Page 17 of Survivor
8
VEX
The conveyor belt moves at a slow, lumbering pace, probably because of all the crap it’s hauling. Hunks of metal, parts, and crushed metallic debris. It all ends up here, and it’s our job to pull out the recyclable stuff. At the end of the belt is the crusher that’ll squeeze all the rubbish into a cube and shoot it out for loading onto the shuttles.
Somewhere out there is an asteroid belt made entirely of these cubes. A huge space dump called Minerva X.
Xavier works on the opposite side of the belt, picking up stuff, examining it, and then putting it back on the belt or slinging it in a crate behind him.
It all looks like shit to me, but Xavier has an eye for useful things.
We don’t speak because the whirr and chug of the machines around us make it hard to hear anything else. Conversations are stored up for break time. Five minutes with a cup of water and then back to work.
Another two hours before we can head back to the ship, back to Rogue. She’s effectively alone with Tide … will they… Not something I need to dwell on. Xavier has become close, a friend, a confidant. He’s accepted me from the start, and even though the others have grown closer, they won’t be part of our family, not until Rogue takes them.
It will happen.
There is no doubt in my mind, and I’d never have thought I’d be amenable to sharing a woman, but Rogue … Rogue is something else.
The buzzer signaling break goes, and everyone drops what they’re doing and heads for the water cooler.
We break in shifts, so there aren’t too many of us. Fourteen to be precise. Xavier joins me as we slip into the queue.
“Can’t wait for this shift to be over,” Xavier says.
I grunt in response.
“Forgotten how to speak, big guy?” He pats me on the back.
He’s the only one here that can do that and get away with it. Anyone else would find themselves eating their own arm.
We’re almost at the cooler when a commotion breaks out through the arch that leads to the shuttle sector.
One of the workers from the shuttle bay heads straight for us. Fast.
“What is it?” Xavier asks.
The guy, some species I’ve never come across with flat features and leathery skin, babbles in some yippy language while glancing frequently over his shoulder.
Xavier, the freak that understands way too much, nods and then freezes. Shit, has he gone pale? Hard to tell with his blue skin, but yeah, he’s lost some color.
“Xavier? What is it?”
Xavier grabs my arm and leads me away from the cooler and straight for the exit. “We need to go. Now.”
“Why?”
“Bounty enforcers. And they’re looking for Athions.”
He doesn’t need to say any more. We break into a jog and get the hell out of there.
9
LORE
The fever’s gone. My body is cool. I raise my hand and study the wound. Clean and no healing. Rogue … she was here. She tended to me. I recall her voice and her cool hands on my face. It takes a minute to realize I’m lying on her mattress in her nook, and then the absolute silence registers. I’m alone.
Something isn’t right. Rogue should be here.
