Wreck of the Nebula Dream (20 page)

Nick drew the other three adults toward the stairs. “You’d better not distract her.”

“What’s going on?” Hand on his arm, Mara stopped Nick a few feet away. “How does she know them? When did they ever meet before?” She eyed Nick sternly, waiting for her answer. “You know more than you’re sharing with me.”
 

Needing to steady his nerves, he took a deep breath. Closing his eyes, he had to fight off the events from his own past crowding in. “She’s giving them the Peace of Mellure.” Nick spoke to Mara, the words coming in stiff tones, holding pain he rarely chose to let himself think about. There was a physical pain in his chest, grief, old but treacherously potent.

She stepped closer, almost embracing him, her face concerned. “How do you know?”

“I was given the same gift, when I was about Paolo’s age, after the Mawreg attacked the colony where I was born. I watched from hiding as the Mawreg destroyed the place, killing and torturing anyone who hadn’t been well enough hidden, including my parents, my baby sister. My father ordered me –
ordered me
– not to stir from hiding, no matter what horrors I saw.” Nick bit his lip, getting a better grip on the blaster.
I’m not talking about this anymore tonight.
It was pure chance his hiding place was more secure than most of the hapless colonists’. “Eventually, the Star Guard came in and leveled the entire colony, taking out Mawreg and captives alike. I ended up at the Star Guard Orphanage, on Terra. The Mellurean consultants there do what Damais is doing now, for Paolo and Gianna.”

“Which is what?” Mara prompted, her eyes glistening with unshed tears.
 

“The Mellureans take the horror and the pain away, partition it off. You have to keep access to some of it, or risk losing what makes you human.”
How do you explain the inexplicable? I went through it, and even I don’t truly understand it.
“They make it so you can hold the good memories without being overwhelmed by the bad ones.”
 

He shut his eyes again and half shook his head. Leaning against the bulkhead for a minute, he kneaded his left shoulder, which continued to ache abominably. Nick welcomed the physical pain as a distraction from the emotional variety. The former he could handle, could deal with. The latter scared him, even after all these years.

Wordlessly, Khevan took Twilka by the elbow and led her down the stairs, sitting with her on the bottom step facing outward into the casino, blaster lying across his knees, ready if needed. Partially closing the door, Khevan settled in to keep watch, hidden from the view of anyone crossing through the adjacent part of the casino.

Mara wrapped her arms around Nick, holding him tightly, fiercely, as if she could somehow protect him from his own memories. Tensing at her touch, he relaxed into the embrace for a moment.

“It’s all right, you don’t have to go there,” Mara whispered, reaching one hand up to smooth a strand of his longer than regulation black hair off his forehead. “You don’t have to say anymore. I’m glad the Mellureans were there for you, at the orphanage.” She watched the silent tableau of Damais and the children, locked in the ebb and flow of their private communication. “I’m glad she’s willing to help the kids tonight.”

“I’m fine.” Done with this visit to his own distant past, and more than somewhat embarrassed by it, Nick gave her a quick hug of reassurance and then stepped away. “I need to set up the fastlink booster.”
 

“The fastlink won’t disturb what Damais is doing?” Mara asked.

“Not as long as we’re quiet, and as long as we don’t set it up on the damn bench with her, no.” Nick deliberately made his voice impatient, business-like.

He knew he didn’t fool Mara for a second, but rather than say anymore, she walked away to summon Khevan.

Unfastening his bag, Nick reached inside, carefully pulling out the small black box he had been so anxious to find in the chaos of the hold. He walked the length of the observatory, trying to figure out where the best spot was. Finally deciding on the exact center, Nick prepared to carry out his attempt at communication.

Kneeling, he set the box on the deck. As soon as he locked its small grav clamps in place to secure it, a cone shape morphed silently up from the center of the black square. Nick discovered he had an interested audience. Even the Lady Damais and the children were staring at him now, although he had taken great pains not to infringe upon their concentration.
Damais must have finished whatever therapy she could, or would, offer the children tonight.

Compelled to say something, since they were all apparently transfixed by what he was doing, Nick cleared his throat. “Okay, in just a minute I’ll activate this and hook myself in. I gotta tell you, using fastlink with a field generator screws a guy’s nervous system up pretty badly.”

“Then don’t use it,” Mara voiced her anxiety, eyes narrowed, lips compressed in a thin line. “We’ll find another way.”

Nick shook his head. “There is no other way. Not even the Lady Damais, with all her powers, can broadcast a specific evac call across the Sectors. Am I right?”

Their heads swiveled to her. Her face serene as always, the elderly woman nodded. “You’re right, Nicholas. Even my people have our limits. I could perhaps share a sense of my own danger, of imminent peril, but nothing to solve our problem here. By the time they investigated enough to determine where I was, it would be far too late.”

Eyes wide, Twilka was staring at Lady Damais, mouth in an O of astonishment. “You weren’t with us on the bridge. How do you know how much trouble we’re in?”

Damais smiled slightly. “Obviously we’re in extraordinary difficulties, child. The crew is nowhere in evidence, has not been seen or heard from for hours now. The ship lies dead in space; not where anyone would expect to be found, is it?” She raised an eyebrow at Nick, who nodded confirmation, not the least bit surprised Damais knew as well as he did they were in Sector Seventeen. “Enemy territory, is it not?” She waved one translucent, blue-veined hand at the display of the actual stars beyond the observatory’s canopy. “No illusion of mine can disguise that fact.”

Biting her lip, Mara was walking around the fastlink generator, frowning. It wasn’t an overly impressive device.

“This isn’t going to fry my system permanently,” Nick said.
 

“What can I do to help?” Mara said, rubbing her hands on her hips as if getting ready for action. “There must be something?”

“Stay alert. I’ll have to sleep for an hour or two after I do this – recharge my brain synapses. I’m sorry.”
What am I asking her forgiveness for? Giving her cause to worry about me? She’s gotten under my skin as no woman ever did before, but I like it.
“It’s a hell of a lot easier to do this ship-enabled, but a civilian vessel like the
Dream
doesn’t have anything close to the right support equipment.” Since he could see Mara was puzzled by his remark, forehead wrinkled in thought as she stared from him to the box, Nick elaborated. “Some of the big military ships are equipped to facilitate fastlink, in case an SF operator has to make a report on an expedited basis.”

“Do whatever you have to do,” Mara answered quietly. “You don’t have to explain to me. I take your word for it – this is routine for you.” She smiled slightly, shaking her head. “I’m hardly in a position to argue about it, am I? So I’ll keep watch.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m not sure how much time we actually have,” Khevan said from his post at the bottom of the stairs, urging Nick to make haste.
 

Like all SF operators in the reluctant elite – men and women enhanced with the fastlink implants and other neurotech upgrades – he had a love-hate relationship with the technology. It could save a team in a crisis but was incredibly draining for the operator. Sometimes, Nick wondered if Command had deliberately designed the thing to be hard to use so a person could only rely upon the technology sparingly. If there had been any other way to call in an evac, Nick would have taken it in a heartbeat, rather than subject his body to fastlink. Scuttlebutt in the ranks was that each use shortened the operator’s life by a Terran year. Nick didn’t know what the truth was, but it sure as hell took a physical toll on a man.
I can testify to that much
.

Sitting cross-legged on the cold deck, Nick took his place beside the box, tapping a code across a series of barely visible inlaid controls.
 

“Specific evac codes are changed all the time, to avoid the enemy luring anyone into an ambush. But I’m hoping my code from last mission, plus the message I’ll send, will give credibility to the whole thing. Get us rescued.”
What is it with me today, talking too much.

Mara nodded, watching him get the equipment set up. “Whoever gets this call is probably going to have a hard time believing it, given the
Nebula Dream
’s reputation and all the SMT publicity.”
 

“And the fact it emanates from Sector Seventeen will further detract from its authenticity,” Khevan predicted in a dry tone from his perch over on the stairs. “Well, I would be skeptical, were I on the receiving end of this call you are to make, Captain. We must not expect too much.”

“What is it with all of you?” Flinging her arms wide, Twilka stamped her foot on the deck. “Is it so impossible for you – any of you – to think of the positive side?” She pointed at Nick. “I believe in you, soldier.”

“Here goes.” Nick punched in one final command, taking an extra second before hitting the last key, like hesitating before a dive into cold deep water.

A low-pitched hum reverberated in the chamber, as if a hive of giant insects had invaded the observatory. The children rubbed at their ears in annoyance. Gianna whimpered and Lady Damais reached to comfort her with a hug. The sound filled the chamber, made it hard to concentrate.

Pulsing from the cone-shaped top of the device was a barely discernible violet glow. The beam ascended in a tight line through the clear shielding covering the observatory, streaming into the interstellar void, hardly diffusing as it sought a receptor.

“All right.” Feeling intense relief, Nick licked his dry lips. He’d been unsure whether the beam would be strong enough to escape the shielding, one major technical hurdle he couldn’t have done anything to resolve. Fastlink was designed to function from the surface of a planet, in the open atmosphere. It was nothing short of miraculous to Nick to be able to send the call from inside the confines of the ship. Maybe the Lords of Space were going to favor them after all.
No harm in sending them a short plea
–
Watch my back?
–
in case they were paying attention
. He told his companions, “Now for the hard part – sending a specific message.”

“Will anyone be listening?” Mara cocked her head, unsmiling. “The idea of your attempting this without knowing if you’ll succeed bothers me, for your sake.”

“Always some military sensors directed at Sector Seventeen, gathering intelligence. This’ll get picked up, never fear. But we can’t wait for an AI to cycle through its full range of assigned data gathering before passing the signal along.” Nick laughed, despite the ball of nausea in his gut. “Unless some other poor fool is currently running a mission inside Seventeen, no one’ll be searching for fastlink emissions. So, I have to send a detailed distress call, try to target it to the nearest ship.”

Quickly, before he could lose his nerve, Nick flipped open a narrow compartment on the instrument’s bottom level and took out a small, flat, black disk. This he pressed to his skull behind the left ear. Flaring out, the violet glow enclosed him.
 

Nick was vaguely aware of events in the observatory, as if seeing them through the wrong end of a telescope. Lady Damais left the children alone on their bench, walking to where he sat, obviously preparing to step inside the circle of violet light.

“Should you disturb him?” Mara asked. “He was so emphatic about not being interrupted once the fastlink had begun.”

Damais smiled serenely. “It does you credit, to be so concerned for him.” Her voice carried a hint of condescension. “But I can help with this, perhaps shorten the time he must spend linked, which will reduce the hours we must sit and wait, both for him to recover, and for rescue to come. The time left to us grows precious indeed, child.”

Mara probably didn’t appreciate being addressed as child.
Nick grinned slightly.

Damais limped forward slowly, entering the violently blazing light. The illumination enveloped her gradually, like a physical entity, as if she were wading out into a deepening pool. Stretching out her left hand toward Nick’s own hand, which was frozen, claw-like, holding the fastlink locked to his skull, she made contact. Her right hand clutched at her cane with an unbreakable grip. Gently, delicately, Damais rested her fingers on top of Nick’s hand. Shuddering violently at her touch, which sent hot arcs of electricity coursing along his nerve endings, he closed his eyes for a second.

When he reopened them, the purple beam of light purified, became more vivid, pulsed with red lightning fires. It sparkled, as if motes of pure diamond were now floating upward from the deck of the doomed
Nebula Dream
to be carried out to the stars on a ribbon of purple velvet. The humming rose and intensified until it filled the head, making conscious thought difficult.
 

Peripherally, Nick was aware of Mara staggering away from the fastlink box, hands clamped to her ears against the grating sound, until the bench hit her in the backs of the knees and she sank down, hiding her face in her hands.