by B. V. Larson
“Chief Sylvester took charge of them. They’re off to the Halfers ghetto with enough money for rooms, food and a little bit of fun. I hope they’re as disciplined as he seemed to think.”
Loco helped Chiara undress him to his shorts. “They’re military on leave. Can’t expect them to be schoolgirls.”
“I know some schoolgirls who’d wreck a joint. Lie down.”
He did, and she sponged his face and torso with disinfectant. Patches of dead skin and flesh threated to rip free and he grunted in pain. “Leave it alone. Get me some food and painkillers. Let the Bug work.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Where’s Bel?”
“With the guys. I didn’t want her hovering.”
Loco took Chiara’s hand in his. “Thanks. For taking care of me.”
Chiara tried to jerk her hand free. “Let me go.”
He held on tight. “Never, Chiara. I—you’re—”
“Goddammit, don’t say it, Loco. You’ll ruin things. Can’t you just go with the flow?”
“I thought I could. But almost getting killed—again—makes a guy think about things. I’d like to know more about you.”
“You know enough.”
He sighed. “What does your training tell you about dangling secrets in front of a persistent guy?”
“My training?” Her face shut down, and this time she did pull her hand free—and used it to slap him across the face, hard. “Go to hell, Johnny Paloco.” She stormed out, slamming the door.
“Been there, done that,” he said to the empty room, rubbing his cheek. “Why can’t you keep your damned mouth shut, Johnny?”
A moment later, he searched for something to drink. “Shit. No beer left…” He got up gingerly, retrieved two meals from the hold, and popped them in the quick-heat. Chiara was nowhere aboard.
Loco noticed a pain in his chest. It wasn’t his wound.
Chapter 15
Hell’s Reach. Bridge of the dreadnought SBS Trollheim.
In answer to the question of how they could know the intentions of the vortex, Sinden spoke up from her holotank vidlink image. “Xenobiologists don’t kill sentient beings. At least, most rational ones don’t. If this thing is truly sentient, it can see we’re an artificial vessel filled with sentient creatures. Also, while we have little information on this area, there were no warnings in the data we have.”
“That’s thin reasoning to stake our lives on,” Straker said. “Still, I believe we can back off some on the acceleration. Mercy, dial down the thrust slowly, as much as you think you can, to conserve fuel.”
“Fuel’s not the only problem,” she replied. “Any acceleration at all, and we keep gaining speed. At some point the nebula will thicken up again and we’ll be slamming into asteroids—which take more power to deflect or destroy. I have a few ideas, though... ”
“Go on.”
“Helm, reduce power, five percent per minute. Reverse the impellers.”
“Reverse the impellers, ma’am? But that will... ”
“I know. That’ll push back against the fusion thrust. A waste of power, but at least we won’t be accelerating as much. If we’re lucky, we can get the thrust under ten percent and actually decelerate, if the vortex lets us. Plan to curve our course into a giant semi-circle as we slow down, to resume our former course. Maybe it’ll eventually lose interest.”
“Uh, ma’am, if we backtrack, we can be out of this area in under two hours at full thrust.”
“What happens when we run into the dense part of the nebula again?”
“Full decel in reverse should blast anything aside, ma’am, stern first.”
“Blast anything up to a certain size... but we can’t afford to run a big rock up our asses and lose the engines, can we? There are no shipyards out here.”
The helmsman looked surly. “I’m trying to balance risks, ma’am. Just my opinion. I’d rather risk the rocks than this monster.”
Straker saw the captain making an effort to think that over. He himself didn’t have enough information to make a decision, but he instinctively trusted Roentgen. In the fusing, he’d seen the mind behind the dreams and visions. Thorians weren’t given to speculation or guessing. If Roentgen thought the vortex wasn’t hostile, odds were it wasn’t.
Accidents could still happen, though.
Salishan slowly shook her head. “Thanks for your input, Mister Tomlinson, but those are my instructions.”
The helmsman shot a helpless glance at Straker, and then turned back to his board with hunched shoulders. “Aye aye, ma’am.”
Straker wondered what was going on in the man’s head. People weren’t robots, and discipline could never be taken for granted, especially when faced with death. He pulled out his handtab and made a note to bump into Lieutenant Tomlinson as soon as he could, perhaps invite him for a drink. Sometimes all it took to head off a problem was letting someone know you’d listen.
Thrust was dialed back thirty percent over the next half-hour, then reduced faster as the vortex came steadily closer but did nothing inimical. A suggestion to fire weapons had been instantly discarded—the total energy of even all the thermonuclear weapons aboard would be, in Zaxby’s words, “barely a firecracker” to the vortex.
After an hour, the Trollheim began actually decelerating, her course curving into a circle as her impellers slowed her against the five percent thrust maintained. That thrust still threw a plume, which the vortex hugged, looming frighteningly close, but it maintained its distance even as the ship decelerated. Straker was reluctant to order complete engine shutdown for fear the vortex would unintentionally touch the Trollheim and damage her like an affectionate whale rubbing against a rowboat.
“How long can we maintain this situation?” Straker asked his captain.
“Days. The good news is, we’re back on course now that the vortex is following behind, instead of ahead. Maybe it’ll lose interest when we move out of this area. That’ll allow us to slowly accelerate again on impellers alone, which takes less fuel.”
“Maybe.”
“Zaxby to Straker,” the comlink squawked.
“Straker here.”
“Roentgen and I have created a highly innovative transceiver based on neutrino interchange, expandable to muons and other particles if available. We would like permission to activate it.”
Straker exchanged surprised glances with Salishan, then addressed Zaxby. “When have you ever asked permission to do anything?”
“At least two or three times in the nine years we’ve known each other, Derek Straker.”
“My point exactly. Roentgen insisted, didn’t he?”
“It, General. Not he.”
“I’ll call him ‘he’ if I feel like it. His mind felt male to me, no matter his lack of actual gender. You know, I used to call you ‘he’ when you were a neuter, and you thought that was a positive, even if inaccurate.”
“That’s because neuters are a subordinate sex—or one might say, non-sex—in Ruxin society. I felt marginalized and oppressed.”
Straker pounced. “Exactly—and you were all for neuters’ rights back then. You wanted to bring new ways to your people, more equality. So you should sympathize with me, even if I’m being technically inaccurate.”
“Not at all. Now that I’m male, I no longer give a flying fig for neuters’ rights. The traditional ways are the best. Stability and order! Everyone in their place! Females get to be on top. Males have all the fun. Neuters take the risks and do the boring, dirty work. What could be better?”
“Now that you’re a high-status male, you mean.”
“Of course. Just like in the Breakers, those on top stay on top. We are color-blind, gender-blind, sex-blind, species-blind, and merit-based. I, of course, have superior intelligence, superior physicals skills, and therefore superior merit. It’s only because of your numbers, your prejudices and your force of arms that humans still dominate the Breakers. If I had a Ruxin majority, I’d be in charge. Quod Erat Demonstrantum.”
/> “Sir...” Salishan muttered.
Straker abruptly remembered how pointless it was to argue with Zaxby, especially in public. It was fighting on Zaxby’s territory, with Zaxby’s weapons. “Whatever. Go ahead and try the transceiver—but Roentgen does all the talking to the vortex. All of it. You’re only there for tech support. Understood?”
“Derek Straker—”
“Discussion over, Zaxby. Follow orders. Keep your vidlink up and report on Roentgen’s attempt to communicate.”
“Aye aye, Your High Lord Breakership, sir.”
Straker waited. The vidlink picture of Zaxby—holo-link picture, really—performed various inscrutable actions with its tentacles. The ship continued on its course. The tension stretched to the point of its maximum, then seemed to ease as nothing of note happened for minutes upon end.
“Come on, Zaxby—”
“Wait. Roentgen says he’s in communication via neutrino exchange. The vortex is... barely sentient, somewhere between high animal and low human intelligence, with a rudimentary language composed of single words or two-word memes. It—perhaps we should call it she, ha ha—is benevolently curious about us. Roentgen says she is learning from him even now, at a high rate, much as an ape would learn sign language from a human teacher. He says they are extending their conversation with muons, and asks that we drop our shields to block less particulate radiation.”
“Do it, Mercy.”
Salishan’s face took on a strained quality, but complied. “Shield power to zero.”
“Shield power zero aye.”
“Roentgen says that is better. Our transceiver has gained greater throughput. He says... he says he wishes to fuse with the creature. I suggest allowing this.”
“Why, Zaxby? It might kill him.”
“Thorians can withstand extremely high energy levels, The vortex might kill him, but he believes he can persuade the creature to withhold its energy before he dies.”
“That’s nuts.”
“Thorians don’t have a Ruxin or human-normal level of self-preservation instinct. They’re explicitly willing to die to gain knowledge or achieve something new for their people—quite admirable, but in this case extremely unwise.”
“In this case?”
“We only have the one Thorian. Had we two, I’d support the idea, but he’s an invaluable and unique resource in our current circumstances, much as I am.”
Straker shook his head in dismay. “A resource. Zaxby, you never cease to amaze with your ruthlessness and amorality. Roentgen is a person—and an honorary Breaker now, in my view, not merely a resource.”
“One moment—Aha! General, he says he wishes to undergo fission.”
“Fission? You mean he wants to... ”
“Reproduce. Divide and create two Thorians.”
“That’s crazy.”
“Perhaps not. Perhaps it’s a way out of our dilemma.”
“How long would that take, anyway?”
Zaxby considered. “Given the proper conditions, perhaps two hours. In answer to your next question, yes, that would result in two identical, adult Roentgens, each with all the knowledge of the original... who is not actually the original, anyway, as this Roentgen is merely one of many fissionings stretching back to the first Thorian ancestor creature. In fact, he already fissioned, leaving another Roentgen behind on the Thorian ship in order to personally testify to your fusing—and to that of the Humbar Ternus.”
“Weird.”
“Indeed. Further, he suggests he eventually fission several times more, so there are—in his words, not mine—‘sufficient Roentgens to die as often as necessary.’ You see, this is one reason they are so often willing to risk death. As long as there has been a recent fission, the individual lives on in his twin-descendant.”
“We can’t ask him to do that,” Straker replied. Yet he found himself wavering. “There’s no reason to. If he can keep the thing from harming us, we’ll simply sail away and wave goodbye.”
“He says if he doesn’t, the vortex is likely to try to take him anyway, as a foolish child might seize and crush a tiny creature it became obsessed with. If he—or his new sibling, the Earthan language is insufficient—if he does this thing, he may well survive within the vortex long enough for her to bring him to a place he can prosper and again reproduce. Thorians need nothing but radiation to live.”
“That’s insane!”
“Dak kumlee,” Salishan muttered, or something like it that Straker didn’t quite catch. She turned to him and spoke in a low, intense voice. “It may seem insane to us, sir, but my people—my ancestors on Old Earth, I mean, who lived in the arctic—were thought strange by visitors too, for some of their customs. He’s an alien, General. Like Ruxins and Opters are alien. A human might not choose to do this—but maybe he would. You and I’ve both been willing to risk our lives for others. What if you had a perfect clone that could carry on if you died?”
“A perfect clone... ” Straker gazed into her face, her passionate visage reminding him of Carla’s, in a way. He thought about the golem. “I do know something about that, actually. That’s why I’m having trouble with it. But you’re right. It’s his choice, and he might save all our lives. So Zaxby, are you listening?”
“Of course.”
“Give him the go-ahead—after he’s fissioned. Set up whatever he needs for this... this craziness, and keep the bridge apprised. I’ll be down soon.”
In Zaxby’s laboratory, a converted cargo space one deck above the infirmary, Straker found the Ruxin in his four-armed, four-legged battlesuit, with two of his gauntlets removed and replaced by safety gloves. He was working on machinery strewn across one corner of the lab, assisted by two Ruxin neuters in radiation suits.
Roentgen stood nearby, unmoving, in his own suit.
“Stay ten meters back, General,” Zaxby said. “We’re working with exposed Uranium-235.”
“Is that a... a nuclear warhead you’re disassembling?”
“It was the most convenient source of fissionable material I could find on short notice.”
“Gods and monsters, just don’t blow us up.”
“There is zero chance of that. At least, not with atomic yield. The conventional explosives inside which initiate the nuclear blast are another story entirely—but I’m being careful. I calculate that there is less than a one-in-one-million chance of an accident.”
“Good odds with anyone but you.”
“Is that a pathetic attempt at humor?” Zaxby asked.
“Yup. Roentgen, would you come over here, please?”
The Thorian moved directly toward Straker, to stop in front of him. “I am here.”
“Yeah, uh... look, I’m not entirely sure what to say.”
“What is there to say?”
“If you were human, I’d say a lot.”
“Friend Derek,” Roentgen said, “say what you’d say if I were human.”
Straker wished he could clasp hands again with Roentgen, and then realized he could—sort of. He reached out to take the Thorian’s glove in a handshake, finding himself strangely moved. “We became friends when we fused. I don’t want you to die.”
“One of me will surely live. Perhaps both of me will live. You will see no difference. I will become two. I have fissioned before. I will fission again. This is right and natural. This is as it should be. Besides, fission has already happened since we fused.”
“Yeah, I heard, but I don’t really understand.”
“I whom you see before you am the sibling of the one who remained with my people. After you and my parent fused, it fissioned, that the memory of our fusing and the understanding between us would be safeguarded. Fissioning means the parent is no more, yet twin child-siblings remain. So you see, the Roentgen you see before you is already once removed from the Roentgen you experienced, though complete in every detail.”
“You... you’re not actually the same one... ”
“I am not, and I am. Perhaps you should think of m
e as half of myself, with the other half regrown—as if you were to lose half your body, and have it regenerated. Technically you would not be the same person, but functionally, you would be.”
Straker’s mind whirled, seizing on a minor detail. “What about a suit for your... ”
“My sibling, who will be me? It will not be necessary. In the future, if I fission again, Zaxby and I will make suits as needed. Fear not, Derek. Part of me extends into the future upon a wondrous adventure. The part of me to be left behind already envies that person. Don’t you also envy that person?”
“Maybe I should, but I don’t. I’m not an explorer. I’m a warrior and a protector.”
“Then accept this as the way I protect my friend and his people. I remind you again, as strange as it is to your kind, you will not lose me. In fact, much of Thorian culture revolves around bonding, reproduction, and descendancy, as does yours. Fission and fusion are as much spiritual journeys as physical. You experience love when two humans fuse, and also when you reproduce. You are willing to die for your descendants. There is great honor in this. We are not so different.”
Straker fought back a lump in his throat, telling himself that Roentgen wouldn’t be dead even if one of him died. In fact, it wasn’t sorrow that moved him—it was honor, that willingness to sacrifice self.
An old, familiar passage from Jilani’s holy book rose in his mind: Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
His friend was about to do that.
Straker swallowed a lump in his throat. “I accept that, friend Roentgen. I honor you for it. I want your sibling to know that, so that whatever happens with the one who fuses with the vortex, he knows it too.”
“He will be honored and comforted by the knowledge that part of me will remain here as your fusing-friend. You sacrificed a part of yourself for our fusing. I am willing to sacrifice a part of myself for this other fusing.”
Straker sighed. “Okay. That makes me feel better.” He let go of Roentgen’s gloved hand, wishing he could fuse again... but he knew that Thorians rarely fused more than once with any one person. To do so bordered on taboo.