"Pride out." She punched it off. Gods, likely every kif on Mkks had access to that com transmission. She caught Haral's worried look.
"He's not there," Pyanfar said.
Haral's brow wrinkled.
"I'm betting," Pyanfar said, "he's not aboard. Geran, get me Rhif Ehrran."
"Aye." Geran made the call. "She's on, captain."
That quick. So he's not there, and Rhif's at the boards.
"Ker Rhif. Letting you know we're back online."
"We have your count. We assume it's accurate."
"It's accurate. Do we have a sequencing yet?"
"Can't this be processed at some other level, Chanur? Or is this a social call?"
"Just wondering, Ehrran." She broke the contact without the protocols. Looked at Haral.
"He's with the kif or he's loose on the docks somewhere."
"Gods-rotted lousy time to take a walk,"
"I figure he knows what he's doing." She got back to the messages. A Mkks consortium lodged protests. A mahen prophet babbled something about retribution and visions. A self-claimed psychic saw humans descending on Mkks in their thousands and bringing some invention that would make antimatter, obsolete—"Good gods, Geran, you screen this stuff?"
"Sorry, captain. That's the good ones. We got crazier. Thought you'd like the local temperature, huh?"
"They're scared. Can't blame them for that." She tried not to think about it. "Where's Vigilance's complaint about visiting kif?"
"They never logged it with us."
"Huh." That bothered her. She bit at a snagging underclaw and watched the readout run past. Khym arrived with gfi for everyone on the bridge, regulations fractured. But it was her rule, and she broke it with a grateful sigh.
"I reckon," Geran said, "they expect us to take a lot of this data during system transit."
"They better." She sipped the gfi and looked up again as breakfast arrived, Hilfy with a tray of rolled sandwiches. "Thanks, imp."
Hilfy glanced at her in a strange, ears-back way as if the little-girl word had jarred. Perhaps it had. Pyanfar noted that as Hilfy turned away and served the rest, with Khym and Tully. Tully's moves this watch were full of winces. Besides the usual spacer's breeches he wore a white, stsho-made shirt, likely the last he had. It covered the wounds. His mane and beard were combed and neat. His eyes, always light arid unnerving-quick, darted and danced in a kind of desperate counterpoint to Hilfy's quiet. He smiled. He looked happy. It had the look of desperation.
Fear of them? she wondered uncomfortably; and then caught Tully's look at Hilfy's back, that one glance in which the smile died and something else showed through until Hilfy pricked up her ears in a semblance of good humor—
—for her, she thought; he wore the cheerfulness for Hilfy's sake; and the inside-out of it shivered through her nerves. He moved like a woman walking round some man on the edge of his control. Don't jostle, be pleasant, have your temper elsewhere. Hilfy might see it or might not.
Human instinct?
Or were they tied together, one holding onto sanity because of the other—and Hilfy further gone than she suspected?
"Captain?"
Pyanfar blinked and gulped down a large part of the sandwich, turning to the board. "Thanks." Data turned up. She swallowed the other half in two bites and punched a key. The nav-system engaged and ran the data. .
"Three quarters hour," Haral said.
"We aren't getting checkout from our friends out there."
"I'm—" Geran said; then: "We got a call from Aja Jin's first."
"About gods-rotted time. What does she have to say?"
There was a stir at her side. Hilfy slid into her seat and started checkout. Tully edged in next to Chur.
"That's Khym's seat," Chur said sotto voce. "Take the one the other side of Tirun's."
"Captain, Jik's on his way over here. So his bridge says."
"Huh." Pyanfar's eyes went to the time ticking away in the corner of main-monitor. Small alarms went prickling up and down her spine. She sipped at the gfi. "Coming up on the half hour mark and Jik pays social calls. Are those Ehrran guards still on watch in our lock?"
"Had a call from Vigilance a few minutes ago," Haral said. "They say they're going to pull them out at the half hour mark. I gave them thank-you and told them we'd take care of ourselves from then on out."
"Gods-rotted pointless anyhow. Gods-rotted Ehrran priggish gods-be punctilious nonsense that keeps an Ehrran ear to Chanur business, that's what they're up to. Sealed lock and they've got to set guards in it." Pyanfar's lip twitched. A thought came through. "That blackbreeched bastard knows something's interesting in our downside corridor. Never mind what passes through our lock."
"You think?" That rated a turn of Haral's head.
"Khym was on guard down there when Ehrran first came aboard. That kif Skukkuk walked up to our ship and never came off; you want to bet no one on the dock saw that? And that Rhif Ehrran hasn't been sniffing round everyone she can interview on this station? If she missed any of that, she heard me ask Sikkukkut what to do with the bastard: by the gods she knows. Knows about Sikkukkut coming here to talk, And she's waiting on me to cave in and send some explanation what we're doing with the kif."
"File's got to fill whole banks by this time."
"Doesn't it? I swear I'll give that kif to her." She gulped the last of the gfi, looked around for someone free to carry it to the galley. Tully sat beside Tirun. Khym was rattling about in galley; latches snapped and thumped.
Tully turned wide eyes on her, blue and holding that perpetual hint of panic. "Trouble?" he asked Chur, with a glance her way.
"Explain it to him." Pyanfar shoved the empty cup down the security-bin. "I'm going down to talk to Jik when he comes in."
"Want company?" Haral asked.
"Sit on things here. Who's going to do that undock?"
"Central says they've got crew moving up. Mahendo'sat."
"Fine." Pyanfar headed for the door. "Fine.—Get Tully's drugs for jump. Tully, hear?"
"I got," Tully patted his pocket. "But kif—"
"Thank the gods. Brains."
"I work jump."
"You work, huh? You work it flat on your back. You go to bed, hear? And, Chur, you're going to quarters on this, from undock out."
"Captain—" Chur powered the chair about and opened her mouth to protest.
"You heard me. You're still! not sound. Haven't got time to take care of you. Don't make me problems."
"I'm begging you this one. Captain. I'm going to be fit. It's a rough one. / want to be there."
"Huh," Pyanfar said. Thought about it a moment too long and shook her head. "Gods rot it, all right, take duty."
"I," Tully said. "I work."
Another unanswerable stare, blue-eyed this time. His mouth trembled in that way he had when he had gone his limit.
She remembered then she had put a thing in her pocket, transferred from yesterday's plain trousers. She had meant to give it to him. Now it took on a superstitious feel, like saying no to Chur. She fished it out between thumb and foreclaw and took his hand and laid it there, a small gold ring meant for human hands, not ears.
He closed his fist on the small bit of gold that had belonged to some lost friend. It meant something profound to him. "Where get?"
"Just keep it on your hand this time."
He put it on- his finger. Looked up again with fever in his eyes. Then he clasped her hand with a fierceness that disarranged joints and claws; she flexed claws out in self-protection, strength opposed to strength, and he let go. "You sit this chair, huh?" You sit here, stay steady, keep Hilfy—gods, keep her thinking. Shame her into it. Don't let her be a fool, Tully.