The Greatship

by Robert Reed

  “Will it escape your mind, Washen?”

  “But I am not a Submaster.”

  “And you are modest in the worst ways.”

  “Perhaps.” Washen offered a brief nod. “I’ve been given orders and intend to carry them out to the best of my ability.”

  “As is right.”

  “The investment group,” said Washen.

  Surprise showed in Miocene’s narrow face. “To which group do you refer?”

  “Inquiries,” Washen said. “By several routes, I’ve made inquiries, and I think only one person stands behind the corporate mask. An unidentified human owns properties in an assortment of districts. And she once held title to a comfortable little apartment that now, purely by chance, belongs to an angry fellow named Hoop-of-Benzene.”

  The smile was respectful, perhaps even impressed. “Please, dear. Go on.”

  “When Hoop was searching for a home, he found help from an agent with ties to that investment group. The terms of the sale were very lucrative for the buyer. Someone made certain that this one passenger was placed inside that particular apartment, and more than two thousand years later, here we are.”

  “A captain did all this?”

  “I know what seems to be, even if I can’t prove anything.”

  The dessert was cooling, losing its delicate, precious flavors. Yet the Submaster seemed unconcerned, setting her spoon aside, focusing on the novice captain standing beside her.

  “Hoop recently learned who once lived inside his home,” said Washen. “You have no connections with the harum-scarum who delivered that news. As far as I can see, you are blameless. If there is any blame to be given, that is.”

  “That is so good to hear.”

  “Hoop doesn’t want that man walking inside his house.”

  “I would imagine not.”

  “He intends to fight the invasion with every tool at his disposal.”

  “Which leads him where?” Miocene showed a big grim smile. “To his ruin, I would think. That’s the only possible destination for the poor fellow.”

  Washen sighed. “But this decision to give Ishwish an award, to do it now and hold the ceremony in that location…I find it easy to believe you were the one who set this slippery business into motion…”

  With a chilled glance, Miocene asked, “Is there anything else?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Define your ignorance.”

  Washen bent at the waist, explaining, “Until yesterday, Ishwish didn’t realize who Hoop was or that he had roots in Tidecold-6. Until I delivered the refusal, Ishwish assumed that the harum-scarum would love the idea of a famous captain strutting about inside his rooms. But if the Submaster suspects trouble, then he will do whatever is possible to make this problem vanish.”

  “Whatever is possible,” Miocene agreed with a tiny wink. “At this moment, my colleague is meeting with a team of advisors and confidantes. Yes, my dear, he has given up on you and your patient ways. New plans and brutal consequences are being considered. And by the end of this day, his problem will be solved.”

  “What plans?”

  “I wouldn’t know,” Miocene replied. “But several minutes ago, our security soldiers have learned that we have a murderer among us—a brutal criminal who happens to be a tall, strong, and very dangerous harum-scarum.”

  “Not Hoop,” Washen muttered.

  “This is a matter for our courts, my dear. Not captains.”

  Washen fought with a scream.

  For the moment, Miocene said nothing. Then with a soft pitying voice, she asked, “Why are you here? What did you believe would happen, if you and I happened to speak?”

  “What am I supposed to do, madam?”

  Miocene shrugged.

  “Thousands of years ago, you put Hoop inside Ishwish’s home. In some fashion or another, you are responsible for this situation. And now I’ve become your agent…although I don’t see what it is you hope to gain…”

  “Are you a captain, or aren’t you?”

  Washen threw back her shoulders. “Yes. I am.”

  “This ship of ours is still almost entirely empty,” Miocene said. “But before the end of our voyage, we will be walking these hallways with a hundred thousand other species, and nothing will matter more than having a cadre of good captains…wise captains…human leaders who deserve respect from this multitude of odd entities…”

  “Yes, madam.”

  “If you want to become one of the Great Ship’s important officers,” said Miocene, “you must be able to navigate your way to the best destination available. Without the help of anyone else, I might add. And even if this means, in one fashion or another, doing something that happens to be right.”

  7

  Once more Washen returned to the diamond door. Hoop was surprised but gratified to see the human, and then she told him what she wanted. She told him what she wanted, offering no explanations why. Instinct took hold. Feet squared on the floor, shoulders tilting forward as the eating mouth pulled into a tight pucker. And once again, the young captain made her very simple demand, adding, “If you will not give me this, then I will fight you.”

  “No,” Hoop replied. “I refuse your challenge.”

  There was little time remaining. With one nexus, Washen tracked an order-of-arrest as it moved past amiable judges, while another nexus watched a team of security officers gathered in a nearby bunker, preparing for the moment when every signature was in place.

  She said, “You can’t refuse.

  “But I have,” he protested.

  Then the mirrored uniform fell away, and Washen took the proper stance for combat. “I demand this,” she said, citing codes more ancient than her species.

  Hoop nearly turned away from the door.

  Suddenly harum-scarums appeared in the wide hallway. A few were neighbors, but most of the towering creatures were strangers from the far ends of the Ship. There were dozens of them, more arriving by the moment, and walking at the lead were a few wearing distinctive gold emblems on scales and spikes. The emblems marked them as belonging to the clan that had once fought Hoop’s clan, both standing on a world that neither would keep.

  Hoop looked at the bystanders and then glared down at tiny Washen. “You brought them,” he said.

  She said, “In their presence, I challenge you.”

  “And I will kill you.”

  “Break my bones and smash my heart,” she said, “and I will heal again and stand here again. And I will launch a second challenge.”

  The diamond door opened up.

  Out stepped the giant figure, peeling off his clothing while half-heartedly taking the defender’s pose. “What is happening?” he asked.

  “You have lost,” she whispered.

  “No.”

  She lifted a fist.

  Again, he said, “No.”

  “But there are different ways to lose,” she said.

  Hoop said nothing.

  On this public ground, Washen announced, “The challenge is accepted, and now I strike.”

  Her opponent smoothly deflected the first blow.

  Then she drove left fist into his chest, and a human finger broke.

  Twenty more blows were absorbed. Washen sliced her arms open against the spines, and every finger was shattered, and Hoop stood like a statue defending honored soil. But she kept hitting him, and beneath her increasingly miserable breath, she told the giant again that he was beaten and it didn’t matter how and the only rational course at this point was to trust a friend to find the best route to make his retreat.

  The forty-third blow astonished everyone.

  The harum-scarum remained invulnerable. Covered with his opponent’s blood, he had to do nothing and Washen would soon bleed dry and collapse. But there was frustration in Hoop’s posture, and sorrow, and a measure of boredom too. Those were all fine reasons to end this chore. One fist tightened, and maybe he hesitated too long. But really, who would guess that the human h
ad any strength to spend? Hoop hesitated and then swung at the naked captain, and Washen spun and wrapped one arm around her enemy’s arm, clinging to him as she swung her entire body, throwing a bare foot into the armored neck.

  The target was tiny. The harum-scarums decided that only an expert in alien physiology would recognize the weak point in an otherwise invulnerable throat, and of course there was luck involved. But humans did enjoy strong legs and a famous rage. Washen broke toes with the impact, but Hoop’s head snapped back. He did not fall, not immediately. Anything looked ready to happen for a moment or two. Then the head dropped and pulled the rest of that great body to the floor, into the open doorway, and the bloodied victor took her rightful place on his chest, standing only on her good foot.

  * * *

  Security forces arrived to discover that a minor captain now owned the apartment and a wanted criminal had vanished. Neither the alien witnesses nor the captain knew where to find the harum-scarum, which was frustrating; and even worse, despite the severity of these charges, the arrest forms were suddenly turning into dream, evaporating despite the valiant efforts of their owners tried to hold tight to them.

  8

  “Brilliant,” Ishwish said, walking in front of his new protégé. “That was a brave, bold, marvelous job. A little too noisy, I think. But still, you managed to find a solution to this difficult problem.”

  “There are no difficult problems,” Washen said. “Not with a simple solution in hand.”

  The Submaster laughed amiably.

  Washen’s wounds had healed. But she still felt sick, and she wasn’t sure what she believed, and then she decided that she was certain, yes, and that was why her entire body ached.

  The procession had almost reached her new home. The Master Captain and Miocene were directly behind her, speaking about matters that seemed tiny to them and huge to a little captain like her. There were young captains like Washen, and others of higher rank, and every Submaster was there too. She glanced at the faces. She looked at her own face mirrored in Ishwish’s back. Then she took the lead, hurrying to the diamond door, her presence causing it to open.

  “Still the old furnishings, I see,” said Ishwish.

  The wooden harum-scarums guarding their original ground, with one new shape standing at the back of the hall, watching events.

  “Oh, well. You’ve been too busy to see to every detail,” he said with uncommon charity. Then he turned to face the other captains, golden eyes shining with a boyish joy. “Welcome,” he said. “Welcome all. I’m so glad you could be here. And it is such a pleasure, coming back to this wonderful district that I remember so well.”

  “My home,” Washen whispered.

  “You are all welcome here,” Ishwish declared. Then he turned to his protégé. The happiest creature in existence, he said, “This will be your first celebration in your lovely new home.”

  Washen nodded, and on quick legs, she stepped up to the door.

  To the very important gathering, she said, “Come inside, my welcome guests.” Then in the next moment, she turned back to Ishwish, whispering a few words that took the blood from his face and nearly knocked him to the ground.

  “Except you, sir,” she said. “In my home, you will never be.”

  Bridge Two

  Starships are always exhausted on arrival, their fuel spent, every system crying out for repairs. And a good portion of the ships are damaged during the voyage, some mangled to the point where one more insult will collapse them to dust and bone. This is because the slowest vessel has to move fast enough to match velocities with the Great Ship, and the Great Ship plunges forward at one-third light speed. This is because the emptiest space is not empty. A hundred thousand kilometers of vacuum must be crossed every second. Place one cold stone on that path, or a lump of ice or someone’s misplaced tooth, and the collision will transform that fleck of nothing into a fierce plasmatic bomb. Hyperfiber is formidable. Every starship wears at least a slathering of hyperfiber as armor. But quality varies and there are strict limits to its depth and mass, and even the premier grades will evaporate under a billion degree torch. Frailty is a fundamental truth of star travel. Passengers and crew can be ageless, but every sane traveler recognizes that one anonymous chunk of stone can strike without warning, erasing the Forever.

  The typical starship is spun from high technologies that predate most of the species presently using them. But these vessels struggle to move significantly faster than the Great Ship, which is why the captains fire up the engines on occasion, tweaking their velocity just enough that decades later the Ship will fall under the spell of a muscular, compliant gravity well. Approached at the proper angle, at the perfect distance, a smoldering white dwarf star will throw the giant vessel into a fresh, profitable vector. Like a serpent happily wandering in tall grass, the Great Ship weaves and wobbles its way through the best portions of the galaxy, and if a sluggish transport is clever, following an exceptionally straight line, it will catch its goal before too many centuries pass.

  But certain passengers demand a superior machine. Great wealth can buy long, arrow-shaped wonders called streakships. Streakships are tipped with the best hyperfiber and powered by supercharged engines, using fusion fire and antimatter spiking and strangelet tricks and hyperfiber endowments to shove against the possible, driving them across dangerous skies at better than two-thirds light speed.

  Streakships and their slow cousins don’t arrive at the Ship every day. But transports are always approaching, hundreds of them scattered across the light years and all begging for landing instructions—a steady rain of machines and old souls that is coming faster as the galaxy begins to appreciate the marvel that is snaking its way through the civilized realms.

  The Great Ship is like nothing else.

  Reliable and comfortable, luxurious and deliciously strange, it is a supremely safe mode of travel: Gravel and snowballs are nothing to its ocean-deep armor. Mountains and comets are trivial hazards. One fat asteroid could slam down on the Ship’s bow, but the passengers would have no reason for fear. Maybe their luxurious homes would shake for a moment. Maybe they would awaken from some luscious dream. But afterwards the immortal travelers would journey to the hull—if permitted—standing on the lip of a broad crater that soon would be filled and patched, and gone.

  Even little ships will be greeted with pageantry. Powerful aliens deserve spectacle and elaborate diplomatic receptions. Each new species is met by captains who have worked hard to understand them. This is critical. The average captain makes plans and more plans, making ready for the most unlikely guests. Parades and parties and elaborate banquets will stretch on for days and months, unless the newcomers prefer to be ignored, or they appreciate insults, or they cannot find any comfort unless one exceptional captain climbs inside a cavernous mouth, the ceremony demanding that she will be swallowed up whole and then ceremonially vomited back out again.

  And sometimes, too many times, an approaching ship vanishes.

  Disasters don’t happen every day. A full year can pass between tragedies. But a big space liner might fail to report its progress and nothing more is heard, or an emergency beacon will flicker to life and then fall silent again, marking the death of a streakship.

  There are ceremonies for every arriving ship and ceremonies to honor the dead as well.

  Every approaching ship is logged on its first day, its passengers and crewmembers named and known. And there are a few captains who do little with their days but plan for every ship’s death. Just in case. They compose speeches meant to honor lost souls, honoring all as friends, and they wrap their words around rituals designed to satisfy the species involved. Then all the surviving ships are warned about the loss and its location. Debris fields have formed, and they will keep charging ahead at some fraction of light-speed, spreading out and slashing at everything in their way. And the captains always share elaborate maps showing where the danger is greatest, and they always wish their future passengers safe travel, b
ut even when odds are poor, they never tell anyone, “Change your course. Please, steer clear of us and save yourselves, please.”

  Mere

  1

  She should have been born with a fuller, richer name—a loving name bestowed by helplessly adoring parents—and she should have grown up happy and smug inside their loving grasp. Blessed with her native talents as well as the inherited wealth, all things good would have been inevitable. Life would have brought long years of trusted pleasure punctuated by tame adventures and the occasional romance, and as often happens in these cases, the daughter would have eventually fallen short of her family’s lofty ambitions. But that wouldn’t have prevented her from becoming a delightfully ordinary soul, raising her own little family or perhaps a series of families; and as the aeons mounted, that happy creature would have achieved the heavenly state that comes to the typical immortal: Entire centuries of existence would quietly escape her grasp, her mind reaching its natural limits, her snug and ordinary and generally untested existence shared with faces very much like hers and stories as eternal and as bland as her own little self.

  But for a knob of black ice, that would have been the child’s destiny. Her fate. She should have become someone else or she never would have been in the first place. But if you are one of the rare souls who both understand and believe as the Tila understand and believe, then you have no choice but accept the premise that your existence is a single thread, insubstantial to the brink of being unreal, and every thread is woven together by a universe of shadow and possibility, and buried among all those infinitely forgettable women is a strange and precious rope of pain and gold known as Mere.

  * * *

  Mere’s parents were the wealthiest citizens on a distant colony world. Their piece of the universe wasn’t as developed as some, and the available streakships were small and relatively short-ranged. But the Great Ship and its long voyage around the galaxy were too much of a temptation. How could they not take part in history? Husband and wife purchased the five best ships, then chopped them apart and cobbled together the finest pieces. In the end, there was no more powerful human-built vessel anywhere. The new streakship had efficient engines and redundant life-support systems, a talent for self-repair and just enough cabin space to house two people along with an entourage of twenty-three giddy friends. A slab of high-grade hyperfiber rode ahead of the bow and a few lasers clung to the armor, primed to attack every hazard. But the Great Ship was nearly out of range by then. Velocity was the critical need, and hard decisions had to be made. Studying projections of risk laid over time, the couple massaged the numbers until the numbers told a comforting story, and then they made themselves laugh, saying, “We’ll just have to drag a little sweet luck along with us, and what is the mass of luck? Nothing, that’s all.”