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Walking back down, level by level, he felt the attention on him In the lift, a man tried not to stare at him In the hall outside the security office, a woman smiled at him and nodded, nervous as a mouse that se and another man froreeting hiesture and aot?” Bull asked
“A couple dozen people caure about half a kilo more dust just appeared out of nowhere”
“Okay, then”
“I’ve got a file of everyone ent in You wantthem in the syste deal It’s no big deal You can kill the file”
“You got it, boss”
“I’ll be incomes up And somebody start a pot of coffee”
He sat down on the desk, his feet resting on the seat of his chair, and leaned forward He was suddenly exhausted It had been a long, bad day, and losing the dread he’d been carrying for the weeks leading up to it was like being released froe waiting from Michio Pa The XO hadn’t requested a connection She didn’t want to talk to hi, her face was lit from beloith the backsplash of her hand terht and sort of faded away somewhere around her cheekbones
“I sahat you did there That was very nice Very clever Wrapping yourself in the OPA flag,the old man wonder if the creouldn’t take your side More-Belter-than-thou It was graceful”
Bull scratched his chin The stubble that had grown in since ernails sound like a rasp It was probably too much to ask that he not make any enearcoat it withsoet this I just hope you have enough soul left that what you’ve done still bothers you”
The recording ended, and Bull smiled at the blank screen wearily
“Every time,” he told the hand terminal “And next time too”
Chapter Ten: Holden
T
he Rocinante was not a small ship Her normal crew complement was over a dozen navy personnel and officers, and onthe Roci with four people meant each of them did several jobs, and that didn’t leave a lot of downtime It also meant that it was pretty easy at first to avoid the four strangers living on the ship With the docu ops, the airlock deck, the , they were stuck on the two crew decks with access only to their quarters, the head, the galley, and sick bay