“Yeah, if we survive that long,” Becker said. “Anyhow, it won’t hurt to ask Hafiz about it.”
“If the Khieevi find the drone and destroy it, that would give my beloved uncle an economic motive anyway,” Acorna said. “He just hates to lose something he’d hoped to make a profit on.”
“You know, me too,” Becker said. “Your uncle and I have got quite a bit in common.”
Acorna smiled mischievously at him. “I know.”
Becker gave her a sideways glance from under his bushy eyebrows. “Seen much of Aari lately?” he asked innocently.
“Not too much,” she said, feigning lightness. “He has been assisting his parents in the laboratory, from what I can tell. They’ve determined that the sap contains a spore which, -when it comes in contact with an insect’s carapace, metamorphoses into a fungal infection of great virulence.”
“I knew it had to be something like that,” Becker said. He didn’t mention that she’d changed the subject away from Aari. “So all we gotta do basically is lure them to the place where we got the sap and tell them to eat their fill.” He chuckled. “I’m getting good at this decoy business. We faked Ganoosh into thinking the Federation Outpost was the Linyaari homeworld and now all we have to do is convince the Khieevi fleet that whaddayacallit-vine worlds is full of yummy bug food and let them and the plants fight it out to see who eats who. Piece of-you should pardon the expression-cake.”
“First, however,” Mac said, “I must fix the transmitter on this unit. While I have no problem with concentration or distractions, Captain, you do happen to be sitting against the access panel. Perhaps you would consider moving?”
“Mutiny!” Becker grumbled. “C’mon Acorna, I’ll treat you to a bouquet or something dirtside.”
They ate together in one of the little bistros Hafiz had set, one to a building, circus, or block, for times “when people did not want to meet in one of the several great dining halls. All of the ones in the main compound, which contained the Linyaari compound, opened onto gardens for al fresco mixed human and Linyaari grazing.
“Have you tried any of the activities around here?” Becker asked Acorna casually. “Nadhari and I are going to take a room in one of the fantasy suites at the hotel. Complete holo landscapes in every suite.” He sighed. “She’s an amazing woman, Nadhari.”
“You really like her, then?”
“That’s a little mild. I mean, there’s not many women I’d let take RK with them while they’re working, but she said he wanted to see what she did. She’s the first Makahomian he’s been around since the crash. He likes being worshipped. I guess everybody ought to try it once. Being worshipped, I mean.”
Becker did not need RK. He himself looked like the proverbial cat who had swallowed the unfortunate proverbial canary.
“I am pleased for you, Captain. Have the two of you made any long-range plans?” Acorna asked.
“It’s a little early yet,” Becker said complacently, “But I figure after we save the universe as we know it, -what with her brawn and my brains …”
Acorna didn’t warn him, but Nadhari herself, clad in her green security forces uniform, crept through the garden until she was directly behind Becker, where she caught his head in a hammerlock, “And then what, oh brains of the outfit?” she asked. RK, slipping through the weeds behind her, stopped at her feet and wound around her ankles.
“Whatever you want, babe,” Becker said, removing her arm without difficulty and distributing kisses up the crease in her uniform sleeve.
Nadhari actually wrinkled her elegant, if oft-broken nose at Acorna. “Isn’t that cute? He called me babe. Nobody ever calls me babe. If most men did it I’d have to break at least a finger. But from Jonas, it’s not lack of respect, it’s protective.” She put both arms around his neck and gave him a half-comic noisy smooch before melting back into the garden as if she were one of the plants, the cat’s plumed tail the last vestige of their presence.
Becker sat there with a silly grin on his face. Acorna remembered the word used for someone whose internal dam had broken so that the banks of their dry stream -were filled to overflowing. Besotted. Becker and Nadhari were besotted and Acorna was glad for them.