The Reaches

Two spacers forward were discussing an entertainer in Redport on Titan. From their description of her movements, she must have had snake blood.

The thrusters roared, braking hard. 'So. .' said Ricimer. 'You're going to be a factor one of these days?'

Gregg looked at him. 'Probably not,' he said. 'My brother inherited the hold. He's healthy, and he's got two sons already.'

He paused, then added, 'It's a small place in the Atalanta Plains, you know. Eryx. Nothing to get excited about.'

The edge of Ricimer's mouth quirked. 'Easy to say when you've got it,' he said, so softly that Gregg had to read the words off the smaller man's lips.

The thrusters fired again. Gregg held himself as rigid as a caryatid. He smiled coldly at Tancred beside him.

Ricimer stroked a lever down, gimballing the thrusters sternward. The cigar-shaped vessel dropped from orbit with its long axis displayed to the shock of the atmosphere. Now that they'd slowed sufficiently, Ricimer slewed them into normal flight. They were about a thousand meters above the ground.

'You know, I'm from a factorial family too,' Ricimer said with a challenge in his tone.

Gregg raised an eyebrow. 'Are you?' he said. 'Myself, I've always suspected that my family was really of some no-account in the service of Captain Gregg during the Revolt.'

His smile was similar to the one he had directed at Tancred a moment before. 'My Uncle Benjamin, though,' Gregg continued, 'that's Gregg of Weyston. . He swears he's checked the genealogy and I'm wrong. That sort of thing matters a great deal-to Uncle Benjamin.'

The two young men stared at one another while the cutter shuddered clumsily through the air. Starships' boats could operate in atmospheres, but they weren't optimized for the duty.

Piet Ricimer suddenly laughed. He reached over the console and gripped Gregg's hand. 'You're all right, Gregg,' he said. 'And so am I, most of the time.' His smile lighted the interior of the vessel. 'Though you must be wondering.

'And there. .' Ricimer went on-he hadn't looked toward the vision screen, so he must have caught the blurred glint of metal out of the corner of his eyes-'is what we're looking for.'

Ricimer cut the thruster and brought the boat around in a slow curve with one hand while the other keyed the radio. 'Ricimer to Sultan,' he said. 'Home on me. We've got what looks like a Molt compound with two Southern Cross ships there already.'

'And we're all going to be rich!' Leon rumbled from where he squatted beside the bow hatch. He touched the trigger of his cutting bar and brought it to brief, howling life-

Just enough to be sure the weapon was as ready as Leon himself was.

4

Salute

The Preakness, third and last vessel of Captain Choransky's argosy, spluttered like water boiling to lift a pot lid as she descended onto the gravel scrubland. Her engines cut in and out raggedly instead of holding a balanced thrust the way those of the Sultan's boat had done for Ricimer.

Compared to the Sultan herself, the little Preakness was a model of control. Choransky's flagship slid down the gravity slope like a hog learning to skate. Gregg had been so sure the Sultan was going to crash that he'd looked around for some sort of cover from the gout of flaming debris.

The flagship had cooled enough for the crew to begin opening its hatches. It had finally set down six hundred meters away from the boat, too close for Gregg's comfort during the landing but a long walk for him now.

The roaring engines of the Preakness shut off abruptly. The ground shuddered with the weight of the vessel. Bits of rock, kicked up from the soil by the thrusters, clicked and pinged for a few moments on the hulls of the other ships.

'Let's go see what Captain Choransky has in mind,' Ricimer said, adjusting the sling of the rifle on his shoulder. He sighed and added, 'You know, if they'd trust the ships' artificial intelligences, they could land a lot smoother. When the Sultan wallowed in, I was ready to run for cover.'

Gregg chuckled. 'There wasn't any,' he said.

'You're telling me!' Ricimer agreed.

He turned to the sailors. Two were still in the boat, while the others huddled unhappily in the vessel's shadow. Venerians weren't used to open skies. Gregg was uncomfortable himself, but his honor as a gentleman-and Piet Ricimer's apparent imperturbability-prevented him from showing his fear.

'The rest of you stay here with the boat,' Ricimer ordered. 'Chances are, the captain'll want us to ferry him closer to the Southern compound. There's no point in doing anything until we know what the plan is.'

'Aye-aye,' Leon muttered for the crew. The bosun was as obviously glad as the remainder of the crew that he didn't have to cross the empty expanse.

'And keep a watch,' Ricimer added. 'Just because we don't see much here-'

He gestured. Except for the Venerian ships-the crews of the Sultan and Dove were unloading ground vehicles-there was nothing between the boat and the horizon except rocky hummocks of brush separated by sparse growths of a plant similar to grass.

'— doesn't mean that there isn't something around that thinks we're dinner. Besides, Molts can be dangerous, and you know the Southern Cross government in Buenos Aires doesn't want us to trade on the worlds it claims.'

'Let them Southerns just try something!' Tancred said. The boy got up and stalked purposefully around to the other side of the boat, from where he could see the rest of the surroundings.

Gregg and Ricimer set out for the flagship. The dust of landing had settled, but reaction mass exhausted as plasma had ignited patches of scrub. The fires gave off bitter smoke.

'Do you think there's really anything dangerous around here?' Gregg asked curiously.

Ricimer shrugged. 'I doubt it,' he said. 'But I don't know anything about Salute.' He stared at the white sky. 'If this really is Salute.'

From above, the landscape appeared flat and featureless. The hummocks were three or four meters high, lifted from the ground on the plateaus of dirt which clung to the roots of woody scrub. Sometimes they hid even the Sultan's 300-tonne bulk from the pair on foot.

The bushes were brown, leafless, and seemingly as dead as the gravel beneath. Gregg saw no sign of animal life whatever.

'How do you think the Southerns are going to react?' Ricimer asked suddenly.

Gregg snorted. 'They can claim the Administration of Humanity gave them sole rights to this region if they like. The Administration didn't do a damned thing for the Gregg family after the Collapse, when we could've used some help-didn't do a damned thing-'

'Don't swear,' Ricimer said sharply. 'God hears us here also.'

Gregg grimaced. In a softer tone, he continued, 'Nobody but God and Venus helped Venus during the Collapse. The Administration isn't going to tell us where in God's universe we can trade now.'

Ricimer nodded. He flashed his companion a brief grin to take away the sting of his previous rebuke. Factorial families were notoriously loose about their language; though the same was true of most sailors as well.

'But what will the Southerns do, do you think?' Ricimer asked in a mild voice.

'They'll trade with us,' Gregg said flatly. He shifted his grip on the flashgun. It was an awkward weapon to carry for any distance. The fat barrel made it muzzle-heavy and difficult to sling. 'Just as the colonies of the North American Federation will trade with us when we carry the Molts to them. The people out in the Reaches, they need the trade, whatever politics are back in the solar system.'

'Anyway,' Ricimer said in partial agreement, 'the Southerns can't possibly have enough strength here to give us a hard time. We've got almost two hundred men.'