Gardner, James Alan - League of Peoples 03 by Gardner James Alan

Author:Gardner, James Alan
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf

The three of us ate breakfast together, Ramos and I making small talk while Tic sat silently... communing with the cutlery for all I know. As for the admiral and me—bright women, brilliant conversationalists—we talked about the weather. I waxed poetic about snow-covered tundra, while Ramos preached the glory of temperatures so sweltering your armpits melted. (She was born on the colony planet Agua, in a region as hot as Demoth's tropics. "But," said Ramos, "our farm was two-thirds of the way to the south pole. On Agua, even I would roast near the equator.") Eventually, talk turned to the business at hand: Maya, killer robots, and such. I'd given Ramos a precis

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on the phone, but now she wanted the whole story. Even with Cheticamp's warning not to trust an admiral, I saw no reason to hide anything. Vigil training: tell the public everything, unless there's strong reason not to. (You can imagine how warmsome that endears us to politicians.)

"So," Ramos said at the end of things, "killer androids." She sat back in her chair, her expression going dark. "If the probes find Maya's hypothetical dig, do you think there'll be robots there?"

"The police believe Maya had no connection with the killers," I replied. "Me, I'm not so sure."

"Hmmm." Ramos drummed her ringers on the table. "My training didn't deal with androids. When a society is advanced enough to build robots, the Admiralty claims there's no need to send Explorers for first contact. Just ship in diplomats right away." She rolled her eyes. "Let's not discuss what a pathetic first impression that makes, introducing ourselves to aliens with dipshits rather than Explorers. But getting back to the point... I'm not qualified to go on a robot hunt."

"You don't have to go," I said. "Tic and I have ScrambleTacs to bodyguard us. We'll be fine."

"But I want to go with you," Ramos growled. Her voice sounded angry. "I don't have a thing to contribute, but I desperately want to go." She shook her head. "What kind of irresponsible idiot am I turning into? Eager to waltz into danger when I'm not even helpful." Her face puckered sour, and she fingered her shirtsleeve disdainfully. "Maybe it's the admiral's uniform. Something in the gray dye is rotting my brain."

"You can come or not, whatever you like," I told her. "Where's the problem?"

"The problem is in my head," she replied. "Look, Faye, people shouldn't want to walk into unnecessary danger. Especially people who know what danger is. Especially people who serve no useful purpose on the mission. Do you know what I think of thrill seekers? Going someplace you don't belong, just for a cheap adrenaline high? That's evil; I honestly believe it's evil. Decadent. Trying to titillate yourself into some semblance of feeling because you're numb to the real thing. And me with an important job that the Admiralty would sabotage if I got myself killed."

"Ah," Tic said. "So you've become inexpendable."

Ramos whipped around to look at him, her mouth falling open as if she'd been slapped.

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