Downbelow Station Part 19

The trooper moved suddenly. Came toward them. Damon looked. Others further down the hall started moving, all of them, at a near run. "Abort that," the first trooper snapped, reaching them. She reached for the panel herself. "We're on a call."

"I can get you a priority," Damon said-to be rid of them. The move indicated trouble; he thought of them shoving stationers around on other levels. "Do it."

He took his card from his pocket, thrust it into the slot and coded his priority; the lights went red. The rest of the troopers arrived as the car did, and armored shoulders pushed them aside as the troops all crowded in, leaving them there. The car whisked away, nonstop for whatever destination they had coded from inside. There was not a trooper left in the corridor. Damon looked at Josh, whose face was pale and set.

"We take the next car," Damon said with a shrug. He was himself disturbed, and quietly coded in blue nine.

"Elene?" Josh asked.

"Want to get down there," he said. "You come with me. If there's trouble, it's likely to end up on the dockside. I want to get down there." The car delayed in coming. He waited several moments and finally used his card a second time, a second priority; the lights went red, signifying a car on priority call, then blinked, signifying nothing available. He slammed his fist against the wall, cast a second look at Josh. It was far to walk; easier to wait for a car to free itself... quicker in the long run.

He walked over to the nearest com unit, keyed in on priority, while Josh stood waiting by the lift doors. "Hold the car if it comes," he said to Josh, punched the call in. "Com Central, this is Damon Konstantin on emergency. We're seeing troops pulling out on the run. What's going on?"

There was a long delay. "Mr. Konstantin," a voice came back, "this is a public com unit."

"Not at the moment, central. What's going on?"

"General alert. Emergency posts, please."

"What's going on?"

Com had cut itself off. A measured siren began to sound. Red lights began to pulse in the overheads. People came out of the offices, looked at one another as if hoping it was drill, or mistaken. His own secretary was outside, far down the hall.

"Get back inside," he shouted. "Get those doors shut." People moved backward, retreated into offices. The red light by Josh's shoulder was still blinking, indicating no car available: every car in the system must have jammed up down at the docks.

"Come on," he said to Josh, motioned toward the end of the hall. Josh looked confused and he strode over, caught Josh by the arm. "Come on." There were others in the hall, farther on. He snapped an order at them, cleared them out, not blaming them... there were others besides Konstantins who had loved ones scattered about the station, children in school and nurseries, people in hospital. Some ran ahead of them, refusing orders. A station security agent shouted out another order to halt; ignored, laid a hand on his pistol. "Let them go," Damon snapped. "Let be."

"Sir." The policeman's face relaxed from a grimace of panic. "Sir, I'm not getting anything over com."

"Keep that gun holstered. You learn those reflexes from the troops? Stand your post. Calm people down. Help them where you can. There's a scramble going on. Could even be drill. Ease up."

"Sir."

They walked on, toward the emergency ramp, in the quiet hall... not running; a Konstantin could not run, spread panic. He walked, trying to hold off panic in himself. "No time," Josh said under his breath. "By the time the alert gets here, the ships are on us. If Mazian's been caught at dock..." "Got militia and two carriers out from station," Damon said, and remembered all at once who Josh was. He caught his breath, gave him a desperate look, met a face as worried as his own. "Come on," he said.

They reached the emergency ramp, heard shouting, loud as they opened the doors. Runners were headed in down it from other levels. "Slow down!" Damon yelled at those who pa.s.sed him, and they did, several turns, but a few became many, and suddenly there were more coming up, the noise increasing, more running... the transport system jammed everywhere and all the levels pouring into the spiral well. "Take it easy," Damon shouted, grabbed shoulders physically and tried to slow it, but the rush accelerated, bodies jamming in, men, women, and children, impossible now even to get out of it. The doors were full of people trying to go down.

"The docks!" he heard shouted. It spread like fire, with the red light of alarm burning in the overhead, the a.s.sumption that had been seething in Pell since the troops came-that someday it would come, that the station was under attack, that evacuation was underway. The ma.s.s pressed down, and there was no stopping it. ii Norway; 1105 cfx/knight/189-8989-6877 easyeasyeasy/scorpiontwelve/zerozerozero/ endit Signy keyed back acknowledgment and turned to Graff with a wide sweep of her hand. "Hit it!" Graff relayed, and go sounded throughout the ship. Warnings flared, spreading to dockside. Troops outside finished stripping the umbilicals. "We can't take them," Signy said when Di Janz fretted in com. It sat ill with her to abandon men. "They're all right."

"Umbilicals clear," Graff shouted across, off com. It was a go-when-ready from Europe, which had left its troops, already moving out. Pacific was moving. Tibet's rider was still heading in behind the wave of the original message, signaling with its presence what Tibet had already sent; and what was happening on the fringes of Pell System was as old as the light-bound signal that came reporting it, ships inbound, more than an hour ago. The lights on Norway's main board flicked green, a steady ripple of them, and Signy released clamp and set Norway free, with the troops who had made it aboard still hastening for security. Norway moved null for a moment under the gentle puffs of directionals and undocking vents, continued the roll of her frame and cut in main thrust with a margin that skimmed Australia's clearance and probably set off alarms all over Pell. They acquired hard G, the inner cylinder under combat synch, rolling to compensate stresses: weight bore down, eased, slammed down again. They came to heading, with a clutter of merchanters in lower plane; Europe and Pacific ahead of them, Australia breaking clear behind. Atlantic would be moving any second; India's Keu was on-station and headed for his ship; Africa's Porey was downworld. Africa would move out under its lieutenant's command and rendezvous with Porey shuttling up from Downbelow, running tailguard at best. The inevitable was on them. That rider was some minutes behind Tibet's message, insurance. Its message was reaching them now; and a chatter of further transmission from Tibet itself, and North Pole's voice added itself, along with the alarm of militia ships helplessly in the path of the strike. Tibet was engaged, trying to make the incoming fleet dump speed to deal with them. North Pole was moving. Merchanter vessels serving as militia were altering course, slow ships, short-haulers, at a standstill compared to the speed of the incoming fleet. They could slow it if they had the nerve. If.

"Rider's turned," scan op said in her ear. She saw it onscreen. The rider had gotten their acknowledgment minutes ago, had put about; that scan image was meeting them now. Longscan comp had put the rest of the arc together and the comp tech had reasoned the rest by human intent... the yellow fuzz going off from the red approach line was long-scan's new estimate of the ridership's position; the old estimate faded to faint blue, mere warning to watch that line of approach in case. They were headed right down it in outgoing plane, while the incoming rider was obliged to go nadir. And they were all streaming out together, right down the line.

Signy gnawed her lip, cautioned scan and com monitor to keep up with events all around the sphere, fretting that Mazian had hauled them out in one vector only. Come on, she thought with the taste of one disaster in her mouth, no more like Viking. Give us a few options, man. cfx / knight / 189-9090-687 / ninerninerniner / sphinx / twotwotwo triplet / doublet / quartet / wisp / endit.

New orders. The late ships were given the other vectors. Pacific and Atlantic and Australia moved onto new courses, slow motion flowering of the pattern to shield the system.

iiPell: stationmaster's offices merchanter hammer to ecs in vicinity/maydaymaydaymayday/union carriers moving/twelve carriers our vicinity/going for jump/maydaymaydaymayday...

swan's eye to all ships/runrunrunrun...

ecs tibet to all ships/relay/...

Over an hour old, proliferating through the system in relay through the com of every ship receiving and still going, like an echo in a madhouse. Angelo leaned to the comp console and keyed through to dockside, where the shock of a ma.s.sive pullout still had crews spilling out on emergency call: military crews had handled it, their own way, undocked without interval. Central was in chaos, with a pending G crisis if the systems could not adjust to the ma.s.sive kickoff. There were palpable instabilities. Com was jammed. And for nearly two hours the situation on the rim of the solar system had been in progress, while the message flashed its lightbound way toward them.

Troops were left on the dock. Most had been aboard already, barracked onship; some had not made it, and military channels on-station echoed with incomprehensible messages, angry voices. Why they had pulled the troops, why they had delayed to board those they could with attack incoming... the implication of that was the liberty of the Fleet to run out on them. Mazian's order... Emilio, he thought distractedly. The schematic of Downbelow on the left wall-screen flickered with a dot that was Porey's shuttle. He could not call; no one could-Mazian's orders... com silence. Hold pattern, traffic control was broadcasting to merchanters in orbit; it was all they could say. Com queries flowed from merchanters at dock, faster than operators could answer them with pleas for quiet.

Union was bound to have done this. Antic.i.p.ated, Mazian had flashed him, in what direct communication he had gotten. For days the captains had stayed near the ships-troops jammed aboard in discomfort-not in courtesy to station; not in response to their requests to have the troops out of the halls. Prepared for pullout. Despite all promises, prepared for pullout. He reached for the com b.u.t.ton, to call Alicia, who might be following this on her screens... "Sir." His secretary Mills came on com. "Security requests you come to com central. There's a situation down in green."

"What situation?"

"Crowds, sir."

He thrust himself from his desk, grabbed his coat.

"Sir-"

He turned. His office door opened unasked, Mills there protesting the intrusion of Jon Lukas and a companion. "Sir," Mills said. "I'm sorry. Mr. Lukas insisted... I told him..." Angelo frowned, vexed at the intrusion and at once hoping for a.s.sistance. Jon was able, if self-interested. "I need some help," he said, and his eyes flicked in alarm at the small movement of the other man's hand to his coat, the sudden flash of steel. Mills failed to see it... Angelo cried aloud as the man slashed Mills, scrambled back as the man flung himself at him. Hale: he recognized the face suddenly.

Mills shrieked, bleeding, sinking against the open doorway; there were screams from the outer office; the blow struck, a numbing shock. Angelo reached for the driving hand and met the weapon protruding from his chest, stared disbelievingly at Jon... at hate. There were others in the doorway.

Shock welled up in him, with the blood.

iv Q.

"Va.s.sily," the voice said over com. "Va.s.sily, do you hear me?" Kressich, at his desk, sat paralyzed. It was Coledy, of those who sat about him, hunched and waiting, who reached past him and punched the respond b.u.t.ton. "I hear," Kressich said past the knot in his throat. He looked at Coledy. In his ears was the buzz of voices out on the docks, people already frightened, already threatening riot.

"Keep him safe," Coledy said to James, who was over the five others who waited outside. "Keep him very safe."

And Coledy went. They had waited, had hovered about com, one of them always near it, gathered here in the confusion. It was on them now. After a moment there was a rise in the noise of the mob outside, a dull, b.e.s.t.i.a.l sound which shook the walls.

Kressich bowed his face into his hands, stayed so for a long time, not wishing to know.

"The doors," he heard finally, a shout from outside. "The doors are open!"

v Green nine They ran, stumbling and breathless, jostling others in the corridor, a sea of panicked people, red-dyed in alarm lights. A siren still went; there was a queasiness of G as station systems struggled to keep themselves stable. "It's the docks," Damon breathed, his vision blurring. A runner hit him and he fended the body off, pushed his way, with Josh in his wake, where the ramp opened onto nine. "Mazian's peeled off." It was all that made sense. Shrieks broke out and there was a ma.s.sive backflow in the crowd that brought all the press to a stop. Of a sudden traffic began to go the other way, people retreating from something. There were frantic screams, bodies jammed against them.

"Damon!" Josh yelled from behind him. It was no good. They were pushed back, all of them, against the crush of bodies behind. Shots streaked overhead, and the whole jammed ma.s.s quivered and rang with screams. Damon got his arms in front of him for leverage, to keep from being suffocated... ribs were compressed. Then the rear of the press turned, running in panic down some route of escape; and the crush became a battering flood. He tried to stand in it, having his own direction. A hand caught his arm, and Josh caught up with him, staggered as the mob shoved and stampeded and they tried to fight the current More shots. A man went down; more than one-hit. The fire was going into the crowd.

"Stop shooting!" Damon shouted, still with a wall of people in front of him, a wall diminishing as if a scythe were hitting it. "Cease fire!" Someone grabbed him from the back, pulled him as fire came through. He got the edge of one and jerked in pain, scrambling for balance in the rout, running now-it was Josh with him, pulling him along in their retreat. A man's back exploded an arm's length ahead of them, and the man fell under the others. "This way!" Josh yelled, jerked him left, down a side corridor where part of the rout was going. He went, that direction as good as the other... saw a way to double back through, redoubled his effort, to get to the docks, running through the maze of secondary corridors back again to nine.

They made it as far as three intersections, frantic people scattering everywhere, at every intersection of the corridors, staggering in the flux of G. And then screams broke out in the halls ahead.

"Look out!" Josh yelled, catching at him. He gasped air and turned, ran where the curving inner hall rose up and up into what was going to turn into a blank wall, the sector division.

Not blank. There was a way. Josh yelled and tried to drag him back when he saw the cul de sac; "Come on," he snapped and caught Josh's sleeve, kept running as the wall came down off the horizon at them, became level, a blank wall with a painted mural, and at the right, the heavy door of a Downer hatchway. He leaned up against the wall, fumbled his card out, jammed it in the slot. The hatch opened with a gust of tainted air, and he dragged Josh into it, into virtual dark, numbing cold.

The door sealed. Air exchange started and Josh looked about in panic; Damon reached for the masks in the recess, thrust one at Josh, got one over his own face and sucked a restricted breath, trembling so that he could hardly get the band adjusted.

"Where are we going?" Josh asked, voice changed by the mask. "Now what?" There was a lamp in the recess. He took it, thumbed the light on. He reached for the inner-door switch, opened it, a sound that echoed up and up. A slant of the beam picked out catwalks. They were on a grid, and a ladder went down farther still, into a round tube. G diminished, dizzyingly. He caught at the rail. Elene... Elene would be in the worst of it; she would go to cover, get those office doors locked-had to. He was not able to get through out there; had to get to help, reach a point where he could get security forces moving in a front that could stop it. Up. Get up to the high levels; that was white sector on the other side of that part.i.tion. He tried to find an access to it, but the beam showed no way. There was no direct connection, section to section, except the docks, except on number one level, he remembered that-complicated lock systems... Downers knew where-he did not. Get to central, he thought; get to an upper hall and get to com. Everything was amiss, G out of balance-the Fleet had gone; maybe merchanters too, throwing them out of stability, and central was not correcting it. Something was ma.s.sively wrong up there.

He turned, staggered as G surged sickeningly, grabbed an upslanted rail, and started climbing.

Josh followed.

vGreen dock There was no response from central; the handcom kept giving back the standby, interspersed with static. Elene thumbed it off and cast a frantic look back at the lines of troops that held green nine entry. "Runner," she called. A youth came up to her on the double. They were reduced to this, with com blacked out. "Get to all the ships round the rim, one to the next as far as you can run, and tell them to pa.s.s the word on their own com if they can. Hold where you are, tell them. Tell them... you know what to say. Tell them there's trouble out there and they'll run headon into it if they bolt. Go!"

Scan might be out. She had reckoned the blackout the Fleet's doing; but India and Africa had gone, leaving troops to hold the dock, troops they had no room to take; and the signal was still being interrupted. No knowing what information the merchanters were getting, or what messages the troops might have gotten over their own com. No knowing who was in charge of the deserted troops, whether some high officer or some desperate and confused noncom. There was a wall of them at the niner entries of blue and green docks-a wall of troops facing up the curving horizons sealing off those same docks from either side, rifles braced and ready, the sealing of their square. She feared them no less than the enemy incoming. They had fired, turned one mob, killed people; there were still sporadic shots. She had twelve staff members and six of them were missing... cut off by the com blackout. The others were directing dock crew efforts to check the dumped umbilicals against a fatal seal breach; the whole section should be under precautionary seal-if her people up in blue control could get it straightened out: they had dead switches, the whole system jammed by an override. G flux still hit them at intervals; fluid ma.s.s in the tanks had to be shunted as fast as the lines could jet it their way, everything in tanks anywhere, to compensate; station had att.i.tude controls; they might be using them. It was terrifying in a huge s.p.a.ce like the docks, the up and down of weight, unsettling premonition that at any moment they might get a flux of more than a kilo or two. "Ms. Quen!"

She turned. The runner had not gotten through: some a.s.s in the line of troops must have turned him back. She started toward him in haste, toward the line that suddenly, inexplicably, was wavering, facing about toward them, rifles leveled. A shout roared out at her back. She looked, to the upcurving horizon, saw an indistinct wavefront of runners coming down that apparent wall toward them, beyond the curtaining section arch. Riot.

"The seal!" she shouted into the useless handcom, dead as it had been. The troops were moving; she was between them and targets. She ran for the far side, the tangle of gantries, heart pounding, looked back again as the line of troops advanced, narrowing their perimeter, pa.s.sing her by, some of them taking positions in the cover of the gantries. She thumbed the handcom and desperately tried her office: "Shut it down!"-but the mob was past blue control, might be in it. The noise of the mob swelled, a tide pouring toward them while others were still coming down off the horizon, an endless ma.s.s. She realized suddenly the aspect of the distant faces, behavior not panic, but hate; and weapons-pipes, clubs- The troops fired. There were screams as the first rank went down. She stood paralyzed, not twenty meters from the troops' rear, seeing more and more of the mob pouring toward them over their own dead.

Q. Q was loose. They came waving weapons and shrieking, a sound which grew from distant roar to deafening, with no end to their numbers. She turned, ran, staggering in the flux, in the wake of her own fleeing dock crews, of scattered Downers who saw man-trouble and sought shelter. The noise grew behind her.

She doubled her pace, a hand to her belly, trying to cushion the shock in her stride. There were screams behind her, almost drowned in the roar. They would overrun these troops too, gain the rifles... coming on by the sheer weight of numbers. She looked back... saw green nine vomiting forth scattered runners, getting past the troops. Panic showed in their faces. She gasped for air and kept going, despite the dull ache in her pelvic arch, dog-trotting when she must, reeling in the G surges. Runners began to pa.s.s her, a scattered few at first, then others, a buffeting flood as she pa.s.sed white section arch; and on the horizon ahead a tide breaking crossways from niner entries, thousands upon thousands up the sweep of the horizon, running for the merchanter ships at dock, screaming that merged with the cries behind, men and women screaming and pushing each other.

Men pa.s.sed her in greater and greater numbers... b.l.o.o.d.y, reeking, waving weapons, shrieking. A shock hit her back, threw her to a knee and the man kept running. Another hit her... stumbled, kept going. She staggered up, arm numb, tried for the gantries, the shelter of supports and lines... shots burst out ahead of her from a ship's access.

"Quen!" someone yelled. She could not tell the source, looked about, tried to fight the human tide, and stumbled in the press.

"Quen!" She looked about; a hand caught her arm and pulled her, and a gun fired past her head. Two others grabbed her, hauled her through the press... a blow grazed her head and she staggered, flung her weight then with the men who were trying to pull her through, amid the web of lines and gantries. There were screams and shots; others reached out to seize them and she tensed to fight, thinking them the mob, but a wall of bodies absorbed her and the men with her, merchanter types. "Fall back," someone was yelling. "Fall back. They're through!" They were headed up a ramp, to an open hatchway, a cold ribbed tube, glowing yellow white, a ship's access.

"I'm not boarding!" she cried in protest, but she had no wind left to protest anything, and there was nowhere but the mobs. They dragged her up the tube and those who had held the entry came crowding after as they hit the lock, hurtling in. They jammed up in a crushing press as the last desperate runners surged in. The door hissed and clanged shut, and she flinched... by some miracle the door had taken no limbs.

The inner hatch spilled them into a lift corridor. A pair of big men pushed the others through and steadied her on her feet while a voice thundered orders over com. Her belly hurt; her thighs ached; she sank against the wall and rested there until one of them touched her shoulder, a huge man, gentle-handed. "All right," she said. "I'm all right."

It was easing, the strain of the run... she pushed her hair back, looked at the men, these two who had been out there with her, heaved through the crowd, shoving rioters out of the way; knew them, and the patch they wore, black, without device: Finity's End. The ship that had lost a son on the station; the men she had dealt with that morning. Going for their ship, perhaps... and they had gone aside after one of their own, to pull a Quen out of that mob. "Thank you," she breathed. "The captain-please, I've got to talk to him... fast." No objections. The big man... Tom-she recalled the name-got his arm about her, helped her walk. His cousin opened the lift door and hit the b.u.t.ton inside. They walked out again into a fair-sided center, crowded at the moment by the lack of rotation. Main room and bridge were downmost, bridge forward, and the two brought her that way... better now, much better. She walked on her own, into the bridge, amid the rows of equipment and the gathered crew. Neihart. Neihart was the ship's family; Viking-based. The seniors were on the bridge; some of the younger crew... children would be snugged away topside, out of this. She recognized Wes Neihart, captain of the family, seamed and silver-haired, sad of face.

"Quen," he said.

"Sir." She met the offered hand, declined the seat they offered, leaned against the back of it to face him. "Q's loose; com's out. Please... contact the other ships... pa.s.s word... don't know what's wrong in central, but Pell's in dire trouble."

"We're not taking on pa.s.sengers," Neihart said. "We've seen the result of that.

So have you. Don't ask it."

"Listen to me. Union's out there. We're a sh.e.l.l... around this station. Got to stay put. Will you give me com?"

She spoke for Pell, had done so, to this captain, to all the others; but this was his deck, not Pell, and she was a beggar without a ship. "Dockmaster's privilege," he allowed suddenly, swept a hand toward the boards.

"Com's yours."

She nodded grat.i.tude, let them show her to the nearest board, sank into the cushion with a cramp in her lower belly-she put her hand there-not the baby, she prayed. She had a numbness in that arm, her back, where she had been hit. Instruments blurred as she reached for the earpiece, and she blinked the board into focus, trying to focus her mind as well as her vision. She punched in the ship-to-ship. "All ships, record and relay: this is Pell dock control, Pell liaison Elene Quen aboard Neihart's Finity's End, white dock. Request that all docked merchanters seal locks and do not, repeat, negative, admit any stationers to your ships. Pell is not evacuating. Get this much on outside broadcast if you can make it heard on loudspeakers; station com is blacked out. Those ships in dock, if you can safely release dock from inside shutdown, do so; but do not undock. Those ships in pattern, hold your pattern; do not leave pattern. Station will compensate and regain stability. Repeat, Pell is not being evacuated. A military action is in progress in the system. Nothing will be served by evacuating the station. Please play the following section for outside broadcast where possible: Attention. By dockmaster's authority, all station law enforcers are requested to do their utmost to establish order in whatever areas they are. Do not attempt to go to central. Stay where you are. Citizens of Pell: you are in serious danger from riot. Establish barricades at all niner entries and all section lines and prepare to defend them to prevent the movement of destructive mobs. Quarantine has been breached. If you scatter in panic you will contribute to riot and endanger your own lives. Defend the barricades. You will be able to hold the station area by area. Station com is blacked out due to military intervention, and the G flux is due to unauthorized undock of military ships. Stability will be restored as quickly as possible. To any refugee out of quarantine: I appeal to you to contribute your efforts to the establishment of defense lines and barricades along with Pell citizens. Station will negotiate with you regarding your situation; your cooperation in this crisis will make a profound impression on Pell's grat.i.tude, and you may be a.s.sured of favorable consideration as this situation is stabilized. Please remain where you are, defend your areas, and remember that this station supports your lives too. All merchanters: please cooperate with me in this emergency. If you have information, pa.s.s it to me on Finity's End. This ship will serve as dock headquarters during the emergency. Please play ship to ship and broadcast appropriate sections over exterior systems. I am standing by for your contact." Messages flashed back, frantic queries after more information, harsh demands, threats of bolting dock at once. All about her the folk of Finity's End were making their own preparations for flight At any moment, she hoped, at any moment com might clear, station central might come through bright and sane, bringing contact with command-with Damon, who might be in central and might not. Not, she hoped, in those corridors with Q run amok. Mainday noon-the worst of all times-with most of Pell out away from jobs and shops, in the corridors... Blue dock was his emergency a.s.signment. He might have tried to come there; would have tried. She knew him. Tears blurred her eyes. She clenched her fist on the arm of the chair, tried to think away the diminishing ache in her belly. "White section seal just activated." Word came to them from Sita, which had a vantage. Other ships echoed reports of other seals in function; Pell had segmented itself in defense, the first sign that it had defensive reactions left in it.

"Scan's got something," came panicked word from a crew member behind her. "Could be a merchanter out of pattern. Can't tell."

She wiped her face and tried to concentrate on all the threads in her hands. "Just stay put," she said. "If we breach those umbilicals we've got dead in the thousands out there. Do manual seal. Don't break, don't break those connections."

"Takes time," someone said. "We may not have it."

"So start doing it," she wished them.

viPell: sector blue one: command central The red lights which had flared across the boards had diminished in number. Jon Lukas paced from one to the other post and watched techs' hands, watching scan, watching the activity everywhere they still had monitor. Hale stood guard beyond the windows, in central com, with Daniels; Clay was here, at one side of the room, Lee Quale on the other, and others of Lukas Company security, none of the station's own. The techs and directors questioned nothing, working feverishly at the emergencies which occupied them.

There was fear in the room, more than fear of the attack outside. The presence of guns, the lasting blackout... they knew, Jon reckoned, they well knew that something was amiss in Angelo Konstantin's silence, in the failure of any of the Konstantins or their lieutenants to reach this place.

A tech handed him a message and fled back to his seat without meeting his eyes. It was a repeated query from Downbelow main base. That was a problem they could defer. For now they held central, and the offices, and he did not intend to answer the query. Let Emilio figure it a military order which silenced station central.

On the screens the scan showed ominous lack of activity. They were sitting out there. Waiting. He paced the circuit of the room again, looked up abruptly as the door opened. Every tech in the room froze, duties forgotten, hands in mid-motion at the sight of the group which appeared there, civilian, with rifles leveled, with others at their backs.

Jessad, two of Kale's men, and a bloodied security agent, one of their own.

"Area's secure," Jessad reported.

"Sir." A director rose from his post. "Councillor Lukas-what's happening?" "Set that man down," Jessad snapped, and the director gripped the back of his chair and cast Jon a look of diminishing hope.

"Angelo Konstantin is dead," Jon said, scanning all the frightened faces. "Killed in the rioting, with all his staff. a.s.sa.s.sins. .h.i.t the offices. Get to your work. We're not clear of this yet."

Faces turned, backs turned, techs trying to make themselves invisible by their efficiency. No one spoke. He was heartened by this obedience. He paced the room another circuit, stopped in the middle of it.

"Keep working and listen to me," he said in a loud voice. "Lukas Company personnel are holding this sector secure. Elsewhere we have the kind of situation you see on the screens. We're going to restore com, for announcement from this center only, and only announcements I clear. There is no authority on this station at the moment but Lukas Company, and to save this station from damage I will shoot those I have to. I have men under my command who will do that without hesitation. Is that clear?"

There were no comments, not so much as the turning of a head. It was perhaps something with which they were in temporary agreement, with Pell's systems in precarious balance and Q rioting on the docks.

He drew a calmer breath and looked at Jessad, who nodded a rea.s.suring satisfaction. viii The webbery of ladders stretched before and behind, a maze of tubes across the overhead, and it was bitterly cold. Damon shone the beam one way and the other, reached for a railing, sank down on the gridwork as Josh sank down by him, the breather-sounds loud, strained. His head pounded. Not enough air, not fast enough for exertion; and the maze they were in... branched. There was logic to it: the angles were precise; it was a matter of counting. He tried to keep track. "Are we lost?" Josh asked between gasps.

He shook his head, angled the beam up, the way they should go. Mad to have tried this, but they were alive, in one piece. "Next level," he said, "ought to be two. I figure... we go out... take a look, how things are out there..." Josh nodded. G flux had stopped. They still heard noise, unsure in this maze where it came from. Distant shouts. Once a booming shock he thought might be the great seals. It seemed better; he hoped... moved, with a clattering ringing of the metal, reached for the rail again and started to climb, the last climb. He was overwhelmingly anxious, for Elene, for everything he had cut himself off from in coming this way... No matter the hazard, he had to get out. There was a static sputter. It boomed through the tunnels and echoed.

"Com," he said. It was coming back together, all of it. "This is a general announcement. We are approaching G stabilization. We ask that all citizens keep to their present areas and do not attempt to cross section lines. There is still no word from the Fleet, and none is expected yet. Scan remains clear. We do not antic.i.p.ate military action in the vicinity of this station... It is with extreme sorrow that we report the death of Angelo Konstantin at the hand of rioters and the disappearance in violence of other members of the family. If any have reached safety, please contract station central as soon as possible, any Konstantin relative, or any knowing their whereabouts, please contact station central immediately. Councillor Jon Lukas remains acting stationmaster in this crisis. Please give full cooperation to Lukas Company personnel who are fulfilling security duties in this emergency." Damon sank down on the steps. A cold deeper than the chill of the metal settled into him. He could not breathe. He became aware that he was crying, tears blurring the light and choking his breath.

"... announcement," the com began to repeat "We are approaching G stabilization.

We ask that all citizens..."

A hand settled on his shoulder, pulled him about "Damon?" Josh said through the noise.

He was numb. Nothing made sense. "Dead," he said, and shuddered. "O G.o.d- Josh stared at him, took the lamp from his hand. Damon thrust himself for his feet, for the last climb, for the access he knew was up there. Josh pulled him hard, turned him around against the solid wall. "Don't go," Josh pleaded with him. "Damon, don't go out there now." Josh's paranoid nightmares. It was that look on his face. Damon leaned there, his mind going in all directions, and no clear direction. Elene. "My father... my mother... that's blue one. Our guards were in blue one. Our own guards." Josh said nothing.

He tried to think. It kept coming up wrong. Troops had moved; the Fleet had pulled out. Murders instant... in Pell's heaviest security... He turned the other way, the way they had just come, his hands shaking so he could hardly grip the railing. Josh shone the light for him, caught his elbow to stop him. He turned on the steps, looked up into Josh's masked, light-distorted face.

"Where?" Josh asked.

"I don't know who's in control up there. They say it's my uncle. I don't know." He reached for the lamp, to take it. Josh surrendered it reluctantly and he turned, started down the ladders as quickly as he could slide down the steps, Josh following desperately after.

Get down again. Down was easy. He hurried at the limit of breath and balance, until he was dizzy and the lamp's beam swung madly about the framework and the tunnels. He slipped, recovered, kept descending.

"Damon," Josh protested.