Out in the Black Ch. 05

"Wow, Rusty. You look like shit." I made an obscene gesture. "Are you drunk?"

"Could be. Issa possibility." I'd puked up a good part of what I'd put in my stomach earlier, but surely some of it had made it through to torment my liver.

"Maybe you should drink some water," she suggested. "Get some sleep. You'll feel better."

"Thassa problem," I said petulantly. "Can't sleep."

"Oh." Her forehead was creased. It smoothed out and then creased again in a totally different manner. In that moment, I found the whole process fascinating. Yeah, I was maybe more than a little intoxicated. "Oh, that makes so much more sense. I get what's going on now." That made one of us. I couldn't remember what we were talking about. "Shit, right, yeah. You're at Shangri Las Vegas, so Carolinas is doing his thing and he left you behind on the ship."

"Wasn't no 'left behind,'" I insisted. "He's doing his work, I'm doing mine."

"Then why are you bitching about rules and calling me while drunk off your ass?" I didn't have an answer for that. Shrugging took too much work, so I just sat there and blinked at her, trying to keep her face in focus. "Something happened between you that's got you all - " Kells waved her hand toward me.

"Ain't no 'us.' Why I gotta keep saying that?" A rather foul burp forced its way out and Kells wrinkled her nose like she could smell it. "Cap is with his people."

"Which doesn't include you, apparently?" She shook her head. "It did, though, didn't it? At least once?" She gave me a shrewd look that made me want to find somewhere to hide. I felt like everything that happened over the last few days was painted on my face. "So you broke your precious rule and now you're having a pity party because you're feeling rejected?"

"No." Even I could hear how childish I sounded, the vowel drawn out into a swooping arc.

"Here's my question, Rusty," Kells continued. "Are you pissed because you're not getting fucked? Or is him fucking other people what's gotten under your skin?"

Ouch. My mouth worked but I couldn't even think of where to start to form a response. "You don't know what you're talking about," I mumbled finally, ending the call before she could come back at me with something else to make my headache worse. I set my protocols to do not disturb and crawled into my bunk. Head throbbing, mouth dry, I tried to think about anything other than the question she'd asked. Of course, doing that just meant it was all I could think about. The answer was obvious, wasn't it? Because I could have been balls deep in somebody from that bar. But I wasn't. And I didn't like what that said. Not at all.

I stayed in bed through most of the third day - if I was sleeping, I wasn't thinking - only emerging late in the afternoon to run my system diagnostics for the third time. We were supposed to be leaving the next morning, though there had been no sign of Cap to confirm or deny that. Even so, I wanted to get everything done and haul ass away from this place at the earliest opportunity. One of the techs caught me on my way back to the crew deck to remind me the crew was eating dinner together so we could watch the captain's show. I must have made some kind of face because all the guy got all pale and he stumbled back like he thought I was going to bite him. Wonderful.

My stomach pitched and rolled and I was a curious combination of rushed and reluctant while cleaning up. I stretched my time in the shower but hurried through getting dressed without drying off properly, so it was a struggle to pull my pants on. Shaking my head like a dog scattered drops of water across the floor of my quarters. There had been a steady stream of people into the galley, their footsteps echoing through the corridor outside, and my nerves were jumping under my skin even before my door opened and the noise of the gathered crew all talking over one another flooded in.

Every seat crowded around the galley's single table was taken when I got there and what empty floor there was to one side of it in the small room was filled with people shuffling around and bullshitting, food in hand. On the other side, the XO was standing by the spread in a little bubble of space, the scowl on her face enough to keep most everyone at a distance. It was rare that we all took a meal at the same time, so the one eating surface was usually enough. Though I wasn't thrilled about getting close to her - especially since I was pretty sure I was the reason behind her bad mood - I didn't much feel like rubbing elbows with people who were all full of excitement to see our very own captain actually talking to real life celebrities! Like he hadn't been doing this job for cycles. Li glanced at me and away as I moved to fill a plate. I didn't acknowledge her at all. Whatever Cap told her had her righteously pissed at me, that much was clear, and I didn't feel like getting into it. Especially not with an audience.

More than one person cheered when the captain's face appeared on the wall display. I snorted a laugh that was lost under the noise. The XO moved to stand next to the door and I took her previous spot, leaning against the counter as I ate. I'd never admit it out loud, but seeing Cap's smile did make my stomach do the tiniest flip. It was barely even a thing, but whatever else, the guy was hot as hell and the camera loved him. Then the show itself started and I had to fight not to roll my eyes as some celebutante gushed at him about her latest charity work. Cap somehow managed to look interested and impressed, skillfully steering the interview and keeping her on topic with only the occasional question.

While I appreciated working on a ship the quality of the Marzi, this was the part of the job I hated. These fucking people sat on their gilded thrones and patted themselves on the back for vanity projects; Cap - and by extension, the rest of us - gave them the attention they demanded. Over and over, new ambitious undertakings were announced and the system praised the generically attractive person chosen to be the public face, fawning over them until the next big thing came along. Did anybody even think to check up on all this shit later, make sure anything had actually been done? Not a chance. Meanwhile, the people doing the real work struggled to get by, invisible to the rich fucks. It was gross and it turned my stomach to even be a part of it, but there wasn't much work out there for a guy like me that didn't cross a moral line or two. At least my job on the Marzi didn't involve hurting or killing folks, and that was quite a few steps up from my last employment.

Glancing around the room as the celebrity on screen led Cap and the viewers through the virtual tour of some new water purification system - one that sounded suspiciously similar to the last hundred ways they were going to revolutionize clean water - I took a moment to really see my crewmates. They seemed relaxed, happy even, but the differences between them and the perfect beauty on the screen were clear. There were countless scars, wrinkles, and freckles or moles. Noses and ears that were too big or too small to be fashionable, mouths that were too wide, shoulders that were too narrow. The doc's wheelchair was pulled up to the end of the table. As she laughed at something one of Cap's creatives said, the lights of the galley glinted off blue streaks in her hair. Halfway down the far side of the the table, one of the researchers grinned at the person across from him. The smile pulled at the burn scar that stretched across the right side of his neck and jaw. To judge by the standards of the people Cap was eating with right then, we all should have been horrified. The sheer amount of so-called ugliness that was on display would have damaged the fragile retinas of Miss Chipper Bikini and her friends.

Me, I saw character. Life. All these people gave a shit about something that wasn't keeping their skin smooth or their stomachs toned. The scars I'd earned working as a merc - and the others I couldn't think about - wouldn't make me stand out among them. A weird sort of warmth washed through me and I realized I actually kind of liked most of these people - excepting my stern-faced nemesis at her post by the door. And even her I was protective of. This crew of normal-looking people with all their weird quirks and impressive talents was mine, and I would have been more than happy grant anyone thinking them unworthy of respect an introduction to my fists.

Gritting my teeth, I dumped the remains of my dinner in the recycler and put my plate in the sanitizer. This kind of shit was exactly why I didn't get involved. A man like me, who came from where I came from, couldn't afford to think he had found a place where he belonged. Everything was temporary and getting attached just meant more hurt coming my way when it inevitably ended. Fuck, look at how I was acting after just a couple nights with the captain. Somehow he'd gotten in my head and it was the clearest sign possible that I needed to keep my distance from Cap even after he came back.

Returning my focus to the display, I settled in to watch the show, feeling 100% solid in my commitment to that resolution. My life being what it is, this lasted for about five minutes.