Crossways

by Jacey Bedford

  “There isn’t time.” Max’s eyes are wide in panic.

  Gen bats something away that Cara can’t see. She looks through the gestalt. The otter-kind, dense as eels in a barrel, fuss around Gen, curious, excited.

  “Enough, get them out of he—”

  Her words end in a groan as another contraction follows sharply on the last.

  The otter-kind suddenly flee as a void dragon swirls into the workshop. It twists around Ben and Alia then pushes its huge head between Gen and Max. This time Cara sees it herself, not through the gestalt.

  “Know you,” she says to it.

  *Know you,* it responds, then looks at Gen again. *?* it asks.

  “Young.” Cara pictures Ricky and then pictures him smaller and younger and finally in his mother’s belly. She reverses the process.

  “Who are you talking to?” Max asks. “Is Ronan coming down?”

  “It’s a void dragon,” Gen says between contractions. “It wants to know what’s going on.” She reaches out and puts her hand on its snout. Its prehensile beard-claws wrap around her hand and hold on while she has another monster contraction.

  “I want to push,” Gen says.

  “Wait, no, hold on. That can’t be right.” Max glances at his handpad. “Hell, this says six hours. We can’t have been in the Folds for six hours, can we?”

  Cara looks over to Ben. He and Alia Kazan clutch each other’s hands now, deep in concentration.

  “I don’t know,” Cara says, “But if she wants to push, better get these trousers off her.”

  Between them they settle Gen on the couch, strip off the bottom half of her clothing and drape Dido’s cheap throw over her.

  The void dragon hovers, fascinated by the whole process.

  *?* it says again.

  Cara tries to imagine birth for it. It seems to be laughing.

  *Yeah, I know. It’s just the way humans are made. You should see how the baby gets in there in the first place.*

  The void dragon laughs again as if saying how small human minds are.

  *You can’t just float this thing out. It doesn’t work like that.*

  Cara has never been present at a birth before, but females of every species have been having babies since before midwives were invented. How hard can it be?

  Gen groans again and begins to curse.

  Hard enough.

  “It’s all right, Gen, I’ve got this.” Max pushes his sleeves up, sounding a lot calmer than Cara feels. “You’re doing well.”

  “Do you know what you’re doing?” Cara whispers.

  “Yeah, I’m getting ready to catch a baby and hoping nature takes its course. You got any better ideas?”

  “Uh, not really.”

  “Okay, then. Let’s do this thing.”

  Ben’s aware of Gen dropping out of the gestalt and knows why, but he can’t spare a thought for her. Cara will deal with it, she always does. Alia Kazan turns to follow Gen, but Ben pulls her back. *I need you here. Find the line.*

  They search for the line to Olyanda, finding and discarding those that aren’t strong enough to pull a whole station into being.

  The void dragon swirls into view and sweeps itself around them like a life preserver. *Find,* it seems to say. Its presence strengthens them and they search again.

  Ben hears a cry, but ignores it. Cara will deal. Cara will deal.

  With no sound at all Alia sinks to her knees and topples over. Dido drags her away and Grigor springs up to take his wife, completely oblivious to the void dragon he’s just stepped through.

  Just Ben now.

  He holds the focus and searches for the line.

  A baby cries.

  Don’t get distracted.

  Then Cara’s standing behind him, pouring her energy into him.

  She wraps her hands around his waist from behind and hugs herself to him, two bodies, one mind. He staggers. She pulls him upright and puts her hands over the top of his.

  Find the line.

  His vision fogs.

  He staggers again and this time she can’t save him. They fall together, but Cara doesn’t let go.

  “Benjamin!” He hears Dido’s voice from a long way away.

  There’s another Navigator in the mix. Gen!

  “Are you sure about this?” Max asks.

  “Just set me down and hold me steady.”

  Ben feels someone else on the deck plating beside himself and Cara. Gen, giddy with euphoria. Max is next to her, clutching a small bundle.

  “Oh, hell, one in, all in.” Dido Kennedy’s bulk drops down into the huddle and though she’s not a Navigator, she’s a human being and she’s offering all the support she can offer.

  The void dragon knots itself around them all. Is it laughing? It seems to have picked up Gen’s euphoria. Another life brought into being. That can’t be something a void dragon experiences every day.

  Ben feels a surge of energy.

  Find the line.

  Find. The. Fucking. Line!

  There.

  Strong and sure, the line that leads to Olyanda draws him on. He grabs it and begins to draw himself toward it.

  With a shiver the void dragon disappears.

  Realspace again.

  A shuddering thud announced that they surfaced in the middle of a battle.

  Shit!

  Ben disentangled himself from the dogpile of humans.

  “How is this better, Benjamin?” Dido yelled. “You were supposed to be getting us out of danger.”

  *Benjamin, what’s happening?* Mother Ramona asked via Ully’s link.

  *Welcome to Olyanda. Just making a few adjustments. With respect, launch everything you’ve got at the Trust. You should have them well outnumbered now.*

  He’d intended to put the station into high orbit around Olyanda, but they were too damn close, yawing like crazy in a decaying orbit that would take them into the planet’s atmosphere. Well, at least they were here.

  He scrabbled for the control and fired the thrusters, easing them into higher orbit and higher still. *Crossways Control, can you stabilize us?* he asked.

  *We’re on it, Benjamin. You leave the shitty job for us, huh?*

  *Don’t grumble, Briggs. You can do it.*

  “Won’t the Alphacorp fleet simply follow us?” Cara asked.

  “Not without a gate.” He stood unsteadily and took in the whole workshop: Alia Kazan, still stretched out, unconscious, Grigor by her side; Dido just rising to her feet; Cara, Gen, Max, and a baby still all in a huddle.

  A baby!

  “I thought . . . ah . . . I seem to have missed something,” he said, taking in the relieved smiles.

  “Me too,” Ronan dashed in, med kit in hand. “Sorry about the wait.”

  “Max delivered her,” Gen said. “With some help from a void dragon. Meet Olivia May Marling.”

  “Constant,” said Max. “Olivia May Marling-Constant.”

  Gen gave him a look.

  “Well, perhaps there’s time to decide that later,” he said. “She seems well and happy and that’s what counts.”

  “Better see to Alia, Doc,” Ben said. “It looks like Gen can wait a while.”

  He turned to leave. “Where are you going?” Cara asked.

  “I have one more job to do.”

  “Need me to come?”

  “I would appreciate it. Can you get Gwala and Wenna to meet us at Solar Wind?”

  “Are we going out there into battle?”

  “Not quite. Just shutting a door . . . and stealing a jump gate.”

  Chapter Forty

  DIVIDE AND CONQUER

  “YOU’RE SURE ABOUT THIS?” CARA ASKED AS the Solar Wind’s hatch closed behind them and sealed with a reassuring hiss.

  “It was your
idea,” Ben said. “Why hasn’t anyone ever thought of stealing a jump gate?”

  “Yes, but I didn’t exactly mean you should try it.”

  “We’re going to steal a jump gate?” Wenna asked, sliding into the systems station.

  “Our own—well—Crossways’ own.”

  “Good plan,” Gwala said, settling in to tactical.

  “Leaving the joint fleet without a way home suits me perfectly,” Cara said. “Oh, I know they’ll get home sooner or later, but it will be a hell of a long way around. The megacorps will either have to build a new gate—”

  “Which we can watch for and destroy,” Ben said.

  “Or they’ll have to resupply their space-locked ships with jumpships. It’s going to tie them in knots.” She smiled. “This is nuts, Ben. I think you should see Ronan for a psych eval.”

  “Probably, but—your idea, remember?”

  “I think I should see Ronan for a psych eval.” She grinned and settled into the comms station.

  “Crossways Control,” Ben said. “Solar Wind ready to launch.”

  “Solar Wind, I don’t suppose there’s any point in asking you to wait until you’re a hundred klicks befo—”

  “Absolutely not. This will be a short hop into the Folds.”

  “Good luck, Solar Wind.”

  “Thanks, Crossways Control.”

  Ben eased Solar Wind out of the air lock. The sudden arrival of the station had diverted some of the Trust vessels away from engaging Oleg Staple’s fleet but the sudden launch of Crossways’ fighting ships, plus the remaining drones, had set them on their heels. The four jumpships had materialized as well and Staple had the Trust on the run.

  A Trust cruiser began to circle around to put them in its sights. It lined up.

  “Solar Wind? Benjamin, is that you?”

  “Captain Duran of the Simonides, I believe,” Cara said. “I recognize your call sign. Ben’s here. Want to talk?”

  Ben hit the comm link. “You said to come out fighting if we ever met again, Captain, but I think the tide has turned in this particular battle. Let’s not fire in anger.”

  “What just happened?”

  “We got a party invitation and decided to accept. Olyanda is doubly protected now. Crossways has it and we’re keeping it. You’re outgunned, Duran.”

  “I believe we are. I’ve just had an order to stand down and withdraw.”

  “Wise decision.”

  It would be all over by the time they got back.

  “They don’t need our help,” Ben said, “but I wish I knew whether Garrick’s ship had come right the way through the Folds with us. Any news?”

  Cara got straight through to Ully.

  “Nothing yet,” she told Ben. “They’re all watching for him, but if his shuttle was dumped in the middle of a battle . . .”

  Ben nodded. “I know, it could have gone in a puff of smoke before anyone knew it was there.”

  Less than thirty klicks from Crossways, Ben hit the jump drive.

  “Scoot!” Ben brushes something away. “Can anyone else see them?”

  “Void dragon?” Cara asks.

  “No, the little ones.”

  She shakes her head. “I saw the big one, though. In Red One.”

  “We might make a Navigator of you yet.”

  “Do you want weapons running hot as we break into realspace?” Gwala asks.

  “Cold, let’s play dumb and see if we can gain a little time.”

  “Phasing ship ID,” Cara says.

  Ben takes the line that leads to Crossways’ previous location and pops out into realspace barely two klicks beyond the dark gate.

  Wenna brought up the full display on the forward screen. They’d dropped right in the middle of a swarm of ships converging on the gate: Alphacorp, Eastin-Heigle, Arquavisa, Ramsay-Shorre, and Rodontee, with the two big Monitor battlewagons bringing up the rear. Only the Sterritt Corporation was noticeable by its absence, and the Trust, of course, whose ships had all been concentrated on the Olyanda attack.

  “They’ve seen us,” Cara said. “They’re all running hot, weapons primed for launch.”

  “Unknown vessel, this is Alphacorp One. Please identify,” the comms unit spat out.

  “Sorry . . . err . . . Hi,” Cara said via the vox. “This is pleasure cruiser Oklahoma. Sorry we seem to have crashed your party accidentally. Changing course now.”

  Ben swept Solar Wind up and over in a wide one-eighty loop.

  “Oklahoma, your ship ID is phasing. Repeat, your ship ID is phasing. Please transmit registration and port of origin.”

  “Oh, sorry, is it? I’m a bit new to all this.” She thought she’d try a Max on them. “The regular comms operator is in the head with the squits. They only said to sit here until he got back. Captain Skinner, how do I stop the ship ID from phasing and . . . Sorry, Alphacorp One, let me get this sorted.”

  “Oklahoma, you’re heading directly for an offline gate. Come about and stand by for further instructions.”

  “Hang on, let me tell the pilot.”

  “Oklahoma, this is your last warning.”

  “What? No! We’re complying, Alphacorp One.”

  Cara saw two telltale puffs from the forward ports of the closest Alphacorp ship.

  “Missiles launched,” she said.

  Gwala answered with pulse-cannon and blew both missiles. Five more puffs.

  “They’re too late,” Ben said. “Here we go.”

  Ben pointed Solar Wind directly between the gate impeller and the control housing, where the blacker-than-black ellipse, the gate to foldspace, normally hung, blotting out the stars.

  As he passed between the two he hit the jump drive. The flight deck air rippled and they were through, leaving the missiles behind but pulling in both sections of the gate.

  “You got them,” Cara said.

  “Okay, let’s keep them. Straight in, straight out again. I’ve got the line to Olyanda.”

  Another pop and they were hanging in realspace behind Olyanda’s largest moon.

  Cara contacted Oleg Staple to reassure him that it wasn’t an incursion, then she called Ully to pass on the message that Garrick’s wish had been fulfilled, Olyanda had a new gate just as soon as a team of engineers could reconfigure it. Cara smiled as she told Ully the combined fleet had been stranded on the far side of nowhere.

  *Still no Garrick?* Cara asked.

  *No.*

  “We should retrace our steps through the Folds,” Ben said.

  Cara nodded. *Crossways Control, we’re going to try cruising the Folds.*

  *Thank you,* Mother Ramona answered through Ully. *You’ve done wonders already. All I ask is one more minor miracle.*

  *We’ll do our best.*

  Ben settles Solar Wind in the black depths of foldspace, cuts the drive and listens. He closes his eyes. Foldspace isn’t really black, neither is it empty. It glistens like moonlight on oily water. He can sense the lines that have the potential to lead to anywhere, but those aren’t what he’s looking for.

  Tracks disturb the ripples, faint whispers in the fabric of space-time, maybe where some ship has once passed, maybe a void dragon or the otter-kind.

  “Can we help?” Cara asks.

  “I don’t think so. Keep a watch on the instruments, check the time and let me know if there’s anything unusual.”

  One lone otter-kind appears and settles on the flight deck ceiling, curling around itself like a cat. Another drifts lazily through and out again.

  Ben tries to call up the big void dragon by concentrating, but nothing answers. He’s never seen more than one at a time, has always wondered if there is only one.

  There’s something out there, disturbing the ripples like a crosscurrent. What has been smooth becomes choppy.

  �
��There’s something on instruments,” Cara says.

  Ben keeps his eyes closed for a few seconds longer, trying to feel the shape of it, but it’s just darkness out there in the iridescent black. He opens his eyes.

  “What is it?” Gwala asks.

  “It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen,” Wenna answers.

  The void dragon swirls into the flight deck and asks, *?*

  “I was going to ask you that,” Ben says, and responds with his own *?*

  Ben gets the impression of, *Other,* without any actual words. The void dragon seems almost worried. It changes its shape and becomes foldspace darkness with a bright dot in the center.

  “What is that?” Cara asks.

  “A ship.” Ben recognizes it. “A small two-man shuttle.”

  “Garrick and Kitty?”

  “Could be. We’ll check.”

  As Ben fires up the maneuvering thrusters the otter-kind tumble in, become agitated and shoot out of the flight deck. The void dragon swirls around twice and then disappears.

  “Whatever it is, the big fellow doesn’t like it,” Ben says.

  “I’ll try the vox,” Cara says.

  “Solar Wind to shuttle. Come in please. Solar Wind to—”

  “Cara? Ben?” Kitty answers. “Oh, gods, come and get us. This thing—”

  “We can see it. What is it?”

  “Stay back, Ben,” Garrick says. “If it touches you, you’ll be stuck here like us.”

  “I don’t intend to let it touch us, but we’ve got to get you out.”

  “Oh, yes, please,” Kitty says. “It’s eating the shuttle.”

  “Explain.”

  “Hush, Kitty,” Garrick says. “When it first latched on to us it was just the very tail end of the craft that was mired, but very slowly it’s drawing us in. Half the shuttle is—I don’t know—dissolved into this darkness.”

  “Can you still move around freely?”

  “Yes, within the half of the cabin that’s still clear. Neither of us has tried to touch the shadow-thing, though. It gives off a fearful sense of—I don’t know—otherness.”

  “That’s what the void dragon said.”

  “Huh?”

  “Never mind. Have you tried imagining that it’s not real, that it doesn’t exist?”