Night Train to Rigel

And I’d looked back into that face, and made a little joke, and said yes.

It was ridiculous, of course. Bayta was a casual companion, thrown at me without invitation on a job I’d essentially been press-ganged into doing. She was also a liar, at least by omission, with a private agenda that may or may not have my own best interests at heart. And it wasn’t as if I’d sworn a solemn oath on a multitranslation Bible or anything.

Which was, a small corner of my mind noted, more rationalization.

I didn’t need to rationalize. I was a big boy, and I could do what I wanted. And I didn’t need to care about anyone’s opinion, especially Bayta’s.

So why was I spending all this effort to talk myself into this?

I focused my eyes on the coral in front of me… and it was only then that I discovered that my hand was already stretched out over the pool and starting down toward the sloshing water.

I snatched the hand back, feeling sweat suddenly breaking out on my face. What the hell was going on here? I took a long step away from the pool, looking over my shoulder to make sure I wasn’t going to back into anyone.

I froze. All around me, everywhere I could see, the casino patrons had paused in their games and their conversations.

And they were all watching me.

The tableau lasted only a fraction of a second before they turned away again, casually resuming their activities as if it had all been a giant coincidence, that they’d all merely happened to be looking in the same direction at the same moment. But I knew better.

Earlier, I’d wondered whether Bayta and I might have stumbled into the middle of some strange conspiracy. Now I knew that we had.

I headed straight for the exit ramp, senses alert, face set into a combat mask that dared anyone to try to stop me. Fortunately for them, no one did. I reached the elevators and punched the call button, and a few seconds later was on my way down to our suite.

I arrived to find Bayta slouched low into one of the couches, gazing dully at some unfamiliar dit rec. She looked up as I came in, a flicker of relief crossing her face. “There you are,” she said, her tone a subtle mixture of petulance, concern, and relief. “I was starting to worry.”

“Sorry,” I said, keeping my voice casual as my watch tingled the news that the hidden microphones were still on duty. “Losutu insisted on dragging me to one of the shows afterwards.” I gestured toward the bedroom. “Going to be a busy day tomorrow. We’d better get to bed.”

She twitched, her eyes widening a little. Up to now, we’d never even slept in the same room, let alone together in the same bed. “To—?”

“To bed,” I repeated, leaning a little on the last word as I touched my ear in warning.

She swallowed visibly. “All right,” she said. Turning off the dit rec, she disappeared into the bedroom.

I shut off the lights and opaqued the walls and floor in the main room, then double-checked that the door was triple-locked. By the time I joined her she had similarly opaqued the bedroom wall and floor and was lying rigidly in the middle of the bed with the blanket and overblanket pulled up to her chin. I turned off the light, took off my shoes, and crawled in from the near side. “Mm—you smell good tonight,” I commented aloud for the benefit of listening ears as I maneuvered close to her.

She didn’t say anything, but just lay silently, her body as rigid as a board. Like me, she was still fully clothed. “Sorry about this,” I whispered in her ear. “But the bugs are still active. The ones in this room are over by the bathroom and closet, so we should be able to talk here without them listening in.”

“What do you want to talk about?” she whispered back.

“Let me start by telling you about my evening.”

I recounted everything that had happened, from the dinner to the play to my unplanned detour into the casino. When I had finished, she was silent so long that I wondered if she’d fallen asleep. Then she turned her head to put her lips by my ear. “Are you sure you didn’t touch the coral?”

“I’m positive,” I assured her.

“How can you be?” she demanded. “You said you blacked out for a second. Could you have touched it, then dried your hand on your jacket?”

I shook my head. “The coral where I was standing was deep enough for my cuff to have gone into the water, too. There’s no way I could have dried that off.” I turned my head a little and gazed down at the top of her head. “I think it’s about time you told me just what the hell is going on here, Bayta. Especially what the hell is going on with the coral.”

I felt her body stiffen. “I can’t tell you,” she said, the words coming out almost too quiet to hear. “Not yet. I’m sorry.”

“You may be sorrier than you think,” I warned. “I can’t protect you against danger I don’t understand.”

She hesitated, and I held my breath. But no. “The coral’s not dangerous if you don’t touch it,” she said. “That’s all I can say right now.”

Earlier, up on the surface, I’d thought about simply walking out on this mess. Now, after the eeriness of the casino, I was even more inclined to do so. And to take Bayta with me, whether she wanted to go or not.

But down deep, I knew it wouldn’t work. Whoever our mysterious enemies were, we were already in their sights. One way or another, we had to see this through. “Have it your way,” I said. “Just remember that your neck’s on the line here, too.”

She shivered. “I know,” she murmured. “What are we going to do?”

“We’re going to stick with Plan A, and try to get a look at what the Bellidos have been up to,” I said.

“Before or after you go to Modhra II with your friends to see the starfighters?”

It was usually hard to distinguish emotions in a whisper, but I had no trouble hearing the harshness in hers. “They’re not my friends, and I don’t give a damn about the starfighters,” I growled back. “What have you got against friends, anyway? Or do you just like to rub in the fact that I don’t have any?”

For a moment she didn’t speak. “How are you going to do it?” she asked at last.

I grimaced. For a moment there… But that was all right. I didn’t particularly want her friendship, either. “There’s an employees-only door up in the lodge near the airlocks that’s probably a ready room. I’ll sneak in after the main work force has left and get a suit.”

“Won’t that be dangerous?”

“Depends on whether the whole resort staff is in on the conspiracy or if it’s just the upper-crust elite who come here to play,” I said. “Anyway, assuming I get that far, and further assuming I have enough time in that bend of the tunnel with no one watching, I should be able to poke a small hole through the ice, take a quick look, seal it up, and be back in time for my ten o’clock appointment with Losutu.”

“And then you are going with him to Modhra II?”

“At the moment, I can’t see any plausible way to get out of it,” I said regretfully. “But I’ll say all the things he wants to hear and get back here as quickly as I can. With luck, we’ll be able to grab the afternoon torchferry to the Tube.”

She hissed out a sigh. Clearly, she wasn’t happy with any of this. “What do you want me to do?”

“That’s up to you,” I said. “You can stay here, or you can join the tour group and go ahead of me to the Balercomb Formations. That’s where Losutu’s going to drop me off, so if you do that we can ride back together on the bus.”

“I’ll go on the tour, I guess,” she said. “When does it leave?”

“Seven-half from the lodge,” I said. “I’ll already be gone, so you’ll have to get there on your own. You think you can handle it?”

“I made it to Earth and back on my own,” she said a little tartly.

“I know,” I said. “But everyone on Earth wasn’t out to get you.”

She shivered again. “I’ll be all right.”

“Good girl,” I said. “Did you get that message off to the Spiders?”

She nodded, her hair brushing against my cheek. “But we won’t get an answer before tomorrow.”

“Understood,” I said. “Where is it? I’d like to take a look.”

“On my reader, in the outgoing message folder.”