by C. Gockel
20
Decontamination
In the Captain’s chair, Alaric’s gaze drifted to the monitors and System 33’s distant sun. A light beeping caught his attention, and he pressed a button to the side of his armrest. “Report, Dr. Choi?”
“Dr. Lang is now awake, and her condition is stable. Aside from minor abrasions, the other researchers from Time Gate 33 are fine. We’ve been monitoring our troops and the evacuees in decon and the outer airlock. The Republic doctor has been assisting them.”
“Any suit breaches?” Alaric asked.
“Five—Silva and Russo and three of theirs—”
Alaric didn’t want to ask who, even though his chest felt heavy. Please, not Volka.
“—one of their Marines and two androids,” Dr. Choi finished, and Alaric’s shoulders loosened. “According to the staff from Time Gate 33, the androids can be cooked at 110 C for an hour and be effectively sterilized.”
“The outer airlock can be used for that,” Alaric said.
“Our thoughts exactly, sir. Although, sir, Commander Ran has suggested we release them from the airlock. As we’re stationary, they’d be easy to retrieve, and the vacuum would incapacitate—”
“We’re not going to incapacitate them.” Alaric’s jaw tightened. He’d like to. He didn’t trust the things aboard his ship, but it was by the archbishop’s orders. His hands curled until his nails bit his palms. He was taking a leap of faith for a man of faith. Alaric himself had no faith. He exhaled and reminded himself that Sato had more than faith...he had intel. His eyes roved across the bridge and caught on Sato’s neural port…and the man had experience with Galacticans and their technology.
Choi cleared his throat. “The humans will need to be quarantined.”
Alaric’s chest got tight as he thought of his two men. The Merkabah had jumped four times in twenty-four hours—during the test, back to Time Gate 8, to System 33, and to the asteroid belt at the edge of System 33, far from where Time Gate 33’s defenses could reach them in less than a standard Earth year. They didn’t have business in System 33; that had been a lie on Alaric’s part. They simply hadn’t had time to calculate a more suitable jump after the rescue.
In truth, their hover engines were offline because of the avian onslaught, and their nets were drained. They’d need fifteen hours for repairs and for the nets to recharge. With the addition of the Galactic Republic refugees, they were going to be packed tight. “The brig is the only place we can spare. Seal them for quarantine but make them comfortable. Make sure the guards know our men being quarantined have served with honor and that the Galactic Marine is our guest.”
“Yes, sir,” said Dr. Choi. Alaric disconnected and stared at the hologram of S33O4 and Time Gate 33. They’d reached the planet at just the right time within one hundred kilometers of their target. Also, they’d correctly divined the nature of their enemy. An army of dumb animals that should have been at each other’s throats, not aligned against humans. “To make the humans part of their own,” their intel had said. That was the only bit of information not confirmed. He rubbed his chin. The Galactic Marines had obviously been surprised by the situation on the ground. How had Luddeccean Intelligence wound up superior to the intel of the Galactic Republic? Granted, System 33 was unsettled, and therefore only nominally part of their territory. Still, the Republic was so much more advanced than the Luddecceans. Luddeccea had its spies in the Republic, but most Luddeccean tech stolen from pirates was decades out of date. He eyed the archbishop, seated in his wheelchair not far away, staring into the depths of the hologram just as Alaric had been doing. The archbishop’s neural port glinted in the holo-light, and the white werfle was perched on the armrest, seemingly mesmerized by the holo as well.
Loud enough to be heard by them both, Alaric mused, “The intelligence gathering for this mission was more accurate than I’m used to dealing with.”
The archbishop scratched the werfle’s head. “Isssh was in communication with the werfle among their party and was able to supply us with real-time information.” He frowned, and his hand paused. “Until their werfle passed out from exhaustion. Isssh believes he’ll make a full recovery.” His fingers resumed scratching the white werfle behind the ears.
Alaric’s heart stopped. The words you’re mad were on the tip of his tongue. Biting them back, his heart resumed beating at double time. He almost asked if the archbishop thought he was crazy, but then Sato tilted his head and said, “Haven’t the events of today assured you that there are more things on heaven and Earth than dreamt of in our science, Captain?”
A shiver raced along Alaric’s spine. Not since that fateful day on Libertas when his mind had slid over the android in the inn had his life been anything like he’d dreamt. The universe where he knew his enemies and his friends, where he knew his place, had all but shattered. He thought of the spaceship that traveled without a soundwave, that withstood phaser blasts as though they were soap bubbles, and leaped through space and time in the blink of an eye—something that his physics and engineering classes had taught him would be impossible for a single vessel. Even his certainty in the laws of nature had been shattered. And he was now captain of a vessel that violated one of those laws.
Alaric was saved from having to answer when the blue light on his armrest started blinking. “Yes, Ran?” Alaric asked, his voice remarkably steady, considering.
“Captain, I’ve learned something from our guests you and the archbishop need to know.” Ran’s voice was shaky, not cocky or condescending.
“We’ll be right down,” Alaric said, wondering what had unnerved his First Officer.
“We should invite the engineer, Dr. John Bower, and the android, Trina, to the meeting,” said the archbishop, the weere priest Ujk already wheeling him toward the door. “It will save time.”
Alaric rose from his seat. “It sounds like you already know what Ran has to tell us,” he whispered. He felt lightheaded and as though the gravity was malfunctioning.
“We know what Ran heard, but not nearly enough,” said Sato. The elevator put on the Merkabah specifically for the archbishop opened, and Ujk backed Sato in. “Come, Captain,” said the archbishop. “The human race has need of you again.”
How could someone who knew as little as Alaric be at all of use to the human race? He knew better than to show his unease. Head high, he followed them into the elevator but was amazed when he didn’t stumble on the way.
21
Four Against the Dark
A voice with a Luddeccean accent came over a speaker. “Prepare for ionization and gamma radiation.” Volka swallowed and looked around her.
Within the helmets of the Luddecceans, dark gray shutters came down, completely hiding their faces. Volka started.
“Don’t worry,” Ben said. “The composite in the visors of our helmets is resistant to radiation. We don’t need any internal plates in our visors to protect us.”
“They’re purposely exposing us to radiation?” Volka asked.
“First stage of decon. Works really well,” said Ben. “Hold out your arms.”
He lifted his arms, as did everyone else. Volka copied.
Red lights flashed in the corners of the ceiling. “It will last a minute or so, I suspect,” Ben said. Sure enough, the light stopped flashing a few minutes later. “Irradiation complete,” said the voice in the intercom. In the Luddeccean helmets, the “plates” retracted but no one lowered their arms. “Commencing alcohol shower,” said the voice, and then from every direction liquid began firing at them—alcohol, Volka presumed. It rained down from above their heads, sloshing down their visors in sheets instead of rivulets. It fired from the ceiling corners at their shoulders and arms. It came from the corners where their walls met the floor. It even gurgled up from the floor itself. Volka could feel the pressure beneath her boots. For once, she was glad she couldn’t smell anything outside her suit. The sprayers stopped, but no one lowered their arms. The intercom said, “Commencing evaporation.�
� Blasts of air hit them from every angle and only when they were done did anyone lower their arms.
“Those with suit breaches will proceed to quarantine now,” said the intercom.
Everyone stepped aside and Ben and the two Luddecceans walked to the front, all of their gear on. It occurred to Volka that the suits could keep germs out—or keep them in. Lieutenant Young stepped up to Ben, but before he said a word, Ben said, “I’ll be all right, sir.” For a moment, they said nothing, but then Young nodded and stepped back. A door opened to the ship proper, and Volka saw two armed Luddecceans in suits of their own. The three humans with suit breaches left the room, and the door whooshed shut.
The intercom came on again. “The captain has requested you wait here for further orders. You’re free to take off your helmets.”
There was a moment of silence, and then slowly, helmets came off. Volka took off hers and was assailed by the lingering scent of the isopropyl alcohol shower, sweat, human males, and Walker. Of course, the Luddecceans would have no women among them. For a few moments, the Luddecceans and the Galacticans regarded each other, and then Young held out a hand to Grayson. “I’m Lieutenant Young of the Galactic Marines.” Shaking Young’s hand, Grayson introduced himself. The humans around Volka seemed to unwind. Soon they were laughing and talking as though they weren’t on opposite sides, which, Volka supposed, for the moment, they weren’t. They didn’t look that different, she noted. Their haircuts were the same. The races of old Earth had blended hundreds of years ago, with people who were blonde and blue-eyed like James, or dark haired and dark skinned like Noa, being the exception. The Luddecceans and Galacticans all reflected that blend. The only notable differences between them—besides the lack of neural ports—were that the Galacticans all had perfectly straight teeth and clear skin with no sign of acne. Also, when the Galacticans looked at her, their eyes were soft. The covert glances she caught from the Luddecceans were angry.
Volka shifted on her feet. They thought Alaric was her patron. It protected her, but it also upset the natural order of things. They thought she had power she didn’t have.
Fortunately, as time went on, more glances went to the door and the intercom. After a long while, one of the Luddecceans said, “How long have we been in here?” and a Galactican replied, “Forty-five minutes, sixteen seconds, and forty-two milliseconds,” without consulting a chronometer. All the Luddecceans shifted away from the Marines as though mental chronometers were both undesirable and contagious.
“Might as well settle in, boys,” said Grayson, and the Luddecceans and the Marines took seats on opposite sides of the wall. Volka sat next to the door separating the team from Sixty and James. There was a light spilling from the tiny window. Volka guessed it was from Sixty’s “invisi-filaments” that charged in heat or stunner fire, but she didn’t peek in, trying to remain as unnoticed as possible.
One of the Luddecceans, sitting on his butt, leaning against the wall with his legs outstretched, said, “So on the remote chance we get shore leave in System 1, where would a guy go to meet a weere?”
Ears curling, Volka flushed from her hairline to her toes and stared at the floor. In the context he was using, “weere” was the same as “whore.”
“Well, we don’t have so many weere as you do on Luddeccea,” said one of the Galacticans.
“What are you saying, soldier?” said one of the Luddeccean Guardsmen, his voice rising in mock, or not so mock, anger.
“Who you calling soldier?” a Marine quipped. “We’re Marines.”
Scratching behind an ear, looking somewhat confused, the first Marine said, “But I guess there are a few left in System 11 where they originated...”
Despite her state of shame and embarrassment, Volka’s ears perked.
“...Ben’s grandma is a weere, if I remember right,” the Marine finished, and suddenly Ben’s orange eyes made sense. Also, he’d known Sundancer was hurt, hadn’t he? Was he wave sensitive?
At the Marine’s statement, the Luddecceans looked confused. They might or might not know that weere and humans could reproduce, but whether they did or didn’t, they’d think that the Marine had just called his possibly plague-infected fellow brother-in-arms’s grandmother a whore. And if they did know weere and humans could have children, they’d never admit they were descendants of weere. The Luddecceans’ feet shuffled, and their eyes slid to one another.
Volka glanced at the Fleet Marines to see how they were taking all of this and found her eyes meeting Lieutenant Young’s. The Lieutenant looked angry, though Volka wasn’t sure why.
The other Fleet Marine continued, oblivious, “‘Course, if it was my first and only time in System 1, I would head straight to Kabukicho in Japan or Dongguan in China. They have the best sex ‘bots. You can get anything with sex ‘bots.”
The Luddecceans made noises of disgust and revulsion.
“What? You afraid they got robot teeth that will bite your peckers off or something?” said a Marine, sounding incredulous.
In Volka’s Luddeccean paperbacks, that was a theme that came up frequently. Oftentimes the robots had teeth where they weren’t supposed to. A glance at the Luddeccean Guardsmen confirmed they’d probably read those same books.
“They got diseases!” said one of the Luddecceans defensively.
“What?” said a Marine. “They aren’t human, and they can wash down with isopropyl or even bleach before each customer.”
“And you can get anything you want—” said the first Marine. He went into a rather graphic description of some of the things a man could want, joined by his fellow Marines and even Walker. At the end, the Marine added, “And they like anything you do to them.” His voice was cheerful, with not even a hint of a leer, but Volka couldn’t help but think of the ‘bot who looked like a twelve-year-old boy aboard the Copperhead and all his terrible scars.
The conversation was interrupted by the whoosh of the door opening. A Guardsman carrying a pile of neatly folded clothing entered. Behind him stood a man who might have been an officer, but Volka didn’t know enough about ribbons to say what rank. Before anyone could get up, the maybe-officer said, “Don’t get up. Captain’s in a meeting with some of the Galactic researchers and the archbishop. He wants you to stay put.”
The man with the clothes walked to where Volka was seated, opened a little hatch that she hadn’t realized was above her shoulder, deposited the clothes in it, pressed a button and said, “Clothing for you, Robots,” and then sealed the hatch and walked away, fast, as though he’d been burned. The door to the hallway whooshed shut as he left, and the Luddeccean Guardsmen and the Galactic Guardsmen were left regarding one another again.
“Welp,” said Young, after a long moment. “Hurry up and wait. Kind of makes me feel at home.”
There was laughter from both sides of the room, but Volka couldn’t help but wonder, wait for what? She pulled her knees up to her chest. “Carl,” she whispered, trying to say the werfle’s name with her heart. There was no answer. “Sundancer?” she murmured, before she remembered the spaceship was gone. She felt a gnawing emptiness not just in her stomach, but at the end of every nerve ending, and shivered. Around her, conversation was buzzing again, but she felt completely alone.
And then the door to the rest of the ship whooshed open again. Standing in it, silhouetted by light in the hallway, flanked by Trina and John Bower, was Alaric. He wasn’t wearing the ‘dress greens’ she’d seen him in a few times, but a work uniform. Made of gray camouflage material, the trousers were loose and tucked into high boots around his calves. The jacket was the same material and similarly boxy. There was a gold embroidered dove on his chest, and stars, but that was the only adornment. It might have been the uniform, but he looked like he’d lost weight—his cheekbones were sharper; the clothing hung on him. She thought she saw more gray beneath the cap he wore, and his face was hard and grim. At his feet was a white werfle. Behind him were four armed guards. Volka scrambled to her feet along with everyone
else in the decon chamber. Alaric’s eyes went to Grayson and then to Young—they didn’t so much as graze Volka. The werfle though, it looked at her right away. Her stomach fluttered, and a voice hissed in her mind, “Miss Volka, you will come forward.”
Ears going back, Volka edged a step toward the front, but then Alaric’s eyes briefly met hers and narrowed. They felt as cold and sharp as icicles. She should have stayed back. She shouldn’t have listened to the strange werfle. A muscle in Alaric’s jaw jumped. She was a woman and a weere, and the whole crew thought she was his weere. Bowing her head, she replied silently to the werfle, “No, it’s not my place.” She drew out each word, feeling their meaning.
Alaric’s eyes left her and scanned the room. Oddly, it left her bereft. She should have been relieved that he was ignoring her. Last time she’d spoken to him, he’d ordered his team to fire on her and Sixty. He turned to Young again, and before he even began to speak, Volka knew she wouldn’t like his words.
“What are they waiting for?” James asked.
Body still glowing with power overload bright enough to interfere with his vision, 6T9 couldn’t see James even though the airlock temperature was dropping rapidly. He’d turned off his pain receptors. He still ached, but not from the overload. “This is the last time I’ll be alone naked with you, James, and we haven’t even touched.”
“Sixty, you’re thinking out loud again,” James said.
6T9 scanned his recent processes. He had indeed said that last thought aloud. He groaned, not in embarrassment, but in frustration at his malfunctioning hardware and software. He couldn’t be embarrassed anymore. James had asked him not to reboot because he didn’t want to be alone, and 6T9 had indulged James’s malfunction. James could indulge 6T9’s malfunctions. He also groaned, frankly because he couldn’t see James. “The universe is conspiring to ensure that I never see you naked.”
