Belt Three

by John Ayliff

  The servitors handled the spaceplane out of its little bubble and towards the cargo bay doors, pulling back the sheets of cargo webbing and fastening the last of the cargo containers to the side of the bay. Keldra sat back in her chair, staring distractedly forwards; she was directing the servitors’ operation through her implant.

  The cargo bay doors slid open above them. The Aurelian was there, seeming to sparkle as the dust-coated surface rotated. The Remembrance was holding directly sunward of the Aurelian now, and the old freighter’s shadow was visible on the Earth ship’s side. The Remembrance was 30 years old, and looked it, years of repairs and adjustments visible even in its silhouette. The Aurelian was ten times older, but beneath its coating of dust it looked brand new. It looked ageless.

  The servitors handling the ship gave it a final push, and then it was free-floating. The edges of the bay doors receded around them until all they could see were stars and the Aurelian.

  Jonas glanced at Keldra. ‘Come on. Time to see if it works.’

  ‘It’ll work,’ she said absently. She was stroking the white dashboard, one of the smooth curves exposed at the side of the control panels she’d installed. She snapped back to the present and shot him a look. ‘Of course, it’ll work. I fixed it.’

  She pulled on her control stick and the Seagull’s attitude jets flared to life. The little ship pitched, Keldra nimbly twisting it through 90 degrees and righting it with the Aurelian dead ahead of its nose. She grinned. The engine throbbed gently and the ship began to move forward.

  Jonas unclipped the microphone from his control panel and set up a transmission to the Aurelian’s computer. ‘Aurelian, this is Seagull. We’re approaching in order to dock. Please open the docking bay and give us directions.’

  ‘Of course, Captain.’ The computer’s voice was still noticeably artificial, but Jonas thought that he detected a note of eagerness in its quick response. ‘I have already prepared the Seagull’s hangar for its return. I will de-spin the forward docking cradle for you.’

  He hesitated. He didn’t know what the forward docking cradle looked like, but if the computer thought he was its captain then any admission of ignorance might break the spell.

  Keldra saved him. ‘That’s the docking cradle,’ she said, pointing. About a third of the way down from the Aurelian’s nose, an arrangement that looked a little like a skeletal hand was unfolding from the ship’s side. It was in the middle of an area of rotating hull, but it was moving against the rotation on a barely visible track, stationary, from the Seagull’s point of view.

  Keldra piloted the ship across the gap and began to line it up with the docking cradle. Even with her piloting skills, the unfamiliar manoeuvre in the untested ship was awkward and time-consuming. Jonas could see the frustration on her face and in the increasingly aggressive bursts from the thrusters, and he felt a little of it too: they were so close, and they both wanted to get inside. At last the spaceplane was positioned correctly and the silver claw closed around it with a series of clicks audible from within the cabin.

  ‘The Seagull is secure, Captain,’ said the Aurelian’s computer. ‘I’m spinning you up now.’

  The cradle began to move, carrying the Seagull with it around the surface of the Aurelian. Pseudogravity tugged Jonas down as the cradle approached the rotational speed of the Earth ship’s hull. When it stabilized, he was surprised to find that it had only reached what felt like three-quarters of a gee.

  A door above them opened and the docking cradle pulled the Seagull up into the body of the Aurelian. Lights flicked on around it as it rose, revealing hangar walls lined with storage lockers, coiled umbilical lines, and a many-limbed maintenance robot standing dormant in an alcove. The doors closed beneath them, and the vibration from the docking cradle’s motors ceased. A light on Keldra’s control panel indicated that air was filling the hangar. They were on board.

  All they could see from the cockpit was a utilitarian white wall, but Keldra was staring out at it. Her hand was on the curve of the Seagull’s interior hull. ‘It worked,’ she said.

  Jonas smiled. ‘After you.’

  She broke the hatch seal and clambered down to the hangar floor. He followed her, letting her take the first step. Everything was white, bathed in light from spotlights in the walls and ceiling. He could hear her breathing through the helmet link, but besides that, nothing. The sense of stillness was oppressive.

  A thick bulkhead door slid open sideways at their approach, and they walked through it into an airlock that automatically cycled around them. Keldra was standing confidently, but Jonas noticed that her hand never strayed far from the slug-thrower pistol she had strapped to the leg of her vacuum suit. To his surprise she had made him take one as well, but he tried to ignore the uncomfortable weight. The inner door opened and they advanced cautiously into the crew segment of the Aurelian.

  Blue-white lights came on around them, some of them flickering for a few seconds after their centuries of sleep. They were in an orbital corridor that curved up away from them in both directions. The walls were white, pristine, and where they touched the floor and ceiling the surface was rounded, leaving no hard corners that Jonas could see. It was a little like the Iron Dragon prison cell, but the effect here managed to be comforting rather than intimidating. It was eerily blank, though, with no markings anywhere on the walls. He glanced behind him and noticed that they had brought a faint trail of the Remembrance’s grime in with their boots.

  A chime rang out, seeming to come from somewhere above them. ‘Welcome back, Captain,’ said the calm, childlike voice of the Aurelian. ‘I hope you had a good trip. You were gone longer than I had expected, and I was worried.’ It paused, then added, ‘I see you’ve brought a friend.’

  Jonas glanced at Keldra, who shrugged subtly. It didn’t look as though she wanted to do the talking. ‘This is Keldra,’ he said. ‘You can trust her.’

  ‘Welcome on board, Keldra.’ Transplanted into the ship’s archaic accent, the name sounded unfamiliar and awkward. ‘Captain, you have missed several mealtimes,’ it continued. ‘Are you hungry? I can have the galley put something together for you and your friend. I’m afraid choice will be limited because some of our food stocks are past their safe usage dates.’

  She rolled her eyes. ‘Computer’s broken,’ she muttered over a private channel. ‘Just a dumb machine.’ It sounded as if she had expected better from an Earth ship.

  ‘I’m not sure broken is the best way of thinking of it,’ Jonas sent back. ‘It can’t have been programmed for this.’ He toggled his helmet speakers back on. ‘No, thank you, Aurelian. We were able to eat on board the Remembrance of Clouds. We’d like you to show us the—’

  ‘We’d like the tour,’ Keldra cut in suddenly.

  ‘Captain?’ the ship said.

  Jonas looked at Keldra. ‘I thought we were just here for the artefact?’ he sent over the private channel.

  She shrugged. ‘Yes, but…’ She waved an arm to encompass the white corridor. ‘Earth ship.’

  ‘Captain?’ the ship repeated. ‘Is Keldra attempting to subvert your authority?’

  ‘No, Aurelian,’ he said hastily. ‘Since I’ve been gone a long time, I’d like to inspect the ship.’

  ‘Of course, Captain. Where would you like to start?’

  ‘Let’s start with the bridge.’

  A door chimed open in front of them, revealing a circular chamber with gently cushioned walls and a row of acceleration straps. It was a transit module; it looked as though the concept hadn’t changed in 300 years. The walls were plain white and there were no visible controls, although there was a barely visible panel in the floor that might have contained emergency ones. Jonas was beginning to find the bare walls disconcerting. He found it hard to believe that Earth people had really enjoyed such an uncompromisingly minimalist aesthetic.

  The module began to move as soon as they strapped themselves in. After a short while Keldra lifted her hands to her helmet’s neck seal.
r />   ‘We don’t know it’s safe,’ he cautioned. ‘A lot could go wrong with a hab system in 300 years.’

  She tapped the read-out on her vacuum suit’s wrist. ‘Safe according to this,’ she said. ‘It’s Earth air. I’ve got to. You know.’

  ‘It’s not really Earth air. But, yeah, I know.’

  Keldra’s helmet seal released with a hiss. She lifted it slowly, shaking her hair out into its normal chaotic corona. She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply through her nose.

  ‘Is it safe?’ he asked.

  ‘Smells OK.’

  He cracked his helmet seal as well, and clipped the helmet to its place at his side. The air was cold, and smelled of whatever chemicals had kept it clean all this time. It was a ship smell, subtly different from the air produced by a modern-day hab module, but not very remarkable.

  The transit module opened onto a circular room with a ring of reclined chairs in the centre. Here, too, the walls were plain white, broken only by doorways leading to other rooms or transit modules. There were no control panels, no screens, nothing Jonas could see that would allow the Earth people to control their ship.

  ‘Aurelian, what is this place?’ Jonas said.

  ‘This is the bridge,’ the Aurelian said. It sounded as if it was coming from above them, but he couldn’t see the speakers. ‘As you can see, it is in good working order.’

  Keldra walked forward and examined one of the couches, frowning. ‘There’s nothing here. Even a pilot needs controls to fly properly.’

  ‘I’m not seeing anything in working order,’ he said. He hesitated; he didn’t want to offend the computer so deep inside its territory, but this was clearly not a working bridge. ‘This is just an empty white room.’

  ‘All bridge systems are in good working order,’ the computer said again. Then after a couple of seconds, ‘Captain, I am not able to interface properly with your implant. It has surpassed its expected operational lifespan so it may have ceased functioning. Keldra also does not appear to have a valid implant. I suggest you have a new one fitted the next time the ship is in port.’

  ‘I, er, I don’t think the ship will be in port for some time,’ Jonas said.

  ‘You can use arcaps to temporarily gain the benefit of the implant, but it is recommended that you have a proper implant fitted as soon as possible,’ the Aurelian said. ‘Shall I have a robot deliver arcaps for you and your friend?’

  ‘Ar-cap,’ Keldra said, rolling the word around her mouth thoughtfully. She glanced at Jonas and nodded.

  ‘Yes please,’ he said.

  Almost at once, one of the doors opened and a robot trundled into the room. The Aurelian must have anticipated the request and moved it into position while they were talking. The robot resembled a white potted tree, with four many-jointed arms radiating from the top of a cylindrical body that rolled along on fat little tyres. The two nearest limbs ended in four-fingered claws that held out translucent white caps filled with a mesh of wires and electronics. Jonas had the feeling that he was seeing the ancestors of his era’s memduction helmets.

  Keldra took the caps and handed one to him. ‘You first this time.’

  ‘Equal partners, remember?’ he said.

  She rolled her eyes. ‘Heads or tails?’

  ‘What? Heads.’

  She looked angrily at the ceiling. ‘Aurelian!’

  ‘Yes, Keldra?’ the ship said. ‘Remember, you are not authorized to give me commands.’

  ‘Aurelian, simulate a coin flip. Equal chance of heads and tails.’

  ‘Heads,’ the computer said at once.

  ‘Your turn,’ Keldra said to Jonas.

  ‘All right.’

  The cap fitted snugly, automatically adjusting itself to the shape of his head. He felt the tingle of its mesh making contact, but it didn’t feel as if it was breaking his skin. There was a moment of nausea, a blurring of his vision, and then the bridge appeared around him.

  They were standing on a circular platform suspended in space, enclosed within the intersecting bands of the ecliptic and the Milky Way. Away to one side hung the battered Remembrance of Clouds, sunlight flickering through the rings’ spokes as they rotated. It was an enhanced image: the sun dimmed enough to look at, the Remembrance brightened so that its features were visible even on its shadow side, the belt bodies picked out against the stars. The view was static, not rotating, which made Jonas feel dizzy: his instincts told him that a static star field meant he ought to be in free fall.

  The central chairs were still there, but now they were in the middle of a bewildering cloud of lights. Brightly coloured shapes hung motionless in the air, arranged in semicircles around the head of each chair, such that they would be in arm’s reach of someone sitting there. He recognized diagrams of the Aurelian and local belt charts, as well as more abstract diagrams and planes of text.

  ‘What is it?’ Keldra demanded. ‘What do you see?’ She was standing with her back to the star field, in front of the barely visible ghost of the doorway.

  ‘I see the bridge,’ Jonas said. ‘Put the cap on. It works.’

  Keldra put on her arcap. It visibly squirmed in order to find purchase through her mass of hair, but it seemed to work. After a moment her mouth curved into a lopsided smile. ‘This is more like it.’

  She lay down on one of the chairs. The illusions flickered as she passed through them but re-formed around her. She reached out and touched one experimentally. It responded to her touch, moving with her finger as she dragged it gently. She glanced around, selected a different one, and pulled it in front of her face to examine it.

  Jonas looked over her shoulder. The diagram she was examining looked like a floor plan of the ship, but the symbols that annotated it were alien to him. ‘You understand that?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s coming to me,’ she said, distractedly. She tapped the arcap. ‘It’s not just visual. I’m getting a sense of the ship. I think it acts like a pilot implant. I don’t suppose you’re getting that…you don’t know what to listen for.’

  ‘I suppose not,’ he said. ‘What are you learning?’

  ‘It’s like I thought,’ she said. ‘The hab systems and defences are working, solar powered, but the sail’s gone and the drive is burned out. Even if we refuelled it, it would never fly again.’

  ‘A pity,’ Jonas said, with feeling. Getting an Earth ship running again would have been a great achievement. ‘Can you detect the Worldbreaker artefact?’ he asked.

  ‘I think so,’ she replied. ‘There’s a storage area that was converted into a science lab, towards the stern.’ She didn’t move. She had sounded distracted, troubled.

  ‘What else?’ he asked.

  ‘What’s that?’ Keldra pointed to one of the larger rooms on the floor plan. A group of bright dots clustered at one end of it, incomprehensible to him.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said.

  ‘I think it’s people,’ she said. ‘It’s telling us the location of the ship’s personnel.’

  ‘The location of their bodies, I would guess,’ he said.

  ‘But why are they all together?’

  ‘Perhaps the robots moved them. Is that the sickbay? The morgue?’

  Keldra shook her head. ‘No, it’s…it’s a general purpose assembly room. It’s empty.’ She got up, sending the illusions flickering. ‘It’s close by. We’re going to check it out.’

  The transit module door opened, seeming to appear in empty space. The interior of the module now contained a large diagrammatic map of the Aurelian, the transit module shafts picked out like a circulatory system in a medical diagram. Keldra glanced at the diagram but didn’t touch it. As soon as the doors had closed behind them, the module started to move. Jonas guessed that she was using the pilot-like functions of the arcap to control the module, or else the computer had anticipated her request.

  The module only moved a short distance before the doors opened. Keldra half-ran away from Jonas and along another corridor, whose walls were now adorned wi
th floating labels and direction arrows. A door opened as she reached it, and she stopped.

  When he caught up with her she was staring through the doorway, mouth open. The energy seemed to have drained from her body. Her face slowly creased up, and a tear began to form in her eye.

  Jonas stepped forward and looked through it, and a sense of awe settled onto him as well. The assembly room was filled with a vast, comprehensive, completely convincing illusion. They were looking through a doorway onto the surface of Earth.

  Chapter Fifteen

  They stepped forward, blinking in the deep orange light.

  The room appeared vast, its far walls invisible. In front of them, above the illusory horizon, the sun appeared to be setting, the familiar yellow orb now surrounded by a fiery corona that took up a quarter of the sky. Beneath their feet was grass, neatly cut and healthier-looking than the lawn on the Haze of the Ecliptic. Ahead of them, well inside what Jonas guessed was the real extent of the room, was a group of trees covered in pink blossom, from which some tiny animal softly chirruped. A stream ran along to one side, the water tinkling across gleaming rainbow-hued pebbles; in the other direction, a dry stone wall marked the limit of the garden. Beyond the trees, green hills rolled gently to the horizon, and through a gap in the hills he caught sight of a silver sparkling sea. In front of the sun a group of small dark objects moved erratically. A flock of birds, he realized, after a moment: extinct for 300 years but endlessly circling here in illusion.

  There was a small, strangled sound from Keldra’s throat. She stood a few paces behind him, neck craned back, looking upwards, eyes wide. A tear ran down her face.

  ‘Keldra?’ Jonas asked. ‘Are you all right?’

  She didn’t move. Very quietly, she said, ‘Clouds.’

  He looked up. Away from the sunset, the ceiling was blue, like a dome, infinitely distant. This was the sky, the view from the bottom of the Earth’s naked atmosphere. And across it drifted clouds: great banks of clouds, grey and white above them, edged with pink and gold where their edges caught the sun, multiple levels of cloud moving over one another as they were carried by the wind. They formed into obscure shapes, hinting at figures or objects but never quite cohering, fragmenting into tiny wisps that stretched and scattered.