One of the bridge crew smirked at this, which was a mistake. Katya was by him, glaring into his face in a second. “Shut up,” she said. “You child.” The smirk melted away instantly.
Katya turned back to Kane as Tasya arrived, having dispensed with her escort en route. She looked at the scene and said, “That’s alright, Kuriakova. Make yourself at home.”
“Sorry about… this, Katya,” said Kane, seemingly sincere. “It’s just… well… There is so much at stake.”
Katya wasn’t interested. “Our cargo, Kane. The plumbing stuff. You placed it, didn’t you?” Sergei glanced at her with puzzlement, and then realisation dawned.
“So you’d know where we were going,” he said, half to himself.
“Yes,” admitted Kane. “Sorry about that, too. A small deceit.” He was wearing dark grey trousers, a pale cream shirt and, over it, some sort of buttoned sleeveless top similar to an armoured vest except with a V at the front and made out of normal looking cloth in a shade of brown. It didn’t seem very functional to Katya’s eye, undoubtedly some fatuous item of Terran clothing. From one of the small pockets on the garment protruded a clumsily folded envelope, and this Kane took and held out to her.
“This is twice the agreed transport fee, in Federal notes. Please, take it for putting up with the imposition.” He smiled, a little weakly. “You can keep the supplies, too. If you like. You should be able to get something for them.”
“I don’t want your money, Kane.”
“Yes, she does,” said Sergei quickly. He stepped forward and took the money. As he returned to Katya, he said quietly. “Money, Katya! Actual money! Don’t let your pride get in the way of eating.”
“OK,” conceded Katya with poor grace. “We’ll take your money, and now we’re done. Let us go.”
“Sorry. Again,” said Kane. “I can’t do that. Not after going to all this trouble.”
Katya glanced around, trying and failing to formulate an escape plan.
“You could try screaming and seeing if help comes,” said Tasya, with mock concern.
Kane shot Tasya an impatient look that she accepted with a bored nod of her head. Kane turned to Katya. “Katya, you once said that the worst thing I do… that I’ve done… is not to tell people what’s going on until… well, sometimes, when it’s too late to help.”
“I remember. I also remember saying that I never wanted to see you again.”
Kane bridled at that, and some of the steel Katya knew lurked beneath the scatter-brained persona he wore like a shield glinted for a second. “I don’t need some truculent schoolgirl lecturing me. I need you… this whole world needs you… to help steer it away from Armageddon.”
“I don’t know what that word means.”
“I doubt any Russalkin has ever even heard it before. It’s nothing good, believe me. I just need a couple of days of your time to show you what is happening. Then you can make your own mind up. And you can help us, or you can go. I won’t stop you.” He glanced at Tasya. “We won’t stop you.”
Katya wasn’t so angry that she couldn’t see that a fait accompli had been dumped in her lap. She could spend the next ten minutes shouting at Kane, but she knew it would be ten minutes opposed by his particularly impenetrable brand of apologetic stonewalling, and with an accompaniment of languid sarcasm from Tasya. It was not, she bitterly admitted to herself, a winning proposition. The best she could hope for was to hang onto a few shreds of dignity.
“Two days, then. And you’d better have something worthwhile to show us at the end of it. Oh, and twice the transport fee isn’t going to come close to paying for the trouble we’re going to have with the Feds when they find out we apparently went off in a random direction instead of going to Dunwich — you’re going to have to up that sweetener.” Without waiting for a reply — Kane’s startled expression showed her response had hit home — she said, “C’mon, Sergei. Let’s get our stuff from the Lukyan. Then they can show us our cabins.”
She walked out of the bridge with Sergei, his nervousness evident, following in her wake. As soon as they were a couple of metres through the exit into the corridor, she gestured for Sergei to hold his tongue and stepped silently back to stand in the shadow of the bulkhead by the hatch. She listened intently, trying to make out specific voices over the usual hum and report chatter of an active bridge.
“We’re spending a lot of time and effort to convince Kuriakova,” she heard Tasya say. “I still don’t think we need her. There are other ways of getting in.”
Kane didn’t answer at once. When he did, he sounded worried and unsettled, a man who had bet everything on very long odds. “All your ways involve killing people, Tasya. I don’t want to try to end the bloodshed by spilling more.”
“Not all my plans involve killing, Havilland. I did table a stealth infiltration, too.” She sounded very slightly offended.
“Yes, that’s true, you did. But even you agreed that it would almost certainly be detected before the job was done. Then there would be shooting. No, Katya’s our best chance to get this done silently and without the Feds realising what’s going on until it’s far too late.”
“You overestimate her.”
The bulkhead safety override timed out and the door to the bridge slid shut, cutting off Kane’s reply. Katya snorted with irritation. She walked past Sergei without looking at him. He glanced nervously at the closed hatch, and followed her.
CHAPTER SIX
Armoured Merpeople
It was strange being aboard the Vodyanoi again. Katya could never quite get past the feeling that this was not just a hostile boat, but that a strange air of otherness hung around the cabins and corridors. She knew why, too — this boat was alien. The Vodyanoi had been borne to Russalka in the belly of a Terran invasion ship, and that sense of enmity could never be purged. Her design philosophies were a little different too; she felt sleeker and more confident, almost smug, in her lines both inside and out. Equipment was stowed a little more efficiently than aboard a Russalkin boat; a hundred little gimmicks and gadgets made life aboard just that pleasurable shade of convenience better.
It had taken her a while to understand that Russalka had never really won the war against the invaders from Earth — it had just weathered it longer than the Terrans were prepared to fight. Presumably the decision makers of Earth had looked at their spreadsheets and decided Russalka was worth no further effort. The initial invasion force had proved insufficient, and even the dreadful Leviathan had failed to crush all resistance. That was all they were prepared to waste, and so they abandoned the attempt, the machines, and even the men and women of the assault forces. These had done the best they could, throwing in their lot with the Yagizban.
The crew of the Vodyanoi was entirely Terran, she knew. It disturbed her that she found them perfectly human, even likeable in some cases. Part of her hated them for what they were, what they had come to Russalka to do, but it was a small part. In the flesh, they were just people who were doing their jobs. For all that, however, she didn’t speak to them much. Casual conversation would sooner or later touch upon the invasion, and that was not something she wanted to talk about to people who may have been personally responsible for her father’s death.
Sergei had watched her easy familiarity with the Vodyanoi’s layout with something like superstitious fear, as if knowing where the head was required witchcraft. Yes, he knew she had travelled in the Vodyanoi before, but the proof of that tale still came as a shock to him. Katya had the uncomfortable feeling that the simple fact that she knew her way around was somehow treasonous in his eyes.