Rimrunners (29 page)

be careful, Yeager. Be damned careful."

She drew a deep breath. "Yessir. I got that straight. All of us.—But there's

others taking our side in this Hughes business. McKenzie and his shift.

Williams. Gypsy Muller and his mates. Nobody in quarters is standing with Hughes

now. So we got that, sir."

Bernstein digested that piece of news for a second. Then: "You check in with

medical at all?"

"Nossir."

"Get the hell over there."

"I can—"

"Documentation."

"Yessir," she said, having it clear, then. "But what do I tell them happened?"

"Tell 'em the locker door that got NG got you. Musa and Freeman can walk you

over. Keep you with witnesses."

"Musa—" she protested.

"NG's on duty, he's not going anywhere. I don't want you getting stopped."

"Yessir," she said, on a breath. "Thank you, sir."

But she was scared, deep down, about going to the meds, about leaving the

situation with NG. She thought of a dozen things that could go wrong or get out

of hand, the kind of superstitious unease that jump set into her. You left

things at loose ends and they came back and got you, in ways you never planned.

Chance always got you. And if you left any string untied, it happened.

She stopped like a coward and looked back at Bernstein, wanting—God knew—to ask

him what he thought, wanting reassurances. But that wasn't the most important

thing. Bernstein outright deciding he couldn't trust her wasn't the worst thing

that could happen.

Worst was the irrational stuff, the kind that went wrong just because you

trusted it—and it killed you.

"Sir—what I told you about me… I don't think NG'd feel at all comfortable to

know that."

"I don't think so either," Bernie said.

CHAPTER 20

« ^ »

They walked past the lockers, around the curve to rec, where alterday's

breakfast was cleared away and mainday was having evening beers. "Just keep

moving," Musa said, when they started through.

Damn right, Bet thought, conscious of her face and the reason for the stares.

God, there was Liu-the-bitch, with Pearce, the senior Systems man, Freeman's

yesterday mates—Liu and Pearce stared, Musa waved a hello and kept going, and

Freeman undoubtedly looked back—a man had to, when he had to walk by his former

mates on alterday's duty, and miss the beers and the talk, the bed-sharing and

the partnering and everything else the situation had yanked away from

Engineering's mainday shift.

Like being kidnapped and raped in the bargain, it was, and small wonder if Liu

and Pearce didn't look exactly cheerful seeing them kiting past on Bernstein's

affairs.

Not a happy crew back there, not happy looks that came their way—mainday had

been messed with, Engineering was far and away the largest command in the

'decks, and if mates had been transferred, if Mr. Smith was unhappy and Mr.

Fitch was pissed, then it wasn't going to be a happy crew for some little while.

Freeman, poor sod, looked like he was bleeding a little; and she wished she

could say she was sorry, but she didn't think Freeman wanted to hear it from

her, most of all.

"Locker door, huh?"

"Yes'm," she said to Fletcher, while Musa and Freeman waited outside and she was

sitting buck-naked on the surgery table letting Fletcher shine light in her eyes

and look in her ears for blood or such.

"Not concussed, I think," Bet murmured, wanting the exam over and her clothes

back. The surgery was cold and Fletcher's hands felt colder. "I had that before.

Doesn't feel like it."

"Happens you're right," Fletcher said, turning the light out, flipping the

little scope other-end-to. Fletcher put a steadying hand on her shoulder.

And jabbed her in the back with the scope. Bet straightened up and swallowed

down a damn! with a gulp of air, because breakfast nearly came up and her eyes

watered.

"Just fine, aren't you?"

"Thing was cold," she said. With the cabinets and the counters shimmering

through the water in her eyes and her nerves still jerking. Fletcher ran the

probe lightly up and down her back.

"Should have been in here last night," Fletcher said. "I take it that's when

this happened."

"Yes, ma'a—" Stars exploded. Her breath went short. "—'am. Did."

God, she was going to pass out.

"So you went to sleep on it. Who with?"

"I just went to bed."

"Alone?" Fingers ran over the sore spots. "Hell, you couldn't come by after it

happened. You have to wait and call me out of my rec time…"

"I'm sorry."

"You ought to be." Fletcher went over to the cabinet, looked at the scan-images

again, made notes with lines going to this part and that, then started searching

the shelves, in that way that inevitably meant medicine. Hopeful sign.

Prescriptions meant there was a pill to fix it.

Fletcher said, "Must've been just after I saw you last night."

"Yes'm."

"When?"

She didn't like that kind of question. Documentation, Bernie had said. It was a

damn Q & A about what kind of story she was spreading about Fitch, that was what

it was turning into, and she wanted off the edge of the table, wanted to get her

feet on the floor and take the strain off her back. Most of all she wanted to

get to Musa outside and get back to Engineering, where, God knew, if somebody

called Bernstein out to the bridge or somewhere, NG was all alone with a half

dozen mad as hell transfers.

Fletcher found what she wanted and picked up a hypo. Popped the cylinder in.

"I don't need any shot," Bet said. She thought about Fitch, about maybe Fletcher

putting her out, Fletcher working with Fitch—

You signed on a ship and you were subject to the meds, that was the way it was.

Like God. You got walked into sickbay for a simple lookover and a pill and not

even Bernstein could keep Fletcher from giving her that damn hypo…

Fletcher knew it, of course. "I'll do the prescribing, Ms. Yeager. And that

means following orders. No core-crawling for the next couple of weeks. No

deck-mopping. No bending work. No lifting. That's an order. I'm writing it on

your record."

After which Fletcher shot her first in the shoulder, then in three

excruciatingly painful spots in the back, and told her, while she was close to

throwing up, that she was going to check her into sickbay for forty-eight hours.

God!

"I got duty—"

"You've got a strained back, is what you've got, Ms. Yeager, not mentioning the

bruises."

"Ma'am, I've got orders, I can sit station. The department's short, we've got

new transfers—"

Fletcher turned her back-and searched the drug cabinet again.

God, maybe she was in with Fitch.

"Dr. Fletcher, I swear to you, I don't need any sickbay.—Look, look, I'll sit.

Won't walk around at all."

Fletcher unwrapped a packet and started making notes of some kind. "All right,

I'll make a deal with you. None of the things I named. No using the arms. Sit

and watch, period, or I'll put you in here and I'll trank you down and see you

rest."

"Yes'm," she said.

Documentation, hell. God, Bernie, what did you do to me?

But, shit, any damn thing could go on if I get stuck in sickbay, NG's back there

alone with those guys, and in quarters, all it takes is somebody distracting

Musa, Musa turning his head, NG just getting out of sight half a minute, near

Hughes or his friends—

Showers or somewhere—

"Your drug test was negative," Fletcher said, handing her two different pills

and a cup of water. And after she had swallowed them: "It won't be now. Hear

me?"

She stared at Fletcher a moment, replaying that, trying to figure out what

Fletcher was telling her, whether it was a setup or a rescue—

No way in hell they could get a valid drug test now—in case there was any reason

to try again…

"You steady enough?"

"Yes'm." She hauled herself off the table, determined not to flinch, and started

pulling her clothes on, fast, because the jolt started a sweat, and she was

afraid Fletcher was going to take that for an excuse to hold her after all.

Just get me the hell out of here—

Scan. Reading the scan. Hypos. Pills. The longer this took, the longer Musa was

standing out there in the hall.

And the longer Bernie and NG had no help.

Fletcher gave her a paper and two packs of pills. "You stay out of trouble,"

Fletcher said. "Follow directions. You've got a written order there, exempts you

from certain duties. Carry it. Call me if the pain gets worse. And don't ignore

it, dammit."

"Yes'm."

"One of those pill-packs is NG's. Fool didn't pick up his refill. Make sure he

stays on it. Hear?"

Fletcher was one of the friendlies, she suddenly knew that. She suddenly knew

what Fletcher was doing with her papers and her shots and her pills and she

suddenly knew why NG might not have been a useful target in any trumped-up

drug-search.

"Yes, ma'am," she said.

Fletcher didn't say anything, Fletcher just dismissed her with a back-handed

wave of the hand and kept writing.

Go. Be smart. Keep your head down.

Damn right, she thought, and she went, light-headed with relief, out into the

corridor to pick up Musa and Freeman.

Not just Musa and Freeman.

Liu was out there.

Bet stopped cold, off-balance and thinking, Oh, God…

"All right?" Musa asked her.

"Gave me some pills," she said, clutching the packets and the paper Fletcher had

given her, while the corridor went tilted and her head floated. Liu, senior

mainday, gave her a head-to-foot sidelong stare and said to Musa, finishing

something or another: "Much as we can, anyway."

Secrets. The whole corridor drifted and steadied on Liu's sullen face, before

Musa took her by the arm and steered her down-rim toward the galley-section.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"It's all right," Musa said, and let her go at the step-up, where the deck

narrowed.

Through the galley-cylinder to rec, in among others, not fast, just walking.

Liu was behind them until then, Liu dropped off at the galley counter and

Freeman stayed with her a second, then caught them up again.

Place smelled of beer, the quarters had that same damned vid playing again, she

could lip-synch the words. It could have been alterday rec, you could expect

McKenzie and Gypsy and the rest to be here, but they were all the wrong faces,

the faces that arrived in the morning and left in the evening, they were the

bodies that just filled the beds during alterday, and they were standing,

watching, conversation fallen off in this uncanny quiet.

Maybe it was just Fletcher's damned pill that made things seem so unnatural and

so dangerous. Maybe it was the shots that still hurt and made her a little sick

and shocked.

Maybe everybody was looking at her and her company, and the rumor had gotten to

mainday that there was the fool that had taken on Fitch and made all the

trouble.

She wasn't navigating well when she got to Engineering. She did a fast scan to

find out NG was there and safe, and that war didn't seem to have broken

out—mumbled, "I got to sit, sir," when Bernstein asked what Fletcher had said,

and then things were fairly fuzzed after that, except voices kept coming and

going and things echoed.

"Think I'm sick," she said, not quite mad, not quite scared, she couldn't get

that far, but she was sure now that she'd been dosed, and that she wasn't in

pain anymore, and the back didn't hurt, and she could have worked, could have

done most anything including float around the section, except Bernie came over,

the skuz, and got her attention with a hand on the shoulder and asked if she

wanted lunch—

—meaning the cup of tea and the little Keis-rolls Services brought you, the

stuff that was about as appetizing as a glue-stick. Usually she skipped it, but

Bernie said it was a good idea she eat it, and she couldn't find where she'd

misplaced her objections to pushy people who wanted her to do things: so she did

it

Just absolutely zee'd, no question. She sat there with the padded seat tilted a

little back, watching and listening in complete placidity, heard people talking

around her.

And finally, a while after lunch, the voices started coming clear and the boards

in front of her came into a little clearer focus.

She had to go to the head. She was aware of being spaced, she sat there as long

as she could stand it, until the discomfort was more or less overcoming the

fuzziness, and finally she got up and walked.

Somebody grabbed her. It was NG. She blinked at him and said, "I got a

prescription for you, the doc give it to me…"

She felt damned embarrassed by mid-afternoon, cold sober again and realizing,

with a sudden snap to clarity, that she was sitting in Engineering at station

three, and that people were talking near her seat, one of them being Freeman,

one being Musa, and one being Bernstein.

"Awake?" Bernstein stopped to ask her.

"Yessir." She reached after the arm of her seat and got up, still wobbly and