Dragon and Liberator

CHAPTER 4

She waited for a grand total of maybe two minutes. Then, being careful not to make any noise, she set out to explore the office.

The last time she'd been in here, when Frost had had her break into Neverlin's desk safe, he'd kept her in the main room. Her first task, therefore, was to see what was beyond the side door.

There were, as it turned out, two other rooms in the suite. One was a private washroom, the other a secure communications nook with a direct link to the ship's radio and InterWorld transmitters.

There were, unfortunately, no exits from either room.

She got a drink of water from the washroom and then returned to the main office, a fresh idea occurring to her. It was right after she'd opened this particular safe that Frost had fulfilled his part of their bargain and given her the satchel she'd gotten from Virgil Morgan's Semaline lockbox.

More important, that was the point where Frost's interest in the Advocatus Diaboli's various safes had suddenly stopped.

Something in that safe had apparently been very interesting to Neverlin's ally. It might be worthwhile to see what that something was.

She'd already opened the safe once, which theoretically meant she already had the combination. But there was always the chance that Neverlin had changed it since then.

Anyway, it wasn't as if she didn't have a few minutes to spare. Pulling out her burglar's tools, she got to work.

It was just as well she'd checked. Neverlin had indeed changed the combination. Using her MixStar computer to track down the new sequence, she got the safe open.

Inside was a two-inch-thick stack of papers, plus half a dozen data tubes. Setting the data tubes aside, knowing they were probably encrypted, Alison pulled out the papers and set them on her lap. With her light clipped to her shirt collar, she started going through them, wondering which one had caught Frost's attention.

Five pages from the top, she found it.

She had finished looking at the papers, and was going through the desk's drawers, when Taneem returned.

"The ship is very quiet," the K'da said after Alison had helped her back through the opening. "I saw only two humans seated in the main control rooms."

"The bridge," Alison identified it. "Probably Neverlin's night-shift crew. Any passengers out and about?"

"The ducts carry the smell of many Brummgas," Taneem said, a brief shiver running through her. "I think there are also a few other humans."

"Frost and some of his men," Alison said. "At least now we know where we stand. Which is more than Frost can say right now."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I found out why he was almost on my side for a while during our little vacation on Brum-a-dum." Alison held up the interesting paper she'd found. "I helped him find out that Neverlin's trying to do an end run around him."

"What's an end run?"

"Actually, in this case it's more of a double cross," Alison said. "Remember that we figured out earlier how Neverlin was going to get the ships he needed for his attack? That Frost was going to steal them from one of the planets where the Malison Ring is fighting one of their wars?"

"Yes," Taneem said. "Only it was you who figured that out, not us."

"Oh," Alison said, momentarily thrown off-track. "Yes, I suppose it was. But it doesn't really matter who came up with the idea."

"Yes, it does," Taneem said, a bit primly. "Draycos says a person must always give proper credit for cleverness and resourceful thinking. Especially if that same person is equally quick to assign blame."

Alison grimaced. "Let me guess. Jack was grousing again about me opening the other safe for Neverlin?"

"Actually, at the time I believe they were discussing your plan for getting through Frost's security cordon into the Chookoock hangar back at the Ponocce Spaceport," Taneem said. "Jack thought your Trojan Horse idea was very clever."

Alison felt her eyebrows crawling up her forehead. "Jack actually paid me a compliment?"

"And Draycos agreed." Taneem twitched her tail. "Is that so hard to believe?"

"From Draycos, no," Alison said. "From Jack, yes. But never mind that." She tapped the paper. "The point is that Neverlin has contracted with a Compfrin company to buy a dozen surplus KK-29 system patrol ships."

"Those are fighting craft?"

"Very much so," Alison said. "Probably not as powerful as the ships Frost could get from a Malison Ring base. But they'll be plenty good enough."

"Draycos has told me that the refugee ships are well armed."

"Which won't matter a twig against the Valahgua's Death weapon, will it?" Alison countered. "Which is why Neverlin can get away with a relatively small attack force. All he needs is to keep the defenders busy while the ships carrying the Death slip inside the perimeter and start killing everyone."

Taneem's eyes flicked around the room. "Do you think any of the Death weapons might be aboard this ship?"

"I'd sure keep one close to hand if I was Neverlin," Alison said. "You didn't happen to smell anything besides humans and Brummgas, did you?"

"I don't think so," Taneem said. "But there were cooking aromas that might have disguised other scents."

"And of course, you don't know what a Valahgua smells like," Alison pointed out. "Well, we can look into that later. In the meantime, we've got work to do."

"Finding a way out of here?"

"Actually, that shouldn't be a problem," Alison assured her. "I was referring to the need to share this little news flash with Jack and Draycos."

"How do we do that?"

"You'll see." Putting the papers and data tubes back in the safe, Alison resealed the door. "Come on—the link's in the other room."

The Advocatus Diaboli's InterWorld transmitter, she found as she settled into the nook's comfortable armchair, was already set on standby. Either someone had been sending or receiving messages earlier or else someone was planning to do so in the near future.

Either could mean there was someone paying attention to the bridge's InterWorld control station. If so, that someone might notice a transmission coming from a supposedly empty office, and wonder about it.

But they would just have to risk that. The longer she and Taneem sat here in Neverlin's office, the greater the chance someone would accidentally stumble over them.

It was the work of only a minute to key in the Essenay's own InterWorld frequency and pattern information. Mentally crossing her fingers, she tapped the microphone switch. "Jack?" she called softly. "Come on, kiddo; look alive."

"Alison?" Uncle Virge's voice came back. "This is a relief, lass. Where are you?"

"Aboard the Advocatus Diaboli," Alison said. "And we don't really have time for chitchat."

"Understood," Uncle Virge said. "First things first. Did you get the rendezvous location?"

"I have the data diamonds," Alison said. "Unfortunately, the K'da reader Jack brought back from the Havenseeker is still on your side of the universe."

"Neverlin must have one of his own."

"Which isn't anywhere in his office," Alison said. "Either it's in one of the other shipboard safes or else he's carrying it with him. I'll try to get my hands on it, but I'm not too hopeful."

Uncle Virge muttered something under his breath. "In other words, we've got to find a way to get you out of there."

"You don't have to sound so unhappy about it," Alison said archly. "But that's not why I called. Tell Jack to haul his carcass out of bed—I need to talk to him."

"Jack's not here," Uncle Virge said grimly. "He wrecked his car getting back to my part of the spaceport."

Taneem gave a little gasp, her breath briefly warming the back of Alison's neck. "Are they all right?" Alison asked.

"They're fine," Uncle Virge said. "But before they could get away from the scene, Jack was arrested for car theft."

Alison wrinkled her nose in disgust. She'd begged Jack to simply buy the stupid vehicle in the first place and be done with it. But he'd said that would be too expensive, and that the paperwork would take too long anyway.

She should have argued harder. Too late now. "Can you get him out?"

"I can't exactly show up at the jail with bail money," Uncle Virge said huffily. "And he hasn't tried to contact me."

"Probably doesn't have enough privacy to get to his spare comm clip," Alison said. "I guess he and Draycos will have to figure it out on their own. In the meantime, take a message for him."

She relayed the information about Neverlin's private collection of patrol ships. "I don't know when he's planning to send crews to pick them up," she finished. "But if Jack can get to the depot on Bentre before that, maybe he can do something."

"Such as?"

"Such as making sure Neverlin doesn't get them," Alison said patiently. "Now that the Malison Ring has been alerted to the fact that something fishy is going on with Frost, he shouldn't be able to just waltz into one of their bases and commandeer a large number of their ships. If we can also deep-six these KK-29s, Neverlin should find himself in a bind."

"He'll still have the Valahgua and their weapons."

"Sure, but the fewer ships he has to throw at the refugee fleet, the better the chances the K'da and Shontine will be able to paste all of them before they get close enough to use the Death."

"I don't know," Uncle Virge said doubtfully. "I'm thinking about the three hundred Brummgas Neverlin's already shipped off Brum-a-dum. Even fully crewed, a dozen KK-29s won't carry more than seventy-two of them. Either he's very confident that Frost can grab more ships or else he has those extra ships already stashed away somewhere."

"We do know he's got several Djinn-90s," Alison pointed out.

"Which are single-seat fighters," Uncle Virge countered. "Three-seaters if you throw in the optional gunner and observer. He can't have enough of those to need three hundred Brummgas."

Alison scratched her cheek. Unfortunately, he had a point. "I'll see what I can find out about that," she said. "In the meantime, you and Jack see what you can do about those KK-29s, all right?"

"I'll give him the message," Uncle Virge said heavily. "Provided he gets out of jail before they fly."

"If he doesn't, Taneem and I will just have to deal with them," Alison said. "I've got to go. Don't try to call me here."

"Thanks, I had figured that part out," Uncle Virge said sardonically. "Take care of yourself, lass. You and Taneem."

"I will. Good luck."

She keyed off the microphone. "Do you truly believe you and I can handle all this by ourselves?" Taneem asked.

"What, you mean that thing at the end?" Alison asked. "No, of course not. That was just for Jack's benefit. Sometimes the best way to get someone on the job is to hint that he can't do it."

"That seems rather . . . I don't know the word."

Alison sighed. "The word is cynical," she said. "Or maybe manipulative."

"You can change," Taneem reminded her quietly. "All people have that capability."

"I know." Reaching down, Alison scratched Taneem briefly behind her ears. "But to tell you the truth, I kind of like myself just the way I am. Go back out to the main office and listen at the door, will you, while I close down here?"

Taneem nodded and trotted back out of the nook. Alison leaned over to close the door between them, then quickly reset the transmitter's frequency.

The man waiting at the other end of the connection picked up instantly. With the word manipulative running through her mind, Alison launched into the report she hadn't wanted Taneem to hear.

Fortunately, this one was much shorter than the conversation with Uncle Virge had been. Within a minute she was finished and had signed off. Resetting the controls to their original positions, she rejoined Taneem in the main office.

The K'da was by the door, her ear leaned against it. "Any change?" Alison called softy as she sat down at Neverlin's desk.

Taneem shook her head as she moved away from the door. "Both guards are still there," she said, coming to Alison's side. "You have a plan?"

"I do," Alison said as she keyed on the desk computer terminal. The system was code-locked, of course, but Alison had her own version of Jack's sewer-rat technique for getting into uncooperative computers. "The trick with military organizations like this is to know how things get done," she continued. "The key is that every order goes through at least two levels of command before it gets where it's supposed to go."

"Even in a group this small?"

"Even here," Alison assured her. The mole program did its work, and the menu came up. Scrolling down the assignment roster, she found that the two guards currently standing outside the office door were a human named Rennie and a Brummga named Grisfel.

"What I'm doing now is issuing a new set of orders to the night duty officer," she explained as she typed. "I'm telling him to send our guards out there to the main conference room for a brief consultation with Colonel Frost."

Taneem was silent a moment. "But surely they'll quickly discover the orders are false."

"Of course they will," Alison said. "But they won't be able to trace which of the ship's computers sent the message." She smiled grimly as she added a second order to the list. "And you might be surprised how easily suspicious minds like Neverlin's and Frost's can be nudged in the wrong direction."

She logged both orders and shut down the computer. "Come on aboard," she said, holding out her hand. "One last job and we'll be ready to go."

Selecting the largest and longest-range needle transmitter from her sewing kit, she slid it into the carpet beside one of the desk legs, out of the normal traffic pattern, the way her father had taught her. The carpet wasn't thick enough to hide the needle completely, but no one was likely to see it unless he was specifically looking for it.

Then, making sure she hadn't left behind any other trace of her presence, she stepped to the door and set her burglar's pickup microphone against the panel.

Frost's mercenaries were nothing if not efficient. Barely two minutes later she heard a faint comm clip voice from outside the office. There was a short, half-heard conversation, followed by a quiet order to the guard's companion.

Followed by the sound of two sets of footsteps moving away down the corridor.

"Is that it?" Taneem murmured from Alison's shoulder when the footsteps had faded into silence.

"That's it," Alison said. Steeling herself, she opened the door.

She'd half-expected to discover that the trick had failed, that she would find herself facing men and Brummgas with drawn weapons and evil grins. But the corridor was deserted. Getting her bearings, she headed forward. "Where are we going?" Taneem whispered.

"You'll see," Alison whispered back. Another corridor cut across theirs directly ahead. She paused to check around the corner, then turned into the cross-corridor and headed outward toward the ship's hull.

A minute later, they had reached their destination.

"What is this?" Taneem asked, lifting her head from Alison's shoulder to study the red-rimmed door in front of them.

"One of the ship's lifepods," Alison said, running a finger across the thin, multicolored seal pasted across the edge of the door. "Two weeks' worth of food and water and air for four people. Perfect place to hide until we reach the rendezvous."

Taneem seemed to digest that. "And the catch?"

Alison lifted her eyebrows at her symbiont as she pulled a small coil of nearly invisible but incredibly strong monofilament thread from her shirt cuff. "The catch?"

Taneem shrugged, a sideways flip of her crest. "Jack says that when something looks too good or too easy there's always a catch."

"Talk about cynical," Alison commented, taking the cap off her pen and carefully setting the loops at the ends of the monofilament into small grooves in both cap and pen.

"Is he wrong?"

"In this case, no," Alison said. Setting the pen and cap on the deck, she pulled out a pair of thumb caps and worked them onto the tips of her thumbs. "See this seal? It's designed to break easily so that people can get into the lifepod in an emergency. But once it's broken, it's broken."

"Showing that someone has been inside?"

"Exactly," Alison said. "It's supposed to discourage people from sneaking inside and pilfering any of the goodies."

"But you have a way to repair it?"

"Not exactly." Picking up the monofilament again, Alison gripped the pen and cap in opposite hands and set the thread against the door by the end of the seal. Pressing the thread firmly against the metal with her protected thumbs, she eased the thread beneath the seal. "The plan is to get the seal off but keep it intact."

It was a technique she'd practiced many times under her father's watchful eye. But she'd never had to do it in the field, and rather to her surprise she discovered it actually worked. The monofilament slid smoothly beneath the seal, cutting through its adhesive and releasing it from the metal.

Her biggest fear was that the seal would simply fold itself back onto the door as the thread passed beneath it. Fortunately, that didn't happen. Instead, the seal curled slightly away from the metal as she worked, eliminating that danger.

A minute later, she was finished. Praying that Neverlin hadn't added any entry alarms, she touched the release.

He hadn't. The door slid open, the pod's lights came on, and she slipped inside.

"Are we going to close the door?" Taneem prompted, peering out Alison's shirt back into the ship.

"Patience," Alison said, pulling out her multitool and getting to work on the control panel plate beside the door. "Closing the door normally starts a ten-second eject countdown."

"Oh."

"Oh, indeed," Alison said. "We'd really like to keep that from happening. Especially since I'm not sure what happens to a lifepod ejected while the ship's still running on the ECHO stardrive."

"But you can keep that from happening?"

Alison grimaced. "We'll find out in a minute."

The plate came off. Nudging the bundle of wires out of the way with her screwdriver, she located the right one and popped the end out of its socket. "That should do it," she said, tapping the door control.

She watched the status display carefully as the door slid shut, counting down the seconds to herself. Fifteen of them later, she finally started breathing again. "Yes," she said, closing the multi-tool. "That did it."

"Not quite," Taneem said. "Would you press your back against the door a moment?"

Frowning, Alison complied. Taneem shifted around on her back, probably checking the corridor one last time.

But no. Something else was happening, something that felt subtly different from anything else Alison had experienced with her companion.

She squeezed her hand into a fist, a fresh wave of tension flowing into her. If Taneem fell off into the corridor, this whole thing would have been for nothing.

And then, to her relief, she felt the K'da's weight shift again as she came fully back onto Alison's skin. "There," Taneem said with satisfaction. "I've smoothed the seal back into place on the door."

Alison blinked. "How in the world did you do that?"

"I leaned over the wall as if preparing to fall to the other side," Taneem said. "Only instead I merely leaned one paw over and pressed it against the seal."

"I'll be sniggled," Alison said, eyeing the K'da with new respect. "That's a new one on me. As a matter of fact, I don't think even Draycos has tried that one. Nicely done."

"Thank you," Taneem said. "I was afraid it would be seen."

"It might have, at that," Alison agreed. In actual fact, she knew, the flowing air currents out there would eventually have reattached the seal more or less where it was supposed to be.

But Taneem was so proud of her accomplishment that Alison had no intention of popping her bubble. Besides, this way the seal was back in place that much sooner.

"I'm glad I could help," Taneem said. "What now?"

"Now the evening is finally over." Alison yawned widely. "I don't know about you, but I'm beat. Let's check out the food supplies and then see about getting some sleep."