Rimrunners (27 page)

She sucked the cut lip and kept staring at him.

"You're asking for it," Fitch said.

She didn't say a thing.

"Catch your breath," Fitch said calmly. "You want a drink?"

"Nossir."

Fitch cut the recorder off, ran it back a minute or so.

Didn't restart it. And she worried then.

"I keep the records," Fitch said. "See what smart gets you? Come onto this ship,

go right for the troublemakers—You've been damned useful, Yeager. You think

you're smart. But I don't need a thing out of you—now we're off the record. I

just need you to exist. Bitch."

She figured she was in for it, then, figured Fitch had plain revenge in mind and

a whole lot of things could have been a bad mistake.

"Now," Fitch said, "I want you to think about something. I want you to think how

you can save your own ass, because this is the chance you've got. I want you to

think about how you can go on being useful to me, and I'm going to help you

think about that, you hear me?"

"Yessir."

Damn! No simple son of a bitch…

Going to hurt for this one, Yeager…

So you lie. But what's he want? ,

"All you have to do is get along with me."

"Yessir."

He got off the edge of the desk, he came and took hold of her the way he had and

she flinched, mad that she did that, but the nerves remembered, the body wanted

to protect itself and if you did that they'd space you sure.

He slapped her across the face, once, twice, three times, and he stopped, but he

was still holding onto her and her bones hurt and her ears rang and her vision

fuzzed… and hit her the way he could, and her obliged to take it…

He shook her, one neck-popping snap. "You want more?"

"Nossir."

"Those drugs yours?"

"Nossir."

He hit her again. "Are you any use to me?"

"Dunno, sir." Talking made a bubbling feeling, now. Blood, maybe. "I try."

Fitch said, "How's that?"

"Try, sir. Real cooperative."

"I think you're lying, Yeager. Would you lie to me?"

"Nossir."

The grip on her clothes let up. She tensed up, expecting a sneak blow, but he

let her sit there.

"You want your friends to be all right, is that right?"

"Yessir."

"There's a washroom back there. You go clean up. Then you can go."

She stared at him.

"You understand me," Fitch said. "Report on the drugs is inconclusive.—I sure as

hell better not catch you in any more trouble, Yeager. You or your friends, you

hear me?"

"Yessir," she said. She got up, the way he said, wobbling, she managed to focus

enough to see the door, and she went back into the cubby with the sink and

toilet and turned on the cold water. The mirror showed a face better than she

expected, the blood from her nose and mouth went with a couple of handfuls of

cold water. The red on the sides of her face didn't.

She blotted dry with the towel, she looked up and Fitch was mirrored in the

doorway.

Her gut clenched up. She couldn't help it, and couldn't help it when she had to

turn around and face him, and pass him when he moved back ever so little to let

her brush past him.—Dammit, she knew what he was doing, wasn't half surprised

when he put a light hand on her shoulder, enough to make her stomach heave.

"You do better in future," he said. "And we'll get along just fine. Hear?"

"Yessir."

He motioned her toward the door. She went, opened it herself, .walked out into a

vacant corridor. The cold of the water was going. Her bones ached, her vision

still kept blurring, and she had to walk around the rim and get some rest and

get up, she supposed, at alterdawn—back on duty; but she realized numbly that

she had no idea where NG and Musa were, or what had happened to them or whether

NG was next in Fitch's office.

She grayed out for a second, found herself in rec, walking up to the quarters

door, got just about that far before she got dizzy and had to hang there a

second. Then she shoved off and walked into the dark, past sleeping crewmates,

down as far as Musa's bunk and NG's, and they were both empty.

God.

She had to sit. She picked Musa's bunk, and sat down and after a moment lay

down, in the idea that if either of them came back the way she had, they'd come

here, and she didn't think she could make the loft, she was too dizzy and too

sick.

The dizziness got better after a few minutes of lying down. But the fear didn't.

Exactly what Fitch had done to NG.

Exactly.

Except it could get worse. Except you toed the line with Fitch or he'd see you

had accidents, and he had his hand-picked skuz aboard to see you got up on

charges—no damn wonder Hughes and his bridge connections were so solid—

Goddard. Goddard, over nav, Hughes' operator.

Friend of Fitch's.

Fitch picked the personnel.

Got himself a skut who carved up two people on Thule, just out of the goodness

of his heart and his faith in humanity hauled her aboard and let her loose—

Like hell.

Like hell Fitch didn't run this ship…

Or intend to.

Bernstein had to be a pain in the ass to him. Bernstein had been on mainday

until he got a bellyful of Fitch and transferred to alterday—

—like anybody else who could manage it.

Alterday was where you went if you couldn't get along with Fitch and you had a

little pull—like Bernie had gotten NG and Musa to his shift; or you got there by

being Fitch's hand-picked damn spies—

—like Lindy Hughes. Should've killed that skuz.

Will.

Except—the facts were real clear now, what the real rules were on this ship—that

meant you went head to head with Fitch, and that meant—

Fitch had just given her a preview of what it meant.

And Fitch had NG in there by now, another locker-door accident, that was all. A

lot more valuable alive—

You didn't make martyrs, you just beat hell out of 'em and you turned 'em back

into the 'decks to start the rest of the campaign—

—like little accidents to your stuff, and then little accidents to you, so you

knew if you fought back you were going to be in Fitch's office, and maybe in the

brig when the ship went jump—

—like little accidents to your friends. And your 'friends' would pull off and

leave trouble alone, if they were smart.

Or just human.

You always gave your enemies an out, right in the direction you wanted 'em to

go. That was what the Old Man used to say. That was what Fitch was doing. And he

shouldn't make her scared, old Phillips had belted her across a hallway once;

but Junker Phillips wasn't trying to kill you, he was just trying to keep you

alive.

Fitch was trying to kill you. Or Fitch was trying to break you. And those were

the two choices you had. Crew like this had to have an example. Like NG.

But NG was too crazy to break and too valuable to kill.

Not when NG was a way to Bernstein's gut.

And Fitch didn't damn well need her now—except as another way to put the screws

to NG.

Who wasn't as crazy as seemed, not half as crazy as seemed, if he was still

alive and Bernstein was.

Man named Cassell wasn't.

Man named Cassell had had a fatal accident. In Engineering.

And NG Ramey took the shit for it.

Cassell had been a friend of NG's. And Bernstein's.

She found her hands in fists, tasted blood and swallowed it; and knew if Fitch

so much as stopped her in the corridor after this she was going to be shaking

head to foot.

Shake like hell suiting up, she thought, flashing on what it felt like, with

your body cased in ceramics, with the servos whining when you moved and the

pressure of the bands on your body that told the suit what the body wanted. And

the damn servos got confused as hell if you started shaking and everybody knew

it, because they stuttered and chattered—

Embarrassing as hell. So you developed a sense of humor about it, since you did

it every damn time—

Adrenaline charge. Stutter and rattle.

Smell of oil and metal and plastics. Human sweat and your own breath inside the

helmet.

You were machine, then. Human gut inside a human-shaped machine. And it took a

damn lucky shot to damage you.

Sure missed that rig, sometimes. Sure hated to leave it, in that corridor on

Pell.

Shakes stopped after you got going. Servos smoothed out and you floated, like

nothing was effort, and nothing could stop you.

But armor's got no thinking brain, armor's got no guts.—That's you, skut, you're

the Operating System. It'll walk after you're dead, but it don't fight worth

shit in that condition. You're the brain and the guts. Remember it.

Damn right, Junker Phillips.

Somebody bumped the bed. She woke up with her heart thumping, knew right off

that she was in quarters, and in Musa's bunk, waiting on her mates, and that

there were two men, shadowed against the night-glow, one with Musa's shape and

Musa's smell, and one with NG's, touching her, gathering her up when she tried

to move, hugging her so everything hurt.

"I'm all right," she said. "You?"

"Fine," NG said, or something like that, and she just held onto them a while,

not caring that it hurt. NG felt over her face, and the way his fingers stopped

at her lip and her right cheek, and the way the spots were both sore and a

little numb from swelling she got a mental picture the same as he had to, what

she had to look like.

He didn't say a thing. And NG was dangerous when he didn't.

She grabbed his hand. Hard. "You listen to me," she whispered. "You listen good.

Not going to talk, here. But craziness is what Fitch wants. Hear me?"

NG didn't say anything. He tensed his hand just enough to keep the bones from

grinding.

"Going to bed," Musa said, putting a hand on her back, giving her a little

shove. "His bunk. Hear?"

"Yeah," she said, feeling a little tightness in the throat. She leaned over and

pressed her mouth against Musa's stubbled cheek. "Love you," she said. "Love

you, man."

Musa shoved her again, and she crawled out after NG, to follow him.

NG grabbed her and held her at arm's length. "He'll kill you," NG hissed at her.

"He'll kill you, you understand me?"

She wobbled on her feet and hung onto him and left him nothing to do with her

but get her to his bed, and get in with her, and hold onto her, clothes and all.

"I got him figured," she said into his ear, fainter than anything was likely to

pick it up. But you never knew. Fitch could even bug the damn pillow. She

wrapped a leg over him, snuggled body against body until they fit together,

which was the only way to be comfortable sleeping double in a bunk. Her back

hurt. Her head was pounding. She said, wishing Fitch could hear, "I seen skuz

before. Nothing new. Shush, they could have bugs in bed with us." She moved

against him, gentle as she could, figuring he could have sore spots too, and

that was one of them. But he didn't seem hurt, didn't seem interested that way

either, he just kissed her face and made that kind of love to her, just real

gentle, real careful, not even sex, but she liked it.

Liked it and found herself scared the way she'd never been scared for anybody in

her life. You served with guys, you knew people got killed, and partners did,

like Teo, sometimes real hard ways. But none of them she had lost had been her

fault, and none of them had ever had to risk what NG was risking for her.

She drowsed what felt like a few minutes before the morning bell went off,

before it was time to move and go up and get a change of clothes, and face

stares at her face and hear the whispers behind her back.

Face NG and Musa too, with the lights on. "Pretty bad?" she asked them: Musa

grimaced and shook his head, and NG said, "Damn him to hell."

She had to face Lindy Hughes, too, and Presley and Gibbs, who gave her dark

stares and snickered about her looks.

"Hey, Yeager," Hughes yelled out, "your man been beating on you?"

"Hell, no," she yelled back, "Fitch did. Wanted me to kiss his boots for him.

Which end did he make you kiss?"

Real quiet in the quarters, just then. A lot of stares.

"You got a mouth, bitch."

"You're all mouth, skuz. You dropped the drugs in my bunk. Or one of your skutty

friends did. Funny thing, I thought I smelled you up there."

Deathly quiet.

"You'll get yours, bitch."

"Yeah, from the back. Same as you got NG. Tried it on me in the showers and you

got your head busted, didn't you? Damn shower-crawling skuz. Looking up the

stalls. That the only thing that does it for you?"

Nasty cut on Hughes' forehead. And one eye was turning black. Didn't improve his

looks any at all.

A few people were walking around, going to showers, trying to ignore the

shouting match.

But one of the bystanders was Gabe McKenzie, who shouldered past the gawkers and

came and stood by her and NG and Musa with his hands in his pockets.

And another was Gypsy Muller, who strolled into the middle and said, "You got

what you deserved, Hughes. Swallow it and choke."

Park and Figi came in, then, right beside Gabe McKenzie, and then Meech and

Rossi; and Moon and Zilner, Gypsy's mates, and then, God, one of the women, Kate