Rogue Galaxy, Episode 1: The Captain and the Werewolf

by J. Boyett

  As she took her first few steps past the somber personnel lining the hall, though, she saw Farraday approaching. With him was Dobbler, carrying propped on his shoulder a set of plastic poles with multiple complicated joints and attached nets—after a confused moment, Blaine realized it must be traditional gear for wrangling para-apes. They had crap like that on the ship? Maybe the punk had kept the stuff in his trunk, as a memento of his glory days on the Bone World rodeo circuit. Blaine came to attention for Farraday, managing to simultaneously cast a stern glance at Dobbler, who also came to attention. Which was awkward to do, while carrying all that junk.

  “Everybody at ease,” said Farraday. “What's going on, Commander?”

  “Not sure, Captain. But the upshot is that we don't seem able to reliably seal the Tubes. The seals keep detaching on their own, as if we were telling them to. We may have to seal off the whole deck, just to be safe.”

  “Well, now, hang on, Commander. That doesn't sound very safe to me. The deck seals run on the same program as the Tube seals, don't they? What's to say they won't spontaneously pop open, as well?”

  “It would be a calculated risk, sir.” A pretty dangerous one, she had to admit.

  “I don't know, Commander; I think you better concentrate on trying to fix that glitch before we go opening any hatches. In the meantime, I guess Ensign Dobbler and I will go into the Tubes after all. Just until you're able to seal them—then we'll skedaddle.”

  Blaine narrowed her eyes at Dobbler. “If I may ask, why do you have all that para-ape gear? If the current plan is to blow the Tubes?”

  “I did hear that, Commander, but the last order the captain gave me was to gather my gear and meet him here,” said Dobbler, innocently. “I figured I shouldn't assume anything had changed till I heard it from him directly.”

  So those had been the orders Farraday was giving Dobbler when he took him aside in Sickbay? What had he been saying to Fiquet, then? Blaine shook the idle speculations off. “Anyway, I've got to get to Engineering and see if there's something more I can do. Sir, you and Dobbler can't go into the Tubes. As soon as I fix the problem we've got to blow them. Even if I can't repair the seals, we've got Harriman coming up with the portable airlocks to seal the place off manually. They'll be up in twelve minutes.”

  “Then I'll send Dobbler out in eleven. Come on, son.” And Farraday progressed to the entrance, Dobbler in tow.

  Miller stepped in front of him. “Sir, you're the commanding officer of this ship, and I can't let you go in there and tangle with that werewolf.”

  “Lieutenant Summers and the rest of the crew are in immediate danger, Miller. Largely through my own missteps. I've only got twelve—no, eleven now—eleven minutes to make things right. Stand down.”

  “Sir, if you want to make a last-ditch effort to bring the werewolf in, at least send me....”

  “She won't listen to you, Lieutenant-Commander.... See, I really believe Jennifer's still there inside that thing.” Farraday smiled, and leaned forward and spoke softly, so that only Miller could hear: “Don't worry, Roy. If it all goes south, you'll have a hell of a CO to replace me.”

  Miller seemed shaken by sudden emotion at these words. “Sir,” he managed to say.

  But Farraday was already moving past him, saying, “There's no time, Miller. Blaine, if you figure out how to blow those Tubes, you go ahead and do it. For the good of the ship.” He paused, then turned to Dobbler: “Ensign, if you'd like to give me that gear, I can go on alone.”

  “Sir, no way. You can't track that thing well enough to catch it in the next ten minutes.”

  “Ensign, in less than ten minutes, those Tubes will be exposed to space.”

  “Beats solitary. Come on, sir, let's go.” Dobbler marched past him into the Tubes. Farraday watched him for a second, then shrugged and followed.

  Miller turned to Blaine, asking with his eyes what he should do.

  She only shook her head, then turned and headed to Engineering at a run.

  TEN

  Farraday was no expert on para-ape wrangling, but like everyone else he knew it depended on the wrangler establishing some kind of psychic link with the prey. So as he and Dobbler were taking their first couple dozen steps into the Tubes, he kept his mouth shut and let the kid concentrate, even though he was bursting to tell him to pick up the pace.

  Finally Dobbler's eyes snapped out of that foggy look they'd had. He stared straight in front of himself, as if he could clearly see something that was invisible to Farraday, and said, “Let's go.”

  “Have you got her?” the captain asked eagerly.

  “Come on!” said Dobbler, and tore off running, the articulated pole with its nets brandished before him like a spear, or a banner. All trace of deference to his superiors was gone; he was in the mildly psychic trance of a para-ape hunt. Or, well, a werewolf hunt.

  Farraday ran after him, trying to keep up.

  ***

  Blaine and Blackmon both dove into the programming, trying to isolate the glitch in the sealing system and construct a work-around. If they failed, there would still be the portable airlock sealants. Installing those was a pretty straightforward job, and Blaine had her less than brilliant but very reliable underlings doing it.

  “I found the bug!” exclaimed Blackmon, from her terminal. “Highlighting it now.”

  “I see it,” said Blaine, once she'd called up to her own screen the code Blackmon was grappling with.

  “I'm not sure how long it'll take to construct a workaround for this....” said Blackmon.

  Blaine consulted her chronometer. “Well, in five minutes those portable airlocks'll be set up, and if we haven't cracked it by then, it'll be moot anyway.”

  Blackmon was quiet a moment, and her fingers slowed, though she kept working. “Commander,” she said. “Will you really blow Captain Farraday, Lieutenant Summers, and Ensign Dobbler into outer space?”

  “Those are the orders.”

  “But, Commander....”

  “Quiet!” barked Blaire, loud enough to make Blackmon jump.

  The two went back to work, wordlessly.

  ***

  The portable airlocks were big folding screens; when you unfolded them the simple AI whose circuits were woven into the hard, super-strong, airtight fabric gauged the contours of the space it was supposed to seal off—in this case, the hallway—and extended itself in exactly the correct shape. There was a door built into the screen—one had the option of setting two of them up alongside each other, to form a true airlock, but for the Galaxy's purposes they only needed a one-layer seal right now.

  Theoretically, all the personnel setting it up should have to do was run diagnostics on the mechanism before and after deploying it and then, after popping it open and sealing off the target area, checking the atmosphere around its seals to make sure there was no leakage of air flow from one side of the barrier to the other. Theoretically. But in actual fact, the ensigns were having trouble unfolding the damn thing—it was stuck. A male ensign grabbed one corner and a female the other, and they tried to pull it apart. The male's grip was weak, and the portable airlock's corner slipped out of his fingers as his partner went flying onto her backside, the still-folded screen landing on top of her.

  Miller stared at it all in disgusted incredulity, tempted to take over even though he didn't know how to work the airlock. “Seriously?” he said.

  ***

  It had taken Dobbler less than five minutes to accomplish what Miller and his whole team had not managed to do all day—the werewolf stood on its hind legs, staring them down, growling. Farraday had always heard that the psychic link that drew the para-ape wranglers toward their prey worked both ways, and attracted the animals to their hunters. Apparently it really did work the same way for werewolves. Maybe para-apes were some odd local mutation of the meta-species?

  Not that he had time to speculate about it much right now. In fact, as the werewolf glared at them, hair bristling, its deep growl setting his bones
to shake with shuddering vibrations, Farraday wondered if he was ever going to have time to wonder about anything ever again. Impatiently, out of the corner of his eye, he watched Dobbler preparing his lasso-and-pole apparatus for the first cast, a bit slowly and methodically for the captain's taste.

  The werewolf hadn't yet attacked them or run away, both of which were the behaviors one would expect. Was that because the psychic link Dobbler had established held her in some kind of mini-thrall? Or was it because, deep down, despite all the received wisdom of science and wizardry, Jennifer was trapped inside there, a prisoner, gazing out at him, dimly recognizing him and desperately struggling to prevent the werewolf from doing him any harm?

  Gazing into her snarling muzzle, her glaring yellow eyes, he could find no other trace of his lover. But then, the longer he stared, the more it began to seem to him that there was in fact some mysterious something there.... Yes, he was certain of it, sure that it wasn't just his imagination....

  As he was on the verge of taking a step forward, of reaching out a gentle hand to calm his Jennifer, the werewolf roared and sprang at him.

  ***

  Out in the corridors the roars burst out from deep within the Tubes like a physical wave crashing forth. Even the more hardened Security personnel flinched. One of them, Lieutenant Hasegawa, instinctively began running for the entrance, but Miller grabbed her by the shoulders and yanked her back.

  She looked up at him with a wild appeal, but he only shook his head. “How would we ever find it in the next four minutes, with all those echoes rolling around?” he said. “And besides, captain's orders: we wait it out here.”

  ***

  In Engineering, Blaine's fingers fell from the keypad. “Got it,” she murmured. She'd constructed the workaround. Now she stared at the screen as if the program were an unwanted intrusion, as opposed to something she'd been struggling to create.

  “Reports of werewolf roars in the Tubes,” Blackmon said tensely. She looked at the new workaround that was displayed on her screen, then slid her eyes uncertainly Blaine's way. “Ma'am?... Shall I initiate this?...”

  “It's only two minutes till they get the portable airlocks set up.”

  “But ... the captain's orders, ma'am....”

  Something in Blackmon's tone suddenly made Blaine realize just how frightened she was. Well, she was right to be frightened; and it really was stupid and irresponsible of Blaine not to order the Tubes blown now, because it would take only an instant for the werewolf to knock something catastrophically out of whack. And if it was in there roaring and rampaging like that, then Dobbler and Farraday were probably dead anyway.

  But: “Two minutes, Chief,” she said, and held tight.

  ***

  Three minutes later, all personnel on Deck Three had withdrawn behind the portable airlocks, and Lieutenant Storr, standing next to Miller, stood ready to seal off that section of the ship. Miller watched him to see if he would falter, as a way to distract himself from the question of whether he himself would. He thought he saw the glistening hints of some sweat at the man's hairline, but that was all.

  Storr raised his wrist to his mouth. “We're ready to seal them off, Commander.”

  The moment's silence from Blaine's end was heavy. Miller didn't want to imagine how bitter it must feel to her, to promote herself this way.

  But, really, the hesitation was so brief it might have been Miller's imagination after all. Voice firm, Blaine said, “All right, Lieutenant. I hereby....”

  But she was cut off by a cry from inside the Tubes: Dobbler's voice, shouting, “Hold it! Hold it!” The sound of racing footsteps became audible, too.

  Without waiting for orders, the crew started to pour through the still-unsealed airlock, till Miller furiously hollered, “Hey! Where the hell are you going?! Who the hell told you to go anywhere?!” Cowed, they rushed back onto the safe side, while he shoved past them through the airlock door. As he crossed the threshold, he called over his shoulder, “Stay ready to blow this goddam thing!,” then continued on alone to the Tubes entry.

  He reached it just in time to nearly get knocked over as Dobbler came running out, gulping for air. “The captain got it!” he gasped. “He got the werewolf!”

  “'Got' it?” demanded Miller. “'Got' it, how?”

  But Dobbler only shook his head. “He got it under control!”

  ***

  In Engineering, Blackmon was spinning in her chair, hands overhead, cheering. Blaine was relieved, too, but not quite ready to celebrate so whole-heartedly.

  Like Lieutenant-Commander Miller, she had to wonder: how could the merely human captain have “gotten” the wild, savage werewolf?

  She didn't order her team to start taking down the portable airlock until Miller confirmed that, yes, Captain Farraday really was leading out the amazingly docile werewolf, and that Miller and his Security people had safely bound it in titanium restraints.

  ELEVEN

  With the werewolf out of the airlock and tied down in Sickbay, Blaine was able to take a team into the Tubes to track down the damage Beach had wrought. Compared to the madness of recent events, it felt like an easy, straightforward task, and after about a day they had the helm operational. Blaine staggered out of the Tubes, reported to Farraday on the bridge and then, even though she hadn't slept in more than forty hours and was longing for bed, called Miller for an update. He was in Sickbay, with Eban. She listened to him on her communicator as she made her way to her quarters.

  By the time she was halfway to her room the helmsman had already begun taking them out of the system, and Miller was able to confirm that the werewolf had reverted back to Jennifer Summers, once they were an AU or so away from those moons. Happy ending.

  Curiously, the werewolf had stayed docile for nearly two hours after Captain Farraday had led it out of the Tubes. Miller, wonderstruck, had started to wonder if maybe Jennifer Summers really was still there inside the werewolf, since the only new variable he could see that might affect its behavior was the captain's presence. But then, after about two hours, the werewolf had gone savage again, and begun roaring loudly, violently, and constantly enough to make everyone in Sickbay nuts. Anyway, it was over now, and Lieutenant Summers was sleeping deeply and peacefully.

  The only other big news was that the Galaxy had postponed its exploration mission here and was heading back to Kimball. Supposedly Carlson and Walsh had some theories about possible uses of the Weed of Wonder, as a werewolf tranquilizer—word was that Fiquet had contributed some ideas of her own.

  “But listen, Val,” said Miller, over the communicator (there must have been no one nearby, otherwise he wouldn't have used her first name), “all that can wait. You did a great job, but you must be exhausted. Why don't you lie down before you fall down?”

  “Mm.” What Miller didn't know was that while he'd been talking she'd reached her quarters and now was sprawled on her bed. “Sage advice. Blaine out.” The next moment she'd fallen asleep, without ever taking off her uniform.

  Hours later she awoke, with a head full of questions.

  She mulled them over and sorted them in her mind while she showered. Once she was out she hailed the bridge; the captain was there and got on the horn when he heard who it was.

  “All is well, Commander.” He sounded warm and cheerful. “You've done incredible things the last few days, and there's no way you've caught up on your sleep. Take it easy today, while things are still quiet.”

  “I'll take you up on that—thank you, sir,” she said, and signed off. Then she sat and thought a while.

  The captain sounded happy. The truth was, she genuinely would prefer not to disturb him—at least for the moment. She might not personally approve of the way he'd handled things, but he'd had a rough couple days—almost died, almost had to kill the woman he loved—and she preferred to leave him alone, at least until she knew for sure he'd acted improperly enough to warrant talking about it.

  Anyway, if she did talk to the captain, and he
r suspicions were correct, there was no reason to expect him to tell the truth. But she knew someone she could put the squeeze on.

  Ten minutes later, she was heading to the garden. She'd asked the computer to discreetly locate Fiquet, and that's where it had sent her. Blaine was relieved the girl wasn't on-duty—her time sense was so addled from the long stretch of work and then having slept at odd hours, that she had to keep checking the chronometer to see whether it was ship's daytime or ship's night.

  The Galaxy's garden really wasn't a big affair—only a few hundred cubic meters, but its landscaped earth was stuffed full with enough profusions of bursting plant life to create plenty of places to hide. Blaine marched through all the bushes and low-hanging palms and flowerbeds and ivy curtains, exasperated, trying not to show it so as not to make the other loungers think anything was up, unwilling to put Fiquet on alert by hailing her.

  Blaine finally found her, tucked away in a corner that Blaine had never even noticed before, a patch of grassy earth in a pocket of stunted low-hanging trees, their leafy green branches hanging around her like curtains. She was sitting in the lotus position, eyes closed, a barely perceptible smile on her lips. Her eyes opened when Blaine pulled back that wooden curtain, and the gentle smile faltered, as she no doubt wondered why the XO should be seeking out a lowly ensign.

  Or maybe she didn't need to wonder why at all, and that was why she was worried.

  Blaine sat on the ground in front of Fiquet. Now they were both enclosed in the leaves. Fiquet's gaze was like that of a cornered animal, as she waited to hear what Blaine wanted.

  “Don't speak yet, Ensign,” said Blaine, casually enough. “Just let me think a moment, first.”

  Fiquet nodded once, slowly. She took a deep breath and seemed to re-center herself, then waited.

  Blaine played out various scenarios in her head. If she leaned on the young ensign, she could probably get her to crack a lot sooner than Dobbler would, even if the captain had given her a direct order to lie. For example, she could ask if Farraday had asked her if she had heard the doctor and the witch speculate that the Weed of Wonder might be an effective drug to use on the werewolf. And he might have asked her if she had her own secret stash, that she could donate to the cause. With no fear of censure for possession of a forbidden substance, naturally.