Starliner(84)

The elevator door dosed, amputating the word us.

What Commander Hiram Kneale knew was that Bridge had identified 97 passengers as probable agents of Nevasan nationality or in Nevasan employ. That was too close to Wade's "guess" of a hundred for any responsible person to believe it was only a guess.

What Kneale also knew was that so long as there were hundreds of Grantholm returnees aboard the Empress of Earth, the Nevasans could expect a full-scale battle if they attempted to hijack the starliner. And the Grantholmers had disembarked on Szgrane.

The commander stared somberly at his vessel; considering, planning. Something cracked loudly on the pavers behind him.

Kneale spun. One of the birds had dropped its burden onto the roof garden. The object lay between the Trident officer and the elevator.

It was a human thigh bone, with shreds of dry flesh still attached.





IN TRANSIT:

TELLICHERY ORBIT

". . . please report at once to your assigned lifeboat," said the silky, synthesized voice as Abraham Chekoumian trotted along the corridor. Very few other passengers were still moving, at least here in the First Class section.

"This is a drill," Bridge repeated through membrane speakers in the wainscotting at three-meter intervals along the corridor and in every cabin. "However, the vessel will not leave orbit until every passenger has taken their position. . . ."

Chekoumian was in the Social Hall when the alarm sounded. Instead of going straight to his lifeboat, he'd detoured to his cabin to pick up his packet of letters from Marie. Just in case.

". . . in a lifeboat. Please report at once to your assigned lifeboat."

The corridor walls, instead of showing restful land or seascapes, now surged forward in broad arrows overprinted with Bay 32, Bay 34, Bay 40. The fact that some bays weren't mentioned suggested to Chekoumian that while he wasn't the only passenger still delaying the exercise, at least some of the lifeboats were already loaded.

A steward with a holographic data link waited at the branch corridor to Bay 32, Chekoumian's lifeboat station. Chekoumian turned toward him, following the arrow. The link zeeped as it compared the passenger's features with those stored within the ship's AI.

"In here quickly," the steward called, though Chekoumian was already past him. "Quickly quickly, please."

The lifeboat's hatch was broad enough for passengers to board six-abreast in stumbling panic. The interior lighting was dim compared to the bright corridor, but an illuminated yellow arrow slid swiftly down the central aisle to the only empty seat in the 50-place vessel.

Gray faces stared at the newcomer from the occupied places. Many of the passengers carried bundles, quickly gathered from their cabins. Though the announcement had been clear that this was only an exercise, lifeboat drill was unexpected and an unfamiliar event even to experienced travelers.

Chekoumian plumped into the empty place. The companion on his side of the aisle was a heavyset man with a sour expression, holding a disposable hologram reader.

The lifeboats' seat pitch and width were minimal, since the little vessels were designed to accommodate as many people as possible and protect them against the shock of a hard landing. Chekoumian wriggled to settle himself.

He bumped his neighbor. "Sorry," he muttered.

The hatch closed from either end. One of the panels rolled with a singing noise where something rubbed.

"That's all right," his companion answered, speaking Standard but with what Chekoumian took to be a Georgian accent. "If they don't get us out of these sardine cans in another five minutes, though, I'll walk before I lift with Trident again. I thought I was treating myself!"

"You're from Tblisi?" Chekoumian said.

His eyes were adapting to the interior lighting. A sailor seated at the console in the bow carried on a conversation with the starliner proper. Apart from him, the lifeboat was a can containing passengers in four-abreast seating—and five in the last row, where the aisle ended.

"You bet," his companion agreed, switching to Georgian. "Yuri Timurkanov, Gold Star Fisheries. You're from Tblisi too?"

Timurkanov set his reader down on the armrest to shake Chekoumian's offered hand. There wasn't enough room. The reader clacked to the floor.

"Abraham Chekoumian," the importer said. "And yes, from Tblisi, but I haven't been home in five years. I'm going back to be married."

He bent to pick up the hologram reader.

"Please?" a passenger nearer the bow called to the lone crewman. "When will we be able to leave, young man?"

"Oh, don't bother with that thing," Timurkanov said. "It's last week's news-load from Bogomil. It was the only thing I had along when the alarm sounded, but I must have read it a dozen times by now already."