The Caphenon

by Fletcher DeLancey

  “And the flowering ones?” Micah asked.

  The captain smiled. “Not everything serves a purely practical purpose. Those are epiphytes, able to grow without any medium at all. We value them for their blossoms. There’s an entire bay devoted to these, so they can be rotated in and out as they bloom.”

  “How many full-time gardeners do you have on your crew?” Tal asked as they began picking their way down the steeply tilted corridor.

  “Thirty-five. And if I know my head gardener, she’s probably having a fit right now thinking about the damage I’ve caused her babies. Every deck on the Caphenon is planted, but if you think this is nice, you ought to see our top deck. It’s a sacrificial deck, outside the battle hull, so we can’t use it for critical infrastructure. Instead we use it as an arboretum and lounge. When we don’t need full hullskin coverage, we roll enough of it back to uncover the viewports all over the top deck, and the effect is lovely. A park in space.”

  Micah looked at the plants with new appreciation. The Gaians might not have castes, but they had producers who cared for the creations of Fahla even while hurtling through space. Remarkable. He’d envisioned warriors, scholars, and builders on this ship, of course. But not producers, and not crafters. Yet those mosaics were certainly the work of crafters. The only caste missing was the merchants.

  “Are there shops on your ship as well?” he asked.

  “No, Fleet ships don’t have independent shopfronts. We have goods and service providers, but they’re all Fleet personnel. Space stations and corporate liners are a different matter; they’re full of independent merchants.”

  Little else was said as they moved downhill. The Alseans were too busy staring at their surroundings to ask any more questions, and the Gaians seemed subdued. Or perhaps overwhelmed, Micah thought. As a warrior who’d spent his career in the Alsean Defense Force, moving from one base to another with each promotion and mission, he’d never viewed his housing as a real home. Not until he’d moved to Blacksun to be Tal’s Chief Guardian. But these people took their home with them when they moved from place to place. How much more shocking it must be, then, to have that home ripped away.

  And they had done it for Alsea. He and Tal, and every warrior he knew, would probably be dead by now if it weren’t for these Gaians. Most everyone else would be in the process of being rounded up for enslavement. Instead, Alsea was nearly untouched and here he was, walking down an awe-inspiring corridor of this massive alien ship.

  He paused in front of one of the flowers, enjoying its light perfume and gently touching a yellow blossom. To his surprise, the petal beneath his finger turned blue, deepest in the center and lighter toward the edges.

  “Are you a pre-Rite child, that you can’t keep your hands at your sides?” Tal’s voice was amused as she came up behind him.

  “Look at this,” he murmured.

  “Oh…how lovely.” She touched a different petal, and they both watched it react. “Is it responding to our body heat?”

  “To the electrical field of your skin, actually.”

  Micah didn’t recognize the voice and turned to find the shy young weapons specialist standing near as the rest of the group moved past.

  “Are you a botanist as well, Trooper Blunt?” Tal asked.

  “No, nothing so fancy as that. I just love plants, and these especially. They’re Filessian orchids. I always had one of these in my bedroom growing up. My favorites are the purple ones that turn yellow.”

  Funny, Micah thought. When aliens drop out of the sky and save everyone from a ruthless species of slavers, you don’t think about them being children in their bedrooms.

  Blunt was full of information about the various plants on the ship, and Tal kept her talking until they arrived at their destination. Half of the Gaian crew had already passed through an open door when Blunt said, “You should take an orchid with you, Lancer Tal.”

  “I would love to. But will I be able to keep it alive in a different environment, off this ship?”

  Blunt shrugged. “I can give you instructions. They’re pretty easy to take care of. And any orchid you take would at least have a chance of living. All the rest are going to die when the ship goes.”

  “Blunt!” called a voice from inside the doorway.

  “I have to go. It was nice speaking with you.” The young woman smiled and walked off to join her team, leaving Micah and Tal staring at each other.

  Tal shook her head at him, warning him to say nothing, and they silently followed Blunt into the room. But Micah’s mind was racing.

  The Gaians were going to destroy their ship.

  Chapter 31

  Fleet orders

  Ekatya slouched in the chair that had been propped with its back against the table—the only way to comfortably sit in the sloping room—and impatiently watched Kameha fiddle with his console.

  Their new com room was really a conference room, which Kameha had chosen yesterday after scanning the ship for the most structurally stable area with the easiest access. He’d done a lot of preliminary work the previous evening to get things up and running, including restoring full power to this deck.

  Lhyn’s ship, the Arkadia, had kept a geosynchronous orbit over the Caphenon while its crew waited for news. Kameha had made radio contact with them last night, just long enough to establish a time for this morning’s call. The quantum communication system was fried, which made everything more difficult. Not only was the Caphenon’s com system unable to maintain a connection with any crew outside the ship, they were also limited to line-of-sight communication with other ships. The laser com—very old but robust tech—had come through the crash in fine shape, with only the targeting scanners showing damage. Now it was a matter of manually targeting the Arkadia, and Kameha assured her he’d have it in another few minutes.

  Candini, Xi, and the weapons team were on their way, with no difficulties encountered so far other than the effort it took to move through the tilted ship. Baldassar had taken Lhyn and the Alseans to the lab next door, where he was explaining how the structural scanning system worked. Once he’d seen Xi to the cargo bay and Candini’s team to the fighter bay, he planned to give Lancer Tal and her group a video tour of the ship. It was a poor substitute for the real thing, but Ekatya would never again give a real tour of the Caphenon. She tried not to dwell on that.

  “Got it!” Kameha said in a satisfied tone. “Hold on.”

  She sat up straight, and a moment later was looking into the relieved face of Captain Habersaat.

  “Captain Serrado, thank the stars! I’m so glad to see you.”

  “I’m glad to see you, too. It’s been a long day and a half.”

  “I’ll bet. We’ve been monitoring the broadcasts, so we knew some of you had survived, but Lancer Tal never gave any names. We’d been thinking the worst until Commander Kameha radioed us early this morning. I’m very sorry for your fatalities, but relieved that you and Dr. Rivers are all right.”

  Ekatya was startled for a moment by his reference to Kameha’s morning call. But the Arkadia was still on ship time, while she and her crew had gotten their own internal clocks thoroughly out of sorts.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I wish we’d had no fatalities at all, but considering what we managed to do, only three dead is something of a miracle.”

  He nodded, the single braid of his gray beard swaying with the movement. “Indeed it is. It’s too bad you couldn’t see my bridge when you vaporized that orbital invader. For a couple of minutes it sounded like a bacchanal in here.”

  That made her smile in spite of herself. “It was a Hades of a shot. Full credit goes to my weapons team.”

  “I’d say partial credit goes to the weapons team, and full credit to the captain who was too stubborn to let the Voloth get away. I just wish you’d been able to pull the Caphenon out. To be honest, none of us believed until the last second that you wouldn’t be coming back.”

  “There was only so much we could do with no fusion core. If
I could have gotten out and pushed, I would have.”

  “I know. And I have never wished more for a type six tractor beam and the power to run it. It was hard to watch that from here.” He gave a brisk nod and said, “Now I’m guessing you’d like to dispense with the small talk and get down to ship’s business.”

  “I do have a few pressing concerns.”

  “Of course. As I told Commander Kameha this morning, we have accounted for every one of your crew. We managed to bring one hundred and twelve aboard, and I wish it could have been more.”

  “One hundred and twelve? That’s extremely generous of you, but it’s going to push your scrubbers to the limit, not to mention physical space. Where are you putting them all?”

  “Well, just between you and me,” he said with a conspiratorial grin, “those academics hardly sleep anyway, so why would they need such large quarters? We managed to fit eight just in Dr. Rivers’ quarters.”

  “I think I won’t tell her that. What about my wounded?”

  “All aboard. Your chief medical officer was very efficient in letting me know who should get priority and sending those pods to us. I’m afraid some of your wounded didn’t have an easy ride, though. A few of them arrived in worse shape than when they left the Caphenon. But everyone is stable and on the road to recovery.”

  Ekatya settled into her seat, feeling the worst of the tension leave her shoulders. Kameha hadn’t gotten the report on the wounded, just the number of crew accounted for.

  “And now we’re like a mama spider in the web,” Habersaat continued. “One larger ship in the center of a whole swarm of little pods, plus a few shuttles.”

  “Just so long as mama spider keeps them safe.”

  “I will.”

  It was an empty promise and they both knew it. If the Voloth made another attempt before Protectorate forces could arrive, all of those pods, the shuttles, and the Arkadia herself would be nothing more than targets on the shooting range. Ekatya couldn’t relax until her people were on something with a little more firepower than a science ship.

  “What’s the estimated time of arrival for reinforcements?” she asked.

  He sobered. “I wish I could answer that question. It would seem that Fleet has not yet decided to send a battle group. They’re sending a personnel ship to pick up you and your crew, and the Arkadia has been ordered to return with it.”

  For a moment she thought she’d misheard, but his expression told her otherwise. “What in all the purple planets are they thinking? The Voloth could be sending another invasion group as we speak and Fleet is sitting around with its thumb up its ass? Does the Assembly want a Voloth outpost on our back doorstep?”

  “They’re not telling me anything, Captain. I don’t understand it either. Maybe your orders will tell you more, because mine were distinctly lacking in specifics.”

  “Then I need those orders sooner rather than later. Do you mind if we retrieve them now?”

  “No, of course not.” He looked offscreen. “Thwyk, open a channel to the base space relay.”

  “Channel open,” said a deep voice a few seconds later.

  “Captain, your code?”

  With a twinge of reluctance, Ekatya rattled off her correspondence code. Until now she had never given it to another living being, guarding it as fiercely as her command code. While she waited for the Arkadia to make the connection, she reflected on how ingrained some habits were, even when there was no alternative.

  “Packet retrieved,” said the deep voice. “Sending now.”

  “Packet received,” Kameha announced. He tapped his console a few times. “It’s on your pad.”

  “Thank you. Captain Habersaat, I’m sending Dr. Rivers in while I take a look at these. And I’ll need to borrow your quantum com later as a relay.”

  “I expected as much. Thwyk will assist whenever you ask.”

  “I appreciate it. Thanks again for being the mama spider. You restored some lost years to my lifespan with that report.”

  “We’re glad to help, Captain. Shippers know you saved our asses.”

  After sending Lhyn into the com room, Ekatya stepped across the hall to an empty office, retrieved the chair from where it had ended up wedged behind a console, and sat down to read her orders. Five minutes later she stood up, put her foot on the chair, and shoved it so hard that it promptly wedged itself under a different console, making a gratifying crash in the process.

  “Fucking, ass-headed, feeble-minded idiots!”

  She was still seething when a tap sounded on the door and Kameha gingerly poked his head in. “Captain, are you all right? I heard something breaking.”

  “Yes, my Shipper-damned patience!” She wanted to break something else, but nothing was close to hand other than her pad—the pad with the most asinine orders she’d ever had the displeasure to read.

  “Did Fleet not authorize the assault?”

  “No, they did. We’re fine there, at least.” The rage was making her chest tight, and she shouldn’t have been surprised to see Lancer Tal appear next to her chief engineer. She looked concerned, which only served to make Ekatya angrier. At least Kameha had only known something was wrong by the sound of the chair hitting the console. But Lancer Tal was sensing her, and right now she didn’t need that.

  A moment later she changed her mind. If the Alsean wanted to listen to her emotions, then let her get the full mental earful. After all, this concerned her.

  “Commander, will you excuse us, please?”

  “Yes, Captain.” He withdrew, leaving Lancer Tal watching her quizzically.

  “Come in, Lancer.” She waited until the door had closed, then said, “I’d offer you a seat, but you’d have to pull it out from where I just kicked it.”

  “That’s all right. I try never to be caught sitting in a small room with someone as angry as you are.” Lancer Tal braced herself with a hip against the nearest console.

  “Because the best warriors always know when to retreat? Then you’re taking a chance, letting that door close behind you.” She slipped the pad back into its sleeve pocket, removing it from temptation. “I’ve just read my orders from Fleet.”

  Once again she was reminded of how different the Alseans were. Most Gaians would have asked about the orders, or made some guess as to what they contained. Lancer Tal just crossed her arms over her chest and waited silently.

  “The only good news I can give you is that Fleet authorized the attack on the Voloth invasion group. So somebody somewhere has their head screwed on straight. Unfortunately, whoever that is did not prevail, because I received a second set of orders countermanding the first.”

  Lancer Tal dropped her arms. “The Protectorate is not going to defend Alsea?”

  “As it stands right now, no. They’re not sending reinforcements, and I’m ordered to return with my crew to await reassignment. I haven’t spoken to my supervisor yet,” she added, “so I don’t have any answers as to why. It may not be a permanent decision. Certainly there’s some high-level maneuvering going on, because this business of countermanding orders only happens when the politicians are fighting over whose pants are bigger. Exactly who is maneuvering for what, I don’t know. But I can assure you, I’m going to piss on every desk in Fleet to find out. This is wrong on so many levels I can’t even count them all.”

  After a long pause, Lancer Tal said, “Did the battle take place before or after the countermand?”

  “Before. Are you actually worrying about my career right now?”

  “You sacrificed your ship for us, Captain. It makes me feel a little better knowing you won’t be punished for that.”

  “You are something else.” Ekatya’s ire waned in the face of such an unexpected reaction. “That’s the last thing you should be worrying about.”

  “Not the last. But you’re right, this is not good news. Is there a timeline on when the Voloth might try again?”

  “There’s nothing in my orders about that. Once Candini gives us some answers from
the fighter bay, I’ll report to my supervisor and find out what’s really going on. I hope.”

  The anger that surged back up was so strong that she saw the Lancer physically react to it, shifting her weight and widening her stance slightly. It was the instinctive response of a highly trained fighter to a threat, and even in her mood she could appreciate it.

  “Three lives,” she said. “Three lives and my ship, sacrificed for the greater good, and some nameless morons are going to make it all for nothing. They are taking those courageous, good people’s deaths and spitting on them.”

  Lancer Tal relaxed but made no answer, and it took Ekatya a moment to realize how that must have sounded to the person currently facing the annihilation of her entire civilization. She exhaled, shaking her head.

  “I’m sorry. That was…thoughtless. I hope you don’t think I’m only angry on my own behalf, because it’s not true. I’m angry for your sake as well. For Alsea, and what looks like a senseless decision.”

  “I know you are. Selfish anger feels different than anger on behalf of others.” Lancer Tal glanced at the door. “And there’s a summer windstorm of the latter coming this way.”

  The door opened and Lhyn burst in, her face red. “Who are these Seeder-sucking asses at Fleet? You’re recalled and I’m supposed to just leave everything I’ve spent the last year working on so the Voloth can come and destroy these people? Are they insane? I’m serious; is there a clinical, medical excuse for this kind of irretrievably stupid decision making? Because otherwise, it passes all understanding!”

  She paused for breath, her eyes wild, and Ekatya could only shake her head.

  “I don’t know what’s going on, but I plan to find out. And then we’ll start working on a way to fix it.”

  “How can you fix this?”

  “I don’t know yet. Yet,” she said, when Lhyn looked ready to interrupt. “I don’t have all the facts. When I do, we’ll start looking for a way. I have to have faith that the people whose heads actually contain brains will prevail.”