Derelict: Halcyone Space, Book 1

by Lj Cohen

  "I'm sorry, visiting hours are over," the tech said, his voice firm, his grip firmer.

  "And they have nothing to do with me," Jem shouted. So much for his brother's gratitude. The hell with it. He didn't even care about Micah's assay anymore. What did it matter where Barre got the bittergreen? If he wanted to throw his life and his talent away, well, that was a choice too.

  ***

  As far as Micah could tell, Ro hadn't moved from her spot standing in the middle of a personal 3-d show. He strode into his lab, unable to ignore her presence there, even when she stayed silent and focused on her own work. As much as sharing his space irritated him, Ro wasn't the cause of his anger, only the trigger.

  Two weeks and another forced move to another posting that would start out full of promise and end horribly as either his father's enemies would find them, or his father would run afoul of some ethics rule. He glanced through the flexible wall to his plant nursery and cloned the assay data over to his micro.

  Scanning through the comparison showed what Micah knew it would: Barre's bittergreen and his were separate cultivars. He superimposed the graphs of the two samples and highlighted the differences. It also showed him something he didn't expect. "Ro? I have Jem's proof."

  She looked through her display at him with unseeing eyes. Soft brown in this light, they blinked, seeming to sharpen and turn more green as she focused on Micah. Stepping through the images, she held her hand out for his micro.

  "Show me."

  "You're welcome," Micah said. "See this?" He pointed out a spike in one of the graphs. "That's Barre's sample. It wasn't even the bittergreen that made him sick. It was mold. Mycotoxins. He must have had an allergic reaction."

  She scanned up and down the micro's small screen. "You do good work."

  "You sound surprised."

  She shrugged.

  "You left out the 'for a drug dealer' part," he said.

  "No, I mean …," she started, but closed her mouth with an audible click before handing him back his micro and stepping back into her display. "Never mind."

  That was it? She wasn't going to call Jem and show him his results? "You have no right to judge me. You look at me and see my father. Should I look at you and see yours?"

  "That's not fair," she said, turning on him, red blotching her cheeks, eyes bright and glittering with anger.

  "And what, exactly, are you doing here?" Micah gestured at the bright display. "I don't see this on any work order from Mendez."

  "This has nothing to do with you."

  He ignored her and walked into the center of her display. "That is this ship. Don't try to deny it."

  She raised her arms. He stepped closer, getting up into her face.

  "And this is the most convoluted programming I've ever seen. Do you want me to hazard a guess?"

  Ro took a step back and lowered her arms, looking like she'd wanted to stare a hole through his forehead.

  "That's the SIREN source code."

  "So what if it is?" she said, the flush spreading down to her neck. "I'm not doing anything illegal."

  If she thought a subtle threat would make him back down, then she didn't know him very well. "What's illegal about selective plant breeding and exo-botany?"

  "You're growing bittergreen."

  "It grows fast and hybridizes easily. Unless I plan to dry it and sell it, I haven't committed a crime." It wasn't the authorities he needed to worry about anyway. If they discovered a farm even as small as this one, they would just dust it with defoliant and move on. If the cartels found him, or even caught a rumor of what he was trying, Micah wouldn't have to worry about his plants anymore. They'd execute him. Like father, like son, he thought, flashing Ro a grim smile.

  "Get the hell out of here before I call Mendez."

  He couldn't even muster the anger to snap back at her. What did it matter anymore? "Fine," he said, turning his back on her and walking out of the display. "I don't care what you're doing. It doesn't involve me. Besides, I'm getting off this rock in two weeks. You can have the space all to yourself."

  Ro didn't respond, but he could feel her staring at him.

  "Do you have any idea what it's like to watch someone die in pain?" The words slipped out before Micah realized he'd said them, but once he started, he couldn't stop. Memories blasted through him like an ion storm.

  "No," Ro whispered.

  "What would you do if you knew there was one thing that could make it better? But that thing is illegal and when you buy it, the men you buy it from happily take your money. Then they discover who you are. Who your father is. And they threaten to cut off your supply unless he works for them." He squeezed his eyes shut, but the images of his father's face when the cartel chief hand-delivered his son along with a fresh week's dose of bittergreen for his dying wife would haunt him for a lifetime.

  "I'm sorry."

  Micah refused to turn around even when he felt Ro standing close behind him.

  "Call Mendez or don't. I don't care." He gestured to the doomed plants, still happily growing under the more intense light. "This was my last shot to get back at the people who ruined my life."

  "What do you mean?"

  "What do you care?" he shot back. She didn't answer and after a long moment of uncomfortable silence, he turned to face her. "Go back to your work," he said. "I have to salvage what I can in the next two weeks."

  "And then what?" This time he didn't hear any challenge in her voice.

  "My father gets another chance to fuck up." And Micah would be right there with him.

  Ro met his gaze with her own and he struggled not to flinch or look away.

  "My father's been restoring this ship. I don't know for how long. Or why. Or even how far he's gotten, but he couldn't get the AI to work. I stole his plans. I'm going to wake it up." She continued to stare at him for several more minutes of silence before turning back to her work without another word.

  "Wait," he called out, his heart beating with a possibility he was afraid to look at too closely. "This thing can fly?"

  Ro paused, her arms upraised. "Not yet. But it will."

  "And then what?" he asked, too softly for her to hear.

  Chapter 12

  With the station so far from most of the major jump paths and most of the messages routed automatically by the AI, Nomi didn't have all that much to do. Alone in the communications relay, she stared up at the large heads-up display of all the sector's ansible nodes and listened to her recording of the conversation between Ro and Micah.

  Could Ro really get the ship's AI back on line? Nomi whistled, the sharp sound piercing in the empty room. She still couldn't figure out what, if anything, she should tell Mendez. The ship was technically salvage. It didn't belong to Daedalus and if the Space Force hadn't claimed it by now, she was pretty sure they figured it a lost cause. Unless Ro had been given a direct order to stay off the ship, she wasn't breaking any station protocols.

  The ghosting program was a problem and although simply growing bittergreen wasn't illegal, she was certain Mendez would shut Micah down.

  Nomi bit her lower lip. Really, she should tell someone.

  Something Micah said about Ro's father piqued her curiosity. Nomi accessed the station database for the publicly available CV's and contracts and read the scrolling data: Alain Maldonado. Chief Engineer, Daedalus Station. Age 41 standard. Contracted time on Daedalus Station: five years. Time to date: three years. Dependents: one.

  She clicked through to see his previous postings and whistled. For the past 22 years, Alain Maldonado hadn't moved up at all in the Engineering Guild ranks. He'd never held a job longer than a single posting, sometimes less. Even with no guild advancement, a string of broken contracts, and not one single commendation in his file, he kept getting jobs.

  Poor Ro had been dragged around the galaxy from one colony to another, from station to station, and even to one fleet designation. Nomi had lived her entire life in one place, with her parents and her younger brother. Her
own childhood had been considered odd enough by her friends' standards. She couldn't imagine moving every few years for her whole life.

  Now that Ro had an employee posting, her information would be searchable as well. Nomi glanced up at the silent communications array and then back to her micro, hesitating. Ro didn't strike her as the kind of person who'd take kindly to being snooped on.

  A loud buzz vibrated in the still room. Nomi jerked her head up to the ansible display before she recognized her micro's message alert.

  "Nomi. Are you still having trouble with the sound balance?"

  Her heart beat faster at the sound of Ro's voice.

  "Yeah, it definitely cuts out. But Ro, what are you doing awake at this insane hour?"

  "Can I come up now?"

  Nomi reached for the controls that would put Daedalus fully in charge of incoming communications for the next fifteen minutes so she could talk with Ro. From her perspective, there was little Daedalus couldn't do that a human in the relay room could, but station protocols stated otherwise. "All set. It's quiet up here. It'll be nice to have the company." Nomi liked it up here at night. The ansible nodes glittered like stars and with the interior lights dialed down, she felt like she hovered in space.

  It would be lovely to share it with someone.

  "On my way."

  Nomi was glad she'd chosen the red tank beneath her uniform. She cleared the search from her micro. This would be much better than trolling through the database.

  The relay room's doors slid open and Ro stood for a moment, back-lit in the corridor's brightness. Nomi blinked, her vision used to the dim interior. All she could make out was Ro's blonde hair, free of its usual tie back, a soft corona of light framing her face. "Welcome to my quiet world," Nomi said, smiling.

  Ro stepped forward and the doors slid shut behind her. As Nomi's eyes readjusted to darkness, she noticed the frown on Ro's face and her smile faltered. "Is there something wrong?" she asked.

  Ro shook her head and scanned the room with her micro.

  "What are you doing?"

  "Making sure of something." Ro's voice held none of the wry humor it had the other morning.

  "I really appreciate you coming up tonight. I've reported the problem pretty much since I started here. But I guess it wasn't in anybody's queue." She glanced up at Ro, hoping this was more than just a conscientious engineering intern trying to impress the commander.

  She didn't answer and Nomi cursed herself for being so eager for a friend that she'd totally misread signs that weren't there.

  "Here. You can pair your micro to any of the consoles." She pointed to the ring of empty workstations around the raised dais where she sat. If there was ever a need, they could have six comms people fielding signals, but Nomi couldn't imagine Daedalus ever being that overrun by ansible traffic.

  Ro took the station at the edge of the ring and sat half-facing Nomi and the door to comms, completely ignoring the twinkling display.

  "Don't you ever sleep?" Nomi asked.

  "Is it just the high frequencies?"

  "Yes." The silence of the relay room usually comforted Nomi, but now she wanted to fill it with chatter. Even an ansible call would help. She sneaked glances at Ro as she worked with a focused intensity, the holographic display brightening the space around her head.

  "I need a test signal. Push something from the logs through."

  Nomi sat back at her station, slipped on her headset, and took control back from Daedalus. "Here," she said, calling up some of the traffic comms had passed during the last shift. "Try it now." As she waited for the messages to play back through the system, she thought again about what she'd overheard. Should she inform Mendez? Call security? Did Ro know she'd been on the ship?

  Sound burst through her headset. Wincing, she turned down the volume. Standard traffic reports and worm-hole status updates chased away the awkward, nearly one-sided conversation.

  "How's that sound?"

  "Fine. Better." Nomi wondered where Ro's smile had gone. "Thank you."

  Ro collapsed the display and slipped her micro in a pocket before pushing back from the console and staring at Nomi, her eyes cold. "You kept looking for me and Micah this afternoon. Why?"

  Crap. Ro must have captured all her queries somehow. "I — I left you a message. I wanted to talk to you," she said, her lips suddenly dry.

  Ro took a step forward, her dark brows angry slashes across her forehead. Nomi shrunk back against her console.

  "About what?"

  The anger in Ro's eyes sent a chill down Nomi's spine.

  "Did Mendez send you to spy on me? Did my father?"

  "Ro — I — no," she stammered. "I just wanted — I thought we could be friends." She should have reported them when she had the chance.

  A tense silence flooded the room. Nomi's hand stretched out toward the emergency call beacon on her console.

  "You're scaring me, Ro."

  Silence locked them both in place, Ro studying Nomi's face with a fierce intensity, Nomi's hand trembling over the alarm.

  Ro squeezed her eyes shut, and let her shoulders slump. "What am I doing? I'm turning into my father. Shit." She spun on her heel and the door opened again. "I'm sorry."

  Nomi stood alone in the empty room, her heart pounding, the ansible network's imitation starlight twinkling all around her.

  ***

  Ro stormed through her room, gathering a change of clothes, not even bothering to mask the noise. She couldn't live with her father any longer. It didn't matter what happened next. An image of Nomi, her hands shaking, her face pale, and her dark eyes dilated, rose in her mind. She didn't deserve Ro's anger.

  If the crew head on the ship worked, she'd move in there for the duration. If not, she could use the fitness room's facilities. Ro shoved her clothes and toiletries into a bag before pausing to look around the room she'd slept in for the past three years. There was little to show that a person actually lived there. Personalizing her quarters only made the inevitable packing and moving more difficult. Other than the quilt she inherited from her mother and had restored, there was nothing she couldn't walk away from. She folded the patchwork blanket carefully and slipped it inside her bag. Her micro had everything else she needed.

  With one last glance at the closed door to her father's room, she quickly enabled the ghost subroutine. If someone was looking for her while she was officially off duty, Daedalus would place her in her quarters. No one would risk having to deal with her father in order to find her.

  She didn't look back as she strode through the quiet station to her corner of Micah's workshop and the sleeping AI.

  ***

  Jem couldn't block out the shouting. His parents argued late into the night, their raised voices penetrating two sets of doors in their quarters. He curled around a pillow and tried to sleep.

  He didn't need to make out the words to know they were furious with Barre. But it wasn't really even about him. It was about them — about the Doctors Durbin and their selfless, dedicated, brilliant, perfect image.

  A drug-addicted son marred their little fiction and now they were going to send him away.

  Jem threw his useless pillow across the room and rolled out of bed. He pulled on pants and a shirt, grabbed his micro, and slipped out of their quarters.

  Well, Barre had wanted their attention. He certainly got it this time.

  Jem walked through the silent station towards the ship. If he couldn't sleep, he might as well work.

  The soft whirring of the two reprogrammed drones greeted him as he stepped onto the bridge. He was going to have to see if the one he sent after the senator and Maldonado captured anything interesting, but for now, he really just wanted to lose himself in the code. As he slid into the pilot's command chair, his black mood evaporated. If only Ro could get the ship working again, then they could go anywhere.

  Sighing, he pulled out his micro and configured it for wide angle heads-up display. He wasn't as skilled as Ro in managing the interf
ace, but he could get the job done. He had to. Ro counted on him.

  The AI code rose up all around him in its dazzling complexity. It would be easy to get lost, staring at it for hours and getting absolutely nothing done. He forced himself to focus. Jem found the small segment of the code that he needed to work on and expanded it until everything around it blurred away.

  At right angles, he pulled up his mods. Until today, they'd just been theoretical models he'd played with for years, never dreaming he'd have a chance to actually test them. Jem licked dry lips, shut out the scurrying of the drones and the heap of scrap metal in the center of the bridge, and started to work.

  "What are you doing awake?"

  Jem whirled around to see Ro leaning against the ruined navigator's console. He shook out his hands and rubbed his eyes. "What time is it?"

  "0-400."

  "Wow." He'd been working for hours without a break. No wonder his eyes felt so gritty.

  "Show me what you've got."

  "Look, I have no way of knowing if this will work. Not until you get the AI back up." Now that Ro was here, his doubts returned about a thousand-fold.

  She stepped over a drone to get a closer look at his display. "It's a solid idea. What's the worst that can happen? The AI's upper brain is already fried. Besides, there's no reason it shouldn't work."

  Her confidence in him chased off the exhaustion. "Okay. See here?" He gestured at the corner where the two programs touched. "I needed a bridge. Something with enough of the AI's core code that it wouldn't reject the additions." It helped to think of this kind of work like an organ transplant. The body had to be tricked into accepting even the best artificial organs completely. "Sort of a shunt." He gestured to the left at a scrolling page of code.

  She traced the lines of code while Jem fidgeted. What if he'd screwed up? What if she didn't think it would work now that she'd seen the full program? He was sure he must have overlooked something. A sour taste flooded his mouth and his stomach roiled.