Bebe (23 page)

Hugging her legs, sweating and shivering, despite the burning heat raging inside her legs, she stared furiously after him. She didn’t care what her mother—or Ben’s, for that matter—had said. She wanted to go home, and she
was
going to fight.

* * * * *

“She took it off again,” Matt said when Ben came to join him on the other side of the fire.

“I know it.” Ben didn’t bother turning to look. He didn’t like the way she was staring at him, but he had bigger concerns than illness-fed defiance. “That’s the least of our problems.”

“Yeah, she doesn’t look good,” the old man agreed.

“You should see her feet.”

“Figures. First woman we see in fucking years and she gets sick inside a day.” Matt poked at the fire with a stick, slowly shaking his gray head. He snorted, and then he swore. “What are we doing?”

“What do you mean?” Ben turned his face away, preferring to stare at nothing rather than meet the other man’s eyes.

Matt wasn’t fooled. “You fucking know exactly what I mean. Don’t treat me like I’m one of the damn kids! This ain’t surviving, Ben. We’ve got no future here. All we’re doing is counting time until we die. The whole shitty sum and total of our lives boils down to four guys, one muddy fucking cave, a planet full of great big fuckers, and one sick woman. Yippee-fucking-haw.”

“She’ll get better,” Ben said, but without much conviction.

Matt still wasn’t fooled. “So what if she does?” He laughed, a hard and bitter sound. “Will’s right, though I can’t believe I’m siding with the little shit. She’s got great looking tits, Ben, and I am not so fucking old that I wouldn’t cheerfully plant my pole between her lily white thighs and plow her ass into the ground. But for what? What happens when she gets pregnant?”

“At least children would be a future,” Ben softly pointed out.

Matt dropped his stick into the fire and glared at him. “Four guys plus one girl with maybe twenty good child-bearing years ahead of her until she dies of it, equals a whole mess of grandkids so fucking inbred that the wolves won’t even have to work to catch their suppers.”

Reluctantly, Ben’s eyes found Bebe’s over the dancing flames of the fire. She was still glaring, still angry, still very beautifully naked despite the feverish flush that stained her face. After only a few minutes, he looked away again. “They brought her in. Maybe they’ll bring in more.”

“We’re not colonists here,” Matt snapped. “My fucking God, you give me another stupid answer like that and I’m gonna treat you like the kids and smack you in the head!”

“What do you want me to do?” Ben snapped back. He lowered his voice, practically hissing in the old man’s ear in the hopes that Bebe wouldn’t overhear. “Should I kill her right here, right now? Maybe I should just kill the babies if—when—they’re born?”

“Yes!” Matt hissed back, without hesitation. But when Ben continued to stare at him, slack-jawed, accusingly silent, he lowered his stormy eyes. Running a hand through the tangles of his salt-and-pepper hair, his anger deflating, he grudgingly changed his mind. “No...I don’t know. I only know this ain’t living. This
ain’t
better. Having her here might make the time pass faster if she ever gets well enough to spread her legs, but that doesn’t make all this better. I’m trying, Ben. I am, but I don’t see any good end coming out of this. Not with her; not without her. Not ever.”

After a moment, Ben lay a heavy hand on Matt’s shoulder. The two men sat side by side, studying Bebe across the small expanse of dirt and distance that separated them. Half naked and shivering, her skin shimmered in the firelight, coated in a fine sheet of sweat.

“There’s something wrong with her,” Matt said finally, his voice low and grim.

“I know.”

“I’m not talking about infection and fever. Will’s right about something else, too. She doesn’t talk so much as she growls. It’s like she’s trying to be one of
them
.”

Ben’s jaw tightened. “I know.”

“What does that mean, do you think?”

“Maybe she was younger than Will when they brought her here. Maybe a baby even.” Ben’s jaw clenched again. “Or she might have been born here. Maybe that explains why she looks at us like that. Like we're the enemy. I really don’t know.”

Both were silent for a very long time before Matt finally grunted. “If she was born here, that definitely means there are more women out there.”

“It also means there might definitely be a future for us here, whether we want one or not.” Ben frowned, absorbing Bebe’s angry, unwavering, fevered stare without blinking. “The only thing I haven’t yet figured out, is how bad this future could be.”

* * * * *

“She’s burning up,” Ben said, touching her face with the backs of his fingers. “It’s getting worse, not better.”

Bebe shoved his hand irritably away. He’d forced her back into clothes again, and although still uncomfortably hot and repulsed at the touch of the hides against her skin, this time Bebe wore them. She would need them once she escaped. She glared up at Ben until he looked away. Oh yes, she was going to escape all right. All she had to do was wait until it grew late and everyone finally lay down on their mats to sleep. Then she was going to run. She still had no idea where she was or how far away Tral’s station might be. But anything was better than sitting here, waiting for the monsters to decide her fate. There wasn’t much of that strange-tasting meat left. They were probably going to eat her.

“Her feet are infected,” Greg said. “I can smell it from here.”

“It hit fast,” Matt added. He glanced at her over the strips of meat he was cooking. “She must have got stuck by some of those bristle-plants near the fence.”

“The things that killed Paul?” Will blanched. “What do we do?”

“Ain’t nothing to do,” Matt finally muttered. “Either she gets better like me, or her feet’ll rot off and she’ll go the way Paul did: slow and bad.”

Everybody stared at her; Bebe glared balefully right back. She wasn’t going to stay here. They couldn’t make her. They had to sleep sometime—even Ben, who had stubbornly lingered beside her for the last two days, constantly watching—and when they did, she was going to run. Pain or not, she was going to escape.

Ben seemed to know this, and he never left her side anymore. He kept trying to give her melted snow to drink, and she would, but only because her throat was constantly parched. She didn’t like him or trust him anymore. Whatever they had shared the other night, when he had caressed her so gently in the dark, now felt like it had happened a lifetime ago and to someone else.

“Okay,” Will finally said, breaking the grim silence. “I’ll be the asshole who says it. Who gets to go first, second, third and last? I don’t even care if that last guy is me, just so long as I know it’s coming.”

A flash of disgust crossed Greg’s face at the same time Matt actually growled, “Jesus Christ!”

“Hey!” Will snapped in self-defense. “We’re taking care of her. We’re feeding her when we barely have enough for ourselves. Ben’s the best hunter of any of us, and he’s so busy playing nursemaid that we’re almost out of food. Nobody stays for free, Ben. Those are your rules. We all work, and we all get a share. So, let’s start sharing already! ‘Cause from where I’m sitting, I don’t see where she’s contributing anything to the group but more hardship, and that’s already something we’ve got in abundance!”

Will spread his hands expectantly, waiting for someone to jump to her defense. When no one did, he began to tick his supporting reasons off on his fingers. “She can’t hunt; she can barely walk; she’s sick so she can’t take care of herself; she doesn’t cook; she smells; and she’s taking up space. So far, all I’ve seen her do is eat our food, sleep in our beds, use our blankets, and wear our clothes. All that generosity should come with a price. And while flashing a bit of tit is all well and good—I’m not saying it’s not—if all she’s got to barter with is sex, then...” He spread his hands a little wider and let the sentence hang.

There was no expression at all on Ben’s face and no one else said a word for almost a full and heavy minute.

“I’m not raping anyone,” Greg said, casting Will a disgusted stare. “I can’t believe we’re even talking about this.”

“Did I say rape?” Will countered, honestly offended. “Has anyone even
asked
her? Maybe she
wants
a little fuck in the furs. Would it hurt just to ask? Let’s at least give her the choice so we can stop living like fucking monks.”

“Like you know how it feels to live any differently!” Matt snapped.

“We didn’t have girls here before! We’ve got one now. So let’s put her to use already!” Will turned his head to look at Ben. “Preferably before her feet fall off.”

He spread his hands again, but Greg punched him anyway. “Jesus, you’ve got the sensitivity of a barracuda!”

“I’m getting a little tired of getting hit!” Will snapped at him.

On the other side of him, Matt balled up his fist and punched his other shoulder. “Learn to shut up, then.”

Will erupted to his feet, rubbing his shoulder, his eyes blazing.

“Knock it off, all of you.” All eyes turned to Ben when he stood up. As if feeling the weight of their expectation, he moved a few feet away from Bebe. Hands on his lean hips, he stared into the fire. His mouth a hard, flat line, he shook his head twice, but didn’t say a word. For a long time, the only sounds in the cave were the sizzle and pop of grease falling into the coals and the occasional snapping of burning wood.

Finally, Ben muttered, “No one forces her.” He sounded tired, but when he turned back to them, his dark eyes were hot and angry. He pinned Will in the full force of his stare and said, “I’m dead serious. No means no, even here. I
will
kill any man who does differently.”

“No one would have to force her, if we just withheld a little—” Will shut up fast, jumping back when both Matt and Greg rounded on him with fully clenched fists.

“I’m
not
withholding anything!” Greg snapped, at the same time Matt snarled, “Nobody fucking left
you
to starve or freeze when
you
didn’t know how to do a fucking thing!”

“You don’t even like her!” Will protested, scrambling to get away from them both.

“I don’t have to like her not to want her treated like a fucking animal!” Matt bellowed after him. “Fucking, little shit!” He started to turn away, but then bellowed, “Shut up!” when Will opened his mouth.

“Nobody withholds anything,” Ben ordered. “She can sleep on my bed and eat my share if you’ve still got a problem with that.”

“And if you do,” Matt seethed through gritted teeth, “so help me, I am going to belt you right in the mouth.”

Ben took a warning step towards Will. “So will I.”

It was the farthest from her that he had been all night, and in a snap of half-rationed thought, Bebe made use of the unexpected opportunity. She bolted. The pain of that first struggling step was crippling, and she almost didn’t make it the three steps further to reach the hide flap. No sooner had she hit her knees and shoved under it, than did a hand grab her ankle.

“Bay-bay!” Ben yelled, her boot coming off in his hand. And then she was free, spilling face-first out into the cold night and the snow. Clumsily crawling and clawing into the knee-deep drift, she got her feet under her. Her bandages quickly soaked up the wetness, but the cold felt good everywhere it touched her, especially after the heat of the cave. She yanked the halves of Tral’s coat open, laughing when the cold kissed her sweat-soaked skin. And though each step was a sharp and searing lesson in agony, she kept running, slipping and falling and getting back up again to keep going. The moon was out, full and round, and it lit the snow as if it were dawn, only with longer, deeper shadows where the trees rose up against the star-studded sky. But even half-able to see where she was going, she had no idea in which direction to run. All she knew was that the crunch of rapidly pursuing feet were closing the distance behind her. If they caught her, she would likely never get away again.

She fell again, almost striking her head against the tree she grabbed to keep from crashing all the way to the ground.

“Bay-bay, wait!” Ben shouted.

Bebe didn’t dare. Her nails tore on the rough bark, but she got her agony-ridden feet under her again just as Ben and the others caught up with her. Pressing her back to the tree, she faced them, panting, hurting and furious.

Ben held up his hands, palm up, as if that alone might somehow make the larger size and strength of him seem diminished. “It’s all right. Bay-bay, please.”

Behind him, Will half crouched, hands loose at his sides, a hungry look on his excited and grinning face. She ducked around the tree to put it in between them, and Will immediately shot right to circle around her. Matt followed his lead, moving quickly the other way. She had no idea where Greg was. She couldn’t see him at all, but she knew trapped when she saw it.

“Come back with us,” Ben pleaded, low and soothing. He held out his hand to her. “Bay-bay, please come back.”

She wasn’t about to let them eat her, and she knew—just knew—that’s exactly what they wanted, to rip her apart and chew into her bones.

Bebe snapped around to run but got only three faltering steps when she was suddenly struck in the chest. She looked down, surprised to find a shiny silver barb sticking out of the pale skin between the bare valley of her breasts. The bright red tuft of feathers that dotted the end of that barb seemed almost black in the blue-gray light of the full moon.

She touched the feathers, then pulled the short-needled barb out of her to look at it in her hand. The whole world began to spin.

“Tral,” she said, her legs dissolving bonelessly out from under. She collapsed facedown, sinking into the knee-deep drifts of snow and knew nothing more.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The Human Species

“I said
don’t
shoot the little one!” Tral snapped. Barely had the transporter touched down, than did he shove open the rear sliding door. “Get away!” he threw up an arm to block the helping hands of his uncle’s personal guard from reaching in and taking Bebe from the seat beside him. “You’ve all done more than enough already!”