by A. R. Kayne
“No, Jess. You can’t meet people from up there. It isn’t polite. I need you to come down here.”
She pivoted and swung her feet over the side of the hole; they were bare and smeared with grease. As always, Pryce was amazed at how much filth she managed to find on a ship that otherwise seemed sparkling clean.
“Where are your shoes?”
“Back in our quarters. They feel strange. It’s easier to climb with bare feet.”
“You need to wear shoes when you’re walking around the ship, honey.”
“But I wasn’t walking. I was crawling and climbing,” she replied, with the sort of damnable aggravating logic he’d learned to expect from her. She leaned down and squinted at him. “Are you mad at me? You have a mean look on your face. Maybe I should stay up here.”
“No, I’m not mad,” he said through gritted teeth, conscious of the muffled snickers of his team. Was she deliberately baiting him? He knew better than anyone else how cunning she could be, and she was acting suspiciously childlike. “I’m just very, very happy to see you. So happy I’d like to see you closer. Down here. Where the rest of the nice people can meet you.”
After a combination of coaxing and threats, she dropped from the ceiling. He caught her in his arms and held her close for a long moment. As always, when he held her everything else quit mattering. He inspected every part of her, taking in the stains and rips in her shipsuit and a long, bloody gash in her arm. He’d long since forgotten about the other people in the room.
“Ah, sweetheart. You’re hurt,” he murmured. “What happened?”
She glanced at the wound and shrugged. “No idea. I guess I scraped against something. Some of the tunnels are dark.”
“It looks pretty deep. Maybe medical should look at it.”
“It’ll be fine. It should scab over pretty soon. The shipsuit is soaking up most of the blood, and it’s not like there’s anything on the ship that’ll smell it and come hunt me. It’s the wounds that are dirty or spurt blood that you have to watch out for.”
He fingered a large tear in the shoulder of her shipsuit, stroking the soft bare flesh beneath. “What were you doing up there?”
“I already told you. Looking for parts.” She dug in her pocket and pulled out a handful of components. “Look at these. Aren’t they interesting? I haven’t found them all, though, and I don’t know what some of them do.”
“Very nice. Those are some very nice parts.” Even as he said the words, Pryce realized he was treating her like a child. That was a mistake. Her norms and experiences were different from his, but she definitely wasn’t a child. Her childhood had ended the day the Ghul slaughtered her family. “Honey, I want you to meet some people. You’ll be working with them.”
She shrank behind him but managed another smile and wave at the group. Pryce could tell she was uneasy. She was doing far better at interacting with men and strangers than she had a month ago, though.
He was shouldered aside by his First Engineer, a bony man with white, shaggy eyebrows. “Let’s see what you have there,” the man grunted. He took the parts out of Jess’s hand and spread them out on the conference table. Soon he and Jess were deep in discussion. Pryce quit listening when he heard the words “gear ratios”.
“Alright,” he finally said, once it became clear the two of them could mess with the parts all day without getting bored. “Jess, honey, I want you to meet everyone else.”
Once the introductions had been made, he placed a hand at the small of her back and urged her toward the door. “We have to get back to work. Why don’t you take those parts to our quarters and see what you can make with them? I’ll meet you there soon and we’ll go over your schoolwork.”
She dug her heels in and pointed at the hole in the ceiling. “But I haven’t found everything! I need to go back up there. Can you give me a boost?”
“No. You need to go to our quarters the normal way, by walking through the corridor.”
She winced. “There are people out there. Lots of men.”
“Yes. There are people. They’re nice. Maybe you can talk to some of them. Try out your new words.” He stepped close, tipped her chin up so she had to look at him, and lovingly smoothed a tendril of hair away from her face. “Be. Careful. I mean it. No more crawling through weird places in the ship. I don’t want you to get hurt again.”
She scowled at him. “I always am careful, Pryce. Why are you acting so weird? You weren’t worried when you sent soldiers into my home.”
He was at a loss for words. It was true; he hadn’t been worried about her safety when he’d sent troops down to rescue Ro. But things had changed since then. Now the thought of her getting hurt was gut-wrenching. Now he loved her.
He loved her. The thought was so shocking that he swayed. On some level he’d known it might happen sometime – that was what happened between partners, after all – but how had it snuck up on him so quickly? Was this what love felt like? This intense absorption, concern, and admiration that went far beyond the physical? This feeling that he couldn’t be whole or content without her?
“Besides,” Jess continued, “the computer said she could send a mech in to get my remains if I’m injured or die. I think she was making a joke, though. She seems like a nice person. I don’t think she actually wants me to die.”
Pryce was still coping with the realization that he loved her. Before he could remind her that the computer wasn’t alive and didn’t have the capacity to joke, the door whooshed open. A mech stood in the opening. It held a pair of shoes; Jess flounced away and took them. After the door closed behind her, Pryce limped back to the table, sagged down on a chair, and closed his eyes.
“That was Jess,” he muttered. He wasn’t sure what else to say. Somehow the meeting had been blasted to hell the moment she poked her head out of the ceiling. But that was typical since she’d come on board. She’d turned all of his routines upside down. Thank goodness they were in transit between planets so his duties were light. He could delegate all of her care to his staff, but since she was his match it felt wrong.
“Pryce, would you care to announce anything else?” Dr. Ales’ expression was suspiciously innocent, but her eyes were twinkling.
He scrubbed a hand across his face. What the hell? At this point, he might as well. Kellis and Dr. Ales already knew. The rest of them had probably guessed from his behavior.
“We’re matched,” he said bluntly. “Jess and I are matched. She doesn’t know yet. She needs time. She has to adjust and, I don’t know, learn to do things like walk through corridors instead of crawling around in the ceiling.”
There were smiles of understanding. He had to work to swallow past a lump in his throat. Fuck. He loved her. How did people function in this state? Would it feel even more overwhelming in twenty or thirty years? Would she ever love him back?
He drew a deep breath before speaking again. “Whether or not she ever returns my interest, I’m committed to seeing that she feels safe and can start a new life. She deserves that and more. She’s had a rough life, tougher than most of us can imagine. And she’s incredibly naïve. That makes her vulnerable. I can’t stress that enough. No one in this room will be a problem, but I’m sure there are others who might try to take advantage of her. At this point, they could do it without her understanding what was happening. So please spread the word: she’s under my direct protection. I mean that very literally. If anyone touches her, harasses her, or harms her in any way, I will personally, very directly, fuck that person up.”
Pryce knew they’d take him seriously. When he’d been second in command, a child had been brutally assaulted. He’d handled the matter in a manner that was efficient, permanent, and according to some, barbaric. He knew there were still rumors about it.
Dane cleared his throat. “Seems clear to me. I’ll inform my staff.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Jess
“Come here. Sit down and watch a movie with me.” Pryce grinned at Jess expectantly. H
e was already lounging on the couch in their common room with a video queued on the screen.
Jess hovered in the doorway of her bedroom, trying to remember protocol. “How was your shift?” she asked in stilted tones. “Have you eaten yet?”
Dr. Ales said that these were polite questions to ask after someone was on duty. If the person was feeling worn down by the stresses of their day, it was kind for their friends to offer them refreshment. If exciting or troubling events had occurred, they could discuss them and thus reduce their stress. Jess had never encountered those situations on Draco, so she appreciated learning how to handle them. She and her grandmother had simply talked when the mood struck them and eaten when hungry, if food was available.
Three months had passed since her decision to join the ship. The days since then had been filled with counseling, meeting an endless list of people, and studying. One of the study topics was etiquette or, as Jess thought of it, “How to behave unnaturally so you can conform to others’ bizarre notions of decency”. According to the guidelines, perfectly natural functions such as farting and burping were rude. So were body hair and any smells coming from one’s body, particularly the armpits. Remembering that, Jess lifted her arm and took a furtive sniff.
“Checking the pits, eh?” Pryce drawled, looking vastly amused. “Don’t worry; if you’ve bathed recently and you haven’t been sneaking around in the maintenance shafts, I’m sure you smell fine. My shift went smoothly; thanks for asking. It was very routine except for the quartermaster ambushing me about triffenshit. I got rid of him by telling him to inventory all of the tablet styluses on the ship. How was yours?”
Jess blinked at him. She was still a little unclear on how the ship operated and what the different departments did, but Pryce’s statement struck her as odd. “Why did he … doesn’t the quartermaster manage supply levels? Why did he want to discuss feces? Wouldn’t that be a matter for the sanitation group?”
Pryce snorted, but Jess didn’t get the sense he meant it unkindly. “Let me rephrase that. Triffenshit is a slang word for nonsense. Just after I got off shift, I found the quartermaster lurking outside my ready room. He wanted to discuss an issue that my administrative staff could have handled. He has a long history of inventing emergencies about minor matters, so I was annoyed. I responded by assigning him a tedious, time-consuming task so that his attention would be on that instead.”
“Ah.” She nodded as though she understood, but really she didn’t. What a strange place the ship was. It was full of wonders, but she often had the sense its residents were so detached from the basic struggles of life that they didn’t understand what was important. Perhaps that was why they fretted over things like smells and clothing and tablet styluses. Once concerns about survival were gone, maybe that was what was left.
Somehow Pryce was essential to the ship, although she still didn’t understand what he did. Once she’d asked how he spent his shifts. He’d promptly taken her hand and towed her to an array of rooms a short distance from their quarters. They included an ‘office’, a ‘ready room’ which functioned as a secondary office, and a ‘bridge/control room’ adjacent to the ready room. The latter had been filled with colorful displays and uniformed crew.
It had been ‘Captain this’ and ‘Captain that’ in the rooms and Pryce had become a different person. He was serious, stiffer, and somehow bigger. The crew had been deferential and, once he’d introduced her, they’d acted nervous. It had been the same in the corridors, except worse. Officers constantly stopped him with questions. Ordinary crew members avoided his eyes or skittered away. When she asked why, he grunted “They’re afraid that if I get mad, I’ll take them for a walk outside.” He wouldn’t explain what that meant.
She suspected that his life wasn’t easy. Maybe he didn’t get to simply be Pryce, rather than Captain Adamson, outside their quarters. Perhaps that was why he watched awful movies: they helped him relax.
“You’re too damned far away,” Pryce complained, lunging for her hand. “Come watch a movie with me.”
Jess glanced at the screen and groaned. “Are giant lizards rampaging across Earth again? How many times can a city be attacked before people realize there’s a serious problem? You’d think humans would band together to prevent it.”
“Maybe.” Pryce grinned at her, and the sight of his eyes crinkling did something weird to her stomach. “There might be giant lizards. There might also be a big flying insect and some tiny women who sing.”
“Yes, that’s what I always did when the night creatures were prowling. I’d go outside and sing to them. They’d show their appreciation by trying to eat me. What does the insect do, fly over the lizard and shit on its head? Great idea. That should make it go away.”
Pryce looked thoughtful. “Not exactly. You’ve mentioned the night creatures before. What were they? Did you have to fight them?”
She held up her left arm and showed him a long, jagged scar. “They’re meat eaters, mostly. Hunters. We met a few times. They learned to stay away from my cave and I learned to not go out at night. I didn’t see them too much, but hearing their prey scream was bad enough.”
Pryce gave a low whistle and ran his finger along the scar. “That damned near took your arm off, didn’t it? How old were you when you got that?”
“Sixteen, maybe. The years ran together.”
“You were sixteen years old, living in the woods and fighting predators.” He shook his head. “When I was sixteen, I was running around with girls and getting ready for Academy. I thought I was having a rough day when my favorite shirt was dirty. You’ve had a harsh life.”
“So I’m told. It’s just my life, Pryce. I don’t dwell on whether things are harsh or not. We all get what we get and have to make the best of it.”
“Do you miss Draco?”
She shrugged. That was another thing she tried not to dwell on. Draco was home and it always would be. The fact was, though, life was full of compromises. As she’d just told Pryce, one just had to make the best of it.
“Some.” Always. “I appreciate having a full belly and a safe place to sleep. I like learning and going to school again. I don’t miss hiding or the cold or having to kill things. It’s rough being inside all the time, though. This ship is big in its way but it’s also small. Sometimes I feel trapped. The gravity is different so I always feel a little too heavy. The garden is nice, but it isn’t the same as walking through the forest and feeling a breeze against my face.
“It’s also weird the way the days are a different length than they were on my planet. Plus there’s no real day or night. No matter what time it is, if I leave our quarters, people are awake. I was lonely after my grandmother died, but there are too many people here. They all know each other’s business and they try to get in mine. They make comments that sound nice but feel wrong. I appreciate getting to come here, but I always feel odd. I don’t know if I’ll ever belong.”
Pryce looked troubled. “I’m sorry for all of that. I hadn’t realized. We’ll reach one of our research planets soon. The gravity and wildlife will be different, so it won’t be the same as home, but you can spend time outside. Maybe it’ll help a little. You won’t have to feel so confined, at least.”
He took her hand and pulled her down beside him. She flopped in the middle of the comfortably worn couch, brought her bare feet up on its edge, and linked her hands around her knees. “I really should be studying,” she told him, “I have years of work to do.”
“What you need is a break. You’ve only been here three months and you’ve already made astounding progress. I’ve never known anyone who works as hard as you do. Besides, this video is very important. It’s a major historical document. Viewing it is essential for your understanding of traditional human culture. Plus, the synthesizer made us popcorn.”
She wrinkled her nose. “You really like that stuff?”
“Yeah.” He popped a wrinkled white blob in his mouth. “I don’t just like it. I love it.”
“It looks like a carnivorous fungus. I’m afraid it’ll dissolve my tongue.”
“Fine. That leaves more for me, then.” Pryce deliberately stuffed his mouth full, so his cheeks puffed out. As he chewed, pieces spewed onto his beard and his shirt.
Jess fell over giggling. “Ewww. Yuck!”
“Yeah? You think that’s nasty?” He pressed a damp chunk against her lips. “Wait until the fungus monster invades your mouth!”
“Mmbffff!!” She clamped her lips shut and smacked his hand away. He chortled then he coughed, grabbed his throat, and turned bright red.
“Pryce? Are you alright?”
His eyes were bulging. “My tongue. It’s got my tongue,” he croaked, falling on the floor gasping.
Jess was on him in an instant, straddling his chest and clawing at his lips. “Open your mouth! Open your mouth now!” She pried his lips apart and yanked his tongue out with her thumb and index finger, holding it fast for inspection. She peered in his mouth and carefully picked off a few specks of popcorn. “I don’t see anything wrong. Do you hurt? Can you breathe? Maybe we should call medical.”
Pryce began shaking with laughter. When he wiggled his tongue at her, she realized he’d been teasing her.
“Not funny!” she yelled. “Not funny at all, Pryce! What if that had been a real fungus?”
He laughed even harder. This time she smacked him with a pillow. He blocked his face with his forearms.
“I apologize. You’re right. Thank you for protecting me from the evil popcorn. If it hadn’t been for you, it definitely would have gotten me.” The gravity of his apology was destroyed by the fact that he was still shaking with laughter.
Jess sniffed at him and plopped on the couch in a huff, leaving him to clean the mess he’d horked up. Despite Pryce’s awful taste in movies and bizarre sense of humor, she didn’t really mind movie nights. She liked him and enjoyed his company. She even liked it when he touched her, although that had taken some getting used to. She’d even fallen asleep against him a few times. Speaking of which, it had been a long day. Jess feigned a yawn. “Oh my. I’m really tired tonight. Fighting your damned popcorn monster used my last bit of strength.”
