Earthrise (Her Instruments Book 1) (43 page)

“And try to get him to confess he’s a drug lord?” Reese asked. “Why would he do that?”

“Why wouldn’t he do that to a possible partner?” NotAgain said. “As far as he knows, not only did you do the work he asked for, but you wiped out two of his ships when they got in your way. If you sound motivated by money, he may want to employ you permanently. Once he finds out that the pirate ships are gone you become intriguing.”

“And a Fleet ship being in the vicinity isn’t enough reason for pirate ships to blow up?” Reese asked.

NotAgain smiled. “Not if that Fleet ship is Dusted.”

Reese toyed with the handle of her mug. “This sounds very dangerous.”

“It is,” NotAgain said. “But we’ll do everything we can to give you the back-up to get out safely.”

The idea was patently ridiculous. Why would she want to go directly into the den of the bad guys? That was Fleet’s job, not hers. And to do it pretending to be a bad guy herself... she wasn’t sure she could pull off an acting job like that. She was definitely sure that if she succeeded she’d have to figure out how to wash off that famed “psychic dirt” she hadn’t noticed after merely being handled by the bad guys.

“Captain Eddings,” NotAgain said. “These people are killers. They prey on people like you who are trying to make an honest living. They strip their cargoes from them, destroy their livelihoods. They kill them if caprice moves them. They sell drugs that destroy people’s minds and lives. And when they’re done with that, they kidnap people and sell them to the Chatcaavan empire, to be abused by aliens: men. Women. Children barely tall enough to reach your hip. Help us shut them down, please.”

Reese covered her face, rubbed it, looked at her untouched dessert. “I want to help, but knowing how bad they are doesn’t make me feel any braver.”

“It won’t be easy and it won’t be safe,” NotAgain said. “I won’t trick you into this by telling you we’ll be able to insure you come out in one piece. But we’ll do everything in our power, Captain Eddings. Everything.”

She’d gotten them into this. She couldn’t just step out and let someone else fix it. And even if she tried to step out of it there was no guarantee they wouldn’t find her again. No one was going to be safe until Fleet cut the ring apart. She took a deep breath. “All right.”

“Thank you,” NotAgain said.

“Thank me when I walk out of this and after delivering what you need,” Reese said. “It’s not over until then.”

“I’ll thank you twice,” NotAgain said, “because you’ll have earned it.” He grinned. “Don’t dwell on the worst, Captain. In a few weeks you’ll probably be on your way... and just think what a story you’ll have to tell your children!”

“Yeah,” Reese said, grimacing. If she decided to have any. If she
lived
to have any.

He stood. “I need to coordinate the plan. You don’t mind remaining here?”

“It’s not like I have a choice,” Reese said. “My Well drive’s down.”

“We’ll send some people over,” NotAgain said. “Unlike your previous boarders, we’ll actually fix the drive.”

Reese managed a chuckle. “That would be greatly appreciated.”

He nodded. “Expect some people in half a mark. I’ll be in touch.”

“I look forward to it,” Reese said.

The moment the Tam-illee stepped out of the room, everyone else rushed in. Kis’eh’t first, then the wriggling of the twins and finally Bryer, sauntering in last.

“Tell us all about it!” Irine said, Allacazam in her arms.

“I thought my quarters were locked,” Reese said as the Harat-Shar presented the Flitzbe to her.

“Well, we had to find him!” Irine said. At Reese’s expression, she said, “If it makes you feel better, your quarters were the last place I checked.”

Reese stroked the Flitzbe’s fur. “Well, get his lamp set up. We can all eat while we talk.”

“Did the captain like the pie?” Kis’eh’t asked while the twins went for the plates.

“He must have,” Reese said. “He ate it.”

“But he didn’t say anything?” the Glaseah asked.

“We had other things on our minds,” Reese said. She stuck a fork through the end of her slice and tried it. “I’ll say it for him. It’s really, really good.”

Kis’eh’t brightened. “Remind me to tell you about the recipe.”

Once the Flitzbe had been set in the light and everyone had something to eat, Reese said, “We have a task.”

“Uh-oh,” Kis’eh’t said.

“Isn’t this how we started on the whole pirate adventure?” Sascha asked. “With a “task”?”

“I bet we’re not getting paid for this one either,” Irine said, grinning around her fork.

Reese eyed them. “This is not funny.”

“Yes it is,” Irine said.

“Let her finish,” Kis’eh’t said. “I want to hear about ‘The Task.’ “

Reese said, “We’re going to deliver the crystals to the nasty people so that Fleet can catch them in the act of doing something illegal in an extra-planetary way.”

“That sounds dangerous,” Kis’eh’t said.

“Last time we took jobs that sounded easy, they turned out to be dangerous,” Sascha said. “That means the dangerous one should turn out to be easy.”

“I’m not sure you’re taking this seriously enough,” Reese began.

“Give us the democracy speech!” Irine crowed.

“The what?” Reese said, staring at her.

“You know, the part when you tell us that you all hired us and if we don’t agree then we can just have our severance pay in something useless,” Irine said. “Like rooderberries.”

“Or engine parts,” Sascha said.

“Except this time it would be crystals,” Kis’eh’t said.

“Bleh,” Irine said.

“We’re even missing Hirianthial, just like the first time,” Sascha said. “For the same reason, even... he got on the wrong end of a bunch of pirate-slavers.”

Reese fought the sensation that she’d lost control of her own meeting. “Can we stay on target here? We’re about to do something dangerous. I want to make sure everyone knows that.”

“We’re trying to tell you we’re fine with it,” Sascha said.

She looked at them all. “Without knowing more? After everything that’s happened?”

“We’re still breathing,” Sascha said.

“To do this is to serve the Eye,” Bryer said.

Kis’eh’t nodded. “It’s the right thing to do.”

“That’s it?” Reese asked, incredulous. “You’re fine with it? Even though the pay is sporadic, we keep getting shot at and according to you I’m prickly as a potted cactus?”

“A steady paycheck we could get anywhere,” Sascha said. “Finding steady adventure is much harder.”

Kis’eh’t chortled.

“All right,” Reese said, then laughed. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you people, but thanks for coming along.”

“Just don’t forget Hirianthial,” Kis’eh’t said. “He’s one of us too.”

“He might not want to stick around,” Reese said, trying not to sound as resentful as she felt.

“We’ll see,” Sascha said. “Do you need us to do anything, boss?”

“If you and Bryer could help the Fleet engineers with the Well Drive, that would be great,” Reese said. “They’re due in twenty minutes or so. I won’t know more until we’re up and running.”

“Sounds good,” Sascha said. He stood and stretched. “Twenty minutes. I wonder what happened to that DNA-lock?”

“It probably exploded all over the inside of the ship,” Reese said.

Irine laughed. “Oh, Reese. Of course it didn’t. It wasn’t an exploding lock!”

Reese stopped in the act of setting down her fork. “But it had the manufacturer’s seal!”

“Of course it did,” Irine said. “It wouldn’t have been a convincing fake otherwise.” She reached for Sascha’s hand. “Let’s go have a look at it.”

“Is it even a real DNA-lock?” Reese called after them. Irine’s only answer was her trailing laugh. Bryer followed the twins out, leaving Kis’eh’t to cover the pie and put away the dishes. The sound reminded Reese suddenly of her mother cleaning in the kitchen and a surge of melancholy overwhelmed her. It reacted poorly with her anxiety about the forthcoming Fleet mission, and for several minutes she listened to Kis’eh’t’s paw pads scraping on the floor and the sound of the tap running as the Glaseah washed off her hands.

Reese thought she’d be glad for a broken silence until Kis’eh’t spoke.

“I don’t know why you’re mad at him, but you shouldn’t be.”

“What?” Reese asked, startled out of her contemplation of the dregs of her coffee.

“Hirianthial,” Kis’eh’t said. “He only irritated you before. Now when anyone mentions him you tighten up like drying twine.”

“If you don’t know why I’m mad at him, how can you say I shouldn’t be?” Reese asked.

“Because he means well,” Kis’eh’t said.

Reese rolled her eyes. “And that excuses everything.”

The Glaseah sighed and folded her apron, tucking it beneath the counter. “One day, Reese, you’ll have to stop being so closed to other people.”

“I’m not closed to other people,” Reese said. “I’m just cautious. Besides, being closed is a courtesy. It keeps other people from having to know you in order to work with you.”

Kis’eh’t said, “That makes so little sense I can’t even begin to address it.”

“The point is that foisting your moods, opinions and ideas on other people is rude,” Reese said. “And having other people being able to pluck them out of mid-air is worse.”

Kis’eh’t folded her arms. “So that’s it. You’re angry at him for reading your mind when he was so sick he could barely stand, much less do you the courtesy of not hearing the things you were shouting at the top of your mental lungs.”

“Well he shouldn’t have!” Reese said.

“He couldn’t help it,” Kis’eh’t said. “Any more than you could help throwing up on him when your esophagus was tearing apart.”

“How do you know?” Reese asked.

“Because I went through esper school like every Glaseah ever born,” Kis’eh’t said, exasperated. “Unlike ninety-nine percent of my race, I don’t have the faculties needed to become an esper, but I had plenty of theory classes. And I definitely know this: if you’re absolutely shredded, you can’t stop yourself from hearing other thoughts.”

“How do they know?” Reese asked. “There’s no testing it. It might as well be magic.”

“It’s not magic,” Kis’eh’t said. “It’s the facts as we know them, unless you’re willing to accept so many bizarre coincidences that you’d have to rewrite some of the laws of the universe to make them possible. It’s not magic just because we can’t see it and we haven’t codified the math that explains it.”

“He should have stayed out of my head,” Reese muttered.

“You should have stayed out of his,” Kis’eh’t replied.

“I’m not the psychic one!” Reese exclaimed.

“That doesn’t matter,” Kis’eh’t said, then threw up her hands. “You’re so ignorant on this matter you don’t even know how little basis you have for being upset. But there’s plenty of literature in the u-banks. Why don’t you actually read something about esper abilities before you decide to be upset about them?”

“Because it’s not about him being able to read my mind and doing it,” Reese said. “It’s about him having done it and now knowing what’s in my head!”

Kis’eh’t’s round-eyed stare was so shocked Reese fumbled to a halt. The Glaseah shook her head slowly. “Oh, Reese.”

That was it. Nothing else. The Glaseah headed for the door and was out of it before Reese could get up a good head of anger about being pitied. She ran to the door and looked out it. “Oh Reese what?”

But Kis’eh’t had already gone around the bend, leaving her to stand in the door and fume.

The first thing Hirianthial noticed on attaining consciousness was the familiar symphony of a Medplex: the hum of generators, the assorted musical status sounds of halo-arches, the occasional hiss of an AAP. From the range of the alerts, Hirianthial guessed he was in a high-end facility—he hadn’t heard some of the musical combinations since leaving one of the more impressive teaching hospitals on Tam-ley.

“Welcome back,” Sascha said.

Opening his eyes, Hirianthial found himself trapped beneath a halo-arch in a streamlined room. The electronics he’d identified by ear were so tightly arranged he had to be on a ship.

All of which mattered less than the fact that he was within touching distance of a Harat-Shar on a stool and he couldn’t hear the tigraine’s thoughts at all.

“You’re on the UAV
StarCounter
,” Sascha said.

“How’s your arm?” Hirianthial asked, noting the tape.

“Good,” Sascha said. “The doctors told me when they wrapped it that I didn’t really need to keep it on for a week, but we were in Wellspace so I couldn’t transfer over for them to have a look at it until now.”

“You didn’t break it again, then,” Hirianthial said.

Sascha grinned. “Not for want of trying!” He shook his head. “Seriously, I’m fine. They said they were just going to take it off and get a cursory look under my skin to make sure their quick-heal went well.”

“Good,” Hirianthial said. “Everyone else...?”