Children of Steel (35 page)

I looked at the selection of players that
they had available, I was surprised at the sizes and even the
prices of some of the equipment. I could spend a fortune in here
easily! At that point one of the sales people noticed my confusion
and came over to offer assistance.

"May I help you sir?" She asked.

I looked around at the large supply of
equipment, "Yes, you sure can. I'm thinking of buying a player of
some kind, but to be honest I have no idea what to get." I gave her
my best confused look, which in this case was rather easy.

She gave me a smile, "I can see you don't
have any experience with stereo equipment."

"Is that what it's called?"

"Most of it, it's the most generally used
type of a system using just two speakers, a right channel and a
left channel." she explained, "There are systems that use more
speakers to give a better sound, but even those are referred to as
'stereo' in the broad sense."

"I see, I think. So it's basically split to
one channel per ear?" I wasn't totally stupid.

"Basically that's it, how much were you
thinking of spending?"

"I want something that's small, I work aboard
ship. But I do want something of good quality," I could see her
eyes glint at the thought of that! "Not too expensive though! This
is my first ahh, 'Stereo'."

"You won't want something too cheap," she
explained, leading me to a section that contained much smaller
units. "Your hearing is better than a human’s, so you'll be much
more likely to pick up imperfections that are in a cheaper
unit."

I took her word for this, and just hoped I
didn't get taken as well.

"This would probably be a good set for you,"
she showed me a unit that was about twelve inches long, six high,
and six deep. "This unit will accept both memory disks and the
standard digital tape; it will also record on either medium if you
wish to make copies." She indicated two small speakers that sat on
either side of the unit, they were each six inch cubes. "These are
the speakers; they can be attached to the back for storage or
carrying. This unit is very popular with ship's crew members like
yourself."

I looked it over, and was fairly compact, and
looked well built, it had a very sturdy polymer shell and would
hopefully take a lot of abuse without breaking. "How good is it?" I
had nothing to compare it with.

"It has a frequency response from zero to
well past anything you could hear, believe me!" she smiled, and
showed me the literature that accompanied the unit. "Here, let me
play something for you." She turned it on then, and while I didn't
know music very well, it did sound good.

I listened to it for a few minutes while
looking over the spec sheet. The frequency range was well out of my
hearing range alright. I was familiar with some of the other
concepts, such as distortion, power, and channel separation, from
my technical studies. I wasn't too sure how they applied here, but
it did seem to be a very good piece of equipment indeed.

"It does sound good," I admitted, "and these
spec's look very impressive, but how does it compare to the other
units you have?" Maybe a little comparison would help me figure out
if I was getting a good deal, I figured.

"Here, let me play that piece of music on
some of the other sets we have." So saying she removed the disk
that was in the unit, and played it on several different stereos in
the shop. I did notice some differences when she showed me one of
the big six speaker stereos, but I expected that.

We went back to the stereo she had originally
shown me, "So how much is it?"

"Five thousand dollars" she said without
batting an eye.

"Five thousand!" I said shocked, "That's
nearly as much as a good set of armor." I looked at the unit again,
it looked pretty small for that price.

She continued on non-plussed, "It is water
proof, fireproof, can withstand a forty 'G' shock, has a
rechargeable internal power cell, can convert power from any
standard hook up, comes with a headset, and is guaranteed for
twenty years." She picked it up and threw it across the room. It
bounced off the wall before it came to a rest, but kept
playing.

I was impressed, "Okay, four thousand." I
countered, she smiled and we haggled a little bit. It ended up
costing forty-five hundred, and she gave me a carrying case for it
as well as a case of blank memory disks. They brought out a new one
in a box; I opened it and gave it a quick test, then thanked her
and left.

I took a cab back to the company barracks, as
I didn't feel like carrying it all the way back. I stashed the
stuff in my room and then went in search of the cafeteria for
dinner.

The rest of my leave was just one continuous
party; I didn't sleep in the barracks at all. I ended up at one
party at one of the local schools that lasted for two days. That
turned out to be fairly profitable as I met a psychology professor
and I talked to him about my temper for a while. He thought that
mediation was a good idea, but suggested I try it twice a day for
about twenty minutes, instead of just once. That also fit better
into my regular schedule.

I did get to see a few of the other islands
around the area, and enjoyed a few liaisons with some of the local
women. Most of the people were just unbelievably friendly and I got
quite a few offers to spend the night at somebody's place that were
totally non-sexual, I even made a couple of new friends.

Needless to say, that when the time came to
leave we were all sorry to be going, but everybody was in a good
mood. Loading went pretty quickly, as most of the cargo here was
fairly lightweight. I did get to set my stereo up in my room and
started going through the ship library's music selection. I found
that my tastes tended to run mostly to classical and jazz fusion.
Rock was nice, as well as some of the martial music, but it had a
tendency to make me a little hyper, so I stayed away from those
mostly.

After we left Lyceum, we made two more stops
that really weren't of much notice. We stayed at both planets for
about five days a piece getting three days of actual leave at each,
and spent most of our time on the company's grounds, or sticking to
the highly segregated animen section of town. Both of these places
were a lot more like Earth, with animen being tolerated as long as
we remembered our place and didn't get out of line.

So it was about five months after we had left
Lyceum that we finally came back to Hobson's Choice. I was excited
to be back to a place where we were accepted. Also I wanted to see
how Kathy was doing. Both Dave and Rudy were excited too, though
Gabe was ecstatic. It had been more than sixteen months since we
had been here last.

I gathered from the rest of the crew that
Hobson was a regular stop for this ship and one that normally took
place sooner than this. But we had been thrown off our planned
route by circumstance, so here we were. Of course those same people
offered that Lyceum was
not
a regular stop for this ship, so
we should count our blessings.

Most ships, mine included, tended to work in
only one region of space. This way everybody became familiar with
the necessary procedures for dealing with the planets there. It
also allowed the company to divest some control into regional
centers which, with the time delay in communications, worked more
efficiently.

We made orbit around Hobson's without
incident, and commenced unloading immediately. The unloading took
about six days; everybody was in a real rush to get finished. I got
the distinct impression that quite a few of the crew had
girlfriends or boyfriends here. Once we were finished we were all
given two weeks leave, which everybody greeted with enthusiasm.

I sat through the mandatory 'local practices'
briefing, there weren't any questions this time as the crew hadn't
changed at all since we were last here. Neither had the briefing.
It was about noon Thursday, and I had already touched bases with
Gabe and Dave who wanted to go to The Lining, the bar we had been
to last time. They were going to call Karen and Terry, so I thought
I'd call Kathy and see if she'd come too.

I felt a little trepidation as I made the
call, after all I had been gone well over a year, and she may very
well have decided that she had something better to do. I waited
while the phone rang, unsure of what to say.

"Hello?" I heard a women's voice answer the
phone, I
think
it was Kathy's, but it had been a while.

"Hello, this is Raj Rakir, is Kathy there?" I
asked, somewhat uncomfortably.

"Hi Raj, where have you been?" She sounded
happy at least, "It's been so long, I was beginning to wonder if I
was ever going to hear from you again!"

"We just got in an hour ago. I'm sorry I
haven't been around, but it isn't anything I have any control
over." I said apologetically.

"Oh I know that, I was just afraid something
might have happened to you. Kathy told me that she usually sees
Gabe every nine months or so, and of course the company never tells
when a ship is due in."

"Well, we had an exciting tour this time. I
was wondering if you'd like to meet me tonight, Gabe and Dave were
going to call Karen and Terry, and I though maybe we could join
them?" Now I'd find out just where I stood.

"Sure Raj! I'd love to. I'll get in touch
with the girls, and find out what the plan is."

Suddenly I felt a lot better; I hadn't
realized just how much it meant to me until she said yes. "I think
we're going to head to The Lining right away, it’s been a while
since we've been to a decent bar so I think the plan is to meet
there."

"Okay, I'll see you there around eight unless
Karen and Terry have other plans."

"Fine, I'll be looking forward to seeing you
later then. Bye"

"Bye, Oh! check your mail!" she added
cryptically just before she hung up.

I went and found Gabe and Dave, they had
gotten in touch with the girls and they were going to meet us at
the Bar. We grabbed a cab and when I insisted on a detour to the
central post office, they weren't too hard to convince.

Once there I checked the mail, besides the
normal letter for any family member, there were two other pieces as
well. I looked over the envelopes, one was from Sunil which was not
too much of a surprise, the other was from Cassandra! I sat down
and ripped it open immediately.

I read the letter over quickly, and then a
second time a little slower. She had come through here four months
ago, our little fracas on Arboral had caused a shift in the
company's deployment of personnel. She couldn't write where she was
bound unfortunately, but I was happy to see that she was in the
same relative sector at least.

She had heard about Nepal, the company was
always quick with death notices. She had also received news that
Kali was fully recovered and doing well,
that
took a load
off my mind. After that she spent a page telling me what she could
about what she had been doing since we had parted.

The last part surprised me a bit; she had
looked up Kathy as I had mentioned her in the Family mail. I hadn't
considered that possibility! She said she felt it was her duty to
check up on me, and I started to get a little worried, but as I
read on she said that she approved of Kathy and even liked her. I
breathed a sigh of relief at that, we had both agreed that celibacy
was out of the question, but I hadn't wanted to put it to the
test.

Finally she told me that she missed me, that
she hoped we could get a joint assignment together in the future,
and that I had better take care of myself and not get shot down
again! I wondered how she had heard about
that
? She had also
enclosed a recent picture, which I looked at longingly.

I put Sunil's letter in my pocket with her
picture, and quickly scanned the Family letter. Both Sunil and
Cassandra had added to it, I read their brief comments, added my
own, and 'remailed' it. I then found Gabe and Dave who were waiting
for me in the lobby.

"I take it you got some mail?" asked Gabe
noticing my grin.

"Sure did!" I showed them Cassandra's letter,
and once we had gotten another cab I read Sunil's too.

His was just a summary of what had been
happening on his ship, and where he had been. He had seen some
action himself, against another company on some place called Talis
four. He was doing well and while he was here he had looked up
Kathy too. He said I had excellent taste in humans and hoped I
didn't mind. At first I found that last bit a little cryptic, but
then I figured it out and had to laugh.

"What's so funny?" asked Dave.

"Oh nothing, just something my brother wrote
that's all," I smiled. It wasn't any of
his
business anyway;
I just hope we didn't come here at the same time. It would be
embarrassing at the very least, if we should both try and date the
same girl at the same time.

We got to the place around four, found a
couple of seats at the bar and ordered some beers. It was nice to
just hang out and relax for a while, we talked to some of the
regulars and around six we stepped out for a little while to get
some food. Seven o'clock found us back at the bar and working on
some more beers, by the time the girls showed up I had a slight
buzz on and was feeling pretty good.

"Raj! It's been too long," said Kathy
stepping up and putting her arms around me. I hugged her back and
kissed her, I didn't think anybody would complain. I noticed Gabe
and Karen weren't even coming up for air.

"It has been a while hasn't it?" I said
looking down at her. I noticed she was dressed the same way as when
we had first met, all in black, wearing a one piece jump suit that
showed off her athletic figure. I also noticed she still had the
ring I had bought her.