“Such as height,” said Cleggy. “Jenkins is very impressed by tall people.”
“Yeah.” Turnaround grinned. “I always pictured the real Captain Jenkins as an arthritic, pot-bellied, penny-pinching old lech. Is that a disservice, boss?”
Crossing her arms and leaning back, Sun sucked in the memories. “He was some of those things, Turnaround, though he was genuinely tall. He also hated Earth with a passion, said it was choked with too many rules emanating from the bloodsucking blob of bureaucracy. He wouldn’t go anywhere near the place.” She sighed. “Same as us, it seems.”
Her bitterness slashed away the good humor, leaving the table in silence.
“Let’s not talk of things we have no control over,” said Branco. He was sweating and his words were slurred, as if drunk. “Not on our day of celebration. All you need to know, Obadiah, my new friend, is that our Jeha is proud of his name. So if he ever mentions it, could you let drop that you’ve heard of the glorious exploits of his namesake?”
“Captain Jenkins?” Jex whistled in admiration. “What a guy! He was the hero that inspired me to go into space. As a kid, I had a 3D poster of him over my bed.” Jex half-turned toward Branco, ready to catch the swaying man if he fell out his chair. “Enough about this Jeha. It’s my turn to ask the questions. I’ve a lot of catching up to do.”
“For all his shortcomings,” said Sun, righting Branco against his chair back, “Captain Jenkins was always loyal to his crew. I want to put the record straight on that. Continue, Jex.”
“Well, perhaps you can help me, boss. I’ve been reading up on the records for our ship, sometimes named Midnight Sun. And sometimes…not!”
Sun grimaced, making Jex immediately regret his question. This was why the CO should be somewhere else when the boys and girls were chewing the fat. Back when he’d served with the Suffolk Punch, the Old Man had known when to lead the celebrations and when to retreat to officer country.
“Don’t stop now,” said Sun. “Tell us what you found, and then tell me why it matters.”
It wasn’t as if Jex didn’t know he was being lured into a minefield here, but he had no choice. So, he took his usual approach to such situations. He charged full steam ahead and trusted to good fortune.
“When the company was re-registered as the Midnight Sun Free Company, the ship was re-registered as Midnight Sun.”
“It’s true.” Sun’s eyes flicked sideways at the memory. “We washed up on Station 5 with just our kitbags and left aboard an ancient battlecruiser.”
“Six months later, the ship’s name changed to Midnight Blue.”
“S’true.” Branco cleared his throat. “It was Midnight Blue when I first met the Midnighters.”
“Sun and Blue,” ventured Jex. “The two boss sisters. What’s with the change of name? A dynastic struggle?”
“The darkness before the light,” Sun explained. “Our company motto. Midnight Sun wasn’t named after me, it came from our motto, and that came from our fight against the pirate scum of Endless Night. On a whim, Blue renamed the ship after herself. I let her because I saw no harm. But then I saw how she was becoming obsessed with the ship and told her to change it back. She is not the ship. Not sharing the same name helps her to remember that.”
“Maybe we should change it again,” said Branco. His eyes were closed, his words whispered as if dreaming. “Because it still is named after her, Sun-Yin Midnight.”
“I don’t understand,” said Jex, but he did understand the flicker of fear that came over Sun’s face, because she clamped down hard, extinguishing all signs of emotion.
“Eh?” Branco opened his eyes. “What was I saying?”
“Forgive him,” Sun said icily. “The drugs make him confused. That name he spoke…it’s a very personal name he uses for me. Please don’t repeat it.”
The silence was broken by Branco’s snores.
Jex had to fight back the giggles, but it was Sun who saved him from himself. Her granite-hard face softened with concern for Branco. She started wheeling him around to leave. “We marines will have a proper celebration, I promise. Just as soon as Branco’s ready for it. Enjoy the rest of your evening.”
Once the pair left, Cleggy caught Jex’s eye. “In case it isn’t clear, when the major says please, she means that if you even think about disobeying her request, she’ll slice off your stones, mount them in her trophy cabinet, and feed the rest of you to her favorite Tortantula.”
Jex laughed.
No one else did.
“I’m not joking,” said Cleggy.
Jex could see he wasn’t. “Hell, after a few beers, I never remember what anyone’s said anyway.”
“That’s the spirit,” said Cleggy. “Just make sure it’s true.”
“You don’t need to worry about me, Cleggy. But I am worried about Branco. You’ve known him a while. What he was saying to Betty about eating him—was that the beer and drugs talking, or did he mean it?”
Cleggy looked away. “I don’t know, man.”
“I do know there is no cure for my ailment,” said Betty from her table.
No one knew what to say. Sun and Branco had appeared almost affectionate toward the monstrous trooper. Albali, too, to an extent, but Top was elsewhere, enjoying his liberty in other ways.
Betty ambled over from her table. The others shrank into their drinks and avoided eye contact.
Guess this falls to you, Obadiah, old fellow. Despite being the new boy in this team, he was the longest serving sergeant at the table. He stood and looked up into the forward eyes of the Tortantula. “Forgive me if I speak out of turn, Trooper. I know you lost your rider and that’s heartrending, but I’ve seen men lose their women, and women their men, and every other permutation. Many get through it and carry on to find other ways of living a fulfilling life.”
Betty snapped her fangs. “Make your point, new Human.”
“I’ve seen Tortantulas without riders.” Jex swallowed hard.
“Idiot. If you’ve seen singletons in a battle, they are ferals, simple creatures herded to the fight. Elsewhere, you may have seen specialist Torts on occasion. Couriers. Special operatives. If they’re tiny things, they’re males.” She spat out a gobbet of neurotoxin that slid down her fangs.
Jex watched it drip onto the floor where it burnt through the carpet no more than two inches from his boots. He wrinkled his nose at the chemical stench that rose from the wounded floor covering.
“I am none of those things,” said Betty. “My story is a tragedy, but ever since I bonded with Tatterjee a few days after I left the nesting carcass, I’d always had him to guide me through the twists and traps of my life’s path. Without him, I merely persist. I breathe. I eat—when the Humans allow me. I fight. Sleep. Converse with idiots. And I dream. But I do not live. Once bonded with a rider, we are never whole again without them. Sometimes I regret eating Tatterjee, because his spirit resides within me and prevents me from simply withering away. I cannot die.”
“You mean you’re undead.”
Jex instantly regretted his words. After a few pints he always played the bloody giggler, saying what everyone else was too smart to voice.
Jex looked up at the giant alien and added a new maxim to his personal list: Never wind up a Tort.
Humans often described Torts as supersized spiders with a narrow, waspish waist. Unlike the Earth creatures they resembled, Tortantulas were sheathed in natural exoskeletal armor and wielded fangs that could pierce hybrid ceramic battle armor. And that’s before getting to the venom sacks filled with a deadly neurotoxin. He began to doubt he’d ever get a chance to learn his new maxim.
Zombie Torts, though. What an idea! It would make the greatest Tri-V movie of the century.
“You do understand,” said Betty.
Now that was unexpected. Maybe he was being hasty, but Jex began to think he might survive his foolish words after all. At least long enough to order a last drink.
“Good Human,” said the Tortan
tula clicking her palps, the stunted arms that sprouted parallel to her fangs. “Yes, I am the undead Tortantula. I am alone in the galaxy. Unique.”
“No,” said Jex. “No, you’re not.”
Betty let out a banshee shriek and stumbled away. She started circling the bar, scattering tables, crunching chairs, which were unoccupied anyway. No one wanted to sit near a Tortantula. “Stay away from me,” she shouted. “Do not laugh at my pain.”
“I’m not. I meant what I said. You’re not unique. There’s another like you. They call her the Riderless Tort.”
Betty froze. “I’m…I’m not alone?”
“I don’t think you are. I’ve heard about the Riderless Tort too many times to think it’s just a made-up tale. The story goes that there was a Tort who lost her Flatar rider. She underwent a mental crisis but got through it. Now works for a Human merc company.”
She hurried over to Jex. “Which one? I wish to meet this Riderless Tort.”
“Ah…You see, that’s a problem. The story is inconsistent. Some say it’s Burt’s Bees, which personally I don’t believe. I’ve also heard it’s the Starfuries, Les Faux, Winged Hussars, or Ishaani’s Ironclads. I’m sure it’s one of the space-based merc companies because in the stories the Human mercs are always prancing around their liberty stations like stuffed Norfolk turkeys going ‘Oh, will you look at me? I’m not just a dirtside merc, I’m a fucking space marine.’ You know how the space-mercs get.”
“Wonderful news.” A shiver of excitement shot through Betty’s exoskeleton. “I must tell Branco straightaway.”
Turnaround shot to her feet. “Betty, no!”
“Too many people say no,” Betty clicked. “I do not like no.”
“Listen, sister. Branco’s clock is ticking. His time is running out, yeah? He and Sun will want to make the most of the time they have left. Together…”
Betty steamed back to the Human table and glared down at Turnaround through her detail eyes. “You mean Major Sun will be laying her eggs inside Branco?”
“Uh, huh.” Turnaround nodded vigorously. “More or less.”
“It is no problem, Berenice Turnaround Chapelle. I am good friends with both these Humans. They will be overjoyed to hear my news during their mating.”
This time, Jex kept his gob firmly shut as Betty turned and raced away, looking perkier than he’d ever seen her before.
Who knew? The Midnighters were such a weird bunch maybe Sun and Branco regularly enjoyed doing it while being watched by alien monsters.
“You’re not in Suffolk now,” Jex murmured to himself. He certainly wasn’t and that was exactly how he liked it. He’d found the right home with these Midnighters.
“Drinks are on me,” Jex announced.
His poor ears were deafened by the roar.
* * * * *
Chapter Twenty-Five
Docking Pier 301, Station 5
“Who am I?” groaned Branco.
His bed felt like it was moving. Something was happening. Something bad? Was the med-bay under assault again?
He opened his eyes. He was moving, all right, but he was in a wheelchair bumping along the metal lattice floor of a corridor in maybe a quarter G. There was alien writing on the walls.
His pinplants should be able to translate, but they couldn’t break through the barrier of his blinding headache. Luckily, he recognized one of the common glyphs for the numeral five.
Station 5. He remembered now. Looked like he was in one of the docking piers.
He also remembered who was piloting his chair and looked up into Sun’s face.
“Branco,” she said firmly. “You’re fucking Branco. That’s who you are.”
“No, I’m not,” he snapped back. “Branco’s made up. Not real.”
“Listen to me! As Saisho Branco, you’ve lived and loved. You’ve made hard choices and you’ve shown your loyalty. That’s what being alive is about. It doesn’t matter to me if you got your start in life as a file in a Binnig industrial espionage department. You’ve become real.” She applied the brake and crouched in front, gripping his hands. “You’re real to me.”
He brushed back the jet-black hair from her face, marveling at the electricity as his fingertips made fleeting contact with the warmth of her skin.
The sparks spread up his fingers and into his head, popping like fireworks. The sight of her was bleeding away. He couldn’t lose her. He needed her.
“Solara?”
She pinched his lips together hard. Damn that hurt!
“Don’t use that name,” she growled.
The pain intensified, and then she released his mouth.
“Sorry, Sun. You’re right. We’re real. We’re together. We shouldn’t look to our pasts because there’s nothing good there.” He smiled. “All I want is in the future.”
She nodded in agreement, but her expression remained grim.
“What? Don’t want to talk about our future? I might not live long, but that’s why we’ve got to make the most of the time we have. And that’s why I’ll talk to Doctor DiMassi in the morning. The drugs keep the pain at bay, but they’re screwing with my head. Robbing me of who I am. Robbing me of you, Sun. I can’t love you when I don’t remember my own damned name. I’ll take the pain any day.”
“Your medication is not just for the pain, Branco. It slows the spread of the disease.”
He laughed. “I have a feeling I’m going to sound like your sister, but…let me be, Sun. Let me be who I am now. Your sister’s growing into her new self. Let me, too.”
Sun kissed him full on the lips. She tasted of sweet fear. “I’ve got your back, Saisho. Always.”
He took deep breaths with his eyes closed. Lucidity returned, but he didn’t know how long that would last.
Opening his eyes, he gorged on the sight of her. The dark sapphires of her eyes twinkled, and she gave him a shy smile under his brazen attention. He adored the way her rare smile pulled down the scar that ran from above her left eye down to behind her ear. It seemed to be winking at him.
Sun-Yin Solara.
He sighed with delight. Her birth name was as beautiful as the rest of her. He loved her mixed up humanity, too. Malaysian Chinese, Somali, New Brunswicker, and Texan: she had all that and more within her, and look where she had taken it. Sun had commanded marines from many species, and now her superior officer was an alien equally at home breathing water as air. Her sister was the company commander who happened to be merging with the insane ancient heart of a living battleship. Humans were so effortlessly adaptable. The best ones, anyway.
Branco knew his own story was nearing the end of its telling, but humanity’s…Hell, no! Humans would thrive so long as there were people like Sun.
“You’re the future,” he whispered.
“Are you delirious again?”
“No. I’m being poetic.”
“Don’t. It’s only a form of delirium.”
He chuckled. “You don’t have an artistic bone in your body.” He laughed. “I don’t suppose there was room.”
“Are you mocking my small stature, mister?”
“No.” He licked his lips hungrily. “But now you mention it, I’m thinking of taking advantage of your hollow bones—albeit nanite-hardened ones.”
“No one takes advantage of me.”
“Well let’s swap out take advantage…” He reached for her, lifted her by her pert little ass, and deposited her over his lap. “And replace with enjoy the pleasure of.”
She considered him with mock sternness, then gave a delicious wriggle. “I find that revision acceptable.”
A crewman approached on his way to Midnight Sun. A Human. He averted his eyes.
Branco felt Sun tense. And that made him grind his jaw. He wasn’t under her command any longer. Their relationship was no longer a secret.
He heard her swallow hard. Her lithe body still tense, she kissed him. Noisily. In full view for the first time.
Branco had felt so bad all that time s
tuck in med-bay, locked in a losing battle with his wasting disease. In his darkest moments he’d wondered whether there was any point in carrying on.
The answer was sitting in his lap, nestled in his embrace. Sun had fought for him, the least he could do was fight as hard.
He sighed. But the end was coming all the same, and there were things he needed to say while he still could. “The reports say it was close thing. The war between Peepo and Earth, I mean. Re-roll the dice and she could have crushed the Four Horsemen resistance and enslaved our race for eternity.”
She tugged sharply at his hair. “Don’t talk of that now, silly Danish man. Wheel us to my quarters.”
“We need to spread. Humanity. We can’t afford to concentrate so much on Sol System and Earth. Makes us too vulnerable to the next Peepo. We need multiple bases of power to survive and prosper. Multiple concentrations of Human power will lead to rivalry, even wars against each other in distant centuries. But they will be Human, and that’s what matters.” He held her head in his hands and bored his gaze into her. “I only ask one thing of you when I’m gone, Sun. We need another Human stronghold in the stars. To spread. Will you work toward that?”
“Yes.” She attempted a smile, but he could see her shrinking from his words on the inside. “Saisho, talking about…endings. Of a time after we are gone. This does not work for me as foreplay.”
“Just clearing the decks in my mind.”
“Then that is well. You are very sweet, Saisho, but you are only a man, and it is firmly established that men can only think of one thing at a time.”
“You are an unreconstructed sexist, Major Sun, but you happen to be right. There is one thing prominent in my mind.”
Branco wheeled for all he was worth, Sun in his lap, laughing so hard that precious tears streamed from her eyes.
As he slowed for the docking collar, he decided he must be losing his marbles again, because he imagined hearing the sound of a charging Tortantula.
“Umm…Branco?” Sun frowned, pointing at something behind him. She looked bemused rather than angry. “I think someone wants to talk with us.”
Endless Night (The Guild Wars Book 3) Page 13
