Call of Worlds

by K. D. Lovgren

  It wouldn’t make sense.

  That meant they wouldn’t put her on the Ocean.

  She was on the Land.

  “Mech,” she said. “Mech, are you there?”

  “Yes, Captain Black Bear.”

  Kal walked up and down her room. “Mech. Mech, why didn’t you tell me you were here before?”

  “You didn’t ask for me, Captain Black Bear.”

  “Do you know why I’m here?”

  “You’re being detained at the pleasure of Captain Cooley.”

  “Yes, but do you know why?”

  “An issue of cross-contamination.”

  Kal tried to remember the word, the real word for what had happened to Sif and the Carys.

  “It’s commersion. They think I’ve been inhabited or colonized or compromised or whatever they want to call it by Rai, the Ocean’s AI.”

  “I see.”

  “It’s not true, Mech. They’re wrong.”

  “That’s too bad.”

  “Too bad for me and for them. They’re working on something, wasting time, when it isn’t a problem here, with me. I’m just me, Kal Black Bear. Nothing else. Can’t you tell? Wouldn’t you know if you were communicating with another AI? Can you communicate with Rai through me?”

  “No, Captain Black Bear.”

  “You see? Please help me. Please tell them. Maybe they’ll believe you.”

  “I’ll do my best, Captain Black Bear.”

  Kal sank down on her ledge. “Yes. Please try. And…and call me Kal. You don’t have to say my name every time. I’m more informal than that.”

  “Yes, Kal.”

  There was a long silence. Kal said, “Mech?”

  “Yes, Kal?”

  “Are there others on this ship, in containment? You told me there were, before.”

  “Affirmative, Kal.”

  “Are they all right?” Kal lay down on her ledge. She rested her hands on her chest, trying to calm down.

  “They are, Kal.”

  “Are they right next to me?”

  “You are in the same vicinity.”

  “Is there a way for me to see them? Or communicate with them?”

  “Yes. Your captain’s clearance would allow it.”

  Kal’s voice dropped lower. “Let me out. I want to see the person next to me.”

  Kal heard the outgassing of a door unsealing itself. She stood up. In her slouchy apricot pajamas she walked out into the gray room, saw the open door, and walked out into a hallway. It was as easy as that.

  She looked both ways. It was very cold. A faint breeze from the air circulation system wafted through, giving her gooseflesh. She walked one unit down and stood before another door like hers.

  “Now,” she said.

  The door opened.

  She stepped in, out of the breeze. The door suctioned shut behind her. She hadn’t asked for it, but she supposed Mech was following a protocol. No one was in this gray room, identical to hers. She walked to the hallway, which, as she expected, led to another crystal room.

  She stood in the archway, looking in.

  A person was sprawled on the ledge, heavily asleep. The lights had come up in the gray room and the crystal room when she entered, but it hadn’t been enough to wake the sleeper. This person liked the crystal room better, too.

  The figure was covered by a blanket they’d brought in from the bunk in the gray room. Only the top of their head was visible. Kal stepped closer and looked down.

  It was Roan.

  Or was it?

  Something was different. This wasn’t her Roan.

  She stepped back involuntarily.

  Even though she’d told Roan that story she’d made up, with Mech’s help, about what happened on Sextant, she hadn’t wanted to believe it. She didn’t know where it had come from and he didn’t confirm it. Why would she guess right? It was crazy.

  Except for what Mech had told her. It fit with that. He hadn’t told her who they were, the others contained on the Land.

  Kal’s legs crumpled beneath her. She ended up cross-legged on the familiar crystalline floor of the room. How long had he been here alone? Months? How long since the Land had arrived? How could they be so cruel?

  She reached her hand out and touched this Roan’s hair, ran her fingers through it. It was comforting. She did it again and again. He frowned in his sleep, child-like, then blinked his eyes awake.

  She was on a level with him, seated on the floor. The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was her face.

  “I’m Kal,” she said. “I’m here to help you.”

  Roan’s face was frozen in his waking expression.

  “It’s all right. I’m going to get you out of here. I’m sorry to wake you, surprise you like this. I know it must be a shock.”

  “Kal,” he said.

  “That’s right.”

  “I thought you were dead.”

  21

  Rubyglass

  Kal’s fingers were still in his hair. She drew her hand back. “What do you mean?”

  “Kal,” he murmured. “Kal.” He reached out and touched her cheek. “I’m dreaming again.”

  “It’s not a dream.” Kal drew her head back, away from his touch. “How do you know me? You’re Roan from Sextant. You’ve been kept here for a long time. Is that right? Or do I have it wrong?”

  This wasn’t the Roan from right here, was it? Her Roan? Had her senses deceived her? Had they imprisoned him, too? Why would he think she was dead?

  He nodded rapidly. “Yes, yes.”

  “How do you know me?”

  His eyes grew wide, wary. “Don’t you know me?” He sat up. “Kal, you remember me, don’t you?”

  Scrambling out of her cross-legged position on the floor, Kal stepped back, into the crystal stool. “I think there’s some confusion,” she said.

  Roan nodded.

  Kal closed her eyes for a moment. Seeing Roan, what seemed like the old Roan, before she was frightened of him, made her want to go to him, feel his warmth, feel the relief of sharing the nightmare of what was happening. This Roan shouldn’t know her. Why did he know her? She opened her eyes.

  “Let’s go through what we know about each other,” she said. She nodded in emphasis, mirroring him. “Slowly.”

  “You don’t have to be afraid of me.”

  “I’m not. I’m cautious.” She sat down on the stool.

  “Who should start?” he said.

  He sounded exactly like Roan. He looked like Roan. Even his hair was just like Roan’s. If he cut it himself, of course both of the Roans would cut their hair the same way. What would she do with two Roans?

  “Do you want to?” Whatever they’d both been through, it looked like he’d been through worse. He could decide.

  He shook his head.

  “All right. If something I say…if any of it distresses you, I’ll stop. Just tell me. Hold up your hand.”

  “Okay,” he said.

  “As far as I understand it, we’re dealing with some crossing of the wires, so to speak. If spacetime were wires.”

  He nodded again.

  “And you landed on Sextant, for some reason. And then another set of crew, the same as you, landed on Sextant. So you all landed twice. The same ship and the same crew.”

  His eyes drifted closed.

  Kal spoke quietly, her words slow, as if she were speaking to a child. “Something bad happened on Sextant, and not all of you made it. Some of you did. But the ones from your crew, your first crew who made it, the ones who survived, got locked up here on the Land. I don’t know why. Except maybe people don’t like having themselves running around as someone else.”

  Roan opened his eyes.

  “Is that what happened?” she asked.

  “Tell me about you,” he said. “Tell me your story.”

  “I’m from the Ocean.” Kal rubbed her forehead, trying to think where to start. “We got through the portal fine. There were some problems after that. P
roblems with the AIs. Bad stuff happened. I ended up alone, pretty much, on the Ocean, the rest of the crew in the pods. I arrived safely here a few weeks ago. Pod one arrived recently. We’re still waiting on pod two.”

  “What about Sextant?” he said.

  “Um, Captain Cooley wanted me to go back to Sextant, to collect more of something she called rubyglass. It didn’t calculate well for me to swing around and go back at that point. It wasn’t the mission. So I said no.”

  “You didn’t go back.”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  He nodded and looked away. Then he stood, rising like a giant in a fairy tale, towering up high over her low seat on the stool. She looked up at him and thought about all her and Roan’s battles, mock and real. She’d made herself vulnerable. Without Rai as backup. She couldn’t expect Mech to second her half so well, if at all.

  But he didn’t even look at her. He walked out of the crystal room. The room dimmed a little when he left, leaving Kal wondering.

  In a couple of minutes she heard the physio start up. Her hand on the crystal table, she rubbed it for comfort. She even licked her palm to taste the salt.

  He had got on the physio. Why? What was she supposed to do?

  After some internal argument, she decided to wait. If she was the first person he’d seen for months he might need to relieve his tension and shock on the physio. She’d used it for the same purpose. She supposed they all had at some point on their long journeys aboard ship.

  He was on it for a long time. Kal fell into a kind of trance, listening to the rhythmic whirring, staring into the shallow depths of the crystal wall, rubbing her thumb over a slight hollow in his table. He had probably rubbed the hollow there himself. Her table didn’t have such a depression in it.

  She heard him in the shower next. A little cubicle that didn’t fit her very well and he must have been barely able to turn around in. Eventually, he came back, dressed in fresh clothes, an identical apricot stretchy outfit. He carried two cups in his hands. His hair was damp, his cheeks flushed. Set one cup down in front of her. Tea. Roan didn’t drink tea, as far as she knew.

  He sat down on the ledge again. She angled herself a little more toward him. He raised his cup. She did the same. They kept their eyes locked as they each took a first sip.

  “Feel better?” she said, then felt it wasn’t a good thing to say. It minimized his choice, as if it had been a superficial wish to exercise just then to let off steam, when she knew it had to be much more than that.

  “Yes.” His eyes were so clear and awake now, it made her frightened in a different way. She noticed another difference between the Roans. This one could be still.

  “I’m not a very good host. Not used to visitors. I’m sorry.”

  She wanted to say, are you kidding? She tried to tread more lightly. “You’ve welcomed me just as I could have wished. Thank you.”

  “It’s good to see someone. If I do anything awkward, please chalk it up to…” He trailed off, unable to find the word he wanted.

  She didn’t try to find him one.

  “Lack of practice,” he said finally, unembarrassed by how long it had taken him to finish.

  She nodded. “The tea is good. I haven’t tried this one.”

  “It’s supposed to be like Oolong,” he said. “One of my favorites.”

  “Thank you for sharing it with me.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  She thought of herself brushing her fingers through his hair, this stranger’s hair, while he slept, and had to look down into her tea to regain her composure. It had been presuming a lot. Dangerous, too. It had felt really nice.

  “I have to apologize, too,” she said. “I touched you while you were asleep. I shouldn’t have done that.”

  “I felt fingers in my hair,” he said, eyes glazing over. “Like a dream I’ve had before, many times. This time, it felt so real. It felt so good, I didn’t want to wake up. I was so angry to wake up. Unfair to be taken out of it when you have so little of that kind of…” He breathed, glancing at her. “That kind of touch. Dreams are the only place I get it.” He ran his own hand over his hair. “Your own fingers aren’t a good substitute.”

  She half smiled. “I know.”

  “Do you?” His eyes were piercing. She couldn’t hold his gaze, and dropped her own, again.

  “I’ve been alone. But not like you. Not like this.”

  He nodded. “Are you really going to let me out.” He didn’t use the inflection of a question. His voice had dropped lower, rumbling in a way that made her stomach flip.

  “I…I want to. Someone might try to stop me. Stop us.” She was as much a prisoner as he was. It was important to remember that.

  “Is there somewhere I can go?”

  Kal hadn’t planned ahead. There hadn’t been time. She hadn’t known what she was walking into. She should have thought of this when he was in the gray room.

  “There is a place. Only one person on Demeter knows about it. We could go there first. All I need is a roller and I can get us there, I think.” She had been asleep for much of the trip to the mountains, but how hard could it be to point the roller at the mountains and go?

  “What if something goes wrong?” he said.

  “A lot could go wrong.”

  “I know. That’s why I thought maybe we could spend a little more time here, talking. So no matter what happens, at least I’ve had that.”

  “What do you mean?” She searched his face. “As long as I can find a roller—I’m sure there’s one on the Land I can take. They don’t need to know.”

  “I mean if something goes wrong and I die.” His words were deliberate and unemotional. “I want to have had some time with you. I don’t want to rush away and lose the chance of ever having it.”

  “Time with me?”

  He blinked a couple of times and smiled. “I haven’t seen another person. I want to talk and have company for a while, before I risk something a lot worse. Does that make sense?”

  Kal studied her empty cup, the few soggy leaves left in the bottom. “I thought time would be important to you, making sure we can get away.”

  “Time,” he said, “doesn’t matter.”

  “Time doesn’t matter?”

  “Not for us.”

  He was looking at her in that strange way again. She couldn’t define it or get away from it. Half of her wanted to get away from it and half wanted to look right back until he had to look away.

  She made herself look back. “Why not?”

  “If you don’t know, I can’t explain.”

  She held his gaze, her chin up.

  “I think you know,” he said.

  “Time matters to them.”

  “Yes. It matters very much to them.”

  “Tell me why it doesn’t matter to you. Tell me.” She made herself hold his gaze until he dropped his.

  He ran the palm of one hand over the back of the other. The shush-shush of his skin against itself made her shudder. “Because everything is always happening.”

  “At the same time?”

  “Or not at all.”

  She slid her tongue over her lower lip. Sucking her lower lip into her mouth, she ran her front teeth over it.

  “Are you Lakota?” she said.

  He shook his head.

  Her heart sank. “I want you to be.”

  He smiled. “Why?”

  “Then I would know I understood you.”

  “You do understand me. You don’t want to anymore, but you do.”

  “Anymore? You act like you know me already.”

  The air in the room was charged and tense.

  He didn’t say anything, only looked at her in that strange way.

  “Am I supposed to remember something? I don’t. I don’t know you. I mean, I know Roan, but I don’t know you. What should I call you?”

  “I am Roan.” He said it with such authority and conviction she wanted to die. What was this? What was happening? �
�You can call him something else.”

  “I can’t,” she said, the words forced out of her. “I already know Roan. Another Roan. What’s your middle name?”

  His nostrils flared in displeasure. After a pause, he said, “Aata.” A pulse beat in his jaw. “Just for now, then. Just for now, call me Roan.”

  “Roan?” she said. “Roan.” She reached out her hand, she wasn’t sure for what.

  He grasped her hand and pulled.

  She was in his lap, and he was kissing her, and she swirled in a vortex of timelessness. They were not here, on the Land. They were not in the cave of rubyglass. They were somewhere cold and wrong but beautiful in its isolation. Beautiful in its terror.

  “Sextant,” she said on his mouth. “Sextant.”

  “Yes. Sextant.”

  They were on the crystalline floor and it was hard and soft, smooth and rough, but their skin could have been flayed from their bodies and she wouldn’t have stopped, couldn’t have stopped what had happened before, would happen again, and was happening now.

  22

  Ignition

  They bundled together all they had, all they could fit into makeshift packs made from sheets. The only clothes to wear were their stretchy outfits, the color of a gentle sunset, but it couldn’t be helped.

  They took as much compact food as they could, stockpiled drink cubes from a storage area outside their rooms, and packed a roller full of all they would need for a few weeks of roughing it. After that, they’d have to reassess. Maybe they could raid the Ocean later. Aata wanted to release the other three detainees on the Land, but Kal argued against it, at least for now. It would be hard enough to get themselves away, and their chances of being caught were about fifty-fifty, Kal figured. She thought the two of them should take the risks and then rescue the others when the circumstances were clearer.

  Her longer-term plan was to reestablish her credibility and reintegrate with the group. Then she could advocate for the other prisoners. She was sure if all the Demetrians were reminded of the prisoners’ existence, the majority would be on the side of mercy. Maybe that would mean the overthrow of Captain Cooley. At this point, Kal didn’t mind that idea at all.