Two women walked by, heads bent toward each other in passionate conversation. The nearer one glanced up, then away, then back. There was venom in her gaze. Hatred. The contrast was stark. On one hand, Cyn’s vision of a future where Belters were free of the economic oppression of the inner planets – of the central axioms that had formed everything in Naomi’s childhood. In her life. Civilization built by them and for them, a remaking of human life. And on the other, actual Belters actually hating her because she had dared to act against them. Because she wasn’t Belter enough. “Where does it end, Cyn? Where does it all end?”
“Doesn’t. Not if we do it right.”
There was nothing in her cabin that could help her, but since she was confined there and alone, it was where she searched. Hours. Not days.
The crash couch was bolted to the deck with thick steel and reinforced ceramic canted so that any direction the force came from was compression on one leg or another. Any individual strut might have been usable as a pry bar, but she didn’t have any way to unbolt the couch or break one free. So not that. The drawers were thinner metal, the same gauge, more or less, as the lockers. She pulled them out as far as they would open, examining the construction of the latches, the seams where the metal had been folded, searching for clues or inspiration. There was nothing.
The tiny black thumb of the decompression kit, she kept tucked at her waist, ready to go if she could just find a way. She felt the time slipping away, second by second, as she came up blank. She had to find a way. She would find a way. The Chetzemoka was so close to still be too far away.
If she didn’t try to go when they pulled the umbilical? If she could sneak across now and hide there until they separated… If she could get to the armory instead, and maybe find a demolition mech that could act as an environment suit… or that she could use to cut through the bulkheads fast enough that no one shot her in the back of the head…
“Think,” she said. “Don’t spin and whine. Think.”
But nothing came.
When she slept, it was for thin slips of minutes. She couldn’t afford a deep sleep for fear of waking to find the Chetzemoka gone. And she lay on the ground with her hand clutching the base of the crash couch so that it would tug her awake if they went on the float.
What would Alex do? What would Amos do? What would Jim do? What would she do? Nothing came to her. She waited for despair, the darkness, the sense of overwhelming failure, and didn’t understand why it didn’t come. There was every reason to be devastated, but she wasn’t. Instead there was only the certainty that if the dark thoughts did return, they would come in such strength that she wouldn’t stand a chance against them. Oddly, even that was comforting.
When she knocked to go to the head, Sárta opened the door. Not that it mattered. She followed Naomi down the hall, then waited outside. The head didn’t have anything of use either, but Naomi took her time in case inspiration came. The mirror was polished alloy built into the wall. No help there. If she could take apart the vacuum fans in the toilet…
She heard voices from the other side of the door. Sárta and someone else. The words were too soft to make out. She finished washing her hands, dropped the towelette in the recycler, and stepped into the corridor. Filip looked over at her. It was her son, and she hadn’t recognized his voice.
“Filip,” she said.
“Cyn said you wanted to talk to me,” Filip said, landing the words equally as question and accusation.
“Did he now? That was kind of him.”
She hesitated. Her hands itched with the need to find some way to put her hands on an EVA suit, but something in the back of her mind whispered If they think you’re alive, they’ll come for you. Anger and diffidence made the planes and angles of Filip’s face. Cyn already thought she was bent on self-slaughter. It was why he’d sent Filip.
Her belly went heavy almost before she understood why. If Filip thought it too, if when she went missing, her son went to Marco and stood witness to her suicidal bent, it would be easier to believe. They might not even check to see if a suit was missing.
“Do you want to talk here in the hallway?” she said, her lips heavy, her mouth slow. “I have a little place nearby. Not spacious, but there’s some privacy.”