Brightly Burning

by Alexa Donne

  “Science. I’m a virologist, remember?”

  “Then, yeah, I had the Kebbler virus.”

  “And you survived?” Her tone was positively gleeful. She went back to the metal drawer and pulled out a tourniquet and syringe.

  “Clearly,” I said, eyeing the door. “Can I go now?”

  “Let’s make a deal.” She reached for my arm again. “You let me draw some blood—​for science—​and I’ll answer whatever burning question you were quite indelicately trying to butter me up for.”

  My whole body burned at being caught, but a surge of triumph pushed through the heat. She was willing to talk to me. Now I had to figure out what question I wanted to ask.

  “You think about it while I take care of this.” She tied the tourniquet just above my elbow and picked up the needle.

  I could ask about the other governesses, or about the sounds I’d been hearing, but the former wouldn’t get me closer to figuring out who was trying to hurt Hugo, and the latter might make her think I was losing my mind. “Is there anyone on board who would want to hurt Hugo?” I asked finally as Hanada plunged the needle all the way into my vein.

  “That’s a dangerous question to ask.”

  “Why?” I focused intently on her purple-tipped hair to distract myself from the pressure of the needle. I couldn’t look.

  “Because if there were, I might be the one, and I have a needle in your arm?” She was quick to let me know she was kidding before I could jerk my arm away. “No one is trying to hurt Hugo. I mean, you’ve met all of us. Who exactly do you think is a secret killer? The fire was an accident.”

  I bit my tongue, unsure I wanted to tell her about the airlock, or the laughing. Hanada did not exactly inspire trust. When she withdrew the needle from my arm, I let out an involuntary sigh of relief.

  “This was nice,” she said, signaling question time was over. Then she shooed me to the door, leaving me in the dark and feeling entirely unsatisfied.

  The feeling stayed with me all day, like a second skin. Hanada’s question rattled around in my head. I had met everyone on board the Rochester, so who did I think could be trying to harm Hugo? Hanada was odd, but if their weekly poker game was anything to go by, Hugo and she were friends. Xiao, Orion, and Jessa were out of the question—​too motherly, too friendly, and too young, respectively. I didn’t know Lieutenant Poole well, but it was a big leap to brand her a killer. And Albert could have simply poisoned Hugo if he wanted.

  But then there was that laugh. Someone had been in the corridor last night before the fire. I was sure of it.

  Reasonably sure.

  Before dinner, I went back to my unfinished message to Jon, rewriting it now that I’d had some time to collect my thoughts.

  Dear Jon,

  Something happened last night . . . It’s turning into a blur now, and I’m not sure what to think. Long story short, there was a fire in Hugo’s room. I saved his life, and then he left. And everyone says it was an accident, but I’m not sure.

  I’ve gone over it in my head, and I can’t imagine who on board would do such a thing. But then I guess I’ve only been here two months and don’t really know them. Does your uncle have access to the fleet-census database? Maybe he could do a quick lookup on the crew? It’s Iris Xiao, Grace Poole, Mari Hanada, Orion Carmichael, and Albert Hawes. No need to check on the ten-year-old.

  Don’t worry about me, though. I’m still happy here and don’t want to come back. I’d just like some peace of mind that no one on staff is a pyromaniac.

  Stella

  Dinner was fully vegetarian again, pleasing Officer Xiao, the rest of us not even bothering to mention the change. The crew was used to this. Hugo came; Hugo went. I would get used to it too.

  After dinner, I headed for the study. Only once I got there, I remembered: no Hugo, no evening reading appointment. I scoured the corridor, looking left, right, and behind me for good measure before I pressed my fingers to the OPEN button.

  And nothing happened. I tried again. Same result.

  I was locked out.

  Hugo was gone and, with him, access to his favorite spaces on board. To the spaces we shared. Something inside me boiled, like anger. It didn’t seem fair—​I really wanted to read that Agatha Christie—​but I couldn’t because Hugo had chosen to run away.

  I retreated to my quarters and, for the first time since I’d left the Stalwart, allowed myself to cry.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Hugo unwittingly left one piece of him behind. His precious Jungle Book lay forgotten in my quarters until two days after his departure, when I found it inside my bedside storage drawer. At first I ignored it, stowing it at the bottom of my wardrobe, underneath a pair of dress shoes I’d not yet worn. But each morning and evening as I dressed and undressed, it called to me. I had to know what was so beloved by Hugo and his father and grandmother before him that he’d been willing to die for it.

  Fortune would have it that I wasn’t locked out of the library. I found a copy of Kipling’s biography in the archives, transferred it to my reader, and devoured it alongside The Jungle Book. I also found Agatha Christie’s entire catalog digitized, easing the blow of the study a bit. I dug in to her mysteries just as the mystery of the ship quieted down to nothing. There were no more strange sounds, and two weeks after my plea, Jon responded and put to rest my paranoia.

  Hey, Stella—​

  I’m sorry it took me so long to respond. The water-filtration system broke, so that’s forty-eight hours of my life I won’t get back again. Then, when I tried asking my uncle to check out your crew, he gave me The Look again, so I had to implement a different tack. You are looking at Captain Karlson’s new apprentice! Part-time, of course, on top of my engineering shifts. My uncle is finally happy with me, though I don’t plan on telling him that I have no intention of taking over as captain someday. I’ll be on Earth before that happens. But in the meantime, I have occasional access to his tab unit, and it only took me three days to figure out his password.

  So basically: I didn’t find much on your crew. Poole and Xiao appear to have been born & raised on the Rochester, and there is limited data, since the private ships don’t have to release medical records or work progress reports. Carmichael comes from the Lady Liberty—​school records are standard. He’s gay, and yes, you should be as disturbed as I was that that was in his fleet record. I probably don’t want to know what they know about me. Hawes also comes from the Lady Liberty and graduated top of his class from their culinary program. There’s a note that Fairfax must have paid him top digicoin to transfer to the Rochester, given the Lady Liberty was paying him a fortune to head their entire food program. Hanada comes from the Nikkei, transferred to the Marie Curie as a teen, where she rose through the ranks until she transferred to the Rochester. Her files note, more than once, that she has a genius-level IQ and was at the top of the list for fleet enrichment. Apparently smart, talented people from rich ships get special enrichment! I’m learning so much already in my apprenticeship. Oh, and there’s a note of dismay that she chose to transfer to the Rochester instead of staying on the Marie Curie.

  I know you didn’t ask me to, but . . . I checked on your captain, too. Out of everyone, there was a ton of information in his file. The fleet has been keeping tabs on him. I couldn’t memorize it all, but I did note that he’s been sanctioned for drunk & disorderly conduct more than once on the Versailles (he frequents the Moulin Rouge Deck, apparently). Watch out, Stella.

  Jon

  Hugo and the Moulin Rouge Deck? I couldn’t help the furious heat that rose to my cheeks reading it. The stories were notorious—​any salacious pleasure one could hope to find, the Versailles’s Moulin Rouge Deck had. High-stakes poker, drugs, men and women—​all available for a price. Perhaps that’s where he was right now. I just hoped he didn’t gamble away the Rochester on his bender. No one came to claim the ship, so I figured we were in the clear.

  But soon Xiao enlisted me to prepare several roo
ms. When I asked her why, she replied, stonefaced, “Guests are coming.”

  “Prepare,” as it turned out, meant I was to sub in as a chambermaid. Xiao and I went to the lower deck, and I finally got a look inside the old crew quarters. We opened each room, instructing Rori to leave the doors open to get a bit of air circulation going, then fitted freshly laundered bedding onto each mattress. There were four beds—​two bunks—​and a bank of lockers in each room, like what we had on the Stalwart before I’d been promoted to a single.

  “Am I allowed to ask who the guests are?”

  “It’s technically insubordinate, but I’ll allow it,” Xiao said, clearly joking, while she aggressively tucked in a bed corner. “Captain Fairfax will be bringing back with him visitors from the craft Ingram. Needless to say, they are used to a higher level of service than the crew of the Rochester can provide, and thus some members of their crew will be joining us ahead of the party. Maids, valets, a personal chef.”

  “Albert isn’t good enough?”

  “They’re picky,” Xiao said. She clearly was not the biggest fan of the impending party.

  “How long will they be here?”

  “It was a month last time, though that was before . . .” Xiao grimaced. “Well, it was a long time ago. This time, I’m not sure. Bianca is older, and I suspect, well . . . that is neither here nor there.”

  I didn’t know who Bianca was or what Xiao suspected, but it was clear she didn’t plan on telling me. She fluffed the last pillow, and we headed back upstairs.

  “Now, when they arrive, I will guide the more senior members of staff, and I’ll expect you to see to the more junior.” She dismissed me, and I hastened to get to my lessons with Jessa. We barely made it through an hour of math and two of history when my comms buzzed. It was Orion.

  “Incoming birdie, Stella,” his voice rang in my ear. “They’ll be docking in the transport bay in ten.”

  “Roger wilco,” I replied, drawing a satisfied smirk from Jessa. I’d finally learned the jargon.

  I left Jessa watching a movie and hurried upstairs to change into a more formal dress. As I arrived, breathless, at the outer transport-bay door, I quickly smoothed back my hair into my bun before the outer airlock door opened to admit a small shuttle. Once it had docked, with the airlock closing and the red light above the door switching to green, I opened the door to greet them.

  The first thing I was struck by was the uniforms. On the Rochester, we wore a lot of black, dark blues, and stiff, structured styles I had quickly become accustomed to. But our clothing wasn’t identical; we didn’t wear uniforms. The Ingram staff emerged from the craft like a mini army, the men in navy waistcoats with brown insets over navy slacks, the women in navy-and-brown dress coats like mine, but stiffer.

  Xiao appeared behind me, pasting on a smile and approaching the figure at the head of the procession. “Lieutenant Peters, welcome.” She shook the hand of a man who looked to be in his forties, continuing the trend of private ships having a considerably older personnel roster.

  “Good to see you again, Iris,” Peters said. “May I introduce my staff? Much the same as last time, though with a few additions.” They lined up in front of their craft in a coed formation that made it clear they delineated themselves by rank. The senior staff members wore insignia on their left shoulders—​all lieutenants. There were three junior staff among them—​two maids and a valet, with titles familiar to me from the Empire. The maids were to serve the ladies of the party; the valet, a high-ranking male. It gave me a good idea of the gender balance to expect.

  Xiao busied herself with the eight senior crew members, leading them off into the ship sans any bags. Instead, the junior members began to haul bags and trunks from the ship—​one of each for each member of staff.

  “Hello. I’m Stella Ainsley, the Rochester’s governess and auxiliary engineer.” I shook each of their hands, though both ladies stared at my outstretched hand like I’d sprouted tentacles before reluctantly offering me their weak grips. Guess the Ingram wasn’t into that form of greeting. They rattled off their names for me in short order—​Griegs was the valet, and the maids were Elizabeth Greene, Lizzy for short, and Preity Khan. I hailed Orion on comms to come help us with the cargo.

  “Who did you just ask to help us?” Lizzy asked, mouth agog.

  “Orion, the communications officer. Why?”

  “You can just ask senior officers to assist with manual labor?” Preity chimed in. I didn’t think of Orion as my senior, and said as much. All three looked uncomfortable.

  “I’m guessing none of you have been aboard before?” I asked, though their relative ages told that story obviously enough. Griegs and Lizzy were probably in their early twenties, and Preity looked closer to my age. “Well, welcome to the Rochester. We’re pretty casual around here.”

  Orion arrived, and the boys exchanged brief greetings, not even hesitating before shouldering a bag and a trunk each. The trunks, thankfully, were on wheels, but the addition of a bulky bag had me spitting curses under my breath.

  “There are six rooms, twenty-four bunks,” I said as we reached our destination. “So you can spread out if you want.”

  Griegs shook his head. “There are more coming with the Ingram, so we’ll need the space.”

  Accordingly, we deposited the senior officers’ belongings into two rooms, and the junior staff’s into a third. We would leave them to sort out their gender splits on their own. From the way Griegs eyed Lizzy, cohabiting didn’t seem like the best idea. I showed them the basics, how most of the doors they’d have to worry about operated on simple button switches, and how most other things were voice-activated through Rori. Upstairs in the dining quarters, Griegs made inquiries as to which member of the Rochester staff was responsible for serving meals, and when I told him none, he nearly lost his balance.

  The arrival of the Ingram’s staff was a harbinger of Hugo’s return, something I both craved and dreaded. Would he be stiff and formal with me, like our last encounter? Or could we reclaim the easiness we’d had between us, get back to reading and talking like we were friends? The Ingram represented the unknown variable.

  The junior crew provided little elucidation over the next day, choosing to spend most of their time separate from the Rochester staff, alternately sleeping, playing games, and eating. It seemed to me they were taking the opportunity to rest as much as possible until their charges arrived. When I asked how long they thought they might be staying, all I got in return were shrugs and, from Preity, a cryptic “Well, that depends,” followed by a pointed look shared among them.

  They, on the other hand, prodded me for information on Hugo.

  “So, what’s the captain like?” Lizzy asked over dinner on the second night post-arrival. Preity and Griegs—​who was called Thomas by the girls but never invited me to do the same—​leaned in with interest. They’d waited until Xiao left with Jessa, and Orion had also excused himself, before jumping on me. They clearly saw me as nonthreatening, but I wasn’t delusional enough to assume they considered me a friend.

  “We heard he was a bit of a character,” Preity added. “I mean, when he brought the Rochester out to orbit the moon, everyone assumed he was either stupid or crazy.”

  “You mean it didn’t always orbit the moon?” I asked with little hesitation, belatedly kicking myself for participating in idle gossip about my ship.

  “You didn’t know?” Griegs said, not without a seriously judgmental tone.

  “I’ve been here only a few months,” I admitted.

  “Where were you before?” Lizzy this time, same tone.

  “I was on the Stalwart.”

  All four hissed air through their teeth.

  “No wonder you’re clueless.”

  “Do they even have fleet comms on that bucket?”

  I ignored the first—​Lizzy was tactless but sweet—​but responded to Griegs with my head held high. “Of course we had fleet comms. But we didn’t busy ourselves with the a
ffairs of all the private ships. We had more important things to attend to. Like growing most of your food supply.” They appeared rightly cowed by that. “It seems you know more about this ship than I do.”

  “No one from the Ingram has seen him in years,” Lizzy said. “We used to be neighbors, part of the same orbit cluster around Earth. For almost two hundred years. But then there was the . . . incident with the Fairfaxes, and Hugo became captain and hightailed it out here . . . We’ve heard rumors, that’s all.”

  Moving out to the moon was an extreme, if odd, reaction to his parents dying, but it didn’t make Hugo crazy. I didn’t like them using crazy as a pejorative and I told them as much. “The captain is exactly what you’d expect for someone who had to take over when he was fourteen, in not exactly ideal circumstances,” I said. “He’s mature beyond his years, responsible; he can be kind of quiet. But he’s kind to all of us. We’re not expected to put on airs and graces, as you may have noticed.”

  “Just wait until Bianca gets here,” Preity said below her breath. “That’ll change.”

  It wasn’t the first time I’d heard lightly disparaging comments about Bianca Ingram, about whom no one had yet adequately provided me information. I’d asked several times, but the junior crew was as mum on the subject as Xiao. I didn’t bother to pry again, instead castigating myself for saying anything about Hugo. Hopefully nothing I’d said could be misconstrued as overly affectionate.

  The senior Ingram staff arrived for dinner, summarily kicking us out. I didn’t like the segregation by rank they engaged in, nor did I appreciate it when Lieutenant Peters asked me to stay behind to serve them. I politely but firmly declined, most likely earning myself an enemy in the process. But I didn’t care. I was not beholden to them, not because I had lower rank, nor because I was a woman. I was an equal for the first time aboard the Rochester, and I would not yield that for anyone.