“To the Emperor,” the server echoed, and cast down his eyes, as he should have done. Then, after reading Fotsev’s body paint, he said, “I would have thought you soldiers would forget the Emperor after so many years on this miserable planet.”
“That could never happen,” Fotsev said with an emphatic cough. “If I do not remember him, spirits of Emperors past will forget me when I die.”
“How can you males of the conquest fleet remember anything?” the server asked. “Everything on this world seems topsy-turvy; nothing is the same from one moment to the next.”
“Truth there,” Fotsev agreed.
A female sitting at the table not far away turned an eye turret toward him. “How could you of the conquest fleet not give us a properly conquered planet?” she demanded. “Too many of these wild Big Ugly creatures are still running their own affairs, and even the ones that are supposed to be conquered are not safe. That is what everyone keeps shouting at us, anyhow.”
“Those creatures turned out not to be what we thought they were,” Fotsev answered. “They were much more advanced than we expected, and are still more advanced today.”
“When the conquest fleet came, they were less advanced than we are,” the server said. “Is that truth, or is it not?”
“It is,” Fotsev began, “but-”
“Then you should have defeated them,” the server broke in, as if the continued independence of some Tosevites were Fotsev’s fault and his alone. “That you failed speaks only of your own incompetence.”
“Truth,” the female said, and a couple of her companions made the affirmative hand gesture. “We came here to a world that was not ready for us, and whose fault is that? Yours!”
Fotsev finished his alcohol, slid off his seat, and left the establishment without another word. He had already seen that the colonists had a hard time fitting in when they came to Basra. But he’d never imagined the reverse might be true, that he might have a hard time fitting in when he came to the new town.
Tosev 3 had changed him. Tosev 3 had changed every male in the conquest fleet. The males and females of the colonization fleet remained unchanged. They might have been on Home yesterday. And he did not fit with them. What did that say? Nothing he wanted to hear. He took out the ginger after all, and had a big taste. With the herb coursing through him, he didn’t have to listen, whatever it was.
14
“Sorry, Lieutenant Colonel.” The first lieutenant with whom Glen Johnson was speaking couldn’t have been much more than half his age, but the fellow’s voice held brisk assurance. “No can do. Personally, I’d say yes, but I have my orders, and they leave me no discretion.”
“Pretty funny orders,” Johnson said. “All I want to do is pilot one cargo flight up to the space station and have a look around. I’m cleared for the controls-I’d better be; they’re a lot simpler than Peregrine ’s. So what’s the trouble about putting me into the rotation during a stretch when I’m not patrolling? It’s not like I charge overtime.”
“Of course not, sir.” The lieutenant smiled to show what a good, patient, understanding fellow he was. “But you must know rotations are made up some time in advance, and are not casually revised.”
“What I know is, I’m getting the runaround,” Johnson said. The immovable young lieutenant looked hurt. Johnson didn’t care. He went on, “What I don’t know is why.”
He didn’t find out, either. The lieutenant sat there, prim and proper as a nineteenth-century Midwestern schoolmarm. Johnson muttered something about his ancestry, just loud enough to let him hear. He turned red, but otherwise did not change expression. Johnson muttered again, louder this time, and stalked out of the air-conditioned office.
Even early in spring, even so close to the coast, humidity made his shirt cling to him like a hooker who’d just spotted a C-note. Something bit him on the wrist: one of the nasty little gnats the locals called no-see-ums. He slapped and cursed. He sure hadn’t seen this one.
“When the going gets tough,” he muttered, “the tough get… plastered.” He wasn’t so sure about getting plastered, but damned if he couldn’t use a drink. Getting one seemed a far better idea than going off to his sterile little cubicle in the bachelor officers’ quarters and brooding.
In the bar, he spotted Gus Wilhelm. After snagging a scotch on the rocks, he sat down next to his friend. “What are you doing here?” Wilhelm said.
“I might ask you the same question, especially since you were here first,” Johnson answered.
“Sun’s got to be over the yardarm somewhere,” Wilhelm said. “And besides, it’s air-conditioned in here.” He eyed Johnson. “Looks like you could use the cool even more than me. If that’s not steam coming out of your ears, I’ve never seen any.”
“Bastards,” Johnson muttered, and gulped down half his drink.
“Well, yeah, a lot of people are,” Wilhelm said reasonably. He let very little faze him. “Which bastards are you talking about in particular?”
“The ones who don’t want to let me go up there and have a look at our space station,” Johnson answered. He could feel the scotch; he didn’t usually drink before noon. “I’m a taxpayer, dammit. Christ, I’m even a taxpayer with a security clearance. So why won’t they let me fly a load up there?”
“Ah,” Gus Wilhelm said, and nodded wisely. “I tried that not so long ago. They wouldn’t let me go, either.”
“Why the hell not?” Johnson demanded.
Wilhelm shrugged. “They wouldn’t say. C’mon, sir-if they started telling people why, what kind of service would this be?”
Before Johnson could respond to that, another officer came into the bar: a large, good-looking, easygoing fellow who wore his brown hair as long as regulations allowed, and then maybe half an inch longer. He was one of the pilots who regularly took loads up to the space station. Johnson waved to him, half friendly, half peremptory. “Over here!” he called.
Captain Alan Stahl peered his way, then grinned and nodded. “Let me grab myself a beer, sir,” he said, his accent balanced between Midwest and South: he was from St. Louis. After corralling the Budweiser, he ambled over to the table where Johnson and Wilhelm were sitting. “What can I do for you gents?”
“Leave me out of it,” Wilhelm said. “I’m just here to drag the bodies away.”
Stahl gave him a quizzical look. “How much of a start have you got on me?”
Instead of answering that, Johnson asked a question of his own: “What are you bus drivers hauling up to the space station, anyhow, that makes it so precious ordinary working stiffs like me can’t get a peek come hell or high water?”
Stahl’s open, friendly face closed like a slamming door. “Now, sir, you know I’m not supposed to talk about that,” he said. “I don’t ask you how you run your business. Isn’t polite to ask me how I run mine, especially when you’ve got to know I can’t answer.”
“Why the devil can’t you?” Johnson snarled. He didn’t like being balked. Nobody who had the temperament to climb into the cockpit of a fighter plane took well to frustration. But Alan Stahl didn’t give him anything else; he just sipped his Bud and kept his mouth shut.
Gus Wilhelm put a hand on Johnson’s arm. “You may as well give it up. You aren’t going to get anywhere.”
“Well, what the hell are people hiding up there?” Johnson said.
“Sir, if more people know, the Lizards are likelier to know, too,” Stahl said. “And now I’m talking too much, so if you’ll excuse me-” He gulped down his beer, nodded-he was always polite-and hurried out of the bar.
“Well, you spooked him,” Wilhelm remarked.
“I already said once, I’m a taxpayer with a security clearance,” Johnson said. “What am I going to do, step into a telephone booth and call the fleetlord? Radio whatever the hell I find out down to a Lizard ground station next time I ride Peregrine? Not too damn likely, I don’t think.”