by C. Gockel
* * *
“Here,” Noa whispered, slipping James a protein bar. She’d been feeding them to him, like stoking a furnace, since he’d heaved 6T9 over his shoulder. But he could eat all of it, as far as she was concerned. He’d saved her neck, and her authority, and the sorry excuse she had for a crew, by hauling 6T9 up on his back. She took a deep breath—for once, not because she was exhausted—but to keep her anger from boiling over. She told herself that Gunny would have been right, under ordinary circumstances. 6T9 was a waste of resources. But these weren’t ordinary circumstances. Eliza would need the ‘bot to care for her aboard the Ark. Noa had heard 6T9 talk knowledgeably about Eliza’s ailments. He had some expensive apps to augment his native programming. And she’d seen the way he cradled her gently in his arms and took her hands with the utmost care––that was knowledge that would have been integrated in the circuits of his titanium bones and synth muscles. Even if they were to install his motherboard in one of Ghost’s ‘bots, not all of 6T9’s working knowledge could be transferred with the motherboard.
A light went off in her mind, and she drew to a halt. Craning her neck, she looked up at the place her locator app told her was the entrance to Ghost’s lair. It looked no different from any of the ancient cement surrounding it.
“My coordinates right?” she asked James, keeping her voice a low whisper.
“Yes,” he said as the others caught up to them.
Noa held up a hand for a halt and silence.
“Leg up?” she whispered.
James slid 6T9 from his shoulder. Before he lifted her, Noa put a hand on his shoulder. Inclining her head to the ‘bot, she asked, “You’ll be fine hoisting him up too? Should I get some rope?”
James cocked his head. “I believe … yes, I will be fine … save the rope for Eliza.” He cleared his throat. “Although another protein bar would be helpful.”
Noa gave him her last one. He stowed it in his pocket and wove his fingers together. Noa gave a last look to the ‘bot lying like a discarded doll in the middle of the sewer, a trickle of runoff pooling at the small of his back. And then she slipped her foot into his linked hands and said, “On three.”
“What?” said Manuel.
Noa was already leaping up to the seemingly cement ceiling. As she expected, she passed through a hologram, into the vertical shaft below Ghost’s abode. She caught the rung of the ancient metal ladder and looked down. Her legs were swinging through a shimmering floor of light. She heard hushed cries of surprise. Ghost had disguised the access tunnel to look like the rest of the sewer. She looked up and saw another shimmering veil of light between her and the grate above. The ancient metal door to his abode was gone. There was just the appearance of crumbling cement in front of her nose. Understanding hit her in a flash. Ghost was going through extra trouble to hide his dwelling. He was concealing himself even more than before … and he had been well-concealed before.
She shook her head, reached out, and felt the door. It wasn’t locked. “Send Manuel up next,” she whispered. After crawling into the tunnel, moments later she reached Ghost’s lair. This time there were no holos of the Ark’s engine room. It was just his place—the bed, the dirty kitchenette, the clutter of electronic bits and parts—among them a sex ‘bot splayed out in a chair, arms and legs missing, eyes open to the heavens. It was dark even though the geothermal unit was still on. It was humid and too warm.
There was no sign of Ghost.
* * *
Feet in the relative safety of Ghost’s abode, James bent into the crawl-way entrance and pulled on 6T9’s shoulders.
“Thank you so much for doing this,” Eliza said, already in the room, just behind him. “I won’t forget it.”
“Where is Dan?” he heard Manuel say.
“I don’t know,” Noa replied. “But he left the holos on to cover the back entrance, so he must be coming back.”
James gave one final tug and pulled the ‘bot out onto the floor. Hovering behind him, Eliza said, “The geothermal unit has chargers. It will take him a few hours to completely recharge.”
James only grunted. He was exhausted, hungry … and cold. Slipping through the tunnel after the ‘bot, Chavez said, “A geothermal unit? I can recharge my legs, they’re starting to die on me.” She began tearing off the plastic bags covering her prosthetics, revealing metal knee joints and plastic. At the juncture of plastic and flesh, there were bands of fresh duct tape. “Hisha put that on so water wouldn’t get into the connections.”
James saw one of the young men roll his eyes at the sight, and another turned up his nose. James blinked. He didn’t find the sight off-putting, but a memory came back to him of eyeing a woman walking in front of him wearing her prosthetics unabashedly. He had said to a friend, “If you can have synth flesh and look perfectly normal—why wouldn’t you?” He clearly remembers being repulsed. He looked at Chavez’s legs again. The duct tape, the metal, and the plastic––he didn’t find her more or less attractive for it. His eyes went to her face. She winked one of her startling blue eyes at him and grinned. “Where did the Commander find you?” Her Luddeccean accent was thick. He noticed a crucifix hanging at her neck. “And are there any more like you?”
One of the engineers coughed behind his hand. Another scowled at James.
It took a moment to realize she was flirting with him. In another life, would he have smiled at her … or would he have recoiled at the sight of her legs? Would he have turned up his nose at her accent? Would he have looked down on her because she was like Noa, too earthy, too brash, and too loud? Something in him went still and cold. Noa didn’t flirt. Sometimes she recoiled at his touch.
His vision tunneled to the point where he saw only his hands. Hefting 6T9 up like a potato sack, he carried him to the geothermal unit. Setting him down without bothering to be gentle, he let Eliza plug the ‘bot in.
Chavez gingerly picked up a duplex charging wire from a pile of equipment, plugged the single end into an outlet, and the double end into the backs of her prosthetic legs. James’s eyes slid to the kitchenette. On the counter was a jar of peanuts. He looked at the geothermal heater—it felt so good to be close to it. It was so warm, but the peanuts looked delicious. He looked at the wires attached to 6T9 and Chavez and sighed. “I wish I could recharge so easily.”
Rocking on her artificial limbs, Chavez gave him another grin. She was pretty. Her features might be unusual, but they were open and … he tilted his head … symmetrical. She looked healthy and energetic. He remembered a few of his other self’s short encounters. He’d pursued far less attractive women for brief flings. And yet he wasn’t drawn to Chavez at all.
Lifting an eyebrow at his own musings, James retrieved the peanuts, but then immediately returned to the geothermal unit and the halo of warmth around it.
With his first mouthful of food, the conversation around him began to come into focus.
Eliza was clucking at the dismembered ‘bot.
Hisha had taken Oliver out of his carrier, and was gently rocking him while eyeing the same ‘bot. Her nose was wrinkled in disgust. “That is so distasteful.”
Farther away, Manuel was saying, “How long should we wait for Dan?”
Noa answered, “If he doesn’t return, we’re pretty much dead in the water.”
“We could shoot our way up to the Northeast Province,” said Bo excitedly.
Gunny, Manuel, and Noa all looked up at him, and then back to each other.
Manuel said, “If Dan doesn’t get back—”
“I never left!” The buzz of conversation stopped. All eyes went to the door that led to the hallway. Ghost was standing there; he had his hologram projecting necklace on, the glow of it seemingly illuminating perfectly chiseled features.
“You’re not Dan,” said Manuel.
The necklace dimmed, and there was the slightly pudgy face that James remembered.
“I prefer to go by Ghost,” he said, lifting his nose.
Noa rolled her eye
s over to James. He mouthed “ebatteru.” It was Japanese, but translated roughly into “arrogant” with implications of “attention seeker.” He saw her chest heave, and she abruptly coughed. But there was no rasp to it. His jaw only shifted, but internally he smiled.
“Ghost?” said Manuel, his voice dropping an octave.
“Humor him,” said Noa.
Ghost’s beady eyes darted in her direction, but he didn’t respond. Instead his eyes went to the others in the room. His lip curled up. “I suppose these are passengers you used to raise money for my services … but where is your crew?”
There was a short silence. Noa stood a little straighter. “These are the crew.”
Ghost’s mouth gaped. His eyes fell on the engineering students. “Is this a joke?” he whispered.
Noa took a step toward Ghost. “A deal is a deal, Ghost. They’ll do, especially if you can generate one of your stellar holograms to introduce them to the Ark’s engine rooms and to review my plans.”
Ghost stared at the engineering students. His eyes passed over James, lingered on Chavez, then went to Eliza and 6T9, and stopped at Hisha and Oliver. Staring at the boy, he demanded, “What is that?”
James felt his neurons spark. That … denoted something less than human. James didn’t feel the way Noa felt about children, but he felt annoyance sparking like static beneath his skin at Ghost’s wording.
Hisha drew the child tighter to herself. “My son.”
Ghost shook his head; lip trembling, he looked away. “They’ll have to do.” And then his eyes went to Noa. “We have to leave soon. There have been crackdowns, more arrests.”
Noa said, “We put that together.”
“I had to mortar up the other exit,” Ghost said, lip still trembling. “There are too many Guards in the alleys. I think your disappearance has made them nervous.”
“We are all ready to leave as quickly as possible,” Noa replied.
Ghost began to pace. His eyes went up to James’s and then down to the peanuts. “You’re eating my peanuts?”
He didn’t sound angry; he sounded surprised.
“What else would I do with them?” James said.
Ghost’s eyes flicked to the peanuts and back to James. “You’ve got nerve.”
James shrugged. “And an appetite.”
Ghost ground his jaw. His eyes fell to James’s arms. “Interesting tattoos.”
“They are amazing,” said Chavez. “Where did you get them?”
James was saved having to answer by a sudden hum and click from 6T9. “Oh, look, it is one of the XTC 100 models.”
All eyes turned to 6T9, whose focus was on the dismembered female ‘bot on the chair.
“Don’t let it distress you, dear!” Eliza said.
Ghost snorted.
“Why would it distress me?” 6T9 said, turning his eyes to Eliza.
“Because it’s a ‘bot like you and it’s chopped to bits?” said Bo.
6T9 tilted his head. “Only the health of humans matters.” He smiled at Eliza. “And yours more than all others, my love.”
Ghost snorted again. One of the students choked out a strangled, “Blech.”
James’s eyes went to the empty eyes of the dismembered ‘bot on the chair. He found himself rolling his sleeves down to cover the tattoos on his arms.
* * *
A semi-transparent holographic image of the Tri-Center and the sewers beneath it floated in Ghost’s lair. The team gathered around it. Everyone was standing except Eliza and Oliver. Eliza was sitting in a chair. Oliver was on Ghost’s bed, sleeping off the remainder of the sedative he’d received. Carl Sagan was curled up in a ball beside him.
The team had long since gotten past the “how is this possible?” questions about the hologram. James had again asked, “You’re really not using quantum entanglement to pull data from the Luddeccean mainframe?” He had a snippy response from Ghost about frequencies beyond the scope of Luddeccean devices’ ability to detect, that were “beyond your understanding.” Now they were reviewing the final details of the plan.
Noa asked, “Can we get a close-up of the Ark?”
The holo of the ship expanded to fill the tiny room. Designed to take off upright and to glide to a water landing, it looked almost like the old space shuttles of the twentieth century, or like a submarine. Its nose was currently pointed to the sky. From this perspective, they were facing the bottom, the rounded surface that would slide into the water, gracefully slipping across waves, or potentially submerging in inclement weather, and then bobbing up to the surface to float to the nearest shore. The other side, just out of view, was flat and would be the top side if it were horizontal. Unlike the space shuttles of old Earth, the Ark didn’t have bulky external rockets. Instead it had four small rockets at its base. Silver “timefield generator bands” encircled the full 78.5 meter circumference of its exterior hull and short wings. The bands were only a hand’s width wide and were set at intervals of half a meter apart on the Ark’s eighty-meter length. The Ark’s computer didn’t have enough computing power to create a stable bubble in time. Instead, the bands created an unstable bubble that had to be continuously regenerated, similar to antigrav engines. Unlike antigrav engines, the time space “bubble” would encompass the entire ship and allow the Ark to escape gravity when in orbit. Once it reached zero G, the timefield bands would allow the vessel to achieve effective light speed. As the Ark moved into and out of that shifting time space, the vessel would be flung through space as though from a slingshot.
“We’ll be moving at a different time from our folks back home, won’t we?” said the female engineering student who Noa now knew as Kara. Her tone was mournful.
“Yes,” Noa responded. Unlike ships that passed through time gates, the Ark with its timefield generators would experience the time paradoxes of light speed travel theorized by early physicists. Time would move faster aboard the Ark than it would planetside. The difference would fluctuate with the efficiency of the ship’s timefield bands, and hopefully wouldn’t be more than double, but even at optimal efficiency, if they had to make it all the way to Time Gate 7 … she banished the thought.
She heard a few gulps among the assembled team.
Noa took a step toward the hologram. “Rotate it,” Noa said. The portion of the craft that would be top-side during landing appeared. This side was flattened. There were doors set into it, but the view of those was blocked by an elevator shaft. The elevator was not native to the craft; it had been built to take tourists to the various decks of the vessel. The Ark’s original grav generators had depended on acceleration. Those had since been replaced so that the vessel could have gravity even while stationary; however, the design of the vessel still hadn’t changed. Instead of having decks set longitudinally in the long vessel, they were set horizontally. On board, “down” would be the tail, and “up” would be the nose.
Noa pointed to the first door, twenty meters above the ground. “This is the door that leads to the main engineering deck. We’ll get out of the elevator here. It’s possible we’ll be receiving fire at this point, and it would be best if we took cover.”
“The Ark’s hull should be more than sufficient to protect us from ordinary laser fire and bullets,” Gunny said.
“Agreed,” said Noa. Even the more delicate timefield generating bands had been designed to survive for decades in deep space. The forward guns could prevent collision with large asteroids—the hull was designed to withstand the impact of asteroid fragments, should the forward guns be used.
Pointing at the vessel, Noa said, “Gunny, Chavez, James, and I will head to the bridge. Manuel, you’ll lead the team including Ghost to the engineering deck.”
Ghost snorted and the hairs on the back of Noa’s neck prickled. Of course, he expected to be the “leader.” Keeping her voice level, she said, “Ghost, show them what they’ll be dealing with while you’re busy shutting down the defense grid.”
No snort followed that command. Instead
, he projected the engineering room. Noa resisted the urge to roll her eyes. He was such a genius that he couldn’t foresee the need for Manuel to lead the team while his brain was busy with the much bigger task of keeping them from being shot out of the sky.
She followed along as the engineers went over exactly what they’d need to do to get the engines ready for lift-off, and then to gear up for light speed. Then she walked the bridge team through their tasks.
At the very end of the meeting, Gunny said, “You know, I think this just might work.”
Noa felt muscles that she hadn’t even realized were tight loosen in her back and neck. Gunny’s opinion meant more to her than Manuel’s, Ghost’s, or James’s. Gunny was the only one in the room with extensive ground combat experience.
“After we get to light speed, it should be a piece of cake,” Noa agreed.
The older man nodded. “The time paradox will make their weapons useless, and we’ll be nearly untraceable.”
Noa actually smiled. If Gunny believed it, she could believe it. She felt her hopes rise and saw several tentative smiles around the hologram.
Scratching his stubble, Gunny said, “And no one will expect us to try to steal this old hunk of junk.”
Chavez made the sign of the cross, and Kara echoed it. Noa’s smile dropped. That hadn’t been the most encouraging way to put it.
Oliver chose that moment to raise his head and cry, “Spaceshit!”
Gunny choked. “Sort of.”
Hisha ran through the holo toward Oliver. “He can’t say ship,” she said apologetically.
Hopping from the bed, Oliver dashed toward the holographic controls. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
Sitting up suddenly in her chair, Eliza shouted, “I just remembered. Sometimes when the timefield generators stalled, engineer Rodriguez would hit the transformer box with a hammer!”
Ghost snorted, “Crazy old woman.”