by Terry Mixon
“You’re seriously suggesting that we threaten to do something like space him?” Kelsey asked incredulously.
“That’s exactly what I’m suggesting. I hate to say this, but you don’t have a lot of choice in the matter. We can’t trust him to just join us. He’s from the class of people that stick knives in one another for fun.”
“So are you,” she pointed out. “No offense.”
“None taken,” Olivia said with a smile. “I’m going to suggest Jared give this session a pass. It’s going to be brutal, and I don’t want you giving him signs of weakness. You, too, Elise. This needs to be me and Austin. Jared, you have something more useful to do.”
“What’s that?” he asked.
“You need to introduce Kelsey One and Kelsey Two. They need to talk.”
Mertz shifted his gaze to Kelsey and slowly nodded. “You’re probably right. With Austin in with you, that’ll keep the whole interdimensional thing secret from him. He’s not cleared for that just yet.”
Kelsey felt her stomach flip a little. She wasn’t looking forward to talking to this other version of herself. She already sort of hated the woman, though it wasn’t her fault that she’d gotten all the good breaks.
She sighed. It had to happen sooner or later. Perhaps with the FTL being the medium, she’d be able to handle it better. Seeing the other woman was going to be powerful, and probably not in a good way.
In any case, this other Kelsey would be joining them at Terra. She was Mertz’s superior—if one could believe that—and she would be the one most likely to help her get what she needed and get back to her own universe.
21
Talbot stood beside Angela’s seat on the Marine Raider strike ship’s cramped bridge as they moved slowly toward the far flip point that Commander Sommerville had said was there. Their progress wasn’t rapid. Far from it. By any measure, they were creeping along.
“How are the arms?” his friend asked. “Did you break my ship?”
“Rip one hatch off and you never hear the end of it,” he said in a suffering tone as he glanced at the ceiling. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
“Seeing you put yourself into this completely avoidable situation after we warned you not to? Sure. Who wouldn’t?”
Her smile and the twinkle in her eyes took most of the sting out of her teasing, but she was still right. He’d been stubborn and was now paying for it.
“You’re a real riot,” he muttered. “For your information, I’m almost able to do fine manipulation and haven’t broken anything for almost a day. Doctor Zoboroski said I’d probably be ready for training in a couple of days.”
“I know how frustrating this process can be,” she said. “Seriously, I understand the desire to just get it over with, but doing both arms at the same time is a mental setback. You feel like you have no control at all, right?”
“Pretty much,” he said with a sigh. “I can only imagine how Kelsey felt after having it all done at once. I mean, I saw her and knew it was bad, but I really didn’t get it. Now I sort of do.”
Angela’s face became serious. “I hate that happened to her. We’re the only ones with even a clue how bad it was. Well, other than Doctor Stone, but that’s not quite the same thing.”
“No, it isn’t.”
Lieutenant McLeod turned away from the tactical station. “The FTL probe just spotted a ship ahead. It’s almost exactly in the position we were told to expect the far flip point. It looks like a yacht of some kind.”
“We make no assumptions,” Angela said. “Take us to battle stations, Jevon.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The low thrumming call to battle rang throughout the ship until the bridge hatch slid closed and left them in the silence of normal bridge operations. The helm officer retrieved vacuum suits for them all, and they quickly climbed into them while McLeod kept watch. When they finished, he did the same.
Talbot dropped a seat from the rear wall of the bridge and strapped in. He left his helmet swung back like the others. It would only take a moment to seal up, and there was no need to use the finite suit air just yet.
“What’s our current ETA to the ship, Jack?”
“Depends on how close we want to get before we announce ourselves,” the helm officer said. “If we want to pop up in front of him just outside of missile range, we can do that now. If we want to circle around the flip point and get in behind him, that’ll add a couple of hours. Half an hour to get into missile range, if that’s what you want.”
“I think scaring him would be a mistake. People start shooting when you scare them. We want to be friends, not enemies, so we need to act a bit more passively than we’d like. Send the recognition code. Then drop stealth.”
“He’ll be able to run,” McLeod said.
“If he wants to, we can’t and won’t stop him. We want a conversation, not a boarding action.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Message away,” Thompson said.
“Dropping stealth,” McLeod said. “He just went to active scanners. He can’t miss us.”
“We have a return com signal,” Thompson said.
Angela gestured for Talbot to stand and come forward. “This is your show. You need to be standing right here.”
He unstrapped, rose to his feet, and moved to stand beside her. “Put the signal up on the screen.”
The image of a man in some kind of civilian clothes appeared on the screen. He had dark hair and a thin face, one that was filled with suspicion. “Who the hell are you? How did you get so close without detection? Answer or I’ll open fire.”
“Go to active scanners,” Angela said. “Not aggressively, but we need to know what we’re dealing with.”
“Active scanners,” McLeod confirmed. “It’s a fast packet. They’re made for getting messages from one system to another quickly. He’s probably got a single missile tube. Not a threat.”
“He might not be alone. Keep an eye out for other ships. Hell, they might have a destroyer or two on the other side of that flip point. Or a cruiser. We assume nothing.”
“Answer his call,” Talbot ordered. “Focus in on me.”
“Copy that,” Thompson said. “Live in three, two…” The man held up one finger and then a closed fist.
“My name is Russ Talbot, and we’re friends of Commander Sommerville. He gave me the codes so I could come forward and talk with you before you started running or shooting. I know you saw our ships in the Razor system. We’re friends, not Empire enemies.”
The man seemed to consider Talbot for a few moments. “You have the code, but I can’t imagine Danny bringing friends home.”
“Don,” Talbot corrected. “And you don’t know what is happening in Archibald right now. There’s an invasion on. The Ghosts have attacked, and we’ve made common cause. We’re connected with a different resistance cell in another part of the Empire.”
The man seemed unconvinced. “Yet you have two big freighters and that strange ship you’re on. I’ve never seen or heard of anything like it.”
So they’d pegged Audacious as a freighter. Since the Rebel Empire didn’t use ships bigger than cruisers, that was a natural mistake.
“I’d be happy to explain in person,” Talbot said. “Just me in a suit. One of our small craft can send me your way, and you can visually verify it’s me. That way you don’t have to have a strange ship docking.”
“I want to see Sommerville. If you people really are friends, you can send him over alone.”
“Or with a single person accompanying him,” Talbot insisted. “Then we can explain ourselves in person.”
The man seemed to consider that for a few moments and then nodded. “He picks the person and sends me an image. Not you. Back your ship up to the Razor flip point and send an unarmed cutter with the two of them and a pilot. They’ll bail in suits, and my people will pick them up. Your cutter goes back to the flip point while we talk.”
“Agreed.”
The transmission terminated without a response.
“I’m not sure if that could’ve gone better or not,” Talbot admitted.
“It could certainly have gone worse,” Angela said. “There were no shots fired, and he didn’t go scampering off. I doubt Sommerville will leave his people behind, so he’ll try to keep the man talking. Take the win.”
She turned her attention to the helm officer. “Take us back to the flip point. Get the FTL probe into place to monitor the flip point without being detected. If he signals other ships, I want to know about it. Ditto if anyone comes through the flip point or he leaves.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Angela returned her attention to him. “Do you think Kelsey will go on the negotiation trip?”
“She’ll take the lead on this. I just know it,” he said grumpily.
Thompson turned in his seat. “We’re getting an FTL communication from Admiral Mertz. He’s asking for Princess Kelsey.”
Angela shook her head. “I suppose we never got the com transferred to Audacious. You can take it with you when you go. In the interim, it might be best if you give him an update of what’s going on.”
Talbot nodded. “I’ll use your office, if you don’t mind.”
With that, he headed off to bring the admiral up to speed, glad to hear they’d made it out of their own sticky situation.
Jared tried to contact Kelsey via the FTL com as soon as they were out of detection range of the flip point leading to the AI’s system but was told that she wasn’t available. She was on Audacious on the other side of a flip point from Persephone and hadn’t taken her FTL com with her.
That was annoying, but he got an update from Talbot. They’d broken contact with the Clan invaders and were trying to negotiate with the resistance. That was going to change how Jared had planned to proceed, for sure. Olivia would need to be standing by the com in case they needed codes or recognition phrases from her.
The introduction of the two Kelseys would have to wait until his sister was done, too. She didn’t need that kind of revelation while she was busy working such a delicate situation.
So he and Kelsey Two would talk with Fielding. The news didn’t please Olivia, but she understood at once how things had to be.
Kelsey Two was less pleased.
“I’m not sure we make the best interrogation team,” she said. “I still haven’t adjusted to working with you.”
“Then you’re going to have to try harder,” he said firmly. “I’ve gone out of my way to give you space, but we’re out of room. If you don’t realize that I’m not the same man as in your universe, you’re being intentionally blind.”
That caused a flash of anger in her eyes, but she nodded. “I do realize that, but it’s not exactly easy to turn off my emotions.”
“You’re the crown princess of the New Terran Empire,” he parried. “How are you going to deal with people you don’t like in the palace? Glare at them when you think they aren’t looking? Sneer to their faces? This is the same kind of thing. We all have to work with people we don’t like.
“I didn’t much care for Sean Meyer when we first met. Personality-wise, we’re fairly different, and he disliked me. We get along fine in a professional sense now. Are you saying he’s better at this than you?”
“You don’t understand,” she growled. “Mertz is a monster. He killed my father.”
“I. Am. Not. Him.” Jared said slowly, clearly enunciating every word.
She sighed with frustration but nodded. “I need to get over this, I really do. You’re right. Still, can Sean be at the interrogation? That would make it easier for me.”
He honestly doubted the woman would ever get over what had happened to her. It was sad, but there was nothing he could do about it except work around her muleheadedness.
“I’ll have him meet us there. Highness, is there anything I can do to make this better? I really don’t want to be your enemy. If I could find the other version of me and drag him to justice, I would. If I had to, I’d kill him and not lose much sleep over it. It really does sound like he’s a right bastard, if you can forgive the irony.”
She slumped a little in her chair. “You and your people have been nothing but gracious and accepting of me and my people. Intellectually, I know that you’re not the Bastard. He wouldn’t be able to stop himself from being an ass.
“I’ve heard you talking with my doppelgänger, and it’s clear that she likes you. Loves you, even. I can’t wrap my head around that, but I think our personal histories split when we were almost of age. That’s when our Mertz became so nasty.
“Since both of us hated him long before that, you’ve overcome her objections with being a good man. The same with my father, though to be fair, he never saw the other you for what he was. I will try to do better.”
With that, she took a deep breath and stood. “Let’s do this.”
22
Kelsey sat in the seat beside Sommerville with more equanimity than she’d have expected of herself even a year ago. The cutter only had a pilot, so it was an unusually empty small craft and so very quiet. She’d instantly named herself as the second person as soon as Persephone came back to Razor to pick up Sommerville, much to Talbot’s annoyance.
“You don’t seem very worried,” Sommerville commented as they headed out to meet the resistance cutter.
“I’m not,” she confided. “I mean, sure, things could go wrong, but the downsides aren’t that heavy. Not compared to what I’ve faced in the last few years. You’re not going to kill me or put my implants in command of my body.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Did that really happen?”
“Almost,” she said softly. “So damned close I could taste it. Oh, and you’re not going to dissect me while I’m awake. That’s a big one, too.”
“You’ve led a hard life, Princess Kelsey. No, we’re not going to do any of those things. If we can’t convince the others to meet with you, then you’ll go free. We don’t need a ship like Audacious coming to look for you. At least I can tell them you’re not like the Clans. You won’t pour in after us, shooting all the way.
“They’re going to seriously complicate everything we’re doing,” Sommerville continued with a sigh. “An unexpected war is not only going to hurt the Empire, it’ll impact our ongoing operations, just like it did for me at Archibald.”
She shook her head. “That took serious chutzpah to have the enemy build a ship for you.”
“Chutzpah?” he asked with a frown. “I don’t know that word.”
“Gall, impudence, or nerve. Rather all of that and more. Cheekiness.”
He laughed. “It wasn’t that bold. The inspectors were resistance. With me there to replace the logs, no one would ever have known. Freighters don’t get the same level of attention as a warship does. Fleet has no reason to board one at all.
“It wasn’t the first time we’d done it, either. This gives us a number of hulls the Empire doesn’t care about that we can use to project force where they least expect it. Um, we will get it back, won’t we?”
“You’re so suspicious,” she said. “Seriously, we already planned to release it back to you. We’re not thieves.”
“You stole an entire orbital, you broke into a research laboratory, and you hijacked my ship.”
“Okay, we’re thieves, but we have hearts of gold,” she amended.
That made him laugh. “I’ll accept your bargain, and I promise I’ll try to get my people to help. Everything you showed me convinces me that we can accomplish great things together. What are your plans for Veronica and her people?”
The non sequitur made Kelsey’s brain stumble for a moment. “I haven’t thought that far ahead. They’re willing conspirators at this point, so that’s really up to them.”
“I’d like to talk Veronica into staying with us when you depart,” he said seriously. “She could be a bridge between your people and mine.”
Kelsey shrugged. “I have no objection, but she’s
only known us for a little while. She’s not steeped in who we are.”
“I know that, but she’s an old friend and can help us. If you’d like to leave someone that can truly tell us about your people and represent you, I have what might be a controversial suggestion: Justine Bandar.”
Kelsey blinked in shock. “My mother? Seriously? How do you even know her?”
“Veronica introduced us, and we’ve spent some time together. I think she’s charming. Your mother suggested the idea, actually.”
The news flabbergasted Kelsey. She had no idea what to think. If there was a worse representative for the Empire than her mother, she had no idea who it would be.
The pilot chose that moment to call back to them. “We’re approaching the handoff point. I’m slowing to a halt and will draw the air out in a minute. Time to close up.”
“Thank you,” Kelsey said.
She and Sommerville closed their helmets and checked one another in the time they had left. No one wanted a suit failure.
The pilot called to confirm they were ready and then pulled the air out. The shadows became hard lines with the lack of air, and the ramp came down.
Kelsey and Sommerville stepped out into space, and she used her thrusters to turn and watch their cutter move off slowly before accelerating away until she couldn’t see it. They floated alone in space. It was kind of spooky.
“My mother?” she asked, picking the conversation back up. “Seriously? She’s a stowaway and the least diplomatic person I know.”
He laughed. “We all have opinions about our parents that other people just don’t see. You have to accept that she’s not the same to people that don’t have a history with her. She can be very diplomatic. She was the empress of a star nation, after all.”
Kelsey wanted to rub her face, but that was impossible. “I’m going to have to think about it. That’s a heavy load to drop on me. I have my issues with her, but I do love her.”
A thought occurred to her, and she felt her eyes narrow. She turned Sommerville toward her so that she could see his face. “Are you sleeping with my mother?”
