Double Share (32 page)

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said reflexively.

I nodded to acknowledge her response, but continued my train of thought.

“I had to learn everything the hard way—as an outsider.”

“I’m surprised you got on a ship at all, sar. There aren’t that many people who can get through the Union Hall. You almost always have to know somebody or have some experience.”

“I didn’t know that at the time. Nobody told me I couldn’t, so I just went ahead and applied anyway.”

She chuckled at that and we lapsed into a friendly silence. Soon, the hum of the treadmill’s motor and the slap-slap-slap of my feet on the spinning tread took me into that quiet place in my mind and I just ran.

C
HAPTER
T
HIRTY-FIVE
B
REAKALL
S
YSTEM
2358-
A
UGUST-26

We were only two weeks out of Breakall before I completed the software hack that automatically turned on the intercoms when I moved from one space to another within the ship. I’d discovered some dead spots in the process and even—out of boredom more than anything—added a patch to turn on the lights when I entered my stateroom. In all that time, nobody else had ever turned on a microphone.

The study sessions continued to meet on the mess deck every day. A couple of the crew had to step back and re-evaluate their progress toward skipping a rating. I thought it was interesting that it was something they did among themselves and then told me about it after they decided.

A few people—mostly Mosler and Apones—still glowered. They really didn’t like it that their ability to intimidate their shipmates was so severely curtailed. It was good to see the crew becoming more cohesive, more supportive of each other. I smiled thinking that perhaps it was going to work out after all.

“Something funny, sar?” Juliett asked, breaking into my reverie.

“Yes, Ms. Jaxton. I was just thinking about being a ‘girly man’ and how much things have changed in the last few weeks.”

“You’re considering a change, then, sar?” she asked with that twinkle in her smile. “Gonna jump the fence?”

Charlotte snorted from the other side of the bridge.

“You have some contribution, Ms. D’Heng?” I asked.

“No, sar. Not me, sar,” she looked up from her tablet grinning.

“So, tell me.” I said. “What’s the news below decks?”

The two women exchanged glances and Juliett shrugged.

“News, sar?” Charlotte asked. “Is there anything in particular you’re interested in?”

I looked back and forth between them, not sure how far I could push. “How’s life aboard?” I asked. “Has it gotten any better?”

It was apparently Juliett’s turn to snort. “I don’t think it could have gotten much worse, sar.”

Running some of the more egregious possibilities through my mind, I wondered if she was being a bit naive.

Charlotte picked up from Juliett’s lead. “We haven’t had anybody seriously injured or killed this trip.”

“Yet,” Juliett added.

“True,” Charlotte responded with a small nod, “but except for a couple of the stupider members of the crew, I think there’s a lot less tension. Getting people together on the mess deck in the afternoon has done a lot for morale.” She shrugged.

Juliett added, “It’s made a difference in the berthing areas.” She looked at me with a kind of apologetic half smile. “There’s a lot less bunk jumping. People seem to be pairing up…”

Charlotte coughed.

“Well, that’s probably not the right word…forming groups?” she looked at Charlotte who shrugged agreement. “At any rate there’s less random carnality, with the accompanying bad feelings and black eyes.”

I blinked and decided I really did not need to know what kind of circumstance led to “random carnality” in the first place. I couldn’t decide if it was something specific to the
Billy
or if bunk bunny culture was inherently askew.

“It’s harder to get into a bunk where you’re not wanted these days, that’s for sure,” Charlotte said. “Especially if it’s already full,” she added with a wink.

I couldn’t be sure if Juliett blushed or not. She was paying very close attention to her helm.

“I see,” I said, although I really didn’t. “Thank you for that insight.”

“You’re welcome, sar,” Charlotte said. “Any time.”

I settled back down to my watch logs while Juliett and Charlotte returned to their studies.

When 17:45 rolled up, Burnside and Mallory clambered onto the bridge. Perhaps I was just being paranoid, but I couldn’t help but brace myself. He just walked over to the watch stander position and flopped into the chair. For once he didn’t stink of sex, but he didn’t look all that lively either.

“Ship is on course and on tar—,” I started to say.

“I relieve you,” he interrupted, and then he put his head back and closed his eyes.

I shrugged and followed Juliett down the ladder. We separated at the passageway. She headed to the mess deck and I made a beeline for my stateroom. We had twelve stans off and I didn’t need to be back on duty until 06:00 the next morning. I looked forward to cleaning up, having a good meal, and then a solid night’s sleep. I was firmly into a routine, and even passing Simon in the passageway outside the cabin no longer seemed strange to me.

Dinner in the wardroom was a convivial affair to begin with. Arletta and I arrived a bit early and Fredi was already there with her tablet open and reading. She put it away when we breezed in the door.

“How are you, Fredi?” I asked.

“Fine.” She smiled. “Just catching up on the sector’s trading situation. Hasn’t changed much since the last time we were here.”

Mel joined us with a warm smile and a hearty, “Good evening! How is every one?” she asked while walking around to her place, patting Fredi on the shoulder as she passed.

Arletta looked alert and rested, as well she might. She was on her day off and hadn’t had to deal with the ship that much. She returned Mel’s smile with a grin and said, “A few more days and we can get off this tub for a while.”

“Aw,” Mel said with mock sadness. “You don’t like
Billy
?”

“It’s not that,” Arletta said with a wicked grin. “I just think we should see other people.”

Penny Davies brought in the trays and we set to. There wasn’t a lot of gusto but it was filling and warm. That counted. I also think I was finally getting to the point where the food was the food, and my mind wasn’t looking for more than minimum requirements. Whatever else one might find fault with, the food was always filling and warm.

It was a typical Burnside-free meal with fun companions and pleasant banter. For all my dark trepidations about the ship, I felt a little foolish about my concerns. Afterward I headed back to my stateroom, and began taking advantage of the long break between watches by stripping down to my skivvies and crawling into my bunk. I must have been tired because I don’t remember actually lying down.

When the tap-tap-tap on my stateroom door woke me, I immediately thought I’d overslept and missed relieving the watch. It’s one of those recurring nightmares that plague watch standers, like missing the final exam haunts students. The little spike of adrenalin left me confused but I managed to say, “Yeah?” loudly enough to be heard on the other side ,while I was still blinking my eyes into focus.

I heard a woman’s voice say, “Mr. Wang? It’s Davies.”

“One tick,” I told her and scrambled out of my bunk and into a shipsuit. The chrono said 22:50.

When I opened the door, Penny Davies was standing there nervously looking both ways up and down the passageway. She glanced at my face but said, “Sorry, to bother you, sar, but may I come in?”

I backed into my stateroom to give her a chance to enter.

She slipped in with another glance at my face and a grateful smile. She closed the door behind her and I had a moment of doubt. She didn’t come any farther into the room than was absolutely necessary, but stood there just inside the door playing with her fingers nervously and looking down.

“Okay, Ms. Davies,” I prompted softly, “I’m almost awake. What’s up?” I backed up a little farther, but didn’t sit. I didn’t want to sit on the bunk and the side chair was the only other seat.

“I’m sorry, sar,” she said again.

I saw her working up her nerve for something and I was pretty sure I did not want to know what it was.

“I want to be in your harem, sar,” she said without looking up.

I scrubbed my face with my hands and sighed. It was not an auspicious start to the conversation.

“I don’t have a
harem
, Ms. Davies.”

“Oh, yes, sar,” she said softly with little glances flicking up from the deck to my face and back. “I know you don’t have a harem like that, but there are some that think you do, and I’d like them to think that I’m part of it so they’ll leave me alone.”

“Just say no, Ms. Davies,” I said naively. “It’s not like they can force you or anything.”

She did look up at me then, a stricken look on her face.

“Well that’s just the thing. Yes, sar, they can,” she said matter-of-factly. “You’re in a private stateroom by yourself, but I sleep in deck berthing. They most certainly can.”

She lowered her eyes to the deck again.

I blinked stupidly. Of course, they could. I was being dense.

“I suppose I can’t ask who—”

“I’d rather not say, sar. I have to live there.”

“Of course,” I said, scrubbing the back of my neck with one hand trying to force a stream of logic through my sleep-bogged brain.

“Sar?” she pleaded after half a tick. “I don’t know where else to go.”

“Why me? Why not go to Ms. Menas?”

“Because you keep your people safe, sar,” she said. I barely heard her over the low hum of the blowers.

Her response surprised me.

“What makes you think Ms. Menas doesn’t?”I asked.

She snorted and gave me the “you’ve got to be kidding” look.

“Because she can’t, sar,” she said.

“And you think I can?” I asked, trying to find some kind of footing in the conversational bog.

“You do, sar, yes,” she replied instantly.

I sighed again. “How do you propose to join my so-called
harem
?” I asked after a few heartbeats.

“Well, sar, if I spent the night here a few times…” she started to say.

“Whoa,” I said.

She stopped and flickered a few of those furtive glances up toward my face.

“You know I don’t sleep with crew?” I said.

She gave a small nod.

“And that includes my watch section,” I added.

She gave another small nod.

“But that’s why I need to stay the night. I’m not on your watch section, sar. I’m not even in your division. We wouldn’t have to do anything, sar. I’ll sleep on the deck, if that’s what you want.” There was a note in her voice now that had gone over the edge into pleading.

“Do you think people will believe we’re sleeping together?”

“I suspect they will, sar. That’s the whole idea.”

“But I don’t have a harem.”

I came back to the logic. I kept trying to get back there, but I wasn’t having any luck.

“Maybe you could start one, sar,” she said, a small smile curling her lips. “I know others who’d like to join.”

I did sit on the edge of my bunk then. It occurred to me that this might be a nightmare, that I was really still asleep.

“Why?” I asked finally.

“So you’ll protect them, sar,” she said. “Like you protect Ulla and Charlotte and Juliett.”

“Ulla?” I asked. “Ulla Nart?”

“Yes, sar,” she said with another of her little nods. “They stopped bothering her after you stood up to Mosler and Apones in the gym. Everybody thinks she’s with you now and they leave her alone.”

With that we’d moved out of nightmare country and into surreal. I didn’t even know where to go from that point.

“Sar?” she begged, “please? There was desperation in her voice that kept me off balance. “I need you to look, just look. Look at me.”

She reached up and unzipped her suit, stripping it back to show she wasn’t wearing a ship tee under it. It was too fast for me to protest and what I saw stopped me cold. She had a patchwork of bruises—some fresh and dark, some yellow, and others long healed discolorations. Mixed in were what looked like bites and scratches.

“I can’t keep going on like this, sar. This is what you get if you try to say no…it just makes it more painful.”

I had a hard time catching my breath. Behind me I heard Arletta moving around in the head. I glanced at the chrono—23:15. She’d be getting ready to go on watch. She tapped on the door and I reached over to release the latch without thinking.

She opened the door and stuck her head in. “You okay, Ish? I thought I heard—”

In such a small, confined space she couldn’t help but notice the figure trying to get her shipsuit back up over her shoulders.

“I know you’re on your way to watch, Ms. Novea, but if you could spare a few ticks, I think you could be of some assistance. You see, Ms. Davies wants to join my harem.”

Davies finally got her shipsuit back on and zipped, but not before Arletta had seen.