The Color of Rain (6 page)

“My dad was self-educated. He taught us.” I glance around again, this time at the dreary scenery of my home. “But I won't be an Earth Cityite after I jump planet. I'll be a Runner, right?”

“If that's how you want to be known.” He holds his hand out,
and I glance over his dirty glove. “I go by Samson.”

Perhaps I have made a friend. I shake his hand and then peer through the palm-sized window at the top of the pod. Walker looks better through the glass than he did beside the pool. “He'll be fine in there?”

“Aye, Rain Runner. We've used it to preserve meat for years.”

Meat?
I grip the book a little tighter.

“Here,” he holds his hand out for it, and I give the book to him slowly. He tucks it in his pocket. “I'll keep it safe for you.” He touches his nose with one finger. “Just don't tell anyone.”

Samson rolls the pod out, and I help him maneuver it into the trunk of the hover cab. Johnny still stands by the edge of the roof. I hear him whispering something about being his father's errand boy, and I back away to the hover cab.

“You ask permission to come with me?” Samson asks.

“Why?”

“Because you need permission.” His tongue points out the corner of his mouth like he's stopping a laugh.

“I'm going with my brother.”

“Samson,” Johnny calls as though he was listening. “Take her to the ship. I'll finish here and send for you. And tell that Mec I know what he's up to!” His eyes have narrowed into sharp slits, and I'm happy to put even more distance between us.

“Is that permission?” I ask just loud enough for Samson to hear.

“That's dismissal,” the old man returns just as low.

Within a few minutes, we've left my rooftop forever. I sit in the back of the hover cab, watching Ben use a tiny screwdriver on the communicator clasped around his wrist. It reminds me of a simpler version of Johnny's.

“Captain says he knows what you're up to,” Samson calls from the driver's seat.

Ben grins, and I'm not ready for it. His whole face turns boyish and rascally cute. “Thinks he's smarter than me?”

“He can dream,” Samson says while pulling the vehicle over the rooftops. The climbing, gliding sensation is easier to stomach this time, and I look out as the ugliness of the city fades to chunks of dull color. All those skyscrapers can't look down on me now. . . . Lo will never believe this.

Lo!

“Can we make a stop?” I ask. Ben ignores me, forcing a panel open on his communicator. I lean into Samson's driving space. “Mind stopping just up there?” I point to the pier below the spacedocks where I'm sure Lo is sleeping off her liquid dinner.

“He doesn't take orders from you,” Ben says.

I glare back. “Good thing I'm asking and not ordering. I'll only be a few minutes. You can just keep tinkering with your bracelet there.” Samson chuckles, and I touch the old man's shoulder. “Please?”

“It's not a bracelet,” Ben retorts. “So you want to change or something? Don't want to go into space covered in your brother's blood?”

I twist to face him. “I want to say good-bye to my best friend, you jerk.”

Ben blushes, and I can't tell if it's out of shame or irritation. But he's right; I rub at the black-red blooms across my pants and shirt. I
am
covered in my brother's blood. I hadn't even noticed, but then, so is the Mec.

His half-open jacket reveals the red streaks on his plain shirt, and I can't help but remember how fast he sealed Walker's wound and how strange he looked cradling my brother's body in the bottom of the pool. “Thanks,” I say.

“Thanks?”

“Johnny took the credit, but it was you. You saved my brother's life.” When he doesn't respond, I add, “I'm not afraid of you. Even if you're a cannibal.”

“Are you
serious
?” He looks up angrily and finds me smiling. “Wait, you're joking?”

“Should I be afraid, oh scary Mec?”

“No. It's just . . . this is a first.” He refocuses on his silver wristband. “Samson, put us down where she says.” He glances up, and I swear something nice flashes through the intensity of his steely eyes. “You can have five minutes. That's all.”

Samson parks the cab on the far end of the pier. I slip out the door, annoyed to find Ben following. “I'm not going to run away. You don't have to come,” I say.

“I do have to come,” he says. “Get used to it.”

I cast a sideways look at him. “So you have to guard me now? And what did you mean by
sleeping with the devil
or whatever?”

“That was a warning,” he says. “Johnny's not what he seems.”

“He seems like a spoiled, handsome playboy. Am I off?”

Ben leaps around a broken space in the walkway, bumping into me. “Wait. You mean you're not in love with him?”

“What? I just met him.”

“That's—well, that's different. No wonder he's bending over backward with this brother thing.” He examines me like he doesn't believe me. “Then you really are different. Most of his girls are so . . .”

“What?”

“I'm not allowed to tell you Johnny's business,” he says.

“You're just allowed to give cryptic warnings?”

He groans a little funnily like I've beaten something out of him. “Okay, think of it this way.” He holds up his arm. “This isn't a bracelet. It's a communicator—a com. It keeps me in contact with Johnny at all times.”

“How very impressive.” I leap over a serious hole, the waves kicking below.

“Think of it as a tag. A tracker. I can't take it off.” Ben is stopped on the other side of the gap. “He could even use a setting to zap my nervous system—kill me—if he wanted.”

“So you're a slave?” I ask.

“Bound servant.” The wind pushes his hair up into a curly mess.

“And I'll be the same? A bound servant?”

He shakes his head. “You'll be his girl, like you agreed.”

The kiss on the rooftop comes back to me. It was nice. It could get even nicer. Of course, I'll sleep with him, but maybe it won't be like it almost was with Hallisy. Who knows . . . maybe we'll be
perfect for each other in unknown ways.

I hold out my hand, but Ben leaps across the gap without touching me. “What does it mean to be his girl?” I ask. “Has he had many others?”

Ben turns away.

“Hey!” I jog after him. “I asked you something.” He keeps going, messing with his com to keep from looking at me.

“If that com is so important, should you be messing with it?” Panic freezes Ben's expression, and I revel in my leg up. “So I shouldn't tell Johnny about your little experiments there? Or should I?”

“I was fixing it,” he says unconvincingly. “It's none of your business.”

“Oh, right. I'll try not to mention it to him then.”

His mouth pauses midcomeback. “You know, none of the other passengers make eye contact with me, let alone try to blackmail me. You don't know what I could do to you.”

I laugh. “No offense, Ben, but I've seen scarier girls in heels on the corner of Glam Street.” I think he laughs, but it's hard to tell over the wind.

We reach the old ship, and I call out for Lo. Ben wanders around the rotting hull. “This was a Mec vessel,” he declares. “A K-Force ship. One of the first Void-capable ones.”

“Sure,” I say, having no idea what he's talking about. “Wait here. I don't need you freaking her out. She'll probably think you've come to eat her brain.”

“Ha ha,” he fakes, making him seem like he's twelve instead of my age. He takes another turn around the old ship. I try not to
watch him but fail. He reminds me of Simon in all the wrong ways—the flirting ways.

I duck inside, checking the command center and the old passenger section. I even glance into the back cargo area. “Lo?”

WHAM!

The side of my face grinds against the gritty rust of the wall.

Hallisy leans over my shoulder, pinning my wrists behind my back. “Knew I'd find you, stupid slut.” Spit flecks my cheek, and my arms strain to pop out of my shoulders. “Where's that diseased brother?” he asks. “I put in a call to the cops. So they take him, and I take you.”

H
allisy slams his wiry hips against my back. “Won't dick over an honest guy again, huh?”

He slips a hand under the side of my shirt, reaching toward my breast, and I get my wrist free, finding his ear and pulling it as hard as I can. He twists—only to drop against the back of my legs.

I spin, kicking his ribs as he moans on the ground.

Ben holds up a silver syringe that he just jammed into Hallisy's back. “Didn't need me, huh?” He retracts the needle with a click.

“It freezes!” Hallisy clutches his crotch.

“What'd you inject him with?” I brush flakes of rust off my cheek, my hand shaking.

“A testosterone killer. Designed it myself.” Ben leans over Hallisy. “That means it'll be years before you're standing
anything
up again. Understand me?”

Hallisy's shock paints his skin with ash. “Fuckin'—fuckin' Mec freak!” He makes it to his feet through a slew of curses and staggers out.

Ben laughs. “I've been dying to try that stuff. I call it
Limpicilin. Get it? Because it's like penicillin only it makes a guy . . . you know. Limp.”

“I get it.” I'm breathing too hard and a little annoyed that he's trying to find humor in this. “Was that a joke?”

“Hell. That stuff always sounds funnier in my head.” He drops the dose rod into the calf pocket of his cargo pants. “You're welcome, by the way.”

“I would have sorted him,” I lie. That was a close one. I can still feel Hallisy's wiry strength as he forced himself against me. I drop to my knees. “He said he called the cops, so we have to hurry. If they get all the way out here and don't find someone to arrest, they'll take us as abettors.” I smooth some sand that's collected in the back of the ship and write a message:

Lo, Gone to Void with W. Going to Edge. We'll miss you. Love, Rain

I reread my note twice before adding:
P.S. Stop Selling yourself cheap
.

Ben stands over me. “Maybe you should put: ‘Wait until you meet some sugar daddy Void captain and trade it all in.'”

I get up, wiping the grit from my hands. “Are we going to have a serious problem with each other?”

“Hey, I just saved you.”

“Told you, I had that sorted,” I say. “And you can save me a dozen times, but that doesn't mean I'll put up with your lip.” I step into his personal space—something Jeremy always did when he wanted me to back down. “I don't have to like you just because you're a special Mec.”

Ben leans in instead of out.

“Good.” His breath puffs my nose. “Because the last time one of Johnny's girls liked me, she ended up out the airlock.”