Cosmic Cabaret

by SFR Shooting Stars

  One of the waitresses piped up. “But he’s still nobility.” She adjusted her bodice. “And could probably use some companionship.”

  Kella didn’t care about companionship or the guy’s sob story. She wanted to know what Thann knew about why his alliance crashed and burned...and what had happened to his fiancee.

  Nine

  Milady felt shaken, to say the least. She hadn't expected to have quite so much fun pretending to be a cabaret acrobat. But fun was the only thing she could call it. For the scant minute and a half that she entered the null grav field, she forgot herself, the absence of her memories, even the annoying off-time flux of the portside engine and simply reveled in how free she felt, whirling and spinning. She even for God's that she hadn't ever been exposed. Scratch that she forgot that she was supposed to be a mechanic that favored machines over people.

  She heard the music, colored lights flashed in her eyes. The spinning sparks of the holographic fireworks display of color and sound, of exotic flowers from the D’Vaun province of Landfall and a hundred different blooms from Jioni filtered through the air along with the applause from who knew how many guests, seated in the shadows with their eyes fixed on her.

  She only knew that the music and the lights and the glittery fabric covering her body along with the swirling iridescent body paint triggered something in her heart, streaking out of the cage she hadn't even realized she'd been in. In the safety of the null-grav field, she spun through back flips and forward tumbles, extending her arms and legs out in the whirling light field surrounding her. Mere flicks of her fingers sent her spiraling in new directions. A light touch sent her swooping towards the floor amidst gasps from the audience, and her last minute cartwheel through the air evoked applause as if she was born to both the show and the lack of gravity.

  Maybe I was. Maybe I was born on a space station. Maybe I was born on a ship searching for a way to N’tar Cloud, instead of under the crushing pressure of Landfall’s stratified society. The thought that teased her curiosity of the unknown and at the same time caused her despair that she’d ever know the answer...came absent the despair. For the first time, she didn't know who she was, and it didn't bother her. She knew where she was and that she belonged right here, and for the moment, it was enough.

  She paid no attention to the choreography that had demanded a certain rigidity to go along with the music and light show. Yet she somehow managed to strike all the right positions and be where she needed to be with every shift of color and sound and scent telling the story of the outer orbit comet racing towards Landfall, propelled by heroic ancient Shapers bringing water to the thirsting settlers of the new world.

  Then she became a seed bursting from the ground, often a flower, then a bird taking flight, followed by a starship soaring up out of the gravity well of a planet. She held to all these things, the jewels and paint can decorating her body providing her with enough of a mask that she embraced the identity of the girls in the gravity well.

  One final push and she soared upward, the fringe and the jewels and the gemstones wrapped around her body taking flight away from her hips and arms, and when she reached the apogee of the null-grav field, generated by the sphere repelling the ship’s standard gravity which hung suspended at the apex of the amphitheater. She lifted her arms and the final form of her costume unfurled, revealing herself as the center of an exotic orchid, which burst into illusory flame courtesy of the costume’s fiber optics as the music crested, crescendoed, and went silent.

  The room darkened, leaving only herself as the blossom. She caught the acrobatic swing as the nullifier sphere’s influence waned, gently returning gravity to the stage. She floated back down to the floor under the swing’s pneumatic power, her feet just touching the surface when the lights in her costume extinguished, leaving the amphitheater in silent darkness.

  The hush that had captivated the audience during her performance remained that way for almost thirty seconds as the last scent and the last lingering sparks from the light show flared up, fizzled out, and faded, leaving afterimages burned on the spectator's eyes as a parting gift.

  As she touched down, the silence swelled into a murmur which erupted in thunderous applause. The gravity field returned to normal, allowing her costume to drop to her sides, and she remembered to take a bow, even though her heart ached to be up in zero-gee once again.

  In the sudden absence of the lights of the show, she could see the faint glow of the house lights illuminating the exits and the private boxes where the VIPs were located. She lifted her eyes to the top right box and met the eyes of the man sitting there. Even from this distance, she could see his silvery gray irises, or perhaps she just remembered from their time in the stardrive trough. Something drew her. She narrowed her eyes, trying to see more of his face, the lower part of which was cast into shadow. Something pulled her gaze back to that box again and again. The applause took on a rhythm of peaks and valleys, something that shook the stage beneath her feet.

  She took a second bow and when the music queued up for the next act, her back teeth started to itch. She darted across the stage towards the exit, sparing one last glance toward the VIP box to see him lean forward. But the itch in her back teeth turned to a thrum, and she knew it wasn’t just the music or the audience.

  It was the ship itself.

  For a minute she thought she saw him say something as he rose from his seat. Suddenly, she couldn't see the stage in front of her. She could see the structures all right, stage, the props the wings, all faded out to a dim and distant series of shadows as she remembered something about that mouth. The curve of his lips as he smiled? The way his jaw moved as he formed a word she could not understand. It was right there, just on the tip of her tongue, teasing the edge of her memory —

  "Milady! Come on!” Palma grabbed her by the hand and pulled hard, jerking her the last few steps off the stage. With the rush of applause now out of her ears, she could hear it. And the word he'd mouthed found meaning in her brain.

  "Resonance!" She fairly shouted the word at Palma.

  "I know!” Palma took her hand, pulling her further backstage. "That portside drive–"

  "Is out of resonance! I hear it.” She began to fuss with the strap of her costume. "Here! Get me out of this thing, quickly."

  Palma tried to unwind the straps, but as most self sizing garments, the more you struggled, the tighter they got. Finally, Palma withdrew the utility knife from the shirt pocket of her coveralls.

  Milady’s eyes widened. "Portia is going to have your head —" Palma sliced through the straps, freeing her — and exposing her--with the action.

  "She’ll have to get in line," Palma said. "If we can’t re-tune that resonance, Malcolm Zheng will get first crack at our heads!"

  Naked except for body paint and the mask obscuring the upper part of her face, Milady trotted after Palma. "Oh good, as long as we’re popular." She and Palma worked their way through chorus girls on the way to the stage for the next act, scented silks and perfume thighs sending up attractant pheromones meant to enhance the performance.

  All Milady could think of was star drives. Twin fusion suns, pulsating in precision time with one another, like dedicated lovers engaged in an interstellar dance. But one of those star drives out of resonance, unhappy with its mate, turned the dance from romance to tragedy.

  Some of the girls giggled at Milady’s nudity and she dug in her heels. "I can’t go into Engineering without my coveralls!"

  Palma pulled her harder and they passed out of the backstage area down further into the maintenance segments of the ship. "Laundry! Up ahead!" Palma told her harder and jerked her to the side past a repulsor cart full of stun-restraints for the contortionist who’d be freeing himself from a water tank. The cart attendant gave her a frankly appraising once over and raised his eyebrows.

  "We move the erotic line-up to the early show?"

  Milady flipped him a single-digit salute in response to this sarcastic question and skittered a
round the corner after Palma, bursting through the door leading to the laundry facilities.

  The buzz in her head provided a counterpoint to the increasing shake she was experiencing outside her head, in her feet and in the deck plates beneath them. As they ducked past the massive bins carrying laundry from guest services, Palma snagged a garment that was hanging over the edge of one and tossed it back to Milady. "Best I can do." She released Milady’s hand.

  Milady took the garment and shook it out. It seemed to be a man’s flight suit. One of those fancy skin suits made out of yet more self-sizing material. Great, she thought. Some poor guy is going to be torqued when he finds out his flight suit has been--stretched--by a girl. Nevertheless she found the slits in the fabric and inserted her hands and head.

  Next, she hopped along with first one foot, then the other, finding the slits in the bottom half, and wedged her toes just far enough in that the smart fabric began to work its own magic, the self-sizing garment slithered up her body, hugging her hips and thighs, while the top half rolled down and in case the rest of her, stretching to find its mate in the bottom half of the garment until the self-sealing fabric of the top and bottom kissed, fused, and became one. Would that it were that easy with people, she thought, continuing her mad dash towards the engine rooms.

  Ten

  As they ran towards the stardrive trough, she ducked into the supply room, reaching for the first toolbelt she could spot. With each step that carried her closer to the fusion assembly, she felt the resonance fluctuate even more out of time. If asked, she would've told Palma that her guts itched, that's how certain she was that the coils were out of resonance. She flung herself bodily into the fusion bays, the doors hissing closed behind her and the diagnostic slate in her hand before she skidded to a halt.

  "Where are you, where are you?" she muttered. Something itched at her face and she brushed it away. Her hand came away covered in glitter and she realized belatedly that she still wore the head cap from her performance. "I can hear you," she said to the engine. The fusion coil glowed softly and she ran the diagnostic slate over it. Everything was within tolerances according to the diagnostic programs, but she only trusted them so far. “Within tolerances” was not flawless no matter how much prevarication or corporate disclaimers insisted the two were functionally the same.

  The diagnostics were exacting, but in some cases, there just was no substitute for a good old-fashioned lick of a finger and a pinch of a wire. She knelt, squeezing into the trough half-underneath the housing where the forward fusion coil lay nestled in the curve of the flux plasma feeder lines. That thick plasma again. She knew she should have insisted that Palma insist on a manual brushing of the entire system.

  The jolt raced through her body, but not unexpectedly, as she passed her fingers through the force field shielding the fusion coil and shifted the feeder lines as gently as possible. She found the smooth surface by touch, her fingers traveling along the bends in the tubing. Her fingertip collided along the sinewy, partially organic material and she instantly felt calmer. This coil hummed and purred as it should. In time with her heartbeat, and in time with the universe. That meant —

  "This aft coil. We’ll need to replace the entire assembly. It's damaged somewhere, and I don't have time to find it." The voice was unfamiliar, and far too arrogant for her to let it pass.

  "You’ll do no such thing!" She licked her fingers again, wincing at the aftertaste of the bio organic compounds that coated them from her first stroke of the right coil. She strode over and plunged her fingers past the glowing force field towards the lines and curves of the second half of the assembly. "This is nothing a little tweak can't fix."

  As she lifted her head, the headdress’s dangling feathers and beads obscured her face. She shook the worst of the fringe out of her eyes and face the arrogant stranger across the coil assembly.

  He wore a full face helmet, complete with protective goggles. From behind the mask, his voice echoed hollowly. "What in the nine hells do you think you're doing?"

  Milady ignored him, flicking a single glance towards the visored helm. "My job.” She ran her fingers along the curves of the coil, testing out the vibrations as they grew and faded in a Doppler effect along the curves of the assembly. “This isn’t the assembly’s fault," she said. "Only a rookie would want to throw away a perfectly good relationship on a little tarnish. Use the brushes to scrub the lines."

  “A rookie? How about someone with very exacting standards?”

  Her mouth formed an O. “It’s you again!”

  He seemed to come to the same conclusion. “So it is. That plasma thickening you pointed out? It also leaks radiation. We’ll need to replace the feeder lines.”

  “Use a stronger magnetic field and increase the number of diverter plates to pull the heavy impurities out.” She rose, withdrawing her hand from the flux field, and shook the numbness out of her fingers.

  From behind the mask, his eyebrows went up. "I can’t believe I’m taking stardrive troubleshooting advice from a showgirl who ran straight from the stage and stuck her fingers into the flux field."

  "No, a mechanic stuck her fingers into the flux field. I was just filling in for one of the other girls because I’m certified in zero-gee." Together, they moved away from the trough and towards the prep room door.

  "And yet you're here, without bothering to take off your beads and feathers." He held the door for her and she entered the prep room. He followed close behind, and realized she must have changed out of her costume and into...whatever it was she was wearing while she was running to the stardrive trough.

  "I rushed because this is my primary job, and I have to be prepared to compensate when that stardrive prince wanders in here and messes everything up." He let the door to the trough close behind him and they moved through the broad-spectrum arch that cleared them of lingering radiation.

  "Stardrive prince?" His tone took on an amused lilt. "That sounds like the next cabaret act."

  She unhitched her tool belt and began placing the tools in a tray that fitted into a sonic autoclave. "I just hope the guy doesn't turn out to be one of the cabaret clowns. The change orders were all set to replace the stardrive, but not a word about flushing the plasma lines. Lord Fancypants could have really screwed things up."

  "We certainly wouldn’t want that to happen, would we?" he muttered, unsealing the cleansuit to reveal a formal suit with the subtle azure and crimson pattern of House Zalco.

  She froze. “Oh.”

  He grinned.

  “Come out with me.” Thann surprised himself with the offer to his taciturn showgirl-mechanic. “I don’t even know your name.”

  “I don’t want to give it to you now. I’ve just insulted you.”

  His grin wasn’t going anywhere. Neither was the curl in his belly. “I’m a company man. I won’t hold it against you. I’m Thann Zalco, by the way.”

  “I’m Milady.”

  “Milady. Is that a title?”

  Her lips twisted. “More like...a nickname.”

  “Aspirational?”

  “Oh, nothing of the sort. After my time on Quantum, I’m heading to the colonies. I think--I think I could make a new life there.”

  “Something about your old one you don’t like?”

  She shrugged. “I lived in the sublevels of Landfall. What’s not to like there? Air you can chew, random Planetary Security crackdowns, and not being able to see the sky.”

  “I’m--I’m sorry.” Thann had only briefly visited Landfall’s sublevels in his youth, or on rare occasions when the business had called him to the modest neighborhoods from which they drew their manufacturing workers. The oppressive weight of half an arcology still above him filled him with unease. “I’m...not a fan of knowing there are millions of people walking around over my head.”

  She nodded. “I couldn’t stand not to see the stars.” The headdress fell in her face and she huffed it out of the way with an exasperated exhale. When a stray feather fell back in
her face, she finally pulled the thing from her head. “It’s not worth keeping my hair out of my face when the feathers are in it.”

  Her hair tumbled down around her shoulders, fighting free of all the pins that held it in place. A cloud of intoxicating perfume hit his nose and she pulled a cleaning cloth from the shelf. “I’ll go out with you,” she said. “But not looking like this.”

  “Oh, come on, it’d be fun. A cabaret girl in a--” He gestured to her body. “Whatever that thing is.”

  “It’s a pilot suit for the virtual reality suite. Or a some sort of combination workout suit and torture device.” She flicked a tab that had fallen loose from the suit, a port connected to a wire that disappeared inside the suit. “People will mistake me for one of the Cirque clowns and try to put me in the ring.”

  She buried her face in the towel while he chuckled and wondered what he was doing. You’re in the company of a smart, beautiful woman. Everyone in the family would be overjoyed. Maybe he truly had been living too long with ghosts.

  She turned back around and lowered the towel, her face cleared of the cosmetics from the show, and a ghost had risen from the dead..

  Eleven

  Thann stared, blinking rapidly, a stunned expression slackening his features. His jaw worked for a full minute without any words coming out. But the expression in his eyes shot through her like a physical force.

  Silly, she told herself. He was beautiful to look at, sure, but didn't most of the nobility have entire teams of individuals working towards that every moment for them? She stared at him and saw that yes, he did have some sort of glamour around him. The soft locks of hair framing his face, the compelling lightness of his eyes, the soft draw of his lips amidst a scruff darkening his cheeks and jaw. She was shocked to see a tiny scar at the corner of his mouth that she somehow knew to look for.