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  "How will we get onto her?" asked Vezzarn, as they drew into the parking lot.

  "Borrow the ISS loader," said Pausert. "Hulik, contact the agent to let him know that we've got a load of explosives, intended to make doubly sure that the Venture is totally destroyed."

  Hulik looked at him in surprise. "That's not like you, Captain."

  Pausert shrugged. "I don't like to break the law. But I'm wanted here already for murders I didn't do. Stealing an ISS vehicle can't add more than another execution to the list. If we live through this and get to explain, we can always pay for it. Provided we get to use the Venture's money again."

  Vezzarn was already out of the vehicle, working on the door lock of the loader. Breaking in took him barely a minute. The captain and Hulik manhandled Goth and the Leewit out of Fullbricht's groundcar and onto the lowbed of the loader. There was a tarpaulin which he and Vezzarn tossed over the top of the girls. Pausert would have sworn Goth's eyes were now open. But the light was bad and time was pressing. Hulik was already on the communicator.

  "Agent Sboro. We've dispatched a load of explosives to make sure that the vessel is completely destroyed. See that your pilot doesn't attempt to leave before it's aboard," snapped Hulik into her ISS communicator.

  There was a pause. "Yes, ma'am. I will open the cargo hatch."

  Agent Sboro sounded a little breathless, thought Pausert, as they drove across the concrete to the old Venture. Pausert looked lovingly but fearfully at her. If he couldn't work out how to get Goth and the Leewit out of the trap he'd put them into, then they were in even more trouble. It seemed, right now, that the Venture and her crew had only been lurching from disaster to disaster since the beginning of their mission.

  They hastily unloaded the Leewit and Goth. Then, because it was quickest way to do it, rolled the transparent egg shapes up into the cargo hatch.

  The captain saw the flaw in his plan. There was no way out of the cargo hold into the ship—unless, like the Agandar, you had a Sheem war robot that could cut through the bulkheads.

  The ship intercom crackled. "Get off the ship. We're about to launch!"

  "We've got a confidential message for you. It must be delivered in person," said Pausert smoothly. "We can't get off until it is delivered. Orders."

  "I repeat, get off. If you're not out of the cargo hatch by the count of five, I'm sealing it and we'll blast anyway. One. Two . . ."

  "It is essential!"

  "Three. Four."

  "We have information about the hidden passengers. We know where they are."

  The hatch began to close. "I'm coming down. You're about to take a ride into space. Line up against the back wall with your hands away from any weapons."

  "What do we do?" asked Hulik.

  Vezzarn and Pausert looked at each other. Hulik was a fine marksman, and a good companion. But she was no spaceman. Pausert shrugged. "Cooperate," he said. "We have to strap in on acceleration couches for launch."

  "Oh."

  "If this agent Sboro is humane enough to let us." Pausert looked at Goth's definitely open eyes. "We'll just stand behind Goth and the Leewit. We know that the shield can stop even a Mark Twenty blaster bolt." He felt guilty about it all the same. "Put your gun on the floor, Hulik. If need be you can drop and shoot."

  Goth was awake in there. Was she all right? Could she breathe? Or was it like traveling by the Egger Route . . . did she need to?

  The door to the hold opened cautiously. A figure with a Blythe gun in hand stepped though.

  Hantis smiled foxily. "I couldn't be really sure it was your voice, Captain."

  "Hantis!" exclaimed the captain.

  She bowed slightly. "Pul is in the control room with the prisoners. We're in trouble, Captain Pausert."

  The captain pointed to Goth and the Leewit. "You're telling me. I've put them into some kind of shield. If I can't get them out, then we can't use the Sheewash Drive."

  Hantis drew her brows together. "That actually makes it worse. But the problem's immediate. The ISS heard your call to Sboro about the explosives. They just attempted to contact him on the ship communicator rather than his ISS device. They warned him that they think that there may be fake ISS operatives trying to board this ship. I think we can be sure that atmospheric craft have been scrambled and are on their way here."

  Pausert pushed wearily off the wall. "Well, let's get everyone into acceleration couches and show them what the old Venture can do. We'll go down fighting if we can't get away. Come on, we need to carry Goth and the Leewit."

  "She's moving around in there," said Vezzarn looking at Goth. "Do you think the little Wisdom will be able to free herself?

  "We haven't got time to find out right now," said Hulik. "If we use a blanket we can make it into a stretcher of sorts. That will be quickest."

  * * *

  Up in the control room they found an ISS agent and a nervous-looking pilot.

  On the floor.

  Pul was standing over them with a long piece of ISS uniform collar in his jaws. "The churls called me a dog, Hantis. Can I rip their throats out?"

  "It's no use, lady," said the pilot, looking nervously at the grik-dog's powerful jaws. "I won't fly this craft. Not even if you kill me."

  "Dead men don't pilot spaceships anyway," said Pausert tiredly. "Tie them up. We can go and dump them in their loader."

  Two to a prisoner, they hastily carried the pilot and agent out to the ISS vehicle, and tossed them onto the loadbed. Vezzarn hopped into the cab, engaged the vehicle's engine and leaped out. At a run, they sprinted back to the Venture. A bolt of blasterfire licked out at them, adding impetus to their pace.

  Once into the control room Pausert scrambled for the control chair, and began initiating the blast-off sequence. "Sorry, Goth, this is an apology in advance. This is going to be one of my bad take-offs."

  It was. But it was also too fast for the two atmospheric craft that came racing in from an airfield several thousand miles off. The Venture staggered into space, farther and farther from Pidoon. As the planet dropped away below them Pausert felt relief. But he was aware that the fuel gauges were dropping fast. They were already using the reserve tanks.

  The detectors started to bleep. "Imperial Navy ships, Captain," said Vezzarn grimly.

  They didn't even make an effort to hail the Venture. They were already firing. Even yelling that there was an ISS man on board helped not at all. Pausert pushed the thrust down to maximum.

  The Venture's drive surged. And stuttered. A wall of navy fire fell just short. The three Imperial vessels that were racing towards them would be in range for their next salvo. "The nova guns, Captain . . ."

  The Venture suddenly surged again, leaping as if a wasp had stung her. Pausert felt the wonderful, familiar surge of the Sheewash Drive. Looking across at Goth he saw the acceleration nets still covered her couch. Covered an invisible cocoon, in fact. But inside that cocoon, the twisted black wires and strange orange fire of the Sheewash Drive danced. He was almost too tired to wish he knew how it worked. Relief—and exhaustion coming like a wave—overcame him.

  CHAPTER 9

  When he awoke, with a start, the captain found that someone had covered him up with a blanket. He was still sitting in the command chair in the Venture's control room. Looking out of the forward viewscreens showed nothing but an emptiness of space.

  So they'd gotten away. Away in a leaking-hulled vessel with absolutely no fuel. There might be a drop or two in the lateral rocket tanks but other than for docking, those were next to useless. He looked sideways. Goth was still lying above the acceleration couch, surrounded by a layer of nothingness.

  "I see you are awake, Captain," said Hantis. "Good. We must try to undo this shield you have put around Goth and the Leewit." She looked curiously at him. "I was not told that you were such a powerful klatha operative."

  "I'm not. I seem to learn how to do things by accident," admitted Pausert. "I don't know what I've done, or how to undo it." He looked at the Nartheby
Sprite. "Goth said you were klatha-skilled too, Hantis. Can you get her out of there?"

  Hantis shook her mane of foxy hair. "No. It is very difficult for one klatha operative to undo the work of another. Each person's skills seem to be unique, even if they sometimes achieve the same thing. My skills, anyway, lie with levitation, truth hearing and music. They would be of little help to you. But perhaps Goth herself can help."

  Pausert sat up hastily and looked at Goth. "But how? I mean . . ."

  "The same way she got the wires necessary to run the Sheewash Drive. She teleported them across the barrier. She can do that with notes even if she can't talk to you."

  "And the Leewit?" asked Pausert.

  Hantis smiled impishly. "Has been awake, and, by her expressions, whistling and screaming. We can't hear her, of course. Oh, and she's been showing you a number of rude signs. Your little vatch came earlier too. Even it can't get into the shield. Anyway, the Leewit is asleep again."

  Pausert blinked. "Again? Have I been asleep long?

  "About fifteen hours," Hantis said. "Most klatha use is demanding on the user's energy. It looks like you came pretty close to burning yourself out, Captain Pausert. Sometimes new klatha users die like that. You must be careful."

  "I only did it because there seemed no alternative. I feel as if I haven't eaten for a week, never mind slept for fifteen hours. I'll just see to Goth and then it's food!"

  Goth smiled up at him from her shield cocoon. She held up a sheet of paper she'd prepared. It read: Hello, Captain.

  Pausert started to reply, realized what he was doing, and looked for writing materials. They were sitting ready on the console next to Goth. Painstakingly he wrote down what he had done and asked for advice.

  He waited. Goth was plainly consulting with her inner "teacher," the pattern of her mother Toll.

  She wrote: You could try doing it backwards, Captain. See the pattern and then trace it backwards.

  He nodded, and took a deep breath. She scrawled something hastily. Eat first. Then, when he'd seen that, she scrawled: Dangerous.

  Pausert realized she was right. Using klatha in ways that you weren't sure about could be very dangerous—and it certainly wasn't something he should try when lack of food made him feel quite light-headed. Besides, he just couldn't visualize the pattern.

  So he ate. He also took a quick shower and changed into fresh clothes. He cursed the loss of his best boots, and dug a spare pair out of his locker. They didn't fit as well as the his old ones, but he supposed he'd just have to live with it. He wasn't going to get back to Nikkeldepain and Hildo and Naugaf for another pair, ever. Not while his erstwhile about-to-be father-in-law lived, anyway.

  On the positive side, he consoled himself, ill-fitting boots were more comfortable than life with Illyla would have been. Pausert still wasn't taking seriously Goth's placid assumption that they'd eventually get married once she was old enough—well, not very seriously, anyway—but the time he'd spent in the girl's company had made clear to him just how utterly unsuitable a wife Illyla would have made for him. Illyla was ultimately just plain boring—something that could never be said about Goth.

  Pausert could see that now. A bit of distance lent clarity . . .

  And maybe that would work here, too, he thought. The captain forced himself to try to visualize, not the details of the klatha pattern, but the whole thing.

  All of a sudden, it burned clearly in his mind's eye. So, walking back to the control room by habit and feel, he concentrated on it until he got back to Goth.

  Now . . . he traced it backwards . . . erasing it. Carefully. Precisely.

  Goth fell to the couch. The cocoon of force around her was gone. She scrambled to her feet and hugged Pausert fiercely. "You're a hot witch, Captain. That's powerful klatha, that."

  Pausert blushed. That was not from modesty so much as his recent thoughts contrasting Goth to Illyla. The girl was still much too young for him to be thinking about such things as how she might compare to anyone as a wife. On occasion, though, that was hard not to do. And he suddenly realized, uneasily, that the occasions seemed to be coming more often of late.

  He shook his head forcefully. "I didn't know what I was doing and I nearly got us all killed because of it. Thank goodness you thought of teleporting the wires for the Sheewash Drive. That was smart, Goth."

  She gave him that sly little Goth-smile that he had come to know so well. "Neat trick, huh? It worked too. At first, there was that drag we've been getting with the Sheewash Drive. And then . . . it was back to normal." She suddenly started giggling. "Look, the Leewit is awake. And she's mad. Yelling her head off by the looks of it. Shall we pretend we haven't noticed?"

  "I'm tempted. But I guess we'd better let her out." Pausert concentrated.

  A few moments later the Leewit fell to the couch. Still yelling. She jumped up, waving a small finger threateningly under the captain's nose. "What you do? Clumping idiot! What did you do to us?!"

  "Only saved your life," said Hulik, who had come into the control room. "That shield of the captain's stopped a Mark Twenty blaster bolt. You were lucky he did it, and he only did it in the first place to stop your face getting sliced up with a vibro-knife."

  The Leewit had the grace to look embarrassed. "Well. I didn't know. I just woke up trapped in that, that stupid cocoon."

  Hulik smiled coolly at her. "You can hear about it later, but right now we have other problems." She turned back to Pausert. "I'm glad you're up and have the little Wisdoms out, Captain. Hantis had Pul on guard at the door. We weren't allowed to wake you. She reckoned if you didn't rest you might not wake up at all, and that only you could ever get Goth and the Leewit out. But the doorseal is still leaking. We're going to have to go somewhere with an atmosphere pretty quick. And we've no fuel."

  Goth made a face. "We got a real problem, Captain. Maleen was the only one of us who could handle the Sheewash Drive for landings. It takes really fine control. The Sheewash Drive is just too powerful and fast. We need fuel to land."

  Pausert scratched his chin; which reminded him that he needed a shave. "I guess we'll just have to get around it. How much fuel have we got, Hulik?"

  "In the main drive tank, Captain? Maybe a few seconds worth, that's all. The tank for the lateral rockets is about half full. We could pipe it to the main tank, but that still won't give us very much. Not enough to land on, that's for sure."

  "Then we either take to piracy, find a space refueling point or . . . if worse comes to worst, hitch a ride."

  Hulik wrinkled her forehead. "Hitch a ride? What do you mean, Captain?"

  Pausert stood up. "I don't much like the idea of piracy, unless we find the Agandar's fleet and cut a ship out of that, and space refueling is pretty rare in the Empire. Most inhabited worlds outlaw it, because if ships can bypass landing it cuts down on trade. That leaves hitching a ride . . . so you'll have a chance to find out first hand, Hulik."

  He clapped Goth and the Leewit on the shoulders. "We need the Sheewash Drive to take us to Vaudevillia. We're going to join a circus, if we can find one coming in to land."

  The idea so distracted the Leewit that she entirely forgot that she was mad with him. They got the charts up on the display consol and worked out where they were, and where they needed to go.

  Sheewash!

  * * *

  "We've lost them," said Sedmon, to his self. "Not so much as a blip since the ship left Pidoon." There was no hiding the anxiety in his voice. The other understood only too well, anyway.

  "They could be using the secret drive."

  "They have done so before. We've always picked them up on the detectors within a few hours."

  Neither said what they both feared: that one of the other parts of the pursuit might have caught up with the Venture first.

  "It wouldn't be easy for anyone to catch them," said one of the selves, doubtfully. "We all know just how fast the Venture can be, with its secret drive."

  "We'd better land on Pidoon and see w
hat we can find out. Vezzarn is likely to send them to the port at Gerota Town. Remember that one of the smuggling networks we have taken over goes through there."

  "At least we have contacts."

  Between the selves they knew exactly who was involved in the gemstone smuggling ring Vezzarn had so painstakingly investigated for them. It was now quite a profitable sideline for Uldune.

  * * *

  Even after the unrewarding search in the Alpha Dendi cluster, they were catching up on the Venture. The two Sedmons on the ship had been sure they'd finally reach Pausert and his companions on Pidoon. Especially after they received word from their selves back on Uldune that a query on the Venture's credit status had been made by Pidoon Fuels and Lubricants. They'd thought that there would be a day or two of subradio queries and negotiations before the Daal's Bank would allow the account to be accessed. But it appeared that Pausert must have had other funds. The Venture had been tracked leaving Pidoon.

  Since then, nothing. They decided to set the ship down in Gerota Town.

  Into a hornet's nest.

  In the typical fashion of officialdom the galaxy over, the customs officers and the police of Gerota Town were now on high alert. Well after the fact, of course, but no one wanted to look as if they could have been the slackers and sluggards who had allowed such a notorious criminal as the infamous Captain Pausert to escape.

  "My papers are in perfect order," said the Sedmon who was on public duty.

  Which, of course, they were. The very best members in the Daal's extensive staff of forgers on Uldune had worked on those papers. As for finding the secret compartment in which the second Sedmon sat, patiently . . . that was unlikely. One of the side effects of running an extensive smuggling ring into the Empire as a state enterprise, was that the Empire's customs techniques and equipment were well known to the Sedmons. And well countered. The vibro-sensors Captain Pausert had feared would certainly not reveal the second Sedmon's chambers.