A Mind For Trade Part 14

The work was slow, and she frequently rechecked the data because it seemed what she was getting was impossible. Yet it seemed to checkout; they were in real danger. Despite her present physical discomforts, she wondered how the crew on the planet were functioning. And what was going on with the Ariadne survivors? Were they part of the pirates after all-or not? But mostly she wondered how the EM had affected the Solar Queen crew? They'd been there over two weeks.

There was a m.u.f.fled snort from one of the other sleeping harnesses rigged around the perimeter of the lab. Rael turned her head in time to see Steen Wilc.o.x sit up and rub his eyes. His coat bulged and rippled; Rael smiled as she watched him unfasten it, and a black-and-white cat leaped out.

The cat bounded expertly off bulkheads, floor, and ceiling, then disappeared out the hatchway with a twitch of its tail, bent on its own errand.

"So much for keeping warm," Wilc.o.x grumbled.

Silently Rael reached for the pack of jakek tubes and tossed him one. With a nod of thanks the navigator caught it, tabbed the heat mechanism, and opened the" tube. His eyes closed as he sipped.

"Ahhh," he said.

Rael knew from Jellico's earlier report-he had been especially complete-just how cold the control deck was. Its central position in the s.h.i.+p, the high moisture content, and the presence of the humans and cats, kept the hydro relatively comfortable.

She was just settling back to force her mind back to her task again when there was a blur of movement and the captain reappeared from his latest check on the control deck. Since the s.h.i.+p was blind except for brief glimpses at safe parts of their orbit, there was no need for a constant watch. And if the pirates found them, they couldn't power up fast enough to escape.

So far, the pirates had not found them, ricocheting as they were, just like a billiard ball, from high orbit to low, around the moons, out and in.

Rael looked forward to their next run in close to the planet, only so they could flush the air again, regulate the temp for just a while, and take care of other necessities.

She scanned Jellico's face, saw nothing there to alarm her.

It had been a very long two weeks-sometimes in her sleep it seemed they had been tumbling about this system endlessly and would forever after. But on their last check Jellico had been sufficiently happy with the complex course that he and Steen had worked out that they had needed only one correction so far. Again, it had been done close to the planet, so the EM would mask their presence.

Jellico settled into the harness next to hers-she saw then how his jacket bulged, and she laughed, this time out loud, as he unzipped it and the second cat emerged.

Jellico's eyes glinted with humor. "Made it an order. No one does control deck duty without taking a cat. Can stand the cold a lot longer-in fact, it was the cee-oh-two that drove me out, not the cold."

Alpha (or was it Omega? the two cats looked exactly alike) flipped off the bunk, purring loudly, and vanished out the hatchway.

"How's your work progressing?" he asked her.

Unspoken among all of them was the need to communicate, to use the seemingless endless time to keep their minds busy. She could have answered in a very few words; instead, she said, "Tang has been giving me help. He's rigged some elegant matrices for me, to compensate for the lower power! The model I'm building takes into account solar energy, the sunspot cycle, vulcanism, ocean currents, and all the rest."

"Using data from the comsats?" Jellico asked.

"Tang copied the latest data from our last power-up," she said, nodding. "It's a fascinating-if frightening-picture. I have an idea that there is going to be significant interest in the scientific community over this data."

"Which ought to bring lis significant profit," Jellico said. "Well, we've earned it."

If we live to spend it. She didn't say it, but Rael could tell from the sudden narrowing of his eyes that he'd shared the same thought.

"I think I'll tour about, see if Kosti needs a hand in Engineering," Steen said.

Rael appreciated that the others tried to leave the captain and his wife alone from time to time. They all lived crowded in this little area, making each hyperaware of the others. Rael had noted, without commenting, how much care each of these men took to accommodate the others. She did her own part, leaving the men alone from time to time, so they could change their clothing in relative comfort-or just indulge in some male talk, without the politeness they felt due to the captain's lady.

A politeness, she'd noted, that disappeared when she was called on to function as a medic. Then she seemed to transform into a faceless, genderless medical figure-an alteration inspired by respect for her training, another human quirk that she secretly appreciated.

Jellico was squinting at the datapad on her lap.

With difficulty she dragooned her scattering thoughts back to the work at hand.

"Those readings correct?" he asked.

"They are indeed," she said.

Jellico's face tightened, and Rael realized his thoughts had gone beyond the scientific data to the eight crewmembers caught down on the planet underneath that spectacularly building ion storm.

"They don't lift off in, what-" He squinted at the data again.

"It looks like about ten days. If I were down there, I'd set it at eight for a safety margin," Rael said, her innards tightening as she tapped at the keys. "Ten days."

Jellico drew in a slow breath, then rubbed his temples. His eyes opened, their blue gaze strained. "Rip will wait until the last minute, to get as much ore as possible."

Rael looked at the numbers and shook her head. It was only marginally comforting to know that Craig Tau was also with the Queen and thus must have the same data that she had-which could be dinned into Rip's ears. But what other problems was Rip dealing with?

Miceal was thinking on about strategy. ". because that's the only way the two s.h.i.+ps'can synchronize without communication-an obvious rendezvous time."

His expression brightened, and he smacked his fist lightly into his open palr. "That's it. That's what he'll do. Which means now we can plan intelligently."

He launched himself off his sleep harness, and disappeared with a speed and grace that reminded Rael of the cats.

"The first question that comes to my mind," Van Ryke said a little while later, "is whether or not the pirates have also come to the same conclusion."

They were all gathered in the hydro lab.

Kosti grunted. "They have to have good scan gear. And they must know about the comsats."

Rael said, "a.s.suredly. But they might not know how to interpret the comsat data-if they're even reading it. Pirates put their money into weapons, not science officers."

Tang Ya nodded agreement. "They have to be watching the light show down there. An idiot could guess that it's building toward something. But I agree with Rael; they probably don't have the data to project a deadline."

"If they don't know, we've got an edge," Steen Wilc.o.x said, cradling a tube of jakek in his hands.

"Whether they know or not, we've got to do what makes sense," Jellico said. "I am just about certain that Rip is watching this model down there, or one like it, and is going to push up against the deadline as close as possible. For one thing, the ion storm will give him some protection."

Steen said, "We can watch the pirates' orbits as the time approaches. That ought to tell us if they're onto the same idea."

"So where does that put us?" Karl Kosti asked.

Jellico jabbed his finger toward the planet. "Waiting right where they'll least think to look for us-synchronous right over the Queen, masked by the EM. Maybe we can shake them up a little when the Queen lifts."

Karl frowned, then his craggy face altered. He laughed, and slapped his knee. "Thereon's Shadow! That's a sweet idea."

"Sweet and d.a.m.ned dangerous," Steen said. "If these Shver are armed with colloid blasters, we have absolutely no protection. And if we're sitting right above the Queen, and they figure it out, we won't have to paint a target on the side of the s.h.i.+p."

Kosti pointed with his chin toward Rael's datapad, which had been positioned in a place so all could see its small screen. "The building solar storm is distorting the electromagnetic field around Hesprid, so the blasters will have erratic aim. Charged particles wreak havoc with tuned plasma jets."

Rael nodded in realization-Steen and Miceal had both been down in the jet area helping him to retune the jets for the tremendous magnetic storm raging around Hesprid IV. It was the worst s.p.a.ce weather, said Kosti, that he'd ever seen. The blasters would be especially hard to aim in the magnetopause of Hesprid or the moons-at the edge of their magnetic fields-where the flow of the solar wind was turbulent and unpredictable.

"That's what makes a fight possible," said Jellico, grabbing the datapad. "We know where they'll have to be to have a chance of hitting us."

He, Steen, and Van Ryke began a dense three-way tactical discussion over Jellico's datapad. Rael, looking over Jellico's shoulder, watched the plots changing as they ran simulations of possible pirate tactics. This was an area she had only the sketchiest knowledge of-and she could see Ya watching intently, probably thinking the same. Computers and communications gear he knew to an extent that was almost frightening. The vagaries of human action and reaction seemed to be beyond him.

Human beings had been her study. Not human beings at war-she knew best how to patch them up afterward, or how to deal with the terrible emotional consequences when patching didn't work. She loathed war, the mindless destruction, the horrible fallout. There was no purpose to war in her view. Though she had tested extremely high in all subjects in childhood, she had never had any difficulty turning down offers to train in the military.

The discussion ended abruptly, and she realized she hadn't heard the result as her mind had been wandering. Not that it mattered. Whatever decisions needed to be made had been done; Jellico moved with characteristic speed as he flicked the datapad back to Rael's program and then launched himself out of the hydro.

"Course changes?" Rael asked, looking up at Jan Van Ryke.

"Yes indeed, Doctor," the cargo master said, looking pleased. "He'll be going to lay up the course changes necessary over the next few days to put us in a position to take up synchronous...o...b..t without using a lot of energy, which would make us more detectable."

Steen's thin, dour face wore a peculiar smile as he handed himself up to his sleep harness. "d.a.m.n, but he's fast," he said quietly. "I ran high scores in nav school on tactics-it was like a game to me-but he can outthink me every time. Not that I would have anything different, but I wonder why he didn't go into the military."

"Our captain was raised in a military family," Van Ryke said, and Rael nodded. Miceal Jellico seldom talked about his past, but every so often he'd make a comment, or an observation, that seemed to draw on past experience, and a close listener could put these together into a fairly coherent picture.

"And he has a long memory," Ya said. "Probably another family trait, besides the smarts and the honesty. All it would take is one bad command from some crooked or self-serving bra.s.s, and that would be that."

"Free Trader captain is his own man-or woman," Steen said.

"The gift of command," Rael said softly.

"Which Rip might discover in himself," Jan murmured, reaching for the jakek.

A sudden sobriety gripped the others, and Rael, sensitive always to atmosphere and mood, wondered if they were doubting the young man-not his abilities, but whether or not someone so new to command could cope with a set of circ.u.mstances that would be trying even to an experienced captain. Would he follow through on his end, or was Miceal just projecting himself into the younger man, and hoping?

They wouldn't know until the last minute.

Fighting the headache that eternally threatened to return, Rael decided she'd speculated enough. It was time to bury herself in work, hoping the time would pa.s.s faster.

Chapter Fifteen.

Inside the Queen, Ali dropped his hazard gear on his bunk, and stared down at the medicine case on his desk.

"It might interfere with quick thought," Craig had warned. "Not to mention your reflexes. If you feel you have to take the drug, at least use the smallest dose possible."

Ali did not want to jeopardize the others. Of course. On the other hand, a man with half a brain could make certain he took jobs that guaranteed risk only to himself.

In the meantime, there was the prospect of being penned up with Dane and Jasper in a very small s.p.a.ce for long hours, while all were under tremendous stress.

Defiantly he bent down, grabbed a full dose of the medication, and swallowed it. Then he jammed his way into his winter gear, hating the bitter taste of the meds, but angrily welcoming the sensation of an invisible cotton blanket settling over his mind. Or at least over the part of mind that insisted on bleeding over into others' minds.

It did fuzz the speed of his thoughts, but he knew his thought processes, and for that matter his reflexes, were much faster than most people's.

The annoying thing was that though the others might not be as fast, they were not stupid. They sensed the diminution in his speed-he knew it just from the occasional glances, the tightened mouths. No one discussed it with him, which was just the way he wanted it. Nor, from everything he could tell (and he had exerted himself to find out), did they talk around him. They didn't talk at all, not about that.

Good. Don't talk about it, mask the effect, and it would go away. Wither and die, like an unwatered weed, or a muscle that was never used. Made perfect sense.

Perfect way to handle a subject that made no sense at all.

Ali thrust it from his thoughts, impatient with himself for permitting it to creep into his mind even for a few seconds.

He hustled up to the mess cabin, where the others were gathered.

"Any change in plans?" he asked.

"Let's move," Dane Thorson said, pus.h.i.+ng a half cup of something hot into his hands.

Ali swallowed some jakek, ignoring the slight burn. He welcomed the fierce heat inside. It would help him to fight the cold longer.

He drank down the rest, blinking against the burn-sting in his eyes, stashed the cup, and followed Dane's impressive bulk down to the cargo bay. When all suited up, the Viking looked almost like one of the Tath, except he wasn't furry and didn't smell like a rain-soaked mutt.

Ali climbed into the flitter. None of the Tath were with them yet, but the odor clung to the craft from their previous visits. Ali breathed through his mouth to avoid smelling the stink. It didn't seem to bother the others-even Sinbad, the s.h.i.+p's cat, seemed to like the Tath, and one would think a cat would instinctively recoil from their distinctive aroma.

The drug seemed to help with that, Ali had noticed. It muted all sensation a little. He closed his eyes, trying to get his nose to adjust. He really liked the Tath as individuals, and in their camp, with the constantly moving air, they were more bearable. Of course one couldn't ask them to shampoo their fur-the natural oils in it that would wash away were the ones that protected them against the extremes of temperature and humidity.

Ali opened his eyes again as Stotz eased the flitter out of the cargo-bay door. He strongly suspected that there was one other who also had an aversion to the Tath smell, and that was their refined feline medic. Of course Siere would never say anything, but Ali had noticed the silver fur around the medic's slender neck ruffling when the Tath suddenly entered a closed s.p.a.ce, accompanied by the inevitable odor.

As they reached the rendezvous point, Ali sat up straight and made himself focus on what the others were saying. The bad side of the drug was how, if he hadn't eaten recently, it had a tendency to make his mind wander down odd paths. He winced inwardly. What a waste of time, castigating the Tath for something they couldn't help.

". so the tidal scouring has been minimized," Stotz said. "There should be a lot of eggs here, although, again, be prepared for some climbing. You'll plant these"-he held up a small luminescent greenish yellow cone, another Tath barnacle device-"where you find ore eggs, for Lossin, Tazcin, and Vrothin running the egg scoopers. It's tuned to the frequency of Ali's eggfinders. The flash is pretty bright."

"Got it," Dane said, sounding-as always-as unper turbable as an ice floe.

On Ali's other side, Jasper just nodded quietly.

Ali wondered if Weeks was also taking the drug. Not that there was any sign of slowness or any kind of insufficiency in the jet man's work. He was just quieter than before, if such a thing were possible. Was his mind wandering as well, because of that blanketing effect of the drug?

Ali gave a mental shrug. He wouldn't ask; that would be breaking the promise-worse, letting that take hold of his thoughts again.

He tried to relax, watching intently out the viewport next to his seat. Overhead stretched a fleecy ceiling of gray cloud, but far to the west a greenish belt of clear sky beckoned, fading as the terminator swept ahead of them, bringing night, and safety from the Floaters. Occasional flickers of lightning from high above them threatened soundlessly, briefly was.h.i.+ng out the running lights of the sh.e.l.lboat almost a kilometer below them.

AH craned his neck, but the source of the high lightning- quite rare, according to the databanks-could not be seen. It had started quite suddenly, and increased in frequency almost daily. And the comsats reported that the aurora borealis of the planet had stretched over an increasing area of the strange world as the particle storm from the uneasy sun lashed Hes-prid IV with growing intensity.

A blinking light caught his attention: a com request from the Trader camp. The interruption was welcome. He leaned forward to tap the link.

"Here speak Gleef," came a musical, accented voice. "Inform all, developing squall, possible tornadoes. We warn you, watch weather scope." He clicked off; he didn't speak Ter-ran-had probably gotten the words from Tooe-so he wouldn't understand an acknowledgment.

"Tornadoes at night?" Stotz slewed around to stare at them.

Jasper looked up from his work on his hand comp. "Gleef knows weather. He's been predicting this, just didn't know when. There's an extensive rift system east of us, lots of heat energy pumping into the seas, which are shallow there." He help up his hand comp. "I just ran some numbers based on the barometric and wind-direction readings he flashed us on the screen. If there's any more velocity from the south, or the barometer drops here"-he tapped his screen-"then we'd better move out."

Stotz nodded. "I'll get Lossin on the com, see what they think."