“You won’t,” Demsiri replied calmly. “It’s over, Alice. That stunt you pulled back on the ship ended you and your career. You’ll be locked up in the station brig for the rest of the war and then who knows what. All of us are getting moved.”
“He can’t do this,” Alice said, trying to get at the thick straps at her wrists. “Farthing, you can talk to him. Tell him … well, tell him whatever he wants to hear. Don’t let him do this to our ship.”
“It isn’t our ship,” Farthing replied, his normally smooth voice thick with regret. “It hasn’t been mine in a while and I don’t think I carry any weight anymore. I do not command, and I lost my first ship, remember?”
“Oh,” Alice replied, her rage fading into embarrassment. “Oh, Farthing I’m so sorry. I forgot about—”
“Please, Alice,” Farthing replied, his whiskers twitching slightly. “It is a fact of life I now need to accept. Your sympathy is appreciated, but unnecessary.”
“But surely we can call someone else?” Alice said, looking back to Demsiri. “What about Booth? Maybe Josh or the Demons?”
“Josh Goldstein is a few rooms away from here,” the doctor replied. “Resolute really did take a beating, Alice. Her engines nearly ruptured under the strain, just like Kongo’s. Booth might be facing trial too. Last I heard, he was refusing to leave the ship.”
“I’ll bet,” Alice replied. “What about the Demons?”
“Demon Squadron is being returned to carrier duty,” Ronald Chang said, stepping into the room with Kama Yu in tow. “Zeus lost a lot of good pilots out there and we need those ships to take the lead in the fight against the Gizzeen.”
“You bastard!” Alice said, straining hard against the straps. “That squadron was Lee’s. You have no—”
“Lee Pearce is dead,” Chang replied sternly. “His ship is in pieces and his crew is bordering on insubordination. We need all hands ready for battle, Commander Bennett.”
“Untie me and I’ll show you battle ready hands,” Alice said, feeling the trickle of blood from under the straps. “I should put you through the wall for this.”
“Commander … Alice,” Chang said, “you don’t seem to understand what’s happening here. We are in the final war for mankind, not a vanity battle to save your ship.”
“Vanity battle?” Alice howled. “How dare you? That ship was the best weapon we ever had against the Ch’Tauk and—”
“You’re right, she was,” Chang said, stopping Alice’s tirade with a curt shout. “Resolute was the best thing going while Lee Pearce was in the center seat. Lee is gone and I can’t spare the resources to make her space-worthy again.”
“Resources again,” replied the pilot. “It’s all about resources, isn’t it? What about the people who have died for you, Ron? How many resources have you spent on them?”
Chang stared at Alice for a long moment. Instead of getting angry, he stepped close enough she could have reached him. Alice briefly thought he might strike her, but he took a deep breath. Demsiri moved subtly closer to her, wary of the quiet man standing between him and his patient. Chang reached into his duty uniform pocket and withdrew a small electronic key. He reached forward and pressed a stud on the underside of the device, releasing the lock which held the straps around her wrists. Stunned, Alice felt the warmth of blood running down her arm.
“You’re free to go,” Chang said. “I won’t hold you or charge you with anything. Maybe you’re right, maybe I did deserve that and a whole lot more. It was all my fault and I have tried to make amends, but I don’t think it will ever be enough. If you want to go, I won’t stop you, although there isn’t much out there except the war.”
“I … don’t know what you want from me,” Alice said, holding her injured wrists despite the pain. “What do you want me to do?”
Again, Chang simply stared back at Alice. For the first time she noticed his other arm in a sling. The deep lines of his face had been gouged and burned during the battle. She realized the only thing about the man she saw before her that looked anything like the man she had met so many years ago were his eyes. Somewhere inside, he was the same driven man who had commanded Resolute before Lee. That man seemed to have shrunk down inside the damaged and obsessive man who stood before her now, but he was still there. The fury she felt towards him began to erode under a new twinge of shame.
“For the first time in a very long while,” Chang replied. “I don’t want anything of you.”
“Then get the hell out.”
Chang looked down at his feet. He seemed to be deciding something, but Alice couldn’t begin to tell what. She had been manipulated for so long, she didn’t trust anything the man might say next. After another deep breath, he looked back at Doctor Demsiri.
“Doctor,” Chang began with renewed confidence. “Is the captain fit for duty?”
“Farthing?” the doctor replied. “I don’t see anything to keep him here anymore.”
“Good,” Chang replied, turning to Farthing in the further bed. “Captain Farthing, I need you to command a collection mission. I have a courier ship waiting.”
“Of course,” Farthing replied, a little slower than Alice had seen before. “A courier ship, sir?”
“The Kissinger,” replied the admiral. “She’s not much and only has a crew of a dozen, but I need her on her way to Karisia in four hours. We’ve got precious cargo, and with both our ships gone she’s the fastest thing I can spare.”
Alice’s anger flared again at the mention of the ships, but she held it in check. An idea had begun to form in her mind and she needed the admiral to think she was being reflective in silence. Farthing’s crest rose slightly and filled with dark blood. The mention of Karisia brought back memories of their first adventures together, and of Alice’s capture. The Vadne captain looked wary, alert to the dangers.
“I can be ready to transfer as soon as I retrieve a uniform,” Farthing said, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed to the spongy floor. “I have no belongings to collect. Have the Karisiens agreed to join the fight?”
“Negative,” Chang replied, taking a pad from Kama and handing it to the much taller Vadne. “Not the Karisiens, the Engineers.”
Wait,” Alice interrupted, “won’t the Ch’Tauk already know where they are? I mean, that’s where they hid for generations. Don’t you think they’ll have already gone to check?”
“The Engineers contacted me with their location,” Chang said. “They’re holding off the Ch’Tauk, but I can’t guarantee the enemy won’t be waiting for you. You’ll have to get in and out fast.”
“Are there landing coordinates here?” Farthing said, looking at the data pad. “I may not have much time if the Gizzeen are waiting for us.”
“I don’t believe landing will be necessary,” Chang said. “The Caretakers will hold off any ground forces. You are just supposed to do a fast fly-by.”
Alice stared at the Asian man with an intensity reserved for targets. He had just ordered Farthing to his death, and to her seemed proud of it. The defeat of the Gizzeen at all costs was all that mattered to the man and she was tired of it. She had been used by him and had seen him use people time and again and she knew it could not stand any longer. Now he had told them he was willing to sacrifice the four-armed amphibians to achieve his goals as well. She searched her mind for any solution, but none presented itself. She had no blaster and no ship. For the first time since her capture, she felt totally helpless.
“You’re going to sacrifice more of them, aren’t you?” Alice said quietly. “That’s it, isn’t it? Lee proved your concept, didn’t he? You’re going to let those … people blow themselves up to win this war, aren’t you?’
“That was the plan all along,” Chang said. “The Octopods have agreed to work with us on building the bombs, in exchange for their participating in the battle. Suffice it to say, I agreed immediately.”
“Of course you did,” Alice said, looking back at Chang with the same rage as before but more co
ntrolled. “Win-win, right? You kill all of these people and you don’t lose anything, do you?”
“Yes,” Chang said, leveling his eyes to meet hers with a decisive resolve that matched her fury. “That’s the facts of war, Alice. Some people win and some people die. I intend to be one of the winners. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a fleet to rebuild.”
“No,” she screamed as he turned away. “You do not have the right to dump that on us and just walk away. You come back here and talk to me. You need to make this right, Ron, or nothing will ever be right again!”
Alice watched as the man turned on a heel and left. After a few moments Farthing looked up from the pad and back at Alice. Neither spoke, but she nodded to him. He looked to Demsiri, who waved him off. After Farthing left, Alice stared down at her own feet, covered in sheets. As the doctor took her wrists in his hands and began treatment, she realized everything she needed had been handed to her whether Chang realized it or not.
“Alice,” the doctor said, his voice dipping lower than his usual baritone. “I can have you up in a few hours so you can … whatever you want to do. If you want to go back to the fleet, I would recommend you wait for a day or so. Your brain scans are a little irregular and I want to take another look before you get back in a ship.”
“I’m not sure that’s the right thing to do,” Alice replied. “I don’t know what I’m thinking.”
“You know, I’ve been with this crew for a couple years and I’m sick of it,” Demsiri started. “I’m sick of the war and the pointless fighting and the endless battles. I’m sick to death of sickness and burned flesh. Your Lee was a good man, but he was a warrior and I don’t think I can do this anymore, so if you’re planning something, I don’t think I can help you.”
“What makes you think I’m going to try something?” Alice asked.
“I had Lee in my sickbay more than once, you know,” the man replied. “If it was him, he’d already have leapt out of the bed and tried to steal the Kissinger to go after the bad guys.”
“I’m not going to steal a courier ship,” Alice replied, a smile crossing her lips. “I don’t think that would be the smartest thing to do.”
“Then what? I know you too well to know that look means you’re already up to something.”
“I have an idea, but I do need something from you, Doc,” Alice said with a slight sparkle in her eye. “Just answer me one question and I’ll walk away and leave you to your test tubes and analyzers forever.”
“Fine,” Demsiri said, exhaling a long breath. “What is it?”
“Which room is Josh in?”
10
Somewhere Else
Heat and pressure assaulted his senses first. The sound of his gasping breath came next. His lungs were on fire and he tried to scream through a hoarse throat, the pressure immense across his chest, until he felt something lift him and take him away. Consciousness then left him mercifully in the dark.
He awoke again, the skin of his back now icy cold. The familiar warmth of his flight suit was long gone, replaced by the sensation of scratches and cuts along his limbs. The sensation of breathing had eased, a flexible mask pushed against his face. Instead of straps, the mask adhered along the edges of his mouth and nose, providing oxygen but giving off a moldy flavor of stale sourdough bread and thick water. He would have gagged if not for the knowledge that if he did, the mask might not allow him to vomit. He was still in darkness save for a tiny blue light emanating from far above his head. He pressed his fingers along the cold surface under his back and felt metal. It was wide enough for him to stretch his arms wide without reaching the edges, but his feet stayed suspended over the edge of the table, uncovered and exposed. It was a long while before he realized he was naked.
It was wrong. He knew it was wrong but couldn’t deduce why. The nakedness seemed less wrong than the darkness and the smell. He felt panic rising in his chest again, brought on by an attempt to identify the cause of the deviation. As he remembered, though, his panic increased and he was forced to stop the memories. It was more than he was prepared to do lying naked on a table.
He tried to control his breathing. Flashes of memory seemed easier than figuring out why he was here. He saw an image of a dark man with a white smile and long dark hair. Another man, similar to the other but taller and wider with broad shoulders and a suit, flashed through his mind. The final image was of a woman, a girl actually, with dark hair and smooth skin. As the images moved past his eyes, he felt sadness. The older man filled him with a deep longing for something and a deep feeling of loss.
“Who are you?” he heard a voice say. “Who are you to me?”
It was his own voice, he was sure of it. He listened to the sound again. As he moved his lips, the sound seemed muffled. His voice was raspy to be sure, but he definitely heard his own voice and was reassured by the knowledge. If he heard his own voice, it must mean he was still alive. Living was good. Living filled him with hope, driving out the panic. Living meant he could get off the table and …what?”
The panic began to creep across his chest again as he thought of escape. He had no idea where he was, why he was lying naked on a table, or who had put him there. All he knew for sure was that he wasn’t dead. If he wasn’t dead, then he should be able to sit up. The muscles in his abdomen flexed as he rose, feeling as though he had gained an extra hundred pounds. When he had risen far enough, he pushed his arms under him and leaned back onto his elbows. Under him, the metal surface remained cold despite the heat of his body.
The faint blue light above cast only enough illumination to see around the table. All else was in blackness. He focused on the light first, trying to resolve a shape or specific device that emitted the light, and as he stared he noticed the light wasn’t really blue at all. It was the air around him which was tinted. Steadier than when he awoke, Lee lifted an arm and waved a hand through the space in front of him, moving minute particles drifting in the air. The substance wasn’t dust, though, and it appeared to move in violation of the laws of Brownian motion.
The air was alive. As he pressed into a cloud of floating particles, they at first moved away and then back. He felt tiny pricks of pressure along his hands, probing and bumping gently and then moving off again. Before long, his hand was swarmed with microscopic tingling. It was fascinating and strange at the same time and he felt no fear from the organisms. In fact, he was grateful for the mask which kept him from inhaling the creatures. After a time, he moved his hand away from the small swarm and tried to see past the circle of dim light.
At the edge of the table, through the slight haze in the room he could just make out the metal floor, copper in color but with no other features. So … he was about a meter off a hard floor, naked and lying on a wide examining table. Beyond that, he had very little understanding of his surroundings. At a loss for what to do next, he reached up to feel the mask secured to his face.
It felt wet. He looked at his fingers and was surprised to see no moisture. Running his fingers along the edge of the mask, he traced the shape. He had a vague memory of the older man taking him to see an ocean, but the ocean was indoors. He had been bored with the aquarium and ended up seated idly beside a tank full of starfish. The bumpy texture and wide, thick arms of the creatures were similar enough to the mask that he formed a mental image of himself with a starfish over his mouth. The only problem with the image, as far as he could tell, was the face itself. He had no recollection of what it was supposed to look like.
He traced his finger along the line of his nose and forehead, feeling minute scars where he had been injured in the past. His nose was longer than he had thought it would be, but straight and unbroken with just the nostrils covered by the mask. His wide forehead held a few lines, but his eyes held deep creases on either side. He had thick eyebrows and, as he pulled it down to look, black hair just beginning to show wisps of gray. His body was muscular and well-toned, paler than he imagined he should be. Otherwise, he seemed to be intact save for deep
scars along almost every limb.
“Who are you?” he said again, muffled by the mask.
The sound did not echo in the chamber, leading him to believe the walls and floor were not made of the metallic surface he believed them to be. With a deep breath, he swung his legs over the side of the table, feeling the cold metal under his body slide out from under him. He braced himself to place his feet on the ground. There was a feeling deep in his head that he was not on solid ground, a sensation which countered the images he had in his head of wide valleys and open spaces with animals and pastures, but still seemed familiar. It was the sensation, he knew, of being on a ship with an artificial gravity well, and that made his mind hurt again. Instead, he pushed off the table and pressed his feet to the deck below.
A hot, blinding light slammed down over him as his feet touched the deck. He pushed the palms of his hands into his eyes to stop the pain, but the light forced its way past them. He tried to find the edges of the table so he could hide underneath and found the solid base unyielding and not deep enough for him. Not knowing what else to do, he pressed his hands again. The short lip protruding over the base was just large enough for him to find shelter from the light.
It felt as if the white beam were tearing him apart, piece by piece, evaluating his worthiness and discarding what it saw as lacking. The starfish on his face quivered under and he wondered if it too was being examined. More memories of recent events flooded into his mind, images of space and a strange, blue-brown membrane which was at once both terrible and wonderful. He saw ships flying past him in formation, some firing energy blasts at him and others with him. He felt the hand of someone he trusted pinning a medal on his chest and telling him he was the best at what he did. He saw women, many women who’d shared intimacies with him in beds and cots…
Resolute Glory (The War for Terra Book 8) Page 7