“But—all this,” I said, gesturing with my arm close to my chest so that I would not bump any of the close-packed apparatus. “If shooting is so easy, then why is—everything—here?”
Curran smiled. “Up,” he said, pointing to the hatch. As I hesitated, he added, “I’ll give you a leg-up, don’t worry about the power lift.”
Flushing, sure that I was being exiled from Paradise because I had overstepped myself—somehow—with the last question, I jumped for the hatch coaming and scrambled through with no need of the tanker’s help. I supposed I was crying, but I could not tell because my eyes burned so.
“Hey, slow down, kid,” called Curran as he lifted himself with great strength but less agility. “It’s just Whichard’s about due t’ take over guard, and we don’t need him t’ find you inside. Right?”
“Oh,” I said, hunched already on the edge of the tank’s deck. I did not dare turn around for a moment. “Of course, My Lord.”
“The thing about shootin’,” explained the tank lord to my back, “ain’t how so much’s when and what. You got all this commo and sensors that’ll handle any wavelength or take remote feeds. But still somebody’s gotta decide which data t’ call up—and decide what it means. And decide t’ pop it er not—” I turned just as Curran leaned over to slap the iridium barrel of the main gun for emphasis. “Which is a mother-huge decision for whatever’s down-range, ye know.”
He grinned broadly. He had a short beard, rather sparse, which partly covered the pockmarks left by some childhood disease. “Maybe even puts tank commander up on a level with driver for tricky, right?”
His words opened a window in my mind, the frames branching and spreading into a spidery, infinite structure: responsibility, the choices that came with the power of a tank.
“Yes, My Lord,” I whispered.
“Now, you better get back t’ whatever civvies do,” Curran said, a suggestion that would be snarled out as an order if I hesitated. “And don’t be shootin’ off yer mouth about t’night, right?”
“No, My Lord,” I said as I jumped to the ground. Tie-beams between the wall and the masonry gatehouse would let me climb back to the path I had followed to get here.
“And thank you,” I added, but varied emotions choked the words into a mumble.
I thought the women might already have returned, but I listened for a moment, clinging to the bars, and heard nothing. Even so I climbed in the end window. It was more difficult to scramble down without the aid of the antenna brace, but a free-standing wardrobe put that window in a sort of alcove.
I didn’t know what would happen if the women saw me slipping in and out through the bars. There would be a beating—there was a beating whenever an occasion offered. That didn’t matter, but it was possible that Lady Miriam would also have the openings cross-barred too straitly for even my slight form to pass.
I would have returned to the banquet hall, but female voices were already greeting the guard outside the door. I only had enough time to smooth the plush of my jacket with Sarah’s hairbrush before they swept in, all of them together and their mistress in the lead as usual.
By standing against a color-washed wall panel, I was able to pass unnoticed for some minutes of the excited babble without being guilty of “hiding” with the severe flogging that would surely entail. By the time Lady Miriam called, “Leesh? Elisha!” in a querulous voice, no one else could have sworn that I hadn’t entered the apartment with the rest of the entourage.
“Yes, My Lady?” I said, stepping forward.
Several of the women were drifting off in pairs to help one another out of their formal costumes and coiffures. There would be a banquet every night that the tank lords remained—providing occupation to fill the otherwise featureless lives of the maids and their mistress.
That was time consuming, even if they did not become more involved than public occasion required.
“Leesh,” said Lady Miriam, moderating her voice unexpectedly. I was prepared for a blow, ready to accept it unflinchingly unless it were aimed at my eyes and even then to dodge as little as possible so as not to stir up a worse beating.