had a coherency the others lacked, as if memories were trying to put themselves back together and couldn’t quite make it. It took an hour or more to fall asleep. It seemed as if a few minutes had passed when Sasha opened the fresher, used both hands to towel her hair, and kicked my bed. “Up and at ’em, Max. We need to get off this tub.”
I yawned, pulled my clothes on, and followed her to the cafeteria. Breakfast cost a hundred and fifty-two dollars. Each. And it wasn’t all that good. Nor was the company, since Trask sat about fifty feet away. Earth hung behind him like a backdrop, a not so subtle reminder of what he was all about, and an indictment of generations past. He was engaged in earnest conversation with a serious-looking black man, but took a moment to bow sardonically, to which Sasha lifted her coffee cup in reply. Her words belied the smile. “I don’t trust that man. Let’s find some work.”
We had no other choice. Our bankroll was dwindling fast, and Sasha refused to ask her mother for help because to do so would reveal our location to anyone who monitored Earth-Jupiter radio traffic, and that was practically everybody. The fact that I’d have to earn my passage while simultaneously guarding Sasha from the forces of evil didn’t exactly appeal to me, but it was either that or give up any hope of a fifty-thousand-dollar payday.
But wanting work and getting work were two different things. Almost every shipping line large and small had a cubicle-sized business office aboard Staros-3, and none of them were interested in us. What jobs there were went to specialized droids, experienced spacers, or people with the right connections. So we trudged from cubicle to cubicle, waited through what seemed like endless lines, and were refused by men, women, and androids alike.
Oh, we came close once, when the Regis Line offered Sasha a job as a hostess, but there was no slot for me. I actually felt the fifty thousand slip through my fingers, but Sasha shook her head and led me into the hall. Yes, it was strange that she didn’t leave me behind, but I had no reason to question a decision that put money in my pocket, and wasn’t smart enough to think it through.
I did notice one thing, though, and that was the fact that Sasha looked more and more discouraged, as if the weight of the whole world rested directly on her shoulders. With the exception of the kiss, she had never been exactly friendly, but there was an air of desperation about her that I’d never seen before. Not even when we were running from the snatchers and poppers. I tried to talk to her, tried to cheer her up, but it didn’t seem to help. She seldom spoke and became increasingly depressed.
We were exhausted by mid-afternoon. We skipped lunch in an effort to conserve our funds, returned to the cabin, and settled in for a nap. I awoke four hours later to find Sasha gone and a note on her bed. “Max, gone for a walk, back soon, Sasha.”
“Gone for a walk”? Was the girl out of her mind? Yes, of course she was, though the whys and wherefores were a mystery. And I had failed to think of that, just as I had failed to think of so many other things. Visions of Trask and the Trans-Solar goons danced in my head as I splashed water on my face, slipped my arms through the gun harness, and headed for the door. I paused for a moment, performed one of the small rituals that keep me alive, and stepped out into the corridor. Everything looked dark and ominous.
The bulkheads were thick with multi-layered graffiti. They closed in around me and pushed a thousand day-glo images through my eyes. The crowd swirled, became annoyed with my relatively slow pace, and pushed on by. Robo-hawkers, disabled spacers, whores, and itinerant lawyers begged for alms. The smells of sweat, incense, food, smoke, and ozone filled my nostrils and forced me to breathe through my mouth. It was, I decided, even worse than the Sea-Tac Urboplex, and the closest thing to hell I’d ever seen. I watched for Sasha, and did my best to think like a teenaged girl, going where she’d go, doing what she’d do, but it didn’t seem to work. I checked the cafeteria, the retail shops, and the business section, but she was nowhere to be found.
Finally, in an act of what can only be described as desperation, I did what I should have done early on, and stopped at one of the habitat’s public terminals. There, for the absurd fee of twenty dollars, I was allowed to ask about Sasha’s whereabouts. I even remembered to use her alias. The answer came back almost instantly. The voice was synthesized: “Mary Cooper is located in cubicle fourteen of the Staros-3 medical facility. Mary Cooper is…”
I ducked out of the booth, shouldered a dweeb out of the way, and followed the red-cross-shaped pictographs towards medical. Had she been mugged? Raped? Shot? The possibilities were endless, and all of them filled me with fear. Fear, and a sense of shame, since I was her bodyguard and had failed to protect her. Never mind the fact that she should have woken me, should have told me where she was going, it was still my fault. I was a grown-up, and she was a kid, and it was my responsibility to prevent such things.
The shoe was on the other foot now, with the crowd moving more slowly than I liked, which was too bad for them. I’m big, strong, and perfectly capable of taking advantage of that when I want to. Most people scattered, and those who didn’t got shoved. I kind of hoped that some asshole would take offense, would give me an excuse to work off my anger, but no one did. Maybe it was the chrome-plated skull, my size, or the nasty grin. Whatever it was worked and allowed me to reach the medical center in record time.
The receptionist had long orange hair. It had been teased up into a point and allowed to droop like a halfhearted question mark. His smirk told me what he thought about big men with chromed heads.
“Mary Cooper. Where is she?”
“She’s in cube fourteen, and who may I say…”
The route was obvious and I took it. The cubicles were tiny affairs screened with curtains. The numbers got larger. Twelve…thirteen…fourteen. I whipped the curtain aside.
Everything was white including the paint, the bed, and the gown Sasha wore. She stood with her back to me looking in a mirror. The sudden commotion caused her to turn. One hand clutched the front of her gown while the other started towards her gun. The second hand topped, fluttered for a moment, and fell to her side. A bandage covered her left eye. Gauze ran around her head. Tears rolled down her cheeks. My heart jumped to my mouth. “Sasha…what happened? What did they do to you?”
Her mouth moved but nothing came out. It seemed natural to move in, put my arms around her, and let her sob into my chest. She felt small and very, very fragile. Finally, after what seemed like a long time, the sobs died away. She pushed me away and wiped a hand across her mouth. “Sorry about that…it was stupid…and very weak.”
“Stupid? Weak? What the hell are you talking about?”
Her voice grew stronger as she turned and shook out her pants. “No big deal. I sold an eye, that’s all.”
The words rolled around the inside of my head like twenty-ton ball bearings. Images flashed through my mind. I imagined Sasha lying on an operating table as a doctor pried her eye out of its socket and dropped it into a basin. It made me queasy. “You did what?”
She was defensive. “We need money. I sold an eye. People sell organs all the time. It’s no big deal.”
I may be stupid, but even I tweak eventually. This was more than a schoolgirl on her way home, more than a skirmish in some corporate war, this was big. So big that teenaged girls were willing to sell their eyes to move from one place to another. I grabbed her shoulder and pulled her around. “Why, Sasha, why! Why would a girl sell an eye? And don’t give me that bullshit about taking you home. Are you running drugs? What?”
Tears welled in her remaining eye, brimmed over, and trickled down her cheek. She shook her head. “No, I’m on a mission for my mother. An important mission. That’s all I can tell you.”
I heard my voice get louder. “For your mother? What kind of mother would want her daughter to sell an eye?”
Sasha stood tall. She wiped the tears away. Her face grew hard and defiant. I saw hatred in the eye that remained. As if I were responsible somehow. “Who the hell are you to judge? My mother does what she has to do. And so do I. So shut the hell up and step aside. I’m getting dressed.”
We walked through the corridors in silence, she with her thoughts, I with mine. What she’d done was monstrous. What sort of parent, what sort of mission, could justify a thing like that? There was no way to tell, but one thing was for sure. Anyone who was willing to sacrifice herself to that extent would do the same with me. I would have to be very, very careful. Our cabin was just ahead. We slowed down.
Habits are interesting things. They can hurt you or help you, and I need all the help I can get. That’s why I make a fetish out of small things, like checking the load on my handgun every morning, and plastering a tiny piece of transparent tape across my door when I leave. These things were a struggle at first, but they’re second nature now, and I do them without conscious thought. Except when something unusual happens, that is. “Don’t touch the door. Someone’s been in our cabin.”
Sasha frowned. “How do you know?”
“I left a piece of tape across the door. It’s broken.”
