<Its either that or sit here in the dark watching the universe go by and playing with my dick.>

She laughed. <You have to be kidding me.>

<Oh, like you havent ever done that. Rather be doing something than nothing, baby. And if were going to get screwed, might as well try and screw them back, right?>

<I already checked out the specs for the lifeboats,> she said, a grin spreading across her face. <Well leave that pair of assholes to the Marauder, or the Wanderer or whatever its name is, and get the hell home.>

<Let me run some numbers, before you take over from me in the chair,> sent Bash, <and you can check them over once youve finished parboiling your brain in happy juice. If were going to do this, lets make sure we do it right.>

He signed off. Megan picked up her coffee and found it had turned cold. She knew Bash didnt really believe the plan could work. And maybe he was right. But he was also right when he had said it was better than doing nothing.

She still hadnt lost her sense of excitement. She would make it work.

The next few days, prior to their final jump into the system, were only outwardly uneventful. Bash ran some simulations and used them to develop a set of custom modifications for the lifeboats, without Tarrant or Sifra becoming any the wiser. Before long, the engineering decks fabricators were stripping down a lifeboat in preparation for rebuilding it.

Megan meanwhile prepared the way for the core dump that would eject the Beauregards nova drive into space. The mounting within which the drive nestled sported a cluster of miniaturized drive-spines, making it a self-contained starship in its own right. Following an emergency core dump, it could, if necessary, jump to any one of a number of pre-programmed destinations, in order to evade capture.

But if the Wanderer didnt attack, she and Bash were going to have to figure out something else. She wondered if it might be possible to provoke the Wanderer in some way, but, given that they still didnt know how to get it even to respond to them, the chances seemed remote.

You cant even get the Wanderer to acknowledge our signal, she said in exasperation, later that day, as she stepped back down from the chair to find Tarrant waiting for her. Except I got the distinct impression that the Kelvins crew found some way to talk with it before it attacked.

Tarrant had been sitting with one booted foot up on a console, turning a Freeholder knife this way and that under the deck lights. Thats correct, he replied, without looking up.

So what happens when we get there? she asked. How are you going to talk to it? Shouldnt you have told us that by now?

He gave her a thin smile. Itll all be taken care of soon enough, was all he said.