To Fire Called (A Seeker's Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Book 2)

by Nathan Lowell

  Pip sighed and looked up at the overhead. “Pretty good, actually.” He looked back at me. “The larger question for you to ponder is ‘Then what?’”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What will you do when you find him?” he asked.

  I sat there trying to sort out something rational.

  “Hadn’t thought that far ahead, eh?” He sighed dramatically and shook his head. “Ishmael, Ishmael. This will require some significant thought. Sure we’re weeks, possibly months, from jumping into the Deepest of Darks, but that gives you time to formulate the perfect plan. A retribution that makes the skies tremble and the lands weep.”

  I stared at him, trying to figure out if he was mocking me or goading me. Or both.

  “Or we can play it by ear when we catch up with his sorry hide,” he said with a casual shrug. “Your call. Literally, your call.”

  My jaw worked open and closed a couple of times. I was trying to say something. Anything. He’d so derailed me, I couldn’t find the handle on my tongue.

  He nodded as if I’d spoken. “I know,” he said. “I know exactly what you need.”

  “You do?”

  “Beer. You need beer. Do you have any civvies left over from the Great Grav Trunk Purge of ’74?”

  “Yeah, of course, but—”

  “Excellent.” He popped to his feet and headed for the door. “Let me find something less comfortable to wear and I’ll join you in—say—five ticks?” He stopped at the door. “No, don’t get up. I can show myself out.”

  And he did.

  Leaving me sitting there wondering if I’d imagined the whole thing.

  The dusty scuff marks on the far side of my desk convinced me that it had really happened.

  I put my head down on my desk and laughed. Sometimes I was an idiot.

  When Pip stuck his head into the cabin, I was ready for him. I’d broken out the comfy jeans, tossed a polo shirt on under my only half decent jacket, and was just slipping into my least reputable pair of boots.

  “That’s more like it,” he said.

  “I’ve missed you, you crazy bastard.”

  He grinned. “Of course you have. Who wouldn’t? Now let’s go. I hear an imperial pale ale calling my name from somewhere on the oh-two deck.”

  I followed him out of the cabin and down the ladder. “Not a lager?”

  “Maude, no. Only decent lager on this side of the Deep Dark is at Odin’s Outpost. He makes his own, you know? Mines the water from asteroids plucked from between the stars.”

  As Ms. Torkelson signed us off the ship, I realized that I really had missed him. He’d been around while the yard reworked the ship, but we’d each been too busy in our own little worlds. The lock levered shut behind us and I wondered, briefly, what he had been up to. I was certain it had nothing to do with finding Patterson or establishing new trade routes.

  I was equally certain he’d never tell me. I’d just have to wait and see.

  Chapter 8

  Dree System: 2375, January 30

  Pip scored a can of ceramic clay bound for Jett. After being tied down for so long, everybody in the ship was ready to shake the reefs out and go someplace else. The chief thought it would be a good distance to test the Burlesons after their refit. Left to my own devices I might have taken something a little closer, just to make sure they worked.

  She laughed. “It’s not how far you bend space that matters, Captain. It’s whether you can bend space at all. After that it’s just decimal points and power. We’ve got plenty of power. What we need to know now is how much power it’ll take.”

  I had to agree with her. She wrote the book on the subject. If she thought it was right, it was—almost certainly—right.

  “Coming up on the safety perimeter, Captain,” Al said from her station.

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross. Are the generators ready to spool up, Chief?”

  “Safety interlocks are still engaged, but the systems are ready to deploy sails and keel at your command, Captain.” The chief smiled at me across the bridge. She preferred to ride “up front,” as she called it, rather than back in engineering control. She liked the scenery better.

  “We have cleared the safety perimeter, Captain.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross. Pull the interlocks and give us some sail, Chief.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain. Interlocks released. Sails and keel deploying.”

  “I love it when you talk salty, Chief.”

  “How are we on helm, Ms. Torkelson?” Al asked.

  “Helm responding normally, sar. Course locked and we’re on the beam.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Torkelson,” Al said. “Secure the auxiliaries, Chief.”

  The chief keyed a few commands on her console and the almost inaudible rumble of the kickers from the stern faded out to nothing. “Auxiliaries secured. Safety locks set, Ms. Ross.”

  “Thank you, Chief. Captain, the ship has cleared the safety perimeter. Sails and keel are deployed. Auxiliaries have been secured and safeties set.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross. Secure from navigation detail. Set normal watch throughout the ship.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain. Securing navigation detail. Setting normal watch.” She looked at the chronometer. “Logged at 2375, January 30, 1725 hours.”

  After some last-minute business with announcements and a juggling of crew, I stood and stretched. “Thanks, everyone,” I said. “How long do we have until we jump, Mr. Reed?”

  “Five weeks, plus or minus a day, Captain.”

  “Well, nothing to do now but wait, I suppose.”

  “There are always reports, Captain,” Chief Stevens said.

  “Yes, Chief. Yes, there are.” I left the bridge so everybody else could and ducked into the cabin. I needed to visit the head and wash my face. Sharps would have the dinner mess ready in the wardroom in a few ticks. It would be a shame to be late.

  While I was there, I sat at the console to sort through the pile of reports stacking up. It amazed me how fast the queue filled. Most of it just required me to read and initial. Al handled the personnel issues with a level of aplomb I don’t think people expect of a first mate with that much steel in her skin. The chief seemed to float above a sea of reporting that never dragged her down into the dark depths. It didn’t take very long for me to initial, file, and pass the reports on to archive.

  I opened the ship’s log and filled in a cursory entry with the specifics of our cargo and destination. During our ride over from Breakall, I’d spent some time working back through the log entries. I knew I was only seeing the surface. More happens aboard the ship than ever goes into the log, but this one seemed particularly sparse.

  The date record had long gaps—weeks at a time—when the captain made no entries. I wondered if he kept a second log where he wrote down what happened in Toe-Hold space, where he kept all the things he couldn’t write in the official log.

  I almost wished I had a secret log, a journal for my own use rather than an archive of ship’s business. Mal Gains had left his therapist hooks in me. I couldn’t stop replaying that final meeting where he had me talking about my clothes. What did it matter?

  The chronometer clicked over to 1755 and an alert popped up on my console. I’d had to program it to remind me of meal times, or the days slipped their leashes and I had to hunt them down. They all blended together in the yard with no watches and no crew. No cargo to haul. My only focus for months was to get the ship back into space. To fly her away, whole and clean.

  I slapped my console closed.

  I knew it wasn’t as straightforward as that. We had nearly gutted the Chernyakova. The foundations remained, but almost everything else had been refurbished, replaced, renewed. The paint and polish were simply the clothes that hung on the reformed bones of the ship.

  If only I could put myself in a yard somewhere and come away whole and clean.

  The thought left me holding on to the cabin’s door knob—half in, half out. There was something there. Something i
mportant.

  “Are you all right, Captain?”

  Our new third mate, Kim Fortuner—a sprightly young woman with a ready smile and a deadly wit—stood at the head of the ladder leading down to the mess deck.

  “Yes, Ms. Fortuner. Just struck by a sudden thought.”

  She smiled and nodded. “That can hurt, sar. I know the feeling well.”

  She surprised a short laugh out of me and I closed the door behind me to follow her down the ladder. “How are you adjusting to life aboard?” I asked.

  “Well, Captain.” She paused as if to evaluate her answer. “Very well, considering. Having a job made the stress of being a beached junior third mate almost evaporate. I’ll be able to catch up on my student loans.”

  “That’s a feeling I know well, Ms. Fortuner. Very well, indeed.”

  We arrived at the wardroom and she stepped aside to let me enter ahead of her.

  I held the door for her and waved her in. “I’m the captain. Last in, first out.”

  She blushed. “I should have known that, Skipper.”

  “My mother also taught me to hold the door for a lady, Ms. Fortuner. Don’t let it worry you.”

  Chapter 9

  Dree System: 2375, March 5

  Things settled down on the long run out to the Burleson limit. The ship’s long legs did it little good until we could clear Dree’s gravity well. Mr. Reed’s calculations told us we could jump directly from Dree to Jett. According to Chief Stevens, we could have jumped two BUs beyond Jett without straining the big capacitors that drove the Burlesons and let us bend space-time to our mortal wills.

  With that perspective, I understood the chief’s suggestion that a quick jump to Jett was just what the Chernyakova needed for her post-yard shakedown cruise.

  The crew seemed to be melding together nicely as well. I suspected Al’s particular interpersonal skills had a lot to do with that, as well as Chief Steven’s long decades of experience in forming engineering crews—with their various skills, priorities, and expectations—into a machine nearly as precise as the fusactors that gave life to the ship itself.

  I’d never felt superfluous in any of my prior commands, such as they were. We always had some problem to solve, some issue to resolve. I snorted a little laugh at myself. An expert in dysfunctional crews, I felt adrift with the well-oiled machine I’d created with the help of some very unconventional collaborators. Had Frederica deGrut ever felt superfluous?

  I looked around the wardroom at my assembled officers. Al had the watch, but everybody else lounged over their desserts. “My plan is to go to navigation stations at 2000 hours. It shouldn’t take very long, and nobody will have to wake up to make the jump.” I looked at the chief. “Any problems showing up back there?”

  She shook her head. “We’ve burned through a lot of scrubber cartridges, but we expected that. Outgassing from the new materials and extra particulates from construction has started to decline. That’s about it. I’m a little nervous, actually.”

  “Too smooth?” I asked.

  “Precisely. The yard did a heck of a job. Even eked some extra power out of the fusactors. So far no harmonic displacements in any of the systems. We’ll know how well the Burlesons work in about a stan, so that’ll take the worry out of that factor, one way or another.”

  “Mr. Reed, any problems with the navigation?”

  “No, Captain. We’re within a few hundred meters of where we should be. We’re on the flat now and could jump any time we wanted.”

  I looked around the table and nodded. “Thanks for your hard work, folks. We got here because of what you do. Keep doing it.” I stood and left the wardroom so the others could do what they needed to. There were days I missed being a messmate that nobody paid any mind to.

  At 1950 I climbed the ladder to the bridge. I found Al and Thomas Reed already there. Ms. Torkelson had the helm as part of the first section. Going to navigation stations wouldn’t make any difference to either Al or Ms. Torkelson.

  “Are we set, Al?”

  “I think so, Skipper. Is the chief going to join us tonight?”

  “No. She’ll be hanging by the Burlesons, just in case.”

  “I think she just wants to see those bad boys light up,” Reed said.

  I grinned. “You’re probably not far off the mark, Mr. Reed.” I looked at Al. “Make it happen.”

  Al made the announcement and I watched over her shoulder as the engineering section checked in. “We are at navigation stations, Captain.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross,” I said. “I’d like to go someplace else this evening.”

  Al’s grin showed up clearly in the bridge’s subdued lighting. “Did you have any place in particular in mind, Captain?”

  “I was thinking Jett is nice this time of night.”

  “Jett sounds lovely, Captain. Mr. Reed, the captain would like to go to Jett this evening. What say you?” Al asked.

  Reed looked over his shoulder at her. It took him a couple of heartbeats to catch up. “Course to Jett plotted and locked, sar. Ship dead on course.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Reed. Systems, are we ready to jump?” Al asked.

  “Systems green for jump once, Ms. Ross,” Ms. Fortuner said from her console.

  “Thank you, Ms. Fortuner. Astrogation, are we ready to jump?”

  “Astrogation is green for jump twice, Ms. Ross.” Reed seemed more relaxed as the familiar litanies spooled out.

  “Thank you, Mr. Reed.” Al keyed a few strokes into her console and waited a moment. “Engineering reports green for jump, Captain. Ship is green for jump thrice.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross. Ready about, Mr. Reed.” I paused for a moment and wondered, so very briefly if my next words would be my last. “Hard a-lee.”

  Jumping direct from Dree to Jett had the startling effect of watching a sparkling necklace of stars explode into a wash of multicolored jewels on a glowing backdrop of nebulous gas. The nebula itself lay some light years beyond Jett, but that knowledge took nothing from the dramatic result. Everyone on the bridge gazed forward at the sight. Few jumps had the same effect. Most transitions left one feeling that nothing much had happened. Only the system primary would show as a solid pinhead of light in the distance which had not been there before.

  “Jump complete,” Reed said. “Position and vector confirmed. Logged at 2375, March 5 at 2010. Waiting on course correction for Jett.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Reed,” Al said. “Report when ready.”

  We sat for half a tick while the calculations filtered in from the celestial navigation array, through the ship’s systems, and out to Reed’s console.

  “Chief Stevens reports Burlesons locked, sail and keel ready for deployment, Captain.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross.”

  “Plot established and locked, sar,” Reed said.

  “Thank you, Mr. Reed. Helm?

  “Plot locked. Sail and keel deployed. Ship answers to helm, sar.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Torkelson,” Al said. “Ship has jumped to Jett, Captain. Burlesons secured, sails deployed. Ship answers to helm. The universe appears to be unfolding as it should.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Ross. Log it and secure from navigation stations. Set normal watch throughout the ship.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain. Log and secure from navigation stations. Set normal watch throughout the ship.”

  I waited for Al to make the appropriate announcements and log entries. The captain’s chair gave me an excellent view around the bridge and out into space on all sides. The bridge roof blocked the view upward, of course, and the ship’s mass obscured much of the downward view, but what I could see left me breathless. I hated to leave, but Al didn’t need me looking over her shoulder and the other officers needed me to leave the bridge so they could follow.

  At that moment, the rigid priorities and protocols felt binding—like the sleeves of a shirt that was just half a size too small.

  I stood, stretched, and headed for the ladder. “Excellent wor
k, everyone. Thank you,” I said before dropping down the ladder and ducking into the cabin. I wanted to talk to the chief about the status of the drives, but I also didn’t want to jog her elbow so soon after transition. I pulled up my tablet and dropped her a message. “Buy you coffee, spacer? Whenever you’re back on this end of the ship?”

  Her response came almost immediately. “You bet.”

  I didn’t have to wait long. I barely had a chance to use the head before I heard a knock on the door. “Come.”

  The chief bounded in, a massive smile on her face. “Where’s my coffee?”

  “We’ll have to go pick it up. I thought I’d have a little more time.”

  She flopped into a visitor’s chair and let her arms hang off the sides. “In a tick. You want to know about the drives.”

  I sat in my chair and nodded. “Of course.”

  “I love these Origami T’s. They are so smooth. I don’t understand why more ships don’t run them.”

  “Cost?” I asked.

  She made a rude noise with her lips. “Yeah, there’s a bit more sunk cost. Makes the ships a tiny bit more expensive by the time you add in the extra fusactors, the upgraded power, and field emitter buses. Maybe a couple of percent more. That’s all, but we just jumped six BUs and cut out a whole extra jump and realignment between Dree and Jett. Operationally, that probably doesn’t seem like much but those little pieces add up over time.”

  “Well, there’s probably also the reality that the CPJCT has organized most of the Western Annex into strings of ports two or three BUs apart.”

  She nodded. “True. Hard to justify having long legs when short arms will reach the cookie jar. It still makes me happy to be able to make a six-BU jump with two hundred metric kilotons.” She pursed her lips and brought her hands together to steeple in front of her chest. “You know, with a fleet of these, we could remap Diurnia.”

  “Probably remap most of the Western Annex,” I said.

  Her eyes widened. “You think?”

  “Dunsany Roads is spread out across twenty or twenty-five BUs, but Siren is only five BUs from Dunsany Roads itself. Almost nobody but fast packets make that run.” I stopped when I realized that she was grinning at me.