The Better Part of Valor Read Free Page A

had lime green hair and eyes, the former spread out from her head in a six-inch aureole, the latter so pale Torin wondered how she could see since none of the light receptors seemed to be open. Her matching clothing was unusually subdued—in spite of the color—and the combined effect was one of studied innocence.
    Torin didn’t believe it for a moment. Anyone studying that hard had to be working against type.
    “One of my
thytrins
was supposed to be on that shuttle, Sergeant di’Perit Dymone. I didn’t see him get off so I was wondering if he, well, missed his flight again.” Her hair flatteneda little in embarrassment. “He missed the last flight he was supposed to be on.”
    Looking politely disinterested, Torin waited.
    “I thought maybe, if he didn’t miss this flight, he might still be on board.”
    “No.”
    “Are you sure…” She dipped her head and her eyes went a shade darker as she studied Torin’s collar tabs. “…Staff Sergeant?”
    “I’m sure.”
    “But…”
    “I was the only NCO of senior rank on board. Your
thytrin
missed another flight.”
    “Oh.” Her hair flattened farther as she stepped out of the way, one long-fingered hand fiddling with her masker. “I’m sorry to bother you then.”
    Torin swung her bag back onto her shoulder. “No problem.”
    “Um, Staff Sergeant, would you like to…”
    “No. Thank you.” When a di’Taykan began a question with
would you like to
, there was only ever one ending. And that was probably why the girl’s
thytrin
kept missing his flight.
    By the time Torin reached the exit, she’d been delayed long enough for the lines to have gone down at the security scanners. Wondering why the Niln next to her was bothering to argue with the station sys-op—top of the pointless activity list—she slid her slate into the wall and faced the screen. In the instant before the scan snapped her pupils to full dilation, she saw a flash of reflected lime green. The di’Taykan? Scan completed, she turned.
    On the other side of the lounge, now nearly empty of both the shuttle’s passengers and those who’d come to meet them, the di’Taykan had crouched down to speak to a Katrien. Although conscious of being watched, they glanced up and smiled. For an omnivore, the Katrien had rather a lot of sharp-looking teeth in its narrow muzzle and although Torin couldn’t see much of its face around an expensive-looking pair of dark glasses, something about its expression made her fairly certain she’d seen that particular Katrien before. She just couldn’t put her finger on where.
    *You have been cleared to enter the station. Proceed immediately to docking bay SD-31. Your pilot has been informed of your arrival.*
    Torin tongued in an acknowledgment and stepped through the hatch, the Katrien’s identity no longer relevant.
    Facing the lounge exit was a large screen with a three-dimensional map of the station. As Torin stepped closer, a red light flashed over her corresponding place on the map and a long red arrow led to the legend:
“You are here.”
Torin would have bet her pension that the graffiti scrawled next to it in a script she didn’t recognize said,
“And your luggage is in Antares,”
or a variation thereof.
    Shuttle departures were down one level. Unfortunately, SD-31 was not a shuttle bay. All MidSector and OutSector stations had a squadron of two-person fighters for station defense plus a few extra bays in case of fighters arriving without their ships. As no MidSector station had ever been attacked, their squadrons were on short rotation. There were few things more disruptive to a sentient society than a squadron of bored vacuum jockeys.
    “Docking bay SD-31.”
    The map rearranged itself. A second red light appeared. A green line joined them.
    Okay. That was going to take some time.
    “Shortest route. Species neutral.”
    Not significantly shorter.
    The MidSector stations had been in place longer than Humans had been part of the Confederation