Games of Command

by Linnea Sinclair

  “Enough room out here to set up a workable repair bay,” said a voice behind him.

  Serafino. So much for his theory about paradise.

  “We need to set up the security field first,” Kel-Paten said. He strode several paces away from the shuttle—and Serafino—and analyzed the optimal field layout, then paced off a few more. “Here,” he said, digging his heel into the ground, making a long gash. Six more long paces toward the bow. “Second sensor here.”

  Tasha came up alongside him, plucked the datalyzer from his hand. She entered the coordinates as he delineated them, transmitting them back to the shuttle’s computers.

  Serafino stared at him for a moment, then, with a shrug, turned back to Fynn.

  “What’s out here we should be afraid of?” Tasha asked as they rounded the ship’s bow, putting Fynn and Serafino out of sight.

  “According to what ship’s sensors show us, nothing.” No animals, no insects, not even a slitherskimp. Nothing remotely inconvenient, let alone threatening.

  “Do you find that odd?”

  “I’d not welcome any further problems, but yes. It’s illogical.”

  “The furzels agree with you, if that’s any consolation.” She stopped and squinted at the forest on her right.

  “I think ship’s sensors are better diagnostic tools.”

  “Are they?” She was still staring at the trees, then gave herself a small shake and turned back to him. “If we were in the wilds of Fendantun or one of the worlds in the Far Reaches, I might agree with you. But here…” And she glanced at him with a challenge in her eyes that was very familiar.

  It was admiral and captain again, hashing out issues in his office. Except now his office was a large green meadow and neither of them had their usual cup of coffee in hand. “Parameters may be different,” he admitted. Then, as he always asked during their meetings: “Your hypothesis?”

  A small smile touched her lips. “Coffee would definitely help with this discussion, but since you’ve not offered any, Branden, we’ll just have to proceed without it.”

  Branden. Perhaps not the gods’ Lost Paradise but definitely a small slice of heaven. “An oversight. My hospitality skills are lacking.”

  She chuckled softly, then her mirth faded. She drew a short breath. “Are you sure we’re actually here? That we’re not stuck in jumpspace? You know, lost in McClellan’s Void and hallucinating? I thought maybe that’s why Tank’s so upset.”

  McClellan’s Void. Dreehalla. The entertainment industry loved to use that as a setting for its horror vids. Drunken spacers—claiming to have uncovered the secret of the mythical Captain McClellan—loved to use it as a means to cadge another drink. He knew of three planetary cultures that used it as a term synonymous with hell. The Rebashee refused to utter its name, only making an odd protection symbol with their fingers to prevent its noticing them. He knew of no one—no sane person—who had ever experienced it. But that hadn’t diminished the legend of a Captain McClellan, who escaped from an alternate dimension where friends and enemies—some long dead—tortured him through bizarre recreations of his life. Friends he’d trusted betrayed him; women he’d loved spurned him; ships he’d captained imploded under his boots. He was a broken man—shivering and babbling incoherently—when the crew of a passing ore freighter found him and his ship, a hundred years ago. Or so the legend went.

  Kel-Paten preferred to think of paradise. Though no paradise of his making would ever contain Serafino. McClellan’s Void, on the other hand, would be just that paradoxical. If it existed. But it didn’t.

  “To exist in a layer of nonexistence is scientifically impossible,” he told her.

  She stepped closer to him. “I’ve heard of mathematical theories—”

  “I wrote three of them.” Because he couldn’t help himself and because he saw the slight glimmer of trepidation in her eyes, he touched her cheek gently, brushing some short wisps of her hair back from her face. “And have disproved those and ten more,” he added.

  Her lashes lowered to pinkened cheeks, but she didn’t pull away from his touch.

  Dear gods, he’d made her blush! And they were talking about hypothetical equations.

  “Well, then,” she said, once again looking up at him. The small smile was back. She tapped him in the middle of his chest with the datalyzer. “Best finish up before Serafino comes looking for us.”

  He stepped away from her reluctantly and paced to the next sensor point, just aft of the shuttle’s midsection. She followed, making notations, the fidget never far from her heels.

  “And your hypothesis, Admiral?”

  “Still in process. We’re working with possibly erroneous data until we get ship’s sensors recalibrated. Certainly,” and he glanced overhead at the now pale blue sky lightly streaked with cottony clouds, “this doesn’t match what I’d expect from this planet’s location in the hab zone or its slower rotation. Other than that storm we came in on, temperatures and vegetation don’t reflect the extremes we should be seeing.”

  “You mean it shouldn’t be so perfectly conducive to our needs.”

  “Exactly.” He cupped her arm, guiding her along as he paced toward the shuttle’s aft end. She didn’t pull away. Amazing.

  “So why is it?”

  “We don’t know that it is. We only know this small region has attributes in contradiction to our scientific expectations. We haven’t scanned this entire planet—we may be in an environmental pocket, like an oasis in a desert. We’ve also only been here,” he added, “three hours and forty-two minutes. Ask me again in a week. I’ll know more.”

  “Aye, sir. Logged and noted,” she said, then: “What’s your estimate on repair time?”

  He’d thought about that. The preliminary damage-assessment list was long. The more thorough, detailed one that would emerge over the next twenty-four to thirty-six hours would no doubt be worse. “A month, easily. Six weeks wouldn’t be out of the question.”

  “The Vax is probably looking for us, along with the Prospector, the Dalkerris, the Nexarion, the Pride—hell. The whole fleet’s probably on alert.”

  There was a tone of hope in her voice. But they were far off any chart either the Triad or the U-Cees had. Even the damned Nasyry pirate couldn’t find a fix to work with.

  “Tasha—”

  “I know, I know. Don’t give me probability percentages, Kel-Paten. I’m too tired to take any more bad news right now.”

  He gave her the coordinates for the final sensor, then: “There are always miracles, you know.”

  She glanced up at him, lips parted in surprise. “You said you didn’t believe in miracles.”

  “I didn’t, but…” A dozen things he’d always wanted to say to her, about what she meant to him, ran through his mind. None came out, because Serafino suddenly appeared around the side of the shuttle, datalyzer in hand. His long hair was haphazardly tied back, strands dangling around his face. His high-collared shirt was open at the neck, its sleeves rolled up unevenly on forearms that showed purplish bruises acquired during landing. A U-Cee weapon still graced his hip. Kel-Paten increased his mental filters automatically, even though he suspected the Nasyry could get through if he wanted to. And even though those same filters made him feel detached from Tasha. He hated that.

  “I’m picking up a signal! Very clear readings. It’s an outpost or small spaceport. Damn it all, I get nothing from the sensors inside the shuttle. We got nothing coming in on entry, but,” and he shoved the unit’s screen between Kel-Paten and Tasha, “here it is.”

  There it was. Structures. Power fields. Life-form readings—those were the faintest, but they were there, where nothing had been a half hour before, according to their sensors. Sensors that were—with a broken main power coupling and two bent antennae grids—admittedly not functioning optimally.

  Kel-Paten didn’t like it, even though a spaceport could—ostensibly—be very good news.

  “You said there were erratic energy pulses while we were s
till in orbit.” Tasha motioned to Serafino. “Could it be this?”

  “Doesn’t feel quite the same, but I’m not going to discount anything. Not until we get a closer look.” There was a tone of excitement in Serafino’s voice. Clearly he’d found a mission where he could cast himself in the role of hero.

  “We,” Kel-Paten said, stressing the word, “need to first finish securing this ship and the perimeters. Then we all need some downtime. That will also give us more time to analyze—”

  “It gives them time to make the first move. And we have no idea who they are or what they’re capable of. I’m guessing the reason that they haven’t already come calling is that storm that covered our approach. Their power grid,” and Serafino tilted the screen so both Kel-Paten and Tasha could see it, “shows some cold spots. Looks like they’re just getting things back online. I’ve put our systems on yellow alert, just in case.”

  Kel-Paten studied the screen in Serafino’s hand, the hint of technology that could solve many of their problems. “I’m not going to put us all through a forty-five-mile forced march when we have injuries and exhaustion to deal with.” And a forced march it would be. The shuttle had no transbeam unit.

  “I’m not talking about ‘us all.’ You and me.” Serafino waved the datalyzer back and forth. “I only took a few bruises on landing, and I logged my downtime in orbit. Sass—Tasha and Eden can finish calibrating the security sensors, then nap in shifts until we get back.”

  Yes, they could. And as much as it grated on Kel-Paten to admit it, Serafino was right. This outpost did need to be investigated, because it was Kel-Paten’s sworn duty as a Triad officer to return to the Fleet as soon as possible. If this outpost contained the technology and the charts to assist in that endeavor, he had to make every effort to acquire them. He and Serafino were best suited to make the trek, even if Serafino did have more than his admitted “few bruises.” But Kel-Paten didn’t like it, and not because Serafino was more injured than he said or because Kel-Paten had no desire to be in Serafino’s company more than he had to. “I can cover the distance faster than you. If,” and he stressed the word, “the locals do send a probe ’droid or scout team, I’d prefer the three of you be here to handle the situation.”

  “Negative, Tin Soldier. You need me. Unless the natives have some kind of telepathic shielding that I can’t circumvent, I’ll find out far more about them far more quickly than you can with your charming personality.”

  “’Fino,” Tasha said, a clear warning tone in her voice.

  That heartened Kel-Paten but shamed him too. He didn’t need her to defend him. “Don’t interrupt him. He’s teaching me how to be charming.”

  Tasha sputtered out a laugh.

  Serafino cocked his head slightly. “Very good,” he said after a moment. “When do we leave?”

  There was no way he was going to change Serafino’s mind. He knew that. And the bastard did have a point about the usefulness of his talent. But he hated leaving Tasha alone with Fynn to guard the shuttle. Fynn was a doctor, not a soldier. He doubted she’d picked up a weapon since basic training.

  Plus, he simply hated leaving Tasha right now. Something was happening between them, something he needed to understand. He had so many questions, not just about what he hoped were her feelings for him but about her knowledge of Serafino and her suspicions about himself. About the mysterious ambush and Fynn’s newly found telepathy. About where they were going from here—and he didn’t mean their eventual destination via shuttle. There was so much they had to clear up, and there hadn’t been a chance since they left the Vax. More questions kept coming. And he knew of no answers.

  A forty-five-mile trek with her would have been an ideal time to obtain those answers. But that was not to be. It felt almost as if his old luck—or lack thereof—had returned.

  “How strong is your telepathic link to Eden?” Tasha was asking Serafino.

  “In case our comm links don’t work?” he asked. “She’s primarily a touch telepath. But there are ways I can reach her. She just can’t initiate contact with me as easily.”

  “How about Tank and Reilly?”

  This time Serafino laughed. “I’m not taking your fat fidget on a recon mission.”

  “Tank says,” Tasha replied, her eyes closed and a wry smile on her lips, “that you’re rude.” She opened her eyes. “But I was thinking about Reilly. Eden told me your link to him is stronger.”

  “No,” said Serafino.

  “No,” said Kel-Paten at the same time. “Since our preliminary scans of this ecosystem are obviously in error, we don’t know what natural predators are out there. I can’t be watching after him,” and he jerked his chin toward Serafino, “and a furzel as well.”

  Tasha shrugged. “Just a thought.”

  Somehow Kel-Paten knew she was talking to the fidget, even though he was having a hard time accepting that she could.

  “No,” he repeated, giving her a stern look, which honestly had never had much effect in the past.

  “Aye, sir. If there’s nothing else,” she stepped back, turning the datalyzer over in her hands, “I need to initialize the program, do a test run before we set the sensors in place.”

  The warmth he’d sensed from her before was gone. Because of Serafino most likely. Or maybe because she didn’t want him to leave? Maybe it was time…and the excuse of checking on her test data would be perfect.

  He nodded. “I’ll look it over before we go.”

  “Good.” She ducked her head briefly in acknowledgment, then turned.

  “We need to verify coordinates, put together two backpacks with water and emergency provisions,” Serafino said as Tasha headed back toward the rampway, Tank bounding after her. “That shouldn’t take more than twenty minutes.”

  “Half an hour,” Kel-Paten told him. “I want to replace an external power coupling on the main sensor dish before we leave. Have Dr. Fynn pack a small med-kit.” He fixed Serafino with his “that’s an order” glare. It was bad enough he had to spend the next several hours with the bastard. He needed his next thirty minutes free of him. Because he had something important to do after he fixed the sensor dish.

  Calibrating the security-sensor field with a fidget tail twitching across the cockpit’s console screens was no easy task. Calibrating the security-sensor field with a twitching fidget tail on the console, an unhappy CMO in the main cabin, and a furzel-to-fidget mental commentary was getting damned near impossible.

  Sass set the security program into a diagnostic loop, plucked Tank from the console, and marched through the hatchway into the main cabin. Eden had converted one of the cabin’s fold-down seats to a makeshift staging table. She was on one side, arms across her chest. Serafino was at the other, hands on hips. Reilly was hunkered between them, tail thrashing much as Tank’s had. Only his tail thwacked first one half-loaded backpack and then the other.

  Sass didn’t need to ask what was going on. She’d been getting an abbreviated furzel’s-eye view for the past fifteen minutes.

  “I know it’s risky,” she told Eden when her friend turned to her with a pleading expression in her eyes. Tank flowed from her arms onto the makeshift table with a muted thump. The two furzels touched noses, and a chorus of Friend! Protect! echoed in Sass’s mind. She ignored it as she was learning to ignore a lot of their chatter. “The admiral knows it’s risky. Serafino’s never struck me as suicidal. They’re not planning to attack the outpost, Eden. Just gather information and return.”

  “As chief medical officer, I’m responsible for the health and well-being of the officers and crew.”

  “I’m responsible for their lives too.”

  “None of us,” Eden went on, as if Sass hadn’t commented, “should be doing more at this point than what’s minimally required. Damn it, Sass, if we were back on the Regalia, I’d have you in sick bay. I’d be in sick bay!” She rubbed her forehead, wincing. “I’m concussed. You have rotator-cuff damage, a collateral ligament tear in your left knee. Jace�
��”

  Serafino held up one hand. “I’m Nasyry. I heal faster.”

  “I don’t care!” Eden stamped her foot, which signaled to Sass that she cared very much indeed. Eden was not by nature a foot-stamper, resorting to that tactic only when she was down to her last sliver of patience. “Shall I detail your two cracked ribs? Or how about the lumbar sprain? Or—and you!” Eden whirled, pointing at the admiral, who—judging from the footsteps Sass just heard—had entered the main cabin only moments before. “If you’ve run a diagnostic, you haven’t shown me the results. You were damned near half this ship’s power supply for, what, an hour or more? That was a mere four hours ago—”

  “Four hours, eighteen minutes, twenty-seven seconds,” Kel-Paten corrected, his voice flat. It sounded as if he was in ’cybe function, but Sass wasn’t about to turn around to find out. Things happened when he looked at her. Things she wasn’t sure she was ready to feel. She vacillated between regretting kissing him and wanting to tear his uniform off and have wild, insane, sweaty sex, just to get him out of her system.

  That had always worked in the past.

  “I agree with your assessment, Doctor,” Kel-Paten was saying as the two furzels bounded off the table and raced past Sass’s legs, heading for the cockpit, “but these are not ordinary circumstances.”

  “Another four hours,” Eden challenged. “We rest, eat a decent meal, spend some time on the shuttle’s regen table.”

  “No. Our duty to return to the Triad takes precedence over any personal concerns.”

  “Three hours.”

  “Captain Sebastian is staying behind. By the time we return, you’ll have her well-fed and completely healed.”

  “Two and a half.”

  Serafino shoved a small med-kit and a rations pack into one backpack and sealed it. “Ready when you are, Tin Soldier.” He yanked it up to his shoulder.

  Sass saw the momentary thinning of his lips. So did Eden or, given their telepathic bond, maybe she felt it.

  “See? See?” Eden glared at him. “Those ribs are not healed yet.”