They had to let the junior-juniors go out there. They had to look normal. And he had to get them back again, in one piece.
Put Fletcher in charge of the juniors who’d more or less been in charge of him? It might straighten out the accidental kink that had developed in the order of things. He’d have Fletcher report to him once daily about the state of the juniors, he’d threaten Jeremy’s life if they gave Fletcher a hard time, and he’d have a daily phone call from Fletcher coincidentally confirming Fletcher’s own well-being and whereabouts, and necessitating the learning of rules and regulations—which would have galled Fletcher’s independent soul if he’d asked Fletcher to report on himself, or to read the rule book and learn it.
It was as good as he could manage. Better than he’d hoped.
He went to B deck and filed a report with the Old Man’s office, not a flattering one to himself. “I’ve put Fletcher in charge of the juniors,” he began it. And explained there’d been an incident. He’d hoped not to face the Old Man directly, but unfortunately the robot wasn’t taking calls.
Vince and Linda gave Fletcher a speculating look when he came back to the laundry. Jeremy stood and stared, his face grave and worried.
There wasn’t enough work to keep them busy. There was nothing but cards. Fletcher made a pass about the area looking for work to do, anything to keep him from answering junior questions. But in his concentrated silence even Vince didn’t blurt questions or smart-ass observations, maybe having learned he could get hurt.
“Not enough work to justify four of us,” Fletcher announced. “You handle what comes in. I’m going to the room.”
“You better not,” Jeremy said in a hushed voice. “You’ll catch hell.”
“It’s my room,” he said. “I’ll go to it.”
But the intercom speaker on the wall came on with: “Fletcher.”
Jeremy dived for it. “He’s here,” Jeremy volunteered, as if that was the source of all help.
“Fletcher R., report to the senior captain’s office.”
“Shit,” he said, and Jeremy instantly blocked the reply mike with his hand.
“He’s coming,” Jeremy said then. “He’ll be right there.”
“Going to catch hell,” Vince muttered.
Fletcher thought of going to his room anyway, and letting the captain come to him. But, he told himself, this was the person he wanted to see, the person who should have seen him when he boarded and who never yet had bothered. This was the Goda’mighty important James Robert who’d built the Alliance and fought off the pirate Fleet, who finally found time for him, and who might be annoyed to the point of making his life hell and fighting him on his hopes of leaving this ship if he didn’t report in.
“So where do I find him?” he asked Jeremy.
Vince, Linda and Jeremy answered, as if they were telling him the way to God.
“B7. There’s these offices. All the captains. His is there, too.”
Right near Legal. He knew his way. He walked out of the laundry station and down to the lift, rode it to B deck, trying not to let his temper get out of control, telling himself this was the man who could wreck him without trying.
Or finally understand the simple fact that he didn’t want to be here, and maybe… maybe just let him go.
The kids’ description matched reality, an office setup a lot like Legal, a front office where several senior crew worked at desks, all staff, offices to the side.
And JR.
“You set this up,” he said to JR, and was ready to turn and walk out.
“I don’t make the captain’s appointments,” JR said. “Report the situation? I was obliged to.”
“Thank you,” Fletcher said. So he wasn’t to meet with the captain alone. He had JR for a witness, to confuse anything he wanted to say. It wasn’t going to be an interview. It would be a reading of the rules.
He was here. He held onto his temper with both hands as JR opened the door and let him in.
The Old Man everybody referred to wasn’t that old to look at him, that was the first impression he had as the Old Man looked up at him. He was prepared to deal with some dodderer, but the eyes that met him were dark and quick in a papery-skinned and lean face. The hand that reached out as the Old Man rose was young in shape, but the skin had that parchment quality he’d seen on the very long-rejuved. It felt like old fabric, smooth like that; and he realized he hadn’t consciously decided to take the Old Man’s hand. He just had, suddenly so wrapped in that question that he hadn’t consciously noted whether JR had stayed or what the office was like, until the Old Man settled back behind his desk and left him standing in front of it. JR had stayed, and stood behind him, slightly to the side.
It wasn’t a big office. There was a thing he recognized as a sailing ship’s wheel on the wall between two cases of old and expensive books. There was a side table, and a chart on the wall above it, a map of stations and points that had lines on it in greater number than he’d ever seen.
Mostly there was the Old Man, who settled back in his chair and looked at him, just quietly observed him for a moment, not tempting him to blurt out anything in the way of charges or excuses prematurely.
Like a judge. Like a judge who’d been on the bench a long, long time.
“Fletcher,” James Robert said, in a low, quiet voice, and made him wonder what the Old Man saw when he looked at him, whether he saw his mother, or was about to say so. “A new world, isn’t it?”
He wasn’t prepared for philosophy. Could have expected it, but it wasn’t the angle his brain was set to handle. He stood there, thoughts gone blank, and the Old Man went on.
“We’re glad to have you aboard. You’ve had a chance to see the ship. What do you think?”
What did he think? What did he think?
He drew in a breath, time enough for caution to reassert itself, and for a beleaguered brain to tell him not to go too far. And to stop at one statement.
“I think I don’t belong here, sir.”
“In what respect?” Quietly. Seriously.
List the reasons? God. “In respect of the fact I prepared myself to work on a planet. In respect of the fact I’m totally useless to you. In respect of the fact I’m no good anywhere except what I trained all my life to do.”
“What did you train to do?”
“To work with the downers, sir.” The man knew. And was trying to draw him out. While he had JR at his shoulder for an inhibition.
“It’s what I want to do.”
“What’s the nature of that work?”
He wasn’t prepared to give a detailed catalog of his jobs, either. “Agriculture. Archaeological research. Native studies. Planetary dynamics.”
“All those things.”
“I hadn’t specialized yet.”
“What would you have chosen?”
“Native Studies.”
“Why that?”
“Because I want to understand the downers.”
“Why would you want that?”
“Because I want to help them.”
“How would you do that?”
Question begat question, backing him slowly toward a corner of the subject with truth in it, a truth he didn’t want to tell.
“By being a fair administrator.”