"Kane, what do you think—"
"No time to talk, ma'am. These lights have been on too long—somebody's going to notice the energy consumption in General Control any minute now. Besides which, B-Haaq saw you with me, and heard me telling you to get going and report me. So if I didn't kill him—"
"You're crazy! He wouldn't—"
Jon tightened his grip, looked straight into her eyes. "You know he would, ma'am. If only because he hated me so much, and he found you with me. We've got to get going."
"You let me go!" With a quick wrench, she twisted free of him. "You're forgetting, aren't you, that no matter where in the ship you go it will be only a matter of time before you're found? And if they can give you anything worse than the mines—"
"All right then, stay if you want to! Go ahead and gamble that our friend's either dead or has a forgiving nature hidden away somewhere—the only thing I'm sure about is that he didn't blow up all the ship's spacetenders."
"You'll be overhauled in no time!"
"Ten minutes' work and I can triple the speed of any one of those buckets. You coming, or not?"
He turned from her, ducked swiftly through the hatchway and chose a port-side ramp that would carry him up to the Maintenance deck. There would be at least one tender berthed there in good working condition.
He flattened himself against the ramp wall as he neared its end; listened. Nothing. Maintenance was just sitting around as usual, and during the sleep period, there'd be only a skeleton crew.