I’m about to head to Skylab to look at the pool table next morning when I remember what the girl said about leaving something out there. There’s already been a lot of drift overnight, and I probably won’t find it. Hell, I don’t even know what it is—she won’t tell me. But I’m on my knees at the entrance, sweeping snow away, looking for something that might not even be there. A couple of machinists walk by and make some smart comments; I only have time to flip them the bird before I spot it. A pill bottle. Size and shape of a Tylenol bottle, but the label’s been taken off. I almost leave it where I found it, except the container’s got that greasy look to it of having been searched for again and again in a pocket, or held tight like it was the only thing keeping a person alive. I pop the top with my thumb, expecting to find more scratch, but that’s not what I find. I know as soon as I see it. Everything is clear as the new day.
When I get to Skylab, Floyd and a field engineer named Randy are looking at the pool table, beers in hand. “One drop on that felt and I cut off your balls,” I say, and they step away from the table. There’s already one here, in the game room, but it got brought down during Reagan’s first term. Worse than that, the table ain’t level. I been shipping materials down to build this one during my downtime—bundle it up with the three-quarter-inch plywood and snuggle it under a saddle truss or something. The delicate shit—the felt, the netting—used to come down with a cargo coordinator named Jose, but then Jose went Elvis one day on a toilet back home in Tulsa, and I had to start bringing it down myself. Anyway, this table is for the good old boys: no Beakers, no admins, just Nailheads.
I pull Floyd over to the table. “Get me a three-eighth-inch bolt and a Fender washer. You put the rails on crooked.”
“They look all right to me.”
“Just get me the bolts and the washer,” I say. Floyd mutters something and leaves. If the Beakers see that anything about this table is off—and they will—they’ll sneak into Skylab late at night with their laser levels, and we won’t hear the end of it.
“I heard they’re sending that girl back,” Randy says to me. I take a piece of sandpaper from Floyd’s toolbox and start working the edge of the rail.
“Which one?” I say, though I know.
“The finger girl. The artiste.”
“They ain’t,” I say.
“Why not?” Randy asks. I shrug. I don’t know how the feds work down here. “Probably has something to do with the fact that Frank Pavano is the one who cut off her fork.”
“Yeah, I hear we’re getting a visit from Washington,” Randy says. “They’re all up in arms about the Beakers. They’re saying the Beakers bullied him. Fucking Beakers.” I brush the wood dust from my hands and then blow it off the rails. Randy looks at the table like he’s gonna cum all over it. “She’s a beaut, Bozer. When will she be ready?”
“Soon. Sooner if that asshole will hurry up with those bolts and washers.”
I hear the sound of bunny boot on metal staircase, and extend my hand behind me, but someone, not Floyd, says, “I hear there’s a pool tournament at Equinox.” I turn and see it’s a Beaker, that Indian one without the accent. Sri.
“There might be,” I say.
“Is this going to be a station-wide event?”
“Huh?”
“What I mean is—is this going to be open to the entire station? Can anyone enter?” I just look at Randy and smile. He’s new to all this. He needs to learn how to make the Beakers squirm. That’s how we keep the equilibrium around here. Sri shifts his weight onto his other leg. “Is there some kind of entry fee? A case of beer?”
“I don’t drink microbrews.”
“I can get you more Schlitz,” he says.
Although this does sweeten the pot, I don’t budge. “Look, you guys can keep buying me beer, but the tournament ain’t open to Beakers.”
“But that’s not fair.”
“What’s not fair about it?” I say. “This is my table. Use the one in the game room.”
“You know that one’s ruined,” Sri says.
“Well, you Beakers shoulda been more careful with your Shirley Temples.”
It’s hard to get a Beaker upset. Sri keeps coming up with reasons why he should be allowed in the pool tournament, like logic has any bearing on my decision. Floyd finally shows up with the washer and bolts. He’s out of breath, huffing like a steam engine going up a mountain pass. “Jesus, Floyd. You fat fuck.”
“Karl Martin’s here,” he eventually coughs out. “He wants to talk to you.” I don’t care for Martin. He’s fussy. He wasn’t the one who hired me, either—that guy was an ex-military man who’d spent years in El Salvador doing shit that was neither sane nor legal. He was pushed out when VIDS decided to merge with a robotics manufacturer in ’98, and that’s when Martin, this former diplomatic pouch slinger, took his place. I will say that Martin mostly lets me do my thing. He’s never come down and stuck his nose in between any steel girders. But still, I don’t relish the opportunity to talk with him.
All-Call screeches on, and Tucker’s voice comes through the speakers: “Bozer, report to A3 ASAP. Bozer, report to A3 ASAP.”
I find Martin waiting for me in the garage. He’s trying to play it cool, even if he’s made the fatal mistake of wearing the red parka of McMurdo. I can see the crew giggling at him, but he can’t, and that’s all that matters.
“Bozer, sir, good to see you,” he says, slapping me on the shoulder with his mitten. “The new station looked great on the flight in.”
“Just the bones, but we’re set to put the last steel beam on B3 in ten minutes,” I say.
Floyd pulls up on the snowmobile. Martin gets on like he’s getting onto a stallion. This is a big moment. B3 will be the comms and admin pod for the new station.
We motor past the tourists cheesing for pictures in front of the Pole marker, and that’s when I see the girl again, Cooper. She’s standing alone, facing the opposite direction, her hands hanging at her sides. I pull up to where she’s standing. She looks good—healthy, sober—and she smiles at me. I tell her we’re putting the last steel beam on B3. “First of the new pods to get enclosed,” I say. “History in the making.”
“Where?” she says.
“Come on, I’ll take you. All the bigwigs wanna take pictures.” I feel Martin lean in behind me to make room. She hesitates, but when I gun the engine, she allows Martin to pull her on. We’re at the site in no time.
There’s a small crowd by the Mantis crane. The sun glints off its steel body. All around me, I see cameras pointed in our direction, little ones, the kind that Polies brought down in their luggage. All of them snapping a photo that no one else will understand, a photo that will always have to be explained to people who weren’t here: installation of the last steel beam on B3—a state-of-the-art comms hub built at the world’s baddest construction site.
Floyd moves away from the minder so that I can run the crane. The line is taut, and as I move that steel beast atop the structure, I feel as happy as a pig in shit.
Once I jump off the crane, Martin slaps me on the back, hard. He’s giddy. He slaps me again, not so hard this time, and I can tell he wants to talk business. “How much faster can you move on this construction, sir?”
“We’re moving as fast as we can,” I say.
“No doubt,” he says. The words come out as two separate clouds of frozen air. I wait for the rest. “We got a problem, Bozer. You been keeping on top of the news?”
“Two Fingys and a stolen ice-corer on the Antarctic Divide ain’t never gonna end well,” I say.
He leans in. I smell Pearlie’s onion-fried hash browns on his breath. “They’re gonna try to shut this show down, Bozer.”
“I’m listening.”
“Pavano’s got two congressmen who are riding Scaletta hard. They can hold up the appropriations bill.”
I shake my head. “Simple workplace injury, I’ve seen far worse.”