Generation Warriors

Chapter Thirteen

FSP Cruiser Zaid-Dayan, FedCentral

Sassinak frowned at the carefully worded communication. She did not need to consult the codebook to figure out what it meant. It was in the common senior officers' slang that made its origin very definitely Fleet. Almost impossible to fake slang and the topical references. She had used something like this herself, though rarely. Not something a junior would send to a senior but a senior's discrete way of hinting to the more alert junior.

If she could believe a senior admiral would want a clandestine meeting, would return from leave early, this would be a likely way to signal the officer he wanted to meet. Padalyan reefed her sails, indeed! The reference to the ship she'd served on before the Zaid-Dayan almost removed her doubts. But it meant leaving the Zaid-Dayan again, and she had not expected to go back onplanet until Coromell returned just before the trial. There was nothing illegal about it, with her ship secured in the FedCentral Docking Station. She still didn't like it.

If Ford had been here… but Ford was not only not, he had not reported anything, anything at all. She should have heard from him by now. Another worry. It had seemed so neat, months ago, sending Ford to find out about the Paradens from a social contact, and Lunzie to Diplo, and dumping Dupaynil on the Seti. Her mouth quirked. She would bet on Dupaynil to come through with something useful, even if be did figure out his orders were faked. He was too smart for his own good, but a challenge would be good for him.

She realized she was tapping her stylus on the console and made herself put it down. She could think of a dozen good reasons why neither Ford nor Lunzie had shown up yet. And two dozen bad ones. She flicked on one of the screens, calling up a view of the planet below. The fact was that she simply did not want to leave her ship. Here she felt safe, confident, in control. Down on a planet - any planet - she felt lost and alone, a potential victim.

Once recognized, the fear itself drove her to action. She wasn't a frightened child any more. She was a Fleet commander who would finish with more than one star on her shoulders. Earned, not inherited. And she could not afford to be panicked by going downside. Admirals couldn't spend all their time in space. Besides, she had promised to share her memories of Abe with that remarkable designer woman.

Even after all these years, thinking of Abe made her feel safer. She shook her head at herself, then went to the bridge to give Arly her orders.

"I can t tell you more than what I know," she said, keeping her voice low. She trusted her crew, but no sense in their having to work to keep secrets. "Coromell wants a meeting out of his office. I'm taking Aygar along as being less obvious than one of the crew. Don't know how long it will take, or when well surface, but stay alert. If you can, monitor their longscans. I have an uneasy feeling that something may be out there, way out, and if that happens, you know what to do."

Arly looked unhappy. "I'm not breaking the Zaid-Dayan out of here without you, Captain."

"Don't expect you'll have to. But it won't do me any good if someone slams the planet while I'm on it. I'll carry a comunit, of course. Buzz me on the ship's line if Ford or Lunzie show up."

"You're wearing a link?"

"No! They're too easy for someone else to track. I know the com's signal is hard to home on, but it's better than advertising where the admiral is, since he wants the meeting secret."

"Are you sure?"

"Sure enough to risk my neck." Sassinak glanced around the bridge, and leaned closer. "To tell you the truth, somethings got my hackles up straight, but I can't tell what. Ford's overdue. Lunzie, too. I don't know. Something. I hate to leave the ship, but I can't ignore the message. Just be careful."

"And you." Arly snapped a salute. Sassinak went back to her quarters and changed into civilian clothes, as requested. Another worry; in civilian clothes, she had no excuse for the 'ceremonial' weapons she could carry in uniform.

She was aware that her bearing would hint Fleet to any really good observer. Why not simply wear her uniform? But orders, assuming these to be genuine, were orders. She stopped by her office and picked up the things she could carry in one of the pouches currently in style. Aygar should be waiting at the access port. He, at least, had sounded eager enough to go back to the planet. Of course, he had spent only these few months in space; he was a landsman at heart.

She was surprised to see Ensign Timran waiting with Aygar when she came into the access bay. She nodded answer to his swift salute. "Ensign." That should send him away quickly. To her surprise, it did not. Her brows raised.,-= "Captain.., ma'am…"

"Yes, Ensign?"

"Is there any chance that… uh… that Aygar and I could…" Now what was this?

"Spit it out, Ensign, and hurry. We have a shuttle to catch."

"Could go downside together? I mean, you're going to be busy, and he really needs someone along who…" She saw in his face that her expression had changed. "And just how do you know that I will be 'busy'?' He reddened and said nothing, but his eyes flicked to Aygar. Sassinak sighed.

"Ensign, if our guest has shared confidential information, you should have the wit to pretend he did not. You surely heard the announcement I made: no liberty, no leaves. Not my decision, but FedCentral regulations. They don't trust Fleet here. And, if by some mischance you did end up on the surface, that very distrust could get you in serious trouble."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Nor was I aware that you and Aygar were friends."

This time Aygar spoke up, with almost Tim's eagerness.

"He's stronger than he looks, this little one. We began working out in the gym together, at the marine commander's suggestion." Clever Currald, Sassinak thought. These two might even do each other good.

"Even so, he can't come downside. Sorry. And you're going with me. You'll be busy enough yourself."

Timran still looked disconsolate. Sassinak grinned at him.

"Come now. I need the best shuttle-jockeys up here, just in case something breaks loose."

He brightened at once and Sassinak led Aygar through the access tube toward the Station shuttle bay.

They had met nothing to arouse suspicion, but Sassinak felt as tight-drawn as a strangling wire. Aygar had long since quit pointing out interesting shops or odd costumes. He'd lapsed into an almost sullen silence. Sassinak was more annoyed by this than she wanted to be. He was not, after all, Fleet. He could not be expected to react as a trained sailor or marine would.

They had walked out of the shuttle port with no visible tail, into a stifling afternoon made worse by the stinging brown haze over the city. Sassinak was no expert but she had made full use of the gleaming show windows of the shuttleport shopping mall. No one seemed to be following them. No one paused repeatedly to look in the windows when she did. She had beep downside with Aygar before. Unless someone knew specifically of the meeting with Coromell, this ought to look very much like the previous trips.

She would be expected to take him to one of the monotonous gray buildings in which the prosecution attorneys were working up the case against Tanegli, or to Fleet's own gray precincts. Then on yet another walking tour of the sights, such as they were.

She had started as if for the Fleet offices, then, as instructed, boarded one of the express subways bound for Ceylar East, one of the suburbs. None of those who boarded with them were still in their module when they got off and transferred to another line. They had zigged and zagged back and forth under the vast city until Sassinak herself was hardly sure exactly where they were.

Now, only a short distance from the designated meeting place, she wished she'd been born a Weft, with the ability to make eyes in the back of her head. The hot gun and smog made her head ache. She wanted to call Engineering and complain. There, Eklarik's Fantasies and Creations. Its sign was purple curlicues on green with mythical beasts in the corners. Not the sort of place she would ever go on her own; a signal to any follower, as far as she was concerned.

Did Admiral Coromell have a secret passion for historical costumes or antique musical instruments? She gave Aygar a nudge. His shoulders twitched, but he moved across the sideway traffic that way. Sassinak pushed aside the bead curtain and let it rattle closed behind her.

Inside, the shop smelled of potpourri and incense. A ihread of smoke rose to a blue haze overhead. Close on either hand were two suits of armor, one smoothly burnished as if it were but iron skin, and the other shaped into fantastic peaks and points, decorated with silk tassels. Racks of costumes, topped with what Sassinak supposed were the appropriate headgear. Floppy spiked helms, flat straw circles, bonnets drowned in ruffles and bows, a row of tiny red enameled cylinders like oversized pillboxes.

She took a step forward, kicked something that clattered, and realized that she had bumped a tall ceramic jar filled with swords. Swords? She lifted one, then realized it had neither edge nor point - a stage sword? It was not steel; the metal made a flat, unpromising sound when she tapped it with her finger. Cluttering the narrow aisles were toppling piles of boots, shoes, sandals; the footgear for the racked costumes, no doubt. Suspended overhead were masks, dozens - no, hundreds - in shapes and colors Sassinak had never imagined. She blinked. Aygar bumped into her from behind. "What is this?" he began, as Sassinak caught a glimpse of someone moving toward them from the back of the shop. She raised her hand, and he quieted, though she could practically feel his resentment.

"May I help?" asked a breathy voice from the dimness. "I'm afraid Eklarik's not here right now, but if it's just normal rental?"

"I'm… not sure." The message from Coromell had not specified whether Eklarik's shop assistant would do as well as the man himself. "It's about the Pirates of Penzance," she said, feeling like an idiot.

Her knowledge of musical productions was small. She'd had to look up that reference, and although it told her Gilbert and Sullivan were contemporaneous with Kipling, she knew nothing of the work itself. Or what result should follow from the mention of it.

"Ah," said the colorless little person who now came into view between another pair of mounted costumes, these obviously meant for the female form. One was white, a clinging drapery that left one shoulder bare; the other, a vast pouf of pale blue, heavily ornamented with bows, braid, ruching, buttons as if the maker had to prove that he knew how to do all that, bulged halfway across the aisle.

The assistant, between the two, looked so meek and unimportant, that Sassinak was instantly alarmed. No one could be that self-effacing.

"A policeman's lot…" said the assistant.

"Is not a happy one," Sassinak replied dutifully, thinking the same thing about the lot of Fleet commanders stuck onplanet in civilian clothes trying to play spy.

"You are the dark lady," said the assistant. Sassinak was still not sure what sex - and was beginning to wonder what race - the assistant might be. Short, slim, dressed in something darkish that rippled. "Your star is here."

That had to refer to Admiral Coromell. She opened her mouth to say something, but found herself confronted with a crystal sphere slightly larger than she could have held in one hand. The assistant had two hands under it. The crystal gleamed.

"The star you follow," the assistant was saying in a lone that Sassinak would have assumed meant drunk, if one of her crew had used it. "It is dimly seen, in dark places, and often occluded by maleficent planets."

"You have a message for me?" prompted Sassinak when a long silence had followed that after the crystal globe had vanished again into the dimness.

"That was your message." A quizzical expression crossed that face, followed by: "You are familiar with the local bars, aren't you? You are a sailor?"

Behind her, Aygar choked and Sassinak barely managed not to gulp herself.

No," she said gently. "I'm not any more familiar with local bars than with… uh… costumes."

"Oh." Another long silence, during which Sassinak realized that the assistant's pupils were elliptical, and that the dark costume was actually for. "I thought you would be. Try the Eclipse, two blocks down, and order "Planetwiper."

That was clear enough, but Sassinak wasn't sure she believed it was genuine.

"You…" she began.

The assistant withdrew behind the billowing blue skirt, and opened its mouth fully, revealing a double row of pointed teeth.

"I'm an orphan, too," it said, and vanished.

Sassinak shook her head.

"What was that?" breathed Aygar.

"I don't know. Let's go."

She didn't like admitting she'd never seen an alien like that before. She didn't like this whole setup.

The Eclipse displayed a violently pink and yellow sign, which at night must have made sleep difficult for anyone across the street. Sassinak glanced that way and saw only blank walls above the street-level shops. No beaded curtain here but a heavy door that opened to a hard shove and closed solidly behind them. A heavy-worlder in gleaming gray plastic armor stood at one side - evidence of potential trouble, and its cure, all in one. A glance around showed Sassinak that her clothes did not quite fit in. Except for the overdressed trio at one table, clearly there to prey on customers, the women wore merchant-spacers' coveralls, good quality but not stylish. Most of the men wore the same, although two men had on business clothes, one with the crumpled gown of an attorney at court piled on the seat beside him. Sassinak supposed the little gray coil atop it was his ceremonial wig.

She was aware of sideways glances, but conversation did not stop. These people were too experienced for that. She led Aygar to one of the booths and dialled their order. Planetwipers had never been her favorite but, of course, she didn't have to drink the thing. Aygar leaned massive elbows on the table.

"Can you tell me what is going on, or are you trying to drive me crazy?"

"I'm not, and I don't know. I presume that at some point our party will arrive. At least I know what he looks like."

She was trying not to be too obvious about looking around. No one here of Coromell's age, or close to it. Surely they wouldn't have a third meetingplace to find. Aygar took a long swallow of his drink.

"That's potent," she said quietly. "Best be careful." He glowered at her. "I'm not a child. I don't even know why you…"

He stopped as someone stopped by their table. Tall, silver-haired, erect. If Sassinak had not known Coromell, she might have believed this was he.

"Commander," he said quietly. "May I sit down?"

"Do join us," Sassinak said. She gestured to Aygar. "The young Iretan you may have heard so much about." The older man nodded, but did not offer to shake hands. He wore an impeccable blue coverall, what she would have expected of a merchanter captain off-duty.

One hand bore a ring that might have been an Acadamy ring, but the face was turned under where she could not see it. And his movements, his assurance, came from years of command, some kind of command.

"If he was not Admiral Coromell - and he wasn't - then who or what was he?

"There's been a slight misunderstanding," he said. "It is necessary to stay out of reach of compromised Surveillance devices until…"

Sassinak never saw the flicker of light, only the surprised look on his face and the neat, crisped holes, five of them, in his face.

Instinct had her under the table and scrambling before the first blood oozed out. She heard a bellow and Crash as Aygar tossed the table aside and came after her. Something sizzled and Aygar yelped. Then the whole place erupted in noise and motion.

Like all fights, it was over in less time than she could have described it. The experienced hit the floor and scuttled for shelter. The inexperienced screamed, flailed, threw things that crashed and tinkled. Fumes from the shattered bottles stung her nose and eyes. Glass shards pricked her palms and knees. Sassinak bumped into other scuttlers, caught sight of Aygar and yanked him down just as a pink streak ripped the air where he'd been and burst the windows out.

She jerked hard on his wrist, trusting him to follow, as they worked her way through the undergrowth of the table standards, chair legs, bodies. Through the door, and into a white-tiled kitchen. She was to realize that the place sold food as well. More noise behind her, following. She slipped on the wet floor, staggered, and yanked Aygar again.

He threw a last glance over his shoulder, and whatever he saw propelled him in a great leap that ended with Aygar and Sassinak tangled out the back door, and flames bursting out behind them. "Snarks in a bucket!"

Sassinak struggled out from under the younger man and shook her head. Screams, more sounds of mayhem. She looked down the alley they'd landed in. She hated planets… living on them, at least. No one to keep things really shipshape. On the other hand, this filthy and disreputable bit of real estate offered hiding places no clean ship would. Aygar, she noted, had a bleeding gash down his face and several rips in his coverall, but no serious injury.

He was already up on one knee, looking surprisingly relaxed and comfortable for someone who had narrowly escaped death. He had probably saved her life with that last lunge for the back door.

"Thanks," she said, trying to figure out what to do with him. She'd thought of him more as deterrence than serious help if things turned nasty. And at the moment, they were about as nasty as she had seen in awhile.

"We should go," he pointed out. "I was told only Insystem had that sort of weaponary."

"We're going."

Another quick glance, and she chose the shorter end of the alley. Nothing happened on the first quick dash to cover behind a stinking trash bin with rusty streaks down its sides. Sassinak eyed the other back doors opening on the alley. Surely someone should have peeked? Unless the neighborhood were really that tough, in which case…

"There's someone behind the next one of these," Aygar said softly in her ear.

She eyed him with respect. "How d'you know?"

He shrugged. "I lived by hunting, remember? On Ireta, the things you didn't notice would hunt you. I heard something wrong."

"Great."

No weapons. No armor. And all her tricks were back in childhood, the tricks that worked on screen, and not in real life. Real life worked a lot better with real weapons.

"I can take them," Aygar went on.

She looked at him: all the eagerness appropriate to a young male in the prime of his pride and no military training whatever. And he wasn't hers, the way young Inran would have been. He was a civilian, under her oath of protection. She started to shake her head, but he hadn't waited.

Even knowing about the great strength his genes and his upbringing had developed, she was still surprised. Aygar picked up the entire trash bin with all its clink-teg, rattling, dripping, smelly contents, and hurled it down the alley to crash into the next. Someone yelped.

Sassinak heard the flat crack of smallarms fire, then - nothing.

Aygar was moving, rushing the barrier of the two trash bins crunched together With a quick shrug, she followed, vaulting neatly into the mash of rotten vegetables and fruit peels on the far side. Aygar had neatly broken the neck of the ambusher. Sassinak picked herself out of the disgusting mess carefully and smiled at Aygar.

"Try not to kill them unless you have to," she heard herself say,

"I did," he said seriously. "Look!"

And sure enough, the Insystem guard had managed to hang onto his weapon even with a trash bin pinning him by the legs.

"Right. There are times.. good job." At least she wouldn't have to worry about this one having post-combat hysterics. "Let's get out of this."

Aygar hesitated. "Should I take his weapon?"

"No, it's illegal. We'll be in enough trouble." We're in enough trouble, she thought. "On second thoughts, yes. Take it. Why should the bad guys have all advantages?"

Aygar pried it out of the man's hand and courteously handed it to her. Surprised, Sassinak let her eyebrows raise as she took it and tucked it into a side pocket. Swiping futilely at the stains on her coverall, she led them down the alley to the street.

By this time, sirens wailed nearby. With any luck, they would be on the other street. Sassinak motioned Aygar back. With that blood dripping down his face, he'd be better in hiding. Cautiously, she put her head around the corner. As if he'd been waiting for her, a stocky man in bright orange uniform bellowed and then blew a piercing whistle. Sassinak muttered a curse, and yanked Aygar into a run. No good going back into the alley. They'd have someone at the other end.

They pelted down the street, dodging oncoming pedestrians. Sassinak expected at least one of them to try stopping them, but none did. Behind them, the whistle-blower fell steadily behind. Sassinak led them right at the first corner, slowing to an almost-polite jog as she stepped on the first slideway. Aygar, beside her, wasn't even breathing hard.

Then he gripped her wrist. Across the street they were on, ahead, was a cordon of orange-uniforms on the pedestrian overpass above the slideways. They carried something that looked uncomfortably like riot-control weapons. Sassinak and Aygar edged back off the slide-way. This street, like the other, had a miscellany of small shops and bars.

No time to choose. Sassinak ducked into the first she saw, hoping it had a useful back entrance.

"You look terrible, dearie," said someone out of the dimness.

Sassinak started to answer when she realized the young woman was looking at Aygar. Who was looking at her.

"We don't have time for this," she said, tugging at Aygar's suddenly immobile bulk.

"Men always have time for this," said the young woman, setting her various fringes in motion. "As for you, hon, why don't you take a look in the other room." Someone from there had already come to the archway. Sassinak ignored him and tried the only thing she could think of.

"We need to find Fleur. Now. It's an emergency."

"Fleur! What do you know about her?"

An older woman stormed through the draperies of her archway. Somewhat to Sassinak's surprise, she the trim, brisk appearance of a successful professional - which, in a sense, she was. "Who are you, anyway?"

"I need to find her. That's all I can say."

"Security after you?" When Sassinak didn't answer immediately, the woman moved past them to peer nigh the outer window. "They're after somebody, you've got bloodstains and gods know what stinking your clothes. Tell me now! You?"

"Yes. I'm…"

"Don't tell me." Sassinak obeyed. Here, in this place, someone else commanded.

"Come." When Aygar cast a last look after the young who had greeted him, their guide snorted. "Lis-laddy-o, you're looking at a week's salary, unless you're ranked higher than I think, and you'd be dead before you enjoyed it if we don't get you under cover." Then, as she led them down a passage, she shouted to her household, "Lee, get yourself in there with Pearl, I don't think the locals know you yet. Pearl, you Lee come in. The woman with him, if they think saw one, was our street tout." She muttered over shoulder to Sassinak. "Not that that'll hold five cops if they really saw you, but they might not. You can hide here for a while."

Here was a tiny square office, crowded with desk two chairs. The woman pulled open a drawer and an aid kit down on the surface. "You won't pass anywhere, with all that blood. Clean up. Ill be back with another coverall for you." Aygar sat in one of the chairs while Sassinak cleaned a shallow gash and put a sticker over it. He did look conspicuous with the blood off his face. She used more stickers to hold the rents in his coveralls. The scratches under them had long stopped bleeding.

The woman came back with a cheap working coverall tan fabric and tossed it to Sassinak.

"Get that smelly thing off so I can run it through the shredder in the kitchen. What'd you do, camp out in a grocer's trash bin?"

"Not exactly " Sassmak didn't want to explain. She handed Aygar the gun out of her pocket before peeling off her coverall and slipping into the other one. Aygar, she noticed, was trying not to watch while the woman stared at her.

"You must be Fleet," she said, more quietly. "You've got muscles, for a woman your age. Over forty, aren't you?"

"A little, yes."

The tan coverall was a bit short in the arms and legs, but ample in the body Sassmak transferred her ID and the handcom into its pockets and then took the gun back from Aygar.

"Ever heard of Samizdat?" The woman's voice was even lower, barely above a murmur.

Sassmak stared, remembering that bleak afternoon when Abe had told her a tiny bit about that organization "A little." she said cautiously.

"Hmm. Fleet. Samizdat. Fleur. Tell you what, honey, you'd better be honest, or I swear I'll hunt you to the last corner of the galaxy, my own self, and stake your gizzard in the light of some alien sun, so I will. That Fleur's a lady, saved my life more'n once, and never thinks the worse of a girl for doing what she has to."

"She's a Fleet captain," said Aygar. Both women glared at him.

"I didn't want to know that," said the woman. "A Fleet captain with undisciplined crew…"

Before Aygar could say anything, Sassmak said, "He's not crew; he's civilian, an important witness against planet pirates, and they're trying to silence him. We were supposed to have a quiet meeting but it didn't stay quiet."

"Ah. Then you do know about Samizdat. Well, we'll have to get you out of here later, and I'll send word to Fleur…" She stopped, as voices erupted down the passage. "Rats. Up out of that chair, laddy-o, and quick about it."

Aygar stood, and the woman shoved until he flat-tened against the wall. Sassinak, guessing what she wanted, lifted the chairs onto the desk. Beneath the worn carpet was the outline of a trap door. The woman didn't have to urge quickness, not with the words 'search' and 'illegal aliens' and 'renegade posing as Fleet' booming down the hall.

First came a straight drop down five feet to a landing above a short stair. Aygar had scarcely bent to get his head below floor level when the trap banged down, leaving them in complete darkness. Sassinak could hear muffled thumps and scrapes as the rug and chairs went back atop it. She had made it almost to the next level, but stopped where she was, afraid to move in the darkness lest she trip and make a noise. Aygar crept down three steps and touched her shoulder. "What now?" he asked.

"Shhh. We hope the searchers don't know about the trapdoor."

For the first time since trouble started, Sassinak had leisure to think about it and about her ship. She had been fooled by the original communication because it was in Fleet slang. That implied, but did not prove, that someone in Fleet was trying to get her killed. Whoever it was knew enough about Coromell to suspect that his name would lure her and that she would know only his general appearance. He was famous Jenough. It wouldn't be hard for anyone to know his height, his age, and find someone reasonably close to impersonate him.

But why all the complexity? Why not simply have someone assassinate her, or Aygar, or both, as they were on their way out of the shuttleport, or any place between? And, assuming those orange uniforms were police, why were the authorities on the side of the attackers?

She tried to think what someone might have said to convince the local police that she and Aygar were dangerous criminals causing trouble. Fleeing a bar fight was common sense. She'd originally thought to call Coromell's office as soon as she found a telecom booth. And what was happening to her ship, topside? She wanted to pull out the comunit and find out, but dared not with searchers after them.

Time waiting in the darkness had strange dimensions. Endless, seamless, compressed by fear and stretched by anticipation, she had no idea how long it was before she dared extend a cautious foot to the next lower step. She edged down, drawing Aygar after her. Just in case they found the trapdoor, she'd rather be around a corner, behind something, under something. Another step, and another.

When the lights went on, her vision blanked for a moment. Aygar gasped. Now she could see the long narrow room. She ran down the last few steps, Aygar behind her, and looked for a place to hide. There? An angle of wall, perhaps a support for something overhead? She ducked around it, out of sight of the stairs. Then a voice crackled from some hidden speaker.

"… know you have a basement, Sera Vanlis, and you'd better cooperate. This is nothing to play games about."

"I still don't see a warrant." Not quite defiance, but not quite calm confidence, either. "I've nothing to hide, but I'm not setting precedent by letting you search without one."

"I'll call for one."

A pause, then the sound of speech Sassinak could not distinguish. Did the sound go both ways? She had to trust not, had to hope the woman had hit some hidden switch to give them both warning and a way out. But nothing looked like a way out. No doors, in the long opposite wall, or the far end. No door at either end. A fat column of cables and pipes came out of the ceiling, entered and exited a massive meter box covered with dials, and disappeared into a grated opening in the floor.

Aygar nodded toward it. Sassinak looked closer. Not big enough for Aygar and she wasn't sure she could slither alongside the bundled utilities, but it gave her an idea. If this were a ship, there'd be some kind of repair access to the utility conduits. She couldn't find it, and the conversation overhead could have only one ending.

Then Aygar picked up a filing cabinet, one of a row along the far wall, but in line with the path of the cables, and there it was. A flat circle of metal, with a pop-up handle, and under it a vertical shaft with a ladder fixed to one side. She would have had trouble getting the cover free, and up, but Aygar's powerful fingers lifted it as easily as a piece of toast on a tray.

Sassinak eeled into the hole, slipped easily down tile ladder to give Aygar room, and murmured "How're you going to cover it after us?"

"Don't worry."

Nonetheless, she did worry as he slipped the access cover behind the next file cabinet over, and backed down into the hole, dragging the file cabinet with him.

Surely he couldn't possibly move it all the way into place, just with his hands? He could.

They were in the dark again, the top of the shaft walled with the file cabinet, but she could hear the proud grin in his voice when he said, "Unless they heard mat, they won't know. And I think it's been used that way before. That cabinet's not as heavy as a full one would be."

She patted his leg and backed on down the ladder. They ought to come to a cross-shaft… and her foot found nothing below, then something uneven. She ran foot over it in the dark, momentarily wondering why she'd been stupid enough not to bring along a handlight. Lumpy, long, slick… probably the bundled utilities. She couldn't quite reach them with her foot while clinging to the ladder. She'd have to drop. Aygar's foot tapped her head, and she touched his, a slight sideways shove that she hoped he would understand as "Wait!"