Wasteland of flint

"It's turned off? And the crew haven't noticed?" Parker made a face.

"Something else must have happened," Gretchen raised her voice slightly. "But the ship still has power or the transmitter is on a battery of some kind… Can weturn on the transmitter from here? Send a wake-up command?"

Gossi spread his hands. "I am told…no."

Out of the corner of her eye, Gretchen saw Magdalena's whiskers twitch, but the Hesht said nothing.

Gretchen looked around at the others, then back at Gossi, eyes narrowed. "You have another ship to take us to the Ephesus system? I presume Magdalena knows how to fix the transmitter, and Parker can pilot the Palenque home if it's not entirely disabled. Bandao will shoot anything dangerous. Why am I going?"

"You're the senior Company field employee in the sector." Gossi's round smile had returned. He was comfortable with this avenue of discussion. "You are also the only person we could find, quickly, with experience in a biosphere like Ephesus's, due to your time on Old Mars."

Gretchen nodded slowly. The polar excavations had been her first posting. Tedious work in a very hostile environment, picking bits of an unidentified spacecraft out of permafrost. "What else are we bringing back? Something from the surface?"

"Perhaps nothing." Gossi tabbed the briefing packet again. The holo image of the planet expanded, then shrank, focusing in on a section of the southern hemisphere. Long shadows cut across a desolate plain. Some of them made what seemed, in the low resolution of the orbital scan, to be a double-circle. "One of the field reports from the scientists in the initial team says structures – manufactured structures – have been observed from orbit. I wonder – I fear – the team found something and brought it up to the ship for examination. It's an old story…everyone's heard it before, yes? A dangerous artifact, an accident, the crew so horribly slain. Another sixty-five million quills of Company money wiped out."

Gossi stopped, shaking his head in dismay, and there was a moment of silence. It was an old story. The Company suffered a very high rate of attrition – in perso

It was an odd moment. Gretchen thought later that time didn't stop, but it did stretch. She had never really been in charge before. Gangs of native workers in the pits on Ugarit didn't count…the dig director had been breathing down her neck the whole time. These three strangers wanted her to make a decision, to tell them what to do, to be the leader.

In that crisp moment, she saw blue smoke curling up past Parker's head, the glow of the holo-cast shining on his forehead; the points of Magdalena's teeth were showing, fine and white; Bandao was plucking at the sleeve of his plain cotton shirt, the subtle woven pattern almost obscuring the outline of a small flat pistol tucked into the back of his belt. A perfect full awareness filled her – this was not what she wanted to do – but it was what she was going to do. She looked down, breaking the moment.

Gossi coughed, batting his hand at Parker's smoke. Gretchen picked up her briefing pad and tabbed through the pages, a dizzying red-tan-blue-white glow flashing in her eyes.

"The Palenque requires a crew of at least six to operate safely." She looked up, raising an eyebrow at Gossi. "What kind of ship are we taking? Can we split her crew to cover both?"

The Maltese raised both hands, then flared them slightly. He smiled. Gretchen's nose crinkled up. "What kind of ship, Gossi-tzin? We do have a ship to take us there?"

"Oh yes! The Company does not have any ships in this sector, oh no. They are expensive, you know, and the Company is spread thin… I have arranged for you to be taken to the Ephesus system and delivered to the Palenque. If she proves unfit to make transit back to the station, then you will be able to return with the…other ship. However, since the transmitter remains operating, if unreachable at this time, I expect the Palenque will be flyable and you can return in her."

"What ship?" Gretchen tabbed to the end of the briefing packet, watching budget figures and details of the original mission flip past. "A miner? Some tramp freighter working the Rim?"

"It is an Imperial ship." Gossi spread his hands even wider. "They were already going in that direction, you understand. It is…convenient."

"Imperial." Gretchen rubbed her nose, sharing an arch look with the others. Parker seemed amused, Bandao's face was even more expressionless than before, and Magdalena was puzzled. "No Imperial ship is going to truck some macehualli scientists -"

"Or pilots," Parker interjected in a soft voice.

"- to the back of beyond, much less help them recover a derelict – possibly contaminated – spacecraft."

"The captain of the Cornuelle has kindly agreed to investigate the matter, and to take you there, and render you what assistance he can." Gossi's expression changed and Gretchen saw, to her wonder, that he did own a real smile. The corners of his eyes tilted up and his tiny round teeth became visible between rubbery lips. She wondered, briefly, how the Company man had pulled off Imperial "assistance."

"The Cornuelle." Parker tapped the top of his briefing pad, clearing the active document. "That's not a Nбhuatl name. What class of ship is she?"

"A warship." Gossi cleared his own pad and keyed in a locator code. The holo image above the table flickered, was replaced by the station transmission screen for a moment, and then resolved into a view from an outside cam, showing an arc of star-filled sky, dominated by the twin primaries of Ctesiphon A and B, then the sleek black shape of an Imperial starship. "This is your conveyance," he said, smug pride creeping into his voice. "The Henry R. Cornuelle is an Astronomer-class light cruiser commanded by the esteemed Chu-sa Mitsuharu Hadeishi. She has been assigned to the Hittite sector on anti-piracy patrol. I understand from her executive officer, Miss Sho-sa Kosho Susan, they will be able to spend several days in Ephesus orbit, assisting you in recovery operations."

He paused, ru

"Fine." Gretchen looked at Parker, tilting her head in question. "Can you fly the Palenque?"

Parker nodded, ru

The Hesht uncurled from her chair, light shifting on her glossy fur. A harness of leather hung around her shoulders and upper body, holding tools and storage pockets. Each wrist was circled by the gleaming mirror of a comm unit. A claw extended from a long finger and tapped the surface of the briefing pad. "This ship," she hissed in a grumbling voice, "has an older model brain, but it will take most of the newest control package. I might have it, or we can buy one here on-station."