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attention like assassins sneaking up behind her back, or a Mayday from a
luxury liner struck by a meteorite. Now and then she'd suddenly pause, as if
she'd thought of some important point that went over the head of everybody
else in the room... except she never told us what these great insights were,
and after a while, I wondered if maybe she was just playacting.
As my sister's bodyguard, I'd met a lot of diplomats. I'd seentons of
playacting.
So Prope's face appeared on my vidscreen. She was lit from only one side,
which meant the left part of her face was swallowed up in deep dark shadow the
captain's attempt at dazzling me with a dramatic first impression. As far as I
knew, the only way she could get that effect was turning off the lights on one
whole side of her ship's bridge.
"Captain Prope of theJacaranda, calling for Acting Captain Edward York
ofWillow. Are you Explorer York?"
"Yes, Captain." I couldn't help noticing how fast I got switched from acting
captain to Explorer. Maybe Prope didn't like treating me anywhere close to an
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equal.
"How are you feeling, Explorer?" the captain asked. "No ill effects from the
disease?"
"I'm okay," I said. "Are you going to send someone to help dock this ship?"
"Sorry, not yet. Because of the risk of contagion, standard operating
procedure says we start by sending an Explorer team to assess the situation."
"There's not much risk of contagion," I answered. "Really."
"Even so, you can never go wrong following the proper protocols. Don't you
agree?"
"Um." In my years with the Outward Fleet, I'd seen things go wrong all over
the place, protocols or no. "So after your Explorers check things out," I
said, "then can I go home?"
"One thing at a time," Prope replied. "Please go to your transport bay and
let my people in through the main airlock. They should be there in fifteen
minutes."
She nodded a vague good-bye and waved her hand in the general neighborhood of
her forehead. Ship captains are supposed to exchange full salutes after
talking to each other... even if one of you is only a lowly acting captain. I
guess Prope couldn't bring herself to give me a real salute, seeing as I was
only an Explorer.
Lots of regular navy people are embarrassed by Explorers. Or scared of them.
Even fake Explorers like me. Everybody knows Explorers aren't normal.
Before I could show Prope what a real salute looked like, she cut her end of
the connection. I saluted anyway, to the blank screen. As long as I was sort
of a kind of a captain, I wanted to do the right thing.
6
MEETING THE EXPLORERS
Fifteen minutes later I sat at the transport bay's control console, watching
two Explorers float weightless outside the ship. These werereal Explorers, not
just fakes like me. Their suits were as glinty white as washed stucco, with
cords of black piping along the sleeves and pant legs. As they drew close
toWillow, little jets puffed out from their hips and shoulders to slow their
approach.
From my point of view, the two people looked like they were completely upside
down: flying along with their feet poking up in the air, because that was the
angle they'd happened to come in on. But as soon as they touched the ship's
hull, they grabbed the handbar railings that surrounded the airlock entrance
and pulled themselves right way up. I'd already told the ship-soul to open the
outer hatch, so they slipped straight inside.
It took a minute for the airlock to cycle and that minute felt like forever,
I was so eager to see people again. These two were both humans, I could tell
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that from the shape of their outfits... but looking at their tinted visors and
their lumpy tightsuits (with pockets and pouches and electronic attachments
front and back) I couldn't tell if the Explorers were young or old, male or
female, bulky or slim. They hadn't talked to me by radio either; there'd been
no need, and Explorers aren't the sort to chat for the sake of chatting. Not
to strangers, anyway.
Finally, the inside airlock door opened and the two Explorers stepped out. A [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]