“Sal!” he called out. “Meg!” and saw two pairs of eyes fix on him, do a re-take of him and the uniform. Baggage hit the floor. The two best-looking women he’d ever slept with ran up, grabbed him, both, and kissed him breathless, one and the other.
Couldn’t hurt a man’s reputation. Whistles and howls from the gallery. He caught his breath, besieged with questions like what was he doing here, what was this about Dek, and how was he?
Questions without an easy answer. “What are you two doing here?” he asked, and got a stereo account: they’d gotten the word Dekker was in some kind of accident, they’d gotten word they were shipping a carrier out—
‘’God, that thing moves—“ Sal said.
“So we rode it in and transferred over on the shuttle,” Meg said. “And these damn MPs have got to stall us up with questions, shit! of-fi-cers and VIP’s all over the place. —How’s Dek, for God’s sake, he got all his pieces?”
“Everything you’d be interested in. —You enlisted?” That didn’t fit his expectations, didn’t fit what he’d been reading in Dekker’s letter file.
“They hail us down,” Sal said, “in Jupiter’s own lap, a carrier pulls up and says, Have you got Kady? And wants to talk to us. Wants to talk to Meg. And Meg talks to the Man, and we get this news Dek’s in hospital—some kind of crack-up, they’re saying, and they’d kindly give us a ride insystem—“
Shepherds began to ooze over. One said, “Well, well, look what pulled in. Hiya.”
Meg looked. Sal did. Ben didn’t know the face, but Sal struck an attitude and said, “Well, well, look at familiar faces—they let you in, Fly-by?”
Laughter from all about. Not a nickname Fly-by seemed to favor. “God, how’d you get past?” Belter accent, Shepherd flash. “I thought they had criteria.”
“You skuz,” Sal said, but it didn’t have the edge of trouble. Sal put a hand on the skuz’s shoulder, gave his arm a squeeze. “Jamil’s a sumbitch, but he’s an all right sumbitch. This is Ben Pollard.”
“Got the whole team, but Morrie,” another said. “Damn on!”
“Ben, where d’ we sleep?” Meg asked. There were immediately other offers. “Take you up later,” Meg said. “I got a date at the hospital, if I can get the pass they said I had—“
“Get you to the room,” Ben said, and, catching two elbows, hauled them along to 10-A. Good-natured protest followed from the rear, but it died, and a couple of guys, Jamil included, overtook them at the door, set down the baggage and made themselves absent. “Thanks,” he said; discretion was not dead here. “Thanks,” Meg called back, while he was opening the door. He put a hand on Sal’s back, got Meg’s arm and got them inside, into privacy.
“What’ve we got?” Sal said. “Is my radar working, or what?”
“It’s working,” he said. “We got a sumbitch in charge, same damn sumbitch switched Dekker out and some guy in on a test run and cracked up Dekker’s crew, Dek-baby minks he’s in the fuckin’ Belt looking for Cory, and / got a meeting with Fleet Lieutenant J. Graff right on the hour.” He had a sudden idea, fished his temp hospital card out of his uniform pocket, and held it up in front of Meg. “This is a pass. You’re me, just put it in the slot at the main desk, won’t trigger an alarm and in the remote chance they should ask, tell ‘em Graff sent you. Dekker’s hi room 114. They pulled him out of a simulator beat to hell and concussed and there’s some chance he didn’t climb in there on his own, by what I can guess. Tell him straighten up. Tell him where he is, tell him I said so, tell him I’m going to break his neck next time I see him—I’ve got five minutes to make the lieutenant’s office….”
“Somebody did it to him?” Meg asked.
“Hey. You know Dek. There’s got to be a waiting list.” He recalled the atmosphere outside, and said, “We got to talk. Fast. Sit. The lieutenant can wait five.”
The sounds came and went. 2324. 2324. Dekker tried to remember. He said it to himself to remember. And maybe he was losing track of time, but it seemed to him breakfast had come and gone and Ben hadn’t come this morning. That upset him. Ben kept saying he couldn’t stay, and maybe he’d just gone wherever Ben had to go to. He didn’t even want to know where that was. He just wanted to go back into the dark if they’d let him alone, if there wasn’t anybody going to come but doctors with tests and interns and if there was nothing to do but lie here and listen to the halls outside.