The door shut, walling out their guide; and Jase slid right through Narani’s grasp floorward, would have hit if Narani had not caught him a second time.
Bren offered his own arm, supported Jase’s head, and he was cognizant, half-out, as his mother attempted to intervene from the other side. “Sorry,” Jase said.
“Sorry, hell,” Bren said. “Narani-ji. Use my bed. Jase, where are you hurt?”
“Ribs. Slid down the damn ladder.”
“Damn. Damn. Don’t pull on him, Rani-ji. Broken ribs. Banichi?”
“Bandaging,” Banichi said, and gathered him up as if he were a child in arms.
“Ms. Graham,” Bren said, laying a hand on her shoulder. “Yolanda. I take it this is your mother and sister.”
“Yes.” Yolanda was righting reaction, vastly upset, but not letting go. “It’s Tamun that’s done this.”
“I’m fairly sure,” Bren said calmly. “Are you hurt?”
“I’ll live,” Yolanda said between her teeth. “My mother, my sister… This is Bren,” she said suddenly, as if there were no knowing.
“Ms. Mercheson. Olanthe, is it?”
“Yes, sir,” the girl said. She was in her early teens, thoroughly shaken, tear-tracks on her face. Eyes darted to the least movement of the atevi near her.
“These are myfamily,” he said to reassure her. “You’re completely safe with us. Come into the dining room, and we’ll get you something to drink. Fruit juice, Bindanda, if you would. This smaller one is a child.”
“One understands,” Bindanda said. “Yolanda-nandi, will you bring these good persons and come? Come. We will find you whatever comfort you ask.”
“I have a report to give!”
“You have them to settle,” Bren said. “Easy. We have time. God knows, we have time. You can talk to Bindanda. They can’t.”
“See to Jase,” she said, distracted, and went to direct Bindanda. Yolanda always tried to take charge. It was her way, but she worked, she tried with all that was in her. She’d refused to give up on the Mospheirans, and she’d helped Jase, that much he knew.
Tano and Algini were inside the security center, monitoring activity with fervent attention, learning what, he was not sure. Nojana had gone to help Banichi.
Jago was distressed and angry, and had nowhere to spend her temper.
“I do not consider this a reverse,” he said. “Only an obstacle. I need the additional rooms, nadi. Get Nojana, and go take them.”
“Yes,” Jago said fiercely, and went on that errand, braid swinging.
“It hurts,” Jase said, lying slightly propped. “I hit every rung for ten feet, and caught a platform edge.”
Bren could only imagine. It gave him chills. “Banichi says the ribs aren’t broken. Cracked, more than likely.”
“I couldn’t tell.”
“They didn’t hit you.”
Jase shook his head slightly. “Not except when I laid into one who had it coming. Releasing us is what they had to do. They could shoot Ramirez. They can’t hold a crew-wide bloodbath. Couldn’t attack my mother. That was their downfall. Women… women are damned near sacred, remember?”
The necessity of child-bearing. Continuance of the species. The Guild had set that priority and the women had fought it; and kept their job rights, Jase said, even if risks set the Guild’s teeth on edge. But you didn’t attack one. You outright didn’t attack one.
“Good job that’s so,” he said.
“Doesn’t help us, with me here, and her here,” Jase said morosely. “Getting rid of us and our next-ofs this way, nobody’s going to challenge them for what they’ve done. Give it three years and people won’t bring it up again. Maybe she could even come back, and she’d only be a nuisance.”
“I understand that,” Bren said, still doubly glad he’d taken the course he had, the lower-key, less confrontational course. It had left them with resources, the women not least. “But three years, the four years, fiveyears that we may spend building their ship… they’ll hear about it. They’ll hear from us. They’ll get damned tired of hearing about it.”
“I think they know their situation’s precarious.” Precariouswas a long word. It brought a wince, a grimace. “Damn! But it won’t last. They’ll settle in. Nobody questions what’s set still long enough.”
“This Dresh fellow.”
“Uncle of Tamun’s. Ramirez hates him.”
Present tense.
“They didn’t get Ramirez?”
“No,” Jase said in Ragi.
“Do you know where he is?” Bren asked in the same language.
“I might” Jase said.
Trouble, Bren thought. He wasn’t willing to have a confrontation over Ramirez, not until he’d gotten essential personnel to safety. Granted there’d been minimal bloodletting this far, that wasn’t saying what would happen if guilty parties found their backs to the wall… even familial reservations about bloodletting might give way, not even mentioning the fate of aliens in their midst.
But he reached out and patted Jase’s arm, gripped it with some consideration of the bruises. “We just appropriated the next rooms down the row. The station can’t cut power to them except locally, without switching off the entire region, and we’ve got the switch. Everyone will have beds, room, heat, air, every comfort. No shortage of food. We packed the kitchen sink.”
“Don’t make me laugh. God, don’t make me laugh.”
“You’re safe.”
“I’m glad to have my mother out of their reach. You don’t know all she did. Helped us with food, with running messages, gathering up Yolanda… I don’t know who’s in as deep trouble. Her. Yolanda. Yolanda’s set. I think Tamun would have killed us.”
“And still didn’t dare?”
“Didn’t dare. Because of them. Because of what Yolanda and I are. That stops them. But not now.”
“Stopped them long enough,” he said. “Made them turn you over to us.”
“Flinging us onto a planet.”
“How many can they fling down there? Is anybody else in danger of their lives?”
“I hope not. I hope not. Their story started to be that I killed Ramirez. That didn’t work. Then that Ramirez had a mental breakdown. Shot himself. No one believes that, but they have to pretend to. You don’t know what it’s like.”
“Yes, I do. I’m Mospheiran, remember? Denying what’s in front of one’s eyes is a social skill. I know that transaction very well.”
“You have to live with them, that’s all. They can run the ship. But they need the techs, techs need the crew… it’s just the way it is. They’re going to try to work with the rest. And the rest will give in. Nobody but me and Yolanda wants to leave the ship. My mother… she’d rather die, but she’ll go with me. You have to understand. She’s scared. I can live down there. I wouldn’t mind living down there for the rest of my life. But this is so hard on her.”
Jase was working himself into an emotional state. It resonated, with a man with a mother bent on indirect self-destruction, and no damned messages but, You should write to her…
“We’ll get her back up here,” he promised Jase. “We’ll get this patched up. Tell her that. Tell her to give it some time, and we’ll treat her like a princess; we’ll get her back up here if we have to make her a court emissary.”
“I appreciate that,” Jase said shakily.
“Listen. Hear me in Ragi.” Meaning, with the associational web in place. “If we have no choice but this set of captains, that’s what we’ll deal with. If things settle, they may take you back.”
“I won’t go,” Jase said. “ Iwon’t go down there. I won’t take Tamun’s orders, no way in hell…”
“We do what we have to do in the short term to get results in the long term.”
“Short term, Ramirez will die. Bren, I can’t leave. Send herdown, but I can’t leave him here. They’ll find him and they’ll kill him. Get him some helpup here.”
“We’ll talk about it,” Bren said. “We’re not abandoning this post. We’re not giving up. Just get some rest.”