Breathing Space

by S. J. Higbee

  I was munching on a mouthful of egg and bacon roll, when he started hauling the robe over his head. And got stuck. The robe was thrashing about, evidently determined to stay in contact with his body. As he staggered around, his upper body and head completely engulfed in swathes of billowing fabric, I struggled not to laugh. Chris and Eileen were also sniggering.

  Wynn, trying not to look smug and failing, went to his rescue. Which was when it stopped being funny. The dregging robe was strangling Sarge and as Wynn struggled to haul the fabric from around Sarge’s head, it just coiled more tightly around his neck.

  I jumped up, however Chris was closer and despite his own robe’s frenzied movements, he produced a knife and started slashing at the cloth. The duraglass-coated blade sliced through the nanoweave like it was wet paper. In no time flat, the robe lay around Sarge’s feet in ribbons as, puce-faced and panting, he rasped his thanks.

  He was bleeding from a cut on his shoulder where the knife had caught him. I rushed over to the Mergency Aid box, yanked it open and grabbed the roll of steri-skin. Leastways the cut was clean and reasonably shallow, although it was bleeding freely. The front of my robe was bloodstained by the time I’d finished dressing Sarge’s latest wound. His torso, well toned for a man of his age, was a patchwork of scars.

  Tidying away the Mergency Aid box, I noticed Wynn staring at his body with hungry intensity. Before I had time to wonder if there was another, unspoken reason why he’d always had such problems keeping hold of the women in his life, he said, “I’d love to sculpt you.”

  Holed heavens, Wynn! You’re going the right way to be tossed out’ve the nearest handy airlock…

  But Sarge merely raised his eyebrows. “I’m not lolling around bare-arsed, not even for a Wynn piece.”

  “I’d like you topless, wearing your combat fatigues and boots. Checking your aug,” he spoke rapidly, his face lit up, eyes sparkling. “I’ll start off with a series of sketches – you’re welcome to see them – before I begin work.” His face darkened as he shot Chris a look. “Though I’ll have to track down a set of tools. When I got scooped up, mine were left behind.”

  Chris wasn’t listening, intent on slicing himself out of his robe and helping Eileen cut her way out of hers. I felt a sick twist of guilt. No one else in the room would realise just how much it mattered to Wynn to have lost his tools. He’d risked his life to retrieve them from Basement Level, all those years ago. And now, thanks to Chris and Peter’s lame-brained stunt, they’d gone.

  “That’s a shoddy blow.”

  I blinked. That wasn’t the reaction I was expecting from Sarge.

  He shifted. “A lot’ve folks lost their lives on Hawking. There’s piles of stuff in storage, waiting to be claimed by relatives. Maybe we could trawl through it. See if we can find some replacements, there.”

  “You’ll do it, then?”

  I sat down, smoothing the ruffled material over my knees. When will Wynn’s grin stop somersaulting my stomach?

  Good question. Cos this sodding robe keeps trying to fly up around your waist every time you go gooey over him.

  “Yeah. It’s a deal, so long as you answer one question. And tell the truth, cos I’ll know if you don’t,” Sarge’s tone sharpened.

  Wynn’s smile faded. “If I can.”

  Chris and Eileen, wearing only P’s regulation underwear, stopped examining the shredded remains of their robes and looked up as the atmosphere in the room thickened.

  “How come you can wander round in that dregging thing without it tying you up?” Sarge gestured at the robe.

  “Oh that.” Wynn visibly relaxed. “I was raised on a fishing commune. We learnt yoga and how to meditate when knee-high to a frog. Slowing my heartbeat and keeping calm seems to work.”

  Sarge nodded and reached his hand out towards Wynn. Who shook it, clearly used to sealing deals in this manner.

  “And you?” It took me a full minute to realise Sarge was talking to me.

  “Had a real old fight with the sodding thing as it happens. Ask him.” I nodded in Wynn’s direction. “And then, I went into the zone, you know, combat-ready. Like on BalanceJoust. Which sorted it.”

  Sarge locked looks with me. “Did it really? Cos I tried all those ploys and whatever I did was as much use as a newbie inna nuke-sim.”

  I stared back, completely equal to anything Hugo Gently could throw at me. Regularly locking horns with General Norman had been horrible at the time, but left me with a handy legacy. Whoever I ended up dealing with, they weren’t anywhere near as scary as my own father had been. “Who knows? I’m not delving too deeply into the whys and wherefores, given we’re fast running out’ve any other options.” Though if I do sense you’re making a takeover bid, Jessica, I’ll join the others as an ex-merc and risk being spotted by some liner passenger…

  She muttered a curse that would’ve made Nanny Patel’s wig curl, adding something uncomplimentary about my ingratitude. My robes fluttered around my legs and I held my breath, before the material fell still once more.

  I stood up and made for the corner of the room. I’d spotted them when replacing the Mergency Box and been itching to have a go. As I chose one of the neatly stacked Gaiast staffs and tried a couple of experimental twirls to check out the balance, the frozen lump around my heart eased a fraction. My robe suddenly felt more like one of those expensive evening dresses General Norman used to make me wear – annoyingly restrictive, but not so weird.

  I rolled onto the balls of my feet and spun the staff, as I used to on BalanceJoust – except this was the real thing, instead of a virtual tool. And was gratified how similar it felt, except the real object was harder on the hand and not quite so predictable. I grinned at Wynn as I flipped it up into the air and caught it single-handed.

  I’ll teach you to feel sorry for me, you prodder!

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  I’d have beaten Wynn bloody in no time flat, so I couldn’t go through with it. However, it was my turn to be smug and I didn’t bother pretending I wasn’t. For years I’d put up with headshaking sermons from guards and medics alike about my BalanceJoust habit. To hear them droning on, you’d have thought I was some chem-addicted gaper. And while I’ll admit occasionally I was a tad optimistic about the combat level I should be fighting on, which had led to some injuries – you’d have thought the world was about to implode the way they all carried on about the occasional black eye, broken finger and cracked ribs…

  Now all those hours on BalanceJoust paid off. One of the main settings – and my favourite next to Unarmed Combat – was Quarterstaff Fighting. Of course it wasn’t the same as the Gaiast staff drills, but there were enough similarities to allow me to replicate those swirling sequences after a couple of days’ solid practice. Wynn took part during the first morning, though had to stop when his leg started giving him grief.

  A relief. His presence left me weak-kneed and sweaty-palmed, no matter how much I told myself he was just some useless fugee drifter with jellyfish for a backbone. Though it helped concentrating on getting those twirls right and placing my feet there… and there… while I jabbed – just so! The downside was that my hands became badly blistered. By the end of the third day, the steri-skin the Sarge applied was a shredded ruin, while weeping sores across my palms were making it impossible to concentrate. And the pain was interfering with Jessica’s control over my robe.

  Therefore, day four of our ten-day journey to Hawking found me in the wardroom, with Sarge picking the remains of the steri-skin off the oozing mess, which clearly wasn’t going to heal cleanly until it was sorted out.

  “This wasn’t one of your better ideas, Norman.” He jabbed at a trailing shred of steri-skin with the tweezers and ripped it off.

  Which was when Wynn walked in.

  The flare of agony had my robe flapping like a wind-snagged rag. Or maybe it was Wynn striding through the door. “Ow! What about some pain spray before you start flaying me?”

  “You got the smallest notion of
how many nerves, tendons and muscles you have in your hands? Or what a drag you’ll be on the rest’ve us if this mess gets majorly infected?” snapped Sarge.

  I blinked, shaken at the real anger on his face.

  “What is it with you? On board, there’s a library... music… games… But, no. Not you. You push yourself so prodding hard, you blister your hands. And when I fix them up, does it haul you to a halt? Nope. You keep going till you all but cripple your sorry self!” He was now in roar mode. “And then we got to put up with Blondie, here, mouthwhacking us for not taking care of you. But the hard fact is that no one can – cos you’re too damn busy punishing yourself!” He flung the tweezers down onto the table. “And thanks to your crip-wittedness, I can’t even hold these prodding things steady!” With that, he stormed out of the room.

  I watched him go, my jaw grazing the floor. “What was that about?”

  Eileen sighed. “I’ll go. See if I can smooth him down.” She followed Sarge out of the wardroom.

  “So what’m I gonna do, now?” I demanded, waving my weeping hands around.

  “Maybe you should’ve thought about that before you let them get like that,” muttered Chris. “And I, for one, aren’t up to sorting it out. I’ll get the medic. Let’s hope he’s not dealing with a real emergency.”

  “Com-call him, why don’t you?” I was more than a little winded at this outbreak of general anger. Are they all hung over this morning? But after Sarge had dressed my hands last night, we’d all turned in after last dog watch. Though I’d woken in the early hours, shaking and sweat-drenched, grabbed the staff and gone through a few drills, which was the cause of the current damage…

  “Nope. I’ll go and find him. You wait here.” Chris marched out of the wardroom.

  “Don’t you bother your sorry selves. Any of you – I’ll sort it!” I yelled after him, jumping up. Though my robe was whipping about so violently, it was debatable whether I could’ve crossed the room.

  Jessica, you snoozing on the job? Or are you also gonna flounce out on account of my hands?

  What with your temper tantrum and the pain – if I don’t get more headspace, this robe’ll be tying you up tighter than wrapping parch.

  Leastways I was used to Jessica’s snappiness, though under it I sensed she was struggling. So swallowing down my irritation and hurt, I blanked my mind, making space for her to do her stuff with the robe. Between us, it took several minutes. During which I realised she’d become a lot stronger… I mean it. You try wearing my body – I’ll bounce you right out’ve my head so fast, it’ll take you a month’ve Sundays to remember who you are!

  I clearly visualised her face as I closed my eyes. The sudden stillness and slight tightening of her lips. During that long breath-held moment, I realised I wasn’t the only hostage in this business – that if I really tried, I could exorcise her spirit. There were all sorts of complicated reasons why I hadn’t. Some were bound up with guilt. Jessica died because she’d had the putrid luck to get caught up in the Cap’s shoddy schemes due to our friendship. And I’d sorely missed her after her death. So while I often resented her sudden appearances and constant carping, I still worried when she slipped away to wherever she’d go when she wasn’t sitting in the back of my head giving me grief. All this zipped through my head in a nanosec, before she came back full of fighting talk.

  As if I’d want your sorry body! You’re hardly much of a catch, given you keep dribbling over that long streak of blond uselessness and you’ve messed up your hands. Now d’you want me to sort this, or not?

  Yeah. If you can. Once more, we carefully circled each other, until she managed to regain control over the robe while I tried to ignore the pain in my hands.

  “So that’s how you do it.”

  My eyes flew open. What with one thing and another, I’d forgotten Wynn was sitting in the corner of the room.

  “It’s the weirdest meditating technique I ever seen,” he continued, pausing over the open sketchbook propped on his crossed leg. “Though it seems to work, right enough.”

  “Mm. You working on your sketches of Sarge?”

  He flipped the page over, clearly unwilling to share his drawings. “Sorta. What about your hands?”

  I wasn’t about to line up for yet another verbal smacking. “What about them?”

  He sighed, his robe rippling distractingly around his lean frame. “You want me to sort them? Mightn’t be so nifty with the tweezers as Major Marchstep, there. Though I’m not into torturing you with ‘em, either.”

  “That’d be shiny.” I’d been holding them half curled on my knees, trying to find a position where they didn’t hurt. I slowly put them back on the table and gritted my teeth. No matter how gentle Wynn was, this was going to be fiery agony.

  He crossed the room and stood, looking down at them for a long minute before muttering a curse under his breath and rootling through the Mergency box until he snagged a canister of PainEase and carefully sprayed the stuff until my hands were dripping with it – something Sarge would never have done, being too mindful of the waste. Making me limply glad it was Wynn sorting this out, instead of some muscle-caked merc fitted with the PainEase aug for minor injuries.

  He scrubbed his own hands with a steri-wipe, before breaking open the wrapper on another set of tweezers – another wasteful act you’d never catch a Ps soldier doing. He gently pressed the tweezers onto one of the unblistered patches of skin on my palm.

  “How’s that? Cos I can add more mercy-mist if needs be.”

  “No, that’s fine.”

  Should’ve taken up Sarge’s offer of this stuff last night, instead of trying to be all tough. I did say. Jessica’s input didn’t help the situation by a nanospec. For a sodding change.

  Just keep the robe still! This won’t go well if it starts flapping about while Wynn is poking around with those tweezers... “Mercy-mist?”

  Wynn gently started easing off the ruined steri-skin. “It’s what we called the stuff when I worked on the subs. Back there, you had to be mindful of nicks and scrapes, or they’d turn green and runny in no time flat.” He sucked in a breath as one of the mangled strips he was pulling free wouldn’t come. I could feel the tugging as the weeping blister puckered, breaking open the half-crusted scab.

  Think I’ll try watching the mu-screen, instead.

  “You’ve nailed that staff drill. If I were you, I’d give it a rest. Focus on something more useful.”

  Well you’re not me. And what in holed heavens is more useful than being able to defend us if we get cornered without our guard? Not that this was the moment to mention it. “Seemed fairly vital to make sure we could pass for the real article once we’re on Hawking,” was all I said.

  “So, you know where to track down your family once you get to Earth?”

  “They were originally from England. So I reckon once we’ve debarked from the ship, I’ll feed their names into the English-Earth database and take it from there.”

  Wynn paused and looked across at me, his robe shifting around his body as his eyes widened. “That won’t work.”

  “Why not?” It was an effort not to snap, but I was all too aware of those tweezers he was holding.

  His sea-blue eyes locked on mine and Jessica’s curses got steadily filthier as she fought to keep my robe still, before he turned back to teasing stringy strips of steri-skin free of the weeping mess covering my palms. “Earth isn’t like anywhere else. While it’s stable now, there’s been a whole lot of war and chaos going back since forever. Moles don’t go in for pulling together as a planet all that well. And as for keeping complete databases, forget it. A bunch of ‘em take care to stay dark.”

  “Moles?” I flinched. While it didn’t exactly hurt as one of the longest strips trying to graft across the pulpy mess on my right palm tore free, it wasn’t all that much fun, either.

  “Fat little earth-burrowers who are mostly blind to anything beyond the tip’ve their noses.”

  I giggled. It was a per
fect description of the cowardly drossers. “Your name for them?”

  “Nah.” His hair caught the day-bright light as he shook it. “It’s what Cerans call Earthers.”

  “Lnard always reckoned those dirt-stained mudlarks on Ceres were a deal smarter than they made out.” Wonder where he is now?

  “He was the wheeler-dealer on your ship, wasn’t he?”

  “Yeah. My boss. Could’ve cut a stinging deal with the Devil himself, I reckon.”

  “One’ve the good guys.”

  “Yeah, that he was.” It was surprisingly pleasurable to share a memory that went beyond the P’s. My previous life seemed to have belonged to someone else.

  “Left any friends behind? On Restormel?”

  I sucked in a breath as the tugging became… sharper. “A whole lot of fine companions.”

  He casually reached for the PainEase and started squirting the stuff all over my hands again.

  “Hey! Go easy – that stuff’s expensive,” I protested.

  “So is clearing up a mega-infection. Trust me, I know.” He bent over my hands again. “What about friends like those girlies who were trailing in your wake that day down in Hawking? You had anyone like that while you were slogging yourself to a shadow in Merc-land?”

  I thought about the people I cared about. Did I ever let down my barriers? Share my hopes and dreams with them? I shifted, swept with intense longing to twist cloth through my fingers and worry at it. “It’s difficult when you’re Chief. Besides,” I added, keen not to seem pathetic, “I was mostly too busy for that sort’ve thing.”

  “Well, if you’re stumped for something to do, start gathering Intel on Earth. There’s a bunch of places where murder rates are still far higher than on most colony worlds, and as for thievery, beatings and general mayhem – the stats are eye-watering.”

  I stared at him. “Why in holed heavens d’you want to go and live there?”

  “There’s a gallery selling Sector Two stuff. And the owner reckons that she can sell everything I make and some. But getting my sculptures shipped to Earth costs a cripping fortune. And half’ve the last lot arrived in pieces.” He broke off from the finicky business of fixing my hands, his face bleak as he stared across the room seeing something else. “All that work. All the grief… for nothing.”