Cast of Nova

by S J McLaughlin

  “Nova,” he said. “Please stop.”

  She stood up and clenched her fists. Her face was blank, but Kendal could tell she was boiling inside. “448867456. If you ever change your mind.” She walked past him and out the door.

  He didn’t watch her leave, but knew she was gone.

  Even though Nova had gotten everyone to stop staring, they were still keeping their distance from Kendal. He couldn’t stay long, or he might have to get out of a situation. He put on his scarf and hat, and tucked everything tight so no air could get in.

  Outside, the cold hit his face and he bundled the scarf as tight up as he could. His fingers got the worst of it. He’d forgotten that Mira had the gloves until he was already halfway to Alice and was starting to regret not having gone back to get them.

  He warmed up at the barrel. The fire helped keep the Jennifer air from freezing him, but the second he walked away the cold was already back. He had a long walk back and the night was getting worse. It was like time was frozen and every molecule had stopped in place. Alice truly was like death as far as Kendal was concerned. One of the worst places in the system.

  “Jack!”

  Kendal drew his kinetic and aimed it towards the voice. It was only Nova. She stood next to the store, in the alley between an unmarked building. Darkness surrounded her from the store’s shadow casting down, yet he saw that her eyes were locked to his.

  “What do you want?” Kendal asked. His kinetic was aimed straight for her. The cold stabbed at his exposed hand, skin sticking to the metal. He struggled to keep the gun steadied against his shivering.

  Nova didn’t answer, only approached. She kept within the line of fire. No fear or hesitation as she walked up to him and let the kinetic press against her chest, pushing into her thick fur coat.

  Her breath warmed his face as she stood inches from him. His finger trembled against the trigger.

  He could have ended it.

  One bullet and Nova would die on a cold, forgotten planet. He wanted to pull the trigger, but his hand wouldn’t let him. Her couldn’t make himself shoot her.

  Nova grabbed him by the collar and pushed him into the alley where it was dark and no one could see into. His breath quickened and his body felt hot despite how cold the air was.

  They kissed. Not passionate or loving, but a desperate, hungry kiss by two people who’d spent too much time apart. It’d been three years and it still felt the same as he remembered.

  She pushed him over and he fell on his back in the snow that’d built up between the walls of the buildings.

  His head bumped the wall and snow brushed up his back, sending a chill up his spine.

  Without breaking eye contact, she unbuckled his belt and opened his trousers, pealing back layers until he felt the cold against his skin. He couldn’t see her through the dark, but heard her fumbling with her own belt right before she climbed on top of him. He looked up, resting his head against the alley wall as she put him inside of her.

  She felt so incredibly warm, holding him close as she clung to his shoulders and looked down at him with her cold green eyes that shined bright against the darkness.

  He didn’t have to do anything, settled beneath her as both their breaths huffed out in misted bursts, floating up and dispersing into the cold Jennifer night. He closed his eyes and listened to her low throaty voice carried with her breath over the sounds of rustling and compacting clothes.

  It ended much the same as it began, with a desperate kiss. He finished inside of her, and she fell atop him, panting and trembling as he held her close.

  After a few short moments to let the moment settle, she got off and fixed her clothes, tucking her scarf back in and putting up her hood. He sat up and felt a chill run through him as he watched her leave.

  I could have ended it, he thought, still holding the kinetic in his hand. One shot, and the system would be safe from her. I would be safe from her.

  He sighed and got up, putting his belt back together and shaking the numbness out of his legs.

  You can be such an idiot sometimes.

  He walked out the alley and looked out at the flat Jennifer horizon. His ship was that way, but he wouldn’t go after it just yet. Not because of Nova, or because he was afraid to face Mira, but because he knew someone was watching. They weren’t from Alice. Their clothes were too expensive. Factory made fur that fit their form. He guessed Union, but couldn’t be sure.

  Kendal walked back into town and stood above the burning barrel to let the warmth wash over. The man who’d been watching walked up behind him, footsteps crunching on the frost.

  “Keep your hands where I can see them,” the man said.

  Kendal had his hands over the fire. He looked behind, and saw a face between a hat and a scarf. The man held an EG-pack aimed straight for Kendal’s chest.

  “Where is she?” the man asked.

  “You’re Union?” Kendal said.

  “Nova,” he said. “Where is she?”

  “You just missed her,” Kendal said. “Though I’m sure if you ran after you might be able to catch her before she gets back to her ship.”

  The Union officer kept the pack pointed at Kendal while he reached for his communicator. Kendal couldn’t let him call back, or they’d track their ship on take-off. Kendal reached down for his kinetic, but the officer caught him.

  “Hands up,” he said and flicked on his communicator. “Don’t try it.”

  He knew why the Union officer brought an EG-pack. They don’t make much more sound than a hiss, while a kinetic might wake the whole neighborhood up. The problem with EG-packs is that they don’t handle the cold very well.

  Kendal drew his kinetic. The officer shot first, but the blast from his weapon was only a smoldering heat that did nothing but singe the hairs on Kendal’s fur jacket. Kendal’s weapon put a hole through the officer’s chest.

  The shot was loud, ricocheting off the streets and buildings. The communicator landed on the ground, still in the dead officer’s hand.

  “Hello?” the muffled voice said over the speakers. “Is someone there?”

  Kendal stomped on it, cracking and sparking the equipment. If there was one officer, there were more.

  He ran back to the ship as fast as he could, almost passing out from being out of breath when started up the ladder. Jenny air was thin and cold, making it hard to breath when your body truly needs it. The sun was peeking over the horizon and casting the hills and banks with an orange glow that bounced and sparkled.

  He opened the door and was snow blinded in the dark entryway, blinking to get used to the lack of light. Mist flowed in and the doorway frosted until he closed it and let the heat take back over. He stripped off his coat and gear, and woke Mira up.

  She opened her bedroom door, rubbing her eyes. Her hair was all a mess, and he wasn’t wearing pants, or a shirt, and looked pissed. “What do you want?”

  “We need to leave,” he said.

  “I hadn’t even gone through a takeoff simulation,” she said. “I don’t know how.”

  “Well, we have about an hour before the Union starts searching the surrounding plains for a ship. And besides that, Nova’s here.”

  “Who the hell’s Nova?” Mira asked through a yawn.

  “Just get us in space and away from Jenny, we can figure out the rest once we’re up there.”

  “Kendal?” Mira stepped out the room. “I need a bit more than that!”

  “I’m the captain,” Kendal said. “Take us off now!”

  Mira glared at him, her fists tight, but she did what he asked. She put on some clothes and locked herself in the command room until they were off planet and far enough away the Union wouldn’t bother to scout.

  Once they were safe, Kendal sat in the bathroom with the door locked and running the faucet while he washed up.

  He punched the wall, hurting his fist more than anything.

  “Damn it, Nova,” he muttered. “Why did you have to find me?”

  Ch
apter 23

  Something about the ship was especially boring. A large, empty vessel floating through the vacuum of space with only two people aboard. Before, they’d had prisoners to tend to, simulations to learn, feelings to overcome, and plans to construct, but now they had nothing.

  Sixty-four days of nothing until they get to Sintic. Kendal decided to go straight through with no detour. A sixty-four-day journey. They had enough fuel to last them eighty, and enough rations and dried goods to get them one-hundred. This meant they could get a few local jobs and carry them out. Desmond said it was possible, and Kendal didn’t doubt the man.

  “Gotcha,” Kendal said as he found a small board of wood behind the bookshelf.

  Must have fallen back and got forgotten, Kendal thought as he brought it with him to the couch.

  The wood was dusty and dry, but not rotten. He started cutting the board into fat rectangles. All he had were kitchen knives of different sizes which meant he had to slowly saw at the wood rather than cut it, but it worked. It took days to get the pieces. All 32 of them.

  Mira had taken to reading from Desmond’s library. She usually sat in the common room with Kendal while he sawed at the long plank, occasionally slipping and nicking his finger.

  Mira would ask what he was making, and he only answered, “a game.”

  He finished his project after two weeks. He carved the fat rectangles into primitive shapes resembling rooks, knights, bishops, pawns, kings, and queens. He had two sides for his chess board, one color left blank, and the other he painstakingly colored with every ballpoint pen he could find.

  He carefully, and with a straight-edge, carved a chess board into the main table in the common room. Mira roll her eyes, but she didn’t stop him. It’s not like Desmond would mind.

  He set up the pieces and smiled. It was primitive, and probably a huge waste of time seeing as Sintic would have chess boards for cheap, and he could have bought one in Alice if he hadn’t been so freaked out by the Union that he rushed off, but he was proud of it.

  “You want me to play, I suppose?”

  “You can keep reading,” Kendal said, “but yeah I do.”

  Mira closed her book and got up. She sat on the chair next to the table and looked over the board.

  “I know how to play, so don’t bother explaining it.” She moved a white pawn ahead two, and looked at Kendal.

  He moved. “What was your book about?”

  “Aliens,” she said. The game started off passive on both fronts with Mira building a better defense than Kendal.

  “Sounds exciting.” Kendal was smiling as he thought up his moves, and managed to take a bishop from Mira. “I’d like to meet an alien,” he said. “I think they’d be good company. Or good crew. No one would cross us with something like that aboard.”

  Mira smiled. “Good luck there. The ones I was readin’ about are just like us only with green skin and bigger tits. I think the writer might have been projecting somethin’.”

  “Where did you even find a book like that?” Kendal asked.

  “That’s all there is,” Mira said. “That, and flight manuals.”

  They continued clacking the pieces around in a strange game of chase where both sides barely caught hold of each other.

  Mira won by a stalemate. Kendal’s king was left alone and Mira could only chase it around, unable to get it into checkmate.

  “Want to play again?” Mira asked.

  Kendal heard her, but was distracted. Above the common room entrance was a bulb. He’d walked through that entry a dozen times, but never noticed that light until now, and only because it was now blinking a soft red.

  “Kendal?” Mira asked.

  “How long’s it been doing that?” Kendal asked, pointing at the light.

  Mira looked at it, head tilted and eyes narrow. She stood up and walked over to it. “I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never seen this before.” She hesitated a second before running the command room.

  Kendal chased after, almost tripping over the bulkhead. Mira sat in the pilot’s chair and turned the monitors on, one by one. The map showed a field of indicators in their trajectory. A fleet of ships in front of them.

  “The hell is going on?” Kendal asked.

  “We’re flying straight into somethin’ we don’t wanna be flyin’ into.”

  Most of them were Union ships, but a few were unmarked. No ships were unmarked. A code had to be inscribed into the ship’s core or the engine wouldn’t work. The code could be altered, made fraudulent, or set to scramble every odd-second to keep the Union guessing, but never missing. These ships didn’t register, and the console only knew they were ships because of their size and shape.

  “They’re hers,” Kendal whispered. Nova had made it here before them, and the Union had caught up. That was the only explanation. “Can we get around them?”

  “You see how close they are?” Mira said, voice frantic and breath heavy. “I’ve started on decelerating. Smartest thing we can do is reverse.”

  “That’ll keep us clear?”

  Mira laughed desperately. “Clear? We’ll be going at near zero dead set in the middle of all that there Union fleet and whatever they’re doing with that other ships. We ain’t gonna be able to not get caught up in that mess.”

  Kendal stumbled forward as she stared to decelerate. Forty-nine g’s was what the ship was capable of, but Mira was going more than that. Kendal landed on his shoulder, straight into the console, as he was crushed from the force of the ship’s movement. Mira was strapped in, but she was struggling to get the ship’s deceleration rate back to what it needed to be.

  Kendal fell to the ground and picked himself up. The ship regulated, but he was still dizzy. “How long till we can start turning around?”

  “Less than a half hour,” she said. The ship was going too fast, and Kendal could already see the fleet through the camera feed. They were small silver dots, barely distinguishable from the stars around them, but Kendal could tell the difference. There were far less than a half-hour from meeting them.

  With each minute that passed, Kendal could make out the fleet better and better.

  Soon, he could see enough to make out the classes of ships. Most military, but he knew the Morana was head of the fleet. They were firing at the strange unmarked ships, yet weren’t doing a full on assault. It looked more like it was for show, rather than anything strategic.

  “Shit,” Mira said and sat right up in her chair. “Shit, shit, shit.”

  “What is it?” Kendal asked. He leaned up to the monitor and tried to read what was happening, but there was too much text and icons and indicators to see what was happening.

  “We’re being hailed.”

  Kendal swallowed and stood upright, out of habit. Mira typed in a command, and the screen went black as the call came through.

  “What’s this vessel’s ID?” the compressed, crackling voice said.

  I know that voice, Kendal thought.

  “We were just passing thought,” Mira said. “Carryin—”

  “What is the ID?” the voice repeated.

  It can’t be. “Tenna?” Kendal said.

  There was a pause, then the speaking crackled as the voice popped back in. “Lieutenant? What the hell—”

  “Tenna,” Kendal said. “We were close, right?”

  “What are doing there?” she said. “You were decommissioned months ago.”

  “We were close, right?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “You were nice to me. What the hell are you getting to?”

  “Can you ignore this call?” Kendal asked.

  “Can I? No.”

  “We just need to get through,” he said. “No harm to the Union, just label us as no threat and let us go through.”

  “I can’t do that,” she said. “What even happened to you? You look like you’ve been through hell.”

  “Cut it,” Kendal said. “Mira cut it.”

  The hiss of the speaker died, and the screens came
back on.

  “They’re going to start shooting at us,” Kendal said.

  “And they’ll blow us right out of the sky,” Mira said.

  “We made it through last time.”

  “I can’t move this thing like Dess could.”

  “Damn it,” Kendal said. He knew they wouldn’t make it out if they tried. Mira was waiting for him to think of something, but his mind was running blank.

  Nova.

  He grit his teeth. She planned this, didn’t she?

  Kendal had no choice but to contact her. She could get them out safely, or at least hide them until they clear the Union fleet.

  “Open the communication line,” he said.

  “To anyone?”

  Kendal shook his head. “Just a specific frequency. Double-four, double-eight, sixty-seven, four-five-six.”

  Mira typed in the number slowly and heard the crackle of a speak. It was audio only, but it was enough.

  “We need to dock in one of your ships,” Kendal said.

  “How did you get this frequency?” the man on the other end said, almost in a confused panic.

  “We’re flying into the scuffle between you and the Union, and we need to dock in one of your ships to keep from getting blown out of the sky. We’re just a transport ship.”

  “I’m sorry, but your ship’s not recognized in our database. You need to get off this frequency.”

  “Patch me through to Nova,” Kendal said. “Get orders from her.”

  “The commander doesn’t take direct calls,” he said. “How did you get this frequency?”

  “Tell Nova that Jack Kendal is looking to board,” he said. “If you do that, we’ll be having a much different conversation.”

  A pause on the other end. The man seemed conflicted. All he needed to do was contact Nova, and Kendal would have clearance to do anything.

  “I’ll check with her. It’ll be a minute.”

  “Make it fast,” Kendal said.

  Chapter 24

  Nova was in bed, flipping through the pages of a pre-Union novel. She was fascinated by the customs of terraforming and the horrors that early settlers faced. The first ever planet terraformed was called Venus; the second planet from that system’s sun. Nova knew where she came from, even if most of the system had forgotten, or chosen to ignore. She knew earth was still out there and she knew they were wondering if the settlers they sent off survived or not.