The Scar - China Mieville [43]
“For a while,” said Bellis.
“Yes. I’m not saying it’s exactly the same. That’s the big difference: once you join Armada you don’t . . . leave.”
“I’ve been told that a thousand times,” Bellis said slowly. “But what about Armada’s fleet? What about the cray underneath? You think they can’t get away? Anyway, if that were true, if people never did have a chance to leave, no one but the city-born would be prepared to live here.”
“Obviously,” Johannes said. “The city’s freebooters are on sail for months, maybe years at a time till they make their way back to Armada. And they’ll dock at other ports during those journeys, and I’m sure some of their crew must have disappeared. There must be ex-Armadans scattered here and there.
“But the fact is, those crews are chosen: partly for their loyalty, and partly for the fact that if they do run, it won’t matter. They’re almost all city-born, for a start: it’s a rare press-ganged who’s given a letter of pass. The likes of you and me, we couldn’t hope to get on a vessel like that. Armada is where most of us press-ganged’ll see things out.
“But dammit, think who gets taken, Bellis. Some sailors, sure, some ‘rival’ pirates, a few merchants. But the ships the Armadans encounter—you think they all get taken? Most of the press-ganged vessels are . . . well, ships like the Terpsichoria. Slavers. Or colony ships full of transported Remade. Or jail ships. Or ships carrying prisoners of war.
“Most of the Remade on the Terpsichoria realized long ago that they’d never be going home. Twenty years, my eye—it’s a life sentence, and a death sentence, and they know it. And here they are now, with work and money and respect . . . Is it any wonder they accept it? As far as I know there are only seven Remade from the Terpsichoria being treated for rejection, and two of those already suffer dementia.”
And how the fuck, wondered Bellis, how in the name of Jabber do you know that?
“What about the likes of you and me?” Johannes continued. “All of us . . . we already knew we’d be away from home—away from New Crobuzon—for five years at the very, very least, and probably more. Look at the motley group we were. I’d say very few of the other passengers had unbreakable ties with the city. People arriving here are unsettled, sure; and surprised, confused, alarmed. But not destroyed. Isn’t it a ‘new life’ that they promise Nova Esperium colonists? Wasn’t that what most of us sought?”
Most, perhaps, thought Bellis. But not all. And if it’s satisfaction with this place they look for before they let us live free here, then gods know—I know—they can make mistakes of judgment.
“I doubt,” Johannes said quietly, “they’re so naÏve as to just leave us to roam unchecked. I’d be surprised if they didn’t keep careful note of us. I suspect we don’t go unwatched. But what could we do, anyway? This is a city, not a dinghy we can commandeer or scuttle.
“It’s only the crew who’d represent any kind of real problem. Many have families waiting for them. Those are the ones who’d likely refuse to accept that this is their new home.”
Only the crew? thought Bellis, a bad taste in her throat.
“So what happens to them? Like the captain?” she said in a dead voice. “Like Cumbershum?”
Johannes flinched. “I . . . I’ve been told it’s . . . it’s only the captains and first officers of any ships encountered . . . That they simply have too much to lose, that they’re particularly tied to their home port . . .”
There was something fawning and apologetic in his face. With a waxing alienation, Bellis realized that she was alone.
She had come here tonight thinking that she might be able to talk to Johannes about New Crobuzon, that he would share her unhappiness, that she could touch the bloodied part of her mind and talk about the people and streets she missed so hard.
Perhaps that they might broach the subject that had burrowed through her thoughts for