Authors: C. J. Cherryh
Williams, out of Cargo, just planted herself at the edge and stood there with
her arms folded.
Nobody was moving now. Until Hughes said, "Fuck you," under his breath, shoved
one and the other of his mates into motion and walked out.
"Good riddance," McKenzie said.
Not Fitch's plan. Damn sure.
There were new faces in the quarters, Freeman and Walden and Battista and Slovak
from mainday Engineering, Weider and Keene, too, she recognized them on the
fringes of the commotion. She saw everybody staring at her and her mates and
McKenzie and his, and everything still real quiet, so quiet you could hear the
rumble of the ship.
"Sorry," she said, to everybody in general, "damn sorry. I hate a fight."
It was like the whole quarters drew a breath then. People moved. People
discovered they were behind schedule and the shower-line wasn't full.
"Thanks," she said to a few in particular, and then she found herself with a
slight case of the shakes. "Damn!"
"Time we got rid of that skuz," Park said.
Bad news for a man when people on his watch got that opinion of him. Hughes had
to figure it, Hughes wasn't stupid, at least not in that department.
"Hell of a mess," Gabe McKenzie said, looking at her. She put a knuckle to her
cheek, which was so swollen it pulled the eyelid.
"Yeah," she said, and figured he meant her face. She was cold sober for a second
and scared… and that wasn't the mess she was thinking of.
"He's likely headed straight for Fitch," Musa said, "and he won't even stop for
breakfast."
You couldn't stand in the middle of the quarters and yell out warnings about the
mofs. The regs had a name for that kind of activity, and you didn't want to be
the ringleader. But she wanted it passed, and there were people enough in the
circle who would spread it fast. "If they got the quarters bugged," she said,
looking down at the deck and muttering, -"he's already onto it."
They hadn't thought. They hadn't expected. There were traditions and there were
rights and even with all the evidence of what was going on the crew hadn't
thought of that—not even Musa had, and he was damned sharp.
"I got to talk," she said, "but not here and not now."
And after showers, out in rec in the fast-moving breakfast line, where the noise
made specific pickup a lot less likely, she got NG and Musa up close and said,
"Listen. Listen fast. Hughes isn't what's going on last night. It may have been.
But it's Fitch now. I think he's trying to make a blow-up, and not just with
us."
"Bernie?" Musa wasn't slow at all.
"I think it is. He wants one of us to blow up, NG, you hear me? I pushed Hughes
and I pushed Fitch some last night, and he's pushing me, trying to spook me,
same as he tries to spook you. What'd he do last night?"
NG hesitated, his mouth not working real well; Musa said, "Called us in for
questions. Kept us sitting in Ops for a couple hours. Asked questions."
"You and him together?" She hoped to hell it was together, that Fitch hadn't put
all the pressure on he could.
NG nodded. Musa did, and she drew an easier breath.
"So I'm supposed to spook," she said, "and he's not going to lay a hand on you,
he wants you to blow and do something stupid, and then Bernie might."
Musa's eyes went thinking-sharp on that. NG said, a ragged, hoarse whisper:
"He'll put you in that damn locker, Bet, that's the next step…"
She felt a chill, knew he was flashing on that place, that time, knew McKenzie
behind them and Williams in front of them had to be hearing it, even if some bug
wasn't. "I know that. Know it real clear. But we got no choice, Fitch isn't
going to give us a choice, we just got to keep our heads clear. He could grab
any one of us. He can do it any time he can set us up, and that pressures
Bernie, you hear? Skuts like us don't matter topside, you and me don't cross
Fitch's mind one day out of thirty, it's a Bernie-Fitch fight going on, I don't
know a damn thing else, but I pick that up real clear. Some of alterday bridge
crew has got to be transferees like Bernie, them that want clear of Fitch;
others has got to be Fitch's pets. Same as the 'decks. Hear? And Lindy Hughes is
on the way out of here, but if Fitch doesn't own anybody down here now, he's
going to find somebody he can spook or buy. Isn't he?"
They didn't say anything, they were thinking; Williams snatched up her biscuit
and tea and it was their turn, over against the wall to gulp a few bites and put
things together.
"He's fouling up Engineering," Musa said, "hauling in people off their
shift—messing up Bernie's operations, forced transfers into his shift—but not
us. Mad people, lot of heat and no outlet."
"We got to be nice to them," she said, and washed down a fast gulp of breakfast,
hot tea stinging her lip. She nudged NG with her elbow. "We got to be 'specially
nice. Even if they get skutty with us—they been put upon, seriously put upon,
and we got to make things easy as we can."
"They got an earful," Musa said, "and they may've come in mad, but there's no
fools in that bunch. They got contacts back into mainday. I got to talk to
Freeman."
NG nodded, calmer now. He had pocketed his biscuit, was only drinking his
tea—upset stomach, she thought, no appetite; but he was following everything,
she was sure of it. And sure of him, in spite of the fact his hands were
shaking.
"I got two fast questions else," she said. "Where's Orsini this morning and
where's the captain last night?"
"Good question," Musa said after a breath.
"What in hell does Wolfe do on this ship? Does Fitch run everything?"
Scary question, possibly a mutinous question. And she thought about the chance
of it getting past the three of them.
Musa said, in the lowest possible voice, "He ain't a real activist."
"Shit!" she whispered, disgusted, irritated, and, God! missing Africa. Porey
might be a bastard and a bitch, but you never had any doubt somebody was in
charge up there.
Scary, to know what was going on in Loki command; and she tried to put it
together with the slight, cold man she had met, once, in the downside office.
Not a stupid man. Not a man who'd cower in his cabin. Not a man who'd give a
damn about shooting you in cold blood, either.
Damn good captain, at least as far as keeping a ship like Loki alive through the
war years. But you didn't know how many sides he'd played, or even what side he
was playing now.
Spook ship captain and a spook top to bottom, evidently, and she didn't like it.
It was real odd not to be the only ones headed into Engineering—Freeman and
Walden and Battista and the rest headed around the rim in the direction opposite
to what they were usually going, and checking in with Liu and her crew under
Smith—Liu with dark looks and a sullen, short manner, and Mr. Smith a little
down in the mouth, over talking with Bernstein like most mornings.
But Bernstein saw them check in and came straight over, mad and upset even
before he got a look at the damage.
"Damn," Bernstein said then.
"Little argument with a wall," Bet said. "Can I talk with you, sir? Private?"
"Five minutes," Bernstein said, and went back to Smith to settle something,
while they sorted themselves out and Musa got Freeman and Battista and the rest
of the transfers over in the corner. Fast, hard talking was going on over there.
And NG… NG just put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed ever so gently.
"Don't you think about anything stupid," she said. "Hear me?"
Because he was capable of it, capable of just walking into Fitch's office and
killing him. She thought about the same thing, if it got down to being shoved in
any locker with no trank. Take out the main problem and leave the ship to
Orsini. There was a chance for everybody with Orsini.
And you could start figuring like that, if you were good as dead already.
"Hear me?"
He nodded, made a struggling little noise like a yes, as if everything in him
was so dammed up that nothing could get out, and he didn't know how to talk to
people anymore without being crazy.
"Team-play," she said. He got a breath and nodded as if he meant it, then
grabbed up his data-board and went off to do his work. Alone. Like always.
"Sir," she said, when Bernstein got back to her and they got off in the corner,
"has Fitch got something in for you?"
It wasn't what Bernstein had looked to hear. It was impertinent, and maybe it
wasn't information he wanted to hand out to whoever asked.
"He indicate that?"
"I just got this feeling," she said.
"What happened?" he asked.
"Hauled me in, asked me about the drugs, knocked me around and let me go. And I
got this bad feeling it's not finished. I got this feeling it didn't have a damn
thing to do with Hughes. I get this feeling," she said on a deep breath, "he's
got it in for this shift, and it's not NG.—And I don't ask to know, except to
tell you that's what we think, and we're watching out for it.—I tell you another
thing, sir—it's no secret in quarters what happened last night and there's a lot
who don't like Hughes, and a lot I don't think like Mr. Fitch very damn much,
sir. Begging your pardon, but a lot of people don't think we got fair shift and
they think crew's being pushed."
Bernstein was upset. Not mad. Upset. Finally he said, "Musa keeps me updated."
Not surprising, no.
"You being a fool, Yeager?"
"Nossir."
Bernstein passed a hand over the back of his neck. "The lid needs to stay on."
"Yessir," she said, "you want it, you got it."
He gave her a long, long stare then. "Where'd they get you?"
"Sir?"
"Spit 'n polish. Where'd they get you?"
"Thule, sir." Her heart started thumping, painfully hard. "You know that."
"One of Fitch's picks."
"I signed with the captain, sir, at least, I asked him for a berth."
"Fitch picked you out of the station brig."
"Got arrested after I talked to the captain. I had some trouble on Thule. I'm
not in the habit of knifing people, sir."
"Knifing people. That's not what I hear."
"Man asked for it, sir."
"Asked for what you did?"
There was a lot of the upstanding merchanter in Bernstein. A lot of
sensibilities. Like Nan and Ely, back on Thule. She tried to put that in
perspective, tried to see how a man like Bernie would even think, if she told
him what Ritterman was.
"Yessir," she said, and stopped it there. "He did."
Bernstein was quiet a few seconds. Then he said, "Must've. Must've. So the
captain signed you. Personally."
"Yessir," she said, puzzled because it puzzled Bernstein. "At least verbal. I
ran into Mr. Fitch first out of the ship, I says, is there a berth? See the
captain, he says. So I came aboard and I saw him and he said report. But they
arrested me first."
Bernstein rested his thumbs in his waist-loops, looked at the deck a moment,
then at her. "And Fitch came after you."
"Yessir." She felt more and more cornered, wondered if she ought to explain more
than she had, or whether that could only make it worse. "Got picked up on one
charge and they pulled a search and they found this guy…"
Bernstein wasn't paying attention to that, she realized. It wasn't her record
and the murder, it was the Fitch connection Bernstein was worrying about, and
who she was working for, even this deep in—especially this deep in, and this
close to him. She shut up and waited for him to think everything out.
"You just be real smart," he said finally. "You tell me the truth, the whole
truth. Are you Mallory's?"
That caught her so far to the flank her jaw dropped. "Nossir."
"Orsini wondered."
She felt herself shaking and trying not to show it, not to let a wobble into her
voice. "This ship got some trouble with Mallory?"
"Orsini just wondered. Pan-paris militia, huh?"
"Yessir."
"You lying to me, Yeager?"
"Nossir." While the sweat ran on her chest and the air seemed thin and cold. "I
been around a bit. I guess the habits just took."
"I think you are lying."
She stood looking Bernstein in the eye, desperate and thinking that there was no
way back from what he was asking. If he spooked, she was dead, that was all.
"Africa," she said then, dry-mouthed. "Africa, sir. Separated from my ship at
Pell."
Finally he said. "Crew?"
"Marine, sir."
The silence hung there.
"I don't mean anything against this ship," she said. "Truth, I just wanted off
the stations." And in the long further silence: "I give you everything I got.
You're a good officer. And you asked and I told you. All I know to do now, sir."
"Anybody else you've told?"
"Nossir."
Bernstein rubbed the back of his neck. Shook his head. Looked at her finally,
sidelong. "You take orders?"
"Yessir. I take yours."
"Did you hit Fitch?"
"Just shook him up. Thought he'd leave some marks. Only defense I got, sir, let
people know what he's doing, only thing I could think of, maybe to get it on
record what he's doing. Dunno whether that was smart or not."
"It was smart," Bernstein said, "so far as it goes. Where it goes next… Dammit,