Zelde stared. "How'd you do that? Punch it out some way?"

"No, just stretched it-bigger inserts every few days. Practically painless, but it took me over a month."

Henty Monteil opened a drawer, and Zelde saw several gold rings-open, with the cut ends separated a bit. Henty picked up a matched pair, sized for Turk's lobes and more than three centimeters across. "These are the ones you want, then?"

Turk nodded. Henty showed a heavier pair, not bigger around but a lot thicker. "I thought she was going to take these, Zelde, but she chickened out. Now I don't know where I'll find a customer for them."

Zelde put her hand out, and Monteil let her take the heavy rings. Using the shiny panel of an equipment console 62.for a mirror, she held them up to her earlobes and liked what she saw. Handing the rings back, she felt as if she'd lost something.

Now Turk sat. "Here's what I want you to see-how Henty welds these closed without burning me." Monteil put a little grease on one of Turk's rings and worked the end through the left earlobe until the gap was farthest from flesh. On the other side she repeated, then used a tool to close both gaps.

"Now," she said, and held up two blocks of aluminum, grooved to clamp together over a ring, and snapped them into place. "See? They don't touch Turk, and they leave the juncture free for my torch. The heat never reaches her; the aluminum dissipates it." One hand moved the torch; the other fed gold wire to melt into the groove. When Henty's wet finger, touched to the weld, brought no sizzle, she re- moved the blocks and buffed the joint to smoothness. Then she did the other side.

Turk brought out a small mirror and looked. "That's really a tidy job. I'll be another month paying you, but it's worth it."

Henty smiled. "I'm glad you like it. Do you think your man will?"

"That's the general idea. But mainly-I like them."

Zelde made up her mind. "The big ones-how much would those cost me?" The answer was a lot more than she'd hoped, but she said, "You've got you a customer."

She took out her own small b.u.t.ton earrings-Honcho, a long time ago, gave her those. "Let's see how big a stretch plug I can take, for starters."

Henty's brows raised. "You realize these are nearly half a centimeter thick?"

"That's why I want to get started. Not planning on taking any month at it, either.

I don't mind a little hurt."

Climbing back upship, Turk said, "Stop by, why don't you, and have a drink?

Rooster should be off watch by now, and I'd like you two to get acquainted." Zelde had met Rooster Hogan, but not much more than that. So she agreed, and when Turk showed her into the tiny cabin, the little man gave her a cheerful greeting.

"Siddown, siddown!" He made busy, pouring spirits into three gla.s.ses, fussing until the levels were exactly even. He 63.carried maybe sixty bio-years, Zelde guessed, but moved like a much younger man.

He hadn't much of his gray hair left, and his face was deeply wrinkled, but aging didn't seem to cut his energy. He handed gla.s.ses around. "Okay-what'll we toast?"

Turk pushed short, bushy hair back from one ear. "You might notice something, Rooster."

He looked, then laughed and set down his gla.s.s. "So that's what you been up to!

All right-give us a kiss first, then we drink."

He really worked at his kissing, Zelde thought-and his hands didn't stay put, either. Finally Turk pushed him back. "Can't you wait until Zelde has her drink? I tell you, girl-you've got to watch these little old skinny ones. They'll fool you."

"I'll drink to that," Rooster said, and he did it. Sitting, he said, "It's this way, Zelde. Past few years, under UET, I got to where life wasn't any fun-nothing seemed worth the doing. Hadn't even bothered with women in a long time. Then- Escape! Twice I was d.a.m.n near kilt. Once an energy beam missed me-" He held up thumb and finger. "-no more than that. And then a knife . . . but never mind. The thing is that the close calls made me think. And since then-well, I don't waste any day I've got!"

She thought about it. "Seems like a good way to be."

He swallowed the rest of his drink, and stood. "Something I have to do-promised I'd check the watch, down in Drive, and see how the new man's doing. Won't take long."

After he left, Turk said, "That little old goat-he makes me feel like twenty again!

Doesn't mind that I'm built like a tank-well, a small tank maybe, but it's the shape that counts. Only not with Rooster, it doesn't." She looked in a mirror and pulled at the hair bushing behind one ear. "Hair grows out wrong. This ought to be trimmed back."

"You want me to try it?" Turk found comb and scissors, and sat down. Not too sure she knew what she was doing, Zelde snipped here and there until she had the ragged outline down to a fairly smooth curve. She paused, holding up a few strands with the comb, then shook her head. "I think I'd better quit. Take a look?"

Turk did, and nodded. "Hey-that's fine. Thanks." Now Zelde studied the mirror; her own tight-kinked hair didn't look very tidy, either. She pulled a bit of it out straight, 64.frowned, and patted it back. Turk said, "You need a little work, too?"

"Hard to do, I think. With the Kids-you know, that seems like forever ago, but it's not so long, really-being a fighter I just kept it shaved off. On here, though. . . ." She thought of the tattoo, never finished, on her scalp. "No, it wouldn't fit. What I'd like, though-well, as if it was shaved about a month ago. But can you . . . ?"

"No problem-if you don't expect it perfect. Sit." She touched the place where the burn had been. "About even, all over, with this that's just growing back?" Zelde nodded.

This job took longer; then Zelde used the mirror. No, it wasn't perfect-but she liked the look, a tight cap above her face. "Nice, Turk. I'd forgot what my ears looked like-and they forgot the feel of fresh air."

She finished the last of her drink, and left.

When Parnell came into quarters, Zelde was standing naked at the big mirror, seeing herself from one angle and then another. She went hipshot, taut belly pushed forward, head back and tilted. She put circled thumbs and forefingers to her earlobes, half-closing her eyes, imagining how the heavy gold rings would look against her black skin. Then she heard the door close, and looked past her image to see him behind her.

He smiled. "Got a haircut, did you? Not bad at all-nor is the rest of you, by any means. You-whether it's the hormones in your implant, or just nature, you're developing."

She faced him. "The t.i.ts, you mean." She cupped her hands'over them, and laughed. "Sure-just little b.u.mps, they were. Now, rounding out more. I noticed, too.

You like it?"

"Surely I do. Though you didn't hear me complaining before, did you? But yes-it's more comfortable not being reminded how young you really are."

"Sixteen maybe, by now. Don't know exactly, I told you."

He came to her kiss; against her back his hands moved. "It doesn't matter, Zelde.

Sixteen's legally adult-and in many ways you'd grown up before we ever met."

"And others I still don't know from a bowl of beans. Lots to learn yet, Parnell-I know that."

65."You'll get around to all of it; you have time." Through his shirt she could feel, in his muscles, how tense and tired he was-and not the way she could help with.

She said, "Get your shoes off and sit. I'll make you a drink. Then you lie down a while, take a nap. Right?"

In his face she saw his thanks, before he said them.

More and more, now, the Control room made sense. Zelde learned how to feed the computer and to figure the meaning of what it fed back. She still made mistakes, but not as many. What she still didn't understand, was why- and near the end of one watch, she asked Lera Tzane. "I can mostly get along with the computer now, I think-but I don't guess I'm ever going to know how it works."

Tzane smiled. "I don't understand how all the little electrons and their exotic relatives scuttle around in there. I merely know a number of things that the metal mentality is supposed to do on command. If it doesn't-if I think it hasn't-I call a technician to check it out. And that's all that most deck officers can do."

"Really? No scut?" Suddenly Zelde felt as if she'd won a fight. Well, she thought, maybe she had.

Parnell seemed better. He drank more than she liked to see, but never to getting sick or mean or pa.s.sed-out. And the pill bottle sat with the same few at the bottom- no change. He wasn't tired so much-never skipped duty, and hardly ever gave her to know he didn't want her when she was ready. Once in a while she'd see him lean forward a little, with his hand to the hurt side of his gut, and not say anything right away. But that was the only way she could tell he still had troubles.

And for sure, he had Chanticleer under control. Just listening to the people she worked with, she could see that.

One thing she couldn't figure-so one day, the two of them lying a little sweaty, still, she asked him. At the meeting right after Escape, the talk of voting. "So what's to vote on?"

He sipped at his drink, swirling it so the ice cubes clinked. "It's not out here, Zelde-not in travel. Here, I'm Captain and what I say goes. But the ship's a business, too, now-owned on shares, as you heard. If has to make its 66.own living. And the best way to go about that-starting with what we buy and sell at Terranova, and choosing where we go next-all the shareholders have a rightful voice in those decisions."

"But what if you know what's right to do, and they vote to do something else?"

Either he laughed or coughed; she couldn't be sure. "Well-if I couldn't swing the vote or put up with it, I could demand to be bought out, and get off. That's hap- pened sometimes, I've heard. I don't expect it to happen on this ship."

She hoped he was right, and she thought he was. Still, the idea bothered her-if the captain didn't have full say-so, there was a lot more chance for things to get screwed up.

Working for Honcho, there hadn't been any of that c.r.a.p.

Dopples had to test Zelde himself before he'd approve her for a real rating, not just apprentice. He didn't look straight at Parnell when he said it. "It's my job to certify promotions, Captain."

"Or mine, if I choose-though I'm not overriding you, Dopps. But you have Lera Tzane's evaluation there. Isn't that good enough?"

Zelde sensed the First Hat's anger. She said, "I'm not asking for anything more than I've got coming. Mr. Adopolous-when's it handy for you, to run me through all of it?"

He told her, and when the time came, she was ready and waiting. She knew he wouldn't make it easy, and he didn't. But he wasn't going to scare her, either-get her to freeze up and make mistakes.

She did a good job and she knew it. One time he said she screwed up. She thought he'd told her wrong, but all she said was, "Two out of three? I'll go on it if you will."

He looked at her and she knew he'd make the two reruns as hard as he could-and the way they went, he did just that. But now she felt her blood moving, and a little extra sharp edge on everything she saw and heard. Almost before he had the problems set up, she was guessing close to the answers-and then solid on them, soon as she had all the figures.

At the end of it he looked like somebody biting on a 67.sour rock. He said, "You rise well to challenge. I'm not greatly sold on that quality.

Sometimes it works-but when it doesn't, we're all in trouble. I prefer people to be dependable on a steady level. Maybe you are, M'tana-but you haven't proved it."

Why answer? She didn't. Finally he signed the paper and gave it to her. It granted her ratings of Second in navigation, First on the comm-boards, and as watch monitor in general-and approved her for pilot training at the apprentice level.

She said her thanks with a straight face. Dopples didn't speak at all; he only nodded.

Parnell, when he saw the paper, grinned. "Well-you've upped your share aboard here, more than double. Not that it's terribly big, even yet-but, Zelde, in case you're interested, you are no longer dependent on me in any way."

She saw how he meant it, what he said. And most likely she didn't need to show him about the part he wasn't saying. But why not?

More testing, she had to work through-and some things she wasn't so good at as she'd thought she was. Fighting without weapons, she was nowhere near to being a match for Turk, who practice-fought with the big earrings taped flat to her neck.

Zelde caught a lot of bruises before Turk told Dopples, "For now, she's as good as she can get until her weight builds up more." Saying no word, the man looked at both of them, then nodded and signed the paper.

Knives, though, n.o.body could show Zelde much-and sometimes she showed them.

With the blunt, rounded practice weapons, she gave more marks than she took.

Dopples didn't say anything.

Guns were something else. Sure, she'd shot bullets and she'd sprayed energy bolts around-but not enough to learn much. Parnell took over and showed her the differ- ence-holding a bullet gun on target and then firing, but then with the heavy energy projectors, swinging the beam across the target. For some time she had trouble doing it all the way he wanted. But then it began to work for her, and when Parnell handed Dopples the signed paper, he didn't ask whether the other man liked it or not.

68.Any morning her earlobes didn't hurt, she went to Henty Monteil for a larger pair of stretch plugs. She'd made the down payment on the rings with her apprentice credits; now she signed for half her present earnings to pay off the rest.

She was pushing to get those rings as soon as she could-and as she'd said, didn't mind a little hurt along the way. The plugs looked like ordinary b.u.t.ton earrings; until the job was done, Parnell couldn't notice anything. Which was the way she wanted it.

On watch one day, she saw a blip in a screen that hadn't shown sign before. She frowned, then remembered what it should mean. "Mr. Adopolous! We're getting signal from off-ship."

He looked, and nodded. "Call the captain."

She did. Sooner than she expected, still b.u.t.toning his shirt, Parnell came in.

"Move over one, Zelde-I'll take the comm." She watched as he tuned the equipment. "Can't make out what ship it is. Too much hash, at this distance."

"Course?" said Dopples.

"Crossing ours on a skew-small angle. Closest approach, maybe a thousand kilos- but we'll be in talk range for some time."

"So close? Out here, that just doesn't happen." His mouth curved downward.

"Except on purpose."

"You're too suspicious, Dopples. More than one route goes through this volume."

The First Hat worried his hair behind one ear. "The thing is, Parnell-could it change course and intercept?"

Parnell's hands moved on his computer keyboard. After a time, he said, "Possible, if they started in the next few minutes. But why should they? They've got their own trip to make."

"UET? If they get suspicious? We're not where we're supposed to be; you know that."

"Of course I do-but do they? That course doesn't come straight from Earth-or from Iron Hat, either. So how could they know?" He leaned toward the screen, looked closer. "And it's not an armed ship-even from here, I can tell that much. So what could they do if they did follow us?"

Dopples still talked worried. Finally Parnell said, "Don't fret, Dopps; I'll play it safe. We hold off opening visual 69.contact until the last believable second-plead bad signal and distort our own enough to make the complaint sound reasonable. And keep our cover story straight while we're talking, of course. I'm no more inclined than you are to give UET the news, any sooner than we can help."

Zelde spoke. "What if it's another Escaped ship?" Then: "Do we have any scut about what UET trips are scheduled through this part of s.p.a.ce?"

Dopples waved a hand. "Not between colonies. We can't have-the time lag's too long. Remember-we're maybe fifteen years out from Earth, planet time."

That silenced her. She knew in a way-she'd been told-how the ships ate time without seeming to. But she kept forgetting. To her, the time she'd lived through was all that was real.

On the screen the signal changed. "Almost close enough for talking," said Parnell.

"Zelde-call down for some coffee, will you?"

"I'll go get it." The truth was, sitting and waiting, nothing to do, was getting her nervous. Glad of the chance to move around, she went to the galley and brought a fresh pot and clean cups. Lera Tzane had joined the group, and Harger from Engineering. Zelde was glad she'd brought extras. She poured for Parnell and herself and sat again beside him, letting the others serve themselves. Dopples looked at her- but now that she was rated, fetch and carry wasn't her job. What she'd done was because she wanted to.

Turning a k.n.o.b to put his outgoing signal a little off proper tuning, Parnell winked and switched on a speaker. The voice came: ". . . read your beacon, but won't pa.s.s close enough to make out your insigne, most likely. This is the Hoover, calling the Great Khan. Come in, please. Come in. . . ."

"We'll give it a couple more minutes," said Parnell. Again the waiting got to Zelde; she tapped fingers on her chair arms. When Parnell punched the "Send"

switch she leaned forward, but still he paused. Then he cleared his throat and spoke.