Chanur's Homecoming

to run before they reached their turn point. The Pride would query for a Confirm; but if it got no Abort it would make that final dump on its own, reorient, find its own reference star and head out to Kura, would do it if they were all dead or incapacitated, taking its log records and everything it had into hani space, to brake at Anuurn and wait to be boarded ... by hani, pray the gods. The chance that the automatics could do all that flawlessly was about fifty-fifty; but it was their third-backup, failsafe to feeble living muscle and overtired brains. Haral had run all that calc, even had it plugged into one contingency courseplot for Kshshti to Maing Tol; and one for Tt’a’va’o as well, all while she had been tied up with the kif. Brain-bending, meticulous checks, run fast and by the gods accurately. And Haral like the rest of the crew, like Geran back there trying to keep her sister alive, had far overrun her physical limits.

“Tully’s on his way up,” Hilfy said. Internal-com was not her proper assignment; but it was a fair bet Sifeny had not understood him. “Na Khym’s up and headed out upper sec. Tauran crew is on its way.”

“Thank gods,” Pyanfar murmured. Things started to sort out. She could just about hold on that long. “Skkukuk.”

“Hakt’.”

“You’re offduty.” No, gods, no, can’t send him down the lift with Tauran crew coming up, they might shoot him. “Soon’s Tauran crew hits the bridge, you can go to quarters. See you at Kura.”

“Kkkkt. Yes, hakt.” Exhausted as the rest of them. “Hakt’, there is not adequate resistance here. Chakkuf has advised subordinates of this. Akkhtimakt has gone elsewhere. The two advance ships will have gone on. I queried regarding those courses. Our escort does not know.”

“Thanks,” she said. Calmly. There was no course but what they were following. It was academic information. That was all.

While all the agreements that held the Compact together had been shattered.

“On the other hand there a possibility both may have turned and gone for Kita,” said Skkukuk. “Akkhtimakt, defilement on his name, might circle back to Akkht. If he had Akkht he would be formidable again. Homeworld could not stand against him if it were not aware that he is severely challenged.”

“And not to Kura? Leave Akkhtimakt free to go to Kura?”

“We are that contingency, mekt-hakt. Certainly the hakkikt has sent a message to Akkht. But that we are not aware of the course of these ships indicates that they are not part of our business.”

“Or, of course, that our escort has separate orders.”

“Assuredly. Should I have mentioned that? The mekt-hakt’ is no fool.”

She tasted bile. Her heart labored and skipped like something moribund, on its last strength. The lift-door light reflected in the monitor at her right hand. A group of figures exited, shadows in a dimly-reflected corridor. Tauran, thank the gods. And where in a mahen hell’s Tully? She was not mentally fit for problems. She knew that. For godssakes get up here, Tauran, I can’t handle anything, I’m not sure I can walk across the floor. Her chest was hurting again, a persistent pain. She violated her own rule, powering her chair about on a working station. But Tauran was there, Sirany and all the rest of her crew, and-dull shock-Tully was with them, Tully had ridden the lift up with strangers and gotten out unscathed, points to that crew’s nerves and decency.

She unbuckled her restraints and groped after the chair arm. She was in that kind of condition. She heaved herself to her feet as Tully went off the back way to the galley, on duty; and Sirany Tauran and her crew headed for their change-off. “We got it easy,” Pyanfar said, though ops-com had been open for monitor the while. “Escort’s been laying down fire ahead of us, we got no sound out of Urtur station, we got no sound out of kif insystem. We got an hour to run before we hit our last dump and turn. We’re still missing Tahar and Vrossaru. They didn’t make the jump.”

“Understood,” Sirany said. “I’ve been on your com feed since before we dropped. Knnn. Knnn, for godssakes.”

“Knnn and trouble of some kind back there at Meetpoint. Whether that’s good news or bad for Tahar or for the kif I don’t know. I hope to all the gods it’s Goldtooth’s bunch, but they weren’t running IDs.” She passed a glance aside as Skkukuk unbuckled. “Kkkt,” Skkukuk murmured, and got up to his full, if unsteady, height. “Hakt.” That was only one captain he saluted; he bowed and turned and walked off the bridge, bound below, while Tauran crew took the briefings, the critical situations, from Chanur crew on the last of their strength.

Pyanfar straightened her shoulders and looked at Sirany. “You got a real good crew,” she said of Sif and Fiar.

“Yeah,” Sirany said, but the flick of the ears said immensely pleased. And said something else she could not read. “We got it, go.”