We ran between the buildings, and out onto the pier. We could see the city across the river, where there was a cluster of office buildings which mirrored the ones behind us. Signs indicated that ferries were supposed to go across to the city from there. But the ship approaching was no ferry.
It was an ocean liner, showing three flags. The bottom one was a rather raggedy U-town flag, the upstart symbol. Above that was a large white flag with a red cross. The top was the blue and green flag of Bellona.
–The cavalry, my wife said, has arrived. Only not on horseback.
Of course, once people heard the engines of the ship, they began to come out onto the pier, despite what Vicki had said. I saw Jack and motioned, and he and his new assistants started working to control things.
I could easily visualize a situation where everybody would try to pile onto the pier and some people would end up getting pushed into the water, or worse.
As the ship came near the dock, Neil had his field glasses out, but I didn't need them to see Jan standing at the rail, along with Ray, Pete, SarahBeth, Pat, Sam, and Fifteen.
Then, not waiting for the ship to reach us, Vicki stepped back and launched herself through the air and onto the deck, where she threw her arms around Pat. This caused some looks of amazement on the faces of the crew, who were dressed in the uniforms of the Bellona navy, but Vicki didn't see their reaction.
A few minutes later, Jack and his people controlled the crowd while ramps were lowered and the rest of us made our way up to the deck.
There, of course, my first order of business was a reunion with my wife. And, while that happened, she silently filled me in.
I looked up as she was telling me what was going on, and noticed something that amused me.
SarahBeth was apparently trying to molest Perry and beat him up at the same time. Perry was obviously somewhat uncomfortable with the vehemence of her welcome, but he looked thoroughly happy for the first time in days.
In contrast, Pete and Katherine and Daphne were much as they had been in Duffy's some 36 hours before, the three of them embracing tightly, almost motionless. Pete's face was turned toward me, resting on Katherine's shoulder. He was usually a pretty cool customer, but his expression showed very clearly how relieved he was that she was okay.
Then, as Vicki was about to speak, her arm still around Pat's waist, we heard it. We turned and looked up, and so did the sailors, and the people on the dock. A fighter jet streaked across the sky, in the direction of the city. We watched this with as much awe as if we'd never seen or heard such a thing before.
"We need to talk," Jan said. "Obviously. Fifteen?"
"Yes," he said, saluting smartly.
She grinned. "Cut that out. Please have the runners start to distribute the food to the people on the dock, and make it clear to them that more information will be coming soon, but they need to wait where they are for now."
"Jack is down there," Vicki said. "He can assist you with talking to people and keeping things under control, but he has no authority. If he's not helping, throw him in the water."
"May I tell him that I'm relieved he's not dead?"
"Of course, as long as you make it clear that it's just your personal opinion."
The room where we were going to meet was a very small office. There were only two chairs, and Tammy immediately took one. Vicki hopped up to sit on one of the two desks, and there was a bit of confusion about who would sit in the other chair, until SarahBeth plopped herself into it and lit a cigarette. Jan, Pete, Katherine and Ray all lit up as well.
Vicki, rather surprisingly, had asked everybody to join us, so the meeting included Sam, Pat, SarahBeth, Perry, Katherine, Pete, and even Daphne, who was panting happily, leaning her head against Katherine's hip. It was very crowded.
"Here's the short version," Jan said. "When the government in Bellona heard about the explosions, they scrambled to send aid. To us, to U-town. They commandeered an ocean liner, and brought food packs, the kind their soldiers use, medicines, and whatever else they thought we would need."
"Explosions?" Neil asked.
Jan nodded. "Explosions, plural. The very short story is this: multiple explosions, in major cities, and maybe more. A lot of infrastructure was knocked out, including TV and radio, so it's been very hard to get reliable news. Everything's only now starting to be put back together. We don't know for sure what happened. Possibly an attack on the U.S., obviously. Possibly something the U.S. was testing that got out of hand. Possibly something comparatively minor that triggered some sort of domino effect. Possibly a put-up job, a fake, that got out of hand. We don't know the answer."
"Tomorrow's probably a better time to start to take this further," Vicki said, "We're on a deadline. But we will have to figure it out." Neil nodded.
"They're offering us the food and medicine," Jan said. "Or rescue. It would be incredibly tight, but this ship can transport everybody back to Bellona. We don't know much more than that, how we'd be able to live there. The captain has made it clear that he's a military man, not a politician. He will deposit us on the dock at Enyo, as refugees, if that's what we choose, and we'll see what happens then. Or we can stay here.
"Oh, and the captain originally said we had until morning to decide, but now, because of seeing the jet, he says he's sailing at midnight." She turned to Vicki, inclining her head, clearly turning the meeting over to her.
Vicki drew in a deep breath, and let it out slowly. "So, we have," she glanced at the clock, "less than four hours. So, let's start with this." She looked around the room. "Each of you, do you want to go or stay? I'll start. All things being equal, I want to go. Of course, all things aren't equal, if everybody else decides to stay, I have a responsibility. But I want to go."
"Marshall and I have already decided," Jan said. "Our choice is the same as yours."
"I am going where my daughters go," Tammy said. She looked up at Sam, who stood beside her.
"Sarah and Claire and I talked about it," he said. "We all want to go."
Tammy frowned. "Claire?"
"A woman from the medical team I was on. She and Sarah–"
"Let's move on," Vicki said. "Romantic news can come later."
"I'm going with you," Pat said to Vicki. "Anywhere."
Vicki nodded and pressed her lips together for a second, holding Pat's hand.
Katherine and Pete had been talking quietly. "We're going," Pete said. "No matter what everybody else decides to do. The hospitals in Bellona must be in better shape than the ones around here, and we have a baby on the way." He stroked Daphne's head and she barked happily.
Tammy sighed and shook her head.
"I want to go, too," Ray said. "I always have. Doc and I were planning to go together, once U-town was all settled and running smoothly, if that's something we can imagine." That got a few chuckles.
"I intend to go where I'm needed," Neil said, holding back a grin. "And I can't imagine anybody's going to need me more than you folks will, wherever you end up."
That got some chuckles, too, but no arguments.
SarahBeth looked at Perry, who was squatting beside her chair. "What do you think, honeybunch?" she asked, her eyes wide.
He smiled. "As I recall, we were planning to go to Bellona before all this started. I think it's high time we made that trip."
SarahBeth smiled the smile of a girl who has just deferred a major decision to her boyfriend, knowing perfectly well what choice he was going to make.
"Okay," Vicki said, "here's my question. We just polled thirteen people, which took about five minutes. How in the world are we going to have a conversation with a few thousand people in the next three hours?"
Daphne barked, and Pete shushed her, rubbing her head.
"I think it would be better–" Tammy said.
"If we stayed on track," Vicki said quickly. "We don't have much time."
"I have an answer," Jan said. "Pat found out that the ship has some sort of simple printing press, to run off menus and newsletters and so on, during the cruises. I propose we print up a flyer saying the following:
"This ship is leaving at midnight tonight for Bellona. They are offering to take us as refugees, and the ship can take all of us, if we want to go. Or they will leave us here, on the dock, with a small supply of food and medicine.
"Vicki and the others want to go, but everybody has to make their own decisions. We will attempt to share more information over the next three hours, but some questions will not be answered.
"So, discuss this with your families and your lovers and your friends and your team members, and we will need to know your answers by eleven tonight, since the ship will sail at midnight."
Vicki frowned. "I'm not seeing how this is a conversation. They talk among themselves, and we tell them answers, but how do we know what their questions are?"
Jan leaned over and they conferred quietly for a moment. Then Vicki looked up and said, "That's all we need you for right now. Please go and get something to eat, and a nap if you want. Sam can tell you where your rooms are, or at least where you'll be sleeping. Oh, and one more thing. I'm sure we all need a good night's sleep. So, late tomorrow morning, assuming we're still on board, we should reconvene here. All of us. We'll have a lot to do." Daphne barked. "Of course, including you, Daphne."
Jan had already asked me to stay, so I didn't move.
"I'll get that flyer printed," Ray said. "Can you write out the text for me? I don't have Marshall's memory."
Jan pulled a piece of paper from her pocket, trying not to look smug, and handed it to him.
Vicki took Pat's hand and said, "Baby, can you go get some food for Marshall and Tammy and bring it back?"
Pat smiled. "Of course, and I'll get some for you, too," and left with the others.
Tammy had remained seated. "I assume I'm being invited to stay?"
Jan sat down in the other chair. "Of course. It would just be too arduous to explain to everybody about what I can do, and we don't have the time anyway. But I can sense what people's questions are. I can't read minds, but if I'm near a thousand people with the same question, I'll know what it is. So, the big ones will be answered, if we can figure out the answer, and if one person is wondering about something that nobody else cares about, too bad for them."
"What if we don't know the answer?" Tammy asked.
"We'll tell them that," Vicki said.
"But some answers we probably do know," Jan said. "If people are wondering whether they'll have to learn Spanish to live in Bellona, we can tell them that some people there know English, and we can tell them that Spanish won't help in any case, since the national language is Portuguese." She sighed. "In all seriousness, though, what I'm going to do will be difficult, and it will help to have my family around me."
"Of course," Vicki said. "Is there anything else you need?"
I got up to turn off the overhead light, and she smiled. "After a week of candles, it's hard to adjust." I left one desk light on, and she loosened her tie. "When I come up with something, I'll tell Marshall, and he can have Pat print up another batch of flyers, and the runners can get them around to the people on the ship, and on the dock."
Vicki was sitting on the desk nearer to Tammy's chair, so I sat on the other desk. It wasn't comfortable, but I didn't want to be comfortable. I needed to stay awake.
After a couple of minutes, there was a knock at the door. I went to open it, and Pat was outside, with a cart which held three plates of food. She clearly expected me to take it from her, but I opened the door and motioned for her to wheel it in.
She put one plate on the desk next to Tammy, along with silverware, a glass of water, and a cup of espresso, and then she placed another setting next to Vicki. I took the rest and put them on the other desk for myself, as she said to Tammy, "It's a cruise ship, so the food is good. And, with everything you three have been through, I thought you'd probably all like an espresso."
Tammy looked up at her. "Thank you, Pat. That was very thoughtful."
Pat smiled and turned to leave, but Vicki reached for her hand, and Jan said, "Please stay, Pat. You're family." Pat seated herself carefully next to Vicki, who reached up, took off her baseball cap and ruffled her hair. Tammy didn't react to this, but of course she and I were mostly involved with eating.
If Tammy hadn't been so hungry, she might have had something to say about Pat's opinion about the quality of the food. It was bland, normal food: baked chicken, mashed potatoes and green beans. Given what I'd been eating for the past day, and the past week, however, it was heavenly. I ate slowly, savoring every bite.
Then, as I finished eating, Jan silently gave me the first message. I caught Pat's eye, and we went out into the corridor. I carefully wrote out the message on a page from my notebook, tore it out, and gave it to her. Then I went back in and sat down again on the desk. We were being very quiet as Jan sat motionless, her eyes closed.
Vicki pointed at Jan and mouthed, "Will it bother her if we talk?"
I shook my head. "I don't think she'll even notice, unless we shout," I said quietly.
"Do we really want everybody at the meeting tomorrow?" Tammy asked. "SarahBeth and starling–"
"And Daphne, I know," Vicki said, smiling. "It's mostly just for the first time. I have some ideas for things people can do in smaller groups after that. And I admit I don't have anything specific for Daphne–"
"Daphne's a good dog," Jan murmured, smiling.
Vicki laughed. "Well, there you go."
Tammy shook her head.
I chuckled. "I just had a thought. I know we don't have much time, but I should have gone with Pat to proof this flyer, and the first one, too."
"I think Jan wants you here," Vicki said.
"Maybe, but if there's a typo in one of these things, I'll never hear the end of it."
The door opened a few minutes later and Pat came in. She handed us copies of the flyer and we looked it over.
"How is it?" Vicki asked me with a grin.
"Looks clean," I admitted.
"Clean?" Pat asked.
"No typos," I explained. "I was concerned about that, because certain people," I pointed at my wife, "can be particular."
"Oh," Pat said with a smile. "I had Sam look it over."
"Ah, okay," I said. "I hadn't remembered that we had a professional on board."
Jan was facing me, and I couldn't tell in the dim light, but it looked as if her tongue had made a brief appearance, pointed in my direction.
We fell into a routine for the next couple of hours. We sat in the little office, chatting or in silence, and periodically Jan would come up with a question. If it had a clear answer, Pat would go off to have the flyers printed up.
If the answer was more complex, we'd discuss it.
The first question had been easy. People didn't know very much about Bellona. Some had never heard of it, others knew the name, but didn't know where it was or anything about it. So, Jan sketched out some basic facts for them.
The next question was about the explosion, what it had been, what it meant, and in that flyer we focused very much on what we knew (and didn't know), and avoided speculation. So, that one was very short.
The third one was longer, since the question was whether we'd be able to go on being U-town, either in the United States or in Bellona.
The short answer, of course, was that we didn't know. For the longer answer, we had a caucus in the hall. Jan wanted to be even-handed, just say that we didn't know. But Vicki overruled that (with Tammy's agreement), and we made it clear that we had no idea about Bellona, but every indication was that the United States was, and would continue to be for some time, under some sort of martial law, and an autonomous city-state, of any kind, was almost certainly not going to be tolerated.
When that question was resolved, and Pat had gone to see about the printing and distribution, Vicki had turned to go back into the room, but I found myself motionless.
Tammy smiled. "I did want to mention, Marshall, that I think you were wrong about something."
I laughed. "I admit that's possible."
"When we were talking a few nights ago, in the bar, we talked about what Jan can do, as compared to Vicki and me. You said she got less, and I confess I agreed with you.
"But look at her," she said quietly, gesturing at my wife, visible through the half-open door. "She's plugged into thousands of people, their fears and desires and uncertainties and hopes." She shook her head. "Even apart from the ability, there's the emotional balance to be able to sort through all that calmly and come up with the answers. I don't think any of the rest of us could do anything like that."
I nodded. "I try to avoid telling her how amazing I think she is," I whispered, which made Tammy smile.
She turned and gestured at the corridor, which was narrow and drab, painted gray. "I do hope this is part of the crew's section of the ship," she said, "or this is the least luxurious luxury liner I've ever seen."
"I'm sure you're right," I said, "but your daughter and I haven't had a lot of experience with luxury ocean cruises."
She nodded. "I'm sure that's true. I seem to remember that one time you got to Bellona on a garbage scow."
"True, that's been much more typical of the last few years."
I pushed open the door and gestured for her to precede me back into the room.
I didn't mention to her (though I did tell Jan later) that the garbage scow story had never been widely reported, so clearly Tammy had been following her daughter's career closely, even during the years when there had been no contact between them.
"It's eleven," Vicki said. "We should be getting up to the deck to figure out who's going and who's staying."
"Almost all of the U-town people want to go," Jan said, opening her eyes. "So, we should go, too. Some of the stadium people want to go, too, but most don't." She started to get up, but I know the signs and I caught her as she toppled.
"I'm hoping you can handle this without us," I said, shifting my hands so I was carrying her more comfortably.
Vicki nodded. "Of course. And Tammy, you must be tired, too. Why don't you–"
"No," Jan murmured, her eyes closed, her arms going around my neck. "You'll need her."
Tammy shrugged. "I just hope we don't have to get up at some ungodly hour in the morning."
Pat showed us the room where we'd be sleeping. It was a
small cabin, obviously for members of the crew. As we discovered
the next day, we were all quartered in the crew's area, for a
couple of different reasons. One was that, once the passengers
were all aboard, there would be very little room in the passenger
areas. People would be sleeping six or eight to a room, and some
even slept in the public areas. However, since the ship was
carrying nowhere near the number of staff people it would have
needed for a real cruise, the crew areas were much less crowded.
Also, it made things easier for all of us to be in the same area, since the ship was huge and, as we discovered a couple of times, it was easy to get lost in it.
The cabin had two single beds, against opposite walls, with two dressers and chairs, and not much else. I lay Jan on one bed and pulled down the covers on the other one. I started to undress her, and she murmured sleepily.
When her clothes were off, I lifted her and slipped her under the covers of the other bed. Then I started to take my clothes off, wishing I could take a shower. I felt like I hadn't bathed in a month. The room didn't have a bathroom, but I figured there must be facilities of some sort nearby.
Ultimately, what defeated me was exhaustion. I took off my clothes and got under the covers next to my wife. The bed was narrow for two people, but she was very thin, so there was enough room. It wouldn't have mattered in any case, I was asleep before I even had time to think about comfort.
So, we missed quite a bit, though of course we were filled in later.
We missed the process of getting people on and off the ship, and distributing the food and medicine to those staying behind, which was complex enough to delay the departure until after 12:30am. Some people changed their minds a few times, which was not surprising. It was similar to the scene Neil had described when the Jinx had left U-town, except on a much larger scale. Friends, couples, and families were faced with the possibility of splitting up, and Vicki did not want to force people to make an immediate decision, as Dr. Lee had, but there was also the reality that the captain had decided when his ship was going to leave, plus the appearance of the fighter jet, and whatever that might mean.
So, at a certain point, she had let the captain pull up the ramps and leave, even though some people were still begging for more time.
We also missed the flap when the captain recognized Katherine and nearly threw her off the ship. There apparently were a few chaotic moments, including SarahBeth yelling and Daphne barking, until Tammy stepped in and "persuaded" the captain that it would be okay, that Katherine would not flip out and start shooting people on his ship. They had compromised on locking up Katherine's guns for the duration of the voyage (which we learned they had done to the army's rifles as well). Of course, Tammy could have persuaded the captain to let Katherine keep her guns, but I suspect she herself thought it was a good idea to have them locked up.
From what I heard, Katherine had been agreeable about locking up her revolver and the automatic she wore in a shoulder holster, and they didn't investigate whether or not she carried any other weapons.
However, having recently watched her change her clothes, I knew that she did.
When I woke and saw my wife's face in the morning sun (or possibly it was afternoon by then), I kissed her. Then, reading my mind, she grinned impishly, shook her head, pouted, and pointed a long, bony forefinger at the other bed.
I glanced over. Two heads were visible, one with short black hair and dark skin, the other with long, strawberry blonde hair fanning across the pillow.
It is difficult to continue to feel amorous when you suddenly find you're three feet away from your mother-in-law.
–Interesting, of course, that she still looks like Tammy, even when she's asleep, Jan commented.
She laughed at my expression.
–Well, I am a reporter, you know, she reminded me.
–When we were in the tunnels, as I told you, she provided illumination when the flashlights died. But only when she was awake.
–I think her appearance is different. I think it's part of the integration, that she looks like Tammy unless she makes an effort not to. I think it's subconscious.
–Well, that would seem to fit the available facts.
–Thank you, dear.
She regarded me and frowned.
–You're filthy, she said. And smelly, and you've probably got me all filthy, too.
Then she closed her eyes and smiled a dreamy smile, stretching under the covers.
–And I just happen to know where there's a shower we can use.
–Ah, I said, rubbing her flat stomach.
She smiled.
When we got back to the room, some time later, Tammy was standing in front of the mirror, brushing her long hair, and Sam was sitting on the bed, tying his shoes. Tammy smiled as we came in, bringing with us the smell of shampoo and soap.
"I see you found the shower," she said. "We indulged last night before going to bed, but I may take several more showers over the course of the day. I feel like I need to catch up."
We were wrapped in towels, and I was hoping Tammy and Sam would go off to find breakfast so we could get dressed, but then the door opened and Sarah Little came in with a girl I didn't know. They were both wrapped in towels, too, but I could see they were wearing bikini bathing suits.
"You have got to try the pool!" Sarah said, flicking a towel at Sam. "Before everybody else figures out where it is. It's divine."
"Tammy, this is Claire," Sam said, standing up. "Claire, this is Tammy Everett, my lady. And this is Jan Sleet."
"I'm Tammy's daughter," Jan said, "and this is my husband, Marshall." Claire shook our hands, Jan sat down on the bed and lit a cigarette, and I wondered how many more people were going to come in and prevent us from getting dressed.
Claire was Black, a bit taller than Sarah, and quite curvy. It was starting to look like Sarah had a pretty specific physical "type," since Claire was built very much like SarahBeth.
Claire had looked quite serious during the introductions, but then she giggled and asked Sam, "Is it true? I heard Perry Nelson is on board."
We all laughed, except for Tammy, and Sarah said, "I explained that it's awkward, since he's with Nicky, who seduced and abandoned me, but–"
"I really like his books," Claire said sheepishly.
"We'll try to get you an introduction," Tammy said as Vicki came into the room, "but all of us, including Perry, are going to be very busy for the next few days."
"Very true," Vicki said with a grin. She was dressed, but her long hair was wrapped up in a towel, her face scrubbed and pink. Claire's eyes widened as she was introduced to Vicki, and I couldn't tell if it was because of Vicki's unusual appearance, or because of her authority. I was also a little surprised to find out that Sarah Little had apparently never met Vicki before.
"Have you folks eaten?" Vicki asked, hopping up to sit on one of the dressers. She reached up and started to dry her hair.
"No," I said. "Our main hunger this morning seems to have been for cleanliness."
"Wait until you see the dining room," Sarah said. "It's amazing."
"I'm assuming we have time to eat before we reconvene," Tammy said.
Vicki laughed. "Of course. Just because we have clocks again doesn't mean we need to be ruled by them."
Then, to my amazement, my wife dropped her towel and walked across the room to the dresser, completely naked.
This was, to say the least, very atypical behavior. But then, as she pulled out her underwear, and as Claire explained about her enthusiasm for Perry Nelson, I realized that nobody was reacting to the naked woman in their midst.
It wasn't that they were politely ignoring her eccentricity. They were not looking away from her, as I'm sure I had when Katherine had changed her clothes in the woods, and they were not looking at her, no more than if she'd been dressed.
I glanced at Tammy, and she winked at me. Then I figured it out. She was keeping the others from seeing that Jan was getting dressed in front of them. And she was clearly going to do the same for me.
Of course, it meant being naked in front of Tammy, but I told myself that she was family, after all.
We ended up going to the crew's dining room, mostly because it was closer. I knew Vicki well enough to see that, for all of her talk about not being ruled by the clock, she was eager for us to eat and get started. Sarah and Claire tagged along with us, though they had eaten already.
It was a big room, with long tables, and we saw that Neil and Ray were already there, at one of the tables. Once we had our food, we joined them.
The food was very ordinary, a standard steam-table breakfast from a vat of scrambled eggs, and trays of bacon and sausage and ham, plus soggy toast and dry potatoes. I couldn't believe how good it smelled, and I had to restrain myself from raving about it.
Tammy looked suitably unimpressed with the cuisine, but I noticed that she was giving herself ample portions.
Sam introduced Sarah and Claire to Neil and Ray, then I heard Claire emit an eeep sound, and I turned to see Perry approaching.
Claire looked like she was about to faint, but then her eyes got even wider when she saw who was with him, because Perry was walking with Katherine. They put their trays on the table and sat down.
Greetings were exchanged and more introductions were made. Seeing Katherine had obviously driven everything else from Claire's mind, including whatever she had wanted to say to Perry.
Perry said to Vicki, "We are here as a delegation from the apparently sovereign land of SarahBeth."
"She's not coming to the meeting," Katherine said. "She said she has more important things to do."
"Did she give any indication of what things she had to do, exactly?" Vicki asked hesitantly as Sarah whispered to Claire, possibly clarifying that "SarahBeth" was the "Nicky" she had referred to earlier.
"Army training," Perry said.
"Ah," Tammy said. "I wonder if I want to ask what type of training she might be contemplating while we're guests on this ship, or if I'd rather let it alone and just be thankful that she's not going to be bothering us."
Perry pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to Vicki, who glanced at it, giggled, and passed it to Tammy. Neil read it over Tammy's shoulder and laughed.
"Those are good topics," he said, "but I have to question what she knows about any of this."
I held out my hand, and Tammy passed it across the table. It said "U-town Army Training" across the top, and I could see that SarahBeth had located the printing facilities. Under the heading, it had the following list:
"Neil," Vicki said, "I'm sure Perry can back me up, but I speak from experience myself when I say that she is a black belt in all of these areas."
He hooted a laugh. "I get your point," he said.
I heard a familiar bark, and turned to see Pete approaching with a full tray, Daphne's leash looped around his wrist. He put the tray on the table, and put bowls of food and coffee on the floor.
Daphne barked happily, and then she moved over to Claire and started to sniff.
"Hold out your hand," Pete advised. "Let her smell you."
Claire froze for a moment, then she slowly extended her hand. Daphne sniffed it carefully, then she licked it. When she moved to lick it again, Sarah said, "Hey, Daphne, she's mine."
She threw her arm around Claire's shoulders. Daphne barked and turned to go to her food, bumping her rear end against Claire's bare thigh a couple of times as she moved away.
"She must be in heat," Sarah said, squeezing Claire, who looked as if she'd forgotten completely about Perry Nelson.
"Wait," Jan said, and I felt my chest get tight. I knew what that voice meant.
"The bridge," she said. "We have to get to the bridge." She looked around. "Vicki, Tammy, Neil, come on."
She hadn't mentioned my name, but she knew she didn't have to.
We were out the door and down the hall, moving very quickly. As we made our way up staircase after staircase, sailors challenged us at a few points, but Tammy silenced them. None of us had any idea where we were going, of course, but Jan was in the lead.
Then we were on the bridge, breathing hard (I confess), except for Vicki and Tammy. It was large, with windows on three sides, and filled with sailors and with electronic gear that I didn't bother to examine too closely. I looked around quickly, expecting to spot another ship perhaps, but all I could see in any direction was calm ocean and clear blue skies.
"Captain," Jan said as we walked to where he was standing by a sailor who was wearing a large pair of headphones.
The captain was obviously about to demand to know what we were doing on his bridge, but I got the idea it was his own common sense, not any suggestion from Tammy, that changed his mind.
"It's a submarine," he said quickly. "United States, armed with nuclear weapons. They're threatening to sink us, though I've explained that we have thousands of civilians on board."
"What do they want?" Neil asked.
"They have ordered us to return to port to be searched and detained. They will escort us, and they have given us five minutes to comply. I explained that we are on a rescue mission, flying the red cross, and that this is an ocean liner, clearly unarmed. They repeated their threat." His expression was grim. "We are flying our flag, and I have been ordered not to surrender the ship or my crew. I doubt whether–"
"Oh, good heavens," Tammy said. "I will talk to them. Give me that contraption." The radioman started to say something, but Tammy snapped her fingers, and he removed the headset and handed it to her. She put it on and started to talk.
–Looking at the worst case, I said silently to Jan, will Randi step in and rescue us?
–Yes, she said slowly, her silent voice conveying all the emotions she was keeping from showing on her face. But that's 'us' meaning you and me, and Tammy and Vicki. Probably Pete and starling, because she likes Pete. Maybe Sam and Pat, just maybe. But that's it. The rest of our friends, and all the passengers, and the captain and the crew, will all die.
After a minute or two, Tammy took off the headset and motioned us around.
"They are waiting for instructions," she said. "And that's what we need to talk about. There are other forces at play here, over which I have no control. Also, the more I do, the more I reveal about what I can do. For example, I could have them destroy all their radio equipment. That would delay any report, once they realize they should make one."
The captain shook his head. "I'm sure that they have reported this situation. They will be expected to report again when it is resolved. So, if they fall silent, the assumption will probably be that we attacked them in some way."
Neil nodded. "Then the next ship will sink us without giving you a chance to talk to them."
The captain turned to Tammy. "This . . . effect. How long does it last? How long will they be under your influence?"
She pursed her lips. "Probably twelve to twenty-four hours, perhaps more. But remember that I'm talking to two men, the captain and the radioman, out of a whole crew."
"And, once they come out of it and make a report," Neil said, "if someone up the chain of command is thinking this through, they will see us as a very dangerous threat indeed. Especially if they put it together with what the soldiers saw at the stadium."
"Captain," Vicki said, "here's what I think, but I need to hear your opinion. Your people's lives are at stake as much as mine."
The captain nodded, though I could see he was not entirely comfortable talking with Vicki. Tammy may have had abilities he didn't understand, but at least she was a normal-looking adult.
"I think that the more aggressive we are," she continued, "including if we damage any part of their ship, the easier it will be for them to think we're an enemy and come after us. So, we have two options. Tammy can make them think they have destroyed us, or she can make them think they are escorting us back to port."
I shook my head. "We can't sustain the idea that they think they're escorting us anywhere. The rest of their crew will assume their captain has gone insane."
The captain nodded. "I agree. If they report that we're destroyed, they'll get new orders. Their captain can inform his crew of the new orders, but not that he made the false report." He gestured at the horizon ahead of us. "We're heading directly out to sea, or we were. We're drifting now, as they ordered. They can't imagine we're transporting anything of value to them, and it's difficult to think they could hold us responsible for the attacks a week ago, so the only reason for them to come after us is if they think we're a threat now. It's hard to see how they can continue to see us that way if we're heading away."
"At a certain point, I think they'll give up," Neil said, nodding. "They have a country to get back into order, and we're a distraction from that."
After Tammy was done, we made our way, much more slowly, back down through the levels of the ship. As we walked, Jan said, "I'm wondering if we could stop somewhere and get a quick drink, before we meet? That was pretty nerve-wracking."
I could tell Vicki was surprised by this, though she gave no obvious sign. Jan was not much of a drinker, and never during the day.
–What are you up to? I asked.
–It's really for Tammy. She's more shook up than she lets on. After all, she just saved thousands of lives, including her entire family, just by talking to a man over a radio. That's not routine, even for her, and she would really like to just sit for a minute and regroup. And you know she'd never admit it.
By then, Vicki had shrugged, and, as we passed through a door, she said, "That's fine, but where can we . . ."
Her voice trailed off as we looked around.
It was obvious we had wandered into the passenger part of the ship by mistake, and apparently it was more than any of us could absorb easily. We all stood dumbfounded for a moment, on the ground floor of what looked like a huge atrium, many stories high.
Everything seemed to be glass and gilt and light, with glass elevators moving up and down. The whole scene looked so fanciful that for a moment I thought the elevators were really floating up and down through the air, and it took a few seconds for my eyes to refocus and show that they were attached to the balconies which circled every level.
It seemed incredible that this could all be inside of a ship at sea.
The other striking part of the scene was the people who were everywhere. They were clearly not the type of people this opulence had been designed for. They were our citizens, bedraggled, dirty, tired, with torn clothes and odd hair and tattoos and piercings and so on. But, as I looked more closely, many of them were smiling despite themselves, some looking around at the scene with as much amazement as we were.
People started to notice us, and a few moved in our direction, but Tammy shook her head and they returned to their seats on the plush and colorful sofas which seemed to be everywhere.
Jan motioned and we followed her to an escalator, which took us up to the second level. Each level above the lowest was a circular balcony around the central open area, with shops and restaurants all around it. Signs pointed to a movie theater, a jazz club, and various activities like games, dancing, and a gym. Jan led us around the curve, past gift shops, boutiques, fancy coffee stores, and so on, to a small cafe.
Well it had been a cafe at one point, but now it had been occupied by some familiar individuals.
Pete grinned and motioned us in from his seat at the bar. "It seemed you might be busy for a while," he said as Daphne barked hello, "so we decided to have a small libation."
Katherine was sitting next to him, looking amused at our expressions, and Daphne was lying at his feet. Her hands were cupped protectively around a bowl on the floor which seemed to contain beer.
Archie was behind the bar, and the other regulars from Duffy's were in their usual positions, as if they had been transported here as a group. It reminded me of a diorama in a museum.
I thought Tammy might object, remembering her reaction to Duffy's in the past, but she walked toward the bar, and Archie was already pouring her drink. I didn't see the bottle clearly, but the whiskey was dark, he poured a double shot, and she tossed it back and said, "One more, please."
Tammy took her second drink to a table, as far away from the other patrons as she could get in the small room. Neil and Vicki ordered beer, I had a whiskey, and Jan managed to unobtrusively ask for a soda. As Archie was serving us, Vicki leaned over to rub Daphne's head and Daphne licked her hand, in between lapping up beer.
"So, young Mr. Nelson is not with you?" the Professor asked Pete.
"No," Pete said with a laugh. "For some reason, when he heard where we were going, he decided not to accompany us."
"Bah," he said. "That's no way for a writer to act. The Old Man would have come. He knew how to take criticism, and how to dish it out, too." He raised his glass unsteadily. "To the Old Man!" They all repeated the toast and drank as we moved to Tammy's table and sat down.
Tammy made a face. "That's preposterous," she said, sipping her whiskey as Pete and Katherine pulled chairs over to the table and sat down with us. "Jacob Everett's idea of 'taking criticism' was to punch the other fellow in the mouth. That was his idea of 'dishing it out,' too." She glanced at the patrons at the bar, who had apparently lost all interest in us. "Typical of them to celebrate a barbarian like Everett over a talented young writer like Perry."
Pete smiled slightly, and I remembered his curiosity at the wedding about Tammy's name change. I had a pretty good idea that he had figured out who Tammy's father was.
That was not what was uppermost in his mind right then, though. He leaned forward and asked quietly, "What was it? The big emergency."
"We'll tell you when we reconvene," Vicki said. "I want to keep it among us."
He nodded. "I assume," he murmured, "that this has to do with the fact that you folks all suddenly decided to have a drink in the middle of the afternoon, which is not exactly characteristic behavior."
Vicki nodded. "It is possible."
"Tammy?" Katherine said suddenly.
Tammy put her empty glass on the table and she said, "Yes?"
Katherine looked somewhat unsure of herself, which was unusual. "I just wanted to thank you for last night," she said very quietly. "For getting me on the ship."
Pete nodded. "Absolutely. From both of us."
Tammy smiled and waved a hand. "It's no problem. I just thought about it, and, I mean, look around. It would have been me, and a shipload of kids. I do need to have somebody my own age to talk to from time to time."
Vicki smiled. "Besides, we have jobs for both of you." She put her empty mug down. "Maybe we should get going."
Pete snapped his fingers and Daphne quickly finished her beer and trotted over to us.
Pat, Sam and Ray were already in the small office which had apparently become our temporary headquarters. Pat was sitting on the desk where she'd sat the night before, and Vicki hopped up into her lap and kissed her on the cheek. "We're alive!" she announced.
Pat hugged her, looking somewhat embarrassed, and understandably confused. "Is that surprising?" she asked as Vicki kissed her again and slid off her lap to sit beside her on the desk.
I closed the office door as Tammy sat down in one chair and Vicki started to tell them the story. The other chair, which SarahBeth had occupied the night before, stayed empty for a minute until Jan finally sat in it. Ray and I sat on the other desk, and Katherine, Pete and Perry sat on the floor. Neil and Sam stood, and Daphne lay down with her head in Pete's lap.
"So," Vicki finished, "we're all still alive thanks to Tammy." She smiled. "My mom."
Tammy smiled. "Just 'Tammy' is fine. And thank you, dear, but I will point out that we wouldn't have known a thing about it except for Jan, and we all had a part in figuring out what to do. But the important thing is that we all survived, and now I'm sure we have a lot of things we need to be doing."
Vicki laughed. "Nice segue," she said. She took a piece of paper from her jacket pocket and looked at it. "Here's what I think we should talk about," she said. "I'll read it, and then let me know what has to be added:
1. We need to have a public meeting, with everybody. Today?
2. We have to discuss how we're going to relate to the ship and to the crew.
3. What is the best way to use our time here?
4. What about the immediate future?
5. What about the farther future?
6. What are we going to do about Jack?
"Plus there's news," Pat added. "It's not confirmed, but we heard from the ship's crew that Chicago, and part of San Francisco, have declared themselves to be some form of 'U-town.'"
Ray laughed. "Maybe we should have gone there."
She shrugged. "It's not confirmed, and we have no way to get there."
"We couldn't have walked to Chicago with thousands of people," Vicki said. "We could sail to San Francisco, but I'm sure the captain won't take us there, especially after what just happened."
"Also," I added, "even if it's true, which we don't know, are they viable, or are they running up against the same problems we did?"
"Just imagine how excited we would have been," Tammy said, "three or four days ago, if several thousand more people had shown up on our doorstep, expecting to be fed and cared for. We would have been less than ecstatic, I think."
Ray nodded, lighting a cigarette. "All true. I'm interested in seeing how it goes, though."
"Oh, so am I," Vicki said. "We'll have to figure out how to establish communications." She looked around the table.
"In any case, we can't just go somewhere else and try to recreate U-town. It won't work, and it's not what we should be trying for in any case. We need to do better, to learn from both our successes and our mistakes, and there are plenty of both to learn from. We have a few days here on the ship, and I think we should spend it talking and thinking about this. And not only talking to each other, but also to the other passengers, and to the crew, too, as much as we can.
"I think Jan should handle talking to the crew. She can sense a lot of what people aren't saying, and she is, as far as I know, the only one of us who speaks Portuguese."
She turned to Tammy. "I did want to suggest that you talk to the crew as little as possible. The captain has seen and experienced what you can do, and if he sees you talking to members of his crew, he will probably start to imagine things that we don't want him to be thinking about, and not only because they're not true."
Tammy nodded. "That makes sense."
Vicki turned to Pete. "Pete, I did want to explain why you're here. I have a project in mind that I think you'd be able to help with."
Pete smiled, lighting another cigarette. "You need some bass playing? Maybe some lists written down?"
She laughed. "Neither of those, at least right now. No, I have something you and Ray and Perry can work on together, and I'm hoping the three of you can start on this right away. To put it briefly, we need to live in the world, more than we ever have."
Ray nodded. "If you try to ignore it, it will usually sneak up and bite you on the butt."
"Exactly, and I want to give you a specific example. We know that, if Jan and I hadn't been there at the beginning of U-town, Doc and Ray would have died very early on. U-town would have ended up being nothing much, no real functioning, no international recognition. It would not have been, as Marshall says, viable."
Ray shrugged. "That's not that wild, that's pretty logical."
"But there would have been no explosions, at least not when they happened. We know that for a fact, don't ask me how."
Ray looked fascinated, puffing on his cigarette. "Maybe U-town as a viable, successful, independent community made the US seem vulnerable."
"So," Vicki continued, "we need to know what the explosions were, or at least your best guess. I realize it will only be a guess until we get to Bellona, but it should be possible to get more information once we're there."
"I'm assuming I'm not part of this," Katherine said. "It's not really something I'd be very good at."
"No," Vicki said, "I have something else in mind for you. I'm hoping you'll say yes, since you're probably the only person who can do it."
Katherine smiled, stubbing out her cigarette. "That sounds interesting."
"I want you do be our liaison with the army." Katherine frowned. "I'm not asking you to spy on them, and I don't expect you to tell them what to do. But there needs to be some sort of communication. I'm sure everybody here knows way more about SarahBeth and me than they ever wanted to, but the fact is that if she and I have to talk to each other, everything gets much more difficult than it has to be."
Jan smiled as she drew on her cigarette. "We're afraid the army is going to go feral."
Katherine continued to frown. "She's my friend," she said slowly.
Perry nodded. "And you don't want her to think you're siding with the 'important people' against her. But she's very smart, and she knows this 'army' has to be part of the whole thing, otherwise it's just a gang. And that's not what she wants it to be. She'll complain, as she has been known to do from time to time, about various things, but she'll see that this is actually the best solution."
"Hang on," Neil said. "I agree with the proposal, but you're all looking at this whole thing ass-backwards. The important question is not how in the world are we going to deal with one cranky teenage girl. The issue is that this is our army, or the closest thing we have to one. We're heading into a completely unknown situation, and we may need them, possibly very soon. Kat's main qualification isn't her friendship with SarahBeth, it's that she's had Jinx training, both tactics and strategy, plus she knows a lot about weapons and how to use them.
"It's obviously not feasible to have her lead the army, or even be publicly associated with it, but she has skills and knowledge that they have to have. And if SarahBeth is as intelligent as everybody keeps saying she is, she knows that, too."
Perry nodded. "She won't admit it, but I think she'll be glad of the help." He looked around. "Can I mention something else? It's on a different subject."
"Absolutely."
"During the final days of the war in Bellona, when the monarchy was obviously about to fall, the king's army bombed the area of Enyo closest to the docks, repeatedly, basically out of spite."
Jan nodded. "Just to make sure the new government would have as difficult a time as possible, since the port is so important. Marshall and I saw a lot of that."
"Exactly. And, from what I've learned, that area hasn't been rebuilt yet. They've reopened the roads to the waterfront, and rebuilt the actual docks, but the area itself, blocks and blocks, is still bombed out and unlivable."
He shrugged. "It seems we'll do better when we get there if we have a definite proposal, rather than just throwing ourselves on their mercy. We can ask that they give us that area, which is I think is comparable to U-town in size, maybe somewhat smaller. If they give it to us, we'll rebuild it."
"A rebuilding project like that in the fall," Vicki said, "going into winter? That will be rough."
Perry smiled. "Not so rough, since, in the southern hemisphere, it's spring right now, not fall."
"It doesn't answer the question of how autonomous we could be–" Ray said thoughtfully.
"–but it's a great start," Vicki said. "Perry, that's a very good idea."
"And just think of the strategic advantage," Neil said. "We'd basically control access to their docks and shipping."
He laughed at our expressions.
"That was a joke," he said.
Vicki chuckled and shook her head. "A joke we probably shouldn't repeat."
"But thank you for bringing in a note of levity," Tammy said with a smile. "You are indeed a caution, sir."
He laughed again.
"What about a meeting," Vicki asked, "to talk with everybody?"
Jan nodded. "For the moment, people are just glad to be eating and showering and so on, but they're going to start to get nervous the closer we get to Bellona, and they need to hear something from you."
"I agree," I said, "and it would be good to do it soon. Tonight, or tomorrow morning?"
"We can schedule it whenever we want," Neil said with a laugh. "It's not like people have anywhere else to go."
"Is there an auditorium?" Vicki asked.
Pat said, "I'll check with Fifteen. I think he was looking into that."
She went out, closing the door behind her.
There was a pause, then Vicki asked, "And what are we going to do about Jack?"
"We need to have a trial," Neil said.
"A trial?" she asked.
He nodded. "Some sort of formal way to figure out what to do with him. This can't just be, 'Oh, do we let him back in with us, or just leave him as a regular citizen?'"
"But isn't that really the question?" Jan asked.
Neil shook his head. "This is why we need to set a time and place, and take this seriously. Because that's not my thinking at all, and I need a chance to argue for my position."
I had seldom seen Neil this serious, and I had a pretty good idea where he was going.
There was a brisk knock on the door and Fifteen and Pat came in.
"Good afternoon, all," Fifteen said with a proper bow. "There is, in fact, a very large auditorium. It won't hold everybody, but it has a sound system, and there are speakers in the big public areas, like the dining rooms and the lounge. They use it when they have big concerts."
"Can we get this set up for tomorrow morning?" Vicki asked. "Maybe ten-thirty or so?"
He nodded. "Absolutely." He turned to Pat. "We should post flyers."
She nodded and they went back out to prepare.
"Okay," Vicki said, turning back to Neil, "we'll set a time and a place, and a way to do it, but I want to know what position you'll be arguing for."
"U-town was under attack. Jack had a responsibility, especially with Doc dead, and with you and Jan away, to help deal with that and to figure out what was going on and to protect people. Instead, he ran away, to save his own skin. That's desertion under fire, and I think he should be shot."
It was interesting to observe people's reactions to this.
Jan and Sam and Perry were clearly shocked. Ray frowned, but it looked like it was not a surprise to him. Vicki and Tammy were being non-committal. Pete and Katherine glanced at each other, and I had the idea they wanted to talk about this away from the rest of us.
I was working at being non-committal, but I confess I had some sympathy with Neil's position.
"I gather," Vicki said slowly, "that, if we do have a formal trial, you would be willing to argue for the prosecution?"
He nodded. "Of course. And I think it needs to be a jury trial, before twelve u-town citizens. We all know him personally, some of us know him quite well, and we can't judge him impartially. And it's the people of U-town who suffered because of what he did. They should make the decision."
Vicki nodded. "Fair enough." She looked around the room again. "He may choose to defend himself, knowing him he probably will, but everybody should be thinking about how they'd feel about doing it, or working with him." She smiled. "Except for Tammy, of course."
There was a knock at the door, and I went over to answer it. I opened it and the captain came in. He went right to Vicki and shook her hand. "Good afternoon, miss," he said. "I'm Captain Pinheiro. I didn't get a chance to introduce myself before." He had apparently decided that he would have to deal with Vicki, despite her age and her unusual appearance.
"I assume from your expression that this is good news," she said with a smile.
He nodded. "There is no sign of further pursuit or hostility, and we're now turning south. I thought you would want to know." He turned to Jan. "I also wanted to say, Miss Sleet, that we are especially looking forward to your coming to our country again. In addition to the services you have provided in the past, without which our country might not exist, many of us are fans of your work. We have enjoyed your articles over the years, and not only the ones about our country. For example, we got particular enjoyment from the one about the death of Jacob Everett."
She looked up, pleased but clearly puzzled. "Thank you, but why particularly that one? Because he had been there at one point himself?"
"No, because he is there now, and very much alive. He is quite an old man, of course, so he had to be persuaded not to take this trip with us, but he said he is very much looking forward to meeting you."
It had been a rehearsed speech, to convey that one bit of information, and he clearly felt ambivalent about it.
Jan's eyes were wide, and she said, "Oh, shit," as he quickly left the room.
The meeting broke up very quickly after that, and Tammy, Jan and Vicki announced they were going to have a private dinner together. Jan made a comment about "girl talk," which made Tammy wince. I was sure they did have things to talk about, but obviously the instigating event was the news that Tammy's father was alive and waiting for us.
Sam and I ended up getting our dinner together in the crew's dining room. We got food, then took our trays to one of the long tables. As we started to eat, I said, "I remember remarking to Vicki that if this was a movie, it would end with a big reconciliation scene with her and SarahBeth."
He laughed. "Obviously that's not going to happen, and this is more important, anyway. It's time for the three of them to stop tiptoeing around each other all the time."
"I agree."
"I noticed in the meeting that you all didn't have anything specific for me to do."
I shrugged. "Not that I've heard."
"I think I'm going to stop going to the meetings, then. There are still people who need medical help, and Claire says it's much harder to find volunteers to help out. In U-town, it felt like it was an emergency, so people pitched in. This feels like the opposite of an emergency, it feels like a vacation, so people are busy enjoying themselves."
"I'm sure that's fine," I said. "I'll tell Vicki."
He glanced over my shoulder and looked alarmed. I turned, expecting to see an infuriated SarahBeth, perhaps, but it was only Pete and Katherine.
"Can we join you?" Pete asked.
"Absolutely," I said, only realizing belatedly that Sam's expression of alarm must have been because of Katherine. She made me nervous, too, but I was used to keeping that to myself.
They sat down and Pete asked, "Where are Jan and Tammy?"
"Having dinner with Vicki," I said. We ate in silence for a moment.
"What do you think about the idea of a trial?" I asked Pete and Katherine. "It seemed like you were both thinking about it a lot, though neither of you really knew him."
"It's a big question for us," Katherine said slowly. "We've both done bad things." She shrugged and gave us an awkward smile. "You're afraid of me even now." Neither of us bothered to deny it. "But it's pretty basic to us," she indicated Pete, "to our relationship that, no matter what, people can work to get better. If it applies to me, it applies to Jack Longstreet."
Seeing that I was about to jump to a conclusion, Pete said, "But that's only half of it. Because what he did was something I've had some experience with. Not on that scale, but I've bailed out on people who needed me. And that's what I learned from Katherine, that you have to stick with those people and help them, even when it's dangerous. And that's what he didn't do."
"So," I said, "it sounds like you're arguing on both sides."
"We don't think he should be shot," Pete said. "That's the easy part. The rest of it is more difficult, I admit."
"Well, here's the question," Katherine said, leaning forward. "Is he really going to try to do better, or is he going to keep on looking out for himself? He should have to answer that, and Alex can force him to tell the truth, like she did with that guy I shot."
It took me a minute to respond, mostly because my brain was going in three different directions at once.
"I'm sorry," I said after a moment. "I think you're absolutely right, that's what we should do. I'll talk to Vicki. But I was distracted because you called her Alex, a name which most people here don't know, and that reminded me of something."
She and I both knew the other thing which had left me somewhat discombobulated for a moment, which was the memory of her shooting that man in the park. Sam's expression was a frozen smile, and I wondered if he had heard about the shooting.
"When we were resting in the subway station," I continued, "Tammy said something while you were asleep. She told Vicki that one time you attacked her father, Vicki's father, when he woke you up suddenly. I think she said it mostly for effect, you know Tammy, but was that true? Did you know Vinnie?"
She laughed. "And did I attack him one time when he woke me up? Yes, to both. I knew Vinnie and Alex right before they ran away together. Before Jan was born." She shrugged. "Alex may have been pregnant already, I don't know. I didn't know until a couple of days ago that Tammy was Alex, or any of the rest of it.
"Also, I should explain that I didn't sleep with Vinnie, I was just staying with him."
I laughed. "So, you're making it clear that you're not related, even distantly, to any of us."
Pete shrugged. "Or she's worried that I'd be jealous if she did sleep with Vinnie. Because I am so inclined to jealousy, especially about things–"
She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. "–things which happened when you were pretty young, let's just say that."
I did some quick (and very approximate) mental arithmetic, and I figured out that Pete might have been somewhere around four years old at the time mentioned.
I wasn't usually conscious of the age difference between them. It didn't seem to matter in any way, so it was funny to find out that they joked about it between themselves, at least occasionally.
I suspected that Tammy and Sam, who were about the same ages as Katherine and Pete, probably didn't joke about it. Of course, other people's relationships are always a bit mysterious, no matter how well you know the two individuals, and Tammy and Sam could have been very silly when they were alone. But I doubted it.
As you've already seen, however, I was teased at times by my wife for being somewhat older than she was (though the age difference, I hasten to add, was considerably less than some of the other couples around us).
I heard a sniffle and I could see the top of a blonde head pressing against Pete's thigh. He leaned over and gently tilted her head up. Her face was blotchy and it looked like she'd been crying.
"What is it, Daph?" he asked softly, stroking her head.
She sniffed and put her hands up on his thigh, craning her head up toward his.
Pete looked embarrassed. "Daphne, no," he said. "You're too big to be a lap dog. You can't . . ."
He slid his chair away from the table, though, and, with some effort, she climbed up into his lap. This was difficult, she was larger than Pete in every dimension, and a couple of times he had to throw his arms around her to keep her from falling off, but eventually she found a position she liked, with her head on Pete's shoulder facing away from us.
I had the idea this was something that she did periodically in private, but he was embarrassed that now it was happening in public, and in front of us.
"I think it's because she's pregnant," he said apologetically, rubbing her head. His voice emerged from behind her, as if from a great distance.
Katherine rubbed Daphne's back. "She used to go off by herself when she was depressed, but we told her that's what cats do, so she doesn't do that anymore. Now she comes to us instead."
I nodded. "Being pregnant can be rough enough anyway, from what I understand, and that's on top of everything else that's been going on."
"I remember when my mother was pregnant with Sarah," Sam said. "She'd get upset sometimes, but it was different. She thought prayer was the only answer. And she got mad at my dad, so I think Sarah was an accident." He chuckled. "At least, that's what David and I used to tell her."
"I haven't seen T.C. and David and so on," Pete said. "I assume they're on board?"
Sam nodded. "Oh, yes. T.C. is very excited about going to a country with a real, functioning economy again."
I laughed, "I can imagine that."
Perry and SarahBeth came up and sat down with us. SarahBeth looked around. "Where is everybody?" she asked.
"If you mean Jan and Tammy and Vicki," I replied as they started to eat, "they're having dinner together. Privately."
"'Girl talk' was mentioned." Pete added.
SarahBeth laughed. She looked at Katherine. "You don't qualify?"
Katherine chuckled. "I usually stay away from 'girl talk.'" She made the quote marks with her fingers. "When I was in high school, I always wanted to hang out with the guys and talk about guitars and motorcycles."
SarahBeth nodded. "Me, too. So, can I tell you guys something official?"
"I suppose so," I said. "I can try to find Ray, if you want."
"Ray!" She made a brief, derisive noise. "I'll tell you. You can pass it along. Perry told me about this liaison idea." She shook her head. "Katherine will be very helpful in the training, but you can't shove me off to the side like that. This is the army, U-town's army, and I'm going to come to your damn meetings, whether Vicki likes it or not, and you can tell her I said so. That Pat girl won't be happy about it either, but that's too fucking bad."
I felt like standing and applauding, just because of how masterfully she had made it seem like we had been preventing her from coming to the meetings, when she'd spent the previous week avoiding us whenever she could. I caught Perry's expression, and he was enjoying this as much as I was (and as much as SarahBeth was).
"I'll tell Vicki," I said, "or Jan will. How did the training go today?"
"Very well," she said, as if she was surprised it was even a question. "I'll make my official report at the meeting tomorrow morning. I tell you, Katherine and I are going to . . ."
Her voice trailed off. In turning to address Katherine again, she had apparently noticed for the first time that Daphne was sitting in Pete's lap.
"What's up?" she asked, getting to her feet.
"Not Daphne," I said. "She's–"
"Move over," she said to Perry, inserting herself between him and Pete. She put her arms around Daphne from behind and said, "You're among friends, Daphne." Her voice was surprisingly tender.
Daphne barked quietly and took her arms from around Pete's neck in order to reach down and rearrange SarahBeth's hands slightly.
After dinner, Sam went to locate Claire and reconnect with the medical people, and I decided to take a walk out on the deck. The minute I opened the sliding door and stepped outside, I knew it had been a good idea. I stood and breathed in deeply.
It was getting dark and the air was chilly, and I zipped up my jacket and put my hands in my pockets, feeling the tiny droplets of salt spray on my face.
How many days had it been since we'd gone to Perry's house, since the explosions, since we'd lost Doc (and so many others), and gained Neil and SarahBeth and Perry and Tammy? And Pete and Katherine, for that matter. It was difficult to figure out, especially since day and night had looked about the same for the first few days.
I looked around and saw quite a few people, sitting or standing, smoking or drinking (or both), talking or just looking out at the horizon.
I didn't see anybody I recognized, which was fine, and nobody indicated that they recognized me. I started toward the bow of the ship. It felt like the first time I'd smelled clean air in a week.
"Hey, Marsh!"
I knew right away who it was, since only one person has ever called me "Marsh." I spotted Nasty sitting with Beth and two other people I didn't know. She hoisted her beer in my direction. "They've got a great rec room," she called. "Want to go play some pong?"
"Tomorrow," I replied with a friendly wave. "I need to gather my strength."
"Damn right," she said with a laugh as I walked on.
When I reached the bow, I stood and watched the ocean foam away on both sides of the ship as we pushed forward. We seemed to be making good time, but I don't know a lot about ships, so I'm probably easily impressed.
The salt spray was thicker here, more like a light rain than a mist, but I loved the smell and feel of it. I stood there for a while, though it was now too dark out to see very much.
Finally, I started to walk slowly back toward the stern, but on the other side (trying to remember which was side was "port" and which was "starboard"), thinking that it would be nice to walk completely around the ship.
She was sitting in the shadows, but that wasn't the main reason it took me a moment to recognize her. It took a moment because it was the first time I'd ever seen Daphne when she wasn't being a dog. She was sitting on the deck, leaning back against a bulkhead, eating a sandwich.
"Hi, Marshall," she said.
I said hello, trying to be equally casual, as if we'd had many enjoyable conversations in the past, but it came off a bit awkward. She smiled, but she didn't comment. She seemed to have recovered from her earlier gloom, at least for the moment, and I decided not to mention it.
"Where have they stuck you?" she asked.
"Oh, we have relatively luxurious accommodations. It would be plenty of room for the two of us, so of course we're sharing it with Tammy and Sam."
She smiled. "That must be fun," she said. "Who doesn't want to share a room with his mother-in-law?"
"Exactly. There's probably nothing that will make you feel like a teenager more quickly. How about you?"
"We're in a storage closet, basically, but at least it's just the three of us." She patted her belly, which was much more obvious when she was sitting up. "Three and a half, as we say. Katherine makes them all nervous, so nobody wants to share a room with us." She shrugged. "Some of them stare at me a bit, too."
"I can't imagine why."
"Exactly. I'm waiting for one of the medical people to ask Pete or Katherine if I need some sort of counseling, or medication, or something."
"They probably won't ask, if only because they're afraid of Katherine."
"That's actually what I was just thinking about. We've been so lucky to live somewhere where she can live and contribute and most people are cool about it. But it's like we're going back to the real world now, and I don't remember the real world being so accepting."
"Well, her situation is particular, but there are questions for all of us. Jan says the vast majority want to continue as U-town, somehow, somewhere."
"Did she take a poll? Not that I'm disagreeing, she's probably right. I feel the same way, too. But how does she know?"
"She's psychic. Really."
"Ah," she replied after a moment. "I can tell I should have been paying more attention. But that's one of the good things about being a dog. You can delegate a lot of things. When a big crisis comes, I just look up at Pete with my big brown doggy eyes, and he knows he has to figure it out and protect me. Then I can go off and have sex with Perry and SarahBeth without worrying."
"So, I guess they have a private room?"
"Not really. They're sharing a small storeroom with her entire officer corps."
"Doesn't that get awkward? I mean, not as awkward as being with your mother-in-law–"
Daphne laughed. "I think the main requirement to be an officer in the army is a complete lack of sexual inhibitions."
"Ah," I said. "I see."
She nodded. "Everything you're imagining, and more. But, to be honest, mostly I've been spending time with Pete and Katherine." She put a hand on her belly. "I'm just scared Katherine will get kicked out, wherever we end up, and we'll have to leave."
"You'd leave with them? Wouldn't you want to stay where there are doctors and hospitals?"
"They made a commitment, to stick with me and help me with this baby. I feel like that goes both ways. We're a family, the three of us, and I'm not going to be the one to leave. So, that's why I'm worried about where we're going to end up."
"What does Pete say?"
She smiled. "He says it will work out. They were talking about it in bed last night. We have a few thousand people who want to continue to live a certain way, we have to figure out how to do that."
"I guess dogs hear all the pillow talk, huh?"
"Hear it? We're all in the same bed together, and there's barely room. That's why I'm out here now, to give them some private time. I thought I'd visit the officer's mess, as SarahBeth calls it, but I didn't really feel like it."
She looked out across the ocean for a moment. "Is Jan going to write about this?" she asked. "Not just this week, but U-town in general. How are people going to know about it, if nobody writes anything?"
"Given how . . . friendly you are with Perry and SarahBeth, I'm surprised you're not suggesting it to him."
"Oh, they're already writing about it. They're working together. But they just got here, there's a lot they don't know."
"Well, I've always been the last one to know what my employer is planning to do, and marrying her hasn't changed that, but I'll tell you my idea. Perry would write one kind of book, since he's a novelist, and he's very young. Jan is only a little older than Perry, but she's a reporter, not a novelist, and she's had a lot more experience in her life. Plus, as you say, she was in U-town for the whole thing. So, her book would be very different. Pete is not a writer, but he's very sharp, and he collects facts and information. Probably nobody knows more about the day-to-day life in U-town than he does.
"So, in the back of my head, I've been hoping we can figure out a way to combine all of that into one book, one big one, not separate ones." I laughed. "You're actually the first person I've told this idea to."
She held up a finger. "One correction. You said 'person.'"
"Of course. I meant 'dog.'"
She smiled. "Thank you. Other than that, I think it's a great idea. If any of them don't want to do it, you tell me, and I'll bite them." She bared her teeth and growled.
"I'm sure that will help," I said. "But if we are going to continue, somewhere, as we were saying before, we'll have to balance the writing with the doing."
"That makes sense." She shrugged. "I used to work on my college newspaper. Maybe I could help. You know, dogs see a lot. People do stuff in front of a dog that they would never . . ." Her voice trailed off. "That would probably be a different type of book," she admitted.
I nodded. "The kind that won't be on the shelves, but if you talk to the librarian, she might let you see it."
She laughed and turned to face me. "Walk me home?"
I nodded. "Of course."
She took her leash from her jacket pocket and clipped it to her collar. She handed it to me, got down on all fours, and barked.
Of course, I had no idea where their cabin was, but she was in the lead, pulling me along. A few of the crew members gave us strange looks as we passed, but, as always happened, people were starting to get used to her. There was something about the way she walked and barked and shook herself and sniffed at people that made it clear, if you were paying attention, that this was not a joke, that there was no punchline.
As we reached the door she barked, and there were noises from inside the room which indicated that we were perhaps a minute or two too early. As we waited patiently, she leaned her head against my hip, and I found myself stroking her hair, a liberty I never would have imagined taking when we were talking on the deck.
Then, as I was adjusting to this, Katherine opened the door. She was flushed, sweaty and completely naked.
"Oh, hi, Marshall," she said. "Thanks for bringing her home. I hope she wasn't bothering you."
"No," I said after a pause, realizing I was still stroking Daphne's head. I couldn't figure out if it was better to keep my hand there or move it, but that was solved when Daphne barked and bounded into the room. I let go of the leash and she tumbled into the bed next to Pete, panting happily.
It was indeed a small storeroom, basically a closet, long enough for them to stretch out on the sleeping bag on the floor, but, as Daphne had said, barely wide enough for them all to fit side by side.
"Hello, Marshall," Pete said, lighting two cigarettes.
"Hello," I said. "Well, have a good evening."
Katherine nodded, taking a lit cigarette from Pete. "You, too."
As the door closed, I heard her say, "Daphne, I love you, too, but you're going to have to move over."
When I found our cabin again, I could hear voices from inside. Not wanting to interrupt the 'girl talk,' I stood outside the door and said:
–Knock knock.
She chuckled.
–Please come in, dear.
I opened the door to a very cozy scene.
Vicki was sitting on the dresser, her bare feet dangling. Her tiny high-top sneakers were on the floor.
Jan was cross-legged on our bed, smoking. Her jacket and tie were off, and her collar was open.
Sam had arrived before me, and he was sitting at the head of the other bed, leaning against the wall. His legs were apart, and Tammy was reclining between them, leaning back against his chest. His arms were around her, and she was as relaxed as I'd ever seen her. She wore a long, silk nightgown, and a sheer robe, her hair cascading around her shoulders.
"Marshall," Vicki said, "good timing. We were just talking about Jack and the trial."
"The non-trial," Tammy said as I sat next to Jan.
Vicki nodded. "We won't have one, at least not now. We can't have a trial, let alone shoot him or anything like that, because we're not a country, not at the moment. Remember the distinction we drew about the army, that if it was connected to a government, it was an army. If not, it's a gang. With all due respect to Neil, we're not the Jinx, carrying out our own rules and regulations. If we get to be a country again, we'll see about trying him. Right now. we can't. I will make it clear in the big meeting tomorrow that he has no authority now, so he can't take advantage of people."
"Which brings us to SarahBeth," I said. I turned to Sam. "Did you tell them?"
He shook his head. "I thought I'd leave that for you. I'm going back to medicine, remember?"
"Fair enough." I described SarahBeth's reaction to the "liaison" idea.
Vicki smiled as I talked, and at first I thought it was just her enjoyment of SarahBeth's chutzpah, but then, when I was done, she said, "I thought that would work." She smiled at my expression. "We needed to get her more involved. Knowing her, as I do, the only way to get that to happen was to push her away. Now, if I'd proposed the 'liaison' idea to her, she would have figured out what I was up to. But I thought she'd believe it from Katherine."
"Isn't that sort of using their friendship?" I asked.
"In a way, but the biggest thing wasn't their friendship, it was that Katherine is about the most honest person I know. That's why I couldn't let her in on what I was doing." She held up a hand. "I'll take her aside and talk to her tomorrow. I don't think she'll mind."
"She wasn't comfortable with the whole idea anyway," Jan said. "She'd much rather have SarahBeth at the table with us."
"Speaking of a table," Tammy said, "I do wonder if there's some larger room where we can meet. We have a lot to get done, and today was like meeting in a dirty closet."
"And, if Pete and Katherine and SarahBeth have actual seats 'at the table,'" I commented, "real chairs, at a real table, it will make it clear that they are included, and that we're planning, or at least hoping, that they will continue."
Tammy smiled. "It's really just good manners."
Vicki stood up and hopped down to the floor. She reached into her sneakers and pulled out her socks, sitting on the edge of our bed to pull them on.
"I'll talk to Pat," she said. "I'm sure there's a better room somewhere." She tied her sneakers and stood up. "See you all tomorrow."
We wished her good night and she left.
It's always difficult to know where to end a story. Unless it's a
Shakespearean tragedy (when all the major characters are dead, it's
time to bring down the curtain), it's always a judgment call. After
all, as long as you're still alive, there's always going to be more
to tell.
But I think this is a good place to stop, since the problems we'd been facing that week were mostly solved (or at least ameliorated), and the newer ones mostly hadn't become pressing yet.
Or possibly it's just that I want to avoid, or at least postpone for as long as possible, describing how thoroughly Nasty trounced me at Ping-Pong the following morning.
The End
"Sometimes we live no particular way but our own,
And sometimes we visit your country and live in your home,
Sometimes we ride on your horses, sometimes we walk alone,
Sometimes the songs that we hear are just songs of our own."
– "Eyes of the World" (Hunter/Garcia)