Deadman Switch

Chapter 7

It took me over twice as long as the meeting itself had run to describe my observations of it, and when I was finished Randon was impressed.

Though not yet quite willing to admit it out loud. "Interesting," he said thoughtfully, gazing up at Calandra and me as he stretched out a bit more at his stateroom lounge desk. "Very interesting indeed. I'd picked up most of the high points myself, but confirmation is always nice to have. So what exactly do you think they're hiding?"

I glanced at Calandra, got a little confirmation of my own, and shrugged. "No way to tell, sir," I told him. "Also, please bear in mind that they may not be hiding anything specific. It could just as easily be a matter of them not wanting to make things easy for you."

He snorted. "Oh, that part of the group psyche came through in gigapix. And I still think they're hiding something."

"Probably," I conceded. "I just thought I ought to mention all the possibilities."

"Turning the other cheek again, huh? Well, I suppose we'll just have to wait until Schock finishes his tapment check on the cyls and we can get a look at them." He flared briefly with an almost overwhelming impatience, but he knew perfectly well that Schock couldn't plug the cyls into the ship's computer and download them without checking them first. If HTI had encoded some bookbugs or tapsnakes into any of the information, putting them into the Bellwether's system would be an invitation to disaster. Not only could we wind up losing all the HTI data, but a sophisticated enough tapsnake could conceivably open every other file aboard ship to HTI scrutiny and remote manipulation via the phone system.

There were effective methods to prewash suspected cyls, but they took time. So with an effort Randon forced down his impatience and shifted his attention to Calandra. "So. Having heard Benedar's analysis, do you have anything to add?"

"Not really," she said evenly. "I agree that they're hiding something, probably having to do with either their shipment records or trip quotas or the correlation between the two."

Randon frowned. "Why do you say that?"

"Because it was around those subjects that the tension seemed to peak," she explained. "And they were the only subjects that affected all three of the managers in the same way."

Randon looked at me. "Did you get that, too?"

"I picked up the tension increase," I acknowledged. "I can't confirm that it was all three—Karash was off to the side with Schock at the time—but the other two certainly reacted strongly when you hit those topics. Oh, and that guard—the one put there to distract me?—he also made a particularly bad jolt at the same time."

"That one's coincidence," Calandra shook her head. "The guard wasn't in enough control of himself to turn things on and off that way."

"You sure?" I asked.

"Yes. However, I was able to watch Karash, too; as I said, she reacted the same way Chun Li and Blake did."

Randon grunted. "Um. Interesting."

For a minute the room was silent. I watched Randon closely, trying to detect any subtle changes in his attitude toward Calandra. But if there was anything there, it was buried by the myriad of other things on his mind.

The moment of introspection was ended by the whistle of the phone. Picking up his control stick, Randon waved it toward the instrument. "Yes?"

The picture came on: Brad Seqoya, one of Kutzko's more massively built shields. "Seqoya, sir, at the gatelock. Thought you'd like to know that Mr. Aikman's just returned."

Randon made a face. "Thank you, Seqoya. On his way to see me?"

"Probably, sir. And he didn't look too happy."

Randon's sense took on a slyly amused edge. "All right, I'll be ready for him. Anything else going on down there?"

"Nothing much, sir. We had a Billingsgate rep and his customs escort here half an hour ago to pick up the molecule factory shipment, but nothing since then."

The amused edge disappeared, Randon's sense hardening into distaste. "One of our people went down with them, I hope."

"Yes, sir, as per orders."

Randon nodded, trying to clear his mind and not entirely succeeding. One of the laws governing Deadman Switch usage was that even passenger ships had to carry their share of cargo when entering or leaving Solitaire system, and there had been no exception made for the Bellwether. To me it seemed the only decent thing to do: if the toll for our passage was going to be a man's life, the least we could do is make that life count for as much as possible. But Randon didn't see it that way. To him the dead man was a zombi, hardly counting as a human being any more, and it irritated him immensely to have all these strangers traipsing in and out of his ship picking up packages. Aikman, I'd been told, had tried and failed to find any free space in the Rainbow's End receiving center where we could unload the cargo all at once... but given the way Aikman felt about us, I didn't entirely believe that story. "How much stuff is left down there?" Randon asked the shield.

"Oh, probably something over half, sir," Seqoya told him.

Randon grimaced, nodded. "You'd better give customs another call and remind them all this stuff has to be out before we leave for Collet tomorrow. Either they get the appropriate people here to pick it up, or else they find some storage space for it. Otherwise we leave it on the pad when we lift."

Seqoya smiled faintly. "Yes, sir. I'll get right on it."

Randon waved the control stick to break the co

There was a touch of sly satisfaction beneath Randon's words. "I'd expected him to be at the meeting today, sir," I commented carefully. "Was there some trouble?"

"Oh, no—just a long errand I trapped him into." He shrugged. "After all, I could hardly have him walking in on the HTI meeting and letting everyone know they didn't have all the Watchers covered."

That thought hadn't even occurred to me. "I see."

"I wish I could see their faces when they find out who she is," he said, smiling to himself. "Anyway—" he picked up his control stick again and keyed it, and the door behind us opened. "Take her back to her stateroom," he instructed Daiv Ifversn as the latter stepped into the doorway.

I looked at Calandra as she turned silently to go... and for the first time I could see the stirrings of an almost grudging hope within her. "I'd like to stay for a moment, if I may," I said to Randon.

He glanced at me, nodded to Ifversn. "Go ahead," he told the other.

They left; but before I could figure out how to phrase the question, Randon saved me the trouble. "All right, I'll concede the point," he said. "You're a useful person to have at business confrontations; and you and she together are considerably more than twice as useful. Is that what you wanted me to say?"

"More or less, sir," I admitted.

He gave me a tight smile. "I haven't grown up a Kelsey-Ramos without picking up some of my father's tricks. Probably would've made a good Watcher myself if I'd cared to."

And though I have the power of prophecy, to penetrate all mysteries and knowledge... "I'm glad we're able to serve you," I said instead. "Will you be wanting both of us along at the governor's di

He threw me a knowing look. "Still trying to make her more valuable to me alive than dead?"

His sense showed none of the rancor the words might have carried. "All people are worth more alive than dead," I returned, keeping my tone light.

He snorted, taking it in the serious but nonthreatening way I'd intended him to. "So you say. You might have trouble proving it. Anyway. You're in charge of getting Paquin ready for the reception tonight—you know what kind of clothes and whatnot women are expected to wear at such things?"