“Fuck you, too,” Kiva said.
Pinton smiled at that and pointed at Chat, secured and ready for transport. “He’s right, you know. This one’s not going to talk. They’re trained to resist aggressive questioning.”
“‘Aggressive questioning’?”
“That’s the euphemism we used for torture in the imperial service, ma’am.”
“Just fucking call it torture, then.”
“My point is he’s been trained to deal with whatever humans can do to him.”
“We can do better than humans,” Kiva said.
*
“He’s coming to,” Pinton said, some time later.
“Turn on the speaker,” Kiva said. Pinton pressed the button to open a channel. “Good morning, fuckface,” she said, to Chat.
Chat looked at his surroundings. “Where am I?” he asked.
“You’re in a service airlock, in an EVA suit,” Kiva said. “Well, most of one, anyway. You might have noticed you’re missing a helmet.”
“I noticed,” Chat said.
“Good. So, this is the deal. You tell us everything we ask you questions about, and don’t give us any shit about it, and I don’t purge you out the airlock without that fucking helmet.”
Chat looked exasperated, confused, and tired. “Look, I don’t even know what’s going o—”
Kiva pressed the “Emergency Purge” command. The airlock door burst open and Chat was sucked out into space.
“Well, that was quick,” Pinton said.
“I told you I don’t fuck around,” Kiva replied. She pressed the “Emergency Retrieve” button. The winch that held the cord attached to the EVA suit slammed into overdrive, reeling the suit back in, triple-time. “Anyway. So how long can a human live in hard vacuum?”
“Maybe a minute, if he didn’t hold his breath.”
“He was talking,” Kiva said. “He didn’t have time to hold his breath.”
Less than a minute later Chat was back inside the airlock, which was fully pressurized with an oxygen-rich mixture. A minute after that Chat was awake, coughing and vomiting. He looked up at the airlock camera with hemorrhaged eyeballs. Pinton opened the communication circuit again.
“So, here’s the deal,” Kiva repeated. “You tell us everything we ask you questions about, and you don’t give us any shit about it, and I don’t purge you out of the airlock without that fucking helmet. I’m not going to repeat myself again. You fuck with me and you die. Got it?”
Chat croaked and nodded.
“Can you talk yet?”
Chat held up a gloved finger as if to say Give me a second.
“How about now?” Kiva asked, ten seconds later.
Chat looked up through bloodshot eyes with an expression that said You have to be fucking kidding me, but nodded.
“You’re Chat Ubdal.”
Nod.
“You came onto this ship under false pretenses.”
Nod.
“You work for Ghreni Nohamapetan.”
Nod.
“Who sent you out on this ship.”
Nod.
“To kill Marce Claremont.”
Chat held up a hand and made a wiggling motion. Sorta.
“What the fuck does that mean?”
Chat tried to make words, stopped, swallowed, and tried again. “Not primary goal,” he managed to croak.
“What was your primary goal?”
“Take him alive.”
“How the fuck were you going to take him alive? You can’t leave the fucking ship!”
Chat looked at the airlock door and then back at the camera, as if to say, Oh, really.
“You can’t leave the ship alive, then, you enormous asshole.”
“Pirates,” Chat croaked.
“Oh, shit,” Kiva said, looking over at Pinton.
“The pirates aren’t coming for our cargo,” Pinton said. “They’re a shuttle service.”
“But we could get away from the pirates,” Kiva said, back to Chat. “Maybe.”
Chat shook his head. “Bomb,” he said.
“A bomb?” Kiva was incredulous. “You were going to put a fucking bomb on this ship?” Chat nodded. “How does blowing up the fucking ship serve your purpose?”
Chat shook his head and tried talking but he was trying to make too many words and choked to a stop.
“Let me try,” Pinton said, and leaned over so Chat could hear him. “You weren’t going to blow up the ship, were you? You were just going to disrupt the ship’s systems enough that it couldn’t get into the Flow.”
Chat nodded and pointed to the camera, as if to say, You got it.
“That’s why he was touring those particular corridors,” Pinton said, to Kiva. “He was looking for the right place to put the thing.”
“And he didn’t think we would notice? Blinnikka would space him the second he did that.”
“We’d have to deal with the explosion and damage first, and then there would be pirates and we’d be too busy to worry about him for a while. I suspect he intended to leave on the pirate ship, along with Claremont.”
“And how would he get a bomb on the fucking ship anyway? Don’t we fucking screen for that?”
“It’s probably not a big bomb,” Pinton said. “He could probably make it on the ship.” Pinton leaned back over. “If we go through your personal effects, we’re going to find bomb components disguised as toiletries and sundries, yes?”
Chat nodded.
“There you go,” Pinton said.
“This motherfucker,” Kiva said. “I want to space him just on principle.”
“Microphone,” Pinton said, pointing.
Kiva realized she was close enough to the open circuit that Chat heard that last comment. She looked at the screen to see him with a concerned expression on his face. She rolled her eyes and leaned in again. “I’m not going to kill you, you miserable shitfuck. Unless you stop talking. Or croaking. Or whatever the fuck it is you’re doing at the moment. Just keep doing it.” Chat nodded. Kiva turned to Pinton. “Turn that thing off for a second.”
Pinton slapped closed the communication circuit. “What is it?”
“Something’s not right about this,” Kiva said.
“None of it is right,” Pinton said. “This is all highly fucked up, ma’am.”
“No, I mean—” Kiva pointed at Chat, who was waiting, looking up at the camera. “He wants to bring Claremont back, and he’s willing to damage the ship to do it. Ghreni is willing to deal with fucking pirates to bring him back.”
“You said that Lord Ghreni tried holding him hostage to get those imperial funds released. Maybe he just really needs them.”
“Yeah, okay, but shithole here,” Kiva motioned again toward Chat, “tried to kill him once he realized he was trapped and found out. If he couldn’t bring him back, he needed to kill him. But if he killed him, then he couldn’t use him as a fucking hostage, now, could he? So what was the fucking point? Why did Ghreni go through all this effort? What’s the reason?”
“You got me,” Pinton said.
“Yeah. Open that circuit.” Pinton turned it back on. “Important question, Chat. If I don’t believe you, your lungs are coming out through your nose. You got it?”
Chat nodded.
“Why does your boss want Marce Claremont so fucking bad?”
“Don’t know,” Chat croaked.
“Your fucking lungs, Chat.”
“I. Don’t. Know,” Chat said again, so emphatically the last word came out as a wheeze. “I thought ransom. But makes no sense.”
“Because you were told to kill him if you couldn’t bring him back alive.”
Chat nodded.
“Well, can’t you fucking guess?” Kiva asked. “You work directly with Ghreni. You have to have heard something. You have to be able to speculate.”
Chat shook his head. “Doesn’t talk. Unless involved, nothing.”
“You’re involved, Chat.”
“To do. Not for why.”
Kiva nodded to Pinton again, and he closed the circuit. “Well?” she asked him.
“I think he’s telling the truth.”
“I know the fucker is telling the truth,” Kiva said. “I want to know what you think we do now.”
“Well, we don’t space him,” Pinton pointed at Chat. “He’s been cooperative.”
“Hard vacuum will do that.”
“So he’s not a problem anymore. But we still have the pirates on their way. And if Lord Ghreni was willing to go this far to get Claremont back, then you have to figure he has a plan for if Chat here failed.”
“You mean the pirates are going to either come away with their prize or make sure he’s dead.”
“Yes.”