembered him.

"I don't know if it'll help, but I can tell you where you can find a pirate ship."

Torin waited.

After a moment, Kenersk rubbed a hand over the bristles on his head and continued. "It's a Krai ship, the Dargonar. All Krai. Captain Firrg hates Humans, I mean, really, really hates them. Don't know what she thinks about di'Taykan, but Humans, Humans she obsessively hates."

"I got that, Kenersk." The information might have been a warning. Or possibly merely Kenersk trying to talk himself into the betrayal.

"Yeah, well, they say she likes to pick off the occasional ore carrier-just the drones, though, and never often enough to set off alarms-and they say she sells the ore at the Prospect Processing Station. They say, she'll be at Prospect in two days."

"Who are saying…"

Kenersk broke the link.

Presit snorted. "If he are not supplying his sources, I are not trusting his information."

Torin drummed her fingers against the control panel's inert trim. "Good thing it's my call, then."

"Why are you trusting him? Because he are stroking your ego and calling you Gunnery Sergeant."

"No. Because he feels guilty about Winkler getting the sah, and he owes me for not calling in the Wardens. Salvage operators don't like to be beholden. It makes them feel dependent."

"They are not liking to be dependent on the kindness of others. It are a quote from Human literature," she added, sounding annoyed that Torin hadn't recognized it. "I are having read it at university in XenoHistory. You are being familiar with it?"

"No." She slid her hand between Presit's fingers and the board. Presit's claws caught against her knuckles but didn't break the skin. "Don't touch that."

"I are turning light levels down! Humans are always keeping the lights too bright."

"I'll turn them down after we fold. Until then, I need to see the board."

"I are thinking that the station's docking computer are doing the hard part," Presit sniffed.

A ship the size of the Second Star was no harder to fly than an APC was to drive. Easier, since dirtside driving provided a lot more solid objects to hit. Also, APCs were seldom empty, the driver responsible for every Marine on board. APCs, however, didn't have Susumi engines. Torin had read somewhere that eighty percent of all accidents in space were a direct result of a Susumi error. "Firrg's taking the unmanned drones because they're the most likely to go missing in a fold." No computer could compensate one hundred percent for the unexpected.

Presit made a noise that sounded remarkably like the Katrien version of, Well, duh. and then said, "Who are being his source, I are wondering."

"He said it's an all Krai ship," Torin muttered studying the charts to place Prospect in known space. "Four-day fold from here…"

"Four days are not so long, but even you, ex-Gunnery Sergeant Kerr, even you are not being able to go up against a ship full of Krai pirates on your own. Not even if they are out of their ship and under the influence. You are being weighed down by numbers alone. Although," she added thoughtfully, head cocked to one side, "that would be having amazing visuals."

"I don't have to go up against a ship full of Krai pirates. I only need to get one of them alone."

"You are probably needing to be getting the captain alone," Presit scoffed. "You are not able to guarantee anyone else are having the information you need."

"Then I'll get the captain."

"And it being are just that easy for you?"

Torin pulled up the charts with the Susumi equations. Remembered Craig bitching about her basic level math. "I'm motivated."