Chapter 20

"What the hell are you doing?"

Nik looked up from the dismantled coffee maker in front of her to an outraged Holden standing in the doorway of the galley. Since the ship was on the float, she couldn't spread the parts out on the deck, instead she had to keep them in a bag until she was ready to use them. It made the process more challenging, but she was getting used to it now that she was almost done.

"Fixing the coffee maker for you," she told him and went back to reassembling the machine.

Her first forty-eight hours onboard the Roci had been a flurry of activity. Even though Holden and his crew didn't go back to the station, she had stayed busy guiding various search parties through the labyrinth of passages, tunnels, and shafts. The Roci and its crew had turned their attention to the rescue of disabled ships in the area around the station.

But now, all of those that could still be rescued alive were off the station and the search and rescue flotilla was breaking up, each ship heading for its own destination. Holden was only holding the Roci here to keep the peace until everyone was gone. Different salvage crews had been dispatched to continue the decommissioning of the now dead station and were just a few days out.

Also on board the Roci were five Belters and a Martian security guard. The Belters had helped with the rescue and repairs of some of the ships, but the Martian had kept to himself in his quarters. Holden was going to transfer him to one of the new salvage ships once they arrived.

"Do you know what you're doing?" he asked, stepping into the room to loom over her.

Nik didn't bother craning her neck to look up at him; the movement would have exacerbated the dull throb of a headache that had started the day before. So far it was just a nuisance and she didn't want to do anything to make it worse.

"I wouldn't have taken it apart if I didn't."

Holden squatted beside her to watch as she snapped pieces back into place, occasionally looking at the diagram on her handheld.

"The syphon hub was broke in two. Lucky for you, the printer you bought from me printed a new one once I downloaded the file for it." She picked up the offending part and held it out to him.

He took it from her and held it up to his eyes, rolling it back and forth between his finger and thumb, "huh, we've had it fixed three times now and they missed this every time?"

"Seems so. It took me a bit to find it too, so don't be too mad about it." She picked up the newly printed part and snapped it into place.

"Are you this good with everything?"

"Na," she frowned as she fitted the housing over the new part, taking care not to damage it. "Somethings are harder than others, but you can find a manual on just about everything, so you just gotta be willing to learn."

She snapped the cover into place and tightened the screws holding it in place.

"There you go," she smiled. "Good as new."

Holden gave her a hand up from the floor and steadied her as she regained her orientation. Her head still swam whenever she changed positions quickly, and her headache sent a stab of pain through her head making her grimace.

"You okay?"

"Ya, just a headache."

"How about I reinstall and test this machine out and you go lie down and get some rest?"

Normally, Nik would have argued with him, insisting that she make sure the machine functioned correctly after her repairs, but she was feeling tired and a nap sounded like a good idea.

"Kay, just don't lose it if it don't work."

"I won't," he smiled. "I leave it for you to fix."

Unlocking her mag-boots, Nik used the handholds to float through the ship to the room they had given her. She wasn't nearly as graceful as Naomi, but it was less tiring than using the mag-boots to walk there.

Shutting the door behind her, she stripped out of the coveralls she had printed for herself and, grabbing a pillow and blanket from the bunk, she opened the doors of the wardrobe built into the wall. The space inside was small, but so was she and she was used to sleeping in tight quarters. The bunk was just too open, exposed, for her to be comfortable, so after that first night when exhaustion had overridden everything else, she had made a nest in the wardrobe and slept in there. It was small enough that she couldn't float too far off the surface while she slept.

Wearing just her underwear, she crawled in and cocooned herself in the blanket before shutting the doors. She was asleep within minutes.

A pounding that was not her headache woke her up a few hours later. She opened her eyes to complete darkness was disoriented until she woke up enough to remember she wasn't on the space station any longer. The only home she had ever known was gone and she was on the Rocinante with its crew, separated from her family.

There was movement outside of her sleeping nest, and she froze, listening at the crack where the two doors met.

"Hey, Cap, she's not in her quarters. I'll go check the maintenance bay." Amos' voice carried through to her.

Taking a breath, she pushed open the wardrobe doors and peered out at Amos' back.

"What you want?" she asked as she unwound her body from its warm nest.

"What the fuck?" he asked spinning around to stare at her as she straightened up, holding onto the wardrobe.

She met his gaze, refusing to give in to her urge to crawl back into the wardrobe away from him and asked again, "what do you want?"

He held her eyes for a heartbeat before saying, "you have a message." He nodded towards the monitor on the wall of the room, "you can access it from here."

A rude comment was on the tip of her tongue, but she held it in check. This man had saved her on more than one occasion and hadn't asked anything in return. Yet. She wasn't quite ready to trust him, but maybe, just maybe she didn't have to be afraid of him.

"Thank you," she said instead.

He stood still for a moment longer, then spun on his heel and left the room. It seemed bigger, emptier without him. Nik shivered, then realized with a start that she was standing there in just her flimsy under garments. She laughed to herself as she grabbed her coveralls. At least she wouldn't have to worry about him wanting THAT from her now in payment. Not unless he had a thing for scrawny women built like ten-year-old boys. That thought made her feel hollow inside, but she brushed it aside and got dressed.

"You won't believe what they let me do, Nik!" Lucky's excited face filled the screen.

"They let me use a cargo lifter and I got to move this super heavy cargo box. It picked it up like it didn't weigh nothing!"

Nik smiled at his enthusiasm. He acted like he was having a great time on the Villanueva. He rambled on about some of the crew members for a bit before Maggie cut him off.

"Niki girl, somebody else wanna say hi to you," she held Mouse up to the screen.

"Hi, Nik! It smells funny here, but the kibble is yummy, and Nana brought candy, so I get a piece every night. I miss you. I was saving some candy for you, but Nana says you're kay with me eating it for you. Is it kay?"

Nik's eyes teared up at the little girl's message. It was just like Mouse to save some candy for her.

"Oyedeng, Nik! Love you!" She waved at the screen in response to Mouse's wave, even though it wasn't real time. There was a twenty minute delay between the two ships now. Jupiter was on the other side of Sol from Tycho's position in the belt, so the Eva was burning away from them, taking her family farther and farther away.

Maggie set Mouse aside and looked into the screen, "don't be mad, but it's easier if they call me Nana. Not as many questions, eh?" She glanced to the side and smiled at someone out of range. "Lucky is really taking to life on the freighter. He's a natural, that boy."

She looked back at the screen, "I don't have a lot of time, but I wanted to let you know that we're all okay and we miss you. The botanists on board are going to help us find a place on Ganymede and they think they can get me a job in one of the new domes. Hopefully, by the time you get here, we will be settled and all you'll have to do is worry about getting yourself a job. Take care of yourself, Niki girl and hurry up!"

The screen froze as the message ended. This was the fifth time Nik had played it back in the last two days. Her hand hovered over the keypad to start it over again, but she stopped herself. She was going to drive herself crazy if she didn't find something to occupy her time. With the rescue work behind them, all the Roci could do was wait for the incoming demo crews. To her the ship was crowded and small, making her feel trapped. Her nagging headaches weren't helping either.

Sighing, she pushed away from the monitor, propelling herself towards the wardrobe; maybe another nap would help pass the time.

A chime at her door stopped her and she twisted her body to turn around. She still didn't have the hang of maneuvering gracefully in zero gravity and still acted instinctively as if there was gravity. Her spin caused her to awkwardly rotate on a diagonal axis and did little to change her direction.

"Shit." She was barefoot and her mag-boots were on the unused bunk. All she could do was wait the couple seconds until she got close enough to a wall to push off.

The chime sounded a second time.

"Okay, okay, I'm coming," she said loud enough to be heard through the door.

Her feet touched the wall first, and she pushed off towards the door a little harder than she had meant to and collided with the door.

"Umph!" she grunted.

"You okay in there?" Amos asked from the other side.

She rolled her eyes. Of course, it would be Amos that would witness her clumsiness.

She steadied herself against the door, quickly straightened up her coveralls, and smoothed her braid as best she could before she pushed the button to open the door.

"What?" she asked trying to act casual. There was no way she was going to let him know how much he unnerved her.

He took in her floating in the doorway and his bright eyes flicked to her mag-boots sitting on her bunk. Her cheeks and ears heated with embarrassment.

"You should keep your boots on unless you're sleeping," he said without any recrimination in his voice. Just stating a fact. Earth orbits the sun. The walls are gray. Nik is incompetent. Everything comes out in the same tone. Only when he was angry did it change. Sometimes not even then. She had watched him back down the Martian during mealtime yesterday with the exact same tone. Something in his eyes had warned the man not to fuck with him; advice the man had luckily taken. Nik never wanted to be on the receiving end of one of those looks.

"Did you need something, or are you just doing a ship-wide mag-boot check?"

Amos smiled and her flush deepened, not from embarrassment this time.

"Nah, I have some repairs to do and could use an extra set of hands. I thought you might want something to do."

"Ya lik pahang! I mean," she corrected, "I guess I have time to help you out."

The corners of his mouth twitched, "If you have too much going on, I can get one of the others to help…,"

"Na," she interrupted, "the ship is more important. I'll go."

"Put on your boots and meet me in the maintenance bay."

In the maintenance bay, Amos was gathering tools and putting them in a bag. Nik paused in the doorway.

"What are we working on?" she asked.

He looked up from the bin he was digging through, "one of our maneuvering thrusters took some damage when that old shuttle came loose from the docking clamps and scrapped against the Roci."

"Maneuvering thruster," she mused. Then, "wait, that's outside."

"Yes."

"We're going outside the ship?"

"Yes," he turned to look at her, "is that a problem?"

"Na," she answered quickly. "It's just that, well," she paused, chewing her lip, trying to phrase her concern in a way that didn't sound like a lame excuse, "ah, hell, Amos, you've seen me. I'm a mess in zero G, and you want me to go outside?"

He chuckled and shook his head, "everybody's like that at the beginning. The only way you're going to get better is practice. And you won't be floating around out there. You'll have your mag-boots on."

He studied her for a moment, reading her body language, then said in a softer voice, "you don't have to go if you don't want to, but you'll never get over your fear if you don't."

That got her.

"I'm not afraid, welwala," she said indignantly, flushing yet again.

"My mistake," he said with a straight face. "Can you grab that torch and bring it?"

She marched across the space as best she could with the boots and pulled the torch off the wall. Turning to face Amos, she shot him a challenging look.

"Anything else I can carry for you?"

He snorted and stood up straight, "no that's it. Let's go."

Getting suited up was easier now that Nik had printed out two suits that fit her small frame and fitted them up with comms and air. Within minutes, they were ready to exit the Roci and her second spacewalk, although she didn't remember much about her first one.

"When we get out there, keep your eyes down and focus on the ship while you're walking. It'll keep you from getting disoriented."

She nodded her understanding with her fist.

The inner airlock door shut behind them and there was a brief whoosh of air. Amos paused by the outer door and looked over at her.

"You ready?"

She met his eyes, "ya."

The outer door slid open and the void spread out beyond it. Nik stepped up to the threshold and took in the sight. It was everything she had ever heard. Beautiful. Awe inspiring. Scary as fuck.

She jumped when a hand waved in front of her face, "coming?"

She swatted it away, stepped out of the airlock, and followed Amos across the skin of the ship. Keeping his advice in mind, she kept her eyes locked on Amos' feet in front of hers as they made their way across the fuselage to the damaged thruster. Once there, she fought her urge to look up, instead focusing on the equipment. The outer housing was crumpled and pushed into several of the more delicate vanes that controlled the thrust. Two vanes were missing, and three others were crushed beyond use.

Working together, they straightened the housing as much as possible and welded a sheet of material to it to hold it in place until it could be replaced. Nik pried out the damaged vanes while Amos prepared their replacements. Once they were pulled out, she could see that the bearing collar was also damaged, not allowing the bearing to rotate fully.

Pointing it out to Amos, she said, "I think I can print a temporary one for now. It won't last for long, but it will do until we can replace it."

"You okay to go back and do it while I finish these?"

"Ya."

"Remember, don't look up, okay."

"Kay."

Nik did exactly as instructed on the way back to the airlock. In the maintenance bay, she downloaded the right files to the printer from her handheld and waited impatiently as the machine hummed and clicked while printing out the bearing collar.

"Well, look what we have here," a voice said from the doorway behind her.

She turned to face the Martian standing there smirking at her. His name was Lebron and had been watching her the last few days, the look in his eyes promising nothing good. Usually someone from the crew or one of the Belters was around, though, so she had ignored him.

"Where's your watchdog, girlie?" he took a step inside the bay and looked around, verifying that she was alone.

"Amos is waiting on this part," she told him warningly.

His smile showed too many teeth, "I know, but he's outside, isn't he?" He took another step towards her. The maintenance bay was more cluttered than it was the last time she was trapped inside, and he was between her and the door.

Don't back down and don't show fear, it was what he was expecting, she told herself, standing straight and facing him head on.

"I have work to do, so why don't you go lurk somewhere else?"

The printer beeped behind her. The part was ready. Nik forced herself to turn her back to Lebron and opened the printing compartment to lift out the collar. It was small, but fairly heavy. She picked it up with her left hand while her right, hidden from his view by her body, reached for a wrench on her belt.

She heard him behind her and tensed, waiting for him to reach her. When his hand landed on her shoulder to push her forward against the printer, she spun under his arm and swung the wrench at him. He blocked it with a snarl and lunged toward her. That's when she swung the collar will all her strength and it connected with his face making a satisfying thud. Blood and a tooth went flying.

"You little bitch!" he spat.

She didn't let up. Kicking him in the side of the knee would have dropped him if they weren't on the float. Instead he howled and spun away from her, bouncing off the printer. Nik didn't hesitate, she darted for the door and to the airlock.

Once in the airlock, she took the time to slow her breathing before opening the outer door and making her way back to Amos.

"Here it is," she held it out to him.

He took it from her and turned it over in his hands. That's when she noticed the smear of blood on it. He looked up at her and she met his stare blandly, like nothing at all was wrong. Releasing her from his stare, he turned towards the thruster and went back to work. After a moment, Nik joined him and together they finished the repairs.

Gathering up their tools, they turned to go back to the airlock, but Amos stopped her before she could take a step.

"What?"

"Do you want to look?" he pointed up.

"Ya."

"Spread your feet and hold onto my arm. If you start to feel dizzy or anything, just look down at your feet."

Nik did what he told her, then looked up. She had looked out viewports on the station occasionally, but she wasn't prepared for the expanse of space arched over her in every direction, the velvety backdrop of nothingness covered with countless points of lights. Looking to the right, she could see the heart of the galaxy spread across the vastness making everything else seem insignificant.

"So beautiful," she whispered as she swayed forward towards the infinite.

"Okay, that's enough," Amos' voice broke through her trance. "Look down!"

Nik regretfully tore her eyes away from the sight and looked down to reorient herself. She realized that she had let go of Amos' arm and was leaning forward at almost a forty-five-degree angle to the surface of the Roci and one of arms outstretched as if to touch the stars. The only things keeping her from following that urge were her mag-boots and his arm looped around her waist, anchoring her to the ship.

"Now I know why you told me not to look," she straightened up and looked over at him.

"Yeah, it has that effect on some people. Most just get dizzy, though. You good now?"

"Ya," she nodded, "let's go in."

Back in the airlock, after they removed their helmets, Nik stopped him before he opened the inner door.

"Thank you, Amos. For letting me see that."

He shrugged, "no problem." Then he opened the door and walked out, leaving her alone.

Inners. She would never understand them. Especially that one.