“Both or either?”
“Anything. I just need work.”
The counter lit up. A virtual keyboard and a form. He looked at it, his heart sinking.
“Put in your employment ID,” the gray woman said.
“I don’t have an employment ID.”
The flicker of her eyes was longer this time. “Union waiver?”
“I’m not in a union.”
“No ID, no waiver. You’re fucked, kid.”
There was still time. He could run. He could catch the Pella before she left. His father would wait for him. They would burn out to Medina. They would take back the Belt for Belters, and it would be glorious. His heart started racing, but he put his hands on the edge of the counter. Squeezed like he was holding himself in place.
“Please. I just need work.”
“I run a clean shop, kid.”
“Please.”
She didn’t look up. He didn’t move. The right corner of her mouth quirked up like it was somehow independent of the rest of her face. The counter blinked, and a shorter form appeared. PRÉNOM. NOM DE FAMILIE. RÉSIDENCE. GE. COORDONNÉES.
“I’ll see what I can do,” she said, not looking up.
He put his finger on COORDONNÉES. “I don’t have a hand terminal.”
“You can come back tomorrow,” she said like it was a common enough problem.
PRÉNOM: FILIP
NOM DE FAMILIE:
“You okay, kid?” The hard eyes on him. He nodded.
NOM DE FAMILIE: NAGATA
&
nbsp; Chapter Forty-Eight: Pa
The light of the sun was strong enough to turn the tangerine-colored haze to its midday twilight. A bright patch showed its place. Saturn hung on the far side of Titan’s atmosphere somewhere, along with the debris that had been a hundred or more ships. Michio remembered a moment in the chaos of the battle seeing Saturn on her screen. It had seemed so close, she could make out the complexity of the rings. She remembered it, but it might not have happened. Her memory of the violence was spotty.
The resort was astounding. The dome rose up fifty meters above the ground, a swirl of titanium and reinforced glass with ivy dripping down like hanging gardens. Terraces rose in curves, designed to create breathtaking views out of a featureless, hazy sky. Finches darted here and there, flickers of color, as artificial and foreign to the moon’s environment as she was. As any of them were. From where she sat, Michio could look down on swimming pools and courtyards of fake brick and ferns. Bright foil emergency shelters were propped up next to luxurious wet bars. The wounded slept on chaise longues and deck chairs because the hospital beds were full.
The dome resorts had been built decades ago for the wealthy of Earth and Mars. A place for the captains of finance and industry to rest while they worked on building up the settlements on Saturn’s moons and hauling ice from its rings. An exotic site for tourists to come and pretend they’d experienced life in the outer planets without ever having to experience it.
They had done a good trade ever since, and not only among the inners. For Belters, the resorts were as close to experiencing life on Earth as they would ever reach. Open air. A real, free-flowing atmosphere to look at if not to breathe. Food and liquor imported from Earth and Mars. And so it had become a kind of halfway point—a haven for Earthers in the outer planets and a version of Earth that Belters could enjoy. She wondered whether an Earther would find it as unlike Earth as she found it unlike the Belt. Maybe what they really had to share was its lack of authenticity.
She had never been here before, and if she had her way, she would never come back.
Footsteps sounded on the terrace behind her. She turned, winced, and then kept turning despite the pain. The burns on her back only itched now if she kept still. She was afraid, despite all the doctors had said, that she’d scar up and lose her ability to move if she didn’t keep stretching the wounds.
Nadia’s smile was weary, but real. She carried fresh bandages and a white tube of cream in one hand and a hand terminal in the other. Michio grimaced, then laughed ruefully.
“Is it that time again?” she asked.