"Unfortunately, I had to. I'd hoped to put him off to the last, with the rest. Minchenko is probably the most arrogant of Cay's Old Guard—he's never made it a secret that he thought he should have succeeded Cay as Head of Project, instead of bringing in an outsider, namely me. If he hadn't been slated for retirement in a year, I'd damn well have taken steps to get rid of him before this,"

"Did he, ah—voice objections?"

"You mean, did he yowl like a stuck pig? You bet he did. Carried on like I was personally responsible for inventing the damned artificial gravity. I don't need this shit." Van Atta's treadmill moaned in counterpoint to his words.

"If he's been with the Project from the beginning, I guess the quaddies are practically his life's work," allowed Leo reasonably.

"Mm." Van Atta marched. "It doesn't give him the right to go on strike in a snit, though. Even you had more sense, in the end. If he doesn't show signs of a more cooperative attitude when he's had a chance to calm down and think through how useless it is, it may be easier to extend Curry's rotation and just send Minchenko back downside."

"Ah." Leo cleared his throat. This didn't exactly smell like the good opening he'd been hoping for. But there was so little time. "Did he talk to you about Tony?"

"Tony!" Van Atta's treadmill buzzed like a hornet for a moment. "If I never see that little geek again in my life it will be too soon. He's been nothing but trouble, trouble and expense."

"I was rather hoping to get some more use out of him, myself," said Leo carefully. "Even if he's not medically ready to go back on regular Outside work shifts, I've got a lot of computer console work and supervisory tasks I could delegate to him, if he was here. If we could bring him up."

"Nonsense," snapped Van Atta. "You could much more easily tap one of your other quaddie work gang leaders—Pramod, say—or pull any quaddie in the place. I don't care who, that's what I gave you the authorization for. We're going to start moving the little freaks down in just two weeks. It makes no sense to bring up one Minchenko wouldn't let out of the infirmary till then. And so I told him." He glared at Leo. "I don't want to hear one more word about Tony."

"Ah," said Leo. Damn. Clearly, he should have taken Minchenko aside before he'd muddied the waters with Van Atta. Too late now. It wasn't just the exercise that was making Van Atta red in the face. Leo wondered what all Minchenko had really said—doubtless pretty choice; it would have been a pleasure to hear. Too expensive a pleasure for the quaddies, though. Leo schooled his features to what he hoped would be read through his puffing and blowing as sympathy for Van Atta.