by K. T. Hunter
For a brief moment, she forgot her anger at Brightman and her hatred of the Martians. She wanted to explore, like Drake, Magellan, and Raleigh, like so many others who had wandered the circumference of the Earth. She wanted to go farther, farther than Cabot, farther than Vespucci, farther than any of them ever dreamed that a human could. They had been to where the maps end. She had wandered off those maps entirely and was somewhere in the space Between Worlds. She felt the pull to go beyond that, as if there were some other form of gravity out there calling her towards it.
Brightman would never use her knowledge to plunder or murder again. There would be no more Men from Shanghai to haunt her dreams. She wanted to discover, not steal. She would be a pioneer, not a thief. She was determined that, no matter where her body might be, her heart would always be among the stars.
A sob of ecstasy escaped her as she pressed her palm into the window, and she wept tears of joy at the sight.
"So, you aren't so heartless after all."
She jerked her head towards the voice. Christophe stood at the bottom of the stairs that led up to the alcove. She was angry with herself for allowing anyone to sneak up on her. She had not been in the orrery that long; this must be the first place he searched for her. How could he have known?
She struggled to her feet and growled at him. "Just how long have you been standing there?"
"Long enough," he replied. "I only wanted to make sure you were alone. I thought perhaps you and Humboldt..." A smile crept through his voice as the words faded. She could only see a portion of him in the shadows, silhouetted in the light of the chamber's sun. "Well, I saw you standing together at the service."
"Oh!" Gemma was startled by his implication. "Of course we did. We are friends."
"I see," he said with a shade of satisfaction in his tone. He covered the stairs in two long strides. "I thought I might find you here. I wanted to come here for a moment, anyway. I could not think of what to say down at the airlock. The words… the words just wouldn't come. I'd rather be here and remember him." He swept his arm towards the window. The eerie veil that she had seen over him at the service fell away with every word he uttered. "This is what he lived for. The ship was part of him, you know. There were many times when I think he should have been the captain. He certainly deserved it more than I." He drew in a deep, slow breath, held it for a long, stretched moment.
"I never had occasion to speak with him," Gemma said gently, "but he seemed a decent fellow. He certainly commanded the crew's respect. I am truly sorry for your loss. I hope we are able to discern the cause of the accident."
"My thanks," he replied. "I wanted to make sure you were safe. I also wanted to say I am sorry for not coming to you last night. For not updating you, that is. 'Twas a bit dicey there for a bit, but we did manage to get the infant to safety. From all reports, she is quite snug and safe with Humboldt's cousin's wife."
"I'm -- I'm pleased to hear it," she stammered with relief. The news did not completely quell her irritation with him, but it did file the edge off it.
"I thought you might like to know that they named her 'Gemma'," he continued. "Apparently, they had that name picked out, if it were a girl, before we launched." He took a step forward. "Interesting coincidence, that."
A flutter of joy struck her heart, and she averted her gaze to her fidgeting fingers so that he could not see. A message, she thought. She did send me a message. She did think of me.
"Yes. Quite. Quite interesting," Gemma managed to say.
"Pugh said that this would cost you something. I only have a vague idea of what that cost is, but I am guessing that at the very least you will be, shall we say, sacked from your institute."
"Something like that."
"You might have a difficult time finding another employer, given your current location. Any plans?"
She had no answer for that. In her heady rush to rescue the baby -- little Gemma, she thought with a blush -- she had not thought beyond the moment. She had not expected to live long enough to make plans. She shook her head.
"I might be able to help with that," he said, taking another step closer. "But I'd have to know a little more about you, first. Who are you, Gemma Llewellyn? Who are you, really?"
"I don't know. I don't know who Gemma Llewellyn is," she said. "Without Brightman, I don't know who I am."
"I'll tell you what I know about her," he said. He used his long reach to give her shoulder a light squeeze. "She is brave. So very, very brave."
"Brave? I don't feel very brave."
"Oh, brave, and brilliant, and so much more. I am proud to have such a woman as a member of my crew. You just put your job -- and your life, I'll wager -- on the line to rescue someone millions of leagues away. Someone you have never met and someone whom you may never meet. Yet you did it. With that kind of pluck and moxie, you can be whomever you choose to be."
He closed the distance between them. He slid the hand on her shoulder around to her back and pulled her to him in a loose embrace. She had been here before, during the long-ago flare drill, but this time was different. It was not playful; there was something very serious about it. She could feel his warmth suffusing through the rough fabric of the uniforms that separated them.
"You inspire me, Miss Llewellyn," he whispered.
She did not know how to respond. She just breathed as steadily as she could manage, both fearing and hoping for what she could hear coming her direction.
"I might be able to help you, as I said," Christophe said. "No matter what happens with Brightman, you are still a member of my crew. That will not change. I promise you that. But in order to do that properly, there is something I need to know." He brushed his fingertips lightly against her hair. "Do you trust me?"
He hunched over, lowering his face towards hers. She shivered slightly as she thought, Oh, crickets, here it comes.
"Will you trust me?" he whispered.
His lips hovered just next to the sensitive skin around her mouth. She could feel the heat of him, the heat of the man that was both the captain of the Fury who had finally taken up the full reins of command and the innocent lad that devoured kiwis and cackled at Mark Twain. Like a cat seeking a ray of sunshine, in that moment she wanted nothing more than to sink into it.
This was the point where any other man would have gone ahead and kissed her, but he just hovered there, breathing, as if he were teetering on the edge of a fence, unsure of which way to jump. For once, for one fleeting mad moment, she anticipated it, wanted it. For once, she did not feel a choke of revulsion in her throat, as she always had if playing this particular role on a mission.
Why did he hesitate?
She shivered from the tautness inside her. The tiger that had paced in her mind for the past day coiled up for a pounce and made ready for the next move.
At long last, when she was about to tumble off the sharp knife-edge of frustration, he brushed his chin up the side of her face and rested his lips on her forehead, kissing it with the lightest of pressures, more like a kiss for a sister than a lover. He just held her in silence without making another move. She leaned into his chest and rested her face on it, trying to hear what wind was blowing in there. His breaths were tight and controlled, as if he were trapping the words that he wanted to say deep inside him and they were fighting their way out.
Christophe finally released a few of them. "I've lost a brother today, Gemma. I need to know--"
"Captain Moreau?" Humboldt's unmistakable voice floated through the darkness from behind them.
"Damn," Christophe swore softly as he released her, straightened his spine, and turned to the saluting Boolean in the doorway. Only a portion of his face was visible, but she could sense he was stifling a scowl. "Yes, Mr. Humboldt?"
"Begging your pardon, sir. Chief Rathbone asked me to find you. He has an urgent message for you from Admiral Thorvaldson. Priority one, he said. I think it may be about the, um, operation we just performed in London."
Under the cover of d
arkness, Christophe's spine sagged with a resigned exhalation only Gemma could hear. He took her elbow and guided her down the alcove's steps.
"I'll be on the bridge directly, Mr. Humboldt." He swung his gaze back to Gemma, and his eyes glimmered. "In the meantime, would you please escort Miss Llewellyn back to Ladies' Country? I think I can trust you to get her there safely."
Gemma shot the captain a smouldering look, but he only mouthed the word later at her before exchanging salutes with Humboldt and leaving them behind.
Gemma's insides were coiled tightly, and she trembled with the energy of it. She wasn't even sure if she could speak, and she certainly did not feel comfortable with Humboldt seeing her in this state.
"Mr. Humboldt," she began, "we--"
He held up one hand to stop her. "I don't have time for gossip just now, Miss L." He held forth a sheaf of paper. "I'll take you back to your cabin, like the captain ordered," he said, "but first I need to show you something."
They were still just inside the door of the darkened orrery. He tugged her over to a spot that was still inside the chamber but in the light of the corridor. He pulled a page to the front.
"It's your message, the one you wanted me to research," he said. "Try as I might, I could never find the archive copy. I've looked everywhere but under the hay bales on the stable deck. I don't think the wireless blokes ever gave it to us. That's regs, miss. They're not supposed to lose messages. But that's not the weirdest part. See this?" He pointed to the timestamps. "Here, you got your time they sent it and the time we got it. See how close they are?"
Gemma shook her head. "I don't understand. Do the electromagnetic waves not travel fast enough for them to be close in time?"
"When we're on or near Earth, I'd agree with you. They travel at the speed o'light, though. The farther out we get, the longer the delay. See here, look at other messages sent around the same time." He showed her the other messages in his hand. "The delay between send and receive on each one of 'em shows a lag time, except for yours. That can only mean one thing--"
A yelp of surprise cut Humboldt's thought short. He crumpled to the floor to reveal another man behind him, a man brandishing the length of pipe that had just collided with the Boolean's head.
"You've been a naughty girl, Artemis," growled the leering face of Rathbone.
Instinct blossomed in Gemma's brain. She kicked at the pipe to disarm him and missed. Rathbone leapt backwards with an astounding grace, as if they were dancing.
"Don't expect to repeat Shanghai here, love," he purred. "He wasn't ready for you. I am."
Watchers were silent. Invisible. There to Watch and Protect. Philippa would sometimes whisper to her at night, alone in their room, "If you ever see your Watcher, he'll be the last thing you ever see."
Her Watcher swung the pipe again with great force, but this time she blocked him with her arms crossed high. The impact jarred her smaller frame, but she absorbed the hit all the same. Gemma wrenched the pipe from his grasp and released the loudest scream she could muster. Any mere mortal, she could handle. But a Watcher? She would need help.
Rathbone slapped the pipe out of her hand, and it rolled out of the circle of light. It disappeared along with the echoes of her cry.
He lunged at her with a sneer. She tried to block him again, but his move was only a feint. He seized her arm and flung her to the deck as effortlessly as he would a rag doll. She rolled to her feet and scampered out of the light to catch her breath and think.
"Nowhere to run, love," he said as she dissolved into the darkness. Coiled like a panther ready to pounce, he planted himself between her and the chamber door. "Only one way out of here. All I have to do is turn on the lights, love, and you're all mine."
Then, an image came to her, unbidden and hazy, of another door, one marked "Gearage Chamber". And yet another vision followed, as she crawled along in the darkness, timing her movements with the slow groans of the orrery. It was the impression of a horse racing across a great rocky plain, with a gleaming red planet hovering just over its far horizon.
"All I have to do is turn over your messages," he jeered. "'I've decoded them,' I'll say. 'She's a spy,' they'll say. 'Out the airlock with her,' Cap'n'll say. Bad way to go, love, bad way to go. Not so quick a snuff as you might think. Might as well let me do it, love. I'll knock you out first, at least."
She hazarded a look back at the chamber door, but all she could see was Humboldt's crumpled form and the silhouette of the much closer Rathbone. She could not run that way. The impulse to flee was overpowering; it was even stronger than her instinct to fight. She looked to the only light in the room, the orrery's miniature sun, and a plan of action clicked into place.
The orrery covered two decks, pushing its way through a hole in the floor plates like a mammoth whirling tree. The model Mars crept its way around the outside of the railing with its two moons. That must be the Mars in her mysterious vision! This metal tree would have to be her path to safety. It would be tricky, but it was her only choice.
Rathbone could block her every move. He would wear her out. He would take her down. And it would be over. She had just found her life. She was not about to yield it up to the likes of him.
"What, running now?" he taunted. "I do believe you've gone soft, Llewellyn. Time was you'd stand and fight. You took down that fellow in Shanghai right sharp and proper, but since then you've been worse than useless."
Her heart pounded so hard that it threatened to burst out of her chest. She reined in her breathing as well as she could, gathering her strength as she crawled towards the Red Planet. She swallowed down the bitter lump of terror rising in her throat.
"Too bad you didn't know who it was you snuffed," he continued. She could hear his footsteps retreating in the dark. He preferred the advantage darkness gave him. "Might've given you a good turn if you did. But you've not been right in the head since, all the same. Botching the jobs. Leaving the best bits behind. Not skewing the tables enough to throw them off."
She remained silent, wishing for a fleeting moment that the Man from Shanghai was with her, for once. At least then she wouldn't feel so alone. Where was Christophe? Had he figured out Rathbone's trickery yet? There was still no movement at the door and no answer to her scream.
Where is everybody?
She edged forward, taking her time under the cover of shadows, with the edge of the strongest light yet before her.
"I think you've gone more than soft, though. You've gone positively daft out here. And for what? A baby? Or that failed experiment they call captain? Fallen in love, real love, I'll wager. I should have reckoned if we couldn't beat it out of your little Mrs. Davies, we'd never be able to beat it out of you."
The mention of her beloved friend wrenched a howl from her. She raced for Mars. She ran harder than ever in her life; her heart thundered. The pressure in her head urged her on and on, pushing her and pulling her; and like the swift current of a raging river, it was impossible to resist.
Rathbone caught her movement and gave chase, but she reached the railing first.
Mars rose before her. Mars was her only hope.
Rathbone shouted after her as she grasped the slick metal. She did not look back, and she did not stop.
As she vaulted the railing, she kicked out against the control levers. The orrery lurched from its plodding real-time stroll to a trot, and then that tiny park of celestial time burst into a full gallop. She fought to keep her balance on the narrow pole that revolved around the crimson globe like a merry-go-round. It was just wide enough for her narrow feet, and the hope beat wild in her breast that it would be far too small for her pursuer.
He called after her as she lurched across the narrow pole to the trunk that held Mars. Its whirling made her dizzy, but she did not let go.
"I've Watched you for a long time, girl. You were the best!" He followed her course around the tracks. "But Shanghai ruined you. Glad she got me into the Academy after that so I wouldn't be wastin' my time. That's w
hy she sent you out here. Out to pasture. She was done with you before you even launched, girl. She just sent you on one last mission, hoping to squeeze one last drop of worth out of you. But you mucked that up, too."
He pursued the sphere with surprising grace and speed as he spoke again. "Finding Orion is my job, now." Rathbone the warrant officer shed his skin, and the Watcher emerged at last. "Brightman wants it. Brightman needs it. And I'm going to get it for her."
She took a leap of faith from the pole of Mars and just managed to miss a collision with the edge of the track. She landed on the topmost gear beneath the crimson globe. Her knees and ankles protested the shock. Ignoring his mockery, she peered over the side to find the next step down. She couldn't see the bottom of the pit, but it had to be down there, somewhere. The floor of the gearage chamber was lost in a sea of deep shadows. The ship was not bottomless, though, so she was able to fight down the surge of panic in her belly. The gear kept moving beneath her. She was a branch carried along in a swift stream that had curled into an eddy. She would have to time her jumps carefully. He was coming, he was coming, and there was no time to waste.
She could only jump down to the next visible gear, which was as far as she could go without tumbling to her death to the unseen floor below or between the crushing gears. They no longer sang the relentless song of ocean surf; they roared with the rage of a mighty waterfall.
She had to get down. Somehow, she had to get down to the deck below. The images flooded her mind, images that whispered "home" to her, even though the concept of "home" was as foreign to her as the Red Planet. One image, like some dusty memory just now recalled, told her that the floor was shelter. The floor was safe harbour. If only she could get there, she would be safe. Somehow, she would be safe.
She jumped down again, but she landed in a heap and nearly tumbled off into the darkness. Gasping sharply to catch her wind again, she peered around at the platform that had caught her. It was a hidden track that the gear she had just escaped trundled along. Her overestimation of the height had caused her bumpy touchdown. She could not tell how long it would be before the gear swept around again.