Chaos Space - Marianne de Pierres [36]
Rast whooped.
Tears spurted from Mira’s eyes, blurring her view of the map. She dashed them away to clear her vision. ‘Crux! Oh Crux!’
‘FEDOR?’
‘They are all dropping from shift pattern—all of them—they are letting us through.’
A general shortcast pinged from one of the P-classes. ‘Dren from Audacity here. Let the biozoon shift, Landhurst.’
As the message was relayed the other Assailants casually orientated towards the station security vessels.
‘We figure that’ll be the least trouble. And we don’t want trouble. Do we, Stationmaster?’ added Dren.
Mira shifted her focus to the station security vessels. After an excruciating pause they began to withdraw.
She sent a private shortcast to Captain Dren. ‘Thank you.’
‘You should come by the Consilience sometime, Baronessa Fedor. We’ve always got a place for people with guts. And tell Randall she owes me.’
Mira sagged, all her energy drained. If she had been in full vein-sink, Insignia would have infused her with nutrients. But Autonomy had no such pilot nurture. And Insignia was—
‘Fedor?’
Mira wished the mercenary would go away so that she could just sit quietly for a—
‘Fedor!’
Mira jerked awake. How long asleep? A few seconds only but the centre of her virtual map was shimmering with a representation of the shift casement.
Two hundred millimesurs until maximum excitation.
Adrenalin shot through her. Her entire body tightened with anticipation—and dread. Could she navigate them through? . . . The result of an inexact res-shift is catastrophic and will have an irrevocable impact on humanesque tissue. Vibration calibration must be precise or molecules in the tissues will implode the flesh . . . Why did she have to remember that passage from the manual so exactly?
‘Rast,’ she whispered. ‘Shift imminent.’
A fraction of her awareness saw Randall run for her tubercle, saw Catchut crossing himself again, saw Latourn curled up in a ball.
Then Mira stared straight into the face of both her deepest longing and her darkest fear—and wondered which one would say her name.
THALES
Thales slept heavily in the early part of the evening but woke from a dream before dawn. He realised, with a start, that he had not even asked the gentleman his name and yet the man knew much about him and his life.
He climbed out of bed and sat on the cool marble floor for his morning samayik, one small part of his mind tuned to sounds of stirring in the adjacent sleeping chamber. This morning, though, Thales found it hard to connect with Atma. His unchanging reality eluded him.
Discontented, he washed more thoroughly and retied his hair. Today Rene would rescind her complaint and he would be released, he told himself. A lesson in deprivation would not hurt him so much. He felt calmer now. More centred.
Not able to wait any longer for the gentleman to rise, Thales went out into the shared living room. A selection of breakfast foods awaited him—as did the man he had heard getting up.
‘You slept well?’ Thales halted, eyeing the food. ‘At least one cannot complain of being starved. But one could complain about my poor manners. Forgive me for I did not even ask you your name yesterday. My samayik has helped me re-gather myself.’ He sat in the same chair as he had the evening before and served himself a large helping of creamy eggs and bitter cheese.
The man gave a gracious smile. ‘Amaury.’
‘Well, Amaury. As, it would seem, we have time to kill, what shall we talk of today?’
Amaury placed his knife and fork on his plate without making any clatter, like a man who had long practised silence. ‘I am out of touch with the outside world. Not just Scolar, but the worlds beyond. Do OLOSS and the Extropists still sniff each others’ underbellies like cock-stiff dogs?’
Thales laughed. The image was not one he would have expected from this gentleman’s mouth. ‘Well put, Amaury. I shall swap you. Orion’s doings for your own story.’
‘Of course. That would only be fair.’ The gentleman nodded and settled back in his chair. ‘Visitors first.’
Thales smiled and took several mouthfuls