Starliner(92)

She glanced over at Ran. "This isn't any time to stick out like sore thumbs, whatever we want to do."

The two passengers addressed obeyed the sharp command without objecting or even speaking, though the man's mouth opened and closed like that of a carp gulping air. The dozen or so other passengers acted as though a flag had dropped. Their shift toward the door to the corridor became a dead run within three steps.

The man who gave Ran his jacket of pink and puce velour reached for the uniform tunic in exchange. Ran set his hand over the passenger's.

"You don't want this either," Ran said. His voice quivered like the wire of a cheese-cutter.

The passenger jerked away and rushed out of the room, hand in hand with his companion. They didn't look back.

Ran tossed his white tunic into an alcove. Wanda slipped a small pistol from the sidepocket of her own garment to that of her borrowed one, then hid the uniform with Ran's.

He knelt as the Second Officer had done before. "Colville to Kneale," he said with the transceiver tight against the inlaid wood. "Over."

"How do you know it's Grantholmers?" Wanda demanded, backing into the shelter of the reeds as she looked toward the entrance to the Enchanted Forest Her right hand was in her pocket.

"Bridge, where the hell is the commander!" Ran shouted.

"Commander Kneale is not aboard the vessel," Bridge said through the disk. "He vanished from his cabin when I sounded the alarm. Over."

"It says he vanished!" Ran blurted to his companion. "You can't vanish from a starship!"

What you could do was die. If a crewman in Grantholm pay had hidden bombs in the officers' quarters to go off in concert with an external attack, for example.

Ran and Wanda saw understanding in each others' sudden hardening of expression. Neither of them spoke the realization aloud.

"They'll have the arms locker by now," Ran said. "It's on the Engineering Deck, a hundred meters from the Cold Crew hatch they used. I've got my pistol and that cannon we picked up on Calicheman in my cabin, but they'll probably have somebody on Corridor Twelve by now . . . ."

"We'll try," Wanda said in sharp decision. "We need more than one pop-gun, that's for sure."

Her face suddenly fell into a hard smile. "And it's Grantholm rather than Nevasa because the Nevasans were going to hijack the Empress from inside. That means if there's a sponge-space commando attacking, it's from Grantholm."

"Excuse us?" a voice called from the direction of the corridor entrance. The person speaking was hidden by vegetation between him and the officers on the curved aisle. "Lieutenants? We're coming toward you. Your ship's artificial intelligence said you were here."

Wanda drew her pistol. Ran stepped deliberately in front of her, hiding the weapon from sight.

"What is it?" he demanded sharply.

A lanky old man stepped around the stand of Grantholm reeds. It was a passenger Ran had met the day the Empress undocked from Earth: Wade, Richard Wade, and his plump cabinmate Belgeddes trailed behind him.

"A Grantholm commando has invaded your ship, Mr. Colville," Wade said. He gave a courtly nod to recognize Wanda as well. "And we thought you might like our help in doing something about it."

* * *

"You want to what?" Wanda Holly said.

"Thinks we're a couple silly old buffers, Dickie," Belgeddes said, shaking his head sadly. "Well, I suppose we can't blame her."

The plump old man put his index finger to the throat of his tunic and opened it to an undershirt of some bleached natural fiber.

"Gentlemen," said Ran Colville, "please get to your cabin at once. Ms. Holly and I—"

"They'll have somebody in officers' country by now," Wade said, "the Grantholmers will. They won't have had time to search the cabins this quick, though. The two of you head that way, they'll come down on you like lizards on a beetle. But if it's you and I sauntering down the hall, Ms. Holly—well, an old fart and his popsy won't ring any alarm bells in whoever's on guard, will we?"

"Best be me with the young lady, Dickie," said Belgeddes as he pulled his undershirt from beneath his waistband. "And it best be me with the little gun, Ms. Holly, because even if you're better than I think you are, I've got more of this kind of experience."

He tugged the undershirt upward, baring his belly and chest.

"Jesus Christ," Ran Colville said softly.

Much of the scar tissue smeared a bright pink across Belgeddes' pasty torso was of too general a nature to identify its cause, but the line of four dimples from right shoulder to right nipple were obviously bulletholes. It was amazing the man had survived.