“They probably would, but they’re afraid we might have it booby-trapped. They figure if they hang onto us, we can’t deliver it, and if we blow up with them, it serves us right.”

“So why didn’t they come to me directly?”

“Well…” Beeah looked at the deck, and Ky wished she had a scanner to read the inside of his head. She’d never seen him blush before. “It’s… they think if they open a link, you’ll do something. It would let you set off something, they said.”

“Oh, for—” She still could not think of the right comment for that kind of boneheaded stupidity. A worse thought occurred. “So if the station does blow up, they’ll probably blame me—and maybe Vatta Transport—even if we had nothing to do with it!”

“I guess they might,” Beeah said. It was clear he hadn’t thought of that. She watched his expression change as he took it in. “Captain… what are you going to do?”

She hadn’t a clue. But captains weren’t supposed to say that. Instead, she said, “Go down and sendQuincyup, please.” When he’d left the bridge, she calledGaryto the bridge as well. Surely a combined hundred and fifty years of experience ought to be worth something.

“What’s up?”Quincyasked. “Beeah said he couldn’t get the equipment—”

“No, and there’s worse. Wait untilGarygets here.”

Garycame in a moment later, out of breath. “Damned multigang disk cultivators anyway. Stupid things will not stack well, even half-covered in sticky tape. What is it, Captain?”

Ky outlined their situation. “I won’t say it couldn’t be worse,” she said. “Because it always can. But I wanted your comments on this…”

“Not advice?”Garysaid, rubbing his head.

“I’ll hear it if you have it,” Ky said.

“It’s a right mess,”Quincysaid. “Like you said, if some saboteur blows the station, we’ll likely be blamed for it and we won’t be there to defend ourselves. Vatta, too, you’re right. Slotter Key, even. And we’ll be blamed for not making the delivery to Belinta, as well. And we can’t go anywhere,”Quincysaid, looking worried. “Insystem drive, fine, it’s working, but it’s slow and there’s nowhere in this system we can go. We need that sealed unit.”

“Even if we had it, we’d have a big problem,”Garysaid. “If we undock without authorization, they may consider that proof of bad intent and attack us. I don’t see what we can do but stay here…”

“Are we completely spaceworthy for insystem travel?” Ky asked.

“Yes, but it’s no good to us…”

Ky held up her hand, andQuincystopped. “It’s like this,” Ky said. “So far I’ve been reacting to things—I suppose you could consider the Belinta deal initiative, but it practically fell on me out of a tree. Here on Sabine, I’ve been pushed by circumstances. If I just follow along doing the obvious thing, it’s going to get us killed. I realized that while Beeah was talking. If we’re going to get out of this, we have to act. Reaction may kill us, but inaction certainly will.”

Amat shifted in his seat; Ky glanced at him and found him looking at her with peculiar intensity.

“What?”

“Nothing, Captain. You’re making sense. Go on.”

“What are you planning?”Quincyasked.

“I don’t have a complete plan,” Ky admitted. “But the longer we stay here with our ship locked to the biggest remaining target in local space, the more likely we are to be hit. So the first thing is, we undock, with polite apologies to the station. Prep us for undock and insystem travel.”

Quincyblinked, then nodded. “Right, Captain. But how are you going to contact the station, when they’re blocking contact?”

“They’ll have receivers tuned for broadcast, I’m sure. Get us ready, that’s all. How long?”

Quincyglanced at the bridge status boards, then atGary. “Your cargo all locked down?”

“Cargo secure,”Garysaid. Ky could not tell from his expression what he felt about her orders.

“Fifteen minutes, then. They’ll detect it in eight, Captain.”

“Right.” Ky set an alarm for eight minutes and the other two left the bridge faster than they’d come. Time to address the rest of the crew. She cleared her throat, and thumbed the intercom.

“Crew—this is Captain Vatta—” Her voice was steady, but it still felt odd to call herself Captain Vatta. “We are preparing for emergency undock. All sections report green status. Expect emergency undock in less than fifteen minutes. Warning count will be given starting two minutes before undock. Off-duty crew bunk down; this may be rough.”

She heard footsteps in the passage, the rest of the bridge crew hurrying to their stations.

“What happened, Captain?” Lee Quidlen slid into his seat, snatching at the restraints with a practiced hand, and logged in.

“There’s a war starting,” she said. “You know about the ansibles being attacked. The station suspects that we might be bad guys, and won’t let us have the replacement sealed unit. Which leaves us a choice between sitting here like a target, or moving off and hoping no one blows us up…”

Sheryl’s hair was wet and her skin glistened; she must have been in the shower. But she was in her seat in moments, calling up the ship’s navigation functions. “Got any idea where to go?”

“Away from here or anyplace else someone would want to blow up,” Ky said. “But close enough we can get back if it turns out we have a chance to refit. We have to get repairs somewhere, but I’m sure ISC will be doing something about the ansible damage—”

“Mmmph. So we just go out and try to find some nondescript system real estate for the duration?”

“Lacking FTL drive or weaponry, yes.”

“Sounds good to me.” Sheryl turned to her controls.

“Lee, you take the undock; I’ll monitor drives and balance,” Riel said. Lee grunted acknowledgment. Ky glanced at the chronometer. Eleven minutes. Something hissed; she looked up and saw the bridge hatch sliding shut; then pressure pulsed at her ears; seals testing. The hatch slid open again.

“Cargo green,” came Gary Tobai’s voice. Then, more softly, “Suggestion, Captain?”

“Go ahead.”

“Suits? Have ’em out?”

Of course. “Captain to crew,” Ky said. “Suit up as duties allow, stay on ship atmosphere for now.” Her own suit, in its sealed pouch, was under the captain’s seat. She pulled it out, shook it loose of the pouch, then realized she was still in shore uniform.

“I have to change,” she said to the back of Lee’s head. “Two minutes.”

He nodded and she dashed to her cabin, blessing the daily routine of the Academy. Skinning out of shore clothes, a quick trip to the toilet, into formfitting shipsuit, into the pressure suit, back to the bridge.

Slow. Two minutes, five seconds. Nine minutes to go.

“Environmental green,” said Mitt Gossin from his control station. Ky acknowledged that, sank into her seat, and the safety harness slid out to enclose her in its protective webbing.

“Crew quarters green.”

“Seals green.” Now Glennys Jones was as safe from harm as it could be; it would take real weaponry to breach the hull, and anything that size would harm the station. It might even survive a hit on the station, depending on how close and how big. Still, it was attached to the target and not able to maneuver on its own.

Brrrp. The alarm. Eight minutes.

“Insystem drive initiation.”Quincy, sounding bored, which meant not bored at all. Nothing happened at first but a light blinking on the main board. Then the undertone, felt more than heard, of the insystem drive spinning up. The light flickered, then steadied: successful drive initiation. The station would detect that; what they would do about it remained unclear.

“Umbilicals disengaged.” Clicks, thunks, hisses, as Glennys Jones’ attachments went from “sealed” to “retracted.”

“Emergency disconnect boosters enabled.” Soundless, this: merely an electrical signal to the safety interlocks that prevented accidental discharge.

Two minutes now. Ky reminded herself to breathe. Surely the stationmaster would make contact. They didn’t need the cable links; they had broadcast… and what would she say?