CHAPTER SIX
“Dahl, where are you going?” Duvall said. She and the others were standing in the middle of the Angeles V space station corridor, watching Dahl unexpectedly split off from the group. “Come on, we’re on shore leave,” she said. “Time to get smashed.”
“And laid,” Finn said.
“Smashed
“Not that there’s anything wrong with doing it in that order,” Finn said.
“See, I bet that’s why you don’t get a lot of second dates,” Duvall said.
“We’re not talking about
“He is!” Duvall said. “Andy! Don’t you want to get smashed and laid with us?”
“Oh, I do,” Dahl assured her. “But I need to make a hyperwave first.”
“You couldn’t have done that on the
“Not this wave, no,” Dahl said.
Duvall rolled her eyes. “This is about your current obsession, isn’t it,” she said. “I swear, Andy, ever since you got a bug in your ass about Jenkins you’re no fun anymore. Ten whole days of brooding. Lighten up, you moody bastard.”
Dahl smiled at this. “I’ll be quick, I promise. Where will you guys be?”
“I’ve got us a suite at the station Hyatt,” Hanson said. “Meet us there. We’ll be the ones quickly losing our sobriety.”
Finn pointed to Hester. “And in his case, his virginity.”
“Nice,” Hester said, but then actually grinned.
“Be there in a few,” Dahl promised.
“Better be!” Hanson said, and then he and the rest wandered down the corridor, laughing and joking. Dahl watched them go and then headed to the shopping area of the station, looking for a wave station.
He found one wedged between a coffee shop and a tattoo parlor. It was barely larger than a kiosk and had only three wave terminals in it, one of which was out of service. A drunken crewman of another ship was loudly arguing into one of the others. Dahl took the third.
“Welcome to SurfPoint Hyperwave,” the monitor read, and then listed the per-minute cost of opening a wave. A five-minute wave would eat most of his pay for the week, but this was not entirely surprising to Dahl. It took a large amount of energy to open up a tunnel in space/time and connect in real time with another terminal light-years away. Energy cost money.
Dahl took out the anonymous credit chit he kept on hand for things he didn’t want traced directly to his own credit account and placed it on the payment square. The monitor registered the chit and opened up a “send” panel. Dahl spoke a phone address back at Academy and waited for the connection. He was pretty sure that the person he was calling would be awake and moving about. The Dub U kept all of its ships and stations on Universal Time because otherwise the sheer number of day lengths and time zones would make it impossible for anyone to do anything, but the Academy was in Boston. Dahl couldn’t remember how many time zones behind that was.
The person on the other end of the line picked up, audio only. “Whoever you are, you’re interrupting my morning jog,” she said.
Dahl grinned. “Morning, Casey,” he said. “How’s my favorite librarian?”
“Shit! Andy!” Casey said. A second later the video feed kicked in and Casey Zane popped up, smiling, the USS
“Jogging the Freedom Trail again, I see,” Dahl said.
“The bricks make it easy to follow,” Casey said. “Where are you?”
“About three hundred light-years away, and paying for every inch of it on this hyperwave,” Dahl said.
“Got it,” Casey said. “What do you need?”
“The Academy Archive would have blueprints of every ship in the fleet, right?” Dahl asked.
“Sure,” Casey said. “All the ones that the Dub U wants to acknowledge exist, anyway.”
“Any chance they’d be altered or tampered with?”
“From the outside? No,” Casey said. “The archives don’t connect to outside computer systems, partly to avoid hacking. All data has to go through a live librarian. That’s job security for you.”
“I suppose it is,” Dahl said. “Is there any chance I can get you to send me a copy of the
“I don’t think they’re classified, so it shouldn’t be a problem,” Casey said. “Although I might have to redact some information about the computer and weapons systems.”
“That’s fine,” Dahl said. “I’m not interested in those anyway.”
“That said, you’re actually on the
“I can,” Dahl said. “There have been some changes to a few systems on board and I think it’ll be useful to have the original blueprints for compare and contrast.”
“Okay,” Casey said. “I’ll do it when I get back to the archives. A couple of hours at least.”
“That’s fine,” Dahl said. “Also, do me a favor and send it to this address, not my Dub U address.” He recited an alternate address, which he had created anonymously on a public provider while he was at the Academy.
“You know I have to record the information request,” Casey said. “That includes the address to which I’m sending the information.”
“I’m not trying to hide from the Dub U,” Dahl said. “No spy stuff, I swear.”
“Says the man using an anonymous public hyperwave terminal to call one of his best friends, rather than routing it through his own phone,” Casey said.
“I’m not asking you to commit treason,” Dahl said. “Cross my heart.”
“All right,” Casey said. “We’re pals and all, but espionage isn’t in my job description.”
“I owe you one,” Dahl said.
“You owe me dinner,” Casey said. “The next time you’re in town. The life of an archive librarian isn’t that horribly exciting, you know. I need to live vicariously.”
“Trust me, at this point I’m seriously considering taking up the life of a librarian myself,” Dahl said.
“Now you’re just pandering,” Casey said. “I’ll wave you the stuff when I get in the office. Now get off the line before you don’t have any money left.”
Dahl grinned again. “Later, Casey,” he said.
“Later, Andy,” she said, and disconnected.
There was a guest in the suite when Dahl got there.
“Andy, you know Lieutenant Kerensky,” Duvall said, in a curiously neutral tone of voice. She and Hester were on either side of Kerensky, who had an arm around each of them. They seemed to be propping him up.
“Sir,” Dahl said.
“Andy!” Kerensky said, slurringly. He disengaged from Duvall and Hester, took two stumbling steps and clapped Dahl on the shoulder with the hand that was not holding his drink. “We are on shore leave! We leave rank behind us. To you, right now, I am just Anatoly. Go on, say it.”
“Anatoly,” Dahl said.
“See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Kerensky said. He drained his drink. “I appear to be out of a drink,” he said, and wandered off. Dahl raised an eyebrow at Duvall and Hester.
“He spotted us just before we entered the hotel and attached himself like a leech,” Duvall said.
“A drunken leech,” Hester said. “He was blasted before we got here.”
“A drunken horny leech,” Duvall said. “The reason he has his arm around my shoulder is so he can grope my tit. Lieutenant or not, I’m about to kick his ass.”
“Right now the plan is to get him drunk enough to pass out before he attempts to molest Duvall,” Hester
