by Ginger Booth
“How nice! How long?”
“No idea. Haven’t been paid, either. This hero business is overrated.”
Carver laughed out loud. “I can always use talent if you get tired of the stretches.”
“Doing what? I’m a space engineer.”
“Business is good. I’d like to expand. I don’t know about buying a ship. That seems like overkill. I just want to hire more shipping. Predictable, reliable freight, once a month between here and HB. Is that so much to ask? But at times I could use a consulting engineer. Clients wish to ship the damnedest things.”
“Anytime I’m in port,” Remi agreed. “Happy to. Need to earn money to pay the girls, yes?”
“My treat. You deserve a hero’s welcome home! Ah, it’s late and you’re tired! Shall we visit my compound now?”
Remi happily decamped with him, exiting into the unnerving olive twilight. Carver led confidently through the charmingly haphazard warren of Saggytown. Ruled by dire superstition, the paddies erected their fanciful little foamcrete huts to face in odd directions instead of toeing the line of a street. This formed accidental alleys that surprisingly widened into pocket parks, and odd corners graced by tiny shrines, and an air-scrubber poisonous fruit tree installed in mid-intersection. No vehicle bigger than a balloon-tired motorbike could possibly navigate the district. Averse to taxation, under the vast glowing orb of Pono above, the scruffy boomtown of Schuyler supplied little outdoor lighting on the weekend murk. And most locals slept behind blackout curtains, a necessity during the hot bright half of the week. Remi walked close against Carver’s shoulder through the maze.
“Rich Saggies!” someone hissed out of a black corner. That accent was pure Mahina stretch. Carver paused, seizing Remi’s arm.
A clink sounded behind them to the left – their current position was a three-way intersection of alleys. Remi hadn’t heard anything yet from behind and right. He lightly tugged Carver thataway, but the other man pulled him back. Sure enough, footsteps approached from the third alley. Remi sighed.
“I’m a paid client of Josiah,” Carver called out. “You don’t want an argument with Josiah. Do you?”
Remi knew Josiah in passing, king of the Schuyler underworld, and a personal friend of John Copeland, president of Spaceways. Apparently Josiah served as Cope’s mentor as a wayward teen. One of many things which made Remi go ‘hmm’ regarding his employers. Though Abel and Ben seemed fairly upstanding, law-abiding folk. Correction, Abel. Ben was a creature of the Rings. Tough to be law-abiding where no law applied.
“And what’s he?” demanded the man behind to the right. Dammit, a Denali. Remi started to sweat. “He’s Thrive crew! That just abandoned the evacuation of my people!”
“Oh, dear,” Carver breathed.
“I’m confused,” Remi called out. “Are you gentlemen together?”
“No!” replied the Denali. “But no need to argue. The morons want the rich Sag. We want the Thrive traitor. We call dibs!”
“Uh, sounds fair,” agreed the stretch ahead of them uneasily. He’d now stepped out of the inky shadows. And he was indeed a stretch, looming nearly three meters tall across their path. “Ain’t you worried about Josiah?”
The Denali scoffed. “Why would I be? Just one more stupid stretch like you!” Suddenly a hunter dodged past Remi, shoving him into Carver. He dove feet first into the towering stretch, hitting him at full momentum in the chest, felling him like a tree.
Carver had enough. He pulled out a flare gun and shot it straight up, bathing the scene in eye-searing lurid red. Remi wheeled to eyeball what lurked behind them. Only one Mahinan stretch hulked to his previous left. But three Denali hung back in group two. Born and raised in 1.1 g gravity, these guys were solid muscle.
Trained by Thrive service, Remi immediately grabbed Carver and cut in his grav generator. “Jump!” With a good push-off, they sailed over the head of the rear Mahina goon, and did a bank-shot off a high wall onto another paddy’s flat roof, tripping into the inevitable lawn furniture.
One nice thing about fighting Denali hunters – they didn’t know grav generators. Below, running footfalls approached, Josiah’s rent-a-cops to the rescue. The Denali crew, bereft of their chance to bloody Remi, set into the stretch goons instead. But screeching imprecations, a little paddy grandma emerged from the one-story house the pair stood on, waving a steel skillet.
Who cooks with those anymore, mon chere?
“Your pardon, madame!” Carver cried in French. “We hide but a moment from ruffians below! Remi, get us off her roof, please.”
“Gladly.” He grabbed Carver around the waist and launched again to the next roof. He thought that was their direction of travel, anyway. But Carver pointed across the…street, courtyard, whatever, and Remi launched them again, sailing in slow motion. He didn’t quite make it across. They bounced off the wall and down among a rat’s nest of laundry clotheslines.
Remi reset his grav to 0.9 g, favored by Hell’s Bells and Sagamore alike. Holding Carver’s forearm, he led through the linens at a jog, groping his way toward open pavement.
They stood and looked around. The sounds of fighting had vanished, and so too the flare light, fallen into a different light-well. Carver admitted, “I’m lost.”
“Hm.” Remi drew his comm and brought up a map, rotating the device to match the angles of arbitrary walls. He showed it to Carver.
“Ah, this way!” He strode off in confidence again. “Sorry about that.”
“The Josiah goons, they’re quite prompt,” Remi admired. “My apologies. You had all under control.”
“Not at all! I must learn these gravity tricks. Please spend the night, and teach me tomorrow!”
“But of course!” Remi passed a sudden narrow bit, and a generous courtyard spread before them. This one featured a mansion in pride of place, Carver’s house. “Is this trouble typical?”
“Yes, stretches resent these new people. But our little paddies are easier to pick on than Denali. A hunter can beat a Mahina stretch into a pretzel. But a paddy? Easy prey. The Denali, well, that seemed personal.”
“That’s just not right,” Remi commiserated. “Where are the police?”
“What police? What government? Paying Josiah is cheaper than buying off the sheriff directly. No, my friend, Mahina is not ready for this influx. Schuyler has become a dangerous town. Promise me, you won’t walk back to the spaceport alone. But we Sag, we take care of our own.”
Remi purred, “But of course. Thank you, my friend. And I will treat your girls kindly.”
“Of course! Say nothing of it. We are friends.”
Carver’s house proved lovely, heavy with rich textiles in the Sagamore style, with devoted servants aplenty, though his home was smaller than the airy ‘Thrive mansion.’ His wife and children had gone to bed long since. But after another fortifying drink – a fine vintage – a couple cheerful paddy girls led Remi to a comfortable guest room. They expected to entertain him as a duo, but bore no ill will when he sent one away. Perhaps he’d try her tomorrow. But for now the saucier little darling bathed his feet, then danced him a strip-tease for one.
Ah! It wasn’t home, for Remi had none, and hadn’t for decades. Hell’s Bells in his era housed almost entirely men, stinking of sweaty feet and invariably stoned on their off hours. If anything, the monastic student dorms on Sagamore Orbital partied even harder. As for Roy Dome, the spare aristocrat couldn’t wait to escape from under his father’s thumb.
No, Carver’s guest room was a far more comfortable and charming rendition of Sagamore taste, and the girl so very well-appointed and accommodating. For Remi Roy, this was as close to homecoming as it got.
4
Devoted husband that he was, Cope settled uncomfortably on the armchair next to the couch, facing off against the psychiatrist. With the long couch offering many seating options, Ben elected to sit right next to him, dusty boots on the upholstery.
Cope expected to wait in the reception area and get
some work done. Not that he particularly relished the chance to triage email from the legions of Spaceways’ angry creditors and irate employees. But Ben made clear this outing was Cope’s idea, not his, and he wasn’t walking through that door alone. I’m not crazy! I don’t need a shrink! And if I need to go in there, you’re damned well going to suffer alongside me!
“Doctor,” Cope greeted the urb with a wary nod. “Kind of you to see us on such short notice.” The guy looked 25 and perfectly fit, as did every other urb from the elite city of Mahina Actual. His credentials suggested he was actually in his fifties, and not especially successful in his profession, or he wouldn’t set out his shingle here in Schuyler, the settler bastion.
Nor was it generous of him to see Ben today. His receptionist made clear that an immediate visit would cost 100% extra. For a mere 50% extra, she might be able to squeeze him in sometime next month. At Dr. Wankler’s base fee, Denali would freeze over first. The secretary didn’t schedule more than a year in advance. ‘And so much trauma among the immigrants, you understand.’
Cope understood fine. Though he wondered how much of Dr. Wankler’s fees the chick out front skimmed off the top. But that was business, Schuyler-style.
Wankler smiled a wintry grimace at Cope, probably intended as friendly. “You are Ben Acosta?”
“I am Captain Benjamin Acosta,” Cope’s beloved growled. “And I don’t need to be here.”
“I see. Although I’m not quite sure why both of you are in the room?”
Ben glared at the man. Cope reflected that he’d probably get hit if he spoke for his husband again.
“Well, perhaps, Ben – may I call you Ben?”
“I prefer captain.”
“Very well, let’s keep it professional.” The shrink’s smile reminded Cope of a painful bowel movement. “Have you visited a psychiatrist before? Your counseling history form is blank.”
“No.”
“Not even a school counselor?”
“No.”
Cope offered, “I don’t think Poldark had –”
“Shut up, Cope,” Ben invited.
Wankler’s eye twitched as though wincing. “Ah, you’re from Poldark. Did you move to the city for wider career prospects?”
“Perhaps you’ve seen me on the news, doctor,” Ben replied icily. “I’m world-famous for my inconvenient nervous breakdown, endangering the lives of a thousand helpless immigrants over the Denali equator. Lead captain of Thrive Spaceways. He’s the president. My husband.” His tone suggested that last point remained negotiable.
“I don’t follow the news. Why don’t you tell me what happened?”
Ben’s face took on a bitter rictus. “I took off from Waterfalls. I fought the ship through a storm. I freaked out halfway up Denali’s atmosphere. I don’t remember much after that.”
“How long have you flown a spaceship?”
“Half my life. Two decades. I’m the best pilot in – anywhere, so far as I know. And I’ve visited four star systems.”
“And you’ve done this takeoff before, I trust. What was different this time, captain?”
“Not a rego thing.”
“Hm. Thrive Spaceways so far has transferred, what, thirty thousand Denali refugees? In two months? Eight round trips, and you led this effort?” Cope’s eye narrowed at the doctor, not nearly as uninformed as he claimed. “How do you feel about that?”
“I – Dammit.” Ben’s eye leaked a tear again, the muscles around his mouth set in bitter ridges. “Proud. Exhausted. Overwhelmed. Humiliated.” Cope reached for his hand.
“I see. Those are very different feelings, aren’t they? Let’s try to tease them apart, shall we? A moment.” His secretary opened the door and conveyed a nonverbal message to check something on his lap tablet. He stilled, taking in the information blank of face. But then he looked to Ben to respond to the question. “What makes you proud?”
“I saved half of Denali. Well, half of who wanted to leave, anyway, almost. And my team – our team. Not me personally.”
“You’re very precise. And remarkably well-educated for your generation.”
“Yes. We both are.”
The flick of a smile betrayed some humor that time. “You’re not willing to take credit or blame for this alone. Yet sometimes it must feel as though you’re carrying all these refugees personally, you alone. How many lives is that, captain?”
Ben’s eyes bugged out. He shifted back in the cushions. He uncrossed and recrossed his legs, then dropped both heels to the floor and hunkered forward onto them. “Seventy thousand lives. Forty thousand to go.” He dropped his head to his arms and blew out.
“That makes you anxious, doesn’t it?”
Ben exploded out of his seat. “Of course it makes me rego anxious! And I can’t do it!” His voice rose to a full-out yell. “No more fuel! No ground support on Mahina! And you, you useless yutz!” Cope sank lower in his chair as the onslaught targeted him. “Why am I handling the ground game? Why am I begging for fuel, from people I can’t pay? Why am I the one telling my crews I CANNOT PAY THEM! Again, dammit!”
“Mm, so captain, do you perceive this as a marital problem? Or perhaps exhaustion?”
Ben slammed his hands down, one after the other, on the arms of Wankler’s chair. He stuck his face within inches of the man’s. “You tell me, doctor! Could it be that I’m a little STRESSED OUT?” He shoved off with enough force to rock the chair back, yet not quite dump the shrink on his head.
“Buddy, maybe you should sit,” Cope suggested.
Ben copped a pose, fist on hip, then toppled backward onto the couch, which creaked alarmingly but did not break.
During their divorced years, Cope had observed that Ben developed an uncanny precision with tossing furniture and punching bulkheads. He seemed to know exactly how much force to almost but not quite break a wide variety of objects. Cope suspected his then-ex imagined his face on all of them.
“I love my husband,” Cope told the doctor quietly. “But running a failing company together…complicates stuff.”
“Thrive Spaceways is ‘failing’? What do you mean by that?”
“Reference my prior remarks,” Ben stated. His dusty heels probed the upholstery. “No fuel. No money. Forty thousand too-warm bodies left to go.”
“Do you feel…appreciated?”
“No!” Ben rocketed off the couch again to stomp across the narrow confines of the room – three steps forward, slap the wall. Whirl and repeat.
“Captain Acosta, I believe your blood pressure is growing alarmingly high. Is your heart pounding? Palms sweating?”
“YES!”
“Feel as though it’s hard to breathe?”
“YES!”
“Did you feel like this, halfway up the Denali atmosphere the other day?”
“YES!” Ben dropped to the couch again and scrubbed his hands dry on his pants legs. “Oh. This is a panic attack?”
“Yes. I’m guessing you don’t ordinarily suffer a panic attack on liftoff from a planet.”
“Hell, no. I love flying a ship. The crazier it gets, the…”
“The what, captain?”
Ben swallowed. “It just all blanked out. I can handle any emergency. Hell, you should have seen me in the warp gateway trials. And coming back from Cantons! Nearly swam on Pono that time.”
Cope murmured, “You told me it wasn’t bad double-warping from Cantons.”
“So? I lied. Who cares? I can handle it. But on Denali, I was still stunned from getting shocked. All my instruments died. There wasn’t a damned thing I could do. We’d crash into the ocean, and I’d kill a thousand passengers like that!” He snapped his fingers. “Ow. And my fingers are still burned.”
Cope seized his fingers. “Electrocuted?” Damn, his fingers did show a bad electrical burn. The space engineering couple were connoisseurs. They’d zapped themselves and each other many a time.
Ben ripped his hand out of his husband’s grasp and back-slapped him away. “Y
eah. Couldn’t turn to dodge a hurricane. Full up, those transports maneuver like a bathtub in lard. So I clipped the thunderheads. Two simultaneous lightning bolts. They arced through the ESD, then forked together. Like I was trapped in a chicken coop of electricity. Whole bridge shorted out and rebooted. Completely powerless.” He stared at his hands, breathing shakily, powerless at that moment.
“Buddy?” Cope dared. “How long has it taken those hands to heal?”
“It’s been four days. You know that.” Then Ben winced his eyes shut in realization. “So where the hell are my nanites?”
“Sounds like you fried ’em.”
Wankler, understandably hesitant based on Ben’s recent demonstrations, suggested, “Have you experienced panic attacks before, since your Yang-Yang nanites were installed?”
“Sure,” Ben replied, with a quick chuckle. “I mean, it’s my lifestyle. Or…no. I mean, they cut in pretty quick to…” Apparently some neurons connected. “They moderate my hormone levels, don’t they! Adrenaline response!”
“Yes,” Wankler said simply.
Cope felt vast relief. Ben didn’t.
“Wait. That was the real me?” Ben’s expression looked horrified. “There’s been some nanite-controlled fake me handling the pressure all this time? I was never brave?”
Wankler tilted his head. “You tell me.”
Cope stood abruptly. “Thank you for your time, doctor. But we’re in the wrong place.”
“You really didn’t like that question, Mr. Copeland,” the shrink observed.
“No, and I really don’t like shrinks. And before you ask, no, you’re not my first. Buddy, you don’t need a shrink, you need fresh nanites.” He pulled Ben up, who seemed perfectly eager to escape.
Wankler pressed, “We still have some time. Captain, how do you feel about your emotions being nanite-moderated?”
Ben stopped dead, slipping out of Cope’s grasp again to stand staring at the doctor. Slowly, reluctantly, he admitted, “I wasn’t all that brave. I thought I just grew up. Gained confidence.”
“And maybe you’ve been having a panic attack all along. Many enjoy an ‘adrenaline rush.’ Now, I wouldn’t suggest anyone disable their Yang-Yangs. But now this has happened, perhaps you should explore it. Experience the emotions you’ve been suppressing for years.”