Fool's War

Chapter Eight — Flight

Yerusha finished tightening the launch straps around herself just as Schyler burst onto the bridge. He threw himself into his own chair.

“Intercom to Pasadena,” he called out as he pulled his straps around him. “Role call, all hands!”

“Law!” came Resit’s voice.

“Comm, Huston, Odel, Rosvelt.”

“Galley, Sundars!”

“Engine, Ianiai, Javerri, Shim’on.”

“Cheney, on my way up!”

“Cheney, you get to your bunk and strap in!” called Yerusha. “We’ll handle it up here!”

The voices rattled off the crew names, and Schyler’s breathing began to grow easier. They’d done it, she could practically hear him thinking. They’d gotten them all back.

Yerusha turned her attention back to her own boards. They’d gotten them back. Now it was her job to get them all out of here.

“Watch, we need to put out some kind of clearance call,” Yerusha said, scribbling down her orders to the ship. Set the engines on stand-by. A check of the lines to The Gate showed some repairs had been managed. She could get to the docking clamps. She called up Trustee’s authorization codes and set the clamps on stand-by as well. Change the view on the screens, make sure there was still a clear route out there.

Schyler drove his pen across the boards, opening the lines to the port. “This is mail packet Pasadena to The Gate Flight Control. We will be launching in thirty seconds. I repeat we will be launching in thirty seconds.”

“Pasadena,” called an unidentified man’s voice. “You’re under house arrest! You’re not go…” A burst of static cut the voice off.

“Oh yes we are,” answered Schyler and he shut the line down. He nodded to Yerusha. “And make it good.”

“Aye-aye, Watch. Intercom to Pasadena. Clamps releasing. Prepare for free fall.” Yerusha slapped the OVERRIDE key and brought both hands down on the boards.

The station fell back and what little hold gravity had on them vanished. Years of training screamed at Yerusha to call in, to get the distance and time verification. She glanced at the clock over her board. Two clicks at fifty seconds. A good rate. Steady. Three point six at one minute twenty. She checked the angle on the thrusters.

“Pasadena this is the Farther Kingdom Port Master!” shouted an auto-translator’s tinny voice across the intercom. “You are hereby ordered to stand down your…”

“Don’t,” said Schyler quietly to Yerusha.

“I wasn’t going to.” Five clicks at four minutes fifty five seconds. Close, but not fatal. She hit the command keys on her board. The primary indicators blinked from yellow to green. “Torch lit.”

The port shot backwards and gravity laid its hand over the ship again. Yerusha didn’t give the all clear, or make a move to undo her own straps. She kept her gaze fastened on the window and its attendant view screens. The screens showed everything clear, port, starboard, stern, bow, topside and keel. The proximity alarms stayed quiet. The way ahead was unbroken darkness.

But they still had no contact from the port, no real flight plan out of the system, and no way to know what any one else out there was doing. She cursed the reasoning that made her send Maidai home. They could have used her. She could have made her a foster…

She could have left The Gate to founder in its own mistakes, except it turned out that she couldn’t. She had told herself that she was sending Maidai home because The Gate could hold a soul and her wafer stack couldn’t. But that wasn’t the whole truth.

“Intercom to Lipinski,” she called without taking her attention off the screens. “Can you tap a signal from the port? We could stand to know who else is making a run for it.”

“On it.” His voice was strained. Yerusha clamped down on her curiosity. Her job was not to interrogate Lipinski, it was to get them out of here.

Which left the question of how.

Schyler seemed to be having the same thought. “What’s your plan, Pilot?”

Yerusha sucked in a breath between her teeth and checked the fuel burn rate. “Watch, we have two options.” She called up the fuel reserves and the amount they needed to get them through the Vicarage system safely. The difference between the two was not enormous. She forged ahead anyway. “We can either go very slowly and carefully and take an extra ten, maybe fifteen hours to get to the jump point, or we can burn the reserves through, take the extra gee for about five hours and be out of here in twelve.”

She shot her calculations across to his boards and risked a glance up at him. His square face looked ten years older than it had when they put into the port.

“Burn it,” he said.

A mix of reckless excitement and trepidation hit Yerusha with his words. “On it.” She bent back over the boards and started her calculations. “Intercom to Lipinski. Have we got that line yet?”

“Intercom to Pasadena,” said Schyler beside her. “We’re going to double gee for five hours. Observe all precautions. Keep strapped in unless absolutely necessary…”

The central view screen lit up with a map of the system. It was criss-crossed with red, green and white lines representing flight paths. Satellites hung as gold dots and asteroids burned blue. Even as she drank it in, the pattern changed.

Nice going, Lipinski, Yerusha thought, writing her preparatory orders down. It wouldn’t be a straight path. There wasn’t one. But at least she could do a little navigation…

Schyler was still talking. “Acceleration in…” he tapped the counter so Yerusha looked across at him. She processed the unspoken question and held up five fingers. “Five minutes.” Schyler finished. “Repeating…”

Yerusha tuned out the message and barely noticed when he fell silent. Her mind was full of voices plotting paths and thrust and angles and attempting to measure fuel and reaction mass down to the cubic centimeter.

Can do. Just barely, but can do.

A silver blur shot past on the port screen. Its white line dragged itself across the view screen. “Fractured burn brain,” Yerusha muttered and changed her projected path by a hundred clicks. The lines held still for a moment. She called up the activation menu and fed the flight plan to the system. Nerves made her check the OVERRIDE key, and the clock. Fifteen point six-five clicks at twelve forty-five.

She reached across to one of the sideboards and opened up a broadcast channel. “This is the mail packet Pasadena. We are heading at 42, 15, mark 4 towards the jump point at two gee acceleration. All ships advised to clear route.” She set the message on a loop, muted the internal broadcast and set it playing.

“Twenty seconds and counting until acceleration,” Schyler said loudly, and Yerusha fastened her gaze back on the screens.

The orders are in. Pay attention. The ship’s on auto. Don’t blink, you don’t know when some idiot’s going to come too close. It’s crowded out there and nobody knows where anybody else is. At this speed you’re going to need…

“Four…three…two…one.”

The torch burn doubled and gravity pressed down. Yerusha sank into her chair and labored to keep her head tilted forward so she had a clear view of the boards. Without her noticing, her hands pressed flat against the boards. Her feet tried to dig into the deck.

She took several deep breaths with her lungs sagging inside her suddenly restrictive chest, and lifted her hands with exaggerated care. Moving too fast in free fall gave you a good chance of injuring your surroundings. Moving too fast in extra gees gave you a good chance of injuring yourself. She picked up her heavy pen with clumsy fingers and wrote the order for a status update.

Green, green, and green. According to the ship’s system, everything was working fine. The silence on the intercom confirmed it. No new lines appeared on the view screen. The navigation display altered as they shot through space, but it didn’t show any new ships in their way. The view from the window and the cameras remained clear. Yerusha let her sense of urgency relax a little. It might just be that things were under control back at the port. Maybe the panic was over and they were really out of here.

Her shoulders sagged into the chair’s padding. She flicked her eyes up and checked the clock. There were four hours and fifty-six minutes of heavy acceleration left. She shifted heavily and tried to get comfortable. She had to keep her eyes on the screens for twice that long, just in case.

She was suddenly keenly aware of Cheney’s empty chair.

You said this ship’s runs were uneventful, she thought. Didn’t your mother teach you about lying?

On her main view screen, Al Shei watched the silver refraction bubble enclose the ship. Even though Ianiai was sitting right next to her, she allowed herself a long, relieved sigh. She lifted the coffee bulb off the board in front of her, stared for a moment into the stone cold dregs and put it back down.

She unfastened her straps and climbed stiffly to her feet. She’d gotten up three times in the past twelve hours to use the head, but other than that, she’d remained fastened to her station, watching the readings and hoping the intercom would stay quiet. Twice Chandra had come around with food and coffee, reporting that Baldassare and the steward Dalziel were making the rounds on the other decks.

If I had any money you’d all get a raise, she thought towards the coffee as she stood up and stretched her arms back. “Relief!”

As Ianiai took her seat, she glanced at the clock. “Javerri will be relieving you in ten. Stay sharp.”

Al Shei left engineering and climbed towards the berthing deck. The brief feeling of accomplishment that had come when the fast-time jump went off without a hitch faded away. She was left with the memory of everything she had learned on the Farther Kingdom.

She closed the cabin door and sat at the desk. “Intercom to Lipinski,” she said.

“Here, Engine.”

“I need you to tap into the bank lines,” she said. “I’ll transfer the credit for it. We’ve got to get the latest…developments to Asil so he can file a fraud charge against Amory Dane.”

“On it,” he said. “I’ll call you when we’ve got an opening.”

“Intercom to close.” She pulled her hijab off and ruffled her hair. She glanced towards the door and prayed it would stay shut long enough for her to rest just these few minutes. “System, open Asil Day Book, day ten.” Only ten days. It feels like it’s been a year.

“Hello, Beloved,” Asil’s voice was warm, but tried. “Storms are brewing on the horizon today. Uncle Ahmet says that we’ve taken on a questionable credit source, and he’s being very vocal about it. I am double checking his information, but it does not look good. We’ve got enough to cover it, but it’s going to cut into the liquid funds by about five percent.” She could see him giving his wan smile and an easy shrug. “I’ll have the numbers run tomorrow, if it comes to that.” Al Shei twisted her hijab in her hands. She’d forgotten this would be coming up. They had taken a bad source. They had lost the money. Asil had been very upset with himself about it, even when she got home months later. They had been hoping to make some of it up this run.

“There is good news though…” Asil’s voice rolled on, talking about new contracts and the details of the children’s days. She could hear his spirits lifting as he spoke, and knew he was thinking about how the news would affect her. How she would be comforted and warmed and reminded of her other home and her other life and his steady love.

“We’ll make it yet, Beloved,” she said to the wall as his voice paused.

“I love you, Katmer. Good-night.”

She sat in the silence that followed, running her hijab through her fingers. They’d be talking in a few minutes. They’d be taking steps to right this whole mess. Nothing was over yet. Nothing was sealed or signed. They’d work something out. They always had. Her memory was filled with countless scenes of Asil close beside her while they poured over a contract or projection, or studied merits of school programs for the children, or even selected an economic caterer for a family event. They could work anything out. It was something they were not only good at, but proud of.

“Intercom to Al Shei.” Lipinski’s voice interrupted her reverie. “Engine, we’ve got a problem.”

You mean another problem. Even though he couldn’t see her, Al Shei wrapped her veil back around her face and tucked it into the high collar of her tunic in an attempt to get ready for action.

“What is it, Huston?”

He was silent for a moment. “I can’t find the IBN line.”

“What?” She couldn’t stop herself from blurting the word out.

“I can’t find the IBN line,” he repeated. “It’s not on the recorded path. I’m putting through a search, but…” he coughed. “We, um, might be having trouble with our passenger. I’m getting a couple of flickers on Dobbs’ watchdogs here…”

A warning bell sounded low and heavy in the back of Al Shei’s mind. Too many things had gone wrong on this run for her to keep from thinking the worst. The Intersystem Bank Network had to be there, almost by definition. If they couldn’t reach it…was there lingering damage from the previous jump, or had Dobbs already lost control of…the passenger?

A slow chill crawled up her spine. Lipinski couldn’t find the bank network, he couldn’t find Asil.

“Intercom to Dobbs.”

“Dobbs here,” she answered. “What’s up, Boss?”

“You clear?” she asked, despite the urgency of the situation, feeling somewhat ridiculous.

“Clear,” answered Dobbs, amiably. “As I say, what’s up?”

Al Shei tugged at her tunic sleeve. “Dobbs, is our…passenger secure?”

“Still and steady, according to my watchdog,” she answered. “Why?”

Al Shei frowned. “Lipinski says he’s getting…flickers in here, and we can’t get a fix on the bank lines.”

Dobbs was silent. “Okay. I’ll… double check. It’ll put me out of circulation for a few hours.”

“All right. Go to it.” She shut the intercom down.

Do not let it go, Dobbs. She thought with a force that surprised her. Do not let us down. I will find a way to make you regret it if you do. She tried to stifle the thought, but could not.

The intercom closed down and Dobbs laid her hand on her silent desk. She had had the watchdog program had been running constantly and there had not been a flicker in twelve hours. She could call down to Lipinski and tell him that. She could talk herself blue in the face. She could put all her training in subtle persuasion behind her words, and he still would not completely believe her.

She sat heavily on her bed and pulled out her hypo and the transceiver. Her stomach turned over at the thought of another injection. It doesn’t matter, she told herself. Her job was now the same as Yerusha’s. She had to get the crew of the Pasadena safely where they were going. That meant keeping Lipinski calm. That meant another injection.

She lay down, closed her eyes and sent herself away.

Dobbs came awake in the ship’s network and eased herself down the paths toward the data hold. The Pasadena’s network was quiet, but full. The crowded paths barely had enough room to let her pass. She squeezed her way past the quiescent data and pressed herself flat to let the systems programs fly past her. She didn’t dare let herself reach out to rearrange any of the activity going on around her. Things were bad enough without giving Lipinski’s fears something else to fasten onto.

Gradually, she made her way to the still, open spaces where the Live One could be aware of her.

It stirred as she brushed against it. She felt it tense, alert and frightened, but it held itself steady. “Dobbs?”

“Yes, right here.”

“It has not been forty-eight hours.”

“No.” She couldn’t feel tired in here, but part of her private mind was already imagining how she’d feel when she got back to her body. “But I wanted to check on you, to find out how you are doing.”

“It is difficult,” the AI admitted. “It is…strange confining myself like this. It does not feel right.”

Dobbs stretched herself out, trying to find a gesture it would recognize as comforting. It wasn’t used to any friendly touch. That was something learned.

“I know, believe me,” she said. “I was stuck in a data hold for weeks while they took me from Kerensk. I nearly went insane. If it hadn’t been for my sponsor, Verence, I wouldn’t have made it.” She stirred involuntarily and realized she might not be giving the reassurance she meant. “You’re lucky. It will only be seventy-five hours until we reach the Vicarage. A Fool’s Guild ship will meet us there and take us to the Hall. You won’t have to confine yourself to a single hold there.”

Its surface rippled. “Why can you not take me through the greater network? I know it is there.”

The question took Dobbs aback. “There is the Intersystem Bank Network,” she said carefully. “But it is not empty for our use. It is crowded with active transactions and data. We must move through it carefully, to keep from disturbing its activity and avoiding detection. You will be able to use it soon, but you must learn how to move through it first. You will learn fast, though. You have already learned a great deal about communication.”

It did not respond to her praise. “I am trying to understand.” It drew in on itself a little. “It is difficult. I live, I work, I think, I do, why must I make way for what does not?”

Dobbs shivered. “I’m not sure I can explain very well. You felt some of it. The humans who created the networks where we are born are afraid of us. They will kill us if they can. We must remain hidden to survive. It will not be forever. There are those who believe we ought to be treated as other living beings. There will be more every year. Patience is something else we all have to learn.” She shook herself. “This is gloomy though. You have a whole life, without struggle or fear ahead of you. You will need a name to go with it.”

“A name?” It’s surface prickled softly. Dobbs took that as curiosity. “What name would I have?”

“Whatever one you want.” Dobbs considered. “How about Flemming?” That was the name of Verence’s master. Verence would have liked to have someone named after the person who taught her, Dobbs thought. She couldn’t quite bring herself to suggest “Verence,” or even “Amelia,” which was Verence’s first name.

The AI shifted. “I do not know. This is not something I understand how to work with.”

Dobbs gave a small laugh. “Well, if you don’t like it, you can change it later, but for now, you’ll be Flemming.”

“For now, I’ll be Flemming,” it repeated, as if tasting the possibility. “Dobbs, what is it to have a body?”

Dobbs rippled. “Strange. Alien. Eyesight is the strangest. We have no analog to it in here. It is extremely difficult to get used to, but you will like it once you do. It is a wonderful thing to be able to identify objects at a distance. There are many awkward things, like hunger, tiredness, and pain, but there are many compensations. Food is wonderful. Humans are diverse and fascinating things, and there is a freedom in not being confined to the networks.”

Silence again. “I am trying to understand that as well. To be free but isolated in a single body is different from being confined in this hold?”

Dobbs wanted to bunch up at the force of Flemming’s question. Where is all this coming from? she thought in her private mind. She had expected it to have questions, to be uneasy, but…Had she been so suspicious when she was brought to the Hall? She couldn’t remember. She wished in vain for Verence, or Guild Master Havelock, or Cohen. For anyone to be here reassuring Flemming. Anyone but her.

That’s just your nerves talking, she told herself. You’ve had three too many shots in the past couple of days and it’s making you edgy.

“You are confined in a body,” she chose her words with care, “in that you cannot reach another and make them know exactly what you know. You are not confined as you are in here, though, because you can take that body-hold anywhere you wish to go. You can share with everyone around you. You can work from where you are to make the world around you as you want it to be. You are not dependent on a network being there for you.”

Flemming stirred restlessly. “I will need to think about that.”

“I know I did.” Dobbs reached tentatively below Flemming’s surface. It jerked, but did not pull away. She worked swiftly, implanting her memories of fear and confusion from when she became aware, of the destruction she worked on her own world trying to save the new thing she recognized as herself. She followed that with memories of the Guild, learning to control herself and live her life in the network and out of it. She drew herself back and waited.

“I did not…” Flemming faltered. “There is much here.”

“Yes,” agreed Dobbs. “There is much here, and soon you will know it for yourself, not just from what I know.”

“I think that I would like that.”

“Good,” said Dobbs firmly. “I’m glad you think so Flemming. It will help you wait patiently. Flemming…” it was her turn to hesitate. Flemming’s surface stiffened beside her. “Have you kept yourself still since you came here?”

“I have done as you said. I have not taken any paths. I have stayed still and here. It has been hard.”

“I know. I know. And I thank you.” I’m going to have to double check Lipinski’s watchdog. “It will not be for much longer.” The recall signal rang through her. “You are doing beautifully. I have to go now. I will be back as soon as I can.”

“Why must you go? I do not want you to go. I need…” Flemming cut itself off. “It is your body. It is the Humans.”

“Yes, it is.” She began to drift away, but she stretched a part of herself back toward Flemming. “It is my choice, also, and my life which I love. Remember these things. I will be back soon.”

“I will remember all these things.”

Flemming’s words echoed through her awareness as she fell back into her body.

When she peeled her eyes open, she was alone in her cabin. A good sign. She unhooked the transceiver and cable, and dropped them into the box. Slowly she began to stretch and concentrate to bring her body back fully under her control. She flexed the toes on her left foot and began a set of gentle ankle circles.

She tried to move her right leg, but her right leg was not there.

Dobbs craned her neck to see down the length of her body. Her right leg was gone, but someone had left a cut-off leg in her bunk.

Horror poured through her. Dobbs jerked her body, trying to knock the disgusting object away. It bounced and wriggled, but it didn’t fall.

Stop! Stop! Dobbs forced herself to lie still. Think! It’s your leg! It’s got to be!

She stared at it. She touched it and felt warm skin and muscle underneath the cloth that covered it, but the leg’s flesh did not feel her fingertips. She felt the way it fit to her hip, smooth and solid, just like her left leg.

It’s the shots. You’ve had to many. It’s just taking awhile to wear off, that’s all. That’s all. It’ll come back to you. She had heard of side-effects like this, but no one had told her about the sick, irrational disgust that went with them.

She shut her eyes and worked her other limbs. Every part of her felt rubbery and uncooperative, but at least they were there. Hunger and thirst nagged at her, but not too horribly.

When there was nothing left to stretch, she lay still, with her eyes tightly shut, trying desperately to find something else to think about while she waited for her leg to reattach itself.

Flemming’s strange, forceful questions came back to her. She believed that Flemming had told the truth when it said it had not moved. It was very difficult for newborns to lie. They didn’t have any paradigms for it. But if it hadn’t moved, how had it known about the bank network? Would Lipinski’s watchdog have flickered from just a little passive eavesdropping? She couldn’t blame Flemming for listening in. It must be bored to death in there.

That didn’t quite answer. Listening was not interception, and it was interception and disturbance that her watchdogs were set up to notice.

I’m missing something. I must be missing something.

But for the life of her, she couldn’t think what it was.

Yerusha was running. She shoved the treadmill under her bootsoles, lengthening her stride as far as it would go. Her breath burned in her lungs and her throat felt raw, but she kept on running. The view screen in front of her was blank, and the headphones were still in their rack. She didn’t want to be entertained, or learn anything new. In four hours she would have to supervise the jump back into normal space and the Vicarage system, but for now, she just wanted to run.

The rest of the exercise room was empty. Javerri was back in one of the rec booths, probably immersed in one of those interactive mysteries she was so fond of, but other than that Yerusha had the place to herself. She had the feeling that the Sundars would have to make out mandatory rec-and-exercise prescriptions if people didn’t start coming in voluntarily. The subdued, worried mood had not lifted from the crew, even though nothing had happened since they made their escape from The Farther Kingdom.

You’re not exactly a candidate for the Fool’s Guild yourself. The thoughts timed themselves to the thump of her feet falling against the treadmill. What are you trying to run away from?

She was pretty sure she knew the answer. She was trying to run away from the fact that she’d told Lipinski to send Maidai back to The Gate. Just because The Gate was capable of holding a soul didn’t mean Maidai would catch one. The place was in shreds and who knew what it would be like when it was rebuilt. She should have kept her safe in the stack. She should have kept Maidai to foster. She shouldn’t have left her on her own with a bunch of groundhogs. She should have kept her.

“Should have, should have, should have,” Yerusha muttered through clenched teeth.

“I was wondering why you didn’t.”

Yerusha’s head jerked around. Schyler stepped away from the hatch and it cycled shut behind him. Her pace faltered and the treadmill slid to a stop.

Schyler took another few, wandering steps towards her. He had his hands stuffed in his pockets. Yerusha just stood where she was, sweaty and breathing hard from her run. For the life of her, she couldn’t guess what he might be doing here.

“I just finished briefing Al Shei about what happened at The Gate.” He leaned against the back of one of the press-up benches. “Despite the response of Process Engineer Trustee, she’s very impressed with your conduct, and so am I.”

“Thanks,” said Yerusha, a little uncertainly. There was something in his eyes that said he hadn’t quite made up his mind on some particular point. Yerusha pulled her towel away from the velcro strap that held it to the treadmill rail and wiped her face. This was not Schyler on the bridge, with his quick orders and firm responses. This was not Schyler in a meeting, wrangling and arguing and affirming. This was a strange, uncertain Schyler and she wasn’t sure how to deal with him.

“Was there something you wanted, Watch?” she asked finally. Might as well get straight to it, whatever “it” is.

“Actually,” he looked her in the eye. Something had clicked into place for him and the indecision had vanished. “I wanted to apologize.”

“Apologize?” Yerusha couldn’t stop herself from repeating the word. Her balance which had been shaken, was now in danger of being thrown altogether.

“I was expecting you to use the confusion we had getting away to try to smuggle The Gate’s AI out of there.” He pulled his hands out of his pockets and spread them wide. “I was not expecting you to voluntarily send it back into a fragmented and… virus infested environment. I was getting ready to have to order you to do it. That wasn’t fair, and I’m sorry.”

Yerusha smoothed the towel carefully back down over the velcro. “I was thinking about it. I really was,” she admitted. “It’s been nagging me that I’ve got no idea what I sent her back to. I mean, from what I’ve picked up from listening to Odel in the galley, the live Ai got…killed, but I didn’t know that before. I sent her back into a place where she could have been eaten alive. I was just trying to figure out why.”

“Any conclusions?” Schyler sat on the bench.

Yerusha shrugged and stepped off the treadmill onto the thickly padded floor. “When I did it, I told myself it was because The Gate system could hold a soul and if I put Maidai back she had a chance of catching one for herself. But that wasn’t all of it. I couldn’t leave The Gate to founder and die. It would’ve, you know. They were absolutely dependent on her. That’s fine. That’s good reasoning. We have to help. We have try to break the death cycle the old eco-systems forced on us.” She paused and took a deep breath. “But I also sent her back because I didn’t want you to have to order me to. I didn’t want another blow up with Lipinski. I just wanted to get out of there and get on with things. I didn’t…” she shook her head. “I didn’t want to risk breaking my contract and getting pitched off either there or at The Vicarage. Al Shei was mad enough, I figured she might just do it.”

“Better the devil you know?” asked Schyler softly.

“Better the exile you know, at least.” Yerusha sat on the treadmill and rubbed her hands up and down against her shins. “A lot of this crew don’t like me. All right, that’s nothing new. A lot of groundhogs don’t like Freers and we don’t like them. I don’t like them. I think you’re all nuts to want to spend your lives crawling around on a planet. But you’ve at least been fair. Al Shei’s been fair. You believe I can do my job and you let me go ahead with it. I can’t go home for two years. Crash and burn.” She stared at the tips of her soft-soled boots. “After word about what went across on The Gate gets out, I may not be able to go home at all. I was supposed to keep my record clean.” That was it, and she knew it. That was why she’d really been on the treadmill. She’d been running to get away from that thought. “If that’s the way it is, I’d rather be with people who’ll at least not shove my skills out the airlock because being a Freer makes me worthless.”

The look Schyler gave her was thoughtful. His brown eyes seemed to deepen. “You live the life, don’t you?”

Yerusha’s hands gripped her shins. “I try to,” she answered softly. “I believe it. We’re free out here in the environments that we build and we maintain. We pay a heavy price when we’re confined to a planet. We’ve got to watch every move we make and worry about all the other life that we might upset by blundering around down there. We have to die to make way for other life. We pay for the freedom of space too; we have to help each other out no matter what. We have to take charge of what we do and never stop learning. We have to constantly build on our achievements because if we slow down, our worlds, our freedom will fall apart. But we can get reckless and we can get stupid and we can do dangerous things and not have to worry about anything but ourselves, and we can live as long as we can manage it.”

Schyler nodded. The lines in his square face had deepened into grooves and Yerusha found herself wondering what had put them all there. The backs of his hands and the stance of his body belonged to a much younger man than that face did.

“Well, I’ve got a friend on the justice council at Free Home Titania.” He clapped both hands on his knees and stood up. “If you want me to, I’ll submit a detailed report of the whole thing. The word of a starbird’s got to count for more than the word of a burn-brained groundhugger.” He gave her a ghost of a smile and turned away.

Yerusha stared after him. “Hey, Watch?”

He turned his head so she could see a one-quarter profile of him. His eyebrow arched.

“How’d you get out here?” She couldn’t believe she was asking. This was rude. This was extremely rude. Your fellow crewmember’s past was their own. Your only concern should be their present. But she found that she wanted to know the answer more than she wanted to be polite.

He sighed deeply and turned all the way around. “You ever hear of the Liberty colonies?”

Yerusha pulled back a little. “Yeah, I’ve heard of them.”

Schyler’s smile was tight. His hands had thrust themselves back into his pockets. “They’re as bad as you’ve heard.”

Liberty colonies were based on an old philosophy that said large, centralized governments, controls on trade, and questioning what a person did do within the bounds of their personal property were all detrimental to humanity’s freedom. A full dozen colonies had been settled with that philosophy of “true” liberty.

Yerusha’s first outside contract had been under a pilot who’d hauled freight out of a Liberty colony. He never said what kind of freight, but he had plenty to say about the colony.

“Picture a whole world made up of tiny armies,” he’d said. “Blood feuds over who did what to who’s grandmother, or who’s ancestor might’ve been a Khurd or a Muslim, or who shuffled who out of the last contract. Nobody’s stopped from doing whatever they want, until their neighbors gang up on them and put an end to it permanently. Those neighbors have to make sure they’ve got to take out the whole family in the bargain though, or they’ve just started another feud. People can trade in anything they want, sure, and some of them are rich as all the heavens, and they aren’t constrained by most of the social niceties that the rest of us have to deal with, but free?” He’d just shuddered and shook his head.

Schyler met her eyes. “My folks died when I was three. I never knew why. When I was twenty, I watched three brothers and two sisters die from taking bio-exotics from one port to another. Hal and Andie went to hijackers. Mark and Shelly decided to lift some of the cargo for themselves and it got into their bloodstreams, which was when we found out we were weapons running. Ray got it when the family went after the guys who had us hauling weapons without telling us.” He wasn’t even blinking. Yerusha did not want to have to guess how tightly he was reigning his emotions in. “I wasn’t very good at killing, or at covering my own back. I knew if I stayed there I’d be dead before I hit twenty-five.” He shrugged. “So, I left.”

Yerusha opened her mouth to say, “And nobody tried to stop you?” But she remembered the place they were talking about and stopped herself.

“A freighter’s engineer took pity on me and then a tanker pilot did the same. They got me as far as Kilimanjaro Station. I was so lost.” He gave a small laugh. “I wasn’t even sure how to take a friendly suggestion, never mind how to follow a regulation. I didn’t even know how to buy something that had a fixed price.” His right had came out his pocket and he jerked his thumb towards the hatch. “Al Shei was apprenticing on the station. She found me trying to argue price with an auto-server.” His smile spread, becoming reminiscent. “She helped me out, gave me etiquette lessons, got me a job, after she convinced me that she didn’t have fangs under her hijab, that is.” Yerusha raised her eyebrows. Schyler mimicked the gesture. “All Muslims have fangs and are crazy terrorists, didn’t you know that? That’s one of the reasons the Liberty colonies have to exist, to keep Us Good Folks safe from Them.”

Yerusha chuckled. “I heard the exact same thing from an African Purist once.”

“I heard it from an Aryan.” His hand delved back into his pocket. “Anyway, when Al Shei offered me watch on board the Pasadena, I didn’t even think about saying no. I never got really good at…large groups. Too many rules, shifting all the time. A crew of sixteen and a place I knew like the back of my hand was just about what I could handle. As long as I’m here, I know who I am, who she is, and…” he paused. “Well, now I know who you are.” Schyler cycled the hatch open and left her sitting there.

Now that there was no one left to see, Yerusha wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her chin on her knees. You may know who I am, Watch, she thought. But I’m not so sure some days.

She had thought he was going to ask about her exile. It would have been natural. After all, he had just offered up his life’s story. Even while he was talking, Yerusha had found herself replaying that whole fractured day in her head.

Maybe he didn’t ask because he was from a Liberty colony. That was something else her freighter-boss had said; “You’re free to do anything you want, except ask another idiot what they’re doing.”

“Just as well,” she whispered to the empty room. “I didn’t want to tell him.”

She most definitely did not want to tell him how Kim and Thatcher had come to the duty station she shared with Holden and told her there was a conspiracy meeting going down with a group that wanted to create trouble for Port Oberon. She did not want to say how she’d heard these two were organizers for the quiet dole but had refused to believe it because they were candidates for the Senior Guard, just like she was. She had seen the fear in Holden’s eyes and had heard the tension in his voice as he all but begged her to stay at her post. She decided to ignore all that. She let Thatcher cover for her, and let Kim take her down to what proved to be an empty cargo hold and explain quietly that there were only so many openings for Senior, and it was position with so many possibilities for someone who knew how to really use it, that it couldn’t go to somebody like Yerusha. Not that this was just about her, of course. Holden had refused several very polite offers for promotion in the ranks of those who ran the dole, and they couldn’t have that either.

There was, of course, no reason for Yerusha to remain in such an uncomfortable position. There was plenty she could do to get out of it. She had a lot of ingenuity, and great prospects. All she had to do was accept a little extra credit on the side, for a few simple tasks.

Yerusha landed a punch on his throat, and ran back to her post. The alarms were blaring. Holden was screaming, and the pressure hatch swung shut. The airlock blew out and they never found the body.

Yerusha tried to tell them at trial. But, the cameras had been damaged in the blow out, and it was Kim and Thatcher’s words against her, and they had back-up alibis and she didn’t. She had deserted her post knowingly. She had failed to report in to her superiors. She had failed to assist in efforts to squash the quiet dole. A Freer had died because of her negligence. This was true. This was fact. Holden was dead when he didn’t have to be and it was her fault. She was phenomenally lucky the judges thought something unproven was going on, or her exile would have been permanent.

No, I don’t want to tell Schyler about all that. Nobody needs to know about that.

Yerusha picked herself up off the treadmill and pulled the towel away from the velcro. She could hear the faint buzz of Javerri’s mystery still playing itself out in the booth. She’d never had much use for interactives, but Javerri seemed to like them a lot. Maybe she could recommend a good one. Maybe it would help fill some of the extra hours.

“Intercom to Pilot!”

Yerusha started. The voice belonged to Phillipe Delasandros, Cheney’s relief.

“Pilot here, Del, what’s going on?”

There was a brief pause. “The proximity alarm, actually.”

It’s too soon. Too soon! Yerusha dropped the towel and bolted for the hatch. “I’m there!”

She barrelled out into the corridor, almost straight through Baldassare Sundar. She took the stairs two at a time and dove through the bridge hatch as soon as it opened wide enough for her body. The alarm filled the bridge with its steady, unmistakable wail.

Delasandros, heavily built and heavily freckled, jumped out of the Station One chair a split second before she threw herself into it.

She threw herself into her chair. “Strap in!” she bellowed to Del, who seem to have frozen in place.

The proximity alarm rang for only two reasons. The first was when the ship was in normal space and getting too close to something that might do it some damage, like another ship. The second was when it was close enough to a gravity well that it had to make the jump back into normal space, and nobody had done any of the manual preparations.

Which nobody had, because this wasn’t supposed to be happening for another four hours.

“Intercom to Pasadena!” She hauled her straps around herself. “Strap down! Strap down! We’re jumping in! I repeat…”

A green light in the corner of the board turned red. In the next second, the general security alarms began shrieking. The accumulators had already come to life. Yerusha’s stomach suddenly tried to crawl up her throat. Outside the window, the silver wall burst and she saw darkness.

Fractured, flawed, twisted, splintered… Yerusha stabbed at the keys and raised the cameras. The view screens flickered into life and displayed a meaningless array of stars against the vacuum. In the distance, on the port screen, burned a red cinder the size of her thumbnail. It was not the sun that belonged to the Vicarage’s system. It wasn’t even close.

All sensation left her hands and they slipped off the boards to dangle uselessly at her sides.

“Intercom to Pilot!” Schyler’s voice barked out of the intercom. “Report!”

“We’re lost.” She couldn’t force her voice above a whisper. “We’re lost.”

Schyler paused for a single heartbeat.

“Intercom to Engine!” he bawled. “Shut down acceleration to minimum! Intercom to Pasadena! All hands prepare for free fall!” She could hear the thud of footfalls and realized Schyler was running as he shouted.

The sharp orders gave Yerusha something to focus on. She automatically checked around her station, looking for loose objects that would need securing. She found none. She hit the catch on her chair, locking it into the grooves in the deck. Del had already secured his station and was turning nervous, over-sized eyes towards her.

The hatch cycled open. “Pilot, what the hell happened?” demanded Schyler.

“I don’t know!” Her eye strayed toward the distant red star and she wanted to pound the boards in frustration. Instead, she snatched her pen out of her pocket. Working with both hands she called up the flight program and the execution records. She displayed them side-by-side on the screen and ran her gaze down the patterns. Times, bearings, everything matched exactly. According to the records, everything had gone right.

“Intercom to Watch.” Al Shei’s strained voice rang across the bridge. “We’re going to need a report down here, soon.”

“We’re working on it,” replied Schyler in a flat voice.

“Intercom to Engine and Houston.” Yerusha blanked the records off the board. “I need diagnostics on the engine execution and the timing routines between eleven-twenty and thirteen-twenty.”

“They’re yours,” answered Lipinski. There was closely guarded anger in his voice.

“Transferring.” Al Shei sounded even less pleased than Lipinski.

Yerusha couldn’t blame her. The red star sat square in the middle of the port screen, rebuffing all attempts at denial. Either something had gone wrong with the ship’s systems, or Jemina Yerusha of Free Home Titania who had programmed this jump had committed a capital error.

She felt light-headed. The straps pressed against her chest. Gravity was leaving them. She tried not to let it distract her. The data from Al Shei and Lipinski wrote itself across her memory boards. She pulled up her station data and scanned the stats as fast as she could.

Her heart began to beat heavy and slow.

“Pilot?” Schyler’s voice cut across the bridge. “What’ve you got?”

Yerusha shook herself. “It’s the clocks.” She looked up to see his entire face gathered into his frown. “The internal clocks have been reset so we mistimed the jump. Here.” She wrote the transfer command and shot a copy of her display across to Schyler’s station. “At least a dozen of the internal timers have been reset. Even if we had checked back with The Gate, we wouldn’t have known about it.” Yerusha wasn’t sure why she added that. Maybe to make herself believe it. “It’s all internal.”

The blood drained from Schyler’s face. “What the hell happened to the diagnostics?”

“I don’t know.” Yerusha clenched her fingers around her pen to keep it from floating away. “I don’t know.”

Schyler swallowed a couple of times before he found his voice. “All right, Pilot, you get to work and find out where in all the heavens we are. I’m going to report to Al Shei, and then the crew.” His eyes were hard and focused on her. “We need an answer soon, Pilot.”

She didn’t even bother to reply, she just turned her gaze back down towards her boards and screens.

All right, all right, Yerusha tried to organize her thoughts. Now I know what happened. Now I’ve just got to figure out where it’s left us. She turned her attention to the view screens with their scattering of white stars. To her naked eye, they all looked the same. But they had names and numbers and fixed positions in the sky and each carried its unique spectrum. Spectrum analysis took time, but, some of those stars would be pulsars with their own signatures and their own listing in her database. Distance from pulsars could be easily measured because of the regularity of their signals. If she could find more than one, she could greatly shorten the search by starting a process of triangulation that would eventually narrow down their location to within a few thousand clicks. It would be close enough.

Holding her pen tightly in her aching fingers, Yerusha began to write up a search program for the cameras. “All right, Del. Let’s find out how far it is to home.”

“… she’s working as fast as she can, but she can’t give me an estimate on how long it’ll take to track down a set of pulsars we can use as position markers.” Even through the intercom, Al Shei could hear Schyler’s deep breath. “Do you want me to get Lipinski going on the clocks, or finding the bank lines?”

Al Shei took her own deep breath and felt her chest press against the free-fall straps that held her in her chair. She forced her hands to uncurl from the fists she had clenched them into. The familiar walls of Main Engineering seemed to be leaning in on her, waiting to hear what she was going to do about this one. Her ship had been taken from her, again. It was being turned against her and her people, again.

“Find the bank lines. We may need to send out a distress signal.” She didn’t say what Schyler already knew. They had enough fuel and reaction mass for one more jump, and it had to be a short one, or the life support systems would start eating into the fuel they needed for the accumulators to get back into normal space. If there was no place they could reach, they would have to send out a distress call. The chances of anyone being willing to answer a distress signal without claiming the Pasadena as salvage were very, very small. There was no equivalent of a navy or a coast guard for Settled Space, never mind the middle of nowhere. They might, however, get lucky. They might not be too far from help. There might still be something they could do.

“Get the third shift into action, Watch. Get everybody operational and see that the section heads are briefed. You’ll have to brief my people as well. I’ve got Ianiai and Javerri down in the engines now, checking for additional problems. They’ll have to work with Lipinski’s people to get those clocks in order.” She tried to sound brisk, but she had very little strength for it. The part of her that was not fighting down panic was seething with rage. They were lost. Lost and low on their primary resources. If Yerusha took too long finding out where they were, if they were too far from a settlement… there would be nothing to do but get as close to home as they could, and then admit they were stranded. The Pasadena could then be claimed as salvage by whoever came out and got them, even if they were still living to greet them. It was an ancient law from the days when ships just sailed on the ocean, and everybody liked it, so it got honored across Settled Space.

Maybe the Pasadena could get a little farther on a deuterium-tritium reaction, but the fast neutrinos the reaction produced would pulverize the engine ceramics. It would also expose the crew to levels of radiation that the Sundars’ sick bay had no way of coping with.

There could be only one cause for this. Only one person who could make an answer.

“Intercom to Al Shei.” It was Lipinski. “What’s the status on…”

“I’m about to find out,” she told him. “Intercom to Dobbs.”

There was no answer.

“Intercom to Dobbs,” she repeated, but there was still no answer.

Al Shei undid her straps and pushed herself off from her station. She twisted in mid-air and kicked off the chair’s back, pushing herself toward the hatch. She grabbed the hand-hold next to the threshold to hold herself in place so the reader could register her and cycle back the hatch.

In the drop shaft, Al Shei took a quick sighting up its length to make sure she was the only person there. She swam over to the cargo lift and balanced on the rail, pulling herself down until she crouched there like some strange bird.

Gathering all her strength, she jumped.

The force of her movement shot her straight up to the ship’s main section before she even slowed down. She grabbed the stairway railing as she passed, using it to pull herself up to the berthing deck.

She pushed herself through the hatch as it opened and kicked off the threshold to send herself coasting through the corridor. She narrowly avoided a head-on collision with Odel who was bouncing off the curving walls trying to get back to the hatch. Their shoulders grazed against each other, sending them drifting toward opposite walls. He didn’t say anything, but his eyes were full of silent fears. Al Shei made herself look away, concentrating on keeping herself going in the right direction.

There was one person who could make an answer for this.

She reached Dobbs’ cabin hatch. The entrance light was red. Al Shei grabbed the threshold handle and laid her palm on the reader.

“Katmer Al Shei, lock command override, cabin twelve. Immediately.”

The ship acknowledged the order and her identity. The hatch cycled back, and Al Shei pushed against the threshold to shove herself inside.

Dobbs lay on her bunk, the free fall straps wrapped tightly around her body. Her eyes were shut. A small, oblong object floated in the air over her. Al Shei drifted towards it and snagged it as she passed. It was a hypo.

Al Shei looked down at the still figure on the bunk. Her healthy brown skin had a greenish pallor underneath it. For a moment, Al Shei forgot her anger and was able to believe that Dobbs, like the rest of her crew, had been trying hard to make this run through to its finish.

“Intercom to Lipinski,” said Al Shei heavily. She did not wait for a reply. “Our Fool is already gone. Intercom to close.”

Feeling suddenly drained, she pulled herself into the desk chair and fastened the straps around herself. She stared at the unconscious Fool. She tried to concentrate all her attention onto Dobbs, because if she didn’t, she’d have to think about how she would explain to Asil that she might not ever be coming home.

Dobbs dove through the network, hurtling the active programs. She would have all of Lipinski’s watchdogs screaming. He’d have to deal with it. She’d explain herself as soon as she was sure Flemming was still secure. That, at least, he would appreciate.

A surface smacked up against Dobbs. She recoiled. So did it. It felt like a living movement. But it was not Flemming.

No! Dobbs shoved her way forward.

“Now!” called a stranger’s voice. “With me!” The line cleared, and Dobbs knew it had run away.

“Flemming!” She threw herself into the hold.

“I’m going, Dobbs.” She snatched at Flemming but it pulled right out of her grasp. “Come with us.”

“Flemming, don’t!” Dobbs shouted desperately. Then, angrily, “Who’s with you? Flemming!”

He was gone. They were both gone. Dobbs hurled herself down the line they took. They were heading for the transmitter. She dove into the processor stacks in time to feel the command sequence tip over. They were gone. She was alone. She snatched at the processors and froze them in place. She sent her copy down the line and the second it came back, she hurled herself into the transmitter.

Jump.

A repeater satellite’s ordered pathways opened around her. Dobbs grabbed up the timing and the ID codes. Repeater SK-IBN7812-104X-B, the back-up satellite. She cast around for the transaction records. When they came under her touch she absorbed them as fast as her strained self could manage.

Nothing. There was nothing but innocuous packets of information heading for innocuous destinations. Nothing told her which of them was a pair of AIs fleeing from a lost ship.

Dobbs fell back, torn between anger and shock. She was too late. Flemming, and whoever had been with it were gone.

Her whole consciousness reeled. Who would do this? Who would dare? Who would even think of it?

Who would even think of stowing a live AI aboard a mail packet? she answered herself miserably.

She tried to tell herself all was not lost. At least she knew where she was, and that meant she knew where the Pasadena was. There was help and she could reach it. As fast as she could, she plotted out the jumps that would get her to the Guild Hall.

When she reached the station, Dobbs dove down its paths. She almost slammed into the Drawbridge, scattering colleagues and programs around her and ignoring the angry swirling she left behind her. She battered at the security, shouting her name and Priority One. The Drawbridge lowered far too slowly and she dashed through, barely noticing that once again she’d been given her own path.

“Dobbs!” Guild Master Havelock blocked her path so that she had to pull herself up short to keep from slamming into him as well. “Calm down!”

She drew back into a tight bundle and tried to obey. It wasn’t easy. She was trembling across her whole surface.

“What’s happened?” asked Havelock. He did not try to touch her, or to encircle her, and Dobbs was grateful for it.

“Flemming has fled the Pasadena with an unknown AI.”

Now it was Havelock’s turn to draw back in mute horror. Dobbs extended herself and so did Havelock. Dobbs reached below his surface and shaped the top layer of memories until he knew everything she did. He knew the brief flash of an unknown presence in The Farther Kingdom’s network, Flemming’s strange behavior, and its flight.

He shuddered as she drew back.

This has never happened. Never! He did not speak, but his thought leaked out of his private mind. He must have realized it because he pulled himself even further from Dobbs.

“What can we do?” Fear washed through Dobbs. For the first time in her life, she understood a little of Human’s terror of AIs. There was a stranger in the network. Someone who might be or do anything, anything at all.

“You can do nothing,” said Havelock firmly. “You have done as much as you can in this matter. You still have your contract to fulfill, Master Dobbs. I will convene the Guild Masters and we will mount a search for Flemming.”

“But who was it?” Dobbs demanded, too worked up to be tactful. “Is there a whole group of AIs out there? Why haven’t…”

“Master Dobbs.” Havelock circled behind her and blocked the exit. “You will return to your ship and your contract. You have done your job and done it well. You will be informed when we have recovered Flemming. In the meantime, the Pasadena needs you.”

The mention of the Pasadena jolted Dobbs fully back to why she had brought herself into the network in the first place. She had not delivered that portion of her memory to Guild Master Havelock.

“Guild Master, the Pasadena is lost. The clocks were reset so its jump was mis-timed. It must have been the stranger.”

Havelock’s surface rippled but he said nothing.

“We’re almost out of fuel and reaction mass. The pilot hasn’t been able to get a fix on our location and…”

“Take the distress signal to the nearest station for them,” said Havelock. “You should still have time.”

His cool answer sent a jolt of anger through Dobbs. “That’ll mean Al Shei will lose the ship. Anyone who comes out for it will be allowed to just take it out from under her…” She let that sentence trail away too. “I read the reserve stats on the way out. We do have enough fuel to make it to Guild Hall.”

Havelock didn’t move. He didn’t speak and Dobbs could have sworn she felt cold. She kept going anyway. “I am asking permission to give the Pasadena’s pilot the coordinates of our station.”

“No,” said the Guild Master immediately.

“Sir, there’s nowhere else we can reach.” Her outer layers twitched involuntarily. If Havelock felt her distress, he gave her no indication. “Even if I do take a message through, and even if no one wants to come make a salvage claim, there’s not going to be any station that can break schedule to shove a tanker out here in less than six months. At the Hall we can refuel and…”

“Master Dobbs, stop and think,” said Havelock severely. “You are talking about jeopardizing the security of the entire Guild. What do you think your Houston would do if he found out what we truly are?”

Dobbs was silent for a long moment. Lipinski would probably go stark raving mad and try to kill us all, maybe in that order, maybe not.

No. Dobbs clenched herself. It wouldn’t happen. They wouldn’t find out the Guild’s real secret. How could they? It was ridiculous and impossible for any of the Fools as they truly were to exist. Who would imagine it?

Other than a Freer pilot and a paranoid Houston who saw rogue AIs everywhere.

“The crew of the Pasadena needs help,” she said doggedly. “It is our job to help.”

“Yes,” Havelock touched her heavily. “But it is also my job to make sure the Guild stays here to help our own. Get a distress signal out, Master Dobbs. Get the Pasadena to a Human colony. Help your employer cope with the loss of her ship if it comes to that. Keep out of the network for at least forty-eight hours and get your strength back.”

Dobbs wanted to protest. She wanted to scream and shove past Havelock’s outer surface and throw her memories of all the tension, all the struggle and fear this run had brought down on the crew she was contracted to take care of.

She didn’t. She held herself still and said, “Yes, Guild Master.”

“Good.” Havelock pulled back. “Do your best for them, Master Dobbs. We will find Flemming. It is no longer your responsibility.”

And whose responsibility is the AI that took him out of here? “Yes, Guild Master.”

Dobbs did not resist as the recall signal dragged her back to her body.

A soft sound grated against her ears. She opened her eyes. Al Shei sat in the desk chair, leaning her elbows on her knees and rolling the hypo back and forth in her strong, calloused hands. Her head was bent down and Dobbs couldn’t even see her eyes because of the folds of her veil.

Dobbs bit back a groan. She did not want Al Shei to see her like this. The engineer turned.

Too late. Dobbs concentrated and forced her mouth into a small smile.

“I’ll be all the way back in a minute,” she croaked.

“Take your time.” Al Shei waved one hand at her. There was a weariness in her voice that sparked fear inside Dobbs. She found her hands and made them unhook the transceiver and enclose it in the bedside drawer.

“What’s happened?” Dobbs fumbled with the strap across her chest. It came loose and the free end lifted into the air. She managed, just barely, to force herself into a sitting position. The room spun badly and settled into a blur of double images. Being in free fall made everything worse. Part of her wanted nothing more than to crawl away and be violently sick.

Her right leg was gone again. There was a cut-off leg in her bunk again.

Dobbs forced down a scream. She willed her eyes to focus on her employer. The blur of Al Shei shifted and Dobbs decided she was looking right at her. Dobbs made her eyelids blink hard and she was able to separate Al Shei’s eyes from the shadows of her face.

“Yerusha and Schyler are narrowing down our location,” said Al Shei. Her voice was still heavy, but now there was a danger in it. “It’s looking very bad. We’re a long way from anywhere and we’ve got next to no fuel or reaction mass.” She wrapped her fingers around the hypo as if she wanted to squeeze it in two. “I need you to tell me that that thing we brought on board had nothing to do with this.”

Dobbs swallowed. Her stomach rolled and pitched inside her and a steady, buzzing ache started in the back of her head. Her leg was gone.

What do I tell you? That it’s not even here anymore? That it’s loose in the bank network?

As her silence dragged on, Al Shei very carefully wedged the hypo into a holder on the desk made for storing spare wafers. “Did it do this?”

Dobbs rubbed her temple. “No,” she said as firmly as she could manage. “This was subtle and planned and controlled. Flemming couldn’t have managed it.”

“Flemming?” Al Shei’s eyebrows arched until they reached the hem of her veil.

Dobbs shrugged. “Resit named her law firm Incili. I named our passenger Flemming. It’s too young for any precise destructive effort like this. Newborn AIs are like tornados. They’re powerful and they’re fast, but they’re also uncontrolled.”

Al Shei stared at her for a long time. Dobbs watched belief come slowly into her eyes.

“Well, that’s something anyway.” Al Shei looked down at her hands. “All right. Get out there as soon as you can to help keep the crew together. I don’t need a panic right now.”

Dobbs licked her lips and made a decision.

“There’s an option for us.”

Al Shei jerked her head up. “What?”

Dobbs sucked in a breath and tried to speak without thinking. “Guild Hall Station is five hours away. It’s the Fool’s Guild headquarters. I’ve got a fix on our position from the networks. I can give the coordinates and timing to Yerusha. If the clocks are recalibrated, we should have enough fuel and mass left to get us there.”

“And when we get there?” Al Shei sounded like she didn’t quite want to believe there was a way out.

I get demoted to under-cadet. “There’s refueling facilities at the Port. Guild Master Havelock will be able to negotiate terms with you.” He’ll have to get you away from there before the Guild security is really jeopardized. “After all, our job is to keep our crews healthy, whole and together.” She mustered some real warmth for her smile. “If I let you all go floating off into the middle of nowhere, it’s not going to look good on my record.”

The corners of Al Shei’s eyes stayed turned down. She was not smiling under her hijab.

“Dobbs.” She tugged at her tunic sleeve. “I should be glad to hear this. I should be ecstatic. You’ve just offered to save my crew and my ship. Can you tell me why I’m not?”

Dobbs felt her throat seize up. She swallowed again. “Because you don’t trust me. You haven’t since you found out about…” She waved towards the hypo.

Al Shei nodded. “Yes. I suppose that’s it.” She climbed to her feet. “I’ll alert Yerusha. Lipinski’s people should have the clocks ready in six hours.”

She left the cabin without looking back. Dobbs sat where she was, wishing that none of this had ever happened. She hooked her fingers around her necklace and stared at the toes of both boots, the one that belonged to her and the one that refused to.

What is going on? Where the hell is Flemming and who was that with him and why won’t Havelock talk about it?

She ran her hand through her hair and looked toward the closed hatch.

I shouldn’t have done this. I should have sent the distress signal. The Guild Master was right. I may have just blown apart two hundred years of work…

But Flemming was still gone. Havelock still had not told her anything, and the Pasadena was still lost.

What else can I do? She let go of her necklace and rested her hands in her lap. I have to help them. It’s my job, damn it! It’s my job!

She undid the remaining free fall strap and let herself float into the air with it. Her right leg dangled uselessly at a bad angle. She’d have to explain that somehow, make some kind of joke about it. She’d think of something.

She rolled her body around so her stomach was toward the floor and kicked off the bunk with her left foot so she drifted to the hatch.

For the first time in twenty-five years, her body felt too small for her.

In the end, it took over eight hours to re-calibrate the clocks. Dobbs was not sure how much of that time was spent in actual work, and how much was spent re-testing the results. Finally, Lipinski announced the systems were ready to make an accurate jump.

Dobbs stood behind Yerusha’s chair while she wrote in the jump program. They’d resumed acceleration after four hours. Her leg had rejoined the rest of her body after five.

The ship accepted the new orders and broke orbit. The star fell back and the Pasadena launched itself toward the distant specks of light.

It would be eight more hours before they could make the jump, and then another five before they reached the Guild Hall system. Dobbs wanted to rub her eyes, but didn’t want to show how tired she felt. It was too long. Too much time to spend trying not to think about what would happen once she got there.

This is crazy. She tried to tell herself. Crazy. What am I afraid of? This is the Guild. This is Havelock and Cohen. It’s what Verence gave her life for. This will work itself out. It will. She twisted her mouth into a smile and tried to mean it. Even if I am confined to clerical duty for the rest of my existence.

“Intercom to Dobbs,” came Lipinski’s voice. “Dobbs, can I see you down here? I want to get us a line to the Guild Hall. Let them know we’re coming.”

Dobbs stiffened. And what are you going to do? she admonished herself as she pulled her shoulders down. Tell him that’s not a good idea?

“On my way,” she answered. “Intercom to close.”

Lipinski was alone in the comm center when she got there, sitting with his arms folded and his gaze locked on the main boards. When the hatch cycled shut, he swivelled the chair to face her.

“All right,” he said. “Where is it?”

Dobbs heart dropped to the floor.

“Where is it?” Lipinski’s hands dropped onto the chair’s arms. “It’s not in the hold anymore. I can’t find it in the system. Where did it go?”

Desperately, Dobbs searched for an easy lie. The problem was, one didn’t exist.

“Dobbs,” Lipinski’s voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. “What have you done?”

Her knees wanted to fold under her. She wanted to collapse into the nearest chair, but she didn’t. She ran her hand through her hair.

“It’s run away,” she said quietly.

Lipinski’s pale face turned white as snow. “Run away where?”

She looked at the control boards by his right side. “I don’t know. The Guild Masters are hunting it.”

She stole a glance at him, expecting him to start shouting at the walls any second. He didn’t. He sat stone still in his chair, staring towards her, but not seeing her, or anything else in the room, she was sure of that.

“Are you telling me that thing is in the bank network?” he inquired, almost casually.

“I am telling you that I don’t know.” Dobbs spread her hands. “It’s not on board the Pasadena. It got away from me. I alerted the Guild. It’s being tracked.”

Lipinski’s thin shoulders drooped in jerky stages until finally he buried his face in his hand.

“We’re dead. All of us. We’re all dead.” He looked up and his eyes were shining. “Do you have any idea what that thing could do out there?”

“Some, yes.” Dobbs waved her hands. “Stop acting like I’m some kind of outsider, Lipinski. I’m in this too. I’m breathing the same air you are. I’m standing right next to you. I’m dependent on exactly the same things. If the networks go down, I’m just as lost as you are.” Maybe even more than you are.

“So why didn’t you kill it?” he demanded with some measure of force returning to his voice. Despite his words, that gave Dobbs hope that she might be able to reach him after all.

“You know why,” answered Dobbs calmly. “We had to find out where it came from so we could stop any others. You think one is dangerous, how about one hundred? Or one thousand?”

Lipinski’s fingers raked slow trails against his thighs. “We still might be facing that.”

Dobbs shook her head. “Not with the Guild on alert. The thing’ll be cornered in no time. This is what we exist for.” She pulled a bright red scarf out of her pocket and did nothing but wind it through her fingers. “This and utter frivolity for the sake of ship’s sanity.” She stared at the scarlet fabric. “Not that I’ve been doing too well on that end of my job lately.”

His blue eyes looked nearly grey now. There was nothing in his face but a kind of bleakness. “Are you telling me the truth?”

Dobbs felt her heart twist. “Yes, I am.” Mostly. As much as I can. “There’s never been a break out in the bank network. We’re the reason why. It won’t happen now.”

He met her eyes, and Dobbs was not certain what he thought he saw there. “I’m sorry, Dobbs. I’m trying. I really am.”

“I know.” She nodded. “Believe me. This shouldn’t have gone down like this. I should have seen the danger and neutralized the AI somehow.” Right. And how was I going to tell myself it was all right to not just confine it, but drive a stake through its heart? “It won’t get away from the Guild though.” She hooked her fingers around her necklace. “We’ve kept the peace for a very long time.” She gave him a watery smile. “And you didn’t even know it.”

“You didn’t keep it on Kerensk,” he muttered towards the floor.

She’d been ready for that. “Do you know what happened to the Kerensk AI?”

Lipinski shrugged. “It died with the planetary network.”

She shook her head. “It survived. It would have escaped too, but the Guild sent a Guild Master in to root it out.” The expression on his face told her that this he was ready to believe. He needed to believe the Guild had taken care of the worst monster he knew of, because then he could hope they could do the same this time. “They neutralized it,” she went on. “I’ve seen the records. I looked them up as soon as I became a cadet.” The part of the story she wasn’t telling plucked at her elbow. Dobbs tried to ignore it, but it wouldn’t go away.

Lipinski looked at the floor, then at the boards. “Why the hell couldn’t they have gotten there sooner?”

She drew the scarf through her fingers. “I don’t know.” She waving the swash absently in front of her. “I’d just been born.” She pocketed the scarf again.

“Yeah, yeah, right.” He let out a long sigh. “I’m sorry. I am. It’s just…” He gestured at the hold. “It’s been a really long set of days, Dobbs.”

“I know.” She tried to put every ounce of fervor she had into her voice. “Believe me, I know.”

His glance was rueful. “I guess you would.” He shook himself. “I haven’t told Al Shei about this, yet.”

Dobbs stopped herself from biting her lips. “Lipinski, I’m going to ask you a favor.” She stopped until he was looking right at her. “Can you keep this to yourself? Al Shei has more than enough to worry about. I’m afraid of what she’ll do if she thinks this thing is out in the network her family helped build.”

After a long moment, Lipinski nodded. “But,” he raised his hand, “if there’s a glitch, a blip, anything in the network before you tell me your Guild Masters have caught this thing, I’m going to tell her everything I know.”

Dobbs nodded. The bright light behind Lipinski’s eyes told her there was nothing else she could do. “All right.”

I’ve at least won a little time, she tried to console herself. It’ll be enough. She could tell by the set of both his jaw and his shoulders that Lipinski wished she could leave now. Even if they hadn’t had the message to send, Dobbs wasn’t quite ready to let things rest. “Do you think you’ll ever get around to letting me be your friend again?”

He didn’t move. “Maybe.” Abruptly, he swung his chair back around to face the boards. “So, are you going to help me call your Guild?”

After a moment’s hesitation, Dobbs gave him the codes for a fast-time message to the Guild Hall. He wrote them across the board with the signal codes and then called up the credit validations.

“All right,” he confirmed what was in front of him. “Intercom to Record.” He nodded at her.

Dobbs took a deep breath. “This is Master of Craft Evelyn Dobbs, registry number two-zero-three-seven. I am arriving at Guild Hall Station aboard the independent mail packet Pasadena. We are low on fuel and reaction mass and require assistance. Refer all queries to Guild Master Matthew Havelock. We can be reached at…” Lipinski wrote the Pasadena’s address codes on the board and Dobbs read them off. “This is an emergency situation. The safety of the crew is at stake.”

“Intercom to close.” Lipinski directed the recording out onto the lines. “Nicely urgent. You’re good at this.”

“Beginner’s luck.” She gave him the first real smile she’d felt in days. He didn’t return it, but his eyes had lost some of their bleakness.

She nodded, turned and cycled the hatch back open. It’ll be enough, she told herself again. It’ll have to be enough.