“I’ll talk to him,” he said.
“You’re sure you’re all right about that?”
Another psych quiz. Correct answer: “A long trip with no information, run in here straight from the mast, I was a little shaken up myself.” He tossed off the rest of the coffee, got up and pitched the cup into the bin. “I’m fine to talk to him. What do you want out of him?”
“His health,”
“Yeah, well, he’ll pull it out. Knock him down and he bounces.”
“Don’t stress him, lieutenant. 1 really don’t advise another confrontation. He’s been concussed. We want to keep mat blood pressure under control.”
That was about worth a laugh. Dek was already stressed. Dek was in an out-of-control ship in a ‘driver zone with his partner lost. He said soberly, “I’ve no intention of upsetting him.”
The doctor opened the door, the doctor walked him back to Dekker’s room and signaled an orderly for a word aside in the hallway.
Ben walked on in, pulled a chair over and sat down by Dekker’s bed. Dekker’s eyes tracked his entry, stayed tracked as he sat down, he wasn’t sure how focused. Dekker had been a real pretty-boy, a year ago, fancy dresser, rab hair, shaved up the sides. Still looked to be a rab job, give or take the bandage around the head; but the eyes were shadowed, one was bruised, the chin had a cut, lip was cut—not so long back. The hollow-cheeked, waxen look—did you get that from a bashing-about in a simulator a few days ago?
“You look like hell, Dekker-me-lad.”
“Yeah,” Dekker said. “You’re looking all right.”
“So what happened?”
Dekker didn’t answer right off. He looked to be thinking about it. Then his chin began to tremble and Ben felt a second’s disgusted panic: dammit, he didn’t want to deal with a guy on a crying jag—but Dekker said faintly, shakily, “Ben, you’ll want to hit me, but I really need to know—I really seriously need to know what time it is.”
“What time it is?” God. “So what’ll you give me for it?”
“Ben, —“
“No, hell, I want you to give me something for it. I want you to tell me what the hell you’re doing in here. I want to know what happened to you.”
Dekker gave a shake of his head and looked upset. “Tell me the time.”
Ben looked at his watch. “All right, it’s 1545, June 19th—“
“What year?”
“2324. That satisfy you?”
Dekker just stared at him, finally blinked once.
“Look, Dekker, nice to see you, but you really screwed everything up. I got orders waiting for me back at the base, I got a transfer that, excuse me, means my whole career, and if you’ll just fuckin’ cooperate with them I can still catch a shuttle in a few hours and get my transfer back to Sol where I can stay with my program. —Dek, come on, d’ you sincerely understand you’re screwing up my life? Do me a favor.”
“What?”
“Tell the doctors what happened to you. Hear me? I want you to answer their questions and tell them what they want to hear and I don’t, dammit, 1 want to be on that shuttle. You want me to call them in here so they can listen to you explain and I can get out of here?”
Dekker shook his head.
“Dekker, dammit, don’t be like that. You’re a pain in the ass, you know that? I got to get back!”
“Then go. Go on. It’s all right.”
“It’s not the hell all right. I can’t get out of here until you tell them what they want to know! Come on. It’s June 19th. 2324. Argentina’s won the World Cup. Bird’s dead. Cory’s dead. We came out here on a friggin’ big ship neither of us is supposed to talk about and Gennie Vanderbill is top of the series. Do you remember what put you here?”
“I can’t remember. I don’t remember—“
“Because you climbed into a friggin’ flight simulator tranked to the eyeballs—does that jar anything loose?”
A blank stare, a shake of the head.
Ben ran a hand over his head. “God.”
“It’s just gone, Ben. Sometimes I think it’s the ship again. Sometimes it’s not. You’re here. But I thought you were before. What are they saying about the sim?”