Ages in Oblivion Thrown: Book One of the Sleep Trilogy (10 page)

A warm swimmy floating feeling wrapped
itself around her, and she felt the need to remind herself that she
had no intentions of falling for him. It was just nice to feel
slippery. He seemed more worn around the edges, as though this was
just like every other night for him. It made her question why it
was that vices were always the one thing to survive, cockroaching
their way past every human disaster and triumph. Was Vice one of
the four horsemen, she wondered? She couldn’t remember…ought to
be.

They fell down on his couch, feeling tired
and comfortable. She found he was easy to talk to, even if he was
alternately arrogant, self-deprecating, throwing caution to the
wind, fearing eternal damnation, insightful, and naïve. He was
Russian-born, British-bred (she wondered what Britain, or the U.S.,
might resemble these days).

He deplored ceremony, yet he was part of an
organization that thrived on it. She let him ramble on about
himself for some time. It was a relief not to have to answer more
questions about her own life for a change. She’d done more of that
in the past several weeks than she cared for. It was rather
difficult to give answers if she didn’t know them.

Dmitry resisted the reflex to try and direct
her into the bedroom. It was a strange sensation. What was it?
Circumspection? Maturity? He’d already had a long internal debate,
resulting in the conclusion that she was both attractive and that
he was attracted to her. His inner voice spoke up again, wondering
what exactly was
wrong
with him. There was no answer to
that. He just felt strangely at peace. He’d kissed her. He’d had
inappropriate thoughts. The drive to chalk her up as a conquest
wasn’t there. Some part of him protested. Of course it would. It
had nothing better to do than offer helpful suggestions on how to
self-destruct.

He looked over at her to find that she’d
drifted off to sleep. With some effort, he wrenched himself to his
feet, and carried her gingerly to his bed. A moment or two of
poking around closets produced a clean pillow and blanket. These he
carefully arranged under and around her, until he was satisfied
with his efforts.

Somehow after that, he convinced himself
that it would be alright if he slept on his bed as well. He simply
pulled his own pillow to the foot, and rolled up in his sheets.
From this vantage point, he tried to watch her for a while. A quick
glance at the clock reminded him that he needed to be on duty in
only a few hours. He allowed his eyes to close, while strange new
dreams pushed old tattered ones aside.

۞

Tark had just walked in when the call came
in from Dmitry, warning of his impending tardiness. It was zero
eight exactly. There was a strange buzz on the bridge. This hazy
excitement he was inclined to attribute to the return of a large
number of personnel, but for the reaction of the corporal who gave
him Dmitry’s message. She’d blushed to her roots, and run off
before she could be detained for questioning.

The odd behaviors only increased when Dmitry
finally entered and fairly sprinted into his own office. All eyes
cast intermittent glances in that direction, until Tark finally
could stand it no longer, and went into his own office. After a few
more minutes of fidgeting, he went through to the door that
connected the two rooms.

It opened, revealing Dmitry sitting with his
legs cast across his desk. Music played loudly. Tark made a
twisting gesture with his thumb and forefinger, indicating his
desire for a reduction in volume, to his friend. Dmitry complied,
remaining in his position, waiting for what was surely to come.

“
What the hell is going on this
morning? I come in, you’re late, and just when I think I know why
everybody is all energized, in you come and prove me wrong.” Dmitry
stared at a monitor display of current Earth news. He didn’t seem
to react in the slightest, giving the impression that he was
ignoring Tark.

Luckily, his friend knew better. “Did you do
something last night that I should know about?” More silence. “How
about something you want to share with me as your goddamn best
friend.” At that, Dmitry jumped out of his seat and came eye to eye
with Tark.

“
Look, if I think you should there’s
anything you should know, you’ll hear it from me first. But there’s
nothing except rumor flying around out there.” Not quite all
true.

“
What would have prompted this bout of
gossip, then?”

“
I don’t know. Somebody might have
seen me kiss Maeve last night.” Tark’s eyes narrowed.

“
Might have?” Tark narrowed his eyes.
“How’s that?”

“
Because I did, man. So what? I took
her dancing, and that was just a logical ending to the
night.”

“
Dancing? Is this going to turn into
another one of your infamous tales of the many women of Dem?” Tark
spoke perhaps a little too harshly, and he knew he was pushing his
friend in a direction that was not entirely wise. He had the
welfare of Maeve Howard in mind, and that outweighed
diplomacy.

“
Hey, screw you. I’ll be honest with
her.” He turned the other way, standing in a tense pose that Tark
recognized all too well. “You don’t need to protect her. And you
sure as hell don’t need to be in my face, all but pulling rank on
me.” Tark blinked. He hadn’t expected such defensiveness. Usually
Dmitry had more than his share of a sense of humor about his
philandering, but it was gone today. Perhaps there really was more
to Maeve than he knew. She’d somehow cast a charm over Dmitry’s
sensibilities, one that might lead him almost anywhere.

۞

Maeve made it back to her rooms without
running across anyone who might recognize her, showering and
dressing in record time before she heard pounding on her door. She
went and opened it as a round object sailed past her. It was an
orange blur, that crashed into the opposite wall.

“
Oops!!! Sorry, didn’t mean for
that
to happen.” Josh and Leif
fought to get through the entryway after what proved to be a ball.
It seemed they’d started their one on one a little prematurely.
Grace sauntered in after them, carrying a tall covered mug, which
she was smelling with a look of complete contentment.

“
Cappuccino. Feels like an eternity.
Chow hall coffee can’t begin to compare.” She settled into Maeve’s
couch with a sigh. A battle still raged behind her, as possession
was warred over. Finally, with a cry of “HA!!!”, Josh stood, the
victor, with the basketball tucked under his arm. At least, Maeve
thought it was a basketball, the only indication as to its possible
use being the familiar orange hue. Josh saw her looking at
it.

“
Cool, huh? Supposedly it’s
‘indestructible’. I figure we’ll give it the mother of all tests by
the time we’re done.” Maeve nodded.

“
I don’t doubt it, from what I’ve seen
already.” Leif was standing again, red-faced, and scowling. He
didn’t like being bested. In spite of the fact that Josh was a head
shorter than he was, they were pretty equally matched otherwise. It
rankled. In this respect, Josh was fully aware. He had a
long-standing tradition of messing with Leif’s head, as if they
were playing a life-sized chess match. One move up. He withdrew and
sat next to Grace. Maeve watched all of them, wondering suddenly
why it was they were all avoiding looking at her. Suspicion
prickled in the back of her mind.

“
I’m going to take a guess and say
that you came here with a purpose in mind.” Leif interjected before
anyone else could in response to Maeve’s question.

“
Well, yeah. We thought that it would
be good to go and PT, and while we’re at it, we can tell each other
all about our evenings.” Maeve’s eyes narrowed as Leif avoided her
gaze, all innocence, while he guzzled a bottle of water to avoid
further conversation.

“
Sure. We can go and work out. What
did you have in mind, more full-contact sports?” Maeve saw Jemi,
who, having just walked in the door, raised her hand as though she
were in a classroom.

“
Pardon me for saying this, but if you
all are beating each other to hell, I’m going back to bed.” She
wasn’t going to escape that easily though. The others grabbed her
and hauled her out into the hallway. They went and found Antonio
after that. Actually, they invaded his room, seized him and dragged
him out, kicking and cursing.

They made their way through the station’s
underbelly, all the way to the athletics complex. It was quite
amazing. It had a full track, not 200 or 160 meters, but the entire
400. There were a few hard chargers out already jogging around it.
Josh found a layout map, and waved them over. Two swimming pools,
tennis, climbing walls, sparring rooms, heavy bag rooms,
basketball; the list went on and on . The complex spanned all four
levels of the station, and promised at all times something to
occupy anyone who wanted a bit of exercise.

“
Oh, they don’t have a curling area?
That’s it, I’m filing a complaint.”

“
Grace, only you could come up with an
arcane and useless sport like that. I think my grandmother
mentioned it once, as something that everyone used to do, right
between pillaging the countryside and getting cross-eyed on
mead.”

“
What can I say, my giant friend, I’m
an old soul.”

“
Dipstick is more like it.” He tousled
her hair. Grace made a motion with her hand, like a bird’s beak
snapping.

“
Blah, blah, blah. Flattery will get
you nowhere, honeychild.”

“
How’s about we figure out what we’re
going to do?” Maeve still had her eyes on the map, wishing that she
felt better than three hours’ worth of sleep. They all voted and
passed a resolution to seek and destroy the basketball courts. That
was fine. As the rules were laid, it became evident that the only
rule was that rules sucked.

“
The first person who cops an
attitude...dies.” Jemi looked pointedly at Antonio, who seemed a
lot less sullen than he had the night before. He made a
face.

“
How are you going to enforce that,
may I ask?”

“
I am the enforcer! Hulk smash puny
humans!” Leif lunged for the lanky Antonio, who assumed a pretty
decent imitation of terror. Antonio dodged, and broke into a run,
loping up a flight of stairs, loudly declaring his assumption of an
imminent demise.

There was no more to be heard. The last four
of them clambered up the same stairway. They encountered an
unamused woman and her four children, all of whom looked
dangerously close to tears. Leif was plastered to a wall, one
entire shade of russet. Antonio was nowhere to be seen. Maeve took
the initiative to try and placate the shaken mother.

“
I’m really sorry. You know how they
get when you don’t take them out and walk them every day. I’m
thinking leashes might be a great investment.”

۞

Tark was looking over his morning mail,
still feeling the heat from his encounter with Dmitry. There was a
visual reply to his quietly submitted report on what had been
found, the container, and its occupants. He’d sent it on a secure
line to someone he trusted in command back on Earth. He looked at
what there was. A guideline mostly, for future proceedings, and a
few other names that the colonel could look up if he needed more
help.

The most important part was confirmation
that this situation, such as it was, should remain a quiet one.
Only essential personnel were to be included. As far as anyone else
was concerned, the newcomers were just personnel on temporary duty
posting. Tark had essentially given this guidance already. Now he
had official word on it. Now all he had was Dmitry for a
problem.

There was a rap at his door; he hit the
switch next to his hand, and the cloudy white of the door snapped
into transparency. He looked up. It was Sa’andy. She’d understand,
he knew she would. Standing back up, he rapped the pad that opened
the hatch. He took her hand, and led the way out of his office, off
the bridge, toward his new favorite place.

“
Do you want to let me in on where
we’re going?” She was cheerful, but aware that there was something
bothering him.

“
Breakfast.”

“
Is there a problem?”

“
I’ll tell you about it in a minute.
By the way, you get to order. I’d like something from your
homeworld, I think. I’d order for myself, I just can’t pronounce
any of it.” She laughed, watching his expressions ripple as swiftly
as the waters of a rain-swollen fjord. This would be an interesting
morning, most certainly.

۞

Maria Hawke was in the midst of her own
correspondence; currently paused was message from Earth. It was
audio only, to ensure secrecy, but the aftermath left by it was
just as powerful as any image could have been.

There was no reason for such a
reaction, she found herself thinking frantically. They’d secured
her position here for a reason, so that she could provide this very
sort of information for them. And now, they had all but given her
notice.
Reduction in numbers.
A formal reprimand, and the likelihood of being transferred
someplace where she would be watched more closely.
No place in a command billet.
Her
lifelines were being cut.
Raising
unnecessary alarms.
All she’d asked for was a little
recognition for living out in this wasteland.