“Looks like you are making progress,” Adan said. “But you didn’t call us up here just to get a compliment.”
“No, but I’ll take any compliment I can get. Gavin, how good are you at memory integrity work?” Raif asked as Gavin and Adan came to stand beside them.
“What do you mean, Raif?” Gavin asked.
“You see that hole? It is about two-thirds the size it should be.”
“What does that have to do with memory analysis?”
“Because we haven’t started working on closing it yet.” Raif said.
Gavin’s normally placid face wrinkled in confusion. “Are you saying you think this hole wasn’t actually caused by the tunneler?”
“We only got here a little while ago and we have only been running tests since then. Does that look like the puncture from a drilling cone to you?”
Gavin ran his hand across his brow as if trying to coax out the answer to Raif’s dilemma.
Von picked up where Raif left off. “We were wondering if you could take a look at Sierra’s memory of how this happened. She was the only witness.”
“To be honest, I don’t see how even a tunneler could punch a hole in the Maven’s hull. We haven’t found anything that will even scratch it to this point,” Raif added.
“You think Sierra’s memory of what happened was inaccurate?” Adan interjected.
“Not necessarily,” Raif said. “But she was under a lot of stress when it happened. Captured by somatarchs, ship shot down, underground quake throwing rocks down the back of her shirt, watching her friends die—the mind can play diggers on you at times like that.”
“That’s why we thought maybe Gavin might want to check out her memories to see if there were any deviations,” Von explained.
Adan’s teeth set on edge with that last remark. Deviations? That was Developer talk. But he checked his impulse to rise to Sierra’s defense. Adan had no reason to believe the former assessor meant any harm. Von and Raif were Sierra’s friends.
Adan stared back up at the hole. He was not as skilled a memorant as Gavin, but he had experienced Sierra’s memories first hand and was convinced she had seen things accurately. He had witnessed false memories in the minds of some of the members of the Collective and he knew what they were like. Manipulated or inaccurate memories were always accompanied by a certain foggy immateriality. That had not been the case with Sierra.
“The tunneler that pierced the hull had one of the cross stream drills,” Gavin reminded them. “Have you tried using something like that?”
“Well, no,” Raif admitted. “In case you hadn’t noticed, the praxis isn’t exactly rolling in mining equipment. It’s an attack ship. And I didn’t think turning the hybrid cannon around and firing on our own ship would be the best course of action.”
“Ah, come on now, Raif,” Von chided in deadpan fashion. “I’m sure you could build a cross stream drill in your sleep. Or maybe we could try using that spiky head of yours. That hair looks like it would cut through anything.”
Raif rolled his eyes. “Okay, so maybe the tunneler could punch a hole in the praxis’ skull,” he conceded, “but could it make a hole that would close back up again—by itself?”
Gavin’s pointed back up to the odd-looking hole. “The shape is certainly not consistent with a drilling cone.”
“Yep, that repair job looks like it got run through a random number generator,” Raif said, shaking his head.
“We might need to check into the possibility that Sierra’s memory might have been affected by stress,” Gavin said, his tone even more business-like than before. “My guess is that it was not, but it’s best to be thorough. At the same time, I would like for you to search the Maven’s systems and find out more about the properties of the ship’s hull.”
“Got it.” Raif nodded, looking surprisingly earnest for a change.
“So we’ll hold off on repairing this breach for now, I take it?” Von asked.
“For now,” Gavin said. “I’ll look into this while the trace on the Collective fleet finishes. We’ll meet back down in the control room in the morning to see what we come up with.”
“Well, at least you got out of the repair work for a little while,” Von put in dryly.
“Hey, if the ship wants to fix itself,” Raif fired back with a smirk, “I won’t complain.”
Four
The Missing
The next day Sierra and Adan sat on a bench by themselves at a table in the commissary. Most of the other Sentients had already eaten, but a handful chatted and ate at other tables nearby. The Maven didn’t have an invisible viand stream like Oasis to feed its occupants. Instead they used small fabricators in designated eating areas like this one to dispense food. The nutrient fabricators provided fluffy white nutrient cubes the size of the tip of Adan’s thumb from a recessed area in one of the walls. It only took around five to fill a person up. Adan had already eaten four, but he wasn’t hungry. He sat with his gripper, a short plastic stick with an attractor pad on the end, rolling the last cube around on his plate, tipping it end over end. His eyes remained fixed on Sierra, her beautiful face knotted into a tapestry of worry.
“I only slept two slices last night,” she confided to him. “I don’t think I will be able to really sleep until we get everybody back. I feel so helpless.”
“Gavin has been running trace after trace. We will find Nance and the others soon,” Adan said.
Mapping just the right moment when a thought or a conversation took place was the hard part about using the chronotrace. It took a lot of trial and error, but it was only a matter of time before they stumbled upon the right information. Adan didn’t feel like telling her that Gavin was analyzing her memories while the traces were running. He didn’t think they would find anything and as distressed as she was, he worried how she might take the news. “But I know what you’re feeling,” he went on, “It’s hard knowing your friends are somewhere and there isn’t anything you can do about it.”
“I know you mean well, but you don’t really know what it’s like. You barely knew Nance. How could you know what I’m feeling?” Her response had an edge to it caught Adan off guard.
He let the nutrition cube roll to a stop. He twiddled the gripper for a moment in his fingers, unsure of how to respond. Through their bioseine connection, he actually did know exactly what Sierra was feeling and she must have known that. Being a memorant he would have been able to sense something of her thoughts even without his bioseine, but he doubted she wanted to be reminded of that just now. He was on shaky enough ground already.
“The Welkin I met the first time I went into the Viscera are being held in captivity too—in a Wayman city a few days from here,” he said, trying to show that he could in fact relate to what she was going through.
Sierra scowled back at him. “What are you talking about?”
Adan reached out to her mind and Sierra uncharacteristically put up no resistance. Images of Senya and her children Halel, Jarem, and Lila passed from Adan’s memory to hers. She saw Senya at the Wayman tent serving mosh in the city of Hull. Senya’s face wore a look of quiet pain as Adan was carried away from her on the Wayman lev.
Sierra’s scowl softened. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know about those people,” she said. Her mind drifted away from his. “I guess there’s a lot I don’t know about you. And a lot you don’t know about me,” she added. She stood to leave.
Adan rose and touched her arm. “Wait, Sierra. Where are you going?”
“To my quarters,” she said. “I think I need to be alone right now.”
Adan let out an uncomfortable sigh. This felt like the argument between them when they were trapped inside the tunnels of the Viscera. She had pushed him away like this then too, taking everything on her shoulders.
“I’ll let you know as soon as we find out about Nance and the others,” he said.
“Thank you.” She turned and strode towards the exit, but not before lifting her plate in the air and
giving it a shove towards the return cabinet on the back wall. The plate floated across the room, adjusting itself perfectly to avoid the people along its path. The cabinet opened automatically and the plate eased in and filed itself away.
Adan sat back down on the bench after watching her go. It felt considerably stiffer than when he had first sat down. He couldn’t help but notice that several of the other Sentients looked their way when Sierra got up and left. Though he and Sierra had kept their voices down during their conversation, it felt like everyone in the commissary could tell she had been less than happy when she left as well. He resisted the urge to scan their thoughts and see what they were thinking.
His eyes zeroed in on the fluffy white nutrient cube in front of him, as if it, too, might get up and abandon him. He popped the tiny square into his mouth and got up and hurried out of the room. His empty plate sat on the table alone for a while until, having not been touched for the required period of time, it rose up and floated back to the cabinet on its own.
Adan couldn’t sleep. His thoughts spun perpetually around inside his head, running along the same mental tracks over and over again: the quakes, his relationship with Sierra, the captive Welkin, the prisoners captured by the Collective forces during the escape from Manx Core. He must have tried a hundred times to resolve these dilemmas in his mind, but he kept coming up short.
He knew that he should just use his bioseine to force himself to sleep and trust that everything would work out in the end. After all, Numinae was in control, wasn’t he?
Behind all of these concerns, at an even deeper level, the mystery of his past wrapped itself around his thoughts so tightly it felt like it could snap at any moment. He would never truly be at peace until he knew who he was.
When Gavin’s mental presence popped into his head as he lay wide awake in bed, he welcomed the distraction.
“Adan, I’m headed to the control room. Can you meet me there as soon as possible? I’m going to contact a few others as well.”
Adan wondered who else might be coming at a time like this, but he was too tired to ask. He gave his mental assent, yawned, and rolled out of bed. He did not bother changing out of his tunic, merely putting a silver lab coat over it and slipping on his shoes before shuffling out the door. Leaving his cramped quarters behind, he headed down the hallway towards the nearest access shaft.
His quarters were on level four so it didn’t take him long to arrive at the Command Center one level above. He didn’t bother with the lev pads in the access shafts, taking the ramps instead. Ever since one of the floating platforms had fallen out from under him in Manx Core, he avoided them whenever possible. Though he knew the failure of the pad had been a deliberate act on the part of the Collective security forces, he couldn’t shake the thought that one might fall again.
Adan made his way down the access ramp and the central corridor to a thick metal door, which opened easily, and into the Command Center. All the repairs caused by Nox’s explosion looked to have been completed. The image of the Wayman’s large frame being inserted inside a black body bag flashed through his mind, as did Nox’s horrific grin. Perhaps because he had not been present when he died, Adan still found it hard to believe that he was truly dead. If the volatile Wayman had come swaggering into the room at that moment Adan would not have been surprised.
The bridge was empty when he arrived, but the Maven continued flying on auto. In the giant screen which dominated the far wall, the praxis’ sensors rendered the terrain over which they traveled as if it were day outside. Pillowy gray dunes stretched out as far as he could see. Like most of the Vast, there was a monotonous sameness to them, but at least the scene showed no evidence of tremors in this part of the desert.
A set of ten black polymeric chairs arranged around a large table occupied the center of the room. On the table rested the chronotrace, powered off and lifeless, a lidless eye staring up at the ceiling.
As Adan approached the table, Von, Raif, Halerin, and two other Sentients whom Adan had not seen before, walked in together. They were discussing the closing of the Maven’s damaged hull and at first did not take notice of Adan’s presence.
Before Adan could ask about the new arrivals, Trey, who had only just been cleared from medical earlier that morning, walked into the room. Adan was surprised to see him present after his near brush with death. He had been put in a coma after getting caught in one of the quakes back in Oasis. Sierra had shared with Adan at length about how advanced the medical facilities on the praxis were and Trey was living proof of her claims. He had a nasty scar that ran down the middle of his forehead, but otherwise he looked well. Many other Sentients had not been so fortunate.
From the little Adan had been told about Trey, he was a quiet person, well-liked even though he usually kept to himself. Before he got hurt, he spent time working with Raif repairing and building equipment, fetching things for Sierra and the handlers, and commiserating with the Waymen, trying to learn more of their ways. It was encouraging to see him up and about.
The two other new Sentients, like all former Collectives, looked very similar, except that one of them wore his hair closely shaved and the other had let his grow out.
Everyone there was wearing the ubiquitous gray jumpsuits, though thankfully none of them had decided to imitate Raif and his ridiculous orange hair.
“Adan, this is Cade.” Raif motioned to the man with the longer hair who gave Adan’s hand a quick shake. “He was in the same cell as Halerin. Before that, he worked on the atmos array and the energy mesh back in Oasis.”
“Greetings,” said Cade, nodding. “You’re the one who crashed the mesh, aren’t you?”
Adan shifted uneasily. He had never meant to bring down the energy mesh which powered Oasis and maintained its protective atmosphere, but when he did, the ensuing storm had taken the lives of nearly everyone in the city. Though he saw no condemnation on Cade’s face, he still found himself fumbling for a response. “I—yes…it was an accident.”
Cade nodded slowly. “It was terrible what happened, but if you hadn’t done it then we wouldn’t be free.” Cade squeezed Adan’s shoulder warmly. The shift in tone was so unexpected and heartfelt that it rendered him momentarily speechless.
“And this is Jax,” Raif went on, breaking up the awkward introduction. He indicated the short-haired man, who gave Adan a curt nod.
“Heard a lot about you,” Jax said in a rough voice. “They said you got out before the storm hit, but came back to spring us out of the Core.”
Though Adan had not recognized Jax at first, the moment he set eyes on him, he knew who he was: an assessor. And not just any assessor. He was one of the ones who had been hunting for Adan the day Will freed him from the Institute.
The sudden recognition startled Adan. All at once he forgot about the energy mesh and the destruction of Oasis. His mind went back to his last day at the Institute. Though he doubted Jax even remembered that day, Adan’s pulse ticked up several beats in his presence.
“I don’t remember which cell you were from,” Raif inquired of Jax. “Which one was it?”
“B-16,” Jax answered stiffly.
“I thought B-16 got wiped out,” Halerin said, a questioning look in his eyes.
“That’s true,” Jax was quick to reply. “I was the only survivor.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re here,” Von said. “We need assessors to help the others realize what they’re up against.”
“I’ll do what I can,” was Jax’s terse response.
At that point Gavin walked in and down the ramp. He approached the table and motioned for everyone to sit down.
“All right, since you have all had time to introduce yourselves, please, everyone sit down,” he instructed them. He was using a private channel, his thoughts limited to the people gathered around the table.
Adan sat next to Raif while Jax took the chair on his other side. Adan tried not to be bothered by this, but found it hard to concentrate with the assessor sittin
g right next to him. He recalled the word Jax had used to refer to him back at the Institute: non-viable. Adan hoped he didn’t feel the same way now that he was no longer under the control of the Collective.
“Before you get started,” Raif put in, “I was just wondering why you decided to bring in so many people? No offense, guys, but I thought this was just supposed to be a status update on the hull.”
Gavin, who had remained standing, leaned in on the table and took a moment to gather his thoughts. “Well, there are a few other things I would like to discuss as well. The Sentients are going to need leaders if they hope to get through what lies ahead. And I think the people at this table are the best qualified to do that.”
Halerin responded first.
“I’m not so sure about that. Half the members of my cell were on Nance’s ship when it got shot down. If I couldn’t protect them then, what makes you think I’ll do any better now?”
“You are exactly who we need,” Gavin assured him. “Because I know you will do whatever it takes to get them back.”
“But they could be half way across the Vast by now—if they are even still alive.”
Gavin’s eyes sparkled in anticipation. “We will get to that in a moment. First, Raif needs to brief us on the state of the ship’s hull.” Gavin deferred to Raif with a nod.
“Right,” Raif began, his head bouncing with enthusiasm. “Well, in case the rest of you didn’t know, even though the Collective was kind enough to loan us this technological marvel, she was damaged goods. She came with a hole two spans in diameter punched in her skull. This hole was how Sierra got on the ship, but for some reason we have yet to be able to figure out, the hole has since sealed itself back up. It is completely shut now.”
The Chronotrace Sequence- The Complete Box Set Page 72
