City of Ruins du-2

by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  Coop shifted in his command chair, turning toward the full wall screen on the left side of the bridge. That screen showed the door leading into the sector base.

  The door was easing open.

  He almost corrected Anita, but didn’t. His breath had caught, and he felt just a little redeemed. He had thought the outsiders would return.

  And now they had.

  This time there were seven, not five.

  “Compare, would you?” he said to Dix. “I want to know if any of those people are the same ones who were here forty-eight hours ago.”

  Dix didn’t answer. He had been unusually quiet since getting the news about the sector base. He seemed shrunken in on himself, exhausted, as if he couldn’t sleep.

  Coop had seen him like this before, and he knew that Dix, despite his emotional upset, would get the job done.

  Coop’s eyes already told him that the person who had come in the door first was the woman he had noticed earlier. The woman who had put her glove against the ship, as if it were a miracle, something she had never, ever expected.

  He couldn’t tell, however, if the others were people who had come in before.

  “Shouldn’t we go talk to them?” Perkins asked.

  She stood near the screens, her hands clasped behind her back, unknowingly mimicking the posture that Coop had every single time he stared at the same images in the captain’s suite.

  Only he was trying to quell his own emotions, to keep his mind even, focused, and calm.

  Perkins, so far as he could tell, was excited. She wanted to throw herself into the work.

  “Not yet,” Coop said to Perkins. “We don’t want to startle them.”

  She turned and gave him a winning smile. “C’mon, Captain,” she said in a wheedling tone. “They know we’re here. How else would the ship have come in?”

  “The anacapa,” Dix said, his tone as dismal as his posture. “Working automatically.”

  Perkins frowned at him. “They’re outsiders. How would they know that?”

  “How do they know anything?” Yash asked. She was going over the data in front of her as well. “They’re explorers in this place. That’s clear from the way they move. We have no idea how they manage or what they do.”

  “Which is why we’re not going through that door until we’re ready,” Coop said. “We don’t want to surprise them. For all we know, they’ve never seen a spaceship before.”

  “I’d wager you’re right,” Yash said. “I can’t imagine how those environmental suits would survive in space. They probably have just started developing their own space program. And those suits aren’t going to take them very far.”

  “That we can tell,” Perkins said. “Cultures always mix old and new. Sometimes people wear things that are ceremonial.”

  “With equipment?” Yash said. “I don’t think so.”

  Coop smiled. Yash wouldn’t. She always wanted the latest, best, most improved. That was one of the reasons he had hired her in the first place, because she tinkered and improved everything around her.

  The seven outsiders clustered in a group, and the woman gestured. He was right; she was the one in charge.

  “Five are the same, two new, just like it looks,” Dix said without inflection.

  “Do you think they’re always going to be coming in forty-eight-hour intervals?” Anita asked.

  “Doubtful,” Coop said. “If I had to guess—and it would just be a guess—the two new are arbiters of some kind, or people with a particular expertise.”

  Perkins shifted, as if she couldn’t contain the energy she felt. “I could go ask.”

  “And get attacked?” Yash asked. “They’re wearing knives.”

  “Knives, I know,” Perkins said. “How old-fashioned is that?”

  “Actually,” Dix said, “only one of them is wearing a knife, and it seems more like an all-purpose tool than a weapon.”

  “The woman in charge,” Coop said.

  Dix nodded. “She’s also carrying something that looks like a laser pistol. Her hand hovered near it as she came in the door. She was expecting an attack.”

  “Or worrying about one,” Coop said more to himself than the others.

  “They shouldn’t see anything different,” Yash said. “We made sure of that.”

  “I think we should go out there,” Perkins said. “If they’re already expecting us—”

  “To attack them,” Coop said. “They thought we might attack them. Coming out the door is not the best idea at the moment.”

  Although he wanted to go out there himself, quiz them, and figure out if all of the readings his team had taken were right. He wanted to find out what was going on, what had happened to Venice City, if there were still members of the Fleet (or descendents of it) on Wyr.

  Perkins sighed, but said no more. She understood she’d been overruled.

  The outsiders split into three teams, two people staying by the door, two going to the equipment, and three coming to the ship itself.

  “I hope they don’t touch anything they shouldn’t,” Anita said.

  “They can’t tamper with much,” Yash said. “Most of the equipment is in shut-down mode.”

  “Who knows what time has done to corrode it?” Dix said, without looking up.

  “I guess we’ll find out,” Coop said, as he settled in to watch.

  ~ * ~

  FORTY-FIVE

  The hours pass quickly and we haven’t found anything. Or at least, we haven’t found anything we understand.

  We’ve gotten lots of information, recorded many things, explored many parts of the room and a little bit of the exterior of the ship. We even found a name and a vessel number on the Dignity Vessel. I can’t read the name because it’s in Old Earth Standard—or at least, I think that might be standard. It’s an ancient Earth language, anyway, and my Old Earth Standard is mostly limited to helpful words like “danger” and “keep out.”

  I’ve given up on the door. I found the latch quickly enough—it is exactly where latches always are on Dignity Vessel doors—but I can’t open it. I’ve pressed it, moved it, changed it, and it still won’t budge. Either the door is locked from the inside—which is something I’ve never seen in a Dignity Vessel—or it keeps relatching every time I think I’ve opened it.

  Al-Nasir and Quinte have found some overrides for the door leading to the corridor. They’ve also found a way to turn on the interior lights—all without touching a thing.

  The interior lights came on after Quinte ran her hand over a part of the wall nearest the door.

  We all blinked in the brightness and then got back to work. Or at least I did. DeVries and Rea and Al-Nasir and Quinte all stared as if they hadn’t seen the place before.

  And when I finally gave up on the latch, I stared, too.

  It’s not exactly what I thought it was. When the room had been shrouded in darkness, it had the feeling of a place that went on forever, of a room that led to other rooms, which led to even more rooms, which then became a compound.

  Now that the lights are on full, I realize that the room is really one gigantic repair shop. There are several platforms marked “danger” in Old Earth Standard, and unlike the one I’m standing on, those are all empty. There are other equipment consoles built into the walls around each platform, and those consoles show nothing on their screens.

  I wonder idly what would happen if we touch them. Would we get another Dignity Vessel?

  I’d try, except that I want to find out more about this Dignity Vessel first, and then there’s the problem of the death hole.

  This morning before we left, Gregory informed me that the new death hole—the one we think the Dignity Vessel caused (and by extension, we probably caused)—is the largest in Vaycehn’s recorded history.

  I don’t want to do that again. I didn’t want to do it before.

  So I’ve warned my people away from the other consoles, at least for the time being. Not that they were hurrying over there. We’re s
wamped with the consoles we have.

  I’m proud of Kersting and Seager. They’re going over the consoles we have touched millimeter by millimeter, making sure they miss nothing. I can hear their conversation in my comm—”You take that.” “Got it.” “I’m finishing this.” “Good.”—and it feels like an accompaniment to the constant strumming of stealth tech.

  I wish my equipment measured the sound of stealth tech, because it seems to me that the sound has changed since the last time we were here. It was louder just before the ship came in, and slightly different once the ship arrived. Now the sound has less treble and more bass. Even the treble has a bit of vibrato in it that wasn’t there before.

  It’s distracting, and the conversation between Kersting and Seager takes my mind off of it.

  I moved away from the door two hours ago and walked under the ship, booking for the hatches that I know are there. I found one, welded closed (or, at least, it looked like it was welded), and another that’s barely within my reach.

  As I stand on tiptoe to inspect the top part of the hatch, I brace one hand against the ship itself. I run my hand across the top of the hatch and feel nothing. The hatch should have a latch in the very center, if it follows the same design as the other Dignity Vessels I’ve encountered, but I save the center for last.

  I’m not used to standing on my toes for prolonged periods of time and, if truth be told, my legs are still incredibly sore. So I drop down to the flat of my feet and look at the rest of the room.

  I’m tempted to go down there and see if there are ladders or stepping stools or even chairs, something that will allow me to stand above that hatch opening.

  But I can’t touch anything down there, not yet, and I’m not going to. Every time I think of walking outside of this small area, I force myself to remember that death hole.

  The far end of the room curves. There isn’t a platform that I can see, but there are even more consoles and, it looks like, places to hang smaller pieces of equipment. I have a hunch there are doors down there that lead to storage or maybe a place to stay.

  I can’t imagine employees coming down here through those corridors every day, not unless there were hovercarts back when this place was in full use.

  Something else for my historians to research. But after my encounter with Paplas yesterday, I’m beginning to understand the difficulty.

  Either the Vaycehnese don’t want to discuss these caves, the black stuff on the walls, and their technology with outsiders, or the Vaycehnese really don’t know where a lot of the things they live with come from. I’m betting it’s a combination of both.

  I rise to my toes again and run my hand along the edge of the hatch, finding little, not even particles, which surprises me. I haven’t found any on the ship, when it was coated two days ago. That very detail unnerves me.

  When we started, I asked Kersting and Seager if there were particles still on the equipment. Kersting said no, but Seager said there were still some on the underside of the consoles.

  Almost as if someone had wiped them off.

  I move my hand from the edge of the hatch toward the middle when DeVries says, “Boss.”

  His inflection is so flat that I know he’s not telling me he found something. He’s reminding me our time is up.

  I look at my suit’s internal clock. We have a minute to spare. He’s probably been waiting for me to notice.

  I suppress a sigh. We’re going to be here a long time.

  “All right, gang,” I say. “Let’s go.”

  No one complains. No one even gives their work a second glance. We head toward the door. We’re still tired and nervous from our last trip down here.

  And this trip was a victory the moment we opened that door to the room and saw the Dignity Vessel.

  It’s still here, and someday I’m going to get into it.

  Someday, I’m going to make it work.

  ~ * ~

  FORTY-SIX

  Before the outsiders left, Coop prepped his team to go into the sector base. But he warned Rossetti to prepare for one more addition to the team: him.

  He wasn’t going to sit in the command chair any longer.

  After Coop had spoken to Rossetti, Dix had given him a baleful glance, but hadn’t said a word. Instead, Yash had spoken up.

  “You said this is a first contact.” She turned to him, arms crossed.

  “It is,” Coop said.

  “Then the captain doesn’t go near the site until we understand the nature of those outsiders.” She sounded fierce.

  “The captain won’t go near the outsiders,” Coop said, although he wanted to. He wanted to more than he would ever admit to anyone. “They won’t be back for hours, if not days.”

  “You hope,” Yash said. “You have no idea if they had to leave the site to get those extra two people.”

  “I know that they limit their time in the base to six hours. They’ve done it twice, and I think that’s a pattern. So we’ll honor the pattern,” Coop said.

  “And it you run into them?” Yash asked.

  Coop shrugged. “I’ll say hello.”

  She shook her head in exasperation. “We can’t afford to lose you right now.”

  He raised his eyebrows and then smiled. “You can afford to lose me at other times?”

  “You know what I mean,” she snapped.

  And the truth of it was, he did. He did know what she meant. When a captain died within the Fleet, the Fleet command appointed a new captain. Sometimes that captain came from within the ship’s ranks, and sometimes the captain came from another ship. The captain wasn’t always promoted. Sometimes the captain was moved laterally because he or she had skills that particular ship needed.

  No one on the Ivoire had lost a captain in the middle of a command—or at least, a command like this one, where there was no Fleet backup at all.

  “I’ll be fine,” Coop said, and he firmly believed he would be.

  If he didn’t believe it, he wouldn’t be suiting up with Rossetti’s team. They agreed to wear the environmental suits without the face protection, not because they needed their own environment, but just in case the outsiders returned.

  The environmental suit would provide protection against attacks from various kinds of weaponry, including that large knife the woman carried.

  Coop’s hands shook as he detached the hood from the collar of his suit. He wasn’t nervous about going in; he was excited.

  Finally, after two-plus weeks of ordering everyone else to take action, he was taking action, too. Real, physical action.

  Lynda replaced him as acting captain. If she ordered him back inside the ship, he would have to listen. He didn’t mind. He saw envy in her eyes when she reported to the bridge.

  She knew how he felt about moving around; he had a hunch they all did.

  He was the last one into the airlock, and he went by himself. He was last as a concession to Yash, who demanded that he protect himself at all costs.

  He listened to the airlock door latch behind him. The required seconds between the latching of the interior door and the opening of the exterior door felt like hours to him.

  He would have to pace himself. He wanted to run through the entire base, checking on everything and maybe catching a ride to the surface.

  He wasn’t going to, of course. He knew better. But the impulse was strong.

  As he stepped out the exterior door, down the small steps that extended whenever the door opened, he glanced at the base’s main door. He wanted the outsiders to come back. He wanted them back the moment the ship’s exterior door closed.

  Then he would go talk to that woman, knife be damned.

  But no one came in. Just Rossetti’s teams, moving to their assigned places

  Rossetti herself walked across the sector base floor and turned on the interior lights, lights the outsiders had thoughtfully turned off before they left.

  In addition to gathering information, Coop had instructed everyone to leave the equipment r
unning. He also instructed them to leave a couple small things—a partially eaten apple and a mug of coffee.

  He wanted to let the outsiders know that people were inside the Ivoire. Subtle was the best way to do so.

  He stepped into the base proper. It smelled different. It had the same some-what sulfuric odor that Sector Base V had always had, but it also had a musty smell of decay. The scent, old and dry, not mildewy like he would have expected from Venice City’s hot climate, made the hair rise on the back of his neck.

  The conversations from the other team members echoed in the emptiness. The base felt bigger than it actually was. Bigger and lonelier.

  The last time the Ivoire had been here, there had been two other ships in the bays.

  He walked under the Ivoire, deliberately tracing the outsider woman’s steps. She had known where the hatches would be—or at least it seemed that way. She had also released the latch on the door four separate times.

  Fortunately, Dix had programmed the doors to guard, so no one could get in without using a weapon.

  But the woman’s ability to release that latch caught Coop’s eye. He hadn’t mentioned it to the bridge crew—he would later, during a briefing— any more than he had commented on her ability to find the hatches.

  He was convinced she had touched a Fleet vessel before. Her actions belied his earlier supposition that the outsiders had never seen a spaceship before.

  They had—or, at least, she had—and they had seen a ship from the Fleet. They had been close enough to it to know where the lower hatches were.

  He checked the sides, saw no knife marks, nothing except a glove print near the hatch’s release on the far side.

  He smiled. Maybe that meant she spoke Standard. Maybe he would have someone to talk with, after all, someone to tell him the history he had missed, the things he needed to know.

  He hoped so.

  But he wouldn’t count on it. He needed to find out information on his own.