Mission Pack 1: Missions 1-4 (Black Ocean Mission Pack)

by J. S. Morin

  “Computer, five more degrees, please,” Esper said to the room, and she heard a whoosh of warm air begin flowing in to counter the chill that was more in her head than on her legs.

  The datanote wasn’t done with her yet. There was a silk neck ribbon specified as well. After that, in the top of the wardrobe, a black cloche hat with a white bow. The matching shoes were sixty millimeter heels, and Esper wobbled around the room for a few minutes getting used to them. She hadn’t worn heels since she was eighteen.

  She hadn’t removed either her crucifix necklace or her bloodstone charm, which had turned a shade of pink that would be embarrassing if anyone recognized it for what it was. The color stood out against her pale skin—the only touch of color in her ensemble. Leaving it behind seemed foolish. The last thing she needed was weeks waiting for it to attune itself to her again if she was late in putting it back on.

  The door warning chimed. It was time to go. Her escort was the thick-armed guard, who barely spoke a word and looked her square in the chest when he did. It was high school all over again. For a few minutes, once she had worked out the kinks in walking in heels, she had posed in front of the mirror like a glamor model, feeling ladylike and pretty for the first time in a long while. Thick-arms had turned her back into a piece of meat in an instant.

  The admiral’s private office was up a short metal stairway. Esper clung to the railings with an iron grip as she tiptoed in her heeled slippers, the soles so new they might as well have been waxed. But her relief at the top was fleeting, replaced by wonder.

  They were at the top of the ship, in a clear dome, either glassteel or transparent metal, depending on whether science or magic had been used. Stretched out above them was Carousel. It was a dull, ugly world compared to many, but stretched out and filling the sky, it was breathtaking.

  “I’m glad you like the view,” Admiral Chisholm said. Esper blinked and turned her attention to her host and warden. Her eyes went wide, and her tongue stuck in her throat. The admiral had changed out of her uniform and into a dress better suited to sleepwear than receiving company. It was flimsy, diaphanous, and held up by two thin strips of fabric. The admiral’s hair was unbound, still wavy from having been in braids. She wore a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles perched on her nose and held a wine glass.

  Esper’s first step cost her a stumble, her attention fixed on Admiral Chisholm and not on remembering to keep her toes pointed down. “Sorry,” she said as she grabbed the edge of a side table set with a platter of cheeses.

  “It becomes you,” Admiral Chisholm said. “Even if you’re not used to it. Go ahead. Ask. I see the question in your eyes. There can be no truth where questions are feared.”

  “I feel overdressed,” Esper said. She made a gesture as if to point, but stopped short of actually aiming a finger at the admiral. “You… you seem rather relaxed, admiral.”

  “This is a place for getting out of yourself,” she said, flourishing her wine glass. “For you, it’s getting out of the drear and drudgery of your self-imposed life as a spacer. For me, it’s getting out of prim and proper and being called admiral. In here, please call me Emily, Esper.” She gestured to a seat across from her.

  “Thank you… Emily,” Esper replied, sinking gratefully into a seat and sneaking her feet out of her heels. How had she worn those to school every day for years on end?

  A crewman in something resembling a tuxedo slipped in and poured a glass of wine for Esper and refilled Emily’s glass. Esper sipped it, and found it more sweet than biting.

  “If you are wondering about the occasion, I have good news for you,” Admiral Emily said.

  Esper pursed her lips into a dutifully expectant smile as she lowered her glass. She cocked her head.

  “The data specialist you brought with you to Carousel is a mole. My people dug into his … well, details are boring, but he works for an anti-syndicate task force. All your friends need to do is get themselves out of the crossfire, and the Earth Interstellar Enhanced Investigative Org will take care of Janice Rucker for me.”

  “So, I can leave?” Esper asked. She took another sip of the delicious wine.

  Emily gave a sniffing chuckle as she drank, then wiped her mouth with a finger. “No, not yet. But soon enough, should your friends not get swept up in the whole affair.”

  Dinner came, and it was unlike anything Esper had eaten. Despite her family’s rise to wealth and respectability, it had always been a secret shame that her parents had clung to low-class cuisine, preferring the taste and familiarity to the more stylish selections of their newfound peers. Esper had never eaten duck, let alone one basted in Earth-wine sauce, and her apple was infused with chocolate, a feat she had never heard of before.

  Throughout the meal, Emily questioned Esper about her personal philosophy, and how one went about living within the teachings of a single school of thought. In return, Emily shared her commingling of Machiavelli and Augustus Caesar’s views into the command of her own fleet.

  “It’s not as if I earned respect instantly,” Admiral Emily replied. She waved a fork for emphasis, a bit of duck skewered on the end. There was a slur in her voice, not enough to sour its melody, but enough to suggest a saturation with wine. “I was handed the fleet from my father, who had gotten it from his mother. First I Machiavelli’ed the ones who refused to follow me… not suitable for dinner conversation. Then I set my sights on building, expanding, conquering. Do great things. Taking Freeride… all my idea.”

  Esper couldn’t recall who Machiavelli was right then, and Caesar was the one who got killed in Shakespeare as far as she remembered. “That’s impressive. Very impressive. You have the nicest bunch of pirates I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen…” Esper frowned a moment. “…two.”

  Emily laughed, and Esper found it infectious. Crewmen came and cleared away their dinner plates, and refilled their wine glasses. Esper knew she’d drunk too much, but it tasted so good she was having trouble finding a reason to refuse more.

  Emily took a long swallow of wine and sighed. It was the sort of emptying sigh that purges the lungs to leave you feeling clean inside. Esper grinned, and Emily locked stares with her. “You know,” Admiral Emily said. “I might enjoy spending a night in my own quarters.” She licked the wine from her lips.

  Esper giggled. “It’s your ship. Who’s going to tell you where to sleep?”

  Emily stood and dragged the fingers of one hand along the table as she came around to Esper’s side and stood behind her. Esper felt the warmth of hands on her bare shoulders and the whisper of breath on her ear. “Those are my quarters you’re borrowing. I wouldn’t think of imposing where I wasn’t… wanted.”

  Esper blushed head to toe, and her breath quickened. This had suddenly become a sticky situation, with the risk of becoming stickier. The good idea/bad idea portion of her brain was submerged in a liter of wine. She was pretty sure there was sinning on the way—not that drunkenness wasn’t a sin already. A lot of sins seemed to be chasing her down of late, and Esper was doing a poor job of sidestepping this one. Compared to murder, it seemed fairly minor. But that had been an accident, and this one might also be an accident. She hadn’t had a man in her bed in six years, and this wouldn’t even technically break her streak. Not to mention the other night when she’d had her engines revved up to full throttle before diverting emergency power to a harmless massage.

  Esper stood, stumbling to her side and catching herself on the edge of a table with a helpless giggle. Emily bent down and looked her in the eye, laughing along. “I’m… I… flattered, but I… I can’t.”

  Emily hadn’t received the message any more clearly than it had been transmitted. “Sure you can. It’s eeeasy. I can show you.” She reached out and put her hands atop Esper’s.

  Esper pulled away, catching herself on Emily’s chair. “No. Not ‘no,’” she said, holding up her hands to ward off hurt feelings, then grabbing hold of the chair once more when wine and heels threatened to deposit her on the floor. “B
ut it’s a… philosophical thing. Core principle violation.”

  Emily straightened and sighed again, this time wistful. Her drunkenness seemed much less pronounced as she walked over and laced her fingers behind Esper’s neck. “Such a shame. I had assumed, since you shunned Raimi—”

  “Nope,” Esper said, shaking her head emphatically, causing a sudden wave of dizziness. When the spell passed, Emily’s lips found hers. She struggled briefly in her surprise, but the taste of sweet wine and the warm softness relaxed her. Alarm klaxons horned in her brain, warning of error codes and improper signals being received. Esper closed her eyes.

  Emily released her with a gasp. “A pity. Your soul is a work of art. If your friends didn’t make it back, I’d have gladly kept you as my personal attendant.” With that, she turned and headed down the stairs.

  Esper made the walk back to her borrowed quarters barefoot, leaning on Thick-Arms for support.

  # # #

  As soon as the door closed behind her, Esper collapsed against the adjacent wall. The room spun as she leaned her head back until it bumped against the faux plaster with a dull thump. With a push of willpower, she abandoned the support of the wall’s presence, and let her heeled shoes drop to the floor as she staggered toward the dessert cart, freshly replenished in her absence.

  Her stomach sloshed with wine, still being sucked into her bloodstream and her liver, continuing to exacerbate her drunkenness. If she didn’t act quickly, she’d pass out, losing goodness only knew how much vital time. The Mobius crew was walking into a trap, and she was the only one who both knew and was inclined to inform them. The pastries were probably delicious when savored one by one, teasing out flavors from frostings and jellied fillings. Rammed into her mouth in pairs, with more to follow before she finished swallowing the prior lot, it was a sugary mush.

  When the nausea of overeating threatened to overwhelm her, Esper used her magic. “Cuts close, bruises fade; three weeks healing done today; bones knit, pains ease; cleanse the body of disease.” The rhyme was a comfort, a measure of control she had lacked when she killed Kenneth Eugene Shaw. The warm giddiness of her alcoholic stupor gave way to the fevered heat of her bodily functions kicking into overdrive. In seconds, the confusion of drunkenness had passed, along with the overfull sensation of a stomach crammed with jelly-puffs.

  Bryce Brisson worked for the Earth law enforcement. Janice was being set up, and everyone was going to get fished up in the same net if she didn’t warn them. She needed a way to contact them. Her first thought was the datanote on the table. Sure, they had told her it was limited to just a few select functions, but the easiest modification to a standard datapad would be to just lie about what it could do.

  It was a Tooky-brand datapad, which didn’t bode well. If anyone was cheap enough to sell datapads with all the functionality of a few slips of paper, it was Tooky Industries. The menu options were limited, letting Esper see the dress she was still wearing, along with a diagram of suggested accessories. It had an alterable alarm set for fifteen minutes before dinner, but which wasn’t helpful in any other way she could imagine. There were standard functions as well: a calculator, calendar, a number of selectable background images, but nothing that transmitted.

  The application of a butter knife was enough to pop the case open, the front and back halves popping neatly apart. The innards only took up two thirds of the interior volume, the rest being wasted space. Esper pored over the components, identifying each part as she was able. Processor. Screen. Microphone. Data Storage. There wasn’t even a camera or motion sensors, let alone a broadcast antenna. She pushed the pieces off the table in disgust.

  She had already checked the holo-projector, back on her first night with the Poets. It was a receiver only, and she knew she didn’t have the know-how to convert it into a two-way. That left finding a transmitter somewhere else aboard the Look On My Works, Ye Mighty, and Despair. That meant getting out past the guard. Or did it?

  The guards were regular crewmen. They were full-on pirates, with loot and plunder, probably. They could afford fancy clothes and shiny weapons that could do all sorts of interesting and horrible things to people. Her door guards only carried stun batons—which was a small comfort, not that she wanted to get beaten with stun batons—but the other Poets carried a creative array of weaponry. People who can afford expensive things don’t carry around Tooky datapads; they’d have top-of-the-line OmniWalkers or Slashcubes, maybe one of the trendy laaku Yinswoos.

  Esper stopped short. It was the second occasion in the past week where she’d considered stealing a datapad. “I must have some hang-up on datapads,” she muttered. “I should probably buy myself a nice one when this is all over.” That seemed like a reasonable compromise. Head off theft by indulging in palliative consumerism. Not quite a biblical solution to the problem, but that was a matter for later prayer and introspection.

  A quick check of the wall chrono said it was nearing midnight. “What?” she gasped. She had dined and snacked and drank with Emily for hours. She felt a small pang of guilt for apparently leading the admiral on for so long. It was more effort than anyone had put into seducing her in a long time. But the late hour meant that a change of guards was due at any moment. Thick-Arms would hand her over to Paul, one of the few whose name she had learned.

  Her hands shook. They knew what she was thinking before she even admitted it to herself. After cleaning up the broken datanote, she poured herself a glass of champagne. She hadn’t touched the room’s stock of liquors until just then, not wanting to turn into Roddy, who washed away his time in a liquid coma. But she was fully sober, and a sober Esper wasn’t what her plan called for. She downed a half glass in two giant gulps, then refilled it halfway and took a seat in her reading chair. The hat got in the way of her lounging, so she tossed it on the floor nearby.

  The door warning chimed. Her heart quickened. The plan had flaws, not the least of which was that of its several resolutions, the successful paths were all a choice between minor evils. She took another quick sip of champagne to dull that little voice that told her maybe her plan wasn’t supposed to work.

  “Good evening, Miss Richelieu,” Paul greeted her when the door opened. “Anything you need, I’ll be right outside until morning.” He stepped back into the hall, and was about to close the door.

  “Wait!” Esper said. “There is something.” Paul stepped back in and put his hands on his hips. He was rugged, squarish in the shoulders and jaw, with a shaved scalp and pecks that showed through the fabric of his shirt. Esper licked her lips and avoided looking Paul in the eye, but let him see her looking over the rest of him. “Do you have a moment?”

  “Sure.” He looked over his shoulder, then hit the door control. They were alone together.

  “What are your orders, specifically?” Esper asked.

  Paul shrugged. “Keep you from going anywhere. Not let anyone in without the admiral or Indira’s say-so. Pass along if you need anything.”

  “What if it was something you could do yourself?” Esper asked.

  Paul shook his head. “Can’t leave my post. I can get someone to bring you anything, pretty much. What do you need?”

  “Are you breaking your orders right now, then?” Esper asked. “You’re not outside the door.”

  “I can be in here,” he said defensively. “Ain’t nothing wrong with that.”

  “Long enough for drinks?” Esper asked. Oh God, please let her not sound like a blithering idiot. “Maybe… longer?”

  Paul smirked. “I heard about you and the admiral tonight.”

  Esper swallowed, wishing she were a teensy bit more drunk for this. “A girl has needs, but it’s… well, some locks just need the right key.” Dear Lord, had she just said that? Where did that come from? Was it from some sappy holovid? Hopefully Paul hadn’t seen it if it was.

  “Oh yeah?” Paul asked, his smirk turning speculative. Men were such docile brutes. Esper fought back a wave of disgust over just how easy this was prov
ing to be.

  She stood and eyed the wet bar. Tipping back the remainder of her champagne, she asked, “Care to fill me up?” She waggled the empty glass. That line she recognized the moment it escaped her lips. It was from Daisy’s Choice, which she had watched more times than she cared to admit.

  Paul was subtle, unhooking his stun baton and setting it on the table by the door. Nonthreatening. He knew that much, at least. He apparently knew the selection in the admiral’s quarters as well, picking up an unlabeled decanter without hesitation. It was obviously not his first romp in this suite.

  As he poured, Esper slipped around behind him, dragging a hand along the rippling muscles of his back. From the corner of her eye, she could see Paul’s grin widen. But in her other hand, Esper held an unopened bottle of Chateau Descartes 2648; she brought it down on the back of Paul’s skull with all her might.

  Paul grunted and keeled over, stumbling to a knee. Esper hit him again before he recovered. He fell limp, and Esper breathed a sigh of relief, mixed with horror. She crossed herself, closed her eyes, and asked forgiveness. There was just no other way she could think of to save her friends. Sleeping with Paul might have worked, but she had chosen her lesser evil and she was going to stick with it. Besides, it was easier than sneaking around, hoping he didn’t wake up.

  Paul kept his datapad in a pocket at his thigh. Even limp, the muscle was stiff. Esper caught herself admiring his physique, but quickly shoved those thoughts aside. She had been right; his datapad was modern. It was an OmniWalker Tudor, last year’s most popular high-end model—not that Esper had followed such trends, or quietly envied the Harmony Bay scientists’ children who carried them. It was thumbprint locked, which proved to be an impediment for all of ten seconds. Paul limply obliged from the floor.

  Tanny’s safety drills came in handy once more. Esper had memorized the comm code for the Mobius, the one that didn’t show up in general directories on the omni. She punched it in and waited.

  There was no response.