His mouth moves — I'm so sorry, Lenie— and no sound comes out. Shadow doesn't correct him.
This is what you do, she'd said, and then she'd begun to cry. As Fischer cries now. As he always does, when he comes.
The pain wakes him, sometime later. He's curled up on the pallet, and something's cutting into his cheek: a little piece of broken glass.
A mirror.
He stares at it, confused. A silver glass shard with a dark bloody tip, like a small tooth. There's no mirror in his cubby.
He reaches up and touches the bulkhead behind his pillow. Lenie's there, Lenie's just the other side. But here, on this side there's a dark line, a rim of shadow he never noticed before. His eyes follow it around the edge of the wall, a gap about half a centimeter wide. Here and there little bits of glass are still wedged into that space.
There used to be a mirror covering this whole bulkhead. Just like Scanlon's vids. And it wasn't just removed, judging from the little fragments left behind. Somebody smashed it out.
Lenie. She went through the whole station, before the rest of them came down, and she smashed all the mirrors. He doesn't know why he's so sure, but somehow it seems like exactly the sort of thing Lenie Clarke would do when no one was looking.
Maybe she doesn't like to see herself. Maybe she's ashamed.
Go talk to her, Shadow says.
I can't.
Yes you can. I'll help you.
He picks up the tunic of his 'skin. It slithers around his body, its edges fusing together along the midline of his chest. He steps over the sleeves and leggings still spilled across the deck, reaches down for his eyecaps.
Leave them there.
No!
Yes.
I can't, she'll see me…
That's what you want, isn't it? Isn't it?
She doesn't even like me, she'll just—
Leave them. I said I'll help you.
He leans against the closed hatch, eyes shut, his breathing loud and rapid in his ears.
Go on. Go on.
The corridor outside is in deep twilight. Fischer moves along it to Lenie's sealed hatch. He touches it, afraid to knock.
From behind, someone taps his shoulder.
"She's out," Brander says. His 'skin is done right up to his neck, arms and legs completely sealed. His capped eyes are blank and hard. And there's the usual edge in his voice, that same familiar tone saying Just give me an excuse, asshole, just do anything…
Maybe he wants Lenie too.
Don't get him mad, Shadow says.
Fischer swallows. "I just wanted to talk to her."
"She's out."
"Okay. I'll…I'll try later."
Brander reaches out, pokes Fischer's face. His finger comes away sticky.
"You're cut," he says.
"It's nothing. I'm okay."
"Too bad."
Fischer tries to edge past Brander to his own cubby. The corridor pushes them together.
Brander clenches his fists. "Don't you fucking touch me."
"I'm not, I'm just trying to— I mean…" Fischer falls silent, glances around. No one else anywhere.
Deliberately, Brander relaxes.
"And for Christ's sake put your eyes back in," he says. "Nobody wants to look in there."
He turns and walks away.
They say Lubin sleeps out here. Lenie too, sometimes, but Lubin hasn't slept in his bunk since the rest of them came down. He keeps his headlight off, and he stays away from the lit part of the Throat, and nothing bothers him. Fischer heard Nakata and Caraco talking about it on the last shift.
It's starting to sound like a good idea. The less time he spends in Beebe these days, the better.
The station is a dim faraway blotch, glowing to Fischer's left. Brander's in there. He goes on duty in three hours. Fischer figures he can just stay out here until then. He doesn't really need to go inside much. None of them do. There's a little desalinator piggybacked on his electrolyser in case he gets thirsty, and a bunch of flaps and valves that do things he doesn't want to think about, when he has to piss or take a dump.
He's getting a bit hungry, but he can wait. He's fine out here as long as nothing attacks him.
Brander just won't let him alone. Fischer doesn't know what Brander's got against him—
Oh yes you do, says Shadow.
— but he knows that look. Brander wants him to fuck up real bad.
The others keep out of it, for the most part. Nakata, the nervous one, just keeps out of everyone's way. Caraco acts like she couldn't care less if he boiled alive in a smoker. Lubin just sits there, looking at the floor and smoldering; even Brander leaves him alone.
And Lenie. Lenie's cold and distant as a mountaintop. No, Fischer's not getting any help with Brander. So when it comes to a choice between the monsters out here or the one in there, it's an easy call.
Caraco and Nakata are doing a hull check back at the station. Their distant voices buzz distractingly along Fischer's jaw. He shuts his receiver off and settles down behind an outcropping of basalt pillows.
Later, he can't remember drifting off.
"Listen, cocksucker. I just did two shifts end to end because you didn't show up for work when you were supposed to. Then half another shift looking for you. We thought you were in trouble. We assumed you were in trouble. Don't tell me—"
Brander pushes Fischer up against the wall.
"Don't tell me," he says again, "that you weren't. You don't want to say that."
Fischer looks around the ready room. Nakata watches from the opposite bulkhead, jumpy as a cat. Lubin rattles around in the equipment lockers, his back to the proceedings. Caraco racks her fins and edges past them to the ladder.
"Carac—"
Brander slams him hard against the wall.
Caraco, her foot on the bottom rung, turns and watches for a moment. A smile ghosts across her face. "Don't look at me, Gerry my man. This is your problem." She climbs away overhead.
Brander's face hovers a few centimeters away. His hood is still sealed, except for the mouth flap. His eyes look like translucent glass balls embedded in black plastic. He tightens his grip.
"So, cocksucker?"
"I'm…sorry—" Fischer stammers.
"You're sorry." Brander glances over his shoulder, includes Nakata in the joke. "He's sorry."
Nakata laughs, too loudly.
Lubin clanks in the locker, still ignoring them all. The airlock begins cycling.
"I don't think," Brander says, raising his voice over the sudden gurgle, "that you're sorry enough."
The 'lock swings open. Lenie Clarke steps out, fins in one hand. Her blank eyes sweep across the room; they don't pause at Fischer. She carries her fins to the drying rack without a word.
Brander punches Fischer in the stomach. Fischer doubles over, gasping; his head smashes into the airlock hatch. He can't catch his breath. The deck scrapes his cheek. Brander's boot is almost touching his nose.
"Hey." Lenie's voice, distant, not particularly interested.
"Hey yourself, Lenie. He's got it coming."
"I know." A moment passes. "Still."
"Judy got nailed by a viperfish, looking for him. She could've been killed."
"Maybe." Lenie sounds as if she's very tired. "So why isn't Judy here?"
"I'm here," Brander says.
Fischer's lung is working again. Gulping air, he pushes himself up against the bulkhead. Brander glares at him. Lubin's back in the room now, just off to one side. Watching.