by Wen Spencer
So, was it to be the gun or something less dramatic? The door chimed. He reached over and snapped on the "do not disturb" sign.
There was a slow scratch at the door, a Red running its claws down the panel the same way Turk used to when he locked Turk out of his room.
Mikhail hit the door pad. "What?"
"Misha, let me in."
Interesting. He never had audio hallucinations without being a great deal more medicated. He went cautiously to the door and keyed it open.
Turk filled the door way, smelling of the sea.
Mikhail blinked at him, fighting the sense of relief that wanted to flood through him. Turk couldn't be here. Mikhail must have taken some drugs without remembering it. This had to be some kind of mental trick, the part of his brain that didn't want to die. The hallucination gave an exasperated sigh, took the gun away from Mikhail, and pushed into the cabin to close the door behind him.
"Turk?" Mikhail gripped his brother's shoulder to reassure himself that he wasn't imagining him. He felt the solid muscle and hard bone.
Turk stunned him by pulling him into a hug that threatened to break bones. "Oh, you stupid little brat," Turk growled into his shoulder. "When am I going to be able to go off and not have to worry about you imploding?"
One sentence, and the floodgates on everything Mikhail had been fighting with, from the darkest pain to giddy relief, burst. Tears like fire washed into his eyes, and he clung to Turk, sobbing.
"Misha. Misha, please stop crying." Turk rubbed his chin along Mikhail's, an old habit of seeking reassurance. "We're both safe and sound. I'm tired. And dirty. And . . .I haven't had a decent shower for weeks."
Mikhail scrubbed at the burning tears. "I should have known that you're too tough for a couple kilometer drop to kill you. You can use my shower. But talk to me."
"Misha."
"I was counting bullets, Turk. I need to hear your voice."
"Fine, fine, fine," Turk groaned and put the pistol back into Mikhail's safe and locked it shut again. He gazed at the cartoon of himself that Mikhail had drawn over the safe. "Oh, Misha . . . I'll leave the door open."
Mikhail sat with his eyes closed, listening to the comforting deep rumble of Turk's voice as he briefly recounted how he fell from the Svoboda and was captured by aliens. Apparently one of the first things that the aliens did was strip him of his combat suit, thus the reason it was broadcasting no life signs. Thankfully, he'd been rescued by Eraphie's cousins who had been trying to get to Fenrir's Rock, but needed to turn back because of engine trouble. It was ironic that Hardin had told Mikhail days ago that the Rosetta had reached Ya-Ya safely. All this time, there were links between them; Mikhail could have found Turk if he'd pursued the right information.
"I found out some information concerning Fenrir," Turk said. "But I thought you were gone. I didn't see the point of finishing the mission."
The dryer snapped on, and Turk used its roar as an excuse to fall quiet.
"We found its crash site." Mikhail broke the silence.
"Fenrir's Rock?" Turk turned off the dryer and came out of the bathroom in Mikhail's bathrobe.
"Yes." Mikhail told him about the crash, using the EM waves to find Fenrir, and investigating the ruins. "It's just a gut feeling, but I'm sure that the work had been done by outsiders."
"Your gut is rarely wrong." Turk paced the room. Where Mikhail liked to keep still while he was thinking—lest his body distract him from an important thought—Turk thought through motion. "We've been repairing the Rosetta and looking for new engines for it. It takes us down to the salvage yards. They spray paint a complex numbering system onto the parts as they're salvaged off wrecks. The marks on Fenrir's engine were from the salvage yards here in Ya-ya."
"Whoever bought the salvage are probably also the people that used them to modify Fenrir's engine."
"Yes."
"I don't suppose that the people running the salvage yard speak Standard."
"I don't know. Paige only talked to them in Japanese."
"Do you think she'll act as a translator for us?"
Turk nodded. "Financially, though, the Baileys are in a tight spot. I want to help them. They've been nothing but good to me. They treated me like I'm family."
"Certainly." Mikhail sighed. Turk had been avoiding asking about the ship, probably trying not to dwell on the things that had depressed Mikhail. "Turk, I—I lost most of our Reds."
Turk studied him for a minute, before tentatively asking, "How many?"
"I have a dozen left. All veterans." Mikhail named them. "I don't know what happened. The last night on Fenrir's Rock, something just . . ..took them right out of the red pits. We searched for hours. Didn't find any trace of them."
"What did surveillance show?"
"Cameras have them there one minute, gone the next. And I shot Butcher."
"What?"
"He was raping Eraphie Bailey. He wouldn't stop. So, I put my gun to his head and pulled the trigger. I killed them. I killed them all. Furtsev. The bridge crew."
Turk leaned forward and gripped his shoulder and gave him a little shake. "Stop it. We're a warship, and this is an important mission, and we all went in with our eyes open."
Mikhail scoffed at the importance of the mission. "A graveyard of ships?"
"Mikhail this place holds so many mysteries. So many possibilities. Alien races that humans are already living in peace with. Alien technology. Alien weapons."
It so Turk-like to make it seem so simple and clear.
* * *
Paige was starting to think that Ceri was more than a little annoyed with her. It had been days since they made Ya-ya and there been no word from her teacher. She'd started repairs, confident that work would be forthcoming. So far, she'd laid out two-thirds of their cash for materials such as a new radio, ship's intercom, refrigerator, and wood to rebuild the crew quarters. If Ceri didn't give her work, they'd be out of money soon.
It filled her with relief to see Oust finally pull up to the dock and tie-off.
"Konichiwa!" Paige called to him and then swore at herself. The Japanese greeting had become habit in just a few days. She knew that Oust preferred English. "Hi Oust!"
Oust waved back. He strolled down the dock, eyeing the boat with faint disbelief. "I still can't believe you gave up everything to go off in this ugly bucket."
"Hey! Don't trash my boat!"
He gave her a steady look. "It's ugly, Paige, and you loved translating."
Oust was mostly Red, but he had enough Blue in him to know the truth when he saw it. She just hated to hear it.
"I love my family more." She told him and herself.
He acknowledged that this was true with a nod of his head.
"I hope you're coming about a job." She forced the subject off herself. "We need the money."
"Yes, I am. Boats coming into harbor are reporting seeing minotaurs on the Outer Banks."
The Outer Banks was a long narrow strip of islands not much more than sand dunes along the coast of Ya-ya. While sheltered from the brunt of storms by the landing, the islands were still too exposed for anyone to live on.
"Minotaurs?" Paige said. "What are they doing on the Outer Banks?"
"That's what the city council wants to know. They're hiring you to go out and talk to the minotaurs. Find out what they want. Settle it in Ya-ya's best interest."
Whatever it was, the humans wanted to get the best out of the deal.
"How much is the city council paying me?" Paige knew that the landing would be paying Ceri more and that her teacher would be taking a cut off the top. It was the price of business.
"Five hundred to go out to the islands, find the minotaurs and find out what they want. There'll be a bonus hundred yen if you can get them to peacefully go away if they have no plans for trading."
In other words, Ya-ya's city council was slightly afraid that the minotaurs planned to lay claim to land that the humans weren't using. As herbivores, the minotaurs lived off land
that they terraformed. They were masters of claiming landmass out of the ocean; much of minotaur mainland was in fact ocean floor sectioned off with dikes, drained and farmed.
"If minotaurs want to trade?" Paige ignored the fact that she had no clue how she would get out to the Outer Banks. Taking the Rosetta out would require more money than it was worth in tugboat and pilot fees. The islands were too far, though, to take one of the launches.
"Ya-ya will pay an hourly rate on top of the initial fee for you to negotiate a trade—if they want what the minotaurs are offering."
It could amount to a good deal of money. If Paige didn't know that Ceri refused to leave the city, she might have thought that Ceri was being nice to her.
"Okay, I'll do it. Come on up. Might as well sit and have some lemonade while I sign the contracts."
She used the delay of making the lemonade to consider the deal. If she signed the contracts, she'd be committed to figuring out how to get to the Outer Banks. No matter how she did it, it was going to cost money. If it wasn't for the possibility of a trade after the initial contact, she would turn it down immediately. Odds were in her favor, though, that the minotaurs weren't trying to claim the land. It went against everything she knew about the aliens.
She served the lemonade. Orin made small talk with Oust while she read over the contracts. It was all standard clauses and penalties. Most Ya-ya business was transacted without such lengthy contracts. There was something about having no idea what was truly being said made people paranoid.
"Do you have a pen?" she asked Oust when she finished.
Orin gave her a look that clearly said 'but how are we getting out to the Outer Banks?'
"All my crew is out at the moment." She accepted Oust's writing set. As she mixed up ink for the brush pen, she said for Orin's sake, "I'll need to wait for them to get back before hiring a boat. I can't leave the Rosetta unattended."
"Speed is of the essence," Oust said. "The city council is afraid that hostilities might flare up if the minotaurs are left to roam unchecked."
Yes, humans tend to kill what made them afraid.
"We'll leave in the hour." Paige promised. She might have to send Orin out to track down some of the crew.
She dipped the brush into the ink and carefully signed her name. They were committed now.
Once the ink was dry, Oust carefully tucked the contract away. "It might be wise if you leave your man behind." He meant Turk. "He's not going to deal well with the minotaurs."
She blushed. Did the entire landing know she was sleeping with Turk? "He's going to have to learn."
"I can take Ceri being with other men much easier than I can deal with her trading with minotaurs," Oust said.
She nodded. Oust was a male Red; he'd understand the mindset better than her. "I'll keep that in mind."
Orin waited until Oust was gone before saying, "I don't like this."
"Even if we don't get the hour rate for the trade, we'll still be ahead. This is a job that Ceri doesn't want. If we do it, she'll owe us a favor. Right now, we need her in our debt."
"The city council knows more about the minotaurs on the Outer Banks than we do. If there was any hint that a trade might be possible, they'd be sending a council member with us. Something could have pissed the minotaurs off and it's a war party."
"I doubt that if the minotaurs were pissed off, that they would sail a hundred thousand miles and then stop ten miles out of the landing. I've signed the contracts. We're committed."
Orin glanced behind her and an odd bleakness filled his face. "Paige," he said quietly and lifted his chin to indicate something on the dock.
She turned and felt her insides go cold. Turk was walking toward the Rosetta. He was in a clean, crisp dark blue uniform. Behind him was a clean, crisp runabout with Reds in combat suits.
Somehow, against all odds, Turk had found his ship and clearly gone running back to his brother.
"Fuck." Paige breathed. Turk stopped at the edge of the dock. She went to the railing and looked down at him. Either he didn't care about her as much as she thought, or the idiot hadn't thought it all out yet.
"You found your brother." Paige supposed he couldn't be faulted, really. If she'd lost Orin, and found him again . . .
Turk nodded. "He's here with our ship."
Our ship. Paige nodded. She heard all the undertones. It didn't say why he'd come back with obvious intentions. "So . . .?"
"We need your help."
She remembered then how he'd left the boat. Was this subtle blackmail with her little sister hostage? "Where's Hillary?"
He frowned and glanced to where the launch was normally docked. "I—I guess she's still shopping. I assigned one of my Reds to protect her. A yearling named Rabbit."
Oh good god, her teenage sister out with a teenage boy? And Turk thought he was protecting Hillary? Men! She pressed her palm to her forehead to ward off a sudden headache. Carve out her heart and set up a major family crisis. At least it wasn't as bad as it could be.
"We have our own problems we have to deal with," she said.
"I know. We can pay you and you can use the money to solve your problems."
"Pay us with what?"
"Anything we don't need to survive."
"Anything?" You?
He nodded, clearly deaf to her unspoken question. "Within reason."
Gods must hate her. There were so many reasons to say yes, and only the ache in her heart to say no. "Fine. We'll help you. But not right now." At least she had the means to escape him now. "Ceri lined up a job. I need to find a way to get out to the Outer Banks immediately to talk to minotaurs."
"Minotaurs?" Turk echoed. "As in aliens called minotaur? Are they dangerous?"
Paige shook her head. "They're big, and pushy and loud, but harmless."
"Fairly harmless." Orin grumbled.
Turk pounced on the word. "Fairly?"
Paige glared at her brother. Didn't he realize that he was making it difficult to get rid of Turk? Or was he hoping that Turk could lend them military backup? Didn't he realize how dangerous that might get? "Fairly."
"If you could call something that big and that heavily armed harmless." Orin ignored her glare.
"Are they ever hostile?" Turk asked.
"We have an alliance with them." Paige said.
"Which means we make nice by lying through our teeth about our basic nature." Orin said.
"Orin." Paige growled. "Go find someone to watch the Rosetta while we're gone."
"You're not taking the Rosetta?" Turk asked.
My god, it's like swimming in a urchin patch! "No."
Turk watched Orin go and then trailed behind her as she gathered gear. "You're angry at me."
"Yes. I'm angry at you."
"Why?"
"Why? Why? Because you're leaving me! No. You've already left! You ran back to him and you even didn't stop to think about how hurt I might be. You walk back here and don't even say you're sorry, or goodbye, just that you need my help for him!"
"I didn't think . . ."
"Obviously!"
He pressed up against her, trapping her behind his pinning her to the wall. "Finding Misha doesn't change that I love you."
Now he says it. She'd been patiently waiting for him to say aloud the words that his body whispered to her. She clenched her fists to keep from hitting him. The stupid idiot.
Paige fought to keep her voice level. The words clear. "I'm only in Ya-ya until the Rosetta is fixed—and then we leave."
It finally dawned on him. For a moment he stared at her, stricken. She fought the urge to comfort him even while some small dark part of her soul was glad that he at least was going to feel some of the same pain.
He took a deep breath, stepped away from her and smoothed down his uniform. "I see." When he looked up, he'd closed off all evidence of his pain except for grief that lingered in his eyes.
It only served to make her want to hit him more. She wanted him out of her sight before she d
id something that she'd regret.
"Go back to your brother and tell him that we'll help him when we get back." 'We' was a safe pronoun, much less dangerous than 'I' at this moment. She was sure the word would stick in her throat if she tried to say it. Could someone choke to death on polite discourse?
"How are you going?" Turk asked; his voice flat.
"I don't know yet."
"How many minotaur are there?"
"I don't know!"