Banks, Iain - Culture 01 by Banks Iain

Author:Banks, Iain
Language: eng
Format: epub

'Wake up!' Horza kicked Wubslin's leg as he swung back into his chair. Aviger was sitting in the third seat in the flight deck, looking anxiously at the screens and controls. Wubslin jumped, then looked round with bleary eyes.

'Eh?' he said, then: 'I was just resting my eyes.'

Horza pulled out the CAT 's manual controls from their recess in the edge of the console. Aviger looked at them with apprehension.

'Just how hard did you knock your head?' he said to Horza.

Horza smiled coldly at him. He scanned the screens as fast as he could and threw the safety switches on the ship's fusion motors. He tried traffic control once more. The Smallbay was still dark. The outside pressure gauge registered zero. Wubslin was talking to himself as he checked over the craft's monitoring systems.

'Aviger,' Horza said, not looking at the older man, 'I think you'd better strap in.'

'What for?' Aviger asked quietly, measuredly. 'We can't go anywhere.. We can't move. We're stuck here until a tug arrives to take us out, aren't we?'

'Of course we are,' Horza said, adjusting the readying controls of the fusion motors and putting the ship leg controls on automatic. He turned and looked at Aviger. 'Tell you what; why don't you go and get that new recruit's kitbag? Take it down to the hangar and shove it into a vactube.'

'What?' Aviger said, his already creased face becoming more lined as he frowned. 'I thought she was leaving.'

'She was, but whoever is trying to keep us in here started evacuating the air from the Smallbay before she could get off. Now I want you to take her kitbag and all the other gear she may have left lying around and stow it in a vactube, all right ?'

Aviger got up from the seat slowly, looking at Horza with a tense, worried expression on his face. 'All right.' He started to leave the bridge, then hesitated, looking back at Horza. 'Kraiklyn, why am I putting her kitbag in the vactube?'

'Because there's almost certainly a very powerful bomb in it; that's why. Now get down there and do it.'

Aviger nodded and left, looking even less happy. Horza turned back to the controls. They were almost ready. Wubslin was still talking to himself and hadn't strapped in properly, but he seemed to be doing his part competently enough, despite frequent belches and pauses to scratch his chest and head. Horza knew he was putting the next bit off, but it had to be done. He pressed the ident button.

'This is Kraiklyn,' he said, and coughed.

'Identification complete,' the console said immediately. Horza wanted to shout, or at least to sag in his seat with relief, but he hadn't the time to do either, and Wubslin would have thought it a little strange. So

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might the ship's computer, for that matter: some machines were programmed to watch for signs of joy or relief after the formal identification was over. So he did nothing to celebrate, just brought the fusion motor primers up to operating temperature.

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