Even though she was in her own compartment, Carla Sue realized she had just uttered the perfect exit line. Exaggerating a smile, she opened the door a tad and slipped out.
Jaeckle was too dumbfounded to follow. He stared blankly at the video screen and replayed the conversation over and over again in his mind, oblivious to the music and the images of evergreens laden with snow. The stereo was playing “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”
He unfurled a handkerchief from a shoulder pocket of his flight suit and mopped at the film of sweat oozing across his brow. A minute later, his brow still wet, he realized that he had twisted the handkerchief into a knotty coil.
Hovering in the shadows by the hatch to Hab 1, Lance felt his skin crawling with hatred. He had been right. For two hours he had waited here watching Carla Sue’s compartment. Ever since he had seen Jaeckle go into the observation blister.
I was right, he kept repeating to himself. First they spend two hours in the blister and then they come straight back here to her compartment. They think they’re pretty smart, coming back separately. But they’re not smart enough to fool me.
Lance edged closer to Carla Sue’s compartment, his insides blazing. He saw that the accordion door was tightly sealed. Music played inside. Christmas music!
Something—someone—thumped against the door. Lance remembered Freddy’s comment the first time they had seen the observation blister: Newton’s Law.
Lance felt a surge of nausea as he hung in the aisle. A chill spread out from his spine. His mouth filled with bile. He thought first of the Hab 1 Whits; they were only a few feet away. But he wanted to be out of this module, as far away as possible from Kurt Jaeckle and Carla Sue Gamble and whatever was going on behind that door. So he bolted and threw up his guts in the Whit of Hab 2.
Dan Tighe ate alone at a table in the rear of the wardroom. As was his custom, he divided his attention equally between the food tenuously adhering to his tray and the people occupying the other tables. He was particularly interested in Aaron Weiss. The reporter had not developed into the pain in the ass Dan had expected. Except for the incident with Hugh O’Donnell, the only complaint had been from Jaeckle, who was insulted by Weiss’s lack of interest in the Mars Project.
Weiss was sharing a table with Stu Roberts on the far side of the wardroom. Roberts’s bony Adam’s apple was in constant motion, either from slurping his food or from whining about long-forgotten rock stars. Weiss looked as bored as a gelding at a stud farm, thought Dan with an amusement he barely could contain. If Weiss spends much more time with Roberts, he’ll beg to return Earthside. Not a bad idea. Maybe I should assign Roberts to escort him wherever he goes.
Jaeckle, Ramsanjawi, Oyamo, and Bianco ringed another table. A formidable quartet. Jaeckle orated, Ramsanjawi snickered, Oyamo listened politely, and Bianco drank it all in with a twinkle in his dark eyes. Good thing we’re in micro-gee, thought Dan. Otherwise the table might collapse from the combined weight of their egos.
Funny the way Bianco’s adapted to microgravity, Dan thought. Trikon’s Earth-bound medics had sent a long worried report about the old man’s ailments and medication needs. Yet since the moment he had come aboard the station Bianco had seemed strong, alert, healthier than some of the scientists half his age. Maybe it’s poetic justice, Dan said to himself. Bianco created this station; it’s treating him kindly. It’s as if he was always meant to be here.
Freddy Aviles was alone at an adjacent table. There was no sign of Lance Muncie or Carla Sue Gamble. More precisely, Lance Muncie and Carla Sue Gamble. Word was that the two towheads had fallen for each other.
O’Donnell sailed into the wardroom. He hastily prepared a tray at one of the galleys and joined Dan at his table. Dan had read Lorraine Renoir’s report on O’Donnell’s latest blood test. Negative. Dan felt relieved. Still, he found himself scrutinizing every movement of O’Donnell’s hands and analyzing every word of small talk.
“No darts tonight,” said O’Donnell.
“Work?”
“Yeah. I need to log more lab time.”
“Problems?”
“A few unexpected snags.”
“Sometimes it’s a good idea to step back when you’ve run into a wall,” said Dan. “Makes it easier to find your way round it.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” O’Donnell said. “Sometimes.”
There was a general shift in the wardroom crowd. Stu Roberts finished eating, to Aaron Weiss’s obvious relief. Oyamo rose from his foot loops, executed his patented micro-gee bow to each of his three dinner companions, then propelled himself toward the hatchway. Freddy Aviles checked his watch as if waiting for a train that was long overdue. After another minute, he departed as well. Three Japanese techs settled at a table adjacent to Weiss. They grinned at the reporter and he grinned back. Ramsanjawi and Bianco fell into a deep conversation that excluded Jaeckle and attracted the attention of Weiss from the far side of the room. The reporter stared at the scientists as if hoping to provoke an invitation to join them. Instead, Jaeckle moved across to Weiss’s table and started talking to him earnestly, urgently. Weiss stood it for a few minutes, then abruptly pushed himself away from the table and left the wardroom. Jaeckle glared after him.
In the midst of all the movement of bodies and clanging of trays, Lance entered the wardroom. His flight suit was askew and his hair was mussed as if he had just got out of bed. His skin was as pale as it had been his first day on board. But Dan paid less attention to these details than to the simple fact that Lance was alone. He looked at O’Donnell and mouthed the name Carla Sue. O’Donnell shrugged as if to say, Search me.
Lance hung in front of a galley for a full minute before attempting to remove a tray from the magnetized stack in the cabinet. He seemed to grab blindly at the first packets of food that his hands could reach, then stuffed them into the nearest microwave unit. He fumbled with the hot water jet, then missed his cup entirely and sent bubbles of scalding water spraying everywhere. All the while he kept glancing nervously in the direction of the entry hatch.
The bubbles of water floated up toward the overhead ventilator grill. The microwave pinged. Lance attached the meal to his tray and pushed himself away from the galley, still looking over his shoulder toward the hatch. There was one empty table and two others occupied by single people. But Lance chose the last available spot at the table with the three Japanese.
“You see what I see?” muttered Dan.
“Carla Sue’s dumped him?” said O’Donnell.
“I’d bet on it.”
“Do you think he realized she’s a shark?”
“That doesn’t take a hell of a lot of insight,” Dan said.
“It might for someone like Lance,” said O’Donnell.
Lance ate quickly and not very cleanly. The Japanese scrupulously ignored the fine spray of crumbs and gravy spiraling from Lance’s tray to the table vent. Lance suddenly grabbed the edge of the table. His stomach heaved and his cheeks puffed out like the throat of a bullfrog. He shot upwards, banged his head on the ceiling, then dove out the hatch.
“Young love gone bad.” Hugh shook his head sadly.
“What the hell,” said Dan. “Saves me from giving him some fatherly advice.”
Lance managed to keep his stomach under control long enough to reach the Whit in Hab 2, where he heaved a yellow-brown ball of gravy, bread, and bile into an airsick bag. This was his third attack since seeing Carla Sue and Jaeckle together. He wiped his face with a moist towelette and stared into a mirror. His normally cream-smooth skin was splotched and seamed like the surface of the moon.
When Lance exited the Whit, he found Lorraine Renoir waiting for him. He felt an immediate flash of anger.