“Guilty.” He let his head fall to the side, putting those dark eyes on me. “You are shit at following orders, after all.”
“Am I?” I challenged, noting the tension in his shoulders that he tried to roll away.
“Without a doubt,” he replied through clenched teeth. “The worst officer I have ever come across.”
I swerved the rover causing Roys’ shoulder to slam into the door. He glared. I glared.
“You are unbearably childish,” he said.
“You are unbearably annoying,” I replied.
“I genuinely dislike you.”
“I fucking hate you.”
“Just drive.” He set his head on the window.
We stayed silent, although I swerved the rover any time the bastard tried closing his eyes. From the back cabin, Lilea shrieked because Arana threw up and missed the bag. Roys and I didn’t talk the rest of the way nor when he found me during dinner to drop the cleaning supplies at my feet.
“What did you do to piss him off this time?” Ryker asked between a mouth full of food.
“Told him he had a nice ass.” I tugged out a cigarette. Ryker presented his hand in request of a hit that I shared before he returned it to me.
“Why must you constantly attract his attention?” Zavir shoved a spoonful of questionable food in his mouth. Frowning, he tugged a bag from his hip that he carried during all meals and sprinkled over all our food. He pointed a spoon at me. “You’re lucky, but that’s only because you are unlucky.”
Iylene leaned over me. “That lacks sense.”
“Bad things happen that you always avoid, but those bad things end up happening to us, like annoying the captain. One of these days he’ll punish all of us because of you.” Zavir slapped his chest. “I am going to request to move teams.”
“Don’t be like that.” I hugged one of Zavir’s arms and nuzzled my nose against his neck the way he liked it. He shivered when I nibbled on his neck. “You’d miss me and you know it.”
“It isn’t about missing you. It’s about avoiding the trouble you bring. If I had any control over these sticky hands of mine, I wouldn’t be here.” He retrieved a small glass vial from his pocket to sit on the table.
“Fuck off, where did you get that?” Ryker grabbed the vial, half to hide it and half to inspect it.
“Had it since before we got on Main. At the transport, some idiot was selling it. Wasn’t watching me in the least. I grabbed it.” Zavir ate more, so nonchalant about getting those sticky hands on a vial of drought, a party synthetic.
“There’s enough for probably two drops each.” Zavir gave me a curious look, his heart shaped lips slanted into a wild grin. “Thought we could use one tonight.”
I slapped his back. “Count me in.”
“The rest of us should determine a time and location prior to consumption to ensure we are neither caught nor interrupted,” Iylene offered. “I, for one, do not want any uninvited guests.”
“We’ll figure it out in time.” Zavir snatched the vial from Ryker to stash in his pocket. “Keep it to yourselves otherwise we’ll be lucky to get one drop, and I ain’t interested in getting jumped.”
Arana swirled her spoon in his general direction. “Surely you can fight them off with all those extra limbs.”
“That doesn’t mean I want to go through the trouble.”
There would be trouble if the survey team found out, probably. The rest of the troop would sooner suck up to Zavir for a drop. They’d be upset if he said no, but there was enough other shit to go around.
Speaking of shit, after I finished eating, I got up to attend to the restrooms. The troop laughed while I trudged off, swinging the bucket so it’d hit the walls as I went. The droids were ordered to leave the toilets be, and some bastards did a real number on them. Not only did I scrub but I had to take the shit outside for compost. There was a machine for that near the incinerator, but Roys turned it off, forcing me to deal with all the literal shit.
By the time I finished, most of the night had been wasted, though that had been a blessing in disguise. Zavir sent a message explaining that Ryker and Arana agreed to sleep in the communal area for a while so we could have our fun, so I went to the barracks after my shower. Zavir had the drought out. One drop and it sent us spiraling. Everything heightened, sounds, smells, touching, it muddled the mind, made it soft as putty, so easily malleable.
Drought was often taken for exactly what Zavir and I were up to. It heightened the sex, made it feel like you were connected body and soul.Could drag out the play for hours and hours until you thought your body would break. Wasn’t a drug to take if you weren’t aware of what you were about to get into. The trip could be bad otherwise. Another lesson I learned the hard way.
I took drought back at the Colony on the occasions when sex would be the best way to get what we needed. It was better to be too out of it to remember half the shit I did to rid myself of hunger and thirst and the cold. One drop made everything better, made me think for a long, blissful moment that life could get better.
