by Amie Kaufman
Our Ace blinks, lowers her weapon. Turning to her pilot’s console, she wipes off Aurora’s nose blood with a muttered curse, stabs in a series of commands.
“Sempiternity,” she finally says.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“You never heard of the World Ship?” Cat blinks.
“Astrography isn’t my forte,” I reply. “I remember sleeping through most of it.”
“I remember you sleeping with—”
“Sempiternity,” a small chirpy voice twitters, and Tyler’s old uniglass lights up inside Aurora’s breast pocket. “Also known as the World Ship. Located deep in the Neutral Zone, Sempiternity is a trading hub, outside any governmental jurisdiction, run by … interstellar entrepreneurs.”
“It means space pirates,” Cat offers.
“I was trying to be polite,” the device says.
“Silent mode,” Tyler growls.
“Aw.”
The uniglass falls silent as Cat calls up a 3-D schematic of Sempiternity over the center console. It’s an enormous collection of hundreds of thousands of ships, all different makes and models and sizes, bolted and welded and crushed together into a vast lopsided sphere. Beautiful. Hideous. Every kind of impossible.
“Sempiternity started as a single starport,” Cat explains. “Run by a freebooter cartel. Pirate crews would unload there, sell their spoils, head out for more. But over the past fifty years it’s accumulated more and more extensions. Ships that decide to stay and just attach themselves to the superstructure. Place goes on forever now. It’s as big as a small moon. Hence the name. The World Ship.”
I look at Aurora, still slumped in her chair. “So why does she want us to go there?”
As if she senses that I’m talking about her, Aurora groans and slowly lifts her head. Wincing with pain, she realizes there’s three disruptors pointed at her face. Her mismatched eyes go wide, then narrow as she realizes she’s in restraints. That she can taste blood on her lips.
“Um,” she says. “If this is another vision, I’d like to wake up, please.”
“You call that an apology?” I ask.
“W-what am I apologizing for?” She winces again, slowly rolling her shoulders and neck. “And … why do I feel like I was in … a c-car accident?”
“What, you don’t remember slamming me against the wall without touching me? Or Zila hitting you with half a dozen disruptor blasts?”
A kaleidoscope of emotions cross her face. Fear. Dismay. Frustration. Genuine confusion. Looking around and realizing she’s not in the room she went to sleep in. Licking her lips and tasting blood.
“N-no,” she says.
“Computer,” I call. “Replay bridge security camera footage, 01:29 ship time.”
The computer beeps, the central display begins to play the sec-reel. Aurora watches, going perfectly still as she sees herself walk onto the bridge, lift her hand as her eye starts to glow, and slam my projection back into the bulkhead.
“Ezigolopai,” the recording says in that strange, warbling voice. “Emevigrof.”
“I don’t …” Aurora shakes her head, looks with growing panic to Tyler. “I don’t remember doing any of that.”
“How convenient,” Cat says.
“Very,” I say.
“Auri, why did you mess with the navcom?” Tyler asks, his voice flat and hard. “Why do you want to go to Sempiternity?”
She shakes her head and whispers. “What’s Sempiternity?”
“Wait.”
All eyes turn to Zila. She’s playing idly with the tiny knife on one of her earrings, dark stare fixed on the security footage projection.
“Computer, replay footage in reverse. Real time. Include audio.”
The computer complies with a small beep, and we watch the figure of Aurora at the pilot’s console, typing backward. The rivulets of blood run back up her chin, into her nose. My discarded disruptor springs back up into my hand. And Aurora glances up at me and speaks in that strange, warbling voice. Only this time, the audio file is playing backward.
“Forgiveme,” she says. “Iapologize.”
Zila blinks at the recording. “Computer, replay sequence 02:43 to 02:52.”
The footage skips to Aurora standing in front of me, pointing to herself, her face twisted with concentration.
“T-t-ttrig-ggerrrrr,” she says. “Trigg—”
“Trigger,” Zila repeats, head tilted.
“What does that mean?” Tyler asks her.
Our science officer turns to regard Aurora with her dark eyes.
“I have no idea, sir. But I am certain that Commander de Stoy placed Aurora in our keeping for a reason. In my opinion, we should maintain course.”
“For what it’s worth, I think I agree with the tiny lunatic, Goldenboy,” Finian pipes in over comms. “This is getting kinda interesting.”
“I’m sure the thought of the court-martial waiting for us back at Aurora station has no bearing on your decision, Finian?” Tyler asks.
“None whatsoever, sir.”
Tyler sighs, turns to me. It might sound like a little thing, but this is one of the main reasons my baby brother was the best Alpha in the academy. It’s also one of the main reasons I never smothered him in his sleep. He’s never afraid to ask advice when he needs it.
I think of the peeled-open door to the makeshift brig. Of the thin hull that protects us from the black waiting outside.
“I say we go back to the academy,” I say. “If we talk to Command, maybe there’s some way to salvage this. We’re in over our heads here.”
“Damn straight we are,” Cat growls. “I say give her to the G-men.”
“Need I remind you all of Commander de Stoy’s warning to us?” Kal asks. “She said ‘The cargo you carry is more precious than any of you can know.’ ” The Syldrathi looks Ty in the eye. “Admiral Adams spoke directly to you, sir. He said you must believe. What else could he have meant, if not this?”
Tyler chews his lip in thought.
But it’s Aurora who speaks. “I want to g-go home.” Tears begin welling in her eyes, and though she struggles to maintain her composure, it’s crumbling anyway. She looks up at Tyler, her voice shaking. “I’m not s-supposed to be here.”
And even though she almost killed me, looking down at this poor girl, I can’t help but feel a swell of sympathy for her. I put a hand on her shoulder, squeeze it gently as she hangs her head, tears pattering on her lap.
“It’s okay, Aurora.”
“I want to wake up,” she whispers fiercely. “I want to wake up on Octavia III l-like I was supposed to.”
Zila tilts her head. “The Hadfield expedition was bound for Lei Gong III, and—”
“No, it wasn’t!” Aurora insists, a fire lighting in her tear-filled eyes as she glares at us. “I’m telling you, we were headed for Octavia! I spent years studying every centimeter of the planet, I know which one it was! I don’t know why they’re trying to wipe away any trace of it, any trace of me, but that’s what’s happening here.”
Cat rolls her eyes at the outburst, drumming her fingers on her console. Kal folds his arms, his customary Syldrathi callousness falling into place at the display of oh, so human emotion. But Aurora doesn’t seem to care.
“I w-want to go ho-ome,” she repeats, the tears resurging as she abandons the attempt to hold herself together. “I want my family back. I didn’t ask for any of this! I didn’t ask for any of it and I want to go HOME!”
Tyler watches the girl break down, and I can see his heart in his throat. The questions in his eyes. Truth is, none of us know what the hells we’re doing out here. De Stoy and Adams might have sent this girl with us for a reason. But Tyler was raised to play it by the book, and I can see how badly this is eating him. The thought that we’re wanted criminals, probably suspected for the mur
der of our own people.
We’re in deeper than we could’ve imagined.
“Three votes in favor of pushing on. And three against. Squad Leader breaks ties.” Tyler looks sadly at Aurora and sighs. “Cat, set a course for Aurora Academy. We’re going home.”
“Roger that.” Cat smiles.
Kal sighs and shakes his head, but he doesn’t dissent. Tyler drags his hand through his hair as Cat’s fingers fly over her controls.
“Okay, course locked,” she reports. “Should be back at station b—”
The Longbow shudders, sudden and violent. I reach out to steady myself when the ship bucks again, and I’m suddenly thrown into the wall, gasping in pain as I hit the titanium, then the floor. Brushing my bangs from my eyes, I look around the bridge and see the rest of my squad scattered across the decking, groaning, wincing. Only Kal has managed to keep his feet. Finian’s voice crackles over comms.
“What in the Maker’s name was that?”
“Did something hit us?” Tyler demands.
“Nothing on scanners, sir,” Zila reports.
“Cat, report,” Tyler demands.
“We’ve …” Cat stabs at her console for confirmation. “Stopped?”
“Engines are offline?”
“No, I mean we’ve bloody stopped. Engines are at thrust, but it’s like …” Cat shakes her head. “Like something is holding us in place.”
“Not something,” I breathe. “Someone.”
The rest of the squad follows my eyeline, until we’re all staring at Aurora. Our girl out of time has her head thrown back, her right eye burning with ghostly white light. Her body is trembling with effort, veins taut at her neck, in her arms. As we watch, another thin trickle of blood spills from her nose.
“Maker’s breath,” Tyler whispers.
“T-t-ttrig-ggerrrrr,” Aurora says.
Up on her knees, Cat has her disruptor aimed at Auri’s head, but smooth as silk, Kal steps in between our Ace and her target.
“Get out of the way, Kal!”
“You will not hurt her!”
Aurora turns her eyes on Tyler, her whole body shaking. The Longbow’s shaking, too, violent, terrifying, as if the whole ship is trying to tear itself apart.
“Buh … B-buh … ,” she stutters.
“What?” Tyler breathes, leaning closer.
“B … B-belieeeve …”
Another tremor hits, knocking me back to the floor. The hull groans around us, the rivets squealing as they start to turn. Tyler looks at me. At his squad. At the ship around us, convulsing so hard it might fly to pieces. I can see the wheels spinning behind his eyes. Weighing up the danger to his crew. The warning de Stoy and Adams gave us as we left the station. His hand goes to the lump beneath his tunic—our dad’s senate ring, hanging on the titanium chain about his neck. Ty’s always played it by the book. Ever since we were thirteen years old on New Gettysburg, signing on the dotted line.
The cargo you carry is more precious than any of you can know.
“Believe … ,” Aurora whispers.
Tyler clenches his jaw. His hand slips from dad’s ring to the Maker’s mark at his collar. As the Longbow shudders and shakes all around us, Ty crawls across the bucking floor, up to his command console. And as I watch, he logs into the navcom, sets us a new course.
Almost immediately, the Longbow stops shaking. The engines pick up, I feel the press of thrust through our inertial dampeners.
The light in Aurora’s eye flickers and dies like someone turned off a switch. She slumps down in her chair, blood dripping from her nose, out cold again. Zila runs to her side to check her vitals, Kal offering assistance. Cat’s eyes are narrowed, shaking hands wrapped around her disruptor’s grip. My eyes are on the navcom, the new course Ty just plugged in.
“Where we headed, Bee-bro?” I ask, already knowing the answer.
“Sempiternity,” he says softly, looking around the cabin.
“You sure that’s a good idea?” I ask.
“I don’t know.”
He touches the Maker’s mark at his collar again, staring at Auri.
“But sometimes you just gotta have faith.”
14
Auri
“Jie-Lin, wake up.”
I open my eyes, wondering for a moment where I am. I remember the argument on the Longbow’s bridge. Tyler and Kal and Scarlett and Cat. Bright light. But now I’m lying in a soft bed. A warm glow around me. Posters on the walls I recognize, a familiar stuffed toy squirrel beside me.
My room.
I’m in my room.
“Jie-Lin?”
I look up, and sitting above me is a face I never thought I’d see again. Round cheeks. The lines across his forehead that my mom used to joke were there from the age of fifteen, because the world surprised him so much.
“Daddy?”
“I’ve been waiting for you, Jie-Lin.”
He pulls me into his arms and I can feel his chest shaking because he’s laughing and he’s crying and I’m laughing and crying, too. And all the things I could have said, I should have said, are filling my head because he’s not dead and it’s not too late and I try to pull away and speak because there’s so much I want to say.
But I can’t.
I can’t pull away. He’s holding me too tight. And I can’t breathe and I can’t speak. I push hard, forcing him off me, but it’s like he’s made of tar. Pieces of him come with me as I pull back, long strings of him stretching between us like human taffy. Seeping in under my skin.
“Let me go!”
He looks me and smiles, and his irises are shaped like blue flowers.
“Ra’haam,” he says.
“Let go!”
“Ra’haaaaaaam.”
•••••
“Aurora?”
I open my eyes, heart thundering, blinking in the light. Scarlett’s sitting beside me, Zila and Kal standing above me. My mouth is dry as chalk and I ache all over. But slowly, I realize I’m still here. Not there.
A nightmare.
I don’t know whether to be relieved or heartbroken all over again. I’m not home, not back in my room. I’m on a spaceship a million light-years from any of it. Everyone’s still gone, my dad is …
Scarlett hands me a cup of water, concern and suspicion in her eyes. It’s not lost on me that Zila has her hand on her pistol. That Kal is armed, too, watching me with those cool violet eyes from over near the door.
“Do you remember what happened?” Scarlett asks.
I blink hard. Images flashing in my mind. Me throwing Scarlett into the wall. Blood on my lips. Raised voices. My dad’s skin melting into mine like taffy. One image burning brighter than the rest. A name.
“Sempiternity,” I murmur.
Zila and Scarlett exchange a glance, and the redhead nods. “We’ve been Folding for almost four hours. We’re nearly there. Tyler asked us to bring you up to the bridge in case you … see anything.”
I blink hard to rid myself of that image of my dad. The pieces of him melting into pieces of me. Wincing as Scarlett helps me to my feet, I note we’re in some kind of habitation area. Bunk beds and lockers and gunmetal gray, Aurora Legion logos on the walls. I catch a glimpse of my reflection in a mirror. The shock of white in my bangs, the white in my right iris. I don’t know what any of this means, but it feels like a stranger looking back at me. Helpless. Angry.
“I know you all think I’m crazy,” I murmur.
“Nobody thinks you’re crazy, Auri,” Scarlett says, touching my arm. “You’ve been through a lot, we all know that.”
“The Hadfield was bound for Octavia III, Scarlett,” I say, low and fierce. “I studied years to get on that mission, you don’t forget something like that. Every spare minute was training—memorizing maps, rock climbing, orienteering competit
ions. And all of it with one word in mind: Octavia.”
She gives me a sympathetic smile, but shakes her head. “Auri, we checked the records. Octavia III is uninhabitable.”
“That’s what I said,” comes a small chirp from my pocket. “But does she listen to me? Noooo—”
I clap my hand over Magellan to shut him up. “Why don’t we go check it out, then? I know the composition of the atmosphere, the layout of the continents—I’ll show you where Butler settlement and the outposts are, I’ll …”
“Octavia III has been under Interdiction for hundreds of years,” Zila says.
“And the last time we set an alternate course, you almost destroyed the ship.” I look over at Kal as he speaks, and his expression is unreadable as always. But remembering that footage of me attacking Scarlett, holding the ship in place while it shook and my eye burned white, it’s hard to argue with him.
“Seems like this is where you’re meant to be.” Scarlett says. “And maybe we’re heading where we’re supposed to go, too.”
She touches my arm again, and her smile is warm and kind in comparison to Kal’s frosty stare. I can’t help but smile weakly in return. She voted to take me back to the academy, but now their course is set, I realize …
She’s trying to be nice to me.
“Come on,” she says. “Ty wants you on the bridge.”
I don’t miss the glance Zila and Kal share as we leave the room, or the fact that Zila’s hand hasn’t left her gun the whole time we talked. But together, we make our way down a long corridor, Kal in front, Scarlett beside me, Zila walking behind. My bones creak and my pulse is pounding and I’ve got one mothercustard of a headache.
As we step out onto the bridge, the others turn to glance at me, but only for a moment. Looking at the huge screen above the central console, I can see we’re coming in to dock at what must be Sempiternity. Cat and Tyler seem occupied navigating us through a maze of ships and docking stations and loaders and shuttles, surrounding the most amazing sight I’ve ever seen in my life.