by J. E. Gurley
The last Dastoran Thistleship hailed them. “Identify yourself.” The ship had suffered severe damage and was leaking atmosphere from multiple rents in her hull.
“Occam’s Razor, undertaking a mission for Lord Hromhada of the Tuus Clan,” Amissa answered.
“The Avatar,” the Dastoran ship’s captain exclaimed. Suddenly, the Dastoran ship powered up and shot directly at one of the Cha’aita ships attacking Occam’s Razor’s left flank.
Jazon watched helplessly as the Thistleship rammed the Cha’aita ship. Both ships exploded as a cascade of debris sprayed around them. Occam’s Razor’s shields held but just barely. The hull rattled as chunks of molten metal pounded it like a barrage of hailstones. That still left them outnumbered six to four, but the odds were reasonable, especially with Occam Razor’s firepower.
“The Trilock ship is Skipping away,” Amissa announced.
Jazon cursed under his breath as the Trilock Thistleship Skipped out of the battle. “Cowards,” he yelled uselessly at their disappearing wake.
“They scanned us before they Skipped,” Amissa informed him.
Our secret is out now. “Too late to stop them,” he told her.
The ship shuddered as it took a direct hit from a high-yield energy weapon. Many such hits and the shields would fail. A second Terran ship winked out of existence as a salvo of high-energy particle beams sliced into it. Jazon watched helplessly as the aft section of the ship tumbled out of control and fell toward the red giant. Tendrils of nuclear fire reached out and touched it, vaporizing it instantly.
“Poor bastards,” he muttered under his breath.
“Amissa. Take us close to the remaining Terran ship. We’ll concentrate our firepower with it.”
The Terran ship contacted him.
“This is Captain Venture of the Alliance Cruiser Hornet. Who are you?”
“Jazon Lightsinger, aboard a Dastoran research vessel.”
“You pack quite a punch for a research vessel.” There was a pause. “Did you say Lightsinger?”
“Former Alliance Marine Sergeant Jazon Lightsinger, A10054551,” he snapped crisply from a memory he had thought long buried.
“Sergeant Lightsinger? From the Battle of the Rim?”
Jazon’s heart hammered at that dark memory. “Yes. How do you know?”
“I served on the ship that picked you up, sergeant. What the hell ….”
“There’s no time to explain, Captain Venture,” he interrupted. The last thing he wanted to do was reminisce about old times best forgotten.
“Right. We seem to be overmatched, Lightsinger. I suggest you leave the area. Our engines are out of phase, and we can’t Skip. I’ll cover your ass until you’re away.”
“We should pull back together,” he suggested. “Use the sun as a shield and Skip.”
His vision faded as Occam’s Razor stopped dead in space.
“What the hell?”
“Power failure, Jazon,” Amissa informed him needlessly. “Weapons and engines are off-line.”
“Damn! We’re sitting ducks. Route all power, except life support to engines. Get us out of here.”
“My new priority is to protect Dastoran ships,” Amissa protested.
“There are no Dastoran ships. Get us out of here. Now!”
Jazon sighed silent thanks as he felt the ship begin to move, slowly at first, but picking up speed as Amissa routed power to the engines.
“Can we Skip?”
“Not yet.”
“What about the Terran cruiser? Show me.”
The Hornet was taking a pounding as it maneuvered to place itself between Occam’s Razor and the remaining Cha’aita vessels. After one ruthless salvo, its weapons went silent. As Jazon watched, three life pods ejected.
“See if we can ….”
“I believe the Hornet’s engines are overloading, Jazon.”
The ship began to shimmer, and then exploded in a brilliant flash of light. Fingers of plasma reached out and disintegrated the hapless life pods even as Jason had been about to suggest they attempt to recover them.
Occam’s Razor rolled over as if swept by a tidal wave of unseen energy.
“What happened?”
“The Terran ship tried to Skip in close proximity to the Cha’aita vessels with out of phase engines. It exploded, taking three of the Cha’aita with it. The other three ships are backing away.”
“He’s given us time. Use it.”
“Skipping,” Amissa announced a few seconds later.
The Cha’aita couldn’t follow them into interstitial space. The Hornet’s captain had sacrificed his ship and crew by initiating a Skip he knew it could never complete.
“Unable to Skip interstitially. I will initiate a long Skip instead.”
“Damn! Do so.”
The ship shuddered as the engines labored to make the Skip. Some critical relays had fused during the battle. Later, there would be an accounting for this fiasco. Jazon called out over the comm, “All hands to the galley in ten minutes.”
He had to find the traitor that had sabotaged the engines. He didn’t think he would have to look far.
11
“You and I for all vaulted width, know the giant Space is but a myth
Over miles and miles of pure deceit you and I have found our lips can meet.”
Affinity Collected Poems George William (A.E.) Russell
They were waiting for him in the galley, looking more like a hanging posse than a crew, blaming him for the near disaster. He wasted no time. Turning to Huumba, he said, “First, I wish to congratulate you, Protector, and your men for your action in the battle. Your training in the weapons pods paid off.”
Huumba bowed slightly. He seemed embarrassed by Jazon’s acknowledgment of his actions. “We did our duty only,” he replied humbly.
“You did it well. You are a credit to the Dastoran Fleet.” Jazon paused and looked around, his eyes coming to rest briefly on each one of them. “Now, there is a traitor among us.” His words had the calculated effect. Those gathered all stared at him briefly, and then looked at each other suspiciously before breaking into loud denials. He waved them silent. “Someone tampered with the power relays before the battle,” he continued. “It almost cost us our lives.”
Huumba stood and glared at Jazon. “Who would do such a thing?”
Jazon flicked his eyes at M’Kat. Huumba turned and fixed his attention on the Trilock ambassador. Jazon didn’t think Dastorans capable of revealing so much hatred as he saw in the Protector’s eyes. M’Kat said nothing but was obviously uncomfortable at the attention he was drawing from the gathering.
“Where were you before the battle, M’Kat?” Jazon queried.
“Why, in my cabin. You made it clear you did not wish my company.”
“I passed by your cabin on my way to the engine room. You weren’t there.”
“I …” He backed away from Jazon until he hit the bulkhead and stopped abruptly. “I stepped out for a few minutes to retrieve a bag from the hangar room.”
“We’ll see. Amissa,” he called out to the comm. She was busy guiding the ship and directing repair drones. “Pull up security scans prior to our Skip, please.”
“There are no scans for that time period, Jazon,” she replied.
Jazon was stunned. “What do you mean?”
“A twenty-minute gap exists for which there are no security camera logs.”
“That’s impossible. Who has access to the security override?”
“Only the captain and I,” she replied.
“No one else?”
“No one.”
M’Kat smiled, but Jazon’s fierce glare forced it from his face.
“Can you explain this gap?”
“No.”
M’Kat burst up from his seat. “You accuse me because you hate my species; yet you have no proof.” He turned to Huumba. “Why not ask him? He has more knowledge of this ship than he professes. Ask him of his whereabouts?”
“Huumba?”
“You dare accuse me?” Huumba challenged. “I was with my companions in the weapons room. We went straight from there to our cabins. If either of them had left, I would have noticed, and the same applies to me.” He faced Jazon squarely. “You go too far, human. What of your companions? What of our AI? It seems she has allowed a serious breach in security. How does she account for this?”
“I cannot,” Amissa answered.
Jazon was disappointed. His detective work had just gone down the toilet. His main suspect, M’Kat, claimed a valid alibi. The three Dastorans provided alibis for each other, as he suspected they would. He knew Ulrich was innocent, but now even Lyton and Amissa were suspects.
“Amissa, who authorized the change of priority to Skip to the aid of the Alliance ships?”
“That is unknown,” she answered slowly. “I felt an irresistible compulsion to Skip.”
“Great! You lose twenty minutes of security vid, and you take us into battle because you felt like it.” He was losing his temper, and he knew it. “Do you have any more surprises for us?”
“How can I know?” she replied logically.
This angered him even more. He searched for something or someone to strike out at, but knew any such action would simply intensify the tensions aboard the ship. “Run a complete ship’s diagnostics and patch it through to my quarters. When that has been completed, turn ship’s functions over to the computer and confine yourself to quarters until we can talk.” He couldn’t appear to be playing favorites. He turned to the crew. “That goes for all of you. Until I get to the bottom of this, I don’t want anyone running around the ship alone.”
He turned and stalked off; knowing he could have handled it better, but Amissa’s revelation had caught him off guard. If he couldn’t depend on her, the mission was over already.
It was possible Lord Hromhada had set in place a directive to aid Dastoran ships, but it should not have been a priority, and the ship’s captain should have a degree of discretion. It seemed out of character that Lord Hromhada would allow anything to jeopardize his precious Amissa. Could someone else have tampered with the ship, before departure, or perhaps with Amissa herself? All her knowledge came from neuro-link downloads and the few memories that survived her mind transfer to the new body. After six hundred years, Lord Hromhada could have programmed Amissa to do anything he wished. She had a degree of telepathy, but just how strong were her powers? Her ability to see farther than the ship’s sensors spoke of a degree of prescient ability heretofore unknown.
Jazon waited in his cabin until the diagnostics came on screen. As he suspected, the power surge had fused several critical relays. Occam’s Razor would not be Skipping into Interstitial space without major repairs. There was no indication of a twenty-minute security gap in the security system logs. It was as if those twenty minutes had not occurred. Only someone with an intimate knowledge of the ship’s security systems could do that, someone such as Amissa. It was time to confront her. He wasn’t going to enjoy it. Her emotional instability could endanger the mission, but if someone else were to blame, he had to find out whom, and quickly.
He knocked on her door twice before she answered. “You may enter, Captain Lightsinger.”
He didn’t fail to notice her use of his title instead of the more intimate, Jazon. Her frosty tone indicated her anger at having been relieved of her duties.
“How are you feeling?” he asked as he walked in.
Amissa was wearing a filmy gown and little else. It floated about her body like a sea mist. It could not disguise the obvious fact that her young body was maturing at a rapid rate. Jazon remembered his own uncontrollable hormonal changes as a youth and felt a twinge of sympathy. Amissa sat stiffly on the edge of her bed, an untouched plate of food on the bedside table. He wondered if she had slept at all since the beginning of the voyage.
Without looking in his direction, she replied, “You tell me, Captain.”
He didn’t have time for her post-pubescent brooding fits. “Look, you took us into the middle of a battle without asking me, and now twenty minutes of security vid is missing. During those twenty minutes, I suspect someone aboard this ship sabotaged the power relays, almost getting us all killed. I’m doing what I must to maintain the safety of this ship.”
He waited for her to speak, but she remained silent.
Is there something you wish to discuss with me?” he asked.
Her eyes cut into him like a laser. “I am what I was made to be. I am the ship’s AI. If you feel I cannot function in this capacity, then remove me from duty.”
“Where we’re going, we need you. I need you. I can’t rely on a computer. Without you the mission fails.”
Indeed, that was the crux of the problem. If they had to abandon the mission, of what use to Lord Hromhada would he and Ulrich be? Knowing the secrets they did, they were a liability. Somehow, Jazon didn’t think Lord Hromhada would simply pay them off and shrug his shoulders.
Tears welled up in Amissa’s eyes as she burst out, “I know that. Don’t you think I want to remember? It feels as if someone has taken a scalpel and sliced out part of my mind. I can’t explain what I did. I just knew I had to do it.”
Jazon took a chair across from the bed. As she wiped at her eyes with a tissue, he looked around her cabin. On her desk was a small jade statue of an oriental dancing girl. Only one painting relieved the otherwise stark contrast of the wood-paneled walls, a silk print with bold colors. He stared at the painting trying to remember ….
“That painting …,” he burst out. “It’s the one I saw in my dreams when Lord Hromhada contacted me.”
She turned to look at it. “It is mine; or rather it belonged to the first Lady Amissa. She brought it with her from Earth. It has always hung in my room on Lord Hromhada’s ship. I brought it with me. It seemed to comfort me somehow.”
“It’s the one in my dreams. Lord Hromhada is sitting in front of it, calling to me.” He tore his eyes from the painting and focused them on Amissa. “Lord Hromhada’s telepath – have you ever seen her?”
Amissa shook her head. “No. Why?”
The germ of an idea was forming in his head. If correct, it could explain much.
He took a deep breath. “I think Lord Hromhada’s telepath is you.”
Amissa looked stunned. “Impossible. I would know.”
“Like you remember the missing twenty minutes or why you Skipped us into possible danger?”
“No! I … It’s not possible.”
Jazon continued. “I think the Dastorans chose Lady Amissa for her psychic ability. In six hundred years, there’s no telling how refined that power has become in you. They want you for your psi powers, to be their new AI, to guide them through interstitial space. That’s why that Dastoran captain referred to you as ‘Avatar’.”
Amissa sat speechless as she listened to his reasoning.
“This … this feeling we have for each other, at least the other Amissa. I think Lord Hromhada planted something in my mind when you and I, damn, she and I were linked telepathically. He used her to get to me. Maybe it backfired on him. That’s why she gave her life to save mine.”
He paused and laughed. “That must have ruffled Lord Hromhada’s feathers.”
As the reality of what he was saying struck home, Jazon’s carefully controlled emotions erupted. He fell to his knees and began to sob uncontrollably, as he realized what Amissa VI had done for him. She had died for him because she loved him. Amissa placed Jazon’s head in her lap, stroking his head, trying to comfort him.
“Shhh. Don’t weep, Jazon. She is not dead. All she was is still within me. I know how she felt because I feel the same way. These feelings come to me like wisps of cloud on a windy day. If only I could grasp them all before they tatter.”
She touched a finger to his cheek and wiped a tear. “I love you, Jazon, as she loved you. These feelings are real, not remembered. I’m not a little girl. I am a six-hundred-year-old-woman with
the memories of all my previous lives locked within my mind. Like a dam filled with water to the bursting point, they seek to escape, drop by drop, thought by thought; each tiny rivulet merges until a tide washes over me, submerging who I am.”
Gently, she lowered her face until it was a finger's width from Jazon’s. “Please make love to me, Jazon. It will reunite the Amissa you knew and me. I need such a catharsis to become what I was intended, to become whole.”
She kissed him. Slowly, almost reluctantly at first, Jazon responded. With his eyes closed, her smell, her voice, everything about her told him it was his Amissa, not some copy hastily thrown together to complete the mission. When his lips met hers, it was if no time had passed between their first meeting and this minute. Nothing else mattered.
Nothing else existed. Time had ceased in the small space in which their two bodies clung together so desperately; he, because he needed her as he needed life, and she because it was the moment for which she had been nurtured.
Her naked body was flawless; a canvas on which Lord Hromhada’s culture tanks had perfected the art of flesh. Her taste was exquisite, a remembrance, or all that made life worth living, sweet and delicious. Her breath fluttered in her chest as if birthing the four winds of the world. Her aroma changed to that of the first blooms of prickly pear cactus in April when the air of the high mesas was clean, washed by the spring rains. He could feel the thunder from a passing storm in his chest, or was it his heart, beating savagely for this girl.
The thunder became the beating of a medicine drum, an antelope hide stretched tight over a cottonwood log he had dutifully carved and hollowed. Each beat sent shudders through his body as if spasms of memory flung into his consciousness like arrows from a hunters’ bow. The room misted, like the air above the cool flowing streams of his homeland on a cold autumn morning. It slowly dissolved, receded into the future.
He was naked, alone, hungry and frightened, waiting for an animal spirit guide. None came. He felt abandoned by both worlds – the spirit world of his people and the self-serving and spiritual aloof world of the White Man. He had seen the tarantula crawling across the rocks, breaking the strength of his spirit circle of corn and white sage. Anger grew in his young body, fed by his lack of faith and his lack of vision.