Explorer

“Can’t?”

“ Our weapons can not do this kind of damage. Bren. Our weapons can’t do this. We’re not sure what did .”

Very deep breath. And a cold that went to his heart. “That’s useful. Any other advice?”

“ We should do something real soon. ”

“Prep to do whatever we can do,” he said. “I think sooner rather than later. We’ll try to get facts for you.” The lift arrived. Doors opened onto two-deck. “Got to go, Gin.”

Cenedi and his men exited first. They always did, question of precedence. The crewman guard standing watch in the area met their intrusion with startled looks and twitches toward defense, which, fortunately, they didn’t complete.

The dowager walked out with Cajeiri, Bren followed, and Banichi and Jago. He led the way back into the medical section, back to their makeshift prison, tailed by two of the ship’s makeshift security into a section of corridor where Kaplan, Polano, and a handful of common crew were holding a loud and notably profane argument through the grid. “Damned fools!” was one side of it. The other side’s answer was not something he’d care to translate for his companions. So much for authorized responses and crew on short sleep and frayed nerves.

“Gran ’Sidi.” Kaplan’s argument immediately gave way to astonishment, an uneasy deference to her and her armed entourage. Kaplan clearly asked himself whether his captain knew, and what his captain would say.

But Ilisidi waited for nothing. “Where are these individuals?” Ilsidi asked with a wave of her cane at the obvious plastic grid—no prisoners visible, due to the angle of the grid, but the fat was very nearly in the fire, as was.

“The dowager wishes to speak with the detainees,” Bren said. “She wishes to explain matters to them herself. It is cleared, Mr. Kaplan.”

“But, sir.” Kaplan said, half whispering, as if that could insulate Ilisidi from understanding. “Sir, I’m afraid they’re not going to be polite.”

“She won’t be greatly surprised at temper, Mr. Kaplan. Captain’s orders. Will you and the rest of these people stand backup?”

“Yes, sir.” Worried compliance. The company was hardly official, and likely shouldn’t be here. “Yes, sir , yes, ma’am .”

The several detainees, as atevi eclipsed the light outside their plastic grid doorway, backed off and stared in utter dismay.

“You damn bastards!” Esan blurted out.

“Kindly mind your language,” Bren said moderately. “The Guild sent Ramirez to deal with Alpha, assuming it would give all the orders. This hasn’t happened. It’s not going to happen. You’re dealing with Alpha and its alliance. I trust you recall that Alpha has an indigenous population. This lady is the aiji-dowager, grandmother of the ruler of their side of the civilized world. The boy, aged seven, is her great-grandson. The rest are our personal security. We have a close working relationship. We’re here to rescue you.”

Human eyes looked up—farther up than adult men were accustomed to look up at faces, then looked on the level at an aged woman and at a small child. And went on looking.

“This is Gran ’Sidi,” one of the crewmen in the background yelled out. “And she doesn’t take any nonsense from fools and she doesn’t give a damn for your Guild rules.”

Becker didn’t like it. The Guild agents didn’t like it. But Ilisidi had a certain well-savored notoriety among the crew, and if Ilisidi couldn’t understand two words of what was shouted, she stood in perfect comprehension of the unruly crewman’s intent and the jeering support behind her.

“Well,” Ilisidi said, leaning on her cane. Then waved it at the four as if they were tourist attractions. “Are these, nandi, of that pernicious Pilots’ Guild?”

“Yes, nand’ dowager, one understands so.”

“The Guild that opposes our generous gesture.”

“The dowager remarks,” Bren said, “that you have opposed the generosity of this ship and crew and of herself. Possibly motivated by unsavory Guild interest.” It was true. It was implicit in the infelicitous numbers of the dowager’s suggestion.

“Tell her go to hell,” Becker muttered.

“Oh, I wouldn’t do that, Mr. Becker. I wouldn’t. If that’s your notion of dealing with foreign nationals, I can see why you have a hole in your station.”

“We’re not going to be threatened.”

“She won’t threaten, Mr. Becker. I do assure you that. She’s very, very old, she’s made the extraordinarily polite gesture of leaving her comfortable residence aboard, and done you an honor leaders of several nations would be extravagantly pleased to receive. More, she’s brought her great-grandson to let him observe first-hand how civilized people solve problems.”

“Then get the strong-arms out.”

“Her guards are with her, as mine are with me. We don’t haul you into separate rooms for processing, which is our favor to you, and I suggest you take a much nicer tone, sir.”

“Do we hear demands?” Ilisidi asked sweetly.

“She asks if you’re being rude,” Bren said. “Express your pleasure at the visit, gentlemen. Bow. I do recommend it.”

Becker averted his stare, just minutely, a capitulation, at least that he wasn’t quite willing to start a riot. A bow—not quite.

“Mr. Becker?”

“We demand our immediate release.”

“Of course we demand contact with Captain Sabin.”

“Not in my power.”

“Did your leaders indicate to you they were going to silence her communications, while you were vulnerable on our deck? If they didn’t, they certainly left you in a position. Understand, we’re being remarkably restrained—but the captain’s getting some needed sleep at the moment. When he wakes up, I’m sure he’s going to hope we’ve had a reasonable exchange of views.”

Becker drew a deep breath and looked at his fellows. Then he asked, in a much quieter tone, “So what’s she want?”

“A polite answer to her question.”

“Look, we don’t make policy.”

“They claim, aiji-ma, to be lower-level agents of their Guild, incapable of initiating policy changes.”

“And what is this policy, nandi?”

“The dowager asks you very politely what the policy of your Guild is, that has put you here.”

There was no answer at first. Then Becker: “We came here to do a routine inspection of the log.”

He translated that.

“Why has the senior captain not reported to us?” Ilisidi asked, and Bren rendered it: “She wants to know why the senior captain hasn’t called in, and believe me, gentlemen, the ship’s captain also wants that answer.”

“We haven’t any idea,” Becker said—anxious, now. “That’s the God’s truth.”

“What were you looking for aboard?”

“I think we found it,” Becker said under his breath. He slid a worried gaze toward Ilisidi.

“Oh, nothing like you surmise. What you see, sir, is equal partners in an alliance of three governments, in which your Guild, gentlemen, can also look for partnership, but which I assure you it will never order or run. This ship came here at great effort of our entire alliance to rescue you from the situation Captain Ramirez reported to exist here, a situation which we find in evidence, and which you seem either not to know—or to want to maintain, so far as your answers make any sense.”

Ilisidi was patient through that exchange. Becker set his jaw and said nothing at all. The others looked, at best, worried.

“Well?” Bren said.

“Take it up with Guild offices,” Becker muttered through his teeth, doubtless the mantra of his service. “We don’t make policy.”

Bren translated: “He maintains his Guild has sole discretion to negotiate and he is ignorant.”

“Then we should release these persons,” Ilisidi said with an airy wave of her hand. And of course, Bren thought, if they were low-level atevi, persons claiming to be incapable of further harm, it was, in atevi terms, civilized to release the minor players… after the fracas was settled.