“Huh?”
Dev turned to find Brent there, his body covered in sweat and a towel wrapped around his neck. “I’ve never seen anything like that before.” She pointed at the tank.
Brent looked. “Oh. The pool” He said. “Yeah, it’s all right. If you like that sorta thing.” He regarded the man in the tank. “I’m not much for swimming I sink like a rock.” He glanced at her. “You?”
Dev shook her head. “I’ve never done anything like that. Water was very precious in the crèche.”
“Huh.” The tech grunted. “You should ask Jess to teach you. She’s a fish. She and some of the others go down into the tunnels and swim in the ocean down there. Crazy nuts.”
Dev sorted through that. “I might ask.” She said. “I like the shower thing in our quarters.” She said. “Jess mentioned something about the water in the bottom of the citadel – she took me out to see the ocean before and I can’t really imagine going into that. It looked dangerous.”
Brent snorted. “It is dangerous but what the hell difference does that make to us? “ He said. “Everything we do is dangerous. Hell, Jess threw an antipersonnel mine in the damn hallway this morning. If it’d been keyed wrong, we’d all be dead.”
“The purple thing?”
Brent nodded. “Keyed to our scan. But they get it wrong sometimes.” He explained. “That’s why it killed those goons. They aren’t us.”
Us. Dev thought about that word. “Yes.” She said. “I’m glad it worked out.”
Brent continued on his way to the changing room, and Dev turned and headed into the gym, looking around at the different things she could choose to do. She was drawn towards the tank, though, and she walked over to it, kneeling at the side of it and putting her hand into the water curiously. The man who had been in it was gone, and now the surface was still, and quiet.
It was pleasant. Neither warm nor cold, and she tried to imagine being completely immersed in it.
She couldn’t, but she really wanted to, so without any further thought she jumped into the pool headfirst.
It was, without doubt, the weirdest feeling she’d ever had, as the water closed over her and she was caught in a swirl of it surrounding her, pushing and bubbling around her as she popped to the surface, her head breaking out of the liquid as she instinctively took a breath.
So weird. So strange. Instinctively, Dev moved her arms as she started sinking under again, pushing against the water to keep her head up in the air. She could feel the resistance against her motion, and she cupped her hands, moving her legs as well.
Experimentally, she stopped moving. Sure enough, she immediately sank under the surface; glad she’d taken a breath before her head went under. She opened her eyes, and felt the water sting against them, but also found to her delight that she could see after a fashion.
Then her chest started hurting, so she pushed with her hands again, and got back to the surface of the water, spluttering a little and shaking her head as she blinked the water out of her eyes.
“Hey!” Brent rushed over. “Are you nuts?” He went to his knees at the edge of the tank and held his hand out. “Here! Grab on!”
“I’m all right.” Dev waved her hands around to keep afloat. “I just wanted to see what this was like.” She pushed the water away from her and moved over to where Brent was kneeling. “It’s nice.”
“You are crazy.” Brent said. “They picked the right one of you to match with Jess. She’s crazy too.” He sat down on the concrete floor as Dev got close enough to grab the edge of the tank. “You coulda hit your head and drowned.”
Dev put both hands on the edge of the tank, holding herself still as her body drifted in the water. It reminded her a little of being in null grav, but it felt completely different and of course it was a lot wetter. “Well, you said it didn’t really matter, didn’t you?” She said. “That we all do dangerous things all the time?” She looked up at him and grinned.
With a shake of his head, Brent stood up. “Well, be careful. Last thing we need is for one of us to go and get hurt. There aren’t many of us left.” He studied her for a moment more, and then he retreated back toward the dressing room, his head still shaking gently as he walked.
Us. Dev exhaled slowly. It seemed that Brent, at least, had decided to accept her presence and that felt very nice. She was glad. She released the edge of the tank and moved her hands around again, leaning forward and stroking forward in a somewhat awkward motion.
It did move her, though, and she kept at it for a few minutes, until she became a little more accustomed to it, edging forward not exactly gracefully but at least with some good effect.
The water itself felt wonderful. She could feel it moving against her skin, and it smelled like the shower did, rich and wet and interesting. With a good deal of effort, she finally reached the far end of the tank, and discovered it wasn’t as deep there and she could actually stand with her feet on the bottom and have her head stick up from the surface.
That was even better. She could fully appreciate the nice way the pressure of the water moved against her without having to worry about inadvertently breathing in the liquid. She knew the man who she’d seen in the tank was doing something different, and decided she would look up this whole swimming thing when she got back to her quarters to see if the systems had any information on it.
She bobbed there for a minute or so more, then she found the steps that led out of the tank and climbed up them, emerging up onto the concrete and feeling an immediate chill as the air hit her. She heard footsteps approaching and turned, to find Sandy and her partner Todd approaching. “Hello.”
Sandy ignored her and just walked past. Todd gave her a brief nod, lifting one hand in a faint wave as he followed her.
Dev regarded them in mild curiosity.
“Don’t pay any attention to her.”
Dev turned to find Jason standing there. “Oh, hello.” She said. “I wasn’t really.”
The tall, muscular agent had just finished his exercise, and he, like Brent had been, was covered in sweat. “Jess around?”
Dev shook her head.
Jason studied her. “What the hell happened to you?”
“I jumped in there.” Dev pointed at the tank. “I liked it.” She ran her fingers through her wet hair. “I think I should probably go put on a dry shirt though and continue my work.” She gently circled him and headed for the dressing space.
“Hey.” Jason jogged after her and caught up. “So what kind of gym work do you do up in space?”
“Well.” Dev took a towel from a shelf as they passed and dried her face off with it. “It’s not like this. You do running, or walking, jumping, picking things up.. things like that, but they adjust the grav so it’s harder.”
“Huh?” Jason frowned. “What do you mean?”
They were passing the sets of pull up bars and hanging swings and Dev paused, then she went over to the bars and glanced up at them, drying her hands and putting the towel down. “Like this.” She jumped a little, and caught the bar, adjusting her hold and then pausing a moment before she pulled herself up so that her chin was even with the bar.
“Okay, so we do that too.” Jason had his arms folded, and was watching her.
“Then we do this.” Dev hoisted herself up, pressing her body up over the bar, and then carefully lifting herself up into a handstand. She held the position briefly, and then she let her body fall over, swinging under the bar and then releasing it as she came up again, turning in mid air and catching it again and pressing herself back up into a handstand.
“Ah.” Jason muttered.
Dev lowered herself until her shoulders touched the bar, then pushed herself back up again. Then she fell forward again, releasing the bar and landing neatly with both feet planted. “But they change the grav, so sometimes you’re normal, like now, and sometimes you go up to two, or three, or when they want to really work you very hard, to four G’s.”