Strange how Dayo had, in her head, existed as though frozen in time, without aging or forming other ties of her own. Cynwrig had alluded to family. Did Dayo have children? After all those years alone, was it possible Asala now found herself with a hidden wealth of clan-mates? Questions she wanted to ask, but couldn't, not with Cynwrig right there.
And Asala had never imagined that her sister would accept a life with the Gandesians—had always envisioned her trapped on Camp Ghala like most refugees, or else making her way to Khayyam as Asala had herself. Yet she knew it was true that some of the early refugees had been desperate enough to accept the Gandesians' insistence on assimilation, before Gan-De had closed that path.
“Is everything she said true?” Asala asked Dayo. Hana. She remembered, bitterly, that Dayo meant “joy” in the lore of their clan, just as Hana did as a Gandesian name.
“It's true,” Dayo said, her voice like ash and sand. “I am oath-bound to obey, and blood-bound to protect my family.”
Asala's heart clenched within her. Even Dayo's accent had changed, in the common language that they all spoke. Asala's accent retained some of the old rhythms of their clan, with occasional touches of the dominant Khayyami dialect, picked up from her comrades in Ekrem's company. Dayo now spoke with crisp inflections not dissimilar to those of Cynwrig herself. This final betrayal, like the imperfectly removed tattoos, hurt Asala like a knife to the belly.
There was a strange fire in Dayo's eyes, though; Cynwrig did not see it, but Asala did. Dayo kept speaking, more rapidly, as if she only had seconds—and she spoke in the primary language of their childhood, which Cynwrig was unlikely to understand. “Ice to ice, water to water, heart to heart—never forget me—”
It was a line from the Hypatian poet Anahita, a song of family sundered in some old clan conflict.
“Lieutenant,” Cynwrig snapped, and Asala felt a rush of absurd pride that her sister was an officer, even if she was an officer in the Gandesian military. How fucked up was that? But there was no arguing with the heart. “Actions have consequences. I will not belabor the obvious.”
“Yes, ma'am,” Dayo said. “You have always been clear about that. I accept the penalty.”
The signal fizzed out.
“Commander,” Camp Ghala Control cut in, “I've located the source of, er, the lieutenant's signal—” Control forwarded her the information.
Dayo had her own Hawkmoth-class starfighter, designed for a human pilot and drone escorts, flown by the elite. Asala was under no illusions that this indicated any favor on Cynwrig's part. There was a story behind Dayo's service, and she wanted to hear it, wanted to know it all, however much the words cut her.
Except Dayo's starfighter was arrowing straight toward the general's carrier, like a falcon falling out of the sun as the old poet Makani would have said, a collision course that Cynwrig could not ignore.
Asala hailed her own units to scream something, to order them to protect Dayo from what was coming somehow. She couldn't fail to try to save her own sister—
She'd scarcely had time to say her own name, to hear the slight crackling that indicated the comm link was open, when her sensors informed her that Cynwrig's carrier had opened fire on Dayo's ship. Evasive maneuvers, Asala cried in the depths of her own mind.
Instead, the sensors caught a tiny flash of motion, light reflecting off a mote—Dayo had ejected. The question was whether she would survive long enough for anyone to pick her up before her oxygen ran out.
Pilot Twenty-Six was nearest. “Pick up the survivor,” Asala said, her voice hoarse as though she'd been screaming. “That's an order.”
A burst of static, then: “I'm not rescuing a Gandesian pilot,” Twenty-Six spat back.
Twenty-Six didn't know; none of them did. None of them cared.
In the meantime, railgun projectiles swept forward, metal slugs accelerated to punishing velocities, and both punched through Dayo's ship, reducing it to so much debris.
Her heart split down the middle as she said, “Commander Asala to all units. You will escort Uzochi's ship to Camp Ghala. Don't come after me.”
She hoped that the pilots could clear a path for Uzochi without further loss of life, but she knew that it was unlikely to be clean and easy.
“What are you going to do, Commander?” one of the pilots asked as their ships swooped toward Uzochi's vessel.
But Asala was no longer listening. Dayo, wait for me.
Gan-De's far-reaching scout drones had detected the incoming Khayyami fleet and reported it to Cynwrig. The infected systems, in turn, alerted Niko. Niko passed along the approach vector to Camp Ghala Control, even though everyone had already been expecting the arrival of the Khayyami. Control responded with a curt acknowledgment.
What Niko hadn't anticipated was getting a call. One they couldn't ignore—and from an unexpected source, at that. If it had been their allies, they could have signaled that this wasn't the best of times.
But no. The call came from a specific channel. President Ekrem.
Niko took a deep breath, aware that they were shaking. All the words that they'd never been able to say to their father, all the accusations and disagreements, stuck in their throat. If they could somehow persuade the Khayyami forces to take sides on the refugees' behalf—to abandon the cruel, selfish plan to seize Uzochi's wormhole generators for Khayyam's elites and leave everyone else behind to die—
Ekrem's face smiled at Niko from the screen before them. He looked as handsome and assured as ever, even through the faceplate of the helmet. His knack for projecting confidence never changed.
Wait a second. Helmet? Niko's eyes narrowed as they took in Ekrem's surroundings, gleaning what they could from the visuals. Ekrem wasn't on the bridge of a luxury ship or cruiser. He was in the cockpit of a starfighter distantly related to the one that Niko and Asala had flown from Khayyam in an eternity ago, except it was sleeker, better armed, more advanced. Niko could see it in the small details, the gleaming chrome panels, the polished displays, the up-to-date controls. Only the best for President Ekrem, as ever.
“You weren't expecting me, I take it,” he said. Still smiling, the way he always did. “Did you think I'd be voted out so easily?”
“I have a favor to ask, President,” Niko said. They had to keep this professional, and never mind that they ached, even now, for Ekrem to crush them close in a hug as if they were still a child, to say, You've done a good job. Ekrem wouldn't take them seriously if they asked him child to father. As family.
“Do you, now?” Ekrem's smile didn't fade. He was indulging Niko, and Niko hated that.
I can't afford to let my feelings get in the way, Niko reminded themself. “The refugees need your help, President,” they said at their most formal. “Just think—beyond saving the Vela, you could save the whole of Camp Ghala. Share the wormhole devices with the refugees. All those people, those grateful parents and smiling babies? It would be a tremendous public relations coup.”
“Is that what you think of me?” Ekrem said, and now there was a hint of sadness in his voice.
“I'm merely thinking of the practicalities of the situation.” Niko was proud of their level tone.
Ekrem didn't sound proud at all when he responded, only tired. “Publicity stunts are how one stays in office, yes,” he said. “The scientists tell me—hell, your mother tells me—that our sun only has about a hundred years left, even if we reduce the rate at which we mine it and institute population controls the way the alarmists have been insisting. It would take someone with dictatorial powers, someone like General Cynwrig, to pull that off. And the people of Khayyam wouldn't stand for it.”
“Spare me your excuses,” Niko started to say, but Ekrem kept talking.
“You do computers,” Ekrem said. “So you do numbers. Believe it or not”—and his mouth twisted to one side—“politicians do numbers too. The Vela's technology, which you now know about, can save us.”
In another time and place, Niko would have erupted,
railing at how the Vela's secret had been kept from them even as they were sent to guarantee Asala would bring it back. But now was not the time. They held their tongue.
“It can save us,” Ekrem continued, “but it can't save all of us. Even if we shared the cube technology, there are only so many ships to go around, and so many resources. There's no way to evacuate the entire population of the system, no matter how many habitable worlds are out there in the great void.”
“That doesn't give you the right to choose who gets saved!” Dimly, they were aware that they had shouted—at their father, at the president of Khayyam.
“Someone has to choose,” Ekrem countered. “Any colonies founded around undamaged suns will require resources. Healthy settlers. The best and brightest minds to deal with any problems that arise—and let's be honest, Niko, there will be problems. There always are. Shouldn't we give those colonies the very best chance of success, instead of populating them with the dregs of the system?”
Niko stared at their father. “It sounds so reasonable when you put it that way.” They were not being complimentary.
Ekrem sighed. “Your compassion does you credit, Niko. It's numbers,” he said again, as if that made things better. “If we can only save a finite number of people, then we owe it to ourselves—to everyone—to take the best people possible. Just as in the military, you don't pick your squad out of pity.”
There was no use talking to him. He didn't get it, was too locked into his vision of a future for his handpicked chosen few, the idea that only Khayyam had anything to offer.
But Ekrem's next words startled Niko. “It was you behind the Gandesian orbital platforms going berserk, wasn't it?” Ekrem said. “Remarkable work. I bet it gave General Cynwrig fits.”
“I don't see what this—” Niko began to say.
“There's a place for you too,” Ekrem said. “You doubted it—no, don't say anything. Parents always know. I may not have been the best of fathers, but I do keep track. You could be one of the guiding voices in the new regime. There's a place for you by my side.”
Niko was tempted, and hated themself for it. Giving in, however, would require surrendering everything they'd worked for. Even if Niko never told their father about their connections with the rebels, they'd always know. And they would never be able to forget the people they'd left behind—people like Asala.
One of the computers chimed. Rotten timing—was there any other kind? The Gandesian hackers on the other side were attempting to regain control of the corrupted orbital platforms.
“You could be remembered as someone truly special,” Niko said. A last attempt to turn things around, not just for the refugees, but for their relationship with Ekrem. “You could be the man who had the vision to rescue not only his own people, but the destitute and desperate.”
Ekrem's smile returned, that beam he turned on supporters and detractors alike, and Niko knew they'd failed to convince him. “Then we'll have to do this the hard way,” Ekrem said. “Stay safe. I'll send someone for you when all this blows over.”
“You can't just kidnap me!” Niko shouted, but the screen had gone dark.
• • •
Asala was starting to despair. While the Gandesians were stymied for the moment, thanks to the turncoat orbital platforms, she'd lost sensor lock on Dayo's escape pod for the second time. She couldn't count on the drones being neutralized for much longer; she had to get her sister to safety.
Just as she wrestled with the scan suite, another call came in. She was tempted to tell Control to fuck off, but she couldn't do so in good conscience, even for her sister's sake.
“Commander,” Control said, low and rapid. “Please come back. We need you.”
“Did Uzochi—”
“Uzochi's ship safely landed on Camp Ghala,” Control said, “but—”
“But what?”
“It's Hafiz,” a new voice broke in, one that Asala recognized all too well: Soraya, and more specifically, Soraya suppressing fury at this latest development. “Hafiz ordered three blocks—the ones under their control—to detach.”
“Hafiz has done what?” Asala said. She could see it on scan, the ships breaking off from Camp Ghala and streaking away into the night. “What do they think they're going to accomplish by hanging everyone else out to dry? We're all going to the same destination.”
“It's chaos here,” Soraya said, fighting to make herself heard above the babble of noise in the background. “Hafiz already had a supply of cubes for their own ships. Turns out Uzochi has been smuggling them up to the camp in some of the aid packages. So naturally they're first to leave.”
“Uzochi let them do that?” Asala demanded. Interesting: Hafiz's fleet was forming up away from the battle, but she didn't see anything resembling wormholes, either. What were they waiting for?
Soraya laughed bitterly. “Remember, Uzochi's been working with Hafiz from the start. She knows Hafiz is a leader. Just because she's a scientist doesn't mean she's naive. Meanwhile, Hafiz's people have been taking Uzochi's final load of cubes and offering them up willy-nilly to the mob. It's a madhouse up here. You might as well make your escape, Asala.”
Dayo. “Hold on,” Asala said as another amber light came on. “Make it fast,” she told whoever was on the channel.
It was Niko. “Asala,” they said. “Thank the gods.” Their eyes were shadowed. “President Ekrem has finally arrived—and he wants Uzochi's tech. He'll take it at gunpoint if necessary. You have to stop him.”
Dayo, Asala thought again. She would just have to multitask. “The rest of you get out of here,” she said recklessly. “Niko, he's your father.” Niko had to be hurting.
“I know,” Niko said through gritted teeth. “I know.” Their eyes were dry. Somehow that made it worse.
“Then it's settled,” Asala said. Niko would hate her for it, after. She already welcomed the wedge it would drive between them, the telltale bitter draught of anticipatory guilt.
Niko provided Asala the IFF signature of Ekrem's ship, which her targeting system accepted readily. It was hard not to think of the system as an eager predator. Niko was saying something else when the sensors picked up on Dayo's escape pod again—distant from the Khayyami fleet, drifting in the darkness.
I'm coming, Dayo, Asala whispered to herself, and swerved like a hunting falcon toward Ekrem.
• • •
Meanwhile, beyond the remnants of Camp Ghala and the firestorm of the battle, Hafiz's fleet activated their cubes, and a hole sizzled open in the sky, gaping wider, wider, widest, like a winter maw.
Episode 10
The Battle of Gan-De, Part 2
Becky Chambers
There was an eerie moment of stillness. Gunfire stopped. Chases slowed. Only the drones didn’t realize that the game had changed, and continued their dance toward now-distracted targets. Every ship with a human behind the helm seemed to stumble, and the comms filled with the emptiness of a battleground holding its breath.
And then, just as quickly: chaos.
Asala couldn’t make out who was saying what. Everyone was speaking at once now, and the ships leapt into action with them. The noise in her ears was a tumult of swearing, shouting, demands of how, how, how?! It shouldn’t have been possible, not with what they knew. The cubes would take each ship that held one to safety, they’d been told. They’d assumed—assumed, like idiots—that the cubes were keys, and each key had a door, and every ship that held one would slip through their own private exit. But the cubes didn’t behave that way at all. That much was plain now. They were a cluster, a network. Dozens of small parts that linked their efforts together to open not many small doors, but one big one.
Just one.
Dread filled Asala’s stomach the second before the inevitable happened. A ship—one of her stalwart volunteers—peeled off from the battle and barreled in the direction of the wormhole. Gandesian and Khayyami colors followed suit, patriotism abandoned in a blink for a chance at a living future. Did they ev
en know what awaited them on the other side? Did they have any food, any supplies? Clearly, it didn’t matter. But the desertion was not universal, and reactions to it were frantic. Formations fragmented, strategies fell apart, and those for whom decorum mattered most still tried to play the game. Gandesian ships fired on Khayyami, Khayyami on Gandesian, Ghalan on everyone, drones on the enemies of whichever hackers had grabbed the reins for now. She watched as two small craft collided in their rush for the exit. A mangled wing sheared off and crippled a third. The comms filled with the desperate noise of captains and commanders scrambling to regain order, trying to count how many pieces they were still playing with.
This wasn’t a battle any longer. This was a stampede.
• • •
Cynwrig stood amid the ruckus on the bridge. “Quiet,” she said, piercing the din. Heads turned nearly in unison. She stared at them as if they were unruly children. “Unless you have anything useful to offer, I will have quiet.”
“General, Red Squad has encountered Khayyami fighters. They—”
Cynwrig glared. “Lieutenant Sung, yes?”
“Yes, General.”
“Lieutenant, what is your assessment of our current situation?”
The young man swallowed. “Kima?”
“What would you say our immediate strategic priority is?” Her words snapped like bullets. “The status of Red Squad, who have not called for assistance? Or the wormhole our enemy has opened?”
“I—the—”
“You’re demoted.” She looked around the bridge. “I will say this again. Does anyone have anything useful—anything useful—to offer?”
The bridge fell as silent as the void outside.
“Signal to surface command,” Cynwrig directed. “I need to speak with my science advisers.”
The comms officer attempted to obey, but shook their head at the console with frustration. “General, comms to the surface are down. Orbital relays are not responding.”
The Vela: The Complete Season 1 Page 31