Godspeed (38 page)

"His own doing entirely," Shaker said. "He became involved in a dispute with Alan Kiernan—and Swift was the one who started it. Isn't that right, Pat?"

O'Rourke nodded. "Bloody fool took a swing at Alan. Lucky he's not a dead man. If I hadn't stepped in . . ." His voice deepened to a chesty rumble.

Doctor Eileen had finished her first examination. "Doesn't seem too serious," she said. "His nose is broken, and that's where all the blood is coming from. This bruise on his temple is what knocked him out. He'll feel awful when he comes around, but he won't be unconscious for more than a few minutes. It won't stop him from flying us home."

Danny Shaker was standing with his arms folded. He made a little gesture of his head toward Pat O'Rourke and Tom Toole. They left the control room without a word.

Shaker moved to stand in front of Doctor Eileen. "I mentioned that there are several reasons why Doctor Swift will not be flying you home on the Godspeed ship. The fight was just one of them, and not the most important. As you remarked, doctor, the crew wants to change the deal. But not in the way that you seem to be thinking."

"In what way, then?" Doctor Eileen was busy wiping the blood from Swift's face with the front of his own shirt. She did not look up.

"My crew believe that they are the legal owners of the Godspeed ship and the Godspeed Drive, and that you have no claim to either. They are spacers, and space salvage rights traditionally go only to spacers. You and your group are Downsiders, and have no such rights. However, the crew does not wish to be unreasonable. They are willing to give you the
Cuchulain.
"

Doctor Eileen froze in place, her fingers at Jim Swift's temple. "That is a totally preposterous suggestion, as you well know. The
Cuchulain
is not fit to fly. You told me yourself that it's in no condition to take us back to Erin."

"I told you that if I had to make this ship fly to Erin, I would find a way to do so." Shaker might have been discussing a minor change in flight plans for all the emotion in his voice. "But I do not have to fly the
Cuchulain,
Doctor. You do. You and Doctor Swift. Just half an hour ago, he was boasting to the crew of his abilities as an engineer and space navigator as well as a scientist. He will have an opportunity to prove himself."

Danny Shaker turned to me, and the coldness left his voice. "But you, Jay, you don't need to prove anything. The crew agrees that you already did that. You made your decision when we left
Paddy's Fortune,
to become a spacer and a crew member. And you've been blooded. When it came to the point you killed your man. The crew's vote was unanimous: Joe Munroe deserved what he got. There's a place for you with us."

"A
vote.
" Doctor Eileen let Jim Swift float free and stood up to glare at Danny Shaker. "There's no voting on any ship of yours, Captain Shaker, and you know it. The crew takes your orders. You don't take theirs. My God, what an idiot I've been, to trust you and believe you for so long. If there's a plot to rob us of our rights—and of our lives, too, from what I can see of it—then it's not a scheme hatched by the crew. They don't have the brains for it. Anything like that starts in your head, and nowhere else."

"You flatter me, Doctor." Shaker uncrossed his arms and stuck his hands into his jacket pockets. "A ship can have only one captain, true, or it will run into chaos. But I'm the servant of my crew more than their master. They, not me, decided that the Godspeed ship was theirs. They, not me, offered a place among us to Jay Hara—although I certainly agree with that decision." He turned again to face me. "You've not said one word, Jay, though it's you we're talking about. How about it? I'd love to have you aboard. I wouldn't ever mention this with Tom Toole or Pat O'Rourke present, but you have more potential than any crewman on the
Cuchulain.
Sign on with me, and I'll teach you everything I know."

Those words were designed to tempt me, and they came close. But suddenly all I could think of was
what
Danny Shaker knew how to teach. How to hunt down Paddy Enderton, and hound him to his death. How to manipulate Doctor Eileen, and me, and Mel, and who knew how many others, so that he would be led to the Godspeed Base and the Godspeed Drive. How to trick his own twin brother, so that the hands of Stan Shaker would become those now reaching deep into Danny Shaker's coat pockets.

I thought all that, but I was not fool enough to say it. Doctor Eileen and Jim Swift and I would never be able to fly the
Cuchulain
home to Erin. I knew that, and so surely did Danny Shaker. He might be able to fix the
Cuchulain,
but we could not. Leaving us behind while they flew off on the Godspeed ship was sentencing us to a slow death, drifting in space as our supplies of food, water, and air slowly dwindled away.

Our only hope was to fight
now,
when Danny Shaker was alone and unarmed. Then we might be able to get back to the upper level living quarters, and find the weapons that Doctor Eileen had taken to
Paddy's Fortune.

I thought I could hear faint sounds outside the control room. No one entered, but it reminded me that Tom Toole or Pat O'Rourke might be back at any minute.

I had to make Shaker relax by thinking that I was tilting his way, and I had to do it fast.

"I want to come with you," I said. "But what about Mel Fury? Is there any way that she can—"

I never could carry off a lie. My face must have showed the inside of my head, because Shaker at once pulled his right hand out of his coat pocket. It was holding a pistol.

"Nice try, Jay, but I'm too old for that." He saw me start forward. "Don't even think of it. Normally I don't carry weapons, but there have to be exceptions to every rule. And I'd never carry a gun that wasn't loaded."

He was standing with his back to the entrance of the control room. No more sounds came from that direction, but I thought I saw something: a flicker of movement in the big convex mirror that hung in the doorway.

Someone was in the corridor. It might be Tom Toole or one of the other crew members—or, just possibly, it might be Mel. She'd have to be crazy to come out of hiding.

But Mel
was
crazy, that was part of her charm.

"You didn't answer my question." I tried to speak loudly, but instead my voice cracked and squeaked. "You were the one who wanted Mel to come onto the
Cuchulain.
You encouraged her."

I could see the reflection. It was not Mel. It was too big to be Mel.

I felt a moment of despair. And then I realized that the new arrival was Duncan West. He was at the entrance to the control room, and he was holding a gun—Walter Hamilton's white-handled pistol.

I launched myself through the air straight at Danny Shaker. "Now!" I shouted, when I was just a few feet away. I had little hope of disarming Shaker or knocking him out, but I hoped that by distracting him I would allow Duncan to gain control.

Danny Shaker hardly seemed to move, yet I missed him completely. I went flailing on until I collided face-first with the side of a big display screen. I clutched my nose, convinced that it was broken like Jim Swift's, and spun around dizzily in mid-air.

I had bought Duncan West the time that he needed. He had stepped into the middle of the room. He stood by Danny Shaker, gun raised. And Shaker was lowering his.

But then Duncan was moving right past Danny Shaker.

"Duncan!" Doctor Eileen shouted, and I croaked the same word through a spray of blood from my nose.

"Save your breath." Shaker nodded to Duncan, who casually stuck Walter Hamilton's gun back into his belt.

"Duncan and I had our little talk a long time ago," Shaker went on. "He made his decision before we ever lifted off from Muldoon Spaceport. He was tired of being treated like a nothing. And he wanted to be on the side of the winners. Right, Crewman West?"

Duncan nodded. He smiled at us, the same amiable, charming, uncommitted smile that I had known all my life.

"It's a pity—I mean from your point of view, Doctor," Danny Shaker continued. "Because if there's any man in the Forty Worlds who could coax another flight out of the poor old
Cuchulain,
I'm convinced that it's Duncan. But he'll be going with us." He turned to me. "What about you, Jay? You don't give up, and that's the first requirement of a good spacer. I'd like you with me. But this will be my last time of asking."

I shook my head, and Danny Shaker sighed.

"That's the end of it, then. I guess there's more of your mother than your father in you after all. Duncan and I have to be off. The rest of the crew are waiting. So I'll say good-bye. And good luck, too, to all of you. I hope that you make it back to Erin, I truly do."

"Wait." Doctor Eileen had not spoken since her one word cry to Uncle Duncan. Now she moved closer to Danny Shaker. Duncan put his hand on the gun in his belt.

"Stop that, Duncan West," she said reprovingly. "I'm not one for violence, and you know it. I want to say something to Captain Shaker. It won't take long."

Shaker nodded to Duncan. "No gun needed here. Go on ahead, tell Tom Toole that I'm on my way." And, as Duncan left the control room, "All right. Say your piece, doctor."

"You're going to maroon us in the middle of the Maze, on a ship with a dying drive. You can pretend that we have a chance to get home again, but you and I both know better than that. Anyone who stays on the
Cuchulain
is doomed. I can live with that thought for myself. Space is as good a place to die as anywhere else."

"Better than anywhere else. You're a wise woman, Doctor Xavier, and a brave one. Pity you're not a man. You'd have made a great spacer."

"I don't need flattery. I'm too old for it. But Jay Hara and Mel Fury are
children.
Jay will say he wants to stay with me, because I've known him all his life and he feels loyal. But I want you to take him with you, no matter what he wants. And Mel too. Don't kill children, Dan Shaker. It's beneath you."

Shaker sighed, and shook his head. "You are a fine advocate, Doctor. There's just one problem with what you're suggesting: It's wrong. Jay and Mel are not children. Look at them. He's become a tough, self-assured young man in the past couple of months. It would be insulting—and dangerous—to treat him as a child. And from what Duncan tells me, Mel is now very much a young woman. I think he's had his eye on her himself, and compared with most of my crew he's an absolute gentleman.

"So it has to be no. I admit that I control most of what the crewmen do, but I recognize my limits. I'd be insane to take a woman—just
one
woman—onto the Godspeed ship. I owe my crew something, but that's not the way to give it to them. After we've made a trial run of the Drive I propose to take another look at
Paddy's Fortune.
I gather we'll find enough inside to please everyone.

"That's enough of future plans. I have to leave. The Drive is primed."

Shaker nodded to one of the screens. The Godspeed ship hovered in the middle of it. Once more the shimmering smoke rings of violet haze were running back and forth along the axis of the corkscrew and spiraling away into space.

"Goodbye, Doctor. And good luck. I'd like to think we'll meet again. Somewhere, somehow. And good-bye and good luck to you, too, Jay. I only wish you could have seen things differently, and come with me. But remember the Golden Rule: Don't give up—ever."

He turned and left without another word. His departure from the bridge drained the room of every particle of life and hope. Doctor Eileen leaned on the pilot's chair, head bowed in exhaustion or despair. Jim Swift, beginning to twitch and groan and groggily move his head, floated a few feet away from her.

And I, the "tough, self-assured young man" who could no longer be "treated as a child"? I put my swollen cheek and bleeding nose against the cool metal of the cabin wall, and I cried until big globular tears mingled with drops of blood, and floated away across the control room.

CHAPTER 30

Eileen Xavier didn't waste time on pity, for herself or anyone else.

She made a quick review of Jim Swift's condition, came over to where I was still holding on to the cabin wall, and grunted: "Nothing much wrong with you. Snap out of it. You're in charge. I'm going to find Mel and bring her to the bridge."

I believe she was callous on purpose. Her statement that I was in charge surprised me, but it was her other comment that got me moving. There was no way I would let Mel Fury arrive on the bridge and find me sniveling and weeping.

As soon as Doctor Eileen had gone I released my hold on the cabin wall. I staggered along the corridor to a washroom, soaked two towels in cold water, and carried them back to the control room. As I mopped my face with a cool cloth and delicately touched it to my sore nose, I wondered how to handle Jim Swift. He was regaining consciousness, but as he came awake he was beginning to thrash about with his arms and legs. Maybe he thought he was still fighting. Whatever the reason, he wasn't safe to go near. One hit from those flailing fists and I could be in worse shape than he was.

Finally I grabbed one of his arms and at the same time threw a heavy, soaking cloth right into his face. Either the cold or the pain got through to him, because he gasped and reached up to grab the towel.

"Oooh!" He groaned. "Where am I?"

"On the bridge of the
Cuchulain.
You're going to be all right. Don't touch your nose!"

Too late. He had moved the wet cloth to his face. As soon as it reached his nose he gasped and his left eye popped open. He glared sightlessly around him, until his one staring eye focused on me.

"Your nose is broken," I said. "Mop the blood if you want to, but touch it very carefully."

He grunted, and moved the cold towel to set it delicately against his right temple and closed right eye. "Never mind my nose. This is where it hurts
bad.
What hit me?"

"Alan Kiernan. You got into a fight. You lost."

"Tell me something new," Swift muttered. He belched, and I thought for a moment that he was going to throw up. But he just put his hand on his middle and stared at me, wall-eyed. "You, too?"