Al Shei straightened her spine one inch at a time. “Cohen wants to know? Has anyone thought to ask Dobbs what she wants to do?”
Brooke’s face scrunched up in an expression that might have been alarm or simple distaste, Al Shei couldn’t tell. “Dobbs is in solitary confinement right now. We’re trying to get her out.” He turned quickly away and darkened the mirror and both memory boards. One at a time, he lifted them away from the walls and leaned them up against the bunk.
Al Shei just stared at him. “Solitary confinement? An employment guild allows solitary confinement?”
Brooke rested his hand against the mirror frame and nodded.
“That’s uncivilized!” she exclaimed, knowing that the outburst was irrational.
“Probably.” Brooke shrugged and began taking the cloth draperies down from the walls. “But it is reality. Dobbs is in confinement. Cohen and I and a few others are trying to get her out, but she’s going to need a place to go once she gets there. The only place we have to take her is the Pasadena.”
Al Shei felt as if the deck had just tilted under her. “What kind of organization is this? Why doesn’t she just quit?”
Brooke bit his lip and glanced at the open hatchway. “We don’t think she’s going to be allowed to.”
“That’s insane.” This can’t be real. I’m being lied to. Dobbs has done something illegal or…but what could she have done? If she had really broken the law, why didn’t Guild Master Ferrand say something about it?
“It is insane, ‘Dama,” Brooke agreed solemnly, blinking his wide, dark eyes. He was young, Al Shei realized, maybe as young as Ianiai. “It also happens to be the truth.” He cast another glance at the hatchway. Al Shei made no move to close it. “‘Dama, Cohen said you know a little about us, about the Guild. You can understand why there might be fanatics who don’t want Dobbs to just walk away, can’t you?”
“No, I can’t,” she said firmly. “I do not understand one thing about your Guild. This is brutal and irresponsible. You and your colleagues should be mounting a complaint, not engaging in amateur espionage.”
Brooke winced. “Perhaps we should. We want to make some changes, but until we can, it’s important that we get Dobbs out of here. Will you take her, ‘Dama? Please?”
Al Shei swayed on her feet. This was getting to be far, far too much. Maybe we should sell the diaries from this run, Asil, she thought toward the part of her mind that held her husband’s memory. We could pay for The Mirror of Fate off the media adaptation fees. She rubbed her hands together. Brooke, apparently realizing she wasn’t going to answer immediately, moved around the cabin, opening the remaining drawers and packing up the last of Dobbs’ thirty-five pounds worth of possession.
It’s an internal matter. I should leave it, finish the run, go home, get Uncle Ahmet outraged and cut this place open. Brooke disappeared into the bathroom.
But I can’t leave her here. I am not happy with this “guild.” She’s been in the thick of this mess the run’s started, but she risked her ranking, name of God, she risked her whole livelihood to get us to help, that’s clear. She felt the spark of anger glowing inside her again. She remembered Dobbs, tired and overtaxed, doing her best to complete her tasks, not just to deliver the AI to the Fool’s Guild, but to keep the Pasadena’s crew safe and sane.
Brooke came out of the bathroom with a small bag of toiletries in his hand. Al Shei stood up.
“After everything we’ve been through, I’m going to want to run a few extra checks on the feeder lines. We should be ready to leave in four hours. If, after that, it turns out there’s a stowaway aboard, well, that becomes my problem, doesn’t it?”
Brooke, unsmiling, nodded and sealed the satchels. He slung the strap of the first bag across his shoulder. Then, he hoisted the mirror and the memory boards up under one arm and the second satchel under the other. Al Shei left the bare cabin behind him and let the hatch cycle shut.
“I trust you can find your way to the airlock,” she said as they both climbed down the stairs to the data hold. “I’ve got a lot of work to do around here.”
“I understand.” He stopped in front of the hatch and bent reflexively into the Fool’s exiting bow. He caught himself about halfway down and straightened up. He gave a clumsy nod instead.
Al Shei left him and started down for the engineering deck. After a moment, a hatch cycled open and the echoes of Brooke’s footsteps faded to silence. She glanced up and down, the dropshaft was empty.
She leaned across the outer railing to reach a memory board and took out her pen.
Zubedye, she wrote. You need to brush up on maritime law concerning stowaways. I particularly need to know what the captain’s discretionary powers are. She coded it for Resit’s cabin and added the send command. After a couple of seconds, the message faded away.
I’ve heard of more graceful resignation plans, Dobbs, thought Al Shei as she started down the stairs again. But never of one that was more effective.
Dobbs paced around the hospital cabin. There were no windows or books, and, of course, no access boards. The one set of cable jacks had their lids locked down. Pacing was better than just sitting still and thinking. Not much better, but a little.
A flash caught her eye. The door light blinked from red to green. The hatchway opened a moment later. Cohen slipped inside and cycled the hatch shut immediately.
Dobbs’s heart leapt, but whether it was from joy or fear she couldn’t tell.
She ran up to him and grabbed his hand. “What’s going on?”
Cohen squeezed her hand briefly. His face had gone pastey grey. “Dobbs, I’m getting you out of here.”
She tried to pull back. “Cyril…thanks for the thought, but I’m in enough trouble for ten. I don’t want you to…”
Cohen held onto her hand, squeezing it almost to the point of pain. “Dobbs, I know what you pulled out of the personnel files. I touched it as it went by.” She knew he saw the shock in her eyes. “I had to, Evelyn. I had be sure you weren’t the one who was lying.” That hurt, but she couldn’t blame him.
He swallowed hard and his grip relaxed a little but he still didn’t let go. “Evelyn, I eavesdropped on the Guild Master’s session about you. They…they decided to take you apart.”
Dobbs’s heart stopped dead in her chest. “I don’t understand,” she whispered.
Cyril’s eyes were wide and full of turmoil. “Your body is going to be taken apart for the useable material, and you’re not going to be allowed to leave before they do it. They’re going to manufacture an accident for the records.”
Dobbs felt her knees begin to give way. She groped for the bed and sat down heavily. “No. They wouldn’t. Not even for what…for what I’ve done. You’re wrong.”
“I wish I was.” Cyril spread his hands. “I spent an hour trying to convince myself I’d misheard. Maybe I’d gotten garbled data. Anything.” He shook his head. “You’ve got two hours left before the Pasadena leaves. I had Brooke pass a message to Al Shei. If you turn up as a stowaway, she’ll treat it as a personal matter.”
Dobbs pressed her hand against her forehead to try to calm the spinning in her head. She’d already assembled a list of what she had told herself was the worst the Guild could do to her. Lock her up until her body died of old age. Put her on-line under supervision until she was a hundred years old.
Now Cohen, who she’d known since he came to the Guild, was telling her that her masters, their masters, were going to kill her. She couldn’t believe it, and she couldn’t not believe it.
Finally, she raised her head. “And how am I going to stow away?” Her voice had gone hoarse. “Fly through the bulkheads?”