fingers, I pressed the door release.
Nothing happened. I tried again, and once more just for luck. The door was indeed locked up tight. 'Perfect,' I said briskly. 'That should hold him for a bit.'
'We need to hold him longer than just a bit,' Bayta warned, giving me one of those thoughtful looks she did so well. She was smart enough to realize I'd deflected her concern without genuinely addressing it, but she was also smart enough to know when I was telling her to drop a subject. 'It's still several hours to the next station.'
'True enough,' I said, looking at the stacks on either side of the vestibule door. Both were composed of oversized crates with machinery labels on them and double layers of safety webbing. Not a chance in the universe the three of us would be able to knock those over. 'Scavenger hunt time. What I want is a crate with a vertical side-sliding panel instead of the usual top-opening lid. It also needs to be on the bottom of its particular stack. First one to find me a crate like that wins a prize.'
'What kind of prize?' Rebekah asked.
'I'll think of something,' I said. 'You two head back; I'll check the ones up here.'
The crate I'd described for them was important, but it wasn't actually my first priority. As soon as the two of them were out of sight, I headed to the side toward the spot where the Jurskala Spider contingent was supposed to have loaded my special crate.
It was, thankfully, right where it was supposed to be, sitting on top of a short and easily climbable stack of other crates. I pried open the top, made sure my special cargo was inside, then closed it again. The crate had been a vital part of Plan A, and it was going to be an equally important part of Plan B.
It would probably be necessary even if we had to go to Plan C. Whatever Plan C might end up being.
I was back down on the floor, prowling among the crate islands, when Rebekah won the hunt.
'What's in it?' she asked as I worked the safety webbing up and away from the bottom of the crate. It would have been faster to cut it, but this particular webbing I wanted left intact.
'Typically, side-opening crates contain one of two types of items,' I told her. 'Either machinery designed to be rolled out at its destination, or stuff that'll flow out into a bin or other container when you pull up the panel. Hold this webbing up, will you?'
She reached up and got a grip on the webbing, keeping it out of my way. 'Which is it in this case?' she asked.
'No idea, but I'm hoping it's the former,' I said. Popping the catches, I got my fingertips under the bottom of the panel and pulled upward.
I would have been happy with pretty much anything. As it was, I was quietly ecstatic. Packed inside its molded foam spacers was a beautifully restored classic Harley-Davidson motorcycle. 'Bingo,' I said.
'We're planning on riding somewhere?' Bayta asked, looking confused.
'Like where?' I countered, getting a grip on the front wheel and pulling. For a moment the bike resisted, then reluctantly rolled toward me, its spacers mostly coming along with it. 'Besides, it won't be fueled up.'
'Then why do we want it?' Rebekah asked.
'Because this is no longer a classic motorcycle,' I told her as it came free. 'This is a neatly organized collection of spare parts.'
I gave the clutch grip an experimental squeeze. 'A collection of spare parts,' I added quietly, 'that can be turned into weapons.'
Bayta and Rebekah exchanged looks. 'I see,' Bayta said, her voice sounding uncomfortable.
Small wonder. For seven hundred years the Spiders had gone to extraordinary lengths to keep weapons off their Quadrails. Now here I was, proposing to create an arsenal out of something that had sailed right through their filters. 'It's not a big deal,' I told her. 'In the real world, almost anything can be turned into a weapon if you work at it hard enough.'
'I suppose,' she said. 'It just makes the whole no-weapons thing seem rather futile.'
'Hardly,' I assured her. 'Keeping guns and knives and plague bacteria off the trains is what's kept the peace through the galaxy for the past seven centuries. Let's not throw out the heirloom silver just because there's a little tarnish on it here and there.'
'You're right.' She took a deep breath. 'What do you want Rebekah and me to do?'
'Right now, nothing,' I said. 'With only one multitool among us, this is going to be pretty much a one-man job. You and Rebekah can go find yourselves a nice place to sit down and relax.'
'What about my prize?' Rebekah asked, a hint of the ten-year-old girl once again peeking through. 'You said there would be a prize if I found you the right crate.'
'That I did,' I agreed, bracing myself. Someone was really going to hate me for this.
He would just have to get in line. Reaching to the Harley's right-hand mirror, I snapped it off. 'There you go,' I said, handing it to Rebekah. 'Don't spend it all in one place.'
She gazed at it a moment, then looked up at me again. 'Thank you,' she said gravely.
And with that, the ten-year-old was gone again. 'You're welcome,' I said. 'Now scoot, both of you. I'll let you know when I need you again.'
I had never taken a motorcycle apart before, and the very first thing I discovered was that my multitool wasn't much of a substitute for a proper mechanic's kit. Many of the parts came off with difficulty, or thoroughly mangled, or both. Other components never did give up their death grip on the bike, despite the force, ingenuity, and threats I threw at them.
One thing was crystal clear, though: this particular bike would never run again. I hoped the owner had popped for the full-coverage insurance.
Somewhere midway through my work, I heard the first faint thudding sounds from the other side of the vestibule. The walkers had made it past our crate barrier and were tackling the pressure-locked door.
Our time was running out.
The rhythmic banging had been going on for probably half an hour by the time I decided I'd stripped everything I could from the bike. The front fork and rear shock absorbers would serve nicely as clubs, the wheel rims could be used as throwing disks, and I'd worked a section of the exhaust pipe into an arm protector for my left forearm. I'd also collected enough bolts and nuts to make for a couple of good barrages with the slings I'd constructed from the rubber of the tires.
As the final touch, I cut some long pieces of safety webbing and attached the remainder of the bike frame to the crate stacks on either side of the vestibule, leveled at the center of the doorway. With Bayta's help, I hauled the machine back and up, securing it high off the floor with more webbing fastened with a quick-release knot. The first walker to come through that door was going to be in for a very unpleasant surprise.
And after that, there was just one more thing to do.
'I can't,' Rebekah protested, staring into the now empty crate that had once housed the Harley. 'Please don't make me.'
'You have to,' I told her firmly. I could understand her reluctance—the crate wasn't shaped like a coffin, but it didn't have much more than a coffin's worth of space inside. But it would be light-years better than being out in the open when the walkers broke through the door. 'The Modhri wants to get his hands on you. We don't want him to. It's that simple.'
'Trust us, Rebekah,' Bayta said, her voice low and earnest. 'We'll be back to get you. I promise.'
I winced. Unfortunately, there were only two ways that we would be able to keep that promise: if we won the imminent fight, or if the Modhri captured us alive and made us talk. I wasn't counting too heavily on the first, and I didn't much want to dwell on the second.
Maybe Rebekah was thinking about the two options, too, and their respective odds of becoming reality. 'All right,' she said reluctantly. 'If I have to.' Bending over, she eased herself into the crate.
I gave her a couple of seconds to settle herself in as best she could, then slid the panel down to close her in. 'Start moving those foam spacers somewhere else in the car,' I instructed Bayta as I smoothed the safety webbing back into place along the side of the crate. 'I'll give you a hand as soon as I'm finished here.'
The crate's appearance was back to normal, the foam spacers were on the other side of the baggage car, and we were in position at the door when the Modhri finally broke through.
The first in line was a Halka, probably the biggest walker the Modhri had available at the moment. He came charging through the door, faltering a bit in obvious surprise to find the floor in front of him clear of crates or other obstacles. His eyes flicked upward, the Modhri clearly wondering if one of the nearby stacks was about to come
