Apollo's Outcasts (31 page)

"Thank you, sir." Not knowing what else to do, I shook his hand. "Umm...I don't know if it makes any difference, but I had to leave my mule behind."

"Don't worry about it. Half the time, that's what happens."
He stepped past me to close the module hatch.
"We're more concerned about getting you back than your equipment. We'll send someone out later to retrieve it. Isn't that right, Captain Rogers?"

"Whatever you say, Chief."
I couldn't see Gordie; he spoke to us from the cockpit.
"Whenever you're ready, I'll take off. There's some ration bars back there, Jamey, but I wouldn't eat 'em if I were you. You've got a party to go to."

"Party?" I managed to take a seat just before the Pegasus lifted off again. "Oh, no, no...man, I'm too tired."

"Sorry...Ranger tradition."
Mr. Garcia laughed.
"And failure to show up for your walkabout party is not an option."

He was right. I didn't have a choice. A bus carried Mr. Garcia and me from the south landing field to Apollo, dropping us off at Airlock 7. The Chief told me I'd have to go through the suit scrubber on my own, and for good reason; my moonsuit was so caked with dust, it took twice as long as usual for it to get clean. But when the scrubbers finally shut down and the airlock pressurized, the inner hatch opened...

And thirty-four Rangers gathered in the ready-room began to applaud.

I didn't know what to do. I simply stared at them, my mouth sagging open. The applause lasted for several seconds, then from the other side of the room, Billy spoke up.

"Now isn't that just the saddest excuse for a Ranger you've ever seen?" he said.

Everyone in the room cracked up--except for me; I was still speechless--and then a half dozen guys rushed forward to help me out of my suit. I hadn't shaved in two days and stank to high heaven, but that hardly mattered to the people who practically carried me from the ready room upstairs to the Ranger barracks. In the lounge was the first decent meal I had eaten in almost three days. I was shocked to find a T-bone steak among the potatoes and asparagus, and later learned that it had come from the small stock of frozen beef imported from Earth and saved for special occasions. Hunger quickly trumped incredulity, and I wolfed it down while the party went on around me.

Mr. Garcia showed up a few minutes after I sat down at the table. He said a few words of praise about my performance, then left to take care of business elsewhere. No sooner had he left when Mikel Borakov took a seat next to me. Reaching into a trouser pocket, he pulled out a battered aluminum flask, twisted open the cap, and placed it in front of me.

"Drink up," he said. "It's on the house."

My nose caught the scent of vodka. "Umm...thanks, but I'm not old enough." Which was true enough, but the fact of the matter was that I'd never liked the taste of hard liquor; I was just trying to get out of it without seeming rude.

"You sure?" I heard Nicole say. "You may need it for what's coming next."

I turned to look at her. She was standing behind me, Logan at her side. There was a broad grin across her face and even Logan was smiling a little. "What are you...?"

"Time for you to get one of these." Nicole reached up to tap the moon-and-angel wings Ranger tattoo on her cheek. "Right here," she added, then bent over to give me a kiss in the exact same place.

Logan didn't seem to appreciate that very much, but it wasn't long before I stopped caring whether or not he did. Vodka I could turn down, but I couldn't refuse the tattoo. Before I knew it, I was lying across the table, with Mikel holding my head steady while a skin artist used her stylus and dyes to etch the Ranger seal below my left eye.

Nicole was right; the vodka might have helped. On the other hand, I was so tired that it didn't make much difference. The party was still going when Gordie and someone else helped me upstairs to the Laglers' apartment. I managed to shake hands with Mr. Lagler and get hugs from Ms. Lagler and Melissa--my sister shocked me by even crying a little; perhaps all those times she'd told me to drop dead weren't meant to be taken seriously--before exhaustion finally did me in. I fell into bed still wearing my clothes and was asleep within seconds.

I slept solidly for the next ten hours. When I finally woke up, the apartment was empty; everyone had gone off to work. Ms. Lagler had left me a couple of fresh-baked muffins and a pot of coffee. After I had breakfast, I showered, shaved, and put on fresh clothes. Then, feeling a lot less grubby, I went to see Hannah.

The conversations I'd had with myself while walking across Alphonsus had convinced me that I needed to get serious about paying to attention to her. So I called her and asked if we could get together and...well, do something fun, just the two of us.

We agreed to meet at the same place where we'd last seen each other, the park bench in the atrium. I got there first, and before I sat down, I muted my wristband. I was supposed to report to duty later on that day, but until then I didn't want any interruptions. For once, I wanted to be alone with her. Or at least as alone as we could be in a public place. Here and there, other loonies were strolling through the atrium gardens; I hoped they'd mind their own business.

Hannah showed up a few minutes later. She wasn't on a bike this time, nor was she wearing scrubs. She'd put on a long hemp skirt and matching top, and when I saw her walking toward me, I wondered why I'd ignored her for so long. In that moment, she was the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen.

I stood up, but before I could say anything, she threw her arms around me. Neither of us spoke for a few seconds. We simply held one another, sharing relief in the fact that I'd come back alive and unharmed. Then she lifted her face for me to give her a kiss, but when I started to do so, her eyes suddenly widened.

"Oh, my God!" she exclaimed. "What have you done to yourself?"

"What? I don't..."

"Your face! What is that?"

"Oh, yeah," I mumbled, touching the new tattoo. I'd almost forgotten it was there. "It wasn't my idea. Just something Rangers do after they've made their walkabout. Sort of a ritual, I guess."

Hannah scowled. "I don't care if it's a ritual...I think it's ugly! Can't you get it erased? Or at least have it in a different place?"

It hadn't occurred to me until then that I didn't necessarily need to have the tattoo on my cheek. I'd seen other Rangers display them on their biceps or chests. The location had been Nicole's idea, but I
wasn't about to tell Hannah that. "If you want, I'll have it removed and redone on my arm. Would that be all right?"

"Well...okay." She smiled. "You've got a nice face, Jamey. I don't want to have to look at that when I do this."

She kissed me, and although this was the third time she'd done so, by far it was the best. Neither of us cared if anyone saw us. It was a while before either of us came up for air.

Eventually we did, though. We sat down on the bench and I told her all about the walkabout, starting when Gordie dropped me in Alphonsus and ending when he picked me up at the Ranger 9 crash site. The only thing I left out were the long chats I'd had with myself; this was something she didn't have to know. Hannah listened to my story, interrupting only a few times to ask questions, and when I was done, she slowly nodded.

"So you got through it," she said, "and now you're back, safe and sound." She hesitated. "I'm proud of you, you know I am. But..."

She stopped. "But what?" I asked.

Hannah looked away from me, her gaze traveling to the roses Eddie had planted nearby. "It means you're going to be putting yourself in harm's way again. Maybe sooner than you think."

Something in the way she said that sent a chill through me. Before I could ask, she leaned a little closer. "Maybe I shouldn't tell anyone about this," Hannah said quietly, "but I've heard Mr. Porter talking to town council members about what's happening back home. Looks like Lina Shapar is getting set for an invasion. They believe it could happen any day now."

"What makes them think that?"

"For one thing, the government has stepped up the propaganda. The newsnets back home have been carrying a lot of stories the last few days about how terrible things are here. How Americans on Apollo have become second-class citizens and are being forced to work without pay. How we're on the verge of starvation. How the ISC intends to use the embargo to topple the United States..."

"That's crap! None of it is true!"

"Of course it isn't. But look at history. When a country is seriously gearing up for war, one of the first things they do is concoct stories about the enemy so that the public will believe that theirs is a just cause. Mr. Porter persuaded the local net not to rebroadcast the stories. He's afraid of what might happen to morale if people here saw what was being said about them. But that's not all."

"What else?"

"They've received reports of increased activity on Matagorda Island. A number of shuttles are being prepped for lift-off, and it looks like troops are being mobilized." She paused. "It's hard to know what's going on. Our sources...the Resistance, I mean...can't get close enough to see exactly what's happening. But..."

"Jamey! Hey, Jamey!"

I looked around to see Logan jogging down a path toward us. I closed my eyes and mentally swore a curse against him, and Hannah sighed in an annoyed way.
Bad timing, pal
, I thought, and he must have realized the same thing himself, because when he saw Hannah and me sitting together, he'd stopped in his tracks.

"Oh," he muttered, his face going red. "Sorry, man. I didn't...y'know..."

"S'okay," I said, even though I could have strangled him. "What's going on?"

"You didn't answer your wristband, so the Chief sent me to find you." Logan quickly walked over to us. "We're being called up. The Rangers, I mean."

"Called up?"

"Uh-huh. Priority One. Everyone's supposed to report to the barracks for a emergency briefing, right now."

As he said this, Hannah's wristband chimed. She glanced at the readout, then looked at me. "The hospital's calling me in, too," she said quietly. "It's starting."

I didn't have to ask what she meant. We both knew that it was
the very thing we'd just been discussing. I gave her a quick kiss, then she rushed off to Apollo General while I followed Logan toward the nearest elevator. We'd only walked a dozen yards when he glanced over his shoulder at where Hannah and I had been sitting.

"So...are you two a pair now?" he asked, his voice almost a whisper.

"Yeah...yeah, I guess we are."

"Good." Despite our hurry, he stopped and turned to me. "Look, man, I know things have been kinda...y'know, difficult...between us because of what's been going on with Nicole and me, but..."

His voice trailed off, but I knew what he meant. "Forget it," I said. "I guess both of us got who we deserve."

"Since you put it that way..." Logan stuck out his hand. "Friends again?"

"Sure." I was glad that he was willing to put all that behind us; I'd missed not being able to talk to him. So I shook his hand. "Friends again."

"Good. Now let's get going before the Chief fries us for being late."

When we arrived at the barracks, we found a note on the door, telling us that the meeting was going to be held in the civic auditorium. A couple of other Rangers were heading over there, so Logan and I fell in with them. The auditorium was located just off the solarium, a large hall that had been cut within the crater wall and normally used for plays or lectures. I wondered why Mr. Garcia was holding the meeting there instead of at the barracks, but it wasn't until we arrived that I saw why.

Lunar Search and Rescue wasn't the only organization to show up. The town council was there, too, as were representatives from the various major departments: Main Operations, Life Support,
Maintenance, Agriculture, and so forth. Logan and I had just found seats in the second row along with the other Rangers when several members of the hospital staff arrived. A few steps behind Dr. Rice was Hannah; she and I spotted each other, and she gave me a little wave, but neither of us made a move to sit together. This wasn't the time to be boyfriend and girlfriend.