Hammer and Crucible by Cameron Cooper (easy books to read txt) 📗

was divine, too. The menu wrote a big green check mark next to each item I tapped.

I handed the menu back to Dalton. “Is this place your idea?”

“I asked the concierge if it had seen images of old Terran diners,” he said. “Apparently, it has.”

Juliyana smothered her laugh.

I just stared at Dalton.

He gave a defensive shrug. “I like history, okay?”

“Military history, sure,” I said, for I remembered his interest from the days when I had known him on Annatarr.

“History, period,” Dalton said. “I’ve branched out. Time can stretch when you’re hiding from everyone.”

A young brunette woman in a pink dress, overlaid with a white apron, came up to the table carrying a heavy tray. “Morning, ladies and gents. Let’s see here. There’s coffee, coffee and…mm, coffee.” She put thick mugs of coffee in front of each of us. “The rest will be right along, ‘kay?” She winked at Dalton and headed back behind the counter and into what looked like a rear room—a kitchen as antique as this place, I supposed, but it wouldn’t really be there.

Dalton got a silly grin on his face as he watched the waitress move away.

“You realize you’re ogling Lyth, right?” Juliyana told him.

Dalton’s smile faded. “I’m enjoying the ambience, alright?”

Juliyana laughed.

“Actually, I’m right here,” Lyth said. The façade he had been using last night moved up to the end of our table. “May I join you?”

“Coffee, honey?” the waitress called from behind the counter.

“Yes, please,” Lyth told her and sat on the end of the bench as Dalton straightened up and shuffled closer to the window and its distracting view. He put his hands on the table and looked at me. “I presumed you would wish to discuss our immediate future.”

The waitress put an identical cup of coffee in front of Lyth.

We all held our breath, watching as he picked up the mug and appeared to sip it.

And the level of coffee in the mug was lower, when he put the mug back.

I stuck my finger in the dark liquid, felt the sting of hot coffee. I moved to put the finger in my mouth and suck off the coffee, watching Lyth all the time, waiting for him to protest that I should not. He just stared steadily back.

“Danny, no,” Juliyana said quickly as I closed my lips around the damp finger, proving she’d had the same thought I had, that the coffee and the mug was just more of Lyth—nanobots split off and made to look like the coffee we were drinking and the cups holding that coffee.

“Tastes exactly like real coffee,” I said, as Dalton and Juliyana watched intently.

“That’s because it is real coffee,” Lyth assured us. “But we’re getting distracted,” he pointed out.

I blinked, and tried to push away the question blazing in my mind, namely, where the hell he put the coffee he was “drinking”? “Yes,” I said, regrouping. “Juliyana and I have spent a lot of money and a lot of time trying to find you, Dalton. You arriving at Devonire is a coincidence I’m still not happy about, but that’s immaterial for right now. The larger question is where do we go now? I’ve had some thoughts about that—”

“Back up a few steps, Danny,” Dalton said. “You need to fill me in on this whole Noam thing.”

“No, we don’t,” Juliyana said, her tone flat.

“The fuck you don’t,” Dalton shot back. “This is my ship—”

“Danny outranks you,” Juliyana interrupted.

We were back to that. I slapped the table to get their attention. “Just shut up for a moment, will you?”

“No,” Dalton told me. “I was here first. It was an abandoned ship. It’s mine by salvage rights.”

“You can’t even steer the thing,” Juliyana shot back, looking amused. “I’d say you belong to the Lythion, not the other way around.”

“Shut up! Both of you!” I cried.

They shut up. Dalton glared at me.

Lyth raised his hand. “I may be able to offer some clarity on this issue.”

“Go,” I told him.

“My orders were to collect all of you. I just happened to scoop up Dalton first—no offence,” he added, glancing at Dalton.

Dalton pushed back into the corner of the seat, angled so he could glare at all of us. “None taken.”

“I was also instructed to obey all of you,” Lyth added. “That would imply that if any of you own the ship at all, you all have equal rights. And as the more experienced officer, Danny should lead.” He paused. “A democratic leader,” he added. “One that we all agree to follow.”

“Democracy doesn’t work,” Dalton growled.

“Representative democracy does not,” Lyth returned. “Perfect and pure democracy does work, but it rarely exists. Right here, it does.”

I hid my smile as I watched Dalton squirm. Lyth was doing all the work for me. “Are you voting me in as captain, Lyth?” I already knew he had. He had called me Captain Danny last night.

“I believe that was the general thrust of what I was saying,” Lyth replied.

“I vote for Danny, too,” Juliyana said swiftly.

Dalton’s face tinged red and he drew a breath to protest…but the waitress chose that moment to come up to the table with another tray heavy with steaming plates giving off delicious scents.

Dalton had been neatly distracted. We all were. We all ate—even Lyth did, and I really wanted to know what he would do with the food and liquid he was taking in.

I was nearly through my breakfast, which was delicious. It shouldn’t be, for the food was printed and printed food never tasted quite the same as freshly prepared organics, but it did taste marvelous. Maybe it was the false sunshine and the airy notes of music drifting in the background, or the distant sound of a bustling ancient city…who knows? I just know it was one of the best meals I’ve ever had…and I had eaten chef-prepared operatic-quality meals at the clinic on New Phoenicia.

Dalton pushed his plate aside before I was finished and gripped his coffee mug in both hands. “You’re captain for now,” he told me. “I’ve