"We should warn the others the Slime are heading toward the Center," Rivulet insisted.
"How?" Autumn asked. "The Slime tore our communicator to bits." A wing swept over the shattered console. "I am sure they treated our poor ship the same." She turned to Dawn. "See how things stand. Send a message to the Melange if you can."
The second flicked a claw at the rest of the crew. They dragged on their shipsuits and pattered out into the corridor after him. Autumn began to pick up the broken pieces with all her hands. Crescent and the other three ground crew bent to help. Though distressing, the debris was finite. In a short time, the wreckage was all cleared away.
"I feel better," Crescent said, sitting down on his haunches and blowing a puff of air so his upper lip vibrated. "Now I do not feel as though I broke the trust."
Autumn smiled, showing her fangs. Crescent was a simple soul at heart. Once a problem was out of sight, it was gone. "There is wisdom in hard work."
She donned her shipsuit and went out to her craft. Dawn sat amidst the pieces of the control panel, shaking his great head from side to side. The captain looked down at him.
"How bad, my friend?"
"Perhaps the human stayed the Slime's fury," the lieutenant said. "The communication deck is destroyed, but the filtration systems are intact."
Autumn felt the breath leave her body. "We cannot warn the Center in time. The Slime will be ahead of us."
"Very far, I'm afraid," Dawn said, his large eyes worried. "The engine is ruined, but it was in Stage Four breakdown anyway. The landing finished it off."
"The engine?" For the first time Autumn's expression brightened. "Ah." She wheeled on her haunches and trotted down the corridor toward the cargo compartment.
With pleasure she surveyed the secured racks of parts from the CW ship. She was proud that her crew had responded so quickly with the others when the call came from Phyllis that there was a second invader, after the slim ship had escaped them into the atmosphere of the Slime planet. This large ship moved more slowly than the first, so it was easy for the reivers to get into position at the system's perimeter.
As in the three examples in the Manual, the large ship did all the things an enemy would. It signalled them, ordered them to halt, and invoked the authority of the Central Worlds. Verje Bisman, and after him his child, Aldon Bisman, had from the earliest days, reminded the Thelerie that Central Worlds was the enemy. The See-Double-Yew comprised a few planets who stockpiled goods taken from decent beings and refused to allow access to them, even in great need. That was anathema to the Melange, who insisted that all people who could pay, in one coin or another, should have entitlement to all goods. That seemed right and proper.
The Melange had taken goods from this aggressor, to distribute or keep as need dictated. The prize under their feet would have fetched a good price, but Autumn needed it herself now.
At her direction, Dawn and the others knelt to take up the floor plates. Their muscles swelled under their hides as they pulled the heavy metal panels aside to uncover the biggest cargo cradle of all.
Nestled in it a piece of machinery-an engine, a prize, a work of mechanical art. Autumn regarded it with affection and awe. The Central Worlds ship must have been nearly new. Inspection seals etched on the finest metal film were still affixed in the correct places on the engine's surface. The whole unit gleamed. With a claw-finger, Autumn traced the inscription on the largest piece of film: Dee-Ess-See-Nine-Oh-Too.
"Install it in place of our old one. It will give us greater speed and stability for our journey back to Thelerie."
Heartbeat, the youngest of them all, tilted her head up toward her captain, eyes full of despair.
"But the navigation system was destroyed by the Slime."
Autumn tapped the youngster with a wing-finger. "Have you no faith in your own soul? Center. Find your way back to the Center. It may take us many days to reach home, but we shall survive. I regret that we cannot warn Mirina in time. We can only hope she hears the messages we sent when the ship first entered the system."
"Damn that ship," Rivulet said. "I wish they will be lost in the Void forever."
"But it was beautiful, wasn't it?" Heartbeat said, looking at the others with rapture shining from her eyes. "So new." Her hands fumbled on the smooth sides of the engine. "So perfect."
Autumn smiled indulgently. "Someday, such ships will be ours, too. In the meantime, we must tend what we have. Work carefully. Remember all your lessons from the Manual." Heartbeat ducked her head shyly.
Dawn began to sing quietly under his breath. Autumn recognized the anthem: "Thelerie, Heart of the Galaxy." She picked up the melody, her strong baritone joining with his. The others added their voices, their lips spreading with smiles of inner joy. Autumn leaned back on her mighty haunches to help lift the engine. The music helped give the six strength. With a deep breath and a hoist, the unit was out of the cradle and onto the deck.
Sacred orders from the humans dictated that the drive mountings should be made adjustable to take any component that offered itself, though lesser manuals Autumn had seen did not allow for such open tolerances. Their Humans were wiser than those who wrote the books. Hoses, connections, control cables-all were snapped or fastened or sealed into place in very little time. Autumn, taking only a moment to stand back and approve her crew's handiwork, directed the crew into the ship. She guided Heartbeat to the navigator's chair. Dawn took his place in the pilot's sling and engaged the engine. Its soft purr surprised them all. It was so mild, yet so powerful, compared to the old one.
"The Wisdom of the Melange," Dawn said, settling his wings on his back with a satisfied twitch.
"They are wise," Autumn agreed, and turned to Heartbeat. "Now, center, child, center. Make the wise ones proud of you."
The youngster bent her attention on the tank full of stars before her. Autumn stood back to watch, half proud and half sad.
They would mourn their lost ones on the way home.
"Cold, damned rock," snarled Bisman from behind the pilot's chair, as the ship swung into an orbit around Coltera. "Why in the hope of paradise would anyone spend more than a minute here?"
"Because it's theirs," Zonzalo Don said, with a surprised look at the leader. "That's what this girl I met said."
"Don't knock the place too hard in front of the inhabitants," Mirina said, turning up a palm in appeal. "I don't want them to kick our base off planet."
"Sacred, high lady," Bisman sneered sarcastically, making her wince, "I was born here. I flew with my father around those moons when I was a tot. We brought them their first replacement compressors. Don't tell me how to behave with them."
"I apologize," she said, staring him levelly in the eyes. She was stung, but damned if she'd show it. "I know. The nag was automatic. We have few friends in any part of the galaxy. It's important to me that we keep them, especially if they're kin." The raider straightened up, surprised at Mirina's easy surrender.
"Hell, yes, it's important, Miri," Bisman said, slowly, sounding more reasonable than Mirina had heard him in ages. "That's just sense. And you don't insult 'em if you want 'em to buy what you've got. Loyalty goes only so far. But, spacedust, they'd take what's in our hold if we called their mothers mudworms!" He laughed, and slapped Zonzalo on the shoulder. "Get Leader Fontrose on the line, kiddo. Tell him who we are and what we've got. Then call Twilight and tell her we're coming in for refueling."
"Aye, sir," the youth said, with a humorous glance at his sister.
"Fuel pods, radio-ac insulation, enviro-suits-I smell profit," Bisman said, rubbing his hands together in pleasurable anticipation.
"So do I," Mirina said. For a moment they forgot the pressures of the past, and hard times, and smiled at one another the way they used to. It didn't last. In an instant, Bisman reverted back to his normal, harsh self. Mirina hugged herself against imagined cold as the older man turned away with brisk efficiency to the board.