Great. That would help her cause no end. “Owen did mention something of the sort.”
“Jill Paxton and I worked together on an important mission, which brought me to FTL-1. Among other things, your supervisor tasked you to discover why I had left Venture, what mission they had assigned me, right?”
“Correct.” She’d be damned if she’d make any excuses, tell any lies. If he attacked her, he’d just lose himself a son. Not what she wanted, but maybe what he deserved.
“We completed that mission, though we found the forced relationship somewhat uncomfortable. But I learned to trust her judgment. So, like my brother, when faced with a similar situation, I’ll say the same thing to you as he said to that woman.”
She inhaled, waiting for it, waiting for the axe to fall.
“Welcome to the Family, Sharon Temple.”
She froze. Her mind went blank, and she couldn’t think of anything to say.
“That woman, Jaswinder Saroya, became my wife. Because of what he had observed, my brother told his own wife that whether or not Jaswinder and I ever married – or even stayed together – we needed women like her in our Family: intelligent, kind, and fierce. I didn’t observe this in you, but those words, according to Jill, describe you accurately. So, whether or not you remain with Owen, for as long as you desire, you will find welcome in our Family.”
He turned to Owen. “That’s my say. Your turn. Have you anything to say?”
Owen looked as stunned as she felt. “No, Dad, I don’t.”
“That’s good, because I have to leave. I’m going back to Haida Gwaii. I need to be with your mother when we jump the station.”
He turned back to Sharon.
“Oh, one more thing – again with the precedence of my brother. At a dinner, he apologized to Jaswinder, and to the Family. So, I, too, will apologize. Last time we met, Major, you saluted me, and I failed to return that salute. Like my brother before me, I admit that I behaved badly. I apologize, both to you and to Owen.”
He took a step back one step, and snapped a credible salute.
She came to attention, and returned it.
“This doesn’t mean that I like you, Major. But I accept you.” His lips curved up in a small smile. “You don’t have to like me, either. However, I hope you will accept me.
“Two final things, Major.”
“Yes, Captain?”
“One: we don’t salute much in the Families. So, get used to not saluting. Two: we’re pretty informal. So you call me Johannes, and I’ll call you Sharon. That good for you, Sharon?”
She nodded. “That’s good for me, Johannes.”
“I’m attaching you to Shiro Tanaka – Security – until you decide on a place for yourself. He appreciates the type of threat you made. I’m sure you’ll get on well together.
“Now, I really have to run. Owen, I’ll see you when I see you. Venture will jump shortly after I leave, so get to your acceleration chairs. And, after Venture jumps, you might want to take Sharon on a tour of Venture. Start with the cafeteria. She’s probably dying for some real food by now.”
He suddenly laughed. “And I have a sneaking suspicion I know where the tour will end.”
Captain Yrden – Johannes – jogged to the next bay over. The airtight door came down, and they heard the whirr of pumps as Venture evacuated the bay of air.
“Well,” Owen said, still slightly trembling with reaction, “that was different.”
“I take it your father doesn’t often welcome people into the Family that haven’t married Family members.”
“You take it right.”
“I have a question. Why did he say he needs to be with his wife when they jump Haida Gwaii?”
Owen went still. “No one has ever jumped anything that big. And the hull isn’t complete. There’s a fair possibility that they will not successfully jump.”
She didn’t press the point; she could figure out what that meant.
“Before we jump, Sharon, I want to introduce you to Captain Bettina Yrden.”
“I don’t know that I can take another Captain Yrden so soon after the last one.” She blew out her cheeks with an explosive expulsion of air, and then said. “Lead on.”
He led on.
“Captain Yrden, I would like to bring a visitor onto the bridge.”
The woman raised her eyebrows when Sharon walked in.
“This is Major Sharon Temple. Sharon, Captain Bettina Yrden.”
Sharon fought the urge to salute again.
“Captain Bettina, Dad has welcomed Sharon into the Family.”
Heads that had turned to duty after the initial interruption turned back to regard her. Bettina’s face became a study.
“Did he, indeed?”
“He did.”
Bettina nodded her had. “Well, Sharon, as an Yrden Family member, would you like to observe jump from the bridge?”
“I would, very much.” She had waited for this moment for years – since before she had ever joined Space Force. And now she would experience what so few of the population ever had.
“Find her a seat, Owen. And get comfortable, we won’t jump for a time.”
That took them both aback. “Dad said you would jump soon after he left.”
Bettina laughed. “When have I ever regarded what Johannes said as writ in stone?”
That drew a laugh from all present. Informal, indeed.
The captain – Bettina – became serious. “I’m not leaving before I see Haida Gwaii jump.”
“Now, Sharon, if you don’t mind, while we’re waiting, tell us about FTL-1.”
CHAPTER 39
Venture - Lifeboat-3
Tuesday 07 September
After a time, Wen Carson dried his face, and took out the PMI reader. He called up PMI 14.2. The detector. As if the detector hadn’t just proved accurate while keeping them safe from something no detector had been designed to cope with.
Step 1: Turn on, and allow to warm up.
He heard footsteps coming towards the flight deck. He wondered what Angela had forgotten – or if she decided to check up on him to make sure he had no intention of launching.
“Hello, Wen.”
Carly’s voice caught him by surprise. He turned his head, and caught a tentative look on her face.
“May I sit down?”
He shrugged, and indicated the co-pilot’s seat.
“What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be in your acceleration chair?”
“Angela told me you had duty here, that you needed to complete a PMI. She suggested that I help you with it.”
Wen’s eyebrows went up of their own volition. “She did?”
“She said a PMI often goes faster when one person reads out the steps while the other performs it.”
That interfering little minx. He now doubted that Bettina had ordered the PMI done. Angela had set him up.
“So it does.” He handed her the reader – the very one that he had handed Angela what seemed a lifetime ago, doing the very PMI that had engaged him when she came to sit with him in this ill-fated boat. She obviously didn’t hold to any superstitions. Or, perhaps she did.
They worked through the PMI
“Step 6: Turn Range Gauge to ‘4’ and engage test circuitry.”
He turned the Range Gauge to ‘4’ and engaged the test circuitry.
“Wen?”
“If you keep asking me questions, this PMI will take forever. What is it?”
“Tell me a story.”
A story. He recalled telling Angela about Jaswinder Damn-And-Blast-Her Saroya. That wouldn’t be a fitting story.
“What kind of story?”
“Tell me about Lil.”
He remained as he sat, staring at the detector screen. Quietly he said, “Lil’s dead, Carly.”
“Not as long as we remember her.”
We.
“Lil was my partner, my friend, my lover.” He considered Carly’s face, open, ready to hear. He smiled in r
emembrance. “She used to tell me that doing the same thing over and over, and expecting a different result, indicated insanity. Somebody famous had said that, and she had taken it to herself. She accused me of insanity on more than one occasion.”
Lil. His friend, his partner, his lover. Dead – except in memory.
“Are you sure you want to do this, Carly? Didn’t Angela tell you that we engaged in this very PMI when pirates attacked Amalgamated 684? And, if memory serves, there’s a patrol ship – a pirate – headed this way. That ended up with my ship destroyed and me adrift on this very lifeboat with her, all our friends dead.”
“Wanting to relive that definitely would indicate insanity,” Carly agreed. “But if you changed something, you might then get a different result.”
Wen completed step 7. “What would you have me change? Step 8? We go through the steps for a reason.”
A movement from her distracted his attention from Step 8. He saw her undoing the buttons of her shirt.
“According to Angela, she stripped for you, and you refused to touch her. If you want things to change, perhaps you should not feel so constrained.”
She shrugged out of her shirt, and let it fall to the deck.
He suddenly had the almost unbearable urge to laugh. Did Angela figure that this would constitute a new beginning for him? A branching of the path, putting him on the way to a new future in an alternate universe? This one with Carly?
“Did you at least close the hatch?”
She grinned. “Closed and sealed, Pilot.”
He took the reader from her hand, closed it and replaced it in its slot. He turned off the detector.
“I think this PMI can wait.”
She shook her head. “Step 8: Follow the woman to the pilot’s rest quarters.”
He began to laugh, picked up her discarded shirt and followed her.
* * *
Haida Gwaii
Tuesday 07 September
Johannes sent his shuttle towards Haida Gwaii at a high rate of speed. He winced as he saw the unfortunate survivors from the Lunar Colonies, kept away from the station by Colonel Jacoby’s fighters.
“Colonel Jacoby, Captain Yrden on incoming shuttle.”
“Colonel Jacoby.”
“We’re leaving. Get your people on board Haida Gwaii.”
“After you’ve docked, sir. We have our orders.”
Johannes clenched his jaw, but then shrugged. Until he actually retook command, Jaswinder’s word was law.
The shuttle landed in the bay, the doors closed, and air began to fill the chamber. He walked back to the passenger cabin.
“Okay, everyone, we’re here. Haida Gwaii will jump soon. Go to your quarters and prepare. Everyone has the rest of the day off.”
He opened the hatch, and jumped down to the deck. Then he began to run. He needed to get to the bridge, to be by her side when they jumped.
“Jaswinder,” he said, as he entered the bridge.
“Johannes. Why didn’t you stay on your ship?”
He looked at her. “Where else would I be, but at your side?” He walked over to her, and hugged her.
“Give me a minute. Lorrie, give me a broadcast to all the survivor pods and boats.”
She composed herself.
“This is Jaswinder Yrden. A USNA Patrol Ship approaches. Contact them for aid. Haida Gwaii will now jump. We will return at the end of the quarantine period. May your gods go with you. End of Transmission.”
He could see tears in the corners of her eyes. How hard it must have been to deny sanctuary, he would never know. She would keep it to herself.
He took over the bridge. “Are Colonel Jacoby’s fighters on board?”
“Yes, Captain.”
“All our workers inside?”
“Yes, Captain.”
“Ready for jump?”
A short silence, then everyone together replied. “Yes, Captain.”
He picked up the InShip broadcast. “This is Captain Yrden. In one minute, Haida Gwaii will make history as the biggest vessel to ever jump to hyperspace. Stand by for jump.”
He turned to Jaswinder, who had moved to the jump controls. She went over them one last time.
He reached her, took her hand, and held it. “Will this work?” he asked quietly.
“Trust me,” she said, and engaged her program.
The starfield vanished, and the screens showed only the swirling greys of hyperspace. Both of them checked all readings. The field appeared stable. He let out his breath in a long sigh.
“Told you so,” she said reprovingly.
The whole bridge erupted in tension-relieving laughter.
“Now for the fun part.”
He tensed as she entered another program. The field began to distort, ever so slightly.
“We’re accelerating!” someone cried out.
Applause rang out.
“We’ll move the equivalent of a few hundred thousand kilometres, and then wait there for a week,” Jaswinder said.
“Wait there?” Johannes asked.
She turned to him with eyes that had seen much too much.
“We made a promise; I made a promise.”
He held her close.
“Do you expect to find anyone alive when we return?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she turned to the Shift Commander. “Quentin, the bridge is yours.”
And she led him out.
Passing people offered congratulations, and she smiled, accepting them, but he could feel that she barely kept it together. He should have been here to take that burden. He wouldn’t part from her again. Whatever the future held, they would face it together.
* * *
Venture
On Venture, Owen – along with every other member of the bridge crew – watched the detector screen intently.
Haida Gwaii blinked out.
“Textbook entry!” Jordan exclaimed, as he viewed the data.
“Excellent,” Bettina said, looking very relieved. She looked at the icon representing the Patrol Ship, which had come around the Earth and accelerated towards them. “Our turn.”
“Ken, rotate the ship. One last look at Earth. You might never see it again.”
The ship turned offering each lounge and both bridge and auxiliary bridge a short view. The clouds of debris thrown up by the nuclear blasts had mostly covered the globe. No longer a blue world. Venture turned away.
“Drop shields. Jump,” Bettina ordered.
Sharon experienced a small, passing feeling of nausea. She looked out the forward screens. Only swirling greys.
“You’ll find drop much more impressive,” Captain Yrden told her.
“Come on, Sharon,” Owen said. “Let’s go find the cafeteria.”
She suddenly realized that she had not had anything to eat for hours. Not since the Catastrophe Core.
At the entrance, they met their pilot, Wen Carson, walking with a woman, the same destination in mind.
He nodded at them. “Owen, Major.”
“Pilot,” Sharon replied.
“Sharon,” Owen said, “this is Carly – from Cargo.”
She would have a lot of names to memorize. They shook hands. A crowded, loud cafeteria suddenly went silent at their entrance. Sharon felt herself clench. Then applause began. People stood and applauded. She stared around, wondering what it meant.
“It’s for Wen and Owen,” Carly told her, lips close to her ear. “Everyone saw the rescue, heard it. Never has any holo, any entertainment, drawn a bigger crowd, kept them on the edge of their seats, enthralled. They are heroes.” She suddenly chuckled. “For the moment, anyway. Let’s go get food.”
Jill Paxton passed by them, she on her way out, as they went to their table. Sharon stopped her.
“Thank you.”
Jill regarded her with an amused look. “Not sure I did you any favours. Good luck, Major.”
“Sharon.”
“To us, those who survived the Catastrophe Core, you
’ll always be ‘The Major’. Did you know that every one who left carried their readers with them? The readers with those final notes they were writing for posterity. We’ll remember you.” She looked around, a Paxton amongst Yrdens – the enemy. “Where do you think you’ll go?”
“I don’t know. Here, for now, I guess. Johannes welcomed me into the Family, so wherever they need me.”
That surprised the other woman.
“He did? I didn’t think he liked you.”
“He didn’t, and doesn’t.”
“Well, as one woman who he didn’t like to another, I offer advice. Stand up to him. He’ll respect you for it. If he’s in the right, acknowledge it, of course, but if you feel he isn’t, don’t back down.”
“I’ll remember.”
“See you around. It’s a long trip to the rendezvous.”
She sat with Owen, and began to eat what had to be the best meal of her life.
* * *
Alone with Owen in his room, Sharon gratefully stripped and used the shower. A towel wrapped around her, she returned to find him lying in bed. She climbed in beside him.
“A long day. I think I’ll be asleep almost before my head hits the pillow. At least the worst is now over.”
A cough from beside her had her opening her eyes to look blearily at him. “Now what?”
“Tomorrow. Family Dinner. You’ll be the star attraction.”
She groaned. “Can’t I get out of it? I have no clean clothes. I’ve been living for ten days now in the only things I have to – the only things I possess.”
“No, you can’t. And I’ll find you something.” He chuckled. “Or you could just go as you are.”
She gave him a half-hearted swat. “I’ll worry about tomorrow when it gets here.”
Tomorrow arrived all too soon. She had slept the clock around. When she woke, she found herself alone. She left the bedroom for Owen’s common room. He also had a guest room. She wondered where she would sleep? Here in his bed? In the guest room? In a room of her own?
The door swished open, and she felt thankful that she had had the foresight to have the towel from the previous night wrapped around her.
Not With A Whimper: Survivors Page 45