Ky caught another whiff of her pressure suit. She would want it when she went aboard Fair Kaleen, and she’d prefer it dry and clean. It needed its internal powerpak recharged, as well. She was unlikely to need it immediately, with the raiders gone. She hung it back in its locker, hooked up the cable to the powerpak, and set the self-clean cycles to maximum.

The Mackensee ship stayed in the vicinity of the explosions for more than an hour—looking for survivors, Ky assumed—while her own crew continued to work on rewiring the drive control panels. She spent the time finally exploring her implant’s data structure.

It was tempting to explore FAMILY FILES and see what her father had said about her, but she searched the files for more on Osman instead. And there it was: what she could have known ahead of time if she’d not been so reluctant to insert this implant. Her father suspected that Osman had killed his own father, though it could not be proved. Certainly he had lied, embezzled, and made sexual advances and threats to crew. He had inherited his father’s shares of Vatta; he was going to be trouble no matter what they did. Her father and uncle, then the company troubleshooters when their father Arnulf was CEO, had been given the task of “taking care” of Osman. For a cash payment, Osman had been persuaded to give up his shares. He had decamped with a ship, and they had not prosecuted, on the grounds that they didn’t want him that close ever again. Osman’s section ended with her father’s recommendation that any Vatta captain coming across Osman take extreme precautions and report anything learned to HQ. Ky scowled. Someone should have blown him away years ago; it would’ve prevented a lot of trouble. And she would like her father to have known that she was the one who ended that threat to the family.

Ky turned from that to the section headed POLITICAL. Osman might not be their only enemy.

INTERSTELLAR COMMUNICATIONS. Under that heading she found subheads: Contacts, Policies, Negotiations, Potential Conflicts. That looked promising.

Lee came back up the passage with his board, glanced at Rafe and the extra cables in the bridge, and slid into his own seat without commenting or touching any of them. He plugged his board back in. “All right to test functions?” he asked.

“Go ahead,” Ky said. Her implant followed along the test patterns, offering her a choice of views. Then, as time passed, she checked on the medbox. Quincy, the medbox reported, was physically stable, but had suffered some blast damage, probably due to her age. Consultation with advanced medical care for long-term therapy was advised. Ky told Alene and the others to take Quincy out and put Martin in the box. She would have liked to check on them both herself, but she had to stay on the bridge.

With the drive now fully functional again, Ky warned her crew and instructed the ship to bring the artificial gravity back up slowly. As she settled deeper into her seat, she felt the aches from her exertion. At least she was sitting down.

Her screen came alive again, a call from the Mackensee ship. “We got both of them; we’ve picked up several prisoners. Your ISC rep will probably want them taken to ISC offices.”

“I’m sure,” Ky said, with a glance at Rafe, who still looked blank.

“We’ll be back with you in another hour,” her liaison said. “Out of communication for maneuvers until then.”

“Understood,” Ky said. She watched as the Mackensee ship disappeared from scan again, reappearing twice on its way back to her. Slotter Key Spaceforce had a few ships with that capability, but not many. She wondered what it felt like, those rapid transitions in and out of FTL flight, and how they navigated. She turned to Rafe. “Rafe—you might as well take a break.”

He nodded without really looking at her, unplugged himself, and shook his head. “Makes my ears feel strange,” he said. “That and the smells.”

“Monitoring transmissions?” Lee asked.

“Something like that,” Rafe said. He rotated his shoulders, stretched, and folded back up neatly, catlike.

Stella appeared at the bridge hatch with mugs of hot soup and a plate of ship biscuits. Ky sipped the thick broth, realizing as she felt alertness return just how much of her reserves she’d used. “I’ve already fed the others,” Stella said. “Toby asked me to defrost one of Aunt Gracie’s fruitcakes. He hasn’t ever had one.” She grinned.

“Some people like them,” Ky said.

“Boys that age will eat anything,” Stella said. “He’s on his third slice.”

“Stella carried that thing all the way from Slotter Key,” Rafe said. “I asked her why, and she wouldn’t tell me.”

“I had two of them,” Stella said. “The command implant was in one—”

“Is that where it was?” Rafe said, brows rising.

“And I have no idea what’s in the other,” Stella went on. “If anything. Aunt Gracie’s sense of humor at work.”

“We need to get the escape passage cleaned up,” Ky said. “And the air lock, and Osman’s body put somewhere.”

“Why not just space it?” Rafe asked.

“There will be formalities,” Ky said. “I’ll need documentation. Anyway, I don’t want to space it right now.” She didn’t want to move right now. What she wanted, suddenly, was a night’s sleep.

“Heat soup, slice cake, clean corridor, move a body,” Stella said in an odd tone of voice. “My, what my life has come to. Of course, I am still alive, and don’t think I’m not grateful, Ky. I was very, very glad not to have to play the captive princess close up. And glad you foiled Osman’s last ploy, however you did that.” She paused. Ky thought of giving a blow-by-blow, but decided against it. “But,” Stella resumed, when Ky said nothing, “when I thought of life as Vatta’s secret agent, it didn’t mean domestic chores. Though it has, as often as not, more’s the pity.”

“I’ll get some of the others on it,” Ky said. “I could use your advice on some of the things I’m finding in Dad’s implant.”

“Seriously?” Stella asked.

“Seriously. You’ve been home—well, in contact with home—the past four years and I haven’t. Just a second…” Ky called Environmental and, after making sure everything was functioning normally there, told Mitt to take over cleaning up the corridor. “It’s nasty—I’d suggest wearing suits. There’s a body in the air lock; put it in a sealed bag and into one of the cargo holds. We’ll move it over to the other ship if we can.”

“Do we have to… touch it?”

“The corpse? Yes—why? As far as I know, it’s not infected with anything. And you’ll have gloves on.”

“Well…” Mitt sounded less than eager.

“Why don’t you let me take care of Osman’s mortal coil,” Rafe said. “If you happen to have body bags.”

She didn’t. She’d hoped very much never to have a corpse on her ship again, but there he was, dead and in the way. “Not standard issue,” she said. “Can you improvise?”

“Sure. I’ll just go look for something… or we could wait for the mercs to show up. I’m sure they have body bags.”

Rafe went out; Ky told Mitt that Rafe would deal with the body, but might need a help finding the right container.

“Oh, we’ve got some supply sacks that might work,” Mitt said, sounding more cheerful already.

Ky thought privately that getting the passage clean would be worse than stuffing Osman’s corpse into a sack, but she wasn’t going to argue that. “Fine,” she said.

While the environmental techs worked on cleaning up the passage, she and Stella compared implant headings.

“I don’t have ship functions,” Stella said. “I told you that before. Mine’s optimized for financial analysis and contact information.”

“Who do you have at ISC?” Ky asked. “I’ve got about forty—everything from… uh… Mirellia Coston, executive assistant to the Slotter Key main rep—and her, too, of course—to Lew Parminer. I remember him; he came to Corleigh several times.”

“Forty? I have both of those but only a few more. Do you have Rilendo Varise, in Outside Contracts?”