"So what should I do?" I whispered to Tobit. Whispering because if I didn’t whisper, I’d scream. "I’m stuck out in space," I said. "I can’t run away."
"Yes, you can," Tobit answered, "but you have to make your move while you’re still acting captain of Willow. Hop into one of the evac modules and declare an immediate forced landing emergency. Use those exact words: immediate forced landing emergency. The ship-soul will launch all the escape pods straight toward Celestia, because it’s the optimal site for a forced landing right now: close by and habitable. You hit it lucky there, York — Celestia is a free planet, not part of the Technocracy. Once you touch down, the navy has no legal right to drag you back."
"But won’t Jacaranda stop me from getting away?"
"They’ll try. But they can only catch one pod at a time. Even if they’re lucky, they’ll only grab four of the eight pods before you reach Celestia’s atmosphere. You’ve got a fifty-fifty chance of making it to the ground."
"And a fifty-fifty chance of getting caught."
"So what?" Tobit asked. "The worst they can do is banish you to some asswipe of a planet, and they plan on doing that anyway." He gave me a yellow-toothed grin. "You have dick-all to lose, York. And Celestia is reportedly a cream-puff world: all tame and terraformed. If you lie low for a while, you can head back for the Technocracy eventually. Within six months, some new crisis will make the High Council forget all about you. Admirals have the attention span of lobotomized gnats."
Tobit obviously didn’t know who my father was… or he’d know Dad wouldn’t be so quick to forget. On the other hand, I figured my old man wouldn’t waste energy chasing me if I stayed out of his way — more than anything, he just wanted to pretend I didn’t exist.
I asked Tobit, "Will you get in trouble for telling me this?"
He shook his head. "Nah — they won’t have any evidence. I’m not transmitting back to Jacaranda, and you can erase Willow’s records of this conversation. You’re the captain; you have authority to wipe all the memory banks here if you feel like it." Tobit grinned. "I also have a friend in high places: the real Admiral Ramos. She was the one who drafted me for First Explorer on the Jacaranda… to counterbalance whatever shitwork Prope is up to. Eventually the council will find an excuse to get me reassigned; and Ramos will send another of her favorite Explorers to keep Jacaranda honest. Even a dirty-tricks ship needs Explorers. Otherwise, the lily-fingered crew members would be the ones marching into stink holes full of rotting corpses."
Tobit gave a sour look at the nearest dead bodies… and at that very moment, Willow’s alarm bells started blaring out RED ALERT.
8
WILLOW EVACUATING
The lounge’s vidscreen lit up on its own, showing the view through Willow’s hull cameras. "Danger status one," the ship-soul announced. "Awaiting captain’s orders." Its computer voice sounded sharper than usual. That wasn’t good — voice synthesizers don’t simulate emotion unless it’s really important for people to pay attention.
On the vidscreen, a new ship had popped up between the Jacaranda and Starbase Iris: a ship shaped exactly like Jacaranda itself but painted black with starlike speckles. The paint job looked prettier than the navy’s boring old white, but it sure wouldn’t work as camouflage… especially not at the moment, when the black ship was surrounded by the milky swim of a Sperm-field.
"What the hell’s going on?" Tobit asked. "Civilian vessels shouldn’t come anywhere near… holy shit!"
The strange black ship had just shot two missiles at Jacaranda.
The ships were less than a kilometer apart, so it didn’t take long for the missiles to cross the gap: two flashes of flame and vapor racing toward their target in less than a second. I caught my breath, wondering what would happen when the rockets struck home… but instead of banging straight into Jacaranda’s hull, they angled off to swish close by on either side.
The missiles missed the ship, but snagged Jacaranda’s Sperm-field.
Oh. Now I understood.
The missiles plowed on into empty space, and the Sperm-tail bagged out to stay with them, as if the milky field had got caught on the missiles’ noses. Probably, it had; I guessed that both missiles were using Sperm anchors to latch onto the field and drag it with them. They continued angling off in opposite directions, spreading Jacaranda’s sperm envelope wide, like two hands inside a plastic bag, pushing out hard to make the bag stretch.
At the last second, the milky color of the Sperm-field broke into an unstable glitter of green and blue and gold; then the field popped like a soap bubble, stressed beyond its limits.
The missiles continued on their courses, disappearing into the darkness of space.
So much for Jacaranda’s ability to go FTL. The crew would need twelve hours to generate a new field and get it aligned properly around the hull. That gave the black ship loads of time to do whatever it wanted and still escape without pursuit.
The stranger ship swiveled its nose toward Willow. "Uh-oh," Tobit and I said in unison.
Tobit slammed his helmet back onto his head. Even before he’d locked it in place, he was yelling into the radio, "Benny, evacuate the ship. Don’t ask questions. Now, now, now!" "Do you think they’re going to board us?" I asked.
"Maybe," he said. "Or they might take Willow in tow and run off with the whole damned ship."
Steal the ship? While I was acting captain? I didn’t want to think what Dad would say about that.
"No more lollygagging," Tobit shouted, grabbing my arm. "We have to get out of here."
He dragged me from the lounge and down the corridor to the nearest evac module. It wasn’t far — in a navy ship, you’re never more than ten seconds from an escape pod. "Get in," he said. "Next stop, Celestia."
"What about you?"
"As soon as you’re gone, I’ll jump out an emergency airlock. There’s one just…"
The floor heaved beneath our feet. I grabbed at something to keep my balance; the "something" was Tobit, who was grabbing me too. "No more time," he growled, shoving me toward the pod. "They’re grappling the ship with tractors."
"They’re really going to steal my ship?"
"York," he said, "it’s not your ship and it’s not your fault. You’re just caught in a High Council fuck-up. Bad enough that this whole crew died… but the Admiralty must have opened itself a whopping security hole that let all the wrong people hear about Willow. Someone smuggled nano aboard. Someone else heard there’s a crewless ship here, ripe for the taking. It’s a grade A extra large chrome-plated cluster fuck, but you aren’t the one responsible. You’ve stepped in someone else’s dog shit, York; scrape it off your shoe and just walk away."
"Can’t I do anything?"
The ship lurched again; I barely managed to stay on my feet. Tobit stumbled and went down on one knee, but scrambled up again fast.