by K S Augustin
“And what would you do on this ship?”
Moon blinked. “I…I don’t know. Help maintain the engines? Learn enough first-aid to be the Medical Officer?” She’d already had a crash course in pharmacology, Moon thought to herself.
“You would be an acceptable addition,” Saff said, after a pause. “Very well, I will consult with you later on.”
Moon wondered at the little spring in her step as she walked out of Hydroponics. Had Saff really said that she would like to welcome the two runaways as fellow workers on the ship? It was such a small statement, yet it made her feel unaccountably happy and a little proud. It had been such a long time since anyone, besides Srin, had expressed any confidence in her.
With a smile curving her lips, she sought out her partner.
“Later on” turned out to be early evening, ship time. Moon and Srin were in the small observation deck near the front of the Perdition.
“It reminds me a little of my lab on the Differential,” Moon remarked. “Except this view is a lot more panoramic.”
They were seated at one of two cramped low tables. The décor was muted and lushly velvet-like in texture. Beyond the curved panel, the unstoppable industry of 3 Enkil IV was on display. Moon had stopped counting, but it looked as if there were hundreds of shuttles, ships and transports arcing past the gas giant, heading for a satellite that was slowly disappearing behind the bulk of its planet.
Not only did she not know how Saff was going to find their next contact in the sub-light buzz of confusion, but no inspiration had sparked in her own brain over the past few hours either. She was starting to feel depressed.
So intent were she and Srin on watching the near-collisions of dozens of vehicles that they didn’t notice Saff’s approach until she was at their table.
“I have a preliminary plan,” she said.
Moon started then stared up into a pale impassive face.
“Please, join us,” Srin said, almost immediately, pulling out a third seat in invitation.
“Thank you.”
Considering her height, and the compact design of the furniture, Moon expected Saff to awkwardly position herself, but she folded herself neatly, like an elegant piece of origami, into the soft upholstery.
“What’s your plan?” Moon prompted, her voice eager.
“Do you know the element deuterium?”
“Of course,” Moon replied with a shrug. “It’s a stable isotope of hydrogen, commonly called ‘heavy hydrogen’.”
“3 Enkil’s concentration of deuterium is decreasing due to a slow fusion process taking part within the planet. It is now much less than the amount of deuterium found in, for example, a comet.”
Now that she was on familiar ground, Moon felt her confidence growing. Depleted deuterium due to fusion? She knew what that meant. “You’re saying that 3 Enkil is actually a brown dwarf?”
“That is correct. And vehicles that stay within the orbit of 3 Enkil also begin to lose deuterium.”
Moon was quiet for a handful of seconds then her eyes widened. “You’re going to test the vehicles for their deuterium values.”
“We can initially discard ships with high deuterium values. They have obviously only recently moved into the system. But ships that have been here for any length of time should show low values.”
“Then we’ve found our contact!”
“No,” Saff corrected. “We have only found a likely pool of candidates. Once we have done that, we can formulate a refinement strategy. Perhaps that one will find your contact.”
“It seems so obvious now that you’ve said it,” Moon admitted. “Why didn’t I think of something like that before?”
“Perhaps,” Saff replied, rising to her feet, “you have had other things on your mind.”
She flicked a dark glance over to Srin then, with a courteous nod, left them.
“Do you think she’s trying to tell us our love-making’s too noisy?” Srin suggested with a laugh.
Moon punched him in the arm. “Your mind constantly travels along the same old track, doesn’t it?”
He sobered. “Now it does. Now that I can do something about it.”
Moon sobered as well, but there was still a hint of a smile hovering about her lips. “I don’t know where she came from, but Saff’s one smart woman. I could have done with an assistant like her at Phyllis.”
“But think of what could have happened. You might have finalised your work there…”
“…and the Republic would have taken it and held entire systems to ransom,” she finished with a sigh. She punched the seat of her chair. “I wish, I wish there was some way I could do what I love without the need to play politics. Especially not this kind of politics, with billions of lives in the balance.”
“Hopefully, you’ll get the chance,” Srin said. He hesitated. “What do we do, if we can’t find our next contact?”
It was the same question Saff had asked earlier in the Hydroponics bay and Moon felt better able to handle it the second time around.
“What would you like to do?” she countered smartly.
Srin glanced at the receding fourth moon, now almost completely obscured behind the bulk of 3 Enkil. “Right at this moment, at this nexus of space and time?”
Moon nodded.
“I think I’d like to stay on board, ask Tamlan to take us on as crew.” Srin scratched the back of his head absently. “The problem is, we can’t do that, can we? I’m still not well and we have a dwindling supply of medication.”
“We could ask him for some more help,” Moon suggested. “Even with paying him for this one trip, we have more than fifty kilo-credits left. That should be more than enough to buy whatever cure we need.”
“It isn’t money, Moon, it’s time.” Srin held one of her hands. “You keep bringing me back from the brink, but I can feel myself get a little bit weaker with each revival. And I’m not a young man any more.”
With her free hand, she reached for his face, skimming her fingers over his cheek and down to the rougher skin on his chin. “You know I will always love you,” she whispered.
“If I were a better man,” he said, “I’d tell you to hell with this Kad Minslok, let’s try to make a new life for us here, on this ship. The problem is,” he continued with a smile, “I’m such a selfish bastard that I want you, not just for a few months, but for decades more. The thought of dying scares me, Moon, and I don’t want to do it. If there’s some way your friend can help, can cure me of this manufactured affliction, I want to take it. And, in a way, I don’t care if it means that you hand over your work, if millions die – if billions die – as long as it means I can enjoy a long life with you.”
His voice lowered to a whisper. “Do you see what a selfish coward I am?”
She hugged him close and a tear rolled down her cheek. “Never,” she said, brokenly. “We’ll get through this. I know we will.”
Chapter Seventeen
“There appear to be forty-seven vessels that have been orbiting 3 Enkil for more than two weeks,” Saff told the assembled humans in the canteen. “Sixteen of them have not filed any information regarding their origins or purpose, eight have filed inaccurate information, and the remaining twenty-three have filed information that corresponds to both our deuterium findings and their tracked flight routes.”
“So people lie,” Cenredi remarked. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
“Forty-seven possibilities,” Quinten muttered. “That’s not bad but it’ll take time to go through them all, one by one, and there’s no guarantee any of the crews on those vessels will be co-operative.”
“There is another way,” Saff added. “While the Perdition depends on limited supplies, due to our extensive hydroponics system (and small ship population), other vessels are not so fortunate.”
Cenredi snorted. “You mean, they don’t have green stuff coming out their ears like we do?”
If Saff noted the sarcasm in his tone, she ignored it. “Precisely.”
“How many peas can three people eat?” Cenredi complained softly.
“People need to buy fresh supplies,” Quinten mused, ignoring his engineer. “Vegetables, fruits, spices.”
“Humans and most other species can live adequately for a time on replicated foods, especially animal protein. However, regarding other food groups, it is well known that fresh vegetables, grown naturally, are the best.”
“We need to look for markets,” Srin said.
Saff nodded. “Fresh produce markets.”
“Are there any, Saff?”
“There are two, and both are frequented by personnel from the forty-seven vessels I mentioned.”
“How can you know that?” Moon asked with a frown.
“I’ve been tracking shuttle routes.”
The task was less complex than those she had set Srin during their research time together, but it was still impressive. Moon appreciated Saff’s thoroughness, even as her pulse quickened.
“So what are you suggesting, Saff?” That was Tamlan, casually propped up on one table, one leg swinging free.
“I suggest that Dr. Thadin and Mr. Cenredi visit the markets. Perhaps they can observe someone who is likely to be their contact.”
“Why don’t you come with me?” offered Moon. Surely if they were going to formulate another strategy, most probably that of deciding who their likely connection was, having the quick-witted Saff along would make more sense than the quick-mouthed Cenredi?
But Saff shook her head. “I do not…mix with humans readily.”
“It’s best if Saff maintains a low profile,” Tamlan cut in. “And I’m a little too well-known. I think Toy will be your best bet.”
Moon looked from one to the other. “All right. In that case, when do we start?”
Cenredi shrugged. ”It’s too late to scan the dinner-preparation crowd. They’d be done and hitting the porn vids by now. How does tomorrow morning sound, after breakfast?”
Did she have a choice? It was either her and Toy Cenredi…or nothing. Moon nodded. “All right. Tomorrow morning.”
Srin approached Quinten Tamlan in his quarters the following day, after Moon and Toy had left for their first tour of the markets.
“Thanks for seeing me,” Srin said, lowering himself into the seat opposite Tamlan’s small cabin desk. “I know you’re very busy.”
“Sixteen kilo-credits buys a lot of my time,” Quinten replied non-committally. “What can I help you with?”
“I was thinking of this plan from your second-in-command to do regular tours of the markets. How long are you prepared to carry them out for?”
“Shouldn’t you be asking your partner about that?”
Srin’s eyebrows rose and a wry expression crossed his face. “If you can ask that, you don’t know Moon very well.”
A smile tugged at Quinten’s lips. “That stubborn, is she?”
“Once she gets an idea in her head….”
“I know the type.” Tamlan paused and, when he spoke again, his voice had softened. “I’m prepared to do this for a week, maybe a day or two more. But no longer. The Republic’s sure to be on the way and I don’t want to get caught between an enforcement formation and a sweep patrol.”
“And what happens if we can’t find our contact?” Srin eyed the other man intently. “You have to admit, this plan is like a laser shot into the abyss.”
“Saff is very good at finding patterns. Things. People.”
“’Very good’ isn’t the same thing as ‘infallible’,” Srin countered. “And if our mysterious connection doesn’t behave in the way we’ve predicted, then we can tour the markets for two years and it won’t make a bit of difference.”
“In that case, what are you suggesting?”
“This may sound strange,” Srin hesitated, “but neither Moon nor I have felt as safe, or as happy, anywhere as we have on your ship.”
Quinten snorted. “Really? I got the impression that Dr. Thadin didn’t like any of us very much.”
“She’s not an easy person to get close to,” Srin commented, “and she can appear, ah, prickly on first contact but, once you have her trust, she’d rather die than betray it.” He held Quinten’s gaze. “And that’s something I know from personal experience.”
“From what I’ve gathered, your personal experience is somewhat less than a newborn baby’s.”
Srin laughed softly and shook his head. “You don’t hold back, do you? Sure, this stretch of a few months is the longest continuous stream of memories I’ve had in twenty years, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t gathered impressions of people. I trusted Moon, not just once but repeatedly. There is such an unshakeable core of strength in her that I couldn’t help but respond to, no matter how many two-day cycles I was subjected to.”
“And you’d like me to trust her, as you obviously did?”
“Not just her, but both of us.” Srin swallowed. “If we don’t find this much-vaunted contact of hers, I’d like to ask that you take us aboard as crew.”
Quinten watched him with a razor gaze. “And what can you offer us?”
“Well,” Srin smiled, “I may be getting on in years, but I’m still pretty strong. I’d be happy to do whatever odd jobs you have. Toy seems like a nice young man and I think I’d like the idea of being his assistant.”
“And Dr. Thadin?”
“She can be a doctor in a different way. Maybe you can put her in charge of your infirmary? She picks up information quickly and knows how to apply it even faster than that.”
“A physicist? As a ship’s medical officer?”
Srin shrugged. “They’re both scientific positions.”
“Yes,” then, almost reluctantly, Quinten added, “Saff has already spoken to me about this. It’s her opinion that Dr. Thadin would be a ‘favourable’ addition to the ship’s complement.”
Srin got the distinct impression that the Perdition’s second-in-command had used that precise word during her discussion, and suppressed a smile.
“But that still leaves open the question of you,” Quinten continued. “When you were first brought onboard, Dr. Thadin spoke of ‘medication’ that you needed. Isn’t that true any more?”
“Oh, it’s still true,” Srin breathed.
Quinten frowned and tapped the desktop with a finger. “What exactly is wrong with you?”
“It’s the after-effects of a series of drugs that the Republic kept me on. About three times every two weeks, my body temperature keeps rising until hyperpyrexia sets in. In addition, I also suffer from severe bouts of convulsions.
“When we were on Lunar Fifteen, waiting for our escape to Marentim, a doctor there gave Moon some medication to deal with my elevated body temperature, and Moon came up with a mix of drugs to suppress my spasms and keep my mind clear. The only problem is, I go into a severe crash every three or four days.
“I don’t think Moon wants to admit it, but I’m afraid that all the drugs I was pumped with while I was working for the Republic have damaged my DNA.”
“And I’m sure the drugs you’re taking now aren’t helping either.”
“They’re giving me quality of life,” Srin shot back, “which is a lot more than I got from my previous handler.”
Quinten gazed at him for several seconds. “That still doesn’t answer my question.”
Srin’s lips twisted. “I don’t suppose you have a fully-equipped DNA lab stashed away on this ship somewhere, do you?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Then, if we can’t find Moon’s contact, I’m a dead man,” Srin told him simply. “Maybe not now, but soon. I’m afraid the only way I can get better is if I undergo some expensive and lengthy therapy. I think we’ve got enough money for it, but where am I going to find the kind of facility I need? One that is advanced enough, yet unknown to the Republic?” He shook his head. “Better to face the inevitable than the impossible.”
“What do you want me to do?” Quinten asked, after a pause.
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Srin had seen snippets of humanity beneath Quinten’s brusqueness, but that one question reassured him that he had chosen his confidant correctly. Quinten hadn’t asked what would happen next, where Srin wanted to go, how he wanted to gift his possessions. Taking on responsibility as easily as donning a jacket, he had instead asked what he needed to do.
Srin closed his eyes, a smile on his face, before opening them again. Something tickled his nose and he had to blink several times.
“If things turn out the way I’m thinking….” He swallowed and started again. “Look after her for me. Don’t let her leave. She might try to, full of grief and anger and guilt with herself, but don’t allow her to. This ship’s the best thing to have happened to her in a long time and I don’t want her to throw it away.”
“And you? Assuming you’re correct and we don’t find this mysterious contact of Dr. Thadin’s, that is.”
“Shoot me into a star somewhere. That was Moon’s area of research, but you knew that, didn’t you? I think we’d both appreciate the significance of it.”
Dry-eyed, Quinten stared at him. Then nodded. “Okay.”
Srin half-rose and offered his hand. “Will you shake on it?”
“Shake on a deal involving death?”
But Quinten mirrored Srin’s movements and the men’s hands clasped above the desk.
“Thanks, Quinten.”
Quinten’s brow quirked. “Don’t ever mention it.”
The markets resembled freezer rooms tacked on to narrow shopfronts. Every now and then, as someone entered the goods area to get food containers, ripples of cold would roll out from behind the transparent doors, lapping at the customers’ feet like translucent white waves. Posters, luridly decorated in primary colours, advertised the specific food products available at each counter, guaranteeing them against limpness, cryogenic burns, and disease transmission. Protected from the ultra-cold and bundled in swathes of thermal clothing, with not a single extremity showing, the merchants could have been humans or aliens. Communication was carried out either by a mixture of short phrases and gestures, or via duplex displays embedded in the counters.