"There's a treasure right here on Decades," Hawtry said, pretending that he didn't realize he was being ignored, "and I've located it. The Feds here are too cowardly to grab it up themselves!"
A freighter was docked at the far edge of the perimeter, nearly a kilometer from the administration building. That ship had taken much of the Mizpah gunners' attention. One blast of charged particles had struck her squarely, vaporizing a huge hole. The shock of exploding metal dished in the light-metal hull for half its length and set fire to the vessel's interior. Dirty smoke billowed from the wreck and drifted through the nearby fenceline.
I couldn't imagine any purpose in shooting at the freighter beyond a general desire to terrorize the defenders. In all likelihood, the Feds stationed here wouldn't have been aroused to defense except for the sudden blaze of cannonfire.
Blakey whipped off the broad-brimmed hat which he, like many experienced Venerian travelers, wore under an open sky. "Mister Ricimer," he blurted, "I didn't have any choice. It was Mister Hawtry who-"
"May I remind you that I gave you specific direction to land a kilometer north of the Federation compound, Captain Blakey?" Ricimer said in a knife-edged voice. "No one but the Lord God Almighty takes precedence to the orders I give on this expedition!"
"No sir, no sir," Blakey mumbled, wringing his hat up in a tight double roll. The spacer's hair was solidly dark, but there was a salting of white hair in his beard and mustache.
"Now, wait a minute, Ricimer," Hawtry said. He remained on the porch, ten meters away. The Federation personnel about him were easing away, leaving the gentlemen exposed like spines of basalt weathered out of softer stone.
"The Mizpah's condition?" Ricimer snapped.
"We'll jack up the port side to repair the outrigger," Blakey said. He grimaced at his crumpled hat. "Then we'll switch the thruster nozzle, we've spares aboard, it's no-"
"You lost only one thruster?" Ricimer demanded, his tongue sharp as the blade of a microtome.
"Well, maybe shock cooling from the soil took another," Blakey admitted miserably. "We won't know till we get her up, but it's no more than three days' work with the locals to help."
I noticed that one of the Federation personnel was a petite woman who'd cropped her brunette hair short. She nervously watched the byplay among her captors, gripping her opposite shoulders with her well-formed hands.
I wondered if we'd be on Decades longer than three days. Although a great deal could happen in three days.
"Look here, Ricimer!" boomed Hawtry as he stepped off the porch in a determination to use bluster where camaraderie had failed. "The Molts that have escaped from here, they loot the ships that crash into the swamps. There've been hundreds, over the years, and the Molts have all the treasure cached in one place. That's the real value of Decades!"
Ricimer turned his head to look at Hawtry. I couldn't see his eyes, but the six gentlemen stepping from the porch to follow lurched to a halt.
"The real value of Decades, Mister Hawtry," Ricimer said in a tone without overt emotion, "was to be the training it gave our personnel in discipline and obedience to orders."
Ricimer turned to the men who'd accompanied him from the flagship. "Dole," he said mildly, "find the communications center here and inform the Absalom and Kinsolving to land within the perimeter. Oh-and see if you can raise Guillermo aboard the Porcelain to tell them that we're in control of the base."
"I'll go with him," I volunteered in a light voice. "I, I'm good with electronics."
"Yes," Ricimer said. "Do it."
Dole didn't move. I started toward the administration building as an obvious place to look for the radios. Stephen Gregg laid a hand on the top of my shoulder without looking away from Ricimer and the gentlemen beyond. I stopped and swallowed.
Ricimer swiveled back to the Mizpah's captain. "Mister Blakey," he said. "You'll leave repairs to the Mizpah in the charge of your navigator. You'll proceed immediately to the Porcelain, in company with Mister Hawtry and the other gentlemen adventurers who were aboard the Mizpah when you decided to ignore my orders."
"Lord take you for a fool, Ricimer!" Hawtry said. "If you think I'm going to rot in a swamp when-"
Gregg locked down his helmet visor with a sharp clack. The flashgun's discharge was liable to blind anyone using it without filters to protect his eyes. Dole snicked the bolt of his rifle back far enough to check the load, then closed it again. Others of Ricimer's longtime crewmen stood braced with ready weapons. A cutting bar whined as somebody made sure it was in good order.
"There'll be no blasphemy in a force under my command, Mister Hawtry," Ricimer said. Though his voice seemed calm, his face was pale with anger. "This time I will overlook it; and we'll hope the Lord, Who is our only hope for the success of these endeavors, will overlook it as well."
Hawtry stepped backward, chewing on his lower lip. He wasn't a coward, but the muzzle of Gregg's weapon was only two meters from his chest. A bolt at that range would spray his torso over hectares of swamp.
Ricimer's posture eased slightly. He reached into his belt pouch, handed Blakey the compass from it, and resumed. "You will find the Porcelain on a reciprocal of this course. Tell Mister Salomon that your party will guard the vessel until we're ready to depart. The crew will be more comfortable here at the base, I'm sure."
Hawtry let out a long, shuddering breath. "We'll need men to deal with the menial work," he said.
Ricimer nodded. "If you care to pay sailors extra to act as servants," he said, "that's between you and them."
Hawtry glanced over his shoulder at the accompanying gentlemen. Without speaking further, the group sidled away in the direction of the Mizpah and the gear they'd left aboard her.
Gregg opened his visor. His face had no expression.
Dole plucked at my sleeve. "Let's get along and find the radio room, sir," the bosun said. "You know, I thought things were going to get interesting for a moment there."
I tried to smile but couldn't. I supposed I should be thankful that I could walk normally.
DECADES
Day 8
I turned at the console to look out the window of the commo room. Halfway across the compound, male prisoners from the Decades garrison and the damaged freighter were unloading spoiled stores from the Absalom 231. With my left hand I picked a section from the half orange while my right fingers typed code into the numeric keypad.
"That's it!" said Lavonne. She'd been Officer III (Communications) Cartier when Decades Station was under Federation control. "You've got the signal, Jeremy!"
"Thanks to you and this wonderful equipment," I added warmly, patting my hand toward Lavonne without quite touching her. I pursed my lips as I looked over the console display. "Now if only the Mizpah's hardware weren't a generation past the time it should've been scrapped. ."
The console showed the crew emptying the hulk, from the viewpoint of the port-side optical sensors in the Mizpah's hull. Occasionally some of the Venerians and Molts replacing the Mizpah's damaged thrusters came in sight at the lower edge of the display, oblivious of the fact they were being electronically observed. Because the Mizpah's sensors only updated the image six times a second, the picture was grainy and figures moved in jerks.