"With just the nose cone and engine sections sticking out on either side," Isaid, a tingle of cautious excitement running through me as I looked over atIxil. "Possible?"

"I don't see why not," he said. His voice was its usual calm, but the ferretswere twitching again. "At least in theory. We've got the equipment to spot- weld the plates to the spheres, and the plates themselves can be connected togetherwith the same fasteners that are holding them together now."

"I thought the cutting torch was dead," Shawn reminded him.

"We also have an arc-welding torch," Ixil told him. "It's still functional."

"What about supports?" Nicabar asked. "You're not going to have any structuralstrength to speak of here."

"We could add some braces in from beneath," Ixil said. "Assuming the weldingrods hold out, we ought to have enough material."

"And assuming we don't run out of power to run the welder," Tera said. "Howare we on fuel, McKell?"

"We've got more than enough to drive the generators as long as we'll need," Iassured her. "My question is how long Shawn's medicine is going to last."

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence. Apparently, that aspect hadn'tyetoccurred to them. "Yes, that is rather a limiting factor," Everett conceded.

"I'd say we have no more than eight or nine days left on this supply. And that's if we stretch it out."

"Doesn't give us much time," Tera said. "Especially since we also have to get to a port once all this conversion work is finished."

"True." I looked at Shawn. "What do you think? Can you handle a week on low doses?"

He snorted. "I'll handle a week on no doses if I have to," he said bitterly.

"You probably don't know it, but the Patth had some major harvesting operations on Ephis, and were furious when the Commonwealth closed them down by interdicting the place. I don't think I'd get any sympathy from them if they grabbed us. And no borandis, either."

"Though they would probably consider that you had done them a small service,"

Chort said quietly. "You, at least, they could allow to die naturally."

Tera shivered. "And on that note, I vote we get going on this."

"Seconded," I agreed, standing up. "Ixil, let's go break out the tools."

CHAPTER 15

IT WAS ONE thing, I discovered, to suggest disassembling an entire starship from the inside out. It was another thing entirely to actually set about doing it.

Still, it was quickly apparent that the very nature of the Icarus's odd design was going to work in our favor. On a normal starship all the bulkheads and decks were solidly riveted or welded together, with most of the various sections cast or molded to the specific fit required. Our bulkheads and decks, in contrast, were fastened together with the same connectors Cameron's people had used on the inner-hull plates, which made disassembly a fast and simple process.

Furthermore, all the interior framing had been created from the same meter-square plates: a single thickness for the inner hull and most of the walls, double or triple thickness for the decks and supporting bulkheads. In one of my rare moments alone with Tera I asked about that, and she confirmed my guess that Cameron's techs had designed it that way on purpose. Shaped or molded bulkhead sections might have raised eyebrows with Meima's customs inspectors, but simple meter-square building plates wouldn't even rate a yawn.

Ixil's inventory included only three of the connector tools, but since there was also a great deal of hauling to be done the limited number worked out just fine.

Cameron, bless him, had used high-strength but low-weight metal composites, which meant that even Shawn and Chort could lug the plates to the wraparound with relative ease. We rotated jobs every twenty minutes or so, with an eye toward not fatiguing any one set of muscles. As Ixil suggested at one point, there was likely to be more than enough muscle fatigue to go around.

For the first six hours we concentrated on simple disassembly, starting with the nonsupporting walls and moving on to bulkheads, shifting the plates into the wraparound and stacking them by the hatch. At that point, I decided we had enough material to start with Chort's exterior modification plan. We still had two shipboard suits—the third had been left behind on Xathru when we'd filed Jones's death report—and of course Chort had his own suit as well. Putting Tera and Nicabar into the smaller and larger sizes, respectively, I sent them outwith Chort, the welder, and two connector tools and crossed my fingers.

It worked out better than even my best level of cautious hope. Chort, itturned out, was quite competent with the welder, at least as skilled as Ixil if not ashade more so. The proper positioning of the plates was another worry I'd had; Tera solved that one by the three of them assembling an entire longitudinalsection and working it into place between the two spheres before Chort did anywelding. With two of the connector tools now outside, the four of us insideshifted jobs again from mass disassembly to the more delicate task of movingthe gear from the now nonexistent rooms to new quarters against the inside of thehull. The large sphere's gravitational level of .85 gee made the tasks oflifting and carrying marginally easier while still avoiding the missteps andinertial problems of low-gee environments.

The days settled into a steady if slightly frantic routine. Chort spent everywaking hour outside, clearly loving it, except for the brief periods when hehad to come in to have his rebreather recharged. Those of us who could fit intothe remaining suits—which was everyone except Everett—took our turns outside withhim, most of us not nearly as enthusiastic about the wide-open spaces as Chortwas. The rest of our time was divided between more disassembly, shifting thenecessary equipment to the inner hull and tossing the rest, or collapsing onour transplanted bunks in the near coma that had taken the place of normal sleep.

With the verbal sniping and general lack of sociability that had marked thetripup to this point I had braced myself for the escalation in overall tensionthat all this unscheduled exercise was bound to create. Once again—and this one wasreally to my surprise—it didn't happen. There was the occasional snapped wordor under-the-breath curse, but for the most part I found my fellow travelerssuddenly behaving far more like a seasoned crew than a random collection ofsemi-hostile strangers.

In retrospect, I suppose, I shouldn't have been so surprised by the suddentransformation. Before the Najiki near miss at Utheno we'd been little morethan interstellar truck drivers, doing a dull job for low pay, with nothing inparticular to look forward to after it was done, and with only the vaguethreat of a possible hijacking to make it even marginally interesting. Now, suddenly, we were on the cusp of history, with the chance to make a name for ourselvesand at the same time stick it hard to the Patth and their hated economic empire.

We had the chance for immortality—and, even more importantly, for possiblyserious riches—and that simultaneous group grab for the brass ring was drawing usfirmlytogether.

Of course, lurking behind the chance to make history was the darker knowledgethat if the Patth caught up with us even our own personal histories wouldprettywell be over. That was undoubtedly part of the cooperation, too.

But whatever the reason, the progress the first four days was nothing short ofremarkable. So much so that midway through the fifth day I pulled Everett andIxil off the work crews and sent them aft to the engine room to startrecalibrating the equipment that the Najiki ion attack had scrambled. Then, with Chort, Nicabar, and Shawn working outside, I took Tera over to her computerand settled in for a crash course in Alien Stardrive 101.