Jade propped her feet up on the couch. “Doesn’t something strike you as interesting?”
“Lots of things do. But Markher 12 isn’t one of them.” Kuchera tugged on his moustache. He let the few loose hairs fall to the deck.
“Quit shedding,” Jade chided. She checked her sleeve for stray hairs. “You’re worse than the dog Mom and I used to have.”
“Dogs are admirable animals. Loyal, affectionate, and dependable.”
“Thanks for the PR pitch, Rover.”
Kuchera began a retort and changed his mind. He contented himself by tugging harder, then surveying his empty fingers with disappointment. “I give up. What’s caught your interest?”
“If the Markher Cluster lacks both commercial and strategic value, why the interdict? Who’s going to go there?”
Kuchera freed another hair and studied it. “Prospectors?”
Jade snorted. “Huh. Who are they likely to meet? A Gara’nesh prospector? Big deal.”
“Neilson said it was Roessler-spatially close to Windward and Weston’s. So there you are," Kuchera concluded. "It is strategically located, but the desk-jockeys in Naval Operations don’t admit it.”
“Maybe.” Jade chewed on a fingernail. “But the cluster’s only close to Windward and Weston—it doesn’t lie on any trade routes. So again, why an interdiction when the only ships likely to go there are military to begin with?”
“How long has the interdict been in effect?” Kuchera asked.
“Two years.”
“Why don’t you ask your counterpart for this sector?”
“I did. The reply came in earlier today. Commander Bray has no idea either. He’s competent. If there was something going on in his sector, he’d know about it.”
“But something has been and he doesn’t.”
Jade puffed out her cheeks.
“Does that mean he’s in on it, or ignorant of it?” Kuchera asked.
Jade didn’t reply. They lapsed into silence.
The day passed slowly. Jade felt disinclined to talk, and Kuchera contented himself with working on the biography. Jade watched him from time to time, secretly amazed at the speed with which he could string words together. Far faster than she, to whom every report presented a major chore. He didn’t offer to let her read it, and she didn’t ask. She had learned long before that Kuchera didn’t like anyone to read his work until he was satisfied it was ready for public scrutiny.
Several times, Jade caught Neilson observing her out of the corner of her eye, although the pilot looked away quickly. Jade thought seriously about confronting her. But, deciding there was little to be gained, and potentially much to be lost, she let it go.
At lunchtime, however, while Jade was finishing the last of a watercress sandwich, and washing it down with something called bitterfruit juice—one of the few products of Last Chance, a little-populated hell-hole circling Eta Cassiopeiae A—Neilson brought over a tray and sat across the table from her.
Jade decided to let Neilson open the conversation, which the younger woman did after a few minutes.
“What do you think of the peace process, ma’am?” she asked. “Does it have a possibility of succeeding?”
It wasn’t the opening Jade had expected, and she regarded Neilson for a moment before answering. She wondered why she’d never before noticed that the otherwise plain woman, her short-cropped hair emphasizing the drabness of her features, actually had very pleasant brownish-tan eyes.
“That’s a difficult question, Lieutenant,” she said. “To a large extent it depends on the parties involved. Governments can only do so much. It’s the people seated in that negotiating chamber who have the say at the moment.”
“I heard very optimistic reports when I was on my way to Covenant.” Neilson skewered something orange and popped it in her mouth. “News feeds quoted Member Maricic extensively.”
“Optimism is a good place to start.” Jade pushed her plate aside. “What many people fail to realize, Lieutenant, is that peace is not simply the absence of hostilities. Peace is an active process. You can’t wish peace, visualize peace or have pleasant peaceful thoughts. You have to work at peace.”
“Pray God that both sides have the willingness do whatever it takes,” Kuchera interjected. He had taken a break from writing and looked up from yet another decades-old documentary.
Neilson’s face expressed her doubts about the willingness of the warring parties. “Good points, whether or not you believe in a deity,” she said.
She turned again towards Jade. “I ask again, ma’am, what do you think about the chances?”
Jade folded her hands in her lap. “I think they’re good. Depending on what we find at Markher 12, of course, which could affect the peace process profoundly.”
“Or don’t find,” Kuchera chimed in.
“Either will represent information,” Jade said.
“Incidentally, ma’am,” Neilson said, “do you still want me to drop Starwind out a light-year, or go straight in at system periphery?”
Jade thought for a moment. “Out a light-year.”
“If there’s anybody there, they'll detect our transition waves. They’ll know we’re coming.”
“Quick in, quick out,” Kuchera interjected, earning a sharp glance from Jade.
She said, “If we start a light-year out, we can scan the system. If we don’t detect artificial activity, we can move in by increments. If we do detect something suspicious, we may not need to go close at all.”
“Standard recon procedure—” Neilson began.
“Don’t quote procedure to me!” Jade sprang to her feet and leaned over the table. “I was doing recons while you were still struggling with basic algebra!”
Neilson scrambled up, her face pink and blotchy. “With all due respect, ma’am, do you think your relationship with Lieutenant Kuchera—”
“That’s enough, Lieutenant!” Jade said firmly. “Whatever relationship I have with Lieutenant Kuchera is absolutely none of your business!”
“If it influences the outcome of this mission—”
“Lieutenant,” Jade said in a barely controlled tone, “the conduct of this mission is my responsibility. I will run it as I see fit. Return to the bridge.”
“I—”
“That’s an order. You’re dismissed.”
“I want my objection to this course of action noted.”
“It will be.”
Neilson pushed off the table and stalked away.
Jade turned towards Kuchera. The reporter stared at her, mouth agape.
“And what are you looking at?” Jade snapped.
Kuchera closed his mouth. “What’s come over you?” he said. “I’ve never seen you lose your temper like that.”
“One thing I will not allow is anybody accusing me of inattention to duty.” Jade ran a hand over her eyes. “Maybe I was sharp, but I don’t have to explain my actions, least of all to Neilson.”
Kuchera climbed out of the couch and escorted Jade over to it. He pushed her gently backward, then sat beside her. “You’re also a poor liar.”
Jade straightened. “I was not—”
Kuchera pushed her back again. “OK. Maybe not lying. How about denying?”
“Troy—.” She paused, and began again. “If we transition a light-year out we can eavesdrop on the system. Power emissions, local transmissions, and stray radiation will be spreading out at lightspeed. If there’s been any activity in the past year, we can detect it. If not, we move in. It will give us at least a rough estimate of how long activity has been going on there.”
She held up a hand to prevent him interrupting. “It also gives us a margin of reaction time. We have to get back, Troy. If we transition close, and we’re in range of whatever the Gara’nesh have developed—” She put her hands together and then flung them apart to indicate an explosion.
“Are you trying to say that my presence has nothing to do with it?” Kuchera asked, his eyes narrowed.
&nb
sp; Jade leaned her head against his shoulder. Kuchera stroked her hair. “I can't explain it, but something tells me a light-year.”
“Jade, you have to forget about me. Act like I’m not here. No, listen to me,” he said as she attempted to interrupt. “You’re the most important member of this team. You’re the one who has to be calm, level-headed, thinking clearly. You can’t afford to be edgy, losing your temper, snapping over nothing.”
“Do you know how much you’re getting away with?” Jade asked. And when Kuchera didn’t answer, she said, “You forced your way onto this mission, and now you ask me to pretend as if you’re not here.”
“I’m not saying that. It’s a matter of giving up your control. Of not worrying about other people.”
“A good commander worries about those under her command.”
“But not to the point where it compromises judgement. You’re afraid to let go.”
Jade sighed. “Do you remember that time we went kayaking the rapids on Lake Sammeras?”
“Do I!” Kuchera nodded vigorously. “That was the time my stabilizer failed. I capsized and couldn’t reverse myself.”
“Remember how you felt?”
“I was stared stiff.” Kuchera stared into the past. “Certain I was going to die. And then suddenly everything went calm, as if all the worry and fear had been snatched away.” He chuckled. “And then you turned the boat over and saved my life. I didn’t know whether to be happy or disappointed.”
Jade squeezed his knee. “Scared stiff is how I’ve felt every time somebody has come into my life. Only instead of a momentary sensation that passed, it’s been a state of life that’s lasted for years. And that’s how I feel with you on this ship.”
“It’s going to be all right, Jade,” Kuchera insisted. “Do what you have to do and don’t worry about me. I won’t blame you for anything untowards that happens.”
“You have the most insensitive way of being sensitive,” Jade said. She closed her eyes as Kuchera stroked her hair. When she opened them it was to see a smile on Kuchera’s face.
“What are you thinking about?” she asked.
“I was just remembering the first time we met.”
Jade smiled too. “I thought you were insufferably conceited. You reminded me of my younger self.”
“There’s a fine line between self-assurance and conceit. I guess we were both on the wrong side.”
“What did you think of me?”
Kuchera hesitated. “I thought you were cold. Beautiful, but cold.”
“I was.”
“You still are.”
“Cold?”
“Beautiful. I couldn’t wait to see you again. Did it ever bother you,” Kuchera asked, “even a little bit, that people would call you cold?”
Jade lowered her eyes. “The Ice Maiden. Pluto’s Princess. It bothered me a lot when I cared to admit it. But it served its purpose.”
“To protect the warm and caring person underneath.”
Her grin was like the flash of a sword snicking past armor. “To keep pushy, conceited writers and similar undesirables at bay.” She studied his reaction. “Just as well you’re no-longer conceited and undesirable. I can handle the writer.”
“One out of three isn’t bad.”
Jade stood up and moved away. “I’m going to lie down for a while, Troy.”
“OK. I’ll return to the book.”
“Fine. Think of something good for dinner, huh?”
“Anything special?”
“Just for us.”
“Not inviting company?”
Jade glanced towards the bridge. “I don’t think so.”
She entered her quarters and sprawled across her bed. She debated about playing music—Mozart’s Symphony number 40, perhaps—but decided to remain in silence.
Annoyance for lashing out at Neilson nagged at her. It wasn’t how she’d liked to be treated when she was a junior officer—even though now she could remember back across the years to Captain Harriet Mears-Hadley’s acerbic tongue without wincing. Then, of course, she’d felt embarrassed and degraded and anxious and stupid all at once.
That wasn’t the way she tried to treat those under her command.
Ice Maiden.
Pluto’s Princess.
The names still conjured up feelings of regret. And they hurt.
Kuchera had a disturbing knack of seeing through her, and cutting through her defenses. Paradoxically, though, that was one of the things that had drawn her to him.
Yes, his presence had influenced her to be extra-cautious during the approach to Markher 12. But something else, an unease in spirit or an unconscious warning, urged her to be careful.
Had she been asked, she couldn’t have explained the prompting. But it lay in her mind like a stone in a shoe, and she listened to it.
Ice Maiden.
Pluto's Princess.
Perhaps it was time to put those names to rest. Once and for all.
But God, what if something happens? Again?
She drew her knees up and rested her head against them.
Her thoughts warred against each other, as did her emotions—desire versus fear.
Let him in.
You can't—it's not safe.
She wished for someone to confide in—old Father Whiteley, had he not been long dead, would have been perfect. And she longed for the comfort and strengthening of Mass—but that was something she could obtain only infrequently. She prayed as best she could.
But when Kuchera called her for dinner, the conflict still hadn’t been resolved. So she feigned an appetite for his sake.
Then, eleven years ago, it had been a daydream, a reverie to take her mind off the dullness of routine on Retribution’s bridge. Now, it was a sensation, a premonition, a warning of approaching danger…
Before her once again, the sheer rock plunged thousands of feet to the crawling slate-grey sea below while angry gusts of the wind tried to dislodge her and the tang of salt air rose into her nostrils. She envied the yellow-necked windriders who rode the thermal updrafts with ease, to whom the space between earth and stars was home.
And again she felt the sickening lurch of her stomach as she fell over the precipice into nothingness.
She was on that precipice at Markher 12.
She was on that precipice with Troy…
“Transition in fifteen minutes, ma’am,” Neilson announced, breaking Jade’s mental musings.
It was the following morning and Jade sat in the second forward seat on Starwind’s bridge, with Kuchera occupying an auxiliary station behind her.
“One light-year out as you ordered,” Neilson continued.
Jade couldn’t miss Neilson’s undertone of displeasure. She glanced from Neilson’s set face in the seat beside her to Kuchera’s eager gaze over her shoulder.
“Weapons armed, and be ready to take us out at a moment’s notice,” she said.
Neilson’s sullen voice bordered on disrespect. “Nav screens on full, weapons systems on line.” She said nothing for fifteen minutes. Then, “Ready for transition, ma’am.”
Jade took a deep breath. She hadn’t been this nervous when she commanded Retribution, she thought. Or perhaps memory lied.
“Transition now.” With a glare of light and radiation Starwind burst into realspace.
“Guess we made it,” Kuchera remarked as the corona of color diminished, revealing an ordinary starfield.
Suddenly, the corona flickered, and without warning Starwind shuddered and bucked.
Jade’s neck snapped with the unexpected jolt. A stab of muscle spasm tore through her upper back.
Neilson gasped a profanity.
Kuchera gripped the back of Jade’s seat. “What in heaven’s name—?"
Starwind shuddered again, but not as hard. Warning lights rippled across the consoles.
“Neilson!” Jade blurted.
“I’m on it, ma’am.” The pilot’s fingers fled over her console’s sensorpads.
/> “What happened?” Jade demanded.
“I’m not sure,” Neilson replied. “But systems seem to have stabilized. Ship integrity’s intact. I’m running a diagnostic sequence now. I think we hit high-intensity Roessler-spatial turbulence.”
“Here?” Jade evaluated her own co-pilot’s console. Starwind appeared to be undamaged.
“I’m checking, ma’am.”
Neilson sounded harassed. Let her do her job, Jade thought to herself.
She noticed Kuchera inclining forward. She stared at the screen.
One light-year away, Markher 12 was the brightest object in the heavens, dwarfing more distant stars. The red disc shone without distortion. The other stars of the cluster surrounded Marker 12, as consorts waiting attendance on a king or queen. But that was a false impression; the other stars were Markher 12's equals.
Jade magnified the image.
Red giants, she thought to herself, always looked bloated. Fat, obese, out of shape stars. Old and tired. Senescent.
Markher 12 had probably started life looking very much like Sol—a type G yellow star, radiant and warm. Over time, as more and more hydrogen fused into helium, the star’s core compressed, and the outer shell of hydrogen expanded and ignited. The core heated, and began fusing helium to carbon.
If Markher 12 had once possessed habitable planets, they had long since been engulfed by the swelling star. The few planetoids that remained were pitiful objects, more suitable to be the satellites of a planet than the companions of a star. Captured asteroids, perhaps, or the remnants of an exploded planet, circling beyond range of the star’s dying fury.
It wasn’t hard to see why nobody came here.
Or did they?
Conscious that her knuckles ached from her fingers indenting her armrests, Jade gradually relaxed as no further alarms sounded. Starwind remained stable, without additional tremors, her insystem drive a low, comforting hum.
Jade remained glued to the scan console as Starwind flew sunward. Neilson hunched over the control console, working rapidly. Troy tapped Jade’s shoulder.
“See anything?” he asked.
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