"I'm here for you, babe," Jeremy said, pitching his voice down to an exaggerated macho tenor.

The tram stopped to discharge its three passengers on the east side of the VAB. Annie was the first off, and as she led the way toward the huge building's guarded personnel entrance Nimec picked up on an abrupt change in her demeanor. There was a tension beneath the surface he could almost feel her struggling to control, a hurriedness to her step that hadn't been evident when they'd left the reception area for the tram. Whatever was on her mind was something she'd chosen to keep to herself, and he could only admire her poise and composure in doing so.

The floor of the high bay area was as chaotic as she'd warned him it would be, but it was the organized chaos of people faced with a serious and complex task, and operating under intense pressure. He'd known it in combat, known it at police crime scenes, known it all too frequently since joining Roger Gordian's operation; it was part of the game he'd played throughout his entire professional life. What struck him in this instance, however, was the absence of accompanying background noise, the purposeful silence of the men and women Annie had drawn together for her team, some in NASA coveralls, others in civilian clothes, dozens of them scurrying everywhere around and past him. Their silence, and the sheer amount of debris that had been collected here. As his eyes swept the enormous room, he knew it would have been impossible to fully comprehend the annihilating magnitude of the explosions that had wracked Orion on the launchpad without seeing these remains firsthand.

Nimec surveyed the feverish activity a while longer, then realized Annie and Jeremy had already gone on ahead, walking side by side, leaning their heads together in private discussion. He started after them, but on second thought decided to hang back. Though he'd met her a scant half hour ago, he already suspected Annie Caulfield had good reasons for whatever she did. And he had given his word not to crowd her.

He watched them walk up the broad transfer aisle stretching away before him and climb onto one of the movable work platforms, where four or five investigators were gathered over several large sections of the spacecraft. Annie spoke with them briefly, projecting an easy, gentle authority--paying close attention to their comments, patting one woman on the shoulder with the same sort of open, unself-conscious warmth she'd shown Jeremy on the tram. Nimec again found himself singularly impressed by her bearing.

When the group left the platform a few moments later, plainly at Annie's request, she and Jeremy hunkered into what reminded Nimec of a palaeontologist's crouch and began shuffling amid the wreckage, occasionally exchanging comments and pointing things out to each other.

After a bit Nimec figured it would be okay to join them.