ROMA

by R. A. Ender

  “I love looking at the stars. It would be a lot of fun to fly between them.”

  “Yeah,” Heather said, lying down beside him. At the same time, she slowly moved her hand to meet his and held it.

  As strange as it seems, that was the first moment he realized that Heather was aiming at something other than their usual friendly walk or time together.

  Richard instantly tensed up. It wasn’t that he didn’t understand, it was that he very suddenly did. But he’d never experienced physical love before with Heather. Yes, they had been extremely close and loved each other but it had always been an incredibly comfortable connection and never physical. The physical contact, done with such deliberate intention, left him a little stupefied.

  Heather, though, was not in that same stupor. Her actions, when he thought back on them later, over and over and over again, were deliberate, practiced and preplanned. She had set out to be alone with me; she had placed us alone, in a slightly secluded place. She had moved near me, she had held my hand, Richard remembered.

  She looked back and down at him as if to draw him up to her. His fear kept Richard lying on his back, not knowing what to do. For some reason, the obvious didn’t seem possible. She began to rub his hand with her thumb and curve her fingers gently inward to massage his palm. He continued to resist the urge to sit up.

  They were in that position for what felt like forever. Heather just kept looking at him from around and through her hair. Her unspoken effort to have him sit up slowly worked. The debate whether or not to sit up in his head was furious, for he knew why she was drawing him up to her. His fear was all that was keeping him from meeting her lips with his. Eventually, his greed for physical love and the obvious opportunity being presented forced his body to respond.

  He sat up.

  And now, with their faces level with only a breath of space between them, Heather moved forward. It was so subtle, so soft, so slow but also so deliberate. She adjusted her seated position, moving her body closer to his and dipped her head forward and sideways to permit a kiss.

  Richard’s fear kept him from moving. He was afraid because this was his friend and he didn’t know what to think. He was afraid because he had not planned his evening in this way and was completely unprepared. Also, he was just afraid because he had never really kissed a girl before in this way and he didn’t know how.

  His fear finally needed to be expressed, so he pulled away just enough to say, “Heather, I’ve never done this before. I don’t know how so you will have to.”

  Her response was a simple one, “Ok.” With that, she leaned over and kissed him. She pulled away, but only slightly, and kissed him again. She kept kissing him and moved to place her hand on his chest. Slowly, they lay back on the grass on the hillside and kissed under the stars.

  Time disappeared as Richard was focused on how good it felt. Eventually, that feeling broke as the sounds of some teenagers tensed them both enough that they broke apart. Heather slid a little further away and the moment was over.

  She looked at him for a while, not saying anything. Richard had nothing to say.

  Heather finally spoke. “I told you long ago that I loved you. I’m sorry it took me this long to realize what a great guy you are.”

  She returned to silence again and looked up at the stars. Richard kept watching her, wanting to say that he loved her too, but he simply could not muster the words. But, he did find the where with all to move his hand over and hold her hand, rubbing her gently with his thumb.

  She looked back over and smiled.

  They lay there for a while, not talking, looking up at the stars together. Richard didn’t remember how they decided to walk home, but they did. When they split to walk to their own homes alone, they kissed again.

  With a sigh, Richard sat back in his chair, laid his head back and looked up at the ceiling. A smile spread on his face and he thought to himself, Heather, Heather, Heather. How did I lose you?

  Before he could recall that story, a low bass tone series of notes from a Cithara rang out across his room’s sound system. It was the standard chime alert that a message was coming in for the Captain. Taking a deep breath, he reached forward to press the console that would answer the call.

  I’ll have time to think back to my younger days another time, he thought with a smile on his lips.

  CHAPTER 2

  “Commander, armory inventory report for you to sign.”

  The request snapped Commander Robin Shelbus from a momentary mental wander. It brought her mind back to the command deck she was in charge of, buried deep inside the bowels of the ship.

  She looked up to see the crewman who had spoken. He was young!

  Wow, I swear they recruit from kindergarten these days! she thought to herself. She tried to figure out if she knew his name. After a moment, she decided that she did not, not surprising given the hundreds of members of a ship’s crew. She looked to his nametag for the answer, Roger Dent.

  Hmm, a pure old Earth name, first and last. Parents must have been special, she said to herself sarcastically. Always weird people those Old Earth watchers.

  She then looked the crewman up and down. That said, they raised a hell of a good looking boy, Robin thought to herself with some excitement. Being stuck inside a metal box tended to make most people look better but he was classically handsome. But very young. She’d always liked younger men but he might be pushing it. Younger men may be less mature, but they were always a lot of fun and a good challenge. That said, she said to herself, they weren’t usually much for commitment, which explains why I’m still single.

  With that depressing thought, she quickly signed the inventory report, not even bothering to check it. If something was missing, the Chief Armor would have delivered the report himself. With that signature, the crewman saluted, turned and walked off the command deck.

  Maybe I should talk to the Captain about resigning my commission for the night so I can run after that one, she thought to herself with a smile. He would be a hell of a good time!

  But, that was only a passing fantasy every crew member had from time to time. Throwing away all responsibility, running off to find love and the happy family life from the plays. Everyone thinks about it, she thought, no one ever does it.

  Those kinds of thoughts usually become everyday occurrences the longer a cruise lasts. Once you get near the one year mark, it gets discussed over breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And usually at every calda break in between.

  Harmless fun usually but utterly depressing at times. Though, talking about it helped. Of course, the ultimate cure is definitely to ride a nice hard bodied young crewman for a few hours. Or, at least dream about it next time I slide into my sheets! She thought to herself with a satisfied smile on her lips, betraying her thoughts to those around her.

  “He is a damn fine looking man,” came a whispered comment from behind Shelbus. “I’d transfer him out of the cohortes for you if I thought I’d survive the female mutiny it would cause me.”

  The whispered joke came from the head of the ships cohortes, Commander Sara Daridius, manning the weapons station during this shift. Shelbus looked over her shoulder with a smile. “And how do you get any work done down in the armory?”

  With a big smile, her trademark, Sara said, “I’m his commanding officer and I happen to like my job, so it’s easy not to abuse my command.” Now pointing and smiling toward the ship's navigator, “Ask Jen how she manages to walk by the men’s work out deck every night and fall asleep knowing that on the other side of her quarters, he’s working out with only the barest of workout shorts.”

  Jen, or more formally, Lieutenant Jen Klodokus, didn’t even move a muscle. She just focused on her navigation station and said aloud, “Not my type, not by the longest space lane.” This of course came as no surprise to either Sara or Robin. They both knew that Jen preferred female companionship. But, on board a ship, just like any other military outfit Robin had ever served with, joking about one's most intimate
character traits was always fair game.

  “But doesn’t a big amphora of a man like that ever put any doubt in your mind?” Sara asked jokingly. “I know a hot Lass Aphrodite play always makes me wonder.”

  Jen just stayed looking forward but started shaking her head. Robin smiled back at Sara with some joy, but also a quick unstated request for professionalism to return to the command deck. An informal atmosphere was not uncommon, especially on board this ship. Under Captain Richard Hilbornus, the Kordont Executive Class Battle Cruiser Sir Winston Churchill, named after a famous old Earth military leader, had cruised with the same command staff for almost fifteen years.

  It was certainly unusual for a staff to remain together that long. In the fledgling days of the Defense Force and the Confederacy, when humans only lived in the Old Colony Region, it was not unprecedented. But, of course, ships were slower, cruises were longer and Defense Force was not that big an organization. These days, though, it is unheard of. But, somehow, Captain Hilbornus inspires an unusual amount of loyalty in his crew.

  I must have passed up the chance to command at least a dozen ships just to stay here, thought Robin. But, it has paid off.

  And no doubt it had. In their fifteen years together, the crew of the Churchill had become the most known and celebrated crew in the fleet. Captain Hilbornus is the hero of the Veselyy siege, the genius of the F’lwok line and the diplomat that ended the Lanwouk crisis. Without question, riding those coattails has ensured a great future in Defense Force for all the command staff.

  But, of course, the Captain would hate to hear anyone chalk up their success to riding his coattails. “My success is entirely and without question the result of my amazing crew,” he would certainly say. And that is probably why he inspires such loyalty. Add to that an ‘in the trenches’ command style, a willingness to do any chore, and a subtle charismatic style driven by frank honesty and a constant desire to share his appreciation of the crew's hard work.

  Without question, Sara is fiercely loyal to the Captain. His personal bodyguard during all off ship trips, she has saved him from harm on more than a few occasions. She’s also had the opportunity to be involved in fleet level strategy and planning sessions at his insistence for some major historic engagements. Her appreciation for his having insisted on her presence is profound and strong.

  Jen can also attribute her rise to the captain. She ran away from home very early in her teenage years. She’s never discussed details with any of the crew that Robin knew of, but it seems to have been a very brutal experience given the pain she displays whenever they’ve encountered someone being abused by another. She got a job lifting freight from Claudius to orbit. A less than spectacular profession, usually dominated by middle aged, middle intelligence men from the lower end of the societal scale. It was shocking to meet a nineteen-year-old, thin, blond girl doing that job. Robin could still remember her shock.

  But, during the Veselyy Siege, when the Kingdoms banded together all their resources to supply the planet's inhabitants, Jen’s lift record was unbelievable. So, when it came time to run the Canua blockade, the Captain recruited her from the Royalist League fleet to navigate the ship. It was a huge risk, but the payoff was a success, which always makes the risk fade from memory. Ever since Jen’s commanded the navigation station of the Churchill.

  And, without question, she has options. She is the only human navigator to achieve a T class license, certifying her to navigate a Tomauri Class Cruiser, usually the exclusive purview of a Vev’tev pilot. She has also piloted the East Monory trench run on New Earth in the fastest time ever in a Squalus Class Fighter for a human. She managed to come within a second of the fastest ever recorded time, at least in a simulator. Even Jen will admit, she managed that only after days of spectacular, and completely fatal crashes in the simulator.

  But the three command deck ladies were not alone. Etu, the ships Gemberlican doctor, had been a childhood friend of the Captain from back on New Earth and they reconnected in the service many years later. As she rarely fails to mention when the Captain is telling a tall tale from his childhood, “Richard, I was there, you know. Stick to the facts!”

  Another Gemberlican, Mato, Chief Engineer of the Churchill, has been with Richard the longest. His loyalty is divided, though. It is sometimes hard to know which he is more loyal too, the Captain, the ship or his wife, Etu. They certainly are the darling couple of the ship. The diminutive size of Gemberlicans only adds to their cuteness. But Robin always figured his true loyalty was to the Churchill. He had repaired, at one time or another, every part of the ship.

  You rarely found him far from his massive engine rooms. Each room soared at least 20 stories high with a pair of massive graviton fusion engines lying side by side running down at least three stadiums to where they were directly connected into the mass driver jets. The sound was deafening when the engines ran at their maximums, and Robin was always happy that by the time the noise got to the command deck, there was only the faintest rumble on the deck plates. But they made Mato happy.

  In fact, the happiest Robin had ever seen him was a decade ago when the ship finally got its engine upgrade. The upgrade was, of course, made necessary by the fact that two of the engines had been utterly destroyed in a firefight with an especially well-equipped group of pirates operating out of Lanwouk space. But, the addition of the fuel recovery system to the graviton fusion plants made Mato forget all about his two lost babies. And he has never tired of trying to enhance the plants to squeeze every last fraction of power out of them. Without question, the Churchill was the fastest, strongest and most powerfully armed of the entire Kordont fleet from his efforts alone.

  As much as crewmen like Roger Dent came and went, the command staff remained. And therefore, an informal atmosphere of friendship and collegiality had developed among them. It was rare even for the Captain, who did manage to keep himself at least socially apart from the rest of the group, to use a rank or last name while commanding the ship. First name basis among the command staff was standard. As was a good amount of casual ribbing.

  Robin sat back a little more relaxed in her chair. It is a comfortable feeling commanding this ship, she thought to herself, just as a quiet alert started sounding from one of the sensor stations.

  “Commander Shelbus, we have a contact,” the sensor technician said aloud.

  A contact was the purpose of the Kordont fleet. The Kordont’s role in the larger Defense Force strategy for defending the Confederated Union of Worlds was external border surveillance. Each ship's cruise lasted up to a year and involved a very repetitive, but vital effort. For 30 hours, a Kordont Executive Class Battle Cruiser scanned a given area of space. Using passive sensors, they proceeded to run a silent search grid, looking for any evidence of a ship running outside the space lanes. Official transit of all ships within the Confederacy, either for transport, pleasure or military, followed the space lanes. Administered by the C.U.W. and recognized by all member planets, space lanes organized travel. This permitted safe and efficient travel in interstellar space.

  Pirates, smugglers, foreign powers and broken down ships were never found on space lanes. And that was the job of the Kordont’s. Find those not on the lanes and escort them back or, more often, apprehend violators and bring them to the nearest planet for prosecution under Confederate Law.

  Although it could have moments of excitement, such as registering a contact, it was mostly 30 hours of boredom, followed by an unknown amount of time in hyperspace before arriving at the next designated patrol area. With over 130 Kordont’s in the fleet, patrol areas were fairly small, so at least transit times were usually small.

  But now, almost a year into the Churchill’s latest cruise, this was the first contact they had ever received. Robin stood from her command chair and walked over to the sensor station and hung over the technician's shoulder.

  “Has the computer matched the silhouette yet?” She asked while reading the display that clearly showed the computer had not. It
was possible for her to never leave her command chair and receive all the relevant information about the ship with the push of a button. But that was certainly no fun and absolutely no exercise. And besides, Commanders who just sit and read their monitors are never very popular with the crew. It makes crew members feel unappreciated and like a computer could do their jobs just as well.

  So when the technician said, “no, ma’am, the computer has not yet matched the ship to our database,” Robin was not surprised.

  “Can you bring it up please?” With the push of a few buttons, the technician, who Robin noticed was named Leenius, brought the small screen silhouette shot up to fill the screen.

  With passive sensors operating, all that the sensors could see was what the unknown ship blocked by its presence in space, what the ship was sending out from itself, and if very lucky, what was reflected off the ship from a nearby source. Whenever a contact is discovered, the sensor technicians and the ship's navigator always begin to move the ship so that a star, preferably a very bright one, disappears behind the ship. It is by far the best method of obtaining a silhouette, which the computer can usually identify from its database in short order. On occasion, some intervening factor will confuse the computer. On even rarer occasions, the ship isn’t in the database. That is always the most worrying time. An unknown ship is a huge risk.