Not With A Whimper: Preservers

by D. A. Boulter

  “So, they gave us everything.”

  As he hadn’t asked a question, she didn’t feel it necessary to answer. He took her silence as agreement.

  “Very good, Major. If I think of any questions for young Yrden, I’ll send them to you. Wingrove out.”

  “Temple out.”

  She cut the connection, made sure that the vid and aud couldn’t ‘accidentally’ get activated, and leaned back in her chair. What to do now?

  * * *

  Sunday 15 August

  Sharon awoke, tried to move her head, and found she couldn’t. It took a moment to realize that someone breathing quietly behind her lay on her hair, trapping her. She smiled softly.

  Owen had spent the night – made possible because he had no Sunday classes to get up for. Made possible because she had caused him feel comfortable, loved, and cherished. And, strangely enough, she felt the same way.

  However, she operated from the knowledge that Owen loved her – or at least believed he did – while she knew that while she appreciated him, she did not return those feelings. It did feel good to have someone to curl into, someone whose arm had come around her, holding her close, safe, warm.

  His eyes shone with his feelings for her every time she looked into them. Warm, brown eyes below those black eyebrows. Eyes that held no guile.

  She suddenly shivered, and the arm about her tightened slightly in reaction. Other eyes didn’t look at her with such devotion. She had begun to almost fear Captain Harrison and his soldiers.

  All of them exhibited flat eyes, eyes that saw targets, not people. Sharon wondered where they had come from, who could have gathered together such a group – and why.

  Yesterday, at lunch in the Family Cafeteria, Harrison had eaten with her.

  “I got you your second week,” she told him.

  He nodded as if he expected no less. “Good. Better that they give than that we have to take.” He chewed on his food, then a wolfish smile appeared. “Not as much fun, though.”

  She had shivered then, too, but he hadn’t noticed, his eyes following a woman wearing the livery of Paxton lines. She didn’t like that predatory look, either.

  “I’m surprised they sent you up so early,” she idly commented, as she brought her glass to her mouth, and drank down the orange juice.

  He shrugged. “Can’t have too many of us moving at once.” He frowned. “Can’t say I like waiting.”

  “The gym?” she suggested.

  “Getting tired of it. Besides, we all want to really let go, but we can’t afford to hurt each other, not now.”

  “The zero-g rooms?”

  “Nah. We tried it once. Half of us vomited, the other half got in such a tangle that we had to call for gravity. Never again.”

  “I don’t know what to suggest, then.”

  He cleaned off his plate and stood. “Don’t worry about it, Major. We can wait; we’re good at that, even though we don’t like it – especially when we know that we’re due for action.”

  She stood with him, and carried her dishes to the collection area. They exited the cafeteria together, she heading for her office, he to whatever. At least they had maintained discipline. Not even a hint of a complaint. Bill Tannon had almost looked surprised that they hadn’t left the station.

  She took one look back, and saw three Tannon Lines people walking into the cafeteria, talking quietly to each other, not knowing what their seemingly safe station harboured.

  In bed, she shivered again, and again the arm about her tightened in reaction.

  “Owen?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Owen?”

  “Huh, what?” He woke.

  “I need to get up. You’re on my hair.”

  “Oh, sorry.” He moved enough for her get her hair free.

  She got up and looked down at his innocent face, eyes closed, breathing deep, almost back asleep.

  “You awake?”

  One eye opened. “If I have to be.”

  She laughed. “How about if I promise to return in ten minutes?”

  His other eye opened. “If I fall back to sleep, give me a shake.”

  He smiled his gut-twisting smile, and then laid his head back. But his eyes didn’t close; he took in her naked body, and gave his head the slightest shake, as if not believing his good luck.

  “Owen, you make me feel good when you look at me that way.”

  He chuckled. “You just make me feel good – all the time. Even when you’re not near.”

  Sharon turned away, then turned back. “Oh, I have a question. I ate at the Cafeteria yesterday.”

  “Hey, any indigestion isn’t my fault. Don’t hold it against me.”

  She smiled, but she wouldn’t let that stop her. “It seems as if the station population has decreased since I got here. Less people eating there.”

  He nodded. “True enough. Haida Gwaii – our new station – is coming on line even though we haven’t finished it. Some functions have shifted over to it. Warehousing, and ship supply still goes through us, here, though.”

  “What happens to FTL-1 when Haida Gwaii comes fully on-line?”

  He shrugged, his gaze wandering up and down her body. “I’m sure we’ll think of something. Probably in reserve for a bit while we overhaul it. But as trade grows, we’ll need a second station.”

  “Okay. Just wondering. See you in ten.”

  “I’d prefer five.”

  They laughed together, but inside Sharon felt little like laughing. She returned in seven minutes to find him more than ready for her. His arms drew her close even before she pulled the covers over them.

  “Take it easy, no hurry,” she said, laughing even as she said it.

  “Can’t waste time, Sharon,” he admonished her. “I’ll be gone soon.”

  “Oh, right. Live exercises. When do you go?”

  “Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Graduation on Saturday, then seven days to spend with you without worrying about tests, grumpy instructors, or nosy fathers.” He took her face between his hands, and pulled her down for a kiss.

  * * *

  Monday 16 August

  Johannes walked into the Operations Centre to find Helen on the comm.

  “Talking with her sister,” Jill said, voice low. “She just got back from Io Station.”

  “Fantastic,” Johannes heard Carol’s voice. “And the drop from hyperspace – oh, my, you have to experience it – especially while holding hands with someone. Anyway, I’ll stop talking now; you should be getting a call.”

  “Call?”

  A light lit on the board, and Jill looked up in surprise. “It’s for you,” she said to Helen. “From Io.”

  “Hi, Helen,” came Carol’s voice. “I can’t describe it. Jupiter fills the whole sky. You may have beaten me into space, but I beat you into hyperspace. We’re almost at jump. Talk to you when I get there. This is a voice from the past.”

  The voice message ended. Then came Carol’s present laughter from the speaker. “Pilot said he could work it so we’d get back before the signal did. Quite a jolt going into hyperspace, but we did it. And he timed it exactly!”

  Helen looked at Jill, then Johannes. She turned both of her palms up, smiled and shook her head. “Glad you’re enjoying yourself.”

  “Never had so much fun in all my life. Ken says I have to hang up now. Call you after I get back to Venture. Bye.”

  “Bye.” Helen shook her head again, then frowned. “You two look pretty serious. What is it?”

  Johannes looked at Jill, and tilted his head slightly.

  “Scrambled. Wondered about it at the time. You’ll have to talk with him – Ritter I think his name is.”

  “Ken Ritter. Stupid prank. Typical of him. Good pilot, but…”

  “What is it?” Helen asked.

  “Don’t pass around what your sister did to you. No doubt she thinks it just an amusing anecdote that she can regale listeners with in the future. I’ll have someone caution her as soon as she
reaches Venture.”

  “I don’t understand – was it dangerous? Did that pilot put her in danger?” Helen looked unsure as to whether to be angry or not.

  “Safe as houses,” Jill said. “It’s a proprietary information thing. If this coming war goes as badly as your Professor Preston believes it will, it won’t matter at all. If it doesn’t, it could cost the Families a lot.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Good,” said Johannes. “Better that way. Please, don’t try. Just let it be a joke that you share with your sister.”

  CHAPTER 22

  Maid Marion Scout-1

  Friday 20 August

  Inside Maid Marion’s Scout-1, Owen and his classmates sat strapped into the jump seats. Well, most of his classmates. Roy Tannon sat up forward, on the Flight Deck, taking his final exam as the Scoutship jumped and dropped at various places in Sol System.

  “Hope he makes it,” Ben Paxton said.

  “No reason why he shouldn’t,” Owen replied.

  “He struggled a bit at the end.”

  Yes he had. Well, they all had. Veronica Paxton, as his father had said, set high standards. So high that anyone graduating from her course pretty much could get a job anywhere on Detection. Just finishing her course without washing out, most considered an achievement. Real-life testing – as far as those who’d already taken it could tell – seemed easy in comparison.

  Only one of the class – outside of Roy who sat the test at the moment – remained to take it. Him. Owen felt the onset of nerves that accompanied any test. Ben had appeared relaxed for his – but then a Paxton would test him. When he mentioned that, Ben laughed.

  “Owen, she’s harder on us than anyone else. I just dreaded it when I found out that she had the instructor’s job this term. Other Paxtons fear her.”

  “Yeah, well she hates me.”

  “Maybe, but she wouldn’t have the job – the Families wouldn’t allow her to instruct – if she showed blatant favouritism, or bias against anyone because of their name.”

  Easy for him to say. He’d already passed – or so he thought.

  “Don’t worry,” Ben said, clapping him on the shoulder.

  And that change – to a friendly pat from the open antagonism with which they’d started the course – told Owen that these family rivalries, these prejudices, didn’t help the Families at all.

  “Think of something different,” Ben continued. “What are you doing after the course? Me, I get a few hours off before I get shoved onto Star Dust. Then it’s a year of on-the-job training before I can apply for Navigation.”

  “You can always study on the side,” Owen said.

  “And I’ll do just that. Whoa, jump!”

  Owen felt the slight nausea that went with jump. He swallowed twice, and then ignored the effects. He’d gone through hundreds of jumps and drops in his 19 years aboard ships – as had they all.

  “So?”

  “So, what?” Owen asked.

  “What plans have you – or your has your Family made for you – post graduation?”

  “I have a week off.” Seven glorious days to spend with Sharon.

  “Sharon?” Ben asked. “Major Temple?”

  Had he spoken aloud? He must have. Ben stared at him for what seemed an hour, though the stare actually lasted just seconds. He whistled lowly.

  “Still training with her? We got warned off – but good.”

  “Me, too.”

  Ben’s eyes widened. “And you’re still seeing her? If your Family finds out...”

  “They know. My father warned me off. I told him where he could shove it.” Owen laughed. “Well, not in those words.”

  “I should hope not. But, Owen, boy, you have balls!” He shook his head. “Oooh! Drop.”

  Drop induced a short-lived euphoria. Superstition said that if you dropped ‘linked’ – holding hands – with someone, you’d have that connection forever. Only romantics who hadn’t grown up on ships believed that guff. Still, dropping linked increased the euphoria each felt. He’d dreamed of dropping linked – holding hands or linked in some other way – with Sharon. A man needed his dreams.

  “Still doing self-defence?”

  Owen wished he’d shut up. “Some. She helps me with that; I help her in the zero-g room.”

  Ben grinned. “Women always look better in zero-g. I’d love to see Major Temple there.”

  Owen bristled, but then reminded himself that where Ben might take in her clothed form from a distance, he got to see it without clothes, and close-up. He had reality. Let Ben have his dreams.

  “Mr Yrden,” Veronica Paxton called. “Your turn.”

  He jolted, and Ben laughed. “See, thinking about something else takes your mind off of it.”

  Roy took his seat, and Owen floated onto the Flight Deck, and strapped himself in. His eyes automatically went to the detector.

  “Close in, clear,” he reported. He adjusted it. “Medium range, clear. Long range ... we have an asteroid.” He quickly took readings. “Range 500km. Trajectory does not interfere with the ship on this course. Otherwise, all clear.”

  “Very good, Mr Yrden,” Veronica Paxton, sitting beside him said. “Pilot.”

  The pilot – also a trainee, doing the job under the watchful eye of a Treverston instructor – did his calculations, and started the burn that pushed them all back in their seats. And then they jumped again.

  With the rapid jumps and drops, and all passengers being trainees in a scout, rather than a shuttle, they made no announcements. The pilot trainee’s final tests would, no doubt, include them.

  “Dropping in thirty seconds,” the trainee warned Owen, who got ready on the detector.

  Several jumps and drops later, Owen felt trickles of sweat running down his body under his shirt and emergency suit. Sometime previous to the test, someone had dropped navigable buoys with transponders on them. The transponders gave indication of ships. And Owen struggled to catch them all, their trajectories, the varying degrees of possible danger.

  Surely, this test must be the last. He felt like he’d sat in this seat for hours.

  “Jumping,” came the warning. Owen breathed out and relaxed. Detectors were worthless in hyperspace.

  “Dropping.”

  Not again.

  “Close range ... clear. Medium Range...” Oh no! “Ship. Closing. Interception course. Geez! Weapons hot on that one! Possible pirate.” He toggled on the recorder.

  “Shields up,” the pilot trainee stammered. “On max!”

  Instructors Treverston and Paxton remained quiet, as if stunned by events.

  “Firing!” Owen said, voice strained. Shields flared. “Suggest immediate jump!”

  “Engines recharging,” came an equally strained reply.

  “Evasive,” Owen suggested, his suggestion almost an order.

  The scout-ship shifted sideways as the trainee applied attitude and manoeuvring thrusters, and then went to full burn.

  “He’s turning, giving chase. Firing again.”

  The beam flared their rear shields. But a ship of that size couldn’t match the acceleration of a small scout under full burn, and they rapidly pulled away.

  Owen’s eyes widened. “Missile fired.” He traced it. “One hundred kilometres.” The sweat poured off of him. He blinked it out of his eyes. “Fifty kilometres, and rapidly closing. Forty. Thirty. Twenty.” Would it all end here? “Ten kilometres.”

  “Shields down. Jumping.”

  The missile and pirate disappeared from the detector. Owen took in a shaky breath and turned off the recorder. “I got it,” he reported. “Looks like an old Filpor-class freighter, upgraded and up-armed. Must have new engines to support that acceleration. Logged, and we’ll have to send a report as soon as we drop. Warn everyone. Also, a report to the various militaries.”

  Beside him, Paxton laughed, and Owen saw the pilot instructor grinning. The pilot trainee’s hands, however, trembled. He wasn’t smiling.

  “A
nd that ends the test,” Veronica said. “For both of you. Well done, Mr Fontaine, Mr Yrden.”

  “Test?” Owen asked. “That was a missile – not a transponder echo. A real missile.”

  “True enough,” Pilot Treverston agreed. “No warhead, and it would have turned away if it had gotten within five kilometres of the ship. Even if it hadn’t, our shields would have deflected it.” He turned his attention from Owen. “Pilot trainee Fontaine, you are dismissed. Please send up pilot trainee Nakamura for return to FTL-1.”

  Owen still felt his own hands trembling. “Instructor Paxton?”

  “Yes, Mr Yrden?”

  “We would have felt such manoeuvres had they occurred before. Why didn’t anyone else get that test? Why only me?”

  Surprisingly, she smiled. “That part of your test didn’t belong to you, Mr Yrden. That belonged to Mr Fontaine alone. You just came along for the ride, so to speak.”

  “And he didn’t do too well,” Pilot Treverston said. “He didn’t initiate evasive manoeuvres until you called for it. Good call, by the way.”

  “Now, Mr Yrden, would you care to man the detector for our drop back into Earth-space, and our docking with FTL-1?”

  “I would like that very much, Instructor Paxton.”

  “Excellent. Once there, you all – detector trainees – can give your families the news that you passed the course.”

  * * *

  London, England

  Saturday 21 August

  Kiera turned off the vid. The news frightened her. Sidney no longer pooh-poohed it, and everywhere she looked, people grew tense.

  The chrono showed that she had two hours before Sidney would return from his trip to town. With all the tension, she didn’t feel much like going out any longer. And she lived in dread that Pierre would call while she was out.

  Even at the last of her short, yet wonderful vacation, he had not told her the reasoning behind his instructions. However, as he had continued to treat her with utmost respect, asking of her nothing more than to enjoy herself, she trusted his word that it was important – both to her and to them (Sidney and Pierre). Mostly, he stressed that she would greatly benefit from remaining with Sidney until he called.