Valor's Child (Valor's Children Book 1)

by Kal Spriggs

  My room was on the second floor. It was large, with a high ceiling and narrow windows, designed to trap the cool night air and keep the room cool without power use. The bed was a big thing, with an ornate metal frame, like most furniture on Century. Wood was a luxury on our desert world. Plastic was somewhat less of one. Metal, stone, concrete, and silicates were our main building materials.

  The room was clean and clear of dust, but it still had an odd, unused look to it. I pulled out drawers and opened chests, and found neatly-folded women’s clothing, much of it of an older style. I didn’t pull any of it out, because I didn’t know who it belonged to. Besides, I found an empty set of drawers and put my own clothing there. I’d have to ask James whose room I was using and why they’d left their clothing there.

  The next thing I did, after I kicked off my boots and sat on the bed, was to pull out my datapad and access the net. Century had a world network, which was linked through courier ships to the greater networks of other worlds. As long as I could access the planetary net, I could talk to my friends here on Century, update myself on what I’d missed since my parents cut off my net access, and, generally, feel like I was connected again.

  I let out a crow of delight as my datapad connected. Then I let out a low whistle as I saw the bandwidth and subscriptions to which I now had access. The Admiral clearly liked to stay connected, the transfer speed was beyond what my parents had ever bothered with, above and beyond what the school back at Basalt Mesa had. And her subscriptions included all the main news lists as well as some so esoteric that I wasn’t even sure what they were. Some weren’t even abbreviations, just odd alphanumeric codes. That told me they’d probably be either technical subscriptions or direct news feeds. Neither of which interested me as much as the total bandwidth. I could, in theory, conduct full audio-visual holocalls or even a direct neural projection, assuming I had the equipment for it.

  The Admiral does, I remembered with a shiver. I remembered that she had at least a skullphone. If she had more than that, like a full neural computer, then she probably could max out the bandwidth herself, depending on what she was doing.

  What I wanted to do was to log in and update my profile, contact my friends, and even get started on my studies. A glance at the clock, however, reminded me that the Admiral had said dinner would start soon. My stomach rumbled to remind me that I hadn’t had much of a lunch, I had told my mom that I wasn’t hungry, and just nibbled on a sandwich.

  I straightened my shoulders, put my datapad down on the nightstand, and stood up. The Admiral might force me to go to the Prep School, but I wouldn’t let her see me depressed. I focused on that as I stepped out into the hall and then down the stairs. The cool stone steps seemed to muffle the sound of my footsteps. Down in the foyer, I hesitated. I remembered the library and study were to the left… where would the dining room be?

  I turned right and opened the door.

  The room beyond held a large, ornate wooden table, longer than the dining room back home and lined with empty chairs, far more than I thought must ever be occupied. The value of that wooden table, alone, would have impressed me, here on a world where we had all of two native forests, both of them protected parks. The thick stone walls held several paintings. I saw the Admiral and James already present. Clearly I had found the dining room.

  The Admiral already sat, her attention focused on her tablet screen. She glanced up as I arrived and gave me a slight nod. James arrived a moment later and sat down near the end of the table. A moment later, a plump, red-faced woman stepped in, a platter in her arms. She gave me a cheerful smile, “Ah, there you are, ma'am. Glad to have some company here at the house.” She set the platter down and took a seat next to James.

  The Admiral looked up again and noticed that I still stood awkwardly, uncertain where to stand. “Take a seat,” she said. She looked around, “You've already met James, this is his wife Stacy.”

  I gave the plump woman a polite smile and nod. I still felt uncertain as to what James really did, if he was a servant, family friend, or something else. Stacy beamed at me, “You look so much like your mother.”

  I felt my polite smile congeal a bit. “Ah, thanks.”

  “Stacy is kind enough to do the cooking here at the house,” the Admiral said. “Neither James or Stacy are here to clean up after you, though. They'll show you where the laundry is and where to take out your trash, but you need to take care of your own messes, understood?”

  I gave a sharp nod. It wasn't like I needed a servant to clean up after me. Though, I could admit that it would be nice not to have to clean the bathroom or take out the trash.

  “Good,” the Admiral said. She began to help herself to food from the platter. “Eat up, I'm sure you've developed an appetite, and Stacy is an excellent cook.”

  I helped myself. The food was simple but tasty, grilled chicken with some vegetables. I could taste some interesting spices, but I was more focused on my own worries than the food. Part of me worried about the upcoming semester at the preparatory school. Part of me worried that I wouldn't have time to do my prep work for the internship with Champion Enterprises. Mostly, I felt it was terribly unfair. I had worked hard for the internship. And if I had gone against what my parents had wanted... well, at least I had the opportunity. I knew well enough that there were other kids who hadn't worked so hard and who would be going on to far less prestigious jobs... assuming they found work at all. Most of my peers would attend vocational schools, while many of those who had barely scraped by would go right into menial labor jobs. Century just didn't have the money to waste on people getting meaningless degrees.

  James spoke up, “Miss Jiden will be attending the Academy Preparatory Course.”

  Stacy gave a broad smile, “Why, that's excellent! How exciting for you, are you looking forward to it?”

  I grimaced a bit, “Not really, but I haven't much choice.” I didn't bother to hide my bitterness. It seemed silly to even pretend to want to be there and if Stacy and James were around they would learn the truth sooner or later.

  “Oh,” Stacy gave a glance over at the Admiral. “She's like her mother, then?”

  The Admiral didn't respond, but I felt my eyebrows rise in surprise. I knew that my mother had not gone to the Academy and not followed in the Admirals footsteps. My mother didn't seem to think she had any need to serve and I had assumed the Admiral had felt the same.

  The table fell into an awkward silence and I searched the dining room with my gaze as I ate. The archaic room seemed like a place out of time. The huge wooden table and silver place settings were clearly antiques from Earth. A number of canvas pictures in heavy frames lined the walls. The one across from me, above an empty chair, was of a man in Century's uniform, though I didn't recognize the rank on his collar. The brown and tan uniform looked uncomfortable, and the splash of colors from his ribbons stood out in stark contrast. He had a stern but calm face, with sharply defined cheekbones and a dark complexion. His light brown hair was loose and short. His gray eyes were the most lifelike part of the painting and the artist had captured some sense of humor and wit that almost made the portrait to come to life. I peered at the brass plaque underneath. It read: Captain Brett Armstrong, Century Planetary Militia. 185-230 GD.

  I recognized the name, but only barely. Grandfather Armstrong, I thought, the Admiral's husband. My mother had never said how he'd died... and now I wondered if it were in a battle or something from the way she hadn't talked about it. Glances at the other portraits showed pictures of ships, either old wooden ones or sleek-hulled space craft. All of the portraits were signed, but in some odd, flowing symbol rather than a name that I could make out. The portrait of Brett Armstrong was the only one of a person. Clearly, the Admiral kept it in his memory.

  It was an odd insight into the Admiral. I had assumed that the woman would be cold and impersonal. My mother had as much as said so on numerous occasions. Yet the painting of her dead husband kept in the dining room to share with their meal
s suggested something else entirely... though I couldn't guess what that something else might be.

  ***

  “Hock, that’s totally unfair,” Tony said. “You should have that whole trimester off, so you have time to hit the books hard.” Tony had a new haircut, I saw. It was the latest fashion, from what he said, with his brown hair spiked and tufted. I thought it made him look like a hedgehog, but I didn’t want to hurt his feelings to say it. Besides, it was the latest fashion.

  I nodded, “Yeah, that’s what I said, but there’s no budging the Admiral.”

  Tony snorted, “Does everyone call her that? Seems silly, arrogant even. I mean, she’s just a reserve Admiral, not even active duty, right?”

  “Yeah…” I said, suddenly uncomfortable. I thought about the portrait in the dining room, of the grandfather I’d never met. “She is kind of a war hero, though.” Granted I didn't know anything about that, but that was what my mother had insinuated the one time I'd asked her.

  Tony chuckled, “Right... the Dalite War. My dad says we’d be better off, economically, if we’d been annexed and taken over. Plus there was all the damage from the war. I mean, what did she really save us from?” I could hear a tone of derision in his voice, as well as something else. It was most like his tone when he teased Tanner back in school. I hadn't liked it when he did that, but I hadn't exactly stopped him, either. It wasn't that I liked Tanner much either, but it still hadn't seemed nice.

  “Well, they did attack us,” I said. I felt my discomfort increase. I didn’t want to tell Tony that I disagreed, but I couldn’t let that statement go without response. Even my parents, as against the military as they were, agreed that the Dalite War had been an important fight for our planet’s freedom. “And I’ve heard that Fresco doesn’t have it so well off, and they’re part of the Dalite Hegemony.”

  Tony waved a hand, “Yeah, but that’s Fresco. This is Century. Our economy is so much better established, our merchant marine is much larger, and we’ve got Champion Enterprises.”

  I looked away, suddenly certain that it wasn’t worth an argument. “Well, regardless, I’m going to be doing the Academy Preparatory School for this trimester. So I’ll probably be out of contact most of that time.”

  “Well, at least they’re not insisting you go to the Academy,” Tony said. “If they did, I’d say you should fail out, even taking the blow on your educational records. I mean, I’m sure you could write a letter to the Internship Board, explaining it all…”

  I shook my head, “That kind of thing would look really bad. But I don’t have to worry about it, thankfully. Mom and Dad would lose it if the Admiral tried to do that. No, they seem barely on board with the Prep School thing. I even heard my mom argue with the Admiral, right before she left, about this whole thing. There’s no way they’d let her force me to do that. Besides, they’re not unhappy about the internship… just that I didn’t do what they said and apply elsewhere.”

  Tony blew a raspberry, “I still don’t understand that. I mean, granted, you didn’t have the connections I did, so it wasn’t totally certain you would make it in, but it wasn’t like there was too much of a risk from not applying elsewhere.”

  I frowned. I’d tried not to think too much about that when I did it. It had made me nervous to put all of my eggs in one basket. Especially since I had promised my parents that I would apply elsewhere… just in case. If it hadn’t worked out… the other schools deadlines would have passed and I would have had to wait another five months or more before I could even apply elsewhere. More likely than not, I would have a full year to wait.

  Well, unless I actually wanted to attend the Academy, I thought. Unlike the other schools, they opened up for classes in the summer, rather than the fall trimester. Which meant that if I completely lost my mind and wanted to go to the Academy, I could put in my application at the end of this summer.

  Tony interrupted that line of thought, “Hey, Jiden, you awake over there?”

  “Yeah,” I smiled, “It’s just been a rather long day.”

  “I bet,” he said, his voice sympathetic. “I really think that you could get out of this whole Prep School thing, you could make an argument that it’s a hardship…”

  “I can manage,” I interrupted. Tony rolled his eyes. I could tell he disapproved of how I seemed to have gone along with this punishment. Still, I did feel a bit guilty about breaking my promise to my parents and even worse about forging my mother's signature. I knew better than to admit that to Tony, though, so it was best that I change the subject. “Look, I wanted to ask you a question about the actual internship,” I said quickly. “You mentioned you rotate through different departments, rather than just in the assigned one?”

  Tony nodded, “Yeah, it’s kind of lame, I think. I just finished up with that. You get sent around to all the different departments and you cross train. I didn’t really get it, I mean, I’m going to be working logistics, the management track, why would I need to know how the Research Division works?”

  I frowned, “It kind of does sound useful, though. I mean, I’m sure they have crossover projects, from one group to the next, plus, if you do end up as high management, you’d have to know how the departments under you work.”

  Tony waved a hand, “I’m sure they could do it some other way. I’ve wasted a couple months and most of that time I still had assignments due in my main department. I think they just want to stress the interns out. We had four people quit out of my group so far.”

  “Four?” I asked. “Aren’t there only twelve in your group?”

  “Eight, now,” Tony grimaced. “Two of them shouldn’t have made it through the screening process, in my opinion. But the other two just sort of cracked. It was crazy. One girl had a breakdown in the office, just started crying and wailing, building security had to escort her out. I got it all on video, you got to check it out…”

  I grimaced. I really didn’t want to watch that. It sounded… wrong, somehow, to see someone at their most vulnerable. Plus, I was halfway afraid it might happen to me. “So, thirty percent failure rate, and you’re just starting the second trimester. Wow.”

  “Yeah, pretty brutal,” He said. He looked down at his watch, “Hey, I was going out tonight, your grandmother’s house is here in Duncan City, we could meet up. My dad came through and paid for that personal vehicle for me. It’s a really sleek Dahani-Sobu, the Three Hundred Series. Leather seats, great temperature control, and I know a really sweet club we can get into, as long as I flash my intern ID.”

  I bit my lip, “I really need to dig into that course work.”

  “Yeah, but what’s one night? You aren’t afraid, are you?”

  I looked at the door to the room. The Admiral hadn’t said I couldn’t leave… she just had implied it. I didn’t need to guess that the Admiral would disapprove of the kind of adventure that Tony had suggested. If he was going to flash his intern ID, it probably meant he’d cracked it to display a different age. That kind of thing was illegal, but so was slipping into one of the clubs underage. Other kids did that kind of thing all the time here in Duncan City or so Tony said. It sounded fun and exciting, but also like the kind of thing that would get me restricted to the house.

  “Come on, Jiden, it’s just one night!” Tony said, his voice eager.

  I started to nod, “You know, you’re right—”

  A knock at the door interrupted me before I could finish. “I’ll call you back,” I said.

  I closed out the messenger program on my datapad and went to the door. I opened it to find James in the hallway. He still wore his suit, even so late at night. “Yes?” I asked. I noticed, on closer inspection, that though his face was lined, it didn't have any age spots and his hair was still brown. That meant he, like the Admiral, had received life extension treatments. If I didn't get my job with Champion Enterprises and get them to pay for the same treatment, I'd probably die of old age before he did.

  “The Admiral wanted me to give you a quick tour,”
James said as he gave me a smile, “And I imagine you need a break from your studies.”

  “A break?” I asked. I felt confused, how did James know about the internship prep work? Wait, I thought, the Admiral mentioned course work for the Prep School...

  “Yes, the Prep School has a curriculum that they suggest you work through before classes start,” James said in an echo to my thoughts. “You have gone to their site and checked that out, right?” I felt my stomach sink. He saw the expression on my face. “Well, perhaps you should get started on that. I can give you the tour later.” I managed to give him a polite smile, even as I felt like someone had jerked the rug out from under me. “Good night, miss.”

  ***

  I came down for breakfast late the next morning. I felt exhausted, for by the time I had finished going through the list of work I had before me and finally gone to bed, I had tossed and turned for hours, unable to sleep. The sheer amount of work I had to do, not only over the next two weeks, but over the next five months weighed on me.

  Fortunately, the course work was similar. Identical assignments would have been asking too much. Still, it gave me a way to line up the assignments to work through as much as possible as quickly as possible. I'd already put most of it into my planner and had the lessons and assignments queued up.

  I stepped into the dining room and saw that the others were still seated, the Admiral in study of her datapad and James and Stacy in conversation. All three looked up and I gave them a polite, “Good morning.”

  The Admiral arched an eyebrow at her, “Late night?” Something of her tone suggested that she could guess why I had spent most of the night awake… and that she felt little sympathy.