J.D. made a noncommittal noise. It would be bad manners to point out that most of the scientists on board associated mostly with other scientists.
Victoria stopped short. "A moment—" Her eyes went out of focus and her face relaxed into a blank expression.
Her attention returned. "Damn!" she whispered. She looked shaken. "Come on, let's go!" She sprinted across the grass, ignoring the path.
J.D. pounded along beside her. "What's wrong?"
"I set Arachne to signal me if we got any more orders.
The chancellor has forbidden gatherings of more than three
190 vonda N. Mdntyre
people. This is outrageous'" She stowed so J.D. could keep up.
Like most people, J.D. needed to stand still and focus her attention inside her mind in order to communicate with Arachne. She would have to wait till they reached her destination to read the orders.
She had never noticed before that swimming and running used muscles differently, and she was used to swimming. She induced a pulse of the metabolic enhancer and gasped for extra air as the adrenaline hit.
**it really bums me," Victoria said, sounding not the least out of breath. "The U.S. demanded that we run the expedition under your constitution, and now it's breaking its own articles left and right. Who do they think they are?"
At the large hummock that covered the genetics department, she slowed and stopped. J.D. stopped beside her, still breathing heavily, her heart pounding from the enhancer.
When she had caught her breath, she straightened up.
"We think we're powerful and rich, I'm afraid," she said.
She felt both attacked and embarrassed because she had no defense. "It's an old habit."
Victoria looked abashed. "I shouldn't jump down your throat about it," she said.
They hurried into Stephen Thomas's office. Satoshi and Feral Korzybski had already arrived. Professor Thanthavong stood by the window, staring out, her arms folded. Iphigenie DuPre let herself gently into a worn bamboo chair, moving with caution outside zero-g.
Stephen Thomas stomped in. He stripped off his gray Star-farer t-shirt and attacked it with a pair of dissecting scissors. Like Zev, he had fine gold hair on his chest and his forearms.
"There's not a goddamned decent pair of scissors in the place," he said. He sawed at the neckband of the t-shirt. The crystal at the hollow of his throat changed from black to red to blue.
"What are you doing?" J.D. said.
"Complying with regulations." He ripped away the last few inches of the neckband and set to work on the sleeves.
J.D. closed her eyes and read the new orders. First, the prohibition against meetings. Second: "Starting immediately, personnel of Starfarer will wear standard-issue cloth-
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ing. Only regulation apparel will be tolerated." Third: "All faculty members will immediately suspend current research and prepare detailed papers describing the defense applications and implication of their work."
"You'd better shut the door," Victoria said bitterly.
"I think we should leave the damned door open," Stephen Thomas said.
"I think we're in for a fight," Satoshi said. "The clothing rule is trivial—"
"Speak for yourself," Stephen Thomas said.
"—but forbidding public assembly, and suspending research . . . This is serious."
J.D. sank down on the thick windowsill, her shoulders slumping. "I don't know what to do," she said. "My work doesn't have any defense applications, and nobody issued me any standard clothes. I didn't know there was such a thing."
"Don't worry about it, J.D.," Stephen Thomas said. "The orders are obviously illegal." He put on the shredded t-shirt, inside out. The printed emblem showed faintly through the wrong side of the fabric. "How do you like my 'regulation apparel'?"
Thanthavong turned away from the window. She was wearing a gray jumpsuit with Starfarer's insignia on the left chest.
"The orders may be judged illegal." She spoke in a calm and reasoned tone. "But defying them, especially publicly, could cause us a great deal of trouble before we ever get to court, much less win."
,. "Professor, don't you think they're just trying to provoke
us?" Victoria said. "Neither Chancellor Blades nor Earth
* Space has any authority to tell us who we can talk to or what research we're allowed, never mind what we wear!"
"Victoria, have you read your contract?"
"Sure," Victoria said. "I mean I skimmed it when it arrived. It was about a hundred megabytes of legalese, whoever reads that stuff? EarthSpace said do you want to go on the expedition? and I said sure and they said sign here, so I did."
She stopped, abashed by the admission, then looked around and realized that no one else, except Thanthavong, had read the contract through.
"The standard contract gives them a certain authority over you and your actions."
192 vonda N. Mdntyre
"The authority only extends as far as they can get somebody to enforce it," Stephen Thomas said.
"You can be as flippant as you like, Stephen Thomas,"
Thanthavong said. "But EarthSpace can ask any of the primary governmental associates to declare martial law."
The comment astonished everyone but Feral.
Thanthavong continued. "If they declare martial law and send troops—"
"Troops!" Satoshi said. "Good lord—'"
"—to enforce it, I think that our chances of continuing with the expedition are vanishingly small."
"You mean we're screwed," Stephen Thomas said.
"Well put."
"You aren't exaggerating, are you?" Iphigenie said. "You believe they may send armed forces to take us over.''
"I think the possibility is measurable."
For a few moments, no one could think of anything else to say.
"I don't understand why the chancellor decided these orders were necessary in the first place," Satoshi said. "Never mind whether he'll get away with them."
"It's the meeting tonight," Victoria said. "They don't want us to hold it. The other stuff is just for distraction."
"It's more than the meeting," Feral said.
"What can you tell us about this, Mr. Korzybski?" Than-thavong asked.
"It begins with the divers."
J.D. started. "What do the divers have to do with anything?"
"They applied for political asylum in Canada—"
"I know, but—"
"That's an embarrassment to the U.S. government. Which doesn't want to be embarrassed twice in a row. So you get the flak—more restrictions. I can't tell you where I heard this.
I haven't been able to confirm it, but it feels right. The rumor is that the divers fled because if they stayed they'd be coerced into spying."
Victoria turned to J.D. "Did you know about this?"
J.D. stared at the floor. "If Lykos makes a public statement about why the divers left, I can talk about what I know. Otherwise, I can't. Victoria, it doesn't matter—whether I
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knew or not, I wouldn't have made this connection. I should have, but ... "
"We're a resource," Victoria said. "We are. The starship is. The divers were a resource- Governments can tolerate unexploited resources. But not lost ones. Somebody has decided that letting the expedition proceed is equivalent to losing Starfarer.''
"So now they don't intend to allow us to proceed," Iphi-genie said-
"I don't think so."
"But—" J.D. heard someone in the hall. As if she were a conspirator, as if she were breaking a reasonable !aw by sitting in a room and talking with her co-workers, she fell silent and glanced toward the doorway. Her reaction caused everyone else to look in the same direction.
And so Gerald Hemminge appeared in a moment of quiet during which they were all staring at the doorway, during which it looked as if everyone, not just J.D., felt frightened and guilty.