Chanur's Legacy (24 page)

“Aide to
gtst
excellency!”
gtst
protested. “I am no juvenile! I am an honorable person, gainfully employed and competent!”

“What,” demanded Tlisi-tlas-tin, “what is your wretched and undistinguished name?”

What had
gtst
done? Hilfy wondered, stunned by the viciousness of Tlisi-tlas-tin’s attack. Stsho weren’t violent. Stsho avoided conflict, and unpleasantness, and
gtst
attacked a stsho
gtst
called a juvenile ... who hovered in the doorway murmuring,

“Oh, the beauty, oh, the elegance, oh, oh!”

Tlisi-tlas-tin’s crest lowered and lifted.
Gtst
blinked rapidly, and the young stsho bowed repeatedly, and turned and patted Hilfy’s arm.

“Tell
gtst
excellency, tell
gtst
excellency I am overwhelmed, I cannot remember the unworthiness in the face of this magnificence, I admire
gtst
excellency, please say this!”

“Gtst
says ...”

“Gtstisi,oh, gtstisi!”

Gtstisi.
The Indeterminate. The Transitory.

They had a gods-be Phasing stsho on their hands, a personality overwhelmed and disintegrating.

“Gtstisi
says ...
gtstisi
is overwhelmed.” It was all of it she could construct. It was all that made sense.

But Tlisi-tlas-tin turned
gtst
back and walked a few steps before
gtst
deigned to answer.

And
gtstisi—assuming
it was Phasing—crouched on the floor at the doorway.

“Your honor,” Hilfy said, trying to attract
gtst
attention.
“Is
this—“ One could not directly refer to the former identity of a stsho in fragmentation—it was abominable manners. “Is this someone with whom your honor might have business?

Gtst
was clearly agitated, pacing and wringing
gtst
long, white fingers. “Excellency,”
gtst
had the presence of mind to declare, promoting
gtstself\f
a notch, for the visitor’s benefit, one could think. “I do not notice this distasteful event. If
gtstisi
remains,
gtstisi
remains. Where is Atli-lyen-tlas, what am I to think?”

“Excellency, I have had a report
gtst
moved on, likely to Kshshti. This could not possibly . , .
possibly
... be the identical person, please forgive my forwardness.”

“A servant,”
gtst
said, at which the intruder wailed and covered
gtstisi
head with locked arms. “Take this juvenile from my sight. It is insane.”

One hesitated to make any disposition of the wretched creature. One hesitated to lay hands on it: stsho were fragile, and bones might break. But she took it by a fold of cloth and tugged, wondering what she might do with it, thinking of the accommodation they might improvise out of the remaining passenger cabin next door, and recalling that cabin was dark gray and a definite blue.

It might drive the creature over the edge, or pry its last grip loose from reality.
Final arbiter,
the contract said, of the disposition of the Preciousness. And that was the loader clanking into motion, those hydraulics were the cargo hatch unsealing the
Legacy
to the dock-side and the dockers and kifish bandits, by Tiar’s report.

“White paint,” she said, and cast about desperately after resources of personnel or energy. “White paint. Panels. There have to be some pieces in storage.”

“I think there were,” Tiar said.

“Get on the com. Advise Tarras and Chihin there’s kif out there. Get—“ She had the stsho in hand, Meras topside,
gtst
honor in the passenger quarters ... and
gtstisi
was wilting in her grip, wiping at its body paint and its crest indiscriminately. “Lost, lost,”
gtstisi
wailed. “I was someone and I forget, I forget, oh, the misery I have had, and I forget!”

“Get on it!” Hilfy said, and dragged the fainting stsho to the neighboring cabin. “This is temporary,” she said. “It has no taste, no distinction. It will change.”

“Oh, the despair!”
gtstisi
cried, and slumped inside. “I die, I perish, oh, woe and obliteration ... where is my name to be? What shall I become?”

“An honest stsho!” she said irritably, and shut the door and locked it.

And leaned against the wall, surveying over her left shoulder a scattered trail of small abandoned parcels. Tiar was not in sight. Probably Tiar would gladly be several lights away at the moment, and the hold was not far enough.

But she could not blame Tiar entirely. Nor blame Hallan Meras for this disaster. This one came of being here, came of kif stalking them, came of dealing with a scoundrel of a mane who wouldn’t tell her what she needed to know.

She had the most sinking feeling that
this
was the stsho Haisi had claimed was still available and knowledgeable,
this
was the source of knowledge still available to them, and
gtst
had just lost touch with
gtst
own mind—was, in effect, dying to the stsho
gtst
had been, and becoming another entity, if
gtst
could pull the bits and pieces of a personality together.

But
gtst
might not remember once
gtst
had made that transition.
Gtst—gtstisi.
Indeterminate, desperately trying to sort out its reality, and locked, within that storage compartment, in an environment that could lend it no cues.

She shoved herself away from the wall, opened Tlisi-tlas-tin’s door without
gtst
permission and met shocked, offended eyes. “A mahe named Tahaisimandi Ana-kehnandian has been following us since Meetpoint. He said that some of Atli-lyen-tlas’ staff remained ...”

Gtst
honor ...
gtst
excellency, as
gtst
lately styled gtstself... flinched. “This is extremely distasteful.”

“Because that unformed person
is
Atli-lyen-tlas?’’

“No! A thousand, thousand nos. This is a person beneath our tasteful notice. We would not undertake a mission to such an individual. Do not distress us further. This is a juvenile. Atli-lyen-tlas has abandoned
gtst
post and fled in our face. The treachery, the abysmal treachery! I perform heinous insults upon this gift
of gtst
shapeless servant! It will not dissuade me!”

“You mean
gtstisi—“

“Is surely a servile leaving of
gtst
excellency. Can you look at the magnificence of my surroundings and affront me with that disheveled and untidy person?
Gtstisi
may serve here. The lack of servants offends my dignity, which surely your honor knows. I will accept this individual as resident in my quarters, but
gtstisi
must be clean and respectful!”

“I will inform
gtstisi
of your—ah, excellency’s offer.”

“My order!”

“Exactly.” She kept her expression sweet and her ears up, and bowed politely and went to the neighboring cabin to run
gtst
new excellency’s errand.
“Gtst
excellency wants you,” she said to the huddled figure inside. “But I suggest you make yourself presentable. There is a thoroughly tasteless place where you may find water and organize your baggage. Follow me.”

“Oh, oh,” was all
gtstisi
managed to say. “Despair and disaster.”

But
gtstisi
followed, through the litter of the abandoned baggage, while thumps and bangs and the action of the loader heralded the exit of cargo from the hold, and, one could hope, not the entry of kifish pirates off the unregulated docks.

She saw the nameless stsho to the washroom, let
gtstisi
gather up
gtstisi
trail of baggage that was strewn from Tlisi-tlas-tin’s door to the airlock, and meanwhile used the com at the intersection of the corridors to call the cargo lock.

“Tiar? Are you alive out there?”

“Things look quiet,”Tiar said. “They’re gone. “

“Are you armed?”

“Gun’s right here in the lock. We’re legal. “

Thank the gods for favors. She called the bridge:

“Fala. Where’s Meras?”

“Doing the filters.”

“Remind him keep off lower decks. We’ve got a problem.”

“What kind of problem, captain?”

“Two
stsho. One’s Phasing. Ours, thank the gods, is still sane. There are kif on the docks, Tiar’s working outside, they know she brought the stsho here ... where’s Tarras?”

“Right here, captain. You need some help down there?”

“Just be my eyes and ears on dockside. And investigate cargo for Kshshti. Don’t agree to anything yet.’‘

“Kshshti!”

“I know, I know, best I can do. I’ll be on com. I’ve got a scoundrel to call.”

“Aye, captain.”

“So can you still deliver what you asked about?’’ Hilfy asked, and the scoundrel in question said, via station com:

“ You number one bastard thief! How you find?’‘

It was the only pleasant moment in a disgusting day. “Guess.”

“What you propose now, hani bastard?”

“Manners, manners, Haisi. We all lose a few.’’

“Repeat: what you propose?”

“We might have something to talk about. But now we have the information and you’re buying.”

There was a moment of silence on the com. Hilfy leaned her arms on the ops station counter, and flicked her ears to listen to the rings jangle.

“What you offer?”

“I don’t know. Let me think about it.”

“You head for trouble. I number one good friend. Who else you trust?”

“Dear friend. Good friend. You don’t want to rash my decision, do you? You want to give me time. We have to maintain good relations.”

Now and again there were mahen words she hadn’t heard. There followed some. Then:
“Of course. Number one fine. Talk to you later, pretty captain.”

Tarras was looking up cargo for Kshshti. And if they didn’t want to be charged with abducting the Precious-ness, if they didn’t want to pay back a million credit deal ... Kshshti looked to be where they were going.

And out of Kshshti ...

Out of Kshshti, Maing Tol, or back to Kita ... or worse choices. Kshshti lay in the Disputed Territories. It was still a mahen station.

But it was too close to the kif ... far too close for comfort.

And
gtst
excellency had taken a kifish ship at Kita Point?

Or the kif had taken
gtst
excellency. Certainly the young stsho Tiar had rounded up on station might have told them what the facts were, if the young stsho had not been driven straight out of
gtst
mind, either by the harrowing run to the ship,
gtst
conditions on the station, or the sight of Tlisi-tlas-tin. The fact was, they didn’t know and might never know what had been the triggering event, or whether it bore on what had already happened.

So they had to go on. But she would feel ever so much better if she knew how far they were going to have to chase this Atli-lyen-tlas, or into what.

Hallan really, truly did not want to make another mistake. He knew how to clean the filters and maintain equipment, but he had read the manual and the instructions just the same, to be absolutely, unmistakably certain what he was doing. He didn’t think speed was going to impress anyone ... since he was sure they had given him the job to keep him out of the crew’s way; and because it
would
save the crew a little time. He wished he could find a disaster in the making, that he could fix, and by that, impress the captain and make up for what he had done at Urtur.

He had nightmares about that. He had nightmares about the tc’a showing up and demanding he come methane-side and parent its offspring. And of strangling in the atmosphere. But there were probably laws to protect him from that.

There were none to protect the ship from the fines it had suffered because of him, because of having to close the section doors, and scaring all those people...

He didn’t think he could ever live that down. Sometimes he thought he would be better off to go home and live in the outback and do things the way they had always been done and not be a problem to anyone. He was not really a fighter, he never had been, he was just clumsy, which he daily proved, and his elbows continually found something to bash, or his head to knock into, but there was just no use for being his size on board a ship.

He heard someone come up near him. He did everything as precisely and efficiently as he could. Whoever it was stood there watching. And he finished the job before he looked to see. “ker Fala?” “I was just watching.”

That made him nervous. He put the tools away and got up, intending to take them to the storage. He supposed he should go to the crew lounge then, because he hadn’t any other instructions.

She was still staring at him when he walked away. It made him feel—highly uncomfortable.

The crew aboard the
Sun
had behaved like that too. And he didn’t feel the same as he did with Sahern clan, he felt confused, but it wasn’t a confusion he wanted to think about. It scared him. He was afraid she was going to be waiting in the lounge when he got back, but she wasn’t, she was in the galley making lunch. And maybe he should go help her, and not sit in the lounge as if there were nothing on the ship his intelligence could discover to do, but he didn’t want to be alone with her, so he started aft. But Fala said, to his back, “Want to help?”

And there went his available excuse. “All right,” he said, not cheerfully, and came back to the very small galley.

“I think the captain’s getting softer,” Fala said, with a wink. “If she let you sit on the bridge, she’s giving some. You want to get the
cghos
out of the refrigerator?”

He looked. He found it and put it on the counter, and she said, “You can turn on the steamer, it’s the red button.” She was busy and in a hurry, whacking slices off the lunchmeat with a knife, and piling them onto a plate with the cheese. “You can roll those if you want to, it’s just sandwiches. I figure everybody’s going to be eating with one hand and working with the other.”

“Have we found the stsho we’re looking for?” he asked, and Fala gave him a glance.