The supply depot finally came into view ahead of him, an unremarkable door bearing the inscription SUPPLY above it in yellow letters. Rogers punched the door lock with the bottom of his fist, and the door opened into a small waiting area packed with spacers and marines sitting in rows of chairs and looking annoyed. He couldn’t remember a time when there had been so many people in the waiting area. In fact, he couldn’t remember a time when there was anyone staffing the desk, either. The supply room was just sort of the place where you went to get stuff. You went in, got stuff, and got out. There was no need for waiting.

The broad counter stretched the length of the back wall, behind which Rogers could see various cargo crates being moved back and forth through the different warehouses. It all seemed very busy, and he could have sworn that the same container was being moved over and over again.

A bored-looking corporal stood behind the terminal at the counter, not doing anything apparently useful. A sign above his head showed NOW SERVING 103, and a vidscreen off to the side was streaming a muted news channel with no subtitles.

“Can I help you?” the corporal asked in a voice that absolutely crackled with nonchalance.

“Yes,” Rogers said. “I’m here for my equipment issue.”

“Are you a new recruit?”

“Not exactly. I’ve been reinstated after a . . . break in service. R. Wilson Rogers, sergeant.”

The clerk asked Rogers for some additional personal data and started typing away at the terminal keypad.

After a moment, the clerk paused and frowned. “Roger Wilson Rogers? Your name is Roger Rogers?”

“R. Wilson Rogers,” he replied tightly. “Are you new here? Where’s Quintal? He was in charge here last time I was around.”

“Sergeant Quintal was transferred,” the clerk said. “I’m Corporal Suresh, the new supply chief.”

“Who put a corporal in charge of Supply?” Rogers said. In the Meridan Navy, corporals were just barely above starmen, who mostly had achieved the dubious accomplishment of being able to lace their boots properly.

That didn’t brighten Suresh’s day at all. “I am fully capable of the duties assigned to me, Mr. Rogers.”

“Sergeant Rogers.”

The clerk ignored him and continued typing away at the terminal for what Rogers thought was a very long time.

“Is there a problem?” Rogers asked. “I know where everything is back there. I’ll just go and get what I need, and—”

“Nobody not in the supply corps is allowed back there,” the clerk said.

“What are you talking about? Just about everyone in the whole damn ship has been back there at one time or another.”

“Not on my watch,” the corporal said.

Rogers bit the inside of his cheek. He had been betting on his old pal Quintal being here so he could reestablish all his old connections. Things were not going to go well for him at all if he couldn’t have a hand in the goings-on inside the supply depot. He changed his approach.