by Scott Rhine
“What? No. I can’t.”
Roz hit a few virtual buttons and displayed the contract on the wrist of her uniform. “Actually, as of this star system, you’re obligated to as a partner.”
“No, I didn’t agree to that.” Deke read through the legalese franticly.
“Shares bring responsibilities. If I have to find them work, you have to make sure they’re happy and understand their roles.”
He looked genuinely distraught. “Now I’ll never have time for my carvings.”
“Your what?”
“I make architectural models out of small pieces of wood.”
Roz smiled. “Awesome. The new engineer might even be able to help you with your little houses.”
“This is no child’s toy. I’m constructing a scale representation of the Veekarat Cathedral to bring me closer to the Void.”
“Sure. Might I suggest bonding with him about what an unreasonable perfectionist I am?”
Deke nodded. “That would be an easy entrance to any conversation. I will use that to begin each weekly meeting. What will the agenda be?”
“Improvise,” Roz said.
“In what way?” Deke asked.
“Have you ever played Human cards? Max and Reuben like to play, but they need at least four guys. Kesh can’t hold little pieces of paper in his claws.”
“And this would be considered management?”
“If you do it a couple times a week and make an effort to address any problems for the Bat crew, I’ll even provide the snacks.”
Deke licked his lips. “In that case, I accept this promotion.”
Chapter 23 – Butterflies of Doom
For ten nights, the experiments with card games succeeded. Roz could sense the web of possibility and choice around her like a dance. However, Max quit playing after he won with a royal flush. He used his winnings to purchase celebration food and gave her a warning look.
Once the ship dipped into subspace, Roz applied the same technique of analysis to the matrix model of the ship. The moment she held the entire problem in her mind at once expressed as a probability tree, she told Echo, “It makes so much more sense like this. I just wish I could show it to you.”
Echo pounced. One hand feathered the back of Roz’s neck as the other slipped over the base of her spine. “Concentrate and open.”
Roz held her mental image in place with an iron grip as Echo inserted herself into the planetarium of her mind.
Roz held her breath.
The sensation was rather like putting two hands in the same glove—intense pressure and awkwardness but no pain. Control had to be negotiated. She could feel the Magi’s excitement about the solution, which fed Roz’s own. The feedback built to a fevered pitched. When Echo tried to turn the matrix for a better view, they both fell over, panting.
Roz couldn’t form sentences.
“It will become easier over time,” Echo whispered, stroking her hair. “You’ll stretch, and we’ll learn to communicate better.”
The next day, Echo could tell from Roz’s eyes that she was holding the entire equation again. They joined with a suddenness that made Roz gasp. Her vision flashed white. Concentrating, she kept her balance for several minutes until the rotating point of view inside her made her dizzy. She had to grip the sofa to avoid falling off.
Echo dictated several observations in their audio log files. One theory about the data clusters led to Roz simplifying her internal model, making the problem easier to hold.
“We uplift one another,” Echo said. The two remained entwined, neither with much energy to spare.
Roz couldn’t walk for several minutes afterward, and one eye had trouble focusing. “Give me another few days before you try that again.” She was so drained by the experience that she slept twelve hours.
This sharing technique several times a week led to a flood of ideas for both of them. Their research made great bounds in proving the correctness of the new cells but revealed many potential problems lurking in the complex implementation. Roz would have to review every piece of hardware in the ship based on this new data. Three steps forward. Two steps back.
After the first few joins, Roz began to look forward to sharing. Soon, she gave Echo glimpses of other aspects of her life: the physical rush of seeing Max, the multi-layered emotions surrounding Alyssa, and the friendship with Ivy. One mental flash was worth ten thousand words. Echo warned, “Don’t spend time alone with Max. I worry about your chastity.”
“Everyone else on our ship has been doing it. Why not me?” Roz asked. She wasn’t planning to have sex but thought the restriction hypocritical. “The act might finally push Max into committing. He shares so little with me.”
“Chastity before marriage is practice against temptation. It builds the muscles needed for fidelity after marriage. Without the Collective, you won’t psi-bond. Every day will be a new choice to remain with your partners.”
Roz wanted to give Echo something to remember her by because the two were only able to spend time together when the ship was in subspace. When Echo wasn’t with Max, she retreated to her medical stasis unit.
As her final gift of the session, Roz replayed highlights from the shopping on Flowers because Echo had not been out of her room for over a century. The memory of a breeze on her face elicited tears of gratitude from the Magi.
Afterward, Roz couldn’t help but wonder, Why is it she never shares her memories with me? Then again, Max is a sphinx, too. Are they using me for the ship? Is she planning to dump me as soon as it’s delivered and working? Is that why she doesn’t want me to commit to Max, because this is a sham?
****
Three months after the departure from Phoenix, inbound to Butterfly station, Roz complained from the pilot’s chair, “I’m tired of bad news.”
“I thought Max’s PTSD treatments with Echo were going well,” Ivy said, fiddling with cargo manifests.
“Yeah.” Echo would walk through intense memories in detail and attempt to deescalate the triggers. “He just has so many incidents from the Gigaparsec War, and I keep adding to them.”
“Like almost getting shot?”
“The other day, I ran into him at the pond during his exercise hour.”
“In that skimpy bikini?” Ivy guessed.
“Shut up. That isn’t what got his heart racing. I dipped under the surface, and he freaked. He dove in with a weapon to save me.”
“He’s seen friends dragged underwater and eaten by Phibs,” Ivy explained.
“How would I know? Max doesn’t talk to me about it.”
Ivy asked, “So what has you down?”
“We can’t treat him for the damage caused to his hands by the sonic gloves, at least not on the ship. He took an antidote before a Phib gas attack, and the counter-agent bonded to his nerves, blocking out most medicines that would help him now.”
“Maybe you could try some alternate treatments,” Ivy said. “He tends to drop things when he’s in a reinforced pain cycle. A neck and shoulder massage could help him relax and ease his symptoms. It’s also great foreplay.”
“I’d ask you to show me, but the crew is already talking about how much time you and I spend together.” Remembering how nice the foot massage had been, Roz reconsidered. “You know what, screw the crew. I need to help my future husband.”
“That’s the spirit. I’ll show you the basics, and then you can practice on me.” Ivy stood behind the pilot’s couch and began stroking Roz’s neck.
“Everything okay with Reuben?” Roz asked. The question caused Ivy to pinch too hard.
“Eh. We’ve cooled things a little until we offload the newbies. We don’t want anymore rumors starting. I’ve been staying in your room while you’re in with Echo.”
“Sorry.”
“Reuben’s been making commitment noises.”
“That’s wonderful!” Roz said, a tiny bit jealous. Max hadn’t used the L word yet.
“No. I’m assigned to be his bodyguard, nothi
ng more. My regional superior reamed me out for crossing the line.”
“You’ve been in contact? Great. How’s the professor’s trial going?”
Ivy worked shoulder muscles. “I don’t want you to tense up again.”
“I promise I won’t. I’ve been practicing not overreacting.”
Growling, Ivy replied, “The trial ended in record time. One of Aviar’s messengers got nabbed, one with real terrorist ties. I’ve read the guy’s dossier, and he’s pretty hardcore. The government already shipped them both out toward the supergiant.”
“At least we got the cell buddy we wanted to cover the professor. I’m sure Aviar will use his connections to slow the transport until we rescue both Bats. This just gives him more incentive.”
Ivy turned her commentary to the art of massage until she finished.
After checking the ship’s status, Roz placed herself behind the communications chair. “Your turn.” Once Roz had the basic motions down, she asked, “What killer product is Kesh buying from the low-tech world?”
“A delicacy that the Bats at the research station in the next system should pay a premium for—grubs.”
“Ick.”
“Hey, I talked him out of ivory. Don’t worry. Reuben says he’s tried these bugs, and they’re tastier than lemon pudding.”
An intense pressure in her ears made Roz stop the massage for a moment.
“Are you okay?” asked Ivy. “Have you been overdoing the PM practice?”
“No. Mostly, I’ve been learning the interconnected patterns and intentionally not affecting the outcome. When I do, Max gets a little luckier, or the last person to make fun of my cooking misses a straight by one card.”
“Oh, hi, Echo,” Ivy said to an empty space across the room.
Could the out-of-body astrogator be the cause of her discomfort? When Ivy said good-bye, Roz’s hearing cleared like she had shaken water out of her ears. My connection to the Collective Unconscious is healing, or I’m bonding to Echo. She decided not to tell anyone else until she could confirm the symptoms were related.
****
Three of the Bat specialists, including the ceramics and plasma experts, didn’t get hired on Butterfly. The planet didn’t have enough infrastructure to capitalize on them yet. Kesh assured the partners that the research facility would purchase everything the ship still had aboard, including the engineers. He kept two Bats in cargo stasis and didn’t ask their opinions on the matter. Yenang wanted to remain awake to work with Roz and Ivy on the photovore prototypes. He was fascinated by the glass alloy radiator fins and the gravitic stabilizers. “You’re adding a feedback system to make the ship self-adjusting. Your design is almost like a living cell.”
While they debated in broken Banker and AI Bat over the proper alignment of the abstract sculpture, Roz heard a garbled voice say, “Use the two existing holes in the deck to mount it.”
Roz replied, “Promised one, your interface is breaking up a little this close to the transducer coupling. What was that?”
“There is no interface,” Ivy whispered. “She’s out-ay of-ay ody-bay.” Bats couldn’t follow the Pig Latin.
Roz whirled. She couldn’t see her betrothed, but Echo clearly said, “We uplift one another, beloved.”
“I’ll be right back,” Roz said, handing Yenang her wrench.
She ran to the lift and rode it to Max’s room. Giddy, Roz tapped on his door.
He opened it with Jeeves riding him like a backpack. “Hey, gorgeous.”
Beaming, Roz said, “I can hear Echo in my mind. I don’t sense anyone else, but this means I could be normal some day.” She was holding in the tears of joy, waiting for him to pick her up and hug her in congratulations.
Instead, he closed the door in her face.
She gave him a moment. Obviously, he was upset that she achieved the link first because he had been with Echo longer. She tapped again. When he didn’t open, she grew angry. “Maxwell, you’re being a jealous butthead. Come out here and talk about this. Just because I’m no longer a poor little null girl doesn’t mean I can’t be part of this triad.”
He opened the door for her to come in. After she sat on the bed next to Jeeves, he closed them in for privacy. “I’m not envious. I’m just worried for you.”
She crossed her arms, determined not to hear his lame excuse. “How so?”
“At university, I took an elective in English Literature.”
“Show off.”
Max rubbed a spot on his neck. “One short story affected me more than the others. In fact, I was just rereading it. A scientist falls in love with a beautiful woman with one flaw—a birthmark that covers most of her face. Otherwise, she’s the most perfect person he’s ever seen. Still, he becomes obsessed with a formula that will remove the one remaining imperfection.”
“Doesn’t sound so bad.”
“It was the only thing holding her in this flawed world. Without it, she didn’t belong and the angels took her. The scientist lost her forever.”
“Ah.” Roz froze, reminded of the reading-comprehension tests on the scholarship test.
“You’re the woman, querida.” Indirectly, he had just called her beautiful and perfect. For Max, this was a Shakespearean soliloquy.
“You won’t lose me.” As proof, she pinned him to the bed with kisses.
Jeeves left through the doggie door, not wanting to be crushed by the rolling around.
Several minutes later, several people pounded on the door. Before they could acknowledge the interruption, Ivy pushed inside and tossed a bucket of cold water on the couple. “I knew it! Get off of him, or you’ll kill us all.”
Remarkably unruffled, Max took a towel off the bedpost to give to Roz. He grabbed a second from the closet for himself. “You could’ve used your words.”
Beside Ivy, Reuben ogled Roz’s wet shirt for a moment before explaining, “Kesh stashed some of the grubs in the defective stasis unit, and they went through metamorphosis on the trip.”
“So?” Roz adjusted her shirt. Somehow her bra strap had become uncoupled.
“Locusts have flooded the cargo level,” Ivy said. “If we don’t stop them, they could eat our primary life-support system, the trees.”
Roz was reluctant to leave Max. “So wake the other engineers and let them help. Give everybody nets.”
Ivy shook her head. “The black locusts are notoriously hard to catch, and they bite.”
Max cleared his throat. “It does seem like too much of a coincidence that the moment you … express interest in me, a system you just repaired crashes. Maybe your mother was right.”
“Don’t take her side!” Roz shouted. The light overhead started to flicker.
Ivy whispered, “You may need your tranq pistol if she doesn’t calm down.”
Roz closed her eyes. “Minder, seal off all subsections of the cargo floor, including ladders and air ducts.”
The air system whooshed and fell silent.
Roz asked Max, “If these locusts were enemy soldiers, how would you attack them?”
Max paused for a moment. “Wait until evening, after things cool and darkness falls. They’ll go dormant.”
Nodding, Roz said, “Minder, lower the temperature in the biozones to eight degrees as soon as possible. That shouldn’t kill off too much vegetation. Kesh, man the bridge and stay alert. Everyone else, grab the flashlights from the emergency kits in each subsection. Once everyone reports ready, we’ll turn out the lights.”
Reuben turned to Max. “She can be really bossy.”
“Yeah, but she’s been right so far.”
Roz ignored the exchange. “While you guys hunt, I’ll fabricate some screens to fit over all the air ducts so we can still breathe.”
From the hallway, Kesh said, “Be careful not to smash the bugs. We can still sell them. They’ll even be fattened up for market.”
When Roz found Jeeves, he was shivering and sick. Max said the vomiting was from overeating. Jeeves had gorged on loc
usts. Still, she felt like a terrible mother. She put him under the sheets and warmed him until he stopped shaking. Alyssa earned points by bringing the little one chicken tortilla soup.
Chapter 24 – Experiment
Somewhere in the insanity, the crew gelled as a cohesive unit. Far Traveler Unlimited became a profit-generating machine. They delivered radios everywhere and did a robust business in bootleg music. Young and disenfranchised Bats couldn’t get enough.
At the asteroid research post, they traded bugs and other staples for robot shells, software, turbine fans, and odd sculptures. They had to wait an extra week for custom fabrication. The delay made Roz pull her hair out until Ivy pointed out that the wait for cold-blooded ships to Niisham could be as long as five years.
Two of the remaining engineers disembarked at the research post to work on cutting-edge robotics. Yenang stayed with the ship, too fascinated with what it was becoming. “The design is like nothing I’ve ever experienced. Some of the crystal parts in the manifold actually sing when we immerse.” Roz agreed to apprentice him, on the condition that he leave by the eighth stop, a famous Bat shipyard where they could purchase more photovores.
They couldn’t find any tree specialists at the asteroid colony to repair the ship’s oxygen recycling, so she put it on the top of the list for the next trading planet. She told Kesh, “Favor female horticulture specialists of fox red, orange, or brown, but let Deke interview them and make the final choice.”
“Associating with Magi has made you sneaky,” said the Saurian.
“She’ll be with us for over a month. No reason everyone involved shouldn’t enjoy that time.”
Kesh asked, “You’re going to play matchmaker?”
“If we find him a mate, Deke might stay with us through Magi space.”
****
Though Kesh succeeded as a merchant, Roz worried every day about reaching the gateway system in time to save Professor Crakik. Her equation changes were sound and tested, but she still needed to solve the drift problem.
The parade of planets passed in a blur for Roz as she circled in the twin orbits of Max and the Enigma equation. She stopped learning planetary names. At a water world, Sphere took on sunfish, optical glass, pearls, and plankton.