He felt his chest go tight. His thoughts raced.
He felt an immense pressure of emotion in his heart, and an enormous wave of sadness wash over him. But of course, he thought. I’m probably about to die and…No. It was something more specific.
He wished he could see Trent just one last time.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“Perhaps we should pretend they were never here?” suggested Serpico.
Sitting in Haafiz’s office, the two officers smoked Drewdonian leaf-plant, trying to assimilate the enormity of what had just happened while savoring what might be their last few hours of freedom.
“We don’t know who knew they were here. Plus the ship’s data shows them teleporting in, and moving around the ship. And half the crew saw them.” Haafiz shook his head. “There is no way we can hide this from the Federation.”
He took a deep drag of the leaf-plant.
“Are you suggesting we just sit back and wait to be put on trial for murder? Manslaughter?” The pitch of Serpico’s voice climbed, indicating his true level of agitation. “Whichever way you look at it, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that they could think we orchestrated this unfortunate accident.”
Serpico let his head slump into his hands, his elbows resting on the corner of his commander’s large oaklon desk. He needed sleep. And a shower. Dark circles framed his eye sockets, which were now more sunken than usual.
“It was an accident, and that synthbot was in control of that door. There’s no way we’re accountable. This is on the Federation.” Haafiz paused, his leaf-plant cigar halfway to his mouth. “You know, it just occurred to me that the bot could have killed her boss on purpose…”
Serpico looked up, his eyes hopeful. “What was she saying just before it happened? That the Captain had been lying to us, and that we should fire on the prototype? Still, even if that’s true, it doesn’t remove all suspicion from us. It looks like we’re pointing a finger to save ourselves.”
“Yes. But that door looked to be working,” continued Haafiz. His eyes were weary, but a hint of relief had begun to creep into them. “She could easily have opened it as we were talking.”
Serpico nodded. “And she’s disappeared. It would only be natural to assume her guilt.”
The more they talked, the more they convinced themselves they were in the clear.
Haafiz took another drag of the cigar. His shoulders slumped. “It sounds convincing, I’ll give you that. It might even save us. But I don’t feel good about this at all. I feel like throwing up.”
Serpico sighed. “It’s a shock to me too. This is our ship, of course. We can’t help but feel responsible. I think you’re right, we really don’t have any choice except to report what happened. They’ll probably send a ship out here to investigate. That young man seemed to have some weight with the Federation.”
Haafiz’s brow furrowed. “You’re right, he did. Unusual for an Independent. It’s usually the Legionaries who have that much sway. Captain Klingerman seemed like something of a wild card.”
Serpico raised his eyebrows, acknowledging the commander’s observation. Neither of them knew what to make of it.
“Okay. I’m not eager to report it immediately though. I’m not clear-headed yet.” Haafiz stubbed his cigar out in the dish on his desk and stood, stretching his old, tired muscles.
Just then his holo beeped. There was an incoming holocall. He glanced at Serpico, who shrugged. The command team was on a night shift now. There shouldn’t be any need to interrupt them.
Haafiz tapped his arm and opened the holocall screen with a flick of his finger.
“Hello?” he said, not recognizing the origin of the incoming transmission.
“Commander Haafiz?” A woman’s voice. Serpico’s right eyebrow rose again.
The image of a female commander materialized as the connection settled.
“I’m Commander Grace, of the FFS Troy. We’re approaching the orbit of New Atlantia and have orders to rendezvous with Captain Klingerman. It will be some time yet, but I want to establish contact as soon as possible. I believe he’s aboard your ship?”
Haafiz’s eyes opened wide. His jaw dropped spontaneously, only closing when he swallowed hard trying to find the words to respond. If the Troy was already in holo-messaging range, then they were no more than a day away – possibly closer.
His heart suddenly thumped in his throat, and his tired gray complexion paled even more, making him positively ashen.
Serpico was suddenly alert, too. He knew what this meant. No waiting till they were clear-headed to make the call and inform the Federation. It was happening now.
“Commander Grace – glad to make your acquaintance. I’m afraid I have some bad news…”
Haafiz took a deep breath. This was going to be the hardest conversation of his whole career.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It was dark still. Somehow, it seemed to him that it had been dark for a long time now. His neck was stiff and pained; the muscles had been too tense for too long. And there was something else. His mother was there. He knew it.
“Neffy…” she said.
But he had been in space. He knew that, too. Drifting, disoriented, succumbing rapidly to despair and fear. And at the peak of his terror, when he was certain he was going to die, he had thought back to the Academy. It was the place that had shaped him, and the place he wanted to return to, more than any other.
Then there had been that strange, familiar sensation – the one he’d known from his prior experiences with teleportation. How could he be teleported directly from the middle of space, though? It made no sense.
And why would his mother be there?
Perhaps both of them were dead. Or, of course, this was another dream.
“Don’t do this to me again,” he moaned. He felt like he was surrounded by dark and light, a cocoon of flickering shades that shut out the reality of the world around him. Was he dead or was he alive? He wasn’t sure he cared. He knew, somehow, that he had been betrayed.
Darkness welled up from inside and drowned out the world in an immense silence. Everything faded away once more.
+++
Coming to, Neffy winced in pain. His whole body throbbed rhythmically like some strange musical composition. He noticed a muffled hub of activity in the distance, and a soft but persistent mechanical beeping.
The comfort that had enveloped him evaporated as quickly as a dream. Cold light struck his eyelids, making it impossible to keep them closed.
Gradually, as the sounds sharpened, he could make out footsteps. Voices. Activity.
“Nefertiti!” It was his mother’s voice.
What was his mother doing here? Neffy tried to think what might have happened. Where was he? What was the last thing he’d been doing? As he ploughed through the corners of his mind, he dreaded what he would find there.
He tried to lift his head. His neck ached and his head pulsed with the pain of a thousand taser strikes. Unable to bear the discomfort, he let his head fall back into the pillow, initiating another cascade of pain through his nervous system.
“Mom…” He tried to speak, but his words were lost in an inarticulate mumble.
“It’s okay, darling. Don’t try to speak. You’ve been through a lot. Just take your time coming round. I’ll get a nurse.” Neffy heard footsteps move away and a door open and close.
He opened his eyes. They smarted from the brightness, but he was more curious about where he was than about how he could go back into the darkness. Giving his pupils moments to adjust, he managed to peel his eyes open, closing them again several times to shield his retinas from the harsh intensity of the light.
He needed to look at his holo and review his timelog. Then at least he could figure out where he was and what was going on. He tried to lift his arm, but as he took the weight of it, the pain through his neck was just too intense. Again, he relaxed back and awaited his mother’s return.
There were still voices outside,
but he couldn’t make anything out.
Minutes passed.
Eventually he managed to open his eyes fully. He was on T3. That he could tell from the daylight streaming in from the window and the familiar feeling of full gravity.
Then there was the room. Sparse, but comfortable. And the tech he was hooked up to, monitoring his vitals, was new. Judging by that, and the brand of decor, he deduced that he must be in an Academy facility.
Finally, the door to his room slid open again, and a nurse appeared, his mother walking closely behind her. The nurse looked nonplussed that he was awake, and barely acknowledged him before tending to the holoscreen of the machine by his bedside.
His mother looked concerned. That was a first.
Normally Diane would have been more worried about the bigger picture, and her work – but with all that gone, Neffy was the only thing left. Neffy knew this, and took her sudden motherly instinct with a pinch of macca. As far as he was concerned, regardless of what condition he was in right now, his mother’s sudden attention to his well-being was too little, too late.
“How’s he doing?” Diane addressed the nurse while looking at Neffy – almost as if Neffy wasn’t a sentient participant in the exchange.
“Better,” the nurse responded, “now that his fever’s broken he’s recovering just fine. His nano-enhancements are helping him heal quickly, too. Brain swelling should be gone in a few hours.”
She swiped the holo screen closed and turned to look at Neffy, her hands now tucked into the pockets of her tunic. “He should be walking around by tomorrow.”
“Oh, that is good news,” cooed his mother. “I must call Commander Trent. He’ll be thrilled that you’ll be walking around soon. He asked me to let him know when that might be.”
His mother marched out of the room again, tapping on her holo implant to contact Neffy’s CO.
Without realizing it, Neffy must have rolled his eyes at the notion of his retired Flight Sergeant of a mother sucking up to his boss, because the nurse interrupted his thoughts:
“She’s been here day and night for the last three nights since you were brought in.” He could see the judgment in her steely blue eyes. She must have perceived the eye-rolling to be unruly and immature behavior on Neffy’s part.
Neffy wanted to roll his eyes at the nurse now, but thought better of it.
“You have kids?” he asked politely, slipping into mediation mode despite his aching facial muscles.
“Yes. I have a daughter about your age, and three sons,” she responded, lighting up the way parents do when they talk about their spawn.
Neffy’s stomach turned. There was no way this woman was going to believe, let alone understand, what his mother had put him through. Plus, he would probably be divulging classified information if he even talked about it.
“That’s nice,” he answered, remaining aloof, “but what happened to me? Why am I here?”
The nurse seemed reluctant to speak. “I don’t know. We’ve been told to let your CO explain your situation when you’re awake. You’ll have to wait and speak with him.”
“But you know what’s wrong with me?” he pushed, trying to claw some insight out of the nurse. He needed to know why he was here and what had happened.
“Well, the brain swelling seems to have put you into a coma briefly. Plus you were oxygen deficient when you got here, and your white blood cell count was high. That’s all I can tell you.”
White blood cells high? That would suggest being out in space, without even the artificial gravity of a ship. Or a space station without gravity – but those were few and far between these days. Neffy’s trail of thought turned into a web of speculation as he scrambled to understand what might have happened.
He needed to read his holo notes.
“Can you help me sit up?” he asked, feeling particularly vulnerable because he couldn’t see what was going on from a prone position. He glanced again at his holo implant. He needed answers.
“Of course.” The nurse reached across to the holopanel on the machine next to her and swiped at the posture control. Moments later the bed moved and repositioned Neffy so he was now sitting upright. He winced as his head pounded in ten new ways with the adjustment, before eventually returning to the regular, baseline throbbing.
“Thanks,” he said watching the nurse turn to go. Halfway to the door, instead of leaving, the nurse turned back.
“Whatever your mother did, she only did what she thought was best for you. Try to forgive her. No argument is worth losing a mother.”
Neffy’s heart wanted to break. Worse than the pain of what he had actually experienced in his childhood, there was also the knowledge that no one else would understand it. People were always telling him to forgive his mother – as if it was that simple.
The nurse left, and the door slid shut behind her.
Tears burned in his eyes and he fought them back, as if he were fighting to not let his mom back in again. She would return any minute now, and he didn’t want her to see him crying. It would just be awkward, apart from anything else. Things had always been strained between them, and that wasn’t going to change with some heart-to-heart conversation from his hospital bed.
Biting through the physical and emotional discomfort, he moved his right arm across to try to activate the holo implant on his left forearm. The act of raising his arm pulled on his neck and blinded him with pain. Rotating his left forearm strained his left side and hurt along the whole length of his back. He breathed through it, and in seconds had tapped his forearm, opening his eyes to view the panel and try to operate it.
Nothing happened.
He tapped again and it opened, but instead of seeing the familiar panel of options unfold in the space over his arm, his eyes were met with a blank screen.
Nothing.
No options menu. No log. None of his customized patches and routines. Nothing.
Fuck!
Fuck, fuck, fuck, he ranted to himself under his breath.
What could have possibly happened that would wipe his implant?
His felt close to despair with confusion and pain. Something terrible had happened, and he didn’t know what. Between that and the presence of his mother, he was overwhelmed. Tears rolled down his cheek into his shirt collar. He could barely move and wiping them away wasn’t worth the effort.
What was going on? Why wouldn’t anyone tell him what had happened to him? And why was his holo gone? It was his lifeline, his only way to keep tabs on events. To maintain his sanity. To be able to function in this world. And it was gone!
He felt naked and disoriented.
The door slid open and Diane Klingerman walked back in. Seeing her son in this state, she did her best to behave appropriately, but it was like watching a scorpion trying to be nurturing.
“Oh, Neffy. It’s okay. Don’t cry. There, there. There, there…” she said, awkwardly trying to be comforting, rigidly hugging her son and patting him at the same time.
Fuck, even when she’s trying, she’s still godawful at this, thought Neffy. He couldn’t think of anything worse than his current situation. Totally helpless, with his mother patting his back like she didn’t know if she was doing it right.
“Mom,” Neffy started, through the tears, his face smothered by her Milano wool sweater.
“Yes, dear?” she responded, thankful for the excuse to break from the awkward embrace and pull back.
“I need to borrow your holo.”
“Well okay, dear. Though I’d need to ask your CO first. He had yours deactivated, of course.”
“What do you mean, he had mine deactivated?” Neffy burst out, boiling with anger, his eyes like lasers boring holes of white-hot fury into his mother.
“Well, just that. He had the techs come in and deactivate it when you were in a coma. Said something about galactic security while you were unconscious. I’m assuming it’s just routine.” She gave him a smile that was probably meant to be soothing. “That’s why they have
a guard on your door.”
Diane had hoped that this would reassure her son, but Neffy did a double-take, only now just noticing an armed guard through the tiny window.
Something wasn’t right. They weren’t treating him like an injured asset…they were treating him like a criminal.
“Mom, listen to me. Something bad is going down, and I need access to my holo to find out what. I need your help, but I need you not to tell anyone. Do you understand?” Neffy prayed that his mother felt guilty enough to help him, and that the guilt would override her unquestioning loyalty to the Federation. It had never worked that way before, but his mother had been choosing the Federation over her son for twenty-five years. Maybe she was ready to try something different.
She hesitated. This decision was clearly not an easy one for her. “But Trent had said it was for your own protection…”
“Mom, we can’t trust Trent. In fact, we can’t trust anyone. Please.”
“Well…okay, I suppose. What do you need me to do?”
“Pull up your holo. I need to call a friend…”
+++
There was a tap at the door. Neffy looked up. The door slid open to reveal a short, balding man carrying a bouquet of snapdragons. He was wearing a lab coat – and an awkward smile.
Diane Klingerman looked up from her holoscreen, realizing this must be Fred.
“Hey…” said Neffy. He was still straining to talk. The pain was subsiding, but he didn’t dare move too much for fear of triggering another cascade of pain.
Fred self-consciously shuffled into the room, pushing his black-framed glasses back up his nose with his index finger. “Looks like someone has been in the wars! What happened to you?”
“If only I knew!” exclaimed Neffy, “I don’t even know what date it is, let alone anything else.”
“Hell,” Fred said. He looked concerned as he absently handed the flowers to Diane, who busied herself with them. Fred drew closer to Neffy. “So complete memory loss, as well as the holo being wiped?”
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