Merchanters, maybe. But serving as line troops—when the Fleet needed every skilled spacer they could recruit? His stomach was upset. He carded a soft drink out of the machine and spotted a pair of marines at the administrative entrance, the galley office. What did they think, the cooks were going to take the cutlery to the corridors?
Exactly why those guards were standing there. Damned right. Tell it to Porey that the guys weren’t going to go for the knives. Tell it to Lynch. A sight too much real combat readiness and overreaction in the ambient, thank you. A sight too much readiness in these troopers for any feeling that things were safe or under control.
“J-G.”
Demas. Behind him. He took a breath and a drink, and disconnected expression from his face before he turned around. “We’re on standby,” he said, disapproving Demas’ leaving the ship unofficered, before he so much as realized they weren’t the primary ship at station any longer; Demas said, “LongJohn’s on. We’ve got a while.”
He nodded, tried to think of somewhere pressing to go, or something he had else to do, rather than discuss the situation with Nav One.
“You all right, Helm?”
As if he were a child. Or a friend.
“I’m tired,” he said, which might cover his mood; but it sounded too much like a whimper. He didn’t like that. He didn’t like Demas conning him. He said, point-blank: “How much of this did you know?”
Demas’ face went very sober, very quickly. It took a moment before he said, “Not who.”
He hadn’t expected honesty. He hadn’t expected that answer. So Demas wasn’t happy with the new CO either. And Demas was indisputably the captain’s man. That came clear of a sudden.
He asked, under the noise of the heat pumps, “When did this get arranged?” and watched Demas avoid his eyes. Or look anxiously toward the marines—who might have Security audio, he realized that of a sudden. Damn, he wasn’t thinking in terms of hostile action, it was their own damned side, for God’s sake. But Demas was clearly thinking about it.
And Demas was the captain’s man.
Demas said, in a low, low voice, “The Company pulled every string it had, in every congress on the planet. You want to go out to the ship, J-G?”
Of a sudden he had a totally paranoid notion, that Demas and Saito might be reeling him in for good, getting him where he couldn’t get into trouble—where he couldn’t cause trouble. Arrest? he asked himself. —Have I done that badly—or been that completely a fool?
“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 personnel from detention with a reprimand for conduct unbecoming...”
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 announcement.”
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....”