"We'll be spending a lot of time in transit," he said. "I wasn't able to keep up with the current literature in archeology while I was in the Academy, and I planned to be doing a lot of reading."
Not exactly sociable. "Do you play chess?" she asked hopefully. He shook his head. "But I do play sennet. That's an ancient Egyptian game. I have a very interesting software version I could install; I doubt it would take you long to learn it, though it takes a lifetime to master."
The last was said a bit smugly. And there had been no offer from him to learn her game. Still, she did have access to far more computing power than he did; it wouldn't take her more than an hour to learn the game, if that.
"I see that your special interest is in extinct space going races," she ventured. "I have a very strong background in the Salomon-Kildaire Entities."
He looked skeptical. "I think Doctor Russell Gaines-Barklen has probably dealt with them as fully as they need to be, although we'll probably have some chances to catch things survey teams miss. That's the benefit of being trained to look for specifics."
She finally sent him back with mixed feelings. He was arrogant, no doubt about it. But he was also competent He shared her interests, but his pet theories differed wildly from hers. He was possible, if there were no other choices, but he wasn't what she was looking for.
"Chria Chance is up next," CenCom said when she reported she was ready for the next. "But you won't like her."
"Why, because she's got a name that's obviously assumed?" Neither CenCom nor the Academy cared what you called yourself, provided they knew the identity you had been born with and the record that went with it. Every so often someone wanted to adopt a pseudonym. Often it was to cover a famous High Family name, either because the bearer was a black sheep, or because (rarely) he or she didn't want special treatment But sometimes a youngster got a notion into his or her head to take on a holostar-type name.
"No," CenCom replied, not bothering to hide his amusement. "You won't like her because, well, you'll see."
Chria's records were good, about like Garrison's, with one odd note in the personality profile. Nonconformist, it said.
Well, there was nothing wrong with that. Pota and Braddon were certainly not conformists in any sense.
But the moment that Chria stepped into the central room, Tia knew that CenCom was right.
She wore her Academy uniform, all right, but it was a specially tailored one. Made entirely of leather; real leather, not synthetic. And she wore it entirely too well for Tia to feel comfortable around her. For the rest, she was rapier-thin, with a face like a clever fox and hair cut aggressively short. Tia already felt intimidated, and she hadn't even said anything yet!
Within a few minutes worth of questions, Chria shook her head. "You're a nice person, Tia," she said forthrightly, "and you and I would never partner well. I'd run right over you, and you'd sit there in your column, fuming and resentful, and you'd never say a word." She grinned with feral cheer. "I'm a carnivore, a hunter. I need someone who'll fight back! I enjoy a good fight!"
"You'd probably have us go chasing right after pirates," Tia said, a little resentful already. "If there were any in the neighborhood, you'd want us to look for them!"
"You bet I would," Chria responded without shame.
A few more minutes of exchange proved to Tia that Chria was right. It would never work. With a shade of regret, Tia bade her farewell. While she liked a good argument as well as the next person, she didn't like for arguments to turn into shouting matches, which was precisely what Chria enjoyed. She claimed it purged tensions.
Well, maybe it did. And maybe that was why her favorite form of music, to the exclusion of everything else, was opera. She was a fanatic, to put it simply, And Tia, well, wasn't.
But there was certainly a lot of emotion-purging and carrying on in those old operas. She had the feeling that Chria fancied herself as a kind of latter-day Valkyrie. Hoy-yo to-ho.
She reported her rejection to CenCom, with the recommendation that she thought Chria Chance had the proper mental equipment to partner a ship in the Military Courier Service. "Between you, me, and the airwaves," CenCom replied., "that's my opinion, too. Bloodthirsty wench. Well, she'll get her chance. Military got your classmate Pol, and he's just as bloody minded as she is. I'll see the recommendation goes in; meanwhile, next up is Harkonen Carl-Ulbright."
Carl was a disappointment. Average grades, and while he was congenial, Tia knew that she would run right over the top of him. He was shy, hardly ever ventured an opinion, and when he did, he could be induced to change it in an eye-blink. "However, Carl," she said, just before he went to the lift, making no effort to hide his discouragement. "My classmate Raul is the XR One-Oh-Two-Nine. I think you two would get along splendidly. I'm going to ask CenCom to set up your very next interview with him, he was just installed today and I know he hasn't got a brawn yet. Tell him I sent you."
That cheered up the young man considerably. He would be even more cheered when he learned that Raul had a Singularity Drive ship. And Tia would bet that his personality profile and Raul's matched to a hair. They'd make a great team, especially when their job included carrying VIP passengers. Neither of them would get in the way or resent it if the VIPs ignored them.
"I got all that, Tia," CenCom said as soon as the boy was gone. "Consider it logged. They ought to make you a Psych; a Counselor, at least. It was good of you to think of Raul; none of us could come up with a match for him, but we were trying to match him with females."
If she'd had hands, she would have thrown them up. "Become a Psych? Saints and agents of grace defend us!" she quipped. "I think not! Who's next?"
"Andrea Polo y De Gras," CenCom said. "You won't like her, either. She doesn't want you."
"With the Polo y De Gras name, I'm not surprised," Tia sighed. "Wants something with a little more zing to it than A and E, hmm? Would she be offended if I agreed with her before she bothered to come out here?"
"I doubt it," CenCom replied, "but let me check." A pause, and then he came back. "She's very pleased, actually. I think that she has something cooking with the Family, and the strings haven't had time to get pulled yet. Piff. High Families. I don't know why they send their children to Space Academy in the first place."
Tia felt moved to contradict him. "Because some of them do very well and become a credit to the Services," she replied, with just a hint of reproach.
"True, and I stand corrected. Well, your last brawn candidate is the late Alexander Joli-Chanteu." The cheer in his voice told her that he was making a bad joke out of the situation.
"Late, hmm? That isn't going to earn him any gold stars in his Good-Bee Book," Tia said, a bit acidly. Her parents' fetish for punctuality had set a standard she expected those around her to match. Especially brawn candidates.
Well, then at least go over his records. She scanned them quickly and came up, confused. When Alexander was good, he was very, very, good. And when he was bad, he was abysmal. Often in the same subject. He would begin a class with the lowest marks possible, then suddenly catch fire, turn around, and pull a miraculous save at the end of the semester. Erratic performances, said his personality profile. Tia not only agreed, she thought that the evaluator was understating the case.