Invaders (a sequel to Vaz, Tiona and Disc) (10 page)

“Oh, no ma’am,” Third said. “
We’ll
calculate the orbit, I just wanted to know whether you considered this a priority, or whether a high-efficiency low-speed transfer orbit should be used in order to save propellant for other missions.”

Oh,
Levon thought as understanding blossomed in her. Rather than admit that she should have known what Third was asking, she evinced anger, “High-efficiency of
course
! It needs to get there soon enough to send us the data before we leave this damned system. Don’t waste propellant getting it there any sooner than that.” Levon turned abruptly and hunched unseeingly over her screens for a while, then suddenly left the bridge and headed back to her tiny cabin.

Levon didn’t see her officers glancing uncomfortably at one another as she left. Second and Third officers both turned to look at Fifth Officer. Third Officer said, “What did the doctor say?”

Fifth Officer shrugged his wings frustratedly. “He says he can’t tell anything without examining her.”

“I thought he examined everyone that’s not hibernating?!”

Fifth gave a sharp muzzle wave, “He’s
supposed
to. The captain’s
supposed
to have presented herself for the examination. She hasn’t.”

“He should go to her!” Third Officer exclaimed.

“And how’s he going to convince her to step down without a scan?”

“Then he should
demand
she come in for a scan. It’s his job. The regulations say he has to do it and that she must submit.”

Fifth looked exasperated. “He’s a
male
. And a doctor. Talk about a recipe for non-confrontational interactions! I
told
him to do it.” Fifth glanced at Second, “He said if Second wanted it done,
Second
needed to tell the captain to go see him. He said, as second-in-command, it’s your job.”

For a moment, Fifth thought Second would explode. Her jaw twitched several times, but then she nodded once sharply, “Of
course
. As Second, it’s my job to take over for
anyone
who’s shirking their duty.” Looking disgusted she turned back to her own screens.

***

Nolan entered the deli and looked around. He’d eaten before he came with the express purpose of talking to Carolyn quickly about his prior commitment to Tiona, making his apologies, and getting out of there. He had to escape before she talked him into having a few drinks and then led him on another whirlwind.

He didn’t see her, so he moved into Wister’s and began walking around to look into the booths. Just as he’d about decided that he’d been stood up, hands slipped over his eyes and a feminine body pressed up against his back. “Guess who?!”

Even though cognitively, he thought that the maneuver was passé and childish, emotionally he found himself excited, “Carolyn?!”

“Yes!” she said, releasing his eyes and grabbing his hand. Towing him across the room, she said, “You’ve got to meet Randy and Jana!” She slid into the booth and pointed at a foaming glass, “I got you one of those Guinness you like.” She turned to the couple on the other side of the booth, saying, “This is Nolan Marlowe, you know, the guy that went out to the asteroid with Tiona Gettnor and helped rescue the two astronauts? He claims he didn’t do much, but I think
that’s
pretty freaking awesome!”

Embarrassed by her praise, Nolan sat and took a sip of the Guinness,
I’ll just have a few sips to be sociable, then get out of here,
he thought. Now that Carolyn had brought up Tiona, he tried to figure out how to work his and Tiona’s relationship into the conversation…

Nolan checked the time on his HUD.
After midnight!
And he’d definitely had too much to drink!

He’d worked “my girlfriend Tiona” into the conversation several times early in the evening, but it hadn’t phased Carolyn. Nor Randy or Jana. She didn’t treat him like a romantic prospect, she just acted like he was someone she really wanted to be out with.

For someone who’d always considered himself somewhat of a dweeb, having this beautiful young girl smiling at him and begging him to tell her or her friends more about himself was incredibly flattering.

Just like his previous encounter with Carolyn, the night had slowly become more and more tumultuous. Carolyn introduced him as her “friend” or “buddy” to what seemed like an endless stream of beautiful young people. He held what seemed like a bottomless glass of Guinness, refilled sometimes by Carolyn, but more often by some of the new admirers Carolyn introduced him to.

They asked him about the asteroid and the saucer and the astronauts. People were curious about Tiona, even Carolyn who certainly didn’t seem jealous of his girlfriend. A few of her friends even knew about his multi-monolayer graphene, asking perceptive questions about it.

They’d moved to a bar, then to this club. At each transition, he’d tried to beg off and escape. Instead he’d found himself acceding to the wishes of bevies of attractive young admirers, all enthusiastically applauding when he reluctantly decided to stay out.

In the club, he danced with Carolyn of course, but also with several other pretty young women. He’d begun wondering how he’d come to be such a charmer. Maybe Carolyn’s allure was rubbing off on him? Or maybe these people were just happier and friendlier than anyone he’d ever hung out with…

Randy was helping him up the steps into his house. Carolyn opened the door while Jana and a dark skinned beauty stood holding their shoes. Once inside Carolyn poured “one more drink for everyone” while Nolan slouched on the sofa.

Carolyn’s AI piped some soft music to his house speakers. The dark skinned girl started dancing with Jana while Carolyn and Randy sat beside Nolan on the couch talking quietly.

Nolan found himself dozing off, but thinking what a fun time he’d had…

In the morning, Carolyn wasn’t there to help him do battle with his hangover.

He felt relieved.

But also disappointed…

***

Clarice entered Reven’s bathroom with a trash bag on her weekly rounds. Picking up the wastebasket near the sink she lifted it to dump it in the bag, but stopped, startled by what looked like several bloody Kleenex.

She immediately recognized that, because Reven had been at school for several hours, it couldn’t be blood because it was still bright red. She set down the bag and the wastebasket and lifted one of the Kleenex out.
Lipstick
, she thought. Looking again in the basket she saw that there were a lot of smudged Kleenex, red, pink, brown, blackish gray.
Reven’s been experimenting with makeup!

Why haven’t I seen her wearing it?

For a few moments, Clarice thought fondly about her tomboy daughter getting more interested in feminine things. But then her eyes widened as she remembered Reven coming down to breakfast with her face red and her eyes swollen several mornings ago.
That must have been the morning,
she thought,
and I’d guess it didn’t go well.

Hurt, Clarice wondered why her daughter hadn’t asked her for help.

After she’d finished taking out the trash, Clarice sat down with a cup of coffee to ponder whether there was any way she could help Reven without making the sensitive young teenager angry.
School’s going to be out for summer pretty soon. Reven could make herself over during the break… If I can just find a way to help her.

***

Eldon Weiss was reviewing a paper for one of the journals, something he hated, but, as he reminded himself frequently, was important. There was a tap on his door, giving him an excuse to look away. It was George, one of the administrative assistants, “Yes?”

George’s expression was inscrutable, “I know you want everybody to make an appointment, but…”

Eldon interrupted irritably, “But who? The President? The Pope?”

“Tiona Gettnor?” George said with an unmistakable smirk.

Eldon snorted and rose. “You’ve got me there. Where is she?” he asked, wondering just how angry she was.

George led him out to the Department’s tiny waiting area. A pretty young lady rose to her feet,
Yep, Tiona Gettnor. Not as tall as I would have expected from all the vids.
“Hello Ms. Gettnor, what can I do for you?”

She grinned at him, “I thought it was more along the lines of what
I
could do for you?”

Her smile disarmed him. “Well, as you may have heard, I
would
like some asteroid samples.” He cocked his head and motioned toward his office, “But surely you didn’t come all the way to Boston for…”

She was shaking her head, “No, I was already coming up here to talk to someone else.” She grinned again, preceding him toward his office. Giving him a look out of the corner of her eye, she said, “Though it isn’t much of a trip in a saucer. But then I heard the
news
and thought I should drop by to see if I could talk to you directly.”

Once they’d both taken seats in his office, Eldon said, “So,
is
there a chance we could work together?”

“Sure. Oh, you’d have to be checked out in a skinsuit first, but…”

Eldon interrupted, “You’re thinking I’d actually go
out
there?!”

“Well sure. I thought one of your complaints was that you were only getting cast offs, not getting to select your own specimens.”

Though Eldon would have sworn that, as an astronomer, he’d like nothing more than to go out in space himself, he suddenly found his heart beating a little rapidly. “Um, are you sure?” Thinking of all the young “right stuff” astronauts, he said, “I’m not too old?”

Gettnor shrugged, “Getting into space isn’t really very stressful anymore, you know? We have lots of people older than you working up in the habitat. Space sickness would be the biggest issue and we’ve got pretty good pills for that now…” She tilted her head, “Unless you have some kind of medical problem?”

Eldon shook his head, “And it’s safe for me to get out in a spacesuit and…” He realized he wasn’t exactly sure what he might do out there in a spacesuit.

She quirked a lip, “Well, not as safe as staying here in your office, no. But the new suits are pretty safe. Even if you tear a hole in them, you only suffer damage to the tissue right beneath the hole.” She made a wry face, “Of course, if you manage to blow out your helmet, you’re in serious trouble. If you wanted, you could just go along in the shirtsleeves environment inside the saucer. One of our people could grab the samples you picked out using video. You’d still have to learn to wear a suit in case of an emergency though.”

“Couldn’t I use the video to pick out samples from here?”

Gettnor got a delighted look on her face, “Dr. Weiss! And here you’re an astronomer,” she said reproachfully. “It’s…”

He scrunched his eyes shut, knowing what she was about to say before she said it, “Probably 10 to 20 light minutes to where you’re going, right?” he said to complete her thought.

“Yes sir. 20 to 40 minutes round trip, so pretty hard to give directions.”

“And I’m an idiot.”

“Now, now. I didn’t
say
that.”

“I know, I’m a mind reader. Can I take a grad student with me?”

“Sure, as long as it’s okay with your universities policies and she’s
also
willing to sign an interminable list of releases.”

Eldon sighed, hoping he didn’t look as embarrassed as he felt. “When could we go?”

“The training takes a day, but we only have the one big saucer making trips to the belt right now. It’s 3 to 6 days out there, then 3 to 6 days back, so we send it out on a Monday once every two weeks to give our people some down time. Once you’ve done your training you could go on the next mission.” She shrugged, “Maybe 1 to 2 weeks if you’ve got the time to do your training right away.”

“I’ll
make
time, thanks! Where do I sign?”

“I’ll have someone call you with a suit training date. You can ‘sign’ when you come down to GSI for that. They’ll also be taking you up to a weightless-airless environment to make sure you don’t get space sick or freak out in your suit... There is one thing though.”

“What’s that?” Eldon said, hoping this wasn’t going to be some kind of “gotcha.”

“I’m hoping you’ll be able to tell me who at GSI said you couldn’t have any asteroid samples? We don’t want that kind of bad publicity.”

“Um,” Eldon said, casting about for some excuse. “I guess we… didn’t actually
ask.
We, uh, just kind of
assumed
that you wouldn’t have time for us.”

“Oh,
Dr.
Weiss!” Gettnor said, in a tone you might use for someone who’d just peed in their pants or made some other embarrassing faux pas. She tilted her head, “Well then, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to contact those reporters and apologize for
trying
to give us such a bad reputation.”