“Give me a break, Scooter! That was—what? Six damn T-years ago?”

“Really?” Smith’s gray eyes glinted devilishly. “It seems like just yesterday. Maybe that was because the results were so… spectacular. And expensive. I don’t get to see a drive room main bus bar short out everyday, you know.”

“Oh, yeah? Well, one of these days I’m gonna be there when you screw the pooch, Scooter!”

“In your dreams, Silver Spanner. In your dreams.”

“Pride goeth, buddy,” Maxwell said darkly.

“Ha!” Smith deactivated his locker’s counter-grav and let it sink to the deck, then looked around curiously. He’d expected the deck guide to lead him to Candice’s slip; instead, it had deposited him in a cavernous boat bay gallery, which indicated his new ship wasn’t currently docked with the space station, and he cocked an eyebrow at Maxwell.

“You got any idea what it is we’re up to, Maxie?” he asked much more seriously. “I asked around, but the people I talked to knew zero-zip about it.”

“Dunno,” Maxwell admitted, removing his black beret to scratch the right side of his head. “Friend of mine in BuShips told me the Candice is a new, long-range repair ship—a high-speed job, like maybe she’s designed to go in the fleet train for a cruiser raiding force or something. Aside from that, I don’t know a damned thing. Hell, I don’t even know what I’m gonna be doing once I get aboard!”

“You neither, huh?” Smith frowned. RMN personnel orders usually contained at least a brief section on the duty slot one was to be assigned to, not just a ship name with no additional information. Leaving that out of one set of orders could have been simple bureaucratic sloppiness; leaving it out of two started sounding a lot more like a deliberate security measure. But if Candice was only a repair ship, even some new, hot-shot model, then what was there to be secretive about? And if—

“Attention Personnel Draft Seven-Seven-Six-Two,” the voice of the boat bay officer crackled suddenly from the gallery speakers. “First call for transportation to HMS Candice. The shuttle will depart in fifteen minutes from Personnel Tube Blue Four. Repeat. Transportation to HMS Candice will depart in fifteen minutes from Personnel Tube Blue Four.”

“Guess we better get going,” Maxwell observed, and the two of them set off down the gallery, towing their lockers behind them. Smith was in the lead as they approached the designated personnel tube, and he groaned aloud as he saw what rested in the docking buffers on the other side of the thick armorplast wall.

“What?” Maxwell asked, unable to see around his taller friend, and Smith sighed.

“It’s a damned trash hauler,” he said glumly. “Crap! You’d think they could at least give us a shuttle with windows!”

“A shuttle’s a shuttle,” Maxwell said with a dismissive shrug. “I don’t need windows. I’ve already seen a space station, and I’ve already seen a repair ship. All I hope is the run over is long enough for me to get a little shuteye.”