“Especially since we couldn’t even get the cladding off to be used where it would do some good here,” Casper added.
“It’ll be a relief to have her out of the way,” Nimisha said. “She’s beginning to get on everyone’s nerves.”
Meterios had gone through the Broken Bird wreck with Brad Karpla—or rather those areas of it humans could access. Karpla had been keen to see what sort of weapons the ship had mounted. Jon had explained that, according to the Sh’im, they had carried only asteroid deterrents, but Meterios and Karpla had to make a hands-on verification. Since the “cannon” had been situated in the now-broken nose of the ship, they were inaccessible. Karpla could find no other defensive or offensive gear and came back rather grumpy after a hot day’s climbing through the wreck.
“She got real dirty,” Tim announced with a massive grin on his face. What he didn’t say, and which the adults knew from other sources, was that he and his particular Sh’im cronies had shadowed the pair.
“Captain Meterios? Dirty?” Nimisha said, feigning surprise. “That would have been worth seeing.”
“No,” Tim replied. “She was real angry, too, and we kept out of her way.”
“Just as well, or you’d be in for another chewing out,” Nimisha said. In Meterios’s opinion, children should be seen and never heard. Tim usually ordered his Sh’im gang about in a voice that a drill sergeant would have envied.
“I don’t know how she keeps her uniforms in such impeccable condition, but she always turns herself out properly,” Syrona said, trying hard to find something positive to say about the woman. Nesta Meterios was not a tall woman—just making the height required by naval regulations—and skinny, rather than thin. She might have been attractive if she’d tried to emphasize a finely textured skin and rather large eyes and if she’d chosen a more flattering hairstyle.
“Does it herself, I’m told,” Casper said. “Not that those uniforms would last long if she were working the way we are.”
“Not that she’d ever demean herself to do so,” Nimisha said.
Meterios had elected to go on the mission to the Poolbeg, reassembling the entire crew complement of the Acclarke at a time when Jon, Nimisha, and Casper had been counting on the extra hands to help raise a windmill to power a new well. The only person who went willingly, in fact, was Valina Kelly, who wanted to scan the night skies on that side of the planet. Meterios had been difficult about including a “civilian” on a naval expedition until Dr. Qualta intervened and reminded Meterios that after all, Valina’s official and top-priority clearance to be a member of the Wormhunter space station guaranteed that she was cleared for a minor reconnaissance operation.
When the Acclarke lifted at dawn, Nimisha happened to be up, soothing a fractious son. Bouncing him on her shoulder, she hurried into the pilot compartment.
“Helm, are you in constant contact with the Acclarke’s AI?”
“Yes, Lady Nimisha. We have established a permanent link. I can screen their progress for you, if you wish.”
“I do. Keep it up at all times on the B screen and please inform me of any untoward occurrence you two may notice.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Later that day, Nimisha cornered Jon for a quiet conversation with him over the disruptive presence of Captain Nesta Meterios.
“I want her out of here before Cuiva arrives,” she said.
Jon raised his eyebrows in surprised query. “Why then?”
“I’d have to invite her to Cuiva’s Necklacing, and I’ll be damned if I’ll give the woman that satisfaction.”
Jon chuckled. “We don’t like her, do we?”
“No,” Nimisha said flatly. “This is our adventure, venture, colony, world, whatever, and her attitude could affect our relations with the Sh’im. They’re not stupid.”
“We can’t just send her off on the Acclarke,” he protested.
“Why not? Helm would get her back.”
“True enough, but her XO doesn’t think she received any new orders in the packet he handed over.”
Nimisha considered that. “And she’s not the personality to do anything without orders to cover her butt. I’m surprised she went to the wreck.”
“I’m not,” Jon said with a wry chuckle. “She’s going to do all she can to find fault with me or Casper or Syrona. She’s welcome to. We are different branches of service, and what holds for a courier does not hold for an explorer.”
“Then how is she trying to fault you?”
“Misuse of naval property.”
“You used it to survive, didn’t you? Which you once told me was your second operational procedure.”
“I did and it is, and on those grounds she cannot fault me. But that sort of personality has got to try.”
Nimisha let out an exasperated sigh. “Well, we have to do something about her. I’m not having her at Cuiva’s Necklacing.”
“I agree, luv,” Jon said. “Too bad the rest of the crew is so nice—with the exception of that flat-faced toady, Karpla. He takes an altogether unholy delight in hunting. Tim says his wholesale slaughter goes against Sh’im notions.”
“That’s what Casper said, too.”
“May I suggest a way out of the difficulty?” Doc said.
Nimisha swung round. “You have one?”
“If you’re looking for answers, you find them,” he said at his most sententious. “What exactly were Captain Meterios’s orders?”
Jon and Nimisha regarded each other. “Helm, ask Acclarke’s Helm the exact wording of Meterios’s original orders.”
“Yes, ma’am,” was the quick response. “I quote ‘Captain Meterios, Naval ID—‘ ”
“Skip the heading, Helm, and get to the essence of the orders,” Nimisha said.
“ ‘Is to maintain the Acclarke courier vessel, 4CG 2440, in constant readiness at all times. To launch the specially constructed probe the instant the wormhole should appear. To instantly pulse a message of its reappearance Flash Override to Fleet Headquarters on Vega III. To maintain the beacon and all drone beacons in the assigned patrol area. To assist as required the scientific personnel on the space station. If feasible to traverse the wormhole and acquire sufficient stellar spectrum analyses to establish proper coordinates in the space grid. To establish, if at all possible, the current location of Lady Nimisha Boynton-Rondymense. To return at top speed with all pertinent information regarding the wormhole for analysis and dissemination.’ Those are the orders. Shall I prepare hard copy?”
“Yes, but I think we have the one we want,” Jon said, rubbing his hands together with a gleeful expression on his face. “She has not ‘returned at top speed with all pertinent information for analysis and dissemination’ and is therefore delinquent in her duty. We’ve got her.”
“Undoubtedly, because top speed is going to take her four years,” Nimisha said.
“Unless she plans to go back the way she came in the next five, that’d be my assessment.”
“Four years is not so long,” Nimisha added, delighting in the prospect of how bored Meterios would be. “But I’d hate for her crew to have to go with her.”
“They needn’t,” Doc said. “Acclarke’s Helm is as capable as ours in getting her back to Vegan space. She wouldn’t need the crew.”
“Yes, but she is their captain.”
“Hold it right there,” Jon said. “Helm, what orders govern the rest of the crew? Didn’t Globan say something about short tours of duty?”
“He did, he did,” Nimisha said.
“Technically speaking, they would be off duty at the end of those tours, whether or not they have been returned to base and a new assignment,” Jon said, rubbing his chin. “I’d have to check regs on that.”
“If you’ll pardon me, Commander,” Helm said, “you are correct in your assumption. Globan will have served the full four-month tour in another three weeks and five days. The others, with the exception of Brad Karpla, who is serving a year’s tour as he is checked out on th
e special piggyback probe, would all shortly have been replaced. Several, in fact, are overdue for reassignment.”
“Meterios could argue that they are not in a position to be rotated in the normal fashion,” Jon said, thoughtfully, “and are therefore still nominally under her command. I outrank her, and Exploration has the right to draft additional naval personnel to assist in emergency situations, but I don’t fancy trying to argue the matter with her. She can stump me on some unknown paragraph in a footnote in new regs that I couldn’t contest.”
“I could, sir,” Helm said. “The latest updates were added to my memory banks by Commander Rustin on the orders of Admiral Gollanch.”
“That’s good to know,” Nimisha said.
“That would be useful if Meterios happened to admit the infallibility of Artificial Intelligence.”
“She denies it?” Doc said, indignantly. “Maybe I can help out here.”
“So Globan says, and I’d hate to lose him. He’s fitting in here so well. And we need more colonists. Almost none of the science crew want to leave—not with all these undocumented primaries and systems to be listed.” He grinned. “Qualta’s in heaven and hopes her rejuv will last long enough for her to complete the maps.”
“My orders,” Doc began firmly, “are to assist Lady Nimisha in all matters.”
“Even to shanghaiing an officer off-planet?” Nimisha asked, chuckling.
“If need be.”
Jon rubbed his chin again. “Orders would work best. She can’t quibble with direct orders.”
“She’s already ignoring one of the specific orders she was given, Jon,” Nimisha said.
“True . . .”
“It won’t be long before Rustin’s here,” Jon said. “He can say he intercepted new orders for her at the pulse beacon.”
“Any information reaching the beacon is supposed to be forwarded to both Helms,” Nimisha reminded him.
“But, if you tell Rustin what’s been going on here, wouldn’t he help?”
“Does he know Captain Nesta?” Nimisha asked.
“Whose side would he be likely to pick? Yours or hers?”
“Point,” Nimisha said, eyeing him askance. “I’d rather we covered that before Caleb reaches Erehwon.”
Jon cocked his head at her and she shook hers.
“We were very good friends,” she said, “but having met you . . .”
“Propinquity is a decided advantage,” he said, pulling her into his arms and grinning at her.
“And five children,” she added.
“Will you hold that against me forever?” he asked with a chagrined expression.
“Now and then, perhaps,” she admitted. “It’s just as well we have the Sh’im to take over, or my attitude would be considerably different.”
“You do have your implant operational, don’t you?” he asked.
“As of the day I delivered the triplets.”
“Then shall we?”
“I was wondering when you were going to get up the nerve to ask again.”
“Jon,” she began later, “speaking of orders, can you be ordered away from here?”
“Hell’s bells, luv, I was on an exploratory mission that, with due modesty, I can say I have acquitted to the best of my ability. As well as taking a cursory look at two other M-type planets in the immediate vicinity. I’m certain that we have a case for making Erehwon the center for further investigations. Since my knowledge of the area is intimate, I might even get bumped up in rank to administration. Which would suit me admirably.”
“You want to be an admiral?”
“That’d keep me in administration, which wouldn’t hurt my feelings. Depends on how my initial reports and performance are received.”
“Another good reason for getting Meterios out of the picture and on a long and uninterruptible trip back,” she said.
“I agree. I like Erehwon. I like the life we’ve been carving out here. I love you.”
She stood up and curled her arms about his neck. “I rather thought you might, but d’you realize that’s the first time you’ve admitted it?”
“Out loud.” He curved his lips in a very tender smile. “I rather thought you’d’ve guessed as much.”
“I did, but I’d rather hear you confirm the situation.”
“Then, Lady Nimisha, I respectfully request a similar confession from you,” he said softly into her ear, holding her very tightly.
“I do love you, Commander Jonagren Svangel,” she said softly, “though I certainly never expected to.”
“Well, you have designed the perfect long-distance yacht: You are free to set that inventive mind of yours to new challenges.”
“Hmmm. What a good idea.”
Jon gave her another long and deeply stirring kiss before he swung his feet over the bed and reached for his discarded coverall. “I want to have a private word with some of Meterios’s crew. And Dr. Qualta.”
“And I think I’ll just dash off a little note to await Caleb’s arrival at the beacon. Something about orders he’s received for the Acclarke.”
“They’d have to be at the beacon,” Jon said, stamping into his boots. “Headquarters would have had word by now of the loss of the space station and the Acclarke, but he wouldn’t have any pulses while on IS drive. So make it clear he’s stripped them from the beacon now that it’s been repaired and we can get messages to and from.”
“Dear heart, don’t worry. I come from a very long line of devious women.”
Her first instruction to Helm used the cipher she and Caleb had set up for private messages. He’d know to accept and read it by himself. In the opening paragraph, she suggested that the Five B Helm beam orders directly to Captain Meterios on Four’s comunit. That would be less suspicious than for him to have documentation to give her. While a pulsed beam message carried no signature, Caleb did know one of Admiral Gollanch’s private codes to give authority to such new orders. By citing Meterios as a xenophobe, she’d gain Caleb’s understanding of their need to rid the planet of her presence. A pulsed explanation would reach the admiral well in advance of the Acclarke. She also asked Caleb how to keep the useful crewmembers on Erehwon. The long trip home under such a captain was likely to cause severe disciplinary problems. Since the original tour of duty had been four months, not much attention had been paid to matching psych profiles. With a Helm to guide a ship through IS drive, no human watch was actually required, and Helm could always rouse the captain for any emergencies requiring human intervention. Not that Nimisha had much faith in Meterios’s ability to handle real emergencies. She must have exhibited some initiative to get to be a courier captain but Nimisha couldn’t imagine it.
When Jon returned, unable to check with all the people he wanted to speak to, she showed him her message.
“In any case, we have her for not attempting to return back to base as her orders specifically state,” he said. “Send it.”
She did, and marked off yet another day until she would see her daughter again. The waiting was worse now that Cuiva was so close. While she had been busy, while she had been making a new life here on Erehwon, and with Jon, she had been able to censor painful thoughts and the realization that she had missed so much of Cuiva’s youth. And the Necklacing. That was such an important moment in a girl’s life. It had been in hers, when she was suddenly about to take her place in Society and be allowed to talk to adults without waiting to be spoken to: to be grown-up! She only hoped that her dam had not constricted Cuiva to what Lady Rezalla thought was proper for a First Family body-heir to learn. And in that, Nimisha would be to blame, having such an unusual interest as ship design. Cuiva would have had no one like Lord Tionel to stand up for any individual interests she might have developed. Well, Lady Rezalla was fair . . .
XI
“WE ARE EMERGING into normal space, Captain Rustin, in precisely nine minutes at my mark,” Helm said. “Mark.”
“About bloody time,” was Caleb’s soft murmur.
; He had risen well before time and enjoyed a leisurely breakfast before translation could occur. Kendra had joined him; since she was such a light sleeper, she woke no matter how carefully he had tried to slip out of the bed. He devoutly hoped that Nimisha would accept his new alliance without rancor. He suspected she would be sensible, but she’d been alone a long time. Would Kendra understand? Probably. They’d developed a very good rapport. Although the Five B’s initial orders had only covered a three-month trial run, he had been careful to match the psych profiles of all aboard the Five B to form a good environment for Cuiva’s benefit. The result had been felicitous, if startling, when Mareena favored Gaitama and Nazim and Perdimia had paired off. He wondered how Cuiva would take to that, but Perdimia had made it clear to Nazim that Cuiva remained her first order of business. Since he was a Rondymense employee, he accepted that equably.
Kendra joined Caleb in the pilot compartment, slipping into the second seat and netting in. Translations out of Interstellar Drive were not likely to be as rough as entering, but this was totally unknown space. There had been bets that Nimisha, discovering herself alone in a strange section of the galaxy, had taken the obvious out and gone into cold sleep. So the Fiver would be nearby. Knowing Nimisha better, Caleb wagered that she’d been exploring—if that had been an option—since she was not the sort of person to avoid a challenge. They’d soon know, and Caleb had Helm plot reentry well away from the beacon so that, if the Fiver was there, they’d not run into her.
Nine minutes can seem a long time. Kendra was tapping her fingers on the armrest by the final second countdown. By then, the entire crew had gathered in the main lounge in the couches that had security straps.
“Eight . . . seven . . . six,” Helm’s voice counted down, and then exactly on “one” they were out of the dark gray inter-space and back into black space and a bewildering mass of unfamiliar stars. Helm went into instant evasive action, veering away from a tumbled mass of twisted metal.
“Jasassssusss,” Kendra said, tightening her hold on the armrests. “That can’t be the Fiver!”
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