Star Crossed

by C. Gockel

  Gunfire erupted from the building, and a bottle went rushing over James’s head. Others shattered on either side of him and Noa. The remaining Molotov cocktails, he realized. The bottles caught in the decorative planters and the tall, dry tropical grasses erupted in flames and smoke, putting a curtain of fire between the Ark and the Guard in the building.

  “Kenji!” Noa cried under James’s arm as they reached the now-open elevator.

  “Get in,” Ghost shouted, to everyone and no one.

  And suddenly the sky went orange and dark. “Fire retardant,” Noa said as James pushed her into the elevator.

  “Hisha!” screamed Manuel. A bullet whizzed by. Manuel stumbled backward and clutched his arm, his rifle sagging from the strap on his shoulder. He was pushed into the elevator by the still-blindfolded 6T9 carrying a wide-eyed Eliza. Tripping backward, Manuel fell to the floor—and James could smell blood in the air.

  “Get ‘em in there, Chavez!” James heard Gunny roar, and a moment later Chavez shoved the rest of the team in, trapping Manuel, James, and Noa in the back of the elevator. The flames, smoke, and fire retardant were so thick that through the wire cage James could only see a few meters. He felt something on top of his foot and blinked down to see Carl Sagan scurry over him and up the metal cage of the lift. Gunfire was going off in an angry staccato from both directions, but he couldn’t see the shooters. Gunny stumbled into the elevator, face orange, rubbing his eyes. “I can’t see!”

  “Where is Hisha? Where is Hisha?” Manuel stammered on the ground. He tried to raise himself, but slipped. Metal creaked above their heads, and the elevator jerked into ascent.

  From the ground came the sound of Oliver’s wail, rising over the scream of bullets, and the roar of flames.

  Eyes tearing, Gunny was hanging out the still-open door. “She was ahead of me! Oh, God, the kid!”

  “The child is in distress,” said 6T9, setting Eliza down quickly.

  “Help him! Help him!” said the old woman.

  Noa was already pushing toward the front of the elevator. 6T9 was instantly beside her, blindfold gone. James felt his mind alight in fear and frustration. Couldn’t she ever keep her head down?

  Oliver’s wail rose again above the sound of flames. “Hisha,” screamed Manuel from the floor. James looked back to see him crawling, one-armed, toward the front of the elevator between the press of legs.

  “Manuel!” Hisha’s breathless call just barely rose above the din.

  “Stop the elevator! Stop the elevator!” Manuel shouted. The elevator jolted to a stop … but then began to ascend again, this time a little more slowly.

  “I can’t stop it!” Ghost panted. “A bullet … something is jammed.”

  Noa dropped to her knees. The ground was over two meters below. “Hisha!” she shouted, reaching out a hand.

  “6T9, help Noa, you’re stronger!” Eliza shouted.

  The ‘bot reached out a hand to Hisha, too. The woman was jogging toward the elevator, clutching Oliver who was screaming louder with each bullet that fired and ricocheted off the hull of the Ark—each one seemingly closer to the pair despite the curtains of smoke and fire retardant … They couldn’t see Hisha. A thought struck James. “They are aiming at the child’s screams.”

  As soon as the words and thought had passed from him, Hisha fell. Noa screamed, and James could see the muscles in Noa’s arms strain and knew she was going to jump. Oliver was still wailing on the ground. In his mind, realizations collided in a stinging flurry of electricity. Noa wouldn’t leave the child, she’d jump down there, attempt to rescue him, and make herself the target. Before he could second guess himself, or formulate a plan, he shoved Noa down and leaped over her and 6T9, landing on the ground next to Hisha. Above him, he heard Noa say, “Chavez, let loose with all you’ve got!” and heard gunfire from the elevator roar above his head. Noa wasn’t going to jump down—she was going to try and cover him. It was oddly a relief even as return fire came from all directions.

  James knelt down on the ground next to the fallen woman. She’d landed on top of Oliver, now only whimpering. Another bullet hit her side right before his eyes and her body jerked. Oliver wailed. “Hisha,” James said, getting closer, eyes stinging with the fire retardant that was congealing near the ground in a thick cloud. She didn’t move from where she lay, body huddled over Oliver. He touched her shoulder, and felt slick hot blood. He lifted her up and realized there was a bullet wound in the back of her head—and another in the front right above her open eyes. The wailing Oliver was coated in red and gore. The child took a deep breath, and for a moment his cries became soft gasps. James ripped the cloth of the carrier, picked up the child roughly with one arm. His mind went still, blank, and dark. The elevator was too high. He couldn’t make it. He knew it like he’d known how to kill a man with a roundhouse kick, or a quick twist of the neck, or that he could leap two and a quarter meters into the air. Oliver wailed again. Bullets screamed by them.

  He should run.

  Instead, against all logic, he jumped. Some useless part of his brain calculated that he would miss the platform by a good half meter, and even 6T9’s extended hand by at least forty centis.

  Even as that thought was passing through his mind, 6T9 slid down so he was hanging over the edge by his waist and caught James’s hand. And it was like a light had gone off in James’s mind; it spread to the world and every fiber of James’s being and for an instant, everything was brighter.

  And then 6T9 began to slip forward.

  Noa eyes were tearing as she sprayed bullets haphazardly into the wall of red fire retardant. It wasn’t all because of smoke or the cocktail of chemicals doused on the flame. She aimed high, telling herself their snipers would be on the roof. It was also where Kenji wouldn’t be. The elevator shuddered beneath her, and Noa hazarded a glance down just in time to see 6T9 catch James’s arm. Laying flat on the floor of the elevator, 6T9’s entire torso was hanging over the edge. And then it was like a slow-motion nightmare. James was dangling, Oliver was screaming, and bullets were still raging. One of the bullets hit 6T9 square in the arm, leaving a black hole. The ‘bot didn’t flinch, but he was quickly sliding forward. Eliza toppled on top of the ‘bot, shouting, “He caught them!” Manuel threw his weight on one of 6T9’s legs. Noa braced a foot on 6T9’s backside, trying to help, but she didn’t dare stop shooting, for fear the return fire would intensify. As she thought that, another bullet whizzed by James so close she saw a piece of his shirt rip and catch in the breeze. His face remained impassive, but his eyes briefly met hers. He could have climbed up 6T9’s body if he only let go of Oliver, but he didn’t.

  For an instant the scene was crystal clear, in the way that only battle could be. The Luddecceans were firing at James and 6T9. The sex ‘bot, a symbol of all that was degenerate, and the fallen angel of their twisted fantasies were trying to save a human child.

  “Pull them up!” Eliza said.

  “Oliver!” screamed Manuel.

  “I have no leverage, my darling Eliza,” 6T9 shouted.

  Still spraying bullets, Noa half-turned her head and snarled at the students, “Pull him up!”

  Snapping out of their shock-induced comas, the students dropped to the floor and began pulling the ‘bot backward with Manuel and Eliza. Chavez and Noa kept firing into the red cloud. Even Gunny was firing. His eyes were weeping and shut from the sting of fire retardant—but they were all firing blindly anyway.

  The elevator jerked so quickly she nearly lost her footing. Just as she ran out of ammo, she heard scraping behind her, felt cool air against her back, and Ghost shouted, “It’s open!”

  “Eliza! Help guide Manuel and Gunny!” Noa shouted, dropping her useless weapon and falling to her knees to help the students pull the ‘bot, James, and Oliver into the elevator as Chavez continued to spray bullets.

  “Hurry, come!” Ghost shouted. Kara took Oliver from James, and James slithered on his stomach up into the elevator cab. Chavez grunted. “I’m
out of ammo—”

  “Then go!” screamed Noa. “All of you!”

  Everything was a confusing blur of moving legs, intensifying gunfire, and another sound—a low roar. Engines. The Ark’s engines were starting. Noa gaped. Kenji had been wrong—about the mainframe, the elevator … and everything.

  “Keep down!” Noa shouted into James’s ear as he began to stumble upright. Nodding, he kept to his hands and knees. Joining him, she turned to the door of the ship. The door was an archway of light. She saw bullets impacting into the wall just beyond the entrance. She scuttled forward, James was beside her … but then he slipped and crashed to his belly.

  “James!” she shouted, grabbing him beneath the arm, preparing to drag him. But he got up a moment later, and they scurried into the Ark. “Down!” Noa said as soon as they were inside. Flinging herself over James’s shoulders, she pushed. His body gave way beneath hers and they flopped together on the floor with James cushioning Noa’s fall.

  “They’re in!” Chavez shouted. She stood by the door, intermittently swinging around the door frame to fire a small pistol … a pistol that wouldn’t even be powerful enough to break the glass of the museum windows from where she was standing. Before Noa could shout at her to get out of the line of fire, the door slid closed. There was a sound like raindrops on a tin roof … it was the sound of bullets hitting the hull.

  She took a deep breath that came out shakier than it should have, even after taking fire. Her thumb found the stumps of her fingers. Kenji’s betrayal was so fresh that it made her feel physically heavy. The fingers of her left hand curled—and she felt the absence of her ring and pinkie finger. Her breath quickened, as though she were starting to hyperventilate, and she felt like she might be sick. Noa forced herself to calm, bit her lip, and told her stomach to untwist from its knot. She could not break down. Not now. Sliding off James’s back, she rubbed her hand over his shoulder, not letting him go—to anchor herself, maybe, or to comfort both him and herself. He was warm, solid, and real beside her, his tattoos dark on his arms, but fading. He had been a perfect stranger, not Fleet or Luddeccean. She’d met him in the snows of the North, and he’d had no reason to save her, but did anyway, whereas her own flesh and blood had sent her to a prison camp—and would have again, claiming it was to save her. Her eyes briefly caught sight of Carl Sagan, standing upright on his four back legs, waving in the air, his nose twitching. James moved, and she turned toward him. His cheek was pressed to the floor, his shockingly blue eyes were on her. He wasn’t a stranger any more. They were bound as tightly as anyone she’d served with in the Fleet. Her mind instinctively reached for James’s, and she let loose a flurry of emotions—relief and gratitude, and shame for Kenji—but James wasn’t hard linked to her, and the emotions never crossed the empty air between them. There was no time to say all she felt. “Come on,” she said, heaving herself up. “It’s not over—” And then her eyes caught sight of crimson on the floor, smudged by her body.

  “James?” she said.

  He sat up, gingerly touching his side. His fingers came away bloody.

  James stared at the crimson stain on his fingers. His shirt was wet, as was his knee.

  “James!” Noa said again, alarm ringing in her voice.

  “They have a sickbay,” he heard Chavez say. “Commander, I can take him there—”

  “I’m fine,” James said. And he knew he was, without even touching the wound in his side. He’d felt a brief shock when it had hit him—a sensation of danger, and warning—but strangely no pain.

  Noa put a hand on his shoulder. “James, you collapsed outside—”

  “I slipped on the blood on the elevator floor,” he said, climbing to his feet. “But the wound is minor.” The wound in his side didn’t hurt at all. He was more annoyed by the relative chill of the Ark interior.

  Tugging his arm, Noa said, “No, Chavez is taking you to medical—”

  James could feel the thrum of the Ark’s engines beneath his feet, and heard the sound of bullets outside on the hull. Pulling her hand from his arm, James met her eyes. “I’m fine—courtesy of my augmentations.” He didn’t know that, but it was as good a hypothesis as any. “We don’t have time to argue—and you’re shorthanded as it is.”

  At his words the thrum beneath his feet increased in intensity. Manuel’s voice cracked from a round circular grate in the wall. “Commander, I’m in sickbay, but on my way to engineering, Ghost is in command there—”

  Ghost’s voice cracked over Manuel’s. “I’m working on the ground defenses. As soon as I get in, your darling brother is going to go to work getting me out.”

  “Can he really shut off the ground defenses?” Chavez said. “Without ethernet access?”

  James’s eyebrows rose. “He got us this far.” But how … it still nagged at James.

  Noa touched a red button beneath the grate, as they’d all learned to do in Ghost’s lair. “Understood. On our way to the bridge.”

  As she released the button, Chavez stared at the speaker. “This ship is so primitive. Maybe we can set up a local ethernet—”

  “We have to survive the next twenty minutes, ensign,” Noa snapped.

  James realized he was still staring at the speaker, mulling over Ghost’s mysterious access to the mainframe, and whether they might have only scant minutes to live. Even if Ghost could shut down the ground defenses, they still had an armada to face. Noa was already walking over to a sliding door of the airlock they were now in. A moment ago, he’d heard the worry in her voice—heard her heart race at impossible speeds when she’d thought him injured. Apparently she’d recovered from the shock of thinking him near death. James followed her past the airlock, and Chavez followed him.

  Moments later, Noa summoned the lift that ran through the center of the ship from engineering to the bridge. As they waited, James looked around and located the hatches in the walls, floor, and ceiling that could be lifted for access to maintenance passageways in case the lift did not come. As he did, he couldn’t help but notice faded drawings painted on the walls—stick figures of men, women, and children; plants in pots; hearts and crude stars. All the drawings ended at about the level of his waist. He remembered his last visit to the Ark as a child—the tour guide had said that the Ark had been a family ship. During the voyage a few children had been born. They’d been allowed to paint on the walls … and yet, people of the same philosophy that would allow such humanity had just shot at him for being … for being …

  He gripped his side where the blood was rapidly drying, a testament to his frailty, his humanity. They believed he would be the end to the human race. His gaze shifted to Noa. Her chin was high, her shoulders squared, her dark skin in sharp relief with the pale gray walls. He wasn’t sure what he would have done if she’d gone with Kenji … his vision dimmed. It would have all been over then … everything …

  His vision went completely black. The thoughts in his mind stilled to all but one. Everything, what?

  Metal screeched below them, and the engine grew louder. Chavez jumped, and Noa looked down sharply.

  “Is that normal?” Chavez said.

  The lift opened, and Noa stepped into the small cylindrical space. The ceiling was shaped like an oblong pill. Noa’s eyes slid to James’s.

  “Sure,” she said, raising an eyebrow as though daring him to contradict her. In Japanese she muttered, “I have to keep morale high.”

  James remembered standing below the elevator, contemplating not jumping—all would have been lost if he’d given in to the sense of inevitable failure. Raising an eyebrow of his own, James said, “Perfectly normal sound.”

  “Are you sure?” Chavez asked, metal limbs creaking as she shifted on her feet.

  “I’m a historian,” James said. “I have studied these ancient ships.”

  It was the most blatant lie he’d told in his life—or at least since he’d awakened in the snow—it felt oddly liberating. Noa’s eyebrows rose and he thought he saw the hint of a
smile on her face. There was a ding and the lift door opened. They stepped into a space scarcely larger than a coffin. James stood to one side, Chavez to the other, and Noa stood sandwiched between them facing the front. The door shut, but the lift did not move. “Bridge,” Noa said, looking upward.

  Nothing happened. Chavez drew against the wall. Eyes flitting side to side, she held the pistol in her hand so tightly her hand shook. James saw what looked like a small gray door on the wall just as wide as his hand, and about as tall. He opened it, revealing some buttons. James pressed the one that was the highest. The elevator started to move. Touching his chest, James said to Chavez, “See, historic spacecraft, my specialty.”

  Chavez’s shoulders loosened and she grinned.

  “Well done,” said Noa, the edge of a smile definitely on her lips.

  Looking up at the ceiling, James said in Japanese, “I hope we’re going to the bridge.”

  Noa coughed just as the lift jerked to a stop. The doors did not open. Instead, the ceiling slid away, and the walls dropped.

  17

  They were standing in a beam of light, in a circle of stairs much like the one that led out of the rain catch, but not so high. The bright sun outside made it lighter on the outside than in, and Noa had a perfect view of the city. In the distance, she saw smoke rising. For the first time since the skirmish outside the Ark, she thought of the protests Manuel had promised. Her hands turned to fists at her side. The uprising, the ‘civil disobedience’ that was distracting the bulk of the Guard forces, had turned violent. She had no doubt that the protesters would lose … and also, that they were probably responsible for the relative ease with which Noa and her people had made their way onto this ship. “Make this work,” Noa told herself. “For all of them out there.” She must have said the words aloud, because Chavez turned to her sharply.

  “It will work,” said James, and then he added in Japanese, “and if it doesn’t, it is better than the alternative.”