Interesting, Bren thought. His aishid and the dowager’s had both urged a little caution with them. Yet on one level he did know exactly what they were doing: he knew the techniques himself.
Banichi said quietly, when they were close to the spaceport, and when everybody was moving about collecting luggage, “They are hearing, Bren-ji. They are impressed.”
That was good to hear. But this battle-scarred unit had only met one human in their lives and never had to cope with them en masse. Where they were going was a very different place than they had ever planned.
· · ·
The same bus waited at the station, with the same security personnel, and a similar exchange of codes—but this time there was no baggage truck. All that had already gone aboard. There was just the hand luggage. Bren allowed Jago to take the computer as they walked across the platform to the bus, and she would stow it—the one thing he would keep by him. His bodyguard had their single bag apiece, and Narani and the others had each a very small personal kit. Cajeiri’s four—had a bit more, but they would manage.
There was the long dusty drive up to the gate, and through, then the smooth, slow movement up to the yellow hazard line. Their shuttle waited out on the runway, in a cluster of service vehicles.
This time they walked between the painted lines and boarded by the personnel lift, which raised up and let them out into a pale modern interior. The baji-naji symbol of the space program was blazoned on every seat back and on the bulkhead door. The flight deck lay just beyond that thick bulkhead connection.
It might have been any modern airliner, except for the complete lack of windows, except for that unusual bulkhead door.
There were active screens at every seat, and what they showed as they settled in was the preparation going on around the shuttle, the movement of trucks and personnel.
They secured their luggage, such as it was. Ilisidi beckoned Cajeiri to sit by her, with Cenedi and the rest of the bodyguard and staff directly behind.
Bren and company took seats opposite, and the Guild observers sat behind them. Behind them, domestic staff settled in, most of them veterans of previous flights, able to instruct the novices.
The seat backs had a written admonition to use the provided tethers and clip to the rails when moving fore or aft. The interior was far more refined these days, the rules more defined, polished by experience over the years, and he knew the incidents where some of the rules had originated. Moving workers up to the station, the problems had echoed to his desk in the early years.
A different set of priorities was on their horizon. A different set of worries and problems. There was no longer a need for security from assassination, not here, not now, not until the shuttle let them out in what was definitely another world—and even then, the problems Tillington posed were of a different sort.
So just as well to shut the door on Earth for a while. The rest of the planet, in learning that they had visitors coming, would get a further bit of news—that the dowager, the heir, and the paidhi-aiji were all going up to deal with these expected visitors, further developments to follow. And that meant that the station necessarily would find it out. They’d advised Geigi the news was going to break on Earth. Tillington, where the news had already broken, would be aware an atevi shuttle was coming express. Presumably he would learn the Mospheiran shuttle was launching uncommonly close behind it, which in Tillington’s mind would immediately suggest both were related to the emergency, and that there was going to be a conflict of scheduling at the station’s single personnel dock . . . among other complications.
The orderly conduct of the Mospheiran side, and coordinating the unprecedented situation of an atevi shuttle and a Mospheiran shuttle en route that close together was the last reliance they hoped to place on Tillington.
Tillington should naturally conclude under the circumstances that the Mospheiran shuttle was bringing some sort of Presidential response, to which he would have to answer.
Maybe Tillington would conclude in his own head that he should get things in good administrative order and not roil the waters.
They settled in, disposed items where they had to be for safety as well as convenience. The special routing would shave a good twelve hours off their flight—but there would still be a very long time spent in these seats, a long time under acceleration and an equally long and generally uncomfortable braking at the end, after the body had been some time in weightlessness. He didn’t sleep on the shuttle, excepting catnaps, and he was particularly concerned for the dowager.
Cajeiri was out of his seat: that was predictable. But he was leaning on the seat back, constructively pointing out things in the safety instructions for his young aishid—it being their first trip into space—and being very restrained. Cajeiri and his bodyguard had all been very quiet, very by-the-book from the time they’d left the Bujavid.
Exemplary level of attention in the youngsters, all through the train ride. The shuttle was preparing for launch and they were still being very quiet.
It was more than an excess of good behavior. Distractingly more. The dowager’s presence could account for it. But Bren thought not. Likely the dowager herself thought not.
This extremely adult behavior? This complete lack of fidgeting?
There’s something he wants more than he wants anything on Earth, something recently given to him, and taken away, and now threatened by the kyo, up there.
This is Tabini’s son. The dowager’s great-grandson. With the stubborn will of both.
He’s more than a kid. But he is a kid.
He won’t disobey his great-grandmother. He probably won’t disobey me.
But if something untoward happens—
I know which way he’ll want to jump.
But man’chi overrides.
He is atevi. He’s definitely become that, since he was last off the planet.
The speaker came live.
“This is an express flight,” word came from the captain. “We will enter prolonged acceleration once we reach switchover, so it will be some time until we become weightless, but you will experience a gradual feeling that the shuttle is becoming vertical, and the center aisle will become a long fall for the duration. Keep your seatbelts fastened, and for the safety of others, do not attempt to retrieve items from storage. A period of free fall will follow when you can safely move about. I shall advise you again before our prolonged braking and maneuvering to dock. Whenever you are in your seat, it is a good idea to have the seatbelt fastened. Remember that the aisle will be, for anyone above the last three rows of seats, a very serious fall, endangering others below. Whenever you are moving about in free fall, please clip to the line that runs fore and aft on what is now the ceiling. Please use the clip at your seat to secure any object that you are actively using and please put such objects away securely when not in use.
“Please attend any personal needs before takeoff, or wait for the inertial portion of our flight. If you have any emergency during acceleration, please push the button at your seat to advise us.”
Bren read the information card. Even last year, they’d upgraded the flight protocols to include the express routing, and, to his slight surprise at the time, they hadn’t needed him to do it.
The thought of instructions written by computer was a little scary. But they read fairly well, considering.