Children of the Fleet (Fleet School #1)(72)

In other words, how do we keep expeditions from functioning like every real-world bureaucracy ever known? Why should we imagine that this utopian culture can ever possibly exist? Is there something about being on another planet that will automatically transform human nature? Or will the Expeditionary Fleet only choose as its expedition leaders those persons who are already eligible for sainthood? By what system will such leaders be identified, and how will we get anybody else in the expeditions to follow them?

—Teacher comment: Coming from a corporate environment, it is not surprising that this student would assume that the well-known corporate tendency toward bureaucracy and careerism would also dominate in the Expeditionary Fleet. Will counsel student on the responsibility of leaders not to succumb to bureaucratic tendencies.

—Additional teacher comment: Student immediately agreed with all my comments and criticisms. Assume student was entirely ironic in doing so, and privately mocked our entire conversation after it was over.

—Conclusion: This student continues to show remarkable leadership promise.

Monkey was eager to demonstrate on a panel in the game room, but Dabeet said no. “How many kids come in here every hour? A vent near the floor is hidden, but a whole wall coming open?”

So they made their way to an upper level that had no active barracks. The rumor was that the IF had no intention of bringing Fleet School back to the number of students it sustained when it was Battle School. There was talk about quartering soldiers in the unused barracks, or housing faculty families there, or opening some kind of advanced school, but nothing real had happened and as far as Dabeet knew, the IF had no plans for these spaces at all. What mattered now was that nobody was likely to walk past the door while they had it open.

Dabeet braced himself on the panel just to the right of the one Monkey was going to try to open. “All the ones I tried opened from the right,” she said, “but who knows?” This one fit the pattern: Monkey clambered up Dabeet’s body, stood on his shoulders, and palmed the upper-right corner of the panel next to the one he was braced on. It sprang away from the wall about ten centimeters.

Monkey pulled it open farther and then held to the top of the door, swung off of Dabeet’s shoulders, and then dropped down inside whatever space had just been revealed.

“What is it, a closet?” asked Dabeet.

“Come inside so we can close it again,” said Monkey.

“How will we see?” asked Dabeet.

“Sonar,” said Monkey. “Very quiet sonar. You don’t know how to do that? Emit high squeaks and then listen for the echo.”

It took Dabeet a moment to realize she was joking, and a moment longer to be sure that she wasn’t ridiculing him, because it never occurred to her that anybody might not know, instantly, that it was a joke. Only after he had settled his emotional response did he step inside.

Monkey reached around him and pulled the door closed, using a mechanical handle. It was pitch black inside.

Monkey squeaked. Immediately a light came on. She was grinning. No, she was laughing silently, her shoulders shaking.

Dabeet almost asked her how she knew the pitch to squeak in order to turn on the light. Before he could humiliate himself, however, he saw that her left hand was leaning on a wall near a rocker switch. She flipped it down and the place was dark again.

“On please,” said Dabeet.

“You have to squeak,” said Monkey.

“I beg you, no,” said Dabeet.

The light came on. “You have no sense of play,” she said.

“I have no love of silliness,” said Dabeet.

“Same thing,” said Monkey. She started to head around a corner.

“Wait,” said Dabeet. “You’ve seen this kind of thing before, but I haven’t.”

She waited while he looked at the six child-sized emergency suits and the two adult ones, each with a small air tank. “How long are these good for?”

“Half an hour if you hold still, fifteen minutes if you’re active,” said Monkey. “Come on, they trained you on these when you first got here.”

Only then did Dabeet realize that yes, these were just like the training suits, except grey instead of white. “Right,” he said. “What’s this other stuff?”

“I don’t know,” said Monkey. “It looks like cleaning supplies.” She indicated a shelf with plastic bottles.

Dabeet looked more closely. “If we were inclined to make explosives, these would do.”

“You are insane,” said Monkey. “These would make a poisonous smoke and one explosion could wipe out the entire school.”

“Then let’s not make one,” said Dabeet, “unless the school is already doomed. But we should also look into the chemistry and see whether we can make some kind of flash-bang explosion that doesn’t raise a poisonous smoke.”

“Dirtbabies want things to go boom.”

“Those who come against us will be dirtbabies too, most of them,” said Dabeet. “I’m not making any decisions here, I’m taking inventory. But let’s go on and see how deep this corridor runs.”

There were many alcoves and doors identical to the one through which they had entered. The corridor itself was wide enough for a supply cart, and now and then there was a door on the other side, and an occasional trap door in the floor. Dabeet tried to open one; it was too heavy to lift it far, and while he held it up, Monkey looked and told him that it only gave access to a junction of various cables and pipes. “I could crawl along under the floor, though, I think,” said Monkey. “This is a kind of invisible road, this crawlspace. Suppose we led the enemy along the corridor here, then ducked down under and made our way behind them.”