by Jenn Lyons
correspondingly skin-tight.
Instead of blushing, however, he raised an eyebrow at me and looked smug. “I guess it’s your turn to have a show.”
I nodded and stared at the wall, turning my back to give him at least the illusion of privacy. I pried open the fingers of my left hand with my right; the hand kept wanting to close into a fist, as if I were still holding a cigarette lighter and didn’t want to let go.
ggg
Two steps inside the pilot’s cabin of the Aegis, Campbell stopped and whistled. “I want to be in IO. Are there any positions open?”
I closed and sealed the hatch behind him. “Sure, but you wouldn’t snag a shuttle out of the deal.”
“This isn’t a shuttle: it’s a yacht. A very nice yacht.” Campbell looked to me for an explanation as he ran his hand over the silver and blue paneling. His dark gaze was almost an accusation, a dare. How did I get it? Did I steal it? Was some sort of elaborate con involved? If I hadn’t acquired it as part of some kind of terribly complicated scam involving late night assignations, backstabs, betrayals and vinyl catsuits, where could he pick up one?
I felt the corner of a lip curl before I could tap it back down. “The Aegis was a gift.” I pointed to a set of seats. “Make yourself comfortable and don’t touch anything.”
The room itself wasn’t much more than a big round circle, with a few swivel seats around the edge and some backup monitors embedded into the walls in case, for whatever outlandish reason, the main systems were inoperable. To anyone who didn’t know better, it look rather like a security checkpoint, with a metal cradle on a rotating base standing on the platform where people would normally waited to be scanned.
His gaze flickered over to me. “Who gives out yachts as gifts?”
I paused on my way to the center of the room and gazed at him coolly. “None of your damn business, Tal.”
I watched the strong line of his jaw clench and whiten as he ground his teeth together, but he swallowed his anger and tilted his head and even managed an expression that, under other circumstances, might have been friendly. He was trying so hard I wanted to chuck him under the chin and offer him a lollipop.
“When do we leave?” He finally asked when he was done wrestling his impulse to slug me under control.
“As soon as I have clearance,” I said, floating over to the circle. I slipped into the cradle and clipped the belts around my ankles, my waist. I felt the system power up, check retinal patterns, fingerprints, biometric readings, voice print and every other test that I’d been able to come up with to keep it from working without clearance.
Campbell stared at me. Then he realized that I was piloting this ship immediately, not at some unspecified point in the future he could pretend would never arrive. He pulled himself into a chair and began fumbling with the restraint harness.
“Pilot in position. Medusa, engage holographic view array. Expand to demonstration parameters.”
“Holographic view array engaging.” Medusa said it in the driest, most computer-like voice she could tolerate.
An image coalesced around me and expanded to cover the outer wall, including Campbell in the field of vision. He gasped as he saw us both surrounded by the walls of the docking bay. We seemed to be hovering in mid-air where the Aegis was, with no walls dividing us from the air (or lack thereof) outside the ship. He’d clearly not been allowed in the cockpit on the way up—hardly a surprise—so this was likely his first experience with the navigational systems of a Janus Drive.
“Oracle information download complete.”
“Understood.”
“Oracle? What’s Oracle?”
I gave Campbell a long look. “Plan on taking the test to become a League ship’s pilot in the next two weeks?”
“Not really.”
“Then it’s not important. Activate navigational console.” I let my fingers dance unnecessarily over the golden lattice of navigational maps and mathematical models that orbited me in a glowing circle. Medusa had already done any of the work that mattered. I tossed a few charts around and made it look like I was doing Something Important.
I also checked the logs. Medusa hadn’t remote activated any drones. She would scold me later for being so distrustful as to check, but I had to be certain. The way Shaniran died had shaken the hell out of me. Usually when someone complains that it’s like a person’s been reading their mind they don’t have cause to think the complaint is literal.
I was starting to wonder.
When I was finished, I opened a channel. “North Point Station Flight Control, this is the Aegis, requesting permission to activate a zero-momentum jump maneuver.” I wondered how Belisle was going to play this. If he was paying attention, if he was monitoring me, I expected to receive quick permission to get the hell out. If he really didn’t care what happened, I’d be in the queue for hours: everybody wanted to leave North Point Station right then.
My many questions were answered in less than fifteen seconds. “Clearance has been granted. Launch pad 22 is clear.”
“Thank you Control. Aegis out.” I shook my head as I cut the link. “They’re not used to Janus Drives yet.”
“Why do you say that?”
“They offered me a launch pad that’s utterly useless given what I’m about to do.”
“Don’t—” Campbell blinked. “You really can jump from a standstill?”
“Campbell, nothing is ever at a standstill. This space station is gravitationally locked with the sun and our solar system is orbiting the galaxy and the galaxy is orbiting inside a cluster and everything in the universe is expanding. We’re constantly, always, in motion.”
He raised an eyebrow at me.
I sighed. “Yes, we’re jumping from a standstill. I hate docking maneuvers.”
He didn’t reply, but Campbell grabbed the ends of his armrests and squeezed so hard they might break. He inhaled, held his breath and looked like he was waiting for the world to end.
“Engage jump on my mark.” I paused. “Mark.”
There was a very slight shiver, and all around us the hologram changed so quickly that it almost seemed instantaneous, as though a thousand bright blooms exploded into each other, leaving behind them a blue shifting expanse. I smiled. “Welcome to hyperspace.”
“We’re actually in another dimension? Right now?”
“Yup. Right now.” I swiveled around. “Move the ship to minimum safe distance from expected departure routes and hold for further instructions.”
“Understood.”
I unstrapped myself from the cradle and used the hand-rails to pull myself over to Campbell in the zero gravity. “You wanted to talk? This is as private as it ever gets. No one can eavesdrop, no communication devices can pick us up. We aren’t even the same universe as anyone who would be interested. It’s just the two of us.”
Campbell stared at me so hard I almost checked to see if I had something on my face, and then he asked: “Why are you a Black Flag?”
I scoffed, caught out by the unexpected question. “This is what you wanted to talk about? Don’t tell me you came all the way to North Point Station just to ask me that?”
“No, I came all the way to North Point Station because I’ve been taken off the Lorvan case.”
I could only stare at him. “You were what?”
“The Lorvan case. They shut it down. They have the killer; he’s dead. It was a murder-suicide, a terrorist attack, and there will be no further investigation. Case closed. I was told I should take a vacation for a few weeks. Think about my future.”
I closed my mouth. “I see.”
“That’s why I wanted to talk to you. I thought—”
“I am not looking into Vana-Nus Lorvan’s death.”
“Or Shaniran’s?”
“No, not that either.”
Campbell’s voice was tense. “And Tal-Magra Kelhelion?”
I froze. Kelhelion was the Minister of Justice. He was Tal-Campbell’s ultimate superior, a poisonous spider of a
Sarcodinay more hated by Urbans than any other. Shaniran was an abstraction, intangible and unreal to most megacity inhabitants. His focus was entirely on the Colonies and pirate groups, after all. Kelhelion ordered arrests and punishments and interrogations. If they came for your family in the middle of the night, his name was the one on the arrest order.
“When did he die?”
“Two days before Lorvan.”
ggg
I was walking through the garden when Fal-Kora Kelhelion found me. He bowed deep and prostrated himself at my feet.
“Rise, Fal. What is it?”
“His Majesty has asked for your presence. He says it is of the utmost importance...and discretion.”
I frown, because I’m not used to meeting with his Majesty outside of the normal pomp and circumstance of court etiquette.
I sigh. “Now?”
“I assume so. I mean—I think—” He fumbles in his nervousness. “Yes, that is.”
“Let Vana-Nus Lorvan know that I will be late in meeting with him to go over Tu-Shirox template patterns. I am, as always, the Emperor’s loyal servant.”
I gather my robes and leave to meet the Emperor.
ggg
“Are you all right?”
I waved him off. “Sorry, a little lingering pain from my injuries. You were saying?”
“There’s been no announcement, but you can’t hide something like that. All the orders are coming from the Ministry Secretary instead of the Minister. Rumor is the assassin took her own life seconds after murdering Kelhelion. Probably another open-and-shut case.”
“So who ordered the Lorvan case shut down? If Kelhelion was already dead?”
“I’d say