“Sure, hon,” Millicent said.
Alex nodded. “We’ll talk next week.”
The two older folks winked off. Scotty alone remained.
“So… how are you, really?” she asked. “Are you ready for this?”
“I’m heading up,” he said. “I wouldn’t if I had any doubts.”
“Nightmares?”
“Got them under control. How about you, hon?”
That question caught her off guard. “What?”
“How are the nightmares?”
She felt as if he’d knocked the air out of her chest. “That’s not fair, Scotty.”
“Why not? You’ve certainly spent enough time worried about my welfare.”
“You ran away, Scotty.” Almost before the words crossed her lips, she regretted them.
Scotty laughed without humor. “I wasn’t going to be much good to anyone up there, least of all you. I didn’t need to be a quarter-million miles from Earth to work a desk job.”
After the accident, that would have been about all he was qualified for, too. No more surface travel. No vast, razor-like moonscapes and pinpoint stars for Scotty. Life here was hard enough without stress-induced phobias. All the headshrinks agreed that he should go home. Even if it cost a damned fine marriage.
“Are people still talking? If so, I’m sorry.” A pause. “I miss you. And that’s the truth.”
“Me, too. There really hasn’t been anyone much…” She trailed off. Dammit, she didn’t have to explain herself. Lunar relationships were a lot like the ones that formed in Antarctic stations: intense and temporary. Human beings did the best they could. But even given the circumstances, Kendra had always thought they had something special. Something that might have endured, even if they’d had to go to Earth to nurture it.
She felt her eyes mist, and wanted off the line before she wiped them in front of him. “I don’t have time for this right now. Let’s back off before we start fighting.”
He nodded. “I’ll be up there soon. We’ll get it all worked out. Promise.”
She sighed, and managed to smile. “We’d better. I can still kick your butt in thumb-wrestling.”
“Only if you cheat.”
They shared a time-delayed laugh, and the mood genuinely lightened. A good point to end things, while they were still smiling. “Bye, Earthman.”
“Bye, Moonmaid.”
The line winked off.
10
November 5, 2085
The lander arrived precisely on time: a spiderlegged caterpillar settling in a fountain of dust on a wide red double-spiral target pad. The shuttlecar rolled up against its side. Automated flanges locked into place. The doors opened in sequence, three sets, sealing behind the passengers as they boarded a car that looked like a silver sausage. The car ran them to the base airlock and another triple airlock.
At first Kendra saw only two exceptionally statuesque women striding down the ramp, one Asian with straight black shoulder-length hair, the other European with brilliant red hair of similar length and texture. Both were conspicuously muscular with fashionable fat padding. Then they stepped apart, revealing a tiny man-no more than five foot two-walking just behind them as if they were a royal guard.
Even in rumpled travel clothes, Xavier radiated theatricality. Somehow he transformed his typical newbie’s lunar clumsiness into performance art, bouncing and then awkwardly catching his balance with every other step. His escorts were better at it.
Still, she could tell that he struggled to remain unimpressed by his surroundings.
“Mr. Xavier?” Kendra asked.
“Just Xavier, please.” He was beautiful for a man, shaven-headed, with blond eyebrows capping a delicate face. His eyes were a brilliant blue, intense and intelligent. He was small-boned, barely rising to her shoulder, but already flirting with her. “My assistants are Wu Lin and Magique. Magique does not speak.”
“Welcome to Heinlein base,” Kendra said.
Xavier’s angelic little face split in a smile. “I have to admit I thought I’d been everywhere and seen everything. These last weeks have opened my eyes.”
Kendra and her holographic assistant exchanged an expression of surprise.
Kendra said, “We have a pretty tight schedule today, but we want to get you to the game center, and then to your rooms.”
He nodded. “That would be fine.”
They waited for the luggage pods to be loaded onto their vehicle, and then boarded a tube-car for the gaming center.
“I understand that we’ll have privacy?”
“Yes. Much nicer than the dormitories,” Kendra said. “Your own private crater.”
His answering smile was pornographic. “Perhaps you’d care to show it to me.”
“One crater’s pretty much like another,” she kept her voice light and pleasant. “Not luxurious, but hopefully adequate.”
He was staring out through the glass partition at glare-white and coal-black scenery. “Luxury is not imperative. My requirement is seclusion.”
“I’ve heard that gaming parties tend to run wild…”
He shook his small, perfectly formed head. “Not what you think. I can become… intensely emotional when I game. Lamps and chairs and waitrons and cleaner mechs can be at great risk. There is often… a bit of breakage. ‘To create you must first destroy.’ I believe Picasso said that.”
“‘ Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try!’” She paused, then when Wu Lin seemed puzzled, added, “Dr. Seuss said that.”
Magique choked on a silent giggle. Xavier’s thin lips curled up in a smile.
“At any rate,” Kendra said, “if space is what you need, we have plenty of it.”
“So… Dr. Seuss,” Xavier said, nodding as if she had confirmed something. “Have you children?”
“No.”
“Married?”
Kendra said, “Once upon a time.”
The red-haired Magique smirked. She was gorgeous, and muscular with a fatty sheath, in the current European Union Fit/Fat style. The goal was to maintain a perfect blood pressure and immune profile, with the roundest curves possible. She signed to Wu Lin with her plump hands. Wu Lin giggled.
“How long have you been up here?” Xavier asked.
“Seven years.”
“And the ratio of women to men…?”
“We’re outnumbered. As you must know.” Kendra sighed. “I’m fine, thanks. No help needed on that front. While we’re at it, may I ask…? Magique said something that triggered merriment.”
Wu Lin nodded. “She said you look like a twentieth-century fitness model.” The redhead nodded happy agreement.
The trio radiated a cozy, slightly predatory sensuality. Kendra couldn’t resist visualizing a zero-gee anaconda ball, and suppressed a chill of revulsion. Maybe they just thought they were being polite, assuming she’d feel rejected without an invitation to the fun and games. Fortunately, they had reached their destination, and she was able to change the subject.
The Game Center was a dome, of course, the ceiling five meters high. The last few workers were still nipping and tucking, and the smell of fresh paint still tinged the air. Xavier bounced onto the central stage, stopped and looked around himself. He said, “Very similar to the Euro Dream Park unit.”
He waved his hands in an input field, and it calibrated. She’d thought she’d be edging her way out the door, but Xavier’s manner had become more professional the instant he began manipulating alien forms like stringless marionettes. His annoying, smarmy persona faded, and in its place appeared a virtuoso performer. Despite her irritation, she found the transformation fascinating.
A circular metal stage in the center of the room glowed, and a ball of yellow light levitated above it. Xavier bounced up the two steps to the platform. As he did, an insectoid alien bounded into the floating light field. When the little man shifted position, the insect followed his motions precisely. It wore a bandolier hung with weapons shaped to its big padded hands. It moved with an oddly disjointed grace. When Kendra glanced over at Xavier, he was performing the same odd dance.