Tumbler

by Brand Gamblin

  Once inside, Libby could see a small group of men, clustered together and arguing. She'd never seen any of them before, but from the expensive nature of their suits, and from the ring of men who stood around them, Libby could tell they were money.

  Woody stormed in, throwing runabouts on the ground, “Ya bunch of ninnies. If he sees your little toys outside, what do you think he's going to do?”

  One of the huge men stepped over to him, “Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave -”

  Woody jabbed a finger into the man's chest, “Yeah, you'll do. Go out there and get the rest of those silly contraptions. Put them over there.” He pointed at a corner in the distance, “Get another gorilla to help, if you're too much of a sissy boy.”

  The large man blinked and looked back at his boss, who nodded quickly, “Just do what he says. Take Stone with you.”

  The two men headed out to the cave entrance, as one of the bosses looked over at them. He jabbed a thumb at Libby, “What's that kid doing here?”

  Woody didn't even look at him as he stormed into the middle of the group, “She's with me.” He turned to face her as he introduced her, “Tumbler, this here group of milquetoasts are company owners.”

  Libby's eyes widened, and she took a step back. She'd never met a company owner before. The all scowled at her. One spoke up to Woody, “You brought a tumbler here, Smith? That takes some kinda stones.”

  Woody grinned at him, “You got no idea, son. Like I said, she's with me. Besides, she's the one who found this place. You need a witness, you need her.” He looked around at the faces, “I know Bronson isn't here, but where's -”

  A voice boomed over the local circuit, raspy and confident, like sandpaper over a guitar string, “Woody! Who the hell let you in on this? It's not your place.” An old man stood at the cave entrance. Even through the suit, Libby could see that the man was emaciated and pale.

  Woody turned and put on an obviously fake smile, “Jebidiah Scudder. It's been too long. Now you know what we're here for. I hope we can do this without any -”

  The cadaverous old man waved Woody off, “Have we caught him yet? Is he mine? How much did he -” Scudder stopped talking as he entered and saw the piles of equipment. His eyes blazed briefly, “Oh, tell me it's one of mine.”

  Woody held up his hands in a conciliatory manner and started walking over to Libby. “Now, Jeb, we don't know anything yet. Bronson's on his way, and I'm sure he's already made the call.”

  Libby put one hand on his forearm and said, “Bronson's an owner?”

  He shook his head, “S&V LLC is based on Earth. Bronson's just their figurehead out here.”

  Scudder piped up, “So the call was made?”

  Woody shrugged, “Turn on the radio, and see for yourself.”

  Everyone turned to their individual suit radios and switched the channel over to the news. Libby could hear the calm, constant voice of the night host.

  “So if you want in, you're going to have to bring your own food. Should be a barn burner, folks, so don't miss it. In business news, S&V LLC has just announced that they will start excavating in the outskirts near the Campbell quarter. Representative Bronson has informed us that they believe there is sufficient iron ore in that area to start a serious operation. Preliminary investigation has started there, and they should be able to move construction in there within the next two weeks. Speaking of new construction, the new zipline to the Lowell orbital is finally finished, giving our rush hour crowd a little bit easier time with -”

  The owners looked up at Woody and nodded slowly. They gathered together and started arguing about “appropriate actions” and “indentured rights.”

  After a few minutes, Libby touched Woody's shoulder, “Why would they be building out here?”

  Woody shook his head, “No, sweetie, they aren't building anything. But sooner or later everybody listens to the news out here. And that means that someone is gonna hear that message and panic, because they don't want anyone poking their noses in here.”

  Libby started to ask another question, when she saw the bobbing lights of another headlamp coming in through the cave entrance. She turned and said, “Hey, Joey! What are you doing here?”

  The young man stopped dead in his tracks and looked at them all, one hand still clutching the cave entrance. He opened his mouth as if to say something, then turned around quickly and started to run.

  One thing an experienced spacer learns is that you can't run in space. You can bounce, you can even fly if you jump hard enough. But no one can run in a bulky spacesuit, trapped in zero G.

  He skittered and slid toward freedom, and bounced off of the broad chest of Bronson's suit as he stood behind the boy. Bronson just looked at him sadly and pushed him back into the cave.

  It hit Libby then, hit her as soon as she saw the look on Joey's face. He was one of the trapped, like she was. He'd been a Tumbler, back in the day. He had spent years trying to get enough money together to buy a ticket home. And because he needed the money as much as she did -

  “You stole it?” She shouted, surprising even herself.

  Joey looked up at her quickly with a hunted expression. “You can't prove that. None of you can!” He walked backwards, away from the group, holding one hand in front as if to ward them off. Too late, he realized that he was backing into a corner, and stopped.

  Bronson shook his head, “It doesn't work like that, son. We don't have to prove anything.”

  Woody chimed in, “Everybody heard that message. Nine-tenths didn't give a damn. The rest just figgered it might mean more work. Only one person had a reason to fly all the way out here, to this one special hunk of ore.”

  Joey faced him defiantly, “I didn't do anything wrong. I took it, but I never sold it. I was going to take it all back.”

  Bronson nodded, “If it were up to me, I'd let this go with a warning.” He looked back at the group, “let's hope that's all we need to do.”

  A shrill cackle sounded from the back of the group as Scudder stomped forward, “Oh, no. That boy,” he jabbed a crooked finger at Joey, “May work for you, but he signed up with me. He's mine.”

  Joey called out again, “But I didn't do anything. You can't charge me with anything!”

  Scudder continued, “I don't have to charge you, boy! I own you!” He turned to face the group, “Anybody here want to argue my interpretation?”

  The other owners milled about vaguely, looking like they wish they could argue. In the end, though, Scudder turned back to Joey, “No, there's no law out here. When you signed up with me, you became my responsibility. I don't know where you got all of this,” he waved a hand at the piles of equipment, “but I'm the one who's going to be held responsible for replacing it. And I'm holding you responsible for stealing it!”

  Bronson held up his hands, “Now, look. This isn't the first time we've seen this. Remember what happened about seven years ago? The Johnson boy who said he was just gathering up scrap equipment for salvage? We let that kid go, right? No harm, no foul.”

  Scudder practically sneered at him, “You call this scrap? There's a working GeoMack extractor back there. Any of you call that scrap?”

  After a moment, he turned back to Bronson, “No. It's not scrap, and he wasn't planning on giving it back. He's signed up with me, that means I have to take care of his punishment.”

  Joey surprised them all by laughing at that. As they turned to look at him, he held up his hands. “What, are you kidding? What more can you do to me? You've got me trapped out here in my own private hell. I work for you guys all day, stuck on a rock, giving up years of my life, and for what? Just so I can go home? What more can you do to me? Tack a couple more years on my sentence, huh? Well go ahead. I don't even care anymore.”

  Scudder sneered at him, “Oh, no, boy. I won't have a traitor out here, working for me. You want to know what your punishment is? You get your fondest wish. We're sending you home.”

  Joey blinked at him, “Are you serious? I –
Why would you do that?”

  “We don't want your kind out here. You stole a king's ransom, and hid it in this cave. Thieves who steal on the level you did should be put in prison. But we don't have prisons out here. So that leaves us two choices. We can kill you, or we can get rid of you.”

  Scudder looked back at Bronson, “There's some disagreement on whether we should kill thieves, so for now, we don't do that.”

  Joey's eyes narrowed, “Kill me? You – That's not-” He looked around at the group of owners, “You just can't kill somebody like that!”

  Scudder jerked a thumb over his shoulder, “Yeah, that's what they say. So we have to find another way of getting rid of you.” He stabbed a finger at Joey, “You're going home, but you're still going to pay your way there. Once you get to Earth, you're going to jail. You're going to work off the rest of the money you owe me for cleaning this up, and for shipping your sorry carcass back to Earth.”

  Joey blinked at him, “Wait, really? From prison?”

  “Yeah, you'll be making license plates and digging ditches for a lot longer than you would have worked out here. You thought you were trapped before? Wait until you're assigned your six-foot-square cement home.”

  Joey seemed to be weighing it in his head, nodding slowly, “Okay, I can work it off from prison, but at least I'll be home, so we're square, right?”

  There was a mad glint in his eye as Scudder said, “Oh, no, boy. We ain't square by a long shot.”

  Bronson turned to Libby and put a hand on her shoulder, “You don't need to be here for this.” His voice picked up, “I'd recommend we all head back now.” He gave Scudder a hard look, “we aren't needed for this part.”

  As the owners started filing out, Libby saw one of Scudder's bodyguards grab Joey. Scudder turned to him and said, “Stone, I'm gonna take this out for a minute. You'll be fine.” The guard nodded as Scudder reached into the power center of his pack, and twisted a piece loose. He pulled out a long, thin rod. It didn't smoke in the airless passage, but it glowed a fierce yellow-white.

  Joey stared at him, “What is that?”

  Scudder jerked his head up to the cabin of the GeoMack, “That cabin's pressurized, right?” The guard nodded to him, and Scudder grinned at Joey.

  Woody took one of Libby's shoulders and turned her to face the cave entrance. He pulled her lightly in that direction. As she stumbled along behind him, she could hear Scudder answer Joey.

  “This here is a coolant rod. It's standard for all power packs. See, heat doesn't dissipate in space, so you gotta get a coolant system that puts all it's heat in one superconducting location. One place that can get blazing hot without spreading it throughout the suit. Hot enough to melt plastic. Hot enough to burn flesh.”

  The guard started pulling Joey into the cabin of the GeoMack extractor. Joey started calling out, “Hey, no. Don't! You don't have to do this. Look, I'm sorry, okay?”

  As Libby climbed onto her runabout, she heard the screaming. She turned to help, but Bronson stepped in front of her. “Just let it go, Tumbler.”

  “What are they doing to him?”

  Bronson took a deep breath, and grabbed her shoulders “I want you to understand something, Tumbler. This is a frontier town. We make our own laws. Some people don't agree with them, but that's the world we live in.”

  “He's screaming!” She tried to pull away from him, but he held her fast.

  “It's Scudder's right. It's part of the contract. What I want you to know is that this will never happen to you.”

  “What?” The shock of the idea stopped her from thrashing.

  “If you lie to me, if you steal from me, if you conspire against me. I want you to know, Carter, I will never do to you what they're doing to him.”

  “What are they doing?” she shouted.

  Bronson's eyes were cold, “They're marking him. They're branding him a thief.”

  ***

  Libby sat next to Woody at the bar, staring at her reflection in the mirror. Woody held his head up by an elbow resting on the bar, and looked down into his glass. She finally said, “I'm not free, am I?”

  Woody shrugged with his free shoulder, “What happened to that boy can't happen to you. He jus' had the bad luck to sign with that vicious bastard, Scudder.”

  She nodded slowly, “Yeah, but the only assurance I have is that my boss says he won't do that. He had to tell me that he wouldn't burn my flesh if I steal from him.” Her eyes flashed as she looked at Woody, “My boss said that he wouldn't burn me, as a way to make me feel better! How messed up is that?”

  Woody looked back down at his drink. Eventually, Libby turned back to her tea. She took a sip, and then turned back to him, “You're a free man, right?”

  Woody squinted at that, “Well, I don't work for any man but myself, if that's what you mean.”

  “So, if you did that, if you stole from somebody, what would they do?”

  He frowned, “Well, I would expect we'd need to settle it. Pistols at dawn or I have to pay it off or something. It's up to the town, really. If'n they came after me with torches and pitchforks, I'd pretty much have to do what they say.”

  She nodded, “Right, but it's a negotiation. You would be able to answer for your crimes. The community would gather to decide your fate. You couldn't just get branded by your boss the way we can.”

  Woody sat up and faced the mirror in front of them. “Tumbler, what you need to get through your skull is that they don't much like you.”

  She glared at him, eyes wide, “I'm getting that!”

  He shook his head, “No, I mean, those out there who chose it. The owners, the workers, ever'body who paid their way and sacrificed to roll the dice. They don't like you because you cheated.”

  She blinked, “What – How did I cheat?”

  Woody sighed, “Every man who paid his way out here got just as badly trapped as you did, only they did it knowing what could happen. They knew they were taking a chance, and they accepted it. They put a lotta hard-earned money into their trip out here, gave up promising careers, some even gave up families. But you, and Joey, and all the others, you got out here without any sacrifice at all. Most of the Tumblers just turn tail and run as soon as they get out here. Now you didn't run, but that don't make you noble in their eyes. It just means you're someone who took a chance without a sacrifice, and that makes you weak.”

  Libby turned back to face the mirror. “It's not fair. I didn't ask for this. I got shanghaied just as much as they did.”

  “But Tumbler, they had to pay for the privilege, an' you didn't. In their eyes, you got a head start that they never had. And then they see you whining, they see Joey cheating, they start thinking all Tumblers are weak, cowardly, low.” He took a drink and then said, “You heard Bronson, sayin' that this wasn't the first time. Happened a lot in the old days. But so far, every single thief, every one, mind you, has been a Tumbler.”

  He paused for a moment, and stared at her, “Now, if you were looking to judge Tumblers, what would you make of that?”

  She shook her head incredulously, “So they can brand me because they think we're weak?”

  “No. They could brand you 'cause it's part of the contract. But they WOULD brand you 'cause they don't like you.”

  She scowled at that, “But Bronson said he won't.”

  He nodded, “Bronson said he won't.”

  Libby ran a hand through her hair and let out a long breath, “Okay, so, what can I do about it? Maybe I don't get branded, but what can I do to make them stop hating people like me?”

  He shrugged, “Just one thing these people respect. One kinda currency that they use.”

  She frowned, “Ore?”

  “Work. Keep your head down, do your work, and don't complain. That's what they respect. You already made some points with them by buying land out here. Shows you wanna be one of us.”

  “Yeah? Well, I guess that's something.”

  They sat in silence for a little while, then Woody said, “O
f course, saving a little girl's life didn't hurt, either.”

  He raised his glass to her, and she smiled. It wasn't much, but it would have to do for a start.

  Chapter 16

  Libby leaned back in her chair, looking out the window at the sky. She didn't want to look at the work going on. She didn't want to get mad. She knew she was a perfectionist. They were trained workmen, she had no right to question them. It wasn't their fault that they were doing it wrong. Again.

  She took a deep breath and watched the sky. It always calmed her. With no atmosphere, you could see millions of stars forming a pinprick dotted backdrop for the foreground constellations of rolling asteroids. There was no sun, no moon, and the only light powerful enough to see by came from her own worklights on the surface of the dig. But it was still beautiful to see continents slide slowly past you. You could watch your neighbors working their land just by looking up into the sky.

  There was a loud crack, and Libby closed her eyes tight. She wanted to let it go. She wanted to let them be. But that sound allowed no leeway. There was only one response for that.

  She bounced out of her seat, and floated over to the door of the foreman's shack, grabbing her suit. She slipped into it with the practiced ease of a born spacer, and was out the port in a flash, leaping down the wall of the crater. She skidded and bounced on the almost vertical wall of the crater, as she grinned angrily. Over the local circuit, she could hear one of the men mutter, "Here she comes."

  "Oh, you bet I'm coming now. And why wouldn't I? I just heard a very specific sound." She bounced over to the small group of men who were standing around a huge diamond drill. "Yeah, I was sitting up there in my office, writing down reasons why I shouldn't fire all of you and replace you with rabid monkeys. I'd been at it for the last ten minutes, and I'd just realized I didn't need my pen, when I heard a distinctive noise. Anybody wanna guess what I heard?” The men stood in a semi-circle around a massive drill. None of them wanted to meet her eye.