Carl felt suddenly lightheaded, incredulous. “What? That’s… But I saw him just two days ago!”

Neither of the two other men spoke—there was still steam in their argument. Virginia said quietly, “He had a fever yesterday and went to bed. When Vidor went to find him this morning he… would not waken. He died within an hour. Apparently there were no other symptoms.”

“Fever? That’s it?”

“It doesn’t seem he ever woke up.”

The shock of it was only now penetrating, filling Carl with a sensation of falling. Commander Cruz had been the center, the heart and brains of the entire expedition. Without him…

“What… what’ll we do?”

Malenkov mistook Carl’s question. “Sleep slot him—now. There is yet little or no neural damage.”

Dazed, Carl said, “Well… sure… but I meant…”

Saul said, “I still feel we must have more data to study these cases—”

“We are not certain how long he ran a high temperature. Any more time, he risks brain damage.” Malenkov waved a hand brusquely in front of Saul, erasing any objections. “Come.”

They all went numbly to the hub of the sleep-slot complex. Carl was stunned. He tried to think, chewing his lip. The sociosavants had written extensively about how small, high-risk enterprises had to have a clearly superior, Olympian leader to avoid factionalism and weather hard times. A Drake, a Washington. Without the leader…

In the sealed prep room Samuelson and Peltier were running checks and planting diagnostics around a body that was already wrapped in a gray shroud of web circuitry. Miguel Cruz-Mendoza’s face was calm, and still projected a powerful sense of purpose.

Wisps of fog laced the air as the workroom dropped in temperature. Malenkov spoke to the two laboring techs through a mike and the party watched the last procedures of interment.

“So you’d authorized slotting even before our little argument,” Saul noted calmly.

“I wanted you should see my logic. While Matsudo is in slots, I am responsible for health of the whole expedition,” Malenkov said stiffly.

“Indeed you are.” Saul’s voice carried only a dry hint of irony.

“I hope we can bring him back soon—very soon,” Malenkov said. “Damnation! At the very beginning!”

Virginia said gamely, “We’ll all pull together. Of course, we’ll have to…”

“Pick a new commander,” Saul finished for her. “That’s obvious— Bethany Oakes. She’s next in line.”

Carl nodded reluctantly. Another Ortho. All the senior crew were. And Oakes wasn’t even a spacer.

They watched in silence as Peltier and Samuelson rolled the commander’s body into a sleep slot and opened the valves to feed fluids. The tube fitted snugly into a broad wall of similar nooks, gleaming steel certainly wreathed in gauzy fog. So much like death, yet it was the only hope of life to come. It they could figure out what had killed him. If.

Malenkov sighed. “We should have some ceremony. But there was no time.”

Saul said, “And perhaps it’s not such a good idea to assemble everyone in one place.”

Still numb, Carl thought, Miguel Cruz wouldn’t want a stiff little ritual. Some of us’ll get together and hoist a few for him later. The captain would understand that.

And maybe that might dull the pain, when numbness turned to grief.

“Dispersal, yes.” Malenkov nodded silently, frowning. Carl realized they were still talking about what had killed Cruz and whether it was communicable. “Osborn here can adjust job schedules until we thaw Oakes.”

“I am going back to the lab,” Saul said. “I want a full dress review of the lab results.”

“I think not,” Malenkov said stiffly.

Carl saw that Saul was already half-lost in thought about paths of inquiry to follow, checks to make. Saul did not reply at once, but gazed off into space, toward the slot cap that had closed on Cruz. Then he turned slowly to Malenkov. “Ummm? What?”

“Is your turn, Saul.”

“What?”

“This death makes me more firm.” Malenkov bunched his lips together, whitening them, his jaw muscles set rigidly.

“We risk exposure to you even by this talking.” Malenkov gestured brusquely. “Into a slot.”

“That’s ridiculous.” Saul looked irked, as if Malenkov were pursuing a bad joke. “I can help. Hell, if some of my suspicions are true—”

“You are not so big and essential,” Malenkov said stiffly. “Peltier, she knows the immunology well—”

“I insist—”

“I will not risk you dropping dead, my friend.”

“Nicholas, I don’t have whatever killed Miguel Cruz!”

“Look at you—eyes red, nose running.” Malenkov gestured. “You have something. A microbe caught in your lab, could be.”

Virginia stepped to Saul’s side and felt his brow. “You’re hot,” she said.

Carl watched sourly as she put her hand on Saul’s face with unselfconscious intimacy. He looks damned sick to me. Malenkov may be right.

Virginia asked quietly, “How long have you been this way?”

“Days, off and on,” Saul said dismissively. “A cold, that’s all it is. Some fever.”

Malenkov said, “We cannot be sure.”

“I think it’s just a leftover from Matsudo ’s last damned bio challenge. Which doesn’t mean I’m Typhoid Mary.”

“The commander died in hours,” Malenkov said curtly.

“Not from anything he caught in my lab. He hasn’t even been near it.”

“Could catch it directly from you,” Malenkov said.

“Exactly! Then why am I still alive? Use your head, Nicholas. You need me to help track down his killer!”

“It is to save your own foolish life!” Malenkov shook his fist at Saul, tensing his whole body.

“Saul, you must.” Virginia urged, tightness skittering through her voice. “We can’t let you risk yours—”

“No more!” Malenkov shouted. His bulk made the command imposing. The chamber was of hardened plastaform and cupped the sound into a resonant, rolling boom. “No more!”

I knew he’d start browbeating if he ever got a chance, Carl thought. Let him get away with it now and we’ll be taking orders from him forever. I’ve seen guys like this before.

Part of it, though, was simple resentment over anyone giving orders when his captain was barely cold.

“You’re not commander,” Carl said mildly, suppressing his initial urge to raise his voice. “Life Support comes next in the crew chart, as I remember, and this falls under the category of a space emergency. I’m acting officer.”

All three looked at him with surprise. Scientists—they never look beyond their own fiefdoms.

Malenkov hesitated, glanced at the others, then nodded. “True… for now. Bethany Oakes, we can thaw her soon, however.”

“Go ahead.” Carl shrugged. Then she can play these power games with you and I’ll drop out.

Saul said judiciously, “That seems reasonable.”

Carl could not help but smile sardonically. You bet it is. I just saved your ass from the slots.

“I… agree,” Virginia added, but Carl saw conflicting emotions play across her face. They were so obvious to read. If Saul was slotted she would lose him for a year or two. But if he died…

Virginia and Saw Lintz? Carl was stunned. He couldn’t even think about that, right now.

“We’ve got other problems.” he stammered only briefly as he hurried on. “I came in to report some stuff clogging the filters in Shaft Three. We’d better deal with that, and soon.”

Malenkov said, “I still do not see why Saul—”

“Because we need every hand, that’s why!” Saul erupted.

Malenkov’s face compressed, his cheeks bulging, an adamant set to his jaw. “I do not agree.”

Carl said flatly, “Complain to Oakes.”

Malenkov abruptly jerked open the hatch. “One thing I have authority to do! Saul should keep away from all of us. I will not be in the same room with him any longer.”

Saul began, “Come on, Nick, you—”

“I am still chief of medicine!” Malenkov said angrily. “I log you as quarantined!”