“Mmmn,” Sal said. Ben was sure it was Sal’s voice behind him. Muscles were absolutely limp this evening. He was a little off his game—give or take a year’s hiatus. Dekker, the skuz, had had practice. Keep the run going. He didn’t want the cue in Dekker’s hands, not from what he’d seen.
Two in succession. It was rec hall, bar in the middle—a lot of UDC guys on Permission down there, drowning their sorrows. Fleet at this end, some of them too. And a scatter of marine guards—more khaki around the corridors than Ben personally found comfortable, thank you.
Real wringer of a sim this afternoon, he’d earned a beer, dammit, but they had him up again tomorrow, same with all of them.
Opened his big mouth and they’d reset the sim, all right.
Dots and more dots, in a space where the effin’ familiar sun didn’t exist…
Spooky situation. Wanted to feel it out and you were busy tracking damn dots.
Gentle shot. Balls rebounded. “Come on, come on—“
“Ouch,” Sal said.
Shit.
Dekker drew a breath. Armscomper wasn’t the opponent you’d choose in this game. Pilot versus armscomper got bets down, never mind he’d had practice Ben swore you didn’t have time to take at TI.
Hell if. Ben had learned it somewhere, he 1 Meek, maybe. And a Belter, didn’t show you any mercy. You damn sure didn’t want to let him get the cue back.
He saw his shot. Lined it up. Bets were down. Favor points. Military didn’t let you play with money. And nobody had any.
Click and drop. Sighs from half the spectators. Muted cheers from the rest.
Second shot. Ball dropped, balls rearranged the pattern. He was sore when he bent to survey the situation, but it was a good kind of soreness, kind you got from a hard run. Never had realized there was good pain and bad. He’d felt the other kind. Too damn much.
Click.
“Right on, Dek!”
Meg and Sal had bets on opposite sides.
He grinned, took aim.
Click. Perfect bank.
Sudden disturbance, then, in the ambient. Dekker felt it, looked up as everybody else was looking, at a handful of
UDC guys who’d showed up at the table. Marines were in motion, starting to move between.
Rob Childers. Kesslan and Deke. Chad’s crew. A marine said, “Let’s not have any trouble. Get on back there.”
Rob said, “Dek.”
He felt a sudden queasiness in the approach. A sense of confrontation. The marines weren’t pushing. They weren’t letting the UDC crew closer, either, and there was starting to be noise, other UDC guys moving in.
“Wait a minute,” Almarshad protested, thank God somebody on their side had the sense to say something, offer a hand to object to force; and he had to move, himself, had to do something in the split second.
He dropped the cue to his left hand, took a nonbelligerent stance.
“Dek,” Rob said and held out his hand.
Put him entirely on the spot. Marines didn’t move, didn’t know who was who or what was happening here, he scoped that—scoped the moment and the move and the necessity to do something before they all ended up in the brig.
“Rob,” he said, and went quietly past a confused marine and took the offered hand, looked Rob in the face and wondered if Rob was the one who’d tried to kill him, or if Rob knew who had. He took Kesslan’s hand, and Deke’s. The music system was grinding out a muted, bass-heavy beat, that had the silence all to itself.
“Too much gone on,” Rob said. “Both sides.”
He had to say something. He took that inspiration, said, “Yeah. Has,” and couldn’t find anything else to say.
“Let you get back to your game,” Rob said.
“Yeah. All right.” He stood there while the room sorted itself out again, Rob and the rest of them going back to their side. He never managed to say the right thing. He didn’t know what he could have said. He felt a hand on his arm—Meg, pulling him back to the table, while Franklin muttered, “Shit all.”
“They do it?” Mason asked him under his breath.