“But his advice is wrong. And the setup is out of a Graykey textbook.”
“It is.” She paused. “The bastard.” She looked straight at Tal and said suddenly in a new and strong voice, “He didn’t expect to be asked to disarm them.”
“No,” agreed Tal thoughtfully. “He probably expected Security to do its usual thorough good job.”
Keylinn found that her fingers were twitching in a strangle pattern, and forced herself to take a deep breath. There were more immediate concerns. “From his advice, we might assume he wants to take out you, me, and most of Transport. Yet he’s standing right next to the thing now, and he hasn’t touched it.”
“You have a blind spot here, Keylinn. He doesn’t really want to die. He’s putting it off.”
“Cowardly worm.”
“No doubt. But good for us. Listen: We go back and pretend that I take Ennis’s advice over yours. How many more points do you have to deactivate?”
“Three.” She described the order.
“I’ll have you step aside, and ask him to do it himself. I don’t care how prepared he thinks he is, the idea of his own death will put him off-balance. When I say his name, we both jump him. But knock him well out of the way of the panel.”
She only said, “I’m glad you don’t have any ideas about letting off energy weapons around ambrite.”
They returned to Ennis, who was standing, rather palely, by their bomb.
“We’ll do it your way,” said Tal. Keylinn looked resentful, which was not hard under the circumstances. “Your classroom experience was more recent. Keylinn, give Ennis your tools.”
She did so, not meeting his eyes. He said slowly, “You want me to finish?”
“If you would, please,” said Tal.
Ennis swallowed and turned to the bomb. He deactivated another point. Two left. Then he withdrew his hand from the wall, transferred the tool to his other hand, and wiped sweat off on his pants. “Are you sure you want me—”
“Ennis,” said Tal gently, and Keylinn slammed into Ennis, bringing him down with her hands around his throat. Tal barely had a chance to touch him. He prudently placed himself between the fight and the bomb. As Ennis seemed to be in good hands, Tal picked up one of the instruments and deactivated the last two points as per Keylinn’s instructions. When he turned around again, she was smashing Ennis’s head against the floor. Tal said mildly, “Keylinn, stop that We’ll want to question him later.”
She stopped, still astraddle his prone body. Ennis turned his head sideways, looking dazed, as she stood up. She removed his Keith pistol from his boot top, then bent to search him for other weapons. He turned over with difficulty, spitting out blood and a tooth, and sat up— holding another pistol.
“Damn,” she said weakly.
Tal started to move away. “Stay where you are,” said Ennis. His words were barely intelligible.
Keylinn backed away a few steps. “Stop there,” he said, and he inched over to the passage desk and used the comer to pull himself to his feet. “They say the O’Malleys are crazy fighters,” he commented. “I should’ve known, bitch.”
She was not insulted by the word; it was a Redemptionist term that held no emotional affect for her. He’d learned it in the Three Cities, clearly. Keylinn wondered on some distant level if it said anything about his contract-holder. She wondered if Ennis had been drawn into tathiss, the first level of Greykey mistake, or even tathani, the second. It was a pity it wasn’t likely to be the third, for that was invariably fatal. Although it would be preferable to kill Ennis oneself.
Now he activated the link, still watching them both. “Opal, personal, status six connect.”
Keylinn did not recognize the voice that answered. It was hard to make out what it said from where she stood, but it did not sound pleased. Ennis requested a support team. “You don’t understand,” he said through a mouthful of blood, “it has to be here within the hour.”
She looked at Tal. The time limit on the other bombs? Ennis’s contract-holder, if that’s who he was, argued and finally agreed. “Stay where you are,” the voice said. She heard that, it was expressed quite forcefully.
“No shit,” said Ennis. He turned off the link. “I can accept docking from this desk,” he said to them. “My rescue team will be here in twenty minutes, so why don’t we just relax.”
He looked toward the bomb with a mournful expression. Craven worm, thought Keylinn; and adding the worst damnation she knew, she added: Unreliable.
Tal took out a white handkerchief and extended it toward Ennis, who was still dripping blood. Ennis glared back at him, and he shrugged.
Abruptly, Tal coughed, holding the hand with the handkerchief over his mouth. Keylinn looked at him with a sharp expressionlessness.
“And what if they’re late?” he inquired politely, returning the handkerchief to his pocket. “Do you intend to hold us both prisoner until we all blow up?”
Spider, who was pursuing business of his own in warehouse territory, heard that sentence over his riccardi. He listened a little longer and then he dropped his export list and ran for the nearest link.
“I have to talk to Adrian,” he insisted to the first administrator he reached. From anybody else a reference to explosives might be a joke; Tal didn’t make jokes. He was obviously in the deep stuff, and if he was, then Spider would be, too—it was just a matter of time. “It’s an emergency,” he told the second and third functionaries who answered and expressed themselves more than willing to hear whatever die emergency might be. “I have to talk to Adrian,” he repeated. “Just tell him it’s Stratton Hastings, who met him with Tal Diamond.”
Five valuable minutes later he gave up, cut the connection, and ran out into a main thoroughfare of F deck. He looked wildly up and down the street; it was
