Storm Fleet

by Tim Niederriter

  “How did he get aboard this ship?” Enna asked.

  “We don’t know,” said Tulem.

  “He’s clearly been moving a lot lately.” Yajain bit her lip. “I wonder where he joined the fleet. But we know he’s here now.”

  Tulem raised his eyebrows.

  “How did we find out?” he asked.

  Yajain shook her head.

  “He tipped me off. I—I used to know him, years ago.”

  “Well the bastard isn’t going to get away this time,” Tulem said. “There’s no way he’ll get off this ship while it’s in lock down.”

  “Right.” Yajain walked over to the couches. “But I’ll feel a lot better once they capture him.”

  “You said you used to know him,” Tulem said. “Is there anything you remember that could help?”

  “I don’t know.” Yajain massaged one temple. Her fingers dislodged a strand of hair to swing to her cheek. She sighed and tucked the hair away. “I wish I did, but it’s been years. My memory isn’t perfect.”

  “There is a way we could sharpen that,” Joth said. “Does this ship have facilities to support neural fluids?”

  “Every explorer has at least one.” Yajain took a deep breath. “I’ve never used the fluids before. Isn’t it dangerous?”

  She knew the danger all too well. Chaos fluid stimulates the imagination. Order fluid increases critical reasoning. Both are toxic and produce poisonous gas when processed by a human respiratory system. Lin, if you were here you wouldn’t hesitate. Would you?

  “If there’s a chance of catching him we should take it,” said Tulem.

  “There’s no telling what he’ll do.” Yajain bowed her head. “There should be a fluid facility near here. Probably between the ready room and the bridge.”

  “You’re serious!” Enna’s eyes lit up. “This is turning pretty dramatic. We don’t even know you.”

  “It beats being stuck in here another hour longer,” Joth said. “And if we help, they’ll know to trust us.”

  Yajain glanced at Tulem.

  “Any ideas how we can get there?”

  Tulem smiled back at her.

  “A few.” His smile vanished as quickly as it had appeared. “But the captain won’t approve or he would have suggested it himself.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Yajain said. “They may not find him without us.” She breathed in deeply. “The main problem will be getting out of here to start with, and then getting into the fluid chamber.”

  Joth shrugged.

  “Not so hard when you consider this isn’t a military vessel.”

  Yajain and Tulem both turned toward him.

  Joth nodded.

  “I cracked the basics of the locks and order terminals a few hours ago. I bet I can control any terminal we reach and open the doors.”

  “But there are two cablers holding the door of this room. For our protection.” Tulem sighed. “We can’t hurt them.”

  “The schematics of this ship.” Yajain closed her eyes and thought back to her orientation for the survey mission all those months ago. “There’s an emergency exit from every crash room. It could get us out unseen.”

  Enna smirked.

  “Sounds like we’ve got it all put together.”

  “Maybe.” Tulem frowned.

  Yajain touched his shoulder.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know if I like it. Neural fluids can be harmful.”

  “The equipment in there should keep me safe.” Yajain leaned toward him. “Don’t pretend I have an option here. You don’t know Mosam.”

  His hand closed around her wrist, warm to the touch.

  “I understand,” he whispered.

  She drew back from him with a small smile. His reluctance flattered her. I’m glad you care. He let go of her wrist. She turned to Joth and Enna.

  “Alright people, this way.”

  The emergency door was slightly smaller than the main door, and led to a dark passage and another door leading to the outside of the ship, opposite one back into the central corridor. She went to the door leading in. Joth connected a reading pad to the terminal by the sealed interior security door. His codes unsealed the inner door. It opened with a hiss of air.

  They emerged into the light of the hub near the bridge, a short distance from the crash room’s main entrance. Yajain took the lead again, pulling up her uniform’s hood to keep from being recognized. Tulem and the bandojens did the same. They followed her across the central passage. They stopped at the unguarded door to the fluid control room and Joth let them in.

  “Too easy,” he said with a smirk.

  The fluid chamber was white, sterile, and deserted. A transparent box in the center of the room, just large enough for most humans to stand in sat between four drains in the floor. A vent for siphoning away poison gas attached to the top of the box.

  Yajain stared at the box. All the equipment made this safer than being a junkie using fluids on the street, but how much safer?

  Joth manned the control terminal, activating the systems they needed. Enna found the safety clothes and the smart mouthpiece that would keep Yajain from inhaling the gas once she started converting fluid.

  Nerves on edge, Yajain took the clothes from her. Tulem stood watch by the door. He nodded to her, a furtive look stole across his face. His lip trembled. Sweet boy, I don’t know what to say to you.

  Yajain turned from him and slipped off the outer layer of her uniform. She rolled up the right sleeve of her heat suit where the injectors would be positioned. She slipped on the heavy safety clothes and put on the mouthpiece. Her breath quickened as she took two injector patches. Sticky pads adhered to her bare arm.

  She stepped into the transparent box through a near-invisible door. Enna sealed it behind her. Yajain breathed deep. The mouthpiece brought her air from a tank above. When she exhaled it let her breath into the box.

  “I’m ready,” she said. If only I could believe it.

  “Focus on what you want to learn,” said Tulem. His voice was muffled by the box. “Don’t be afraid.”

  Yajain nodded to him. Then she raised the patches and attached them to the ports in her safety cloth’s baggy sleeve. Joth struck a key on the control terminal. Black fluid pulsed through one tube into its patch, and white through other. Yajain bowed her head.

  Mosam Coe. Doctor of Harvest. Mosam Coe. Doctor of Harvest. Mosam, Lin and the armory at Kaga, at home.

  The world spun with possibility. Mosam’s brilliant green eyes gleamed with sinister arrogance. Was she imagining or remembering? She watched him change from the young man she once met at the close of the war into the thin bearded man with the same fierce eyes, the same hard jawline, however he tried to conceal it.

  The questions came first.

  What if only a hologram had been present in Sigali Expanse? An impostor? What if he was never there at all? How did he set this up? How did he board this ship? How did he know I was here? What does he want? What does he need? Why is he here? Why did he apologize to me?

  Tears ran down Yajain’s face. She gritted her teeth, parted them and exhaled. Poison gas flew from her lips into the chamber. She shook her head.

  The last question stuck in her mind.

  Why did he apologize?

  He knew he’d be found out. He knew they’d set to search the ship. He hadn’t miscalculated.

  What if his plan even now was unfolding? Where would he go? When the armory had been destroyed it had taken days to identify him as the perpetrator from a salvaged camera’s snapshot.

  The frames came back to her, and the same sensation of falling returned. His handsome form, his kind expressions, his gentle touch, his smile, and his determination. His will. His love.

  A destructive beast. A wild animal. A free creature.

  Which of those things is he?

  Yajain closed her eyes and exhaled again. He destroyed the armory. He pret
ended to love Lin. He rebelled against Dilinia.

  But is there something more?

  Did he really devise everything purely in his mind?

  Yajain’s skin tingled around the place the patches attached.

  Mosam. Mosam you knew how I felt. Mosam why did you betray us? You must have had a reason.

  Shapes and sounds and lights and voices echoed in Yajain’s mind. She swam through that chaos, inspecting each element.

  “The Doctors of Harvest always looked to the future,” Mosam said from her past. “They saw something inevitable out there beyond the original reef.”

  In another time and in a different place he said, “This universe is of infinite size. There are lifeforms everywhere. Humanity began on the reefs, but its only a matter of time before we meet something else. Something truly native to pillars that can think like we do.”

  The Doctors of the Harvest look toward the future. Always.

  Yajain furrowed her brow. She breathed out. Her voice sounded alien when she spoke.

  “He wants to be on guard. He believes in monsters. He wanted to make contact.”

  Mosam put an arm around her shoulders and walked with her on the way home. Her heartbeat quickened.

  “He wants to protect people.” Hot tears stung her face. “He fights to protect.”

  How can that be true when he could have killed Lin? But he didn’t kill her. Could he have meant to end it that way?

  She may lose her legs. But she’ll live.

  She lived.

  Because of all of that, he came here.

  Because he’s a protector. He wants to protect humanity. Nations and alliances and races do not matter when things come from beyond.

  Green and yellow colors flickered before her eyes. She sank to her knees. The drains ran with coolant. Her poison breath billowed from the mouthpiece, unable to get back into her lungs. Sweat ran down her face.

  Yajain’s eyes widened. She gazed at the two bandojens and Tulem. Tulem. Tulem who came from Goganlear Reef. The reef Mosam had mentioned to her once when they were young. One time he didn’t remember after that. Because he was an orphan.

  He knew what it was to be lost and despised, believed no one should have to be alone. Yajain’s eyes fixed on Tulem. His eyes glimmered as if reflective.

  Mosam never flew properly with arc lifts. Always struggling to stay aloft.

  Tulem labored to lift her from Bahami Forest.

  His arms looked bigger now. His posture straightened from the slight hunch he used to have. His face was different, even from the image of Sigali, completely different, round and childlike. Even his eyes changed in color.

  He paced toward the sealed door of the transparent chamber. His eyes flicked to the pile of Yajain’s uniform topped by her sheathed vare blade. He strode to the very side of the box. One hand pressed against the side. His face went taut, concerned or nervous.

  Hadn’t he known she’d find out?

  He knew.

  He used the fluids himself. He made a plan, a plan to protect something larger than himself. Yajain blinked back tears. Her poison breath wafted upward to the humming vent. She pushed off the floor with one glove that turned wet with disinfected coolant.

  She faced Tulem, knowing it wasn’t Tulem she looked at. Tulem didn’t exist.

  Behind his mask, Mosam Coe nodded.

  “How could you?” she said. “How could you, Mosam?”

  “Cut her off,” Mosam said to the bandojens in the voice of Tulem. “She’s ailing.”

  Joth hit a few keys. The fluid pump stopped. Yajain stared through the fading poison and the haze of drug conversion.

  She stared at Mosam Coe in his disguise. His disguise meant nothing. Now now. A mask with a voice shifter combined with colored contacts.

  How could he do this? Why? But there were no answers to her questions. The last of her poisoned breath flew up into the vent. Yajain swayed on her feet. Joth hit another series of keys on the terminal and unsealed the door.

  Mosam stepped inside. His arms wrapped around her.

  “Yajain,” he said softly. “I’m sorry, Yajain.”

  She shoved him away with what was left of her strength. He stepped back.

  “You know I know.”

  He nodded. Loud knocks hammered at the door of the chamber. Yajain took a step forward and staggered. She supported herself on his broad chest. Her hands found their way up to his chin, his face. She found adhesives, a thin line under the jaw and down to the throat. She pressed herself to him and pulled on the mask. It came free with a tear and snap of broken bindings.

  The mask clattered to the floor, revealing Mosam’s face with dark eyes looking down at her. He wore a sad expression. His eyes searched her face. His lips moved but he didn’t speak.

  The door to the fluid room flew open. A pair of cablers darted inside, weapons trained on Joth and Enna. The bandojens put their hands up. Mosam didn’t turn and look at them but wrapped his arms around Yajain. Protective or possessive?

  Firio stepped into the room, visible over Mosam’s shoulder. Agan Pansar followed him.

  “You are all under arrest,” said the Empress’s agent.

  The cablers’ weapons trained on Mosam and Yajain.

  Pansar growled.

  “Let the doctor go. Now.”

  Mosam’s face turned from Yajain. Lips curved upward, transforming mournfulness into a sneer. His arm slipped from Yajain’s side. She stepped away from him.

  Mosam Coe faced Pansar and Firio and the four cablers flanking them. Joth and Enna cringed by the terminals. Another pair of cablers kept weapons trained on the two bandojens.

  Blood rushed to Yajain’s face as she met Firio’s enraged eyes. The captain said nothing. He held a coil pistol in one hand and in the other he clutched a communicator. Small voices rippled from it in the silent room. Yajain’s heart pulsed. Beside her, Mosam stood like a rock.

  His hands raised and turned over, showing empty palms to the cablers, Pansar, and Firio.

  “I am unarmed. Are you prepared to accept my surrender?”

  Pansar’s face betrayed no emotion. He faced Mosam, hands empty but shaking. Could he be having a nervous reaction?

  “Captain,” he said. “Give me your weapon.”

  Yajain stepped forward. The barrel of a rifle pointed toward her chest. She glared at Pansar.

  “Don’t shoot. He isn’t dangerous. Not now.”

  “I suppose that’s not all you learned,” Pansar said. “But neural fluids can lie.”

  Firio’s face fell. He looked down at the pistol in his grip, teeth gritted. The captain’s hand made no sign and stayed steady. He did not look up.

  “Agent Pansar, I cannot in good conscience follow that order.” He raised his eyes and turned to the lead cabler. “Take them into custody. The brig will give us plenty of time to turn them in.”

  Yajain glanced at Mosam. His sneer remained.

  “The brig sounds lovely,” he said. “But first, I have a message for you.”

  The cablers tensed on their weapons. One finger from Firio’s free hand clicked into his palm, activating his arc lifts. Pansar neither activated his lifts nor sought a weapon again. He folded his arms.

  “Spit it out, Coe. We don’t have time for this drama.”

  “Agreed.” Mosam’s expression remained, completely confident and derisive. “Take me to the bridge of this ship, and I’ll tell you about the incoming enemy fleet.”

  “Enemy fleet?” Firio’s eyebrows shot up.

  “I’ll show you on the bridge, Captain.” Mosam’s smile turned sincere. “I have nothing to gain from the destruction of this ship or its crew.”

  “You’re serious,” Firio said.

  “Why do you think I had the good doctor unmask me?” He glanced at Yajain, a flash of sadness back in his green eyes, then back to Firio. “You need to know.”

  Pansar shook his head.

  “Don�
��t let him trick you. The brig is too good for his sort of scum.”

  “Maybe so, but I won’t have a defenseless man killed.”

  “Take the shot,” Pansar said to the lead cabler.

  The cablers around the room tensed, but no one fired. Yajain’s teeth went on edge. She stared at Firio. His face furrowed, aging him visibly. Yajain bowed her head.

  “Belay,” Firio said. “Take them to the bridge. The bandojens too.”

  The lead cabler lowered his rifle. He motioned for two cablers to flank the box where Yajain and Mosam stood. Then, the leader and the other cablers motioned for Yajain and Mosam to leave the room. Pansar glared at them with a narrowed gaze as they passed.

  Yajain glanced at Firio again. He met her eyes and shook his head. Yajain looked away. She had earned reproach this time and wouldn’t deny it. She walked ahead of Mosam to the bridge.

  Standing at the center of the bridge’s raised central walkway, Firio checked with sensor officers. Yajain watched him turn each away with mounting concern on his face. When the last officer reported he glared at Mosam.

  “You say there’s an enemy fleet incoming. But there are no unidentified ships out there in our sensor range.”

  “Are all your enemy’s ships unidentified, Captain?”

  “Look, Coe. Your trip to the brig is going to be one way unless I protect you. Spit out your meaning.”

  “Look harder, Captain Gattri. Which of the fleets on your maps are capable of attacking a place where Ditari hunters are present in force.” Mosam folded his arms. “I don’t know their identity, but I do know there will be an attack. Soon.”

  Firio shook his head.

  “I’ll run scans on all the approach paths we’ve found. But I doubt we’ll find anything.”

  “It’s just not enough information to go on,” Yajain said.

  Firio nodded.

  “You should have considered the same. Think it over in the brig.” His eyes met hers. “I’ll do my best to make your stay temporary. Don’t do anything like this again.”

  “Captain—” Yajain started.

  Firio motioned to the lead cabler and the team led Yajain and Mosam off the bridge. Mosam hesitated by the door.