In the Company of Others

by Julie E. Czerneda

  And now that Pardell was back on his feet, regardless of the situation, Malley was free to simply enjoy himself and leave agonizing over their situation and future to his friend.

  Pardell knew, Gail decided, suddenly caught by a look from the ’sider as he glanced idly around the room—unable to deny she’d been staring. She recognized both assessment and challenge in his eyes. If they’d thought Malley was protective of Pardell . . . now, Gail knew, they’d have to deal with Pardell’s sense of responsibility for the stationer.

  And of the two, she thought Grant should worry more about now-homeless Pardell, with his knowledge of starships—and deadly touch.

  Not that the stationer wasn’t still capable of being a problem in and of himself. The very next day, while Pardell cleaned up between tests, Gail found herself facing off with Malley—again. “I’m not ready to test the suit’s properties,” she told him, well past exasperated and inclined to call over the FDs leaning in the lab’s nearest doorway.

  “I tried your fancy suit already,” Malley said in an annoyingly superior tone. “It worked just fine. So if that’s what you really want Aaron for, why not go ahead and try the thing? Then you can be done with all this—” he threw out his long arms as if to wipe away the entire lab.

  Gail stood her ground, having become resigned to the fact that Malley would always take advantage of his height during arguments and that her neck muscles would pay for each and every one. “‘This’ is what’s necessary to make sure we have solid results and Mr. Pardell is safe.” She used the word deliberately, willing to guess exactly what had prompted Malley’s new impatience.

  It was as though she’d pushed a button, Gail decided, somewhat smugly. “Safe! Safe!” Malley’s face suffused with red and his fists clenched. “Where were you when Stanley, over there, thought he should test Aaron’s sensitivity to pain?”

  “You know I was here, Mr. Malley,” Gail reminded him, feeling her own face growing hot. They’d all been there, watching as the ’sider obediently gave quiet, utterly controlled rankings of how much he suffered at each new increment, all recorded and compared against the monitors. She’d been there, when Pardell’s face had dropped its calm mask, suddenly turning into a rictus of unbearable suffering as the monitors screamed for him. “Dr. Temujin made sure the test kept within safety limits. Did you think it would all be easy? We don’t know what to expect—that’s the point of the tests—”

  “Are you sure? Or is the point to find out how much he can take before—”

  “That’s enough.” Neither of them had noticed Pardell’s arrival—the man moved like a cat, Gail thought, even when forced to carry around the leads from a dozen or more sensor probes under his robe.

  “Aaron—I was—”

  Pardell shook his head and Malley closed his mouth, but the stationer’s look at Gail was bleak and unforgiving. “What’s next, Dr. Smith?” Pardell asked her.

  Somehow Gail managed to ignore the glowering Malley and adjust her face to something neutrally pleasant. Before she answered, however, she took a moment to study Pardell. He looked relaxed as he stood and waited for her decision, but a glance down showed her his feet were planted slightly wider apart than usual. Unsteady, but hiding it.

  Regardless of Malley’s opinion, the pain trial had been important—telling her far more about Pardell than the numbers listing his tolerances and sensitivities. The ’sider was patently a man used to driving himself past his own limitations, paying the price later when his task or goal was done. She didn’t need to hook Pardell up to the monitors to know he wasn’t ready for more—not that he’d admit it even to himself.

  “Lunch first, Mr. Pardell,” she ordered calmly, keeping her face and voice free of anything more than light courtesy. “I want you to keep up your nutrient levels.”

  Unlike hers, and to some extent, Malley’s, Pardell’s expressions seemed totally unscripted and sincere. In fact, his face could change so quickly, Gail found him harder to read in a way than Grant, whose features might have been carved stone. At the mention of lunch, Pardell’s face went from serious attention to delighted anticipation, lighting up like a child’s. “In the dining lounge?” he asked her eagerly.

  She winced inwardly, thinking of the time lost. But . . . the walk out of the lab would do him as much good as the food. “Certainly, if you’d like. Do you know the way?”

  Malley’s, “I know it,” crossed Pardell’s, “But you’ll join us,” so Gail wasn’t sure she’d heard the ’sider correctly. But Pardell lifted one dark eyebrow and repeated his invitation. “You do eat lunch, don’t you, Dr. Smith? Join us. Please.”

  What did he want? Gail had started to believe the ’sider wasn’t planning to seek any further advantage from her about the ’Mate’s records—or her ill-advised visit to his quarters. Now? She narrowed her eyes slightly, then saw Malley’s face creasing in a scowl. Whatever Pardell wanted with this meeting, the stationer wasn’t happy about it.

  Dissension among one’s opponents was a bonus. Gail nodded before she could change her mind.

  “I’ll meet you there,” she promised.

  Chapter 48

  “YOU want Gail Smith at our table?” The stationer had that stubborn, planning-to-lock-his-mags-to-the-deck look on his face. “You seriously want us to make peace with her, as if she’d understand it. Honestly, Aaron. Did that test unhinge something vital? Talking to that Earther’s like hitting your head on a bulkhead.”

  As if talking to Malley when his mind was made up on something was any more productive, Pardell chuckled to himself. He fell in beside his friend as they walked down the corridor. He’d changed back in the lab—they had a washroom there set aside for his use. Walking was about as active as he wanted to be. The ’sider was quite sure the observant Earther had noticed. Maybe food would help. “You do know the way to the lounge?” he asked Malley.

  “Sure.” It wasn’t quite a snarl. “And I suppose you’ll be inviting Rosalind next and asking what she’s up to—now that she’s finished selling you out.”

  “Rosalind is meeting me for supper tonight. You know it’s necessary, Malley,” the ’sider said softly, pitching his voice to Malley’s ears only. “It’s the way things have to be.”

  Few people had the lung capacity to produce such a thoroughly opinionated sigh. “I need to drop by my quarters,” the stationer said in no uncertain terms. “It’ll just take a minute. If Her Ladyship arrives early, she can wait.”

  Pardell somehow doubted Dr. Smith would, but went along—the stationer wasn’t close to listening to reason yet.

  Making it unlikely this would be his opportunity to tell Malley what Gail Smith had brought him that night. If he did. Pardell wasn’t sure how he felt about gaining so much past at once, not to mention being related to the infamous Susan Witts. That wasn’t going to be easy to talk about. He hadn’t made it through all of her letters yet, just enough to recognize something of a kindred spirit to Gail Smith. Did she feel it? Or was the Earther as focused on her quest as Witts had been on hers? Pardell sighed.

  The FDs followed along without comment, as they did each time either he or Malley left the secured area of the lab. Adams and Baier, today. At least they were willing to wait outside while he and Malley went in to retrieve whatever the stationer was after.

  Which Pardell was not surprised to find was simply privacy.

  “Make whatever peace you want, Aaron,” Malley growled the minute the door closed behind them. “But first, you tell me something. What was that crap this morning?” His face was pale and set into lines that made something implacable, something deadly. Sammie wouldn’t have recognized the expression. Pardell was quite sure Gail Smith would.

  Pardell sank down on the bed, just as glad to be off his feet. “They needed to quantify my reactions,” he said. “It likely looked worse than it was. That last bit—I was surprised, that’s all. You try getting a shock where it hurts and see what you do.”

  “So that’s how it’s going to
be?” Malley asked, hands clenching into fists as he towered over the ’sider. “You’re going to take whatever she feels like doing to you, no complaints, like a good little ’sider? Think this is going to make up for what happened on the station? That this is all some little bit of hell you deserve to be in?”

  Pardell let the harsh words roll past, knowing there was truth in some of what Malley said, if not all. When the stationer paused for breath, he looked up. “Someone, somewhere, was going to hear about me and want to find out what makes me tick,” he reminded Malley. “At least with these people, there’s a reason—a good one. Isn’t that enough for you? It is for me.”

  “Oh, I get it. You’re buying her whole story, every bit, and letting them torture you because of blue eyes and a noble cause.” Malley sank into the only chair, elbows on his knees as he leaned toward Pardell. He said in a tone of complete conviction: “I’m telling you, Aaron, you can’t trust Gail Smith. You can’t believe a thing she says. Look at what she’s done!”

  “Is it what she’s done, Malley? Is it really one person’s fault?”

  Malley appeared incredulous. “Are you kidding me? You know Gail Smith started all this mess. Things were fine before she came!”

  “Were they?” Pardell countered gloomily, shoulders sagging. “The Earther may have stirred things up—but all of this, the riot, the attacks, must have been ready to happen. If not now, then in another few months, a year. No. Things aren’t fine at home, Malley. Thromberg is dying. Everyone there—stationer, immie, ’sider—knows it, deep inside, in that place where we hide desperate, unthinkable thoughts from ourselves, until they can’t be hidden any longer. Once that happens,” he paused, then said heavily, “then anyone becomes capable of doing the unspeakable.”

  Malley dropped his face into his hands for an instant, but didn’t disagree. How could he? Pardell thought compassionately. The stationer was smart enough to see it all for himself. He just hadn’t wanted to admit it. Gail and the Earthers—it was so much cleaner to put the blame on strangers than on the shoulders of people you considered family.

  Finally, Malley lifted his head, his expression resolute, if troubled. “And you believe this project to find the Quill can save the station.”

  “They believe it,” Pardell stated. “It doesn’t matter if we do—there aren’t any other options, Malley, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “There’s one.” Malley leaned even closer, until Pardell could feel his breath. “You sabotage the ship. They’ll have to turn back to Thromberg for repairs. We can escape—hide out in the aft ring. We can tell them what we know. Syd and Tanya can spread it around. Defuse the crisis, explain—”

  Pardell held up a hand to silence the stationer, then started walking to the door, saying: “Time we headed to the lounge.”

  Malley’s voice was almost quivering. “Didn’t you hear me, Aaron?”

  “Hear you?” Pardell whirled to glare at the stationer. “Of course, I heard you. I’m sure everyone did,” he said flatly, pointing up to the ceiling, watching Malley’s eyes widen in shock. “What? Did you think they’d leave us unwatched—ever? Although it’s hardly necessary—they could let me have the run of this ship, but doing any serious damage that didn’t kill us all would take tools and expertise I don’t have.” The ’sider rubbed his gloved hands against his chest, finding sore spots where the last set of probes had left their marks. “Even if I did,” he emphasized, trembling with rage, “I will not go back to Thromberg Station. Ever. Gail Smith didn’t destroy my home and put me on this ship, Malley.

  “My friends did.”

  Chapter 49

  GAIL knew where the dining lounge was—she just didn’t use it. She took her meals on the run, in her office, or in the officers’ mess in the command sphere, where she could conduct meetings with Tobo or Grant. Many of the seniormost science staff had the deplorable habit of taking meals at their workstations, but at least they ate. For some, it was a struggle to get their minds on anything but their research; Gail had assigned ship’s stewards to the more muddleheaded of those.

  The techs and crew of the science sphere were the ones who took their free time seriously, filling the semicircular dining lounge during meals and returning here for music or other recreation at night. The place was rarely empty, given there were two shifts of techs during the day and a skeleton one through the night. Gail had insisted on both the turnover and first-rate facilities to entertain those off-shift—knowing full well the burden her own research schedule could be on the most devoted and professional staff.

  For the Seeker, she’d sought the best available, which also meant they were an unusually observant group. Gail wasn’t at all surprised when her entrance temporarily stopped conversations within a radius of twenty tables, then inspired a veritable storm as the techs speculated enthusiastically about her presence. It didn’t help that Grant had insisted her FD shadows accompany her even in here, standing at each shoulder.

  Gail felt like a one-person event.

  “Over there, Dr. Smith,” one of her shadows offered helpfully. Gail wondered if the FD really believed anyone could miss Malley and his hair, even at this distance, but nodded she her thanks.

  The two men had prepared for her arrival by having a glass of water matching theirs placed before the third seat. Pardell tilted his head interrogatively at the FDs following her. “They won’t be joining us,” Gail announced before he could ask. The FDs took the hint but moved no farther away than the next vacant table.

  This hadn’t been part of her carefully planned schedule, Gail thought as she took her seat, trying to analyze why she’d accepted Pardell’s invitation. There were four days remaining—no one, least of all Gail, had time to waste. They could have pumped her for information, doubtless the reason for this, back in the lab. With a sense of things skewed from predicted, Gail lifted her glass to theirs in what seemed a customarily formal toast. Rosalind had done the same with her tea.

  Before she could put down her glass, Malley said sarcastically: “Grant’s clones tuck you in at night, too?”

  Pardell merely watched her, his eyes curious. So, Gail thought. “Not quite,” she answered. “They stand outside my door so I’m not disturbed. Most comforting.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Malley said, but it wasn’t banter. He was after details. Gail was willing, to a point, to supply them. Questions could be more illuminating than answers. The stationer continued: “I can see having security on Thromberg, but here? These people can’t hate you that much.”

  Pardell coughed suddenly, a hand over his mouth as though to hide a grin. Gail didn’t bother to hide her own. “Most of these people, Malley, have worked with me for years. Many are friends as well as colleagues. Grant’s unit is assigned to protect the project, not me. But since I’m the head of the project, Grant has interpreted that protection as meaning having me followed everywhere. Even on the Seeker. Call it professional paranoia.” Gail let her grin widen. “In case you haven’t noticed yet, you two recently made Grant’s Vital to the Project list.”

  “We’ve noticed,” Pardell said, nodding toward the matched set of FDs at another table. “They wouldn’t sit with us either.”

  “On duty,” Gail explained. “Grant’s a bit of a stickler for that sort of thing.”

  “And you are on duty, as well, Dr. Smith,” Pardell said, rather than asked, lifting his glass and waiting.

  “On duty?” Gail reached for her water again, thinking over the question. She didn’t take anything from Pardell—or Malley—as idle conversation. Pardell sipped as she did. She wasn’t surprised Malley didn’t; she thought this an Outsider ritual. “Always,” she said honestly. “Until we find a way to find, capture—and destroy—the Quill.”

  “Thank you for sparing the time to join us,” he replied with unexpected seriousness. “We value your sharing a meal with us, on this shift, and on this ship.”

  Alerted by the changing nuance of Pardell’s voice, the formality in his choice
of words and how he said them, Gail paused. She met his eyes and saw nothing beyond polite interest. She looked at Malley and saw resignation, as if the stationer knew exactly what was going on and no longer disputed it.

  Before Gail could speak, the steward arrived with three identical trays. Malley surveyed his with displeasure. “I thought in here I’d get to choose my own food,” he complained to Gail.

  “Dr. Lynn has explained the complexity of getting a full range of nutrients after relying on Thromberg’s rations,” Pardell said firmly. “This is from her approved list. If you had your way, we’d be living on spiked orange juice and candy.”

  The stationer roared with laughter and the tension at the table subsided, but only barely, Gail thought.

  She reached for her fork, but Pardell and Malley did not. Instead, they gently pushed their trays inward, until they touched in the middle of the table. There was space left for hers.

  Gail hesitated, then copied their action so all three trays were together. She looked to Pardell for some clue as to what was happening. He appeared to be studying the trays, comparing one to the other. Finally, he smiled and reached for her tray.

  Before Gail could protest, Malley took Pardell’s, then pushed his over to her. “Enjoy your lunch, Dr. Smith,” he said. He appeared more relaxed, and began attacking his apple crisp with enthusiasm.

  What was all that about? Gail wondered, accepting Malley’s tray.

  Pardell’s eyes twinkled. “It’s a Rule, a custom,” he offered, unasked. “To accept anyone on board a ship—or in station quarters—that person must show and share food. It’s more ceremony than substance, now that Thromberg has enough rations to go around. But it was—necessary, once.”