"Well, I can't imagine making admiral, but given the way your family and mine tend to mature, maybe we'd better start working on it."
"Do you think . . . they all have this kind of thing to deal with?"
"Bad memories, times they feel they screwed up? I guess . . . I never really thought about it, but . . . I know my aunt does. She doesn't talk about it to me."
"No, nor Methi with me." Meharry took a long breath, then another. "Sir, thanks. I was . . . just purely desperate."
"I know. And it may come back, at least until you get some treatment. But you're a lot more than one blow in the dark, Gelan Meharry."
"And you're a lot more than one mistake in damage control," Meharry said, with an accuracy that took Barin's breath away. "I'll bet you did the best you could—and you were tryin' to save lives—maybe you'd have lost people anyway."
"It's still my responsibility."
Meharry cocked his head. "So tell me about it. You listened to me; I'll listen to you."
This wasn't in any leadership manual, and he was dead sure his aunt had never been in a situation like this. But he had demanded trust; now he had to give it. That much he knew, bone-deep.
"All right. There was the hull breach, aft of the compartment I was working in . . ."
"Don't they usually have a chief running that?"
"The rejuv problem," Barin said. "Not enough chiefs, too many jigs. Actually our station was up on Troop Deck, but they needed all of us. So there I was, with my team. Enough of the bulkhead between us and the hull breach had spalled off to send shrapnel through the compartment, causing a lot of damage, plus there was a leak to vacuum. When we went in, it was dark, cold, wet, slippery, and you couldn't see more'n a meter at first."
"Sounds like a bad stormy night here," Meharry said.
"What I worried most about was a hydraulic leak," Barin said. "I'd been warned about those, and sure enough, there was one. And then, whether the bulkhead would hold—it was strained, and that's where the air was going." He told the next part quickly—how they'd put up the big patch, how they'd been told to go on and check the environmental tanks.
"Did you have moles in your unit?" Meharry asked.
"No; they were sending us some moles, they said, but in the meantime we could look at gauges and read them off. We had one guy with a chemscan . . ." He stopped, swallowed. "So we rigged emergency lighting. The deck was wet, of course, and part of it was icy as well. Pressure was way down, and the temperature."
"Was the fight still going on?"
"Yeah. But we were too busy to pay much attention. What I should have known was that we had the wrong kind of chemscan; the one we had was fine for the rest of the ship, but didn't identify organics. There was a spike . . ." He went on with the rest, gesturing to show where everyone had been, and what he'd tried to do. "I couldn't move, you see. Not without moving the oxygen around—it's dispersing all the time, of course, but moving would make it happen faster. And Ghormley, he was the youngest, the newest. I didn't realize—I thought I'd convinced him to stand still, but he thought I was moving—"
"He triggered it?" Meharry said.
"He was scared," Barin said. "I guess when I turned my head away from him, he thought we were leaving him alone, but I wouldn't have—"
"Of course not," Meharry said. "If you were that kind you'd have bolted for the airlock first thing, and blown them all up." He pursed his lips. "Kid should have listened to you."
"I said the wrong things," Barin said.
"I doubt it. You kept him there longer than he'd have stayed on his own, right? An' then he panicked. In the dark and cold, knowing he was standing in something that could blow him to bits . . . I can understand that, though he was wrong."
"I couldn't stop him," Barin said. "And if I'd known what I should have about the chemscan, it wouldn't have happened anyway—we'd have known it was a methane leak right off. Two people dead, several injured, because I thought Environmental was boring. . . ."
"I guess you do know about guilt," Meharry said. "So how did you survive, standing in the oxygen?"
"Blind luck," Barin said. "I don't know, really—I was knocked cold—but they said the explosion jammed me in between a couple of tanks. I came out fine." The bitterness in his own voice surprised him.
Meharry's eyebrows went up. "Fine? A medical evacuation here, and how many hours in the regen tanks?" He blew out a long breath. "With all due respect, sir, I think if I need the psychnannies, maybe you do too."
"Maybe I do," Barin said. Now he'd let it out, he could see the resemblance to his earlier experience, when he'd felt so inadequate because he couldn't save them all. "Sauce for the goose, eh? So neither of us gets to jump into the ocean. It's a deal, is it?"
"Deal, sir." They shook hands on it; Barin had the sense that he was shaking hands on another deal, one he didn't quite understand yet.
Captain Terakian offered to let Esmay stay aboard, but she felt she had abused their hospitality enough.
"You will stay in touch?" he said. "I feel responsible—"
"I'll be fine," Esmay said. "Whether they let me back in or not, I'll be fine. And yes, I'll let you know."
Rockhouse Major had hostelries in every style and price range; Esmay checked into a modest hotel where she could afford to stay for weeks, if need be. She put her few clothes away, grimaced at the thought of having to shop for more, and went out to find a communications nexus. There she looked up "Brun Meager" in the Rockhouse Major database, and found long strings of news stories about her, but no address. She found the address subdirectory and tried again. Restricted. Well, that made sense. She entered "Brun Meager, agent of record" and got a name she'd never heard of: "Katherine Anne Briarly." A search on that returned only a comunit number. Esmay copied it to her handcomp, moved to a secure combooth, and entered the number. A screen came up with a message: "Sorry, it's the middle of the night here. If this is an emergency, please press 0; otherwise press 1 and put a message in my morning bin."
Option 1 gave her more choices: voice, text, video. Esmay chose voice and waited until the return signal came. "This is Esmay Suiza, formerly of the Regular Space Service," she said. "I need to contact Brun Meager; I'm presently at Rockhouse Major, at the Stellar Inn, room 1503."
She wasn't even sure which time zone Brun was in—assuming she was in this system at all. She walked back to the Stellar Inn, wondering if she should have stayed aboard the
Fortune
—was she really wasting money, as Goonar had said? But the very anonymity and blandness of the hotel's rooms—the dull colors and plain surfaces, so different from the Terakians' decor—helped her think through what it was she wanted to tell Brun, and what she thought Brun might be able to do. It seemed less practical here and now.
She stretched out on the beige-and-cream bedspread, and turned down the light. She might as well try to sleep. . . .
* * *
The comunit's beep woke her from a dream about Altiplano—not Barin for once—where she had been, for some dream-logical reason, sitting in an apple tree plaiting multicolored ribbons while children sang jingles down below. She reached for the comunit and eyed the time display. Six hours after she'd come back to the room—she'd had more than enough sleep.
"Esmay Suiza?" a woman's voice said. It didn't sound like Brun, but her voice had still been hoarse and scratchy when Esmay heard it last.
"Yes," she said.
"This is Kate Briarley. Does your room have a secure comunit?"
"No—there's one in the lobby."
"Here's my day number—"
In the secure booth, Esmay entered the number she'd been given. The screen lit almost at once, and the video pickup showed both Brun—still unmistakeably Brun—and another blonde woman who looked to be a few years older.
"Esmay—what's this I hear about you leaving Fleet? Did you quit, or did they boot you out?"
"Booted me out," Esmay said, unaccountably cheered by Brun's matter-of-fact tone. "You wouldn't have heard—Barin and I got married—"
"Good for you! Is that why?"
"Yes . . . it's all rather complicated. I wanted to talk to you, if I could."
"Ah—you haven't met Kate—" Brun nodded at the other woman. "Kate Briarly's from the Lone Star Confederation, and she's been helping me out, including with security. What with the assassinations and all, we're being careful."
"That's good," Esmay said.
"But you need to come on down, so we can talk. There's a twice-daily shuttle to Rockhouse Minor, which is all civilian; lots of people take it just to sightsee, and there are excursions to the planet from there, too. When you get to Rockhouse Minor, go to section B, give the guard at the private entrance your name, and say you're expected. You'll be passed through to a departure lounge for private shuttles. No one will bother you." She turned to Kate. "Should we go up and meet her?"
"I'd let your staff handle it," Kate said.
"Fine, then. A steward will tell you when the shuttle's ready . . . let me see . . . you can catch the Rockhouse Minor shuttle in about three hours—"
"If it's not full," Esmay said. "Is it usually booked in advance?"
"Yes, but it's usually half-empty anyway. Tell the concierge—they have some pull with the transit companies. Anyway, if you catch that one, then it'll be about two hours after you arrive before someone will be there to pick you up."
Rockhouse Minor was quieter than Rockhouse Major . . . less bustling. Esmay strolled down carpeted corridors bordered by exclusive shops with window displays arranged like works of art: small, jeweled, entrancing. Here a single shoe, draped with ropes of pearls. There a scarf, behind a diamond necklace. An antique chronometer, a crystal decanter.
Section B turned out to be even more luxurious—the carpet, deeper piled, curved halfway up the bulkheads, and padded seats faced a series of aquaria, each housing a collection of rare marine life. The Lassaferan snailfish, with its elongated purple fin, looked as improbable as its name.
Ahead was a barrier in the form of a huge work of fabric art, with a guard kiosk in front of a gap in the fabric. The guard appeared to be alone and unarmed, but Esmay doubted this was the case.
"May I help you, sera?" the guard asked as she walked up.
"Yes, thank you. I'm Esmay Suiza. I'm expected." She felt silly saying this, even though it was true.
"Ah . . . yes. Excuse me, Sera Suiza, but may I see your identification?"
Esmay handed over the folder, and he checked it over. "If you would just put the fingers of both hands here . . ." She did so. "Thank you, sera; sorry to have delayed you. Go right on through."
As she passed through the opening, Esmay saw that immediately behind the tapestry was a large, efficiently-laid-out guardroom where a half-dozen uniformed personnel manned scan equipment, including a full-spec scan of the corridor she had just come down.
Ahead, in the lounge area, were more clusters of padded chairs as well as an area with tables and desks. She saw a couple of people chatting at a table . . . an older man lounging in one of the chairs . . . and no one else. She chose a chair, and sank into it. Almost at once, a green-vested steward came to her. "Would the sera care for any refreshments?"
"No, thank you," Esmay said. Whatever they served here would no doubt cost four times as much as the same food and drink somewhere else.
"Sera Meager wanted to be sure you were comfortable," the steward said. "This is the Barraclough private lounge, sera, and all refreshment is complimentary. There has been a slight delay in the shuttle; it will be several hours . . ."
She'd eaten at Rockhouse Major before she left, but that was now hours ago. "I don't suppose you have soup . . ." she said.
"Indeed we do, sera," said the steward, now looking more cheerful. By the time the shuttle arrived, Esmay decided that if she couldn't get back into Fleet, she wanted to work for someone who had this kind of life. She could easily get used to such luxuries.
The shuttle came in low over rolling hills, green fields and orchards . . . .much greener than her part of Altiplano, with no soaring mountains nearby. As the shuttle eased down, she saw a small stone building and a few groundcars, then—as it rolled to a stop—she saw two blonde women waving. Esmay braced herself for the impact of Brun's personality as the steward opened the shuttle door. Brun would have her own agenda for Esmay's visit; she needed Brun's help, but staying on track might be a problem.
I'm not here to talk about fashion,
she rehearsed mentally.
I'm here to get into Fleet.
Terakian Fortune
's Rockhouse Major docking space wasn't quite roomy enough for the entire pavilion, so Basil had put up only the sign and half the office segment. With the extra "crew" now helping Fleet with their inquiries, and all the Rockhouse cargo unloaded, he tried to estimate what their cubage and mass allowances were. Would any of the troupe come back? He hoped so; Goonar was grumpier than he'd been for years, muttering about lost time and wasted space—