Part 13 (1/2)
Briskly, holding Seles' gaze with hers, she said, ”You're quite right, that a captain operating in a state of emergency has the right to execute any person on board who is deemed to represent a threat to the security of the vessel. Yes, I could kill you, here and now, with no farther discussion. But I'm not going to.” Seles' mouth fell open, and her hands shook even more. Currald's face had hardened into disgust. ”You don't deserve a quick death and this - ” she slapped the folder, ”sort of thing, these spurious heroics. The Fleet's spent a lot of money training you - considerably more than your family did treating you and s.h.i.+pping you around and yelling at you. You owe us that, and you owe your s.h.i.+pmates an apology for d.a.m.n near killing them. Including Major Currald.”
”I - I didn't know it would hurt heavyworlders - ” pleaded Seles.
”Be quiet.” Currald's tone shut her mouth with a snap; Sa.s.sinak hoped he'd never speak to her like that, although she was sure she could survive it. ”You didn't think to try it on yourself, did you?”
”But I'm not pure - ”
”Nor holy,” said Sa.s.s, breaking into that before Currald went too far. ”That's the point, Seles. You had a bad childhood: so did lots of us. People were mean to you: same with lots of us. That's no reason to go around poisoning people who haven't done you any harm. If you really want to poison someone, why not your family? They're the ones who hurt you.”
”But I'm - but they're - ”
”Your birth family, yes. And Fleet has tried to be - and could have been - your life family. Now you've done something we can't ignore; you've killed someone, Seles, and not bravely, in a fight, but sneakily. Court martial, when we get back, maybe psychiatric evaluation - ”
”I'm not crazy!”
”No? You try to please those who hurt you, and poison those who befriend you; that sounds crazy to me. And you are guilty, but if I punish you then other heavyworlders may think I did so because of your genes, not your deeds.”
”Heavyworlders should get out of FSP, and take care of themselves,” muttered Seles stubbornly. ”It never helped us.”
Sa.s.sinak looked at Currald, whose mask of contempt and disgust had softened a little. She nodded slightly. ”I think. Major Currald, that we have a combined medical and legal problem here. Under the circ.u.mstances, we don't have the best situation for psychiatric intervention . . . and I don't want to convene a court on this young lady until there's been a full evaluation.”
”You think it's enough for - ”
”For mitigation, and perhaps for a full plea of incompetence. But that's outside my sphere; my concern now is to minimize the damage she's done, in all areas, and preserve the evidence.”
Seles looked back and forth between them, clearly puzzled and frightened. ”But I - I demand - I”
Sa.s.sinak shook her head. ”Seles, if a court martial later calls for your execution, I will see that your statement is returned to your family. But at the moment, I see no alternative to protective confinement.” She opened a channel to Sickbay, and spoke briefly to the Medical Officer. ”Major Currald, I can have Security take her down, or - ”
”I'll do it,” he said. Sa.s.sinak could sense that pity had finally replaced disgust.
”Thank you. I think she'll be calmer with you.” For several reasons, Sa.s.sinak thought to herself. Currald had the size and confident bearing of a full-adapted heavyworlder, trained for battle . . . Seles would not be likely to try escape, and under his gaze would be unwilling to have hysterics.
Less than an hour later, the Medical Officer called back, to report that she considered Seles at serious risk of suicide or other violent action. ”She's hanging on by a thread,” she said. ”That note - that's the sort of thing the Gelway terrorists used. She could go any minute, and locked in the brig she'd be likely to do it sooner rather than later. I want to put her under, medical necessity.”
”Fine with me. Send it up for my seal, when you've done the paperwork, and let's be very careful that nothing happens to that coldsleep tank. I don't want any suspicions whatever about our proceedings.”
Now that was settled. Sa.s.sinak leaned back in her seat, wondering why she felt such sympathy for this girl. She'd never liked whiners herself, the girl had killed one of her crew - but the bewildered pain in those eyes, the shaky alliance of courage and stark fear - that got to her. Currald said much the same thing, when he got back up to Main Deck. ”I'm an Inclusionist,” he said, ”but I've always believed we should test our youngsters on high-g worlds. We've got something worth preserving, something extra, not just something missing. I've even supported those who want to withhold special treatment from newborn throwbacks. There's enough lightweights in the universe, I've said, breeding fast enough: why spend money and time raising another weakling? At first glance, this kid is just the point of my argument. Her family spent all that money and worry and time, FSP spent all that money on her boarding school, Fleet spent money and time on her in training, and all they got out of it was an incompetent, fairly stupid poisoner. But - I don't know - I want to stomp her into the ground, and at the same time I'm sorry for her. She's not good for anything, but she could have been.” He gave Sa.s.sinak another, far more human, glance. ”I hate to admit it, but the very things I believe in probably turned her into that wet mess.”
”I hope something can be salvaged.” Sa.s.sinak pushed a filled mug across her desk, and he took it. ”But what I told her is perfectly true: many of us have had difficult childhoods, many of us have been hurt one way or another. I expect you've faced prejudice on account of your background - ” He nodded, and she went on. ” - But you didn't decide to poison the innocent to get back at those who hurt you.” Sa.s.sinak took a long swallow from her own mug - not coffee, but broth. ”Thing is, humans of all sorts are under pressure. There've been questions asked in Council about the supposed human domination of Fleet.”
”What!” Clearly he hadn't heard that before.
”It's not general knowledge, but a couple of races are pus.h.i.+ng for mandatory quotas at the Academy. Even the Ryxi - ”
'Those featherdusters!”
”I know. But you're Fleet, Currald: you know humans need to stick together. Heavyworlders have a useful adaptation, but they couldn't take on the rest of FSP alone.” He nodded, somber again. Sa.s.sinak wondered what went on behind those opaque brown eyes. Yet he was trustworthy: had to be, after the past week. Anything less, and they'd not have survived.
Her next visitor was Hollister, with a report on the extended repairs and probable performance limits of the s.h.i.+p until it went in for refitting. Even though the portside pods had not been as badly damaged as they'd originally thought, he insisted that the s.h.i.+p would not stand another long FTL chase. ”One hop, two - a clear course into Sector - that we can manage. But the kind of maneuvering that the Ssli has to call for in a chase, no. You've no idea what load that puts on the pods - ”
Sa.s.sinak scowled. ”That means we can't find out where they go when they leave?”
”Right. We'd be as likely to end up here as there, and most likely to be spread in between. I'd have to log a protest.”
”Which would hardly be read if we did splatter. No, never mind. I won't do that. But there must be something more than sitting here. If only we could tag their s.h.i.+ps, somehow ...”
”Well, now, that's another story.” He'd been prepared to argue harder, Sa.s.sinak realized, as he sat back, brow furrowed. ”Let's see ... you're a.s.suming that someone'll come along to evacuate, and you'd like to know where it goes, and we can't follow, so ...”
His voice trailed off; Sa.s.sinak waited a moment, but he said nothing. Finally he shook himself, and handed her another data cube. ”I'll think about it, but in the meantime, we've got another problem. Remember the trouble we were having with the scrubbers in Environmental?”
”Yes.” Sa.s.sinak inserted the cube, wondering why he'd brought a hardcopy up here instead of just switching an output to her terminal. Then she focussed on the display and bit back an oath. When she glanced at him, he nodded.
”It's worse.” It was much worse. Day by day, the recycling efficiency had dropped, and the contaminant fraction had risen. Figures that she'd skimmed over earlier came back to her now: reaction equilibrium constants, rates of algal growth. ”One thing that went wrong,” Hollister went on, pointing to the supporting data, ”is that somehow an overflow valve stuck, and we backflushed from the 'ponics into the supply lines. We've got green crud growing all along here - ' He pointed to the schematic. ”Cleaned it out of the crosslines by yesterday, but that's nutrient-rich flow, and the stuff loves it. We can't kill it off without killing off the main 'ponics tanks, and that would mean going on backup oxygen, and we lost twenty percent of our backup oxygen in the row with that s.h.i.+p.”
Sa.s.sinak winced. She'd forgotten about the oxygen spares damaged or blown in that fight.
”Ordinarily,” Hollister went on, ”it'd help that we have a smaller crew, with the prize crew gone. But because we weren't sure of the biosystems on that transport, I'm short of biosystems crew. Very short. What we need to do is flush the whole system, and replant - but it'd be a lot safer to do that somewhere we could get aired up. In the meantime, we're going to be working twice as hard to get somewhat less output, and that's if nothing else goes wrong.”
”Could it be sabotage?” asked Sa.s.s.
Hollister shrugged. ”Could be. Of course it could be. But it could just as easily be ordinary glitches.”
Chapter Thirteen.
Day by day the biosystems monitors showed continued system failure. Sa.s.sinak forced herself to outward calmness, though she raged inwardly: to be so close, to have found a slaver base, and perhaps a line to its supporters, and then - not to be able to pursue. Hollister's daily reports reinforced the data on her screens: they had no reserves for pursuit, and they could not hold station much longer.
She hung on, nonetheless, hoping for another few s.h.i.+ps to show up, anything to give her something to show for this expedition. Or, if Huron's relief expedition arrived, they could take over surveillance. She spent some time each day digging through the personnel files, checking every person who should have been in the quadrant from which the missile came, and who might have had access to a signalling device. There were forty or fifty of them, and she worked her way from Aariefa to Kelly, hoping to be interrupted by insystem traffic. Finally a single s.h.i.+p appeared at the edge of her scanning range, just entering the system. Its IFF signal appeared to be undamaged, giving its ma.s.s/volume characteristics straightforwardly.
”Hmm.” Sa.s.sinak frowned over the display. ”If that's right, it should have the new beacon system installed.” ”Can we trip it?”
”We can try.” The new system functioned as planned, revealing that the s.h.i.+p in question had come from Courcy-DeLan: before that it had hauled ”mixed liquids” on the Valri-Palin-Terehalt circuit for eighteen months. ”Mixed liquids” came in ten-liter carboys, what-ever that meant. Fuels? Drugs? Chemicals for some kind of synthetic process? It could be anything from concentrated acids to vitamin supplements for the slaves' diet. Not that it was important right then, but Sa.s.sinak wished she could get a look at the s.h.i.+p's manifest.
Two more transports entered the system, and cautiously made their way down to the planet surface. The Zaid-Dayan's Zaid-Dayan's sensitive detectors were able to pinpoint the s.h.i.+ps' locations on the surface, confirming that they had both settled onto the original contact site. Then a huge s.h.i.+p appeared, this one clearly unable to land on-planet. A Hall-Kir hull, designed for orbital station docking, settled into a low orbit. Now Sa.s.sinak was sure they were going to evacuate the base. A Hall-Kir could handle an enormous load of machinery and equipment. But the s.h.i.+p was at least twelve years old, and lacked the new beacon; nor could Sa.s.sinak figure out a way to tag it for future surveillance. Its IFF revealed only that it was leased from General Systems Freight Lines, a firm that had nothing on its records. Since the IFF reported only serial owners, Sa.s.sinak could not tell who had it under lease, or if it had been leased to doubtful clients before. sensitive detectors were able to pinpoint the s.h.i.+ps' locations on the surface, confirming that they had both settled onto the original contact site. Then a huge s.h.i.+p appeared, this one clearly unable to land on-planet. A Hall-Kir hull, designed for orbital station docking, settled into a low orbit. Now Sa.s.sinak was sure they were going to evacuate the base. A Hall-Kir could handle an enormous load of machinery and equipment. But the s.h.i.+p was at least twelve years old, and lacked the new beacon; nor could Sa.s.sinak figure out a way to tag it for future surveillance. Its IFF revealed only that it was leased from General Systems Freight Lines, a firm that had nothing on its records. Since the IFF reported only serial owners, Sa.s.sinak could not tell who had it under lease, or if it had been leased to doubtful clients before.
”Fleet signal!” Sa.s.sinak woke from her restless doze at the squawk in her ear, and thumbed down the intercom volume control.
”What is it?”
”Fleet signal-inbound light attack group. Commodore Verstan commanding. It's on a tight beam, coded - but they're sure to have noticed - ”
”I'm on my way.” Sa.s.sinak shook her head, wondering if the slight headache was an artifact of worry, or really a problem with the air quality. Into the shower, fresh uniform, then onto the bridge, where alertness replaced the slightly jaded look of the past few days.
”It was aimed for this planet's local system,” said the Corn officer. ”They must know we're - ”
Sa.s.sinak shook her head. ”They're hoping - they don't know for sure.”