Saltation (14 page)

"You will wish to dance gently tomorrow and the next day—call it a prescription: you must dance gently. You should dance every day. This will be good practice, for as a courier pilot you will need to stand as ready as you did today. A moment more, if you please, Theo Waitley; you will relax, we will together permit these muscles to relax even more . . ."

He did something with his hands, touching one close to the affected area and one to the other side of her head, spreading warmth—

"One additional therapy," he said gently, "and your skin will find itself and we shall soothe it together and cover with just a slight tape . . . she who flies gliders, these muscles we need to relax, we need them to relax so that the parts of you go together properly. You need not always be on the verge of fight, which is wearing and tenses muscles. So, accepting the capability to act, that is good. What is needed, now, is for you to let these muscles relax, to let the skin be natural. This is how we refuse scars the opportunity to form. Let you dance a moment in your head, with your eyes closed, the move that most powers you, then the move that most relaxes you."

With eyes closed she saw Win Ton, dancing beside her, his eyes glinting mischief; felt her own move in response to his joy and the pattern—and sighed.

"Yes, that is fine, that is fine. Ah, excellent, let those emotions work for you. And now the coolmister . . ."

There came another
zzzizzizit
of spray, like fog on her face, and the touch of fingers and a flower smell that reminded her of bluebells and Coyster and home.

When she opened her eyes, the grey eyes of the med tech were surprisingly close, as if he were watching her whole face and person.

He gave a half bow, and reached about to pull a touch pad to her.

"If I may have your thumbprint, Theo Waitley, there will be two pills for pain, which you will not need tonight, but which I am required to issue. The skin cover will come off in the shower in three days; it is best if you not touch it before."

"Thank you," she managed, and stood. She felt . . . light, and . . . calm. Comfortable in her own skin.

"Thank you," she said again, and bowed.

There was a hearing, scheduled immediately, according to regs. Immediately in this case being the first hour of evening watch.

Theo was glad of the delay. Math for dummies was long dismissed. She wrote a note to the instructor, explaining her absence, which was required, then took a shower, being careful not to get the covering over her cut wet, and dressed. She pinned Win Ton's wings to her collar, and made herself a cup of tea.

Good tea, Father used to say, was worth more than its weight in rare wine. She didn't have rare wine, but she did have some tolerably good tea. She sat in the comfiest chair in the joint room, making sure to lean back into the cushion, closed her eyes and sipped.

Carefully, she did a self-assessment. She was still feeling kind of floaty, which she thought might be let-down from the adrenaline, like the medic had said. The calm . . . 
inner calm
, she thought, savoring her tea.

Pilot, that's what
that
was. Pilots had
inner calm
. The sample reports they'd been reading made that clear enough. Pilots acted for the best good of ship, passengers and cargo. That meant more than having good reaction times; it meant being calm enough to
think well
in emergencies.

Since she
was
going to be a pilot, no matter what Wilsmyth and the people like him tried to do to stop her, it seemed like calmness was going to be a good habit to cultivate.

She sighed, and finished her tea, wondering how the scene with Wil would have played out, if she'd managed to stay calm. Whether she'd reacted well to the emergency—well, she guessed she'd find out. Opening her eyes, she looked to the clock.

Real soon now.

Veradantha and Pilot yos'Senchul were waiting for her at the door to Hearing Room Three.

"Waitley," yos'Senchul said, his hand giving her a simultaneous,
Welcome
. He bowed slightly, which was perhaps a sign of the seriousness of the moment.

Veradantha merely nodded. "You are prompt, Theo Waitley. This is good. You display a becoming lack of anger. This is also good. The matter before us should not take much of our time. Be sober, be thoughtful, be alert, and all is well."

"Yes, ma'am," Theo said, looking between the two of them.

"We are here as your advisors," yos'Senchul said, moving his hand toward the door. "Please, after you."

At the table between her two advisors, Theo made sure she had her back against the chair, folded her hands on the table, and advertently noted the location of the second door.

As she settled and looked around, she was aware of the solemn patience of both of her tablemates.

Between them they'd had a lot of practice being patient, she supposed, with Flight Instructor yos'Senchul having to deal with wannabe pilots all the time, and Veradantha—and Veradantha having had more years than Theo could imagine to . . . and there, so much for patience. Veradantha placed a small flat object on the table, flashed her hand over it, and settled back, at ease now that the clock was running.

People were settling into place at the other tables. Wilsmyth sat with an administrator or teacher she didn't recognize, pointedly looking away from her, mostly at the pile of hard copy in front of him.

Chelly was at the head table, such as it was—it was hard to have a head table with three rectangular tables arranged in a triangle shape and each with three chairs sitting behind it—but there he was, very busily not looking at her and not looking at Wil, either. Since Wil sat in the middle of his table as she did at hers, that left Chelly a tunnel straight ahead to look at, along with his notebook, and the people who flanked him. Wil's table still lacked his second advisor, but it wasn't quite the hour yet, according to Veradantha's clock, which was official enough for Theo.

The door opened, admitting Commander Ronagy, who looked around, frowned and pulled the door sharply closed behind her.

"Mister Frosher," she said, "please designate one of your associates to take the empty seat; I'll sit to your right at head table."

Chelly looked to his right and left.

"Dorts is a pilot," he said quietly, "so someone in Admin, it looks like. Goueva, that fits you several times."

The plump woman lifted a hand in acknowledgment, gathered up her notebook, and moved over to Wilsmyth's table with a minimum of fuss. The Commander slid into the newly vacated chair.

Right
, Theo thought.
Veradantha is here as Admin, too. Keeping track of jobs is hard.

Chelly nodded all around as if counting, rapped quietly on the desk in front of him, and began the session.

"Thank you all for coming on short notice; as desk man on Ops the decision to convene is my responsibility. This is an informal fact-finding session convened by the officers of the watch as per standing orders in instances where accidents or conflicts involve the need for medical intervention or staff attention; no notes are to be taken and no notes are to be taken away. Should no consensus be reached over the items under discussion this evening, a formal process will begin, possibly as soon as the close of this session."

Chelly's voice was good and strong for all that he was reading from a cheat sheet, with the head of the academy by his side. "Does any member of this fact-finding wish to go directly to formal process? If so, please state your case now."

Peripheral vision is a wonderful thing, except that it almost cost Theo an inadvertent laugh as hands on both sides of her flashed quick instructions, Veradantha's
No
perhaps a tenth-beat behind yos'Senchul's
silence
.

Chelly looked around, checking with the others at the front table before looking toward Wil, and then, almost pointedly, at Theo. She refolded her hands—left over right—and looked right back at him.
Inner calm.

Chelly let the quiet stretch a moment longer, then nodded, naming all present so that he was sure who was who, and so they could be too, then returned to the cheat sheet.

"With the consensus of all present parties I will state the situation as it came to the attention of Ops."

Inner calm.

Chelly's recitation was bare-boned: a call for medical assistance with security backup came during the early evening free-flight period, with a witness reporting "a discussion or something" between a pilot and the acting field coordinator during which one person "was just about knocked out one-handed" and the other was "bleeding to beat Betelgeuse."

"A moment, Mr. Frosher."

Chelly stopped, head turning rapidly. The Commander's hand motion was a soothing
For clarity
toward Chelly—and a scathing
discussion talk talk discussion
as she glanced between Wil and Theo. Her look was less than warm and Theo wished she had some tea to sip on.

"I've been called from my dinner to
discuss
a
discussion
between two of our students? I see. Please continue."

Theo felt as if she'd shrunk, but the flight instructor's briefly fluttering hand was calm:
fly the ship
.

"Accounts vary somewhat," Chelly continued. "The witness suggests he became aware of an animated discussion in progress as the principals arrived, one which, I guess the word is 'escalated' because both parties were focused on different goals. The witness indicated that perhaps Pilot Waitley was refusing to thumbprint something and during the insistence, accidental contact occurred between the individuals and—"

Theo's twitch was calmed by Veradantha's
smooth, not a problem
hand-sign. Wil, meanwhile, jerked 'round to glare at Theo.

Chelly went on.

"The result was that both parties went to the infirmary. Pilot Waitley suffered a flesh wound to the scalp; Wilsmyth suffered contusions and a few moments of disorientation."

"First strike, Mr. Frosher?"

This from the Commander.

"The cameras might tell for sure, ma'am, but the sequence seems to have been an accidental . . . ummm . . . an accidental swipe of the notebook Wilsmyth carried, which caught Pilot Waitley by surprise. Pilot Waitley's response was, I gather, a move of the dance, a trained response."

"Thank you. Please continue."

"I ask the involved parties if the summary of events to this point is accurate."

Theo sat back, thinking hard, willing away her blush, willing away her anger.
Inner calm
.

"Yes, but—" Wilsmyth began, and stopped as a hand came to rest on his arm.

"I think yes," Theo managed. "That's what Bell would have seen. I mean, that's what happened, I guess. I got swiped upside the head and yeah, that dance move was right there. Automatic."

Chelly glanced around, then down at his cheat sheet, nodding as if he were mentally clicking off options as he read them.

"We have a situation that was not the result of an inherent fault in the physical plant of the academy, nor was it the direct result of catastrophic equipment failure, nor of procedure."

He paused, nodded once more with authority, and went on.

"Does any member of this fact-finding wish to go to formal process now? If so, please state your case."

Theo could see Wilsmyth staring at his pilot advisor, and saw a flurry of low to the table hand-talk she couldn't get much out of. For her part, her hands were still after acknowledging Veradantha's low-voiced, "Please wait."

Chelly looked about carefully and nodded. "Who will assert being a victim?"

The relocated administrator was whispering urgently into Wilsmyth's ear, while at Theo's table, yos'Senchul signed an unruffled:
best stay course
.

After a few moments Chelly tapped his cheat sheet, looking relieved.

"We now go to a short discussion of events prior to the witness account. As no charges have been brought to this point and neither party has indicated a claim of victim, precedence goes to the senior."

Theo vibrated with anger and tension, the phrase
inner calm, inner calm
bouncing around noisily in her head. Her advisors walked on either side of her, Veradantha professing a preference for something out of the ordinary, it being so late in the evening, while the flight instructor was saying something Theo wasn't quite catching about a simple snack from Toovil that could be had for a half-hour's flying.

They left the building, cool air and silence flowing over them. Lost behind were Wilsmyth and his companions, who'd gone right when they'd taken the left at the end of the hall. Wil had been laughing, though she didn't think he had anything more to laugh about than she did.

At that, she wiped her hand on her jacket sleeve again, She certainly hoped never to touch him again. Without a doubt laying him out on the floor was something he'd deserved, no matter how accidental, and shaking his hand may have satisfied custom in a way Father would have approved of, but it
certainly
hadn't satisfied her.

"Orn Ald, that's fine for you to say, but some of us have meetings and classes in the morning."

Hand-talk, compressed and sudden. Theo caught
fix now quick
and then realized they were heading at quite a pace toward the faculty airstrip.

"Why did we have to act like losing my hours was an accident?"

Theo tried not to whine but wasn't sure she'd succeeded.

Veradantha spoke, gently, but not in answer to either the question or the tone.

"Theo Waitley, my good friend Orn Ald and I wish, evidently, to speak with you outside the range of official ears."

yos'Senchul's flashed a general
query yes?

"You are hungry, Theo?" he asked aloud.

"Still mad," she confessed. "I ought to be hungry, I guess." She walked on, glad of the brisk pace, tension in her shoulders and
inner calm
starting to sound like a bad joke.