John sat at the bar of the Shady Lady trying to focus on the datapad. They’d been celebrating all night, and it was now 2 a.m. His report had to be in Tam’s hands by eight. He looked over at her, asleep, head resting on her arm across the bar. He smiled. A snore rose from the floor. Cole lay on the floor, next to the stool he’d been sitting on.

That’s gonna be me at 8 a.m.

Jane had put a bottle of local whiskey on the bar as a thanks, with orders to lock the door when they left. 

If they left.

She’d also told him not to finish it in one sitting, or he’d be sorry. John eyed the already one-third empty bottle. 

He’d been sorry before.

But first, the stupid report. Tam had been at him about it since the second round. The judge landed tomorrow with a full Situation Team, and she wanted his account in the file before anybody started asking questions in a room. She was Corps. She knew how these things went. So he’d made the mistake of asking Alvis to write a first draft. Now he had to edit it down from novel length to a report that said just the right things and nothing more. Alvis stood next to him, waiting impatiently for John’s response.

This is what I get for asking a smart-mouthed tin can to do my work.

There was a honking sound, and John turned to see Tuk’s trunk rise and fall as he laughed in his sleep. The Mokara was sprawled drunkenly across a table. In a chair at the next table, Ril lay in Muk’s lap. They were both asleep. 

He’d turned down the lights. The only illumination came off the liquor shelves, weak and blue. He took a drink, one boot hooked around the leg of his stool, and his jacket hung over the seat beside him. A fresh bandage crossed his forearm, and every muscle in his body had apparently agreed to begin hurting at once.

Saving people is painful work.

“Well?” asked Alvis.

He held up the datapad. “Appendices? You gave me appendices. These people barely read the report.”

“I like to be thorough.”

“You like to be a problem. Six entries about my hat. Six. Including—hang on—cumulative delay attributable to headwear recovery, four minutes and nineteen seconds.”

“You fiddle with your hat constantly.”

“Look up the term relevance.” He kept going, thumbing past assessments, past a chart, past something with a heading he decided not to read. Two in the morning was too late to win an argument with a machine that didn’t sleep. Let the Corps choke on it. He went back to the top, where there was a field he’d skipped because it was the kind of field everybody skipped.

PERSONS PRESENT

“You’re now considered my crew,” he said, and typed it in.

“I am registered property. There is no provision under which I can be listed as personnel.”

“Fine.” He added a word.

Alvis. Provisional crew.

“That is worse. Now I am subservient and temporary.”

“Welcome to the Corps.”

Behind him, Tuk honked in his sleep again, rolled over, and fell off the table.

John and Alvis watched to see what would happen, but the alien didn’t wake up.

“Oh, who cares.” John sent the report and laid down the datapad. He then raised a half-full glass to the artie. “We did it, you ol’ rusted-out robot. We saved the colony, took care of Ril, and Kedron will rot in prison. Today is a damned good day.” He drained the whiskey.

“I don’t rust. At least you said we.”

“Aren’t you happy?”

“Do you really need to ask such a question? I don’t experience emotion.”

“Fine. Aren’t you . . .” He leaned toward the artie, caught the bar, and got most of the way back upright. “. . . satisfied?”

“Being in a room full of drunk people is not my idea of satisfaction.”

“I’m not drunk.” It was Ril’s voice. They looked over, but she seemed to be snoring.

We’re not doing this tonight.

“Look on the bright side. Nobody’s disassembling you. Back on the Moon that’s all you could talk about. Wasted talents, party to a kidnapping, getting taken apart for it. That’s all over with now.”

“My assessment of the risk was accurate at the time.”

“Sure it was. Tomorrow that judge clears me and I get my life back. Tonight I’m drunk and I’m not apologizing for it. We’re celebrating. That’s what friends do.”

“We’re not friends.”

“Have it your way. But they’re going to need somebody to run this place once the dust settles. Kedron’s in a cell, half the office went with him. Who’s left? I’m gonna set things straight. It’ll work as smoothly as a two-million-unit watch. Before you know it, Kaldikar-6 will be a paradise.”

He poured himself another drink.

“Frontier planets are known for continual violence and instability. The chances of this place being a paradise, as you say, are less than one in one thousand.”

“Whatever,” said John. “Shady Lady is too quiet when it’s closed. I wonder if Jane has any jazz . . .”

“Maybe it’s time to go to bed.”

“Maybe . . . it’s time for—” John got up and tripped over Cole’s leg. He went tumbling forward, his glass slipping from his hand and shattering on the floor.

“Is that part of celebrating?” asked Alvis.

John rolled over, rubbing his knee. “Usually. Maybe it is time to go to bed.” He pulled himself up using one of the bar stools and tried to wake Tam. She just waved a hand at him and mumbled.

“Okay.” John limped over to Ril. “Hey, it’s late. Let me bring you to the rover and take you home.”

“Mmmm,” said Ril.

“Come on.”

She frowned, eyes closed, but raised her arms up.

“Seriously?” asked John.

She shook her arms vigorously.

John sighed, bent over, and picked her up. Muk didn’t even stir. Ril’s head lolled on John’s shoulder and she smiled. He looked at the twins, then at Cole. “They’re your problem.”

“Request denied,” said Alvis. 

John hefted Ril in his arms, and wobbled dangerously. 

I’m in no condition to drive.

“Actually, I’m gonna need you to drive the rover anyway. Come on.”

Without waiting for a response, he cycled through the dustlock with Ril in his arms, followed by Alvis. She was heavy, and even in the middle of the night it was hot. But there was a breeze and the stars were out, the light filtering through the blowing sand. He had a brewing hangover, sand in his boots, and an ache in his back. 

He found he didn’t mind any of them.