by Scott Rhine
The two would-be lovers argued until he glimpsed a flash of silk clothing without heat traces. He hid his bloody blade behind his back.
Reuben followed his gaze and suddenly dropped the snack caddy, spilling popcorn everywhere.
Echo’s hologram had appeared in the hallway. “The Enlightened One returns from the testing grounds in half an hour.”
“What’s wrong?” asked Daisy, deflecting attention from why half the crew would be lurking in the hall so late.
“They did it! Other worlds have duplicated Shiraz’s equations. A message torpedo arrived in orbit around the shipyard’s moon.”
Despite the excitement, Reuben remained reserved. “What did the message say?”
“Does it matter? The tech works, and it’s spreading.”
Kesh exchanged a glance with his friend. “They were supposed to send three more torpedoes outward to tell other Magi worlds as quickly as possible. If they wasted one by sending it back here, something went wrong.”
Echo paled. “Do you think someone else died?”
“Speculation is pointless,” Kesh said. “Use your influence to find out. Meanwhile, I’ll wake the others.”
“How did she get back so fast?” Daisy wondered as they fanned out to knock on doors. “That should take weeks.”
Reuben replied, “They outfitted her shuttle with the prototype drive. It’s only capable of in-system jumps, but it doesn’t need to worry about gradual acceleration. She can make the trip in fifteen hours.”
“You knew about this and didn’t tell me?” Daisy smacked him on the shoulder as the Bat opened his bedroom door.
Menelaus brightened. “Are we all beating on the Goat? I’ll play.” He punched the opposite shoulder.
“Watch it! Only women get to beat me.”
Max poked his head through a crack in his door. “Would you mind keeping it down?”
“Your wife is coming in hot. You have twenty-eight minutes to shower and get presentable.”
The doctor cursed and grabbed a towel.
Kesh followed him to the sanitation room. “What’s driving you to drink?”
“That obvious? I thought I was being discreet.” He shoved his sweat-stained clothes into a laundry chute. The Humans didn’t worry about nudity in his presence. As former military, Max only showed modesty around the blonde.
“When the Black Ram complains you’re drinking too much, it’s a neon sign. If I figured it out, your women will.”
Max grunted as he stepped into the water stream, which was a luxury in space. Even so, the liquid be reclaimed and recycled. The humidity made Kesh uncomfortable.
“When’s the last time we saw nature?”
“Giragog.”
“Exactly. This is a prison. I thought coming to Adamantine would mean forests or savannas. I’m treated like a pariah, quarantined up here. But none of that would matter if I had anything to do. As it stands, I’m nothing but—”
“Stud service?”
“I was going to say arm candy.” Max seemed genuinely puzzled. “What are you talking about?”
Kesh was saved from explaining by the reappearance of Echo. “I had no idea you felt this way.”
“When’s the last time you talked to me outside the bedroom?”
“I’ve been in stasis whenever Roz is gone to save my energy.”
Max furrowed his brow. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Kesh didn’t want to get caught between feuding lovers, so he changed the subject. “The contents of the message torpedo?”
Grateful for the misdirection, Echo brought her husband up to speed on the news. “The academy acknowledges a message disc made of immutable material. That way it wouldn’t warp in transit. It was heavily encrypted and can’t be trusted to radio. Roz will share what she knows in person.”
****
The crew gathered in the conference room, waiting for Roz’s arrival. They drank coffee instead of vodka, but this seemed to put them even more on edge. Kesh’s stomach roiled from a meal eaten too hastily, so he remained silent.
Max said, “This is like the service—long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of extreme fear.”
Reuben chuckled. “Which category does reunion sex fall into?”
“You’re disgusting,” Daisy said.
“Come on,” Reuben said with a grin. “He does more pounding than a door-to-door salesman.”
“Eww.”
Reuben’s smile faded. “We don’t all reproduce with test tubes.” This was a reference to the government-run breeding program on her homeworld of Laurelin. No psi could have children outside this program. She frequently used this as an excuse to avoid intercourse, but cross-species unions wouldn’t bear fruit. Each time she teased him with possibility and then turned a cold shoulder, he sniped at her frigidity.
“We only had twenty-five minutes,” she argued. “That wasn’t enough time.”
“Hah! I could do it twice in that amount of time.”
“Not helping your case.”
“Tell me how long you want it to last, and I’ll do it.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re the leader of race, not an out-of-work streetwalker. Show some dignity.”
Turning to Kesh, Max asked, “Is that what you were talking about in the shower? You’re calling me a gigolo? A sperm donor?”
Menelaus retreated into the corner, refusing to get involved.
Suddenly, the exterior window turned opaque. Roz walked into the multisided squabble in full ship’s uniform, including her green gem. “Well, you’ve accomplished your duty.”
Everyone fell silent.
Kesh was the first to say, “Congratulations.”
Max asked, “You’re pregnant? We didn’t even talk about—”
“We have a viable embryo. Female. We can choose a name later.”
He softened. An embryo could be implanted at any time. If necessary, a surrogate could be employed. “Is this some sort of bizarre competition with Lisa?”
“Now he wants to talk. The academy decided to preserve my talent.” She broadcast a synchronization pulse on her team comm unit. “Everyone gather what’s left of your gear. We’re leaving in one hour to resume the mission. Anything that won’t fit on the shuttle stays here.”
As she turned to leave, Max asked, “Is the academy going to allow you to travel in your state?”
“I won’t implant until we get back to Adamantine. I wouldn’t risk losing her. Besides, they’ve already approved my departure.”
“How? What about the problems on Deep 7?”
Roz said, “I made a few suggestions to the tech crews. By the time we arrive, the drive should be operational.”
“You delayed a crucial mission so you could get pregnant?”
“The main reason we went on this mission was to have something to remember Echo by. Without this child, the mission was a failure.”
Daisy said, “Damn, you’re cold and selfish. Billions of lives are at stake.”
Roz replied, “I’m cold? You’re a spy who’s using all of us. You can’t accuse anyone else of betrayal.”
“Name one time I’ve stabbed you in the back.”
Kesh chimed in. “Tonight, you tried to break into her quarters and bugged her door.”
“I wondered why my room wouldn’t open.”
Daisy switched tactics. “We wouldn’t have to listen in if you remembered where you came from—what we lifted you out of and how often our people bled for you. You owe us. You got your education and funding for your fairy-tale adventures from my people.”
Echo appeared. “Be civil to her, or you won’t be traveling with us. Beloved, why the urgency? What swayed the academy enough to place you in danger?”
“It’s more dangerous for me here,” Roz confessed. “The Bankers are coming. They’ll reach the Adamantine nexus any day. The Magi they fly past would’ve warned us sooner, but their ansibles wouldn’t work. They had to wait till the Banker craft left their system to
bring the hopper out of hiding.”
“It took them this long to build one?” asked Max.
“Not everybody has Roz’s skill, and there was probably a committee vote involved,” joked Reuben. “What do you know about the Banker vessel?”
“It’s a Zeno ship. I read a theoretical paper on it in grad school. They don’t bother taking on new fuel in enemy territory. Since the energy needed to make the next transition to subspace depends on the mass of the ship remaining, they shed empty fuel rings to make themselves about half the weight each jump.”
“Like nested Russian dolls?” asked Max.
“More like a train carrying a wagon with a load of fresh horses.”
“That has to be obscenely expensive.”
“They have motivation. We traced the launch to the day we announced our drive at Giragog. They knew exactly where we were heading with the prototype.”
“A sneak attack,” murmured Reuben, bolting for the door.
“Or they’ve come to collect their due,” Kesh reasoned. “We promised they could ride along. The ship might’ve been sent to enforce that right.”
Daisy sprinted for her room. “Either way, we’ve got to leave before they arrive.”
“Hmph,” Roz said, gloating. “Now she’s not so keen on me keeping my obligations.”
Max held up a finger. “We’re going to have words, woman.” He disappeared soon after to gather his gear.
“The moment you take off your clothing, we know what your words will be,” Kesh said under his breath.
Roz smiled. “You’re not going to pack?”
“The Bat and I already did. I gave Echo the map data long ago. The encrypted message and emergency transport meant we were leaving ASAP. Max would have realized that if he weren’t so hungover.”
“Oh, dear,” responded Echo.
“Yeah. Add that to the list of conversations you’ve been avoiding,” Kesh said. “Do you need our help carrying anything?”
26. Last Minute Snag
The upgraded Magi shuttle was ovoid and polished to a glossy sheen. The rear section was reserved for lesser forms but was still safe and pristine. The hanging net chairs were comfortable and universal. Though a thick door separated them from the Magi, Roz maintained an open radio link with the team. From the window, Kesh could see a large hoop added to the midsection. Extra fuel tanks were minimized to avoid spoiling the aerodynamics.
A blast shield rose to cover the windows as the shuttle backed away from the nursery.
The jump happened without warning a hundred seconds later. One moment, they were saying good-bye to the tower, and the next, they were vectoring into the space dock. Despite the fact that he knew days had passed in real space, from the passenger’s point of view, refueling took longer than the trip had.
“You were right,” said Echo over the radio. “Smaller is much more efficient.”
“Meh. Still working out the kinks,” Roz said modestly. “The second hop is usually back to a fuel depot. Plus, it takes a couple minutes to charge the quantum capacitors.”
“Better than the hour it took for Deep 6.”
Roz apologized before switching radio channels. “Opening night. A lot of people want my attention.”
Suited workers and robots swarmed over the new black hull of Deep 7. They disconnected it from the C-shaped construction scaffold that held it in place. A countdown beside the cockpit door read eight hours and thirty-four minutes. Everyone stared in wonder except Max, who slept. Daisy recorded images with her computer pad.
Kesh recited the opening of the ancient epic poem Ocean of Night.
Only the Bat understood the reference and clasped hands with him. “Songs will be written for us after this.”
In spite of their differences, Daisy turned to Kesh. “Which heir?”
“The one who broke the wheelchair on the curb. Crothkesh. He showed eagerness to serve, and the resulting humility suited him.”
She nodded, closing her eyes to inform her remaining sister.
When she finished, he said, “Your triad lost one member already. Isn’t there a provision exempting you from further service?”
The blonde inclined her head. “G, the head of the family, asked me personally to see this through. I’m the witness for history. Many will study at the feet of my memory tree.”
“He offered you a pile of cash, didn’t he?”
“If I can keep the Ram alive, my family is absolved from serving in perpetuity. My children could be free citizens.”
“What if we fail?” asked Kesh.
“No one will be free for a long time. Without Bankers, we won’t receive payments for our last three terraforming jobs. We also don’t have enough triads to handle the mandatory message loads. Anyone with the talent will be working eighty-hour weeks.”
“Just wanted to be sure who you were cheering for.”
Grimly, she said, “Sir, whatever you do, don’t mention our ability to the Bankers. Their agents would hunt us down next.”
He noticed that inside the craft, Reuben’s media ball was dormant. He suspected the computer cameras weren’t recording properly either. “We’re family. Put on some makeup. Something tells me history will mean a lot of posing for press releases.”
She glanced down at the tabard he wore over his chest armor. “Your family crest. Isn’t a little early to get suited up?”
“Once we get started, a month will pass every time we blink. If my first guess is right, we can be facing the enemy in what feels like hours.”
She paled. The mission just got real. To her credit, she picked up her bag and headed for the bathroom. “I’ll change now.”
****
After final clearance, they docked inside Deep 7 proper. Though still spherical, the frame was smaller and lighter. Even Kesh recognized the carbon-fiber struts. As the shuttle settled onto its cradle, Roz announced, “This ship has only one cargo bay on the opposite side, and it’s pretty full.”
“Decoy hoppers?” Kesh asked.
“No. We have nine tiny message torpedoes to send back news. The rest of the space is spare parts for the shuttle. With an estimated twenty enemy ships, we’re carrying three spare rings and enough empty fuel pods for forty in-system hops.”
“So we’ll need to build the remaining decoys ourselves in the field,” Kesh decided.
Roz snapped, “I didn’t say that. Could you stop pushing? I’m a little busy.”
Rolling his eyes, he unclipped.
Max whispered, “She’ll come around, but you’re one voice in a hundred right now.”
“The Bankers scare her. I get it. We won’t let anyone hurt her.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a gap in the IR range as a docking clamp attached itself to the shuttle’s airlock. “How many of those invisible bots do we have?”
“I don’t know exactly. A lot. If the ship gets damaged in combat, they have orders to rebuild and bring us back.”
“Could they spare a few to take the lead if we need to board another vessel?” Kesh whispered.
“Huh. One has been following me for weeks. I never thought about asking it to go first. Be a big help in a firefight. I’ll ask. You should stay under the radar for now, though.”
“Why?”
Max tapped his earbud. “The monsters have arrived.”
The timer read just over seven hours.
Cursing, Reuben ordered, “Send the message that grinds the Goat bureaucracy to a halt. I might not get another chance.”
Pale, Daisy complied.
The video screen flickered to life. A ghastly thin Teller appeared the wall unit. A croaking voice broadcast, “We require an inspection of your vessel.” After issuing his demand, the Teller slumped forward like marionette when the show was over.
Roz said something rude as entered the back half of the shuttle and slid the exit door open. “Chop-chop. I have to hit the bridge and see how long it’ll take to do an emergency lift. The others can stall while we’re sneaking away.”
>
Roz climbed into her spacesuit. Crewmembers filed off, several complimenting her on the smooth landing.
Suck ups.
The screen changed to display the incoming vessel’s location by the star nearest to Deep 7.
A Teller female on the same band said, “Mayday. This is the pilot of the Zeno. We need a medical team. High Loan Officer Ulang has been on an IV diet for months. He gave me the last of his acceleration drugs before the jump. Please. We’re out of fuel drifting. I don’t know how much longer he’ll last.” Though the pilot’s voice trembled with emotion, her Banker diction was impeccable.
Roz beat a fist on the wall. “Damn! So close.”
“What?” asked Daisy, the last person to disembark. She’d donned the matching spacesuit in case the enemy got within visual range.
“They used the one ploy we couldn’t refuse—innocent in distress.”
“They’re lying about the fuel.”
“Doesn’t matter if they jettisoned it on purpose. We can’t let a single person die. We’re the only vessels close enough to rescue them before they drop into the corona. Load the spare stasis pods.”
Echo came over the radio. “Secure the Enlightened One in the crystal vault. We’ll make the rescue without her.”
“You think this is a trap?” asked Daisy. “That they’ll explode to take her out?”
“No, but the ansible might try to probe her or drive us off course.”
“We can’t risk you either,” Roz said.
“My helmet is the only one on the shuttle shielded against their influence. The jumps to rendezvous alpha have all been locked into the nav computer. I’m the most expendable. Get her out of here. Have the ship ready to jump when we return.”
Daisy took her sister’s best friend by the elbow and led her toward the central elevator shaft. Even if the shuttle crew perished, the mission would go on.
The crew held its breath for hours, past the scheduled Deep 7 launch time. Eventually, the academy decided to allow the three visitors to ride along in stasis until the next refueling stop. At that point, Max and the two other medics aboard would treat the High Loan Officer. Once he was healthy enough, the crew would animate the polyp he’d escorted.
