Rimrunners

She stared him in the eyes, thinking, Got you, you sum-bitch.

Got you, if you got any regs on this ship.

He pulled her over to the chair, he sat her down, he went over and set his rump on the corner of his desk, just looking at her.

She sucked the cut lip and kept staring at him.

"You're asking for it," Fitch said.

She didn't say a thing.

"Catch your breath," Fitch said calmly. "You want a drink?"

"Nossir."

Fitch cut the recorder off, ran it back a minute or so.

Didn't restart it. And she worried then.

"I keep the records," Fitch said. "See what smart gets you? Come onto this ship, go right for the troublemakers—You've been damned useful, Yeager. You think you're smart. But I don't need a thing out of you—now we're off the record. I just need you to exist. Bitch."

She figured she was in for it, then, figured Fitch had plain revenge in mind and a whole lot of things could have been a bad mistake.

"Now," Fitch said, "I want you to think about something. I want you to think how you can save your own ass, because this is the chance you've got. I want you to think about how you can go on being useful to me, and I'm going to help you think about that, you hear me?"

"Yessir."

Damn! No simple son of a bitchc

Going to hurt for this one, Yeagerc

So you lie. But what's he want? ,

"All you have to do is get along with me."

"Yessir."

He got off the edge of the desk, he came and took hold of her the way he had and she flinched, mad that she did that, but the nerves remembered, the body wanted to protect itself and if you did that they'd space you sure.

He slapped her across the face, once, twice, three times, and he stopped, but he was still holding onto her and her bones hurt and her ears rang and her vision fuzzedc and hit her the way he could, and her obliged to take itc

He shook her, one neck-popping snap. "You want more?"

"Nossir."

"Those drugs yours?"

"Nossir."

He hit her again. "Are you any use to me?"

"Du

Fitch said, "How's that?"

"Try, sir. Real cooperative."

"I think you're lying, Yeager. Would you lie to me?"

"Nossir."

The grip on her clothes let up. She tensed up, expecting a sneak blow, but he let her sit there.

"You want your friends to be all right, is that right?"

"Yessir."

"There's a washroom back there. You go clean up. Then you can go."

She stared at him.

"You understand me," Fitch said. "Report on the drugs is inconclusive.—I sure as hell better not catch you in any more trouble, Yeager. You oryour friends, you hear me?"

"Yessir," she said. She got up, the way he said, wobbling, she managed to focus enough to see the door, and she went back into the cubby with the sink and toilet and turned on the cold water. The mirror showed a face better than she expected, the blood from her nose and mouth went with a couple of handfuls of cold water. The red on the sides of her face didn't.

She blotted dry with the towel, she looked up and Fitch was mirrored in the doorway.

Her gut clenched up. She couldn't help it, and couldn't help it when she had to turn around and face him, and pass him when he moved back ever so little to let her brush past him.—Dammit, she knew what he was doing, wasn't half surprised when he put a light hand on her shoulder, enough to make her stomach heave.

"You do better in future," he said. "And we'll get along just fine. Hear?"

"Yessir."

He motioned her toward the door. She went, opened it herself, .walked out into a vacant corridor. The cold of the water was going. Her bones ached, her vision still kept blurring, and she had to walk around the rim and get some rest and get up, she supposed, at alterdawn—back on duty; but she realized numbly that she had no idea where NG and Musa were, or what had happened to them or whether NG was next in Fitch's office.

She grayed out for a second, found herself in rec, walking up to the quarters door, got just about that far before she got dizzy and had to hang there a second. Then she shoved off and walked into the dark, past sleeping crewmates, down as far as Musa's bunk and NG's, and they were both empty.

God.

She had to sit. She picked Musa's bunk, and sat down and after a moment lay down, in the idea that if either of them came back the way she had, they'd come here, and she didn't think she could make the loft, she was too dizzy and too sick.

The dizziness got better after a few minutes of lying down. But the fear didn't.

Exactly what Fitch had done to NG.

Exactly.

Except it could get worse. Except you toed the line with Fitch or he'd see you had accidents, and he had his hand-picked skuz aboard to see you got up on charges—no damn wonder Hughes and his bridge co

Goddard. Goddard, over nav, Hughes' operator.

Friend of Fitch's.

Fitch picked the perso

Got himself a skut who carved up two people on Thule, just out of the goodness of his heart and his faith in humanity hauled her aboard and let her loose—

Like hell.

Like hell Fitch didn't run this shipc

Or intend to.

Bernstein had to be a pain in the ass to him. Bernstein had been on mainday until he got a bellyful of Fitch and transferred to alterday—

—like anybody else who could manage it.

Alterdaywas where you went if you couldn't get along with Fitch and you had a little pull—like Bernie had gotten NG and Musa to his shift; or you got there by being Fitch's hand-picked damn spies—

—like Lindy Hughes. Should've killed that skuz.

Will.

Except—the facts were real clear now, what the real rules were on this ship—that meant you went head to head with Fitch, and that meant—

Fitch had just given her a preview of what it meant.

And Fitch had NG in there by now, another locker-door accident, that was all. A lot more valuable alive—

You didn't make martyrs, you just beat hell out of 'em and you turned 'em back into the 'decks to start the rest of the campaign—

—like little accidents to your stuff, and then little accidents to you, so you knew if you fought back you were going to be in Fitch's office, and maybe in the brig when the ship went jump—

—like little accidents to your friends. And your 'friends' would pull off and leave trouble alone, if they were smart.

Or just human.

You always gave your enemies an out, right in the direction you wanted 'em to go.

That was what the Old Man used to say. That was what Fitch was doing. And he shouldn't make her scared, old Phillips had belted her across a hallway once; but Junker Phillips wasn't trying to kill you, he was just trying to keep you alive.

Fitchwas trying to kill you. Or Fitch was trying to break you. And those were the two choices you had. Crew like this had to have an example. Like NG.

But NG was too crazy to break and too valuable to kill.

Not when NG was a way to Bernstein's gut.

And Fitch didn't damn well need her now—except as another way to put the screws to NG.

Who wasn't as crazy as seemed, not halfas crazy as seemed, if he was still alive and Bernstein was.

Man named Cassell wasn't.

Man named Cassell had had a fatal accident. In Engineering.

And NG Ramey took the shit for it.

Cassell had been a friendof NG's. And Bernstein's.