Timothy Zahn - Conquerors' Pride

"Oh, come on," Melinda scoffed. "There are a million and a half cubic light-years of empty space out there for people to shuffle ships around in. Why in the world would anyone choose an inhabited planet to transfer illegal goods at? Especially a planet in the middle of a major Peacekeeper operation?"

"That's a good question," Holloway agreed. "That, along with the time crunch in general, is what's kept this supply dump of yours intact instead of disassembled and run through an extra-fine sand sifter. I'll ask it again: why Dorcas?"

Melinda sighed. "All right," she said. "The truth is that Aric and I are assisting a high-ranking Peacekeeper officer with a somewhat delicate and rather unofficial operation. It involves the space near Dorcas; hence, this is where we rendezvous."

"Very impressive words," Holloway said. "You have any substance to go along with them?"

"If you mean official authorizations, I'm afraid not," Melinda said, trying to keep the hesitation tearing at her throat from showing in her voice. Making up lies on the fly wasn't something a surgical design consultant's career had adequately prepared her for. "As I said, the operation is somewhat delicate. I was told that as long as we didn't request assistance from local Peacekeeper forces, we wouldn't have any trouble with them."

"Were you, now," Holloway said. "Rather naive thinking on someone's part. Have you any documents at all? Of any type?"

"No." She hesitated; but she could think of only one card she could still play. "If you want confirmation, you'll have to contact Peacekeeper Command directly."

He cocked an eyebrow. "Peacekeeper Command. As high as that?"

Melinda nodded. "Possibly even higher."

Holloway bowed his head slightly. "You've piqued my interest, Doctor. I believe I'll take you up on your suggestion. Anyone in particular I should direct the message to?"

The point of no return was well behind her. Bracing herself, Melinda took the plunge. "Send it directly to Admiral Rudzinski's office."

Holloway's eyebrows lifted. "Rudzinski himself, eh? You're definitely running in a higher circle than I would have guessed."

"Just make the message brief," Melinda said, sternly ordering her stomach to behave itself. If Holloway called her bluff and actually sent an inquiry to Earth, she was going to be in a swirl of trouble about seventy hours from now. But the option was to be in the equivalent depth of trouble right now... and in seventy hours Aric and Quinn, at least, should be safely off Dorcas and out of reach of official wrath. "The admiral has a lot of other matters to deal with."

"I shall be the soul of brevity," Holloway promised in what he probably intended to be a seventeenth-century Shakespearian British accent. "As well as the soul of discretion. In case it turns out that Rudzinski actually has heard of you."

"Will that be all, then?" Melinda asked, ignoring the not-very-veiled suggestion that she was in fact lying through her teeth about all this.

"For now," Holloway said. "Oh, there's one other thing. About half an hour ago now, we had a freighter mesh in that was piggybacking what seems to be an old Moray-class long-range battle fueler. Yours?"

From his tone it was pretty clear he already knew the answer. "Probably," she said. "Didn't they transmit a destination invoice?"

"Of course," Holloway said calmly. "I was just looking for confirmation." He nodded toward the crates. "I presume all this will be going aboard. I'll give orders for it to land as close to you as possible."

"Thank you," Melinda said.

"No charge." Holloway glanced at his watch. "If you'll excuse me, I have a great deal of other work to do. Be sure to bring your brother around when he arrives, Dr. Cavanagh. I'd very much like to meet him."

He nodded again and, executing a neat about-face, made his way out the way he'd come. "Right," Melinda murmured under her breath. "I'm sure he'd love to meet you, too."

The fueler came down alone, moving awkwardly in the unaccustomed environment of a planetary atmosphere and gravity well. Melinda held her breath as it wobbled its way toward the landing field, but the pilot evidently knew what he was doing and made it without turning stern up and driving into the ground. Bypassing the usual runways—the fueler had no landing gear to speak of—it curved up into half a loop, and with a roar and splash of Icefire dropped neatly onto its stern at the edge of the field closest to Melinda's rented warehouse.

The Icefire dissipated, and the twisting coronal glow around the edge-effect airfoils faded away, and Melinda started breathing again as she looked it over. The ship was a model of simplicity, little more than a large, slightly flattened cylinder with eight docking ports along its sides and a coupling port at the bow that enabled it to link up with larger ships or other fuelers. The space-normal Icefire drive at the stern was complemented by a Chabrier stardrive at the bow, with the compressed living quarters and control section in the center. Halfway up along the side facing her was a hatchway with an open-air lift-cage track running the length of the ship beside it, and as Melinda walked toward the fueler, a storage compartment near the hatchway opened and the lift cage rotated out and onto the track. It started down, arriving at the base of the fueler the same time she did.

She got in, and the cage started back up. Up close the fueler seemed smaller than she had expected it to be, especially considering that it was supposed to serve as both living quarters and mobile supply dump for sixteen men and their fighters. She wondered if Aric, who had once loudly complained about having to share a hotel room with his brother, really understood what he was getting himself into.

Like the rest of the ship, the hatchway and narrow corridors beyond it had been designed for free fall. Negotiating them in full gravity was something of a challenge, but with some stretching and ingenuity Melinda managed it without too much trouble. Passing through the cracker-box wardroom and half-cracker-box galley, she reached the control room.

It was empty.

She frowned. The pilot ought to be here, running through the check-down procedure. "Hello?" she called.

"Hello, Dr. Cavanagh," a disembodied voice replied from a section of the control board. "My name is Max. Welcome aboard."

"Thank you," Melinda said. So that was why the fueler was two days behind the tentative schedule her father had set for its arrival here. The old fox had thrown her a little twist. "Excuse my surprise. I was expecting to find a human pilot."

"I was apparently an afterthought of Lord Cavanagh's," the computer said. "It occurred to him that having someone of my capabilities aboard might prove beneficial to the mission."

"I'm sure it will be," Melinda agreed. "I'm afraid I'm a little unfamiliar with the CavTronics line of semisentients. May I ask which series you are?"

"I'm one of the Carthage-Ivy group," he said. "Carthage-Ivy-Gamma, if you need the full database designation."

"That's with, what, Class Six decision-making capabilities?"

"Class Seven," he corrected her. "I understand—"

"How about logic structures?"

"Modified Korngold-Che decay-driven randomized," Max said. "If you're truly interested, Dr. Cavanagh, all my specifications are on file. I understand you've brought the supplies for the expedition?"

"Yes," Melinda said, trying to hide a smile. That was a CavTronics computer, all right. Perpetually driven crazy by what he saw as self-absorbed conceit on the part of other companies' parasentient computers, her father had deliberately programmed the Carthage series with a strong reluctance to talk about themselves.

She glanced across the control board, her smile fading. The computer wasn't the only alteration her father had made in the fueler's original equipment. There, to the side of the main display, was a newly installed Mindlink jack for Quinn to use. Quinn, who had once stated at NorCoord Parliament hearings that he never again wanted to use the Mindlink that the Copperhead surgeons had built into his brain.