The Chahwyn noticed Morse, too, and the door abruptly irised closed.
We continued forward to the tender. The door irised open at our approach, and the Chahwyn disappeared inside. Bayta didn't hesitate, but followed him in, so I did as well.
The interior layout was the same as that of the tender we'd ridden earlier, except that the forward set of bunks had been replaced by a workstation and a living area. The Chahwyn went to a wardrobe set against one of the side walls, opened it, and from a hidden compartment in the side withdrew another of the kwi weapons. He turned, and with only a little hesitation handed it to me. "Here," he said. "Do not lose it."
"Thank you," I said, trying it on. The thing was heavier than I'd expected, but not unreasonably so. The adjustment knobs were within convenient thumb range. "Which of these is which?"
"The left-side switch allows you to choose between pain and unconsciousness," he said. "Left is for pain. The right-side switch controls intensity, lowest at the left. Squeeze the grip to activate."
"Got it, I said, adjusting it for full-power unconsciousness. Might as well have it ready to go. "Don't worry, I promise not to misuse it."
"I'm certain you won't," he said gravely. "Because it is telepathically activated."
I froze with the kwi halfway to my pocket. "What?" I asked carefully.
"It must be activated before use by either Bayta or a Spider," he explained, and I could swear there was a hint of malicious amusement in his voice. I'd managed to talk him out of a forbidden weapon, but the last laugh was going to be his. "Once it is activated, you may use it at will."
"And how many shots will I get before it has to be reactivated?" His face puckered again. "I don't know," he said. "We haven't yet—"
"Tried it on anyone," I interrupted. "Right—I forgot. I'll be sure to let you know how it works. Come on, Bayta. Time we were getting back."
The Spider standing guard outside our car stepped aside as we approached, and the door irised open. "About time," Morse said as we entered, the door closing again behind us. "Who in bloody hell was that?"
"Who was who?" I asked. Beneath us, the floor rocked slightly as we got under way.
"Don't be cute," he growled. "That alien. I've never seen one like that before."
"Who, Fred?" I asked. "He's just a Shorshic trying out a new Halloween costume. Don't worry about it."
"Compton—"
"The important thing is that we've now got a plan," I said. "You want to hear it, or not?"
"Please, don't keep me in suspense," he said sarcastically.
"For starters, we're not going to make the exchange at Terra Station," I said, pulling out my reader and keying for my Quadrail system map. "We're going to do it at the Nemuti world of Laarmiten."
"Why?" Morse asked.
"Because that's where the Lynx is going to end up anyway," I said. "We might as well make it easy for them." I paused, as if weighing how much I should tell him. "Besides, we already have a friend on the ground there," I added, remembering what I'd put on Fayr's altered message chip.
"You seem to have friends all over the galaxy," he said. "Just how big an organization are you part of, anyway?"
"I have no idea," I said. It was even the truth, for a change. "There's a train change coming up at Trivsdal a little over forty hours from now. Instead of continuing on down the main line toward Terra, we'll switch to the Claremiado Loop and go to Laarmiten instead."
"Fine," he said. "Incidentally, when we hit Bildim I'm going to see about upgrading back to first class. No sense in staying back here guarding your luggage if there's nothing in there worth guarding."
"Not really," I agreed. It was not, I decided, the right time to tell him I was going to upgrade back to a first-class compartment, too. "Be sure to lift a fine Scotch whiskey to my health."
The corner of his lip twisted. "Of course," he said softly. "Maybe even two."
TWENTY-TWO :
Forty minutes later we felt the slight bump that meant we'd been reconnected with our train.
"It occurs to me we may have trouble letting the other side know we want to alter the exchange point," Morse commented as we started down the aisle of the rearmost third-class car. "I don't suppose you have a forwarding address for them."
"No, but I don't think it'll be a problem," I assured him. "They have people all around."
"So I gather," he said. "I think it's about time you told me exactly who and what this group is."
"Later," I told him.
At the front of our car, one of the restroom doors opened and possibly the widest Cimma I'd ever seen pushed his way out into the aisle. With his eyes on the floor in front of him, completely oblivious to our presence, he started waddling in our direction. "This could be trouble," Morse murmured.
"No problem," I assured him, spotting an empty seat a few rows ahead. "We'll pull in there and wait for him to pass."
We were nearly there when the Cimma suddenly raised his eyes far enough to see us. "Ah—friends," he panted, his blubbery flanks wobbling their way around another pair of seats. Apparently even this much of a stroll was outside his usual endurance level. "Excuse pre please. I am bother of great height."
"That's all right," I said. Morse had already stepped into the gap, and I nudged Bayta to join him. There wasn't enough room for all three of us, so I slipped into the row just behind them, apologizing with a nod of my head as my feet brushed a little too close to the toes of the Juri seated there.
The Cimma worked his way to the row in front of Bayta, then suddenly turned an intense gaze on me. "But you not sit from this car," he said. "I would peer three Humans living here together."
"No, our seats are farther forward," I agreed. "We had to get something from our luggage."
"All three of you?" Abruptly his jaws cracked wide in a sly smile. "You on running, my friend?"
"What?" I asked. The casual Cimmaheem approach to grammar made them masters at mangling all languages except their own.
"You on running," he repeated, even more slyly. "You were cheating at cards, perhapsly, and went dark to hide?"
"No, of course not," I said stiffly, putting all the wounded pride into my voice that I could summon on short notice. The Cimmaheem might be terrible with languages, but they could read attitude and tonal nuance with the best of them.
And they were better than most at jumping to wrong conclusions. "Ah," he said knowingly as he got his bulk moving again, finally clearing Bayta's and Morse's row. "Never fear, friend. I will not orate upon you."
"Thank you," I said. "We appreciate it."
"Nothing littler can one do for a friend," he said, looking directly into my eyes as he cleared my row as well. "Be long-lived, friend, and do run safely to probable."
With that, he continued on back, bumping into every seat and most of the shoulders along his path. I stared at his back as he went, an odd tingling somewhere at the base of my brain. There was something wrong about him, but I couldn't put my finger on what it was.
"You coming?" Morse asked.
I snapped out of my reverie. "Of course," I said, nodding again to the Juri as I stepped back out into the aisle.
Bayta was looking oddly at me. "You all right?" she asked.
"I'm fine." I took a deep breath. "Come on, let's get back to our seats. I want a nap before we hit Bildim."
I was awakened by a hand shaking my shoulder. "Compton?" Morse's voice called from somewhere in the distance. "Come on, snap out of it."
I blinked open my eyes. Everything around me was dim, which meant the car's lights had been lowered to their usual nighttime setting. That must mean we were about to come into Bildim Station. I lifted my wrist to check my watch.
It was only then I realized I wasn't sitting in my nice, comfy
third-class seat amid the smells and sounds of dozens of Humans and aliens. I was, instead, standing amid the crates and trunks in one of the baggage cars, facing a stack of dark blue boxes safety-webbed to the side wall.