Heretics (Stars Edge: Nel Bently Book 4)

by V. S. Holmes

  “So, ah, when does your group split off?” Nel asked, a clumsy attempt at rerouting the doomed conversation.

  “Once we’re out of Egypt. Waiting on whatever data they have there before we finalize our route.” Jem stretched, tugging down the edge of their binder with annoyance. “Guess it’s mostly medical staff. More than that’s classified.” They flashed an apologetic grin.

  “I’m glad they’re splitting us up, cover more ground, more answers that way and all,” Nel offered, a poor attempt at hiding her stinging pride.

  Whatever Jem’s response was, it drowned in a firm voice. “Dr. Bently. Your presence is requested.”

  Dr. Ndebele stood in the doorway leading to the conference car. Nel tried to gauge the woman’s unreadable expression. Apparently she dawdled too long.

  “Now.”

  “Sorry, ma’am,” Nel apologized as she extricated herself from the booth. Neither spoke as she followed the officer across the causeway. The train lurched beneath them. Dr. Ndebele kept her footing easily, but Nel almost pitched over the causeway rail. A graceful dark hand steadied her with a featherlight touch. “Mind the gap, Dr. Bently.”

  “Thanks.” Nel flashed a smile, but by the time the awkward expression was in place, the other woman had turned back and was inputting the entry key. The door hissed open, and Nel stepped into the gleaming, bright lights of the officer’s private chambers. The rear half of the car was an office, but a raised curtain behind her desk showed a tidy bedroom beyond.

  Dr. Ndebele tugged the curtain shut and sat behind her desk. A moment later Lin slipped into the room. “Afternoon. Hi, Nel.”

  Dr. Ndebele brought up a few files on her screen, but Nel could see little through the blurred back of the projection. Catching Nel’s confused expression, Dr. Ndebele explained, “Harris will join us momentarily.”

  When Lin settled beside her, Nel smiled. “Thought I outgrew getting called to the principal’s office.”

  “Quit being trouble and you’ll stop getting into it!” Lin whispered.

  “Thought you liked that I’m trouble,” Nel whispered with a playful grin.

  “If we could keep the flirting to a minimum while on official business?” Harris interjected as he stepped through the door.

  “Sorry, sir,” Nel responded.

  He took up an easy stance in the corner behind the desk and steepled his fingers. His gaze rested on Lin as Dr. Ndebele flicked one of the documents around so it displayed on their side of the hologram.

  “Look, if this is about the booze, I’ll pay for it—” Nel began.

  “This has to do with Komodor Muda Nalawangsa. What booze?”

  Nel blanched. “Nothing, ma’am, my mistake. Please, continue.”

  Her eyes narrowed on Nel, but one blocky finger flicked the file open. “I hope you’ll forgive the paper, we’re running pretty low-tech down here.”

  “What about my brother?” Lin leaned forward. Her face was neutral, but Nel had only seen that pinch around her eyes a few times: on Samsara and the night in Chile when everything changed. She’s scared.

  “This shouldn’t take too long, but it came from on high so…” She trailed off. “Have either of you had any contact with Dar Nalawangsa in the past three weeks?”

  Nel frowned. “I think the memorial was the last place. For ah, Dr. Paul de Lellis.”

  “We met a few times since Samsara.” Lin agreed, voice an echo of the hardness in her eyes. “What is this about?”

  “We are following up on some questions regarding him.”

  Lin slumped back in her seat, long arms draped across her chest. Her lips pursed and for a moment Nel saw the petulant, spoiled girl who took drunken space walks off an asteroid mine. “Is this for some promotion of his, because I don’t know why you bother. If you cut every rung, he’d still climb that ladder.”

  “Your brother never reported for duty two weeks ago.”

  Color drained from Lin’s face and her pout relaxed into disbelief. “What?”

  “His last appearance on security footage was in your corridor the day before launch. There’s a transcript of the video if you’d like, but it’s inconclusive.” She slid it toward Lin, who simply stared, unfocused.

  Dread sank in Nel’s gut. What few science fiction films she had seen told her nothing good ever came from a man missing in space. Please don’t involve an exposed walk out an airlock.

  “After the memorial, he returned to his ship. At 0300 hours the next morning they performed a textbook departure for a classified destination, Estimated Time of Arrival at 1930 a week later. They never arrived. Didn’t even make the first checkpoint. We’re just trying to track down what might have happened. You were the last two people to actually speak with him.”

  Lin whirled to Nel. “You talked to Dar? Why didn’t you say?”

  Nel shrugged. “Barely, we walked past each other. I was on my way to your room.”

  “Right, you said that.” Lin turned to stare at the desktop, frowning as if it had been the one to make her brother disappear. “Did you check his trajectory?”

  “Nalawangsa is a high-ranking pilot. With that comes the privilege of not having to report his trajectories prior to departure.”

  Dr. Ndebele brought up a display of reconnaissance reports. “Each attempt at what little communication we’re still permitted meets with static. Never received. Scouting ships are searching several possible routes, but we’re concerned he might not have headed to his deployment at all.”

  “Where was he supposed to go?” Nel asked.

  “Classified, Bently.” Harris’s expression had too many edges to be a smile. “For one, I have no doubts about his safety.”

  The train’s electric hum balanced on the taught edges of silence stretching across the desk. Ferocity returned to Lin’s face. “You’re suggesting he disobeyed orders.”

  “I’m suggesting that we don’t know where he is and are concerned for his safety and that of his crew,” Dr. Ndebele responded, voice level. “Letnan Nalawangsa, your brother had over 250 people aboard the Promise. I’m sure their families are as concerned as you, and so far we haven’t even found a chem trail.”

  Lin’s mouth thinned. “My brother breathes his duty to all of us, ma’am. If he’s missing it’s because something bad happened. Your suggestions otherwise are shameful and a stain on his record. Space is a big place.” She shoved herself out of the chair, tugging Nel up with her. “Keep looking.”

  She stalked from the room, Nel shooting an apologetic glance over her shoulder. Lin didn’t stop at the dining car or the sleeping cabins. She slammed from car to car, as if she could negate their progress by rushing backward through the train. When she burst into the caboose her breath was heaving. Her long fingers gripped the rail as she leaned out over the gangway.

  “What the fuck was that about?” Nel asked.

  Lin’s pupils were pinpricks in the dark cosmos of her irises. “Their nasty questions or me losing it on her for being a bitch—”

  Nel winced as her voice carried off the metal and whipped away into the wind. “I get why you lost it. I’ve been doing it all my life. Never thought I’d hear you jump to his defense that way, but hey.” She leaned on the metal bar, lending Lin the privacy of not meeting her eyes. “I meant with Dar missing.”

  “You tell me—apparently you were the last one to see him.”

  “We both saw him at the memorial for the Samsaran deaths.”

  “Samsari,” Lin snapped. “You know what I mean.”

  “Honestly, all he did was shake his head at me. Like as in, ‘shut it, Bently’ which is pretty on brand for him. And fair, too, since whatever you two were arguing about seemed like none of my business.” Even if it was about me.

  The last sentence seemed to hook in the myriad folds of Lin’s gray matter. Her calculating gaze snapped to Nel’s face. “What’d you hear?”

  “Not much,” Nel lied. “Never had siblings but
seemed like normal bickering. I just waited until you were done to come see if you wanted to say goodbye.”

  Lin’s eyes narrowed on Nel’s, but the archaeologist held her gaze, unwavering. “So you heard his warning. About us dating.”

  Nel shrugged. “Brothers always bitch about me. Or anyone their sisters date. I tried to cut him some slack, what with Paul—”

  “That was years ago. You’re projecting from Mikey or something. He was the one who ended things, anyway.” She looked down, frown in place, voice pitching higher with every word. “He’s an asshole, but he is family, you know. Space feels really big right now. Not knowing in which corner he is. Not knowing if he’s just drifting, if his ship’s life support—” Acrid vomit interrupted her words, splattering with a sizzle onto the electrified middle rail. She pressed the back of one shaking hand to her mouth before disappearing back into the car.

  It might have been the coward’s way out, but Nel didn’t follow her. This panic, this worry, felt as alien to her as anything Lin did. Perhaps her brain had simply overloaded and couldn’t bear thinking about one more mystery. Or I’m just not sure why everyone’s concerned about one asshole. It wasn’t fair. Nel would have overturned every rock between here and the galaxy’s edge to find Mikey if she’d known he was missing before cops arrived to discuss his murder.

  Her eyes traced the sun-bleached swath winding through the jungle. Cold solidified her in her gut. Dar wasn’t the only person missing. Out there, beyond the foreign mountains and across the gray depths of the Atlantic, waited her mother.

  “I’m not overwhelmed by mysteries,” she admitted to the eddying wind of the caboose deck. “I’m pissed hers rates higher than mine.”

  SEVEN

  Nel rested her head on the edge of Zach’s door frame. “Hey,” she began, wondering what the right words were.

  “Ah, it’s the archaeology badass herself.” His gentle smile made it clear his words were more genuine than jab. “What can I do for you?”

  “I was wondering if you had a moment? I don’t really know about setting up an appointment or whatever.”

  “Depends on whether this is for therapy or friendship. As for the appointment, I was under the impression that we were taking this on an ‘as-you-wanted’ basis.”

  “Does that make for effective therapy?”

  He snorted. “No, but you know that, and I’d rather you have some as opposed to none. I have time now—I was just finishing my notes, and the rest of what I need to do for the day can wait. I think better in the evening anyway.”

  She closed the door behind her and settled on the bench. Beneath her, the train hummed. The landscape outside seemed to creep by, the uniformity making their speed seem like a snail’s meander. Where to start? She wasn’t even sure what muddled series of thoughts had dragged her reluctant stomps to the psychologist’s door.

  “For someone who’s never been within a thousand miles of India, I was really fucking happy to see it,” she chuckled.

  “I was happy to see Earth again too. It’s been a long time since I last walked on her.” His gaze eased into thoughtfulness. “I imagine we’ll find out more soon, but, God willing, this mission brings us a bit closer to familiar ground.”

  Nel made a show of crossing her fingers, but lapsed into silence.

  “Did you want to discuss being back? Maybe how things have changed? I was disheartened to see some of the developments since I was here last.”

  “You mean pandemics and missing people and killing soundwaves, or…”

  He didn’t seem to mind humoring her snark, but the look in his eye told her he knew it was just a tactic. “Mostly that much of the control has been transferred to a very powerful few. But this is about you.”

  “That’s kind of my issue, I guess,” she hazarded. “I don’t know, a large part of me wants to take off. Just keep feeling like I need to grab a pack of smokes from a seedy gas station and watch the wind come off the lake at night, you know?”

  “I didn’t know you smoked.”

  “I just mean, that’s the feeling,” Nel protested. “I don’t. Or rarely. Most archaeologists smoke more than the fire pits they dig up. Only time I ever did was one summer. Going through a breakup. Rather, a breakup was going through me, I guess. Tearing me apart. Whenever sleeping next to her, listening to her breath at night got to be too much, I’d walk to the corner market in Burlington where we lived at the time and grab a pack—unless I had some left over from the last time, and I’d walk down to Champlagne. There’re these docks there, and a crepe place by the train tracks. Wind would rush across from the New York side when storms hit.”

  “What was it about those times that brought you peace?”

  “Other than leaving?”

  “Does leaving bring you peace?”

  She shrugged. “I guess. Never been much of a connection person.”

  “No?” He tilted his head. “I imagine Mikey would disagree. You don’t need a whole group of friends to connect. I’d pick something that makes you feel ‘normal,’ as you put it, and focus on that, at least until there’s more to do.”

  Nel frowned at her hands clasped before her. The usual calluses were softening, her body morphing into whoever IDH wanted her to be. “Most of it’s stuff I can’t do—go out to a bar. Drink. Call my mom. Take a hike.”

  He waited, not patient, but expectant. “Have you talked about this with Lin? Therapy is well and good, but support from loved ones—”

  “Pump the brakes there, shrinky-dink. I like her fine. I don’t know her well enough to say I love her.” She stopped, hearing the words spin around her head. I don’t know her. “I’ve learned some things about her, about her family, that I feel like I normally would have known by now.”

  “Do you want to know her?”

  “Of course,” Nel retorted without thinking. She paused. Lin was strange. Odd. Wild. Whatever string of words both captivated and challenged everything Nel knew about relationships. It already seemed as if eons had passed since they stood, allied, watching a planet burn. Lin’s normally bright expression was now more often tempered with exhaustion Nel shared. If either had slept since Samsara, it was fitfully and full of dreams. “I do want to. I’m not really used to that, honestly.”

  Zachariah had the kindness not to mention everything she had done for a woman she still insisted was a stranger. “Maybe you aren't familiar with being involved with someone who’s guarded too.”

  “I thought about looking stuff up on her. On their family. Never dated someone who was Google-able before.”

  “Have you tried asking her? Or sharing smaller pieces of yourself first, to test the waters?”

  “I mean. A bit about Dar and their family. Awkward,” Nel drawled.

  “I meant about herself. Getting to know her. The way you might if all of this,” he gestured to the train, to the Earth, to the universe beyond, “weren’t a factor?”

  “Like go on a date? How?”

  He shrugged. “Or whatever you two got up to when you first met. I assume there was a point that tipped you over the edge from friends to whatever you’d prefer to call your current arrangement.”

  “I grief-fucked her on our hotel roof and then her brother’s spaceship blew up my site and everything caught fire.”

  His smile brightened. “This is why you’re princess badass. Just think about it. If nothing else, maybe the two of you can ignore this mission for long enough to relax.”

  “I like the way that sounds.” She looked down at her hands. “Even in my wildest dreams. In my most bizarre nightmares, I didn’t see any of this.”

  “I think the only ones who did are the people who got us here in the first place.”

  “The Teachers?”

  His hands opened in a graceful shrug. “If I knew, then we wouldn’t be here.”

  “Good point.” She rose. “Thanks. Sorry to barge in and puke my feelings at you.”

  “I’m always
happy to see you, Dr. Bently. And would support seeing you more regularly, if your schedule permits.”

  “My ego and avoidance, you mean?”

  “Your words, my dear, not mine.”

  She snorted and slid the door open, enjoying the rumble and rock of the train’s movement. “At least the train’s pretty cool. Have a good afternoon.”

  “You too.”

  She shut the door behind her, staring out the bank of windows opposite the row of office doors. Short of sitting down in their tiny shared room and asking Lin who the fuck she actually was, Nel didn’t know the first thing about getting to know anyone. Let alone someone who she actually cared about. You did it with Mikey.

  Mikey didn’t take effort. Or keep secrets. Or have a family entwined in an interstellar conspiracy. Shaking away the snark, she returned to their room. Her computer still balanced on the edge of the tiny folding tea table by the narrow window. Daylight bathed her face. Leaving the lights off, she opened the database and typed in her mother’s name.

  SEARCH UNAVAILABLE

  Shoving aside her mounting frustration, she erased the search and tried again:

  SEARCH: Mindi Bently

  SEARCH UNAVAILABLE

  After a glance around to make sure no one was reading through the haze of the translucent screen, she typed in Lin’s surname.

  SEARCH/Nalawangsa

  Surname, popular in Southeast Asia; for the family associated with IDH administration see: Laksamana First Class Tirta Nalawangsa; for the missing-persons case see: Mansur Nalawangsa; for the legal suit see: Nalawangsa vs. Phillip Clark

  Nel stared at the seemingly endless list of alternative searches wondering how many pertained to Lin. How many were common knowledge? She couldn’t shake the feeling that she stumbled into a relationship and was now Googling “Corleone.”

  She hovered over each link, only to see all but the first was gray and dead. Clicking on it brought her a single paragraph:

  Laksamana First Class Tirta Nalawangsa is a well-known philanthropic figure in the upper levels of the IDH. She is known for her work brokering peace between her place of origin, Samsara, and the larger overarching governing body of IDH, most notably through her marriage to Brigadir Jenderal SantoSo, Nalawangsa in 13-521. While superficially controversial, many of her petitions and bills are lauded as groundbreaking among politically progressive sectors. She has two children with Brigadir Jenderal Nalawangsa, Dar and Lin, who follow in their parents’ respective footsteps.