by Amy DuBoff
“Can’t wait,” Raena and Jason said almost in unison.
“Let’s go.” Wil led the way with Saera, each carrying their own travel bag. Raena and Jason fell into step behind them.
They took the main Junior Agent corridor to the central lobby and boarded the elevator toward the surface port.
Raena and Jason took seats on the bench at the back, watching the pulsing white light next to the door indicating movement. After a couple minutes, a loud thud sounded outside, reverberating through the car. Their parents seemed completely unphased.
“What was that?” Raena asked. “I remember it from before.”
“The old containment lock from the subspace shell,” Wil explained. “Back when Headquarters was still suspended in the subspace bubble, the two containment locks provided a pass-through transition from normal space into subspace. Since the transition—slightly before you were born—the locks now serve as a gateway into the sphere around the facility. Having a sealed environment around the ring structure gives an extra level of security. After all, the shell was originally constructed to withstand the structural stress of subspace flow.”
“Which is a lot, I’m guessing?” Jason said.
“Yes, but highly variable and complex to represent,” Saera replied. “You’ll learn all about it in your navigation classes.”
Raena looked at her parents questioningly. “Don’t you have computers to navigate for you?”
Wil nodded. “Of course, but some things take hands-on involvement from a sentient mind. And, moreover, navigation and piloting are closely tied. If you want to fly, you need to take a few classes first.”
“At least you won’t have to worry about having me as an instructor,” Saera said. “I used to teach Advanced Navigation, but since becoming Lead Agent I don’t teach classes anymore.”
That would be awkward having a parent as a formal teacher. “What about you, Dad?” Raena asked. “I can’t seem to figure out what you do around here.”
“I answer questions,” her father replied simply.
Raena frowned. “That doesn’t—”
The pulsing white light ceased as the elevator reached its destination. The doors slid open, revealing a transparent dome rotunda and three broad corridors angled out ahead. Outside the dome, the gray, dusty surface of the moon shone white under light cast from the sun peeking over the horizon, and a magnificent starscape spanned overhead.
Raena’s breath caught as she took in the sight for the second time. “It’ll take a while to get used to this view.”
“No kidding,” Jason breathed next to her.
“It still gets me, even after all this time,” Saera said with a smile.
Wil seemed amused by their fascination, shaking his head slightly as he headed down the corridor on the right.
Raena followed him, but her gaze focused upward toward the stars. The view was nothing like from anywhere down on Earth, even from up in the mountains. The stars were so much brighter and there were so many more than she thought possible. The idea of getting to see some of those distant worlds thrilled her down to her core.
One hundred meters down the right corridor, Wil stopped outside a small oval-shaped craft with a gray base and a transparent roof reinforced with metal strips around the main structural points. A protrusion from the spaceport’s corridor conformed to the same arch as the craft, creating a perfect seal around the entry door. He boarded and looked expectantly at his family to follow.
Once they were onboard, Wil tapped on the control console at the apparent front of the vessel. The door slid downward over the opening, and a secondary hatch simultaneously sealed off the corridor to the spaceport.
A subtle vibration resonated through the floor of the vessel and it began pulling away from the spaceport. Though there was barely any sensation of movement, Raena found herself feeling unsteady on her feet so she quickly sat down on the cushioned seat that wrapped entirely around the circumference of the interior, aside from a break for the door on one side. We’re actually in space right now. Even seeing it with her own eyes, it hardly seemed real.
The craft gently ascended toward the space station above, which seemed to get even bigger as they approached. Raena stared at the glowing underside of the station, noting a mammoth cable that appeared to tether it to the moon’s surface. Their craft took them upward parallel to the length of the cable, and then outward to a concourse lined with small vessels identical to theirs. It slid into the berth and came to rest with a gentle bump and hiss. The door shot upward with a cool blast of air.
“All right, now for a real spaceship,” Wil said, gesturing for his family to exit.
Raena collected her travel bag and stepped out onto the metal deck plates of the space station. The air pulsed with a low mechanical hum. “There’s no rotation. Is this artificial gravity?”
“Yes, same as down in Headquarters,” Saera replied. “Well, down in Headquarters it’s more ‘augmented’ gravity. This is full-on artificial.”
“It feels… strange,” Raena commented.
“You do get used to it, but it’s not the healthiest environment,” Wil said. “Muscles are prone to atrophy in artificial gravity.”
“So what do you do?” asked Jason.
“Regular exercise and high-protein diet.” Their father smiled. “Running laps on stairs does have some benefit.”
Jason scowled. “I was afraid you were going to say that.”
They walked down the concourse toward the central hub of the space station. The ceiling was almost entirely transparent, with clear panels curving upward to meet at a thin metal band overhead. Support beams arched the width of the corridor every five meters, but the flared based smooth lines tapering to meet the central support band made the structural feature come across more like a sculptural work of art. By far, the most impressive feature in the corridor was the seamless integration of information displays, with holographic projections and readouts embedded in the transparent walls.
The colorful displays transfixed Raena as she passed by, and she found herself studying star maps projected next to concourses leading out to empty berths. So many worlds to explore!
As they continued down the concourse, they passed by a group of four Agents walking in the opposite direction. The Agents inclined their heads to Wil and Saera.
“Where are you headed?” a woman with red hair pulled back into a ponytail asked, her eyes concealed by tinted glasses.
“Tararia,” Saera replied.
“Of course,” the women said with a prim nod.
Raena couldn’t be sure, but she thought she detected some hostility between the two women.
The other Agent evaluated Raena and then Jason. “A lovely family,” she said.
“There’s still time for you, Leila,” Saera replied.
One of the male Agents in Leila’s group snickered. Leila shot him a seething glare. “Safe travels,” she muttered to Saera and picked up her pace.
Saera shook her head as soon as the group had passed.
Raena jogged two steps to walk beside her mother. “What was that about?”
“Oh,” Saera chuckled, “Leila Gardis is one of my former roommates. We have a classic frenemy relationship.”
“Did you have a falling out?”
“We were never proper friends to begin with. She came from a privileged life on Tararia and I was an Earth girl. She hated that I out-performed her in class, and as soon as things were public with your dad and she realized that I’d landed a High Dynasty heir, things really went downhill. Fortunately, most of her assignments keep her out in the field the majority of the time.”
“She’s a fine Navigator, but she always wanted Command track,” Wil added. “She’s a perfect case study for why personality is an important consideration with any assignment, not just skills on paper.”
“Competitive and self-centered,” Saera agreed. “I don’t think she has any genuine friends left in my cohort. That Command Center crew she’
s with now is the first assignment that’s stuck in years. Most request her to be transferred out after one or two deployments.”
“Yikes. That’s sad,” Raena said.
“It is,” Saera said, “but she brought it on herself. I tried.”
“Even Elise couldn’t find common ground with her, and she gets along with everyone,” Wil added.
Raena smiled. “Now that puts things in perspective.”
They reached a three-way fork in the corridor and followed the passage around to the right, circumventing the central hub. They continued to bear right at the next branch, taking them down another corridor jutting out from the hub. This one hosted much larger crafts than Raena had seen elsewhere, and they got larger the farther out they went from the center—going from fifty meters to several hundred.
Raena admired the sleek forms of the ships. Their hulls gleamed under the lights of the spaceport, showing off an iridescent quality like mother of pearl. Compared to everything else she’d seen over the past several days, these ships were definitely the most alien in appearance.
“There are so many ships here,” Jason commented.
“Oh, this is nothing,” Wil replied. “This is a quarter of the complement we had stationed here while I was growing up.”
“What changed?” Raena asked.
“The threat was eliminated and we disarmed,” her father said curtly.
More dodging of the same questions. What aren’t they saying? Raena looked to her mother, but Saera gave a subtle shake of her head, indicating to let it go.
Releasing a slow breath to vent her frustration about the non-answers, Raena turned her attention out the windows toward the impressive ships. The body styles seemed to fall into one of several basic designs, but the common feature across all of them was a forked protrusion toward the back of the vessel.
She pointed to the fork at the back of the nearest ship. “Is that the engine?”
“One of them,” Wil said. “It’s the external component for the jump drive, which generates the spatial distortion to allow travel through subspace.”
“Are some ships faster than others?”
“Travel speed is a function of the navigation system and the ability to lock onto more distant targets. That has nothing to do with the jump drive. But yes—some ships have more advanced navigation systems than others.”
“Why not upgrade everything?”
“Money and politics,” her father replied. “Ah, here’s our ride.” He gestured to a ship up ahead.
The ship was similar to many they had already passed. Boxier in appearance, there were windows along the sides and only the slightest taper at the front. The design seemed impractical, but Raena had to remind herself that these crafts were built in space and never designed for atmospheric entry and exit.
A gangway just wide enough for two people to walk abreast extended up from the main concourse to a portal in the center of the ship. Wil and Saera went first.
“I call window seat,” Jason said to Raena.
She rolled her eyes. “I think we can both have window seats.”
“Just throwing it out there in case.” He grinned at her.
“Whatever.” She let out an exasperated sigh and headed up the gangway.
At the top, a man dressed in a dark gray uniform was waiting to receive them. “Hello, my lady,” he greeted Raena. “Please make yourself comfortable and let me know if there’s anything I can do to assist.”
My lady? Raena forced a smile and bobbed her head. “Thank you.”
“Greetings, my lord,” the man said when Jason entered.
Raena noticed her parents were heading down the hall toward the front of the ship and she followed, hanging back slightly so Jason could catch up. “What’s that ‘lord’ and ‘lady’ stuff all about?” she whispered.
“I think the High Dynasties are kind of like royalty, so…”
“This is going to be so weird.”
Raena followed her parents into an open room at the end of the short hall. It contained a dozen plush armchairs and expansive windows that wrapped around the nose of the vessel.
“I don’t think we’ll need to fight over the window seat,” she said to her brother.
“Yeah… I take it back.” Jason scoped out the room and headed toward a pair of chairs adjacent to where their parents were getting situated in the middle of the room.
Raena followed him and took the other chair angled toward the window. “Also, I’m not sure how much a view matters when it’s just one never-ending starscape.”
“Oh, this’ll change as soon as we get underway,” Saera said from her chair as she pulled out a tablet from her travel bag.
Wil just gave them a knowing smile as he retrieved his own tablet from his bag and took a seat.
“Disengaging from dock. Prepare for subspace jump,” a female voice said over the intercom.
Their mother craned her neck to look at them. “The subspace transition can be a bit unsettling at first.”
“The ship won’t fall apart, I promise,” Wil added without looking up from his tablet.
What’s that supposed to mean? Raena wondered as the transport ship pulled away from the spacedock.
Then, a low rumble began underfoot, slowly escalating until the air was filled with a buzz of energy. The ship shuddered under the intense force, seeming like it was going to rip in a thousand directions at once.
Raena gripped the armrests on her seat with white knuckles as her brother flashed her a look of alarm.
Out of the corner of her eye, Raena saw a blue-green haze forming outside the window. The mist swirled around the ship as the shaking came to its climax. Then, the vessel was enveloped in light.
Blue-green strands wove around the ship, dancing ribbons extending from an infinite, glowing expanse. The ship glided through the sea, magnificent forms of billowing light passing them by. The shaking ceased, replaced by a slight vibration emanating through the floor.
Raena was completely transfixed by the view out the window. “This is incredible.”
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Jason murmured.
“And you won’t anywhere else,” Wil said. “The depth of light is a phenomenon completely unique to subspace. Even nebulas have much more definition.”
“I can already tell I’ll be staring out the window the whole trip,” Raena commented.
“A nice sentiment,” said her father, “but you have some studying to do before we arrive.”
Jason frowned. “Of what?”
“Taran formal customs. I wanted to wait until we were on our way. Firstly, because it would be fresh in your minds, and secondly, because now you’re a captive audience and can’t steal away on a ship back to Earth.”
Raena’s stomach dropped. “Seriously?”
Wil nodded. “Sorry. Check your handhelds for the walkthrough. It’s only half as bad as it seems at first glance.”
Raena pulled out the device from her pocket and saw a message that eight new videos had been added to a shared folder. She looked over at Jason and he shook his head and sighed.
She opened the first video, titled “Making an Appropriate First Impression”, and took one final gaze out the window. This is going to be some trip.
* * *
Cris paced across the pavement at the edge of the port. Situated at the south boundary of the Sietinen estate, the port was surrounded by lush foliage that blocked the view of the main mansion. It figures they would order this arrival be out of sight from prying eyes, he thought sullenly.
It was no wonder that his parents had exhibited such a lukewarm reaction to news of their great-grandchildren’s entry to the fold of their Taran birthright. While Cris had been reluctant to go along with Wil and Saera’s plan to raise their children outside of Taran influence, he at least understood the purpose it would serve and supported the reasoning behind the decision. His parents, however, had outright resisted the plan. Were it not for some careful intervention on the
part of the TSS, the twins likely would have been taken by force back to Tararia as infants. That, of course, would have undone any goodwill Cris had rebuilt with his parents over the years, but he wouldn’t have put it past them to go to such extremes.
As it stood, the twins were now outsiders in much the way Saera had been at first. They had all of the pedigree and none of the conditioning to make them suitable leaders in the eyes of those that presently controlled Tararia. Except that’s what makes them so perfect.
The sound of thrusters in the distance cut through the serene bird calls filling the gardens. As the shuttle came into view, the birds silenced.
Cris watched the shuttle land, anticipation tightening his chest. He had watched his grandchildren grow up through pictures and short videos—it would be quite a different experience to finally meet them in person.
The whir of engines began to wind down as soon as the shuttle came to a rest on the pavement. Several seconds later, the side door slid upward and the exit ramp extended at a gentle angle to the ground.
Wil was the first to emerge from the cabin. He spotted Cris and waved. “Hey!” he called out.
“Hi,” Cris replied, waving back. He walked closer to the shuttle. “How was the flight over?”
“Not bad. It was actually kind of fun experiencing such a commonplace activity through fresh eyes.”
Cris smiled. “I’m sure.” He eyed the doorway, anxious for the twins to emerge. I wonder who they take after more?
Then, Raena came into view. She paused at the top of the ramp, taking in the view of the garden. A gust of wind sent a wave of her chestnut hair into her face and she brushed it back with one hand. She spotted Cris and grinned. Without hesitation, she hopped off the side of the ramp and jogged over.
“You must be my grandfather,” she said.
Cris took her in, realizing that she was somehow a perfect hybrid of her parents. “I guess I’ll have to get used to that title. It’s so wonderful to finally meet you.”
She looked him over from head to foot. “Dad really wasn’t joking about the family resemblance.”
Movement at the periphery of his vision caught Cris’ attention and he looked over to see Saera approaching with a teenage boy that could have been Cris’ twin were it not for his blue-green eyes. “And you must be Jason.”
