Still dazed, he answered automatically, as if reciting a lesson. “Is that her name?” Since his death, such dissembling had become an ingrained habit.
“Inea Cellura. Her degree’s in astronomy. Worked at Arecibo. She’s supposed to be your assistant, but she’s been running the observatory station all by herself for weeks now. I wonder who she mistook you for?”
“Would you expect me to know?” She’d always scorned his passion for astronomy because his fascination with the possibility of other life forms in the galaxy disturbed her. Obviously, she’d changed. A knot of apprehension, which he hadn’t even known was there, unraveled. He wiped a sheen of cold sweat from his upper lip and pulled the display toward him.
“If I were you,” mused Shimon, “I’d like to be the one she mistook you for. She’s maybe not so pretty, but with the pretty ones who get to you physically, it fades fast. With her kind, it gets better each time.”
Not pretty? How could anyone say she isn’t pretty? “You’ve slept with her?” I’ve no right to be jealous!
“Not yet. But if you want her, don’t worry about me. She’s not Jewish and maybe not even available.” He glanced at the shut blinds. “Except maybe to you.”
Shimon will be a good source of contacts if it ever comes to that. As revolting as the idea was, the thought gratified Titus, for it signaled that he was still able to think defensively. He couldn’t afford a careless move now.
Titus’s fingering produced a blank page, a sponsor’s pitch that faded to the seal of Brink’s Security and the request, “Please enter your security clearance, personal code, and passwords.”
Irked, Titus hit ESCAPE but the thing bleeped at him.
“Yeah,” commiserated Shimon, “you must secure everything...even grocery lists.”
Titus complied and began taking notes. “The first thing I need to know: my special star catalogue–on the modules I had shipped here...is it intact?”
“No. We transferred it to our new hardware here but something went wrong. Either it was corrupted, or it became corrupted on transfer. Both copies are useless now. I must order a new interface card before I can restore from your backup...after I discover why it did that.”
Titus sagged. The backup had been in his flight bag. “I don’t have a backup with me. Make a list of the hardware we need. I’ll obtain a copy of my catalogue. As you’ve guessed, it’s customized for just such a hunt as we’re about to stage. Now, give me a rundown on what happened.”
Titus listened, mentally tracing the damage, for there was one question he couldn’t ask. Built into the system, there had been a black box Shimon had been instructed under Influence not to tamper with. It was Titus’s link to Connie on Earth. He had no idea if it could be replaced.
It had been designed for this project, and could send and receive messages hidden in the checksums that ensured the accuracy of all telecommunications. The two computers repeated sequences back and forth and filtered out the data from the noise. Titus’s black box simply preempted several of the repetitions to send Titus’s message, which the computer on the other end discarded as noise but the black box on Earth captured and decoded for Connie’s operatives.
Now it appeared that Abbot’s sabotage had destroyed the device. How could he tell Connie what had happened? How could he get her to resupply him with blood? How could he get her to send someone else to deal with Abbot?
He spent some time berating himself for not predicting Abbot’s swift move. Abbot had, after all, spent the voyage resting and refreshing himself with his new human. He had not arrived hungry and exhausted, but....
Titus’s mind leaped. Abbot had learned something from Mirelle, something about the clandestine project with Project Hail. That had made it necessary for him to gain some time. Rebuilding the device Titus had destroyed was only an excuse. He’d never have taken such a risk for that. But then why did he do it?
Titus had no time to pursue that question. The rest of the day went into assessing the damage and scouring the station for hardware. His computer system was a complex of interlinked units designed to accept, store, and digest the input from all Earth’s observatories, to create and continually update detailed, multi-dimensional maps of space.
Their one small lab room contained more computing power than had existed on all of Earth a decade before. It was designed to become the astrogation and command center of Earth’s interstellar exploration fleet...or its battle fleet.
Within four hours, Titus realized they were racing Abbot from storeroom to storeroom, gleaning the dregs he left them. Grimly, Titus began to anticipate Abbot’s moves, and garnered two or three hauls that would chisel days off the repairs. He listed the items he suspected Abbot had swiped out from under them by deleting them from inventory or by misfiling them on the shelves. Later, he’d find them himself.
By the time he left the lab, Titus had requisitioned everything that had to be ordered from Luna Station or Earth. He had a thorough report entered into his Bell. And he had an appointment with Carol Colby.
He had spent hours framing his report in such a way that he would not appear, to the humans, to be blaming Abbot for what had occurred but that would signal to any Resident who saw it that he couldn’t handle Abbot.
With Colby, he used all his persuasion augmented only by a touch of Influence. She assigned him a priority level that would override Abbot’s. Whatever equipment his father had not used or altered, Titus just might get back. And to do that, he was prepared to break into storerooms and scour the shelves in person.
As he left the Director’s office, Titus was convinced that this Colby, as she’d boasted, didn’t crumble. She’d set a deadline of two weeks to get Titus’s system up, and she’d put in a direct call to Earth for his supplies. Titus couldn’t begin to estimate the monetary cost of saving two weeks downtime, but an idle crew also ate money like crazy, so the expense of the call was, no doubt, justified.
Turning toward the nearest lifts, Titus knew he had to go out to the alien craft, investigate the medical dome and discover what Abbot had learned from Mirelle. But he was tired, his coordination off so much that his newly learned walking technique deserted him every few steps.
He hadn’t slept since the night before departure. Yet if he did not move swiftly, Abbot would again have the jump on him. On the other hand, like any human, he could make ghastly mistakes from fatigue. He hated to admit it, but Abbot was right. Powdered blood was not as good a restorative as freshly cloned blood, and neither could compete with a human. As he pondered the lift doors, one pair opened and Inea strode out.
She stopped short, and stared up at his face, weighing, assessing, and finally admitting again, “Darrell.”
“Titus,” he corrected gently. His eyes feasted on her. All the love was still there, but with something stronger added. He’d never felt like this for a human before.
The lengthy silence was finally broken by the arrival of another lift, full of office workers arriving for the next shift. Titus had no idea what time of day it was supposed to be. He didn’t even know what shift he was supposed to work.
“Titus, then,” she granted. “We’ve got to talk.”
He blinked hard. “I’m not ready for this.”
