He saw the lieutenant out of the tail of his eye. Graff wasn’t looking at him. Hadn’t told him… God, how much else had Graff kept from him?
Porey said: “We’re talking about a fault in the Aptitudes, and I want your well-considered opinion here, Mr. Dekker, whether you want a go-with as-is, or whether you personally want to make a personnel switch. Both your crewmembers are demonstrably capable in the seats they’ve trained for— but “capable” is a fragile substance in a Hellburner crew, you understand me?”
“Yes, sir,” he managed to say. “Extremely well. Pollard and Aboujib?”
“Exactly.”
“Can I talk to them?”
THUMP of Percy’s hand on the desk. “You’re the pilot! Gut decision! Which?”
An answer fell out. “I’d ask them, sir.”
“Correct answer,” Graff muttered, looking at the floor.
Hard to argue with Porey. Hard to think in Percy’s vicinity. But there was Graff. Graff agreed with him… Graff handed him secrets that could mean Graff’s own career; and Graff had failed his promise to tell him if there was news from Sol One…
Porey said, “Then we’ll put the decision up to them, since that’s where you want it. No preferences. You’ve lost one crew. Let’s see if this one’s worth the investment. Meanwhile, Mr. Dekker, do some thinking about your own responsibilities—like executive decisions. Do you make executive decisions, Mr. Dekker?”
“Yessir.”
“Do you remember your instructions, regarding what you’ve seen and heard?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What are they?”
“Silence. Sir.”
A hesitation. A cold, cold glance, as if he were a morsel on Percy’s plate. Then a casual wave of the hand. “Dismissed. Two-day stand-down.”
“Yessir.” Anger choked him of a sudden, out of what reserve of feeling he wasn’t sure. But it wasn’t at Graff. He refused at gut level to believe Graff had deliberately lied to him. The service had. The out-of-reach authorities had, and not for the first time in his life. He saluted, turned and reached for the door.
“Mr. Dekker,” Graff said, from the side of the room. “Excuse me, sir. —Mr. Dekker, outside, a moment.”
“Yessir.” He wasn’t enthusiastic. He didn’t want to talk. But Graff followed him outside, between the guards.
“Mr. Dekker, I failed a promise. —Do you want the information, on your mother’s whereabouts?”
He nodded. Couldn’t talk. He was acutely conscious of the guards on either hand; and Graff steered him well down the corridor, toward the corner, before he stopped. “Your mother is on Earth at the moment—everything funded by the Civil Liberty Association, as far as we can tell.”
“Why?”
“The peace movement finds the case useful—the Federation of Man, for starters—as I warned you might happen; there is a financial connection between certain of these organizations, the CRA, the Greens and a number of other organizations—“
“It doesn’t make sense! She’s not political!”
“I’m afraid it’s rather well left the original issue. It’s the power of the EC mat’s in question. There’ve been demonstrations at the Company offices in Bonn, in Orlando, Tokyo, Paris—“
More and more surreal. “I don’t believe this….”
“There’s a great deal of pent-up resentment against the Company, economic resentments, social resentments—so Saito tells me: mass population effect: the case came along, it embodied a concept of Company wealth and power against a helpless worker. The Company is understandably anxious to defuse the situation; they’ve offered a settlement, but concession seems to have encouraged the opposition. Salazar’s plane was forced to land in Dallas because of a bomb threat, that’s what the commander was talking about: whether that was a peace group or a random lunatic no one knows. I can’t overstate the seriousness of what’s happening downworld.”
“She’s never been on Earth. She can’t have any idea what’s going on…”
“We certainly wish she had decided against going down.”
“Did she ever call back?”
“No: my word on that, Mr. Dekker, I swear to you. Most probably her lawyers advised her against it. Most probably— considering who funds them.”
“I’ve got to call her! I’ve got to talk to her—“
“Reaching her, now, through the battery of bodyguards and security around her, on Earth—I earnestly advise against it. I don’t think you can get through that screen. If you do it’s almost certainly going to be monitored, very likely to be placed back on the news, by one side or the other in this affair.”