by B. V. Larson
“He doesn’t…? What?”
“There is no stepfather, James. No marriage.”
“You lied?”
“I didn’t lie. I’m not a liar.”
“What would you call it, then?” I demanded.
She looked uncomfortable. “I don’t like to be called a liar. I’m a scout, an honorable member of my—”
“Look, let’s forget about that. Who’s taking care of Etta if there’s no stepfather? Is your father doing it?”
“The Investigator?” she asked incredulously. “No, he’s much too busy guiding my people for such a trivial thing.”
“Who then? Don’t tell me she’s out eating rockfish on her own.”
She squirmed. “Natasha. Natasha is doing it. She wanted to help—she volunteered.”
That left me scratching my head. “Okay,” I said. “Natasha is caring for Etta—oh.”
“What?”
“Now I understand why you lied. You told me about Etta back on Machine World, but at that point you hadn’t confessed about Natasha yet. So you made up the stepfather story to cover for Natasha. But then later, you told me about Natasha’s copy. Why didn’t you confess then?”
“A scout does not lie—at least, we’re not supposed to.”
“I see. You had to cover up one lie with another. That’s the kind of thing I understand. I get into trouble that way myself sometimes.”
Della stood up angrily. I couldn’t help but admire her body as she struck a sleek pose without trying. I don’t think I’d ever met a woman who was more fit and graceful. She wasn’t like an Earth girl that worked out all the time—it was all natural with Della. She was like a feral cat, possessing a body built of tight muscle through natural means.
“I don’t see why I even came here,” she said. “All you offer is insults.”
She took a step toward the door, but I gently caught her hand. She stopped and frowned back at me.
“You’d best let go,” she said.
“That’s why you kept coming to my bed back on Machine World, isn’t it?” I asked, hanging onto her lightly. “You weren’t really married—but you couldn’t tell me. I shouldn’t have rejected you back then, but I didn’t know the truth.”
“What’s done is done. Mistakes were made. Now, I must go.”
My mind worked with unusual speed. I only had one move left, I could tell that. Then I’d have to let go of her hand before she cut mine off for me.
“Don’t worry,” I said, “your honor is safe with me.”
I could tell by the look on her face that was the right thing to say. Some people think I’m as off-key as a hound in a firehouse, but with women, I’ve often managed to turn a bad situation around at the last moment. We all have our gifts.
Della smiled. The whole mess between us had been about her honor. She’d been lying about one thing or another since I’d met up with her again on Cyclops, and it had been grating on her. By assuring her I wasn’t going to run around talking crap about her, she was instantly relieved of her greatest fear.
She sat back down on my couch decisively.
I’m not going to claim I’m a master of timing, but I am an opportunist. I rarely pass up women who are smiling and within easy reach, for example. I put my hands on her gently, and she didn’t resist.
We were in a lip-lock inside of five seconds. I had to mentally congratulate myself. Della had been converted from a murderess stalking me in my sleep into an urgent lover inside half an hour.
But it wasn’t all my doing. That’s just how things tended to go between the two of us. There was no middle-ground.
Things progressed quickly. She bared her breasts and then her teeth as we made love. I’d seen that last part about the teeth before, and it’d always freaked me out a little. She turned animal when we had sex—every time. I can’t think of any other way to describe it.
Afterward, I inspected my bloody throat in my bathroom mirror. Damn, that girl had come closer than I’d realized to severing my carotid. I put a band aid on the wound and gave a long whistle. I was impressed.
I was glad she hadn’t pressed her sharp blade into me another few millimeters. A morning meet-and-greet with my parents would have been awkward if she’d killed me the night before.
After I washed all the blood off, we curled up on the couch together. We slept in a warm tangle of limbs until the gray light of dawn cut through my tattered curtains.
-3-
The next day went much better all the way around. My mom was thrilled to meet Della, who even had a few fresh pictures of Etta from Dust World that none of us had seen. Della seemed touched by my mom’s honest desire to make a connection with her granddaughter. I gathered that her own people had only feigned polite interest in the kid.
On Della’s planet, Earth’s one and only colony world, family units were much less bonded and tight. Della’s family were important people she respected—but they weren’t anything like what any kid from North America Sector would think of as doting relatives. They were more like your family doctor: a friendly, caring person who you grew up around, but who maintained a certain professional distance from you and your problems.
The conversations we had with Della concerning Etta and her life were strange ones. My mom did her damnedest to keep a smile fixed upon her face. I could tell she all but wanted to shout at Della, demanding to know what she’d been thinking when she’d left her baby behind on some hellish desert planet alone. Managing to control herself, she kept her cool and worked every bit of charm she had on this newcomer who had her granddaughter’s life in her hands.
The whole thing made me feel a bit bad. I’m not the kind of man who’s a worrier. I go with the flow most of the time, and if the world isn’t bothering me, I don’t bother it. As a case in point, the women in my life had never dominated my thoughts. I’d always floated from one to the next, not taking any relationship too seriously.
But things had changed. Knowing I had a kid living on a rock circling a distant star was even working on my mind, I could feel it. The knowledge was affecting my parents, too.
“So, Della,” my mom said, moving in for the kill after ten-odd minutes of beating around the bush, “what do you think about the idea of us all going out to visit the little darling?”
While she said this, Mom stretched out a hand to pour each of us a fresh cup of coffee. I could tell Mom was nervous. Her hand shook a bit while she poured. For all that, she didn’t spill a drop.
Della hadn’t touched her cup as she wasn’t from Earth and she thought coffee tasted like used motor oil, but that didn’t stop my mom from topping her off.
“I think it’s workable,” Della said in a neutral tone.
That was classic Della. Dust-Worlders weren’t the type to run around doing a happy dance when they met a friend or a relative. They were an impetuous, somewhat paranoid people. I guess they’d spent too many decades watching the sky for slave-ships to be celebratory as a group.
Still, my mom was pleased by Della’s answer because it wasn’t a flat “no.” Mom gave us both a big smile.
“It’s a plan then,” Mom said. “When do you think you’ll be going back?”
“I hope to do so after the arrival ceremony at the spaceport. Legion Varus members are required to attend.”
My mom gave me a frown. “What ceremony?”
“I meant to tell you about that,” I said. “It must have slipped my mind. The whole legion, including Winslade’s cohort of dragons, is going to stand on the parade grounds to welcome the first freighter back from Machine World. They’re bringing in a load of titanium as I understand it—thirty thousand tons. Can you believe they got that much metal out of that mountain in a few short months?”
“It’s the worker machines,” Della said. “They work for metal, but they mine much more than they eat. Did James tell you about them?”
My parents gave her baffled looks. My dad leaned forward. “James likes to keep the details of his campaigns to hims
elf.”
Della nodded and looked at me, impressed. “Be sure, be safe,” she said, quoting a Dust-Worlder proverb. “Even at home, you keep secrets? I’m learning from you still.”
That was the perfect example of how conversing with Della often went. She didn’t always get what we meant, and we didn’t always know what she was talking about, either.
The real reason I’d neglected to fill in my parents on the Machine World campaign was because it had been bloody as Hell and…well…downright weird. But Della had assumed I’d stayed quiet out of a paranoid sense of caution and secrecy, as she might have done.
I decided it was best not to correct anyone and switched the topic instead.
“Are you guys going to go?” I asked my parents. “To the ceremony at the spaceport, I mean?”
“We’d love to,” my mom said before my dad could do more than open his mouth. He closed it again and looked glum.
“It will be quite a drive,” he muttered.
“No problem at all,” Mom insisted. “Della, I didn’t see any vehicles out front…?”
“I was given a ride by a man from Atlanta,” she said. “He repeatedly requested sexual contact, but I refused as I found him unsavory.”
My mom cleared her throat and nodded. “I see. Well…we’ll have to drive you, then. When is the ceremony, James?”
“Uh…Thursday, I think.”
As it was already Tuesday, my mom raised her eyebrows. “All right…you’ll have to stay with us until then, Della. I have a guest bed all made up on the second floor. We hardly ever get any visitors who stay with us in the main house.”
“No thank you,” Della said. “I prefer to stay with James on his couch.”
My parents fell silent for a second. Their eyes flicked back and forth between us. They knew I entertained various women in my shack from time to time, but this was different.
I expected my mother to frown disapprovingly, but she didn’t. She smiled instead. “That’s just fine,” she said.
It took me a second to get it. Mom wanted me to sleep with Della. That felt strange on the face of it. Maybe she was already having some kind of fantasy that the two of us would get married. I could have told her the odds of that happening were slim indeed, baby or no. Hell, the woman had almost killed me in my sleep just last night.
The next few days were pretty nice, from my point of view. I had a girl sharing my room and my bed, and my parents were treating us like royalty. This was an unprecedented situation.
My folks didn’t ask any probing questions, they never mentioned Anne, nor did Mom give Della a single disapproving stare. They tried to make things pleasant and comfortable for both of us and insisted we take our meals in the main house. The four of us spent a lot of time together.
All that said, Thursday could hardly come fast enough for me. Don’t get me wrong, I love my parents. But despite the fact I look to be about twenty-two years old, I’m really pushing thirty, and I’d gotten used to having my own space.
On the day of the big parade, we rode up to Atlanta and gathered our equipment at the chapter house. The old tram could barely carry our rucks with all four of us in the cabin, but we made it to the spaceport and left my folks at the gate. They moved off to join the audience that ringed the spaceport fence.
Carlos was there, rolling up on his foldable alien-made unicycle. He’d bought it back before Hegemony had started confiscating Galactic credits and sweeping all our legion accounts of hard currency.
What surprised me wasn’t the vehicle itself. It was the fact that he had a passenger riding with him. I recognized her, and I noticed she hugged onto him like she meant business.
“Kivi?” I called out in surprise.
Carlos steered our way and nearly ran us down. He only had partial control of his bike, being an alien contraption that wasn’t entirely meant for a single human to ride, much less two.
After half-crashing to a stop, Kivi climbed off and slapped him lightly.
“You didn’t tell me this thing would give me a butt-ache,” she complained.
“Let me kiss it better,” Carlos suggested.
They chased each other around for a moment while Della and I shook our heads.
When they’d at last settled down and come close, Kivi looked Della up and down. “Oh. You’re not Anne, are you?” she asked, as if that thought had just occurred to her.
My gut felt that jab of hers. Kivi had always been moody, and this afternoon was no exception. If I had to put a name to it, I’d say Kivi’s mood was “catty” today.
I glanced at Della, hoping that Kivi’s jab hadn’t landed. Unfortunately, Della seemed to have gotten the reference. She was frowning.
“I’m Della, a specialist, and your superior,” she said.
Kivi smiled and lifted a finger. “Not anymore. I’m a specialist now, too. A tech.”
“And I’m a bio in training,” Carlos said. “Anybody want to turn their heads and cough?”
I clapped my hands together, making a booming sound. They all looked at me. As long as the girls were pulling rank, I figured I might as well pull mine. I was a legion veteran, and I outranked them all.
“Let’s go to the rally point,” I said firmly. “We’ve got to suit up and get our dragons out of storage. My briefing email said they’re in the lifters.”
Together, our group traveled across the seemingly endless expanse of asphalt to the waiting line of lifters.
The transport spacecraft were broad, squatty and built for utility more than looks. We marched up the metal ramp with a few dozen other troopers and an hour or so later we were lined up in our dragons beside the rest of Legion Varus. We were all standing at attention.
As the senior noncom, Veteran Harris held the Wolfshead pennant in his right gripper. It was an honor to hold the pennant. As a newly hatched veteran, I could only watch him and note his obvious pride.
Thousands of us lined up, unit by unit. Less than ten minutes after we’d completed our formation, the lifters took off and another set roared down to take their place.
More troops in armor with polished weapons marched from the ramps. They had pennants too, but their flags were from a rival legion.
“They’re flying the Rising Sun of Legion Solstice,” Harris said loudly. “Stand straight, look sharp. Don’t shame me, people.”
Legion Solstice had fought and died with us on Machine World. I had mixed feelings about their troops for personal reasons, but I saluted them along with the rest of our dragons. Solstice legionnaires were true fighters, if a little rough around the edges. I could only conjecture as to they thought of us.
Soon, over twenty thousand troops stood in long lines and squares all over the tarmac. We covered two square kilometers, maybe more. It was an impressive sight, and I felt glad to know my parents were in the crowd somewhere, watching us. They didn’t often get a chance to see my legion presented with any kind of honor.
Standing on a stage in front of the two legion formations was a knot of officers and politicians. A gaggle of reporters with camera-drones clustered around them. I noticed only a few of the drones were panning the troops. Most were focused on the stage.
Imperator Turov spoke first. I wasn’t surprised that she was there or that she was hamming it up for the cameras. She was a glory-hound that rarely missed such opportunities—in fact, she created them whenever possible.
“In a few minutes, history will be made,” she said, her voice rolling out over the assemblage. She had an amp system set up, and some joker had cranked it up to full blast. “I welcome the eyes of Earth today. I, Imperator Galina Turov, have brought home a great bounty from beyond the borders of the Empire itself. As most of you know, I was in command of an expedition into uncharted space. After a hard-fought campaign, legions Solstice and Varus defeated no less than three alien forces on Machine World. Now today, at last, we’ll see the fruits of that expenditure of blood and treasure in space…”
She went on like that for a very lon
g time. The woman could make a speech, that was for sure. She made certain to mention her name and her command status in every paragraph as she waxed eloquently about the immeasurable wealth she’d brought home to Earth.
Finally, long after I’d stopped listening, a rumble sounded above us. The skies flared brighter. We craned our necks—despite the fact we were supposed to stare at our commanders and nothing else.
The freighter had come in. It was a big one as such ships went. A super-massive, they called them, a class of ship built to haul goods from star to star in quantities that could serve a whole planet.
“Something’s wrong,” Della said in my headset.
I frowned. She was right. The ship didn’t look the way it should. That first flare—what had that been? Too bright for braking jets. I could see those now, blooming from the forward modules.
“She’s in too close,” I said. “She must have dropped out of warp too late. She should be parked in orbit by now.”
Turov went on, seemingly oblivious. “There she is!” the imperator boomed. “Take note of our lifters rising to greet her. Thirty thousand metric tons of titanium—just think about it! Earth’s annual production is less than a tenth of that, and a freighter like this one will be arriving every month from Machine World from now on—”
She broke off then as everyone present, thousands upon thousands of us, turned our heads up to the skies.
There was another brilliant flash of light. The effect was bigger this time, silent in space, but bright enough to make us squint all the way down here on the surface. The troops around me gasped and exhaled in amazement.
“She’s listing,” I said. “She’s way too close. Dragons, activate your engines. Rev them. We might have to move fast.”
“To where?” Carlos demanded. “There’s nowhere to run. The lifters ditched us already. Turov thinks they’re headed up to dock, but I say they’re fleeing the scene.”
“Quiet in the ranks!” Leeson boomed over the platoon chat. “We’ve got word from command that something’s gone wrong with the freighter. She’s coming in hot, and she’s not stopping.”
