"But—" She got up unsteadily and headed for the bar. "That's crazy. I can't claim salvage unless I fly out to the thing."
To her dismay Max nodded. "You've got to physically visit the wreck to establish your claim. If you don't within a reasonable amount of time, it'll go to whoever gets there first. And that is why you are in trouble. The cycler's going to be beyond our reach in a matter of days or weeks. Anything that's done has to be done now.
"It gets worse, too. Think of it— this is a cycler! A cycler! We haven't seen one in… what? Twenty years? If it really is a ghost ship, its value is incalculable. Since the lit worlds abandoned us, the Compact is in trouble anyway; but as long as the remaining cyclers are loyal, it controls travel between the halo worlds. A cycler in the control of the Treya government means they could challenge the Compact itself. In other words, this cycler is valuable enough to kill for.
"Since you're completely impoverished, there's two possibilities: either somebody funds an expedition for you— and uses you as a powerless figurehead— or they block you from going somehow, leave you scrabbling in the muck— or dead— and go out there themselves. Which is by far the better option from almost anybody's point of view. That's why they were converging on you earlier— the wolves smell blood and it's more likely to be yours than anybody's.
"So drink up. Tomorrow's going to be a mess."
Rue had uncorked a bottle of sherry, hoping it would taste better than the scotch. She resealed it and put her glass down. "This somebody who's going to fund the expedition," she said. "Would that happen to be you?"
Max scratched under his chin. "Maybe."
"So I'd be your 'powerless figurehead, then?"
"Oh, look around you, Rue. I have money. I don't do anything with it. Why should I want more? Truth is, I've never found much worth taking it out of the bank for."
"Then why help me?"
Max didn't answer for a long time; he just sat on the couch like a broken doll, staring straight ahead. Finally he said, "Mother has started a court case against me. She claims I was still a minor when I won my money. It's not strictly true, but true enough… This time she's got the best lawyers and… I don't think I can win. You see, Rue, I expect I'm going to lose all of this to her and sooner rather than later. So it's a case of using it while I've got it.
"And frankly, I can't think of a better way to thwart Mother than by making you rich beyond your wildest dreams."
RUE HAD STAGGERED off to sleep shortly after Max made his proposal. She lay in bed for a while thinking about what was involved in catching a ghost cycler and concluded that the whole thing was impossible. First, the starship was retreating almost as fast as light itself and for all they knew it was just a tangle of dead radioactive metal— except for the plow sail, which was an electromagnetic ramjet and presumably too hot to get near anyway.
Whatever expedition was able to catch up with the thing would need to bring it under control and turn it. She wasn't too clear on how starships turned, but knew it was a gradual thing. It might be thirty years before they «cycled» back to Erythrion. She'd have to be crazy to throw away the best part of her life sitting in a cold metal can in the middle of nowhere; that was the existence she'd just come from, after all.
No, it would never happen. Consoled by this thought, Rue found sleep came easily at last.
Morning was different. She awoke to find Max already up and bustling about. He wore the same clothes as last night and hadn't showered, but otherwise he was being frighteningly efficient.
"I've verified that there's an emergency shipbuilding order been put through by the Treya Provisional Government," he said as Rue came into the kitchen, knuckling her eyes. "They've applied to the Order for power to accelerate a cargo to point eight-five light-speed. Seems they're acting already."
"Oh," said Rue as she peered into the fridge. "I guess that settles it, then. They got to the Compact first."
"Doesn't work that way. Your claim has priority. If you apply to the Order for beam power, you'll get it."
"How much would that cost?" she asked as she reached for some fruit juice.
"Four million dites, I reckon."
Rue nearly dropped the juice container. "Four million! You can't be serious!"
Max looked insulted. "I'm good for it. Besides, you're going to pay me back."
"No. No, Max, this is crazy. I just got here, I'm not going back to deep space and exile myself for half my life just to get rich. If that cycler can't sustain life anymore it would be suicide to go there anyway! Let's just drop it."
"Admittedly we need to send a bigger than usual cargo," said Max. "Life support for several years, tools, repair equipment… But it's still doable. And what's this about exiling yourself for half your life? Look, the cycler's going to pass Chandaka in two years— that's one year cycler time. All we have to do is alter the cycler's course to bring it back past Erythrion, then climb back in our cargo magsail and coast to Chandaka. Then we're in FTL space. A holiday among the lit worlds, just think about it! You'll have enough credit at that point to afford an FTL ship to come back here. So you could be home and rich in two years, Rue!"
"Oh." She hadn't considered such an option. "And if I can't change its course?"
"Well, shucks, then we're just stuck in FTL space, on a Rights Economy world. We'll get by."
"You said 'we. Are you coming on this… hypothetical expedition?"
For the first time since she had met him, her cousin looked completely serious. "I wouldn't send you into something I'd be afraid to do myself," said Max.
"Think of it this way," he went on. "I'm proposing we visit the stars. That's a once in a lifetime offer, Rue, you're not going to get it again. We'll just happen to be riding alongside, or maybe in, a cycler we've found."
"When you put it that way…" Of course she had dreamed of visiting FTL space all her life, like anybody else. A realm where people could travel freely between the stars at unbelievable speeds, leaving the crawling cyclers of the halos behind… You could see a hundred different worlds in your life, even visit Earth. It was an unreachable fantasy for almost anyone in the halo; and the Rights Economy was nominally the enemy— it had abandoned the halo worlds, because travelling to them was so expensive. Still, the allure was intoxicating. Rue had never expected to be able to go anywhere except Erythrion, unless she emigrated to another of the orphan planets drifting in interstellar space between Erythrion and Chandaka.
She still didn't really believe what Max was saying; maybe because of this, she said, "Okay. Why not? Let's go to Chandaka."
"That's my girl!"
She held up a finger. "One condition. The cycler is mine." She pointed the finger at herself. "My cycler. Mine mine mine. And my expedition. I'm the captain."
"Fine by me. I'm not the leader type."
"Okay." She was being reckless; it felt good. "Shake?"
Solemnly, Max held out his hand. "Shake."
" F IRST THING I guess we do is apply for the beam power, right?"
"No. Rue, that would tip our hand. Hopefully they don't know where you are right now and I don't want to let them in on it until the last minute. We do all the other essentials before they know you're even in the game. Then we pop it on them."
Rue watched as Max transfered an unbelievable amount of money into the accounts of a dormant, numbered company he'd created years before. With a casual shrug he erased the debt Rue had accumulated for docking her shuttle and sent an offer to Jentry to buy the shuttle. Jentry would jump at it, Rue knew; the offer was absurdly high. Max's logic was that they would do best with a proven shuttle, rather than something right off the shipyard. After all, there would be no shakedown cruise for this expedition.