Free Linesman by S. K. Dunstall Page B

lines. No, that was another ship. The lines on this ship were clear and good. Line one was happy. Line six was . . . He closed his eyes. Line six was good, but the captain wasn’t happy with him, and he’d made a complete fool of himself over line ten. He curled up and pulled the quilt over himself, suddenly cold.
    They owned his contract. They could ensure he never worked as a linesman again.
    He blinked hard, eyes gritty. Stupid to get emotional over things he couldn’t control. And he would work with the lines. Nothing could stop that even if he wasn’t part of a cartel.
    He couldn’t remember going to bed. He remembered weaving his way down to his room like a drunk, stripping off as soon as he entered the apartment, making direct for the fresher because he wasn’t sure if he was going to be sick or just wanted to be clean. He remembered sitting on the floor of the fresher, knees to his chin in the tiny cramped space,long after the water cycle had finished. After that, he couldn’t remember a thing.
    Ean sighed and sat up. He didn’t know what would happen now, but he’d slept away half the day cycle. Not a smart thing to do on the first day of your new job, especially not if you’d given your employers real cause to doubt your abilities the night before.
    His formal clothes were on the bench built into the opposite wall. He looked at the precisely folded bundles with foreboding. He didn’t remember doing that, and he had never been good at taking care of clothes.
    Don’t think about it. Act as if nothing happened.
    He shaved, but didn’t shower. If they were rationing water, they probably rationed it by the tenday. He didn’t want to use up his allocation in the first two days.
    Radko was seated on one of the couches in the living area. She jumped up as Ean came out. “Sir.”
    â€œWhy don’t you just call me Ean.” He wondered if he was under arrest for injuring the two top-ranking people on the ship.
    â€œYes, sir.”
    Ean gave that one up for the moment. “So what happens now?” He didn’t know what to do, where to go. And if he was under arrest, he probably couldn’t go anywhere.
    â€œMedic first,” Radko said promptly. “Then food. Then I’m to take you down to the briefing room.”
    He followed Radko’s long-legged stride down the corridor, trying to keep up, but he ached all over, and when a machine on line three flared into use, his bones vibrated with the feel of it.
    Two people waited at the hospital, but the medic took him first. He felt bad about that. Radko leaned one booted foot against the wall and swapped insults with the sick men as he went in. He hoped neither of them was badly ill.
    â€œLet me have a look at you,” the medic said, and Ean stripped for his second medical in two days.
    â€œDoes this happen every time you go through the void?”
    He wanted to lie. Whoever heard of a linesman grade ten who didn’t travel? “This is my second trip.”
    â€œAnd did it happen the first time?”
    â€œI . . . something. I’m not really sure. It was years ago. I was untrained. I didn’t know what to expect.” It hadn’t been as bad as this. Maybe his tutors were right. Maybe you couldn’t learn the lines as an adult. Not properly, anyway.
    The medic was gentle, but Ean had to grit his teeth in order not to wince. As a boy, he’d been beaten by his father when his father smoked Juice until he’d learned to stay away from home after the Juice dealer had been through. It felt like that, which was stupid because he was unmarked.
    â€œAnd your bones?” the medic asked.
    â€œBone-weary” was a term Ean had never thought had a literal meaning, but right now that was how he felt. As if his bones were too tired to hold him up.
    The medic looked at his face. “I wish I’d seen what happened,” he said.
    He