Pirates of the Thunder by Jack L. Chalker

worth the risk of improvising and following. I had no idea that such people could get something of this size and complexity running so smoothly at all, let alone this quickly. I would be willing to work with most of these people, but I shall never be comfortable while that creature is loose. I should have destroyed it ten years ago, when I had the chance. It is my greatest mistake.”
    He sighed and patted Nagy on his shoulder. “Don’t worry, my boy. They need you. They need us. We just have to watch our backs, contribute, and bide our time. If, somehow, that creature can be controlled when it is free of constraint, we are where we want to be, aren’t we?”
    Sabatini had entered the compartment and had just stood there, listening to all this. “Yeah, well, that’s all well and good for you two, but I’m dead meat to them. I lost my ship, I lost my pilot, and the inmates are running the asylum. I just want out. Failing that, I could die happy if I could just push them Chink bitches out some air lock like they did me.”
    Nagy turned to stare at Sabatini. “You know, Captain, I’d listen to the Doc here and stop all that talk. Cooperate, go along with them, make yourself useful, even friendly—and survive. They can’t carry much excess baggage even if they do have a ship as big as a small city. Watch you don’t get dumped.”
    That was enough spying for now. Analysis—Reba Koll. The response was almost instantaneous. Insufficient information. Input provided by subject and Clayben consistent with possibilities inherent in transmitter and psychogenetic technology. No more. Scans do not show her in any way different than would be expected for a human female her age.
    The analysis of Clayben’s ship was more productive. As China had guessed, it was almost a miniature state-of-the-art laboratory, as well as a zone of comfort and an interstellar spacecraft. It was a larger and more elaborate variation of the Melchior fighter design, and it contained full and rather impressive armaments, not sufficient to do more than minor damage to the Thunder if it penetrated the fighter screen at all, but sufficient to do a lot of damage to lesser craft.
    Also aboard was a reference computer system of unfamiliar design, possibly developed by Clayben personally. The information in it could be gleaned by a normal type of computer interface, but it was stored in a highly compressed and coded system. The decryption method was unclear; it might be hardware or special codes or a combination of the two, but it was quite sophisticated. The ship did not contain a practical transmuter, although it had one that it used for its interstellar drive fuel and maintenance; it did, however, have a single-unit, fully functioning mindprinter, attached to a psychochemical unit. While they were tied into and run by the encrypted data computer system rather than the ship’s computer, the design and operation was straightforward. Star Eagle was working on duplicating the system and creating his own, tying it into his own banks for operation. Such a system might be very handy indeed.
    Unfortunately, the smaller ship was still too large for the Thunder’s transmuters to duplicate, but it could be flown, at least. The pilot had a cold, neuter persona, but would obey anyone who had the control codes to activate it.
    China and Star Eagle continued to explore, spy, probe, and hypothesize as the Thunder sped on through the nothingness.
     
    “There,” Star Eagle told them. “The second planet out.” Not much was clear from the images on the screens; they were computer graphics and not true pictures in any event, and showed a huge sun and some small, bright dots that represented planets.
    “Won’t it be too hot that close to the sun?” Chow Mai asked worriedly.
    “Perhaps,” the pilot responded. “No way to know for certain until we take a close look at it.” It was the third one in the region they had checked out. The first had been far too cold; the