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"Nothing! I don't know," I conceded after taking a breath. "I just contracted to run out a quarantine by taking our cargo to Idwal and picking up a new load. We didn't know what the new cargo was."
The others flinched at the mention of our destination.
"You knew where that was, right?" Duff said. "The problems out there?"
"We shove cargo forward; we don't have to like the destination." I said sourly.
"What quarantine?" Mathet broke in.
"Mandragala Station received a report of slagmander contamination at our cargo's source world, Galray."
"We are aware of that history. What was your cargo?"
"Metal ingots. Picked up at one of their orbital smelting facilities."
"You know—" he began.
"Yes. But the station put us on a forty-two-day quarantine anyway. Accepting the job was our only way to save the Thief's Hand from repossession." Why was I doing this?
Because a little kid was still out there in danger.
"What," Mathet asked me coldly, "were you supposed to do at Idwal?"
"Pick up new cargo. The contractor refused to give us the details until we got there." I quickly explained the disastrous incident. "That's how the Ritto-ssa got involved. They pulled the kid and me from the Vasty and Saura from our ship. You know the rest."
"Who attacked you?"
"I don't know. I have never seen a ship profile like it."
"And the contracted destination for the new cargo?"
"Saura says it was Jian Jian," I said. "It's—"
"An EA military science facility," Mathet finished for me.
"That's not an unreasonable destination," I muttered.
"Who contracted you?" He continued to press.
"The cargo owner. Not who we originally signed with."
Everyone waited. I sighed. "There was this MoMo and Frairy..."
All the gray ears tipped in disbelief and the Frairy's twitched.
Mathet closed his eyes and drew a long, slow breath. "You Humans are such fools," he said.
Yeah, in retrospect, maybe. I didn't have enough energy left to defend against his statement. "But we wanted to keep our ship."
Mathet looked at Duff. "What do you know about this?"
"Nothing. The MoMo do their own thing." He scowled at me. "Flygirl did mention contact with a MoMo earlier, but I didn't pay much attention since we had Endar security invading our poker game."
"I don't understand," I said loudly to draw their attention back to the present issue. "If the kid can affect Ritto and Frairy memory, why not mine?"
"Maybe she trusts you because you look similar to her," Duff suggested.
He appeared remarkably calm, considering the situation. In contrast, the furry ears around me were twitching with tension. If mine could have twitched, they would have, too.
"Maybe. Or maybe she can't erase my memory because Humans aren't telepathic!"
"Then what is she?" Shoff asked. Leave it to her to find the core issue.
"I don't know. I didn't recognize the shape of their shuttle, either. But we have to bring her in before the Endar can lay their claws on her!" I said.
"What, so Humans can claim her skills?" Duff demanded.
"No!" His insinuation infuriated me, even though his suspicion was justified. "I don't want anyone to claim her. She's a kid. She should be returned to her people." And their world isolated from Whooex contact.
"Agreed." Saura gave the others a sweeping glare. She understood why I wanted to secure the kid's safety. "But, Vivi, how?"
"Tabisee can move around this place freely. I'll go back out in the torture suit and find her." I could survive a few pinches, bruises, and blisters to save a little kid.
"Even Tabisee have limitations on our activities set upon us by the Sat Quar inside the Zone," Mathet said.
Damn the Endar! As I opened my mouth to protest, a shadow glided across the live feed on the screen behind him and my heart gave a twist of shock. "What was that?" I gasped.
Mathet's ears flicked irritation. "We will not play this game again."
"No! Seriously! Can you replay that last bit?" Mother Universe, please let them have some type of recording system on the feed! I looked at Shoff. "In slow motion? Please."
It appeared the female half of the assassin team had learned that if I turned white and started to shake it might be worth investigating. She looked at Mathet. He grudgingly made a gesture for one of the techs to replay the image.
I watched the shadow darken the lower edge of the screen again. Starlight rippled out and back in along its wake.
"What is that?" I croaked.
"An Endar ship. Skate Class," Shoff replied.
My heart tried to leap out of my chest. "Do you have an image of one?"
"Yes." She made it sound like a stupid question. Again, Mathet nodded.
Her fingers danced in the air between us. A black ship, its lines broken with a profile of sharp spines, formed in 3-D detail on her personal display screen.
Space rippled with the passage of those jagged edges inside my head.
"Vivi? Okay?" Saura pushed at my shoulder.
"No, Saura, not okay," I said. Meeroush gripped my arm as I sagged. "The ghost—it was Endar. They fired on the shuttle at Idwal."
"Not Endar territory," she said in a carefully correcting tone.
"No. But close to! You said."
"Yes." She stared at the screen behind Mathet. "You certain? Grave situation if right. Or wrong."
"I'm certain." The long, skinny, black-clad spacers...
"Why would Endar attack Humans outside Primacy space?" Mathet demanded.
"They didn't. I told you. They jumped into Idwal's grav well and attacked a shuttle. A shuttle that I didn't recognize. They killed everyone except the kid, because the explosion threw her into the airlock and I pulled her inside the ring." My stomach churned at the memory. I looked at Saura. "Did you see anything?"
"Only ship's movement on Hand's screens."
"It's the same profile. The same death black hull." The same ripple of starlight in its wake.
"You're saying the Endar destroyed the shuttle and then tried to get the kid?" Duff said.
"Yes," I said slowly. "When they realized she was alive they tried to breach the ring. My guess is the Ritto-ssa ship, responding to the station's distress call, forced them to decide killing her was preferable to letting her fall into other hands." I had only been peripheral damage, along with the facility.
What had been the Endar reaction when that Ritto ship arrived on the Moneyworld, carrying an Idwal survivor? My shipskins were working overtime to control the sweat that drenched me. "The High Jerak questioned me about what I saw at Idwal, but I didn't tell him anything, and he couldn't pressure me in front of the Xix attendant."
"If Endar stalked ship to Idwal and committed act of war to prevent contact, they know something of child," Saura said.
My partner had just hit on a cold truth.
"He ordered you put on a ship to the Endar Primacy," Meeroush said.
"And told me it was Tabi so I would go quietly."
"Even as he put DNA from your medical detritus aboard our ship, to force our submission to their future demands." The tips of Mathet's claws dug into the surface beside him again.
Seok, the clever bastard, killing two birds with one stone. I didn't dare say that out loud or I'd have to explain it.
"They're making a move to entrap the last of the independent votes," Duff said.
"They destroyed a Tabi ship," Mathet growled.
"That too," Duff agreed. "But the big issue right now is what Seok will do when he discovers Zant is not on their ship. He'll turn attention to us and the city. The Sat Quar will try to shut down T'lek T'la."
"They will demand access to all embassies and restrict our activity."
And what activity was that?
"All because of one Human."
"No." It was not all because of one Human. I'd had the help of a renegade Frairy and a MoMo, but it didn't seem the time to point that out. "We have an invisible telepath out there. The Endar know something about her. If they find her first, she'll disappear and we'll never know what they're up to." It hurt to think of the kid as a political object. "They could load the Trade Zone up with spies like her. No one would be outside their influence." I visualized a swarm of tiny, invisible blond angels spreading out like a disease across the Whooex Union.
"You can't kill her or me," I said abruptly. "I'm the only one who can bring her in without creating a big scene and she's the only one who can tell us what the Endar are up to."
"We must move now while have chance," Saura said.
"Major Syrhas," Mathet scowled at her. "This is Planetary Force jurisdiction. Do not presume to tell us what to do!"
"Ambassador on the verge of capitulating to High Jerak's demands," she reminded him sharply.
"We cannot—will not—gamble the future of our people on a bumbling Human idiot." Mathet looked over at his assassin team. "Go with the Frairy squad and eliminate this threat. Others will take care of these two."
"What? No!" I yelled. I had to give him a reason not to kill the kid beyond her being a child. "What if she's not the only one?" I stammered.
That went over well.
"She cannot pass our mechanical security," Shoff said.
"Not now. But you can't anticipate what the Endar will figure out in the future. Then it could be too late."
"There is no guarantee you will succeed in finding her and bringing her in."
"No. But the outcome is guaranteed if I don't: you'll all be hopping around like little puppets on strings, mouthing Endar script."
Ears flattened and eyes blazed.
"Okay, puppets was a bad choice of words," I conceded. "But you'll have to do whatever they tell you. You won't have a choice. This is your one chance to turn their manipulation around on them. Find out what's going on, call their bluff, and force them to back down on their blackmail."
"We can make all the other members aware of the threat this child represents," Mathet declared.
"Then you should do it right now. Because as soon as the High Jerak discovers that you've seen her, he'll shut you down and no one will ever know what happened to you. He'll create a situation—anything! Who's going to argue with him? You'll be dead and everyone will be under Endar control."
Mathet stared at me.
I counted to twenty.
"I know why the Primacy hates you," he said at last. "Humans bring nothing but trouble."
"Does that mean you'll let me help?"
"Do we have a choice?"
It seemed wise to treat that as a rhetorical question.