Star Peregrine

by Jake Elwood

  "Ay-hay," she said.

  He looked at her, baffled. "Pardon?"

  She blushed. "Sorry. I thought you were Nehiyaw."

  "I'm Cree," he confirmed. "But I don't really speak it." He shrugged, embarrassed. "I understand more than I can speak. And I can say a few things. Tanisi. Ekosi maka. And I can count to ten."

  She cocked her head, puzzled. "But I thought you were from Earth."

  "I am." He shrugged. "I grew up at Spirit Lake. My parents tried to speak Cree at home a little bit, but most people just spoke English."

  "Really?" She lifted an eyebrow. "We only speak Cree at home. Everyone's worried we're going to lose our language and culture. There's only about thirty of us on the whole planet, after all. So people frown at you if you speak English to another Nehiyaw." The line between her eyebrows reappeared. "I always thought it would be different back on Earth. I thought the culture would be stronger."

  He grinned. "It's different back on Earth, all right. Just not the way you think."

  He told her about life on the Spirit Lake Reservation, and she told him about a little town called River Forks on the outskirts of the colony on New Panama. The Cree community formed about a quarter of the town's population.

  He forgot about his nervousness, forgot about their early argument, and forgot completely about his responsibilities. They talked about their homes, and then they talked about space travel and how life in the Navy differed from life on a merchant ship. Janine was clever and funny and insightful, and when a soft chime came from his bracer he looked away from her wide brown eyes with a sense of real loss.

  "I'm due on the bridge."

  The corners of her mouth turned down in a display of disappointment that warmed him to his toes. She got to her feet and opened the hatch, stepping through to let him pass. "We should talk again."

  "I'd like that." He smiled and stepped past her, then headed back to the bridge and the burden of his responsibilities.

  Chapter 12

  When the ship was two hours from Zin Tom told O'Reilly he was in charge and left the bridge. He went to his cabin and stretched out on his bunk, hoping for a nap. He'd been exhausted for so long he couldn't remember what it felt like to be rested. Now, as so many times before, he stared up at the ceiling with his mind racing, completely unable to sleep.

  Finally he gave up, swung his legs to the floor, and stood. Who needs sleep when there's coffee?

  He headed for the wardroom. One of the stewards who'd been in charge of the wardroom before was still alive. With most of the officers gone, though, he wasn't making the wardroom much of a priority. Tom figured the odds of finding fresh coffee in a pot that had been cleaned recently were fairly poor.

  Still, coffee was coffee.

  He entered the compartment that had seemed so small the first time he saw it, with Nishida, Brady, Carstairs, and a couple of others all crammed in there. Now it seemed cavernous. A wave of melancholy washed over him as he remembered the fallen officers. He'd barely known Carstairs, but the man had seemed cheerful and likable. Nishida had terrified him, while Brady had been his mentor and guiding hand. The ship had held more than a dozen other officers, most of them nothing more than faces he'd seen in the corridor or in the wardroom. Now they drifted through hyperspace wrapped in shrouds.

  "Here's to you guys," he murmured as he crossed to the coffee maker.

  "Hmmm?"

  Tom started, looking around. The long table that ran the length of the room was empty, but someone had dragged a chair into a corner. A figure sat slumped there, motionless, peering at Tom with bleary eyes.

  "Dr. Vinduly. I didn't see you there."

  Vinduly didn't speak, just grunted.

  A tray beside the coffee machine held an impressive number of dirty mugs. A few clean mugs still remained, so Tom poured himself a cup. The coffee was murky and had an oily sheen he didn't like. He dealt with that by not looking too closely. He added a couple of glucose pellets and some powdered cream, then looked around, wondering if Vinduly wanted company, or to be left alone.

  The man looked as if he wanted solitude – but Tom walked over and sat in the closest chair to the doctor. He took a sip of coffee, grimaced, and set the cup aside. "What's up, Doc?"

  Vinduly shrugged.

  "How's Fagan doing?"

  "Better than he deserves," Vinduly muttered. His breath washed over Tom, sour and reeking of whiskey.

  Tom stiffened. "You're drunk!"

  "Not yet," Vinduly said. He glowered into his coffee cup, then took a sip. "I'm working on it, though."

  Tom stared at him. "But you're on duty."

  Vinduly shook his head with the ponderous solemnity of the truly soused. "According to Mr. O'Reilly's schedule, my shift ended three hours ago." He snorted. "Are we calling him Mr. O'Reilly? Or is he Acting Mr. O'Reilly?" Vinduly giggled, the sound shocking coming from a man who was normally so dour and dignified.

  Tom stared at him while the doctor ignored him and took another sip from his mug. "Is something … bothering you, doctor?"

  Vinduly peered at him. "You mean, for instance, is anyone pestering me endlessly when I'm trying to enjoy a quiet drink?" He glared at Tom until the glare collapsed in a smirk. Vinduly chuckled, then twisted in his chair. There was a counter mounted to the wall beside him, and he reached behind a napkin dispenser and drew out a flask. "Here. Freshen up that drink."

  "I have to be on the bridge in less than two hours."

  Vinduly gave a derisive snort. "What are they going to do? Report you to the captain?"

  Tom took the flask from him, opened it, and sniffed. It was whiskey, all right. He poured a few drops into his mug, just enough to placate the surgeon, then capped the flask and set it on the table.

  "Oh no you don't. Give that back."

  Tom returned the flask, then lifted his mug in salute and took a sip. The coffee was bad enough that he briefly wished he'd been more generous with the whiskey.

  "We all have our burdens," Vinduly said. "But you and me, we're a couple of special cases. An awful lot of bucks stop with us."

  Tom took another sip of coffee and listened. The surgeon had a sharp mind, even blunted by whiskey.

  "According to the official command structure," Vinduly said, pronouncing each word with exaggerated care, "I'm the head of the medical department, the department consisting of myself, three medical corpsmen, and one nurse who is also a qualified spacer and spends most of his time doing maintenance work. Officially, I report to the captain." He made a vague gesture with his mug, then muttered a curse as coffee splashed across his knuckles. "The thing is, though, the captain has no idea. No offense, but you're not qualified to tell me how to run my surgery. Neither was Nishida. You're not surgeons. So it all stops with me."

  He set his cup down on the edge of the counter, then immediately picked it up again and took a sip. "I don't get to consult with anyone. There's nobody qualified to help me make a decision. And if I make a mistake …"

  He lapsed into silence, and Tom stared at him, feeling completely out of his depth.

  "It's the same for you," said Vinduly. "You don't even have a First Officer. Not a real one. You've got a jumped-up helmsman. You've got no one who can give you advice when you make the tough choices. And no one you can talk to afterward if you make a mistake." He leaned forward, peering at Tom. "Nobody except me."

  "I …"

  "Quiet!" Vinduly snapped. "I wasn't done talking."

  Tom closed his mouth.

  "Sir," Vinduly added belatedly. He frowned to himself. "I'm the only person you can tell," he said at last.

  Tom said, "Huh?"

  "That you don't know what you're doing." Vinduly grinned. "You're a sublieutenant, for God's sake. Of course you don't know what you're doing! You don't even know how to be a lieutenant yet, never mind sitting in the big chair." When Tom opened his mouth Vinduly held up a hand. "I'm not saying you're doing a bad job under the circumstances. Of course, what do I know? But it seems like you're d
oing all right. But that's not the point."

  Tom looked at him, waiting.

  Vinduly stared into space, seeming to lose his train of thought. "The point," he said finally, "is that you are in way over your head, and you can't admit it. You have to be the captain. You have to be confident and in charge. All the time. Because if you ever admit how scared and lost and confused you are, this ship is going to fall apart."

  Tom stared at him, then reached for his cup. He gave the flask a speculative glance.

  "But you can tell me." Vinduly gave Tom an exaggerated wink. "I'm outside your command structure. And I can see right through you, so you don't have any secrets from me anyway." He chuckled, then became serious. "Everyone else has someone above them. Some kind of supervisor or superior they can confide in. Or a peer. Someone at their own level. You're the only one who doesn't have that. But you've got me."

  For a time the two of them sat there, not speaking. The doctor had effectively put into words some of the terror Tom had been feeling, the unrelenting pressure to always make the right choice.

  The pressure to never let anyone see that he was under pressure.

  Strangely enough, the doctor had dragged it all into the open, and now Tom felt no great need to speak of it. He said, "That's my issues covered. Now, what's eating you?"

  The smile Vinduly gave him was tinged with so much sadness it broke Tom's heart. "They were my friends," Vinduly said. He was looking at Tom, but his eyes were focused on something else. "I served with them for years. They were my friends, and they relied on me, and I couldn't save them. I couldn't do a God-damned thing for them. All I could do was watch them die."

  Chapter 13

  When Battle Stations sounded, Alice headed for the mess hall. She didn't have a weapon to operate or a role to play in damage control, so her job was to wait and be ready to use the tables in the mess hall for triage in the event of heavy casualties.

  "I did the rest of the tables," Collins told her as she came in. "Do you want to get the last one?" He pointed to the back of the hall, where empty cups cluttered one table.

  She grabbed a tray, cleared the table, then wiped it down, first with soap and water, then with disinfectant.

  After that there was nothing to do but wait. The mess hall had windows along one bulkhead. She went to the window, half a dozen crew joining her, and stared out into hyperspace. A crackling wall of storm loomed in front of her, looking dangerously close. Then the light of a hyperspace portal dazzled her, making her close her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, the ship was in normal space.

  "Looks quiet," said Collins at her elbow.

  She nodded. There was nothing in sight but the gleam of stars in the bottomless blackness of deep space.

  The stars didn't move, which meant the Kestrel wasn't manoeuvering. Which meant they weren't under attack. So far, so good. Alice told himself sternly to relax.

  It didn't work, of course.

  "You shouldn't have told them."

  Alice glanced at Collins, startled, then looked past him. The rest of the kitchen staff stood at the window, along with several other crew assigned to emergency triage. None of them seemed to have heard Collins's low murmur.

  "You mean about Rivendell?"

  He gave her a tight-lipped look. "You're damned right I mean about Rivendell. They're UW Navy. How could you tell them?"

  She stared at him helplessly. It wasn't as if she hadn't given the question any thought. She'd agonized over it before she spoke up at the meeting, and she continued to agonize over it. She knew why she'd done it, but all her reasons rang hollow in her mind. She looked at Collins and didn't speak.

  "Are you so desperate to impress them?" he said bitterly. "Or is it because you want to save your own skin?"

  Some of the closer crew were beginning to glance in their direction. Alice moved farther along the window, out of earshot of the spacers. Collins followed.

  "The Dawn Alliance is our real enemy," she said. "I'm going to help the war effort. The war against the Dawn Alliance is our war too."

  "I might have believed that a couple of days ago," Collins said. "But the Free Planets are negotiating for peace. We're not at war with the Dawn Alliance."

  "Neorome is a Free World," she said. "Tazenda is too."

  That made him squirm a bit. "They could have negotiated. It's not our fault they didn't."

  She didn't speak, just raised an eyebrow.

  Collins flushed. "Anyway, we don't know what's happening on Neorome or Tazenda. It might not be bad."

  "Do you really believe that?"

  He shrugged angrily. "We don't know if we have to fight the Dawn Alliance. But we know we have to fight the United Worlds. They had their boot on our neck for a hundred years."

  She said, "How much do you want to bet the Dawn Alliance has killed more of our people in the last three days than the United Worlds ever has?" The United Worlds insisted that they owned the colonies in the Green Zone, and maintained military bases throughout the Zone, but they were fairly benign masters.

  "You don't know that!"

  "Neither do you!" she snapped. The Navy personnel were staring at them now, but she no longer cared. "The DA is a cancer in the galaxy, and you know it."

  He stared at her, looking mulish, but he didn't argue.

  "I did what I thought was best," she said softly. "I still think it was for the best. I understand that you don't agree. But I didn't do it to impress the UW Navy, and I didn't do it to save my own skin."

  Her voice hardened a bit on the last few words, and Collins lifted his hands in a placating gesture. "Okay, okay." He scowled. "I don't think you should have done it. I wouldn't have. But I understand your reasons."

  She turned away from him and stared out into space, angry and frustrated and a little ashamed. Something precious was slipping away from her, something so fundamental it had never occurred to her she could lose it. The simple trust of her shipmates was eroding. She'd shared danger and hardship with them, victory and defeat. In many ways they were closer to her than family. Those bonds had been damaged. She could imagine a time when the intimacy she'd taken for granted would be gone. Collins and Silver and Fagan and the others would be people she'd once worked with, and that's all.

  Collins murmured, "Have you been to see Fagan?"

  She shook her head.

  "He's looking pretty rough. His arm …."

  She nodded again, not knowing what to say.

  "He's up and around, though." There was a note of false cheer in Collins's voice. "He's learning how to do things with one hand."

  Fagan, who'd always been so competent, so full of confidence, wouldn't like being an invalid. God, who would?

  "Maybe I'll go see him after Battle Stations."

  Collins shook his head. "I don't think …. He's pretty bitter."

  You mean, he knows I told the Navy about Rivendell. And he'll never forgive me.

  "I count five ships total, Captain." O'Reilly looked up from his console, eyes bleak. "We're screwed."

  Tom nodded. He wanted to ask if there was any possibility O'Reilly was wrong, any chance at all that these were neutral ships, or friendly. The fleet at the Boot, however, was making no attempt to hide. The ships had their transponders on.

  They were Dawn Alliance ships. Every one of them.

  "I get a light cruiser, a heavy cruiser, and a corvette." O'Reilly tapped his screen. "Make that two corvettes. And a light carrier."

  That meant probably half a dozen fighters or bombers. Not that it mattered. The Kestrel was hopelessly outgunned.

  And out of fuel.

  No one spoke. No one looked at him. But he could sense the bridge crew waiting to see how he would react.

  And he had no idea what to do.

  "We'll wait," he said, trying to sound calm, confident. Anything other than hopeless. "We'll gather intel, and we'll see what happens."

  In his mind he ran through one scenario after another, knowing each of them was hopel
ess. In normal space, a body in motion would remain in motion. The storms in hyperspace affected matter in strange ways, though. It took energy to pass through a storm without losing velocity. If he made the transition to seventh-dimensional space and started the ship moving, it would eventually drift to a stop. He would never arrive at a destination of his choosing, not without burning fuel he no longer had.

  Zin was the Kestrel's last stop. They were here until they found a way to steal some fuel.

  We have to surrender. We have to throw ourselves on the mercy of the Dawn Alliance and hope for the best. His mind recoiled from the idea – they would get no mercy, not from the Dawn Alliance – but what was the option?

  Starvation?

  Would it be better to die in a hopeless battle?

  "Things change." He said it to bolster the morale of the bridge crew, and also to bolster his own flagging courage. "The Dawn Alliance doesn't need five ships in the middle of nowhere. This is a fuelling stop, nothing more. They'll move on."

  It sounded plausible once he said it. That all five ships would leave seemed a bit much to hope for, but it could happen. If a single corvette remained behind, well, that was a fight the Kestrel could actually win.

  "Stand down from Battle Stations." He looked around the bridge. "Silver. Onda. You two have been here the longest. Take a break."

  O'Reilly's amplified voice came over the bridge speakers, instructing the crew to stand down from Battle Stations. Word of their situation would filter slowly through the ranks, starting with whomever Silver and Onda spoke to. Tom looked at the arm of his chair and the microphone stowed there, wondering if he should make an announcement to the ship's company. The problem with reassuring people was that you sounded as if you thought they needed reassuring.

  He left the microphone where it was. Let them see that it's business as usual.

  O'Reilly said, "How long do we wait, Sir?"

  Tom shrugged. "We wait until something happens."

  Tom was in the spine of the ship, walking toward the aft section, when a rattle in the corridor behind him made him stop and turn. Another spacer, a young woman named Secrest, stood thirty or so paces behind him, staring at the port bulkhead. She backed away a couple of steps, then stood frozen as a couple of loud bangs came from behind the bulkhead. The rattle stopped, and dark smoke seeped out through a seam between panels.