Zach Hughes: Deep Freeze

Josh spread his hands. "You wouldn't like to go out and have a bite to eat? On me? There's a good restaurant just around the corner."

"Thank you, we ate at the Port," David said.

"You're doing this deliberately," Josh said.

Ruth raised her eyebrows. "Doing what, little brother? Are you trying to tell me that, heaven forbid, you have a—" She gasped in mock shock,

"—girl in your bedroom?"

"Not any more," the lieutenant said as she came out of the room and slammed the door behind her. Her sprucely simple Service blue skirt was just a bit awry, her blouse not quite tucked in properly.

"Angela—" Josh pleaded as he watched the lieutenant's stiff, straight back disappear toward the entry.

The lieutenant turned. Her smile showed that she was aptly named, for it was angelic. "Family matters first," she said. "Call me when you're free, Josh." She closed the door quietly behind her.

"Nice girl," Ruth said.

"Old Josh could always pick 'em," David said.

"I'm thinking of marrying this one," Josh said.

Ruth clutched at her heart. "Easy," she said. "I'm sensitive to shock."

Josh pouted for a moment, then beamed. "Well, hell, aside from the fact that you've ruined my evening, it's great to see you."

"I guess you'll have to sleep on the couch," Ruth said to David.

"Unless little brother wants to be a good host and give me his bed,"

David said.

"You're here about Dad and Mother," Josh said.

Ruth's face softened. "Any word?"

"None. I've been doing my best to change the schedule, but it's going to be at least another four months before a patrol vessel is in that sector."

He sat down, pulled his dressing gown tight around him. "There's really no need to worry, Ruth. You know the old man. He's thorough. He's a nut for detail. My guess is that once he found himself in an unexplored sector with a few million likely stars to check out he started with the nearest one and began methodically to work his way in toward the core. David can tell you how time consuming that can be. They're out there somewhere having the time of their lives, a second honeymoon. You know how we all used to be just a little jealous of their closeness. If ever a couple made a completion, just the two of them together, it's Dad and Mom. They've just sorta lost track of time, I'd guess. When they have to start eating space rations, they'll come out a lot faster than they went in."

"I want you to be right," David said.

"Yes," Ruth said, nodding.

"But?" Josh asked.

"I've got a new Zede Starliner that needs a shakedown cruise," David said, "and good company for the trip."

"You must be concerned, to leave your job and your precious kiddies,"

Josh said to Ruth.

She nodded again.

"We'll need the coordinates for the point where they left the extragalactic route," David said.

Josh nodded. "A Zede Starliner? C or D series?"

"E," David said.

Josh whistled. "Is what you do legal?"

"Why?" David asked. "Thinking of coming in with me?"

"Actually," Josh said, "the Service would suffer greatly if I left." But, he was thinking, even if he made admiral some day, even if he made fleet admiral, which was highly unlikely since the last three had been Far Seers from Old Earth, he'd never be able to afford an E series Starliner.

"I'm a little bit tired," Ruth said.

Josh showed her the guest room and the facilities. David poured himself a glass of Selbelese wine, the finest in the U.P. Josh came back into the room and sat down.

"Where did Dad take his orientation?" David asked.

"He took night courses at the academy in T-Town before he retired and then he spent three months in flight training."

"Three months."

"He's good," Josh said. "I checked him out when he and Mom came through here to get their permits. I wouldn't want to put him into a mock battle against young hotshots, but he's fully capable of taking that old Mule star-hopping out in the big empty."

David was feeling the warmth of the wine. The tension began to leave him. He liked his younger brother, enjoyed being with him. Josh's reassurances had the ring of truth.

"Wouldn't care to take leave and go with us?" David asked, after a comfortable silence.

"Dave, the promotion list comes up next month. I've been breaking my ass to make it." He spread his hands. "If I felt there was some real danger to Mom and Dad, I'd go in a heartbeat, but I want to get back into space, and I want to go back out there as H.M.F.I.C. of my own ship. I want those captain's stripes."

"Well, I think this family needs one genuine Service M.F.," David said.

Josh laughed. "The Webster kids haven't done too badly, have they?"

"One Service captain-to-be on the way up, a famous holostar, adedicated education professional—"

"A businessman rich enough to own a Starliner and—"

David made a face. "One social lioness."

"Not bad," Josh grinned. "Not even the lioness. I know that Mom and Dad are proud. They told me so when they were here. Got right mushy about it. Mom acted as if she was leaving forever instead of—"

He paused, his face going pale. He had forgotten how sentimental his mother had been on that last night.

David asked, "Mother had a bad feeling about the trip?"

Josh told himself that he was being foolish. "You know Mom. She cries when Sarah and her kids leave to go home—all the way across town."

David laughed. He always told his mother goodbye in the house and hurried away lest she follow him out to the aircar and make his own eyes misty by her weeping.

"Show me that couch," he said. "We're scheduled for an early lift-off."

"I'll wake you at five."

"Not that early," David said.

"There's something I need to arrange before you leave," Josh said. "It might take some time."

True to his word, Josh was up before sunrise. A blast of music so accurately reproduced that one could almost reach out and touch the musicians brought Ruth out of a dreamless sleep instantly. David was not far behind. They had breakfast at Josh's favorite neighborhood restaurant and joined a stream of centrally directed air-car traffic in Josh's little runabout. At the huge X&A headquarters complex Josh left the aircar in the care of an attendant who would file it somewhere in a cavernous underground park with a few thousand other vehicles and escorted his brother and sister to his office. The lovely young lieutenant who had left Josh's apartment with her uniform in some disarray looked up from her desk and smiled brightly.

"Morning, sir," she said.

"Lieutenant," Josh said. "Meet my brother and sister, Ruth and David.

Kids, this is my executive assistant, Lieutenant Angela."

"A pleasure," David said.

"We've met," Ruth said with evident disapproval in her voice.

Angela's smile did not change. "Coffee for all?"

"Thank you," Josh said. "And see if you can get us in to see the admiral first thing."

"Yes, sir."

As Angela left the room, her uniform not at all in disarray, David looked at Ruth and raised an eyebrow. "Meow," he said.

"I do not believe in double standards," Ruth said.

"I'm going to marry this one," Josh said.

The coffee was Selbelese. It seemed that most things that were good to drink came from one of the Selbel planets. The admiral would see Commander Webster and his guests in twenty minutes. That left time to have a second cup and for Josh to run over the day's schedule with his assistant.

Flux cars, moving at daunting speeds along rails through narrow corridors, carried them to the admiral's office. David was surprised and pleased when he saw the lettering on the door: Admiral Julie Roberts.

Everyone knew of the woman who had followed Dean Richards as captain of the Rimfire.

Service discipline and an iron will had kept Julie Roberts slim and vital.