“I’m in space.”
“So are they.” The captain clicked off, clicked back on again. “If the port authorities call, ignore them.” She turned back to Han and Radko. “Here’s the code for the shuttle.” She pushed it through. “Tell Leonard to let me know when you’re on board.”
“Thank you.” Radko clicked off and turned to check each suit before she clipped them into a line. Chaudry behind her, then Han, and lastly van Heel. Van Heel might be injured, but at least she’d done some ship work. “I’ll do all the work. You stay put. If it gets too bad, close your eyes.”
“What about him?” Han asked, looking at the still-unconscious pilot.
“We put the ship on auto and set a beacon. He’ll come around in two hours.” The biggest danger for the pilot was that Redmond would reach the shuttle before he returned to consciousness and blast him out of the sky. Unfortunately, she wasn’t going to stay around to ensure he was okay. And she definitely wasn’t going to mention that possibility to the others.
She zipped him into one of the remaining emergency suits. At least that way, he’d have a chance.
“You said he was staying here,” Chaudry said.
“Just in case,” Radko said. “Are we ready?”
The air lock was too small to fit all four of them. She broke the link between Chaudry and Han. “We’ll go first.”
Outside, through her helmet, she heard Chaudry swallow.
“Keep still, Chaudry,” and made her voice commanding, and hoped he’d instinctively follow the order. “Close your eyes.”
She linked herself magnetically to the side of the ship as she waited for the air lock to recycle, and listened to Chaudry gag in his suit. She’d once told Ean how important it was not to be sick in your suit, but if she even mentioned the word, then Chaudry’s stomach would rebel properly.
“Are your eyes closed?” She snagged Han as he exited and clipped his line to Chaudry’s belt. “If any of you have problems, close your eyes.”
“But you still know.” It was little more than a whisper from Chaudry. “You can’t hide from it.”
Radko fired her jets. The sooner they were in the other shuttle, the better.
The trip took seven minutes. Behind her she heard nothing but heavy breathing and choked-off gasps. One of them was hyperventilating, probably Chaudry. “All of you, keep your eyes closed.” Didn’t they take the trainees out into space anymore during training?
It felt like the longest suit journey Radko had ever undertaken.
She called Leonard when they were close enough for Leonard to track them from the shuttle. “Leonard, Captain Engen told you to expect us.”
“Don’t know that I’d like to be doing what you’re doing.”
Radko didn’t mind. She liked space. She shifted, and changed direction to aim for the air-lock door she could see. “We’re close to your hull. Can you let us in, please?” She turned her magnets on and clicked onto the hull.
The air lock opened. “Two of you at a time,” Leonard said.
She unclipped Han from Chaudry again and pushed Han and van Heel into the air lock. “Be gentle. One of them is injured.”
Outside, while they waited for the air lock to recycle, she said, “Chaudry, are you listening to me,” and kept saying it until he was. “We’re up against the side of a shuttle now, and I’m attached to it magnetically. You’re safe.”
As safe as he could be in a suit without any controls. It was for emergencies, after all.
“Ready?” Leonard asked, and opened the outer air lock.
Radko made her way in and dragged Chaudry in with her. “You’re safe now,” she said again. “You’re in the shuttle.”
Chaudry didn’t relax until they were in the shuttle cabin proper.
“It’s not how I’d choose to travel,” Leonard told them, as Radko stripped off her suit, and helped Chaudry, then Han, out of theirs. Van Heel was struggling out of her own. “Hello, I remember you lot. I told you San See was a better port.” He called up the ship. “Captain, I have our passengers. Heading back to the ship now.”
“You realize,” he told them, “that we spoiled an order of shellfish for you.”
“They were our orders,” Radko said. “I don’t see why we can’t eat them at dinner. We owe you.”
“As if,” Leonard said.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: EAN LAMBERT
Worlds that had stalled on providing line trainees suddenly managed to find extra linesmen in their fleet. There were so many trainees that eventually the Department of Alien Affairs put a hold on arrivals while new modules were ordered for Confluence Station because the Gruen was full.
“One can only imagine,” Ean heard Helmo say wryly to his second-in-command, Vanje Solberg, “how they’ve all scrambled to get this far.”
Fergus was a lifesaver. He organized the groups, organized which trainers were training who, and kept Ean sane.
He’d been Jordan Rossi’s assistant before he’d come to work with Ean. “Rossi must be really sorry you’re not still working with him,” Ean said.
“Jordan’s life isn’t the same as it used to be. He hasn’t got the same need for an assistant.”
Ean couldn’t see that Rossi was doing much different than what he’d always done. Fixing the lines. True, he was behind a protective curtain of military security now, but he was working harder than ever. Although, from what Ean could gather, a lot of Rossi’s old life involved politicking, for it was no secret Jordan Rossi had wanted to be Grand Master of the line cartels.
Leo Rickenback—Rossi’s old cartel master—was Grand Master now.
“Does Rossi still want to be Grand Master?” Ean asked.
“Even if he could, Orsaya wouldn’t allow it,” Fergus said, which wasn’t an answer at all. “Not unless it benefits Yaolin.”
Rossi as Grand Master of the line cartels wasn’t as useful to a world going to war as a level-ten linesman who could communicate with the lines.
“Does he mind?”
“More important is do we think he’s ready to train linesmen on his own?”
Ean could take a hint.
The trainees were personally escorted and introduced by admirals of the fleet. Ean hadn’t expected that.
“Let them come,” Orsaya said, when Sale protested. “Don’t hide him away like some relative you’re ashamed of.”
“The whole point of putting Ean on Confluence Station is to keep him away from people.”
“Specific people. Let these people have their say. He’s proxy for the one person they can’t say it to.”
The first to arrive was Admiral Trask of Xanto.
“Governor Shimson sends his regards,” Trask said, as he looked around the area Sale had made public. It was bleak at the moment, with temporary chairs and tables bolted onto the floor, the only furniture in the room.
“And please pass my regards back to him,” Ean said warmly. He liked Governor Shimson. Most people did, which was rare this high in politics. “Tell him he’s welcome out here anytime he wishes to come,” for Shimson was a single-level linesman himself.
He could feel Sale’s disapproval right through his bones but ignored it.
“Allow me to introduce you to the Xanto linesmen.” Trask moved over to where four soldiers stood at attention. “Spacer Thomas Peacock, Engineer, currently stationed on the Foundation.” Peacock had six bars under his name. “Group leader Lina Vang, currently part of our own training team at Xanto barracks.” Vang also had six bars under her name. “Spacer Alex Joy, also of the training department.” Joy had no bars under his name. “And team leader Nadia Kentish, from the Elysium.” Likewise, no bars.