Citizen of the Galaxy (24 page)

"I know his reputation."

"If there is any fact I would stake my ship on, it is that Colonel Baslim would
never
ruin a boy. Okay, so the kid has had a rough time. But he has also been succored by one of the toughest, sanest, most humane men ever to wear our uniform. You bet on your dogs; I'll back Colonel Richard Baslim. Now . . . are you advising me not to enlist him?"

The psychologist hesitated. Brisby said, "Well?"

Major Stein interrupted. "Take it easy, Kris; I'm overriding you."

Brisby said, "I want a straight answer, then
I'll
decide."

Dr. Krishnamurti said slowly, "Suppose I record my opinions but state that there are no certain grounds for refusing enlistment?"

"Why?"

"Obviously you want to enlist this boy. But if he gets into trouble—well, my endorsement could get him a medical discharge instead of a sentence. He's had enough bad breaks."

Colonel Brisby clapped him on the shoulder. "Good boy, Kris! That's all, gentlemen."

Thorby spent an unhappy night. The master-at-arms billeted him in senior P.O.s quarters and he was well treated, but embarrassingly aware of the polite way in which those around him did not stare at his gaudy
Sisu
dress uniform. Up till then he had been proud of the way
Sisu's
dress stood out; now he was learning painfully that clothing has its proper background. That night he was conscious of snores around him . . . strangers . . . fraki—and he yearned to be back among People, where he was known, understood, recognized.

He tossed on a harder bed than he was used to and wondered who would get his own?

He found himself wondering whether anyone had ever claimed the hole he still thought of as "home." Would they repair the door? Would they keep it clean and decent the way Pop liked?
What would they do with Pop's leg?

Asleep, he dreamt of Pop and of
Sisu,
all mixed up. At last, with Grandmother shortened and a raider bearing down, Pop whispered,
"No more bad dreams, Thorby. Never again, son. Just happy dreams."

He slept peacefully then—and awoke in this forbidding place with gabbling fraki all around him. Breakfast was substantial but not up to Aunt Athena's high standards; however he was not hungry.

After breakfast he was quietly tasting his misery when he was required to undress and submit to indignities. It was his first experience with medical men's offhand behavior with human flesh—he loathed the poking and prodding.

When the Commanding Officer sent for him Thorby was not even cheered by seeing the man who knew Pop. This room was where he had had to say a last "good-business" to Father; the thoughts lingering there were not good.

He listened listlessly while Brisby explained. He woke up a little when he understood that he was being offered status—not much, he gathered. But status. The fraki had status among themselves. It had never occurred to him that fraki status could matter even to fraki.

"You don't have to," Colonel Brisby concluded, "but it will make simpler the thing Colonel Baslim wanted me to do—find your family, I mean. You would like that, wouldn't you?"

Thorby almost said that he knew where his Family was. But he knew what the Colonel meant: his own sib, whose existence he had never quite been able to imagine. Did he really have blood relatives somewhere?

"I suppose so," he answered slowly. "I don't know."

"Mmm . . ." Brisby wondered what it was like to have no frame to your picture. "Colonel Baslim was anxious to have me locate your family. I can handle it easier if you are officially one of us. Well? It's guardsman third class . . . thirty credits a month, all you can eat and not enough sleep. And glory. A meager amount."

Thorby looked up. "This is the same Fam—service my Pop—Colonel Baslim, you call him—was in? He really was?"

"Yes. Senior to what you will be. But the same service. I think you started to say 'family.' We like to think of the Service as one enormous family. Colonel Baslim was one of the more distinguished members of it."

"Then I want to be adopted."

"Enlisted."

"Whatever the word is."

CHAPTER 16

Fraki weren't bad when you got to know them.

They had their secret language, even though they thought they talked Interlingua. Thorby added a few dozen verbs and a few hundred nouns as he heard them; after that he tripped over an occasional idiom. He learned that his light-years as a trader were respected, even though the People were considered odd. He didn't argue; fraki couldn't know better.

H.G.C.
Hydra
lifted from Hekate, bound for the Rim worlds. Just before jump a money order arrived accompanied by a supercargo's form which showed the draft to be one eighty-third of
Sisu's
appreciation from Jubbulpore to Hekate—as if, thought Thorby, he were a girl being swapped. It was an uncomfortably large sum and Thorby could find no entry charging him interest against a capital share of the ship—which he felt should be there for proper accounting; it wasn't as if he had been born in the ship. Life among the People had made the beggar boy conscious of money in a sense that alms never could—books must balance and debts must be paid.

He wondered what Pop would think of all that money. He felt easier when he learned that he could deposit it with the Paymaster.

With the draft was a warm note, wishing him good business wherever he went and signed: "Love, Mother." It made Thorby feel better and much worse.

A package of belongings arrived with a note from Fritz: "Dear Brother, Nobody briefed me about recent mysterious happenings, but things were crisp around the old ship for a few days. If such were not unthinkable, I would say there had been a difference of opinion at highest level. Me, I have no opinions, except that I miss your idle chatter and blank expressions. Have fun and be sure to count your change.

"Fritz

"P.S. The play was an artistic success—and Loeen
is
cuddly."

Thorby stored his
Sisu
belongings; he was trying to be a Guardsman and they made him uncomfortable. He discovered that the Guard was not the closed corporation the People were; it required no magic to make a Guardsman if a man had what it took, because nobody cared where a man came from or what he had been. The
Hydra
drew its company from many planets; there were machines in BuPersonnel to ensure this. Thorby's shipmates were tall and short, bird-boned and rugged, smooth and hairy, mutated and superficially unmutated. Thorby hit close to norm and his Free Trader background was merely an acceptable eccentricity; it made him a spaceman of sorts even though a recruit.

In fact, the only hurdle was that he was a raw recruit. "Guardsman 3/c" he might be but a boot he would remain until he proved himself, most especially since he had not had boot training.

But he was no more handicapped than any recruit in a military outfit having proud
esprit de corps.
He was assigned a bunk, a mess, a working station, and a petty officer to tell him what to do. His work was compartment cleaning, his battle station was runner for the Weapons Officer in case battle phones should fail—it meant that he was available to fetch coffee.

Otherwise he was left in peace. He was free to join a bull session as long as he let his seniors sound off, he was invited into card games when a player was needed, he was not shut out of gossip, and he was privileged to lend jumpers and socks to seniors who happened to be short. Thorby had had experience at being junior; it was not difficult.

The
Hydra
was heading out for patrol duty; the mess talk centered around "hunting" prospects. The
Hydra
had fast "legs," three hundred gravities; she sought action with outlaws where a merchantman such as the
Sisu
would avoid it if possible. Despite her large complement and heavy weapons, the
Hydra
was mostly power plant and fuel tanks.

Thorby's table was headed by his petty officer, Ordnanceman 2/c Peebie, known as "Decibel." Thorby was eating one day with his ears tuned down, while he debated visiting the library after dinner or attending the stereo show in the messroom, when he heard his nickname: "Isn't that right, Trader?"

Thorby was proud of the nickname. He did not like it in Peebie's mouth but Peebie was a self-appointed wit—he would greet Thorby with the nickname, inquire solicitously, "How's business?" and make gestures of counting money. So far, Thorby had ignored it.

"Isn't what right?"

"Why'n't y'keep y'r ears open? Can't you hear anything but rustle and clink? I was telling 'em what I told the Weapons Officer: the way to rack up more kills is to go after 'em, not pretend to be a trader, too scared to fight and too fat to run."

Thorby felt a simmer. "Who," he said, "told you that traders were scared to fight?"

"Quit pushin' that stuff! Whoever heard of a trader burning a bandit?"

Peebie may have been sincere; kills made by traders received no publicity. But Thorby's burn increased. "I have."

Thorby meant that he had heard of traders' burning raiders; Peebie took it as a boast. "Oh, you did, did you? Listen to that, men—our peddler is a hero. He's burned a bandit all by his own little self! Tell us about it. Did you set fire to his hair? Or drop potassium in his beer?"

"I used," Thorby stated, "a Mark XIX one-stage target-seeker, made by Bethlehem-Antares and armed with a 20 megaton plutonium warhead. I launched a timed shot on closing to beaming range on a collision-curve prediction."

There was silence. Finally Peebie said coldly, "Where did you read that?"

"It's what the tape showed after the engagement. I was senior starboard firecontrolman. The portside computer was out—so I know it was my shot that burned him."

"Now he's a weapons officer! Peddler, don't peddle it here."

Thorby shrugged. "I used to be. A weapons control officer, rather. I never learned much about ordnance."

"Modest, isn't he? Talk is cheap, Trader."

"You should know, Decibel."

Peebie was halted by his nickname; Thorby did not rate such familiarity. Another voice cut in, saying sweetly, "Sure, Decibel, talk is cheap. Now you tell about the big kills you've made. Go ahead." The speaker was non-rated but was a clerk in the executive office and immune to Peebie's displeasure.

Peebie glowered. "Enough of this prattle," he growled. "Baslim, I'll see you at oh eight hundred in combat control—we'll find out how much you know about firecontrol."

Thorby was not anxious to be tested; he knew nothing about the
Hydra's
equipment. But an order is an order; he was facing Peebie's smirk at the appointed time.

The smirk did not last.
Hydra's
instruments bore no resemblance to those in the
Sisu,
but the principles were the same and the senior gunnery sergeant (cybernetics) seemed to find nothing unlikely in an ex-trader knowing how to shoot. He was always looking for talent; people to handle ballistic trackers for the preposterous problems of combat at sub-light-speed were as scarce among Guardsmen as among the People.

He questioned Thorby about the computer he had handled. Presently he nodded. "I've never seen anything but schematics on a Dusseldorf tandem rig; that approach is obsolete. But if you can get a hit with that junk, we can use you." The sergeant turned to Peebie. "Thanks, Decibel. I'll mention it to the Weapons Officer. Stick around, Baslim."

Peebie looked astonished. "He's got work to do, Sarge."

Sergeant Luter shrugged. "Tell your leading P.O. that I need Baslim here."

Thorby had been shocked to hear
Sisu's
beautiful computers called "junk." But shortly he knew what Luter meant; the massive brain that fought for the
Hydra
was a genius among computers. Thorby would never control it alone—but soon he was an acting ordnanceman 3/c (cybernetics) and relatively safe from Peebie's wit. He began to feel like a Guardsman—very junior but an accepted shipmate.

Hydra
was cruising above speed-of-light toward the Rim world Ultima Thule, where she would refuel and start prowling for outlaws. No query had reached the ship concerning Thorby's identity. He was contented with his status in Pop's old outfit; it made him proud to feel that Pop would be proud of him. He did miss
Sisu,
but a ship with no women was simpler to live in; compared with
Sisu
the
Hydra
had no restrictive regulations.

But Colonel Brisby did not let Thorby forget why he had been enlisted. Commanding officers are many linkages away from a recruit; a non-rated man might not lay eyes on his skipper except at inspections. But Brisby sent for Thorby repeatedly.

Brisby received authorization from the Exotic Corps to discuss Colonel Baslim's report with Baslim's courier, bearing in mind the critical classification of the subject. So Brisby called Thorby in.

Thorby was first warned of the necessity of keeping his mouth shut. Brisby told him that the punishment for blabbing would be as heavy as a court-martial could hand out. "But that's not the point. We have to be sure that the question never arises. Otherwise we can't discuss it."

Thorby hesitated. "How can I know that I'll keep my mouth shut when I don't know what it is?"

Brisby looked annoyed. "I can order you to."

"Yes, sir. And I'll say, 'Aye aye, sir.' But does that make you certain that I wouldn't risk a court-martial?"

"But— This is ridiculous! I want to talk about Colonel Baslim's work. But you're to keep your yap shut, you understand me? If you don't, I'll tear you to pieces with my bare hands. No young punk is going to quibble with me where the Old Man's work is concerned!"

Thorby looked relieved. "Why didn't you say it was that, Skipper? I wouldn't blab about anything of Pop's—why, that was the first thing he taught me."

"Oh." Brisby grinned. "I should have known. Okay."

"I suppose," Thorby added thoughtfully, "that it's all right to talk to
you."

Brisby looked startled. "I hadn't realized that this cuts two ways. But it does. I can show you a despatch from his corps, telling me to discuss his report with you. Would that convince you?"