“He wants us to move the ship, Ean.” Sale looked at the paramedic holding the blaster on Ean. “I can’t move it,” she told him. “The linesman is the only one who can.”
On the Lancastrian Princess, Vega said, “Find out where that message originated.”
“Ean.” Sale’s voice was amplified by the lines. He forced himself to look at her. How long would they keep Radko alive?
“He wants you to jump.” Her message was clear. He’d jumped ships before, switched places with other ships in the fleet. She expected him to do that now. She also expected that the other ships already knew what was happening. After all, that was what he usually did.
Ean sang the lines open to the bridges of the fleet ships. Both fleets, for there was no time to choose specific ships, and Craik and four of her team were on the bridge here on the Confluence. They needed to know what had happened.
“What the hell?” the paramedic said. “What’s with the singing? Now?”
If Sale had been Radko, she would have said, “He does that sometimes, it’s his way of coping with nerves.”
But Sale wasn’t Radko, and if he didn’t save her, she wouldn’t be around much longer to say things like that.
Sale shrugged, as if she wasn’t sure. “Ean, the jump.”
Another single-level linesman, this one in Balian uniform, said, “We refuse to allow this ship to be taken. If you do this for them, Linesman, you are a traitor. A traitor to the New Alliance. A traitor to Lancia.”
“They’re traitors anyway,” another trainee said. For the Lancastrian linesmen—those who were standing—had produced weapons as well.
“Shit,” from the ship, and Ean had to look to be sure Sale’s mouth hadn’t moved. But the linesmen heard it, every single one of them who was capable of it.
“Did you?” Never mind. It wasn’t the time or the place.
The Lancian captors—they were all Lancastrians, Ean realized—rounded up the linesmen. Was Lancia trying to steal the ships?
Fergus struggled to his knees. “I think I’m going to be sick.” He crawled over to Kentish. “She’s alive.”
“Who are you?” Sale demanded of the Lancastrians. “Who sent you?”
“I need that jump, Linesman,” the paramedic said, holding the weapon on Ean. “Otherwise, I start shooting people. Starting with that one.” He indicated Sale.
“No one will cooperate if you shoot Sale.” Least of all the ship.
Line eight was getting louder. So much so that the human eights—all of them singles—were showing distinct signs of distress.
On the Lancastrian Princess and the Wendell, response teams ran for the shuttle bays.
“Give me the coordinates,” Ean said.
Helmo clicked through to Vega. “Are you receiving this?”
“Spacer Radko? Loud and clear. I’m sure everyone is.”
“Radko? No, I mean the Confluence.”
“Tell me.”
“The coordinates. Please.” Everyone on all 135 ships heard that.
Peters strained forward. “He’s as much a traitor as the other Lancastrians. See how none of them are fighting it.”
“That’s because we’re outgunned,” Hernandez said. “Group Leader Sale isn’t stupid.” Hernandez was like Sale, expecting him to swap with another ship. If he did that, he left Radko to die.
The paramedic gave Ean the coordinates for the jump.
Ean read them aloud. “They were 2341.123416.23.21. Where’s that?”
“None of your business,” but Ean hadn’t been asking the paramedic.
Answers came, almost simultaneously, from Helmo and Vega on the Lancastrian Princess, Wendell on the Wendell, and Kari Wang on the Eleven. “Redmond sector.”
Which was still half a sector away from the Worlds of the Lesser Gods, where Bach and Radko were. At least where he presumed Radko was. Half a sector. Far enough away that Redmond couldn’t reach them before they’d had time to rescue Radko and return home.
As for the people on the Confluence. They wouldn’t be any worse off near the Worlds of the Lesser Gods than they would be here.
“Lambert,” Vega said. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
Vega wouldn’t give him Radko’s coordinates.
“Ean,” Sale said. “We need to act.”
Ean nodded, and directed his song to line ten. “Can you take us to where Radko’s signal was?” The lines wouldn’t remember the signal if they left it too late.
He realized the lines were already acting, and hurriedly sang line seven in. It wouldn’t do to take the whole fleet with him. That would be an act of war.
And this wasn’t?
He didn’t care. Radko didn’t deserve to die. Especially not by Jakob’s hand. Or by traitorous Lancastrians’.
But they couldn’t rescue Radko without people to do it, and they couldn’t do that while the Lancastrians—enemy Lancastrians—were holding weapons on them. And line eight was more than ready.
Maybe Rossi was right. Let the ship do it. Don’t try to force it.
“Well,” the paramedic said.
“We’ve already jumped,” Sale said.
Line eight was waiting. Ready to protect its people and its ship.
“Linesmen, drop,” Ean sang, and put all the force he could behind his words. “Drop. Drop now, to the floor. If someone near you doesn’t drop, pull them down, or they’ll be hurt.”
He didn’t know how he knew it, but he knew the lines would come in waist high. Maybe they always did. After all, they hadn’t exactly measured them, had they.
The lines came in strong to support him, line eleven, too, and if the trainees standing hadn’t been single-level linesmen, the strength of it would have knocked them all down. It sent Ean to his knees, and it was a struggle to stay that much upright. “Drop, all of you.”
The lines took up the chant. “Drop, drop. All of you.”
“What’s going on?” the lead paramedic demanded of Sale.
“Lines. When they’re strong, they overpower the linesmen.” Although she knew as well as Ean did that the single levels shouldn’t have gone down at all. “I need to give Lambert oxygen, or he’ll be no use to you.”
Ean glanced around. His trainees were all down. And the Confluence wouldn’t hurt Sale or her people. “Protect us. Protect Ship from the marauders,” he sang to line eight.
A tsunami of sound rushed past him. A force-wave that crashed into those standing. They were tossed like flotsam in it. Against the wall. Against the ceiling.
Sale was in the wave’s path.
“Sale!”
But the wave flowed around her, and around the paramedic holding his weapon on her.
Sale snatched his weapon while he watched the carnage, openmouthed.
She shot him.
Ean sang a counterwave around himself to protect Bhaksir and her team. The two waves canceled each other out, but he didn’t need it, for line eight flowed around them as well.
Above his singing, he heard Sale, amplified again by the Confluence. “Trainee linesmen. Those of you who are able, collect the intruders’ weapons. Subdue any who resist.”
Sale took out her comms and called Craik, who’d been on the bridge all this time. “Where did he take us?”
“Redmond sector,” Craik said. “We’re still determining exactly where.”
“Redmond.” Sale’s voice was accusing. “You took us where he wanted to go.”