by T J Mott
He eventually found his boss sitting in the aft officers’ lounge. It was a small, quiet, intimate room with a few tables set throughout, and large windows which gave an excellent aft view from above the frigate’s main thrusters. The Caracal ran with far fewer crew than she was originally designed for, and so several areas of the ship saw very little use, including this lounge. Which made it a good hiding place for anyone searching for quiet and solitude.
If there was anything Marcell loved more than Earth, Reynolds thought, it was solitude. When on a mission, he rarely made his presence known except when necessary.
The room’s lights were dimmed, nearly out, leaving the room in a darkness that made the starlight outside look intense by comparison. Marcell was the only person in the room. He sat at a small circular table barely suitable for two, set right up against the room’s tall aft-facing observation windows which curved around the back of the space. He stared blankly out into space behind the frigate, appearing totally lost in thought. He had a glass of something undoubtedly alcoholic in front of him. Reynolds could smell its fumes all the way from the lounge entrance.
Marcell made no indication that he was aware of Reynolds, so the captain finally cleared his throat. Marcell slowly looked away from the window, yawing his head towards the entrance at a glacial speed that could probably be outpaced by a large star cruiser with half its maneuvering thrusters offline, and leaving Reynolds with no doubts about Marcell’s state of intoxication. “Mind if I join you, Admiral?”
After a moment, he quietly responded, “Yeah, sure, take a seat, Captain.” He turned his head back towards the window as Reynolds sat down opposite him. “How did the mission planning go?”
Reynolds looked down into Marcell’s glass. It was about half full with some kind of clear, noxious fluid that smelled distinctly like paint thinner. Judging by the large size of the ice cubes it was probably still pretty fresh. Reynolds wondered how many drinks came before it.
“Most of the details are in place,” he answered. “However, there is still a lot of…concern. Waverly Depot has a squadron of Uhlan-class patrol craft, at least six ships that we know of. If they get involved, we’ll be forced to retreat.”
Marcell jerked his head suddenly, twisting his attention away from the window and turning to face Reynolds. “Retreat is not an option,” he snapped with slurred words. “Hit fast and hit hard so we can leave before the Depot responds.”
Touchy. “Unfortunately, we do not know what their response time will be,” Reynolds said carefully. “And since we don’t know the Cassandra’s other jump points, we have to intercept her in the Depot’s immediate airspace. Everyone agrees it will be very hard for them not to respond.”
After a moment, Marcell took a heavy sigh and looked back out the window. “So close,” he said softly and slowly, his tone and expression showing no hint of the anger he’d displayed just moments before. “I wish we could raid it out in interstellar space somewhere, but that’s just not an option. Not with our limited intel. If we lose her now, we lose her forever.”
He paused to take a large gulp of his drink while Reynolds considered the ambiguity of Marcell’s words. Did her refer to the starship or the slave? Or even Earth itself?
“I know what a lot of you guys think of me. Frankly, if I were in your shoes I suppose I’d think the same things.” He sighed almost inaudibly. “Then this comes up. After all these years, finally a potential real clue about Earth. And I know we sometimes play those mind games, especially the Commodores, and we joke about what’s going to happen when I find Earth, or they prove me crazy, or whatever.”
He took another gulp, one that nearly finished his drink, and met Reynolds’ gaze with glassy eyes. “I’m not really out to prove you guys wrong or anything. I mean, I guess I am, but not like that, not like rubbing your nose in it. I just want to return home. Get back to my old life. Visit friends and family.”
Reynolds just bobbed his head in a tiny nod. He certainly understood the sentiment of Marcell’s mission, although he doubted the facts behind it.
“To tell the truth, lately, sometimes even I question it,” Marcell said. The frustration in his voice grew. “Why does no one believe Earth still exists? Was Earth a colony? Or was all of this out here a colony of Earth? Do you know what it’s like to go through life like this, desperately searching for something no one believes in, being alone in that? Well, except for the crazy treasure-hunter types I get lumped in with. Unfairly.”
“No, I guess I don’t know,” said Reynolds, speaking slowly as he tried to digest Marcell’s slurred and wandering thoughts. Though he definitely knew what it was like to work for one of those crazy treasure-hunter types, which he decided not to say aloud, although he smirked slightly at the thought.
“You know, I’ve thought, more lately, what if I am wrong? I don’t see how I could be, but what if? Maybe I should…ugh…Maybe I should give up on the search…and just stick with the mercenary stuff. I have a tonne of intel resources chasing down supposed Earth leads, and not one of them has ever borne fruit. But this…this was complete accident. Had nothing to do with my search, it was just a manifest illegally obtained by Coop’s hackers on a routine patrol…I don’t know why I was even looking at it. Total accident. Would have been so easy to miss. It just makes me think.”
He’d wondered about that himself. If—and he found this very unlikely—there were somehow a few people from Earth scattered throughout the galaxy’s population, they were a percentage far too small to be noticed, and easy to dismiss as simple mental cases, as many had dismissed Marcell. The chances of any two of them ever accidentally stumbling into each other would be so low as to be impossible. “What if you’re only seeing what you want to see?” Reynolds said. “There are trillions of people in the galaxy. It’s not uncommon to find a complete stranger who looks like someone you know.” He watched Marcell’s drunken expression, looking for any kind of reaction, but his face betrayed no emotion. Marcell was not a typical alcoholic. Even while heavily intoxicated, he was still an expert at masking himself off from others.
Either that, or he just didn’t feel anything at all.
“I don’t know. If it is real, maybe she doesn’t know any more than I do. I know I was abducted by slavers, but I don’t have any detail about who they were, or where we traveled. Why would it be any different for her?
“Or, I don’t know, what if she is someone else, and just happens to look the same and have the same name, and this is just yet another fruitless mission on my search?” Marcell’s eyes twitted back and forth a few times as he pondered all this. After a few moments he shrugged, then chuckled. “Or maybe I am crazy. Maybe I drank too much and this is all just a weird dream.”
Reynolds knew the younger man had obsessively spent much of his adult life on his search, and the quest had certainly taken its toll on him. Over the past few years he’d started showing signs of age: a few wrinkles near the eyes, some gray hairs at the temples, skin toughened from a life of intrigue, espionage, swashbuckling, and combat. He looked older than his thirty-four years.
“So who is she?” Reynolds finally posed. “Family? Friend? Lover?”
For the first time in their conversation, Marcell smiled. He leaned back into his seat and closed his eyes, obviously remembering more pleasant times, and the sudden cheer intrigued Reynolds. Normally he was a bundle of barely-concealed depression and high-functioning alcoholism.
“Adelia…” he said, opening his eyes again. He leaned forward and clasped his hands on the table, still smiling.
“I graduated from University and just finished getting my engineering certifications, and landed a nice job on a cruise liner called Lunar Dawn. This was about as cushy as it got. I got to play with a nice starship and all its systems, and we took on wealthy passengers for cruises around the Moon.
“I was there for a few months, enjoying my junior engineer position, when I noticed this lovely stewardess named Adelia.”
He paused fo
r another sip, still smiling the entire time. “She was so good with the passengers…I could never do that. Sweet girl. Lovely dark hair, lovely eyes, lovely smile…just lovely. Older than me…but not too much…I hardly knew her but I was young and was already in love. I watched from afar for a couple months. It was awkward, but I finally found the courage. So I talked to her, introduced myself, and asked her out.”
Reynolds smiled and chuckled to himself. Marcell rarely took the time to date anyone as far as Reynolds knew. He was just too solitary, not very social, and so hyper-focused on Earth and the logistical challenges of his organization that anything outside of that just didn’t even exist in his universe. Not to mention his damaged long-term memories, heavy drinking, and regular episodes of depression, sure to scare off any woman who might otherwise have had an interest in him. “So what happened?”
“She agreed.” Marcell’s smile dissolved. “But that very weekend after, before our first date, I had to travel for work. They were sending me to a seminar on Mars. And sometime on the way there, that was when I was abducted, and ended up out here…wherever here is.” He waved a shaky hand at the window in frustration to accentuate “here”.
“So you never saw her again.”
“Right.” Marcell leaned back again. “For years I wondered what she thought. Do they know what happened to me? Did she think I got scared and ran off? Or what about my parents, and brothers? What about when I return? It’s been long enough…surely she’s married and started a family by now.” He set an elbow on the table and rested his forehead in his palm, and let out a long, frustrated sigh before grabbing his glass and finishing his drink in one startlingly fast gulp.
He looked back at Reynolds. “Finally I just quit asking myself, and settled on knowing they all thought I was dead. Especially after this long. Although I still wonder what they’ll all think when I return.”
Reynolds was getting a rare glimpse into the inner workings of Marcell’s mind. Despite his occasional prying, he’d never managed to get him to open up much. Not like this. Reynolds wasn’t sure if Marcell letting his guard down was a good sign, or a bad one.
Marcell continued. “Truth is, I get pretty lonely. I missed her, and home, and…lots of other things, really. Sometimes I wonder if all this is a dream. And I’ve just been too busy to think about it, for the most part. About finding a wife out here, that is. None of them can get past the whole ‘I’m from Earth’ thing. Eventually, I guess I just gave up…but it still hurts, when I actually have the spare time to think about it. I guess that’s why I keep myself so busy. Makes me not notice it as much. Until times like now, the downtimes when I don’t have much to do but wait.”
Reynolds could think of nothing to say.
“And the chance of seeing Adelia again has set off all kinds of old feelings I’d forgotten about, but…Eleven years now. I know in my head it’s probably too late for us. Stupid internal conflict. Brain says one thing, heart says another, and I’m stuck in the middle where it hurts. I don’t understand it.” His eyes began to appear wet. “I heard you have grandchildren, don’t you, Captain?”
“Uh-huh.” Reynolds nodded. “Two children, and five grandkids between them. They all live in the Keide Sector. I try to make it out there once a year to visit, although it’s been a while now.”
“Wife?”
Reynolds shook his head. “She died fifteen years ago in a shuttle accident while I was out on a long-term patrol. And she’d already been gone for three months by the time I got the message.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Marcell tried to take another drink, then cast an annoyed scowl down into his already-empty glass.
“It’s not easy being an officer. It’s hard to have a family and impossible to have a home life. Especially for those of our rank. But, I accepted that a long time ago, and I’m content with it.”
“Well, you’re a better man than I. I’m far from content. Which is why I keep so busy, why I get so caught up in my work, my search…makes me forget. Distractions. Eleven years,” he remarked while staring into his empty glass. “She’s probably got a husband, kids…and if it goes the same way it did with me, she’ll never see them again. They’ll all think she’s dead…and that’ll be the worst of it all. How can I face having feelings for someone whose family thinks she’s dead? Or how will it play out when we return to Earth?”
“It’s been a long time,” Reynolds warned. “Don’t let yourself get hooked on old feelings. And people can change. She is probably not the woman you remember anymore.”
“Yeah,” said Marcell. He fell silent again and stared into his empty glass, his countenance once again downtrodden. Then he smiled suddenly. “You know…I gotta admit…and this is probably way out of line, given…well, everything…that pilot of yours…oh, what’s her name? She’s actually pretty cute.”
“Oh no.” Reynolds’ lips curled up amusement. “Not Lieutenant Poulsen?”
“Hmm, sounds right. The tall blonde?”
“Yeah, that’s Amanda Poulsen. She joined us a bit over a year ago.” Reynolds suppressed a laugh at the mental image of those two. “Hell of a starship pilot. But—”
“Well, she’s gorgeous. Tall, fit. Amazonian—”
“And she would eat. You. Alive,” interjected Reynolds, jabbing a finger at Marcell as if to punctuate each word, and wondering what “Amazonian” meant. “She’s got issues but won’t talk about it. Barely respects authority, and at the same time doesn’t respect those who lack discipline. And she’s got a severe repressed temper. One of these days she’s going to snap.” Reynolds shook his head, still suppressing a laugh. “I can deal with her, which is why she stayed in my command instead of getting kicked to the street, but you dealing with her, in the manner you’re suggesting! You should see her kickboxing in the gym. She would break you in half!”
“To be honest, that might not be a bad thing…” Marcell said with an exaggerated head tilt. Then he pursed his lips and his expression sobered. “But, I guess it doesn’t matter…the thing right now is to rescue Adelia…then, who knows?” Marcell’s tone drifted back towards lonely and depressed. Reynolds was somewhat surprised he was still awake after that last glass of liquor.
The shipwide intercom buzzed. “Attention… Attention, all hands. A ten-hour hyperspace jump will commence in thirty minutes. A one-zero hour hyperspace jump will commence in three-zero minutes. That is all.”
Marcell stood, rather shakily, keeping a hand flat on the table to balance himself. “Well, I guess that’s my cue to get to my cabin and get some sleep before the sauna fires up again.”
Reynolds nodded. “That sounds like a good plan.”
“You have no idea, Captain. I haven’t slept in two days.”
Reynolds was not surprised by the revelation. “You look like hell, Marcell. Go get some sleep.”
Marcell carefully staggered towards the lounge exit, trying not to stumble over himself, leaving Reynolds alone to contemplate his boss’s drunken ramblings.
Chapter 5
Lieutenant Commander Green stood in the cramped lounge-like corridor outside the main officers’ quarters, reviewing his notes on a tablet and making a few last-minute changes before heading to the morning’s mission planning session. As chief of the Caracal’s gunnery department, it was his responsibility to consider how the frigate would make its attack. Analyze the target, determine weaknesses, and prioritize its subsystems for targeting. In a way, if their plans to rescue Adelia through nonviolent means failed, the entire mission rested completely on his shoulders.
He wasn’t entirely comfortable with that thought.
The lounge was like a small cul-de-sac, a common space surrounded by officer cabins, with a few large chairs and even artificial potted plants set up long ago to make the space feel more like a friendly family living room. The deck was even carpeted here, though the short ceiling and bare metal walls covered in a network of piping and conduits still made it obvious that one was aboard a small warship.
A small, overheating warship, he reminded himself as he wiped the sweat from his brow yet again. One with an obviously unstable commander who thought he was from Earth. Green had heard the rumors before, but he’d always dismissed them as silly ship’s gossip or tall tales used to haze the new guys. But hearing it straight from Marcell’s own mouth had been unsettling.
I knew her from Earth. Marcell’s insane statement still rang fresh in Green’s mind.
He heard a door open nearby and turned to look. His eyes quickly found the source of the noise. One of the corner doors in the rectangular room was open, and Lieutenant Poulsen, with her face flushed from the heat, stepped into the hall, appearing sharp as always in her Blue Fleet uniform. “Good morning, Amanda,” he said with a broad grin.
“Shut up,” she said flatly without even looking in his direction.
Green chuckled lightly. “You know I’m a Lieutenant Commander now. You should try to show your superiors some respect.”
“Shut up, sir,” she said flatly, and moved to walk past him.
But Green stepped in her way. She stopped walking. She frowned, glared at him, and her nostrils flared in anger. He started to wonder if he should duck. “In all seriousness, can we talk a minute?” he asked.
“I don’t think we have anything to discuss.” The starship pilot’s expression looked dangerously annoyed now, and she began to step around him.
“It’s about the mission,” he added. She stopped again. A moment later, she turned to face him, standing tall with her chin held high, her expression completely blank. “I want to know what you think of Admiral Marcell and our mission,” he asked. “Off the record.”
“Off the record?” She raised an eyebrow. “He’s an arrogant, drunken cock-thistle and his mission is reckless and pointless.” He stifled a smirk as he mentally filed away the new insult. Her frankness could still startle him at times. “And that stays off the record or I will beat you to a pulp. Sir.”
