Derelict: Halcyone Space, Book 1

by Lj Cohen

  "Look, I appreciate your willingness to help. I just don't see this working."

  Why couldn't his brother just shut up? "Go jump out an airlock," Jem muttered, his gaze shifting from one side of the station schematic to the other. "Airlock. Wait." Looking up, he smiled at Barre. "I've got it."

  Jem found the station exit the furthest away from the derelict ship. It was a simple matter to get the door to log an unauthorized egress for one Durbin, Barre. "If anyone tries to look for you, Daedalus will report you as out of range, off station."

  Barre's eyes widened. "How'd you … never mind." He whistled softly. "You're something else, you know?"

  "Not me. Ro," Jem said, a sour taste in his mouth. "We should go now. Before Mom shows up and while Dad's still out cold."

  "So you've bought me some time. Then what?"

  "I'm not sure. But maybe some time is all they'll need to come around."

  Barre quirked his lips into a wry smile. "Do you really believe that?"

  "No," he said, not looking he brother in the eye. "But it's worth a try."

  "Whatever happens," Barre said, pausing to look around his room, "I owe you."

  Jem waited as Barre slipped a bag across his chest. He hadn't even asked where Jem was taking him, not that it mattered. If their parents couldn't let Barre have his music, then maybe there was a way off Daedalus. Fixing Barre's ident to make him an adult wouldn't be easy or legal but neither was this. Not really. And then there were the guns in the hold of the ship. "Ready?"

  "Not much choice even if I'm not."

  "No."

  Barre put his hand on Jem's shoulder and squeezed it lightly. They walked out of their quarters, past their sleeping father and into the station's corridors. Jem could feel the skin on his back crawling and struggled to shake off the sense of being watched. Keeping his breathing even, he led Barre through the station. Hardly anyone noticed them, but then again, as far as anyone on Daedalus knew, there was nothing unusual about the Durbin brothers. All their discord stayed behind sealed doors.

  His brother remained silent until they reached the deserted corridor that led to the ship. "You've got to be kidding," Barre said. "Does it even have air?"

  "Would you rather camp out on the bare rock?" Jem lifted his chin towards the external airlock. "We're not the only ones here, so you need to stay out of sight. I can bring you some food later."

  "Others? Who?"

  "Rotherwood and Ro." Jem winced. He wouldn't be on either of their short lists.

  "The senator?"

  "No. Micah."

  "I guess I owe Ro a thank you, too."

  "Well, she didn't do it for you," Jem said, nearly spitting out the words. "And if she finds you're here, she'll report you, so stay out of sight."

  "Whoa, cool your afterburners," Barre said. "I though you and Ro were friends."

  Jem frowned and looked at the floor. So did he. "I need to check something before I get you settled," he said, pulling out his micro, accessing his link to the drones. He exhaled, letting his shoulders relax. Ro hadn't shut him out. Driving the little robot like it was his avatar in a 3-d game, he had the drone scout out the ship's main corridor.

  He parked it at the junction that led to the bridge and the forward storage area so it could warn him if either Ro or Micah entered the corridor. "All clear. Let's go." Jem led Barre down the ship's central corridor and into what had been crew barracks.

  "You've got to be kidding me," Barre said, standing just inside the room.

  The rectangular space might have been the size of Jem's and Barre's rooms put together, but it looked like it was meant to house twenty-one. The walls were lined with metal bunks, stacked three high, each covered with a thin mattress. The material had been some kind of white foam in its past life. Flecks of it coated the floor like artificial snow. A small metal box hung on the end of each frame; otherwise the room was utterly bare.

  "So sorry. Would you rather go back to the comforts of house arrest?" Jem bit his lip to keep from apologizing for real. He wasn't the one who screwed up. "Look, I'll try to bring you a blanket or something, okay?"

  "No, it's fine. It's just for a few days anyway."

  "At least there's light. And oxygen."

  "Oh, joy," Barre said. "What about a head?"

  "Must be one here somewhere." Jem looked around and spied a door on the far side of the room. "It should be there," he said. "If it works."

  "Great."

  "Don't worry, I'll bring you a bucket."

  Barre wrinkled his nose. "You're all heart, Jem."

  ***

  Micah walked back to the forward hold. When had his father turned into someone who could run guns without even a twinge of conscience? You're growing drugs, man, he thought, how different are the two of you?

  "Different enough," he said aloud to his silent lab. Bittergreen didn't kill, even if the cartel would. The door opened. Micah didn't bother to turn around. "Did you find him?"

  "Yes." Ro sighed. "He's gone."

  Micah logged into his terminal. Whatever data could be saved, he'd save. Ro drifted to stand behind him.

  "What are you doing?"

  "Shutting it down."

  "Then what?"

  Why couldn't she'd leave him alone? "Pack and get ready to move again."

  "I could use your help."

  "That's funny," Micah said, pivoting in his chair to face her. "I thought you didn't want anything to do with me." He flashed her a wry smile. "It's mutual, by the way."

  "So you're just going to let your father disintegrate your life all over again?"

  Micah's mind flashed on the image of all those guns. Anger pulsed through his chest, a pounding wave of heat that rose though his throat and into his face. "No."

  "Then help me," she begged, a desperation in her voice that he'd never heard before.

  He barked out a harsh laugh. If their fathers could work together, he guessed the two of them could, too. And if anyone could sabotage the ship, it would be Ro Maldonado.

  He canceled the commands to end the artificial climate program. At least for a few more weeks he would let his plants have a chance to live and keep growing. If they were successful in keeping the ship grounded, maybe he'd buy himself a little more time. Would that be enough to keep his father from delivering the weapons? Would he and Ro have to go further? The thought of getting his father arrested made him queasy, but letting those guns out was worse. His mother would have been horrified.

  "So, what do we disassemble first?"

  ***

  "What are you talking about?" Ro asked, staring at him.

  "What do you mean, what am I talking about? We have to keep this ship from ever taking off."

  His expression was as open and as intensely focused as she'd ever seen.

  "She won't fly until the AI is fixed and my father isn't capable of doing that." She might not be, either, but she wouldn't know for sure until she could check on the progress of her program. Without Jem, the work would be harder. Micah was no eager assistant, but he was competent. With his help, maybe they could get the ship fully functional again before her father and the senator needed to finish their deadly transaction.

  "Then it's okay." Micah met her gaze, looking as earnest and as naïve as Jem. "If they can't take the guns off station, we have a chance to figure out what to do."

  Ro laughed, an uncomfortable echo of her father's mockery in her mind. "This ship represents simple convenience for our fathers. Do you doubt they would find another way?"

  "Then what are we going to do?"

  "I'm going to take control of the ship. Figure out a way to lock them out." She turned to her monitor. The guns weren't her concern; the AI was. If she wanted to finally escape her father, she had no other options. In a weird way, the guns and his partnership with the senator helped her. Getting the AI on line would give her powerful leverage.

  "You can't be serious."

  Micah grabbed her forearm, trying to turn her around. Her arm bur
ned with the memory of her father's hand pressing into the same place. Heat burst up from the pit of her stomach. She twisted until Micah's arm torqued and his fingers sprang open. "Don't ever touch me again," she warned.

  He raised his hands and stepped back. "We … I can't let my father do this."

  "If you're not going to help me, figure out a way to delay him and leave me to my work."

  "Damn it, what do you want me to do? Tell Mendez?"

  "And what happens when she sees your little farm?" Maybe they'd do a two-fer deal — a father and son special.

  "Fuck the bittergreen, Ro, this is serious."

  The guns frightened her, too. How could she explain to him that her way was the only way she knew to fight back? "Do what you have to do."

  Chapter 18

  Jem grabbed a few blankets from central supply, charging them to his parents' account. By the time they looked at their bill, he hoped this would be long over. Food would be more problematic. Walking around with meals to go would definitely raise suspicions. Barre would have to be grateful for the protein bars Jem nicked from the commissary. Not very tasty and with a texture that could crack teeth, they would sustain him for a few days.

  He checked with his snooping drone again and sneaked back onto the ship.

  ***

  The room's illumination slowly warmed from darkness to twilight to full daylight. Nomi blinked awake and reached for her micro. She had an hour before her shift. "Ro?" she called, not really expecting an answer.

  Standing, she stretched, letting her blanket pool to the floor, her bare skin shivering in the cool air. "Daedalus, set temperature to twenty-one degrees, please." The room heated quickly and she walked around the bed toward the empty sitting area.

  The pillow and blanket she'd given Ro were neatly folded on the sofa. Nomi leaned down and picked up the blanket, raising it to breathe in Ro's scent. Well, it was a start, she thought.

  Humming to herself, she washed up and dressed for work, wondering what Ro was doing. Maybe they could meet for breakfast when her shift was done.

  ***

  Barre paced the empty barracks, his footfalls making percussive sounds against the hard floor. The metallic surfaces made the space extremely live. It would create some interesting overlapping echoes. Even now, the possibility of music was everywhere. How could his parents do this to him?

  Sitting down on the thin bunk pad, the metal frame pressing into his spine, Barre wondered when Jem would return. He wished he could believe this little stunt of his would change anything. As smart as Jem was, he was pretty stupid about their parents. Barre closed his eyes and picked his favorite play-list. He stretched out on the rigid bed letting the music flood his brain.

  ***

  Micah strode through the ship's corridor toward Daedalus, trying to sort out who he was more furious at — his father or Ro. Right now, they were pretty even in the polling. If Ro wasn't going to help him, he had to figure out how to stop his father on his own.

  The real question remained — what was he willing to risk? How much would the commander believe? He frowned, wondering how his father even got those fake diplomatic seals. He didn't have the skills to counterfeit them. The penalties for that were probably more severe than even smuggling the weapons.

  At the ship's airlock, he froze. The seals. He needed Mendez to find one of those seals — preferably in his father's possession. Micah smiled and headed back to the storage bay.

  ***

  "Good riddance," Ro said, to Micah's rigid spine. She wasn't surprised when he didn't turn back. First Jem and now Micah. Relying on anyone other than herself had been a mistake. Her father was right.

  An image of Nomi's sleek, dark hair and her expressive almond-shaped eyes flitted through her mind and she pushed it away. Friends meant liabilities and compromises that led to disappointment and loss.

  Ro grabbed her micro. Her program had terminated several hours ago and if the AI hadn't been utterly fried, it should be starting to re-integrate itself by now. With one last look at Micah's lab, she headed to the bridge.

  The door slid open at her touch. Soft red down-lights glowed from the walls to illuminate the smashed displays. The rest of the space lay in shadow. A drone's small white light blinked from the floor across the room.

  She accessed Jem's interface, hating the fact he was so good at this. With a few casual waves of her hand, her micro paired easily with the autonomics and she manually shifted the illumination from night vision to daylight mode. The room brightened steadily until the entire bridge was bathed in an even, white light.

  It looked like all the environmentals worked fine.

  As Ro scanned Jem's code again, something in his programming snagged her eye. "Huh," she said, her voice loud in the empty room. He had side-loaded a sophisticated voice module.

  The environmentals were controlled by the autonomic subroutines, but just like in humans, the cortex could override them, at least to some degree. If the AI could parse a voice command and send it on to be processed, she would know the sensory input modules functioned.

  "Illumination — night vision."

  The brightness wavered. Ro held her breath, waiting. Nearly imperceptibly, the lights began to dim. Ro blinked and the shadows deepened. Shivering with anticipation, she stared, grinning as a red glow replaced the harsh white.

  She opened her mouth to start another voice-command sequence when her micro beeped.

  "Ro?" Nomi's voice warmed the harsh room, bringing an unexpected smile to Ro's face.

  "I'm here," Ro said. The red lights deepened as she tried to figure out what else to say.

  "I found your hack. Well, that's pretty obvious, right?"

  "I'm sorry. I probably shouldn't have broken into your micro."

  Nomi laughed. "Serves me right for not locking out the defaults."

  Ro could imagine her shrugging one slender shoulder. If someone had hacked her stuff, she would have been supremely pissed. "No static?"

  "Five by five," Nomi said. "You free for breakfast?"

  She glanced at the time on her micro. "You just got on shift. It's hours until breakfast."

  "Yeah, but I don't want you making other plans."

  The lights started shifting between night-vision red and daylight white. That wasn't supposed to happen.

  "Ro? You still there?"

  "Hang on a minute. Tracking down a glitch." Maybe it was the voice integration. Ro shifted back to her micro's heads-up display and found the manual illumination settings. "Let's try this again." She set the light levels back to daylight mode. Harsh white light dazzled her vision, as bright as a lightening flash. "Shit." It washed out her display.

  "Ro?"

  "Working on something." Nomi would have to wait. "Illumination — night vision," she said again, trying to override the stutter and get the environmentals to reset. The room glowed red. Ro's sight cleared and her displays returned to focus. Setting two additional windows, she called up her program in one and the live code in another. They should have been identical. The AI should have reverted to a factory reset with Jem's interface and Ro's tweaks enabled.

  She opened her toolbox and pulled out a compare and contrast module. Given the complexity of the code involved, it would likely take hours to run.

  "Yeah, breakfast sounds great, Nomi," Ro said, surprising even herself, as she superimposed the two windows and flicked the assessment module over. Maybe she could even get a few hours of real sleep first.

  The program tumbled end over end, a complex cube shape of glowing colors. It struck both windows and winked out, like a flame extinguished in a flood of water. "Huh," Ro said. That wasn't supposed to happen. "Nomi, can I catch you later?"

  The bridge vibrated beneath Ro's feet, long dead engines growling like recently uncaged and hungry animals. Red lights pulsed. The wail of emergency sirens deafened her. The ship leaped up and Ro fell to the floor, her hands clasped over her ears. A giant's fist pressed her to the ground, her leg twisted at an awk
ward angle nature never intended. She screamed as her ankle broke beneath her, the sound swallowed by the klaxon and the angry engines.

  Chapter 19

  The communications array seemed a lot less lonely and boring knowing Ro was on the other end of Nomi's micro, even if she was busy tinkering with something. The sound of a rumbling engine filled the array, even through the micro's tinny speaker.

  "Ro, what are you working on?"

  The whining increased until Nomi could practically feel the vibration through her bones.

  "What the …" The whole communications room shook. Her micro trembled on the edge of the console before tumbling to the ground. An alarm Nomi had never heard outside of her orientation training dopplered through the station. She could hear it from the corridor, slightly out of pitch and out of phase from the array's own alarm.

  Commander Mendez's voice boomed through the communication system. "Alert level alpha. Emergency crew to stations. All non-essential personnel to quarters. This is not a drill."

  "Ro!"

  Even if she did answer, Nomi couldn't have heard it over the wailing siren. Lights flashed red all over her console. Her chair, bolted down for the vanishingly small chance of a station-level impact, shivered beneath her. She pressed her knees against where the armrests molded into the seat and leaned her torso against the console to keep from being dumped to the floor.

  Red lights strobed through the room, dazzling Nomi's eyes. The room lurched beneath her and a new alarm added to the cacophony. That sound she knew. It was the warning of an airlock breach.

  Her chair gave one more violent shake and then the motion stopped. All Nomi could feel was the wild pounding of her heart. She checked the air pressure. Wherever the breach happened, this room was tight. Closing her eyes, she struggled to think, alarms still ringing in her ears. What the hell just happened? She scrambled for her fallen micro. "Ro? Are you okay? Ro!"

  The klaxons quieted to an irritating alert. "Bridge to communications, report!" Commander Mendez's voice cut through Nomi's confusion like a bucket of ice water down her spine. She dropped the micro into her lap.