Of Fire and Night - Kevin J. Anderson [103]
Maybe somebody might have noticed danger signs among the compies if they hadn't been so preoccupied with chasing down Roamer settlements. . . .
He was sure that General Lanyan and Chairman Wenceslas had somehow brought the EDF disaster down upon themselves, just as they had triggered the Roamer ekti embargo. He couldn't believe Lanyan had coolly denied the whole incident about destroying Kamarov's cargo ship! They'd made the current mess, so let them deal with it. Patrick had already resigned from the Earth Defense Forces, and he could not stomach the thought of serving such a flawed organization. How many other eager young officers, like himself, had been ordered to fire upon Roamer trading ships?
Patrick felt as if he would explode from frustration.
Fortunately, in the last few days Maureen had rarely been around to see him. She had suggested that he keep himself busy in the vehicle bay. Patrick did find working with the old engines therapeutic--changing oil, replacing spark plugs, checking fan belts and air filters. The physical work freed his mind and helped him to think more clearly.
Back at Osquivel, he had talked with Zhett about vehicles from the mid-twentieth century, ones built before computer chips and intelligent/adaptive circuitry allowed private autos to diagnose their own problems and repair themselves. The internal-combustion technology was primitive yet effective in a brute-force way. He had downloaded detailed guidebooks for his 1957 Plymouth Fury, his 1972 Ford Mustang, and (strictly for practice) a rusty little 1981 Chevrolet Chevette.
Now that he was done with political nonsense, his military career path, and his family reputation, he made plans while working on the cars. As soon as his grandmother let her guard down, he would do something she'd never be able to prevent. He didn't think he'd have any trouble fooling the therapists trying to "deprogram" him from Roamer brainwashing. Stockholm syndrome, indeed!
He slipped behind the Mustang's steering wheel and turned the ignition's old-fashioned analog key, then pumped the accelerator to awaken the beast under the hood. "At least I can make something work right."
He mused while looking through the windshield at the other ships in the vehicle pool, especially the space yacht. He knew how to fly every craft here. Why not just take the starship and go searching for Zhett? If the Roamers had packed up from the rings of Osquivel, he had no idea where he would even begin to look, but he certainly wasn't going to find her by sitting in an engine bay and playing with old cars! Patrick began to make more concrete plans.
He released his foot on the accelerator, and the Mustang's engine stuttered, coughed, then died in a choking gurgle. Bluish-gray smoke curled up from the rear of the car, and Patrick could smell the harsh-sweet fumes of internal-combustion exhaust. Silence returned like ripples fading in a pond after a thrown pebble.
As he climbed out of the driver's seat, Fitzpatrick spotted his grandmother standing at the entrance to the service bay, watching him. She looked wrung out, her skin pale, her gray hair bound back in a quick and serviceable clip rather than her usual elegant coiffure. He'd never seen her look so haggard.
He slammed the car door, self-consciously looked at his grease-stained hands, then wiped them on his pant legs. "You look like you've aged a million years, Grandmother."
Patrick had long since grown immune to her melodrama. All his life, he had seen her swing through the pendulums of crisis after crisis. She overreacted and exaggerated the importance of every scandal; each time a council vote did not go her way, it seemed like the end of the world.
"Is it any wonder?" She stared at her grandson under the service bay's intense overhead lamps, and her eyes were sparkling with tears! Patrick had never seen such a thing; the Battleaxe had long ago learned not to bother putting on an act for him. "I'll get your uniforms ready,