by C. Gockel
Volka exhaled and nervously smoothed an ear. “I thought of the ship attacking us, and Alexis, when I…I…wished to know where to go. I imagined Alexis in danger…I couldn’t put a face on the others, or really even the ship so well.” Alexis’s disdain she couldn’t forget.
“Yep, me too, Hatchling.” Carl wiggled in her lap.
Nodding to herself, Volka swallowed. “We have to go rescue her and the others.”
“What?” Carl blurted, his necklace crackling.
“We need to tell the Luddeccean Guard,” Sixty said.
Rolling to his stomach, Carl nodded vigorously. “Sixty is right. They need to come here and rescue them. Not us.”
“Errr…” said Sixty. “I’m still trying to find out exactly where we are.”
“How can you not know where we are?” Carl protested. “There is a gate nearby, or there wouldn’t be pirates nearby. Certainly all the gates are on maps.”
“Errr…actually, no,” said Sixty.
“No?” said Volka and Carl in unison.
Sixty fell into his data dump voice. “At the beginning of the Time Gate Era, some enthusiastic investors launched fully automated vessels with prefabbed gates aboard. Their goal was to find new habitable worlds, and then when those worlds were identified, to have the vessel erect a gate.”
“But surely investors would want to keep track of their investments?” Carl said.
Sixty winced. “The beginning of the gate age was centuries ago. A lot of gates were lost when firms went bankrupt, cloud computing resources were sabotaged, nations collapsed, and less successful colonies completely died out.”
Volka’s brow furrowed. “Are you saying that we could be centuries away from Earth even at lightspeed?”
Sixty nodded.
“But if the gate was lost, how would pirates find it again?” Carl protested.
Sixty shrugged. “They could have found its coordinates accidentally or stolen it from someone who had acquired it legally. There are really too many possible scenarios to bother speculating. If they’re here, they have a gate. It is likely very old, so it has limited capabilities. It may only work with the gate near O7, or at most, one other gate. It isn’t sending pirates to any of the major public gates; that is certain. Which also means Fleet won’t be coming here—not soon enough anyway.”
“We have to rescue Alexis and the others now,” Volka said, heart beating fast, the chill of sweat on her spine. “The fact that Sundancer came here and didn’t just drop in and scoop her up means that for some reason she can’t do that. She brought us just out of sight, just over the horizon, so we can sneak in.”
Sixty’s head tic came back. “Let me rescue the others. You can stay here.”
Her nostrils flared. “You can’t kill them, Sixty. These are pirates, and ten-to-one they need some killing.”
Carl held up a paw. “I agree, they could use some killing—”
Volka scratched behind his ear. “I could use your help.”
“Rat livers, that feels good.” Carl purred, and then shook himself. “We don’t have to do this. This is Guard business.”
“You could be killed,” Sixty said. He didn’t move as he said it, didn’t lean forward, or blink. His hands were motionless at his sides. He was, in that moment, very robotic.
“There are multiple hostages,” Volka said. “Some of them children. My one life for their many. Isn’t that a logical trade off, Sixty?”
Sixty’s head jerked to the side.
“Ah!” Carl said. “No need for us to go then! It’s only Alexis.”
Volka blinked down at the werfle.
He rolled on his hind paws, and she swore he was smiling. “Isssh sent me words while I was a plant—”
“When you were a plant?” Sixty blinked.
Carl nodded earnestly. “One of the ones outside. Just for a few minutes.” Turning to Volka, Carl explained, “The shuttle Kenji talked about was found! The off-duty Guardsmen aboard the Manna during the attack intuited like us that it was an inside job and didn’t respond to hails until they had a Guard ship they recognized on their scopes.” He tapped a paw to his chin. “Also, Alexis herself thought it might be an inside job. She bravely pulled the release lock that let them escape—so you can be sure she’s fine with not being rescued.” He shrugged six of his shoulders. “She sacrificed herself. She knew the risks.”
Volka stared at the werfle in shock. Just Alexis…not innocent children…because she’d sacrificed herself for them. A stuck-up, superior, Luddeccean lady who left a party in a huff because Alaric had defended her. Mr. Darmadi could say that Alexis was afraid because Alaric loved her, but that wasn’t what Volka had seen. She’d seen disgust in the woman’s stride and turned up nose. Yet the woman saved innocent children. Volka felt sick again, and cold.
“I will go,” Sixty said again. “You can stay here, Volka.”
Wrapping her arms around herself, Volka’s head bowed. “It’s a test.”
“A test?” Sixty and Carl said.
“A test from God.” Certainty sank into Volka’s bones. “I don’t want to rescue Alexis, but I must because it is right. God is testing me.”
“There is no God!” The words from Sixty were a shout.
Volka’s ears went forward; her mouth gaped. Her heart felt as though it had been pierced by ice.
Sixty took a step toward her. “You are just trying to find some meaning for suffering. But there is no meaning in the universe.”
Shaking her head, Volka stood up. “No, no, you’re wrong, Sixty. Remember how I found you in the creek and took you in? I was scared, but the prophet, peace be upon him, said that he who is not kind has no faith. It is also said, show hospitality to strangers, for you may entertain angels unawares. I took you in on faith and you were the angel that saved me from the Guard and their wires and pliers, a fate worse than death.” She’d reflected often on those words since he’d rescued her.
“The Three Books also say I’m an abomination!” Sixty retorted.
Putting a hand over her heart so she didn’t reach out and touch him, Volka said, “I’m a product of genetic engineering, Sixty. I’m an abomination, too. The books aren’t perfect…but they also are…” She struggled to find words. “True, Sixty. They are true. Your saving me makes me believe even more.”
Running a hand through his hair, Sixty said, “I would have saved anyone. I was not the product of a personal savior.”
“You would save anyone because you are an angel,” Volka said, all uncertainty gone from her mind.
Sixty held up his hands as though he might shake her, but he didn’t so much as touch her. Of course. “Volka, of all humans you are…” He closed his eyes. “…to me…important.”
Volka swallowed and gave him a small smile. “You love everyone, as you must, but you hold me in special esteem. I think that means you love me. Thank you, Sixty. But you are going to go to rescue Alexis, and I have to go too, to follow in the path you’re revealing to me.” Her brow furrowed. “Or go ahead of you, if we need to shoot something. I will get the weapons.”
She began walking to the back of the ship.
Carl hopped after her. “Volka, remember, we felt the Dark before the light jump. The Dark is in the camp.”
Volka paused. “Is Alexis infected?” Her heart beat fast. Part of her really wanted Carl to say “yes,” not because she wanted Alexis to die…just that she was beginning to feel afraid. She didn’t want to face pirates again. She’d rather stay here and wait for the Guard.
Carl wasn’t responding. She glanced back at him sharply. “Don’t lie to me.”
“She isn’t infected,” the werfle confessed.
Hands feeling clammy, she said, “Well, we should wear envirosuits in any case.” Her eyes went to the hull, currently nearly transparent. “Does the armor for Sundancer attach in a gravity well or do we have to leave the planet?”
“It will attach in this planet’s gravity,” Sixty said.
Carl ho
pped after her. “I was happier being a flower.”
“Me, too,” she whispered.
“Ah, to be like the lilies of the field, right?” Carl said, paraphrasing Jesus.
Volka smiled at the little creature. It struck her that Sixty’s attack on her faith had been disturbing. But perhaps he had to, because he had to use any way possible to dissuade her so she didn’t die. He couldn’t not protect life, so he didn’t understand that for her not following God’s will would mean real death—the death of her soul.
Standing outside of Sundancer, 6T9 tested the turf. It was strangely springy. Closer study revealed it was made of tiny rootlets.
He glanced side to side. He saw insects, and, here and there, bird-like creatures.
“Sixty,” Volka said, standing beside him. “We need to hurry.”
Since the Dark was here, Sundancer needed to wear her armor. He pulled out his tablet while Volka walked around the clearing, phaser rifle ready. The visor of her suit was up. Something about, “not being able to smell makes me feel blind.” Carl was in the backpack she held in front of her body, wearing his “sausage suit,” visor similarly up because he liked to be able to smell, too. The local plant life, according to 6T9’s chemical receptors, produced molecules that would be pleasingly floral to humans, and, apparently, werfles. Although currently, the little weasel’s eyes were closed, and every so often he snored.
Carl was insistent that the Dark wasn’t close and that the pirates didn’t know that they were near…or he had been insistent when he’d been awake. 6T9 wasn’t precisely surprised that they hadn’t been noticed. The “independent traders” he’d traveled with weren’t terribly good at following basic security protocols on inhabited worlds in known space—let alone worlds where they’d have no reason to expect visitors.
6T9’s fingers hesitated above the tablet. “I need to establish local ethernet to put the armor on.” The armor was currently on the ground beneath the ship. A dark sphere of black, iridescent scales with attached drones would wrap it around the ship. The color and the silvery, spherical drones gleaming on the surface of the armor had made Volka declare that it looked like Sundancer had laid a dragon’s egg dressed for Easter.
“Is establishing local ether a problem?” Volka asked.
“Pirates aren’t very good at security protocols.” They relied on “moral flexibility” more than good sense to get by. “But that doesn’t mean that they don’t have security drones.” Very stupid drones that might not be able to differentiate Sundancer from a rock. She was unique, and her appearance probably wouldn’t be in their databanks. Also, she had no external heat signature—when she wasn’t causing glaciers to melt, anyway. However, “They scan for ethernet signals. If there’re any in range, they will notice. Also, they’ll be able to see the heat signatures of the armor’s drones.”
“Will they be able to pinpoint the location of the signal?” Volka asked.
Sixty met her eyes. “Yes.”
She mulled this for a moment, eyes going to the “forest” beyond the clearing the ship had landed in. Forest didn’t quite describe it. “A giant’s flowerbed” would be a better description. The “flower trees” each had a central trunk bearing a single, enormous bud at its apex. Some of the blooms were larger than Sundancer. The flowers looked like tulips. The petals were not smooth but had zigzag edges instead, a shade lighter than the petals proper. Volka called them “fringes” and said they were “pretty.” Like tulips, instead of having branches, the trees had enormous leaves that sprang from their bases and reached to the blooming tops.
One of the bird-like creatures fluttered just above their heads. Volka followed it with her eyes. “Once the armor is on, can you turn off the drones?”
“If they’re not on, they won’t be able to react if she’s struck by one of the Dark’s weapons.”
Volka bit her lip and stared at the ground. “What do you think we should do?”
Sixty restrained the urge to pull her into his arms. “Get back inside and wait for the Guard.”
Volka met his gaze. “You mean have Carl and me wait there.”
“Carl can come with me. If his current form dies, I lose the asteroid, but not him.” 6T9 had known the genocidal weasel through multiple lifetimes. “If I lose you—” He didn’t want to talk about it, because that involved thinking about it. While Eliza was dying, and after her death, he had lost interest in things. He’d had a brand-new shiny Q-comm with which he could have probed the mysteries of the universe, explored the latest sex clubs on Earth, and been able to intellectually entertain sapient sexuals—a fervent desire before his Q-comm installation. But he hadn’t done much of anything without James’s or Noa’s coaxing—and sometimes physically dragging him. His vast processor had kept replaying alternate if-then scenarios, looking for where he went wrong—how he could have kept her for a while longer. He’d failed, and even if he logically knew that death, for humans, was inevitable, it had darkened his circuits for a long time.
“Sixty,” Volka said. “I love you, too.”
Every circuit in him fired at the word “love.” It was so frighteningly imprecise, and frustratingly close to “lover.” He wasn’t Volka’s lover; her biology and his programming made them uniquely unsuitable, and it made him…His head tic returned, but he shook it away.
Her gaze shifted to the alien forest. “But this I have to do for myself. For my soul, Sixty.”
His circuits fired in fury. “That’s ridiculous.”
Her jaw hardened and her gaze snapped back to him.
He rolled his eyes. “Look. Even as a logical machine I can accept the concept of a soul on some basic level. We are all matter and energy. Your energy might be conceived as a soul.”
Her brow constricted. “Would that mean inanimate objects, like rocks and…and…machines, have souls too?”
His circuits sparked at the direction her thoughts had taken. “It would.”
Volka’s lips made a small “o.”
“But not according to your Three Books,” Sixty replied, his lips twisting wryly.
Her lips pursed. “Well, I’ve never thought that they were right in every detail.”
“Volka,” Sixty protested. “It doesn’t matter. That soul, that energy, is tied up with the subatomic particles that make up your atoms, and those atoms are tied to the molecules that build the proteins that make up your cells. One day you will die, and your cells will break down, the molecules will break down, and the energy that is you will become incorporated into something else…most likely compost. Now, someday, the universe may collapse in upon itself and all the matter and energy will be reunited, but in that case, your energy will still be combined with the energy of everything.”
Her eyes widened. Disturbingly hopefully.
6T9 raised his hand again. “At no point will the energy that might be construed as a soul zip off to some heavenly cloud.”
One of her nostrils flared. She scowled at him and exhaled through her teeth. “Heaven and Hell are real places, right here, right now, and if I don’t save Alexis…” She snarled. “Who despises me and smells like pee…” She bowed her head.
6T9’s jaw dropped. He’d never heard Volka be so petty. He found himself coming to Alexis’s defense. “Quite a common condition among women who’ve recently given birth, or who’ve had lots of children.”
“That’s why I have to save her!” Volka declared.
Which made no sense.
Snarling, she pointed at the armor. “Put that on Sundancer while I try to explain to her that as soon as it is on, she has to lead the pirates’ drones on a wild werfle chase.”
Which was actually a good idea. It would keep the pirates’ drones away from them as they approached the camp. Even if their suits hid heat signatures and were camouflaged, they weren’t invisible; moreover, they would be moving and they were human shaped, which even dumb drones would notice.
Jaw hard, Volka growled. “Do it, Sixty, or I’ll leave on my own.”
His circuits fizzled. “Right.” Turning his attention to the tablet, he activated the local ethernet and connected to the drones. It took him 8.63 minutes to get the armor on the ship. He hadn’t used their hover functionality before, just propulsion in zero G, and it was a clumsy job. Finishing, he turned to Volka. “It’s done.”
Her eyes were closed, but at his words, they opened. “She knows, and machines are coming. Let’s go.” Swinging the pack with the still-sleeping Carl onto her back, she took off—and leaped a meter off the ground with a gasp. “What?” The gravity here was about .4 standard G. Volka had no experience in it.
“Skip!” 6T9 commanded, hearing the whine of drones 500, 251, and 323 meters away—all in directions they currently weren’t heading…fortunately. He folded up the tablet and tucked it into a pocket on his chest. Just beneath the tablet rested Eliza’s ashes.
Volka changed her gait and began skipping through the flower forest. She went slowly at first, but then faster as she got her low-G legs, her tiny frame slipping neatly between the flowers’ leaves and stems. In the background, the whine of drones changed. Peering over his shoulder, 6T9 saw Sundancer taking off from the clearing and zipping away above the immense blooms. Presumably she would come back when Volka or Carl called her. If they weren’t dead.
They kept up their brisk pace. He noted plenty of wildlife—insects and bird-like creatures—but nothing on the ground. The bird creatures seemed to inhabit the forest from the level of his shoulders to a few meters below the flower blooms.
Volka didn’t slow until they saw the hazy glow of yellow lights through the trees. 6T9’s processors identified the lights as coming from a source 479 meters away. He also heard shouting in that vicinity. Drawing to a halt, Volka threw out a hand.
He glanced down at her just as her visor snicked shut. “The Dark is nearby. I smell it, Sixty,” she whispered.
Nodding, he let his own visor click into place. With a jerk of her thumb, she indicated Carl still snoring in her pack, and 6T9 closed the werfle’s visor as well. Volka murmured, “I would never think I’d like losing my sense of smell, but it’s so rank.” 6T9’s chemical receptors hadn’t picked up “rankness.” He wondered about that, but Volka was already moving again.