Supergiant (Gigaparsec Book 2)

by Scott Rhine

  Roz didn’t like being pushed into any course of action, but she didn’t want pride to make decisions for her either. What would she have done without the Magi’s revelation? As an engineer, she couldn’t walk away from the greatest invention in history. As a friend, she wouldn’t leave Echo to die or Max to suffer. As a null, Roz wanted the chance to belong to something larger. As a woman, she couldn’t bring herself to abandon a relationship with Max, even if it seemed a little unconventional. Every aspect of her urged her to yield. The most she could do was dictate the terms of her surrender. “If I do this, no more hiding things from each other.”

  “Agreed.”

  “I want him to ask me first, though, and without prompting from anyone. A girl has to have some standards.”

  “So Max meets with your approval?”

  Roz shook hands with the frail Magi, trying to sound businesslike. “This guy could have a lizard tail and I’d have to agree. The subbasement drive is too important to pass up.”

  “Such noble sacrifice.” Echo suppressed a smile.

  Halfway to the elevator, Roz remembered why she had come down here. “Do you approve of what they’re doing for Deke?”

  Echo stood and tilted her head. “How could I object to someone else being freed from slavery and allowed to develop their potential, whatever their race? Besides, the military AI on Deke’s shuttle has a great deal of navigation data about our route, saving us weeks of guesswork.”

  “Did you know Alyssa is a criminal?” Roz asking, hoping for some moral outrage.

  “Nothing violent. What you call a confidence artist,” Echo explained, waving the furniture away. “Max has informed me of the relevant details, and I approve. I believe in the power of love to heal and reform a wounded soul. Don’t you?”

  Roz opened her mouth to object, but no arguments came. All she could manage was a weak, “If any of them endanger my ship, I’ll kick them off at the first police station, bound and gagged.”

  “Your ship?” teased Echo. Before Roz could fumble an apology, she said, “Our ship.”

  ****

  Roz returned to her room, confused and aflutter. One of the most advanced species in the Union had treated her as an equal, asking for help in complete honesty. She couldn’t be mad at Echo. That left a complicated snarl of emotions for Max. For his sake, Roz had left behind everything in her stable, boring life. The new job had worked out better than her wildest dreams, so why was she angry? She dragged the sleeping Jeeves out from under the bed to have a one-sided conversation. “Your daddy has been hiding things from me. I’m not okay with that.”

  She pulled a pouch out of her pocket, which contained fresh coconut meat. Jeeves devoured the offering, making noises of pleasure.

  After a long discussion, Roz decided she could repair her relationship with Max for the sake of their “child.” Jeeves was sensitive and might react poorly to seeing his daddy shouted at and kicked in the testicles by Mommy. At the very least, she promised Jeeves that if she absolutely had to act on her anger, she would take Max into another room first.

  She stroked Jeeves until he slept in her arms. Then she decided to catch a nap herself because Deke starting his shift early meant she would begin her next stint at about three in the morning. That time shift alone should help buffer her from others until she could better face them.

  Chapter 11 – Hidden in Plain Sight

  Roz managed to avoid Max for over a week until the transition to subspace. Both he and Ivy hovered over her narrow bed like nervous, old women. “We just jumped,” Ivy announced at last.

  Max had been watching the EEG readout. “Your electrical activity spiked.”

  “That’s because she squeezed my hand like a python swallowing a rabbit,” Roz complained. The event hadn’t hurt this time. It affected her more like the rush of falling from several stories up. “I’m fine. You can all go back to your daytime duties and let me rest.”

  “You shouldn’t spend so much time alone,” Max said.

  “I’m not alone. Echo is teaching me some branch of Magi mathematics I hadn’t even heard of until this trip.”

  He shuddered at the topic of math. “I’m glad you’re doing it. I can compute dosages based on body mass, but don’t ask me for much more than that.”

  Ivy made a gagging gesture. “Remembering flavor ratios for mixed drinks is my limit. All of that ‘two trains approaching each other on the same track at different speeds’ stuff seemed like a waste of time.”

  Roz peeled off the monitor strips with increasing irritation. “So you’ve replaced me on all the valuable tasks aboard except the mental equivalent of janitorial service. If you’ll excuse me, I’m taking my required vacation day in the jungle room. Jeeves is waiting down there for me.” She swept out of the room before the others could object.

  Playing with Jeeves was just what she needed to relax. His favorite game was hide-and-seek. In the rare event Jeeves made a mistake or taunted her with an easy hiding place, she would try to sneak up to him. The moment she tripped over a branch, however, he would shriek with joy and scamper back to the safe spot without getting tagged.

  “Turkey,” Roz said, limping back to home base to give him his treat.

  The only time she could fool him, even briefly, was by standing motionless between several good hiding places but choosing none of them. He would search each possible location, ruling out each until he caught her in the last available place.

  Sometimes the mimic would let her read while he took a victory nap on her lap. The math transformation exercises Echo had assigned were harder than hull ceramic. Homework assignments could easily take three hours a day. Then Echo would demonstrate a solution to each in minutes. The only term Roz could come up with for the latest technique to convert complex flow graphs into alternate graphs was mind-expanding. The equations were drastically different ways of modeling the same system—like viewing a star from above and below Einstein’s rubber sheet. She felt like everything in graduate school had been Tinkertoys by comparison.

  The days blurred together as she synchronized to the jungle’s light schedule instead of the ship’s. Several “afternoons” later, Max appeared behind her, silent as a shadow. “I wasn’t finished with your examination.”

  Roz hopped up, spilling her homework and Jeeves onto the ground. The mimic immediately flattened himself and turned the same green as the undergrowth. She glared at Max and flicked soft dirt off the corner of her computer pad.

  “Sorry to startle you,” Max said.

  “I was just reading about the effects of malnutrition on child development. Now I’m not sure if Jeeves walks hunched over because that’s what his species does or because his growth’s been stunted.”

  Max raised an eyebrow. “Don’t borrow trouble from medical libraries, please.”

  “So I shouldn’t have him tested for Attention Deficit Disorder? He doesn’t always listen to me when I’m trying to explain things.”

  He opened his mouth to reply but changed topics instead. “Are you avoiding me? I haven’t seen you at dinner since Alyssa started cooking.”

  “She makes me sack lunches,” Roz explained. “The first night, she cooked Ropa Vieja for me. It was like being home again.”

  “Did you tell her that?”

  “No, I’ve only really met her once.” Roz recalled the wan face that could have graced a museum painting, with dark hair and a mysterious heritage. Alyssa’s ancestry could have been Mediterranean, Arabic, or even Indian “Honestly, it’s like she’s hiding from me.”

  Excited by the word “hiding,” Jeeves approached to sniff Max’s feet. Hopping up and down, he squeaked, “Seeeek-seek.”

  Roz rolled her eyes. “I played with you almost an hour today, greedy boy.”

  Max looked stunned. “He … speaks?”

  “When he really wants something, and only words with the long e sound. He can’t get enough of hide-and-seek. Again, I’m not sure if his speech difficulty is species related or due to insuf
ficient vitamins in the formative months.”

  “He plays?”

  “He’s too old now for peekaboo, which would be peek-peek,” Roz said. “Maybe he’d be better off learning Bat than Human. Their phonemes might suit his mouth better. Although, some of his reluctance to speak might be due to his desire to remain unnoticed.”

  “Could you demonstrate?” Max acted like she had just told him those paintings of dogs playing poker were real.

  “Counter or runner? I’ll warn you, he can’t count to thirty, and you have to shout out when you’re ready. He can find you pretty easily after that.”

  “Why don’t I just watch the first time?”

  Roz shook her head. “Oh, no. I’ve been doing all the play-play. It’s your turn. I’ll count, and the two of you run. The first one caught has to count next time.” She hid her eyes and counted to thirty slowly.

  When she raised her head, the jungle was utterly still. For three minutes, Roz walked in a circle, searching. “You’re good, Max. There’s a chance I’ll find Jeeves first this time.”

  Suddenly, a pebble rattled through the underbrush, striking Max’s hiding place in the tree. “Ow. Hey, that’s not fair. He cheated.”

  “Shh,” Roz said, closing her eyes to concentrate. She knew the pebble was a distraction and where the mimic would be running. She crept toward the home base, aiming her arms in the opposite direction of Max’s tree. She adjusted her position when she heard the rustling underbrush and knelt. As Jeeves burst from the shrubs, she opened her arms to catch him. She hugged him tightly, tickling him until he squealed for mercy.

  Unnoticed, Max crept up on them both. “You’re amazing.”

  The way he said it made her shiver—in a good way. “What did you want to do to me? You know, medically.”

  He held out a hand to help her off the ground. “I brought a dose to inoculate you against the radiation in the Phoenix system.” Once she was on her feet, he didn’t let go of her hand. “How did you catch Jeeves?”

  “A trick. His distance vision isn’t the best, so he relies too much on his mental senses. Once he’s running, I stand in a spot where there are at least two choices to hide but don’t commit to either. As long as I don’t move, I could be anywhere.”

  Max stared down at Jeeves as she scratched the mimic. “You used your Probability Mechanics to pretend to be one of his species?”

  “Yeah. Kind of.” Max was still holding her hand, distracting her.

  “You’re brilliant. Maybe why he was so drawn to you. He senses your talent to blend in.”

  “I like to think it’s more than that,” Roz said. “He knows I’ll take care of him like a mommy should.”

  “Mee-mee,” Jeeves affirmed.

  Roz held out her arms for Jeeves to climb in. Instead, the mimic enveloped their joined arms. Hand in hand, she led Max to the door. “Now, as the loser, you need to take me to dinner.”

  “After we put Jeeves down for a nap.”

  As they ambled toward the lift, Max continued to stare at her in wonder. Roz found she enjoyed the attention and contact.

  ****

  Roz hummed to herself happily in the mirrored chamber that evening.

  Echo said, “You’ve patched things up with Max, then?”

  The humming stopped. “Mostly. How could you tell?” Oddly, Echo knew more about her by now than her own family.

  “I may not have a uterus, but I can tell love and contentment when I see it.”

  “Maybe,” Roz allowed, focusing on the three-dimensional matrix. “The more I learn about math, the stranger this asymmetry seems.” Understanding flickered at the edges as Roz flexed her mental muscles.

  “Our theory was that it represented the time axis, which cannot go in reverse.”

  Roz wrinkled her forehead. “What does the rest of the equation represent?”

  “A better question would be, ‘What was constructed to model this equation?’”

  Glancing around her, Roz guessed, “The ship?” Echo touched the base of her neck. All manner of details fell into place for her then. “That series represents the power cascades. That part is the collapsing manifold. Oh, God, it’s all so …” She fell to her knees. The massive problem dwarfed her, like the globe of Earth pressed down on Atlas.

  “Overwhelming?” Echo draped a silky arm around her, encouraging and stabilizing.

  For an instant, Roz felt certain the problem was solvable with just the right viewpoint, but the tiny pieces in her brain couldn’t hold together. They scattered like a handful of ash in a breeze. “It was staring me in the face all the time. Does anyone else know?”

  “Among the living? Only us, promised one.”

  Dizzy, Roz closed her eyes. “It’s so heavy. We’re so small. How do you manage it?”

  “Faith, friends, and focusing on a piece smaller than myself.” Furniture appeared, and Echo guided Roz to first sit and then lie down. “This is enough for one day. Rest.”

  Chapter 12 – Crystal Ball

  Roz wandered about in a daze for days, followed by a worried Ivy. Comparing this ship to those in the library let her know the difference between features that were merely conventions and those that had specific intent related to the prototype drive. Every time Roz stroked a smooth wall or examined a control panel, she gasped and muttered how it fit the pattern. The first time she found something that broke the model, she became agitated. Ivy asked, “What can I do?”

  “I need to fix this.” Roz circled the area with her red marker and logged the need for a critical repair on her tablet. She knew the name of the power-regulator component from the diagrams of similar Magi ships but not the specifications for this vessel’s. “That idiot, Zrulkesh, probably removed anything he didn’t know the purpose for.”

  Ivy shrugged. “So buy parts in Phoenix.”

  “You can’t buy these off the shelf. Humans can’t fabricate tech like this. We’d have to custom machine them to nanoprecision, which is impossible.” Pacing, Roz called Echo on the intercom and informed her of the complication.

  “We have 3D images of the original equipment in the archives,” said the holographic projection of the astrogator.

  Roz snapped her fingers. “Photovores.”

  Echo nodded. “If the components aren’t subject to high stress, we can implement them that way, but we’ll need to keep extras in case elements break when we run power through the drive.”

  “Like one of Edison’s bulb filaments,” Roz agreed.

  “Look, I’m glad you’re finally in the land of the living, but what are photovores?” asked Ivy.

  Roz looked both ways. “Echo, are there any non-partners in earshot?”

  “Negative,” replied the astrogator with out-of-body talents and access to ship security systems. “But I’ll keep watch.” Her image vanished.

  “Very slick, high-grade nano imported from the Magi. They love light, especially the edge conditions. You pour them into a hologram, and they fill in every crack of the shape. Then you feed them the desired material, and they die in place like coral polyps, solidifying into the image.”

  “A plaster cast,” Ivy said.

  “Yes. One that can be adjusted to any scale. I’ve used photovores for a temporary repair on a Saurian vessel the way you would a spare tire on a jeep.” Roz chewed her lip. “A low-population, high-tech world like Phoenix might have a small quantity for emergencies. I’m not sure if they’ll want to part with them, though.”

  “Sounds expensive,” Ivy muttered. “How important is this part of the drive?”

  “The drive mechanism is a dynamic system, almost alive. What would happen if you took out 1 or 2 percent of your body at random? We need them sooner rather than later because even if we had the photovores tomorrow, it would take us months to reconstruct the subbasement drive. When we reach the professor, I’d like to have everything in place.” By then, we may be able to improve on the old model.

  “You really think we should put all our eggs in one baske
t this way?”

  “It’s a winning hand. This beats every other prize in the known galaxy,” Roz insisted.

  “Fine. We’ll find something to trade, or a way to borrow the nanos.” Ivy seemed glad to have a problem in a realm she could tackle.

  Roz held up a hand. “No more breaking the law.”

  “How do you feel about bending it till it begs?”

  “No more sex analogies, please,” Roz pleaded.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Max held hands with me the other day.”

  Ivy put a hand on her chest. “Heavens to Betsy. Lock up your daughters. The Casanova pirate is on the loose.”

  “It’s not funny. I’m not sure if he’s being nice to me because he wants my genes or he really likes me.”

  “He wants what’s in your jeans. Heh, heh.” Ivy wiped the smirk off her face. “Sorry, I’ve spent too much time around the Goat. Everything sounds dirty after a while. I’ll tell you what. You’ll need to pick up the photovores on Phoenix. No one else will know what they look like. They could put modeling clay in a crate and fool us. We’ll send big, mysterious Max down with you as a bodyguard. You can use that time to finagle answers out of him.” Touching her comm badge, Ivy said, “Reuben, what kind of romantic scenery do they have on Phoenix?”

  Over the radio, the young Goat snorted. “The planet is a radioactive rock that has to import water.”

  “What’s something I might find pretty and be grateful for?”

  “The crystal fields have tours. This time of year, they have spawn bursts.”

  Roz perked up. “I’ve always wanted to see that phenomenon. A crystal flower absorbs nutrients and energy until it reaches critical mass. The head vibrates for a while and then—boom. Seeds go everywhere.”

  “Yeah, I’m the one focused on sex metaphors,” Ivy mumbled.

  “I hear the colors are spectacular and very romantic. Thank you, Reuben.”

  “Have Kesh wrangle one of those tours for our team,” Ivy said. “You know, to show our representative of the Magi that the crystals are authentic and robust.”