When they were burning, Naomi used the time to calculate a safe transit schedule and tightbeam it to the other ships. From the start of the campaign to its end, they’d lost thirty-two ships, and just shy of two hundred lives. They had retrieved Jim and Amos, taken in Teresa Duarte, and destroyed the mechanism of production that Laconia depended on for its high-powered fleet. The Whirlwind was still a massive killing machine capable of taking control of any system it chose. But it was only one ship. It couldn’t attack through any of the ring gates without leaving Laconia underprotected. It was pinned.
The Storm reached the gate and sent back a formal salute to Naomi before it passed through. Jillian Houston taking her ship back to Draper Station and waiting for new orders. That was a strange thought. Naomi had spent so much of her mental energy and focus on winning the battle she’d almost forgotten about everything that came after. Freedom from Laconia didn’t—couldn’t—mean a return to de facto rule by the Transport Union. For one thing, Medina Station was gone and no one would be setting up a permanent base in the ring space again. For another, Laconia had replaced the structures of trade and control with its own.
But still, there were ways. There wouldn’t be a choke hold on the ring space the way there had been, but there could be a network of cheap, easily replaced relays that announced incoming and outgoing traffic. Ships could know, at least, what the chances were of going dutchman before they made the transit. There weren’t many people who’d choose to go through a ring gate if they knew they wouldn’t come out the other side. Give the people enough information, and they’d be able to make the right decisions on their own. That was a problem for later, though. For the moment, she could watch the drive plumes of the ships that had broken Laconia touch the gate and escape, one after another, and think to herself, Safe. Safe. Safe.
In the breaks between the hard burns, the crew celebrated and, unfortunately, fought. In the tension before the attack, Ian Kefilwe and another young man—an engineer named Safwan Cork—had fallen into bed together and were now negotiating the difficult romantic territory of having survived. She tried to keep out of it, but once she saw Jim sitting with Ian in one of the now-empty torpedo bays, listening while the young man wept. It seemed right.
The ship was only about three hundred thousand kilometers out from the ring gates, and the remaining burns were all braking, making sure that when they did the transit, they had time on the far side to maneuver and not just slam into the other side of the sphere and vanish. The Laconian forces hadn’t come after them. Not even to throw more long-range torpedoes.
Teresa Duarte was an astounding beast of a human being. Naomi tried to make a connection with her, but only once. They were in a pause, Alex making a gentle quarter g, and Naomi was getting dinner. It still felt strange to her, seeing the galley full. In her mind, there were still only six crew on the Roci.
Teresa was by herself, leaning against one of the walls, a bowl of noodles in one hand and chopsticks in the other. Her hair was braided back, and it made her face look harsher than usual. No one was sitting with her. No one was speaking to her. Probably because no one knew what to say.
Naomi served herself a bowl of white kibble and sat down across from the girl. Teresa looked up, and there was a flash of outrage before she reined herself in.
“Is this okay?” Naomi asked.
“It’s your ship. You get to sit where you want.”
“Got to be a little strange, being someplace like this, yeah?”
Teresa nodded. Naomi took a bite of her kibble and wondered if they were going to sit in silence. Teresa shook her head. “There are people everywhere. And there’s nowhere to go. Back home I could be alone. No one’s ever alone out here.”
“There are ways,” Naomi said, thinking of her cargo container. “But there are usually fewer people here. It does get a little full.”
“You should have a crew of twenty-two.”
“We usually made do with six. Sometimes four.”
“I don’t like it here,” Teresa said, standing up. “I’ll want to find someplace else once we leave.”
She walked away without saying anything else. She didn’t put her uneaten bowl in the recycler, so when Naomi was finished with her own meal, she cleaned up after both of them, then walked down the corridor to her cabin.
To theirs.
Jim was in the crash couch. His jumpsuit was drenched in sweat at the armpits and down the back. He looked at her and shook his head.
“I will never, ever get this out of shape again,” he said. “This is miserable.”
“You’ll get better,” she said, and lay down beside him. The couch shifted to account for her added weight. Every time she saw him, she felt herself not quite trusting it. Not quite letting herself believe he was really back, in case it was all a dream or a false reprieve. As if the universe would take him away from her again. It was getting better, but she wasn’t sure it would ever completely go away.
“I saw your friend in the galley,” she said. “She’s having some trouble adjusting, I think.”
“Well, she was the only child of a galactic god-emperor, and now she’s eating oatmeal in a half-antique gunship. That’s got to be a hard transition.”
“What are we going to do with her once we get to the supply depot? You know she’s too important to just let her go, right?”
“I don’t know that we can make her stay. Not unless we’re talking about throwing her in a prison. But there are other options.”
“Are there?”
“There were plenty of Martians who didn’t take off with Duarte back in the day. Some of them will be cousins of hers. If we’re lucky, some of them may be counselors and therapists. Or … I don’t know. Run rehabilitation centers.”
“If not?”
“If there aren’t, some can be made. Everyone’s related to everyone, if you go back far enough. We’ll just go back until the right people are connected to her.”
“You sound like Avasarala,” Naomi said.
“I’ve been thinking about her a lot. I feel like I built a little version of her in my head. You ever have that feeling?”
“I know the one,” Naomi said. And then, “Teresa doesn’t just need a place to land and some sort-of relatives. She needs love.”
“She had love. Her father loved her. He really did. What she didn’t have was a sense of proportion.”
“And then you brought her here.”
“She brought herself,” he said. “Just like we all do. And it’s a pain in the ass for each and every one of us, every time it happens. Outgrowing your family? Hard work under the best of circumstances. Which these aren’t.”
She lay down, snuggling into his arm. He was sweat-damp, but she didn’t care. She stroked her fingertips across his forehead and down his cheek. He turned his head, pressing into her hand like a cat that wanted petting.
“Do you think she’ll be okay?” Naomi asked.
“No idea. She will or she won’t. Either way, it’s going to be up to her. I’m pretty sure she’ll be herself while she does it, though. That’s a victory for her. We’ll help if we can. If she’ll let us.”
The alert went on. Ring passage in five minutes. Jim sighed, stood, and started changing into fresh clothes.
“What about you?” Naomi said.