Repair Dock
Ahab-Esais was a neat vessel, larger than the courier her lines suggested. A small trader, perhaps—there were holds, but no pod-mounts. It was not a new ship, though certainly it was newer than Jen Sin’s knowledge of space-going vessels.
Still, he thought, standing at dockside while Tolly Jones plied the key, a ship was a ship, and ships were what he understood best.
The hatch rose, and the mentor glanced at him, making a small motion with his hand, as if Jen Sin ought to precede him.
“We will wait for the pilot,” he said. “She had said she would meet us here.”
The other inclined his head. “So she did,” he murmured, and came back to Jen Sin’s side, his posture that of a man content to wait until duty called him.
As it happened, they did not wait long. It was mere moments before the pilot approached, comely and graceful, glowing with a subtle illumination as her pale chassis floated a few inches above the decking.
“Pilot,” Jen Sin murmured, bowing honor to the ship’s master.
She paused.
“This ship belongs to the Lyre Institute. Its rightful pilot is Inkirani Yo.”
“Inkirani Yo now flies a route beyond our ken. The copilot, therefore, ascends.”
“As the Guild teaches us. Of course.” Tocohl inclined somewhat before moving up the ramp and into the ship.
“After you, Light Keeper,” Tolly Jones said, which was a nice parsing of melant’i from the holder of the ship’s key. Jen Sin accepted the courtesy, and walked up the ramp in Tocohl’s wake.
“I was a prisoner on this ship,” Tocohl said, as they followed her into the piloting chamber, “isolated and abused by a mentor who wished to break me to her will, and knew exactly how to go about it.”
The piloting chamber was spacious, the board well laid out, the screens plentiful. First Chair had been pushed all the way back on its track, Jen Sin supposed to accommodate Tocohl, who had no need to sit, and apparently disdained shock webbing.
“To compress the story as much as possible, I was able to win free. I took over this vessel, subverting every system. I discovered several devices which sent regular signals to a particular receiver and I destroyed them.”
“Well, then,” Jen Sin murmured, when she did not go on. “Here is your concern answered, Mentor. You may go so soon as you are ready.”
“One transmitter remains,” Tocohl said. “It is built into the Struven unit, and it is entirely possible that any attempt to disable it will also disable the ship.”
“Ah. So she has been sending updates to the Lyre Institute from dock?”
“No; the station has the means to suppress the signal, and has been doing so. Perhaps there may be a way to continue the suppression, once the ship is away—”
“But the smart money,” Tolly Jones said, from where he was leaning by the door, “says that’ll disturb ship functions. Besides which, the Institute already knows where the ship is—or it knows the location of the last received signal.”
“Yes,” Tocohl admitted, rotating to face Jen Sin. “If you wish to save the ship from Ren Stryker, the only safe thing to do with Ahab-Esais is to send her away, and let her report herself elsewhere.”
“That’s not safe, either,” Tolly said. “The Directors sent Inki to subvert the Light—the Old Light. Ahab-Esais reported its last location and hasn’t reported anything since. The Directors won’t have too much trouble figuring that means Inki found the Light and she’s working. The minute the ship starts talking again, they’ll expect a report from Inki, and when they don’t get one, they’ll come right here.”
“They will also come here,” Jen Sin said, “when they deem Mentor Yo has been too long at her task. Or perhaps they will come to check her work. In fact, nothing that we do to or with Ahab-Esais will prevent agents of the Lyre Institute from arriving at this station. The issue is not the ship, but the arrival of those agents, which is foregone. Is this reasoning sound?”
Silence greeted him. He crossed the chamber to second board.
“Yes,” Tocohl said. “Your reasoning is sound.”
Jen Sin ran his fingers lightly over the familiar pattern of switches and buttons, and swallowed against a sharp need to take the chair and bring the board live.
“That this ship has been sabotaged is regrettable,” he said quietly. “Aside the mandated sending of a signal that would be better silenced, she is a perfectly able and functioning vessel. Is that so, Pilot Tocohl?”
“Yes, Pilot Jen Sin, that is so.”
“We therefore have one sound option before us, given a blameless vessel made suspect by villains.”
“And that is?” Tolly Jones asked, sounding…careful.
Jen Sin turned to look at him.
“Why, to destroy the receiver, certainly.”
“Destroy—” Tolly Jones began to laugh.
“That would be an act of aggression, which might be seen as inviting retaliation,” Tocohl said.
“Indeed. However, we have already determined that the Lyre Institute will be arriving, whatever happens to the ship. This station can and will defend itself. If we are to be an honest venue for commerce, as you, Cousin Tocohl, have lately reminded me that we are, then we do not practice piracy. When piracy comes to us, we answer fitly. Would the delm disagree?”
Tocohl’s laugh was far more charming when it came from the body she had been meant to inhabit.
“The delm,” she said, somewhat unsteadily, “would embrace you as a brother.”