Playing God(132)

“Good.” Lynn murmured to her implant to add the names to the list in front of her. “Get a head count and order the shuttles down there before they have a chance to change their minds. How much space have we got?”

“Four ships without the Ur,” said Trace. “We've currently committed for one hundred thousand, not counting the Ui Shai and Fvrona. So …” She paused while either she or her implant made a calculation. “We've got room for three-pomt-five-million more immediately.”

“That'll make a dent, anyway,” Lynn sucked on her lower lip. “How soon before we get more ships?”

Trace threaded through to another memo. “We've got three more on the way with Keale's reinforcements, but that's still two and a half weeks away.” She touched another key. “The engineer's reports from the belt say they'll have the Dublin together in a week and down here two days after that.”

“Okay, good,” said Lynn with the grim firmness that had marked her voice since she'd gotten the go-ahead for her plan. “That's another two-point-five-million spots in five weeks. We load them up as fast as we can convince them to leave.”

For the first time, Trace gave her a searching glance. “And if we can't convince them all?”

Lynn shook her head. “We have to.”


Praeis stood beside Theia in the engine room. The entire engineering crew stood behind them in a tight semicircle. It was too quiet. The place should have been filled with the roar and hiss of machinery, with the smell of hot diesel and oil filling the air. Praeis's nostrils flared. The smell was still there, but now it was strangely sour, like bread dough left out too long. She crouched and reached into the frozen engine, running her fingers along the side of one immobile drive shaft. They should have come away coated with smooth, black grease. Instead, they were covered with foamy grey gunk. She sniffed her fingertip, and her nostrils clamped shut.

“How much is down?” Praeis asked the engine room's prime-sister as she stood up, examining the tacky substance on her fingers.

“Everything,” Prime-Sister said bluntly. “We're cleaning and relubricating as fast as we can, but we can't run anything while that … stuff is in there.” Her face went tight with distress. Another prime-sister, probably her blood sister, put a hand on her shoulder. “Where'd this come from, Task-Mother? Have the Getesaph got a new weapon?”

“I don't know, Prime-Sister,” said Praeis heavily. “But we're going to find out Carry on with the cleanup. Let us have a progress report in three hours.”

“Yes, Task-Mother.”

Praeis flicked an ear toward the stairs. She felt Theia follow her as she trudged up to the bridge.

“You do know,” murmured Theia in her ear, “there is no way the Getesaph did anything like this.”

Praeis bared her teeth and stopped in mid-stride with Theia two steps below her. She bent down until her lips brushed Theia's ear.

“No, you are right. It must be the Humans,” she breathed.

Praeis straightened up, but she held her daughter's attention with both eyes and ears. Theia dipped her ears once. Good. She got the message and wouldn't say anything.

She had grown so much in the last few, hard, sad days. The work of the war had not ceased for their grief. The report ships had gone out with their letter to Armetrethe to tell her that Res and Senejess had died. They had written the letter one slow word at a time. Since then, Praeis had been out of Theia's sight for maybe five minutes. She wasn't sure if this was healthy. She was certain they were bending the rules to the breaking point, but on that score, she didn't care. She did not want to leave her daughter, and her daughter did not want to leave her.

Now, this … thing had happened. All the ships were suffering the same problem. Machinery seized up. Weapons seized up. At least one copter was down. They had engineers posted by the planes, but Praeis had no faith in that doing any good. Neys and Silv were out in the fleet, getting a firsthand look at the damage.

They had arms-sisters dug in on the shore. Without support, they'd be slaughtered. They were in the midst of a brief respite while the Getesaph pulled back and regrouped, but it wouldn't last forever.

The only thing that would throw her arms-sisters into a worse spin than all the rumors flying around the decks would be to have the worst ones confirmed: that it wasn't the Getesaph, it was the Humans who had done this. The immediate mediate conclusion would be that the Humans had thrown in with the enemy.

Praeis resumed climbing the stairs, and Theia went back to following her. Praeis couldn't keep herself from panting gently. Theia came up beside her and brushed Praeis's shoulder with her shoulder. Praeis was grateful for the gesture, and wished she could put her arm around her daughter, but she didn't dare. They couldn't let the arms-sisters see how bad it was, even if every last one of them knew.