Keft’aerak said, “She shows no sign of wanting to be a boy again.”
“No,” said Captain Druvvin, “not today. Not that we’ve seen in the past seven days. Who would be to say that she actually feels that way? Who could say what Dylan or Zoi’ne will show in the next six to eight months? She is a good person, I can grant you that, but she is not Il’lyse.”
“You’re right about that.”
“Look, I truly am sorry. My brother was an ass; that was my fault. I took on Benedict as my commander to try and redeem my poor choices, but he is not my brother either. Redemption for what had happened is steep. It is not as simple as replacing those we lost. Yet you insist on this. Here is my answer.”
One of the engineers said, “We have isolated the signal. They are in the Recreation Hall, second level.”
“Zoi’ne?” the commander called, but she ran.
She knew her promise never to run off again, but that was it. It was a promise not to run away from her family. The promise said nothing about running toward them. So she ignored the commander, the engineering rooms falling behind her, and made for the stairs. Zoey intended to give Captain Druvvin a piece of her mind.
[ 17]
She flew, as much as was possible, up two flights of stairs and across the upper deck’s corridors until she found the only room that was able to rival the Hearth Hall in size. Until now, she’d had no reason to explore the room behind this door, but here she was because it was necessary. She opened the door and saw her parents standing there. It didn’t matter what the ship’s captain had said to them. They were still her family.
“Zoey, what are you doing here?” Bon’sinne asked as they walked out.
“There’s a bug in here, and I need to talk to Captain Druvvin,” Zoey said. “Would you wait for me please?”
“A bug?”
“Please, Mom.”
“OK. Don’t be too long. We have news for you.”
“So will I.” Zoey stepped past them and into the room.
It had been designed to look like a cross between an indoor garden and an observation window for the facilities below. She could almost see how members of the crew would use the space below for exercises, playing sports, or receiving shoulder rubs in one corner. Almost; it was dark behind the window with three dim lights on.
Zoey turned her head toward the captain, who saw her enter and look his way.
“Blast!” he said.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, but someone has been listening to the goings-on in this room. The admiral, or his wife, was using a radio to spy on you.”
“I had a feeling someone might have been.”
“Tong-Chang found the receiver in their room.”
The captain took a deep, agitated breath and studied Zoey. “Is that all?”
“No, sir, I see a pair of pointy ears in dire need of talking off. Ever since I got on your ship I have felt unwelcome by you, and you alone. You have yet to explain to me how I even got on your ship, in this alien body, which is totally mine now and I love it, by the way. For that matter, why are the Hulda’fi rebels the way they are, and what did your brother have to do with all that happened to Il’lyse? I need answers, just as much as I need the loving, overly caring people outside your door here to be the first and only family I’ve ever had. Yet you protest. What the fuck, Captain?”
Captain Druvvin pinched his brow with one hand and closed his book with the other. He stood up from his chair, walking to the cabinet that looked like a microwave near the top. He put two mugs inside of the device and pressed a few buttons.
“Do you prefer chocolate or green tea?” he asked.
“Will it matter?” said Zoey. “I like either one, but I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”
Two more buttons were pressed. “While we wait for this machine to make our drinks, let me make one thing clear. I do not hate you. I avoided you because of what your face meant to me for the past several weeks, or more. When you slapped me last night, the error I’d made began to catch up to me in force.”
“Is that an invitation to slap you again, sir?”
“It is not. I would appreciate it if you did not revisit this action of yours.”
The machine chimed. Captain Druvvin extracted the cups, which Zoey saw now had fluid in them, unlike when they went into the device. The mugs had a silver sand texture to their outward design, as smooth as they actually were along the surface, and blue stripes close to the top. He set these mugs down on the observation table.
“Please,” he said, “grab a seat. Ensign Leezu, if you are listening still, you are to overload the device so it blows on our end. I will take that as a sign of full cooperation and discretion.”
“The commander and two engineers are with her too,” Zoey said, sitting down.
“Ah, good. Enjoy the chocolate tea then. I had the last ensign in her position program it into the system since my ship was missing it from its synthesis catalogue. Now then, what I am about to tell you is not something I generally like to share, nor do I want it heard by too many ears.”
Something tiny popped, on cue, atop one of the forest paintings that hanged on the wall. The captain nodded toward the direction.
“I trust so many people,” he said, “but I may well trust myself least of all. My brother Buska’vild was a charming man when he wanted to be, but a liar and good at hiding his faults in many matters. Il’lyse fell for him. Bonny and Aerak demanded their daughter to stay away from him, and they asked me to get my brother to back away. I made the wrong choice for what I thought to be the right reason.
“It’s my belief that young love should not be persuaded one way or the other by the rest of us. Well, my brother was twenty revolutions younger than me, and I should have thought better of his age, as well as his habits. Yet he went on courting young women who were fifteen to twenty revolutions younger than himself until one day when everything went very wrong. He stole a shuttle and took Il’lyse with him. There was a magnetic storm, residue from a previous battle combined with some stellar activity, and they were caught in it, never to be seen again.
“Bonny and Aerak have blamed me ever since that day. It was my brother, and that was my battle, which I took so seriously compared to matters of family. I never tried to ask their forgiveness, because I wasn’t sure I deserved it.”
Zoey said, “Wow, I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Our parents were among the first to die to these rebels. So I understand, to some degree, your overwhelming desire for a functioning family in your life. As to the rebels themselves, none of us are sure. The Hulda’fi are made up of some part violent criminals and some part cultists whose desires deal in matters of the flesh. They claim to desire independence from the Hoshi-Lacartan Alliance, to which we have tried to be amiable and accommodating, even trying to find them suitable places to dwell that will not hinder our own way of life. Our best intentions thus far have been met with theft, violence, and sabotage. Their criminal activity has been on the rise for the last twelve revolutions.”
“Have you tried tracking them down and making arrests in the last several years?”
“We have tried locating their hideouts and lairs, but they elude us. You have seen first-hand what one of their attacks look like. There may be a spy among us. It’s not you, not your new family, nor the three of my crew who weren’t aboard the Marslou when we were ambushed. Everyone else will need to be interviewed.”
“What about the admiral and his wife?”
“They are out of my reach, both literally and figuratively. This device that Ensign Leezu found will not be sufficient evidence to open an inquiry against them, as much as I would like to press them for what they might know. I have my doubts regarding their involvement, however.”
Zoey finished her tea and set it on the counter. “How did I come to your ship, looking like this?”
“In our pursuit of a smaller craft, we pushed through what appeared to be a wormhole of considerable size for
us to make such an attempt, though it may have been smaller than necessary for our ship as a whole, meaning we had to detach our shuttles and have them follow us beyond it. It affected our systems, and we were too late getting to sa-Gir-2-V-n-3 – I mean Earth. We had an inside man among them; our joint government I mean. The building you were in was on fire and about to explode. His final words were to demand that we beam you both aboard. I sent word through the closing wormhole as soon as I recognized your face. A few weeks later, here we are. Your new family has more information in the classified files handed to them, if you want more detail than that, according to what we do have. You may not like what you see and hear, however.”
“My family? You’re calling them my family now?”
“It was the least I could do after all that has happened. Go to them. I hope you will understand better when you see them.”
His face quivered. Zoey got up and took two steps toward the door when something dawned on her. She turned around and saluted; the Earth way, hand flattened and extending from her brow.
“W-what is this?” Captain Druvvin asked.
Zoey said, “There’s something I’ve needed to say since I woke up a week ago. Permission to come aboard, sir.”
The captain’s eyes watered, and he burst out laughing as though the poor man had finally been broken. He said, “That wasn’t necessary, Zoi’ne, but granted. Granted!”
She walked outside of the room and found her parents waiting against the opposite wall for her. Bon’sinne raised a brow toward Captain Druvvin’s direction and then smiled at Zoey.
“I guess he already approves of us being a family?” Zoey said after the door closed.
Bon’sinne said, “It surprised us too, dear.”
“OK. What do I have to do?”
Keft’aerak handed her a digital pad. He said, “This asks you for your approval on two things. One would be the final step in your name, and the other would allow us to jump several dozen obstacles to adopt you. You’ll need to provide your signature if you know how to write it.”
“Right, signatures. I think I have my new one figured out.”
She skimmed the document as it was visible to her. There were no tricks, no sign of anything being taken away. Then she saw her full name at last, and it made her arms shake. Zoi’ne Thalassas; all she had to do was sign and Dylan Wilde would be no more. Did his Earth friends grieve him? Had his things been given away? Was she truly ready to make this step?
With stylus in hand, Zoey hovered over the pad for a moment to think about it. This was really it. In Aelfen culture, there was at least one name to mean “new life.” Tonight? After a whole week, she made that meaning truly her own.
* * *
The next morning was the last time she would wake up in this hotel room. Zoi’ne almost didn’t want to leave, her naked body and Tong-Chang’s still clinging together.
They checked out together and stumbled, half-awake, into the train headed for the dock. Zoey wore a new outfit that, Tong-Chang claimed, the Ginserei had bought with her own money instead of her father’s. Dasos had apparently washed it for her last night and handed it over before everyone went back to their rooms that they’d paid for.
A number of dock workers saluted the crew as they boarded the Marslou. Zoi’ne boarded the ship and was looking for a good spot to watch their own departure from Natt Grans when Dasos found her. Where were the windows when she wanted them? She wondered if she needed to head back to her single room again so soon.
“Hey, sis,” he said. “Are you looking for something?”
“Yeah, actually, a good view of our takeoff,” she said.
“We’ve got one. Come on.”
Das led Zoey to the family’s suite, where their parents were sitting on the reclining couch and watching the monitor. She saw that the departure was on there in four different angles.
“Nice outfit, Zoey,” said Bon’sinne.
“Thank you,” Zoi’ne said. “Tong-Chang bought it for me.”
As the ship drew further and further away from the station, Zoey could finally see how the two rings were interwoven with one another, their motion barely visible unless you looked at the outer edges.
The intercom chimed once the ship was accelerating and leaving Natt Grans far behind.
Captain Druvvin said, “Welcome aboard, everyone. I hope you had a restful two days. We will be home in an estimated six more days since all of our systems are fully functional again. Now then, I have some less fortunate news. We will be conducting interviews with everyone starting at thirteen hundred hours. This will be mandatory for everyone except for Commander Consilius, who will be heading this task over the next couple days. I ask that you all be forthright, as I’m sure you will be. I refuse to believe that we have a spy among us, but recent events call for action and proper evaluation. Thank you all.”
[ 18]
Three corridors led to the ship’s bridge. Before the two outermost hallways reached the front of the ship, they curved further inward, leaving a pair of corner rooms that Captain Druvvin and his commander used as their private offices.
Zoi’ne paced back and forth past the door on the starboard side. The placard on the side read “Commander Fons’benedict Consilius” in the Aelfen lyurunics, which only became so familiar to Zoey as she looked at it periodically. Being here made her nervous. Waiting for any sort of word from within filled Zoey with worry or concern.
The door opened, suddenly, and Tong-Chang walked out. She exhaled deeply.
“Hello again,” said the commander from his chair.
“Hi,” Zoey said in turn before directing her attention to Tong-Chang as the door closed. “How did it go?”
“It went fine, I think?” Tong-Chang said. “He apologized for thinking the worst of me when I brought in that receiver and so quickly identified it. Then he had a few questions for me about my time in the academy program at school, as well as aboard this ship. We never brought up what I did for the Fjorfolias, but I think he suspects it. What if he reports that to the captain?” Her voice had escalated and words hastened, her body tensing before Zoey.
“Tonny, love, breathe. Breathe.”
Her friend inhaled and exhaled, and her body became less rigid. Had she pressed her ears against Tong-Chang’s chest, Zoey imagined she would have heard her heart soften. At the same time, the attempted comfort gave Zoey some relief as well, knowing that her friend was alright.
Tong-Chang said, “Thank you for coming with me and waiting. It means a lot.”
“Of course, Ensign,” said Zoey. “Are you still on duty?”
“I am. I better head back down there. Why do you ask?”
“I was just wondering. My mom’s wanting me to meet her in the Recreation Hall in a bit, actually. She said something about helping the both of us while we’re headed for Elysium IX.”
“Did she say anything about what you need to wear?”
“Nope.”
“Go naked. I’m kidding, of course.”
* * *
As soon as she entered the lower level of the Recreation Hall, Zoey saw that Bon’sinne had set aside a spot on the floor with a wide, but thin, mat. Her mom was brushing off one of the sleeves on a piece of clothing that was hanging off the side of a dummy.
Bon’sinne turned her way and said, “Hey, you made it, and you’re a couple minutes earlier than I asked. Good.”
“What is this?” Zoey asked.
“Our family has a tradition on Aerak’s side, going back a few generations. Everyone gets to learn the basics of martial arts, and by ‘basics’ I mean enough to complete the second level in a few different forms. It just so happens that I care for it more than Aerak ever did.”
“He looked amazing from what little I saw.”
Her mom hummed. “Yes, I suppose he’s good at it when he wants to be. The man prefers stealth and hunting more than hand-to-hand. Everyone has their own preferences.”
“You make it sound as though you’re better.�
��
Despite her Aelfen senses, Zoey could barely see the fluid motions that her mom made. Bon’sinne swiped the clothes off of the dummy and flung them at Zoey, which she had time to catch within her arms, though it tested her reflexes. Had Zoey been any slower, she would have fumbled it, unlike her mom, who seemed to move without any effort.
Bon’sinne said, “When he isn’t enjoying a good tree climb or hunting in a forest, your dad practices his cooking or reads old seafaring novels while putting on a theatric performance. Your brother plays a variety of tabletop and video games when he isn’t out running around a track or field. I too love some of those games, but am the most active in practicing martial arts, something I’ve fallen behind on in the last couple years and mean to rectify now.”
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