Black skeins of webbing hung in front of them, around the curve. Crew safety-area, hammocks up and down it, empty black-mesh bundles strung vertically along the left-hand wall. She limped ahead, walking more on her own now, just sore from the G-stress and the cold, through the safety-area, curtain of hammocks giving way into a rec-hall, crew members sitting on a low main-deck/burn-deck bench along the wall, where the walkway mat spread out wide, clear up to the swing-section galley. Sandwiches and drinks. Food-smell hit her stomach hard, she wasn't sure whether it was good or bad.
A handful of crew stood up to look at her, not in any wise friendly.
"This is Yeager," the man holding her said, and turned her loose and said, "Good luck, Yeager."
She stood there, just managed to stay on her feet for a few breaths, dizzy in the G-stress, dizzy in the sudden realization they were turning her loose, that they had bought the story, everything—
She had a chance, then—fair chance, exactly that, exactly the way you got when you got swept up into the Fleet, volunteer or otherwise. You were the new skut in the 'decks, you got the rough side of things, and you learned the way to live or you died, end of it, right there.
Good luck, Yeager.
"What ship?" a woman asked from the bench, while she stood there in front of everybody, maybe thirty, forty crew, varied as the Fleet was varied, a dozen shades, most of them looking at her as if she was on the menu.
"Ernestine."
"Why'd you leave her?"
"I was a hire-on. They got a mechanical, couldn't take me further."
"You any good?" a man asked, one of the ones standing.
"Damn good."
Any way you want to take it, man.
Long silence, then. While her knees shook. She set her jaw and stared at them with sweat cold on her face.
"You about missed board-call," a second man said.
"Had a problem."
Another long pause. "Makings on the counter," another man said, from further down the bench, and made an offhand gesture toward the galley. "You want anything you better get it now."
"Thanks," she said.
Permission to help herself, then. Handcuffs and all. She walked on to the counter, did an instant soup out of the hot-water tap, got a packet of crackers; she came and sat down at the end of the bench where there was a little room, and drank her soup, deciding finally she was hungry and that food was what her upset stomach needed. Her hands were still shaking. The salt stung where her teeth had cracked shut on the inside of her cheek. The man next to her seemed less than glad of her being there; he was no temptation to conversation, which was all right, she had no interest in talking right now: the soup was uncertain enough on her stomach; and she phased out, staring at the detail of the tiles, not interested in advance planning at all. Her situation could be hell and away worse. And all the planning she could do now had the shape of memories she had just as soon keep far, far to the back of her mind.
A fool kid had volunteered herself onto Africa's deck, volunteered because Africa was going to take what they wanted from that refinery ship at Pan-paris, anyway, which was always the young ones, and that was her. Better choose, she had thought then, because that way you were a volunteer and that was points on your record; and because she hated her life and hated the mines and she wanted starships more than she wanted anything.
And the fool kid had found herself in something she'd never remotely imagined, and the fool kid had figured out damn fast how not to be a fool. The Fleet taught you that straight-off, or it broke you, and she was still alive.
The fool kid had gotten part of what she'd wanted. She still reckoned that had to be worth the rest of it… and still must be, since she'd just had her chance at station-life, and here she was back again. If it killed her, she thought, right now it was like something in her was back in connection again and a part of her was alive that wasn't, on station.
And you couldn't make sense of that, but it was true.
She drank her soup, she kept her mouth shut except when a man two places down the row asked her questions—like her side of the business on Thule.
Like it was behind her already; and that was a breath of clean air too.
"I killed a couple bastards," she said quietly. "They picked it. Me or them."
Fitch walked in. Her pulse picked up. She looked up very carefully while Fitch made himself a cup of tea at the counter.
Fitch stood there to drink it and look at her, and after a moment he tossed a key down three or four places down the row. It lay there a moment.
Finally one of them, older man, picked it up and tossed it down toward her.
The man next to her, the unfriendly one, picked it up and gave it to her.
"Thanks," she said. She fumbled around and got the cuffs off.
No one said anything. She certainly didn't expect a You're Welcome from Fitch. She just pocketed the cuffs and the key. You didn't leave junk on the deck, and nobody asked for it.
"Hour till," Fitch said. "Yeager?"
She looked up, fought the twitch that said stand up, reminding herself this was a civ ship. "Yes, sir?"
"You like this ship?"
"Yes, sir."
"Like what you see?"
"Fine, sir."
Long silence.
"You being smart with me, Yeager?"
"No, sir. I'm glad to get off that station."
Fitch sipped his tea. And ignored her after that, thank God. Fitch left, and some of the rest did.
"Is there a place I'm supposed to pick up a trank-pack?" Bet asked the man next.
The man shrugged, pointed with a forefinger and his cup. "Galley. Right there by the hot, should be."
She got up and went and opened the cabinet, found the plastic-wrapped packs and found the c-pack in a clip beside it. "Thanks," she said, coming back to sit.
"Name's Masad," the man said, and indicated the man on his left. "Joe. Johnny." The one past that.
"Bet," she said.
Other crew came through the section. And the jump-warning sounded.
"Better get hammocked-in," Masad said. Olive skin. Fortyish. Shaved head. "You got any problems?"
"No," she said, and got up and offered a hand for other cups—hard to do, a lets-be-friends move; but she was smarter than she'd grown up: the surly brat who'd signed onto Africa had gotten hell and away smarter nowadays. And a little friendly move won things with strangers, sometimes. So they handed theirs over, she chucked them all in the galley bin, then walked with them down-ring, found herself a vacant hammock, stepped in, wrapped up and snugged the tabs closed. Then she carefully put the c-pack in her breast-pocket and took her trank-dose.
Going out of here, she told herself, while the bell kept ringing and the ship drove toward jump. She had no idea where they were going. It could even be Pell. But she felt the trank take hold and felt herself drifting, old familiar feeling, live or die, you never knew how or if you'd come out when the ship made transit.
The burn stopped. They went weightless for a few seconds, inertial. And slowly the G started pulling her down horizontally instead of vertically. Main-deck orientation, now. The light that had been shining in her eyes was clearly, by body-sense, truly in the overhead, and her back was to the deck.
Going out of here.
Goodbye, Thule. Goodbye, Nan and Ely. You give stationers a good name.
Blow the rest of you to hell.