John Maddox Roberts - Spacer: Window of Mind Read online

  "Tor," said the blond woman, "fix Kiril something to eat. Make it light, her stomach probably won't tolerate much. Meanwhile, I'm going to give her a med exam. Nancy, bring some of your clothes. You're the only one close to her size." This last was addressed to a tiny, almond-eyed woman who had been sitting as still as a bronze statue throughout the meeting. She signified assent with a tiny nod. "Come along with me, dear," said the blond woman. She took Kiril's hand and led her out of the mess room. Kiril was a little shaky and lightheaded with fatigue, hunger, and relief. She was still on her guard, but beginning to feel a feint glimmering of hope, and hope was something she thought she had suppressed years ago.

  "I'm Michelle LeBlanc, med officer," said the blonde. "Call me Michelle. Except for the skipper, we're on a first-name basis in this ship." Just forward of the hold Michelle stopped her at a door which bore a stylized emblem of a serpent wound around a staff. Inside were an examining table and a profusion of instruments, and Kiril could only guess at their function.

  "First I'll have to give you a physical exam," Michelle said. "Go ahead and take off your clothes."

  "Hey, what is this?" Kiril asked suspiciously.

  "Don't you know it's all right to undress for a doctor?" Michelle said, amused.

  "I've never seen a doctor before."

  "Well, I can't examine you unless you do." The woman smiled winningly, but Kiril didn't trust smiles. The feeling she always had about such things told Kiril that the woman meant her well, but life had taught her to pay more attention to feelings of threat than to those of benevolence.

  "Okay," she said at last, "I guess it's your ship." Just now she was willing to do almost anything to avoid leaving the ship. Almost. She unfastened her ragged coverall and slid out of it, sitting on a low table and pulling the filthy garment off over her bare feet. She was wearing the thin daggers strapped to both forearms.

  "You'll have to take those off before I can take readings," said Michelle, as if such accoutrements were the most ordinary thing in the world. "You're safe here, Kiril," she added gently.

  Kiril took off the knives and placed them on a shelf. Michelle attached tiny instruments to Kiril's wrists, chest, back, and forehead. She then proceeded to poke, prod, and pry with a businesslike forthrightness.

  "Hey, what's that for? What are you doing?" Kiril was indignant. Michelle was examining her in places she was not used to having handled.

  "Almost through," said Michelle. She began to unfasten her devices. "Now, step into that booth." She pointed to a iransparent door in a wall. Kiril slid the door open and stepped inside. The chamber was barely large enough to turn around in.

  "Don't be frightened," said Michelle, sliding the door shut. "It's just a medicinal bath. I know it's something different in your experience, but it's good for you."

  Kiril started as a thick foam began rising in the booth. It had a harsh, astringent sting to it, and it kept rising. She was beginning to panic when it stopped short at her chin.

  "Duck your head under and stay down as long as you can. Keep your eyes shut while you're under. Do that several times."

  Kiril held her breath and closed her eyes. Screwing up her courage, she ducked. Immediately, she could feel the foamy stuff scrubbing at her scalp. "Different" was no adequate word for it. A bucket of cold water had been her only experience of bathing in Civis Astra. The stinging stopped and she could feel her pores opening. It began to feel good. Eventually the foam receded and she stepped from the booth. Michelle wrapped her in a huge, heated towel. It was the softest fabric she had ever felt. There was a knocking at the door.

  "It's me, Nancy." The door opened and the woman entered, carrying a pile of clothes.

  "This is Nancy Wu," said Michelle, "communications officer."

  "How's the patient?" Nancy asked.

  "Poor condition, physically. She's sixteen, but her physical development is that of a thirteen-year-old. That's mainly a result of malnutrition. Good food will clear it up, plus I'll put her on a hormone treatment. She's got enough problems to keep me busy for quite a while, but nothing that won't respond totreatment. Actually, it's kind of nice having a patient again I don't have enough to do around here anyway "

  The comm officer left and Kiril tried on the clothes. The coverall was baggy on her thin frame. She studied Michelle with curiosity.

  "Why are you looking at me?" asked Michelle.

  "I can't figure you. In Civis Astra a woman with your looks would belong to a big K'ang leader, or maybe some polit. Same with that other woman, Nancy. You two work on this ship, just like the rest?"

  "That's right. Nancy handles communications, though she's not very communicative personally. I handle the medical department and see to everybody's health. Plus, Torwald and I take turns as ship's cook."

  "You mean that big schturtzl with the gun cooks?" The idea strained Kiril's credulity.

  "He's a man of many talents. His official capacity is quartermaster—he sees to equipment and supplies, but he's also a gourmet chef." Kiril didn't understand this. Food to her was fuel, nothing more. "Speaking of which," Michelle continued, "let's see if that food's ready." She guided Kiril back to the mess room again. Kiril sat at the table and Torwald put a tray in front of her. There was a soup and a few light, solid items.

  "Eat this slowly, beginning with the soup," said Torwald. "We'll have to increase your intake gradually. I was a POW in the quarries on Signet during the War. I didn't look much better than you when I got liberated. The navy gave us as much as we could eat, and we all got sick, so take it slow."

  Kiril began to spoon up the soup. It was delicious, and she had to fight the urge to bolt it and the rest. Food had always been something to eat as fast as possible, before someone else took it away from her.

  "You all act as if I was going to stay here." She looked at them suspiciously. "Why's that?"

  "Well," said Torwald, "you can't go back there, you'd just be killed. So, you stay with the ship."

  "But I told you, I don't have the money anymore. 1 can't pay for a passage."

  "Then you can work for it," Michelle said. "It happens that our last ship's boy left us a while back. He outgrew the job, so we have an empty berth. How would you like to be ship's girl?"

  Kiril looked at her incredulously. "You mean I can stay until you reach another planet?"

  "You can stay as long as you like," said Torwald. "Stay until you outgrow it, as long as you do your job. How about it?"

  "Are you kidding? I'd do anything to get out of this sink." She paused. "Well, almost anything," she amended.

  The skipper came in, carrying a flimsy printout sheet. "I've been talking with Port Authority. Seems a local 'businessman' named Pao Lin claims we're harboring a fugitive."

  Kiril sat in her chair, paralyzed. The fear she had almost discarded came rushing back in full force. "Are you gonna let I hem take me?" Her words were edged with panic.

  "No, of course not," said the skipper. "Just finish eating. The port people said that it'd take days for him to process enough red tape to extradite Kiril from the port area. They also say that Pao Lin is the biggest crook in the city and it's a pity we didn't let the Vivers kill all his men."

  "Told you," said K'Stin, the taller of the two Vivers. The skipper looked at him with disgust.

  "Since you're staying," Michelle said, "you might as well get to know people. Let's see, you've met Torwald and Nancy and Bert and Finn. That's Ham Sylvester over there. He's mate." The huge black man grinned and waved. "That's Achmed with the mustache, he piloted the AC that picked you up. Achmed's the engineer. That's his assistant sitting next to him. His name's Lafayette." The last named was a young man, perhaps nineteen or a little older. He had curly hair and a rakish look.

  "The two Vivers are K'Stin and B'Shant. Don't bother trying to talk to B'Shant. K'Stin's his senior and always has first say." Kiril couldn't imagine wanting to talk to either of them. They were the most fearsome-looking creatures she had ever seen outside of a nightmar
e.

  "Hello, are you going to be traveling with us?" The voice came from somewhere around Kiril's elbow, and she looked down. She then jumped nearly into the middle of the table. In the canals around Civis Astra there was a small creature called a crab, named for a resemblance to an Earth creature. The voice had come from something resembling a crab, only this one was about two feet high and four feet wide.

  "What's that thing?" she yelled.

  "That's just Homer," said the skipper. "He's the first intelligent alien ever discovered. He hitched a ride with us a while back and just sort of stayed. He's a poet."

  "Vivers! Talking crabs! What kind of ship is this? Are you pirates or smugglers or something?"

  "No," said the skipper, "just ordinary tramp freighters, moderately honest and usually broke. Now," she continued, "to our next order of business. When I checked with the port people about Kiril, here, they'd just received this message for us. It's from Earth High Command, ordering us to return to Earth, severing all contracts if necessary."

  "How can they do that, and why?" asked Finn.

  "I don't know why," the skipper said, "but as to how, it's under the old wartime Emergency Seizure Act. For all practical purposes we've been called back into the navy."

  "Don't we ever get a break?" Torwald complained. "Why do we have to play footsie with those clowns?"

  "Because they'll revoke our license if we don't," said the skipper. "We might as well go see what's on their minds. Liftoff in an hour. Kiril, if you've finished eating, come on up to the bridge."

  Kiril still felt hungry but thought she had better heed Torwald's advice about taking it easy on the food. She got up and followed the skipper from the mess room all the way forward. The skipper opened a door and they stepped into a big room lined with control consoles. The skipper touched a plate on one of the consoles, and a thin, flexible strip of gold-colored metal was ejected.

  "This is a spacer's bracelet," said the skipper, clipping the band around Kiril's left wrist, just below the dagger. "It will contain all the information regarding your service as a spacer. Once per ship-month you'll turn it in to me to have it updated. You're now Probationary Spacer, Second Class, aboard the good ship Space Angel." The skipper smiled for the first time, obviously an unaccustomed expression. "Glad to have you aboard, Kiril." Kiril didn't know quite what to say, so she said nothing, dropping her eyes to stare at the bracelet. The skipper took her arm and steered her back toward the mess room, which seemed to be the focal point of collective ship life.

  Lafayette," said the skipper, "show Kiril her quarters."

  Aye aye, Skipper," said the young man. "Come on, kid." He led Kiril back almost the whole length of the ship. "Your cabin's just abaft the main hold."

  "Abaft?" said Kiril, mystified.

  "That means behind. Forward means in front of." He pointed to a door. "That's a hatch, and that down there is the deck, not the floor. A stair is a companionway, and this," he slapped a wall, "is the bulkhead."

  "Why does everything have a different name?"

  "Tor says that when the first caveman paddled a log across water, he renamed everything on it so nobody would think he was a landsman. We carry on the tradition in space. Here you arc, kid." He opened a door—Kiril corrected her thought—a hatch. Lafayette took her arm to guide her in, then froze when she whirled and laid a knife across his neck, just below the ear.

  "Hands off!" she hissed. "I'll take orders and I'll do any job I'm told to, but you and the other men don't lay a hand on me, that clear?"

  "Uh, extremely clear—pellucid, so to speak. Would you mind putting that blade up? Thank you. You weren't kidding about being from a rough neighborhood, were you?"

  "Not hardly," Kiril said, going inside.

  The cabin was about four paces long by three wide. Folded against a bulkhead were a bunk, a small desk, and a chair. There were some shelves, a sink, and a mirror.

  "Who do I share this with?" Kiril asked.

  "Nobody. It's all yours."

  Kiril was awed, but tried not to show it. In Civis Astra a room this size would have housed a family of seven or eight. Even so, she had never been lucky enough to live in one. She had always slept in doorways, abandoned cellars, packing crates, anything that would keep off bad weather.

  "We'll be lifting in a few minutes," said Lafayette. "Lower your bunk and strap in." He showed her how to release the catch holding the bunk in an upright position, and demonstrated how to fasten the straps. Then he went to his own cabin, across the passageway. Only when he was out of the cabin and the hatch securely locked did she get into the bunk and strap in.

  A faint vibration started, then a slow, directionless pressure.

  Both intensified, but did not become disturbing. After two or three minutes both halted abruptly and a feeling of weightlessness took their place. Then the feeling of gravity returned and a bong sounded in the intercom speaker.

  "All hands unfasten, we're in free space." It was Ham's voice, coming over the intercom. Kiril loosened the straps and sat up. The bunk was uncomfortably soft and springy. She looked around more closely. There was a small bulb set in a recess in the bulkhead above her bunk. She touched a plate below it and a light came on. There were old clips on the bulkhead where former occupants had hung pictures or some such. She wondered briefly who they might have been. There was a knock at the hatch.

  "Who is it?" Kiril called, hands going instinctively to her dagger hilts.

  "It's Michelle." Kiril opened the hatch. Michelle was standing outside, holding a pile of white cloth and a cushion. "I've brought your linen," she said.

  "Linen?"

  "The cloth stuff that goes on the bunk. And a pillow."

  "Oh, ah, thanks." Kiril was embarrassed that she wasn't sure what to do with the stuff, but Michelle walked past her and began making up the bunk, moving slowly so that Kiril could follow her actions.

  "Michelle," Kiril asked, "what's this business about being called into the navy and having to go back to Earth without even a cargo?"

  "No telling till we get there. This ship was in a peculiar situation a while back. We were forced to go to the center of the galaxy, thousands of times farther than humans have ever been before. That was when we got Homer. You mean you've never heard of the Space Angell I thought the story had reached every corner of human-occupied space by now."

  "I think I heard some spacers in the houses talking about it lately. I never paid much attention. Never thought I'd be spacing."

  "I suppose you had other worries. Well, like it or not, you're a spacer now. You'll hear all about it on the way back to Earth, till you're sick of it. Torwald and Finn are the gabbiest braggarts you've ever met, and they're teaching Lafayette bad habits.

  I >on't believe too much of what they say. I don't doubt that our '.ummons is somehow connected with that episode. Earth government never paid any attention to the Angel before. Nowadays we can't make a trip back there without some sort of complication.

  "Look, you're pretty exhausted. By ship time, this is night. Why don't you try to get some sleep? There'll be plenty of time tomorrow for you to start learning your duties."

  Suddenly Kiril was aware of just how exhausted she was. Too much had happened in too short a time. "Thanks. I could use some sleep."

  "I'll see you tomorrow, then. Ham and Bert have bridge watch tonight until second night shift, then Finn and Nancy take over. You'll be assigned a watch later."

  Michelle left and Kiril locked the hatch, then undressed and lay down on the bunk, shoving her daggers beneath the pillow. She had trouble getting comfortable. The bunk was so soft, and the pillow elevated her head at an unaccustomed angle. She tossed and twisted, finally hauling the mattress off the bunk and putting it on the deck. With that much solidity it seemed more familiar. It wasn't enough. She next discarded the pillow and set her daggers on the mattress beside her. That was better. She rested her head on a bent arm, put her free hand on a dagger hilt, and fell into a nervous, fitful sleep.


  There was a bleep from the intercom. "Morning watch. All hands to the galley for breakfast or I'll throw it to the hogs." It was Michelle's voice. Kiril got up, yawning and stretching. Even on the floor—the deck, she reminded herself—the thin mattress had been soft enough to leave her stiff and sore after a few hours of restless sleep.

  She went to the tiny sink and splashed cold water in her face, then washed in hot water, reveling in the luxury. She studied herself in the mirror. She had never really looked at her own face before, and she wasn't sure that she liked it much. Her dark-blond hair had always been kept trimmed as short as possible, so that she couldn't be grabbed by it. Below the hairline her face was thin and finely drawn, dominated by huge, almost spectral gray eyes. The skin, lightly dusted with freckles, was stretched so tight across the delicate bones that she looked emaciated. Well, maybe regular meals would fix that.

  She realized that, for the first time in her life, she was thinking about her looks, as if they really mattered. She decided

  that the presence of women as striking as Michelle and Nancy

  was making her conscious of her own plainness.

  Satisfied that she didn't look too disgraceful, Kiril went in .< arch of the galley. Now that she had more time and was less confused, she took the opportunity to examine her new home. Her first home, to be precise. She might as well start thinking of it that way. It looked like she wasn't going to be anywhere else tin a while.

  from her cabin hatch she turned right and walked out onto the catwalk that ran through the center of the hold. The hold itself was a cavernous, cylindrical chamber, now totally empty. Ai intervals around its circumference Kiril could see the big hatches that were used for loading and unloading it. Immediately past the hold was a hatch opening onto the passageway labeled Cargo Crane. Kiril figured out the words quickly, but a hatch on the opposite side of the passage gave her some trouble: Hydroponics. She spelled the word out to herself, her lips forming the sound of the letters, but still it made no sense. Overcome by curiosity, she glanced up and down the passageway. Assured that nobody was watching, she gingerly opened the hatch. What she saw inside was a room full of plants, all lloating in long baths of nutrient solutions. Puzzled, she pulled her head out and closed the hatch.