Captain Cosette

by R. Bruce Sundrud

  In some novels she had read, computers talked and robots were servants, intelligent and sassy, but she had never seen one in real life, and she wasn’t even sure if they were real or fiction.

  Computers are real, obviously. Too bad I don’t know how to use one.

  She didn’t want to leave the rifles out in the open, so she stacked them into the room labeled AREA KK-02 as she had been told.

  Quarter-master Raimy, annoyed by her interruption, explained to her how to find Professor Roland. She followed the directions to the professor’s laboratory, a room painted in green and lined with cages. In some of the cages strange beasts paced back and forth, animals she had never seen before.

  Professor Roland saw her when she came in. He put down a microphone, pressed a button, and turned to her. “Well?”

  “All assembled. The machine worked.”

  “No, your brain worked. The machine always works. It’s the human brain that fails. So they’re all assembled, catalogued, and put away, and the trash disposed of?”

  “I didn’t catalog them. I didn’t know how.”

  And the empty boxes are still sitting there.

  “You didn’t catalog them? But it’s a simple matter of… Oh, I see. You don’t have the background knowledge. Where were you raised?”

  “Up in the highlands. You know, where they raise fruit.”

  He smiled in a patronizing way. “A true country girl. But even Toulouse-educated youth barely know how to do these things, so I shouldn’t be surprised. You need background training.” He tapped his lips. “Tomorrow morning then. Ten of the clock, ante meridian, we’ll do your background training. The human brain needs a period of sleep between sessions to clean up the old signals.” He stood. “Done. Tomorrow. And don’t be late again! Then you can catalog the rifles, and I’ll tell Raimy you’re ready for your next assignment. Don’t think these easy days will continue, recruit whatever-your-name-is. The more you know, the more work you’ll be able to do. Now go. Shoo!”

  She shooed.

  She found her way back to the area where she had assembled the rifles, found a huge rusty container marked REFUSE, and pushed all the boxes into it. She hung the crowbar back in its place and left the wooden crates where they stood. Maybe they would be reused, maybe they wouldn’t, but she wasn’t going to bother Raimy or the professor again to ask.

  She enjoyed an early dinner – meat sandwiches, a yellow fruit that was tasteless and hard to chew, actual milk, and an incredible frozen dessert that she nibbled as slowly as she could in pure delight. An old woman in coveralls and a hair net was the only one working in the mess hall. Hoping she wouldn’t get yelled at, Cosette asked the woman if there was a library in the compound.

  “Library?” The old woman looked puzzled. “Don’t you have a book?”

  “Yes, I have two books, but I’ve read both.”

  “Oh, you’re talking about paper books. We don’t have paper books. You’re a recruit, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “In your room, in your desk. There’s supposed to be a library book there. The power switch is on top. It’ll explain itself. They should have shown you that.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No problem.”

  Before returning to her room, she walked around the training center to get used to the layout. The male recruit housing was empty but untidy; she guessed that the men had been called away to action without warning and hadn’t had time to clean it up. Either that or it was just the way men kept their rooms, like her stepbrothers.

  She walked back to her room in women’s housing, took another hot shower, and found an electronic book just where the woman had said it would be. She settled onto her bunk, turned on the light – lovely light! – and puzzled over the book. It was rectangular, had a screen, and when she pushed the button on top, a menu appeared. She didn’t know how to work the book, and almost set it aside before her hand accidentally brushed the screen and the choices FICTION and NON-FICTION came up.

  “Just like the professor’s screen,” she said to herself. “You just touch it. Why didn’t it say so?”

  She tapped FICTION, and another set of categories came up.

  She could choose HISTORICAL or CLASSICAL or MYSTERY or SCIENCE FICTION – why anyone would choose that one was beyond her – or ROMANCE or… She tapped ROMANCE.

  Then came a choice of TITLES or AUTHORS. She chose AUTHORS, and then touched her favorite author, Renée Chevalier.

  A long list of titles appeared, and she gasped. She had only read three of them.

  She touched the first title that she hadn’t read, and the text appeared.

  She stole the pillows from the other beds and immersed herself in the pain and trials of TRAMPLED LILIES OF THE FIELD.

  *

  Rasora knocked on her door. She looked up to find that hours had passed. She was on the last chapter, the climax of the book, but she set it aside and invited him in.

  Bouncing with excitement, she told him about her learning to assemble E7 rifles, and crazy Professor Roland, and the new foods at the mess hall, and her new book with a million books inside of it.

  Only then did she calm down and listen to him tell of finding a sanctuary, of praying until he felt that Imsami was no longer in despair about his sudden death. “I will find holy places and pray again many times, I think, until both he and I are at peace.”

  Then Rasora sat on the bunk opposite hers and told her of the fighting going on in the city. “This base is secure and well fortified, but the Alliance sympathizers are making a good fight of it. I hope the commandant isn’t being complacent.”

  “Why is there fighting?”

  Rasora laughed. “Don’t you know?”

  “No. It doesn’t affect us up in the highlands.”

  “Well, to put a pin in it, Sorine is one of the planets held by the Union of Planets. They like to keep things neat and orderly, meaning they have lots of laws and lots of enforcement, with a solid central government.

  “The Alliance, however, is a larger group of planets that believe in a loose, casual form of governance, determined at the local level. Over the past couple centuries the Alliance and the Union have had peace and they have had war. Right now it’s war.”

  Cosette nodded, trying to look interested. She was anxious to get back to the last chapter of TRAMPLED LILIES but she also found herself enjoying Rasora’s company.

  “The Alliance sympathizers,” he continued, “are people here on Sorine who want to throw off the Union rule and have Sorine join the Alliance. Both sides claim moral right, freedom on one side, order on the other, and it’s come to fighting. With luck it will die down and people will go back to working and complaining.”

  “What side are you on?”

  He shrugged. “We didn’t care. Fighting opened up opportunities for mercenaries like us. Now it’s just me. And I still don’t care, but everything changed when Imsami died. I don’t know. Now I need to find that mess hall and a bunk for the night.”

  “You’re staying here?”

  “Yes.” He studied the palm of his hand. “I promised your father that…”

  “He’s just my step-father.”

  “Well, I promised your step-father that I would take care of you. For now, this also gives me a place to stay, but once things settle down here, I’ll try to decide what Imsami would want me to do.”

  Rasora excused himself, and Cosette settled back down to the ending of TRAMPLED LILIES.

  The main character, Amadora, had grown tired of Julio’s vacillating love affairs with other women. She climbed into their flier and told the robot to take her back to the spaceport.

  “But Amadora,” cried Julio, “wherever shall I go? Whatever shall I do?”

  “Frankly, my dear Julio,” said Amadora, “I don’t give a damn.”

  In the last paragraph, Amadora flew back to the spaceport lamenting the loss of her love for Julio, but confident that there was always hope, because tomorrow… tomorrow was
another day.

  Cosette laid down the book and wiped her eyes, aching for the love that was never to be, and glad that the novel had ended on a note of hope, however desperate.

  Where does she get these marvelous plots?

  She thought about starting another work by Chevalier, but she felt she ought to get a good night’s sleep.

  She took another hot shower, got into her night clothes, and turned out the lights.

  As she settled under the clean sheets, she found herself thinking again about Rasora’s dark eyes, and his deep emotions when his brother died. There was a good heart in him, despite his wild life with Imsami.

  Don’t you start falling for him, you silly girl. Go to sleep.

  But it would be nice to give him a hug, sort of an “I’m sorry your brother died” type of hug, just to see what his arms would feel like around her, even though her head would be at the level of his shirt pockets.

  Go to sleep!

  Oh, well.

  Tomorrow is another day.

  Chapter Five

  Cosette sat down on the leather seat of the teaching machine, her mood optimistic. “What am I going to learn today?”

  Professor Roland turned left and right, his green laboratory coat swirling, as he double checked the connections. “What?”

  She watched him checking the manual. “Why do you have to look things up? Don’t you know it already?”

  He glared at her and adjusted his glasses. “I told you already, this machine is second-hand, taken from the Alliance. It’s primitive, and it’s had rough treatment. Oh, don’t worry, it won’t hurt you. But I need to triple-check everything.” He stared out the dirty window at the parking lot beyond. “If I was in a modern facility, this machine would be half its size and fully automated.” He broke out of his reverie and resumed checking the connections. Finally he put gel on the headband and fastened it over her brow.

  “What am I going to learn today?” she asked again.

  “Today you learn….” He grabbed the clipboard and studied it. “Today you learn background information.”

  “What’s that?”

  He tapped the screen, pulling up the menu. “You need background in operating computers…” He tapped a title, and a submenu appeared. “Might as well do some undergraduate chemistry and physics, the basics.” He moved through other menus.

  “How much can that machine teach me?”

  He laughed, indicating her question was childish. “There’s not a library in any computer on Sorine that can match the archive in this machine. Look here.” He began tapping the screen. “You want to know maintenance? How about every piece of military equipment ever made, Union or Alliance? Spacecraft, orbiting stations, wherever you get sent to work, even how to pilot the spacecraft. See here? Historic works of war, strategy and tactics. And more and more and more. You see? You could spend every day in here for a year and hardly scratch the surface. But today all you need is to learn to how to catalog those rifles, and get some background knowledge.” He enlarged one menu. “Shouldn’t take but a few minutes.”

  Someone ran past the window, shouting.

  “Ah,” said Professor Roland. “Sounds like the men are coming back. They’re going to want those rifles. We’d better get started.” He adjusted the cap on her head, and tied the leather straps on her arms and legs.

  In the distance she could hear the sounds of gunfire. “Shouldn’t we wait? That fighting sounds close.”

  “No, no, no, we need to get this done so you can make those rifles available.” He held out the gauze-covered grounding disk. “Now bite down and hush.” He pressed a key, and again she felt the sensation of a piece of soft material drifting down onto her mind. “The bell will ding when it’s finished.”

  The sound of fighting rose in the hallway, and he stepped away from the machine. “One moment,” he said. “I have to tell those people to be quiet. I’ll be right back.”

  She watched with anxiety as the professor stepped out of the training room and closed the door behind him.

  Another layer of knowledge settled on her brain, dimming her vision and muffling sounds. She could hear weapon fire outside the room, and something thumped against the outside wall.

  Another layer, and another. Each packet of knowledge was gentle as it settled down, like soft snow from a windless sky.

  But like falling snow, the layers accumulated. Her arms and legs grew numb, and she felt them twitching within the constraints of the leather straps.

  I’m starting to twitch. I didn’t do that last time. Something’s wrong.

  When is he coming back? What happened to him?

  I’m frightened!

  The layers kept falling, burying her mind, dimming her perception. The room seemed far away, as though she was looking at it through a tunnel. Sounds muffled until she could only hear her own pounding heart, and then the pounding of her heart softened.

  Too much! Too much! Turn off the machine!

  She cried out, her teeth still clenched on the ground wire disk, but could barely make a grunt. It was like being in a nightmare, the sort of nightmare where she could not make herself move, could not struggle against the restraints, could not make herself heard, and the unnamed horror kept growing.

  She spat out the grounding disk and tried to scream.

  The falling packets became a blizzard, unrestrained. An avalanche engulfed her mind and her senses failed. She could see nothing, hear nothing, and feel nothing. Her body was lost. There was nothing left of her but a tenuous candle of consciousness as a snowstorm of information softly and gently obliterated her.

  And then she flickered out.

  *

  She was moving.

  Or she was being moved.

  “….the door while I ….”

  Silence.

  What was that?

  Movement again, and dull sounds without meaning.

  “…be permanent or she might be able to….”

  “…can’t you …”

  “…find her way out by herself….”

  Long stretches of quiet that seemed endless, and then again the sounds.

  “…can’t swallow, so this tube…”

  “…use a ventilator until she…”

  One sound, one word, reverberated. She could make no sense of it, but it matched the edge of one packet of knowledge among the many that smothered her.

  Ventilator.

  Snap.

  “Positive-end expiratory pressure is maintained during a breath…” Floating in her mind were the parts of different ventilators and how they worked.

  “…seems to be trying to breathe on her own.”

  “…can see by the oxygen analyzer that she’s…

  Oxygen Analyzer.

  Snap.

  “Two dissimilar electrodes immersed in an electrolyte solution….” Dials, sensors, cables, an array of analyzers lay before her. They settled into the context of her mind.

  “…making some progress.”

  “Can she hear me?”

  “Rasora, we can’t tell if….

  Silence.

  “…sugar may be low. Check her blood chemistry….”

  Chemistry.

  Snap.

  A parade of elements swam before her, combining and recombining in an orderly fashion. The knowledge slid into place in her mind, reducing by a fraction the weight that buried her.

  Light appeared.

  A tiny circle of light, far in the distance and very dim, but it was light. Shadows moved.

  “See there? Her pupils dilated. I told you her brain wasn’t fried.”

  “But what if she stays like this?”

  “She’s fighting back. Just give her time.”

  Silence.

  “No progress?”

  “Not today. I asked them to send down a specialist with the next shuttle, but they…”

  Shuttle.

  Snap.

  Snap.

  Snap.

  Schematics roared
through her brain, wiring diagrams snarled, engine specifications detonated. A riot of knowledge about shuttles and other space craft bullied its way into her mind like shrapnel and took up residence.

  She cried out with the pain.

  “She moved! Look at her arm!”

  “Calm down, Rasora. It was just a twitch.”

  Something gripped her hand and she clung to it like a mast in a hurricane. The circle of light grew larger, and she could see a face.

  “Can you hear me, Cosette? Squeeze my hand if you can.”

  The words had no meaning.

  She closed her eyes, blocked out the light, and slept.

  *

  She drank from the glass being held to her lips, but spilled much of it. Someone wiped the water from her face and neck.

  Other pieces of knowledge had slipped into place as she woke and slept, and with each piece she saw and heard more clearly. She still could not speak, though. Everything was dim and language made little sense. People kept talking to her, but unless they happened to say something that triggered another piece of information to seat in her brain, it was all a meaningless jumble.

  A tall man sat by her, talking to her, holding her hand. He said his name was Rasora, but she forgot it after he said it. She knew she ought to say something to him, but no words ever formed.

  The circle of her vision had enlarged yet again, and she was able to move her eyes and look around the room. The walls were painted a powder blue, and artificial flowers stood in a vase beside her bed.

  Time seemed disconnected, uneven. Sometimes minutes passed slowly, sometimes hours would pass in the blink of an eye.

  She liked it when people talked to her. Sometimes they said a word that caused a bit of knowledge to fit, and every time that occurred, her burden lessened. She remembered feeling crushed, obliterated, but now she could chew and swallow and observe the things around her.

  She blinked, time flickered, and a man in a lavender laboratory coat sat beside her. “How are we doing today, young lady?”

  She focused on him, trying to understand.

  He picked up her hand. “Can you squeeze my hand?”

  She liked him holding her hand. He had brown eyes.