The wreckage of thousands of vessels covered that metal world, both the drones of the Singularity and the jets of those come to fight it. The gears and cogs on the surface had fallen still. The lights had turned off. The machine was hollow, no ghost left in the shell. A dead computer the size of a world, strewn with ruin. The floating corpse of the Singularity.
It grew from one life, Riff thought, standing at the windshield. One living creature, an alien life form who built a machine . . . who started a chain-reaction that nearly destroyed the cosmos.
He shuddered. He wondered how many more life forms were out there right now, perhaps even in the future, building machines, building computers whose intelligence eclipsed their own, whose will to serve would become the desire to dominate. Suddenly hunting living aliens—even brutish skelkrins and winged spiders—seemed simple.
"By the gods of rock and metal!" Piston explained, barging onto the bridge. Soot stained the gruffle's beard and tufted eyebrows. "I've never seen so much damage to a starship. I've been retired for a few days—just a few days!—and I come back to a ship full of holes, fried fuses, shattered engines, a broken wing, collapsed heating vents, cracked portholes, and the list goes on." The engineer shook his fist. "Damn it, Twig, I thought you were ready for this."
The little mechanic trailed after him, her belt jangling with wrenches, her pockets jingling with bolts and screws. "It's not my fault, Piston! We were fighting robots. Giant robots! A whole robot planet."
Piston ignored her. He lolloped toward a collapsed control panel. The joystick, throttle, and monitors had been torn out, leaving a trail of cables. "Oh for pity's sake, look at this mess! Who was flying this ship, a Carinian stone beast?" He tugged at his beard. "I've never seen a bunch of clods cause so much damage. Just a few days! You even destroyed the kitchen microwave. The microwave!"
Romy entered the bridge too, back in her dinosaur pajamas. The demon bit her lip. "Well, the microwave, uhm . . . that wasn't the Singularity." She glanced around nervously. "For future reference, nobody try to cook robot isopods. They don't taste like real ones."
Piston groaned and returned to the smashed control panel, grumbling as he sifted through the mess of uprooted cables.
"That does it," the gruffle muttered. "I can't possibly go back to retirement now. You lot would just destroy the damn ship again. You clods are forcing a very old gruffle back to work, when I should be enjoying the autumn of my years on Haven. Damn whippersnappers have no respect for the elderly or for a good starship, I say, and . . ." His voice faded to muffled grumbles.
Riff struggled to hide his smile. He patted Piston's shoulder, mussed little Twig's hair, and walked off the bridge.
He walked downstairs to the hallway, then paused. He stood still for a long time. There was somebody he had to see, a conversation he had to have, a pain he had to bring up.
He took a deep breath, prepared to walk to his quarters, when a light from the kitchen caught his eye. Riff frowned, stepped into the kitchen, and saw beams streaming through the portholes.
He leaned closer and his eyes widened.
"Jets," he whispered. "Scorpion jets."
A dozen of the slick, golden starjets were flying toward the Dragon Huntress, their hulls emblazoned with a red tower, the sigil of House Tashei, Ashmar's royal family. Among the small, single-seater jets flew a larger luxury vehicle, its panels jeweled. The convoy halted by the Dragon Huntress, and a covered walkway stretched out from the larger vessel, connecting with the Dragon's airlock.
Riff shoved his task to the back of his mind. He would have to have that conversation later. For now, he rushed onto the main bridge and toward the airlock. A knock came on the door, and Riff pressed the controls, opening the airlock for his visitors.
Two servants in livery stepped onto the main deck, raised trumpets—one at each side of Riff's head—and blared out a fanfare. Riff winced and covered his ears. The servants lowered the trumpets, stepped back, and stood at attention. Through the doorway stepped another figure, tall and stern, clad in a white cloak over golden armor.
"King Tavyn," Riff whispered, collected himself, and managed a salute. "Sir! I mean . . ." He bowed instead. "Your Highness?" He glanced up, hoping he had used the correct epithet.
The king stared at him—a stare that made battle axes and wrecking balls seem soft and fluffy. Then he glanced over his shoulder. "Are you sure, daughter, that this is the hero who saved the cosmos?"
Riff's eyes widened. Nova! Nova was here, entering the airlock!
The ashai princess nodded. "Hard to believe, isn't it?" She gave Riff the faintest of smiles. "But it's true, Father. He saved us. With a little help from his friends."
"A lot of help," Riff confessed. He looked around him and winced. "I'm sorry, Your Highness, this place is hardly worthy of royalty. I, uhm . . ." He kicked a pair of polka-dot boxer shorts and a few pizza crusts under the couch. "Ignore that please."
Nova gestured down hard with her eyes, and Riff cringed and zipped up his fly. His cheeks burned.
King Tavyn did not seem amused. "You are right, Starfire." He lifted his boot off a piece of gum, grimaced, and placed his foot down again. "This starship is not worthy of royalty. It's not worthy of nobility. It's not worthy of commoners. It's not worthy of any living creature who seeks to live with a semblance of dignity." He sighed deeply. "Yet to my daughter, it is home."
Nova stepped forward and came to stand beside Riff. He looked at her, eyes wide. "Does that mean that . . . you're coming back?"
She nodded. "Can't let you lot fly off without me. Look what happened last time I left. You ended up crashing onto a giant robot planet."
Riff stiffened. "Well, technically that's because Giga wasn't helping with the controls, and Piston wasn't here to fix the breaking engines, and—" He gulped as Nova turned on her electric whip. "I mean, totally because you weren't here." His voice softened. "Thank you, Nova. Thank you for coming back. I was heartbroken when you left, and . . ." He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to sweep her into his arms, to carry her to bed, to make love to her. But he forced himself to turn toward her father. "Thank you, King Tavyn. Thank you for bringing her here."
The king suddenly looked old. His shoulders stooped the slightest. "I've learned, Starfire, that it's not my right to command my daughter. She left home as a youth, chasing a love I thought could not endure—a love with a human, with a man from a species I thought weak. But Nova is older now, and wiser, wise enough to choose her own path. And . . . I am wiser too." His voice dropped. "Even kings can be fools. Even old men can learn new wisdom. Look after her, Captain Starfire. Look after all your crew, and keep looking after this cosmos we live in. I hope that someday Nova returns to me, to her home. And I hope it's from her own will, not my own."
The king seemed to hesitate a moment, then stepped forward and embraced Nova. For a long time, father and daughter stood holding each other. Then, without another word, the King of Ashmar and his servants turned and left the Dragon Huntress.
Once the airlock was closed and the king's convoy gone, Riff pulled Nova into his arms. And he too simply held her for a very long time, silent.
"Do you want to go to your room?" she whispered, a crooked smile on her lips. "Take a nap?"
He did. Oh gods of blues, he did.
But not now. Not yet.
He stroked her hair. "Will you wait for me here, Nova? There's something I have to do."
He saw in her eyes that she understood. She nodded. "Let me go find that tin-man brother of yours. Last I heard, that rusty relic was claiming he shot down more robots than me." She barked a laugh. "Can you believe that?"
She wandered off, calling out Steel's name, seeking him throughout the ship.
Riff took a deep breath. Joy, relief, and a hint of sadness mixed in his heart. He walked into the corridor. He opened the door to his chamber. He stepped in.
"Giga," he said softly.
* * * * *
She sat on his bed. The same bed he h
ad bound her to. The same bed where she had cackled, screamed, vowed to kill them all. Now Giga sat with her knees pressed together, her hands clasped on her lap. No more steel cables wrapped around her, and she wore a new kimono, the ivory-colored silk embroidered with white lotus blossoms.
"Captain," she whispered.
Riff sat beside her on the bed. "Are you connected again, Giga? Interfacing all right with the Dragon Huntress?"
She nodded, then lowered her head. Her black, chin-length hair drooped to hide her face. "Yes, Captain. Happy to comply."
Something warm and sad seemed to melt inside of Riff. He placed a finger under Giga's chin, gently raised her head, and looked into her dark eyes.
"I want you to understand something, Giga. Something important. You never have to serve me. You never have to call me 'sir' or 'Captain.' You never have to be happy to comply with anything." He held her hand. "You have free will. You proved that down on the planet. You can make your own choices. Not a choice an algorithm makes for you, but your own decision with your own consciousness. I saw that consciousness. I saw it down on the planet, and I saw it again and again on this ship. You are alive, Giga, and you are not just hardware and software, and you are not just a servant. You are a friend. A friend to all of us. A friend to me." He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "You're my best friend."
She lowered her head again. A tear trailed down her cheek. She looked back up at him, and her lips quivered. "Sir, I . . . in the hub, I told you that I love you." She held his hand. "And I meant it. And . . . at first, when we came back here to the ship, and Nova wasn't here, I . . ." Pain filled her eyes. "I dared to hope. To hope that I would be more than a friend to you. That you could love me too. Love me not as a captain loves an android but as a man loves a woman. What does that make me, sir? Does that make me bad?"
He pulled her into his arms. He held her against him, and he kissed the top of her head. "It makes you human," he whispered. "I love you too, Giga, as much as I love anyone. Nova is back, that's true. Nova and I have loved each other for a long time, and I cannot leave her." He wiped her tears away. "You understand that, right? You understand how I feel?"
Giga sniffed and looked at her lap. "It hurts to be alive. To have feelings. To have a heart that can break. Sometimes I wish I were only a mindless robot, a machine that could not love. But . . ." She embraced him again, squeezing him. "But I wouldn't give this up. Not these feelings. Not this ship. Not this . . ." She hesitated for a moment, then smiled through her tears. "Not this life."
Through the porthole, Riff watched the ashai jets gather to fly away, and he watched starstrikers blast their guns down at the planet, destroying whatever remained of its computers. For a long time, Riff sat there, holding Giga close. The lights from outside streamed across his face, and Giga's scent of jasmine filled his nostrils.
Finally he pulled back and looked into her eyes again. "Giga, there's something more I want to tell you."
She tilted her head. "Sir?"
"Do you remember what happened on Haven? When I carried you out of the Dragon Huntress?"
She nodded. "Yes, sir. I lost consciousness. My memories were almost erased. I almost died." She shuddered. "I cannot leave the Dragon Huntress. Not ever. I'm part of her. The only reason I was able to leave on Antikythera is because the Singularity let me leave." She sighed. "I'll never be able to leave again."
Riff squeezed her hand. "Well, I talked to Piston about that. For a while, we had to keep your wireless driver away, unplugged from the Dragon Huntress until it was safe to let you control the ship again. And while the wireless driver was out of the dashboard, Piston had a look at it. He took it down to the engine room and plugged it into his computers and ran some tests. And . . . he thinks he can make a few modifications. He should be able to boost its range." Riff smiled. "You'll be able to step outside of the Dragon Huntress now. Not very far. Maybe only a few hundred meters. But enough to join us on different planets. To enjoy some shore leave with us every once and a while."
Her eyes widened, and she gasped. Fresh tears filled her eyes. "Really, Captain?"
"Well, we have to test it first, and Piston still has some work to do on it, but . . . yes." His smile widened into a grin. "Really."
Giga leaped onto him, hugging him more tightly than ever, and she wept onto his shoulder. "Arigato, Captain. Domo arigato!" She gasped. "I have to thank Piston too. I have to find him a present!" She hopped off the bed and rushed toward the mirror. "Do I look like I was crying? Is my hair a mess?" She laughed. "Oh, arigato, Captain."
She raced out of the chamber, calling out to Piston.
Riff remained alone in his bedchamber. For a while he stood at the porthole, staring outside at the dead mechanical planet.
I almost lost them, he thought. I almost lost them all.
He took a deep breath and tightened his lips. From the main deck, he heard Romy laughing and calling them all over for a game of Snakes and Ladders.
Soon they would fly away from this planet. Soon they would face more enemies, more danger. But for now, Riff turned away from the window. He walked into the main deck. He sat on the couch, squeezing in between Steel and Romy. The others all gathered around the table, rolling dice and laughing. Riff glanced at Nova, who smiled at him. He looked over at Giga, who was rolling the dice, staring intently at the board. A sadness filled Riff—a bittersweet sort of sadness, the realization of mortality perhaps, the comprehension of what he had almost lost.
We aren't just a group of mercenaries, he thought. We're a family. And this isn't just a rusty old starship. It's a home.
Romy elbowed him, interrupting his thoughts.
"Go on!" The demon shoved the dice into his hand. "It's your turn."
He rolled the dice and he moved his piece, climbing a ladder, hoping to never run into any snakes.
CHAPTER THIRTY:
FALLING COCONUTS
Riff lounged on the beach chair, sipping a pina colada from a hollowed-out coconut. The sky was blue, the sea bluer, the sand soft under his feet.
"This is living, old boy," he said. "To hell with technology. This, right here, is life." Riff turned to look at his brother. "Though I still can't figure out why the hell you're wearing your armor to the beach."
Steel sat beside Riff on his own beach chair. The knight wore his full plate ceremonial armor, and his antique sword hung at his side. In his gauntlet, he held his own pina colada coconut, complete with a cocktail umbrella.
"I do not condone bare flesh." The knight frowned as a pair of lovely ladies walked by, most of their flesh very bare. "I'd rather stay in armor."
"I prefer bathing suits," Riff said. He wore a pair of trunks he had picked up on the way over to Kitika, this resort planet. "I rather . . . like . . . them . . . oh . . ."
His mouth went dry as Nova stepped out of the water ahead, tossed back her wet hair, and came walking toward them. The ashai princess wore a gold bikini that made Riff's jaw unhinge.
"Stick that tongue back in, buddy," she said when she reached him, "or somebody's going to trip over it. Got me a coconut?"
He nodded and handed her one. "That'll be five credits."
"That'll be my foot up your backside." Nova glanced up at the sun and winced. "Damn sun here's almost as hot as back on Ashmar. Would you rub some suntan lotion on—"
"Yes." Riff took the bottle and squeezed lotion into his hands.
As he worked, the sound of deep grumbles reached his ears. He looked across the beach to see Piston and Twig in the sand, working away at their sand castle. The elaborate structure rose several feet tall, a complex of bridges, towers, and moats.
"You've got the central load bearing pillars wrong!" Piston was rumbling. "How do you expect to balance the tower roof without adding some buttresses, you clod?"
Twig groaned. "It's your job to add structural support! I'm busy building moats before the tide comes in."
Piston tugged his beard. "Well of course it'll have to be my job now. I— T
wig, those moats!"
A wave washed ashore, quickly filling the little canals dug into the sand, then overflowing to knock over the castle's outer wall and several towers. Piston and Twig moaned and quickly got to arguing over whose fault it was.
Riff sighed and looked away. "Never can relax, those two."
"That's how they relax." Nova pointed at her back. "Now keep rubbing, lotion boy."
He got back to work, only to be interrupted again, this time by ear-piercing squeals and giggles. He looked up to see Romy racing across the beach, kicking up sand. The demon wore a pair of rubber flippers, huge purple sunglasses, and an inflatable ducky around her waist. Giga was chasing her, wearing a floral bathing suit, firing a water gun at the demon. As the two raced across the beach, Romy plowed right through Piston and Twig's castle, incurring howls of protest.
"Captain!" Giga cried as she ran, laughing and firing her water gun at Romy. "Oh, Captain, it's wonderful!" She paused, panting, and gazed around with bright eyes. "The sand. The water. The fresh air. The world! A real world, not just in photos but really here around me, and—ah!"
The android squealed with delight as Romy hopped onto her, shoved her down into the sand, and began wrestling.
"I told you all," Steel said, staring at the scene with stern eyes. "We should have gone to the Marble Monastery of Maruvia for our vacation."
Nova rolled her eyes. "Yes, and then you could have prayed and everyone else could have killed themselves out of boredom." She scooped up sand and tossed it onto the knight. "There! Now you have to take your armor off or you'll chafe all over."
Steel groaned and marched off, muttering something about going to explore the ancient castle ruins at the nearby hills.
With Nova fully lotioned, Riff grabbed Steel's abandoned pina colada. He was just about to settle back for another lazy drink when the cry rose from ahead.
"Woo! Woohoo! Look at me, kids! Look at me! Look . . . look out!"
Riff cursed and leaped aside.
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