by A. C. Ellas
“You present a convincing argument,” Cai finally said. “But I don’t remember you. I don’t recall anything from before the Guild.”
“There are techniques available to restore suppressed memories,” Samuel said levelly. “I don’t claim to be an expert on the subject, but surely what the Guild did to you isn’t irreversible?”
“Were I even to look into those techniques, surely the Guild would notice... and wonder why.” However, he didn’t want to let this unusual opportunity to thwart the Guild pass him by, either. Cai gestured to the sitting area. “Please, have a seat. Would you care for something to drink?”
They sat, refreshments were served, pleasantries were exchanged, then Sammie said, “You might not be able to research how to reverse memory suppression, but I can. We support research in a wide variety of fields already. I’ll make some inquiries once I’m home. My contact information is on that cube I gave you.” They continued to chat, strangers getting to know one another, until the banquet.
* * * *
Cai picked up the crystal containing their orders and turned it slightly before mating the depression on the bottom to the crystal in his right palm. He didn’t know exactly how he knew how to orient the crystal, there were no directions on it and it was symmetrical, but somehow, he always knew which angle to orient it at before seating it. Information flooded him, a torrent of words and images flashing through his mind. He passed it to the AI and to the display screens of the room he stood in. Nick and his officers studied the screens as they came up.
“What system is that?” Cortez was leaning forward, expression intent. The system on the screen showed an aging ginger star orbited by but a single planet. There were multiple asteroid belts, but the system was one of the most desolate Cai had seen. It was as if some cosmic war had occurred here, destroying the planets that should have been there and leaving nothing but rubble in its wake.
Cai searched his databank for the name of the system. “I have no record of this system,” he announced. Their orders also did not include a name. “All we have been provided with is route and instructions to go there. This system, whatever its name, is ten jumps away from here. The rest of our orders are locked pending our arrival there.”
“We should be heading for Hevetich,” Harve complained. “We need repairs and to resupply, we’re in no shape to carry out a secret mission.”
“Ten jumps?” Cortez shook his head. “Bloody system could be halfway across the galaxy. Has Admiralty lost its mind?”
“There’s only one way to find out,” Nick said firmly. “We have our orders, people. I know we’re not in optimal condition, but I’m confident that we can meet whatever challenge has been set before us. Let’s get to it.”
Cai placed the crystal containing their orders back into the foam-lined case. “Our orders have been uploaded and hard copy has been printed in three locations per regulations.” Those three locations were always the same—the bridge, the engineering office and his own chambers. He closed the case and sealed it. He would have one of his adjuncts store it in their small vault.
“Thank you, Astrogator. How long until the first jump?”
“Several hours, Captain.” Cai shrugged. “I will have to adjust our course and cross part of the system to catch the first hardpoint.” It was actually more complicated than that—he’d need to use at least two slingshot maneuvers around planets to aim himself at the hardpoint. He inclined his head. “With your permission, I will go make my preparations now.”
“Granted,” Nick said promptly with a wry smile for their formality.
Cai actually enjoyed the formal exchanges between Astrogator and captain mandated by Space Corps regulations. It made for an interesting contrast to their personal lives. Each Corps ship controlled by an Astrogator served two masters—Admiralty and the Guild. Cai represented the Psionics Guild and Nick represented the Space Corps, though Cai was also considered a Space Corps officer. He wasn’t a line officer but could override the captain at need. The relationship between the ship’s captain and the ship’s Astrogator set the tone for the entire ship—the better the two cooperated, the happier and more efficient the ship. Laughing Owl had excellent morale.
Upon reaching his chambers, Cai barely paused to accept the bowl of Synde his adjuncts had prepared. He drank it steadily, enjoying the flavor but not lingering over it. He set the empty bowl aside and strode into the Chamber itself. The room was octagonal with six chairs spaced along the walls and a single chair in the center. They called them chairs even though they were really acceleration couches. Cai wondered if there was some ancient model of spaceship that had used actual chairs or if it was just another odd quirk of the Guild to call the couch a chair.
Cai settled into his seat and waited for a moment, until he sensed that the four adjuncts he’d use for this jump were ready. He pressed the crystal in his palm into the receiver in the arm of his chair. The ceiling opened, the crystal array descended, and in a rush of expanding consciousness, Cai became Laughing Owl. He accelerated, feeding more power to the ion engines. At the same time, he tapped his thrusters in a specific order, firing each for a carefully calculated length of time, until he was aimed at exactly the right place in exactly the right attitude.
He reached the first planet. The gases slid along his hull like silk over skin, sensual and seductive, but his speed was enough that the planet missed its grab for him. He shot back out into the inky void in an entirely new direction—aimed for the second planet he’d need.
“I love planet surfing,” Cai commented, causing various reactions of amusement from the crew since he’d broadcast that on the public channel.
“You’re good at it, too,” Nick replied.
Soon enough, he reached the second gas giant he wanted and he slung Laughing Owl around it with the same ease and sense of enjoyment. Now, he was aimed at the hardpoint and traveling at a standard point five c. He had time for some lunch, some sleep and some Nick before he’d have to jump but not necessarily in that order.
He collapsed the linkages and the crystal array retracted. He sat up on the edge of his chair and stretched before attempting to stand. Long immobilization left him stiff and sore, but the sensation passed quickly. He walked out of the Chamber and smiled at Nick.
Chapter Nine
Nine jumps he’d performed through systems that had grown increasingly sparsely inhabited. The last two systems had shown no sign of human occupation at all. Not even relay satellites. Cai set up for the last jump with the same meticulous precision of the previous nine. He’d paced himself, taking no more than three days to cross each system. That was plenty of time to recuperate between jumps. He could have done a jump a day had he wanted to, but he wasn’t in any hurry and there hadn’t been a haste code on the order sending him out into the middle of nowhere.
The crew was safely tucked away in their acceleration couches and the number storm was cascading down through his consciousness. He slowed his perception of time relative to reality, turning seconds into minutes as he crunched the numbers, solved the equations and reached into the dark heart of the ship and twisted the singularity inside out, forming an instant wormhole through which he fell into the chaotic underpinnings of the universe.
He surfed down the incline, accelerating as he slipped the leash of the star behind him, dodging and weaving to avoid the strange obstacles of things that might or might not have really been there, but you didn’t play Shroedinger’s games with a spaceship, you assumed all obstacles were real. Cai leaped the void, the vast emptiness of nothingness that hovered between the local gravity hills of massive objects. He landed smoothly on the incline of the system he wanted, allowed the ginger star to throw him a new leash, and they pulled on each other until Cai had a firm hold and could untwist the singularity and pop back out into real space-time at the heliopause of the ginger star.
He scanned the system as he set a course for the lone planet. To his surprise, there was a lot of
human activity there. He counted at least six massive space platforms and dozens of other ships. When he took a closer look at the other ships, however, he felt a chill. They were all dead ships. Not one active registration in the lot. “It’s a graveyard,” Cai told Nick on their private channel. “Why have we been sent here?”
“Laughing Owl, this is Skaith Command, do you copy?”
“Skaith Command, this is Laughing Owl, we copy.” Cai wondered at the name. It sounded familiar, but he couldn’t place it.
“Please access the remainder of your orders. Authorization code transmitting now.”
Cai accepted the code as it came in—it was a long string of random characters. He applied it to the block on the orders he’d uploaded, and the data unfolded for him. He was instructed to dock Laughing Owl at the station in the L5 position around the planet Skaith. The Guild had people standing by... “I’m being transferred.”
“So are we,” Nick replied. He’d been reading his orders as well. “The entire crew—we’re to strip everything we can use from Laughing Owl and ferry it over to Dark Star. Once Laughing Owl is decommissioned, we’re to crew Dark Star through the operational trials.”
Cai wondered what it would be like to lose Laughing Owl. He’d been on this ship for years. It was his, a part of him, really. The entire ship was attuned to him, and he to his ship. He didn’t want to leave, but Dark Star was majestic. Ten klicks from bow to stern. The Star Wolves are the largest class of ship ever. This ship had been promised to him back when he was still a student in the Guild hall. He’d seen the lead ship of the class in action at Aldebaran. Now it was a reality if he had the courage to accept it. He took a deep breath and sent Laughing Owl toward the station.
Docking was smooth, routine, without a hint of anything out of the ordinary. Cai ignored the whispered conversations on the shipnet although he was aware that the crew didn’t want to give up their ship any more than he did. He powered down fully, leaving the mighty fusion reactors turning out just enough power to keep the singularity contained. Soon, he’d be hearing the bass rumble of a different singularity. He wondered if he’d be able to tell them apart.
He collapsed the linkages between himself and the Laughing Owl for the last time. He felt regret as the crystal array retracted. He hadn’t realized that leaving would be this hard. He slid from the couch and exited the Chamber, hoping that Nick would be there, but he knew better. His spouse had a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it in. He was surprised but grateful when Nick’s arms encircled him. He turned and burrowed his face in Nick’s jacket—his husband was dressed, an unusual occurrence.
“Are you okay with this?” The concern in Nick’s voice was touching.
“I am. But it’s so hard to leave... I’ve been here for so long.”
“I’m told this is a normal reaction.” Now there was a hint of humor in his voice. “A Guildsman called Ortat is here to see you.”
“Ortat?” Cai pulled away enough to meet Nick’s gaze. “He was my trainer.”
“He’s on his way to your chambers now.” Nick caressed his face, the strong hand felt good, comforting, as it stroked him. “You’re strong, you can do this.”
Cai nodded, accepting the reassurance. His mind was puzzling over Ortat being here. “Why did they send him?”
The door chimed; Cai immediately sent the command to open it. Ortat walked in. He hadn’t changed much. His hair had more grey in it, his face a few more lines, but otherwise, he looked as he had when he’d ruled Cai’s life, waking and sleeping.
“Astrogator Cai, Captain Steele, I am pleased to see you both.” Ortat inclined his head. “Cai, I am here to facilitate your transfer to your new ship.”
“They sent you all the way out here for this?” Cai shook his head. “Why?”
“The Guild always sends someone the Astrogator knows; it makes things a little easier. This transfer should be scaring the piss out of you, not because you’re weak or phobic or anything, but because the Guild programmed deep inhibitions into you to prevent the very thing we’re contemplating, namely, you leaving this ship. The reason doesn’t even enter into it.”
Understanding flooded him. His deep unhappiness at the thought of leaving Laughing Owl now made sense. It was more subtle than the palpitations he felt when faced with an open airlock, but it was the same mechanism in action. Without Cai, the ship’s neurologics would die, rendering the ship useless. To prevent this, the Guild did everything it could to prevent an Astrogator from leaving his ship. Once Cai had been brought to Laughing Owl upon his graduation, he had never left it.
“How will this transfer happen?” Nick’s question was both gentle and concerned; Ortat didn’t seem to take it amiss, no more than he’d reacted to the sight of Nick embracing Cai.
“Cai will fall asleep here in his chambers and wake up in his new chambers on the other ship. From his perspective, no time will pass. As his spouse, you are welcome to observe and even assist in every aspect of this transfer.”
“When?” Cai was pleased that Nick could help, but he wanted to get it over with before he lost his nerve. I can’t bear to leave... He resolutely ignored that inner plaint.
“Whenever you want. The sooner the better—don’t give your subconscious conditioning time to come up with a new tactic.”
“Let’s do it now. I’m already having second thoughts and it will only get worse for waiting.”
Ortat gestured toward the bedroom. “Go lay down and we’ll get started.”
Cai stepped back from Nick but caught his hand, and they walked to the bedroom together. Nick’s calm, steady presence helped quell the butterflies in Cai’s stomach. He reached the bed and laid down.
Nick sat on the bed beside him, still holding his hand. “You’re doing great, my dear.”
“Thank you,” Cai managed, and then Ortat walked in, carrying a case.
Ortat set the case on the end of the bed, opened it and busied himself with the contents. He held up a device that Cai had seen once before. “Astrogator, are you ready?”
Cai hesitated until Nick gave his hand a comforting squeeze. “Yes, Trainer. I am ready.” He locked his gaze on Nick and ignored the hand approaching his head with the device.
* * * *
Ortat inserted the end of the device into Cai’s dataport, and the Gator’s body immediately relaxed, his eyes closed and he appeared to be deeply asleep. Ortat looked pleased as he stepped back.
Startled, Nick asked, “Is that it?”
“Pretty much.” Ortat shrugged. “The device renders him unconscious and will keep him that way until removed—that won’t happen until he’s safely aboard Dark Star and the first set of neurologic tunings have been completed.”
The bedroom door opened, and Cai’s six adjuncts came in with a floating medical pallet. Nick stood aside and watched as the adjuncts smoothly transferred Cai to the pallet.
“Follow me,” Ortat commanded. He led the way out of Cai’s chambers, followed by the adjuncts and Cai’s sleeping form.
Nick followed them, bringing up the rear and feeling superfluous, but he couldn’t bear to not be there for Cai. He was mildly surprised to find the corridors packed with crew, all silently and solemnly watching as the ship’s Gator was removed. The Laughing Owl was fully tied to the station for power and life support, a necessary occurrence since the frigate was about to lose its navnet.
Ortat ignored the crowd, and when the crew fell in behind the procession, following them, he made no effort to prevent it. Cortez appeared beside Nick. “I figured the packing could wait until Cai was comfortably enthroned in our new ship. The decision to escort him over there was unanimous.”
“You put it to a vote?” Nick was both amused and pleased.
“Why not? Crew appreciates having a vote in some matters.” Cortez was experienced enough to know what could be left to the crew to decide and what could not be, such as issues affecting the safety of the ship. “I’ve already announc
ed the contest to design the new ship’s logo.”
“Good thinking,” Nick said approvingly. They’d reached the airlock, and he took a deep breath, half expecting Cai to shoot up off the pallet as he was guided through the first hatch. Nothing of the sort happened. They passed through the airlock in silence and then through the outer hatch and into the station corridor. Nick shivered in atavistic fear as Cai was carried outside the confines of Laughing Owl’s hull for the first time in over six years. Nothing happened immediately, but without Cai, the Laughing Owl’s navnet would start to die, and in just a few hours, it would be completely inert. “He was a good ship.”
“He might be again.” Cortez shrugged. “The hull’s new enough and the boat in good enough shape that the engineers might rewire him for a new Gator.”
“Perhaps,” Nick agreed, but more to be polite than out of any real hope—rewiring a ship was only marginally cheaper than building a new one. He’d never heard of any ship being rewired twice, but maybe it would happen for Laughing Owl—the Corps had spent a lot of money rehulling the Owls less than two years before, not enough time for them to just scrap the ship.
They continued to follow Cai into the station. According to the station’s net, Dark Star was located in the central cylinder of the station, which was apparently nothing but a construction cradle for starships. Dark Star wouldn’t leave that cradle until Cai took him out of it. The cruiser couldn’t function until it had its Astrogator. Cai’s procession didn’t attract as much notice as Nick had thought it would, but after a few minutes, he figured out why. This station existed to build ships. Seeing Astrogators being brought to their new vessels must be almost commonplace here. From what Cai had told him, he’d been unconscious when he’d been brought aboard Laughing Owl, too, so that must be the standard procedure for installing a new Gator.
