Timothy Zahn - Angelmass

"Thanks," Chandris said, getting a grip on the wrench and giving it a tug. This time it stayed on.

"That's it, all right."

"Just one of those things you pick up with experience," Hanan said modestly. "You'll get it in time.

That is, if you stay."

"Where else would I go?" she countered, keeping her eyes on her work.

She sensed Hanan shrug. "Back to running, I suppose. You were running when you first came here, if you remember."

With a final tug, Chandris got the connector loose. "I'm not much interested in running anymore, thank you," she told him, in a tone carefully designed to discourage further questioning.

It was a waste of good voice control. "You know, you never did give us any details about this crazy man you said you were running from," Hanan commented. "He must have been really crazy for you to have run all the way to Seraph to get away from him."

"He was," Chandris said briefly. "You have a spare grommet there?"

"Sure." He found one, handed it to her. "Tell me about him."

"Why?"

He sighed, just audibly. "So that maybe we can help you find a way to get clear of him. Before you leave us."

Chandris felt her throat tighten. "Who says I'm leaving?"

"Ornina. She was right, you know: we do need you here."

Chandris snorted. "That's the trouble with you two. You talk too much to each other."

"She talks and I listen, anyway," Hanan said, a hint of his usual flippancy peeking through. "I'm serious, though, about wanting you to stay. For starters, who else will play this helpless-maiden routine with me if you go?"

Chandris grimaced. So much for him not catching on. "Maybe that's why I want to leave," she growled. "Maybe I'm tired of playing games. Ever think of that?"

For a long minute he was silent. Chandris finished attaching the new connector, then set the wrench's line-lock on the next one and broke it loose. "We're all running from something, Chandris," he said at last, quietly. "Did Ornina ever tell you I wanted to be a surgeon?"

Chandris paused, the connector halfway off. "No," she said.

"It's an art, you know, surgery," Hanan said, his voice oddly distant. "One of the few real arts left.

Maybe the only one where you can genuinely feel that you're doing some good for people."

Chandris heard the faint whine of his exobraces as he moved his arm. "How far had you gotten?" she asked.

"I was in my second year of college when our parents died," he told her. "Ornina had just finished basic, and insisted on going to work to help me pay my way. I was able to work some, too, but she was the one who kept us afloat. I let her do it because I knew that when I got into practice I could afford to send her to college, too. To pay her back for everything.

"I was six months from finishing when the disease showed up."

Chandris blinked away sudden moisture. "They couldn't do anything about it?"

"Well, that's the point, you see," Hanan said, his tone suddenly strange. "They could have."

She turned around to look at him, expecting to see anger in his eyes. But all that was there was sadness. "I don't understand," she said carefully.

He let out his breath in a gentle whoosh. "It could have been cured, Chandris," he said, gazing at his trembling hand. "Not just helped; cured. All it would have taken would have been some highly specialized neural surgery and six months of intensive treatment... and about two million ruya to pay for all of it."

Unbidden, a memory from the Barrio flicked into Chandris's mind: old Flavin, limping painfully along on an ankle that could easily have been replaced. "I'm sorry," was all she could think of to say.

Hanan's eyes came back from his hand and his memories, and he threw her a tight smile. "So was I," he said. "For a long time I was pretty bitter about it, I can tell you. I wasn't asking for charity, you know—I could almost certainly have paid all of it back over a lifetime of surgical work."

Chandris nodded, an old saying floating up from the depths of her memory. " 'The rich get richer,' " she quoted.

" 'And the poor get babies,' " Hanan finished.

"What?"

"My own version. Skip it." He cocked an eyebrow. "So. Your turn."

She felt her stomach tighten. "His name is Trilling Vail," she told him. "For two years he was—" she hesitated, groping for the right word.

"Your lover?" Hanan suggested delicately.

"Yes, that too. But he was a lot more." She shook her head. "You have to understand what the Black Barrio was like, Hanan. Poor people, lots of scorers and koshes—probably a lot like that part of Magasca near the spaceport."

"Sounds pretty grim."

"It wasn't fun. I started out as a trac—that's someone who plays decoy or distraction for a scorer—and worked my way up to where I was the one doing the scoring."

"All of this by yourself?"

"I was never really alone," Chandris said. "But there wasn't anyone who really cared about me, either. Mostly the people who kept me around did so because I was useful.

"And then, when I was fourteen, I met Trilling."

She turned back to the access panel, unwilling for Hanan to see her face. "He was real nice at first.

He took care of me like no one else ever had. Taught me all sorts of tricks, got me involved with his friends, let me move in with him."

Bittersweet memories flashed past her eyes, making her throat hurt. "What can I say? He took care of me."

There was a brief pause. "What happened?" Hanan asked quietly. "Another woman?"

Chandris snorted. "Not Trilling," she said. "He always said he was a one-woman man. As far as I know he never tommed around while I was with him. No, what happened was that he started acting... strange. I mean really strange. He'd try to score tracks he wasn't ready for, and then go crazymad when they popped. He'd get mad at me for no reason at all, or else drop into a black pit for days at a time. He'd disappear, too, at strange hours and blow up when I tried to ask where he'd been. And he started playing around with reeks a lot."

"Sounds like someone on the glide path to a mental breakdown," Hanan said. "Did you try to get him to talk to someone?"

"About twice a week. But he blew up every time I suggested it. Besides, there wasn't much of anyone left for him to talk to; most of his friends had chopped and hopped by that time. They said he was a crash waiting to happen and didn't want to be around when it did."

"Some friends," Hanan murmured.

"The Barrio was like that," Chandris told him. "No one ever did anything for anybody unless there was something in it for them."

"Well..." Hanan scratched his cheek. "Pardon me for pointing it out, but you stayed with Trilling.

And it doesn't sound like you were getting much out of it."

Chandris felt her lip twist. "Don't try to make me look noble, Hanan. I wasn't. Even at his worst Trilling was the most security my life had ever had, and I didn't want to lose that. Or maybe just didn't want to admit that it was already lost. You lie to yourself a lot in a place like the Barrio."

"People lie to themselves a lot everywhere."

Chandris shrugged. "Anyway, it finally got to the point where I couldn't take it anymore. I decided I had to get out." A sudden, violent shiver ran up through her at the memory. "And then, like a complete fool, I went and told Trilling I was leaving."

Hanan took a step closer to her, his arm slipping around her shoulders. "Did he hurt you?" he asked gently.

Chandris shivered again, the memories flashing across her vision. "He never even touched me. All he did was stand there, staring at me with a crazy look in his eyes. And then he told me, in complete detail, what he would do to me if I ever even tried to leave him."

She shook her head. "I still don't know how I got away the way I did. I guess he didn't really believe I was serious."