But he said none of that. “I don’t know what to think,” Derec said, frustration thick in his voice.
“I think the key’s still hidden wherever Aranimas kept it. Jacobson didn’t mention the key because he doesn’t know anything about it. He’s just worried about the ship in general.”
“He knows. I’m sure of it,” Derec said stubbornly.
“Look, if Jacobson knows about the key and the robots found it, then it went out onFariis. Which means he has it by now. End of story.”
“Not necessarily,” Derec said, shaking his head. “The packets are contract haulers, not Nexonian nationals. Do you think he’d trust them with something that’s probably ten times more valuable than their whole fleet contract? For that matter, do you think he’d put it on an unarmed vessel with the raiders still sitting out there somewhere trying to figure out how to get it back?”
“What, then?”
“Put yourself in their shoes. First you protect your find from being disturbed, and then you get together a team to go retrieve and investigate it. As long as you’ve done the first one right, you can take your time doing the second. They’ll be here when they’ve assembled the people and the hardware they need. At the very least they’ll need to scare up a bulk freighter to carry the spacecraft back and a warship to give the raiders second thoughts.”
Katherine sighed. “What a mess. Maybe we ought to just let them have it.”
“The hell with that,” Derec spat. “As long as Aranimas doesn’t have the key, and the raiders don’t attack, and Jacobson is still on Nexon-we’ve got a chance.”
“But it’s a race.”
“Yes. It’s a race. And we can’t wait around for you to get a clean bill of health from Dr. Galen before we start,” Derec said pointedly, bracing for an argument.
The argument never came. “You’re right,” she said simply, swinging her legs over the side of the bed and feeling for the floor. “Where to?”
Before that question could be considered, there was Dr. Galen to deal with. The robot came bursting into the room before Katherine’s bare feet even had a chance to pick up a chill from the floor.
“Please return to the bed, patient Katherine,” Dr. Galen requested. “Florence can see to whatever needs you might have.”
Derec was girding himself for another protracted argument, but Katherine surprised him. “I’ll go where I want when I want,” she snapped. “And if you start trying to act like a warden instead of a doctor I’ll have your brain reprogrammed for basket-weaving.”
“I must protest strongly-”
“Am I in danger of dying?”
“No, patient Katherine. But your recovery-”
“Then save your protest for your medical log: ‘Patient Katherine Burgess disregarded recommended rehabilitation program.’ Isn’t that the phraseology? Derec and I are going for a walk. If you don’t want me catching pneumonia you’d better get me some normal clothes. And something for my feet.”
Any human addressed in that tone would have been clenching his fists and strongly considering using them. But Dr. Galen only nodded slightly. “I will have clothing brought.”
“If it’s not here in five minutes I’m going out like this,” she warned him. “And don’t get any ideas about following us around. If I have any problems, Derec will be there to bring me back.”
When the robot left, Derec stared at Katherine in amazement. “How’d you learn how to do that?”
She shrugged. “Medical robots are as bossy as they come, but they can’t make it stick unless you’re really in some danger. I’m not.”
“All the same, it would have taken me twenty minutes to get to the same point, if I’d ever gotten there at all.”
“That’s because you always let yourself get suckered into arguing with the robots. I just give them orders. Much more efficient.”
“I guess it is, sometimes,” Derec said. “But you ought to know, in about four hours your dermal analgesic is going to wear off and your skin is going to start feeling like someone’s scraping it off with a spatula.”
As Derec spoke, Florence entered, wordlessly laid a sleeveless jump suit and a pair of foot pillows on the end of the bed, and then left.
“Thanks for the warning. Let’s make a point of being back in three and a half,” Katherine said. “Now get out of here while I change.”
By the time Katherine emerged from the ward, Derec had decided to go along with her proposal that they look for Aranimas’s ship first. He had several reasons for surrendering that the ship was the last known location of the key, that even if the key had been found and removed it might logically be kept nearby. But the most important reason was that if he didn’t show her early that she was wrong, she’d soon be trying to order him around as she did the robots.
The electronic map on the wall of the lobby offered little help, Rockliffe Station was built out of three connected spheres. The central sphere, called C Section, contained some forty levels from top to bottom. Two satellite spheres barely half as large were anchored to it by cylindrical pylons only a few levels in diameter.
Large areas within the station’s outline were colored black and labeled “Inactive.” No amount of coaxing could persuade the map’s controller to reveal what facilities were in those areas or even show the traffic grid.
Less than fifteen percent of C Section was drawn in with the pale blue color, labels, and identifying symbols of the active zone. Most of E Section, which contained the known dock facilities, was blue. But W Section, together with its connecting pylon, was completely black.
“There,” Katherine said, pointing to W Section. “They probably had an east terminal and a west terminal.”
“Symmetrical design,” Derec agreed. “Makes sense.”
“It’s a good place to start, anyway.”
“Let’s hope that those sections are just closed down, not closed off.”
The hospital was located near the center of C Section, three levels down from the main thoroughfare. Together, Katherine and Derec climbed up to the main level and headed west. There were no physical barriers, though the four-lane express slidewalk was not operating, obliging them to walk.
But past the boundary of subsection 42, the corridor lights were out and the directional “lightworms” were off. Based on what he had seen during his earlier excursion, Derec had thought that might be the case. He had hoped for either a local control option or a presence sensor, but in vain. With eighteen subsections of blackness ahead of them, they were forced to turn back.
They recruited the first robot they encountered to show them where hand lanterns were kept, and soon returned to the subsection 42 threshold. The beams of the powerful portable lights stabbed deep into the cavelike corridor and created a cozy island of light around them. But they were very aware of the darkness beyond, the way their footsteps echoed hollowly, the chill of the unused spaces they were entering.
Ten minutes of walking brought them to the great triple pressure seal doors at the outerboundary of C Section. The doors were resting retracted in their grooves, apparently deactivated. Past the interlock, the throughway narrowed to a single-lane slidewalk in each direction with far fewer jumpoffs and side passages than before.
Derec expected to find robots guarding the entry to W Section, and told Katherine so. But when they reached the far end of the slidewalk, they were still alone. The west docks were there, just as they had guessed. But the main public entrance to the complex was not even locked.
“No guards, no locks,” Derec said as they stood on the threshold. “This looks very bad. Maybe they had one of the tugs take the ship and stand off a hundred klicks from the base.”
“Let’s find out,” Katherine said, starting ahead.
If the west docks were being held for possible military use as Dr. Galen had implied, it was merely as a line item on some logistics officer’s list of resources. There was no sign that the complex had even been or ever would be anything other than a general purpose cargo and passenger transfer node. All the familiar facilities were there: Import Registry, Customs, the travelers’ Personals.