Lamont's collar suddenly felt a bit too tight. He forced himself to smile. "Naturally, I can't tell you the whole story," he said, edging past her.
"That's right," Lamont said stiffly. They had reached the end of the corridor and were in front of the lift. "Where did you say you were going?"
"Down to the command deck," Rosemary replied. "The drink dispenser there continues to be the most reliable onboard."
Lamont nodded, punching the control beside the lift doors. "I was thinking of heading there myself."
"It seems strange that we'd still be worried about those things," Rosemary said as they waited for the doors to open.
"What things?" Lamont asked.
"East and West. Scientific Society and Free World." Rosemary bit her lower lip in thought. "God, it all seems so small from here. Like trying to cut a pea in half."
"It's not just about geography," Lamont insisted. The lift doors slid open, and three tired-looking crew members mumbled greetings at the pair as they parted to let them through. Lamont and Rosemary stepped into the lift and Rosemary punched the button labeled "COMDECK."
"It's an ideological divide," Lamont continued. "They see the future of humanity as depending on control, centralization, collectivism. We see it as collaborative competition and free thought. After Epiphany, we all had to find way to work together to survive. But those differences were too fundamental."
Rosemary regarded him with a chiding smile. "I went to school too," she said.
The doors slid open again, and Lamont waited for the medic to exit before following after her. "You were wondering why United Space would make room for me. Well, that's why. It seems like a little thing on the surface, but it's actually everything."
Rosemary, a few paces ahead of him now, stopped and turned toward him, cocking her head. "That makes sense," she concluded after a moment. "But I don't think it's the whole story."
Lamont's collar suddenly felt a bit too tight. He forced himself to smile. "Naturally, I can't tell you the whole story," he said, edging past her.
"Why not?" Rosemary demanded.
The newspaperman gestured helplessly, glancing over his shoulder as he made his way toward the entrance to the main command deck. "If I did, who would buy my book?"
"That's not fair," Rosemary objected, jogging after him. "You can't keep everything to yourself for the next three years."
They stopped just outside the range of the electronic eye for the command deck's automatic door. It was no longer permanently ajar; a testament to the incremental repairs that were being made.
"I can't very well go throwing things into the ship's self-proclaimed rumor mill," Lamont said, watching her expression.
"I was teasing when I said that," Rosemary protested. "I can keep a secret."
As she was speaking, the door slid open. Chief Santana stopped on her way out of the command deck to avoid bumping into them. Her black eyes regarded the two curiously. "Excuse me," she said, holding her clipboard against the front of her neatly-pressed uniform skirt.
"Is Captain Carter in?" Lamont and Rosemary both asked at the same time, in a confused jumble of English accents.