Eighteen
Eighteen
T he violence came and went according to its own logic, shaking the ship and bending Rickar’s mind in a stuttering of hours and days that felt random. The gaps between the hits took on the feeling of a hurricane eye: moments of eerie calm that made the violence before and after more pronounced.
The Budon of Luus responded to the stress by increasing their reproductive efforts.
For days, tiny black nymphs the size of Rickar’s thumbnail spread through the common space, searching in vain for whatever environmental niche would have let them flourish to adulthood before they dried out and died.
The adult Budon ignored their swarms of dying children magnificently, and Rickar found himself wavering between pity and admiration.
Evolution often engineered a fatalism in its prey species.
Under stress, some trees would increase their pollination, some fish would up the output of roe.
There were lizards that, in times of trouble, would forgo sexual reproduction altogether and clone themselves.
One of the strategies the universe kept reaching for was to throw as many babies at the future as it could and hope that this apocalypse wasn’t the last one.
From where Rickar sat, it was as close to optimism as nature ever got.
The only bright spot in the long endurance was his discovery that Vaudai had access to the Carryx tactical data, and would share it if Rickar asked.
They didn’t seem to care about the concept of military secrets.
Their strategy of make a mistake and watch your species burn was the only backstop they needed.
The display was the same volumetric spread of light that the Carryx used for their version of a written language, only instead of abstract shapes, Vaudai had a schematic version of the solar system they were in from the local star in the center to the skin of the heliosphere.
At scale, it would have been an emptiness punctuated by dots of light too small to see, but with the overlays that Vaudai conjured up, Rickar could track the twelve major planets, the clouds of asteroids in two distinct belts, and—more importantly to him—the positions of the Carryx ships and the enemy fleet.
Thin cones defined something Vaudai called exclusion-and-control fields , wider ones fundamental decoherence zones , and a few hair-thin curving lines void tendril probability arcs .
The giant slug thing seemed to enjoy explaining what it was seeing to Rickar.
Sometimes, Rickar even followed some of what it was saying.
“The battle is in essence already over,” Vaudai’s translation half-mind said.
Rickar was still uncertain what signals it was taking from the slug that became language.
To him, the voice of the machine was the voice of the alien.
“What remains is for the enemy to choose the manner in which they lose.”
“How humiliating for them,” Rickar said, scratching idly at his leg.
“And lethal. But there are strategic concerns outside this particular battlefield. The enemy may choose to continue this battle, even though it means losing their ships here, in order to keep the dactyl occupied instead of redeploying elsewhere. Or they may blunder in their disengagement, in which case they will lose these four ships.” Four of the symbols in the display pulsed.
“Or they may decide to lose these two ships, which are of lower value, in exchange for this one, which they prize more highly. Whatever decision they make, it will have implications in the larger war in other systems. The shape an enemy adopts in defeat is telling.”
“What’s your bet?”
Vaudai went silent for a long time. Rickar was used to these lapses.
Sometimes, the giant slug would come back with an answer a few moments later.
Sometimes, it would start a new conversation as if Rickar hadn’t asked.
Across the common room, one of the Sinen waddled by on its short legs.
It wasn’t the usual overseer. This one had thicker tentacles and the shape of its eyes was rounder.
Rickar noticed with a distant amusement that he was now able to tell Sinen apart by their looks.
“This one is dead, but their behavior indicates they don’t know that yet,” Vaudai said, and one of the ships on the far side of the solar system from their ship pulsed once.
“They will lose it in four cycles. The attempt to protect it will come from here—” A region of the display lit up.
“And here.” Another joined it. “But the attempt is flawed, and both supporting vessels will be lost or driven back. Once the other ships escape or are destroyed, it will detonate itself rather than be captured.”
“Suicide?”
“It is an enemy command ship. They do not permit them to be examined.”
“And what then?”
“Then we will see what our Carryx masters think is best,” Vaudai said.
It was probably just Rickar’s imagination that the half-mind’s voice took on a nuance of sarcasm when it spoke the words.
It was easy to pretend a common sense of humor with the alien.
And maybe it was even accurate. Maybe evolution in its largest form selected for amusement and contempt for organisms that lived without power and agency.
Across the common room, one of the Budon lifted its head. Its throat thickened and a single clear, beautiful note rang out. Across the common room, two others rose up, their voices harmonizing in something more than music.
“Well fuck,” Rickar said.
“Yes,” Vaudai agreed as it spread its body wider against the deck to adhere better.
“I’m heading back to my cell. I’ll see you when the overspill’s done.”
“If we live.”
Ghati’s eyes were open, but he hadn’t moved since Campar had left his room, hours before. Campar stood in the doorway for a moment that seemed to stretch forever, and then Ghati took a breath and time started again.
“You’re looking dour, my dear,” Campar said, stepping in.
“Did that last episode exhaust you? It wore me out.” He closed the door behind him.
The room smelled rank. Unwashed body, yes, but something else.
Something darker. Campar’s heart ticked up its pace and his jaw hurt.
He tried to relax, but his body refused to.
It knew what this was. It had been here often enough that it would not—could not—pretend safety.
He sat on the edge of Ghati’s bed. The already slender man had lost weight.
His cheekbones had gone sharp and the dip at the top of his collarbone never went away now.
His eyes were glassy in a way that made Campar think of hospitals.
Ghati’s gaze found him slowly. Campar tried smiling but it felt false. Ghati didn’t try.
“You’re sick,” Campar said.
“I’m in hell,” Ghati said. “I’m in a box buried in a vacuum. Demons are hurling me through endless nothing and taunting me with visions of death.”
Ghati didn’t try to pull back when Campar took his hand. It might have been better if he had. It would have taken effort, anyway. Campar would have felt a thousand times better if they were fighting.
“You’re breaking a little,” Campar said. “That’s all. We all do it, one time or another. It would be strange if we didn’t.”
“I had a garden,” Ghati said. “When I was young, I had a garden that my mother kept. We grew our own flowers there. What’s funny is I don’t miss the smell of the flowers as much as I miss the smell of the dirt they grew in.
How long has it been since you smelled soil? Do you remember what it was like?”
The temptation was to lie. To say that he did, and that they both would again. The glimmer in Ghati’s eyes was a warning. “No, not really.”
“We kept bees too. A bee taken from its hive? A bee alone? It dies. You can give it water. You can give it food. You can keep it warm, but it doesn’t matter. It dies. I haven’t seen the sky in so long, Campar. I’m dying without it. I can’t live here, and there’s nowhere else to go.”
Campar drew his fingertips across Ghati’s forehead like he could smooth away the furrows there. And they did ease, a little. Only a little.
“We are in a ship we don’t control, on a mission we don’t understand, and every now and then, someone tries to kill us,” Campar said.
“Of course it’s overwhelming. But we live through it, and there’s more unexpected things on the other side.
Remember when we left Anjiin? Those terrible rooms with the cold and the dark?
This is better than that. We have better food, we know more.
We lived through that, and we can live through this. ”
“Why do you want to?” Ghati asked. An accusation in the form of a question.
“In the hope that I’ll be pleasantly surprised,” he said, making it half a joke. “Like you. You were a wonderfully pleasant surprise.”
“You’re a good man, Campar. I wish I’d known you before.”
He meant before the Carryx. There was only one before for any of them now. “You should eat something,” Campar said.
Ghati seemed to collapse into himself and he looked away. And now he pulled his hand out of Campar’s with enough strength that he seemed annoyed. “I’m not hungry.”
“I didn’t ask whether you were hungry, I said you need to eat.” Ghati didn’t reply. The lines at the side of his mouth, already stark, grew deeper. Campar stood. “Would you rather come with me, or should I get takeaway and we can have breakfast in bed?”
“I’m tired. I want to sleep.”
“Bed it is, then,” Campar said. “Wait for me here. I’ll be right back.”