Paragon

by Autumn Kalquist

  McGill shook his head, but he hefted a rock from the pile and dropped it to the ground.

  Dritan pushed aside thoughts of his crewmates, of what he’d done, and focused on the pile of rock in front of him. Each rock they moved was one step closer to rescue—one step closer to the tube and the promise of the recyc fan beyond.

  One step closer to Era.

  Explosives.

  The word had cycled through Tadeo’s mind over and over since he’d seen the empty canister in the terrorists’ cubic. Explosives were missing on the Paragon, and they could be anywhere. He strode down the corridor on level six, an archive cube case tucked beneath his arm, high off the threat—the danger of it all. He barely saw the guards who quickly moved out of his path as he plowed by. He passed the guard barracks, the galley, and then hit Central corridor.

  His comcuff buzzed.

  “Raines.”

  “Where you at?” came Chief’s tense voice.

  “Almost there. I have the cubes from the Repository.”

  “We’re in my cubic.”

  He turned into Central Records. Temporary records were logged here, where colonists had to come to get their shift cards altered for new jobs. Guards sat behind their stationaries, searching through records, doing routine tasks like clearing next week’s work schedules.

  They looked up as he passed, and a few of them stood.

  “Lieutenant Raines,” a chorus of voices said.

  They stared at him as he went to Chief’s work cubic. Omar stood outside it, his hands folded in front of him, a sheen of sweat coating his dark skin.

  Tadeo rapped on the door, and it slid open, revealing Chief. Nyssa sat in a chair against the wall.

  The president’s eyes were bright, intense as she watched him take a seat. The chief picked a bag up from the floor and took out the empty metal canister and placed it on the table before him.

  Tadeo read the text engraved on the side, and his heart rate increased.

  ARTEX 500

  WARNING: HIGHLY EXPLOSIVE

  The manufacture date stamped on the canister was only two weeks ago, mere days before the terrorists had been airlocked.

  Tadeo laid the archive case on the table beside the canister.

  “I’m not calling a board meeting on this yet,” Nyssa said, breaking the tense silence. “What is said in this cubic stays in this cubic. Chief? Brief us.”

  “Artex is only used in mining,” Chief said, his voice hard. “The Perth makes it, and they’ve been using it to aid clearing mines on meteors and on Soren. It’s tightly regulated. It never should have made it onto the Paragon.”

  “What kind of damage could this amount do?”

  “It could damage a few cubics—but the blast would be contained. The damage would be minimal.”

  They sat in silence for a moment, and Tadeo clenched his hands into fists. He wanted to be out there, searching for it. Not sitting in here.

  Nyssa cleared her throat. “I want to know how it got past imports. If the Moscow has traitors aboard, they could be smuggling anything anywhere.”

  The Moscow was the fleet’s supply deka. Their transports picked up supplies from each deka, then transported them wherever they were needed. The chief had already tried to punish them for turning a blind eye to smugglers and black market thievery, but their board member, Nassef, always seemed to come up empty-handed when it came time to hand over the perpetrators.

  Chief pulled some cubes off the shelf behind his table. “I have the terrorists’ work orders, as well as the import and export records, but there’s no record of any Artex making its way through,” he said. “The only time it leaves the Perth is when Moscow transports bring it to Soren.”

  “Could it have come from Soren?” Nyssa asked.

  “Once it’s on Soren, it’s just as tightly controlled as it is on the Perth. So either someone personally carried it off a transport, or we have traitors on the Moscow and definitely in our imports sector. This had to have been smuggled over from the Moscow.”

  Nyssa pressed her lips together. “We need to find the connection between imports and our three terrorists.”

  Tadeo gestured to the archive case he’d brought. “I ordered work records from the Repository for all recent transfers from the Perth and Moscow. And I got a list of everyone working in imports and exports, so we can cross-check their work schedules with the terrorists’. But there’s a lot to go through. Hundreds of names and dates.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant Raines. And Era Corinth? Chief said you found a power cell insert and a medlevel card in her cubic? Have you discovered any connections between the terrorists and what you found?”

  Tadeo shifted in his seat and swallowed. “The power cell insert had no ID number—nothing to trace it with. And I don’t know where the medlevel card came from yet, but… I do have one lead.”

  “What is it?” Nyssa asked, leaning forward.

  “Tatiana Carizo went to medlevel when she got here. So did Era. And they both saw the same medic. A Nora Faust.”

  Nyssa darted a glance at Chief but didn’t respond. His face was blank, unreadable.

  “I think she knows something. She—”

  “Clearly just a coincidence,” Nyssa said. “All women go to population management annually.”

  “But—”

  “No,” Nyssa said, holding up a hand. “If you’ve made no progress with Era, we need to focus on finding the smugglers.”

  “Well, I talked to Nora. She acted suspicious, and—”

  “Lieutenant Raines,” Nyssa said, her voice harsh, “if you haven’t found what I told you to search for, the investigation into Era Corinth must be set aside for now. Or would you have us chasing medlevel clerks while we have explosives aboard?”

  Tadeo’s cheeks warmed. “No, of course not. You’re right, Madame President.”

  “Good. We follow this new lead, then.”

  Chief cleared his throat and pointed to the archive case. “We have several hundred colonists working in close contact with imports and exports. It’s going to take a few shifts to question everyone, even if we narrow it down. We can start with imports.”

  Tadeo cleared his throat. “Is there anyone else in the sublevels we can—?”

  “Any possible traitors are dead,” Chief said, a smug look on his face.

  “I know about the crews who died on Soren, but—”

  “Almost all the subs who worked with the terrorists came from the Meso. Did you think we’d leave your traitorous kak on our ship? They all died in that cave-in. Every last one.”

  “Enough.” Nyssa held up a hand.

  Tadeo swallowed. He’d never live down the shame, never be allowed to forget the terrorists came from his ship.

  “Chief,” Nyssa continued. “I want you to assign guards to enforce curfew tonight. No transports will be allowed to board or leave the Paragon, but we won’t share why. Tomorrow you will question everyone in imports, starting with the Moscow and Perth transfers.”

  Chief grunted. “Yes, Madame President.”

  “Lieutenant Raines,” Nyssa said, turning toward him, “come first shift, I want you and your squad investigating the terrorists we airlocked. Look into every site of every single job the terrorist crew worked—from the date this explosive was manufactured to the date they were airlocked.” The president stood. “Both of you can take as many squads as you need to get the job done, but keep the details you share to a minimum. We need this to look like we’re simply investigating the terrorists’ work to ensure nothing else was sabotaged.”

  “President Sorenson,” Tadeo said, “shouldn’t we get started searching now?”

  Nyssa shook her head. “It’s nearly last mess, and if we start now, the board will wonder what’s going on. And I don’t want them knowing about this. Not yet. You’re dismissed.”

  Tadeo got up to leave, and Chief narrowed his eyes at him as he left the cubic. The door slid closed behind him, leaving the president and Chief alone once m
ore.

  Tadeo’s heart rate picked back up as he passed the guards in the room. Omar followed him out to the corridor.

  “Are we gonna search?” Omar asked, keeping his voice low.

  “Tomorrow.”

  “But—”

  “Those are the orders. And we can not talk about this again. I’ll brief you first shift.”

  “Yes, sir.” Omar rubbed the back of his neck. It was clear he wanted to ask more questions, but he kept his mouth shut.

  The last mess buzzer went off, and Tadeo and Omar walked in silence to the command level galley. The meal was tense, and Kiva’s attempts at banter with Omar were met with more silence. Tadeo ate quickly and avoided looking at the board members.

  As he left the galley, he looked down the main corridor toward the massive doors that led onto the bridge. The terrorists had been from his ship. His ship. When he was in charge, he’d make sure nothing like this ever happened again. But how had they managed to slip through the screening process? How had they gotten permission to transfer in the first place? There was so much he didn’t know about them. Their records only went back ten months.

  Tadeo strode toward the bridge doors. No one except the president, the board, and the captain were authorized to use the private bridge comms, but the president had told him he could comm his mother. And it had been a long time since he’d had a live conversation with her instead of the recorded messages sent through the Comm Station.

  He’d ask about Nora Faust and find out what the traitors had been like on the Meso. He rested his hand over his pocket and swallowed. Maybe seeing his mother would give him the strength to throw out the grimp.

  A guard let Tadeo through the bridge doors, and he stepped onto the gleaming bridge. The glasstex arched across the far end. Black space filled up most of it, and the edge of Soren’s red surface filled up the rest. Bits of metal glinted in the distance, glimpses of some of the other ships, as they orbited Soren. The closest ship was the metalworking deka, the London.

  Paragon’s bridge crew worked at their stations, checking data that came in from all over the ship, ensuring that everything ran smoothly. It felt like home up here. The bridge was much larger than the Meso’s, but the low hum and tones, the amazing sight of space… it was everything he’d grown up with.

  Except for the captain in the chair. Captain Lopez sat in his seat before a massive clear holo screen that bisected the space. He was aging and gray and only a captain in name. Here, the president and board made the rules. The captain simply did what he was told. When he died, the president would choose a new captain to take his place. There was no family line in charge here. No real lineage to respect. Every deka captain, including Lopez, knew who was really in charge on the Paragon. The president.

  Lopez sat up in his seat as Tadeo approached him. “Lieutenant Raines? Is something wrong?”

  “I need to use the private comm. President’s orders.”

  Lopez activated the eyepiece he wore. “Which ship do you need me to notify?”

  “The Meso. Captain Lara Raines.”

  He nodded. “I’ll get them on.”

  Tadeo headed toward the line of doors at the back of the bridge, to the middle one that led to the private comm. He passed through the door and hit the button to shut it behind him. A table and chairs filled the space, and a comm screen took up one wall.

  Tadeo picked a chair at the center of the table and sat. The screen flashed in front of him, and the wall faded into a familiar scene: a nearly identical comm cubic on the Meso. Except in that cubic, his mother was seated at the table.

  Tadeo sat up straight as the connection loaded, but his heart twisted as he took in the sight of his mother. She smiled at him, and he tried to smile back.

  He had the same full lips she did, and his own large brown eyes stared back at him. There’d been a running joke on the Meso that his mother had such high standards she’d made him in her own image by herself—without his father’s help—so she could be sure the ship would be well-run after she died. That’s how alike they looked.

  But their resemblance had faded. She looked so thin, her high cheekbones sharp, her once tanned skin pasty under the light of the lume bar. And her thick black hair was streaked with gray. Had she looked this old in the messages she’d sent? Why hadn’t he noticed? When she’d begged him to visit, he should have gone… no matter how much he dreaded stepping foot back on the ship where he’d lost Kit.

  A tone sounded, verifying that the connection was fully established.

  “Tadeo,” his mother said, smiling.

  “Mother.”

  “It’s so good to see you. Does this mean Nyssa talked to you about coming to visit? She says she’ll let you take a transport over. I really need to talk to you. It’s important. You’re almost 21. I—”

  “It’s good to see you, but no. This isn’t about that.”

  His mother sat up straight, and her expression turned grim. “What happened?”

  Tadeo ran his hand through his hair. Now that he was sitting across from her, he didn’t even know where to start. He couldn’t tell her everything… why had he even commed her?

  “I’m conducting an investigation.”

  “About…”

  “The terrorists. They came from the Meso.”

  His mother glanced away from the holo screen, toward some point near the door. She fiddled with her sleeve. “Yes. They did. The president said they were responsible for the hull breach, but… I’m not convinced. You’re lucky you weren’t there when it happened.”

  “Those terrorists were responsible.”

  “Are you certain?”

  “We are. And now I need more information on them.”

  His mother took a deep breath and met his gaze. “I already talked to Nyssa about them. What else do you need to know?”

  “How did they get clearance to come here?”

  “As I told Nyssa, they were clean. None of them had ever caused any trouble here. There was no indication they would do what they did.”

  “I need to know what jobs each of them held… What did they do before coming here?”

  “What’s going on?” Her eyes filled with concern. “They were airlocked. The threat is gone… Isn’t it?”

  “Just answer my question. What jobs did the terrorists have before they came here?”

  “If you want me to help you, you’ll tell me.”

  Tadeo swallowed. “I can’t tell you. Nyssa’s orders. It’s against the rules.”

  His mother leaned forward. “This is one of those times when you have to know when to break the rules. They exist to protect the colonists of this fleet, but sometimes they get in the way. You should understand that… better than anyone. “

  Tadeo’s throat thickened, and he held up a hand. “Don’t bring that up. That’s not why I commed you.”

  “Isn’t it? Isn’t it why you haven’t visited? Why you won’t come home?” His mother asked, her voice low.

  “Don’t talk about it,” Tadeo said, commanding her in the same way he commanded his men.

  But she didn’t respond to others’ commands like his men did. His tone didn’t even make her blink. “Maybe we do need to talk about it. Isn’t it the reason you still haven’t found a match? It’s your duty—the one thing you must do before you can lead.”

  Her words stung, and Tadeo tensed. “Has it occurred to you that maybe I don’t want to come back because of you? Because of your incessant nagging that I pair—your reminders about what happened?”

  She jerked back as if he’d slapped her and averted her eyes to focus on her hands. She let the silence go on for a moment. “You’ve changed,” she said quietly.

  “Yes,” Tadeo said, pushing down discomfort at the hurt look on his mother’s face. “I have changed. I don’t break the rules. I follow them. Now will you answer my questions or not?”

  His mother peered at him for a long moment, then settled back in her chair. “If you want my help, you have to tel
l me everything.”

  “I can’t.”

  His mother got quiet. “Do you trust me, Tadeo?”

  “Of course I trust you.”

  “You should. Out of everyone on this fleet, I am the one person who will always have your best interests at heart. You know that, don’t you? Even if I’m an unfortunate reminder of what happened to you—”

  “What I did.”

  “What Kit did to you. She was as responsible as you were—if not more so.”

  “Stop!”

  “If you trust me, and you should, then tell me so I can help you.” She leaned closer to the holo screen, searching his face. “Are you in danger? You need to tell me exactly what’s going on.”

  He stared at his mother, his stomach churning. He never should have come here. This was a mistake.

  “Do you know a medic named Nora Faust?”

  His mother stiffened at the sudden change of topic and then slowly shook her head. Her brow furrowed in confusion. “No. I’ve never heard that name before. Was she working with them? Please tell me what’s happened. I might be able to help.”

  Tadeo let out a breath. His mother was not the enemy, whatever Nora Faust had said about her. And she wasn’t a board member, either. The president hadn’t told him not to tell his mother. She’d only said she didn’t want the board members to know anything. Nyssa had said last night how much she trusted his mother—they were best friends.

  Private bridge comm conversations weren’t recorded. He could tell his mother the truth… no one would know.

  “Alright,” Tadeo said. “Tatiana, Jonas, and Sam all shared a cubic in singles sector. Today we found an empty canister of Artex explosive powder hidden in the cubic. We have no idea where the powder is.”

  His mother sucked in a breath, and she stood. She began pacing back and forth before the screen. “Are you sure it was their cubic you found the explosives in?”

  “Yes.”