“What? That’s never happened to me.”
“Yes, it has. When we first arrived Security warned you to stay away from Scar. Day one, Mara. Your first day on this rock, before you’d unpacked, mine security walked you down a hallway and told you to stay away from that specific male.” He leans forward. “Doesn’t that mean anything to you? At all?”
“That’s not — “
“And theface.That’s not a work accident, that’s not a rockfall, that is aknife, or a claw, or whatever they use, and somebody put it there on purpose. Somebody tried to take that guy’s head off. And you’re sitting here telling me he’s a nice colleague who helps with your paperwork, and Mar — whatever he’s mixed up in, it’sviolent, and you don’t know the half of it, and you’re having him walk you to work.”
“Don’t,” I say.
“Don’t what?”
I’m standing. I don’t remember standing. My hands shake and my voice remains firm. “Don’t talk about Cayzor that way. You want to know how he got that scar? Ask him. He’ll tell you. He toldme the whole story, while he sat at that table right there, and it is the single worst thing I have ever heard in my life.” My throat’s gone tight. “And you’re using it as a debating point to put him down?”
“Mara…”
“No, I don’t want you talking about the Fever Brothers crew or their family that way. They invited us to their home and they werenothing but polite to you. They passed you the food and they answered your questions and nobody said one unkind word, and you’re talking about them behind their backs, calling them dangerous.”
Andrew’s jaw works. “You want to talk about how nice they’ve been? You cannot move on this planet without one of those people appearing, and you think that’scharming?”
“Yes,” I lift my chin. “I think it’s lovely.”
“Lovely.”
“I think it’s the nicest thing that’s happened to me in years.” My voice cracks a little and I let it. “Andrew, I have eaten about nine hundred dinners by myself in rented rooms, and here, on Timbur, there are people whonotice where I am.Somebody always walks with me or feeds me. Somebody knocks. I don’t know what you want me to say, but I’m not frightened of the way I’m being treated. I’ve been waiting my whole life for someone like Cayzor and his family.”
And my brother looks at me like I’ve said something in a language he doesn’t speak. “What is happening here? Are you falling in love with a miner? Are you going to clasp hands with him? Are you going to try being hisbride, is that where this is going? Are you kidding me?”
“No. I am not going to clasp hands with Cayzor.”
And it’s true. There is never going to be any clasping. He scented me in my own kitchen weeks ago, with those steady dark eyes:we are not compatible.He’ll never ask. He can’t ask. Whatever this is — the walks and the tablet at midnight and the way my whole body reorganizes itself when he comes through a door — it is a thing with a wall at the end of it, and I have known about the wall since the beginning. I have been very sensible and very grown-up about it every single day since. He simply enjoysmy company and considers me a close friend. I wish we could be so much more, but it’s never going to happen.
It’s sad but true.
“Cayzor and I are close friends.” I sigh. “And coworkers.”
“Yeah. Right.” Andrew laughs, and it isn’t a nice laugh. “This is ridiculous.”
“Andrew, I like it here. Obviously, you don’t like it here, but I do. I like it a lot.”
Andrew goes still. “Meaning?”
“Meaning I’ve been thinking about approaching Minecorp.”
“For what?”
“For a position with them?”
“Where? Here, on Timbur?”
“Maybe, or wherever they could fit me. Andrew, Minecorp has holdings in four sectors. Processing on Kesh, the refinery chain, three transfer stations, and every single one of them runs on Illibrium infrastructure that nobody understands as well as I do right now. There’s no permanent systems engineer for the whole network. There’scontractors.There’s people like us, flown in when something breaks.”
“You want a staff job.”
“I want to build the position and then have it.” I can hear myself getting fast and I don’t care. “A permanent systems role, based here, covering the whole umbrella. I’d have the source material, I’d have the deepest existing knowledge of the oldest grid they own, and I’d never have to take another six-week contract on an ice planet again as long as I live.”
“You’d want to be based here, on Timbur?”
“That’s where the mine is, Andrew,” I say. “That’s where the crystal comes out of the ground.”
