Time Past

by Maxine McArthur

  “You should remember that this part of the station was one of the earliest built,” Florida was saying as he approached. “This hall was the original command center.”

  The others stared up at the building he was pointing at, an unimpressive single-story community hall, now used as a temporary storage facility. I didn’t remember it being the command center, but then, I didn’t take over as head of station until the station’s third year, after the first head had quit, two committed suicide, and the one in between was poisoned.

  The people with Florida must be the Confederacy Council representatives that Sasaki had mentioned; a human woman in colorful caftan and two men in drab suits, five Dir, all wearing robes of a single guild with their hoods open, two fur-covered Achelians, and a high-caste Leowin attended by its retinue of smaller slaves.

  Leowin are a species thought by everyone else to be distantly related to the K’Cher but they deny it vehemently themselves. They are bipedal by choice but can move just as fast on four limbs. Their upper manipulators are jointed, unlike K’Cher feelers, and their chests and abdomens flow into each other. This one wore a robe similar to that of the Dir, but in a more subdued weave and color.

  “Hello, Dan,” I said. The scene took me back half a year or more to the day Florida and I had escorted Calypso ’s Sleeper passengers on their first tour of the station. Their first tour of the twenty-second century.

  Florida stared. “I heard the rumor, but I didn’t believe it.” He bounded forward and wrapped his arms around me in a bear hug.

  I felt as though I’d been wrung out. He was as big and bouncy as ever.

  “Good to see you back,” his voice boomed in my ear.

  I squeezed his torso briefly in gratitude at this welcome and hoped he wouldn’t notice my eyes were watering.

  “These are some of my delegates.” Florida indicated the group with a flourish. “Consul Reo of Achel and his aide. Amartidjar of the Leowin. Count Quertianus, and his captains. Councilor Sarkady of Earth. Councilors, this is Commander Halley, Head of... former head of station.”

  I bowed to the Achelians and nodded to the count, a high-status Dir whose quick glance evaluated everything about me from uniform to body parts. The Leowin ignored me, as its protocols demanded.

  Sarkady grasped my hand without turning a gracious gray hair and looked me over with eyes that might have been wise, or merely the result of a career spent trying to look wise. She wore a loose gown of bright-colored cloth that glowed in the humid air.

  “Commander. Weren’t you reported missing?”

  “A slight misunderstanding.”

  “Presumably you’ll be able to clear it up.”

  “I’m sure we will.”

  Sarkady nodded in turn at the two humans with her. “My aides.” One, a human with pale mottled skin and reddish hair, shook my hand North American style. The other, seeing me flex my squeezed hand with a grimace, merely inclined her head. A trim, correct woman, she was like an older version of Ensign Lee.

  “We’re on our way to the garden,” said Florida, ushering his charges ahead of us. “Come along now, we’ll miss the best part of the morning,” he chided gently. After minor jostling between the five Dir and the Leowin slaves, they walked on ahead of him.

  “Where have you been?” he whispered to me.

  “Nowhere interesting,” I whispered back, then felt ridiculous. “Dan, I need to talk to you about Central,” I said in a normal voice.

  I wanted to hear his views on the likelihood of the neutrality vote being passed, and compare it to what Veatch had said. Florida might be brash and obnoxious, but he had a knack of making useful contacts and his verbosity could be an asset.

  “Come to dinner tonight. A few of us, in the observation lounge in the center.” He pointed upward. “Level Three.”

  “There is no observation lounge on Level Three.” Then I remembered Sasaki’s comment when we arrived last night.

  He grinned. “Thought I’d catch you on that one. Will you come?”

  “If I can.” If I’m still here. And if I’ve figured out how that ship works.

  “The new head of station...” he began.

  “Acting head of station.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Acting head of station decided it’d be impressive to sit and watch the stars spin around while we ate dinner. Don’t want to miss that, do you?”

  “You could have used one of the construction platforms,” I grumbled, thinking of the complex logistics of redecorating a section of Level Three.

  “Ah, but he wants the gravity field on. Can’t have important guests chasing pieces of their meal in free fall.”

  And we’d get complaints from travelers who didn’t want to step out of their airlock into Earth gravity... “Wait a minute. This is an official dinner?”

  “You got it. Dress uniforms, antique cutlery, speeches, the lot.”

  “You sneaky bastard. You know I hate that sort of thing.”

  He grinned. “It’ll be a great chance for you to reemerge, so to speak. Give you a taste of what happens at Central.”

  “I don’t want to go to Central. That’s why I sent you.”

  “I thought it was to get rid of me.” He grinned as he said it, but his eyes were shrewd.

  “You make a better lobbyist than I do, Dan.”

  “Maybe I believe in neutrality more.” This time his face was serious, but I still had the impression he was laughing at me.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I glared at him but we’d reached the spoke and the agricultural section, and Florida was tapping open the entry with one hand.

  He patted my shoulder with the other in odious sympathy. “Don’t worry, Commander. I’ll make sure you don’t embarrass yourself too much.”

  The EarthFleet blue panels opened and warm, heavily oxygenated air rolled out to meet us with the unmistakable smell of growing things. Beds of vegetables, fruit, fungi and gillus rose in terraces to meet the reflected gold of the “sky.” A diffuse, pale light covered everything. The fields were originally an eighth of this size and designed to merely augment the station’s food supply. Under Confederacy neglect and alien blockade, however, we expanded them in order to survive.

  “Lovely, just beautiful,” Sarkady enthused.

  “Charming,” agreed the Achelian.

  One of the Dir tapped something into his handcom and showed the result to the others. “Dan, I have to go.” “Ah, to the mysterious Invidi ship that brought you home, no doubt? We haven’t seen an Invidi, though.”

  I’d forgotten how fast rumor spreads on this station.

  Florida looked down at me with a speculative gaze. “Did you know some of the officers have a betting pool? Guessing where you went.”

  I groaned. They should have better things to do.

  “Until you came back with Bill Murdoch, do you know what the favorite was?” he persisted.

  “That I blew up?”

  “No. Odds on that you took Calypso ’s engines and whatever they could do, and gave them to the New Council.”

  “What?”

  Sarkady’s female aide turned in surprise at my yelp of disbelief. I smiled feebly at her and lowered my voice. “Why would they think that?”

  “Why do you think? Because you nearly did it last time.”

  I could have hit him. “That was a completely different situation. If our survival had depended on us allying with the New Council, then I might have agreed. But it didn’t. And I certainly wouldn’t join a group that allies itself with something like the Q’Chn.”

  Florida seemed unconvinced. “Methinks you protest too much. I think it’s highly likely you took the prototype to the New Council. And now you’ve got your hands somehow on a proper Invidi ship and you’re trying to get it past ConFleet and away.”

  Should I meet this drivel with the silence it deserves, or cut it off early?

  “Dan, you can’t spread unsubstantiated rumors like this. It’s neither professional nor ethical.”


  The skin around his eyes flushed. “That’s a laugh. What do you expect when you never give out information?”

  “I’m not free to do that, and you’re going to have to live with it.”

  “Don’t blame me if people fill in the gaps, then.”

  We glared at each other. It made my neck ache, as he was a lot taller than me.

  “You really don’t give up, do you? Don’t you have enough work to do at Central without manufacturing ridiculous rumors?”

  “Plenty, thank you. I’m concerned about Jocasta.” He spread one large hand. “It may surprise you, Commander, but I want neutrality as much as you do. I’ve worked with the ordinary residents here—hell, you know I came here illegally myself. I’ve seen what it was like here under the Confederacy, and it can’t be any worse if we’re independent.”

  “How is spreading rumors about the New Council going to help get the neutrality vote?”

  “It’s not. I’m not spreading anything.” He shook his head, resigned. “I said that because I want you to know that a lot of us have a big investment—not economic, either—in an independent Jocasta. And it seems to me that your... research might get in the way.”

  “I won’t let that happen,” I said, uneasy at his perspicacity. “And I promise you’ll be the first to know if we decide the information can be released,” I said. “But it’s a bigger story than me defecting to the New Council. Just wait awhile.”

  He hesitated, then nodded reluctantly. “It better be good.”

  “It’s sensational.”

  The old fighter bays were in the sunside of the center, between where the slim cylinder emerged from the protective cocoon of the rings and its far end, which sprouted into a forest of unlikely looking wings and sails to harvest sunlight, emit heat waste, and other mundane functions that kept the station alive.

  The uplift took me to Level Six. Normally it was full of floating figures and luggage, but today the gravity field was activated and a clamor of voices in different languages mostly voiced complaints at the heaviness of bodies and the awkwardness of containers. The gravity field certainly increased the time spent waiting for people to get out of one’s way.

  Most of the people were heading for Levels Four to One, at which ships were docked or from where they could access the outer docks or orbital shuttles. I took a corridor crawler—a lift that moved within the center—down from Level Six and I was the only passenger when it reached Level Eight, where Serat’s ship had been placed.

  Outside the airlock to Bay 12, a security guard waited. He nodded at me and let me pass without question.

  Inside the airlock, the bay was like an ovoid cave, nothing obvious to show that the wall on one side could become a round exit. Gantries and grappling arms clustered around the edges of that wall, in readiness to fling ships without internal-use thrusters out into space. Lines in various colors showed the “floor” for when the gravity field was not in use, and indicated where maintenance and service machinery should be positioned. Despite the overall gray, these lines gave the bay a festive air.

  The ship sat safely nose-up on the launch base, the center-side wall of the bay when the gravity field was off. Its smooth hull looked out of place against the reinforced surfaces of the bay, which were studded with maintenance stations and access points. Like a child’s toy in a gun turret.

  Three people stood beside it. Murdoch, another security guard, and, unexpectedly, Rupert Stone. I was taken aback, to say the least. I’d been looking forward to a quiet investigation of my... An Serat’s ship, not more debate on whether to keep it or not.

  Murdoch faced Stone and was pointing at the ship. The lanky security guard—Thoms, that’s right—loomed beside them.

  They must have got word that ConFleet’s on the way, I thought with a stab of despair. I’d have only an hour or less to look at the ship.

  “What’s going on?” My voice echoed impressively in the maintenance alcoves in the sides of the bay.

  Murdoch looked up. “Thought you’d never get here. Didn’t want to use your comm link in case someone heard.”

  “Is it ConFleet?” I said.

  “Not as such.” He waited until I was three paces away, then tossed me something small and hard. “Thoms gave me a call, like he was ordered to do if anyone came in here. I scooted up and found him”—he nodded at Stone— “putting that on the ship.”

  Stone watched us. His light eyes narrowed with hostility, his whole personality seemed more focused than last night.

  “What’s she doing up here?” he said. “She’s supposed to be under arrest. Dammit, Murdoch, I’ll arrest you as well if I have to.”

  “She’s on bond and assisting us with our inquiries,” said Murdoch, “part of which involves assessing possible threats to this station. Which includes this ship and”—he nodded at the thing he’d tossed me—“that device.”

  The small oval nestled on my palm in a familiar way. It had no distinguishing features, no cracks or bumps. The material felt warm and slightly velvety. Not cold and hard like ordinary metal. It felt like the Invidi device that An Barik had given my friend Brin Quartermaine to break into our security when the original Calypso arrived. The device that led Quartermaine to his death.

  “What does it do?” I said to Stone.

  He sniffed superciliously and said nothing.

  “The last person to use this kind of Invidi device on this station died,” I said. “Do you want to end up the same?”

  He drew himself up straight, his gaze flickering anxiously at the guard. As if he’d just realized security could be used against him. “Are you threatening me?”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” growled Murdoch. “She’s telling the truth. You can’t trust them.”

  “Where was it?” I said to Murdoch.

  “He was trying to stick it on the hull. In an inconspicuous corner. It doesn’t match anything in our files, including what little we got on that thing Quartermaine used.” Murdoch glared at Stone.

  “We couldn’t analyze Quartermaine’s thing,” I reminded him.

  Murdoch adopted what he seemed to think was a jovial tone. “Come on, Rupert. We’re all in this together. An Barik’s not here. We are. Tell us what’s going on.”

  “I’m acting under orders from my superior,” said Stone. He shifted uneasily and pulled his suit coat closer across his chest. “You people seem to forget that we need the Invidi. We need their protection. Think how much they’ve given us. We owe them.”

  “Did An Barik send a message buoy directly back to you?” I said. “Or did this order come through the Bendarl cruiser?”

  Murdoch met my eyes and rubbed his head in frustration. Whichever the case, Stone had got the message past Security’s communications monitoring. It was galling, the way the Invidi could skip around inside our systems.

  Stone said nothing.

  “What if it’s a bomb?” said Murdoch.

  I handed the small oval back to him quickly.

  “You could endanger everyone,” he continued. “For what? A chance to play spy.”

  I thought of Dan Florida’s suspicions of my own spy activities. He’d got the wrong person.

  “Not a bomb,” said Stone, “he said it was a disabling device. Nothing violent.”

  “So we can’t fly the ship away until he gets here. You believed him?” I said.

  Stone glared at me.

  Murdoch glared at him. “We can expect An Barik back soon then, can we?”

  “I don’t know,” said Stone sullenly.

  It made sense. The Invidi don’t do their own dirty work. When they need to fight, they have the Bendarl and Con-Fleet do it for them. When they need someone on the ground, people like Quartermaine and Stone are keen to oblige. And, until recently, myself. In pre-blockade days, if An Barik had asked me to help him, I would have agreed without question. As Stone said, the Invidi helped us, we should help them. My memories of pre-Contact Earth nagged at me—Stone was partly right. The Invidi s
aved us from destroying ourselves, we owed them something.

  “Bill, why don’t we forget this whole thing,” I said.

  Murdoch frowned. His expression shifted rapidly from are you mad? to what the hell are you up to?

  “I mean,” I said slowly, “Mr. Stone believes he’s doing the right thing...”

  “I am doing the right thing,” Stone almost shouted. “It’s you two who are endangering the station.”

  “... however much it may look like sabotage,” I finished.

  Stone blinked and was silent. Let him work out we’re at a stalemate. If he didn’t push about Murdoch’s involvement in our being on the Invidi ship, Murdoch wouldn’t push about Stone’s private communications with An Barik.

  Murdoch had worked it out, too. And hopefully he’d keep a closer watch on Stone from now on. “Yeah, well, I reckon we can be generous this once.” He jerked his head at the door. “Come on, Rupert. You and I have got work to do. Residents Committee meeting, fire drill, concern about the cruiser...”

  “You’re going to leave Halley here?” Stone resisted Murdoch’s hand on his arm.

  “She’s got her job to do,” said Murdoch.

  “But she’s in custody.” He sounded so frustrated, I almost sympathized.

  “Yeah, and I’ve got her formally on bond, if it makes you feel any better.”

  “It doesn’t,” said Stone. But he allowed Murdoch to usher him out of the bay.

  Twenty-three

  They left me alone with the ship. A relief, in a way. I’ve spent most of my life alone, and much of that time in pursuit of some technical problem. Longer in the company of ships than with people. Sometimes I think I’m more comfortable with the former.

  Could that be why your personal life is such a mess? asked an annoying internal voice.

  It’s not a mess, I told it crossly. My marital problems with Henoit came from his activities as a terrorist with the New Council. Nothing to do with my job.

  I shook my head to clear it of that thread of thought, and walked around the ship, reconfirming my memory of its outer configuration. A bulbous diamond shape, no distinguishing features on the outside, no protrusions from the smooth hull.