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budget meeting on the Hill. It’s been a pleasure to meet you, Dr. Murphy.”
    Then he was out the door, where a female aide anxiously waited for him, attaché case in hand. Harry mumbled something about making a phone call, then he hastily stood up and exited the conference room. Out in the hall, Murphy heard him taking the opportunity to shake hands with Ordmann and thank him profusely for his time and patience. Never too late to curry favor, he reflected sourly.
    Which left him, for the moment, alone with Morris. At first, the Public Affairs chief studiously avoided meeting his eye as he folded his notebook and gathered his papers. Then he picked up the copy of Analog and his gaze lingered on the cover art, a Vincent Di Fate painting of an astronaut spacewalking outside a large spacecraft.
    â€œYou really like this sci-fi stuff, don’t you?” he asked.
    â€œBeen reading it all my life.” Murphy kept his voice even. Like most lifelong science fiction fans, he despised the word “sci-fi.”
    Morris shook his head. “Not for me,” he murmured. “Too unbelievable. I prefer real stories.” He dropped the magazine on the table. “Kinda like The X-Files , though. That’s pretty good.” He turned toward the door. “Anyway, keep in touch.”
    Murphy waited until he was gone, then he picked up the discarded Analog . Leafing through the magazine, he noted that several passages of his article had been highlighted with a yellow marker.
    For some reason, he found himself oddly flattered. At least Morris had bothered to read the piece. Too bad he hadn’t understood a word.

Mon, Oct 15, 2314—1045Z
    Franc expected to have a meeting with the Commissioner, yet not for several hours. When he arrived at his quarters on Deck 5E to drop off his bag, however, his desk had a message for him: Sanchez wished to see him and Lea as soon as possible.
    Lea apparently had received the same message; he found her waiting for him in the central hub corridor, just outside the hatch leading to Arm 5. As a selenian, she could have taken a room on one of the upper levels, but since she was trying to get herself reacclimated to Earth-normal gravity, she had requested a berth on 4E. During the flight up from Tycho, Franc had once again tried to talk her into sharing his quarters on 5E. She had politely turned down his invitation, but it wasn’t too late to ask one more time.
    â€œWe can still get a room together, you know,” he said. “I checked with the AI. It told me there’s a double available on my deck, right across from where I am now. I looked at it before I came up here, and it’s really quite comfortable. All we have to do is move our stuff over there and …”
    â€œThank you, but no.” She favored him with a smile. “I’d prefer to sleep alone, if you don’t mind.”
    â€œWell …” He hesitated. “Yes, I do mind, since you ask. I thought we were partners.”
    â€œOh, come on now.” She gave him a admonishing look. “We are partners … but I think you’re taking this a little too seriously for your own … our own good. Keep this up, and the next thing you know, you’ll be asking for a contract.”
    â€œI never said anything about a contract.” Although, in fact, the thought had crossed his mind more than a few times lately. Even a twelve-month MH-2, with a nonexclusionary clause, would do. “I just hate breaking up a good team.”
    She was about to say something when they were interrupted by a shrill electronic beep. They looked around to see a service bot moving down the corridor, the electrostatic brushes at the ends of its rotating arms sweeping dust from the cylindrical walls. “Move aside, please,” it droned as it approached. “Move aside, please.”
    Irritated, Franc resisted the urge to kick the bot out of the way. That would have been recorded by