by Astrid Amara
White cotton sheets. A pillow. Home.
Tover blinked. The air was thick and humid, full of the odor of cut grass and wet soil.
He tried lifting his hand and was surprised he could. His left hand was heavy. A nutrient bag was attached by IV to his wrist. He felt sluggish and weak as hell, but he was alive.
Alive, and free.
Something warm shifted beside him. He groggily turned his head and saw Cruz, sleeping alongside, his bruised face shiny with nu-skin. It was dark outside. He wasn’t sure if it was simply the time change from DK Station or if he’d slept an entire day. He nearly asked Cruz, but he looked so peaceful sleeping there, Tover simply turned on his side and stared at Cruz’s face until he fell asleep again.
He had a new nutrient bag when he awoke the second time. By now it was light out and Cruz was no longer beside him. Tover sat up, feeling queasy but excited that he was here, on Carida. He adjusted his respirator.
The room was momentarily unrecognizable, until he spotted the light lace cardigan hanging over a chair in the corner. He was in Lourdes’s bedroom. He felt a moment of utter grief that he had been the destruction of someone so good and pure.
The smells of something with cinnamon and chocolate baking filled the room, and his stomach rumbled in response. In the living room he could sense the presence of several people, and heard low voices speaking a mixture of Spanish and English.
He lay back down, luxuriating in the feel of sheets warmed by starlight. Everything smelled delicious here.
The bedroom door opened hesitantly and Ana poked her head in. “You’re awake!”
She shut the door and rushed in, hugging Tover to her. Tears filled Tover’s eyes, and before he could stop himself he sobbed onto her shoulder. She cried as well, and he thought, what a pitiful sight we make, but he couldn’t care. He was here, and all the doubts and indecisive anxiety he had about the idea of giving up everything—his career and safety and identity—to return to this toxic planet evaporated. He had made the right choice, he knew it by the way his bones settled in the bed, the way he felt an all-encompassing sense of comfort.
Home.
“Can you believe I missed you, you complaining bastard?” Ana said, pulling back. She wiped her eyes.
“I only returned for the food,” Tover told her.
Ana slapped his shoulder, smiling. “Asshole!” She lifted his nutrient bag. “You’re almost done with another one?” She shook her head. “Over the last two days I’ve given you enough liquid calories to resuscitate a small army, you know.”
“That must be why I have to piss so badly.”
Ana grinned. “Need help?”
“No way,” he scoffed. “Where’s Cruz?”
“Talking to los jefes in the living room.” Tover tensed, but she quickly added, “Don’t worry, Ramirez and Peres aren’t here. Ramirez got shot when they captured Cruz from the safe house, and Peres has been pushed out. You aren’t in danger.”
“Unless I take the hardware out of my head, I’m too valuable to ever be out of danger,” Tover told her. He offered a smile. “But I appreciate the support.” Standing, he had to hold his trousers up with his right hand to stop them from falling down. He gripped the nutrient bag with his left.
“Lourdes’s bathroom is through there.” Ana pointed to a door on the far wall of the bedroom.
“Thanks.” Tover made his way to the bathroom and leaned against the wall, breathing in the thick, humid air of Carida as he relieved himself. When he returned to the bedroom, Ana still sat on the bed.
“I’m cooking tamales and a cake for you and los jefes, but what do you want for dinner? I’ll make whatever you want.”
“That soup.” Tover sat next to her. “The one you made when I first got here? I still dream about it.”
Ana smiled. She reached up and touched his neck.
“Looks better, right?” Tover asked.
“Amazing.” She shook her head. “You can’t even see where the scar was. They did a good job on you.”
Yes they did, he thought bitterly.
Ana dropped her hand. “You heard about Mom, right?”
Tover nodded, clenching his teeth together. “Ana, I’m so sorry. It’s my fault—”
“Don’t,” she interrupted, lifting her palm as if to physically hold him back. “I only just finished convincing Cruz it wasn’t his fault that she was killed. I don’t want to waste more time doing the same to you.”
“If she hadn’t healed me, she wouldn’t be dead,” Tover said. “It’s the truth.”
“And if you told her she would be shot for healing you?” Ana replied, “she’d do it anyway. The blame lies only with the person who ordered that soldier to shoot her.”
Tover looked over at Lourdes’s cardigan. “I missed her. More than I thought I would.”
The door flew open and Cruz entered, dressed casually in dark-olive cargo pants, a lightweight black T-shirt and military boots.
His dark hair had just been cut short, and his face looked nearly healed thanks to the nu-skin. Only the hint of a scar ran across the bridge of his nose. His expression, normally so guarded, lit up.
“Hey.” The corner of his mouth curled up into a grin. He walked to the bed and kissed Tover. Tover leaned into the solid weight of him.
Worth it, he thought. All of it. Worth this.
“Ugh,” Ana groaned, getting up to leave. “Don’t mind me sitting here.”
“Get out,” Cruz said, never taking his eyes off Tover.
“Prick!” she replied.
“Thank you,” Tover added, breaking another kiss to smile at her.
“By the way, Cruz, Feo asked me to marry him last week and I said yes.”
Cruz spun around as Ana slammed the door behind her.
Tover laughed. “Uh-oh.”
Cruz looked angry for a second. Then it melted and he grinned lazily, carefully leaning Tover back across the bed. “I’ll deal with that later.”
“What about los jefes?” Tover asked.
“Now they’re waiting for Ana’s tamales.” Cruz ran his hand down Tover’s chest. Tover involuntarily shivered at the touch. “God, you’re so thin. How are you feeling?”
“Hungry, but fine. How about you?”
“Horny.” Cruz kissed him again, carefully leaning over Tover’s body.
Tover was almost amazed at his cock’s ability to swell with blood, given how emaciated he was two days ago. But clearly the army’s worth of nutrients and calories Ana had pumped into him had gone somewhere.
He didn’t have energy for much though, and neither did Cruz, it seemed. He set a lazy pace for them, simple kisses and strokes, and with a quick working of Tover’s fly Cruz had both their cocks in his hand, pumping them in rhythm, delicious friction causing Tover to moan into Cruz’s neck.
“Shhh,” Cruz whispered, “there’s like six guys in the next room.”
Tover stopped writhing. “Shit. Will they freak?”
Cruz laughed. “No. They don’t care, but I don’t want anyone sticking their head in here and thinking they can join in on the fun.” He kissed Tover deeply, then pulled back, staring into Tover’s eyes. “You’re your own man now, and I won’t let anyone ever touch you again without your explicit permission, you hear me?”
Tover thrust into Cruz’s palm, his precome lubricating the movement. It didn’t take much longer. Cruz’s ejaculation spurred his own, and although his breathing grew labored, although he was now sticky with come and ravenously hungry and tired as all hell, he couldn’t think of a time when he’d felt more happy.
Afterward, Tover and Cruz got cleaned up, then joined Ana and los jefes in the dining room.
Tover felt nervous, surrounded by those who had wanted to enslave him. But he recognized several of the faces around the table. And Feo was there, giving Tover a h
ug and a sloppy kiss on the forehead like he was some lost sibling.
“I told them you’ve joined our side,” Cruz clarified, pulling a chair out for Tover. They all sat around a massive wooden dining table that had always been covered in medical supplies and various unpacked shipments the last time Tover had stayed.
The makeup of los jefes surprised Tover. Something about the term suggested to him dozens of white-bearded men directing the fate of the Caridans impassively.
Instead, there was only one man sitting at Lourdes’s massive dining room table with a white beard. The rest looked younger, and there were women as well.
“Tover, I want you to meet the leaders of el Pulmon Verde. This is Diego.” Cruz pointed to the bearded man, and moved clockwise. “Ramon, Luis, Maria, Tomas, Olivia and Soto.”
Tover inclined his head in greeting.
“And friends,” Cruz said, giving Tover a look of fierce pride, “this is Tover Duke, one of only forty-two improvisational navigators in the universe. His powers are beyond your wildest beliefs. And he saved me.”
Tover flushed with the compliment. Los jefes looked at him with a mix of expressions—curiosity, suspicion and gratitude.
“Thank you for bringing Arcadio home,” the old man, Diego, said. “We’re grateful for this.”
“He’s done more than that!” Ana burst out, clearly incapable of remaining silent for longer than two minutes for any occasion. “Tover’s also the one that broke the newscast. He gave the story to Republicast! We owe him everything.”
That seemed a bit of an exaggeration, but he smiled at her regardless. “Has there been any pickup of the story? I left as it broke.”
The man named Luis laughed. “You could say that.”
Feo helped Ana bring platter after platter of food to the table. Once everything was laid out, he sat beside Ana and held her hand. Cruz watched Feo, frowning, but didn’t comment.
As the food was passed, Tover’s stomach growled loud enough that he feared everyone would hear and mock him. But they’d already moved on from him and were instead discussing what came next. The group switched easily between Spanish and English, clearly everyone fluent in both languages, so Tover missed quite a bit of the discussion. He decided one of the first things he would do as part of his new life on Carida would be to learn the native language.
Thinking about language made him think about studying, and maybe seeing if there were reference materials on the net he could get ahold of in Spanish regarding native Caridan bird life. The thought made him tap his feet in excitement.
Tover’s attention was drawn by the heaping platter of food that was passed around the table. Dozens of small items wrapped in banana leaves were emitting some mysterious, delicious odor that, embarrassingly, was making his mouth water.
“You like tamales?” Olivia whispered, handing Tover the platter.
“I don’t know, but I have a good feeling I will.” He took two because the smell was so incredible.
The taste was to die for. His body still demanded fat and protein, no matter how many bags of liquid nutrients he’d absorbed in the last two days, so he ate with an oblivious, ravenous hunger. He briefly recalled those first days on The Baroque, stuffing flavorless meat and potatoes in his mouth, plotting his escape.
But this was different. Each bite was an explosion of flavor, and while the men and women surrounding him weren’t friends—he wasn’t even certain they were allies—he had Cruz and Ana with him, and he was as home as he’d ever been.
While he ate he listened to the parts of conversation he could understand. He gathered that, after the document leak about Harmony’s duplicitous plans for Carida, a special hearing had been ordered by a committee of CTASA council members. An investigation was already underway. The story had been picked up by syndicates across CTASA colonies, and protests were being coordinated in all major settlements including Great Arland. There was even talk of entire colonies boycotting Harmony products, although los jefes seemed to think that wouldn’t last.
Tover got the impression that while Harmony itself wasn’t hurting badly from the repercussions, it was no longer going to scuttle Carida without a fight.
At some point someone said something, and everyone laughed and stared at him. He wiped his face—did he have food on his respirator?—but then noticed one of the guests pointing at his plate.
Most of the others had only helped themselves to two, at most three tamales. In contrast a mountain of discarded banana leaves piled beside Tover’s plate.
Cruz grinned. “I guess you like tamales after all.”
“Shit. Sorry, Ana,” Tover said. “They were too good to stop.”
Ana pretended to look upset, but Tover could tell she was beaming. “Don’t apologize to me, apologize to the guards outside. You just ate their dinners.”
“How about I help you whip up another batch for them?” Tover offered.
Ana shook her head. “Tamales are labor intensive, but I’m sure we could come up with something quick.”
“We have more important work for him,” Diego interrupted.
Cruz’s smile immediately disappeared. “If he wants to,” he said. He stared at Tover. “Only if you fucking want to, Tover. Your days of being ordered what to do are done, I promise you.” Cruz glared at the rest of the table in challenge.
Diego inclined his head slightly. “Of course, if you choose. It is your call.”
“And if I don’t want to help?” Tover asked, alarmed by Cruz’s anger. “What will happen to me?”
Diego shrugged. “Nothing. You’ve more than done your part for our cause. If you wish to have nothing more to do with the protection of Carida, that’s up to you.” He leaned forward. He rubbed his hand over his beard. “But we desperately need your help. There are supplies we need to identify, and I understand you can determine contents of cargo loads without manifests, yes?”
Tover nodded. “To a degree. I can’t tell details, but if you want me to identify the gist of a shipment, I can do that for you.” He swallowed. “So you don’t need me to jump?”
Olivia opened her hands. “We don’t even have a vessel with a navport at the moment.”
Tover let out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.
“But if we got one,” Ramon added, narrowing his eyes. “You could use it, right? You could help us with supplies and moving troops, if need be?”
“Perhaps,” Tover said. “I can’t make any promises. But I’ll consider it.”
“Then, until we get ourselves a ship, that will have to be the best we can hope for,” Ramon replied.
Epilogue
The political fallout from Cruz’s report on the Republicast continued to shake Carida and the entire CTASA colonial empire.
Tover and Cruz watched the aftermath from Lourdes’s bedroom, now claimed as their own, while the Pulmon Verde worked to take advantage of the situation. There had been pressure on Cruz to move back to Villazul where he could take more of a leadership role, but he declined the offer. He wasn’t a military leader—he was a structural engineer. And one who had done his part.
One unexpected benefit of the havoc was Tover and Cruz’s short-term safety. At first Tover assumed Harmony didn’t pursue him because they were too occupied with other matters. But now he saw how badly it would reflect on Harmony, if they chased their navigator back from the planet they were planning to eradicate.
One month after the news leak, word came that a commission was holding a special hearing on Carida itself, and several dignitaries high up in the political wheelhouse of CTASA would be in attendance. Cruz’s participation was requested by los jefes, as well as the attendance of his partner.
At first Tover wasn’t sure why he was specifically requested. He was able to inform el Pulmon Verde of manifest contents from Lourdes’s home, he could sense them anywhere. But then he learned
one of the attending council members, a finance minister from the wealthy colony of Marsha One, had traveled to the planet on his own personal broadship. A broadship that had a navport option.
Cruz insisted that Tover was there to break them into the ship, not to navigate it. It seemed like a weak excuse but Tover didn’t think too hard about it as he and Cruz traveled by nave into the city, and met up with Lalo, Feo, and the other Pulmon Verde at the port.
The vessel was beautiful, and expensive. Obviously the dignitary had money and was striving to make an impression.
Why he hadn’t thought to secure the vessel, however, was anyone’s guess. The night guard of the port dock was easily paid off. It took Tover all of one second to jump himself and Cruz inside; it took fifteen seconds more to disable the security door and let the other fifteen Pulmon Verde soldiers waiting in the corridor inside.
Tover still tensed when surrounded by the fatigues and rudimentary bolt pistols of the guerilla soldiers, but that reaction was fading. For the last month he’d been respected as a navigator, but even moreso as a hero, the one who broke Cruz’s story after Zoya had pulled the plug.
Cruz broke open a panel near the security door and yanked out a microchip. He tossed this onto the port dock facility and followed the rest of the men inside.
Tover led the men through the vessel, scanning each cabin as he walked to confirm the make was the one he’d researched when first told of the opportunity. The ship would be perfect for their needs. It was small and could be disguised well amongst a small fleet of personal vessels; but it had a trade compartment large enough to move extensive cargo.
As Tover and the other Pulmon Verde stepped into the bridge, he immediately saw the helmet suspended in the rafters.
“It has a navport installed,” Tover said.
Cruz scowled and held out his hand. “No one’s forcing you, Tover, got that?”
“I’m fine,” Tover said quietly. He found the navport and swiveled the chair. It was an older model, the 2000 range, but it wasn’t as primitive as the ship on Jarrow. He flipped a switch to descend the helmet and inspected the pipe. It was clean, at least, and a gentler shape.
