"Why this course, to St. Lawrence?" Piet asked suddenly. "It's a week's transit in the wrong direction if you intend to return to the Solar System."
"Reaction mass," Cinpeda grunted. "I wonder, master, could you. ."
He extended his tiny glass. I filled it from the carafe.
"Ah, thank you, thank you indeed, master," the Southern captain said. He shuddered as he tossed the shot down, but his eyes gained a focus that had been missing a moment before.
"Reaction mass," Cinpeda repeated. "Prothero's crew, they'd refilled the air tanks when they landed on Riel, but they hadn't hooked up to the water yet. Food we had, air we had, but there wasn't water for ten days under power."
"There is water here, isn't there?" Rodrigo asked in sudden concern as he gazed around him. The planet must have looked like a desert from orbit, and the slight greenery of this arroyo wasn't much more inviting.
"We've bored a well," Piet said. "You can draw from it, now that we've topped off."
"If you were trying to escape," Stephen asked, "why did you land by us-and without signaling?"
"Fucking collimator's out," Cinpeda said with a scowl. "On the laser communicator. Fucking thing drifts. And the VHF transmitter, it's been wonky since they installed it."
He looked as though he was going to ask for another drink. I shook my head minutely.
"We thought you'd done the same thing we did," Rodrigo said, answering the first part of the question. "Come here to get away from Prothero. We knew other ships escaped when we did."
"Didn't even notice this one before we landed," Cinpeda said with a nod toward the Oriflamme. "What is it-don't you reflect radar?"
I shrugged. Ceramic hulls did reflect radar, but not as strongly as a similar expanse of metal. The Oriflamme was an outcrop in the gully to a radar operator unless the fellow was actively looking for a Venerian ship here.
"And there was no reason to come to this place," Carmen added, "except to avoid being on Riel. So we thought you might be from the Southern Cross too, until we saw your guns."
"Does your vessel carry guns?" Stephen said. There was no challenge in his tone, only the certainty of a man who will be answered.
"A small cannon," Rodrigo said. "For the Chay, and perhaps not much use against them. We can't defend ourselves against you, sirs."
Piet stood up with a nod. "Nor do you need to," he said. "We have our own needs and can be of little help to you, but we certainly won't hinder."
"How long will you remain on this planet?" Carmen asked without looking-pointedly without looking-at me.
"No longer than it takes to mount two more thruster nozzles, madam," Piet said with a wry grin. "Which is some hours longer than I wish it would be, now that you've arrived."
"Are we so terrible?" Carmen said in surprise.
"The people who may follow you are," I explained gently. "The Feds know how much reaction mass they left on your ship, and they've got the same pilotry data as you do to pick the possible landfalls."
"But we'll deal with them, if it comes to that," Stephen said, hefting his flashgun. His eyes had no life and no color, and his voice was as dry as the wind.
No Federation force would be half so terrible as we ourselves were.
"Piet?" I said as I stood up. "The Abraxis has a first-rate commo suite. If you'll let Guillermo help me, I can swap it into the Hercules in less time than it takes Winger to fit the nozzles."
"That leaves the Abraxis without. ." Piet said. He smiled. "Ah. One ship or the other."
"And the choice to the men with the guns," Stephen said. He was smiling also, though his expression and Piet's had little in common. "As usual."
"Yes," Piet said. "Go ahead."
"Guillermo!" I shouted as I ran for the forward hatch and my tool kit. "We've got a job!"
The Oriflamme's siren shut off as Guillermo and I clambered aboard the 17 Abraxis. Piet had held the switch down for thirty seconds to call the crew aboard. Men were scattered from here to the Hercules. Hell, some had probably wandered off in the other direction for reasons best known to themselves.
When the alarm sounded; Fed prisoners returning the sledge to the 17 Abraxis slacked the drag ropes to see what was happening. The Molts continued to pace forward. Maher, one of the pair on guard this watch, punched a Fed between the shoulder blades with his rifle butt.
The prisoner yelped. He turned. Maher prodded his face with the gun muzzle. The Feds resumed the duties they'd been set.
"We don't want to screw up the navigational equipment when we lift this," I said to Guillermo as I tapped the freighter's communications module. "Do you know if any of the hardware or software is common?"
"No, Jeremy," the Molt said. "I could build it from parts, of course, since one of my ancestors did that a thousand years ago."
Guillermo's thorax clicked his race's equivalent of laughter. His three-fingered hands played across the navigation console. "What we can do, though, is to bring up the AI and keep it running while we separate the communications module and attempt to run it."
"Right," I said. Molts were supposed to operate by rote memory while humans displayed true, innovative intelligence. That's what made us superior to them. You bet.
I bent to check the join between the module and the main console. The speaker snapped, "Presidential-
I jumped upright, grabbing my cutting bar with both hands to unhook it. The only reason I carried the weapon was I hadn't thought to remove it after we returned from the Hercules.
"— Vessel Keys to the Kingdom calling ships on St. Lawrence! Do not attempt to lift. You will be boarded by Federation personnel. Any attempt at resistance will cause you both to be destroyed by gunfire. Respond at once! Over."
The commo screen was blanked by a nacreous overlay: the caller could, but chose not to, broadcast video.
"Stay in the image!" I said to Guillermo. Venerian ships didn't have Molt crew members.
The voice had said, ". . you both. ." The Feds had made the same mistake as Captain Cinpeda: they'd seen the metal-hulled vessels, but they'd missed the Oriflamme in her gully.
My fingers clicked over the module's keyboard. It was an excellent unit, far superior to the normal run of commo gear we produced on Venus. I careted a box in the upper left corner of the pearly field for the Oriflamme.
Piet looked at me, opening his mouth. I ignored him and said, "Freighter David out of Clapperton to Presidential Vessel, we're laid up here replacing a feedline and our consort's commo is screwed up. What the hell's got into you, over?"
Guillermo stood with his plastron bowed outward. He scratched the grooves between belly plates with a finger from either hand. I'd never seen him do anything of the sort before. The activity looked slightly disgusting-and innocent, like a man picking his nose.
"Who are you?" demanded the voice from the module. "Who is this speaking? Over!"
Piet nodded approvingly. At least he thought we looked like the sort of folks you'd find on the bridge of a Federation merchantman. .
"This is Captain Jeremy Moore!" I said, tapping my chest with the point of my thumb. "Who are you, boyo? Some bleeding Molt, or just so pig-faced ugly that you're afraid to let us see you? Over!"
Through the open hatch I saw men staggering aboard the Oriflamme. Sailors' lives involved both danger and hard work, but their normal activities didn't prepare them to run half a klick when the alarm sounded.