Let him laugh, Theo thought, he's got his jacket.
They'd got to Jump distance with no problems, a comfortable meal in their stomachs and her pair of companions only breaking into song three times in response to conversational cues Theo hadn't known were cues at all.
The thing was that after dinner, Theo began a mild stretching routine, letting it ratchet up to a little more of a workout so that she'd be done before they needed to get to actual work, like to a spot where Theo ought to soon be setting up for a Jump run or determining Primadonna's long term orbit.
In the midst of that exercise, Mayko handed over the ship's run. Well, not exactly. What she did was hand over a list of places she needed to be within a more-or-less set time frame, with a bonus load of interdependent priorities, and a request that sooner would be better in all cases. All of the prefiled destinations were included, and a couple more.
"Pilot Theo, these are the needs of the company," Mayko had said innocuously. "As the board is yours, this is clearly a pilot's choice situation. I think it best that we be outsystem in the next quarter shift."
Which would not have been Theo's usual choice with such a multiplicity of routes available, but if the ship was hers for the duration of the run—well, that clarified things immensely. Part of this was to push her, she knew. Part was real need. Mayko had said that Hugglelans needed to move in a hurry, while trade was still confused.
But there, the information was already gathered, the decision point just lacked confirmation.
"Mix and match?" she asked. "All of the destinations in the same run, priority fast and efficient?"
"Indeed, that would be best," Mayko allowed.
Theo nodded, raised her voice.
"First Board declares Jump check. Tranza, please secure the galley and confirm tie-downs, locks, goods and staterooms. The count to start our runout is two hundred, starting in seven."
"Right," he said and moved.
Next to her Mayko raised an eyebrow, began to speak, was overridden by Theo.
"Second, your main screen should match mine. Confirm Volmer coordinates, confirm ship safety, confirm scans."
Theo glanced toward the seat Tranza left empty in his rush; then toward Mayko, hands deftly touching the manual confirms on the automatics, readouts being echoed.
"Our route?" Mayko inquired, laughing as Tranza burst into song while he made some final seal in the galley, and dashed onto the flight deck.
"Volmer," Theo stated succinctly. "The coordinates are in, the ship is rigged, and there's eight flight plans ready to go once we get there. Volmer's closest in transit time, Volmer's in the priority loop, and Volmer it is."
Mayko opened her mouth again, but was cut off by Tranza's, "Confirming secure, Pilot Theo."
"Confirmed."
"But the route?" Mayko insisted.
Theo sighed.
"Unless this is a touch-and-go when we get to Volmer, we'd best calculate fresh when we have fresh news. I'll set two probables into the go-stack in case we need to move in a hurry, but we're set. We have a count of one hundred; I'll start the Jump on count."
"But my plans?"
"Your plans are to get there as quick as you can. We'll do that. Can't make the second Jump first though. Confirmation please, Second."
Tranza began to whistle a tune, and Mayko, studying the second board, joined in.
"Confirmed, Pilot Theo."
At this rate, they'd be out of the system in a tenth shift instead of a quarter, Theo thought, and that would do.
Theo lounged in the galley, eyes closed. On bridge, Tranza sat in the vacated First Chair, while Mayko retained Second.
"Pilot," came Mayko's call from the flight deck, "have you signed the contract yet? It would be good to—"
"I haven't," Theo admitted, "opened the file yet. Contracts are much harder for me than doing Jump equations in my head. I'll get six hours real downtime—at least—when we reach Volmer and look it over then."
"Pilot, when we reach Volmer we may want that done already in order to confirm—"
Somebody was pushing, Theo thought, around a spike of irritation. Did Mayko think she was going to lose the contract, or something?
"Sorry, Second," she said, "I'm on break unless there's a ship problem." She paused, counted to twelve, and asked, "Is there a ship problem?"
There was muttering in the background, Theo thought, and then realized it was Tranza singing one of his silly song snippets, something about "the ship Jonny B."
"Rig, you're not helping!"
Theo waited a beat, then repeated her question.
"Is there a ship problem, flight deck?"
Again she could hear Tranza, this time singing something that sounded like "We had enough cooks for an army, and only one can of . . ."
"No, Pilot," came the reluctant reply, "there is not a ship problem."
"Right, Theo," Tranza confirmed. "None."
* * *
"Primadonna, we've got all green for you, welcome. Please inspect your tie-down and sign for it at the gate; we're showing this a field stop charged to Hugglelans Galactic. You've got a cart on the way and a hot pad available for a turnaround tomorrow at this time."
"Thanks for the welcome—and for the cart."
"Cart comes gratis. Can we get our updates here on channels seven and nine?"
Theo keyed in the channels and the updates went through, showing Pilot in Command as Theo Waitley and dual seconds of Rig Tranza, Captain, and Master Pilot Mayko Ikari.
"Hey there, Primadonna," came another voice, this one full of energy. "We're holding high priority mail we can squirt through as soon as we get the certificates to talk to each other. One's a problem 'cause it's a special, may take a little time for that to finish up."
Problem mail?
Theo shrugged; she wasn't in a particular hurry to look at chained landing gear.
The trip to Volmer had gone without a ship problem, though Mayko managed to dredge up a fire alarm, two false positives on engine issues, a technical question on ship's financials, assorted runs of "what would you do if" and a really silly multilanguage drinking song that Tranza wouldn't stop humming once Mayko sang the first three verses.
Other than that—
The incoming screen lit, showing the Pilots Guild emblem.
"We have a private and confidential file for Pilot Theo Waitley, transcription through Pilots Guild encryption format. You'll need your card and certificate for this, and receive in person in the comm office."
"Theo," Mayko was saying, "we need to talk about the contract . . ."
"Right, you do," said Tranza, then saw the symbol on the screen.
"I'll do tie-down, Theo" he said, suddenly all business. "Go!"
She went.
Finding the comm office was easy once she parked the cart and entered the Guild port area; what was hard was keeping herself calm as the rest of the process unfolded. A pinbeam message? For her? She'd never sent a pinbeam in her life and couldn't think of anyone she knew who'd send one, especially to her. Could something have happened to Father or to Kamele? Had Captain Cho and the Scouts decided to bill her for her failed education?
The Guild staffer checked her card, checked her against her card, checked her against the ship schedule, checked—she didn't know what they checked.
"RSVP," said the clerk neutrally. "That's free, well—prepaid. There's a return receipt that'll go as soon as you open it. You can take it in booth four; please record because we erase as it streams. You can send your reply any time within seventy-two Terran hours of receipt."
In the booth she inserted her card one more time, tagged her key to the connecting port, saw a series of letters go by and a warning that reading the following message without authorization was a breach of pilot ethics and . . .
Sweet Mystery, began the text, you are an amazement beyond measure. Kara ven'Arith supplies me with the start of my search and a history worthy of a dancer such as yourself. I commend you. The Pilots Guild supplies me with the filed plans of the good ship Primadonna, and thus you are found.