“You watch your damned mouth! Get out of here! Get out of here and don’t let me see you again, don’t let me ever see you!”
“What, you’re going to avoid mirrors from now on? I’m you, damn you, Jordan! That’s what you had me born to be, isn’t it? The newer, better you?”
“On your best day you aren’t, you little bastard! You’re her piece of work, you’re back in bed with her–”
“Forget your favorite obsession! You knew that territory before I ever got to it, you knew it, you connived your way into it, maybe you were even, God help you, in love with something other than having your own way. Maybe you can remember that. Maybe you can remember what it’s like to care about somebody besides yourself. Paulmight appreciate it!”
“You shut up about Paul! You let him the fuck alone, damn you!”
“Good!” he said. “Finally! Thank you!”and he gave way and let Grant drag him the rest of the way to the door.
And out it.
At which point they stood there in front of the security desk, and Mark and Gerry straightened up properly, as the door shut.
Justin drew in a deep breath, and looked up at Grant, who nursed a cut lip. “Is the tooth all right?”
“I’m sure it’s very solid,” Grant said. “I apologize. I sincerely apologize.”
“What for? For taking the punch?” He was all but vibrating with anger, but he had no one around him who wasn’t azi, and absolutely didn’t deserve what he was feeling; at the moment, a combination of the desire to break something and a conviction trying to surface, that what he’d just done and said hadn’t been the right thing–damn it. Damn it all, he’d set Jordan off, and not to Paul’s good. “I should go back in there.”
“You absolutely should not,” Grant said. “He’ll do many things, but he won’t hurt Paul.”
“What do you mean he won’t hurt Paul? He’s done nothing buthurt Paul.”
“Trust yourself. Trust Paul to handle it. Let it be.”
They had four witnesses who hadn’t asked to be witnesses, and who looked entirely confused and slightly upset.
“It’s all right.” Justin said, obliged to say it, being the only born‑man in the hallway, and supposedly rational. “It was a born‑man argument, over with. No one was hurt.”
“It is all right.” Grant said to the guards, who probably saw Grant as the sane and offended party, who had a bloody lip. “We’ll go to dinner now.”
“Are you going to be able to eat?” Justin asked, remorse and a decent shame finally making it to the surface. And he was still shaking with anger. “I don’t think I have much appetite.”
“Fruit ice,” Grant suggested. “That might do for a sore jaw.”
He was tempted to say a bar would do better, but not after his quarrel with Jordan. “Fruit ice,” he agreed, and they took the lift down and bought ices for Mark and Gerry while they were at it, over in Ed, where the best ice parlors were.
Everything was normal. Kids ran and played. Two preoccupied lovers walked along the mall, under the willows. The ice parlor had a vid, and it flashed, ominously enough, with the News logo.
Justin took a hard draw of the shaved lime ice, just watched. They had the transcript crawl on. It said:
Councillor of Information Catherine Lao has been taken to the hospital this evening with chest pains…
He nudged Grant, but Grant was already watching, solemn‑faced.
The Councillor’s sudden crisis came in a late committee meeting. She has been in failing health for several months. The Proxy Councillor for Information, Adlai Edgerton, has not been available for comment.
Meanwhile the crisis continues in Defense, as the incumbent Councillor for Defense has continued to postpone any announcement of a Proxy appointment; and has been closeted with the Proxy Councillor for Science in a session closed to the news media.
Meanwhile the state of affairs in Reseune seems to hare normalized, with a declaration by Reseune Administration that, while Yanni Schwartz, current Proxy Councillor for Science, remains as Administrator of Reseune. Ariane Emory, aged eighteen, has formally assumed administrative control of ReseuneSec…
“So they know,” Justin said.
“Lao being sick, that’s no news.”
“That’s the sort of thing they say before somebody turns up dead,” Justin said.
“And Edgerton’s gone quiet.” Grant shook his head and took another draw on the lime. “It’s not sounding good.”
“It’s sounding like we could have a new Councillor for Information before long,” Justin said. “It’s what Ari said, we’re losing too many that have a grasp of what went on.”
“Ignore it,” Grant said. “It’s over our heads. We don’t have an opinion. Keep it that way.”
“I do,” he said. “That’s the hell of it. I can’t advise her. It she asked me what to do, I wouldn’t know the least thing to tell her. And she put me in charge, mores the pity.”
“I’m not sure Yanni knows what to do at this point,” Grant said. “Cheer up.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know why,” Grant said. “I just know it’s what I said, over our heads. We can’t stop it. We can’t do a dammed thing, except–”
“Except wait for Jordan to blow?”
“That, yes.”
“He’s not speaking to me. Remember?”
“I give it seven days.”
“I don’t know why. He has a very good memory.”
“He’s something we can take care of,” Grant said, “so he doesn’tland in young Ari’s new security office…and neither do we. We stay out of there, and we’re doing the best we can be expected to do.”
“And we keep Alpha Wing from revolt,” he said, feeling a little lighter‑hearted. “At least that’s not going to happen.”
“Won’t,” Grant said. “But we can double‑check that the services are going to work, if we do get another shut‑down.”
He nodded. It was a practical thing to do, a Grant kind of thing to do. He’d interfered outside Alpha Wing for what he’ promised himself was the last time, the only time. If Jordan wanted to talk to him hereafter, he’d talk; but if Jordan wanted not to, well, maybe in a quieter world and with Paul better off, he might have options that didn’t exist with the current state of affairs. Time cured some things.
It hurt. It hurt a fair bit that Grant had taken the shot for him, but that was a revelation in itself. Maybe it would penetrate Jordan’s hard head, that that was exactly what Paul had done. Jordan’s perfectly run little hell had just gotten revised, for good or for ill. And what was Jordan going to do about it? Suggest to Paul that he go on absorbing guilt and responsibility, the way things had been?
He didn’t think Jordan would do that, not when it came to putting it into words. And maybe if Jordan read the manual he’ll annotated for twenty years, read it in the light of what he and Grant had just done to fix it, there was a remote chance Jordan would even see it for himself.
BOOK THREE Section 5 Chapter xi
JULY 27, 2424
0403H
“So you want to know about the military,”the first Ari said, out of Base One. “Are you having trouble with Defense?”
“Yes,” Ari said.
“So did I,”the voice said, which was more and more like her voice, or vice versa. “I particularly had trouble with Azov, who was a bastard of the first order. But you probably don’t want to hear about Azov. Is your question about Azov?”
She was tempted. But it was the small hours of the morning, and her head hurt so, and she didn’t have the time. “No.” she said.
“Is your question about defense projects or about the Bureau of Defense? You can give a keyword now. The program will find it.”