"I rather expect most of them wish Skeeter Jackson and Goldie Morran had never been born, never mind made that idiotic wager," Malcolm noted wryly.
Kit glanced up at the chronometer board again.
Malcolm laughed. "The clock won't move any faster just because you keep staring at the numbers."
Kit actually flushed, then rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, well, I guess I've missed the brat."
Malcolm cleared his throat. "Well, since you mention it, I am rather anxious to see her again."
Kit gave him an appraising glance. "Yes. She might say no, you realize."
"I know." The quiet anguish in his voice betrayed him. He couldn't shake the fear that his notorious luck might still be holding steadily on "bad."
"She might say no to what?' a voice boomed behind them.
Malcolm winced. He and Kit turned to find Sven Bailey, hands on hips, watching them like a bemused bulldog.
"What in bloody hell are you doing here?" Malcolm muttered.
Sven grinned, a sight that made most men's blood run cold. "Waiting for my pupil, of course. Gotta see if she remembers anything I taught her."
Kit chuckled. "If she doesn't, we'll both wipe up the mat with her."
"Oh, goodie." Sven Bailey, widely acclaimed the most deadly man on TT-86, rubbed thick-fingered hands gleefully. "I can hardly wait. I never get to have that much fun with the tourists."
Malcolm rubbed one finger along his nose. "That's because the tourists would sue."
The terminal's martial arts and bladed-weapons instructor grunted. "No lawyers allowed in La-La Land and you know it."
A new voice said, "Good thing for you, too, isn't it, Sven?"
They glanced around to find Ann Vinh Mulhaney grinning up at him. Very nearly the only person on TT-86 who dared laugh at Sven Bailey, the petite shooting instructor's eyes sparkled with delight. Their matched heights produced a comical appearance: squat fireplug, stood beside a sleek bird of prey.
"What is this," Malcolm muttered, "a welcoming committee?"
"Well, she is my student," Ann pointed out. "I'd like to say hello and see if she remembers anything." Her eyes flashed with unspoken humor, whether at Malcolm's discomfiture or in remembrance of Margo's early lessons, Malcolm wasn't sure.
Sven just snorted. When Ann glanced curiously at her counterpart, Kit chuckled. "That was Sven's excuse, too. You two are complete fakes. Why you should even like that brat after what she put us all through is beyond me."
"Like her?" Sven protested. He managed to look hurt, an astonishing feat, considering that his eternal expression was that of a rabid bulldog about to charge. "Ha! Like her. That's good, Kit. I just want another look at that Musashi sword guard of yours. You know, the one you said I could peek at if I trained her."
"And I," Ann said sweetly, pulling off the wheedling tone far more effectively than Sven, "covet another week in the honeymoon suite at the Neo Edo." She batted her eyelashes prettily.
Kit just groaned. Malcolm grinned. "You're as bad as they are, Kit, if you expect me to buy that theatrical groan any more than I buy their excuses."
Kit just crossed his arms and compressed his lips in a pained expression, as though he'd crunched down on a poisoned seed pod and didn't know whether to admit it or curse. "Friends." Disgust dripped like ice from voice.
"Kit," Ann laughed, touching his shoulder in a friendly fashion, "you are the biggest fake of any 'eighty-sixer walking this terminal. It's why we love you."
Kit just snorted rudely. "You sound like Connie. Do all the women on this station get together and compare notes?
Ann winked. "Of course. You're famous. Half the tourists who come here are dying for a glimpse of the Kit Carson."
Kit shuddered. His loathing of tourists was La-La Land legend. "I would remind you, I'm not the only famous `Kit Carson' by a long shot."
Sven nodded sagely. "But you're both scouts, eh?"
Kit grinned unexpectedly. "Actually, I'm not named for Kit Carson, Western scout, at all."
All three of them stared. Malcolm scraped his jaw off the floor before the others. "You're not?"
Kit's eyes twinkled wickedly. "Nope. I used to build balsa airplanes and launch 'em when I was a kid, then shoot 'em down with a slingshot off the side of some cliff. Dahlonega, Georgia," he added dryly, "might not have much left but a checkered history, but cliffs we had in plenty. So when I started hitting every little balsa plane I'd made with a nice, fat rock, he took to calling me `Kit' for his favorite WWII Ace Pilot, L. K. `Kit' Carson. Came darn near to matching Chuck Yeager's record."
"A fighter pilot," Sven said, eyes round with lingering astonishment. "Well, hell, Kit, I guess that's not too bad a thing, being named after a flying ace. Ever have a chance to do any real flying?"
Kit's expression went distant. Malcolm knew the look. "Yeah," he said very softly.
Before anyone could -pry the station announcer interrupted.
"Your attention, please. Gate One is due to open in one minute ..."
The four watched in companionable silence as the circus of a Primary departure wound up to a crescendo of baggage searches, purple faces, outraged protests, and the exchange of shocking sums of money collected by agents in no mood to put up with anyone's lip on this particular departure. By the time the gate began to cycle, causing the bones behind Malcolm's ears to buzz, tempers were ragged on both sides of the tables.
"Good thing the gate's about to open or we'd have a fight or two, I think," Malcolm muttered to no one in particular.
"Yep," Sven said with characteristic loquacity.
The sound that was not a sound, heralding the opening of a major gate, intensified. Beyond the imposing array of barriers, armed guards, ramps, fences, metal detectors, X-ray equipment, and dual medical stations stood a broad ramp which rose fifteen feet into the air, then simply ended. Light near the top dopplered through the entire visible spectrum. Then Shangri-La Station's main gate-and sole link with the rest of the uptime world-dilated open.
Uptimers streamed into the station, hauling baggage down that long ramp toward the Medical station barring the way. One by one, station medical personnel scanned and logged medical records. Malcolm waited in a cold sweat for the one slight figure in all that crowd he'd waited months to see-and dreaded meeting again. Then, before he was ready for it, she was there, hair back to its natural flaming red, all trace of brown dye banished until she was ready to take up time scouting as a professional.
Margo ...
Malcolm's belly did a rapid drawing in. How could he have forgotten what that little slip of a girl could do to a man's body chemistry, just by walking down an ordinary ramp? Margo was dressed-to Malcolm's astonishment in a chaste little floral-print dress that came nearly to her ankles. The swing of its long skirt and the way it clung to skin he vividly recalled the taste and touch of did bad things to Malcolms breath control. Her hair was longer, too, and-if possible sexier than ever as it curled around her ears. Oh, God, what if she says no? Please, Margo, don't walk down that ramp and tell new you've met some boy at school ....
She caught sight of him and her face lit up like Christmas on Picadilly. She shifted a heavy duffle bag to wave and blow a kiss right at him. His belly did another rapid drawing in that made breathing impossible. He waved back. His knees actually felt weak.
"Buck up, man," Kit muttered in his ear. "You're white as a sheet."
The ring in his pocket all but burned him through the cloth. He'd thought to give it to her here, but with all these well-intentioned onlookers ... Then, again before he was ready, she'd cleared station medical and dropped the duffle bag to run straight into his arms.