by Scott Rhine
“Maybe we could find some ice, too,” he mused. “Then any water we happened to lose due to an unexpected course change would vanish in the noise. Everyone would be too focused on the side mission to care.”
“Sure,” she agreed, uncertain why this was important.
“Would Mercy complain about the extra risk?” he teased.
“No. Since Sanctuary can match speeds with an asteroid so easily, we could almost climb down to the asteroid surface on a tether—a glorified EVA. If we can’t pull off a practice run to the corner store for chips and drinks, we’ll never manage a landing and return from a higher g moon.”
Tilting his head, Zeiss decided. “We could do this. Good work, specialist.” He casually scribbled a few notes, as if he moved mountains every day. “If the others agree, we can dedicate a fab to your arm as soon as we have the necessary minerals.”
Her heart skipped a beat. In a matter of a few months, she could have an arm. He was simply giving it to her, with no prerequisites or years of slavery. Yuki stared at him, realizing for the first time how different a leader he was. People solved problems with Zeiss not for him, and they did it because . . . they were a family. Thanks to Lou and Mercy, she had family.
She had been crying for several moments when she put her arm around the astonished commander. “I won’t let you down,” she said, slobbering on his shoulder.
Embarrassed, Zeiss tapped his badge. “Um . . . Red, could you come out here?”
****
Sojiro hated bureaucracy, so he brought his sketch pad to the all-hands meeting. His new, tilted musketeer hat hid his earbud from the others, and he listened to Vivaldi. The heat in the barn meeting hall put everyone on edge. They bickered about the stupidest things. After hours of arguing, the crew agreed to two test runs. If they needed more raw materials, they could follow the same procedure later in the Oblivion system. Planet Beta showed indications of rings that could be mined.
The first experiment would extract fuel components from the head of a large comet. To accomplish this, they would strip Ascension from its eighteen-person capacity down to a mere six. They could enlarge the fuel storage as well as build an apparatus to siphon hydrocarbons from melted ice. As usual, the command crew would need to ride in the cockpit: Zeiss, Lou, and Red. Everyone was anxious to see if Lou’s new gravity sense would work on the comet. Lou bragged that, once Mercy was thawed, he would be able find his way back to her without instruments. They still had to choose three people in the cargo section.
The most experienced space hand and former miner, Oleander, was disqualified from this impromptu journey due to pellagra—a vitamin B3 imbalance caused by too much corn and not enough beans. She was pale, tired, and the sun gave her a butterfly-shaped rash. No one had noticed until the planning meeting because she always worked night shifts. Oleander explained, “Mercy hasn’t been around to nag me into eating right.”
Toby said, “This disorder may have been the source of some vampire legends.”
Sojiro was already busy sketching her in a variety of Vampirella costumes.
“This is a simple extraction, though,” Oleander advised. “Outside the shuttle, we just need someone to chop the comet ice into manageable chunks and suck them up through the vacuum hose. Herk can work the drill in his heavy space armor. The other two people can run the distillery inside the craft to separate the pure water from the shuttle fuel components.”
The identities of the two crewmen took the most debate.
Mercy knew the most about the ship’s specifications, as she’d built it. However, she wouldn’t be fit for the journey due to the heavy medications and high-risk pregnancy. Nadia, the energy expert, was a distant third choice to monitor the fuel conversion, which left one more person for the cargo hold.
As a propulsion designer and Nadia’s lover, Park lobbied to accompany her. Zeiss was reluctant to agree because the task would require constant talking and adjusting of dials based on gut feelings—neither of which fit the Korean’s profile. Furthermore, someone had to pilot Sanctuary.
Toby, as a nano expert, and Sonrisa, as a metalworker, would be constructing the chemical distillery. Both wanted to be there for the field trial; however, no one trusted Toby to be alone with any of the women. In the end, Sonrisa won out for the mission.
The second mission, at the other extreme, would pull a handful of small, metal-rich meteors into the landing bay with glorified lassos or nets. They discussed spear guns, but a failure could knock the chunk of rock further away. The targets clustered in a cloud of debris along their existing path to intersect the subspace nexus point. Yuki answered questions about where the most sought-after minerals could be found in the greatest concentrations so that with one stop, the team could collect the best haul.
During this discussion, Sojiro sketched a wooden arm positioned in a martial arts block. During a pivotal part of the debate, Yuki was staring at his paper instead of paying attention. Pratibha had to ask her twice for details about Yttrium and tradeoffs for other types of lasers. When the meeting slowed to a close like the viewing at a funeral, Yuki leaned over to her new roommate and whispered, “Am I Pinocchio now?”
“We can save two weeks of fabrication if we carve the elbow section out of wood. Later,” the artist promised.
Watching the details of her new hand unfold, she noted that the palm held the battery unit, making power connections closer to the servo motors and preventing a repeat of her earlier disaster if the battery ever exploded. Hypnotized by possibility, she barely paid attention to the rest of the crew as they adjourned for cookies and coffee. Then she watched him as he worked from memory. “Damn, I wish you were straight,” she told him when the light started to fade.
Sojiro smiled wanly. “Let’s concentrate on something we can change, shall we?” He flipped back to the first sketch. “As replacements go, legs are far easier. The blades don’t even have to look like the originals to function well. Transhumeral prosthetics are hard, all custom. Your first replacement has twenty-six joints, eighteen motors, and 100 sensors.”
“How do you know what it’s going to look like? I haven’t even been in to the doctor’s office for measurements.”
“Toby scanned your old arm thoroughly when you were in stasis. I’ve also seen your clothing closet . . . or floor as the case may be, so I know roughly how much bicep you have left by where you placed the pins in each sleeve. We’ll do the fine work just before final assembly. All I’ve built so far is a harness that goes across your chest and over the shoulder. An artificial arm is full of design tradeoffs. Knowing you, I’ve favored durability over lightness, usability more than looks, and immediate gratification over permanence. I’ve also made the components easily accessible so you can repair them one-handed or tinker with improvements.”
She grinned at the personality analysis built into the arm. “Could I lift heavy loads like that cyborg on TV?”
The artist shook his head. “Your spinal column would collapse. That’s why Herk uses space armor with an exoskeleton to do his superhero impressions.”
“Could I put a soldering iron in the finger? That would be handy.”
“Maybe. Come to the computer lab with me; otherwise, you’re not going to let me get any sleep tonight.” He led her to his workroom in a cool cave in the Hollow. “How are the experiments going for eavesdropping on the Oblivion natives?” Sojiro asked idly.
She thought, I can collect the necessary devices as soon as everyone is out of Olympus and I’m the only one on duty. As an early explorer in the saucer, she had planted Mori Electronics listening devices everywhere. If she removed them one at a time, someone might notice and examine one of the other devices. Rummaging in other peoples’ bedrooms was tricky business. “I’m close to a breakthrough.”
Inside the lab, he had assembled the first wave of sensors on a gel-pad harness and another set on a headband. All of them were jacked into a computer with a three-dimensional display tank.
“You’ve star
ted making the arm already?” Yuki asked.
“This is your practice gear.”
“My what?”
He placed the electrode-laden headband over her brow. “This headband is just until you get done training.” When she began another question, he said, “Take your shirt off. It’ll make attaching the rest of the rig easier.”
She smiled. “If you wanted to see me naked, all you had to do was ask.”
Stripping off her sweaty clothes, she watched him affix the sensors to her stump with infinite care and no sign of revulsion. She had never been with someone this safe or caring before. It was agonizing.
When everything was strapped into place, he turned on the display. “This is practice contracting your new bicep. Try to move the yellow ball through the blue hoop.”
The odd exercise took her an hour before she mastered it consistently. “We’ll aim for smooth later. The sweat from your forehead and armpit is interfering with the contacts.”
“This is hard work,” she complained. “You try it.”
Holding up his hand with the artificial digits, he said, “Already have, tiger cub. The next exercise is an elbow bend. Then, we can move to hand grip and advanced maneuvers like twisting a screwdriver.”
She gasped at the scope. “That’s weeks of work.”
“If you’re not ready by the time the chips are done, Pratibha can always find other uses for the fabricator.”
“Screw you. I’ll be ready.”
After a while, the silence bothered her. Yuki tried to get Sojiro to talk about himself. “Do you have a thing for Park now?”
“No. He’s dependable and a good sparring partner. He appreciates architecture, but he’s afraid of color. The man blends into wallpaper.”
Yuki reached out to a red dot with her virtual fingers on the screen. She felt like a cat being teased with a laser pointer. As soon as she touched the spot, it would move. “Solid and loyal is good. Pretty will dump your ass in a week.”
“So when you’re fifty,” he asked, “who do you see yourself coming home to?”
“It seems shallow, but I want my lover to be honest, well-educated, and a respected expert in his field. It’s not all about the prestige. My father was a carnival barker, and I was ashamed to stand near him in public. He was always working an angle.”
Sojiro raised an eyebrow. “People have accused you of the same thing.”
“Yeah. Not proud of that.”
“Dress for the job you want, girlfriend.”
All she had to do was impress everyone with an unprecedented linguistics project and hide the evidence of her past treachery—soon.
Chapter 11 – Spousal Reunion
The medical team worked an average of sixty hours a week to make the three-month deadline. They needed to clear Mercy out of the stasis chamber in case someone became injured on the fuel run. Synthesizing a talent-suppressing serum proved to be the easy part of the equation. After Auckland demonstrated that the serum was harmless on the guinea pigs, Yvette volunteered to be the first human test subject for her friend’s sake.
Yvette dreaded returning to the command saucer. The strangeness of the elevator helped to prevent her from hyperventilating as she approached. Seeing Red on the patio, she focused on the other woman and gave a weak smile. “I suppose you think I’m silly.”
“Not at all,” said Red. “Your physical reactions are very real. Having a kidnapping attempt at age six changed my behavior for the rest of my life. If it will help, you can close your eyes, and I’ll take you to the room.”
“Please,” Yvette said with a quiver in her voice. Concentrating on her friend’s need, she clenched her jaw, squeezed her eyes shut, and counted her breaths as Red led her to the medical bay.
After the door irised shut, Yvette opened her eyes. Five people crowded into the cramped medical bay: the entire command and medical teams except Toby. Even so, the room held more equipment by volume than people. The electroshock paddles and a wide array of medical countermeasures were laid out on the exam table. “Oh my. Worried much about how the experiment will affect me, doctor?” she asked.
“You don’t have to do this,” Auckland whispered.
Lou jerked his head at this offer.
Yvette could see the flash of panic followed by pleading in Lou’s face. She and the other women of the camp had taken turns looking out for the sad puppy for months. His earnest, pathetic look could make any woman with an ounce of maternal instinct fold. “Mercy would do it for me. Go ahead.” She sat on the padded chair while Auckland announced his procedure and the date to the recorder as he injected her with a low dosage of talent-suppressing solution. The initial euphoria surprised her but helped her to cope with the tension.
Lou chewed his thumbnail, waiting for some sign that this could help his wife. Sweat pasted the fabric of his shirt to the curve of his lower back.
Yvette announced, “I can feel Doctor Auckland worrying about the dosage and Red fretting about Yuki’s last workout session with Zeiss.”
Glancing at her husband, Red said, “I trust him. She’s just aggressive. He has new bruises, and we’re leaving in a few days. It could impair the mission.”
“With no sexual outlet, Yuki’s very frustrated,” Yvette explained.
Coughing, Lou said, “Thank you for that news flash, Dr. Ruth.”
“You’re making your own sexual tension worse,” Yvette said.
“How exactly is Mercy being frozen my fault?” asked Lou.
Yvette replied, “When I went to your room to retrieve another DNA sample from Mercy’s hairbrush, I caught you smelling Mercy’s pillow. You keep it in a plastic bag and inhale it like cocaine.”
“Auckland, how long before Captain Blunt here can hold her tongue?” Lou asked.
“The Ethics effect is hardwired into her brain. We can’t change that. We can only diminish her Empathy responses. Give it a few minutes. Talk about something innocuous. How’s the language toolkit coming?”
“Slowly,” Lou confessed. “We’ve had several hilarious mistakes, though. We’ve been running newspaper clippings and magazine articles through the AI pidgin translator. The first was the train wreck in India that left eighty dead people throwing garbage on the tracks. It meant littering, but we made a lot of inconsiderate zombie jokes after that.” He regaled them with a few other examples. “My favorite was the man who ‘felt left behind.’ That phrase somehow came out ‘groped a little ass on the side.’”
Drowsy, Yvette said, “That’s strange. I didn’t feel the laugh.”
“You mean hear?” asked Auckland.
“No, feel,” Red explained. “Just before someone laughs at a joke, there’s a mental tickle that lets you know it’s coming. I use that sensation to tell when to fake a laugh.”
“Not with my jokes,” Zeiss said.
“No, of course not,” Red promised.
Lou chuckled, patting the commander on the back. “You thought you were rocking her diaphragm. Sorry. She was just being polite. I told you Red was really an alien.”
Zeiss elbowed Lou in the solar plexus, but Yvette couldn’t feel the backlash of pain.
“That sense is gone,” Yvette said. “Numb. It’s quiet in my head for the first time in years.”
“It’s going to work,” said Lou. “I’m getting my partner back.”
Auckland replied, “Call it a miracle if it wears off as anticipated and there are no other side effects. You’ll only have a few days together before the six of you and Toby have to crawl up the shaft to the loading dock.”
“This is wonderful,” Yvette mused, closing her eyes. “So many times, I longed to just switch this talent off.”
There were only two negative effects from the experiment. First, the shot took sixty hours to wear off instead of twenty-four, causing Auckland to refigure his dosage charts and examine Yvette’s endocrine levels for another four hours. While the medical team slept at their groundside homes, Lou complained that he would only have a day to b
e reunited with his wife before the grueling mission began. The second effect was more personal for the nurse. Immediately after she awoke the next morning, with the serum entirely out of her system, she craved another injection more than coffee or human contact. She was sure that the desire would fade with time.
When the medical team tried to have a peaceful breakfast at Garden Hollow cafeteria, Lou was there waiting. Auckland and Yvette stopped chatting about new methods of generating casts with the fabricators, filled their coffee mugs, and walked the path toward Olympus. Lou thanked them and followed close behind, so close that he bumped into the doctor when they stopped suddenly to watch a rodent scurry by with a nut.
At the base of the elevator, Lou cupped a hand to his earpiece. “I’ll ask her.” When they were in the lift, he whispered, “Toby was up all night adjusting the mixture. He wants your permission to stand in the command center in case Mercy needs him.”
Yvette swallowed panic. “That means we’ll have to go past him.”
“I’ll guide you,” said the blind man. “He won’t hurt you.”
“Why not make him hide in his cell?” she asked.
Lou looked down. “I’m not saying I like the guy, but he did bond with you. Not feeling my wife for almost four months has been hell for me. I can sympathize. He only wants to look at you as you pass by.”
“Do you realize how hard it’s going to be for me to revisit that chamber?” Yvette hissed.
“I climb into Snowflake twice a week, and it still makes me sweat. He strapped me to that interface and opened the inputs to maximum as we went by that sun. When we enter the Oblivion system, I’ll be reenacting the scene that left me this way. I do it for Mercy.”
“It’s not the same.”
“No. Would it help if I told you Toby worked eighty hours this week?”
“I’ll think about letting him see me on the way out, depending on how I feel.”
“Fair enough,” Lou said. He turned his body away from hers, tapped his throat microphone, and relayed the response like a ventriloquist, not moving his lips.