Ethan ordered up three-fourths of a gram of salicylates and some B-vitamins from the room service console, and pressed them on the pale telepath. Cee took them and rolled back up with a never-mind-me gesture that failed to reassure Ethan. But Cee's clenched glazed stupor at last relaxed into sleep.
Ethan watched over him, chafing anew at his own helplessness. He had nothing to offer, nothing half so clever as Quinn's bags of tricks. Nothing but an insistent conviction that they all had hold of the problem by the wrong end.
Quinn's return woke Ethan, asleep on the floor. He creaked to his feet and let her in, rubbing sand out of his eyes. It was time for another shave, too; maybe he could borrow some depilatory from Cee.
"How did it go? What did you find out?" he asked.
She shrugged. "Millisor continues to maintain his cover routine. Rau's back at the listening post. I could call in an anonymous tip to Station Security where to look for him, but if he slipped out of Detention again I'd just have to track him down someplace new. And the warehouse supervisor can drink premium aquavit by the liter and talk for hours without remembering anything." She smothered a slightly aromatic belch herself.
Cee awoke to their voices and sat up on the edge of his bed. "Oh," he muttered, and lay back down rather more carefully, blinking. After a moment he sat up again. "What time is it?"
"Nineteen-hundred hours," said Quinn.
"Oh, hell." Cee jerked to his feet. "I've got to get to work."
"Should you go out at all?" asked Ethan anxiously.
Quinn frowned judiciously. "He'd probably better maintain his cover for the time being. It's worked so far."
"I'd better maintain my income," said Cee. "if I'm ever to buy a ticket off this vacuum-packed rat warren."
"I'll buy you a ticket," offered Quinn.
"Going your way," said Cee.
"Well, naturally."
Cee shook his head and stumbled to the bathroom.
Quinn dialed orange juice and coffee from the room service console. Ethan, scooting around the table to reserve a place for Cee, accepted both gratefully.
Quinn sipped from an insulated bulb of shimmering black liquid. "Well, my shift was a bust, Doctor, but how about yours? Did Cee say anything new?"
This was mere polite conversation, Ethan gauged. She had probably recorded every snore they'd emitted.
"We slept, mostly." Ethan drank. The coffee was hot and vile, some cheap synthetic. Ethan considered that it was being charged to Cee, and made no comment. "But I've been thinking about the problem of tracking the shipment. It seems to me we've been going at it wrong way round. Look at the internal evidence of what actually arrived on Athos."
"Trash, you said, to fill up the boxes."
"Yes, but—"
A peeping noise, as from a captive baby chick, sounded from Quinn's rumpled grey and white jacket. She patted the pockets, muttering, "What the hell—oh gods, Teki, I told you not to call me at work…" She pulled out a small beeper, and checked a glowing numeric readout.
"What is that?" asked Ethan.
"My emergency call-back signal. A very few people have the code. Supposedly not traceable, but Millisor has some equipment that—hm, that's not Teki's console number."
She swung around in her chair to Terrence Cee's comconsole. "Don't talk, Doctor, and stay out of range of the 'vid pick-up."
The face of a perky auburn-haired young woman wearing blue Stationer coveralls appeared over the holovid plate.
"Oh," Quinn sounded relieved, "it's you, Sara." She smiled.
Sara did not smile. "Hello, Elli. Is Teki with you?"
A tiny spurt of coffee shot out the bulb's mouthpiece as Quinn's hand tightened convulsively. Her smile became fixed. "With me? Did he say he was going to see me?"
Sara's eyes narrowed. "Don't play games with me, Elli. You can tell him I was at the Blue Fern Bistro on time. And I'm not going to wait more than three hours for any guy, even one wearing a spiffy green and blue uniform." She frowned at Quinn's grey-and-whites. "I'm not as taken with uniforms as he is. I'm going ho—out. I'm going out, and you can tell him that a party doesn't need him to get started." Her hand moved toward the cut-off control.
"Wait, Sara! Don't cut me off! Teki's not with me, honest!" Quinn, who'd seemed about to climb into the vid, relaxed slightly as the girl's hand hesitated. "What's this all about? I last saw Teki just before his work shift. I know he got to Ecobranch all right. Was he supposed to meet you after?"
"He said he was going to take me to dinner, and to the null-gee ballet, for my birthday. It started an hour ago." The girl sniffed, anger masking distress. "At first I thought he was working late, but I called and they said he left on time."
Quinn glanced at her chronometer. "I see." Her hands flexed, gripping the desk edge. "Have you called his home, or any of his other friends yet?"
"I called everywhere. Your father gave me your number." The girl frowned again in renewed suspicion.
"Ah." Quinn's fingers drummed on her stunner holster, now refilled with a shiny lightweight civilian model. "Ah." Ethan, jolted by the thought of Quinn having a father, struggled to pay attention.
Quinn's eyes snapped up to the girl in the vid. Her voice became lower in register, with a clipped hard edge. This one, Ethan thought involuntarily, really has commanded in combat. "Have you called Station Security?"
"Station Security!" The girl recoiled. "Elli, what for?"
"Call them now, and tell them everything you've told me. File a missing person report on Teki."
"For a fellow who's late for a date? Elli, they'll laugh at me. You're laughing at me, aren't you?" she said uncertainly.
"I'm dead serious. Ask to speak with Captain Arata. Tell him Commander Quinn sent you. He won't laugh."
"But Elli—"
"Do it now! I have to go. I'll check back with you as soon as I can."
The girl's image dissolved in sparkling snow. Invective hissed under Quinn's breath.
"What's going on?" asked Cee, emerging from the bathroom fastening the wrists of his green coveralls.
"I think Millisor has picked up Teki for questioning," said Quinn. "In which case my cover has just gone up in smoke. Damn it! There was no logical reason for Millisor to do that! Is he thinking with his gonads now? That's not like him."
"The logic of desperation, maybe," said Cee. "He was very upset by the disappearance of Okita. Even more upset by Dr. Urquhart's reappearance. He, um—had some very strange theories about Dr. Urquhart."
"On the basis of which," said Ethan, "you went to a great deal of trouble to find me. I'm sorry I'm not the super-agent you were expecting."
Cee gave him a rather odd look. "Don't be."
"I meant to push Millisor off-balance." Quinn bit through a fingernail with an audible snap. "But not that far off. I gave them no reason to take Teki. Or I wouldn't have, if he'd done what I told him and turned around immediately—I knew better than to involve a non-professional. Why didn't I listen to myself? Poor Teki won't know what hit him."
"You didn't have any such scruples about involving me," remarked Ethan, miffed.
"You were involved already. And besides, I didn't use to baby-sit you when you were a toddler. And besides…" she paused, shooting him a look strangely akin to the one Cee had just given him, "you underestimate yourself," she finished.