Martinez grinned. The commonplace trumped the dramatic every time. “Permission given,” he said. “Transfer the comm displays to my board while you’re gone. Be careful.”
Moving under two gravities was like walking with another person on your back. Sprains and breaks were common, and Martinez couldn’t afford injured personnel.Corona’s “doctor”—actually a pharmacist second class—was also the team doctor, and had been left behind on Magaria.
But he didn’t want the crew in Command to pee all over themselves either.
“Whoelse needs the toilet?” Most of the hands went up. High gees were hard on bladders.
Come to think of it, Martinez thought, he could use the toilet himself. He made a general announcement to the ship’s company that people would have some time to make ablutions, again with care.
IfCorona survived the next few hours, he’d put the crew into vac suits, with the necessary sanitary appliances built in.
Four crewmen had rotated in and out of the toilet before Alikhan reported in. “I’ve got the safe open, my lord. No luck.”
Black anger descended on Martinez. This failure had very possibly killed everyone. “Search the room,” he said. “Then his office.”
“Very good, my lord. Does he have a safe in his office?”
“I don’t know. If there is, you’ll know what to do.”
Martinez was last in rotation for the toilet. Stooped with the weight of gravity, he had just shuffled back into Command when the next transmission came from Ring Command. “It’s the elcap, my lord!” Vonderheydte proclaimed cheerfully, as if in the belief that Tarafah’s mere electronic presence would straighten out all misunderstandings and solve allCorona’s problems.
“Stand by,” Martinez said. He lowered himself gently into the couch, released the cage to gimbal to a more comfortable position, then lowered the displays to lock in front of him.
Martinez wondered if he shoutedWhere is your captain’s key? at some point in the conversation, whether Tarafah would have the chance to answer before the rebels flattened him or switched off. He wondered if Tarafah would even consider giving him the answer to the question.
And he wondered that if he so much as asked the question, would he be confirming Ring Command’s worst suspicions and immediately trigger a salvo of missiles aimed inCorona’s direction.
He decided he’d better not ask.
“Martinez here,” he answered.
Tarafah glowered at him from the display, which jerked and bobbed a little. It was probably someone else’s sleeve camera, since Tarafah was wearing sweats and had no sleeve rig of his own. Martinez heard crowd noises in the background. Tarafah was somewhere indoors, with institutional decor, and his voice echoed off the hard walls—probably he was in one of the rooms or corridors beneath the football stadium.
“What’s this I hear about you launchingCorona and going like a skyrocket all over the ring?” Tarafah demanded.
Delay, Martinez thought.
“I hear the Coronas are ahead three to one, my lord,” he said. “Congratulations, first of all—your careful planning is bearing fruit.”
“It’s four to one now,” Tarafah said. A touch of vanity tinged his anger.
“Sorensen to Villa to Yamana to Sorensen to Digby—and goal. Brilliant, my lord.”
“Thank you,” Tarafah grudged. “But I’ve got to get back to the team—we don’t want the Beijings to get another goal in the final minutes.”
“Yes, my lord. I’m sorry you were asked to leave the game.”
“My ship.” Tarafah’s eyes narrowed. “What about my ship?”
“Armed Naxids tried to board theCorona, my lord. I had to get her out of dock.”
Tarafah gave a dismissive look. “That’s been explained. It was a surprise inspection.”
“They werearmed, my lord,” Martinez said. “Why do inspectors need guns? And they were storming every ship on the station. Forty of them to every ship. Naxids.Only Naxids. With guns.”
Tarafah’s eyes cut away, to something or someone out of frame, and then back.
“Was it a Naxid who brought you the information, my lord?” Martinez inquired gently. “Are there Naxids with you now?”
Tarafah hesitated, and then his look hardened again. “Of course they’re Naxids,” he said finally. “They’re from Fleet Commander Fanaghee’s staff.” His tone turned accusing. “You’ve got thefleetcom involved, Martinez! Do you know howvast this is?” A loud cheer roared up from the nearby crowd, and impatience crossed his face. “I’ve got to get back to the game. Now you turnCorona around and get back to the station—everything will get straightened out once you get back.”
Martinez’s heart sank. This, he thought, is the precise moment at which any of this stops being fun.
“You’re saying this freely?” he asked. “Under no duress or compulsion?”
“Of course,” Tarafah snapped. “Now getCorona back to the rim and we’ll get everything settled.”
“Yes, my lord,” Martinez said, tasting the bitterness that striped his tongue at the knowledge of what he’d have to say next.
Delay, he told himself. Delay was all. Delay would justify everything.
“If you’ll just give me the code word,” he told Tarafah, “I’ll swing the ship around and start the deceleration.”
Tarafah had started to turn, ready to return the football pitch, but now he swung back to the camera. “The what?” he said.
Martinez tried to keep his face earnest. “The code word,” he said. “The code word you gave me last night.”
A snarl of frustration crossed Tarafah’s face. “What are you talking about, Martinez?”
“Remember?” Martinez said, sorrow and dread entering his heart even as he tried to keep his face earnest and eager. “Remember at dinner? When I raised my suspicions about the Naxid movements, you told me that no one was to boardCorona unless you gave the password.”
“I never gave you a password!” Tarafah said. “What are you driveling about?”
He seemed genuinely baffled. Sadness weighed on Martinez like the slow, inevitable pressure of gravity. Tarafah didn’t yet understand just how seriously he had been betrayed.
“The password that tells me that you’re free and uncoerced,” Martinez said. “You’ve got to give me the password, my lord, before I can turnCorona around.”
“I didn’t give you anything—” The camera on Tarafah jiggled. “—Anything of the sort. I—” He hesitated, his eyes cutting out of frame, then back. “I demand that you turnCorona around and return to the ring station!”
“Without the password?” Martinez said, and this time he allowed his sorrow to show. “I understand, Lord Elcap. End transmission.”
He could have kept the dialogue going for another few rounds, but he didn’t have the heart for it.
He had bought time, and he had bought it with his captain. It would take time for the Naxids to get a password out of Tarafah, the more so because the password did not exist.
For a moment Martinez gave himself up to the images of Tarafah being slashed with stun batons, battered, shackled, shot. He saw Tarafah lying in his blood, insisting through pain-clenched teeth that there was no password.
Delay.He had bought time, that was the important thing.
He paged Alikhan again. “Anything?”
“Therewas a safe in the elcap’s office, my lord. Nothing in it but documents.”
“Have you searched the office?”
“I’m doing so now, my lord.”
“Shall I send you help?”
“Can you trust anyone else for the job, my lord?”
The question brought Martinez up short. Whocould he trust? The captain’s and lieutenants’keys were the most dangerous items on the ship. It was a capital crime—one of those involving flaying and dismemberment—to possess a key that didn’t belong to you. Was there anyone on the crew who was truly convinced that it was necessary to get ahold of the keys, and actually obey the order?
Martinez considered the matter, then laughed as a possibility occurred to him. He checked the crew manifests to find where the crew action stations were, then paged Zhou and Knadjian. The two stared at him from the displays, surprise plain on their bruised faces.