Each of the dark men grabbed an ankle and yanked her down, careless of what her head struck on the way. An attempted karate kick on her part was foiled by brown-silk and turned into what would have been a nasty fall in higher gravity and still didn't look exactly pleasant. Pink-suit pinioned her arms from behind, and brown-silk took the fight out of her with a breath-stopping blow to her stomach.
One on each side, they hustled her away up the corridor ramp toward the emergency exit as pressure-suited Stationer damage control squads began to pour into the chamber from several other entrances.
"They're—they're snatching Quinn!" Ethan cried to Cee. "Who are they? What are they?" He danced from foot to foot in an agony of bewilderment, pulling Cee up.
Cee squinted after them. "Jackson's Whole? Bharaputrans, here? We've got to go after her!"
"Preferably while there's still air to breathe—"
Clinging to each other, they proceeded in a sort of bounding hobble as rapidly as they could across the docking bay and up the ramp.
At the emergency airseal they had to wait for terrifying seconds, working their jaws to protect their ears against the now rapidly decreasing air pressure, while the trio ahead of them cycled through and vacated the personnel lock that permitted escape from blocked chambers. Jabbing at the control button in a panicked tattoo, or even leaning on it, did nothing to hasten the process, Ethan found; the door opened only when it was damn good and ready.
They fell through, and had to wait again while pressure equalized, and Quinn's assailants gained a lengthening head start. Ethan gasped in relief. He had been entirely mistaken about Stationer air; it smelled just great, better than any air he'd ever had.
"How the devil," Ethan panted to Cee as they waited, "did Millisor and Rau ever get out of Quarantine? I thought even a virus couldn't escape it."
"Setti sprang them," Cee panted back. "He came in either along with, or pretending to be, the guard taking them to their deportation dock, I'm not sure which. They walked right out the door. All the documentation and IDs perfect, of course. I don't think even Quinn realizes how far into the Station computer network they'd penetrated in the time they were here."
The emergency airseal lock hissed open at last, and Ethan and Cee staggered up the corridor in hot pursuit of a quarry now out of sight. They bumped to a halt at the first cross-corridor.
Cee, his arm flung out, turned in a circle a couple of times like a damaged clockwork mechanism. "That way," he pointed to their left.
"You sure?"
"No."
They galloped down it anyway. At the next cross-corridor they were rewarded by the sound of a familiar alto voice, raised in protest, wafting from the right. They followed on, to come out in a stark freight flex-tube foyer.
The man in chocolate-brown silk had Quinn shoved up facing a wall, her arms twisted behind her. Her toes stretched and sought the floor, without success.
"Come on, Commander," the man in pink was saying, "We haven't got time for this. Where is it?"
"Wouldn't dream of keeping you," she replied in a rather smeary voice, as her face was being squashed sideways into the wall. "Ow! Hadn't you better run off to your embassy before Security gets here? They'll be all over the place after that bomb blast."
The man in pink whirled, raising his plasma gun, as Ethan and Cee skidded into the foyer. "Wait," Cee said, his hand restraining Ethan's arm.
"Friends!" Quinn shrieked, twitching. "Friends, friends, don't fire, we're all friends here!"
"We are?" Ethan, winded and dizzy, dubiously absorbed the tableau before him.
"Mercenaries who take money for contracts they can't carry out don't have friends," growled brown-silk. "At least, not for long."
"I was working on it," argued Quinn. "You goons have no appreciation of subtlety. Besides, you can litter the place with corpses and run off to the protection of your House consul. No skin off you if you're deported and declared persona non grata on Kline Station forever. Not only do I have to play by different rules, but I wanna be able to come back here someday. Let's try for a little finesse, huh?"
"You've had nearly six months for finesse. Baron Luigi wants the House's money back," said pink-silk. "That's the only subtlety I have to appreciate."
Brown-silk lifted Quinn a few more centimeters.
"Ow, ow, all right, no problem!" yammered Quinn. "Your credit chit is in my right inner jacket pocket. Help yourselves."
"And just where is your jacket?"
"Millisor took it off me. It's back in the docking bay. Ow, no, honest!"
There was a disgusted pause. "It could be the truth," mused pink-silk.
"Docking bay's crawling with Station Security by now," brown-silk pointed out. "It could be a trick."
"Look, fellas, let's be reasonable about this, huh?" said Quinn. "Luigi's deal was half in advance and half on delivery. Now, I already took care of Okita. That's one-quarter right there."
"We have only your word for that. I haven't seen a body," said pink-silk.
"Finesse, Gen'ral, finesse."
"Major," pink-silk corrected automatically.
"And it was I who took out Setti in the docking bay just now. That's half. Seems to me we're even."
"With our bomb," said brown-silk.
"You gonna argue with results? Look, are we allies, or not?"
"Not," said brown-silk, and elevated her slightly more.
Voices, and a clatter of boots and equipment, echoed down the corridor from the direction of the docking bay. Pink-silk shoved his plasma arc into a holster out of sight under his embroidered jacket. "Time's up."
"Are you going to let this slide?" demanded brown-silk.
Pink-silk shrugged. "Call it even at half-pay. You right-handed or left-handed, Quinn?"
"Right-handed."
"Take the Baron's interest out of her left arm, and let's go."
Brown-silk, quite deliberately, let Quinn drop, achieved an arm-bar, and popped her left elbow. The muffled cartilaginous crack was quite audible. Quinn made no other sound. Again, Cee restrained Ethan's forward lurch. The pair of Bharaputrans stepped delicately into the nearest lift-tube, and sank from sight.
"Damn, I thought they'd never leave," Quinn sighed. "The last thing I need is for Security to catch up with those guys and start comparing notes." She slithered greenly to a seat on the floor, her back propped against the wall. "I want to go back to combat duty. I don't think I like this Intelligence stuff as well as Admiral Naismith said I would."
Ethan cleared his throat. "You, ah—need a doctor, Commander?"
She grinned wanly. "Yeah. Do you?"
"Yeah." Ethan sat down rather heavily beside her. His ears still rang, and the chamber walls seemed to pulsate. He mulled over her comment. "This isn't by chance your first Intelligence assignment, is it?"
"Yep."
"Just my luck." The floor beckoned; never had friction plating looked so soft and inviting.
"Security's coming," she observed. She glanced up at Cee, hovering in anxious but helpless solicitude. "What do you say we do them a favor, and simplify the scenario for them? Get gone, Mr. Cee. If you walk and don't run, those green coveralls will carry you right past 'em. Go to work or something."
"I—I…" Terrence Cee spread his hands. "What can I ever do to repay you? Either of you?"
She winked. "Never fear, I'll think of something. Meantime, I haven't seen any telepaths around here today. Have you, Doctor?"
"Not a one," agreed Ethan blandly.
Terrence Cee shook his head in frustration, glanced up the corridor, and faded into the Up lift tube.
When Security finally arrived, they arrested Quinn.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN