Family Law 3: Secrets in the Stars (52 page)

Gordon tapped the little window and a face appeared. "How may I help you?" a pleasant young man asked. The screen captioned it and offered translations too.

"I'd like a Derf sized coffee with brandy and my Human traveling companion would like a mug of Mocha," Gordon requested.

"Thank you. You are third in queue, so it will be about ten minutes," he said, and the window reverted and became smaller too.

The attendant brought their drinks and pulled out a holder for each of them. Lee saw the hole but had thought it was an air vent, until he stuck a finger in it and pulled.

"Not bad, huh?" Gordon asked with a sweep of his eyes that encompassed everything.

"I think this is what they mean in my historic novels by 'traveling first class'." Lee said.

"Yeah, except they used to actually have separate sections on airplanes, depending on how expensive your ticket was," Gordon told her. "They called the cheap section with the cramped seats different names, economy, coach, or business, but they might as well have called them steerage or the 'cattle car' to be honest."

"Steerage? Cattle car I can figure out, but that's a new one."

"That's from steamships. Steerage was down in the bottom where the greasy bare cables were strung that worked the rudder. The only thing worse would have been the bilge where water leaking in collected and had to be pumped out. Nobody could ride there, except maybe a few rats."

"We always pampered our rats," Lee said, distressed at the idea, even though they weren't pets.

"And the mice and sparrows," Gordon remembered fondly. He didn't bother to explain.

Chapter 31

The docking was smooth. To the point Lee wasn't sure that's what had happened. She'd been on shuttles that made more of a racket when you flushed the toilet. When they entered it went very quickly. There was a woman in a blue security uniform behind a lectern. A white plate in a frame stuck up on the edge closest to them, and a bar raised over it like a safety bumper. They couldn't see her board, but it was obvious she was reading something for each of them who moved forward. Gordon was in front of her so his bulk kept her from seeing the process for the fellow ahead of him.

Lee stayed close and looked around Gordon to see what was happening.

"Name?" The lady asked. She didn't seem surprised by a Derf.

"Gordon," was all he gave, not his full name.

"Would you touch the pad please?" the agent requested.

Gordon touched the white surface with a single digit and after he withdrew it there was a very brief flash. Apparently it worked just fine for Derf.

"Name please," the woman asked Lee. She seemed a little nicer for some reason.

"Lee Anderson," she said, taking her cue from Gordon to use the short form.

"Touch the plate please," she requested.

Lee did, but there was no sensation. It wasn't particularly hot or cold. She couldn't tell that anything had happened. It did flash again once she removed her hand.

"It's a taster pad?" Lee asked.

"Yes, it reads your DNA," the woman confirmed.

"What's the flash then?" Lee asked puzzled.

"There are lasers in the bar. They heat the surface very briefly to sanitize it. Any organic traces, or disease, are vaporized," she explained. "The Loonies wouldn't touch it otherwise."

That was interesting. She had them pegged as
not
Loonies.

"What would it do if your hand was still there?" Lee wondered.

"Stick it back," the woman offered. She did something on her board and it flashed again. Lee didn't feel anything, but she thought she smelled it.

"It burns a few dead cells away, but your hand conducts heat away much better than the ceramic. Of course your hand is now free of any bacteria or viruses. But there are two more passengers behind you, so if you want more details please wait until they've been processed."

"Oh! I'm sorry. No thanks, that's plenty.” Lee moved away and looked back at the man behind her.

"I'm sorry. I'm not used to lines."

He smiled, and looked at her more thoroughly. "Deep space? Family ship?" he assessed.

"Something very much like that, yeah. Thank you," Lee said and hurried after Gordon.

"They don't care what you call yourself, do they?" Lee asked.

"That's the impression I got too," Gordon agreed.

The elevator had arrows and toe bars on the side that would be down. They oriented themselves and waited while a couple other people came in behind them. When they were all positioned the doors closed and the screen announced they would drop to the outer ring in fifteen seconds. Nobody was getting off in the higher rings, apparently. They felt an odd tug towards the deck and then a pull the other way as the elevator started moving slowly.

Gordon looked over at Lee astonished, and then clamped his mouth back shut, visibly deciding not to say something.

They slowly grew heavier and when the doors opened signage directed them to the cafeteria and the communications room. Businesses each way down the corridor were listed, including the Lunar Suites where they had reservations.

"I'm a bit hungry," Gordon announced, which didn't exactly surprise Lee. "I'm sure the hotel has food, but the cafeteria is right here. Why don't we see how the natives eat?" Gordon suggested.

"I'll find room for something," Lee agreed, although it was a little early.

There was a screen at the entry explaining the options. You could order a la carte, which looked to be pretty expensive. A 500 gram steak dinner was 143.00 USNA$, 37.00 Ceres$, or .0032 ☼. Bean coffee was 8.00 Ceres$, a breakfast muffin sandwich 18 Ceres$. They noted day, week, month or annual cards, single or family, as well as discounted off shift rates and a breakfast only option.

"It smells OK," Gordon said. His nose was much keener than Lee's. "We need supper and maybe a snack later, tomorrow and another three days for your treatment. Maybe breakfast the day we go back. It looks to me like the week card would be the way to go even if we don't use a day."

There was a teller to buy the cards, and an automated buffet beside a hot bar, then an open counter to the kitchen for cooked to order. Gordon went over there and must have tripped some sort of sensor because a young man immediately appeared.

"Excuse me. Can you tell me what the rate for Derf is?" Gordon inquired.

"Same as the Human family plan," the young fellow said. "The cost is in labor and transport more than bulk cost. It doesn't take me longer to dish up for you than her," he said, nodding at Lee. "We never have more than two or three Derf on station. Sometimes none. It would be more trouble to set up a different payment scheme than we'd gain. Even the family plan is the same whether you have two or six."

"Ah, I love a bargain!" Gordon said. "We'll buy week cards and be right back."

"If you want something cooked to order tell me and I'll get it started," the fellow offered. "You can pay after it comes up. If it's not on the board," he said waving at the three big screens behind him, "it's a special order, but still cheaper than a la carte."

Gordon considered the board critically. "I'll have Grandmother's meatloaf with candied yams, the corn bread and sautéed spinach with bacon and onions, as well as the peanut butter pie."

"Anything to drink?"

"Do you have a mug suitable for Derf?"

"Of course," the fellow said, looking hurt.

"Then coffee is fine. And whatever my daughter wants," Gordon inclined his head to Lee.

To the fellow's credit he only blinked twice before looking at Lee expectantly.

"A Slim King Jim," she had no idea what that was, but she loved the cute names, "the fries, the same pie as Gordon," Lee decided, "and coffee."

"Coming right up," the fellow promised. If he entered it into their system it wasn't visible. Maybe they had voice recognition, but that usually had a feedback screen to double check.

They went back and bought the week cards. A fellow grabbed a quarter kilo hamburger and salad off the auto buffet and it looked decent, but bite size for Gordon. He'd probably order six of seven of them. But it was still promising.

Their stuff came pretty fast even figuring the time to buy cards. Gordon's on two trays. He had what looked like half a meatloaf, maybe three kilos with gravy, with a serving bowl of spinach. On the other tray the yams had raisins and cinnamon, Lee could smell. The corn bread had little flecks of something in it and kernel corn. Gordon looked pleased, but he asked, "Did you forget the pie?"

"No sir. If I give it to you now the ice cream will melt. You do want ice cream don't you?"

"Ah, my error. You have everything under control, carry on."

Lee found out a Slim King Jim was a half loaf of Italian bread slit and grilled, with about two centimeters of fried honey ham dripping with cheese and an interesting sauce. The fries were much better than any shipboard fries.

"I don't know about anything else," Gordon said, after he'd made some headway on his supper, “but I could easily live with the food here."

"You've only tried one thing," Lee objected.

"But I can tell somebody back there knows what they're doing."

"What surprised you in the elevator?" Lee asked.

"Oh, that! Didn't you feel it?" Gordon asked. "We got heavier before the elevator moved. Normally you'd be hanging on your toe straps with that setup."

"I thought it worked pretty well," Lee said. "It just felt
odd
, because it was like somebody grabbed you by the ankles."

"Exactly. They have something very much like the Badgers' gravity plates. The field is much stronger right by your feet than your head. It sure does feel weird. That's what I noticed too."

"That shouldn't surprise us," Lee said. "You played me that conversation with Mr. Ellis. He said straight out they have high acceleration, so they must have some gravity tech, I expect the story about the crater and having pure fusion weapons will prove true too. Between that and everything Captain Roosevelt told us I'd say we didn't have any idea about what went on here before," Lee said.

"Yes, I'm sorry I doubted Jeremiah and Captain Roosevelt
both
, quite strongly. I'm still having a hard time coming to grips with the things April told us, but I
believe
them, now."

That seemed to embarrass Gordon to admit, and he ate silently for awhile.

"You notice some of the folks here have spex without any lenses? Lee asked.

"I wondered about that," Gordon admitted. "It looks funny to me."

"Yeah, it will take some time not to notice it. I like the feeling that my eyes are protected, and you can't darken the lenses for privacy," Lee pointed out.

"Maybe that's considered more polite, not to hide behind them," Gordon said.

"You know, April didn't
admit
they have jump ships that don't need a strong vector on their targets to jump out,” Lee reminded him, changing the subject abruptly. "She avoided the subject instead of giving you a real answer. But I'd still bet everything in my accounts that's what we saw that time."

"That's what we saw," Gordon agreed. "If it wasn't them it was somebody else. It wasn't any kind of an illusion. They're the best candidate, so I can't argue that one. The only reason she'd infer they had the tech when they didn't, would be to throw us off who
does
. I already decided she's far too much like you – a real straight shooter – to play those kind of games."

"Yeah, I like her too," Lee agreed.

"But I'm glad you didn't take her up on becoming a subject," Gordon said.

"You still want to do some polishing on me, I know."

"That's a fact," Gordon admitted. "I promised to do that." That was as close as he'd come in a long time to reminding her about her parents' death. She wasn't near as sensitive about it now.

"Are you going to finish that?" Gordon asked of her sandwich. "It smells really good."

"No way." Lee said; she'd eaten maybe half. "Finish it off and we'll get pie." She didn't bother to worry it might not leave him room for pie. It took him four bites.

"That should be illegal," Gordon said of the pie when he was finished. They'd brought him a half pie still in the pan with vanilla ice cream filling the other half.

"The chocolate crust surprised me. It works well," Lee said. Gordon found 'well' entirely inadequate.

"Can you waddle to the hotel?" Lee asked. "Or shall I call a freight cart?"

"It takes a lot more than that to make me
waddle
," Gordon assured her.

* * *

Gordon was favorably impressed with the hotel. The corridors were wide and the rooms suited to Derf. The entry door was a double and the shower looked like you could park a ground car in it. His room had a pad and Lee's a bed. It didn't have a garden like April's guest rooms on the moon, but there were a few live plants tucked in the corners and hanging in baskets.

The message light was already blinking when they went in and Gordon took a walk through and tipped the fellow who brought their luggage in, even though it was led on an automated cart. He did hang some things and asked if they needed cleaning services. Lee declined having her things put away, because she wanted to know where they were without searching.

"Huh, interesting," Gordon said when he read the message waiting for them.

"What's that?" Lee was forced to inquire when he didn't volunteer more.

"Thor informs me the Caterpillar ship and Central have been carrying on protracted conversations with each other. At some point they apparently got across how to do encryption and everything stopped being in the clear at that point."

"I wouldn't know how to tell them that," Lee admitted. "Sounds like they've already got ahead of us with them. I admit, I was just as glad the Caterpillars weren't pestering us while we were all involved with other stuff. I imagine April's people will share what they learned about communicating with them if we ask."

"They
learned
awfully fast," Gordon said, skeptically. After making faces and thinking on it awhile he shared his thoughts further. "April said they are established off deep.
Very
deep. Maybe they have some experience already talking to Caterpillars. We have no idea how far they range."