"What?"
Jantine’s face was just on the other side of the holo, and her hands must have strayed into the projection. The equations spread out around them, and Janbi had to crane his neck to find the ones he needed to verify.
When he did, he shook the handheld very delicately, not wanting to disturb the image any more than it already was.
"I’ve been running a decryption program on the Earther communications network. Doctor Harrison gave me his access codes for the institute’s library, from which I was able to decipher his clearance codes for the Reclamation council."
Jantine nodded, and Janbi knew she was extrapolating from his words the kinds of networks they could now access. It seemed that she too needed a challenge to pit herself against, which wasn’t all that surprising given how he’d developed the same personality trait.
"Ever since we exited the debris field I’ve been trying to figure out what happened to the other container. After the crash the shuttle’s core was too compromised to run this kind of search, but the ones they have here are a lot more powerful and we have access to a very sophisticated microwave communications grid.
"This program," he said, indicating the equations with his stump, "has analyzed all encrypted transmissions moving through the network for the last seven hours. And I’m fairly sure I know where they are."
"JonB, are you telling me you know where the sleepers landed?"
Janbi didn’t take offense when Jantine used the mocking designation, taking it for an excited utterance.
"No. As far as I can tell, they haven’t landed at all. I think one of the ships that fired missiles at us recovered it, and has been trying to find a way inside ever since. There are multiple transmissions referencing ‘modules,’ and quite a few of them contain the word ‘Chimera.’ If we can find that ship, we can find our people. Jantine, we don’t have to be alone!"
Janbi put the handheld down, raised his hand into the holo and made a fist. The holo obediently disappeared, giving him an unobstructed view of Jantine’s face.
Her eyes were alive, and a tight smile teased the edges of her mouth. And the same eagerness she was feeling was alive in him as well. But he was completely unprepared when she leaned across the table, grabbed his head, and kissed him.
Janbi had to keep his hand on the desk to avoid falling, but he found it very pleasant to let Jantine maneuver herself around the side of the desk while maintaining contact with his mouth. Once they were next to one another, she drew him into an even tighter embrace than before, this time kissing him so forcefully that despite Mordecai Harrison’s assurances, he couldn’t breathe at all.
Mira
"WELL, MY DEAR," MORDECAI HARRISON SAID, "YOU have some very interesting readings here. I’d like to talk to you about them, if you’re feeling up to it."
Hearing Mordecai’s Harrison’s voice made Mira think of every time her grandfathers had come to visit. But unlike the Pappys Harlan, Mordecai wasn’t here to hug her or slip her candy when her mother wasn’t looking. He was a scientist, and if Captain Martin was correct, he was the foremost expert on the Transgenic virus in a thousand light years.
But from where she was lying on her bed, watching him absently tug on his wild white hair while his staff moved around the Institute’s infirmary, he looked more like a character from a fairy tale than a preeminent scientist and statesman.
"I’m a lot better now that I’ve had some rest. My head’s a bit fuzzy, but it doesn’t feel like it’s going to explode anymore. After the last few days, that’s one heck of an improvement."
Mordecai’s smile was as devastating as his voice, and Mira was having problems reconciling the avuncular professor with the High Councilor. She didn’t remember his selection to the council, or even if she’d voted for him. But it was easy enough to see how he’d earned the total respect of all the Institute’s staff.
I just wish the captain had told me more about you before everything got turned upside-down.
To be perfectly honest, Mira felt great. Part of it was being out of her hardsuit, but another factor was the incredibly soft and decidedly non-regulation hospital clothes she had on. They were some kind of cotton blend, with an almost invisible set of seams on each side so the attendants could "open her up" if necessary to attach more ice-cold probes. They’d removed most of those before she went to sleep, but Mira could still feel a couple of them in uncomfortable places on her chest and back.
"Well, that’s the thing. You were dangerously dehydrated, and even though we pumped you full of fluids, you burned through every kind of sedative we tried to keep you asleep. So Paul had the bright idea to get you drunk instead. Apologies if you’re not a bourbon fan, but since we had some on hand it easy to synthesize and introduce into your bloodstream."
"Umm, thanks?"
The last time she’d done any serious drinking was with Tommy, and she only remembered that because of the ribbing her fellow cadets gave her when she came back on duty with a very distinctive body odor. Mira offered up a silent prayer that she wouldn’t have the same reaction this time.
"Paul’s a fairly intuitive fellow. In another forty years or so, he might even be ready to take over this place from me. If I’m tired of it by then, that is."
A tall man snorted from several meters away, where he was examining a bank of monitors attached to Katra’s biobed. The Gamma’s injuries were far more extensive than anyone but Janbi and Carlton knew, but apparently she’d threatened them in some pretty inventive ways not to tell Jantine during their starlight run.
"He’s just jealous because I’m so much better looking than he is. Hello, Lieutenant Harlan. I’m Paul Czegeny, but apparently you know that already."
Mira smiled. He was good-looking, if a bit skinny for her taste. But compared to the faces she’d been looking at for the last three days, he was a duck among swans.
"Not your last name, but I do recognize your voice. It’s . . . complicated."
Paul shrugged in a very Harrison-like manner, and she wondered how long the two men had been working together. Mordecai held out a medicomp to Paul, leaning against her bed for support as he put his cane aside. The younger man swiveled his head between the monitors and the smaller device, then gave another shrug. His expression wasn’t quite a frown, but it conveyed a similar message.
They don’t know what to make of me. And as long as I’m sidelined by Paul’s whiskey derivative, I can’t use my abilities to figure out why. I can almost feel them, but after my emotional overload up on the surface, I’m okay with that for now.
Mira took a few seconds to consider this new development. It seemed foolish for her abilities to be counteracted by such a common substance, but she didn’t have any referents for intoxicants in the Colonies. She’d have to ask Carlton the next time he stopped by to check on Katra. Bringing the matter up to Serene didn’t seem right, especially if her current state gave her any advantages she didn’t know about yet.
Paul stepped forward and took the medicomp from Mordecai, but he didn’t seem pleased with what he saw.
"So as near as I can figure, Miss Harlan, you have two active strains of the T-Virus in your system. Neither matches the one your friend the Type 13 has, and—"
"Katra, Paul. And she’s a Gamma, not a Type 13. Whatever information you have on the Colonials needs to be updated."
If Paul was chagrined by her words, he gave no sign of it. "Your friend Katra the Gamma, then. But you and she share some remarkable healing abilities that . . . that the young man who is so insistent on being called Janbi doesn’t. Does she have . . ."
Paul waved the medicomp in a small circle near his head, and Mira smiled and shook her head.
"Okay, then. I can’t explain either of you. But one of the active strains in your body matches the one in that little girl—Serene, is it? And unlike you, her readings are stable. Is she a Gamma too?
Interesting. Now I definitely need to talk to Carlton.
Mira wasn’t sure whether or not t
o tell Paul the truth about Serene, but as she’d been prepared to hand the girl off to Mordecai sight unseen several days ago, she reasoned that there was nothing to be gained by silence.
"No. She’s something else. An Alpha, but she does share my empathic abilities. More complicated stuff—I really don’t understand it myself. Jantine, Janbi and Carlton are Betas; Artemus is a Delta. Jason and . . . well, the big fellas are Omegas, but don’t expect a lot of conversation out of them. In fact, they’re the reason I ended up like this, so if they ever decide to tell me why, I’ll be sure to pass it along."
Paul nodded, entering data into the medicomp. She thought she detected a hint of curiosity from him, but it was nothing compared to the burst of curiosity she felt from Mordecai. It was strong enough to bring back a bit of her headache, but when she tried to "feel" more, nothing happened.
Good stuff, that bourbon.
"Are you sure about that, Mira?"
Huh?
"Sure about what?
"You said Serene was an Alpha. Is that true?"
Mira nodded. Jantine would be furious, but after what she pulled in the courtyard the Beta could lump it. Mira wasn’t quite ready to forgive her yet, but if they couldn’t trust Mordecai’s people there wasn’t really anything they could do about it.
"Yes, sir, I am. Captain Martin had more information, but he was sure this was the place to bring her. As for the virus, well he told me ‘she wasn’t done cooking.’ Something about how she’d spent so long in suspended animation that the rest of the human race just moved on, and so did the virus. I’ll admit, the distinction is a bit beyond me, but that’s what he said. If we can get at the data he left for us, we’ll know more."
"I’ve asked a friend to come to the institute to help with that," Mordecai said. "But I think I can explain what he meant, even if I can’t explain how you ended up like this."
"I’m all ears, Mordecai. But my head’s starting to hurt again, could I have some more of whatever it was you gave me? I don’t recall dreaming about a glass and ice, so I’m assuming I didn’t drink it."
Paul leaned forward and pushed a button on the side of her bed, and a few seconds later she was feeling no pain. It was just enough to knock the edges off the hurricane in her head, but not so much that she couldn’t follow what Mordecai was saying.
"So it’s like this. That girl, that marvelously strange girl, is from another world and another time. I can’t say definitively where and when, but Paul, myself, and everyone here on Earth has a very stable strain of the T-virus. We see maybe a handful of minor expressions each year on Earth, and a few more in orbit. It’s just enough to keep the grants coming in and rules in place about athletics and military service. I’m amazed that you have had such a complete transformation, but even more so that you’ve been infected twice."
"That’s the part I don’t understand, doctor. I’m not going to say that’s impossible, since you’re telling me it’s true. But what they told us in school was that once you went active, you couldn’t be infected again."
Mordecai’s head was like a child’s bobbing toy, and he started waving his hands around in the air as he spoke.
"I know! That’s the best part. Serene’s strain isn’t causing your abilities, it’s magnifying them. And none of the others are showing the same effects. You two are a couple of fascinating case studies, and I think we should keep you both under observation for a while just to make sure nothing happens to you."
Mira pushed herself up on the bed, feeling the sensors attached to her skin shifting. Then a spike of pain forced its way through the pleasant bourbon haze and past her strong desire not to be poked and prodded for the rest of her life. She closed her eyes and gasped, and she felt strong hands catch her before she could fall off the side of the bed.
~Mira, what do you know about Chimera?~
Mira was surprised by Janbi’s sudden intrusion into her thoughts—and the very vivid mental image of his immediate surroundings that accompanied it. When she opened her eyes, Mordecai was shining some kind of small light on her face.
"Chimera? But that’s a myth!" Her voice was much louder than she’d intended.
"Hmm? What’s that, Mira?"
Harrison’s upturned eyebrow was almost comical, but Mira was too confused by both Janbi’s question and why he’d be asking it at this exact moment to answer him.
"Something above your paygrade, Mordecai," said a reedy voice from her Academy days. All activity in the room came to a halt. "And yours too, Harlan, but we’ll get to that in a moment. Now, does one of you young people have an explanation as to why I had to come down the gravity well in the middle of the afternoon, instead of having a nice cup of tea in my wardroom?"
Mira was off the bed and standing at attention before she fully processed the appearance of Commodore Ykaterina Maranova in the room, resplendent in her dress blacks with the left half of her tunic almost completely covered in service ribbons.
In contrast, Mira’s shapeless cotton outfit was woefully inadequate to receive a senior flag officer, but that didn’t stop her from saluting. Or trying to, anyway. Between the fading pain of Janbi’s unexpected message and the bourbon, she was having trouble standing up straight.
When Maranova stalked over and glared up at her, Mira felt just as awkward as she had on their first meeting, when, as a very junior midshipman, she arrived late and hung over for a fleet tactics symposium and had been called on to answer questions about the final days of the Tranquility uprising for the rest of a very long afternoon.
"What happened to your face, girl? It looks like someone took a brush and scoured off all your character."
Mira hadn’t fully seen her own face for several days, save for chance glances at herself in the mods’ faceplates. But she knew what the commodore meant.
"Well? How about it?"
"Ma’am, at 1245 ship time on July 17th, a then unidentified object made an unauthorized hyperspace emergence . . ."
Ykaterina
"HARLAN, I’VE LISTENED TO THIS STORY TWICE NOW, and it’s still the biggest bunch of bullshit I’ve ever heard. Even the parts of it about me are bullshit, and damned if I don’t believe every word."
Looking around the storage area at the variety of gennies present, Commodore Ykaterina Maranova felt every minute of her age.
Hell, all of the gennies added together might come close to my age, and that’s a generous estimate.
They were something to see, she’d give them that. Tall ones with extra arms wearing slick black bodysuits, and even bigger ones in tattered coveralls with orange skin and decidedly inhuman faces, one of whom was serving as a living chair for a little girl with impossibly smooth skin and an oversized head.
The child, Serene, looked much different than she had the first time Maranova had seen her, floating in a sleeper unit aboard Aloysius Martin’s shuttle a few weeks back. She was wearing a very baggy set of shapeless cotton scrubs like the ones Harlan and the more human-looking gennies had on.
That the Alpha child and Harlan were here and Aloysius wasn’t stung a bit, but Martin was a career man, principled. That he’d gone out on his own terms said a lot about him, and those he trusted.
Here and now, Mira Harlan and the strange faces she’d surrounded herself with were watching her with a mixture of surprise and trepidation.
What the hell am I supposed to do with this lot? Harlan I have to arrest, I have to pretend Mordecai isn’t committing treason against himself, and if I don’t shoot the gennies for breaking the Exile I have to find someone to arrest me!
But far and away the worst part of watching beings from another star system interacting with humans was listening to one of her prize students speak on their behalf, and as one of them.
"Ma’am, I’m just as much a part of it as you are, and I don’t understand it all either. But Captain Martin brought me into this, dropped your name, and sent me the long way round here to the Harrison Institute. I was in no way expecting you to walk in that door, b
ut I’m glad you did."
Maranova snorted.
"That’s all well and good, but it still doesn’t explain why I’m here. Mordecai all but ordered me to come down and play a game of chess, and when I arrived what do I see but him giving care and comfort to not only one of my protégés but also the author of a transmission that has the fleet on high alert and me planted in orbit for the last three days trying to determine whether or not a state of war exists with the Outer Colonies.
"So here I am, waiting for an explanation no one seems to have. And let me tell you this for free, Mordecai, standing around while these children stare at me is definitely not my idea of a relaxing afternoon."
Maranova scanned the more normal faces among the gennies, in particular Jantine, or JTN-whatever the hell her number was. She’d cleaned up in a hurry, but there was no hiding her freshly fucked face, or the shit-eating grin on the one-handed boy standing next to her.
That girl would just as soon spit in my eye as shake my hand. There’s some definite promise there.
"So what about it, Jantine? What’s your play here?" Maranova watched Jantine cock her head, as if she was listening to something no one else could hear. If Harlan’s story were true, the girl was probably asking Mira with her mind for clarification, and Maranova would be damned if she’d let a shavetail speak on her behalf.
"Don’t ask Harlan, ask me. I’m the one you have to convince."
Jantine’s look was pure ice, but she returned her focus to Maranova while contemplating her response. Maranova thought Harlan was going to pop a blood vessel trying not to explain it herself.
"I will have my people back, or die in the attempt. What this man, this Horass has done is unforgivable. He will die as well. After that it is up to you and your government."
Whore-Ass. Pretty much sums up that pissant Kołodziejski, and she’s never even met him.
"That’s a goal, not a plan. I need something to work with, if I’m going to help you."
"Ma’am, if I may?"
At least Harlan’s voice hasn’t changed. Still afraid of the sound of it, no matter how tall she stands.
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