Bedivere coordinated every single ship, in a prodigious display of multi-tasking and control. Every time Catherine or the three Hana pilots had a question, Bedivere always had the answer. And he was doing it all while piloting the Aliza himself.
Catherine didn’t speak to him directly at first. She didn’t want to trip him up with unnecessary chatter when he was so busy himself. The Hana pilots were equally busy. She had no idea how they were doing it, but every Varkan pilot was coordinating with every other Varkan pilot so that no ship jumped into a location around Varnham that was already occupied by another ship. She could tell it was taking all their concentration to do it, though, for all three of the pilots wore glazed expressions and moved like automatons, as they communicated via their tethers and the datacore, pooling their data and conferring with each other.
The Varkan are uniquely skilled. They are the only ones who can do this, now. Devlin had been profoundly correct. This was completely out of mere human hands.
On the second day, though, Bedivere contacted her directly. They had just closed the doors on the Hana and were floating carefully out into open space. Catherine had squeezed through the crowded corridors to her room, which held another few dozen people, to use the bathroom facility there and take five minutes to breathe. His communication code sounded on her personal board as she emerged.
Surprised, she answered it. “Aren’t you too busy to be talking to someone like me?” she asked as his image formed on the screen.
“I’m talking to anyone I have to,” Bedivere said shortly. “It’s the only way this will get done. Your cortisol levels have risen in the last two hours, Cat, and your body temperature has fallen. You need sleep.”
“No kidding. You’re…following me?”
“Your AI that you told to monitor the crew has been monitoring as requested. It says you told it to go away when it suggested you sleep.”
Catherine growled. “I don’t have time for sleep any more than you do. You look like last week’s leftovers, Bedivere.”
“I’m sleeping on Charlton, while the ship unloads.”
“In your chair and upright, I’ll bet. I’ll sleep when you do,” she replied curtly. “You have better things to focus on.”
“I am focusing on them.” He gave her a small smile. “I hope you’re not disappointed that you’re not my sole priority right at this moment?”
Catherine blinked her eyes back into focus. In the last few seconds as he had been talking, she had been drifting sleep on her feet. Damn, but he was right. She was passing out for lack of it.
“Sleep, Cat,” he said softly. “Even five minutes. You know you can’t function without it.”
True. She felt the ship shiver as it jumped back to Charlton. From experience, she knew it would take nearly an hour for the ship to offload all the passengers. An hour’s sleep sounded like a luxury.
Devlin’s quarters were the only ones not being used by evacuees. There were too many sensitive controls and equipment there to allow strangers into the suite. She dropped onto the sofa there and it was possible she was asleep before her head settled.
* * * * *
The last day and a half of the evacuation was a blur of ceaseless activity. Everyone had become more practiced and efficient at shepherding frightened people aboard and helping them disembark, and they had also become accustomed to dealing with the problems that occurred, from lost luggage to injuries, to fights that broke out when people thought they were going to be turned away from the ship when they had come so close to rescue.
Devlin worked tirelessly. He was as stubborn as Bedivere and would only sleep when he was crumpling from the lack of it. He took all his catnaps on the sofa on the flight deck. As the days stretched on they both needed more and more of them to compensate for the lack of deep REM sleep.
Devlin was needed. He was deft at dealing with people—frightened, angry, hysterical, withdrawn, traumatized and sick…everyone who shuffled on board wore a shell-shocked expression as they dealt with the sudden end of their current lives. Devlin seemed to be everywhere at once, soothing and calming pockets of fear and fury before they got out of hand. He left the piloting and control of the ship to the pilots and told Catherine to keep an eye on them. She handled the odd question the three pilots had, but they were getting most of their directions from Bedivere so she left the flight deck to fend for itself while she coordinated the coming and going of passengers.
The job of moving millions of people out from under the descending Periglus would have been next to impossible without Devlin’s skill.
On the third day and eighteenth hour of that day, Bedivere sent a widecast message that she not only heard on the flight deck, her board alerted her and the pilots all turned to repeat to her as well.
“The Periglus have come to a halt. We have time only for one last round trip.”
They were on Charlton when the message arrived. Catherine nodded. “Hurry. Back to Varnham. This time, we tie people to the ceiling if we have to. No one gets left behind.” She turned to look at the Varkan crew sitting on the bare deck plates, crowding the back of the flight deck. “Everyone off who isn’t directly assisting. Clear the deck and the boardrooms. I want every skerrick of floor space freed up. Take furniture with you. Out! Out! Run!”
They ran. Devlin squeezed past the stream of hurrying Varkan and climbed up to the flight level. “I heard,” he said. His eyes were red-rimmed and his chin dark with growth. “This is the last chance.”
“We’ll take as many as we can,” she told him. “Even if we have to hang off the sides of Mael’s chair to do it.”
The engines began to rumble and the deck to vibrate under their feet as Mael got the Hana ready to lift off again and everyone began to move even faster. She could hear the barely controlled panic in their movements and speech, echoing up to the deck through the corridors.
The last jump took the longest, because they sat on the docking pad at the station until the very last moment, squeezing in more and more until there was no one left waiting. Then they lifted off, moving very slowly because of the extra weight and inertia and drift out into space.
Catherine squeezed and sidled her way onto the flight deck. There were people there, too, although they weren’t quite clinging to the back of Mael’s chair as she had threatened to let them do. There wasn’t a lot of clear space between them and the pilots, though. Devlin stood between Mael’s chair and Wayna’s and glanced at her. “Look,” he said, nodding toward the windows as they moved out of the docking bay.
The armada of Periglus ships hung like a black crescent above them. They were too far away to see any details, but for the mass of ships to create that dark shadow, there had to be thousands of them.
In the middle of the crescent, something was glowing and pulsing in a deep, angry red. The corona of the glow was growing bigger as she watched.
“The terraforming device,” she breathed. “They’re not going to wait even a second to assess the planet?”
“They had three days to do that on their way here,” Devlin pointed out. “They’re not shooting at us, or paying any attention to us. Draven Tucker was right. We’re cockroaches to them and that thing, whatever it is, will exterminate us.”
“Ready to jump,” Mael announced.
“It’s time. Let’s get out of here,” Devlin replied.
The space around the station was empty. There were no more ships or shuttles coming up from the surface, either. The Hana was one of the last ships to leave.
Catherine pulled out her device and connected with Bedivere. “Tell me you’re at Charlton already,” she said.
“Almost.” He looked like he was on the very last reserves of energy. Even his shoulders were hunched over the console.
“What does almost mean?” she demanded. “You’re either there or here and if you’re here, you need to be there now!”
“There’s one last thing to do,” Bedivere replied. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
“There’s no time! Jump now!”
“He can’t,” Devlin said quietly. “Bedivere’s right. He has to finish this.”
“Finish what?”
“I have to destroy the jump gates,” Bedivere told her.
The Hana jumped, leaving Bedivere behind.
Chapter Twenty
Charlton Space City, New Cathay (Ji Xiu Prime), Ji Xiu System, Perseus Arm. FY 10.187
“Print more beds and put them in Bedivere’s room, too,” Lilly told Zoey as they hurried along the Centre City concourse. “We can recycle them later and reclaim the energy, but for now, no room, no space on Charlton is sacrosanct.”
“Including my room,” Brant said, teasing Lilly. He had worked for two days straight to find beds, accommodation and food for the refugees and it had been his idea to open up their room temporarily, which had made Lilly swear and mutter before nodding shortly and agreeing that it should be done. Now, whenever he mentioned sharing their room, Lilly blushed and lost track of her thoughts, so he kept doing it. It was good to know he could still flummox her. Sometimes, anyway.
There were even camp beds and pallets being spread in the parks and gardens, which had given Yennifer a moment of hesitation while she adjusted the weather controls for those areas so the new occupants wouldn’t have to deal with rain on top of everything else.
Charlton was splitting at the seams and the stresses were showing. There had never been a formal policing authority in the city as the population had been overwhelmingly Varkan, who could get along with each other far more peaceably than humans did. The minority of humans were law abiding, too. Any civil disruptions had been dealt with by the mayors and reeves of each village, with the verdict being voted upon by the village residents. True democracy worked very well, but only if the numbers were small enough that everyone voted for themselves on every decision.
As soon as the population grew too large to make direct voting unwieldy, the system broke down. They had reached that point two days ago, which was why they were all hurrying across the city to Celestial.
There had been a murder.
It was Charlton’s first murder and it was a chilling statistic. The murderer, Farago, was in custody. The man Farago had killed had been stealing food vouchers and Farago’s defense was belligerent and centered on a right to self-defense and preservation of food. Farago hadn’t denied killing the thief at all.
The mood of the refugees camped on the streets and corridors of the city matched Farago’s. All they had were the clothes they wore and the few possessions they had been able to carry with them, which made those possessions all the more valuable to them.
The question of what to do with Farago was compounded by the sympathy the killer was getting from the refugees and the outrage the permanent residents of Charlton were feeling over the breaking of the peace that had made the city such a pleasant place to live in for nearly a century.
If Brant had still been an active Ammonite enforcer, the answer would have been easy. Execution had always been the response to murder on the worlds the Ammonite had controlled. If the response to murder was not swift and unequivocal, it would not keep the citizens submissive.
Yet, this was not an Ammonite world and Brant was no longer the man who had become an Ammonite to further Glave’s precepts.
“Yennifer is meeting us there?” Brant asked. A logical, unemotional voice would be useful.
“She’s witnessing the process. We can’t talk to her,” Lilly warned.
“Is Devlin back yet?” Even having Devlin around would be useful. He wasn’t unemotional, but he always acted like oil on water among a crowd.
“Three hours ago. They’re all sleeping. I won’t wake anyone if I can help it.”
“Bedivere? Connell?”
“I don’t know,” Lilly said. “This Farago thing has taken up all my attention for the last few hours. I haven’t had a chance to check and Yennifer wasn’t there to ask.”
“Connell Yair docked forty minutes ago,” Zoey said helpfully.
“And Bedivere?” Brant repeated.
“There is no record of his arrival yet,” Zoey said. She flickered as they crossed the threshold into Celestial itself and the projectors switched servers. “If he intended to destroy the Sunita gates, then it would take him several hours to reach them even at the Aliza’s maximum speed.”
“He can’t just jump there?” Brant asked.
“I don’t believe Interspace is useful over very short distances,” Zoey replied.
“Connell told me it’s like trying to physically jump from where you’re standing to a spot two centimeters in front of your toes. There’s a good chance you’re going to jump right past the location, because it’s just too close,” Lilly said.
Brant sighed. “Zoey, tell me the second he lands, okay?”
“I will.”
They hurried onward. Celestial was on the dark side of the city right now, which was where it had been located for decades before the city had acquired a daily rotation. Celestial had been designed to take advantage of the darkness.
The big single dome that covered the entire village gave everyone a view of the star field no matter where they were in the village. The paths and passages that wound between the buildings were lit by street lamps that edged the walkways, shedding a soft yellow glow. Generally, the lighting in Celestial was kept around the same level as twilight on a dirtball, which gave the village a lovely, peaceful feeling.
It really was one of the more pleasant villages in the city. Gantry, by contrast, was a business district from where most of the transport and dock support services operated. There were stiffly-angled, unadorned office buildings surrounding their square. On the edges of the village were the residences of business owners and employees who chose to live there as well. It was a well-monied village that ran short on aesthetics, unlike Celestial, which prided itself on its beauty.
Although even Celestial was looking ill-used right now. The light levels had been increased to allow people to see clearly. There were refugees from Varnham sitting and lying everywhere, on the open floor and with their backs against the buildings. They had done their best to stake out quarters by spreading the bedding they had been given, but there was no privacy and very little room.
“Glave save us…this is just awful,” Brant said in an undertone.
“They’re alive and if they’re alive, they can regroup and go on,” Lilly told him. “New homes will be found for them on other worlds.”
“The Varkan are going to be busy for a good long while yet, I’m thinking,” Brant observed dryly.
“They have to evacuate the rest of the Sunita system first,” Lilly pointed out. “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.”
“Then we’d better get this sorted out quickly.”
They stepped carefully over and around the pads. Everyone sitting and lying on their bed watched them go past with sharp, suspicious gazes. It wasn’t good that they must be on guard in that way. No one in Charlton had ever needed to actively guard their possessions…until now.
They reached the big open area that was the middle of the village, which had been brightly lit. Celestial was like many other villages and Charlton itself. Decision-making processes over the running of the village took place in public spaces where everyone could witness and weigh in on the matter if they chose to.
Nichol August was standing in a very small clear space in the main square, with the person Brant had to assume was Farago, because everyone camped on the outer edges of the square was watching the pair of them very closely.
Brant got his first shock. Farago was a woman. She was taller than Nichol, slender…and very young. Younger than most women preferred to keep their cosmetic age, which was usually plenty young enough for Brant’s tastes. Had she even reached an age where she needed rejuvenation therapy, yet?
Unease touched him. The Ammonite way of executing a transgressor would be impossible here. How could they execute a woman? Death for women
was a permanent death. They couldn’t regenerate like men did. The process just didn’t work for them, with their double-y chromosomes.
There were other reeves and mayors standing in a loose circle around Farago. Brant knew them all. He also knew that they were here only because of the unique circumstances. No one had needed to deal with a murder before. The mayors and reeves would want to see how this was handled in case they were faced with the same issues. As every single village in Charlton was filled to the brim with refugees, it was entirely possible they would.
Yennifer stood on the outside of the circle. She was turning her head to watch whoever was speaking, but she was not trying to become involved in the conversation. It was very clear she was in witness mode, for her face was immobile and blank, her gaze merely recording everything that occurred.
Around the small group in the middle of the cleared space were more people. They were strangers and their clothing was rumpled and dirty. Possibly, friends of the victim or just concerned refugees.
Everyone who had a stake in Farago’s fate was arranged around Farago and as Lilly and Brant moved through the narrow trail to the center of the square, every head turned to track their progress. There were even more people packed into the square, far more tightly than they had been in the passages and paths beyond the square, although everyone was sitting on the floor. He suspected that they had pushed into the square to hear for themselves what Farago’s fate was to be.
Zoey had disappeared. Either the projectors didn’t work here, or Yennifer had told her to withdraw.
“This could be bad,” Lilly murmured as they trod carefully along the narrow path of cleared floor.
Brant didn’t answer. There were too many strangers sitting too close to them for him to speak aloud. He agreed with Lilly, though. This situation had the potential of becoming a nightmare. He already knew it was a turning point. How Charlton handled this first murder would lay precedents for the future, shaping penal policies and civil peace and order.
If they got this wrong, then the refugees who currently outnumbered the permanent citizens may rise up against them in protest.
Cat and Company Page 17