Death Match - Diane Duane [37]
“I tried once or twice,” said George. “One guy asked me who wrote my speech. Another of the interviewers wanted to know, was I thinking about running for office?” The flicker in George’s eyes this time was not a happy one. “I don’t talk that way to reporters anymore. Competitiveness, ruthless competitiveness, that they understand. But joy…?” He trailed off, shaking his head.
Catie made a wry face. “Trying to teach a pig to read,” she said, “wastes your time, and only annoys the pig.”
George burst out laughing, and Mike and Hal both looked at him.
“What was that punch line again?” Mike said. “I missed it.”
“Nothing,” George and Catie said, more or less in unison.
Catie was immensely relieved when Wendy arrived to ask who wanted dessert. Hal, as always, was game. Catie often wondered where he put all the calories he ingested in a day, and how he always failed to show any sign of them afterward. For herself, she passed, content to finish her soda, and George and Mike asked for coffee.
“What time’s the press conference?” said Mike, making the writing-on-a-notepad gesture to Wendy when she came with their coffees.
“Two-thirty,” George said. “We’ll all stand around in the lobby of their headquarters, trying to look like we really want to be there. They’ll have ‘real’ jerseys there for us to wear, to illustrate what the virtual ones are going to look like.” He gave Catie an amused look. “Whether they’ll fit anything like as well as the virtual ones is another question. And then there’ll be another grilling from the media people, under those hot lights…and then we’ll have to go virtual and do it again. A couple of hours’ worth of interviews, at least, when we should all be in the cubic, practicing. And then back on the plane and home again….”
“But can’t you just play the game from up here?” Hal said, surprised. “The sponsor must have Net facilities you can use!”
“They probably have a lot better ones than anything the team has,” George said, nabbing the bill from the newly returned Wendy before anyone else had a chance at it, “but I don’t care about that, and neither does the team. When we’re playing, we all prefer our own Net setups at home. It takes valuable time to get used to someone else’s rig, and you never feel quite comfortable…and what happens if something goes wrong with it in mid-game? If your own Net machine malfunctions, that’s one thing, and maybe you’ll know what to do about it. Get up and kick it, or jiggle the phone cable, or whatever. But play a tournament-level game in a strange building, using a strange new machine? No, thanks. I’ll admit the extra travel time is a nuisance, but if it gets us home before midnight, that’s going to be good enough for me and the rest of the team. We’ll manage.”
Catie thought she could see his point. George fished around in his pockets and came up with an ElectroWallet card, handed it to Wendy. “Please take ten,” he said, and she went away smiling even harder than she had been, which Catie would have thought impossible.
George looked over at Hal. “So have you got your ‘seats’ sorted out for the game tomorrow?” he said.
“Yup…took care of it yesterday.”
“Not a bad idea,” George said. “The reservations computers have been having trouble with last-minute bookings, the last game or so, they tell me. But do you want to swap your seats for positions in friends-and-family space, down close to the heart of things? We’ve got room.”
Hal was delighted. “Can we really?”
George glanced at Catie. “No problem. Suit you?”
“Suits me fine,” she said. “I always like a close look at a winning team.”
“Then it’s settled. When you’re online this evening, check the team server and give it your seat locations. It’ll make the swap. Look, I’m sorry we have to go, but the new sponsor would get pretty cranky if the captain was late for the big press push. And if I know these guys, they’re going to want some time privately with us before the public part of