Tripoint (2 page)

But he hadn’t laid a hand on the main boards since long before they left Mariner. He was absolutely sure of that.

Balance wasn’t steady yet. He bashed an elbow, slid the bathroom door open—the whole end of the 2-meter-wide cabin on a circular track. He met his own confused, haggard face in the mirror, squinting at the automatic glare of white light. He peeled out of his clothes, set the shower on Conserve, for speed, slid through the shower door without losing vital parts and shut his eyes against the 30 second all-around needling of the cleaner-and-water spray. A quick, breath-taking blast sucked the water back again. The vacuum made his ears pop, and didn’t at all help a nervous stomach or a sick headache.

But he was scrubbed, shampooed, shaved, and saner-looking as he shut the bath behind him. He struggled into clean coveralls, remembered the key-card while he was walking his boots on, went back and found it on his dirty coveralls, clipped it on one-handed as he opened the door onto the lower main corridor.
Ship is stable
meant no take-holds expected, no clip-lines required, and he made a dash down-ring to the lift. Crew was coming and going, likewise at speed when they had to cross the ship’s axis. Somebody for sure had reported ill: he could see the infirmary lit and the door open, down the positive curve of the deck.

But Com had ordered him specifically to the bridge, see the captain, and bridge it was—he found the lift idle on rimside level and rode it up, a good deal calmer in that ride, now that he wasn’t jump-rattled and half-asleep—but uneasy, still, mind spinning around and around the handful of guesses his experience afforded him.

The lift clanked into lock and let out into the dim grey plastics-and-computer light environment of the bridge. Heads turned, senior cousins interrupting their work to stare as he walked through, the way people stared at victims of mass calamities.

Which didn’t help his nerves at all. But his first glance accounted for his whole personal universe of relatives he cared about: his mother, Marie, stood in the middle of the bridge, talking to Mischa. Mischa was sitting at the main console. Marie and the captain were sister and brother; and Marie was clearly all right—but what Marie was doing on the bridge during approach was another question.

God, what had he done that rated Mischa calling Marie up from the cargo office?

“Sir,” he said, feeling like an eight-year-old criminal, “ma’am.”

“Station schema just came in.” Mischa tapped the screen in front of him, a schematic of Viking station and its berths, same as any such diagram the outsystem buoy delivered them when they dropped into system. He didn’t understand at first blink, or second, since he had nothing reasonably to do with that input or the system that put it up.

Mischa said, “
Corinthian
. Austin Bowe’s in port.”

Hit him in the gut, that did. He couldn’t look at Marie. Mischa pointed to a certain berth on the station schema. “They’re scheduled for undock nine days from now, we’re in for fifteen days’ turnaround, and we’ll make dock tomorrow morning. Figure right now that there’ll be ample time after he’s left to do any personal touring you want to do around that berth. I’m giving an absolute order, here, that applies to you, Marie, and you, Tom, and everyone in this crew. No contact, no communication with
Corinthian
in any way, shape, or form that doesn’t go through me, personally. We can’t afford trouble. I’m sure
Corinthian
doesn’t want it either. I swear to you, I’m not going to look the other way on this, Marie. On government contract, we’ve no latitude here, none, do you read me clear on that?”

“Perfectly clear, “ Marie said. Too cheerful by far, Tom thought. Marie’s calm ran cold fingers up and down his spine. “Bygones can be bygones—unless, of course, Austin Bowe comes onto
our
dock.”

“I don’t like that attitude, Marie. I’ve half a mind to hold you and him and the whole crew aboard until he’s out of here. And
nobody’s
going to be real damn happy with you if that’s what I have to do.”

“And how would
that
look? You want Viking saying we’re afraid of him?”

“Viking, hell. I’ll lay odds no stationer here remembers any problem between us and them.”

“I’ll lay equal odds that ships at dock remember.”

“This is our business. And it
is
business, Marie. No personal vendetta of any member of this crew is worth our legal standing, and anybody sane is going to understand that. This isn’t the War. The man’s a senior captain now. We’re talking about our entire livelihood at stake.”

“I absolutely agree. I don’t see a problem.”

Lying through her teeth, Tom thought again, hands locked behind him, face absolutely neutral. Mischa knew Marie was lying, and couldn’t get her to engage with him.

“Bygones, is it? You listen to me, Marie. You, too, Tom. You listen
up
Government contract and government cargo means we’ve got clearances, we’ve got special ratings, we’re in first on the port they’ve been negotiating for the last twenty years, and the Board of Trade isn’t going to care about excuses. Neither is the rest of the Family.”

“We’re in the middle of the damn
bridge
, Mischa, why don’t we just throw the com open so the whole Family can hear it? Send the kids to the loft and let’s just tuck down and hide in our ship until
Corinthian
goes away, why don’t we? We know we can’t defend ourselves. Rape’s a lovely experience if you just lie back and enjoy it. God, I can’t believe I’m hearing this!”

“Quiet it down, Marie!”

“I’m going to do my job, Mischa! I’m not sitting in this ship. I’m not hiding
I
didn’t commit any crime.
I’m
not a rapist, in case you got it backwards at Mariner, and I’ve nothing to be ashamed of! If
Corinthian
wants trouble, they can come looking. If they don’t—”

“—if they don’t?”

There was quiet all around. Tom stood there remembering, to breathe, and felt a tremor in his whole body when he heard Marie say, quietly, reasonably, “I’ll do
my job
, Mischa. I’m not crazy, “ and heard the captain say to her, then,

“You do that, Marie, you damn well do it, and
nothing
else. That goes for every member of this crew.”

Marie walked out. The captain’s sister, cargo chief, Marie Kirgov Hawkins, challenged the captain to lock her in quarters for the duration—and walked out, with the whole ops section watching.

Mischa possibly could have handled it better—but you never knew where you were going with Marie. Mischa could have been easier on Marie—but she’d lied to him the minute she’d said bygones could be bygones with that ship. She’d lied to his face, and her brother, as ship’s senior captain, had laid the law down.

Drawn a line Marie Hawkins shouldn’t cross—and that was a mistake with Marie, on a
good
day.

Her son said, quietly as he could, “May I be excused, sir?”

“I want to see you. In my office. One hour. I’ve got my hands full right now. You leave your mother alone. You don’t need her advice. Hear me, Thomas?”

“Yes, sir.” At least, at twenty-three, he’d outgrown ‘boy.’ Other uncles managed to say ‘son’ to their sisters’ offspring. Mischa never had. It was ‘your mother’ when he disavowed Marie, it was ‘Marie’ when they agreed, and ‘Thomas’ when
his
behavior was in question. “Yes, sir, I hear you.”

“Go on.” Mischa gave him a back-of-the-hand wave.

He walked back to the lift. Other heads averted quickly, back to business, except the most senior cousins, who gave him analytical stares, wondering, quite probably, whether Thomas Bowe-Hawkins was in fact part of the Hawkins family, or whether, because of that ship sitting at Viking dock, he was going to do something lethally stupid.

“Son.”

Saja. Tech chief. Likewise giving him a warning stare, turning in his seat to do it.

But Saja was senior on duty right now and couldn’t break away, so that was one heart-to-heart lecture he could duck, although if he had to choose, he’d take Saja’s over the captain’s, no question.

The lift came up from downside, where Marie had left it. He punched Down, hoping Marie had gone to her office, and left the corridor. She’d
be
working, after this, nonstop, and God help anybody in the Family who walked through her office door. He knew her fits: Marie worked when she was mad, Marie worked when she was upset, Marie got up for no reason at all in the middle of the night and went to the office, staying there nonstop, thirty-six, forty, fifty hours, when she got in a mood, and he wouldn’t go near her now by any choice.

The lift stopped. The door opened. Marie was waiting for him on lower deck, leaning against the opposite wall, arms folded.

“What did you say to him?”

“Nothing. I swear. Nothing.”

Marie’s eyes were grey, black-penciled like her brows; and cold, cold as a moon’s heart when she didn’t like you. In point of fact, she didn’t always
like
her son. She was undoubtedly thinking about
Corinthian
, maybe seeing Bowe’s face on him… he didn’t know. He’d never known. That was the hell of it.

So now Austin Bowe was
Corinthians
senior captain. Mischa and Marie kept current using dockside sources he didn’t have, clearly they did.

“I’ve done my job, “ Marie said, “I’ve
worked
for this ship. Where does he get off, calling me on the deck like that, in front of the whole damned crew?”

“I think he just wanted you to know, before the word got out—he couldn’t leave…”

“The
hell
he couldn’t! The
hell
he couldn’t manage the intercom. Wake up, Marie, oh, by the way, Marie, could you come
up
here, Marie?
Damn
him!”

“I’m sorry.” When Marie blew, it was the only safe thing to, say. Teenaged cousins clustered in the corridor, now, down by the infirmary. Probably it was a shock case, some young fool cheating on the nutri-packs. Every half-grown kid thought he knew what was enough—at least once in his life.

“Mischa’s going to be
talking
to you, “ Marie said. “I know his ways. He’s going to be telling you all his good reasons why poor Marie can’t be trusted outside. Poor Marie’s just too emotional to do her job. Marie who got raped and beaten half to hell while her mother and her brother dithered about station law just might do something like go down the dock and take a cargo hook to the son of a bitch that did it, because poor Marie just never got over it. I chose to have you because
I
choose what happens to me, and Mischa doesn’t trust poor Marie to manage her own damned
life
! Well, poor Marie is going to go around to her
office
and study the market reports and see if there’s any way in hell to screw Austin Bowe’s ship lit the financial market, legally, because that’s my arena! So when dear Mischa calls you in to tell you you’ve got to spy on poor Marie, for the sake of the ship, you’ll know just what to tell him.”

“He wants to see me.”

“How could I not guess? Tell him to—” Marie shut her mouth. “No, tell him whatever you want to tell him. But I’m not crazy, I’m not obsessed. Motherhood’s not my career, I’ve always been clear on that, but you’ve turned out all right.” She reached—in teenage years he’d flinch—she’d fought that piece of hair all his life. She brushed it away from his eyes. It fell. “Tell Mischa he’s an ass and I said so.—It was a long time ago I told you kill that son of a bitch that fathered you. It was a bad time, all right? I made some mistakes. But you’ve turned out all right.”

It was the first time Marie had ever admitted that. She paid him a compliment, and he latched on to it with no clear idea how much she meant by it—like a fool, he tucked it into that little soft spot he still labeled mama, and knew very well that Marie of all people wasn’t coming down with an attack of motherhood. She was absolutely right. It wasn’t her specialty—though she had her moments, just about enough to let on maybe there was something there, enough to make you want a whole lot more than Marie was ever going to give, enough sometimes to make you feel you’d almost attained something everybody else was born having.

She walked away, on her way to her office.

The general com blasted out the announcement that juniors should be careful about the nutri-packs, and take their dosages faithfully.

You could guess. Some kid down in infirmary had muscle cramps he thought he’d die of and a headache to match.

Always a new generation of fools. Always the ones that didn’t believe the warnings or read the labels.

He’d trade places with that kid—anything but show up in Mischa’s office and listen to Mischa’s complaints about Marie. Mischa couldn’t tell Marie to sit down and shut up. He didn’t know why, exactly, Mischa couldn’t. But something Marie had said a moment ago, about her mother and Mischa waiting for station law—that was another bit in a mosaic he’d put together over the years, right pieces and wrong pieces. Put them in and take them out, but never question Marie too closely or you never got the truth.

Sometimes you got a reaction you didn’t want. His nerves still twitched to tones in Marie’s voice, nuances of Marie’s expression. Sometimes she’d strike out and you didn’t know why.

Not a good mother—although he
liked
Marie most of the time. Sometimes he admitted he loved her, or at least toyed with the idea that he did, because there was no one else. Gran was dead at Mariner. He didn’t remember her except as a blurry face, warm arms, a lap. Saja… Saja was solving a staff problem, by taking his side. And Mischa…

Well, there was Mischa.

—ii—

“How’s your mother taking the situation?” Mischa asked, leaning back, with the desk between them.

That was a trap, and a broad one. Mischa, monitor the lower corridor? Spy on his own crew and kin?

Maybe.

“I don’t know, sir. We did talk. She wanted to.”

“She did.” Mischa didn’t seem to believe that, just stared at him a beat or two. “I don’t know how much of the detail she ever gave you…”