“The thrusters are set to pulse in triple sequence,” Admiral Torgis said, “and they’re just as far out of phase as they always were on the Maspero when I was her third lieutenant. That was the sort of idea that only a naval constructor who’d never tuned a thruster himself would’ve come up with.”
“She’s Archaeologist class, all right,” said Daniel, rising to his feet. The poor servant barely avoided sloshing herself with an urn of soup. “That means Commodore Pettin’s here in the Winckelmann, and that means, Admiral, that my officers and I need to return to the Princess Cecile at once.”
“Of course you do, Lieutenant,” Admiral Torgis said, also rising. “The service of the Republic is a hard life, I’ll tell the world—but by God, I wish I had a real command myself instead of being a damned chair-bound politician like they’ve made me!”
“But Danny . . . ?” Ms. Lully said with a stricken pout. “You were going to come out in the desert with me tonight to watch the moons rise.”
Daniel bent down and kissed her forehead, right at the part from which the red hair flared to either side like a boat’s bow wave. “Sorry, child, and you can’t imagine how sorry I am, but I need to get back to my ship ASAP or sooner yet.”
“We can get there fastest if I fly you,” the woman said. “Remember, I have my aircar here.”
Just possibly she wasn’t the bubble-brain Adele had assumed. At any rate, Lully had grasped the salient point of the situation and responded to it with impeccable logic.
“Yes!” Daniel said. “How many seats does it have, dear one?”
“Well, four,” Lully said through a recurrence of the pout. “But I thought you and I could—”
“Right!” said Daniel. “Lieutenant Mon! Front and center! We’ve got to be aboard the Princess Cecile before the commodore opens his ports.”
Mon had already pushed in through the double doors from the balcony. He walked with the studied earnestness of a man who was sure that his head would fall off if he didn’t keep it centered squarely over his spine.
Daniel grimaced and turned to Adele. “And you as well, Officer Mundy,” he said. “If we get back in time, you’ll take over as duty officer from Woetjans. I’m certain that the commodore will expect the duty officer to be sober, and I’m equally certain that Woetjans is even less likely to meet that standard that I am myself.”
Lifting Ms. Kira Lully, now chauffeur, in much the same fashion that he’d carried her up the stairs earlier, Daniel said to the room, “Good citizens, duty calls! May my every landing find people half so generous as you!”
He strode to the stairwell, the redhead clutched against him like pirate’s booty. Though unburdened, Adele struggled to catch up. Even so Lt. Mon was treading on her heels as she reached the door. Real spacers were amazingly surefooted when moving through clutter.
“By God, we’ll all go greet the squadron!” Admiral Torgis cried behind them. “Gerson, get my car ready!”
* * *
Kira Lully held her trim red-and-gold aircar in ground effect just above the pavement until a roar of steam drowned the snarl of the Winckelmann’s plasma thrusters. Only then did she drop the vehicle’s nose over the cliff edge and plunge toward the Princess Cecile in spirals so tight that centrifugal force pressed the occupants outward.
Daniel had thought of suggesting he take the controls himself, but he’d kept his mouth shut for fear that the redhead would order them all out of the vehicle in a fit of pique. As it turned out, Kira was a much better driver than he was.
Also his fear that she’d blind herself by looking into the heavy cruiser’s exhaust was remarkably silly when he used his head—which wasn’t the part of Daniel Oliver Leary most often to the fore when he was dealing with pretty girls. Obviously, nobody living adjacent to Flood Harbor could be ignorant of the dangers of starships landing and lifting off.
“She’s been running on eighty percent of her masts, and four of her thrusters are out of service too,” Lt. Mon remarked from the rear seat beside Adele. “Christ, I’d forgotten what a bucket the Winckelmann was.”