Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 105936 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105936 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
I shook my head frantically, and tried to get out from under his heavy arm again. I had to get out of here—to get away from the fishy stench of the awful supper and the hyper-masculine reek of sweat and testosterone and unwashed bodies.
But Jerx wasn’t letting me go. His grip on me tightened, his long fingers—which had fingernails caked in black grease, I noticed distractedly—curling around my arm.
“Uh-uh, navvie. Or should we call you ‘Catty?’” he breathed in my face. “You’re not goin’ anywhere. You and me have a date in my bunk in about—”
But he didn’t get any further for at that moment the contents of my stomach heaved themselves up and out…all over his chest. I watched in horror, unable to stop, as slimy chunks of chewed bread-loaf lodged themselves in his thick chest hair and dribbled down the front of his open uniform shirt.
Puking wasn’t pleasant but it saved me from almost certain rape.
“The fuck!” Jerx shouted and shoved me backwards, off the bench. I somehow twisted and managed to land on my side, not my back. I staggered to my feet, still gagging as Jerx brushed frantically at the chunks of vomit in his overgrown chest hair.
The other crew members made way for me as I staggered through the narrow aisle between the tables and out of the mess hall. I had a thought that I ought to tell them again that I was a navigator—not a Catamite—but I felt too sick for that.
Instead, I staggered further down the hallway until I found the communal washbasin and toilets. I rinsed out my mouth in the basin and drank some water to calm my angry stomach. Then I pushed my way past the curtain into a toilet stall.
The stalls were separated by metal walls on the sides but the plain white curtains at the front really didn’t offer much privacy—it wasn’t like you could lock yourself in.
I bent over the plain metal rim, waiting to see if anything else would come up…but nothing did. My stomach was still rolling, but it felt a lot better now that the stuff I’d had for supper was gone.
I frowned as I rubbed my mouth with a swatch of wiping paper. It must have been the bite of greasstain that had affected me so badly. I didn’t think the bread-loaf would have done it. I would have to be really careful about what I ate from now on—I couldn’t be puking during every meal.
Though I couldn’t say I was sorry I’d thrown up during this one. It was embarrassing, sure—nobody wants to throw up in front of a room full of strangers. But it had saved me from Jerx’s disgusting plans for me—which was doubtless to drag me off to a dark corner and…
I couldn’t finish the thought—it was too awful.
I was really going to have to watch my back here, just like Snuffy had warned me. But I was going to be living and working with these men for at least a solar month—could I really keep my distance for that long?
I didn’t know—but I surely hoped so.
Otherwise the living conditions aboard The Illyrian were going to go from unpleasant to downright hellish.
12
JESSINA
After using the communal bathroom, I went back to the navigators’ bunk and got dressed in my pajamas. Gurflug wasn’t there yet, but his stench still lingered. I felt my stomach roll again as I changed. Goddess of the Four Faces, how could I live with this smell in my nose for a whole solar month?
I hung my uniform neatly on one of the hooks mounted on the wall and crawled into the bottom bunk. Once my noxious roommate came back, I would be forced to move to the floor. Aside from the danger that he might fall through the sagging springs and crush me, I also knew I couldn’t bear the stench of his flatulence all night. But while the room was my own, I curled into a ball in my bunk and pulled the covers over my head.
A while later—maybe an hour—Snuffy stuck his long nose in my room. He was carrying a towel which he hung on a hook by my uniform. He placed another, larger towel, on the top bunk—no doubt for Gurflug.
“Hey, navvie—you all right? Are you? Are you?” he asked me, coming over to bend down and peer into the bottom bunk which was only an inch off the floor.
“I don’t know,” I croaked, honestly. “Think it was something…something I ate.”
“Yes, I heard you were sick—all over Jerx too. Yes you were—yes you were,” he emphasized, grinning.
“I didn’t mean to puke on him!” I protested weakly. “I don’t…don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“I do. Yes, I do,” Snuffy told me. “You have worm hole sickness—that’s all.”
“What?” I looked up at him, horrified. “Are you saying that jumping through that worm hole is what made me sick? But I’m a navigator! I can’t get sick in worm holes—what good would I be?”