Regeneration (Czerneda) by Julie E Czerneda Page B

that way —he’d never burst into her rooms before. Not to mention she usually heard about her attendance, or lack of it, from Mudge.
    “I don’t need to be there, but I was coming.” Eventually. “What’s wrong?” She waved him out of her closet and followed behind. “Besides, you’re better at those things than I am,” she added honestly. And enjoyed being in charge.
    Like Mudge, Lyle Kanaci was Mac’s height, but with an academic’s tendency to slouch that made him appear the shorter of the two. It also made it easy to see the red mottling the pigmentless skin of his scalp and neck. Something’s definitely up, Mac decided.
    He whirled on her the moment they were through the door. “You could have at least warned me!”
    “About what? Oh.” Mac nodded. “The move offworld. Things fell into place—” she made a helpless gesture “—fast.”
    “I don’t like it.”
    Déjà vu. She felt like grabbing Lyle by the shoulders and giving him a good shake. While she was at it, Mac decided grimly, she’d shake the rest of the universe with him. “You’ve been complaining for weeks about not returning to Myriam,” she pointed out. “I’d have thought you’d be thanking me.”
    “Not when it’s some trick by the Sinzi to make you cooperate.”
    Was he worried about her? Mac wondered. She scowled. “This was my idea. There’s no trick, the Sinzi- ra —” the emphasis on the honorific a rebuke, “—and I are in complete agreement as to the benefits to everyone, especially Emily, and what made you walk into my closet anyway?” Oh, for doors that locked, she thought wistfully. Just once.
    “You weren’t anywhere else.” He had the grace to look embarrassed. “Emily said you were still in your quarters.”
    She scowled a moment longer, just for effect. “I’d better have privacy on Myriam.”
    “You’ll have your own tent,” he promised, then half smiled. “Middle of a sandstorm, you’ll be alone for days.”
    Mac rolled her eyes. “Don’t remind me.”
    “Mac.” Lyle lowered his voice. “Are you sure about this? Myriam, the Chasm. It’s not what you’re used to—we’d understand—”
    Ouch. She decided to be equally blunt. “I do my best work in the field, Dr. Kanaci. As do you. A little—a great deal—” she amended, “—of sand doesn’t change that. We can’t learn what we must about the Dhryn here.”
    This drew a measuring look from his pale eyes, followed by a short, quick nod. “Then let’s get going. Charles has the specs for the flight—if you’re finished meditating?”
    “All done,” she assured him serenely, feeling a growing impatience herself.
    Field season. Not to a river or her salmon, but the potential for discovery was there nonetheless. It quickened the heart, steadied priorities into one. Move .
    “Let’s go,” she told Lyle.
    If she replaced the ring around her finger, turning it twice with regret, that was no one’s business but her own.

    Familiarity couldn’t breed apathy. Not here. As always, Mac slowed when she entered the Atrium, taking a good look at its remarkable space. The vast underground research facility beneath the IU consulate deserved it.
    Aerial platforms filled the inverted cone that was the Atrium’s core. Most were rooms without walls, linked in various temporary configurations to better serve the needs of the researchers using that space. Some were docked against the steplike levels that formed the outer walls, if you’d call a wall what resembled more the side of a giant pyramid under excavation, studded with entrances to still more rooms and facilities. Other platforms were in motion in every direction. Mac had yet to see a pattern to the traffic, although she had to admit she hadn’t seen a collision either. A few near misses.
    The ceiling, high enough to feel like sky, was the underside of the stones forming the patio, itself in the lee of the main consulate building. Tree roots formed wisps of brown cloud, the