“Oh, I’m sorry,” Dorolow said.
“Look,” Horza said, staring at Aviger and Wubslin, “you think there’s somebody out there looking for one of us?”
“A man,” Wubslin nodded slowly, “and a little, tiny, really mean-looking drone.”
With a chill, Horza recalled the insect which had settled momentarily on his wrist in the smallbay outside, just before he had boarded the CAT. The Culture, he knew, had machines — artificial bugs — that size.
“Hmm,” Horza said, pursing his lips. He nodded to himself, then looked at Yalson. “Go and make sure Gravant gets off the ship, quickly, all right?” He stood up and got out of the way while Yalson moved. She went down the corridor to the cabins. Horza looked at Wubslin and motioned the engineer forward towards the bridge, with his eyes. “You two stay here,” he said quietly to Aviger and Dorolow. Slowly they let go of each other and sat down in a couple of seats. Horza went through to the bridge.
He pointed Wubslin to the engineer’s seat and sat down in the pilot’s. Wubslin sighed heavily. Horza closed the door, then quickly reeled through all he had learned about the procedures on the bridge during the first weeks he had been aboard the CAT. He was reaching forward to open the communicator channels when something moved under the console, near his feet. He froze.
Wubslin peered down, then bent with an audible effort and stuck his big head down between his legs. Horza smelled drink.
“Haven’t you finished yet?” Wubslin’s muffled voice said.
“They took me off to another job; I only just got back,” wailed a small, thin, artificial voice. Horza sat back in his seat and looked under the console. A drone, about two thirds the size of the one which had escorted him from the elevator to the CAT’s bay, was disentangling itself from a jumble of fine cables protruding from an open inspection hatch.
“What,” Horza said, “is that?”
“Oh,” Wubslin said wearily, belching, “same one that’s been here… you remember. Come on, you,” he said to the machine. “The captain wants to do a communication test.”
“Look,” the little machine said, its synthesised voice full of exasperation, “I have finished. I’m just tidying everything away.”
“Well, get a move on,” Wubslin said. He withdrew his head from underneath the console and looked apologetically at Horza. “Sorry, Kraiklyn.”
“Never mind, never mind.” Horza waved his hand. He powered up the communicator. “Ah…” He looked at Wubslin. “Who’s controlling traffic movements around here? I’ve forgotten who to ask for. What if I want the bay doors opened?”
“Traffic? Doors opened?” Wubslin looked at Horza with a puzzled expression. He shrugged and said, “Well, just traffic control, I suppose, like when we came in.”
“Right,” Horza said; he flicked the switch on the console and said, “Traffic control, this is…” His voice trailed off.
He’d no idea what Kraiklyn had called the CAT instead of its real name. He hadn’t got that as part of the information he’d bought, and it was one of the many things he had meant to learn once he’d accomplished the most immediate task of getting Balveda off the ship, and with luck following a false trail. But the news that there might be somebody looking for him in this bay — or anybody, for that matter — had rattled him. He said, “…This is the craft in Smallbay 27492. I want immediate clearance to leave the bay and the GSV; we’ll quit the Orbital independently.”
Wubslin stared at Horza.
“This is Evanauth Port traffic control, GSV temporary section. One moment, Smallbay 27492,” said the speakers set in Horza and Wubslin’s seat headrests. Horza turned to Wubslin, switching off the communicator send button.
“This thing is ready to fly, isn’t it?”
“Wha—? Fly?” Wubslin looked perplexed. He scratched his chest, looked down at the drone still working to stuff the wires back under the console. “I suppose so, but—”
“Great.” Horza started switching everything on, motors included. He noticed the bank of screens carrying information about the bow laser flickering on along with everything else. At least Kraiklyn had had that repaired.
“Fly?” Wubslin repeated. He scratched his chest again and turned towards Horza. “Did you say ‘fly’?”
“Yes. We’re leaving.” Horza’s hands flicked over the buttons and sensor switches, adjusting the systems of the waking ship as though he really had been doing it for years.
“We’ll need a tug…” Wubslin said. Horza knew the engineer was right. The CAT’s anti-gravity was only strong enough to produce an internal field; the warp units would blow so close to (in fact, inside) a mass as great as the Ends, and you couldn’t reasonably use the fusion motors in an enclosed space.
“We’ll get one. I’ll tell them it’s an emergency. I’ll say we’ve got a bomb aboard, or something.” Horza watched the main screen come on, filling the previously blank bulkhead in front of him and Wubslin with a view of the rear of the Smallbay.
Wubslin got his own monitor screen to display a complicated plan which Horza eventually identified as a map of their level of the GSV’s vast interior. He only glanced at it at first, then ignored the view on the main screen and looked more carefully at the plan, and finally put a holo of the GSV’s whole internal layout onto the main screen, quickly memorising all he could.
“What…” Wubslin paused, belched again, rubbed his belly through his tunic and said, “What about Horza?”
“We’ll pick him up later,” Horza said, still studying the layout of the GSV. “I made other arrangements in case I couldn’t meet him when I said.” Horza punched the transmit button again. “Traffic control, traffic control, this is Smallbay 27492. I need emergency clearance. Repeat, I need emergency clearance and a tug straight away. I have a malfunctioning fusion generator I can’t close down. Repeat, nuclear fusion generator breakdown, going critical.”
“What!” a small voice screeched. Something banged into Horza’s knee, and the drone working under the console wobbled quickly into view, festooned with cables like a streamer-draped party goer. “What did you say?”
“Shut up and get off the ship. Now,” Horza told it, turning up the gain on the receiver circuits. A hissing noise filled the bridge.
“With pleasure!” the drone said, and shook itself to get rid of the cables looped round its casing. “As usual I’m the last to be told what’s going on, but I know I don’t want to stick around this—” it was muttering when the hangar lights went out.
At first Horza thought the screen had blown, but he slid the wavelength control up, and a dim outline of the bay reappeared, showing its appearance on infra-red. “Oh-oh,” said the drone, turning first to the screen, then looking back at Horza. “You lot did pay your rent, didn’t you?”
“Dead,” Wubslin announced. The drone got rid of the last of its cables. Horza looked sharply at the engineer.
“What?”
Wubslin pointed at the transceiver controls in front of him. “Dead. Somebody’s cut us off from traffic control.”
A shudder ran through the ship. A light blinked, indicating that the main hold lift had just slammed up automatically.
A draught briefly stirred the air in the flight deck, then died. More lights started flashing on the console. “Shit,” Horza said. “Now what?”
“Well, goodbye chaps,” the drone said hurriedly. It shot past them, sucked the door open and whooshed down the corridor, heading for the hangar stairwell.