“Xander.”
“Sam,” Xander said, a shade uneasily. He was Andie Mae’s man, but he had been involved with this convention for a number of years before Andie Mae had reached out to raise him to his present position. For all of those years bar this last one, it had been Sam Dutton who had been the reigning God King of the con, whose very name had been synonymous with it for almost as long as Xander had been alive. Xander’s loyalty was to Andie Mae, but he could not help the tiny twinge of guilt, and he could not seem to make himself look Sam in the eye. Quite.
“It’s okay,” Sam said, with a mixture of serenity and resignation. He understood this reaction perfectly. “Listen, I just wanted to say… if there’s anything I can do. You know.”
“It did occur to a few that you might have invited these things,” Xander said, with a commendable attempt at a sincere chuckle.
Sam snorted. “I think you might have rather enormous delusions about my grandeur. If I could pull off this kind of thing, I probably would have done when I was actually in a position to rake in the glory, as it were.”
“But this way you don’t get the responsibility,” Xander said. “And you still get to enjoy watching everyone squirm.”
“Son, trust me. Nothing to do with me. I haven’t even been formally introduced to the Creatures from Outer Space yet. Yes, I was at the Opening Ceremonies, yes, I read the newsletter, yes, I realize that we aren’t exactly in Kansas anymore, Toto — but I don’t know anything beyond what I could piece together myself from all of these sources.”
“You should come see the replicator,” Xander said.
“Oook?” Sam said politely, tilting his head a little. “What would those be…?”
“They…well, you watched Star Trek,” Xander said. “Those things. You ask, and it produces. Anything from tea to, I’m sure, fresh and lustily squirming racht for the Klingons amongst us.”
Xander didn’t really think he was breaching the agreed — upon need — to — know arrangement when it came to the replicators — this was Sam, and with only a tiny tweak in the space — time continuum he would have been the one in charge of this whole mess anyway. But he had forgotten, in the heat of the moment of the reveal, that the two of them were not alone.
The kid from the panel blinked, clutching his paraphernalia close to his chest. “You’re telling us. We have. Working. Replicators.”
“Marius,” Sam said absently, making the belated introduction. “Marius Tarkovski. His mother entrusted him to my care this weekend, God help her. Marius, meet Xander Washington. And Xander… what Marius said. Are you serious?”
“I asked one for Earl Gray,” Xander said, quite unable to hide the grin that crept onto his face. “And it produced exactly that. Then someone asked for a pizza and it produced one the like of which you’ve never…”
“Xander!” Libby came surging out of the stairwell that led into the corridor which the panel rooms were on. Xander flushed, guiltily, caught in the act of spilling the replicator beans — but Libby had other things on her mind. “Is everything… all right?”
“I think so,” Xander said. “The kid helped.”
Marius turned an alarming shade of beetroot. “I did? Really?”
“You took on the crisis, and you headed it off at the pass,” Xander said. “Kudos.”
“I trained him,” Sam said, with a quicksilver grin. “I meant what I said, all joking aside. If there’s anything I can do… and yes, I would love to see a replicator.”
“You told him about those?” Libby said, eyes flicking to Xander’s face.
“This time last year, he would have been the one dealing with them,” Xander said, a shade defensively. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Don’t worry, Libby, the secret is safe with me,” Sam said. And then added, directly to Xander, “Do you still have my cell number?”
“What, is your cell working? Mine has been pretty much a brick since we left Earth orbit.”
Sam gave a small helpless grin, and shrugged. “Instinct,” he murmured.
“Well, I suppose we’ll have to figure out other means of communication. Just think, we may go back to the basics. When was the last time you actually remember sending messages on paper? Just like they used to do in pre — history? In the meantime…have fun. Try not to fall off the edge of the world. And if you see anything you think we ought to know about…”
“I don’t think Andie Mae wants me anywhere near ops,” Sam said. “I’ll send a ringer.” He tapped Marius on the shoulder.
Xander nodded. “Secret handshake, kid. Remember it. Just ask for Xander.”
“Right,” Marius said.
“We’ll keep in touch,” Sam said. He and Marius nodded at the two committee members and walked off towards the elevators.
Libby rounded on Xander.
“What was all that about?”
“Tell you later,” he said. “Is everything okay upstairs — with Boss and the underdroids?”
“I told you this would be a bad idea,” Libby grumbled as the two of them fell into step along the corridor.
“No, you didn’t. Or more to the point — everybody might have. I thought it was worth a try — we needed to get a conversation — is that Rory over there? In full fig?”
Their media Guest of Honor, Rory Grissom a.k.a. Captain James Fleming of the starship Invictus, was lounging against the wall as they came out of the stairwell and rounded the corner into the main corridor. He was dressed in his tight — fitting Invictus uniform, which showed off a still remarkably fit physique given that at least a decade had passed since his star turn and the TV series in which he had made the uniform famous. Surrounding him was the usual bevy of fans simpering up at him, and Xander shook his head in astonishment
“I’m damned if I know how he does it,” Xander muttered. “Some of those girls were in kindergarten when he strutted around as Captain Fleming. How do they even know who he is?”
“Somebody in the Green Room called him Captain Charisma,” Libby said.
“No kidding,” Xander said. “Let get out of here before he… aw, damn, too late…”
Rory had noticed them, and raised a silver — clad arm in a gesture that was half greeting and half salute. And then he bent his head to his audience and said something to them before giving them a small bow and striding towards Libby and Xander.
“I see you’re enjoying the con,” Xander said to Rory, nodding toward the giggling girls who were still hanging together in a tight knot of whispering and eyelash — batting adoration.
“You might do me a solid,” Rory said, in a low conspiratorial voice.
“Sure, anything I can do…” Xander began, in full ConCom mode to the convention’s Guest of Honor.
Rory turned his head marginally and indicated his groupies with a subtle jerk of his chin in their direction.
“Some of them, they’re a tad nervous about things,” Rory said. “You know, about all this. Being on a rock flying through space headed for maybe the Moon and maybe — if we miss it — who knows where, and if we don’t miss it, well, then, you know… Anyway.”
“They tell us they’ll take us back,” Xander said. “Right now, it’s all I got. We have to trust them.”
“Mutiny would probably be easy,” Rory said. “There’s only four of them as best as I can tell, and the sheer numbers…”
“Easy? It would be naked savages with dart guns facing laser cannons,” Xander muttered. “But even if that were not the uncomfortable reality, it would be fairly pointless, wouldn’t it, because, well, take them out and what do we do next?… We just have to trust them. For the nonce. Not much real choice there.”