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“Hear this,” the com said suddenly. “This station and all station facilities, civilian and military, have passed under Fleet Tactical Operations, by action of the Joint Legislative Committee. Military command has been transferred as of 1400H this date to the ranking Fleet Officer.
“Let me introduce myself. I am Comdr. Edmund Porey. I am not pursuing the interservice incident that marred the station’s record this afternoon. I am releasing all perso
The glove first.
“... but let me serve notice that that is the only amnesty I will ever issue in this command. There are no excuses for failure and there is no award for half-right. If you want to kill yourselves, use a gun, not a multibillion-dollar machine. If you want to fight hand to hand, we can ship you where you can do that. And if you want to meet hell, gentlemen, break one of my rules and you will find it in my office.
“Senior officers of both services meet at 2100 hours in Briefing Room A. This facility is back on full schedules as of 0100 hours in the upcoming watch. Your officers will brief you at that time. Expect to do catch-up. If there are problems with this, report them through chain of command. This concludes the a
He looked at Demas, saw misgiving. Saw worry.
He thought about that request to go up to the ship, and said, “Nav, I understand these people. I’ve worked with them. You understand? I don’t want any mistake here.”
Demas looked at him a long moment—frowned, maybe reading him, maybe thinking over his options, under whatever orders he had, from the captain, from—God only knew.
“J-G, —” Demas started to say. But there were the guards, who might well be miked. Demas put a hand on his arm, urged him toward the door, toward the corridor, and there wasn’t an office to go back to, unless he could get one through Porey’s staff. Demas’ hand stayed on his arm. He had a half-drunk cup in his other hand. He finished it, shoved it in the nearest receptacle as they passed.
Demas said, in a low voice, “Helm, be careful.” Squeezed his arm til fingers bit to the bone. “Too much to lose here.”
“The Shepherds’11 blow. One of them’s going to end up his example. If you want to lose the program, Nav—”
“Too much to lose,” Demas repeated; and a man would be a fool to ignore that cryptic a warning. He let go a breath, walked with less resistance, but no more cheerfully; and after a moment Demas dropped his hand and trusted his arrestee to walk beside him.
“Ens. Dekker,” the man said, letting him into Graff’s office. But it wasn’t Graff at the desk. It was Porey, for God’s sake—with a commander’s insignia. Didn’t know how Porey was here, didn’t know why it wasn’t Graff standing there, but it was Fleet, it was brass and he saluted it, lacking other cues. He’d dealt with Porey before, had had a two-minute interview with the man on the carrier coming out from the Belt and he didn’t forget the feeling Porey had given him men; didn’t find it different now. Like he was somehow interesting to a man whose attention you just didn’t want.
“Ens. Dekker,” Porey said, with his flat, dark stare. “How are you?”
“Fine, sir.”
“That’s good.” Somehow nothing could register good in that deep, bone-reaching voice. “Hear you had a run-in with the sims.”
“Yes, sir.”
Long silence then, while Porey looked him up and down, with a skin-crawling slowness a man couldn’t be comfortable with. Then: “Bother you?”
“I’m not anybody’s target, sir.”
“And you lost your crew.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hear they were good. Hear Wilhelmsen was.”
“Yes, sir.”
“So what are you?”
Nerves recently shaken, shook. He didn’t know what the answer was, now. He said, “I want to fly. Sir.”
“What are you, Dekker?”
“Good. Sir.”
“You’re going back in that chair. Hear me? You’re going to go back in and you’re going to forget what happened here. You want to fly?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then you do that. You take that crew we’ve put together for you and you get back in that sim and you do it, do you hear me?”
He wasn’t thinking clearly. Nobody he’d ever been in a room with gave him the claustrophobic feeling Porey did. He wanted this interview over. He wanted out of this office... he wasn’t up to this.
“Do you hear me, Dekker?”
“Yes, sir,” he said.
“Then you go do that. I want results. You say you’re the best. Then do it. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, sir,” he said.
“You’re dismissed.”
“Yes, sir,” he said again, and then remembered Meg; and Ben; and Sal. “But with another crew, sir, than the one I’ve been given...”
“The Fleet’s assembled the crew you have at cost and expense, Ens. Dekker. We’re told they’re good. We’ll see it proved or we’ll see it disproved—in the field.”
“They’re not ready, sir.” He shoved himself forward, leaned on the desk and stared Porey in the face. “They haven’t had the year I’ve had, they’re not up to this, they haven’t flown in a year at least....”
Porey said, “That’s what the sims are for.”
“What are you after, a body count?”
People didn’t talk to Porey that way. He saw the slight surprise in Porey’s eyes, and something else, something that chilled him before Porey said, “I’m after whatever you’ve got. As much as you’ve got. Or you and your crew dies. That’s understood, isn’t it? We’re Test Systems here. And you test the systems. Do you want them to live? Then you don’t question me, you do it, mister. Do you have that?”
“It’s not reasonable!”
“I’m not a reasonable man.” Porey’s eyes kept their hold. “I never have been. I never take second best. Have you got it, Ens. Dekker? Or are you talk, and no show?”
He trembled. No human being had ever made him do that, but he shook and he knew Porey could tell it.
“We give you everything you ask for, Dekker. Now you do what you say you can do, you pull the Hellburner out. You do it. Don’t give me excuses. I don’t hear them. Am I ever going to hear your excuses?”
“No, sir.”
“You’re meat, til you prove otherwise. Prove it. Or the. I don’t personally care, Dekker.”
He couldn’t get his breath. He couldn’t think, he wanted to strangle Porey so bad. He choked on it. Finally: “Yes, sir. I copy that clear. Am I dismissed, —sir? Because you fucking need me, don’t you, .sir?”
Porey kept staring at him. Looked him up and down. Said, “Aren’t you the bitch, Dekker?” and finally made a backhanded move that meant Get out. Dismissed.
He took it, saluted, turned and walked out, oxygen-short, still on an adrenaline burn, and snaking, while he was still remembering Porey from the ship, remembering that Graff had said even then: Don’t get close to him.
Then he hadn’t been able to figure whether Graff had meant that literally or figuratively, but he had a sinking feeling he’d just made a move that amused Porey—in the sense of defying Porey’s expectations. That was an intelligent man—maybe the most intelligent man he’d ever met; maybe too intelligent to mind who lived and who died. He believed what Porey had said—he believed lives didn’t matter in there, lives didn’t matter in this station at the moment, law didn’t matter...
Guards fell in with him, the same that had brought him there. He hadn’t even any notion where they were taking him, but they escorted him to the main corridor and told him go to barracks, everybody was confined to barracks.
Deserted corridor. Deserted conference rooms. Guards posted line of sight along the curvature. The vacancy of the corridors was surreal. The echoes of his own steps racketed crazily in his ears. The downside of the adrenaline surge left him dizzy and chilled.
Several turns, more empty corridors. Guards at the barracks section door asked for his ID. “Dekker,” he said, and pulled his card from his pocket, turned it over numbly, all the rush chilled out of him. “Off duty. Just out of detention.”