Jumpspace did things to your mind. And the business with Tully walking off from her, that was a nightmare that didn't quite go away. You could get superstitious, you could start to think it was something external to yourself or that you were communicating with somebody across stellar distances, when an educated being knew that there was no such thing, that it was one's own subconscious and one's own inner thoughts.
So what was it with the kid, that she came out the other side of Jumpspace with a gut-deep feeling they couldn't desert him?
She punched the call button. The lift door opened and she got in, faced the perspective of the galley-dodging corridor that led to the bridge as the door shut and the lift started down.
They couldn't desert him, because, by the gods, they weren't the scoundrels Sun Ascendant crew were, they weren't the sort to take advantage of the kid, they weren't the sort to have run and left him like abandoned garbage, and she wasn't the sort that could have left him locked away in a featureless room…
Lift door opened. She got a breath, set out down the main lower corridor for the airlock.
Another gods-be small space. Which she didn't like to think about closing around her when she was in this kind of funk. She punched cycle and watched the lights run their course, met the different-smelling air of another port and walked the ribbed, lighted tube to the ramp and the dockside.
Where customs was waiting… "Welcome Kita Point, hani captain! Sign all form…"
And past that obstacle, just beyond the rampway access, by the control console for the gantries and the lines that were feeding the Legacy water and taking off her waste…
"H'lo, pretty hani." Haisi waved at her approach like an old friend. "How you do?"
"Hello, you rag-eared scoundrel. What do you know, how do you know it, and why shouldn't I file charges for endangerment?"
The kid wanted to do whatever routine maintenance wanted doing, and faced with such self-sacrifice, a body thought of all the things nobody wanted to do… like the cursed filter changes, that weren't exactly due, but almost, and if they had somebody that wanted to lie on his back and crawl halfway into the ventilation system, that was fine, let him.
Meanwhile there were the customs people, and, left in charge, with the stsho making calls from below-decks and the customs papers looking like a mere formality, a sensible person in want of rest might draw an easier breath. Which Tiar drew. And headed downside to talk with customs in the captain's wake.
"Everything in order," the customs chief said. "All clear with Urtur, all clear here. You captain sign, all fine." There were benefits to dealing with the small stations, the newly built. Luxuries were scarce.
Necessities were short. If you weren't armed and dangerous you could get through customs with most anything; and you didn't expect dispute.
But you did have to take the aforesaid customs report and trek to the station office in person to file for various services, and schedule for off-loading.
Which in the case of Kita Point and their berth was a distance off, far enough to be inconvenient on a station too small and too rough to afford a full time shuttle service.
So one walked. And walked, stood in line at the office because Kita Point had no separate line for ships'
lading credentials or spacers wanting to certify a live pet for transport, which made a very strangely assorted, unruly and uncomfortable line to be in — a line that snarled and snapped in two instances, and struggled in wild panic in another.
"The hani trader Chanur’s Legacy," she was finally able to say, with the waft of kifish presence in her nostrils — two of them were in line behind her, but the mahendo'sat with the wildlife had gone through.
She slid the physical papers across, left the mahen agent in peace to survey the requisite stamps, and made out the request for cargo receipt.
"Station load," she said, meaning it was for the station's own use. And that usually got priority. She stood waiting.
And felt something in the back waist of her trousers.
She reached back, suspecting wildlife or an off-target pickpocket.
And found a piece of paper.
She looked around, found nothing but a blank-faced shrug from the mahe immediately behind her in line, and saw a whisk of a white scuttling figure in a gray cloak vanishing around the corner.
Stsho. But no way was she going to leave her place in line to give chase.
"Sign," the agent was saying, and she took the stylus and the tablet and signed, in the several places marked.
"You when want offload?"
"Ready now. Soon as possible." She tried to sneak a look at the paper, but the agent was saying, "You got volatiles? You need sign form."
"Right. No problem." She got a look. It said, in bad block print, Help. 2980-89.
A phone number? An address?
"You sign here," the agent said.
She looked distractedly at the form. She read the variables and signed, collected the requisite form and took the paper with the message with her, on her way to a public phone.
Better not involve the captain.
Haisi Ana-kehnandian took a puff on the abominable smoke-stick, blew the contaminated air into the neon-lit ambient, and smiled lazily. "I tell you, pretty hani, you got one bastard lot luck. Just so, Atli-lyen-tlas come here like we know. Then… not good news. Atli-lyen-tlas gone kif ship."
"Kif!"
"And four stsho dead like day old fish. Big damn mess."
She didn't want to owe Haisi a thing. She didn't want to have to ask. But the mahe sat there smiling smugly and knowing she had no choice.
"So? Why?"
"Kif big suspect. Or maybe scare to death."
"Residents here or come in with the ambassador. Don't string it out, out with it."
"You so impatient. Got pretty eyes."
"Who were the stsho?"
"Three resident. One secretary Atli-Iyen-tlas." Another cloud of smoke in the pollution zone. "I got photo, you want see?"
He reached into his pouch and pulled them out. She leaned over gingerly and took the offering, fanned them in her fingers. Not a pretty sight, no, especially the close-ups. "What did they die of?"
"Poison, maybe. Maybe scare to death. Stsho delicate."
"Where'd you get these?"
"Got cousin in station office."
"You got cousins everywhere."
"Big-"
"Big family. You said."
"Same like Chanur. Big fam'ly. Influ-ential fam'ly."
"I'm a merchant captain trying to make a living! I've got no influence with my aunt, I don't know her business, she doesn't know mine, we don't speak!"
"Hear same. Sad, fam'ly quarrel."
"None of your business.''
The waiter set the drinks down. Iced fruit for Ana-kehnandian and iced tea for her. Intoxicating tea. She sipped hers carefully.
"What's the truth?" she asked. "Who's your Personage aligned with? Who does she do business with?
What's her connection to my aunt or does she have one?"
"A. You want I say my Personage business."
"Might increase my trust of you."
Another puff on the smoke-stick. "You long time on The Pride, now you not speak? What story?"
"Not your business either."
"You clan head."
"I am. In name. Ker Pyanfar appointed me."
"You not forgive her for that, a?"
"Maybe not. What's it to do with anything?"