by Ben Bova
NEW LIVES
By the time Theo returned to the Shoo-Shoo restaurant from his meeting with the Jupiter station’s recruiter he was beaming with happiness. Until he saw his parents sitting at one of the restaurant’s tables, with Angela and Dorn.
Dad’s not going to like my news, he said to himself. Drawing in a deep breath, he headed for his family.
The restaurant was filling up. The customers at the other tables were casting uneasy glances toward the cyborg, but Theo ignored them as he hurried to join the group. He grabbed the empty chair between his father and sister, and started to say, “I’ve got news for—”
Victor Zacharias cut off his son’s words with a dark scowl. “Since when do you encourage your sister to drink wine? In the company of strangers, no less.”
Angela, across the table from Theo, tried to suppress a giggle. And failed.
Theo blinked at his father. “Dad, Angie’s an adult.”
“That doesn’t mean—”
Pauline laid a hand on her husband’s arm. “It’s all right, Victor. It’s nothing to get upset about.”
“I wasn’t drunk,” Angela said. Then she hiccupped.
Victor tried to frown at his daughter, but slowly a smile spread across his face. “Maybe I’m overly protective,” he admitted.
Angela nodded vigorously.
Turning to Theo, Pauline asked, “What’s your good news, Thee?”
He glanced at his father, then replied, “I’ve landed a position on the Jupiter station. It’s only—”
“Jupiter?” His father seemed startled.
“You’re going to leave us?” Pauline asked.
“I’m going to Jupiter, too,” said Dorn.
Ignoring the cyborg, Victor asked, “How in the world could you do this? Why didn’t you talk it over with your mother and me first?”
Because you’d say no, Theo replied silently. Their surprise and displeasure was about what he’d expected. “I met with their recruiter less than an hour ago. A girl I met here at the sushi bar introduced me. It’s only a menial position, really. I’ll be a junior-level technician. But I can take university courses electronically and work toward a science degree!”
“Jupiter,” Pauline murmured.
“The girl who introduced me is the medical officer on the ship that’ll take me to Jupiter,” Theo went on. “She’s really elegant.”
“They took you on?” Victor demanded, suspicious. “Just like that?”
“They need people, Dad. They’re having trouble getting qualified people.”
“I’m not surprised,” Victor grumbled. “That outpost is a long way from civilization.”
“They’ll train me on the job,” Theo went on enthusiastically. “It’s a great opportunity.”
“Jupiter,” Pauline repeated. “It’s such a long way off.”
Angela asked, “How long will you be there, Thee?”
“I’m contracted for two years.”
“You’ve signed a contract with them?” Victor asked darkly. “Without asking me? Without telling me?”
“I’m telling you now, Dad. The pay’s good, if that means anything to you.”
“Two years,” Pauline murmured.
“At least,” said Theo.
They fell silent, each thinking their own thoughts. Pauline looked at her husband. Victor knew what she was trying to tell him. Theo’s grown up. It’s time he went his own way. This was inevitable. But he saw the pain in his wife’s eyes. Leaving for Jupiter. Just like that. Spur of the moment. The boy has no common sense.
“I’m going to Jupiter, too,” Dorn said again.
“On the Hyades?” Theo asked.
“Yes.”
“We’ll be on the ship together, then.”
With the bare minimum of a nod, Dorn said, “Big George wants me off the habitat in two days.”
“But Hyades doesn’t shove off for a week,” said Theo.
“I’ve made arrangements to live on the ship, starting tomorrow. That will keep George’s blood pressure down to normal, almost.”
“What will you be doing at the Jupiter station?” Angela asked the cyborg.
Dorn made a one-shouldered shrug. “I think they want to study me. They’re making deep dives into the Jovian ocean, and a man who’s already half machine may be very useful to them.”
Pauline started to say, “You’ll be leaving in a—”
“So there you are!” called a voice from halfway across the quiet restaurant.
Heads turned. Cheena Madagascar threaded her way between tables, her eyes aimed at Victor. She was wearing a shiny black suit that fitted her like a second skin, polished knee-length boots, a flaming red scarf knotted around her throat.
Victor stumbled to his feet, his face flushed. Theo and Dorn rose, too.
Without being asked, Cheena took the unoccupied chair at the foot of the table.
Flustered, Victor introduced, “Cheena Madagascar, the owner and skipper of Pleiades.”
Cheena made a brittle smile. “Not anymore, Vic. You screwed me out of my ship.”
Victor sputtered as he resumed his seat. Theo almost laughed. He’d never seen his father looking so flummoxed. Then he realized: Madagascar; that’s Altai’s last name, too. And they look so much alike…
“I’m Pauline Zacharias,” said his mother, smiling steel-hard at Cheena.
Cheena nodded. “And you must be Angela. And Theo. And you’re the one we voted to exile.”
Before anyone else could speak, Victor said, “I’ve brought Pleiades back to you. I’m sorry I—”
“Can it, Vic. I don’t own Pleiades anymore. The insurance consortium owns it. They paid off on the bird when you stole it and I bought a new ship, Hyades.”
“Hyades?” Theo blurted. “Then Altai is your daughter?”
“Smart fella,” said Cheena. “Like your father.”
“So what do I do with Pleiades?” Victor asked.
“You don’t have to do a thing. Insurance agents are taking it over right at this instant. They’ll probably want your hide, but that’s not any of my business. Not anymore.”
With that, she got to her feet, blew Victor a kiss, and sauntered away from their table.
Victor ordered another bottle of wine.
* * *
It wasn’t until they were in bed that night that Pauline asked, “Just who was that woman?”
Glad that it was too dark for her to see his cheeks reddening, Victor cleared his throat before replying, “I told you, she owned Pleiades. I stole it from her.”
“And now her insurance carrier has repossessed the ship?”
He stared up at the shadowy ceiling of their bedroom. “Yes, and they want me to pay for damages—the difference between what they paid Cheena and what Pleiades is worth on the open market.”
Pauline fell silent and Victor was glad of it. He closed his eyes and tried to change the subject.
“Big George says he’ll hire me for the new construction program. There’s a lot of building going on here, and new projects in the planning stage.”
“Then we can stay at Ceres?” Pauline asked, sounding pleased at the prospect.
“For as long as they keep building. We won’t have to be rock rats anymore and I’ll be able to pay off the insurance debt, in time.”
“Angela wants to go to Selene, to the university.”
“The Moon? But how—”
“She says she’ll work her way through. She’ll take classes part-time and find a job.”
“Doing what?”
He sensed his wife’s amusement. “She learned a lot while we were on Syracuse without you. She’s got a good head for math.”
“Do you think she’ll be all right, on her own? She’s never—”
“Victor, dear, it’s time for Angie to go out on her own. We can’t keep her with us forever.”
He nodded reluctantly. “I suppose not. But with Angie going to Selene and Theo going to Jupiter—”
“It
will be just you and me, Victor. The two of us, alone together.”
“The way it was in the beginning,” he said, reaching toward her.
Pauline melted into his arms, but asked softly, “Just how well did you know this Cheena woman?”
He froze. There it is, Victor said to himself. For the flash of an instant he thought about lying his way through, but he heard himself say, “When I was forced to work on her ship, we slept together.”
“That’s what I thought,” Pauline said, her voice gentle, far from accusative. “She had that possessive air about her.”
“I didn’t have much choice,” he tried to explain. “She was captain of the ship and—”
“And we’d been separated for years,” Pauline finished for him. “You didn’t even know if we were still alive.”
“I didn’t have much choice,” he repeated.
“Neither did I,” Pauline whispered.
It took a moment for Victor to understand what she’d said.
“You and Valker?”
He couldn’t see her face in the darkness, but he heard the remorse in her voice. “Once.”
“He forced you?”
“Not really. I was trying to protect Angie. He would’ve gone after her.”
“I should have killed the bastard when I had the chance.”
“It’s over and done with,” Pauline said. “Let Big George and his people take care of Valker.”
It took Victor several moments before he could reply, “Over and done with.”
“It’s time to start our life together again.”
“Time to start new,” he muttered, wondering if he could. “Fresh.”
She leaned into him and they kissed, neither of them knowing what the future would bring, each of them hoping for the best.
EPILOGUE
There was a Door to which I found no Key:
There was a Veil past which I could not see …
—The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam,
Edward Fitzgerald
ASTEROID 67-046:
THE ARTIFACT
Tamara Vishinsky absolutely refused to see the artifact again. All the way out to the asteroid Tamara had been Alex Humphries’s willing bed partner. She knew that what the artifact had showed her the first time was the absolute truth: her way to wealth and power lay in her ability to manipulate wealthy and powerful men. It was her path to comfort, to safety. Her way to escape poverty and danger.
During the days of their full-g flight to the Belt she had noticed Yuan regarding her with amused tolerance. Fool! she thought. All he wants from Humphries is to open his stupid restaurant in Shanghai. I want more. Much more. And I’ll get it.
But once their ship established orbit around the asteroid Tamara knew she could not face the artifact again. She remembered the pain of its revelation, the aching remorse of reliving her miserable childhood. Not again, she told herself. Never again.
Alex Humphries seemed keenly eager as they rode the shuttle-craft down to the asteroid’s surface, his cold gray eyes glittering with anticipation.
“This could be the most powerful force the human race has ever encountered,” he said, as much to himself as to her. “I’m going to link to capabilities no one’s ever even dreamed of.”
Sitting beside him in the padded shuttlecraft seat, Tamara suddenly realized that if he was right, if the artifact empowered Humphries they way he anticipated, she would lose him forever. Her safety, her future, would vanish.
“Do you think it’s really a good idea to expose yourself to the artifact?” she asked, in a whisper. “I mean, look what it did to your father.”
Alex Humphries was silent for a moment. Then, “All right. You go look at it first.”
“Not me!” she blurted. “It was too painful the first time.”
“And you’re afraid it will be painful for me?”
“Disabling. It crippled your father, didn’t it?”
“Temporarily.”
“Don’t risk it. Let Yuan go in. He wants to see it again.”
Humphries fell silent again for several long moments. At last he asked, “That first time you came here: why did you kill Commander Bolestos?”
She blinked with surprise. “He … I didn’t think…”
“He was in your way,” Humphries said softly. “Is that it?”
Scrambling in her mind to find an excuse, she finally admitted, “Yes, that was the reason. I had to get past him to see the artifact.”
“And once you saw it, the experience didn’t change you at all, did it?”
“Not really, but it might hurt you, Alex.”
He smiled at her and patted her knee. “We’ll see. We’ll see.”
A full security team was waiting for them at the glassteel dome that protected the opening of the tunnel that led deep into the asteroid’s interior. Humphries ordered them to stay at the dome.
“Captain Yuan knows the way down,” he told the chief security officer. The man stepped aside as Humphries strode to the tunnel entrance.
Turning, Humphries said to Tamara, “You can stay up here. You don’t want to see the artifact again, do you?”
Looking uncertain, Tamara stammered, “No… I… but, but don’t you want me to go with you?”
“No,” Humphries said, cold as honed steel. “You stay here.” He pointed to the chief of the security detail. “Captain Bolestos will take care of you.”
“Bolestos?”
The young security officer pulled his laser pistol from its holster.
“The son of the former commander here,” Humphries said.
Wide-eyed, Yuan looked from Humphries to Tamara to the grim-faced security captain with his drawn pistol.
“Alex!” Tamara called to Humphries. “Don’t leave me! Please!”
“Come on,” Humphries said to Yuan, turning his back on her. “You come with me.”
Slowly, fearfully, Yuan followed Humphries into the down-sloping tunnel. For several minutes neither man said a word. Then a scream echoed off the tunnel’s rock walls.
“What was that?” Yuan shouted, knowing the answer, dreading it.
Humphries didn’t even turn his head. “Justice,” he said. And he continued down the tunnel.
They ducked their heads where the tunnel was low, then found themselves in the grotto just outside the artifacts chamber. The rocks glowed with cool light. The ceiling vaulted above them. The partition that closed off the artifact’s chamber was wide open.
Humphries licked his lips. “Me first.”
“Fine,” Yuan said.
Humphries looked surprised for an instant, then his eyes went hard. “You’re afraid of it?”
“No. I want to see it again.”
“Then …?”
“I can wait,” Yuan replied.
Humphries nodded. “All right. Wait here.”
He stepped across the faint groove in the dusty floor that marked where the partition rested when it was closed. The walls of the tunnel glowed coolly, bathing him in a golden glow. He felt his pulse thumping in his ears. A whiff of an odd scent tickled his nostrils; something that he vaguely remembered…
Hesitating, Humphries turned and saw Yuan standing back there, watching him. Tamara was afraid of the artifact, he said to himself. What did it do to her to make her so fearful? Could it harm me? The thought sent a shudder of alarm through him. It drove my father insane—temporarily. What will it do to me?
His pulse thundering now, Humphries stepped farther into the chamber. The light was bright but warm, like sunlight on a tropical beach. He did not notice the partition sliding smoothly, silently down the chamber’s entrance, closing him inside.
Turning the corner in the stone tunnel he stood face-to-face with the artifact.
Nothing. The chamber seemed empty. Humphries felt his-brows knit with puzzlement, then anger. To come all this way… Were they lying to me? Is this all some elaborate fraud?
The odor he had noticed seemed slightly stronger here. It brough
t back a memory from his childhood: Christmas morning with the huge tree and all the decorations and the brightly colored packages beneath it.
Then he noticed a tiny glow on the far wall of the rocky grotto, nothing more than a candle’s flickering. But as he watched the glow brightened, grew until it was like a lamp shining in his eyes, a spotlight, a miniature sun blazing its intensity. Humphries threw an arm over his eyes; the light was painful, searing, yet he could not take his eyes from it.
And within the light, shadows. Something formless shifting, moving, slowly taking shape. It was his father. Three-year-old Alex saw his father looming above him, reaching for him, cradling him in his arms. Young Alex felt the warmth and happiness of his father’s love. For a moment.
Other people crowded around Martin Humphries, separating Alex from his father. Alex was a teenager now and his father was distant, aloof. He watched as his father drifted farther and farther away from him. And changed.
Martin Humphries grew larger. The figures around him shrank until they were dwarves, midgets, vermin scurrying beneath his father’s feet. Martin Humphries pointed at one and the figure exploded in a flash of flame. Alex felt pain, like a red-hot iron pushing through his guts.
His father was becoming grotesque, hideous, larger and larger as he turned into a ravening monster, terrifying everyone his fiendish eyes fell upon. Martin Humphries laughed like Satan enjoying the torment of damned souls, and suddenly Alex realized that this wasn’t his father, it was him, Alex, who had become the monster.
He sank to his knees, unable to tear his eyes away from the vision of torture and pain. Is this what my father saw? he asked himself. Is this what my life will become?
He saw the cyborg, Dorn, and the aged Elverda Apacheta: hostages in his power maneuvers against his father. Marionettes, their strings in his own hands. And he saw Tamara: beautiful, cunning, ruthless Tamara staring at him with the eyes of a needful child. She reached toward him with both hands but Humphries saw her cut down by the hand of death. His own hand. Dripping with her blood.