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Misfit'smaneuvering rockets weren't designed for sustained use. They
were meant forthe precision trajectory corrections needed during docking
alignment at spacestations. The rockets were chemical. Depletable
chemical agents. Fuel that hadto be replenished each time the ship was
berthed. That they had lasted thislong bordered on the miraculous. One
miracle wasn't going to be enough today.
Not if Dorjan intended to save ship and crew from the circling, stalking
LungT'ou. The man hunched over SIPACUM to Dorjan's right glanced at his
captain.
Varnalgeran Yuw's expression contained the same helplessness that had
beenimplicit in his silence. The computrician's eye-blinking red shirt
lay mattedagainst his overweight body. Soaked with five hours of sweat.
And fear! Thesame sweat drenched Dorjan's own clothing. The same fear
set his templespounding as though they contained bass drums gone
berserk. The Outie'sappearance provided no reassurance of Dorjan's
ability to extricate ship andcrew from their perilous position. Dorjan
had never seen the man sweat-
before. While others might crack and crumble under pressure, Varn
remainedcool, iceberg cool. For this native of the planet Outreach to
... A blip onthe green monitor broke Dorjan's digression. His fingers
jabbed at the consoleonce more, matching Misfit's trajectory with the
pirate ship's. "One minute,
forty-five," Varn called out the time remaining to the
maneuveringrockets. 13 Dorjan toed open intraship communications. His
voice came from histhroat in a harsh bark. The strain of five hours of
unrelenting tensioncrackled through Misfit. "Damn it, Songan, how much
longer! I can't keepSotKil off Misfit forever! Stop playing with
yourself and get the drive up!" Agrille hissed on the console before the
master of Misfit. The words thatcrackled from the speaker sounded less
than human-mechanical. They were. Yearsago on Harb, Songan's vocal cords
had been severed. He spoke through a voice
box inset in the small of his throat like a chainless medallion of
gold. "Dorjan, if you think that you ..." The speaker grille went dead
for along silent moment. When Songan's voice returned, it was
restrained. "Thepolarization cell is repaired and functioning perfectly.
We need at least tenminutes for final adjustments and closing the
housing." "You've got less thanfive!" Dorjan saw Varn's eyes narrow. The
Outie wasn't accustomed to hearing asharp exchange between captain and
Mate. Nor did Songan deserve it. No man orwoman who roamed the spaceways
could ask for a better Mate than Dorjan'sfellow Harbian. The two had
once been slave-gladiators on the outworld planetHarb. Both still
carried permanent reminders of that former life. For Songanthose
souvenirs of bondage were, his tattoos (from the top of his shaven
scalpto the soles of his feet with no sem between left unembellished),
hisgenetically engineered strength, his voice box . . . and a good brain
that hadbeen encephaloboosted beyond mere genius. Dorjan's chromosomes
had also beenmanipulated while he had been in his mother's womb. He was
a sport, a geneticfreak, An albino (though his skin was now subcutaned
to a deep nutbrown). 14 As an adult he had been blinded, his vision
restored via theTP/telepresences in his neck. Bioengineered wings of
ultra-thin unipolymerplasteel were attached to his back. Retractable
plasteel claws (each a fullthree sems in length) were surgically
implanted to replace his fingernails.
(The claw in each forefinger could become a mini vibe-knife with one
consciousmental command). The alterations of mind and body were the
