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The crowd thinned as people began to wander away, many still looking back with smiles, and that was when Apollonia realized that Brooks was standing only ten meters away, watching.
He was smiling just a little, but still looked overall as serious as ever.
And she felt her own feelings of failure return.
“I can take her now, I think she needs some rest from this excitement,” the assistant said.
“Sure,” Apollonia said lifelessly. “Will . . . Can I see her again?”
“Of course,” the woman told her. “She’s one of the ship’s dogs now.”
The woman left, and Apollonia just stood there, watching Brooks.
He finally came over.
“I’m glad we finally got the ship dogs,” he said evenly. “It’s taken almost a year.”
“I hear you’re a free man,” she said flatly, ignoring that.
“Free was not in question. But I am still captain, yes.”
He began walking, and she found herself walking with him. That annoyed her, that she’d just start following him. Like a damn puppy, herself.
“I guess I didn’t manage to fuck it up all the way, huh?”
He looked surprised. “You did nothing wrong, Apple.”
She scowled, not wanting to look at him right now. Partly out of anger, partly out of shame.
“Then why the hell did you sneak me out of there like I was a shameful secret?” she asked.
Brooks took a deep breath. “Director Freeman was trying to pull off things to have you transferred into his control. To be quite honest, I do not trust the man’s motives. I wanted you back here – it was safer that way.”
Brooks had led them out of the Gardens, to one of the banks of inter-ship shuttles. The pod could move any orientation, taking a person to almost any section of the ship, or at least close.
They got on in silence; Apollonia said nothing until the doors closed. Brooks pressed a button, and it began to slowly move.
“So . . . you just sent me away, didn’t tell me why. To protect me?” she burst out.
“Yes,” Brooks replied.
“Would it have really been too hard to say?” she asked, anger surging through her. “Just a few words!”
“I knew you’d have questions, Apollonia, and we didn’t have the time-“
“And did you really think I’d be so naive as to follow the bad man offering me candy? I mean, that’s all he could do to really entice me, isn’t it? Offer me some fancy stuff, a bigger room, all that, and I’d just go along like a dumb kid?”
She stepped away, towards the wall of the pod, throwing out her hands in frustration.
Brooks saw her stop, try to become still. Taking several deep breaths, she seemed to succeed in containing her temper.
“I’m sorry,” she said deliberately. “I shouldn’t have lost my temper. But I’m not crazy, being angry here, am I? I feel like I was treated like a child. And honestly – who’s to say I wouldn’t maybe want the opportunity to move elsewhere? Freeman maybe wouldn’t even have to trick me – did you ever consider maybe I’d be happy going elsewhere?”
Brooks hesitated. It would be easy for him to say that if it had been someone – literally almost anyone – else in the human government he wouldn’t have tried so hard to block it, and given her the choice.
But he wasn’t actually sure that it was the truth.
“Freeman wasn’t wanting to give you any choice in the matter. His transfer was to be non-negotiable – to strong arm you into his control. The way he was going about it was not right – not for you, and I think you’d have agreed.” He sighed. “If I had told you. So no,” he continued. “You’re not out of line. You are right to be angry.”
She threw up her arms in anger. “Why can’t you be pissed back, Captain? Dark, I’m trying to have an argument here and you . . . you just . . . you’re being reasonable!”
He was not sure how to reply to that. Perhaps in this one case, being defensive would be appropriate?
But he didn’t want to give into the temptation, and just stood silently.
“And me, I’m like a fucking feral animal out here. I told Admiral whats-his-face that I had rabies!”
“That was pretty funny,” he admitted. “But you are not ‘feral’, Apollonia.”
“In comparison to you people I am!” she said. “Look at me, you had to look me in the eyes and tell me a few days ago that no one was going to shiv me on Earth! I really couldn’t fucking believe it and I just realize more and more how much I’m not like you people!”
“You come from a different place with different conditions,” he said. “Conditions that formed you into who you are now. You can’t undo that – I fully understand that. But that’s not a fault or a failure of yourself. You’re still a person who deserves a future.”
“And you want to give that to me?” she asked dryly.
His answer was without guile. “If I can. Yes.”
“God, you’re so fucking selfless,” she said, rolling her eyes, though the true anger seemed to have drained out of her. “And I’m being such a bitch. But you just . . . you don’t even seem like the rest of us, Ian. You’re like one step down from Kell’s lifelessness. Do you ever feel envy? Selfish? Eat all the ice cream from the tub you were supposed to share?”
He snorted in amusement, but paused before answering. “I’m as human as anyone else . . . Though I’m not fond of cold food.”
He laughed, then, but it was suddenly dry and bitter.
“I say it as a joke, but it’s true. I absolutely hate food that’s cold. It reminds me too much of my past.”
He paused for a moment, thoughts racing behind his eyes. “It’s one of those things that triggers the bad memories. Not just memories – the feelings themselves dredged up from the worst times. You remember those moments, those fucking moments forever. When you were suffering from something. Freezing to death, needing to eat. But the food was as cold as the world outside.”
He stepped aside now, facing one of the walls of the pod, that was a screen showing what floor they were passing. He seemed no longer able to keep his eyes on her.
The pod had come to a stop at some point, she realized.
Years seemed to gather on his face, in every crevice as he turned back to her. “Sometimes people say that Antarcticans have ice water in their veins. I’m a pre-eminent example, I suppose. But it’s important for the captain to be stoic and look infallible.”
“You might take it too far,” she said. “You don’t have to be perfect all the time.”
“Maybe,” he agreed. Then, softer, he spoke again. “And sometimes I am selfish, yes.” His eyes flickered every so briefly over to her.
She felt a plummeting feeling in her stomach as she realized what he meant.
“Why do I deserve it?” she asked. “It’s not because I’m a CR. You don’t even care about that, do you?”
Other Terrestrial 