Tripoint

Things came and went. Covers whispered. Bed tilted. Capella leaned close. "We dump down hard, and we're mass-heavy to start with. So you keep those belts on."

"Yeah."

"Dockers are going to earn their pay, now, no question. Unload fast as we can. I thought maybe we could skim on through, maybe make Viking, loaded as we are, but this sum-bitch is good. He's on us, not overjumping, and we can't make it: if he adds his mass to ours in hyperspace, he can push us faster on the exit than we can brake with the mass we're hauling, that's what it adds up to—send us right to Viking and right into hungry, hot old Ep-Eridani."

"You sure?" Falling into a sun… wasn't how he wanted to go.

Colors came and ran in disturbed sheets. Space warped and twisted.

"Tommy, I've worked it every way I can think of and I can't drop us far enough out that we can do any damn thing but fall. He can stop, but us, with all the mass, one way we end up plasma and sunbeams and the other we go outbound with no fuel. Patrick-bastard's given me no choice."

"Shit…"

"No, now, listen, Tom. You listen. I got to drop us in solid at Tripoint, if I can fake him once. Use our mass to throw him, here. In one scenario, I won't throw him far enough and he'll be in our laps. In the one I want, we'll buy that time we need to dump mass. Depends on if Patrick reads my intention to drop us out, and if Patrick-bastard knows to a navigational precision just where that supply dump is. I do. "

Shook his head. "Can't do. " Didn't like what he was hearing. Didn't know you could control anything in hyperspace… he knew there were things you could do right at the edge of jump or drop, but… this… God…

"Bet our lives I can. Have to. Patrick's out there. And I can't wake Austin up to tell him how things in the universe have changed, you read me, Tommy-person? You got to read me, Tommy, pay attention."

"I hear."

"You got to tell Austin it's no doublecross. He doesn't trust me. And this time he's got to. This old hulk sits in the dark out there, you follow me? And it's got stuff inside for us to take and it's got loading racks we can offput stuff to, real fast."

" That'swhat those cans were, at Viking."

"Old, old cans, from the War. Salvage, legitimate salvage, if it didn't come from the Fleet. And ordinarily another ship comes to this old hulk and gets the cans we leave in trade, and takes our cans to somewhere else. But this isn't ordinary. Patrick's not our breed. You want to say Mazia

What other port? he asked himself. Out of Tripoint there was Mariner, or Viking, cheapest vector out, or there was Pell, priciest, fuel-wise.

But he was following most of it. At least… the cargo part. The mass they had to get rid of before they came in at Viking velocity-high and fuel-short, aimed at the sun.

And he believed there was something out there dogging them in hyperspace: he feltsomething he couldn't explain.

But moral argument and promises of deliverance from a person he didn't half trust himself? Not so easy.

He felt Capella straighten his collar.

"Tommy-person. If I say on com, we got to move, we got to move. Tell Austin—if I was against him—I'd have switched keys on him. You know I could've, if he doesn't. I can open any door on this ship, pick any pocket right now. He's got that key I'm talking about. I'll give him the code that answers that son of a bitch out there, the way I said. If everything goes wrong—he's got to use it. Tell him so. Understand?"

"Chance this Patrick does know… where we're going?"

"We see in the dark, lover. But not that well. Even figuring that old hulk's on the Pell reach and the Tripoint perimeter… that's a lot of space to search, for a quiet object. No. Odds are absolutely on him not knowing, especially the way he's riding us. He doesn't want to lose track of us. And if he's any appreciable distance past us, hard-ordnance is impossible for him. Not impossible for us. We'll fire right down his tail. That's what I'll try to do, position us where we got that chance. But Austin's going to come out with everything screwed. Cargo screwed. Extra ship in the soup. Man's going to be real damn mad at me."

"Not your fault."

"Yeah. But, you got to understand, I'm on real short credit with him."

"Don't understand."

"Since Chrissy's stunt at Pell? Both of us are on Austin's shit-list. I want you to know this one more detail: this little card Austin's got? Austin's gotto offload that mass, that's one, because we're loaded, and Patrick isn't; and he's got to feed the old wreck that keycard real fast, close as I'm dropping us. Austin doesn't know that. It's not a detail he's ever needed to know. Keeps the suppliers honest, you understand. Now he has to know. That key-card gets the hold to open, in the lock slot. But in the cargo console slot, with the right code, that old wreck can write to that key-card—and he's gotto get me that authorization, he's gotto use that codeword before we get out of here. But if happens he doesn't believe me—Tommy, if he won't input or if he takes me off that nav board, we are screwed. I've got to be on the bridge. Beatrice has got to take the next figures I give her. If the captain orders me off the bridge, I tell you, I'm locking-down the navigation computers."

"You can't do that!"

"Oh, I can do it, Tommy, I can do it, and Bianco can probably crack my lock, given an hour or so. But Patrick'll blow us to hell first. Austin will figure that part with no prompt at all."

"God, you're crazy."

"I've been accused of that. But you watch me not talk, Tommy-sweet. Austin can ask me, pretty please. Austin can do what I say. " A hand brushed his forehead. "I just want somebody but me to know, if it happens. But, listen, if Austin's the man I think he is, he'll deliver that damn cargo. That card's his proof. His credit with the Fleet. Call it old-fashioned honor. I think they still use that word. He'll fight to keep it."

"How?" Consciousness came up for a moment. He saw her shadow against the ru

"Not much else you can control in this space, lover, just the power you can throw into the interface. Or dump off. Yeah, there's things I can do. Patrick-bastard's trying to hang back on me, not using the power he's got. It's an old trick, ride our wave and try to drop in behind us. He'd like to haul me down, but it's dangerous as hell, and say he can't do it without a gravity slope, so we're safe for the while. Besides, he knows I got to dump down anyway—and I know where and he doesn't. So when we hit the Tripoint slope, he'll expect I'll bobble the field and feint a drop. Wrong. I'll drop us for real, right out from under him. So if he doesn't read my mind, he's potentiating elsewhere. Same event-packet. Puts us time-wise near simultaneous, position-wise as far separate as I can fake him, the gods of physics know where: the variables are hell, and one of 'em's Patrick. WishI knew if that ghosty freighter's an echo. If it's real, she'll come down, too. Just don't know where."