B00BFVOGUI EBOK Read Online Free PDF Page B

building blocks. But humanity was good at building, and container traffic was something Earth merchants understood. Whirlibangs paired with other stars were constructed. By 2138, the opportunity was open to most anyone who wanted to go.
    Jamie had never wanted to go, but that didn’t stop his escorts from shoving him into the ’box preparing to depart from Charlie. They’d manhandled him the whole way, sneaking him back into the transport Falcone had arrived in. They hadn’t even let him pack a bag.
    “I don’t want to do this,” Jamie said, grasping for a handhold in the zero gravity. “I’ll just go home, like I was supposed to. Falcone can square things!”
    “Forget it, man. You’re going.” O’Herlihy’s frame blocked the exit — not that Jamie would have been able to get there if he tried. He was having enough trouble staying off the ceiling.
    The interior of the passenger ’box was spare. Where the commercial modules the tugs took to and from Earth had dozens of seats, this one had only eleven — including one at the front, near a control panel. At the controls sat a brown-skinned woman in her sixties, dressed as his escorts were.
    “This the guy?” golden-haired Geena Madaki asked, glancing back at Jamie for only a second.
    “Yup,” O’Herlihy said.
    Madaki saw Jamie swimming against the ceiling, desperately trying to make it back to the seats. “Good God,” she said. Observing that O’Herlihy and Dinner were casually strapping themselves in, she activated the door seal.
    Jamie had recovered his bearings against a wall when a metallic clang reverberated through the compartment, sending him sideways. He’d seen it a hundred times from the outside: the container was in the queue and ready to be loaded onto the whirlibang’s energized track. Nocked like an arrow. There wasn’t much time!
    Finding a surface to press against, Jamie shoved himself toward an empty chair just behind Madaki. Hurriedly strapping himself in, he glared back at Dinner. “Thanks for the help.”
    “My pleasure,” Dinner said.
    Jamie gulped as the ’box lurched again. A noisy clack, and the container began to move in the tracks. Slowly at first but quickly picking up speed. The trader felt the pull now, the floor of the cabin hugging the outside of the colossal wheel of rails. Gravity had been simulated centrifugally on Ops, but this was increasing swiftly. “How fast will this go?”
    “Don’t fear,” Madaki said, punching a button. “As we speed up, the pulse generators rip us a nice hole through space — our angular momentum goes off into another dimension. Then it’s smooth sailing.”
    Jamie looked back behind his guards. For the first time, he noticed their HardSHEL suits, secured in transparent lockers. But there were only two. “Shouldn’t I have a space suit or something?”
    “There’s one under my seat if we need it,” Madaki said. “Which we won’t.”
    “What about me?”
    “You’re out of luck,” she said. She glanced back at O’Herlihy. “This child fret all the time?”
    “I can shut him up if you want,” the bruiser replied.
    “No problem,” the pilot said. She looked back at Jamie. “We’re already in the rift,” she said. “Good and easy. You can breathe.”
    Jamie looked at his hands. His fingers had crushed indentations into the armrests. “Oh,” he said.
    But he didn’t let go.
* * *
    Jamie knew the calculation by heart. In traversing twenty-four light years, one day would pass in normal time — and one hour, for those aboard the ’box. Forty minutes passed in the cabin during transit, time in which the security guys snored. There was nothing to look at: for his benefit or not, Madaki had shuttered the forward viewport. They didn’t need to see to travel anyway. A ’box was a speeding bullet while in transit — with just as much control.
    The trader had almost begun to relax when the cabin shook with a noisy, crashing jolt. The breath went out of Jamie’s lungs