He let out a long slow sigh, leaned over and put his hand on her knee. Just kept it there a while and she didn’t know what to say to him. Sal came and massaged his shoulders. Ben lowered himself into the chair by the bed and said, “So is this ship going to grapple and tow us or just pick us off?”
“Tow,” Dekker said. “As I gather. Thing’s probably not doing all it can, even the way it’s moving.”
“Starship,” Meg said, thinking of a certain flight. “I’ve seen ‘em glow when they come in.”
“Freighters,” Sal said. “This thing’s something else.”
An old rab had a chill, thinking about that “something else” next that one pretty memory. Thought—Earth’s blind. Earth’s severely blind.
Feathers on the wind. Colonies won’t come back.
Kids don’t come home again. Not the same, they don’t.
Lot of noise. Dekker had no idea how big the carrier was, but it had a solid grip on them, and they could move around now, get what they needed before they sounded the take-hold and shut the rotation down for the push back to R2.
But before that, they had a personnel line rigged, lock to lock, and he had an escort coming over to pick him up. The Fleet wasn’t taking any chances of a standoff—while they were falling closer and closer to the mag-sphere.
Hadn’t told Meg and Sal. Hadn’t told Ben either. He intended to, on his way to the lock. Meanwhile he wanted just to get his belongings together. The Hamiltonhad had their personals out of Trinidadbefore they freed her, Bird’s too: they’d been packed and ready to go, all the food and last-to-go-aboards stowed in Trinidad, that being where they’d enter and where they’d ride out the initial burn. It was all jumbled together now— Hamiltonhad had no idea who’d owned what—and he found an old paper photo—a group of people, two boys in front, arms around each other, mountains in the background.
Blue-sky. He didn’t know what these people had been to Bird. He thought one of the boys looked a little likeBird. He didn’t know what mountains they were—he knew the Moon better than he knew Earth and its geography—another class he’d cut more than he’d attended.
But he looked at it a long time. He didn’t think it was right to take what was Bird’s—he hadn’t had any claim on him. Ben did. But you could put away a picture in your mind and remember it, years after.
If there were years after.
He took what was his. Put on the bracelet Sal had bought him—he thought that would make her happy. He didn’t know, point of fact, whether they’d let him keep anything. Worth asking, he thought.
“Dek?” Sal asked.
About finished, anyway. He stuffed a shirt into the bag, wiped his hair out of his eyes and caught his balance against the lockers as he stood up.
All of them—including Meg. Sal was holding her on her feet. Ben, behind them.
“Meg, God, I wasn’t going to skip out—the meds’ll have a seizure.”
Meg said, “Thought we’d walk down to the lift with you.” In that tone of voice Meg had that didn’t admit there were other choices. “Hell of a thing, Dek.”
“Yeah, well, I wasn’t going to worry you. —Walk you back to your cabin.”
“Doing just fine, thanks. Going to check these so’jer-boys out. See if we approve the company they’re putting you into.”
He picked up his duffel, put a hand on the wall and came closer. Familiar faces. Faces he’d gotten used to seeing— even Ben. And Meg. Especially Meg.
He leaned over, very carefully kissed her on the cheek. Meg said, “Oh, hell, Dek,” and it wasn’t his cheek she kissed, for as long as gave him time to know Meg wasn’t joking, and that close as he’d been with Cory, it wasn’t what he felt right now.
Sal kissed him too, same way. But not the same. He couldn’t talk.
Ben said, holding up a hand, “If you think I’m going to, you’re wrong.”
You never knew about Ben. Ben saved him losing it. He got a breath, halfway laughed, and picked up the bag again, hearing the lock operating.
“Sounds like my appointment,” he said. “Better move, so they can get us all under way. Risky neighborhood.”
“Yeah, well,” Meg said, following him, on Sal’s arm. Hard breath. “They better take care of you. Lettersare a good thing.”
“May be a while,” he said, glancing back as he walked. Not good for the balance. “But I will. Soon as I can. Soon as I have a paycheck. Don’t know whether I’ll be at the shipyard or where. Sol, maybe. I just can’t say.”
Trying to pack every thought he had into a handful of minutes. Thinking about the Fleet’s tight security, and the tighter security around him.
“Maybe if you ask the Shepherds they can find out where I’m stationed. Maybe the captain can get a letter to me, even if I can’t get one out. My mother’s Ingrid Dekker, she’s on maintenance at Sol—write to her, if that doesn’t work. She may know where I am.”
Or maybe not, he thought, as they came into the ops area, where the lift was, to take him up to the lock. Fleet uniform on the blond and two marine MP’s, with pistols. Standing with Sunderland. He hoped they didn’t take him off in handcuffs. Not in front of Meg, please God…
“Mr. Dekker?” the crew-type said—young, insignia he couldn’t read. Outheld hand. He took the offer. Didn’t read any threat. “Name’s Graff. Going to take you across and see you signed in.”
Didn’t sound like a threat. It wasn’t handcuffs at least.
Graff said, “This your crew?”
“Meg Kady, Sal Aboujib, Ben Pollard.” He spotted Sam Ford over to the right, Ford with his arm in a sling. “Sam Ford. Ran the com for us.” He wasn’t sure Ford liked the notoriety. Maybe he shouldn’t have opened his mouth. But damn-all the Fleet was going to do about the rest. They were getting the one they’d bargained for, and Graff didn’t look like a note-taker. He shook hands with the captain, waved a small goodbye at his shipmates, took Graff’s signal they were going.
Lift took him and Graff and one guard. That was all that would fit. Graff said, on the way up, “Ops training’s real glad to get its hands on you. Move of yours gave the lieutenant an attack. You didn’t hear that.”
He looked Graff in the face. Saw amusement. Saw the MP biting his lip.
Lift let out at the dock. Cold up here. He stood and shivered, thought then to ask, “They going to let me keep my personals? Or should I leave them?”
“Put them in stowage. Few months, you can get them back.”
The lift was coming up again. It opened.
Ben came out with the other MP.
“Thought we saidgoodbye,” Dekker said.
“Yeah, well,” Ben said, and said to Graff, “Got room for another one?”
Differentkind of ship. ECS5 was her designation—didn’t have a name yet, and wouldn’t, til she was commissioned. Gray and claustrophobic, huge flexing sections on the bridge. Instruments he didn’t understand. Most of it was dark. The crew was minimal, evidently, or the boards weren’t live yet. The personnel ring wasn’t operational—it was acceleration that let them walk the deck, g-plus at that, with the Hamilton’smass. Graff had said he’d do a walk-around with them.
Real quiet walk-around. It was a working ship. They didn’t belong here. They weren’t under arrest. Graff, Dekker got the idea, was doing a sell-job. “Good program,” Graff said, about flight training. “They don’t wantyou to come in with a lot of experience—new tech. Whole new kind of ship. Can’t talk about it. Can’t talk about it covers a lot we deal with.”