“Not me, commander.” Vleit shook her head, still giggling. “You tell them. Rank Has Its Problems; remember?”
“Yeah!”
“What was it?”
“Yeah; come on; tell us!”
“All right, all right,” Sharrow said, sitting up properly in her seat. Then, suddenly, she looked worried; her smooth brow furrowed. “Shit,” she said. “I’ve forgotten what the fucking word was.” She shook her head.
She put her head down on the table and pretended to cry. At least two caps bounced off her before Cenuij roared, “Schlotch!”
Sharrow looked up quickly. “You sure?”
“Positive,” Cenuij said precisely.
Sharrow sighed. “Yeah; schlotch.”
“So?” Miz said, arms wide. “What’s schlotch onomatopoeic for or with or whatever?”
“It’s the sound,” Sharrow said, leaning conspiratorially over the table, and glancing up and down the street. “Of…” She shook her head. “It’s no good,” she said with feigned regret. “I’m just not drunk enough yet to tell you.”
“WHAT?”
“Sharrow!”
“Oh, come on…Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Vleit; what the hell was it?”
“Sharrow; you said you’d tell; what is it?”
Sharrow grinned, fended off a flung cap then put her head back and laughed loudly while the others protested.
A timid-looking waiter approached from out of the bistro, holding a tray nervously to his chest as though it was a shield. He came up to Sharrow; she smiled at the young waiter and adjusted her cap.
The waiter coughed. “Um, Commander Sharrow?” he said.
“You read a good name-tag, kid,” Miz said, winking at him.
“Yeah,” Cenuij said. “Stick with us, we’ll make you a waiter. Oh. You are a-”
Sharrow waved them both to be quiet. “Yes,” she said, staring rather blearily at the youth.
“Phone call for you, Commander. Military.” The young waiter scurried back into the bistro.
Sharrow looked puzzled. She put her hand into the pocket of her uniform jacket, which was hanging over the back of her seat. She winced and grimaced, then brought her hand out covered in red goo. “What miserable scumbag put ghrettis sauce all over my fucking comm set?” she roared, standing and letting the red sauce drip onto the pavement.
“Shit,” Miz said in a small voice. “I thought I did that to Dloan’s jacket, back at the inn.”
“Dloan’s?” Sharrow shouted at him. She pointed at Dloan’s uniform. “How many bars on his jacket? One! How many on mine? Two!” she yelled, pointing at them with her other hand.
Miz shrugged, smiling. “I thought I was seeing double.”
“Fucking double guard duties,” Sharrow muttered as she strode past him towards the bistro interior. “Get that shit out of my pocket; now!”
“Must be strong stuff, that ghrettis sauce,” she heard Dloan musing. “Mil comm set’s supposed to be waterproof to a pressure of…”
Inside the bistro it was quiet and dark; only the staff were there. “Thanks, Vol,” she said to the proprietor as she took the phone.
“Commander Sharrow here,” she said, nodding appreciatively to Vol when he handed her a cloth for her hand.
She closed her eyes as she listened. After a while she said, “Comm set broke down, sir. No idea why, sir.” Her eyes screwed tighter. “Possibly enemy action, sir.”
She wiped her hand and nodded again to Vol, who went to sit at the far end of the bistro with the rest of the staff.
She glanced back through the bistro’s windows to the street at the group, who were trying to sort out whose cap was whose. She smiled, watching them, then returned her attention to the phone. “Yes, sir! On our way, sir,” she said, and made to put the phone down. “I beg your pardon, sir?” She frowned at her reflection on the other side of the bar, visible through the glasses and between the up-ended barrels. “The doc? I mean, surgeon-commander… of course, sir.”
She looked at her reflection again, shrugged at herself.
“Yes,” she said into the phone. “Hi, doc; what’s the problem?” She leant on the bar, pushing her cap up and rubbing her face. “What-? Oh, the check-ups.” She grinned at her reflection. “What is it; somebody taken a rad-blast, or are we talking exotic diseases?”
She listened for half a minute or so.
She watched the reflection of her face in the mirror go pale.
After a while she cleared her throat and said, “Yes, I’ll do that, doc. Of course.” She started to put the phone down again, then stopped and said, “Thanks, doc,” into it, and only then put it back behind the counter.
She stood there for a moment, staring at her image in the mirror. She glanced down at her shirt. “Shit,” she whispered, looking back up to her reflection. “And you’re pickling the little fucker.”
Vol came back round the other side of the bar with a tray full of dirty glasses. She started when she saw him, then leaned over, beckoning.
“Vol. Vol!” she whispered.
The aproned proprietor, burly-fit and placid as ever, leaned over to her and whispered back, “Yes, Commander?”
“Vol, you got anything’ll make me sick as a lubber?”
“Sick as a lubber?” he said, looking puzzled.
“Yes!” she whispered, glancing out at the others. “Filthy gut-grenaded,throat-scouring, turned inside-out sick!”
Vol shrugged. “Too much drink usually does the trick,” he said.
“No!” she hissed. “No, something else!”
“Stick your fingers down your throat?”
She shook her head quickly. “Tried that as a kid; got it to work on my half-sister, but never on me. What else?” She glanced at the others again. “Quickly!”
“Very salty water,” Vol said, spreading his hands.
She slapped him on the shoulder. “Fix me enough for two.”
She turned and walked towards the door, hesitated, then bit her lip and put her hand into a trouser pocket. She pulled out a coin and clutched it in her hand as she went out to the others. They looked up at her. Miz was still scraping her jacket pocket clean of sauce; the comm set lay on the table covered in red, like something butchered.
She spread her arms. “Well, they still haven’t sorted out the situation, guys,” she told them. There were various mutters, mostly of disapproval. “They’re still talking,” she said. “But meanwhile the festivities continue; looks like another tour at least. We’re overdue at Embarkation Asshole now.” She sighed. “I’ll go phone a truck.” She hesitated, then went up to Miz and presented the coin in her hand to him. “Toss that,” she told him.
Miz looked round the others. He shrugged, tossed the coin. She looked at how it landed on the table. She nodded and turned to go.
“Yes?” Miz said pointedly.
“Tell you later,” she told him, and went back into the bistro.
“Thanks, Vol,” she said, taking the glass of cloudy water from him and heading for the toilet. “Phone us a military truck, will you?” she called. She took a preparatory sip of the salted water. “Yech!”
“Commander Sharrow!” Vol called after her. “You said make enough for two; is that all for you?”
She shook her head. “Not exactly.”
“Bleurghch! Aauullleurch! Hooowwerchresst-t-t!” she shouted down the toilet-hole, and for a few moments, as her stomach clenched again (and she thought, Hell, maybe this’s doing the little bastard more harm than the booze would have), she listened to the noises she was making, and remembered the game they’d been playing, and actually found it all ridiculously funny.
Zefla watched Sharrow looking at the facade of what had been the Bistro Onomatopoeia, and which was now an antique bookshop.
Sharrow shook her head.
“Oh well,” she said. She looked down at a coin she held in her hand. “Guess that proves it.” She put the coin back in her pocket. “You never can go back.” She turned and walked away.