Confluence 2: Remanence

by Jennifer Foehner Wells

  There was a lot of excited chatter coming from the seats behind him, so many voices overlapping and speaking so fast in Mensententia that he couldn’t make out more than four or five words out of every ten, but he didn’t really need to. The newbs were freaking out over the size of the ship. Jaross, Tinor, and Pledor had never seen anything like it.

  He turned in his seat to see their gawking faces. Even Schlewan and Ryliuk looked more animated than usual. Heh. Spaceships had that effect on people everywhere.

  Everything went off as planned. External service hatch 245 opened. That was on deck thirty-seven, the cargo bay next to the one Jane had used to scoop up the Providence with the nanite-enraged Compton, Walsh, and Varma inside. That seemed like a lifetime ago.

  Jane landed without so much as a jiggle. Ei’Brai reset the synthetic gravity to the bay on her command and they settled into their seats. Alan was so buzzed to get back, he flung off his restraints and barely noticed the momentary disorientation as his body adjusted to gravity again.

  They all waited impatiently while the service hatch closed, the bay repressurized, and Jane triggered the electromagnetic-pulse generator they’d set up inside the bay before they’d left, to decontaminate the shuttle of any bad nanites they might have picked up on Atielle.

  The shuttle door flipped up and they all piled out. Everyone stood in a clump staring at each other.

  Jane hopped out last, her movements slow and jerky.

  He sent her a thought. “Welcome home, Doc.”

  She met his gaze, and one corner of her mouth quirked up. Then she was all business again. She raised her voice to get their attention. “I realize everyone is excited to be here, and also fatigued from the journey. Ajaya, if you would please find adequate lodgings for our guests on the same deck as our own? Help them settle in? Show them where to find food, etc.?”

  “Of course, Commander. If I might suggest—”

  Jane cut her off. “Alan, Ron, and I will complete a thorough inspection of the shuttle for unwanted parasites, then we’ll join you.” She dismissed Ajaya and the atellans and turned without preamble back to the shuttle.

  Ajaya dropped her hand, what had clearly been an impending plea for Jane to rest unspoken in the face of a direct command. She ushered the atellans out of the chamber.

  Jane glanced at Alan and Ron. Her tone of voice brooked no nonsense. “We’ll start at the nose and go inch by inch over the entire ship. I want three sets of eyes and a camera with magnification on every single compartment they could possibly wriggle into, even the ones we think they couldn’t breach. I don’t want to chance a single slug getting loose in the ship.”

  “Understood,” Alan said in unison with Ron, and they immediately got to work. It was a shame they couldn’t put it off. Jane and Ron both looked exhausted. Jane had dark circles under her eyes. She moved stiffly and with purpose though. She seemed to be driven by determination alone. She kept her thoughts to herself. Checking the shuttle was clearly the only thing on her mind.

  They worked for hours, methodically. They did find a few more very small slugs. Wherever possible they used a palm-held concussive-blast cannon to kill off any that were too small to see with the naked eye.

  When they finished the sweep of the shuttle, Ron and Jane went off to find their beds, but Alan stayed behind to tinker with some drones he’d created. They’d keep watch over the bay and blast any stragglers before they could make their way into the rest of the ship. Just in case.

  38

  Jane desperately needed to rest, but that would wait a little while longer. She traversed the halls of the ship now with a strange, giddy feeling swirling in her stomach. She’d never in her life imagined she’d be so happy to see pea-soup-green walls.

  When she’d left this ship, she’d fully expecting to hand over control to a sectilian officer. But she hadn’t had to.

  The adventure wasn’t over yet. She was glad. There was no denying it—she was ecstatic to be back aboard. The future was uncertain, but that no longer seemed so frightening. She’d made it to Atielle and returned with her crew not only intact but augmented.

  Despite her fatigue she felt like she could handle whatever the universe threw at her. And relish it.

  She entered her rooms and took the data sticks Jaross had given her to the small terminal in her quarters to download their contents into the database. Ei’Brai immediately began to pore over the data.

  Then she briefly showered and changed, slipping on a warmer layer of clothing, and left her quarters for the central core of the ship. It was cooler there.

  Her eyes adjusted to the twilight dimness as she crossed the railed gantry that led to the gangway that circumnavigated Brai’s domain. His presence was heavy on her now. She’d forgotten the difference proximity could have on the connection between them.

  He was waiting for her. He hovered horizontally, limbs unnaturally outstretched in alignment with his body in a torpedo shape, with his eyes averted. It was the submissive pose he always performed upon greeting her in person. She noted that his arms trembled with the difficulty of maintaining the position. He shimmered, his quicksilver skin pulsing with a crimson glow.

  He was happy to see her. His mental touch was effusive with pleasure.

  She couldn’t help but smile. “You don’t have to do that,” she said to him solemnly.

  There was a small rush of emotion within him as he contracted his mantle, pushing water through his funnel to right himself, allowing his limbs to curl around his body in more relaxed and natural arrangements.

  “That’s better,” she said. Still, something wasn’t quite right.

  His enormous, limpid eyes turned on her, meeting her gaze without flinching. The thought struck her that he looked sad, though she couldn’t say why exactly she thought that.

  “You truly do not expect this behavior of me?” he asked, his mental voice softer and smaller than she’d ever heard it.

  Jane placed a gloved hand on the glass, her brow furrowing. His behavior perplexed her. “Brai, I’ve told you this before. I don’t see the point in it. It doesn’t mean anything to me. Just be yourself. We don’t need any silly rituals between us. They only get in the way.”

  He was silent. She could sense a tumult of emotion behind his eyes.

  She had been going to wait until after she’d rested to ask him what was troubling him. Seeing him now, though, she realized it couldn’t wait. She leaned against the glass. If he’d been human she would have pulled him into a hug.

  “Tell me,” she said, and closed her eyes, readying her mind to move closer—not to be told, but to see.

  “I would prefer not to trouble you now. Your fatigue is great.”

  She pushed in anyway, dismissing his concern.

  He tried to stay calm, but that only lasted seconds. Each segment of his minds seemed to have its own rush of conflicting thoughts to convey all at the same time.

  She could barely breathe. Grief, anger, fear, helplessness, rage, sorrow, jealousy, animosity…all of these and more washed over her. She opened her eyes and could see the colors he flashed had changed hue. The dark crimson of friendliness was transmuted in an instant to the fierce yellow of anger, then to the bright-blue broadcast of alarm, and then a brief magenta flicker of fear.

  Images flitted through his mind so quickly she could only glimpse them. His training with the mind masters. His life with Rageth. The years of forced solitude under the weight of the yoke. Herself. But one moment in particular kept bubbling to the surface again and again, until she began to see the pattern, discern what was truly troubling him amid the waves of emotion. Through her own eyes, she saw small Tinor in the carriage asking, “They are people?”

  She rested her head against the glass until her body was trembling with cold and tears streaked down her face, until he’d shown her all of it and she finally understood.

  She straightened again to look at him. There was a haunted bleakness behind his eyes.

  “That was you
r past,” she said firmly. “It cannot be changed.”

  He said nothing, but there was a tenor of confusion in the mental strand that connected them. He felt adrift, vulnerable. He was afraid of what she would say next.

  “Your future will be different, Brai. I assure you.”

  “But you have invited the Sectilius aboard.”

  She inhaled deeply, trying to understand. “You believe they will influence me?”

  “I believe they will strive to do so.”

  She could see the profiles he was drawing in his mind of each individual she’d brought from Atielle, that he was preparing an argument, ready to supply reasons for his concerns. She held up a hand and, though she was tired, perused his mental dossiers until she was satisfied that she had seen enough. “None of this surprises me.”

  His arms were practically in corkscrews. He was literally wound up tight. He flashed only crimson at her now, but that was sporadic and undisciplined, not the regular rhythm she was accustomed to.

  She decided to try something she’d never done before, give him something he’d frequently given to her. She settled a blanket of reassurance over him in her mind. She mentally projected herself wrapping her arms around him and keeping him safe.

  He was surprised but didn’t draw away. He drank it up, until they both felt warm and calm. It was draining, but she gave all she had. She didn’t need to say more, but she did anyway. “I wasn’t born on Sectilia or Atielle Brai. I have command of this ship and we will do things my way, you have my word.”

  When she released her hold on him, she noted he appeared to be more relaxed, more like the confident being she’d come to know.

  She eased back from the glass. “You have the data I uploaded?”

  “I am processing it now. I will have calculated proposed routes for you to look at when you wake, Jane.”

  She smiled. It was good to hear him address her with her given name. “I look forward to seeing them. It’s time we were on our way.”

  He pressed a tentacle to the glass. The suction cups kneaded the surface.

  She placed her hand over the same spot. “We’re saving each other, Brai.” The ghost of gratitude flickered between them.

  She took a step back, dropping her hand. “I’ll see you when I wake.”

  The club of his tentacle remained on the glass, still kneading.

  She turned and walked back down the gantry. When she arrived in her rooms, she wearily tossed off the extra layer of clothing and curled up in bed, asleep instantly.

  39

  Jane murmured thanks to Ajaya as Ajaya passed her the last tray of nutrition squares to lay on the tall, narrow, buffet-style table in the crew cafeteria. Jane had asked Ajaya to make up a tasting menu, with a variety of flavors for the new crew members to try. Ajaya had arranged them carefully with the Mensententic names for every flavor on 3-D printed cards that were propped in front of each tray.

  She could have just held a meeting, but they were a small crew and breaking bread seemed like a good way to bring them all closer. Jane wished it could be something more elaborate to make their first meal together aboard ship memorable, but she hoped this was festive enough.

  It seemed like an opportunity to encourage more interaction between the sectilian and human crew. In the few hours since she awoke she’d seen a lot of aimless wandering but little socializing between the two groups. That was going to have to change. Cliquish behavior would be natural in this circumstance but also ultimately divisive. She needed to think of creative ways to bring them all together to work as a team for their common cause. The task that lay ahead of them would be challenging.

  Jane had been chatting with Ajaya and watching the newcomers react to the food cubes and their varied flavors. Tinor in particular was delightful to watch. The adolescent’s reactions were big, and iad asked Schlewan a lot of questions, tasting each flavor carefully and trying to name it without looking at the cards. But the scarcity on Atielle meant that many of the tastes were new. Schlewan was wistfully describing at length all the fruits, vegetables, grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, and fungi that the food-cube flavors were meant to represent. Eventually she located a tablet to call up images and facts from the ship’s library.

  The rest of the room was nearly silent by comparison. Jaross was less enthusiastic. She politely tasted each flavor one at a time, listening to Schlewan and Tinor’s banter but not participating or commenting in any way. She kept her eyes downcast and seemed uncomfortable.

  Jane was still learning to interpret sectilian body language. Though she had Rageth’s memories and Brai’s mental insights, they composed an incomplete picture. She was careful not to ascribe human attributes to some of the behaviors she observed, but it did seem as though many sectilians operated in a very closed-off, introverted manner. There seemed to be a preference for a degree of isolation as well as a tendency toward pedantic speeches and obsessions over minutiae that might not be important to anyone else. The thought had occurred to her that something akin to Asperger’s might be neurotypical for the species. Someday psychologists on Earth would study these similarities and differences and it would probably do a lot of good on both worlds, but for now she could only speculate and continue to record her observations in her personal journal.

  Pledor’s reactions to the food were less muted than those of Jaross. He’d tried three cubes so far and set them aside, making faces with varying degrees of revulsion. Ryliuk came forward to companionably suggest a few of his favorites. Pledor tried one of those and then coughed and possibly even gagged. Jane thought she might have seen him wiping his tongue with his napkin, but she was trying not to stare, and then Alan sidled up to her, stealing most of her attention away from Pledor’s antics.

  Alan glanced at her sideways. “That dude’s gonna get real hungry,” he murmured dryly in English, just loud enough for her to hear.

  Jane didn’t dare smile for fear she wouldn’t be able to stop at just that. She licked her lips and nodded gravely. She was glad that he was talking to her again. She didn’t want to ignore him or send him the wrong message. She turned to him and raised her eyebrows briefly. No one else would be able to see that.

  He chuckled softly. She had hit the mark, then. “Before we started eating these, I was pretty worried about how they might affect us.”

  That surprised her. “You were? Why?”

  “I was pretty sure they would poison us.” He nodded slowly and popped an entire food cube in his mouth.

  Jane was nonplussed. “What?”

  He chewed thoughtfully. “Oh yeah. I figured there would be some heavy metal that the Sectilius needed nutritionally but that our livers wouldn’t be able to get rid of. I figured it would build up in our blood until we went nuts or got weak and sick or something.” He took a swig from a cup of water he held.

  The thought had never occurred to her. Maybe because of the engram Brai had put in her brain. She felt a small spasm of guilt that she hadn’t reassured the others more about the cubes’ contents. Her brows drew together. “Oh, wow. I didn’t think—”

  He shrugged. “Then I really thought about it. All the elements in the universe, aside from hydrogen and helium, come from stellar nucleosynthesis. The proportions should be roughly the same everywhere, so wherever life evolves, its needs will be pretty similar, especially since there was some godlike super race rampaging around, planting humanoids everywhere.” He picked up another food cube thoughtfully. “This flavor is growing on me, but it needs more salt. I’m going to tinker with the food printer and see if I can make it do that.”

  Jane smiled. “Which one is it?”

  He gazed at it like he wasn’t sure how to describe it. “It’s kind of like the flavor of chili. Beany, beefy, but more earthy than that. There’s a hint of spiciness.”

  Jane nodded. “Oh. That’s the flavor of a subterranean fungus that grows in dry forestland on Sectilia.”

  He made a wry face. “I’d rather not know, thanks.”

 
She pressed her lips together so she wouldn’t smile again. “Sorry. I’m pretty sure the flavor is just a synthetic replication.”

  He waved her off and contemplated the food cubes like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to eat more. He set them down on a nearby table. “Anyway, I’ve analyzed them. There’s nothing scary in them that I can find. I’m no chemist, but I’m pretty sure they’re a solid nutritional value for humans too. Kinda weird though. Like eating dog food in a way. All the essential vitamins and minerals in a uniform bite-sized kibble.” He grinned.

  She grinned back. He always had the oddest way of looking at things that she found so endearing. It was nice to talk to him again like this. It felt tentative, like they were both unsure of where they stood, but she thought that maybe it was a good place to get their feet back under them and try to start again. A comfortable silence lengthened between them.

  Tinor suddenly exclaimed, “Pua fruit! Oh, this is tasty!”

  Pledor narrowed his eyes and grumbled, “Which one?”

  Tinor bounced over to the table where the food was displayed and gestured with an open hand. Pledor snatched one and nibbled on it suspiciously. He ate the entire square slowly, his expression still mostly in a moue of disgust, but when he finished that cube he went back, emptied the tray of that variety, and walked away to turn his back on the rest of the group, greedily consuming them one after another like a starving man.

  It made Jane think about what Alan had said about the food poisoning them. Then she remembered him telling her once about being certain that the aliens inside the Target were going to tear them limb from limb. She turned to him, her brow furrowing. “You have a bit of a doom-and-gloom streak, don’t you?”

  He frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “You always imagine the worst-case scenario.”

  His hand went to the back of his neck, as it often did when he was thinking. “It saves being disappointed, I guess.” He sent her a probing look.

  She met his eyes, unflinching.