by Mel Keegan
“Only ten to Velcastra,” Marin argued, “only nine to Saraine … not that there’s anything much on Saraine. Yet,” he added. “Mark sent the Carellan there immediately, to seed the comm buoys. It’s ironic. Now the Zunshu threat is history, he could found a new Resalq colony, live on Saraine safely – but Confederate agents would be on him like a rash. How’d you like to put your neck on the block to save the Deep Sky – humans as well as your own people – and wind up shot dead by a bounty hunter on a fat sanction issued in Chicago or Marsport?”
“Its stinks,” Travers agreed, “and you know the clans back on Earth – the Rutherfords, the Carvalhos, even the Mayhews – will be gunning for revenge. They’ll call it justice, but a bullet is a bullet.”
Twenty yards back from the beach a cable rang, bell-like, against the flagstaff from which flew the blue and green banner of Carahne. Marin stopped there, watching the moons rise while Travers admired the stars of the Mare Aenestra with the fresh eyes of a transspace navigator. Hellgate was not visible from this quadrant; the stars were brilliant, inviting, almost taunting him to explore, with the promise of new worlds, the possibility of very different intelligence flourishing in extraordinary places.
“Excuse me … sorry to interrupt, but…”
The Slingo language and the accent of Borushek, in this place, jolted Travers back to the present. He turned toward the voices, grateful for the pale, cold light of two moons, which made the Carahnean night a soft blue twilight. Marin had taken a step forward, not quite defensive as old reflexes triggered, but Travers perceived no threat.
Seven young Resalq were coming down from Raishenne; three carried blankets and cooler chests. They were not just young by Resalq standards, Travers saw – they were younger than himself and Marin, by years. He saw manes of gold-blond hair, knee-less blue jeans, rope sandals, white meshlex tunics loose around slender limbs, single-thumbed hands. Two of them were almost girls, and for a moment he wondered if they were actually human, till something indefinable about the faces, the eyes, told him the truth. Some of them were teens, probably not even twenty years old yet, of the generation of Resalq who had grown up among humans, been nurtured by human culture, to the point where they identified with gender.
They were alien here on Carahne. The truth hit Travers hard. These kids spoke Slingo with an accent, the dialect of a military town. If they spoke more than a few words of the old language, he would have been surprised. They followed steelrock bands and aeroball teams, turned on to human dancers and actors, wore this year’s Sark and Elstrom chic, braided their hair with beads and feathers, the way kids did in Hydralis, flaunted their long-fingered hands –
And on Carahne they were fish out of water. Travers was taken aback by the realization, but Marin was offering his hand to the young man who had spoken to him. “I know you,” he was saying. “Not personally, but I’ve seen you on CityNet, haven’t I? You won the Arago Challenge – twice, in fact. Tigh Stromberg, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. Thanks for remembering.” Stromberg took Marin’s hand, clasped it in what seemed to be a genuine expression of gratitude. “It’s nice to be recognized – I mean, here. That is, I mean …”
“Hey, it’s okay.” The long-limbed, gold-maned ‘girl’ stepped closer, taking Stromberg’s arm. “They probably know what you mean, Tigh.”
“This is Winona.” Stromberg slid his arm around her. “Winona Breck. We’re, uh, from Riga.”
“I know. I’m Colonel Curtis Marin …. this is Colonel Neil Travers.” Marin shook the girl’s hand and smiled sidelong at Neil. “These two were all over CityNet, after Riga was evacuated.”
“I remember.” Travers took the young man’s hand, gave the girl a smile. “You’re a long way from home.”
“Tell me about it,” Stromberg groaned. “The thing is, it’s all over town … you guys got back from Zunshu space.” His eyes widened in the moonlight. “You won?”
“You beat them?” Winona’s eyes were vast pools of silver-gold.
Little wonder, Travers thought, these kids were the darlings of Borushek society. Stromberg was exotically beautiful, with almond eyes, tawny skin, a wide, sensual mouth; Breck was so outrageously beautiful, even Travers could not fail to notice, and Grant, Inosanto, Ingersol, would have worshipped at her feet.
But here, he realized, she and Stromberg belonged to the generation no one wanted to acknowledge. He could only imagine how Emil Kulich scorned them, how the city equeros must spurn them. Back home in Sark they were pursued by CityNet paparazzi, feted on the society pages, courted by human celebrities. Here, they were snubbed, even despised, so they drew together into a tribe of their own; and the desperation was naked on their faces.
“We’re back,” Marin was saying, “and we won through. You’ve nothing to fear from the Zunshu – the Deep Sky is safer than it’s ever been.” He paused with a half-smile. “Let me take a wild guess. You want to go home?”
“I guess we’re pretty obvious, huh?” Stromberg mocked himself, Winona and the others with a humorless little laugh. “You, uh, you don’t have a way out of here, do you?”
“You don’t?” Travers wondered.
Stromberg gestured at the westernmost moon. “There’s only the Freyana, parked right here, and bloody Kulich says she can’t take anybody anywhere. He means won’t. He just won’t authorize a flight.”
“That’s why the highband didn’t get fixed,” Breck added. ”I’ve been telling you, Tigh. I’ve been saying this for bloody weeks. If Kulich fixed the highband, the Freyana could go anywhere we wanted to – God knows, we offered to pay enough!” She looked at Travers with the enormous eyes – almost the same height as himself, which was petite for a Resalq. “I offered to pay charter fees for the ship.”
“And go where?” Marin tilted his head at the kids. “Until the Wastrel showed up here about four hours ago, you guys didn’t know the Deep Sky was safe.”
“But the Middle Heavens is,” Stromberg argued. “You can get far enough from Hellgate, the Zunshu don’t hit those worlds. We thought, Pakrenne’s nice. Santorini, you know? Lie on a beach and drink vodka till you guys destroyed the Zunshu … or whatever happened.”
“We offered a lot of money,” Winona assured Marin, “a lot more than the charter was worth. But bloody Kulich doesn’t want anybody leaving. He needs bodies to build a community here – I guess I understand that. We all do. Just so long as he doesn’t have to look at us. Hybrids, you know? We have to be here, but do as we’re told, stay out of his way. Do the jobs the ancestrals reckon they’re too good for.”
“Damn,” Travers whispered. “I thought it’d come to this.”
Marin wore a deep frown and lifted a brow at Travers as he asked, “Has anyone discussed your options with you?”
“You mean, about staying?” Stromberg looked far from comfortable. “They’re asking us to stay and ‘contribute to the community.’ What they mean is, we should all get busy and make babies … but only if we pair up with ancestrals.”
“Because they figure,” Winona spat, “they can breed us right out of existence in a few generations. Breed us right back to the ancestral type, like that’s the only kind of Resalq that’s worth the dirt we walk on.”
“Who says this?” Travers thought he could guess.
“Captain Bald-head Twelve-fingers,” Stromberg muttered. “And I know the Resalq need to get our numbers back, but there’s got to be two thousand of us, spread across the Deep Sky, and they’re dribbling in from all over. There’s gotta be plenty of ancestral types, they don’t need to breed us like cattle, and – Winona and me, and the rest us here, we’re Resalq too. That’s Jason, and Yoko, and Paulo, and Johnny, and Loong. We’re Resalq, fuckitall.”
“Or, we would be,” Winona sighed, “if they’d let us be. But it’s like we’re not good enough to belong to their club. They just want us to stay here and be pregnant, have their babies, so in four or five generations the likes of us have vanished, and us mongrels will be just a tiny
little handful of weird old bastards who can get the hell off their precious world and be forgotten.”
Tigh Stromberg might have been a two-time champion sportplane racer, but here he was young, disadvantaged, marginalized. “We, uh, don’t want to vanish, Colonel Marin. Jesus, we’re only like Pakrani, or Kuchini or Lushi or something. They’re all human. Aren’t they?” He searched Marin’s face, looking for answers.
“They’re very human,” Marin told him. “And they’re at liberty to be, in the Deep Sky. I have to tell you, though, back in the homeworlds those types are shunned. They have no place back there.”
“And we don’t have much place here,” Winona told him. The vast eyes were somber, sad.
“Besides which –” it was Paolo, with the long sun-blond braids, the ragged shorts slung at half-mast around human-slender hips, the big platinum rings in his nipples “– there’s nothing here, man. Nothing happens. Ever. I mean, seven freakin’ months I’ve been here, and there’s not one damn’ thing to tell you which day’s which!” The accent was not merely native to Sark, it spoke of the Kumukahi sector, which fronted onto a beach famous across the planet for its massive surf and the board riding championships.
And all these kids wanted was a berth on any ship headed out. Marin turned back to Travers, his face as filled with questions as Stromberg’s, albeit different ones. “You can ask,” Travers said easily. “The Wastrel’s a commercial vessel but she’s not fitted out for carrying a lot of passengers, Tigh. You’re not going to travel in starclipper style.”
“I’d hitch a lift on a garbage scow to get outta here,” Paolo muttered. “We figured, you know, the Wastrel’s only gonna be here for a day, so we better ask the question, quick.”
“And it’s a very good question,” Marin decided. “How many of you would there be?”
Tigh and Winona looked speculatively at each other. “I reckon, forty,” Tigh hazarded. “We’re all from Riga families. There’s plenty of money, Colonel. We can buy the tickets – Christ, we’ve been trying to pay to charter the Freyana.”
“And everyone is definitely wanting to leave?” Travers insisted.
“Bloody desperate to get back to the real world,” Winona assured him.
“Ready to go right now?” Marin nodded up in the direction of the big moon which had been designated Raishenne High Dock. “The Wastrel is right there. Any closer, and you could see her. But she’s not going to stay long.”
Stromberg was literally fidgeting with anxious energy. “Give ’em an hour to sling their trash in a backpack, and tell ’em where the line forms up.” The gold almond eyes were wide, unblinking. “We can round ’em up fast.”
“Then, you need to be talking to Captain Vaurien,” Travers decided. “And you lucked out for once. He’s here.”
Winona blinked at him. “Here in Raishenne?”
“You’re shittin’ us,” Paolo breathed.
“He’s having dinner with someone called Mad’ue,” Marin told him. “You might have seen us land beside the house.”
“Mathew. Mad’ue-gre. When he does business with humans he calls himself Mathew Gray.” Stromberg’s tonguetip flicked over his lips. “Would Captain Vaurien talk to us? Tonight?”
“I don’t see why not,” Travers guessed, “especially since you’re a commercial proposition. Passengers for Borushek … except, we’re not going to Borushek. We’re headed for Saraine. We can get you that far, and you can charter something from there. You’re only a few days from Velcastra, well inside of easy comm range.”
“Brilliant,” Winona decided. “I’m packing, Tigh. Right bloody now.”
“Still gotta talk to the captain,” Stromberg warned.
“I’ll pay ten times the ticket,” Winona muttered. “Cheap at twice the price, to get Kulich off my bloody case! He thinks I’m a freak.” She peered down at herself in the moonlight. “Look at me. Colonel, please.”
Travers held up both hands to stop them. “Passengers aren’t going to be swindled. If Captain Vaurien agrees to take you to Saraine, it’s just a job. Simple ground rules: stay out of Operations, off the engine deck, don’t get in the way of the working crew, take care of yourselves – you’re not on a clipper. She’s a salvage ship, there’s no army of stewards about to run about after you. Other than that, enjoy the ride.”
“She’s, uh, a nice ship, though?” Tigh wondered. “She’s not a scow, like Paolo said?”
The question was far from inappropriate, but Travers had to chuckle. “She’s our home. Curtis and I live there. And even if she was a scow, you’re not exactly spoiled for choice.”
“Tigh!” Winona gave him a savage nudge with one elbow. “Stop insulting them. That’s the Wastrel you’re talking about. This is Richard Vaurien – you mind your freakin’ manners, or let me talk to him!”
So Richard’s name was known in their circle too. They would have heard it often in these last years, and the Wastrel was as well known as the Carellan Djerun and the Aenestra. Travers was moving, heading back toward the Capricorn. “Let me have a word with the captain. I’ll see if I can pry him away from dinner.”
The broad avenue leading back to Mathew Gray’s property was lined with jacarandas, no more than a meter high. In a scant few years they would be tall, shading the road with brilliant blue canopies each summer. Oleanders and magnolias rustled in the sea wind; night birds called from the branches of an old, old tree around which the new road curved.
The Capricorn’s engines were cold now, but the ramp was still down, the cabin lights still on. Marin beckoned the Resalq inside. “Make yourselves comfortable. The ’chef is set up … configured for humans, of course, but there’s a choice, and a nice line in drinks. Music right there … air, heat, comm. You might want to call around your group, at least let them know you’re talking to the captain. Don’t make promises, but people need to ready. Neil?” He lifted a brow at Travers.
The kids had begun to look for music and beverages as Travers headed down the ramp and into the spill of light from the side door to Gray’s house. The strange, lilting sounds of ancient Resalq music whispered from within, and the old language was spoken as often as Slingo. Voices led them to a dining room off the main hall. A little handling drone waited there among green plants, abstract art, bass reliefs very much like those in Mark’s house on Saraine. Slate tiles were cool and dark underfoot; glowbots drifted unobtrusively where they were needed between pale stucco walls.
The four-meter dining table was littered with the debris of dinner. Many of the dinner group were still eating but Vaurien and Jazinsky had left the table. They sat on a low couch under the long windows, where bamboo blinds knocked quietly in the evening wind. Shapiro and Rusch had taken over the story; they were still in the Zunshu city, in the basement where the stasis chambers were long forgotten, half buried in silt.
At one end of the table Mark, Dario and Midani sat together, answering in their own language as they fielded questions from eight elder Resalq – all of them ancestral types, and all scientists, if Travers was any judge. Of Emil Kulich, there was no sign. As Travers and Marin appeared at the door Mark looked up across the chaotic table, but Curtis made subtle gestures and pointed at Vaurien.
Richard paused, brandy halfway to his lips, and gave Travers a curious glance. Neil beckoned discreetly. With a whisper against Jazinsky’s ear, a kiss for her cheek, Richard handed the brandy to her and stepped out into the hall, between bass reliefs depicting Resalq life as it would have been lived in their golden age.
“Trouble?” he asked quietly.
“Not … as such,” Marin said carefully. “But you must be wondering where all the younger Resalq are, or the ones who look as human as Dario and Tor.” His brows rose. “A bunch of them ran into us, probably not quite by accident. They were on their way down to the beach for supper, and there we were, watching the moons.”
“I’ve been wondering,” Vaurien admitted with all due caution. “We’ve been hearing commentary from the ancestrals.
Once or twice Mad’ue shushed them; I don’t speak the language, but I’d be prepared to swear he was telling them to mind their manners. Midani’s so close to steaming mad, he didn’t eat, though the food looked superb, from the Resalq perspective. So, Neil?”
“So … you ever hear the name of Tigh Stromberg?” Travers wondered.
“Won the Arago challenge,” Vaurien remembered. “A couple of times. Got engaged to a Sark socialite, just before we left.”
“Riga socialite,” Marin corrected. “Winona Breck … except she’s not a girl. They’re both very young Resalq. And they want out of Carahne.”
“Maybe forty paying passengers, Carahne to Saraine, if you’re interested.” Travers slid hands into pockets, and with a frown studied the ancestrals around the dining table. “This isn’t a good place for Resalq of Stromberg’s generation, any more than Earth and Mars would be the place for Barb or Jo, or even Mick. They’re too different.”
“They’re what the Deep Sky made of them,” Vaurien said thoughtfully, “and they’ve a right to be what they are.” He was looking at Jazinsky even then. “Forty passengers?”
“As far as Saraine,” Marin affirmed. “They can charter themselves a ride from Velcastra, be home in a couple of weeks. Riga,” he added, “might just come right back to life. These kids are in a jam, and they just want to go home. The family estates in Riga are waiting for them.”
“Commercial passengers,” Travers added.
Richard gave him an amused look. “You’re wheedling?”
“Negotiating,” Travers said expansively. “It’s got to be easier money than pulling a freighter off the accretion disk of Naiobe!”
“Ouch.” Vaurien winced visibly. “Where are these kids?”
“There’s a delegation – on the Capricorn,” Marin told him. “Stromberg, Breck, a few of their friends. They’re calling the rest of the group. Give them a nod, and Gill Perlman can fly a couple of shuttle flights.”
“All right, let’s hammer out some details,” Vaurien agreed.
