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“Reaching her, now, through the battery of bodyguards and security around her, on Earth—I earnestly advise against it. I don’t think you can get through that screen. If you do it’s almost certainly going to be monitored, very likely to be placed back on the news, by one side or the other in this affair.”
“God. Where is she—right now, where is she?”
“Bo
“Do they know what we are? Do they understand this ship?”
“The general public knows now it’s no missile project: no one believed we could maintain cover after the bearings, yes, it’s leaked, what it is—senatorial aides, company representatives, nobody’s sure exactly what; but we’re completely public; and the program, with what we’ve found out in the last three hours, is in such disarray we can’t take another round of hearings. The coalition that put command of this facility in our hands is extremely shaky—as I understand it. If political reputations are threatened by the wrong kind of publicity, certain key votes could shift—and we could be massacred in the legislative committee. That, aside from your personal welfare, is why the Company and Fleet Command are extremely anxious to stop that bill; certain citizen lobbies are very fearful of wildcat attacks from the Fleet provoking a military strike at Earth; and even knowing it’s a certain faction in MarsCorp pushing that bill, certain key senators desperately need a success in this program to play against it or they can’t—politically—stand the heat of standing against the bill.”
“What do they want from us? I’m not a criminal! Jamil and his crew aren’t criminals! I want to know who’s trying to kill me that doesn’t fucking care if they get my crew along with me! Nobody’s going to do a damned thing about those guys that did this, are they—are they, sir?”
“Keep your voice down. The guards have audio. We don’t even know at this point that it wasn’t a simple mechanical. Those systems have been under heavy use. But FU grant you we don’t think that’s the case. That’s one problem. And I’ll tell you between us and no further, I had a real moment of doubt at the outset whether to make an issue of the Aptitudes with your crew or let it ride the way it was. The temptation to let it stand and save this program one more major setback was almost overwhelming— but I know, and I think you know, this system is operationally too sensitive and strategically too critical to accept half right. I hate what happened to Jamil. I wish I’d ordered a general stand-down-—but hindsight’s cheap. As it is, the pod sims are in stand-down, we’ve got a question of other sabotage possible—what you’ve given us is very valuable; but we’re ru
“Yessir.”
“I have confidence in you,” Graff said, turned and walked him back to the marine guards, “Corporal. One of you take Mr. Dekker where he wants to go. Get him what he needs. —I suggest it’s a beer, Mr. Dekker. I strongly suggest it’s a beer. Tell galley I said so. Check with me if they quibble.”
“Yes, sir,” the marine said. “This way, sir.”
“Beer, sir,” the guard said, had even gotten it for him and brought it to him at a table back in the galley, quiet refuge in a flurry of cooks and a clatter of pans around them—and in consideration of the Rules around this place, and politeness, and the damned regulations—Dekker shoved the kid’s hand back across the table, with: “Sip, at least. Where I come from—fair’s fair.”
“Nossir,” the corporal said, and shoved the beer into his hand, “We can, any evening, and you guys can’t, and, damn, you guys earn it.”
Misted him up, he’d had no expectation of that, and he hid it in a sip of beer. Guy he didn’t know. Young kid who was going to ride that carrier out there with two thousand other guys and get blown to hell if he made a mistake.
Guy’s name was Bioomfield, T.
And if Graff could have done anything personal for him—he was grateful to the lieutenant for Cpl. Bioomfield, who didn’t know him, had no personal questions, didn’t chatter at him, just let him sip his beer. He felt the alcohol go straight for his bloodstream and his head: after months of abstinence he was going to be a serious soft hit. He thought about going back to barracks and catching some sleep, he thought about his crew and Jamil and the guys he knew; and he wanted quiet around him, just quiet, no one to deal with, and when they got to the changes they were going to make in assignments—that wasn’t going to happen.
He wondered where Meg was, most of all, finally said to Bioomfield, “You have a com with you. You think you guys could locate a female about my height, red hair, shave job, Reel uniform...?”
“That one,” Bioomfield said reverently. And kept any remark he might have to himself. “Yessir.” And got on the com and said, “This is Bioomfield. Anybody on the com know where the redhead is?”
Remarks came back, evidently. Bioomfield listened to something on the earplug, struggled for a sober face, and asked, looking at him: “You want her here, sir?”
He managed a laugh. “Tell her it’s Paul Dekker asking. Cuts down on casualties.”
CHAPTER 16
YOU knew it was bad, Mitch put it, and trez correctly so, Meg thought—when they gave the whole barracks a beer pass, and brought cans and chips into the sacred barracks to boot. Pod sims were severely crashed, mags could be down a week, if sabotage wasn’t the cause, as was the ru
Beer helped the mood, though: the ping-pong game got highly rowdy, a couple of armscompers not quite in their best form, but at least everybody was laughing. Word from hospital was guardedly optimistic—the meds weren’t talking about life and death with Jamil and the guys now, but how long they’d be in hospital, about the percentage they could expect to come back and how soon. Jamil was conscious, Trace was. In the ruckus around the table, nobody questioned Ben and Sal slipping late into barracks. Ben just settled down soberly on Dek’s other side with: “Heard the news. Bad stuff,” while Sal went for beers. “Meg pulled them out,” Dek said, “Got to them fast as anybody alive could. And the sim chief was on fuckin’ duty this time, didn’t have to stop to get fuckin’ Tanzer’s fuckin’ authorization, he just braked the other mags and cut the power, was all. The worst part’s the stop. I can tell you that. —They go on and switch you guys, or is somebody going to tell me what they did, or what?”
Dek had had considerably more than one beer, not a happy drunk, but direct.
“Yeah, they switched us. Damned right they did.”
At which Dek looked at Ben and Meg recognized it was a good thing Sal came back with the beers.
Dek asked: “Why in hell didn’t you tell me?”