by C. Gockel
“Does it involve storming the Tri-Center’s secure wing?” he asked. In the dimness it was hard to see, but she imagined that his jaw was shifting in an attempt to smile, and he’d lifted an eyebrow.
Thumping her chest, she summoned a smirk. “What if it did?” She had to stay cocky, optimistic, brave …
James drew to a stop. She still couldn't make out his features in the dark. “Don’t joke.” A hover rumbled softly overhead, and the sound echoed through a drain.
She wanted to return with a witty rejoinder. A joke was always appropriate when you were going to steal the Ark, which even she could admit was almost a suicide mission. Her stomach was tying in knots, but the thought of thousands—maybe millions of people if James was right—tortured and dying kept her going. If she didn’t laugh at times like these, she would go mad with the weight of it all. Instead of laughing, she coughed, and the force of it was like nails hitting her lungs.
“Noa,” James said. “I need to know what your plan is. If I don’t know what the plan is, I can’t calculate the odds of its success.”
Noa suddenly didn’t feel like joking either. Her blood went cold. “Calculate the odds of success?” Her jaw dropped. “Some things are worth more than any odds.”
“I don’t want to throw our lives away,” James snapped.
“It’s not throwing your life away if it’s the right thing to do,” Noa said, feeling a burn in her lungs; she didn’t know whether it was from the coughing, or the heat of anger.
James’s head cocked. “Yes, it is.”
His voice was too even, and maybe it was the dim light of the sewers but he looked completely emotionless. Alarm bells went off in her mind. She thought of the man he’d killed on the train, of the way he’d dispassionately said he’d kill Ghost, and of the way Ghost kept subtly alluding to James not being human. It would explain his dispassion, his apathy …
She felt herself tremble with rage, not weariness. No, James wasn’t an alien. He was worse. He was a spoiled Earthling who let himself be protected by a Fleet disproportionately made up of Luddecceans and people from the newer worlds—people whose lives weren’t so sheltered that they forgot that some things were worth dying for.
“If that’s what you believe, then go!” Noa hissed. “These tunnels can take you right out of Prime!”
James didn’t move, but his fists balled at his sides.
And Noa had had enough—of his looking for every flaw, of his cowardice, laziness, apathy, or whatever the solar cores it was that would let him turn away from the suffering of millions.
Flinging up her arm, pointing to the nearest exit from the city, Noa hissed, “Go!”
“Go!”
The word hit James like a physical blow. His mind went still, and his vision flickered. And then his neurons roared to life, and it was like an alarm had gone off in his mind and body and every nano and cell was screaming, “Failure!”
He wavered on his feet. Noa stood before him, staring up at him, brows drawn, lips curled. All he could see was her, whether because of a fluke of his augmented vision that tunneled in the dark, or because … because …
“Get moving!” Noa said.
He couldn’t leave her. He’d never been able to leave her, and now he could only stand helplessly trying to formulate a way to make this better. He didn’t think millions were worth dying for. But it occurred to him that he would die for her—not precisely happily, or bravely—he just couldn’t help himself. But he didn’t think that would reassure her.
Noa’s head whipped around into the gloom, and she took a step back.
Before James could say a word, she threw up a hand and motioned for silence. And then he heard it, a soft thumping too light to be human. It was followed by a light cheeping.
“Rats?” he whispered.
Shaking her head in the negative, Noa padded off in the direction of the sound. James followed. Ten steps later, the source of the noise became apparent. In a beam of streetlight fractured by a manhole cover, a small, serpentine creature swayed back and forth like a cobra. As they drew closer, he saw it was less like a serpent, and more like an Earth ermine. It had large eyes and tufted ears, with dirty gray fur that might be white if it were clean. It had ten limbs, and was currently standing on the back four, its other tiny paws curled to its belly.
His mind searched his data banks and he found a match for the creature. His nanos piped: “Werfle, name derived from English ‘Weasel’— extremely rare, venomous, native to Luddeccea, master escape artists. Omnivorous, but favors meat. Population has grown since rats have become an invasive species on Luddeccea. Sometimes semi-domesticated. Experimental data on cognitive ability not available as Luddeccea has outlawed animal experimentation.”
James had never seen a werfle before. He was struck by how high its forehead was, and how the large eyes met his almost appraisingly.
Noa sat on her heels, and the creature dropped to all ten legs. When it hopped cautiously toward her, it used only its front and hind-most limb pairs, the middle three pairs curled up to its stomach. He thought he’d heard werfles could carry their prey with their middle limbs for many kilometers.
Noa took off the outer jacket of the train uniform and held it before her like a hammock. James’s eyes widened, realizing what she intended. “They’re venomous!” he said.
Noa snorted as the creature hopped into the outstretched fabric. “Did you notice he’s wearing a collar? His venom has already been milked.”
James blinked. Sure enough, the werfle wore a thin red collar around its neck.
“Someone’s pet,” Noa murmured, looking down at the tiny form rolling onto its back in her arms. “But he’s in bad shape.”
On its back, the creature opened its mouth wide and made a high-pitched cry. James noted that he could see its ribs through its sparse, dirty fur.
Noa murmured, “I know you’re hungry, little one.” She sighed. “You lost your family, didn’t you? And there aren’t any more rats in the sewers.” She wrapped the creature in her jacket so only its head was exposed, pulled it to her stomach, and ran a long dark finger down its exposed chin.
Without looking at James, she stood up. “What are you still doing here? You think stealing the Ark is ‘illogical,’ and are afraid of stealing 15,000 credits from the Central Authority.”
The darkness in James’s vision returned … He lifted his eyes from the softly sighing werfle to Noa. He almost asked if she intended to keep the animal, and then stopped himself. He felt as though gears were clicking into place in his mind. Of course she’d keep it. She surmised it had lost its family. It was starving. It was her.
It was a needless burden that she shouldn’t take on. He could confront her and they could fight about it, and she could demand once again that he go. And he wouldn’t be able to.
Meeting her eyes, he sighed. “I don’t believe that stealing the Ark is completely illogical.” He looked up at the dark cement ceiling above their heads. “I think it is near suicidal … but since learning that the time gate has been disabled, I realize staying here would be suicidal, too.” He felt a flair of static and irritation beneath his skin. “I can’t think of a better ship to buy or steal.”
Noa looked up at him for the first time since she picked up the animal. Her finger ceased rubbing its chin.
“I will help you steal the Ark,” James said.
Noa’s jaw tightened. “I don’t need your help.”
In her arms, the werfle made another soft cry of hunger. Noa soothed it with her finger.
James blinked down at it, and searched his data banks. Although they preferred meat, werfle “chow” was often made with soy. Searching his pocket, he pulled out one of the remaining soybeans from Hell’s Crater. He offered one to the tiny beast. It sniffed his finger cautiously, but then took the proffered bean. “You need all the help you can get,” James said.
Noa’s shoulders fell. She watched the creature noisily chew the soy bean. After two minutes and th
irty seconds she said, “Fine, let’s go.”
It was two more blocks before James dared to speak to Noa again. “Please tell me acquiring the 15,000 credits doesn’t involve raiding Central Authority … not that I am not committed to stealing the Ark, but maybe we could come up with a better way to get the money?”
Noa snorted. “Do you really think the Central Authority would have 15,000 Galactic Credits lying around?”
James blinked in the darkness. Of course they wouldn’t. It wasn’t a bank. Far in the distance he heard water dripping. He remembered the intense feeling of failure that had radiated through his very being just minutes ago. “It was all hypothetical,” he murmured.
“I’d do it if I had to,” Noa said. “But I was planning on borrowing the money from a friend.”
James cocked his head toward her. Noa gave him what she’d informed him back in the freight car was her “patented cornball grin.” He’d had to explain that cornball was not a sport. In her arms, the werfle purred. Rolling his eyes, James looked away, irritation flickering under his skin, like static.
“I think I’ll name him Fluffy,” Noa said.
“He isn’t fluffy,” James snipped, perhaps in a bout of misdirected ire. “His fur is short. That name doesn’t even make sense.”
“They are fluffy when they’re kits,” Noa said. “We named our werfles Fluffy back on our farm.”
“You named more than one werfle Fluffy? How is that even practical? They wouldn’t know which one you were calling.”
“Not at the same time!” Noa whispered. “After the first died, we named the second werfle Fluffy. That way we didn’t slip up and call werfle number two Fluffy, when his name was actually Rex, or Spot or something. Calling him by a dead werfle’s name would have been rude and weird.”
“But technically, you were calling him by the dead werfle’s name,” James protested, feeling the static again. “Fluffy was the dead werfle’s name even if it was also werfle number two’s name.”
Noa huffed. “Fine, if you don’t like Fluffy, choose another name.”
James looked down at the creature. Snuggled against Noa’s stomach as she rubbed its chin, its lips seemed to stretch in a smile. Irritation flared beneath his skin again. “I wouldn’t even think you’d like werfles. They look like rats.”
Noa’s eyes went wide and she gasped. “They look nothing like rats. Their noses aren’t long and pointy, their eyes aren’t small and beady, they’re clean—well, when they have access to clean water, they’re clean. Their tails aren’t naked, and they don’t eat people.” She lifted the creature to her nose. “They eat rats. They’re cute, they’re friendly, and they’re intelligent—smartest native creature on Luddeccea—at least as smart as ravens as far as anyone can tell.”
James swore the creature’s smile actually grew wider as it touched its nose to Noa’s. The static beneath James’s skin turned to heat. “Fine, call it Carl Sagan if it’s so smart.”
“Carl Sagan?” said Noa.
“Twentieth-century scientist,” James muttered, looking away from the whiskered snout of the werfle. “He theorized that there was intelligent life in the universe, just that it hadn’t visited us.”
“Carl Sagan,” said Noa. He could hear the smile in her voice, and the world lightened. “I like it.”
The creature purred. Noa beamed up at James, and he wanted to smile back despite himself.
They approached an intersection in the sewers. Looking above, Noa said, “We’re almost there.” She frowned, and he saw some emotion flicker across her face. Worry, maybe?
“This person you’re going to ask for a loan, do you think they’ll turn us in?” James asked.
Noa shot him a glare.
“I have to ask,” he said.
Noa looked away. “No, it’s not that.” Her shoulders fell. “I’m actually more concerned about whether Ghost will be able to shut off the defense grid. If he can’t, this is all for nothing.” Her brow furrowed. “I know he built the new main computer, so he’d know the weaknesses; but he’ll have to exploit the weaknesses through a landline … which is slower, if you explained it to me correctly. And he isn’t as smart as he thinks he is.”
James’s head tilted. She’d said something similar before. “He created the holographic necklaces.”
Noa snorted. “They are tricks of the light.”
“I think you underestimate their sophistication,” James said.
Noa’s jaw became set. She lifted her chin. “No, I don’t underestimate it. I’ve known real geniuses, my little brother ...” Her voice trailed off and her jaw softened. “Ghost ... he doesn’t have the tenacity to put his mind to work. In the Fleet, as soon as he had a disagreement with someone, or he thought someone didn’t kiss his behind enough, he’d say he was being underutilized and ask to be transferred. There is a lot of hard work behind genius and invention. Only to a real genius, like my brother, it’s not work, it’s compulsion. Kenji, he can seem dismissive sometimes, but it’s just that he’s wrapped up in his own brain, and he sometimes forgets other people exist … but he’s actually humble, and if you ask him to explain something in a way mere mortals can understand, he will. He’s excited to share his passions with everyone.”
James didn’t know what to say. He never did when she spoke of her brother. Talking about Kenji always made Noa quieter. It made her fidget with the stumps of her fingers, and her eyes drift away.
“Kenji discovered that fifteen percent of Time Gate 8’s power expenditure was unnecessary,” Noa whispered softly. Her thumb grazed the place where her fingers used to be. “The thing has been hanging in the sky for a hundred years, and some of its auto maintenance features have built themselves up to be so big—they actually built in unintentional redundancies. He was working on fixing that … ” She took a breath. “He’d been stationed planet-side … ” Her brow furrowed. “He wouldn’t have been on the station when the explosions happened.” He heard her swallow and saw her lips turn down. “I don’t think.”
She drew to a halt beneath a manhole, a ladder beneath it on the wall. Tucking the bundle that was Carl Sagan into her shirt, she said, “We’re here.”
“I can go first,” James suggested, but she was already scaling the ladder.
Chapter Ten
As James crept after Noa in the darkness of a small side street, he heard footsteps, the murmur of voices, and shouts from patrols. Closer to him, he heard Noa’s breathing. It was too loud and too fast. Still, she didn’t hesitate as she guided him around a corner. They were in a neighborhood a few kilometers beyond Port of Call. The buildings were still stucco, but they were surrounded by high- wrought iron fences covered with red-leaved ivy and bright white and yellow flowers. Most had at least one hover parked on the rooftop between solar cell wind turbines.
Noa reached a gate in a fence that looked no different from the rest. “There should be a buzzer … ” Noa muttered, gently probing among the flowering vines as Carl Sagan peeked out the neck of her shirt. A moment later, James heard the sound of a doorbell ringing in the home beyond. And then there was silence … for two minutes and forty-five seconds.
“This person—”
“Eliza.”
“How well do you know her?” James whispered.
“We’re practically family,” Noa whispered. “Great, great, great, great aunt thrice removed.”
The answer didn’t fill James with confidence. Fifty meters down the street there came the shout of a patrol.
“Could she have been arrested?” James asked as another precious thirty seconds went by. He scanned the small street for a manhole and saw none.
“She was one of the original settlers,” Noa whispered back. “They couldn’t have possibly arrested her.”
“One of the first settlers?” James protested. “But that would make her—”
“Really, really old,” Noa finished.
“And a fanatic!” James whispered back.
“Ahhhh … ” Noa winc
ed. “No … sometimes we wished she were. She has some eccentricities … ”
“What kind of eccentricities?” James said.
Noa turned to him, her mouth opened, but before any sound came out a beam of light at the intersection caught James’s eye. Arm looping around Noa’s waist, he pressed her and himself into the ivy. Her dark eyes widened and met his.
“We can climb the fence,” James whispered.
Noa shook her head. “No, there are alarms. Would draw even more attention.”
At the intersection, someone called out, “I think I see someone! You there, show yourselves.”
“Nebulas,” Noa hissed.
“Fight or flight?” James said, hand tightening on her waist. Noa closed her eyes. A flashlight beam caressed the curve of her back just peeking out from the flowers and leaves. James ducked his head into the space of her shoulder and neck and breathed deep, his arm tightened around her.
Noa didn’t answer.
“You there,” the man called again. “I see you.” James could see the flashlight beam bouncing. He counted no fewer than six pairs of footsteps. He remembered the laser pistols of the Guard in the bar. At that thought, a red spotter beam grazed the ivy above Noa’s head and began to drop. James took a deep breath. He wanted to explode from his skin. He felt trapped in a nightmare, knowing what would happen and helpless to do anything about it. The tracer dropped to a centi from her head … and then there was a creak of metal and darkness came too quickly for James’s vision to adapt.
“Quick, inside,” a raspy voice whispered.
James blinked. The gate had opened between them and the approaching patrol, and a stooped figure was standing there, wobbling on a cane. He blinked again, and two exceptionally bright blue eyes came into focus. The eyes were situated in a face more wrinkled and worn than any he had ever seen.
“Halt!” cried the patrol officer. James heard the troops break into a run.
Before he could gather his wits, Noa pulled him through the gate into the garden between the ivy-covered fence and a lavender stucco home. The gate slammed behind them. From the house came the thunderous sound of a piano playing the opening to Carlos Chen’s Time Gate Ten Overture. Behind him, he heard the woman cry in a warbling voice, “Fluffy! Fluffy! Where are you!”
