Free Baby Is Three by Theodore Sturgeon

way?”
    “No.”
    “Stop trying to look like an innocent babe! Your stubble gives you away. You knew I was going to solo, didn’t you?”
    “No one said anything to me.”
    “No one ever has to,” he said in irritation, and then chuckled. “Man, I wish I could stay mad at you. All right—what next?”
    “You’re not going to take off?”
    “With you in here? Don’t be foolish. The station’d lose too much and I wouldn’t be gaining a thing. Damn you! I’d worked up the most glamorous drunk on methyl-caffeine, and you had to get me all anxious and drive away the fumes … Well, go ahead. I’ll play it your way. What do we do?”
    “Stop trying to make a Machiavelli out of me,” I growled. “Give me a hand back to my quarters and I’ll let you go do whatever you want.”
    “It’s never that simple with you,” he half-grinned. “Okay. Let’s go.”
    When I got to my feet—with more of his help than I like to admit—my heart began to pound. He must have felt it, because he said nothing while we stood there and waited for it to behave itself. Clinton was a good lad.
    We negotiated the court and the Gate all right, but slowly. When we got to the foot of my ramp, I shook my head. “Not that,” I wheezed. “Couldn’t make it. Down this way.”
    We went down the lateral corridor to 412. The door slid back for me.
    “Hi!” I called. “Company.”
    “What? Who is it?” came the crystal voice. Tween appeared. “Oh—oh! I didn’t want to see anyone just—why, what’s happened?”
    My eyelids flickered. I moaned. Clinton said, “I think we better get him spread out. He’s not doing so well.”
    Tween ran to us and took my arm gently above the splint. They got me to a couch and I collapsed on it.
    “Damn him,” said Clinton good-humoredly. “He seems to be working full time to keep me from going Out.”
    There was such a long silence that I opened one eye to look at them. Tween was staring at him as if she had never seen him before—as, actually, she hadn’t, with her eyes so full of Wold.
    “Do you really want to go Out?” she asked softly.
    “More than …” He looked at her hair, her lovely face. “I don’t think I’ve seen you around much. You’re—Tween, aren’t you?”
    She nodded and they stopped talking. I snapped my eyes shut because they were sure to look at me just for something to do.
    “Is he all right?” she asked.
    “I think he’s—yes, he’s asleep. Don’t wonder. He’s been through a lot.”
    “Let’s go in the other room where we can talk together without disturbing him.”
    They closed the door. I could barely hear them. It went on for a long time, with occasional silences. Finally I heard what I’d been listening for: “If it hadn’t been for him, I’d be gone now. I was just about to solo.”
    “No! Oh, I’m glad … I’m glad you didn’t.”
    One of those silences. Then, “So am I, Tween. Tween …” in a whisper of astonishment.
    I got up off the couch and silently let myself out. I went back to my quarters, even managing to climb the ramp. I felt real fine.
    I heard an ugly rumor.
    I’d seen a lot and I’d done a lot, and I regarded myself as pretty shockproof, but this one jolted me to the core. I took refuge in the old ointment, “It can’t be, it just can’t be,” but in my heart I knew it could.
    I got hold of Judson. He was hollow-eyed and much quieter than usual. I asked him what he was going these days, though I knew.
    “Boning up on the fine points of astrogation,” he told me. “I’ve never hit anything so fascinating. It’s one thing to have the stuff shoveled into your head when you’re asleep, and something else again to experience it all, note by note, like music.”
    “But you’re spending an awful lot of time in the archives, son.”
    “It takes a lot of time.”
    “Can’t you study at home?”
    I think he only just then realized what I was driving at. “Look,” he said quietly, “I have my troubles.