Adrift

by W. Michael Gear

  “Yeah. The farthest one from Transluna.” Dek studied his thumbnail. “Three years transit time just to get there, and her contract was for twenty years. Assuming she’s still alive.”

  Talina cocked her head, considering. “Guess there’s worse things in the universe than quetzals and TriNA.”

  “The part that still haunts me is that when my father told me to sign the order, I didn’t even argue. Didn’t try to bargain. I just signed the damn thing without so much as a peep.”

  “You were fifteen.”

  “I was a Taglioni.”

  32

  Felix jerked awake in the dark room, pulled rudely from the peculiar dream when his leg began to spasm so hard it shook his whole body. Just as he started to slip off to sleep, his leg jumped again. Hard. Like he was kicking something. And whatever it was, he sure hadn’t ordered his leg to do it.

  Anything but. He’d been in open turquoise water, bobbing and riding the waves while sunlight filtered down around him. Not only that, he’d been listening to music—an eerie singing sound of rising and falling melodies unlike anything he’d heard the adults play from their pads or recorders. Remarkable sound had filled the water, a high symphonic humming augmented by thumps, low booms, and something that might have been called squealing mixed with a yodel.

  Outside of the magic of it, he was slightly frustrated because he knew it was telling him something. That understanding was so close, just barely out of his grasp. Like the times when adults were talking, using words that sounded sort of like words he knew.

  His leg continued to quiver like it had a mind of its own.

  He glanced around in the darkness, aware that Kim Yee snored softly where he slept with Mother in the big bed. They always slept better after sex. The faint hiss of the air conditioning was reassuring. The room still felt strange after Ashanti. But Felix had to admit he so enjoyed having his own bed on the other side of the room.

  Like tonight, it was easier to ignore Mother and Yee. After the lights were out, they’d whispered just soft enough that Felix couldn’t make out the words but could still hear the concern. Only when they thought Felix was asleep had Yee hushed mother and shifted his body onto hers.

  They had tried to be quiet. Felix couldn’t help but sense that tonight was different. Almost desperate, right up to the intensity of the sounds they tried so hard to stifle. Then their panting slowed, and the rustle of the blankets finally went still.

  Desperate. Yes, he’d felt that way as he finally drifted off to sleep. Only to dream that wondrous dream.

  Felix closed his eyes again, floating in the sea as the sunlight glowed blue and gleaming in the water around him. He had never floated, never been in water. But now he lived it, rocking, carried by the waves in a universe of movement.

  His fingers tingled, and he extended his arms, reaching out for the sunlight on the water. As he did, his fingers expanded, growing slick, and when he could see them in the sunlight, they were slippery and green-blue and had become the algae.

  And that was all right. If he turned into algae, he could float forever in the golden sunlight and remarkable blue waves . . .

  33

  Supper that night in the Pod cafeteria was subdued. Michaela struggled with shock and disbelief. Lara Sanz had been forty-three, with a PhD in crustal geology. Her expertise had been in seismology, hydrophonics, and mapping. She had only begun to collect data from the few buoys that had been deployed. Her work would have provided the overview, the framework into which the rest of the Maritime Unit’s research would fit.

  Lara had always sat at the back table with Dik Dharman. They’d never officially married, but during the last couple of years in Ashanti, the two had formed a monogamous bond. Now Lara’s chair next to Dik was achingly empty. The man looked on the verge of emotional collapse, his face working, hands knotting and twisting his coveralls. His eyes puffed out, red and swollen from weeping.

  Who could blame him? They were all reeling. Michaela might have allowed herself to topple into the endless pool of grief but for the hard-blue stare in Kalico Aguila’s eyes.

  What the hell was the woman made of, anyway? Sialon? But that look in her eyes couldn’t be mistaken, it practically screamed, Don’t you dare.

  Jym Odinga, the ichthyologist, had been sobbing off and on through the meal. For a while, back in the early years aboard Ashanti, he and Lara had cohabited in their upper bunk in the rear of the Maritime quarters. Maybe he’d never fully gotten over his fondness for Lara, even though he’d moved on to the curious relationship he had with Casey Stoner and Tobi Ruto.

  First Shinwua and now Lara Sanz. Both without warning.

  Michaela figured that enough of them were finished with the evening meal that she should speak. She took a deep breath and stood, calling, “If I could have your attention. I know it’s a horrible shock. Lara was, in many ways, the best of us. Her loss is a terrible blow, not only to us personally, but to the project itself.”

  “How did it happen?” Dik cried out, as if her telling of it this time would be any different than the last.

  Aguila stood. “She didn’t obey orders.”

  “What orders?” Bryan Atumbo asked. “As I hear it, she was right beside you.”

  Mumbles of assent filtered through the room. The children were staring wide-eyed, looking, well, somehow strange. Even little Toni, normally a self-absorbed three-year-old boy, was watching her with the most peculiar focus. The eerie, half-possessed-and-almost-alien stare sent an uneasy shiver through her.

  Kalico rose from the table and stood at ease, hands behind her, rocking back and forth on her feet as she said, “Dr. Sanz was told to go no farther than a couple of paces from the seatruck. The spot where she was taken was a good fifty meters away, less than ten meters from the edge of the pad. Whatever grabbed her was most likely hidden in the tumble of trees and overburden. No clue as to what it was, and being on freshly scraped bedrock, there were no tracks. Best guess as to the predator? Step Allenovich and I suspect a quetzal.”

  “How come you didn’t see it?” Varina Tam demanded. “It had to be right there! It grabbed her out in the open!”

  “Could have been there the whole time, watching, camouflaged to match the piled rock, soil, and trees.” Kalico raised her hands to stifle any protest. “People, this is Donovan. It plays for keeps. Get it through your heads that you have to think differently. Act differently.”

  “We’re not trained for this!” Anna Gabarron snapped from her chair by the door. “I’m an aquatic chemist, not a space marine. I’m here to do science, not bundle about carrying a big gun and looking to shoot things before they eat me. You’re the Supervisor. It’s your responsibility to ensure that we can do our work without danger. So instead of standing up there lecturing us about rules, why don’t you call your Corporate Mine and dispatch some people out here who can take care of us? That’s your responsibility to us as citizens.”

  To Michaela’s disquiet, her people began to applaud, nodding in affirmation.

  Kalico fixed her steely glare on Gabarron, who, as usual, was too socially incompetent to understand the ramifications. “My people have enough on their hands as it is. Corporate Mine is not here to provide services that you yourselves can perform. My responsibility is not to keep you safe. It is to manage Corporate ventures on Donovan, not play nursemaid to people who can’t adapt to Donovan’s challenges.”

  “Then perhaps we’d be better off on our own,” Gabarron declared stiffly. “We did well enough on Ashanti by relying on ourselves. And here we have a better hydroponics system that we can recharge. Not to mention an ocean full of resources. So, if The Corporation refuses to honor its responsibilities to its citizens, then perhaps cutting ties, as Port Authority did, will be in our better interests.”

  “Wait!” Michaela cried, raising her hands before Aguila came unglued. She stepped forward, calling, “Since her
arrival, the Supervisor has gone out of her way to—”

  “She’s been present at each death!” Gabarron cried, pointing a finger at the smoldering Aguila. “That’s the constant! She was standing right there when Shinwua was taken, the same for Lara. If she’s so smart about Donovan and danger, why is she always a little too late, and more than a little short when it comes to saving our people?”

  Mutterings came from around the room. All but the children, who seemed to be watching with those new eerily wide-eyed and emotionless expressions. What the hell was it about them?

  “Fine!” Aguila snapped, eyes gone fierce. “If you want, I can shut this whole thing down.”

  “Supervisor, please,” Michaela turned. “We’re just a little upset. To have so many losses, so quickly. It’s emotion talking, not—”

  “Is it?” Bill Martin asked from where he stood in the kitchen door. He looked at the now-sobbing Dik Dharman. “I hate agreeing with Anna, but how many of us are going to lose loved ones if we keep doing things the Supervisor’s way? I understand her responsibilities, but we’re the Maritime Unit. We’re the ones trained in oceanography, marine biology, and the functioning of the Pod and its equipment.”

  “Supervisor Aguila is an administrator,” Kevina Schwantz stated as she stood and looked around the room. “Key word: Administrator. The role of a Supervisor is to oversee the big picture. She might know what’s best when it comes to Corporate Mine and digging holes, but we are the experts when it comes to the oceans. Will we make mistakes? Sure. But I think we’re better equipped to adapt our methodologies and equipment to Donovan’s maritime environment.”

  Yoshimura rose even before Kevina stopped speaking, and said, “Let’s not be too hasty. I was out there the day the scimitar grabbed Shin. The Supervisor’s instincts were correct. We just didn’t know what a scimitar was. What it was capable of.”

  “And Shin’s dead!” Bill Martin cried passionately. “The person I loved more than life was needlessly and cruelly taken from me. In my nightmares do you know what I see? It’s his body in those jaws. That’s my partner. The man I loved with all my heart.”

  To Michaela’s surprise, Aguila hadn’t exploded. Instead she stood with one hand on her pistol butt, a flint-like hardness in her half-slitted eyes.

  “Supervisor,” Michaela told her, stepping close. “They’re just . . .”

  “I say we go it on our own,” Dharman interjected. The man’s jaw trembled, his cheeks tear-damp and shining in the light. “It worked on Ashanti, it’s best for us now.”

  Gabarron cried, “Who says we do it as we did on Ashanti? We’ve always functioned the best when we did so as a family. I’m with Kevina. Let the Supervisor supervise from Corporate Mine, but we need to run things the way we think they need to be run. Who’s with me? Raise your hands.”

  Michaela’s chest went tight, seeing the growing determination in the expressions, in the defiant looks and thin-set lips. She knew them well enough to mark that instant when they had reached a consensus. One by one, the hands went up. The last to lift his was Yoshimura, who was plainly conflicted.

  Maybe, if Shinwua had been there to back her, she might have persuaded them to give the Supervisor another chance.

  Michaela shot a desperate glance at Aguila, saw the ghost of a deadly smile flicker across the woman’s lips.

  Michaela told her. “I don’t know where this came from, but maybe after we can come to terms with what’s happened to Shin and Lara . . .”

  Aguila’s stare might have been a laser the way it burned through Michaela. “Director, I hope you and your people know what they’re doing. They remind me of a flock of sheep. The last time The Corporation brought sheep to Donovan it didn’t work out well.”

  “Supervisor, don’t close us down. Give us a little time to come to grips with our loss, work some things out.”

  “You still don’t get it, do you?” Aguila still had her hand propped on her pistol. “Sure, I could close you down. Bring a couple of my marines in armor and load you all up to go work in Corporate Mine. Cut the Pod loose from the reef and haul it to the mainland.”

  “Please, don’t.”

  The room had gone deathly quiet, people straining to hear.

  Aguila took a quick measure of the room. Said, “Once, I would have done just that. Ordered this place evacuated. Shot Gabarron for mutiny and stuck the rest of you in the most menial jobs I could find for the rest of your contracts.” She paused to let the import of her words sink in. “I’m not the same person I was back in those early days. Since then, Donovan has provided me with a macabre sense of humor. I’ll give you my final decision in the morning.”

  So saying, she turned on her heel, boots rapping on the sialon as she strode from the room.

  Michaela felt her guts turn to sand, sank into the chair, and closed her eyes. What the hell had just happened? How had this day gone so wrong?

  When she finally looked up, it was to see her people talking, looking nervous as they stood in clusters, many laying reassuring hands on Bill Martin and Dik Dharman. Sharing their sympathy.

  Gabarron had a self-satisfied smile on her face—as if she’d just achieved some remarkable victory.

  Where they were scattered around the room, the children were still watching with that unnerving and blank-eyed stare.

  Aguila can close us down. What the hell am I going to do?

  34

  Kalico awakened to a stiff pounding on her door. Dragging herself from a troubled sleep, she threw back the covers, calling, “I’m coming.”

  Memory of last night returned, and with it the fact that she’d just been present at a mutiny. The Maritime Unit had tossed her out. They hadn’t quite gone as far as the Donovanians at Port Authority after they’d killed Clemenceau, but this was just a step short of that.

  Or is it? Kalico wondered as she pulled on her coveralls and secured the utility belt at her waist. She pulled her hair back, pinned it, and loosened her pistol in its holster. Stepping to the door, she flicked on the camera, and to her relief, found only Michaela Hailwood on the other side. Not an armed mob with assassination on their minds.

  Kalico opened the door, greeting, “Director. I’m hoping that cooler heads have reassessed the situation and retracted that bit of theater we witnessed.”

  Michaela’s face reflected anything but relief. “Dik couldn’t sleep. Checked the radio. Corporate Mine is calling. Desch Ituri is desperate to talk to you. There’s been a cave-in the Number Three. People are missing, and they’ve evacuated the mine shaft. Ituri says it’s bad.”

  Kalico’s stomach sank. “People missing? Who?”

  “I don’t know. Ituri just told Dik that he needed to—”

  “Get the seatruck ready. I mean now! Tell your good friend Dik to tell Desch I’m on the way. And he needs to tell Makarov to have my A-7 at the beach pad, waiting, when I get there.”

  “Of course, Supervisor. I’ll have some food prepared and ready for you to—”

  “After last night, I’m not sure I want to trust my health to anything Bill Martin might fix.”

  Michaela’s eyes widened, her lips parting. “Certainly you don’t think he’d—”

  “Director, I don’t know what the hell to think. Now, I’m packing my bag, and I’m going to want that seatruck waiting on the deck by the time I get there. So move!”

  Kalico slammed the door in the woman’s face. Not that she had a lot to pack. She washed, threw her few things into the bag, and all the while was picturing the Number Three. That miserable hole through crumbling and dripping rock.

  It’s cost me people? Who? How many?

  More familiar faces, human beings with whom she had joked, eaten, and shared. Companions who had given their all in the effort to make Corporate Mine into a miracle.

  When she stepped out onto the dock where the seatrucks were stored, a stif
f wind blew in from the east. Given the looks of the white-capped swells, it was pushing a two-meter sea. Where she waited beside the seatruck, a stiff gust tried to push Michaela Hailwood off balance and ruffled the woman’s coveralls. Up in the seatruck’s cab, Bryan Atumbo sat at the wheel, his dark face a mixture of excitement and apprehension.

  Kalico Aguila let her gaze shift from one to the other of them.

  “I’m so sorry for all of this,” Hailwood told her. “I don’t know where all that anger came from. Shin dying the way he did, it sort of acted like a catalyst. Then, to have Lara go like that? It’s like they have lost all of their direction. When Anna said we should go it alone, they just all jumped on it, as if they’d found something to cling to even if it was wrong.”

  Kalico grabbed her hair as the breeze tried to whip it around her face. “You have something to ponder here, Michaela. If your people are so lost, if they’re looking for something, it’s your job to find it for them. If there’s a failure here, it’s yours.”

  The woman’s dark brown eyes widened, then hardened. “Don’t lay this on me, Supervisor. I did everything I was supposed to. I got my people out of Deck Three, kept them unified. I got them to Donovan. No one prepared me for what we’d find here. It’s The Corporation’s fault. They should have given me the tools I’d need to keep my people safe.”

  Kalico chuckled. “Shig Mosadek once told me that if I could overcome my cultural baggage, look past who I used to be back in the Solar System, I could accomplish great things on Donovan. Maybe you can, too.”

  “Are you going to shut us down?” Michaela asked. “I saw how mad you were last night. Are you going to take it out on us?”

  Kalico staggered under a gust that flapped her pants against her legs. “I thought about it. On the other hand, when people have made up their minds and won’t listen to reason, sometimes you just have to let them run headlong off the cliff. Maybe I’ve been spending too much time around these damned libertarians. Tell your people I said they’ve got their chance. Welcome to Donovan.”