"Hey, it's all the same to me," Brim answered. "If you'd rather inspect than have me finish this foundation, suit yourself. I doubt if I'll have a hard time finding other places looking fora good axeman."
"Yeah, well..." The man frowned and scratched his head through gray, stringy hair. Clearly, Brim had scored a point. He turned to a weather-beaten construction manager bent over a nearby console, clearly deep in concentration. "Whadda you think?" he demanded.
"Let him finish," the old man replied without looking up. "He'll be all right, believe me."
The supervisor's eyebrows raised for a moment, and he waited for a justification—which he didn't get.
"All right," he conceded after an embarrassing pause, "—ah, go ahead and finish the job. But just you keep in mind that if the work ain't perfect I won't pay. Got that?"
Brim laughed. "I got that," he said evenly. Striding back to his station in Hador's pitiless afternoon brilliance, he hoisted the big machine to his shoulder, braced himself, and squeezed the triggers. It was going to be a long, hot work day.
CHAPTER 3
Old Friends
The following morning, Brim parked his gravcycle in the visitors' lot outside Base Headquarters, and grimaced. The monstrous new building was four times the size of its predecessor and incalculably more elaborate. For a moment, he wondered how many fine warships had been scrapped to pay for the colossal glass structure. Unfortunately, Gradygroats alone seemed to know how to make buildings into weapons, and even they'd managed that only once.
Then he shook his head. Military matters were no concern of his. In Avalon's new CIGA-riddled Admiralty, it seemed that the perception of strength was far more important than the real thing. Every day, the Fleet got weaker while the League got more bold. Only the week before, Zoguard Grobermann, the League's Minister of State, had issued a trumped-up warning to Fluvanna, a tiny but strategically critical domain astride the Straits of Remik. Along with Rogan LaKarn's Torond, Fluvanna provided most of the Empire's supply of celecoid quartz kernels from which Drive crystals were grown.
Taking a deep breath, he joined a colorful, noisy throng of Halacian civilians streaming through the main entrance tunnel. Just before he reached the guards at their turnstiles, he jostled his way left and stopped at a door marked with a small plaque that read, DUTY CREWS, BASE OPERATIONS.
Except for the plaque, the door's surface was otherwise featureless. However, a button marked VISITORS and a scanner lens were set into the right-hand frame at about eye level. Brim reached out to press the button, the scanner lens was clearly for flight crew members only. But before he could do it, he found himself stepping aside, deeply affected by a sudden onslaught of anxiety.
Or was it embarrassment?
His head was in turmoil; it couldn't be anxiety. He still considered himself to be as good a Helmsman as any: better than most, truth to tell. It had to be embarrassment, pure and simple. He didn't belong with flight crews any more. He might have made himself into one of the city's best beam axe operators, a considerable accomplishment in construction circles. But on the other side of that door, his axemanship wouldn't even rate a cup of cvceese'. Biting his lip, he tried to get a grip on himself while he stared at the entry button.
"I say—were you going in?" a cultured, masculine voice asked. At the same time, a long index finger touched the glowing scanner window and the door started to swing on silent hinges.
Brim jumped, startled from his reverie. "Er, y-yes I was," he stammered, abruptly focusing on a pair of blue eyes that sparkled with good-natured humor, a grand promontory for a nose, and the droll, confident sort of smile that fairly shouted wealth. The man was tall, blond, and, Brim judged, about the same age as himself. He was wearing the distinctive blue cape of an Imperial Fleet officer with the device of a Lieutenant Commander on its left collar just above his Helmsman's insignia. He also wore the discreet red-on-green insignia of the Imperial HighSpeed Starflight Team, quite a distinction in anybody's book. The uniform sent a twinge of emotion through Brim's gut. He'd forgotten how much he missed his own uniform and the feeling of belonging it provided.
"Right ho," the Commander returned with a grin. "Then I have just done both of us a favor." He motioned Brim through the door and followed him inside. "I say," he drawled presently, "I don't believe I've seen you around the ready room before. Was there someone you were meeting here perhaps?"
"That's what I'm led to understand," Brim replied. "But I don't know who it is—someone here was supposed to be looking for me." He peered around the crowded room. It looked like any of the thousand-odd ready rooms he'd encountered during his wartime travels: a little on the dingy side already and cluttered with awkward furniture. Here and there, knots of people were drinking mugs of cvceese' or viewing newsframes; many were playing cre'el, a game of chance that Brim never had found time to master. Situation boards covered one whole wall, updating their brilliant colors in what appeared to be real time.
"Oh, I see," the Commander said doubtfully, turning to hang his Fleet cloak on a nearby rack. Beneath, his uniform was clearly custom made. "Ah, on business, perhaps?" he asked with a frown.
Brim felt his face flush. "I'm sorry," he said. "I suppose you are wondering what I'm doing here." He laughed in spite of his embarrassment. "My name's Wilf Brim. I'm applying for a civilian Helmsman's position I understand is open at the base here."
"Ah, so you're a Helmsman, too," the Commander exclaimed, extending his hand. "Well, I'm glad to meet you. Tobias Moulding's my name—and no tired jokes, please. Call me Toby for short." He frowned.
"You were with the Fleet yourself at one time, I expect?"
"A thousand years ago," Brim said, gripping the other's hand.
"It's a bad thing the CIGAs have done at the Admiralty," Moulding said with a frown. "But then I'm sure nobody has to tell you about that." He took a deep breath. "Certainly Minister Grobermann had the situation firmly in mind when he sent his threatening message to Fluvanna. Not much we could do without Drive crystals."
Brim only shrugged. "I don't keep up with the League much anymore," he said. "I'm simply anxious to get behind a helm again."
"Well, I hope you will," Moulding said. "But first, we'll need to find out who it is you should report to."
He looked around the room. "I say, chaps," he called out. "This man's name is Brim and he's here to see somebody about one of the civilian Helmsman's positions. Who's doing the checks this morning?"
Presently, one of the cre'el players—this one also a Lieutenant Commander—looked up from his game.
"Tell him I'll be with him when I finish this tomer, and not before," he said, dearly resenting the disturbance.
Moulding looked at Brim and raised an eyebrow. "That Cravinn Townsend," he observed with a look of embarrassment "Friendly sort, isn't he?"
Brim shrugged wryly. "I guess I can't blame him—I never had much truck with civilian fluff merchants either," he said, remembering only too well his attitude toward nonmilitary workers when he was a member of the Fleet. Things that went around had a way of coming around, he filed that away for better future, too.
"Big of you," Moulding said, looking at him quizzically "I'm not sure I'd have reacted in the same way."
"You're not looking for a job, either," Brim chuckled. Then he spied the ubiquitous cvceese' brewer, steaming away in corner. "Come on," he said, "If you've time, I'll buy us both a mug." Inside he laughed—he'd become a big spender again! It hadn't been so long ago that he'd had to beg for one at a Norchelite mission.