by Tasha Black
He sailed out of the dining room without even waiting to see if they were coming. Raina got up and hurried after him and Nick brought up the rear as they traveled through the living room and the bedroom and into the closet. BFF20 led them straight to the pod and Nick closed the door behind them.
When he turned back, BFF20 was folding himself inward, slipping one end of himself into a tiny slot in the pod’s feed device, the other half of him unfolding outward like a plate.
There was a single chime and an image appeared in the air over the droid. Nick figured he must be projecting light from the feed to create the ghostly figure.
The projection looked familiar…
“Captain Reese,” he murmured.
Raina bent to watch.
“This is Captain Edith Reese,” the little figure said. “It’s January sixteenth, 2270. Yesterday at oh-five hundred hours, our ship heard a distress signal. We alerted the other two ships in our caravan. All three proceeded to change course immediately to the location of the signal, following protocol for responding to a distress signal in a non-military zone. But before we could locate the distressed vessel, we encountered an odd turbulence. We opted to slow our speed and proceed with c—”
The little figure was interrupted by something they couldn’t see. She ducked and looked around furtively for a moment, then straightened again.
“with caution,” she continued. “But as soon as we slowed, something seemed to take hold of the ship. It was as if we were being held in a force field. At least that was what we thought, although it wasn’t producing readings consistent with anything in our archives. We are a luxury cruiser, with no military applications, certified as non-combatant in all zones. We had no reason to expect a hostile encounter, until it invaded the ship.”
“We have lost contact with our companion vessels,” she said, sounding more defeated than Nick had ever heard her. “We think our comms are down because of some kind of magnetic field this thing has generated in its web.”
Again, she appeared to hear something. She ducked down and went silent for a moment. At last she straightened again.
“We’ve attempted to put all alien life forms into auto-stasis. And we’ve done what we could to protect our cargo. Power has been diverted from the ship’s other systems to ensure seamless power to fuel the pod. If you’re seeing this message—”
A third distraction had caused Captain Reese to turn away from the recording. The little figure screamed out loud, then one of her hands shot out toward Raina and the feed went dead.
“Gods,” Nick murmured.
“Yes, the quality was excellent for a two-hundred-year-old message,” BFF20 noted. “I cleaned it up a bit, but I really can’t take credit. That recording device was top notch for its day.”
As usual, the little robot had missed the point, but something he had said…
Nick staggered backward as he registered what the little droid had told him.
“A two-hundred-year-old message?” he echoed in disbelief.
“Not precisely two-hundred years, but I can define it down to the minute, if you wish,” BFF20 offered.
“No thank you,” Nick said.
“Nick,” Raina said softly.
“You knew,” he said, turning to her, furious. “You knew how long I was out, and you didn’t tell me.”
She opened her mouth and closed it again, looking down at the floor.
He saw a flash of movement behind her and stomped past her to look at the pod.
Inside, the baby slept on in his amber liquid, one hand curled in a chubby fist, the other spread out, tiny fingers like a starfish. He must have imagined the movement.
But he couldn’t seem to look away.
He felt a pull so strong it was as if his heart were coming out of his body.
He placed his hand against the glass instinctively, feeling a bond grow between himself and the tiny creature.
Peace soothed his anger and he studied the small human, the curve of his round cheeks, the swirl of hair on his little head.
“I guess this little guy is the reason the gravity is in and out,” Raina said softly.
“Mistress Raina, I need to speak with you,” BFF20 said.
“What is it?” she asked.
“In private,” he told her.
“Um, okay. Nick, we’ll be right back,” Raina said.
He nodded, still studying the child.
Raina and the droid went into the bedroom and closed the door behind them.
Darkness settled over the little room and Nick reached through the bond he shared with the child to see if it was conscious in spite of its slumber.
The baby did not respond, but he did hear something. It was too soon for his bond with Raina to have developed so much, but somehow it was already strong enough to allow him to pick up the details of her conversation.
“We have to get out of here, now,” BFF20 said. “If that pod malfunctions, the ship could divert oxygen, heat, everything it has. It’s not safe for you here.”
“Then you need to figure out a back-up source for the pod so we can take the baby with us,” Raina told him.
“It has a back-up, but there is no reliable way to predict how long that fuel cell will last. It’s hundreds of years old,” BFF20 told her. “We’ll come back for him.”
“Like hell we will,” Raina said. “I’m not going anywhere without him.”
Nick’s chest swelled with pride at his mate and her ferocious desire to protect the child.
“If you try to take him with you it could kill him.” BFF20 told her.
“Leaving him here could kill him too,” Raina countered. “I won’t do it. He’s too precious.”
Precious.
Oh.
Rage threatened to consume him.
He wrenched his thoughts out of their bond so as not to hear anything more.
Nick had bonded to this woman, and to this innocent nestling. He was prepared to protect them with his life.
And all Raina cared about was that the baby was rare and valuable.
She’s human, he reminded himself. It is her nature to pillage and steal.
But the injustice of it burned in his chest and his skin prickled with the desire to shift into something terrifying to prevent her from having her way.
13
Raina
Raina stared at the little droid, unable to believe her ears.
“The Privateer’s Handbook states that after this many years of abandonment, the booty no longer belongs to its original owner,” he finished.
“Do you seriously think I’m going to try to invoke Finders-Keepers over a baby?” she demanded.
“What I’m saying is that you don’t have to risk life and limb to get him out of here,” BFF20 reasoned. “It’s not an abandonment crime against human culture to leave him.”
“It’s a crime against everything it means to be human to leave him here, alone and vulnerable,” Raina said. “He will not be abandoned under my watch. Period. Nick will back me up on that.”
“Why don’t you just tag him?” Nick spat as he climbed through the closet door and into the bedroom.
“What?” Raina asked.
“If you tag him, then you won’t have abandoned him, and you can still claim him later, right? Isn’t that how you guys do it?”
Nick’s voice bubbled with undisguised hatred.
“I- I don’t understand,” Raina said. “I thought you would agree with me. We can’t leave him here by himself.”
“You knew,” Nick said. “You knew how long I’d been out, and you didn’t tell me.”
Tears prickled Raina’s eyelids.
“I’m sorry,” she told him. “I wasn’t sure how to let you know. I guess I thought you would figure it out slowly.”
“Well, I didn’t,” he said.
“We were sitting directly under the stars eating dinner. Didn’t you notice their position?” Raina asked.
“I was only looking at you,” he said.
The sadness in his deep voice unnerved her. It was one thing to be angry, but his sorrow spoke of something else.
Her chest felt ripped in two.
“I hate to interrupt,” BFF20 said. “But we need to get off this ship, Raina.”
“As soon as you figure out how to bring the baby, I’ll go,” she said. “But until then, I suggest we find a way to communicate with the Stargazer.”
“Comms are down,” BFF20 said.
“Then we find a way to get them back up,” she replied.
“Even if we did, what would that mean?” BFF20 said. “We don’t know how to power that pod if the back-up support goes out.”
“The Stargazer has a sick bay,” Raina said. “They can help him, figure out what to do. I’m not leaving him here.”
She turned to Nick, hoping he would support her cause.
But he had left the room.
Her heart sank.
“I’m going back to the control room,” she told BFF20. “Maybe there’s something there we didn’t notice before.”
“You heard the captain’s message,” the drone said.
“I don’t care if she gave up,” Raina explained. “I’m not giving up.”
“The control room is on the other side of the ship. You might bump into that thing,” BFF20 said. “I won’t allow it.”
“You won’t allow it?” Raina asked.
“Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but I’ve grown rather fond of you,” BFF20 said in a wounded voice. “And while that massive creature you’ve been fawning over might be able to share your biological form when he chooses, I have your best interests at heart. And I don’t want to watch you sacrifice yourself in some illogical quest to save a single baby, who quite honestly might not make it out of stasis anyway after such a long hibernation. I insist that we locate an escape pod and take you back to the Stargazer where you belong. Let that hulking alien babysit the pod if you’re worried about it.”
Raina felt a surge of rage at the idea of leaving Nick behind as well as little Tesla.
The fact that BFF20 was right only made her angrier.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she spat and turned on her heel to stalk out of the room.
“Raina, wait,” BFF20 said.
“I’m not waiting,” she called over her shoulder.
But he was already hovering in the air beside her.
“Listen, if you really insist on doing this, please let me try to find the secondary controls for the ship,” he implored her. “I can’t stand to see you put yourself in danger.”
“Why would there be secondary controls here?”
“Each room in this wing has its own control panel for lighting, temperature, humidity, the whole gamut. A woman with your skills could find a backdoor to hack into the rest of the system from there,” BFF20 said. “If she had a friend who could recreate the ship’s schematics. Then she would not have to take her life in her hands and leave her friend in despair.”
Raina turned to the little droid.
He was so good to her. Consistently.
Too bad he was a four-ounce carbon fiber sheet.
“I was really rude to the only friend I have who can recreate schematics,” she said carefully. “If he would forgive me, I’ll bet we could do exactly what you proposed.”
“You’re talking about me, aren’t you?” BFF20 asked, sounding very pleased.
“Of course I’m talking about you,” Raina said. “I’m sorry I didn’t want to listen to you.”
“I’m only a drone,” he replied.
But she could tell he was pleased anyway by the way the LEDs shimmered up and down the rims of his little body.
“I’m going to grab my tools out of my pack. Can you find us a likely control panel?” she asked.
“I’m on it,” BFF20 said as he zipped through the air.
14
Raina
A little while later, Raina was squinting into the thermostat panel in the bedroom.
She’d been able to hack into the communications system, but so far, the signal was insufficient to carry her messages off the ship.
BFF20 hovered over her shoulder in a friendly way, emitting encouraging beeps and hums whenever she seemed to be making progress.
She sent another test and watched the screen go blank. The signal was just too garbled.
“Damn it,” she said. “I need to clean up the transmission, or we will never be able to get anything usable out of this outdated tech.”
It was odd to call technology that was generations ahead of her time outdated, but it was the truth.
“How would you do that?” BFF20 asked.
“I’m not sure,” Raina admitted.
She pushed off the wall and stretched, enjoying the low gravity as she loosened up her muscles.
Unfortunately, half-floating around the bedroom wasn’t helping her think.
The problem was that there was so little to work with here. None of the kitchen equipment would be of use boosting a signal. There was nothing in the bedroom suite that could help except possibly some component of the baby’s pod, and of course she couldn’t interfere with that.
She drifted to the edge of the bed, her head in her hands.
Think, Raina, think, she urged herself.
“Don’t be sad, you’ve worked very hard,” BFF20 told her.
“For nothing,” she moaned into her hands.
“At least you’re making an organized effort,” BFF20 said. “Not off sulking in the dining quarters, like some occupants of this vessel.”
“Nick is going through a lot,” Raina said. “He just found out everyone he ever knew is dead. It’s not an easy thing. Trust me.”
She felt bad just thinking about it. She hadn’t ever expected to go back to Earth, but when she learned that she never could, well, it hadn’t exactly been a good feeling.
“You never sulked,” BFF20 said. “You were brave and defiant from the moment they woke you.”
“Thank you,” Raina replied, moved that he had noticed.
“Perhaps you need a mate who is more like yourself,” BFF20 offered. “Someone more disciplined and organized.”
More drone-like, you mean, Raina thought to herself.
“If you were human, I would be honored to go on a date with you,” she told him. “You’d be quite a catch.”
“Good heavens,” BFF20 said, obviously taken aback by the notion. “Human biology is clunky and inefficient. You would hardly recognize me as the friend you’ve grown to care for if I were lurching about heedlessly in some meaty carcass. You, on the other hand, would make an exquisite origami robot. If such a thing were possible, I would be honored to share your dock.”
“Um… thank you,” Raina said, taken aback.
She tried to imagine what it would be like to share a dock and then it hit her.
“My wristband,” she breathed.
“Well, we would need a larger dock than that,” BFF20 said. “Unless we folded ourselves together, which could be exceedingly pleasant so long as we didn’t interfere with one another’s heat sensors…”
“No, I meant that I might be able to use it to reroute the communication signal,” she said. “If we start with a better source, we might be able to make it work.”
“Ah,” BFF20 said, sounding a little disappointed. “It would be a minor improvement, but perhaps enough.”
Raina peeled off her wristband and tugged off the silicone cover plate that protected the workings inside.
Raina enjoyed tinkering and the intense concentration made it easier not to fret about the argument with Nick or her fears about the baby. She lost herself in the painstaking task of deconstructing the wristband to find the communications node.
“I hope you’re able to put that back together again when you’re finished,” BFF20 said.
“Don’t worry, I’ll have it up and running again for you in no time,” Raina said, hoping she was right about that.
At last she worked
the comms node out of its housing.
She grabbed the little multi-tool from her pack, grateful once again that she had it. For all that Mama, her captain, had sent her with, this simple Earth tool, a gift from her actual mother, had saved the day for her more than once.
She went back to the panel and began removing the tiny screws that would allow her to slide off a sensor screen behind the main control and insert the comms node from her wrist band.
“Moment of truth,” she told BFF20 as she slid it off and then grabbed the small bit of circuitry and gingerly eased it into place.
She rebooted the console and sent another test message.
Nothing.
“I’m sorry, Raina,” BFF20 said quietly. “The electromagnetic field is interfering with the signal. It’s just too strong.”
She sighed and then slipped the comms node back out and clicked it into her wristband.
BFF20 watched carefully as she replaced all the components and slid the silicone back on.
She touched the pulse point and the wristband lit up.
“All good,” she said calmly.
BFF20 made a joyful whistling sound.
“Now I just have to put this thing back together,” she said.
There was no real need to rebuild the thermostat, but Raina hated untidiness. Besides, it was another way to avoid the inevitable confrontation with Nick.
She slid her multi-tool behind the glass panel again and tried to ease the first screw back into place.
It slipped down instead.
“Damn,” she said.
She slid the screwdriver after it. At least the end was magnetized, so she should be able to pick up the screw with it.
But when she lowered it in, the screw flew sideways - repelled instead of attracted.
“Wait,” she said to herself. “Wait, wait, wait…”
“I’m not going anywhere,” BFF20 said.
“You said there was an electromagnetic field interfering with comms, right?” she asked.
“It would appear so.”
“And there is some kind of alien net holding the ship in place?” she asked.
