Before she left the station, Ky made her reservation at the Captains’ Guild—“an acceptable expense chargeable to the company.” She also placed a call to the escort service Vatta Transport used—“a captain never prowls about alone; if no senior crew accompanies, a captain will hire an escort from the usual service [list appended.]” Belinta was supposed to be a safe port, but this was her first voyage; she would take no chances. Executive Escort promised to have a suitable individual on call when she arrived. She chose to meet the escort at the Captains’ Guild.

On the down shuttle, she leafed through travel brochures she would never use, such as “Beautiful Belinta, Belle of the Hub Worlds.” Nobody but the residents would call this sector the Hub Worlds, unless they thought the rest of the wheel had fallen off. Belinta advertised “unparalleled cultural opportunities,” “scenic sights,” and “marvelous experiences for the value-conscious traveler.”

The “cultural opportunities” looked like a group of people in costume singing something; and the “scenic sights” looked like a cliff over an ocean. Ky wondered what kind of brochures Slotter Key handed out to tourists. She wondered if Slotter Key had any tourists.

She turned over some of the others. “Salzon’s Singing Sands,” far across the planet, looked like piles of gray dirt, but the “Singing Sands Luxury Resort” promised “unparalleled self-indulgence amid the shimmering dunes.”

“See the Sights of Mystic Valross Valley” showed a mountain valley, with a large red arrow pointing to the Mystic Valley Luxury Resort perched on a cliff on one side.MysticValley’s hostelry promised the same unparalleled self-indulgence as well as horseback tours toSpiritFalls. More interesting—at least in the brochures—was the “Sea Isle Reef Extravaganza Tour” with stays in the Sea Isle Luxury Resort promising the now-familiar unparalleled self-indulgence.

The brochures were archaic—plasfilm, with inert illustrations and no linkup codes. Ky put them aside for the next passenger to enjoy as the shuttle landed. Belinta had only one shuttleport, near its capital. She caught theCityCentertrain, using the coupon from the brochure. No humods on the train, a disappointment; aside from the dull clothing, everyone seemed normal. She came out of the grimy, strange-smelling station across a paved street from the Captains’ Guild, a dark brick building in a row of other dark brick buildings, with the starred flag of the Captains’ Guild waving in a gentle warm breeze over the entrance.

She had been to the Captains’ Guild with her father back on Slotter Key, where he—like all the Vatta senior captains—was personally known to all the service personnel. But this was her first time to enter a guildhouse in her own right. She half expected the doorman to ask for her ID, or suggest that she wait in the Visitors’ Lounge for her father. She resisted the impulse to flick her dress cape back from her sleeves to reveal the rings, and walked toward the door as if she owned it. The doorman at the Captains’ Guild opened the door for her at once, and the on-duty steward met her in the lobby.

“Captain Vatta, a pleasure. Right this way, please.” Of course: their implants would have picked up her ID before she arrived. Her overnight bag disappeared with a bellboy up a flight of stairs; the steward led her to the registration desk. “Just to check that everything’s in order—” It was. Ky looked automatically at the status board. Princess Cory, Captain R. Stennis, Ind., NR, LPoC Vauxsin; Pir K., Captain J. Sing, Ind., R, LPoC Local System; Glennys Jones, Captain K. Vatta, Vatta Transport, Ltd., R, LPoC Slotter Key. She made herself quit looking at her own name on the status board—”Captain K. Vatta” right out there in public—and tried to extract from the simple list all the information she could. Two independents, one staying in the guildhouse and one not. Pir K. was probably an insystem rig; Ky wondered what she carried and to and from whom.

“Your room, Captain—number six, second floor. You require assistance?”

“No, thanks,” Ky said.

“Will you need us to arrange an escort?”

“No, thank you,” Ky said. “I have contacted a service already. I’ll call them again from my room and let them know I’ve arrived.”

“They should have met you at the ’port,” the desk clerk said. “Unless you requested that they not…”

“I said here would be fine,” Ky said. “But thank you.” She ignored the elevator and went up the carpeted stairs to the second floor where a single short cross-hall made it clear that the Captains’ Guild on Belinta didn’t expect much business. Her room overlooked the street and although it contained all the amenities the Captains’ Guild promised its members, it was smaller and plainer than the room her father had shown her back at Slotter Key’s Guild residence. Ky turned on the comconsole and uplinked to her ship, giving them her onplanet contact codes. Then she called Executive Escorts, where the same pleasant voice promised to send someone over immediately. She had just unpacked when the desk called to tell her that the escort had arrived.

Back on Slotter Key, Vatta had its own security personnel, wearing company colors; Ky had never dealt with outworld security firms before. The stocky young man in dark green tunic and brown pants looked nothing like the Vatta employees, but his ID patch fit the information she’d downloaded from the escort service. Conor Fadden, senior operative, certified and licensed to carry those firearms deemed appropriate for private hires on Belinta. He had the little bulge in the left temple that indicated an implanted skullphone, and the larger bulges under his tunic that must be his weaponry.

“Mr. Fadden,” Ky said, as she came into the lobby. He turned from the desk.

“Captain Vatta? You’re not the same Captain Vatta—?”

“No. It’s my first run here.” The here slipped out, implying more experience than she had, because of the way he’d looked at her. “Your credentials, please.” The Captains’ Guild staff would have checked already butGaryhad impressed on her the need to check everything herself.

“Of course, ma’am,” he said, handing over a datapak. Ky ran the hand scanner over it—clean—and then offered hers to his hand scanner. He took his ID pak back and straightened. “Where first, Captain?”

“The Slotter Key legation,” Ky said. “If it’s close enough, I’d like to walk.”

“Easy close enough,” he said. “Just across the street and down a ways.” He led the way to the door, and then out onto the street. According to the Captain’s Guide, escort services could provide a range of services, but the only one authorized on the company account at Belinta was “guide, basic protection.”

Ky felt a strange combination of young and important as she walked with her armed escort along the street of a city on a planet she’d never seen before. It smelled different. People dressed in different colors, different styles. Although Belinta was supposed to have “nominal normal” gravity, her feet didn’t seem to hit the ground with the same impact as on Slotter Key. Ky tried not to gape at the sights, keeping her eyes firmly on the Slotter Key flag which her escort had pointed out, a short walk away. When they got to the Slotter Key legation, she nodded to the guards at the gate and handed them her ID pak. They nodded back, ran a scanner over it, and opened the gates for her. Her escort paused; the guards checked his ID, and then allowed him into the gatehouse. Ky walked on up to the door; another uniformed guard opened it for her.

Inside, the legation’s reception area had tiled floors and cream-colored walls hung with tapestries representing the Six Colonies. Ky handed her ID pak to the desk clerk, a cheerful middle-aged woman, who ran it through a reader and returned it. “Need to see the consul, Captain Vatta?”