“Violation?” Killeen bristled. “We sailed into this place in search—”
“Appearing out of the Far Black like that, you set off alarms. The Regency had to muster defenses. You might have been mech, after all.”
“We fly an ancient human ship!”
“Deception runs rife in the Far Black. And you sent no forward-hailer to let us know. Defense costs money, rebble-dep, time, trouble. A debt that must be paid in the work-house.” The judge shrugged. “Simple social justice.”
Killeen stiffened. Bishops were not merely scavengers; they had always traded with the other Families, to good advantage. There had even been a time, the infamous Accommodation, when Families bargained with mechs. Killeen said shrewdly, “Maybe we’re carrying something of interest to you.”
The judge tossed her hair with feigned disinterest. “What could you possibly have?”
“Fresh samples of space plants from a molecular cloud.”
Killeen waved forward Cermo, who added, “We’re regrowing them. Good eating.”
“Ummm. Regional delicacies? Marginal at best.” The judge looked off into space.
Killeen said quickly, “We carry tech we’ve picked up from our homeworld.”
“Ummm.” No reaction.
“And from another. Some strange artifacts. Ancient, maybe.”
“More planet-level goods?” The judge looked bored. “We get rafts and rafts of it when immigrants pour in.”
“Well . . .” Killeen glanced at Toby. “We’re carrying an alien.”
The judge brightened. “What phylum?”
“Myriapodia.”
Her mouth turned down with surprise, then snapped back into a canny flat line. “You’re sure?”
Not a good recovery, Toby thought wryly. And how could anybody mistake Quath for something else? Killeen said offhandedly, “She captured me on the last planet we visited. I got to know her pretty well.”
“She? I didn’t know they had sexes.” The judge blinked, plainly dumbfounded.
“Several, as far as I can tell.” Now it was Killeen’s turn to fake disinterest. “They’re complicated. Good memories, too. She’s told us a lot about the Myriapodia’s heritage.”
“Excellent, excellent. There is certainly a market for that information.” The judge thumbed her desk, glanced at a fresh display in the top, nodded. “I could probably negotiate a suspension of your work-house duties if the proper authorities could have some time with this alien. I assume you’re holding it under strict arrest?”
Killeen looked shocked and Toby knew it was real. “She’s a friend.”
“Sure, fine, no offense. You realize this will take some delicate negotiations? Experts will have to journey here from ’way out in the esty. Given the cross-shifts, we’ll have to—”
“Good. See to it.” Killeen was his commanding self again. “We’ve got other business here and we’ll pursue it.”
The judge glanced at her desk again and seemed to receive a message. “The alien, that is an important issue. We would prefer to have it under our control until—”
“Naysay!” Killeen said angrily. “She’ll be with us.”
The judge hesitated, then her eyes narrowed. “How do we know you’ve really got this Myriapod?”
“We’ll bring her ashore,” Killeen said simply.
“What? Here? But that could be dangerous.”
“Not to us.”
She looked alarmed. “Those things killed people without pity.” Toby recalled Quath’s casual references to how she and her kind had thought of humans as Noughts, beings who didn’t matter a jot on the Myriapodia’s scale of things. And her forerunners had hunted primate-type species. Maybe people here were slow to forget—or knew something he didn’t.
“I’ll guarantee your safety,” Killeen said airily, plainly enjoying himself now. “And I won’t even charge you extra.”
Toby could tell that Cermo was having trouble containing his laughter. Then he looked behind them. Somehow, without their noticing it, a dozen people had quietly come into the big room and were standing at the back. They didn’t look threatening but they didn’t smile either. They wore small, rectangular backpacks and looked authoritative. This was serious stuff.
“Very well,” the judge said. “Please bring the alien here.”
“Not so fast,” Killeen countered. “I want some information.”
“I can assure you that you’ll be properly briefed once—”
“Now.”
“I suppose we could compromise somewhat—”
“And your Andro here, he said something about a message waiting for us.”
“In due time—”
“Same time as you question Quath. No later.”
She pursed her lips, paused, and then nodded to the people at the back of the room. “I would appreciate it if you would send a few of your people along with mine here. They can work out the transfer of the alien to our control.”
“Hey, you won’t own Quath,” Toby put in.
The judge looked at Toby as if seeing him for the first time, and not much liking the result. “We will establish proprietary ownership of the information we gain from—”
“You just take it for granted that Quath will talk to you at all,” Toby said rapidly, looking at his father. “Plenty times, she won’t say a peep.”
“I believe that is a technical matter for the teams which will be sent to interrogate and—”
“Just a second here,” Killeen said. “Toby’s right. You got to handle Quath just so, or you won’t get a used fart out of her.”
The judge blinked. “A used . . . ? I shall assume that was hyperbole, a figure of speech.”
Cermo chuckled and Toby remembered how Quath had built her complex warren, sticking it together with her own feces. “Not entirely,” Toby said, and smiled mysteriously.
The judge regarded Toby skeptically. “Then perhaps we can enlist your aid. Someone who could help us talk with the Myriapod?”
The other Bishops were looking at Toby. He said, “I suppose so. What you do with whatever Quath decides to tell you, that’s your business. But we’re not handing her over to you. She stays with us.”
The judge paused, studying the surface of her desk, then glancing at the others in the back of the room. Mildly, but with a clear threat, she said, “I don’t think you are in a position to dictate terms.”
Killeen turned and gazed steadily at the people behind them. The other Bishops also did an about-face, standing with knees and elbows slightly bent, hands ready to move. A long, silent moment stretched.
Toby saw his father’s point. These people had tech probably beyond theirs, but they were still human. A lot of communication was not talk, but presence, and the Bishops towered over these other men and women. Jocelyn and Toby, the shortest, still were half again the height of these arrogant dwarves.
Killeen let this fact work on the room, and then said, “I expect you to abide by the letter and intent of our agreement.”
The judge paused, sensing the situation. Then she smiled for the first time. “It is pleasant to encounter a visitor who understands the nuances of negotiation.” She held out a hand. “Monisque, I’m called by my friends. My enemies prefer shorter words. Let’s get our terms worked out in detail. Then maybe we can all have a drink.”
Some human rituals were eternal. Toby had no doubt that the drinks would contain a liberal lacing of alcohol.
FIVE
Trans-History
Quath clambered along beside them, clanging and scraping through Andro’s reception area. She had been forced to squeeze through the loading docks and equipment bays of the port, because the personnel areas were hopelessly small. Toby could have sworn that Quath had added some more legs into the bargain, but the knobby steel shanks moved so fast, her pneumatic joints wheezing, that it was hard to tell.