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They trudge back to the Frontier after a long day of running around Neon.
Nema, who already knows every square inch of the place from her days as a teenager; is sick and tired of people asking her what she's been up to all these years, as they simultaneously attempt to convince her to do things for them out of the sheer goodness of her heart. As if people do anything at all out of the "goodness of their heart" on Neon.
Twice already, she's had to talk herself out of visiting an Enhance! clinic to change her appearance just so people stop knowing her name. It's mortifying to have her nefarious street-kid past constantly dredged in front of Sam, who is honest and good and a Coe, for fuckssake. When her last name means less than nothing and belongs to no one of importance.
They've been awake far too long and Sam is exhausted. She can see it just in the way he's walking down the gangway.
Nema is so used to ignoring her impulses to sleep and her baseline for that is so clearly different to Sam's, she hadn't even realised he was dead on his feet until she turned around to ask him a question and he was dozing off against the wall. She'd felt so awful and had immediately abandoned talking to the corporate shill she'd been trying to get a few extra credits out of. Rousing Sam and making a beeline back to the Frontier.
When they arrive the lights are dimmed and Cora is asleep on the single bed, a dog-eared copy of Frankenstein left open on her chest. The sheets are bunched up around her feet and there's a packet of unopened apple flavoured Chunks next to her.
"Shit," Nema says softly, glancing back at Sam with a guilty expression, "Sorry. There's only one bed, I should've booked a room somewhere."
Sam stifles a yawn but waves her concern off all the same, "Don't you worry about it. I'll sleep in one of the jump chairs. Hell, I've slept in worse places."
A frown comes unbidden to her face as she stares at the jump chairs, all metal and hard-foam cushions. Regardless of what he says, she can't imagine he'll get anywhere near a good night's sleep on one of those. But unfortunately she can't conjure another bed out of thin air as much as she'd like to— and she'd really like to.
"Nema," he interrupts her, an exasperated edge to his voice, "Stop stressin', I'll be perfectly fine."
He sidles past her to Cora and gently takes the book out of her hands, making sure to save the page for later. He puts it down on one of the many cluttered shelves and then pulls the covers up the rest of the way over his daughter. Cora stirs slightly, eyes moving back and forth behind her eyelids. Sam squats down next to her and Nema looks away, feeling awkward at witnessing a moment that she really has nothing to do with. She slinks off to the cockpit and busies herself with plotting the route to Jemison.
She's swivelling in the pilot seat, clicking buttons and flicking switches when Sam approaches.
"Okay, I'm gonna knock out now," he tells her while jutting his thumb back at the other room, "What's the plan for tomorrow?"
Tomorrow being a relative term there, considering she's kept Sam awake for something close to twenty hours now.
She shakes her head, being careful to keep her voice down, "I'll take us to New Atlantis. You and Cora deserve some time away from me I think. Get some sleep in an actual bed, eat a decent meal."
Sam raises an eyebrow at her and it disappears up into his stupid hat, "You trying to get rid of us?"
Her heart skips a beat in her chest even though she can hear the teasing lilt to his words, "Shit. No, Sam. Absolutely not," she blurts, panic inexplicably squeezing her chest at the thought of driving him and Cora away, "I just meant that I've probably not been giving you the breaks you need. I– I'm so used to being on my own, I guess I forget what's it's like to think about other people. Which, I will work on."
"So, you're not trying to get rid of us?"
"I—" she blinks, "Still, no."
"Good then," he smiles at her easily, his eyes shine with something even though they're half-lidded from sheer exhaustion, "Take us to New Atlantis, but don't think we're gonna stay away from you, Nema. Cora wouldn't hear it and frankly, neither will I."
Nema bites down on her bottom lip, having been rendered a little bit speechless, "Right."
"Right," he nods simply, "G'night then. Wake me up when we get there."
He leaves then, shutting the door to the cockpit behind him and Nema feels a bit like she's been hit over the head with something. In a good way, if that's at all possible. Dazed and with some emotion she can't identify stuck in her throat, Nema takes off from the spaceport and sets course for Jemison.
That night bothers her for the next few months after. It carves out a nook in her brain and settles in. She replays her conversation with Sam over and over— don't think we're gonna to stay away from you —and wonders what someone like her did to earn someone like Sam Coe's loyalty.
She also makes sure to keep in mind that most people don't go twenty or more hours without sleeping or eating. Most people try to take care of their bodies and aren't on some inane quest to run themselves into an early grave.
So she books them hotel rooms and tries to keep most of their missions short so they have enough time to grav jump back to the nearest settled planet. A few times they even stay on Paradiso— Sam tries to insist on paying for his and Cora's room but Nema can't stomach it. She's the only reason they're there in the first place and if she's going to hustle them to Akila City the next morning then the least she can do is pay for their accommodation. Besides, she's not the one who's spending all their money to keep a kid alive. Sam has enough credits going towards Cora's sprawling book collection.
This is another thing she thinks about.
All of Cora's books on the Frontier's shelves that used to be filled with ship parts and the random junk Nema can't help but pick up. Cora's collection has already filled up her room at the Lodge and now makes its way onto the ship, where she arguably needs books the most. Sam tells her constantly that he can talk to Cora about reducing the amount of books on the ship at literally any time— but she can't stomach that either. It's bad enough they leave the kid on the Frontier for hours at a time while they run jobs, even if it is for her own good.
Yet, the books do take up valuable space Nema kind of needs for parts (and her precious garbage).
Instead of doing what a sane and normal person might do —like just asking the kid to move a few books somewhere else— Nema buys a bigger ship.
An upgrade is probably overdue anyway. She's done some work on the Frontier since she acquired it from Barrett, but it's still fairly slow and doesn't do that well in a dogfight. It does the job, but she counts far more reasons to get rid of it than to hang onto it.
She spends three hours with the Akila City spaceport technician while Sam and Cora spend a strained afternoon with Jacob Coe. She decides on a Class A called Narcissus II. It's better on all fronts; faster, bigger and more resilient. Not necessarily cheaper, but she talks the guy down from one-ninety-five thousand credits to one-sixty and gets him to throw in a hand moving all their shit. She considers that a win, even though she'll probably be skimping on food and ammo until a big enough job comes along. Though, if she's desperate enough she could always run the Red Mile for a quick score.
Anyway, she promptly decides she no longer cares how broke she is when Cora lays eyes on the thing.
Smart as she is, the kid understands what it is before her dad does. She takes off running toward it before anyone can stop her. Further away, Nema can already hear her talking a mile a minute to herself as she weaves under and around it checking out the landing gear, turrets, blasters and the like.
She watches Sam scrub a hand over his eyes as he approaches, sliding the hat off his head. She hasn't heard much about his relationship with Jacob but she at least understands that it's a strained and tenuous thing. He endures for Cora, but it's obvious it takes a toll on him.
"Hey," Nema says, trying to stop her mouth from curving into too wide of a smile.
"Oh, don't you 'hey' me," he fixes her with an almost serious look, "Don't tell me you actually bought that ship?"
"Okay. I won't."
Sam rolls his eyes at her. But through the exasperation and exhaustion she can see the same something shining in his eyes. He looks from her to his daughter and Nema can't bear to keep watching him. There's fatherly affection and pride and then something else sad in his expression. It reminds Nema of absolutely nothing and she thinks that is what hurts most of all about witnessing it. Though, her parental abandonment issues aside, it’s difficult to look at him sometimes for other reasons.
She sets off toward the new ship, hearing Sam's footsteps follow behind her.
"There's more room," Nema tells him as they climb up the ladder, "More storage space. A bedroom. Two beds."
They can hear Cora running around on the floor above where said storage space and bedroom are, already full of her book collection. Nema gives Sam a brief tour of the lower deck; pointing out the cockpit, jump chairs for the crew she doesn't have, the navigation table. Sam takes it all in quietly.
Then, "Did you buy a new ship 'cause you felt bad about me sleeping in that jump chair?"
Huh. She was hoping he'd forgotten about that, or at least enough that he wouldn't connect the dots between her obvious guilt and the shiny new ship on the landing pad.
"I– no. Not exactly."
"Right," he scratches absently at a spot on his hairline, sounding unconvinced, "But a little bit though."
Nema scrunches her nose, "A little."
Rather, a main instigator of the idea, she doesn't say. Instead she watches Sam bite down on a smile. It pulls at the side of his mouth and she averts her eyes before it can turn into anything she can look at.
"You–" he shakes his head, "Hell, Nema. You don't have to do anything on account of me— on account of us."
She shrugs him off, but doesn't say anything. She isn't sure what she could say because it would just be a lie.
He’s right, she supposes. She doesn’t technically owe them anything, never mind a new ship with more room. But it’s not so much about tangible debts, as it is about the emotional debts. She owes him because what other person in the settled systems is dogging at her heels like this in exchange for nothing but the promise of adventure? All her life, Nema has had no one. A few friends maybe, but no one who wouldn’t take something from her just because they could.
Sam isn’t like that. Sam is good.
The very least that she owes him and his daughter is a ship that has enough room for them to sleep in.
“Don’t worry about it.”
(And he doesn’t. But that doesn’t mean he forgets).