Kinder des Schicksals 4 (Xeelee 9): Resplendent

need to clean out her
nest.’
    Poole’s eyes narrowed. ’What else?’
    ’That woman needs exercise. You’ve seen the logs. She only gets
off her bed to use the bathroom, and even that’s only a couple of
times a day. What good will it do anybody if she keels over from a
thrombosis even before we get to the Chandra? Especially if she’s got
a dead man’s switch, as she claims.’
    ’Those are all reasons for separating Mara from her bomb, despite
your promises to the contrary. I don’t trust you as far as I can
throw you, Captain. And if I don’t, how can Mara?’
    Captain Tahget glared; he was a bulky, angry, determined man, and
his scar was livid. ’Michael Poole, my only concern is the safety of
the ship, and everybody aboard - yes, including Mara. I am an
honourable man, and if you have half the intuition for which your
original was famous you will understand that. I give you my word that
if she is willing to leave her room, briefly, for these essential
purposes, Mara’s situation will not be changed. When she is returned,
everything will be as it was. I hope that we can progress this in a
civilised and mutually trusting fashion.’
    Poole studied him for long seconds. Then he glanced at Futurity,
and shrugged. ’After all,’ Poole said, ’she’ll still be able to
detonate her bomb whether she’s in the cabin with it or not.’
    So Mara emerged from her room, for the first time since before
Futurity’s first visit to the ship.
    A strange procession moved around the ship, with Tahget himself in
the van, and a handful of crew, mostly female, surrounding the
central core of Poole, Futurity and Mara. Mara insisted that Poole
and Futurity stay with her at all times, one on either side, and she
brought a pillow from her cabin which she held clutched to her chest,
like a shield. Futurity couldn’t think of a thing to say to this
woman who was holding them all hostage, but Poole kept up a
comforting murmur of mellifluous small-talk.
    Futurity saw that the crew checked over Mara surreptitiously.
Maybe they were searching for the devices that linked her to her
bomb. But there was nothing to be seen under her shapeless grey
smock. Surely any such device would be an implant, he decided.
    The peculiar tour finished in the observation lounge, where the
view was still half obscured by the hull of an over-friendly ship
that had sidled up to the Ask Politely. Further out, nuzzling ships
drifted around the sky, like bunches of misshapen balloons.
    Mara showed a flicker of curiosity for the first time since
leaving her cabin. ’The ships are so strange,’ she said.
    ’That they are,’ Poole said.
    ’What are they doing?’
    ’I don’t know. And the Captain won’t tell me.’
    She pointed. ’Look. Those two are fighting.’
    Futurity and the others crowded to the window to see. It was true.
Two ships had come together in an obviously unfriendly way. Both
lumbering kilometre-long beasts, they weren’t about to do anything
quickly, but they barged against each other, withdrew, and then went
through another slow-motion collision. As they spun and ground, bits
of hull ornamentation were bent and snapped off, and the ships were
surrounded by a pale cloud of fragments, detached spires and shields,
nozzles and antennae and scoops.
    ’It’s a peculiar sort of battle,’ Futurity said. ’They aren’t
using any weapons. All they are doing is smashing up each other’s
superstructure.’
    ’But maybe that’s the point,’ Poole said.
    ’So strange,’ Mara said again.
    Captain Tahget blocked her way. ’But,’ he said, ’not so strange as
the fact that you, madam, were able to smuggle a monopole bomb onto
my ship.’
    The mood immediately changed. Mara, obviously frightened, shrank
back against Poole, coming so close she brushed against him, making
his flank sparkle with disrupted pixels.
    Poole said warningly, ’Captain, you promised you wouldn’t
interfere with her.’
    Tahget held up his big hands. ’And I will keep my word. Nobody
will touch the bomb, or Mara here, and we’ll go through with our
flight to Chandra as we agreed.’
    ’But,’ Poole said heavily, ’you had an ulterior motive in getting
her out here, despite your promises.’
    ’All right,’ Captain Tahget snapped. ’I need some answers. I must
know how she got us all into this situation.’
    Futurity asked, ’Why?’
    Tahget barely glanced at him. ’To stop it happening again.’ He
glared at Mara. ’Who helped you? Somebody