The nurse waggles her blond brows. “I did. You just processed the meds faster than most.”
“Damn.”
Her blue eyes dart over a screen as she smoothes her navy blue scrubs, sending her gold ABR badge dancing on her shirt. “I have two questions for you.”
“Okay.”
“How would you fix a broken friendship?”
“Food. It’s the most basic of needs. To share it with others shows I’m willing to care for their life. But they still have to play their part, or it’s a one-way star street, not a relationship.”
“What is pain, to you?”
“A necessary evil.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Nobody likes it, but it’s a feedback system. It tells us when something is wrong that needs our attention. A thorn, a sting, a fractured bone, a broken heart.”
A doctor walks over, her hair tied back in a braid. She draws a tablet from her pocket. “Results?”
“She didn’t run but didn’t accept it either. Just talked.” The nurse swivels a screen toward the doctor above my bed.
The doctor muses over the results and enters something on her tablet. “Fearless but in denial. Daring enough to be curious and have a conversation?”
“A bit sassy,” the nurse adds. “Red?”
“Orange.”
The nurse takes the monitor off my forehead. “Please proceed through the doors to get your first set of uniforms and bands. Everything else will be in your assigned room, which you can access with the wristband you’ll get.”
I thank her and follow the other women who are getting up from their naps. We form a line. The room we enter is large and filled with female racers. When I get to the attendant at the counter, she confirms my name. A vertical chute system sends a package to her. She pulls out the contents and slides a navy one-piece uniform, wrist band, and orange arm bands to me.
Carrying my things into the locker room, I change. Several of the other girls shower and help each other comb out matted hair or cover up bruises and scrapes with makeup. I know I am fortunate to have my own money, armored suits, and a place to sleep that is mine, but seeing them now brings reality to it.
A woman sets a dirty duffel bag down on the bench beside me and sighs like she’s exhausted. She looks around at the other girls like she feels an outcast. I feel the same for different reasons.
“Hi, I’m Brynna.”
She looks over at me with pale gray-blue eyes, hiding inside black eyeliner. “Skylar. Most just call my Sky.”
“Where are you from?” I ask.
“Suburb of Mega-city Fairlane. Couldn’t make enough for tech school. Just ran road repair robots. Sorry. I’m sure I smell like asphalt.” She digs through her bag and pulls out a small case. “Kept looking for a better job. A cleaner job. One where I wasn’t always surrounded by speeding hover cars. Had two wrecks just in the last day. Autopilot gone haywire.”
I hum a note, familiar with unruly bots. “I have some hydroponics systems and pollination systems that could use an upgrade. I can’t pay much. Profit isn’t great in the mobile nursery business. But I could use a second pair of eyes. If you have time.”
Sky’s expression moves through surprise, confusion, and ends with hope. “That sounds like a dream.”
“I thought so, too.” I change out of my clothes into my race suit and put on my orange arm bands. “Then the Novarks eat holes in the hull trying to get inside to steal food. Talhuskins ice engines. Nebs just zap you. EMPs, so the whole ship is dead. But they don’t usually raid my ship. I did have one on board, though.”
“You’re kidding.” Sky slowly changes. “Did he hurt you?”
“No. Took a few things and left. Didn’t even break anything,” I reply, tying my hair into a ponytail.
“Weird.”
“Right?” I strap on my wristband and put my things in a locker. Swiping my wristband over it, the door locks. “It seemslike everyone is focused on war and has forgotten how much farmers make or break civilization. No food? Everyone dies. And yet prices are so high for goods that I barely eek by with my net pay. It’s why I’m here.”
