Engaging the Enemy (10 page)

Selkirk transferred her gaze to Ky. “Captain, you astonish me.”

“More to the point,” Rafe said, “I have technical data you need, including a report on the situation at Lastway when we left there. It may bear on the relationship between the attacks on our ansible system and Captain Vatta's family and home world.” He glanced at Ky. “Some of this should be transmitted back to Nexus Two as quickly as possible. Is your link there still reliable?”

“Yes,” Selkirk said. “We lost ansible service here for only six standard days. We had contact with ISC headquarters before that, and that link functioned as soon as we were back up.”

“The locals claim they fixed the ansibles here, instead of an ISC repair crew,” Ky said. “Is that true?”

Selkirk flushed. “You have to understand Rosvirein culture, Captain Vatta. They're a very proud, impatient people and they do have considerable technical expertise. I was told, when I was assigned to this post, that it was advisable to allow their crews to assist ours in case of technical difficulties before calling for a repair crew.”

“That would be a yes,” Rafe said. “And was the problem found to be in the interface circuitry in the spatial…er…area?” He glanced at Ky and away.

“Yes,” Selkirk said, folding her hands.

“I suggest that the decision to allow Rosvirein crews unsupervised access to the ansibles should be reconsidered. I'm not prepared, at this time, to recommend action against them, but some emotional conflict is better than compromised communications.”

“I see,” Selkirk said. She glanced at Ky again. “Captain, I mean no insult, but would it be possible to discuss proprietary matters with your crewman alone?”

“He's not my crew,” Ky said. “He's your agent. Would you prefer that I leave now—in fact, I have nothing more to contribute on my own—or that Rafe come back later?”

“The matter may be urgent.”

“Then I'll take my leave,” Ky said. She could not help feeling a little annoyed, but she didn't have to show it. And after all she had plenty of other work to do. “Meet me later, Rafe,” she said. “Shall I leave you an escort?”

He grimaced. “I think I can take care of myself, Captain, thanks all the same.”

Ky wondered if he would tell Selkirk about the shipboard ansibles. She hoped not. She didn't want to turn them over to the ISC.

She picked up Martin and Lee on her way out.

“Rafe's staying?” Martin sounded wary.

“He is ISC, after all,” Ky said. She still felt twitchy out in the open, even though she saw nothing more menacing than a uniformed woman shepherding a line of children whose voices would have pierced armorplate.

“He's trouble,” Martin said. “You know what I feel about trusting him, Captain.”

“Only half as far as I can throw him,” Ky said. “But that's a tidy distance.”

Martin snorted and shook his head. “Captain, sometimes you're funny. So is he coming back?”

“I hope so,” Ky said. “He says he has that contact here for trading some of Osman's less legal cargo. But in the meantime, let's look at getting some good crew aboard. We're all overworked at the moment. With all due respect to Lee, we need another pilot, at least, maybe two. Engineering—we need to replace Toby, let him go to school—” If they ever found a safe place for him, that was.

“Weapons crews,” Martin said, as they turned into the docking bay entrance.

“I've never hired weapons crews,” Ky said. “I don't even know what to look for. We could get along just with regular ship crews—maybe they could learn—”

“We could, except that we're an armed vessel,” Martin said. “If you're not armed, you might or might not be attacked, but if you're armed, and can't use your weapons, you're an exceptional prize for those who can take you. We've been lucky so far, but we can't count on being lucky.”

“Luck follows preparation,” Ky said, quoting from a lecture at the Academy. “I know, but—”

“You can't just bluff everyone,” Martin said. His brow furrowed. “Captain, if you want to disarm the ship, that's one thing, but—”

“I get your point,” Ky said. “We have weapons; we need weapons crews. I just…this is where I would be looking to plant agents aboard other ships, if I were the pirates.”

“Sure they would, so we have to be careful. I'm not expert in weapons, Captain, but you said before you think I can spot rotten apples. Trust me for that.”

Ky nodded. “I do trust you, Martin, and you have experience. What about working with Rafe on this?”

As usual when Rafe was mentioned, Martin's expression soured. Well, he has experience with rotten apples, I'll say that for him. But I just said—”

“I know. But on this I think he's trustworthy. If he's with us he won't want to be killed by having approved the wrong crew. Now—do you have any idea how many we'll need just to fight the ship?” How much would it cost, how much cubage would be needed to supply that many people?

“We have eight missile batteries—we'll need a crew for each. Spaceforce had what they called a team for every two batteries, eight to a team. So we'd need four teams of eight, that's thirty-two. Two beam weapons, those can be controlled by one board on the bridge. You do need someone expert on that, and then one or two senior weapons masters to coordinate. Say thirty-six, all told.”

“Plus what we need for regular crew.” Ky shook her head. “We'd better sell off a lot of our cargo; I'm guessing that weapons-qualified crew won't come cheap, and I want good ones.”

Rafe reappeared a few hours later, with the news that he had found his former contact. “You'll have to come with me,” he said. “She won't deal through me; she wants to meet you. But I'll be armed. You can bring someone else, too, if you want. I'd suggest not Martin—he's too obviously military.”

“Lee?” Ky said to her pilot. “Want to come along?”

He grinned happily. “Sure, Captain; I've nothing else to do in port.” As before, he had outfitted himself from Osman's store of personal weapons until he fairly bristled. Rafe cocked an eye, clearly amused; his own weapons were, like Ky's, concealed.

Rafe's contact met them in a dingy storefront a quarter of the way around the station. She was a hard-faced woman with streaks of burgundy and green in her gray hair. She had a yellow ribbon tied around the left sleeve of her gray jacket, and two green ones tied around the right. Signals of some kind, Ky was sure.

“I dealt with Osman,” she said, when Rafe introduced them. “You have the same kind of merchandise?”

“I have the same merchandise,” Ky said. “Osman's dead. I took his ship.”

“So he said.” She jerked her head at Rafe, then looked Ky up and down. “You hardly look tough enough to take on Osman.”

“Both of us Vattas,” Ky said. That got a wry grin in response. They dickered briefly, but the woman wanted Osman's merchandise and eventually agreed to pay what she would have paid Osman.

Ky told herself that the goods Amy was buying—the contents of cranial implants transferred to other media—had already been taken from their owners, and the owners were dead. She told herself that repeatedly, but her stomach churned all the way back to the ship.

In the next days, Ky was glad that Martin had taken over the hiring of the fighting crew. She had enough to do with rest of the cargo—deciding which to sell and where—and interviewing regular ship crew. As the list filled, she realized that Osman's crew had been none too large for this ship in its fighting configuration. She felt uncomfortable with so many strangers coming aboard, but there was no alternative.

In civilian tradeships, the senior engineer often functioned as the captain's second, but this would not work in a privateer. On Spaceforce vessels, the distinction between officer and enlisted was clear, as was the chain of command, but she had no idea how other privateers handled the interesting problem of blending the two functions.

She was still puzzling over this when Martin brought back the first of his finds for her approval: an entire weapons team.

“They were part of a small mercenary company—Calvert's Company—and then the commander died. They didn't like his successor, so they left. They're all one family and they want to be hired as a unit. I looked up Calvert's and it was legit. Small, but good. When Ben Calvert died, his junior commanders—a nephew and a longtime friend—squabbled over who'd take over, and one of 'em died in a training accident, so called. This team walked, along with about a third of the rest.”

“What are they like?”

“Solid, I'd say. They claim combat experience with Calvert's, and familiarity with the kind of weapons we have. You want to see them?”

“Of course.” Ky wondered what she could discern that Martin couldn't. She looked over their files while Martin went to fetch them. Jon, the oldest, was over fifty; the youngest were twenty. Five of the eight were sibs; the other three were first cousins. It reminded her of Vatta.

They filed in, wearing obvious uniforms with darker rectangles where unit or rank patches had been, and lined up stiffly across from her, five men and three women. She could tell nothing from their faces except that they looked biologically related.

“At ease,” she said, hoping it was the right command. They shifted smartly to parade rest.

“This is Jon Gannett,” Martin said, nodding to the man in the center. “He's their leader.”

“M'rating was master gunner,” the man said. He could have been carved from a block of tik wood; his skin had not paled with years in space.

“Master Gunner Gannett,” Ky said. “Chief Martin has explained what we're looking for, I gather?” She noticed, from the corner of her eye, that Martin had startled slightly at the title she'd given him.

“Yes, Captain. You need weapons teams for missile batteries, and you plan to fight pirates.”

“That's right. You have the right qualifications, on paper, but you're used to a strictly military setting. Privateers are technically civilian ships. I need to be sure that you understand the distinction.”

“Would we be expected to do civilian chores?” There was an undertone of contempt.

Ky raised her brows. “You'd be expected to do whatever I order,” she said. “It's unlikely that any work on this ship could be considered strictly civilian, aside from the actual selling and buying of cargo…for which you're not qualified. Ship maintenance, though, of course.”

His mouth quirked. “Understood, Captain. Your—Chief Martin says you are qualified to command a warship—”

Ky glanced at Martin, trying not to show her surprise.

“We mean no insult, Captain Vatta, but we need to know that we're not going to be commanded by—” She could see his struggle to find a euphemism for
idiot,
and waited it out. “—someone who has no experience,” he finally said.

“I'm sure the chief's given you the book version,” Ky said. “I am young, but not unacquainted with danger and violence.” She grinned, letting some of that dark force into her smile.

Gannett nodded abruptly. “If I may introduce my team, Captain?”

“Please,” Ky said.

As he spoke their names, the other team members took a step forward: “Arnold, Podtal, Rory, Hera, Gus, Ted. Arnie and Pod are my crewleaders. You'll make your own decisions, I understand, but they're good. We all grew up in the business; Gus and Ted are the youngest, but they enlisted when they were just fifteen; they're twenty standard now.”

Ky thought of Toby, now nearing fifteen. Had the hard-faced men before her ever been as young as Toby?

“You left Calvert's because you didn't like the new commander, is that right?”

“Yes.” That in a flat voice that invited no questions.

“You broke a ten-year contract to do that,” Ky said. “Does this mean you'd prefer a short-term contract with me?”

That question surprised Jon; she saw the shift of expression. “We're not lookin' to leave anyone, ma'am,” he said slowly. “We'd like a permanent place, if you have one, but we need a job, worse'n anythin' right now.”

Ky thought of a dozen things to say, and ask, but her instinct was that this family group was straight. She glanced at Martin and gave a slight nod.

“All right, then. Your files look good, and I'm offering you a place as my number one weapons team. In our tradition, that's the forward portside batteries.”

“Thank you, Captain,” their leader said. He didn't mention if their tradition was the same, a sign that he understood things were as they were here.

“Chief Martin will show you where to bunk and stow your gear,” Ky said. “And we'll get you some patches for those uniforms.” As soon as she could have them made up; it was yet another detail she hadn't thought of.

Ten days after first docking at Rosvirein,
Fair Kaleen
looked and felt much more like a fighting ship. A new starboard air lock, all compartments fully aired up, environmental supplies complete, new crewmembers busy about their tasks. The Gannetts had settled into the berthing area for the portside first and second batteries; they'd inspected all the batteries and related supply compartments, and reported to Martin that all were in satisfactory operating condition, but the missile racks were not full.

Ky wondered where Osman had expended those missiles, but ignored that stab of curiosity and authorized the purchase of replacements. Meanwhile, a second weapons team, this one made up of two different crews, moved into starboard batteries one and two, and Martin continued to comb the applicants for more he could approve. Environmental filled all positions, then Lee found a good pilot prospect while onstation shopping.

When she made her way through the ship on her daily rounds, her implant cued her to the names that went with the faces she saw: Barton, environmental tech class 3, a humod from Cantab with chem-sensing tentacles for direct assays of pollutants; Leman, engineering tech class 2, from Allray. Her original crew, at first a bit wary of the strangers, soon warmed up, and she came across little gatherings in the crew spaces. Even Rascal, at first inclined to growl and nip, relaxed enough to roll over and let some of the newbies scratch his belly.