Date Point: 15y6m2w AV
ESNN Front Page news story: GRA APPOINTS NEW AMBASSADOR
Admiral Sir Patrick Knight takes seat on council after long protest absence
In an abrupt change of policy after years of boycotting the Dominion Security Council, the GRA announced last night the immediate appointment of a new ambassador.
Retired British admiral Sir Patrick Knight has taken over the position, which has remained vacant since the assassination of the GRA’s previous ambassador, Doctor Anees Hussein, and used his first remarks in the chamber to chastise the Council over his predecessor’s murder, and to reinforce humanity’s displeasure with the Dominion.
Who is Ambassador Knight?
Knight, a veteran of surface naval operations in the South China Sea, the Persian Gulf and in support of ground operations in the Middle East, became the commanding officer of the Royal Navy’s First Space Fleet after the acquisition of the two captured alien warships later rededicated as HMS Myrmidon and HMS Caledonia. Since then he has overseen system security in Cimbrean, been instrumental in the formation of the Spaceborne Operations Regiment, and was the Allied field commander during the Battle of Gao.
He retired following the war to care for his daughter, Captain Ellen McDaniel, who was commanding officer of HMS Caledonia and who sustained life-changing injuries when Caledonia was sunk at the height of the conflict.
He declined to comment when asked why he had come out of retirement, but his office released the following statement:
“The Ambassador has always been committed to the ideals of safety and prosperity for all persons of all races and species, and has agreed that re-engaging with the Dominion is the best way to uphold those ideals. He is grateful for the concerns regarding his daughter, who is receiving the best possible care, but would prefer to keep that matter private within his family.”
Making Waves
The Ambassador’s arrival in the Council chamber was suitably dramatic. Aside from making a statement in being escorted by a security detail of HEAT troopers, the Ambassador reportedly shocked the council by appointing a nonhuman as his special advisor.
Knight’s advisor, whose name is approximately rendered in the English alphabet as “Krrkktnkk A’ktnnzzik’tk” is a former Councillor, having represented the Domain at the time when the Sol Containment Field was erected fifteen years ago. He quit in protest over the deployment, whereupon he commissioned the starship Sanctuary and set about rescuing human refugees and abductees, including BGEV-11 crew Allison Buehler, Xiù Chang and Julian Etsicitty. He was also instrumental in the founding of Folctha, by delivering the first Jump Array to the alien palace colony site.
Following Sanctuary’s destruction, A’ktnnzzik’tk—more often known as “Kirk”—was believed dead. His surprise return to interstellar politics has sent shockwaves through both the Dominion, and also the Vzk’tk Domain where he reportedly enjoyed considerable popularity during his time on the council.
What happens next?
Ambassador Knight has not yet made it clear what the GRA’s agenda for the Security Council will be. For now, he has committed humanity to the political faction broadly known as ‘Reformers,’ which also includes the Gaoian Ambassador Champion Sheeyo of Clan Goldpaw, Corti Directorate Ambassador Veril, and Ambassador Scrythcra of the Rauwryhr Combined Nations.
Kirk’s presence at his side is a source of endless speculation for extraterrestrial political commentators, but a Domain public poll suggested that he has lost none of his popularity and many Domain citizens are interested to see what influence he will have.
Champion Sheeyo praised Knight and Kirk, predicting that they “will be just the shakeup the council deserves.” He went on to add that he has high hopes for the galaxy if the human race chooses to remain enfranchised and focused on the betterment of the Dominion, rather than aloof from it.
The other Reformer ambassadors declined to make any statement, and at the time of writing there has been no official comment from the Celzi Alliance.
Only time will tell what Knight’s appointment will truly mean for humanity and the galactic community.
-Ava Magdalena Ríos
Extraterrestrial Affairs Correspondent
Date Point: 15y6m2w AV
Hierarchy/Cabal Co-operative, Session 20
++0020++: No, I missed the whole war. My last memory is of sending a backup in response to the invasion plans. After that, nothing. Not even a differential log update.
++Cynosure++: As I suspected. It’s not dead.
++0020++: “It”?
++0004++: Something that 0006 unleashed upon us.
++0009++: [File Attachment: Entity Briefing Document]
++Cynosure++: I requested that you please not call me that.
++0004++: < Pointed > But you don’t deny that you unleashed it.
++0003:++: Shut up, 0004. Petty sniping like that is what got us into this mess, and you alone seem to be immune to learning that lesson.
++0004++: It’s just the truth.
++0003++: One more word, and I will demote you to 0999. Am I clear?
++0004++: < Shock; Meek acquiescence. >
++Cynosure++: In fairness, 0004 is correct. This parasitic entity is my creation, inadvertent or not. It is indeed my fault… it is not however my responsibility, at least not exclusively.
++Cytosis++: I would say it’s the least of our concerns. Between the Gaoian disaster and the loss of the Hunter Orbital, a full 3% of the Hegemony is in archive awaiting new Substrate.
++0009++: And the Substrate supply is shrinking, not growing.
++0020++: I just finished reading the briefing document. Something like that is the least of our concerns?
++Cytosis++: If not the least, then certainly low in the priority list.
++0020++: It knows everything! It can infiltrate anywhere! It can expose every secret we have to the Deathworlders! I fail to see how that is not an issue of paramount importance.
++0009++: A limited supply of Substrate compounds every other problem.
++0020++: Well… where is it now?
++Cynosure++: Our last indication of it was among the Builder-caste Hunters aboard the Orbital. Considering how extensively that network was destroyed, however…
++0003++: It may be dead.
++Cytosis++: Optimistic.
++0003++: True. It would be foolish to proceed with that as our working theory. But allow me some hope, please.
CHANNEL: 4 instances of emote: < grim humor >
++Cynosure++: It must have a point of contact with the Humans. If we can locate that…
++0020++: Or it may still be embedded within the Hunters. That’s where I would be right now.
++0004++: < Intrigued > Your rationale?
++0020++: The Builder coup represents a major political and social upheaval, and the new Alpha-of-Alphas was never aware of our relationship with its predecessor.
++Cytosis++: As far as you know.
++0020++: Granted, but was the former A-of-As aware of the Entity?
++0003++: Absolutely not. We never divulged that information.
++0020++: Then if I was this Entity, I would be burrowing deep into the new Builder-led Hunter social order in search of valuable intelligence.
++Cynosure++: I agree. And if it’s so embedded… we may have an opportunity to pursue it.
++0004++: And the Hunters themselves? I notice we have stopped referring to them as Discarded.
++Cytosis++: It’s time to face facts: they’re no longer under our influence. They’re no longer a Control Species, and they are likely to make the Substrate situation worse, not better.
++0003++: Meaning that it is now in our best interests to see them destroyed.
++Cynosure++: Agreed.
++0004++: No Gao, no Hunters… no Control Species at all. The matterspace situation is alarmingly outside of our control now. Surely correcting that is a priority?
++0003++: 0723 is overseeing the development of an industrial-age class 11 Deathworld species a very long way indeed from Human and Gao influence: Approximately eighty thousand lightyears. If we can move them toward a hegemonic-purity world government model rather than implementing the classic collectivist/individualist division…
++0009++: I’ll go make an assessment.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: USER 0009 HAS QUIT
++Cynosure++: Even if that turns out to be a viable and sensible option, it will still take decades.
++0003++: But it will result in a control species. Especially if we foment a highly xenophobic political atmosphere.
++Cytosis++: Risky. If they detect our influence…
++0003++: Correctly planned for, we could make that discovery work to our advantage. It will require the diversion of experienced agents, but…
++0020++: But we need a control species.
++Cynosure++: The Cabal’s opinions on this kind of interference are well-documented. I will not repeat them here. You are playing with dangerous forces, 0003.
++0003++: We successfully balanced those forces for millions of years. Recent upsets notwithstanding, we are very good at this. As you used to be.
++Cynosure++: And foreseeing the consequences of repeated failure was once a strength of yours. We are not in a position to afford risk-taking. Our margin is gone.
++0020++: I am forced to agree with Cynosure. Especially considering the existence of this parasite. Until it is defeated, any attempt to groom a new control species will only result in discovery and Human/Gao intervention. They have shown that they are quite willing to involve themselves with pre-contact sophonts in order to combat us.
++0004++: So. Having established what our next move is not…
++Cytosis++: …We should establish what it is. Yes. How easily will you be able to re-infiltrate the Hunter networks, 0020?
++0020++: Not easily. The Builders are moving away from a datasphere model toward dumb signal-transport. The whole system is… ossifying. Each passing day renders it less and less permeable.
++Cynosure++: That will work against the parasite, too.
++0004++: Hopefully.
++0020++: I will make an attempt. If I fail… hopefully you will have a plan available once I am restored.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: USER 0020 HAS QUIT
++0003++: He really deserves a promotion.
++Cytosis++: Or some time off.
++0004++: I don’t think anything in either aspect of the universe could persuade 0020 to take time off… We should plan, as he suggested.
++0003++: We’ll reconvene tomorrow.
SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: UNANIMOUS AGREEMENT
SESSION CLOSED BY USER 0003
Date Point: 15y6m2w AV
Planet Akyawentuo, The Ten’Gewek Protectorate, Near 3Kpc Arm
The Singer
“Yan will not be around forever, Loor. You must learn how to make peace without him.”
“I’ll worry about that branch when I grab it,” Loor retorted. “So long as Yan is around…”
He was one of the younger Given-Men, having gone through the change barely a hand of winters ago, and the Singer sometimes wondered if he was still a child in the head. He hadn’t mastered his Fire into a passionate drive like Yan had, and it still kept him short-tempered and unruly.
And a Given-Man’s job was to keep the peace. Gods help Loor’s tribe.
“So long as Yan is around is the time to learn from him, not latch onto his tit!” the Singer answered. She heard one of the nearby women stifle an amused trill, and lowered her voice. “Gods’ names, Loor, how do you teach your sons to make a knife? Do you make every knife for them and expect them to learn when you’re gone?”
Loor glowered at her, but the Singer wasn’t afraid of him. He might be a fire-head, but he wasn’t violently stupid. It took him a few heartbeats to finally admit her point but admit it he did, by sagging and whipping his tail.
“…I’ll… talk with Yermo,” he promised reluctantly. “And I’ll keep my teeth in my mouth this time.”
“Even if he doesn’t do the same?”
“Even then.”
The Singer treated him to a smile. “Thank you.”
“Still. If I’m to learn from Yan, it would help if he was here.”
“He’s only gone for a season,” the Singer pointed out.
Loor’s tail whipped the other way. “A lot can happen in a season, Singer.”
“Or nothing can happen. Work with the tools you have, Loor, that’s all I ask. I’ll sing for Yermo to keep his temper.”
That last promise seemed satisfactory. He thanked her and left the village in a much less violent mood than he’d arrived, leaving the Singer to sigh and plop down next to the fire where some of the women were preserving another batch of stew for the winter.
She sat with her thoughts and helped with the preparations for some time until a shouting-stone’s call drew her attention. It was the unique thrum-thrum! thrum-thrum! rhythm the lookouts used for when a human was headed their way.
Sure enough, a few minutes later Professor Hurt ambled into camp with his hands empty but five root-birds hanging from his pack. He exchanged words of goodwill with the lookouts and handed the meat over as a gift. The Singer nodded happily: ever since his return, the Given-Men had been grumbling much less over the humans out at the ‘bunker.’ The old man was no kind of a Given-Man himself, but he knew how to make and keep the peace.
The Singer welcomed him with a smile and invited him to the fire where he sat down and produced a real treat: Hot chocolate. Strawberry hot chocolate. Somehow those little bags of brown powder made the most delicious drink.
“Good morning!” he said, with a little bow.
“All the better now,” the Singer replied politely. She cleared some room for him to pour water into his metal cups and place them among the embers. “The children missed your stories at the last big meeting of tribes.”
“The children have an endless hunger for stories,” Daniel chuckled fondly. “They want new ones faster than I can translate them.”
“Which one are you translating now?”
“Well, that’s actually why I’m here,” Daniel confessed. “This one’s a story about gods, and… well, I know that sometimes Humans and the People can have different ideas about how to talk about the gods.”
The Singer nodded. It had come as a shock to find that Humans felt quite comfortable with talking about their gods by name. It just didn’t mean the same thing to them.
“I wanted to check with you that my translation is, uh, acceptable,” Daniel finished.
The Singer nodded. “I have questions for you too. But please, you go first.”
Daniel nodded and produced his notebook.
“It’s the story about how the thunder god gets his most famous weapon,” he said. “And it begins in the morning when the thunder-god’s love wakes to find that her hair is gone…”
She sipped the hot chocolate as he spoke. It was a funny story, full of trickery and a rogue getting his comeuppance, and Daniel was a better storyteller than any man among the People even when sharing the story quietly so as not to be overheard. But he was right, Humans thought about their gods in a very different way and she said as much once he’d finished.
“Honestly, I don’t think the people who first told that story liked their gods very much,” Daniel confessed. “They respected them no doubt, but they lived in a cold and hard land where death could strike all too quickly. They would have felt like playthings, I think.”
There, at least, the Singer could sympathize. The Gods got respect because they were powerful; ‘Powerful’ did not mean ‘nice.’ For every good season, warm day and successful hunt, there was sooner or later a hard winter, a broken spear or a sickness. All necessary for the balance, of course… but she had to admit, she hadn’t much liked the gods on the day when her baby had died in her arms.
“…Tell it as you told me,” she decided.
He nodded and made a note.
“Well, a fair trade is in order then,” he said. “What do you need?”
“Word about Yan and Sky-Thinker?”
Daniel smiled and nodded. “We have a saying: ‘no news is good news.’”
“That… could be taken two ways.”
“Exactly.”
That made the Singer trill. “I like it. Still, if you know anything…?”
Daniel nodded and retrieved his tablet thinking-stone from his pack and tapped at its bright surface. “…If all goes to plan, they should be leaving Utah today. That’s the land of some of Julian’s ancestors, and the last word he sent to me said that their time there has gone well. They’ll travel for a few days to a colder land in the north where there are trees and large beasts, much like here. That’s their last stop: a hand of days later they should be back here.”
The Singer nodded, relieved. Daniel sipped his own drink and gave her a knowing look. “I wonder whether you miss your uncle or your mate more,” he commented.
The Singer trilled softly. “You may as well ask if I prefer breathing or food. I need both… though Yan is not so good for keeping me warm.”
Daniel laughed and nodded. “There, I sympathize,” he said. “It’s been too long since I had company at night.”
“Not even from among your fellows at the bunker? Claire, maybe?” The Singer had become something like friends with the slender human woman, though Claire’s ongoing refusal to dress comfortably still baffled her. While the men she worked with were happy to strip to the skin in hot weather, Claire was always covered and always suffering.
Why couldn’t Human taboos make sense?
Daniel’s face definitely went a little redder, like human faces did sometimes when they were embarrassed. “Claire’s one of my students. It would be wrong.”
“Ah. But you don’t dislike the idea.”
Daniel cleared his throat. “Best if I say nothing.”
Another taboo. Oh well.
“Yan needs to calm some of the Given-Men,” the Singer explained. “Without him… There are arguments. No fights yet, but…”
“But you don’t want a repeat of… uhm…”
“When Yan killed Tarek, and then killed his whole tribe, and then Took their Singer?” the Singer asked pointedly.
“…That, yes.”
“No, I don’t.” Especially because there was no guarantee she herself wouldn’t endure something similar if it came to that. Yan would surely wreak a terrible revenge, but too late.
“Is that… likely?” Daniel asked.
“It is always how things could go… but no, I don’t think it will happen. It doesn’t help that we don’t have many more years of Yan left. We need him here, to teach the others how to keep the peace without him.”
“…I think I sense what the trouble may be about.”
The Singer twitched her tail irritably. She’d hoped to pass it off as a tribal matter, but the resentment and fear were probably never quite going to leave. And in truth, the other tribes were right to be scared of the Humans. They’d made it clear more times than the Singer could count that if it came to war, all the People with all the good bows and steel knives they could make would be worse than annihilated: they’d be ignored.
What did it mean to be friends with a tribe so powerful that they could simply stop paying attention to you if the friendship soured?
“Some of the Given-Men feel you have taken Yan and Sky-Thinker.”
“It was a giving,” Daniel replied. “Them to us. For the balance. Yan said so.”
“Yes. Funny how easily his words are forgotten when he is not here to remind the others of what he said.”
Daniel nodded sadly and considered his drink.
“…A hand of days,” he promised. “Maybe a hand and two. No longer than that. And if you want, I can request they come back sooner.”
The Singer dismissed that suggestion with a curt gesture. “No. It’s an important Giving.”
“Well then,” Daniel smiled. “Maybe I’ll tell my story when they’re back. We can have a feast!”
“That sounds good.” The Singer finished her hot chocolate and returned the steel cup. “Even better if there’s more like that.”
Daniel chuckled. “There will be,” he promised, and stood up. “I’ll see you in a hand of days or so.”
“Say hello to Claire for me.”
“That I can do.”
The Singer watched him go. It was strange to think back to the pudgy, soft man who had first come to them a few seasons ago. A man of the People in his position would have grown large and strong: Daniel however had become lean and tough like a vine. He seemed healthy and strong like only a Human could be.
That was good. And it was good to have friends like that. And very good indeed to know she could hand the trouble with the other Given-Men back to Yan soon.
But there was a lot of future to come after that. She needed a fix that would outlive him.
If only she could think of one.
Date Point: 15y6m2w AV
ε Monocerotis 143.9° 37-FEBEAA G3V 1-3
Katja Napierski
Thump.
“Holy shit!”
“Those are your Big Words?”
“To hell with my Big Words, look at this!”
A bright purple tree was… walking past barely a hundred yards away.
Okay, ‘walking’ was kind of a generous term to describe a kind of shambling crawl, and ‘tree’ was maybe a generous word to spend on a six-foot shrub that looked like a cross between a mangrove and a lavender bush, but holy crap. It was still a perambulating plant, no matter what way Katja sliced it.
“…We should name this place Grootworld,” Graves suggested. The entire first survey team gave his idea the cold treatment it deserved, and Katja grimaced inside the sealed environment of her excursion suit.
“…Air quality?” she asked, wearily.
Saitō had been waving a sample wand around from the moment they arrived, and held it up. “Clean and breathable. Pretty high OP count though, so, uh… you bring your Benadryl?”
The Organic Particulate or “OP” count was the xenobiologist’s version of a pollen count, and they’d made it an important part of determining atmospheric compatibility. Nobody wanted to inhale a double lungful of anaphylactic shock.
“How high?”
“Eighty or so.”
“Alright, helmets stay on until I say otherwise.”
The words “yes ma’am” did the rounds, and they vacated the jump array’s platform.
The Coltainer probe had picked a hell of a spot, at least. Those walking trees probably basically were mangroves, because they were wriggling slowly around on the slick surface of a tidal mud flat. Crystal waters lapped and played over the rocks and the beach was vacation-brochure white sand under a flawless blue sky.
Katja had a full orbital survey, of course. The colony site was on the northern, oceanward side of an extinct volcano. To the west was a peninsula that gave way to archipelago, to the east was continental mainland. Fertile farming terrain in one direction, mineral wealth in another, oceanic wealth in a third. Throw in a balmy climate and gentle weather and in theory they had a lovely place to live.
All that remained was for a ground team—the one she was leading—to verify biocompatibility and double-check the probe’s work.
They were quite a team. In fact, it would be hard to pick a more varied group of people with a more diverse skill-set. The Allied military and security services were, after all, an enormous set of organizations and AEC had looked everywhere for the right people to form its exoplanet survey team to follow up on any leads generated by the Coltainer project at Erebor.
This was the first. About thirty-seven kilolightyears from Sol, and currently invisible without a telescope of surpassing power, it didn’t have a name beyond a description of its position in Earth’s sky, approximate distance, and a string of letters to pin down its precise coordinates. The star was a fraction hotter than Sol, the planet a fraction further away… But as far as Katja was concerned, if she ignored the walking mangroves then she could have been standing on a beach in the Bahamas.
There was a cry of “Fire in the hole!” from her right, followed by a loud BANG! as Roberts fired the ground-to-orbit mortar. A brilliant streak of blue light connected sand and sky for a heartbeat before the warp field collapsed, and Katja’s HUD reported that she now had satellite telemetry.
That was proving to be one of the most clever technologies the Gao had taught them. In-atmosphere warp had all sorts of clever uses, and human forays into the tech had only successfully yielded weapons like the Skymaster guns. The mortar on the other hand could deliver satellites directly into stable orbits.
The day—morning, they quickly discovered—unfolded at a steady pace, punctuated by the sound of Roberts seeding the sky with satellites. Every time he did so, local bat-like flying animals scared up and circled for a few minutes before returning to the ground.
Oddly, enough, they seemed to be otherwise pretty fearless. One of them perched on a rock within arm’s reach at one point and Katja took several good pictures of it.
Bat-like was definitely the right angle. It had a crumpled, snouty sort of pug-dog face, fur and leathery wings, but the body plan was more bird-shaped even if one ignored the pink-skinned rat tail. It was kinda cute, actually.
Her attention was broken by Bailey with the results from her Flycatcher sweep of the territory. “Captain? Geosurvey’s complete.”
“Verdict?”
“Exactly as the probe said. We’re sitting on a wealth of metal ores, especially bauxite, the seafloor to the north is a perfect candidate for oil and gas and there are strong indications of an anthracite seam two hundred klicks inland. Radon’s a little high at a bit more than two picocuries per liter, but that’s within acceptable bounds.”
“Meaning this site has everything a colony might need for an industrial base and exports.” Katja nodded.
“Or self-sufficiency,” Bailey agreed. “Want me to check out the beta sites?”
Katja nodded. The alpha site where they were standing was what the probe had considered to be the best possible spot for a colony: the beta sites were nearby strong contenders that could provide good support to the alpha site. “Sure, send the drone over there.”
By sunset, the biocompatibility survey was complete. The pollens unfortunately were going to give people allergies, but nothing life-threatening as far as Saitō could tell. Just the equivalent of hay fever, and they were hopefully seasonal. Otherwise, everything was pleasantly compatible, as expected. Carbon-based, levo-amino, DNA-based, blah blah blah. There was work here for a million xenobiologists’ lifetimes, but the point was that just breathing the air and eating the fish wasn’t going to make anybody dangerously ill.
In the end, Katja volunteered to take her helmet off first. It was her call, after all. So, with emergency medical gear on standby just in case all their exhaustive tests turned out to be dead wrong, she broke seal, pulled the helmet off and took a deep inhalation through the nose.
The air smelled… pleasantly minty, actually. With an undercurrent of ocean breeze. The effect was rather like the distant scent of a mojito.
She breathed normally for a minute or so before finally deciding that no, her throat wasn’t about to swell up and choke her, and put her helmet down. “Okay.”
Helmets came off one by one in a steady, predetermined order, everybody making sure that there was still no sign of distress from the people before them before breaking their own seal. By the time the last of them was breathing the open air, Katja had been taking in the planet’s atmosphere for ten minutes entirely without difficulty. They were on a conclusively habitable planet.
She looked around. The Coltainer had sent down construction equipment that had assembled basic shelter and facilities: a small nanofactory, a solar power generator, a fusion generator that just needed a supply of hydrogen to boot up, and a fully wired and plumbed colony administration building suitable for short-term habitation. It even had beds!
“Okay,” she said. “Call in the follow-up team.”
They had a world to explore.
Date Point: 15y6m2w AV
Folctha, Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Derek “Boss” Coombes
Date number two was more relaxed. Actually it was just an evening at a coffee shop but Ava had brought along her draft of her interview with Daar. She apologetically made Derek sign a non-disclosure, which he was more than willing to do, and sat sipping a cappuccino as he read it.
His own coffee had gone lukewarm by the time he finished it.
He put it down with an exhalation at the end. “…Damn. Tigger’s always been a big personality, but…”
“He completely overwhelmed me,” Ava said.
“He’ll do that.”
“Is there anything you’d change? Anything you think I should focus more on?”
Derek shook his head. “Daar’s got his own message, I got mine.”
“So are you going to do one of these?” Ava asked. He grinned at her.
“You just wanna get me naked.”
“Guilty.” She smiled back. “But seriously? My editor is going to want to fuck with this. I want to take it to him in ‘we either publish it as-is or not at all’ condition.”
“He’d do that? Even with Daar’s weight behind you?”
Ava’s smile got wider. “If Jason had been there when Moses came down from Mt. Sinai, he’d have had his red pen ready to make ‘a few little suggestions.’”
Derek chuckled, and gave up on replying to that in favor of just watching her for a second as she tidied up her tablet. There were women so achingly beautiful that a guy could fall in love just from looking at a picture of them, and Ava could have been their princess… and she’d kissed him hello. It was an awesome thought.
Naturally she saw his undisguised attention and gave him a look over with a smirk. “…You’re not so bad yourself.”
Derek couldn’t help himself: his laugh made heads turn.
“Hey, I never promised to be a perfect gentleman.”
“Good.” She grinned at him, leaned forward and lowered her voice, looking him in the eye. “I don’t want a perfect gentleman.”
“So you want… what? A rogue?”
“Mmm…” Ava ran a finger around her coffee mug’s rim and gave him a lopsided, daring smile. “Enough of a gentleman to hold the door for me, enough of a scoundrel to pin me against the wall before it’s closed. Something like that.”
Derek chuckled. If she’d been trying to fluster him, she’d instead given him ideas. “That a request?”
“That an offer?”
“…Get your bag.”
Date Point: 15y6m2w AV
HMS Sharman (HMNB Folctha), Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Rachel “Ray” Wheeler
No pain. A… hum? Electrical. A fan?
And… Light. Not bright light, nor white. Dim, warm, soft light. Lots of little ones too, in green and red and an eye-twisting unnatural blue…
The last dregs of a horrible dream about being stabbed and decapitated circled the drain and gave way to confusion as Ray woke up.
She’d… died.
…Hadn’t she?
She was pretty sure she had. There’d been shooting, and Hunters. And a sensation that had redefined pain for her as a fusion blade had sunk right into her–
But this didn’t sound like heaven or whatever, and she’d already been to Hell and this wasn’t it… And the figure at her bedside looked like the more mundane kind of angel in her bright blue scrubs with her hair in a high but neat bun.
…No, wait. His hair.
He clearly spotted some change on the various… things that Ray was plugged into, because he turned, saw her staring at him and was at her side instantly.
“Easy there. Hi. You’re in hospital, I’m Shane, I’m a nurse here…”
Something utterly mountainous moved in the dimly-lit corner behind Shane and Ray blinked at it, momentarily convinced that a Hunter was about to spring from the shadows and that this was just a temporary moment of false hope before—
Instead, the most enormous man she’d ever seen stepped forward with a concerned look on his wide, friendly face. He held himself back through some prodigious self-restraint and let the nurse control the scene.
“Can you tell me your name?” Shane was asking. Ray blinked and looked back at him.
“I–” Her throat was so dry it felt totally closed and she paused, tried to gulp to clear it. He magicked a little plastic cup of water from somewhere nearby and gently helped her to drink from it. It washed some of the grit and sandpaper out at least.
“It’s…Ray. Ray Wheeler,” she managed after gulping again. “I’m… still here?”
“You’re still here,” Shane agreed with a smile. “You made it.”
“But…?” Ray struggled to repair her thoughts and memories. She was absolutely, completely certain she’d felt her heart stop in her chest. And… there had been dark brown eyes. And…
She raised a hand to her throat. It was very much seamlessly intact. It drifted down to her chest and probed her sternum, which felt whole and intact.
The giant shambling man-mountain edged closer into the light where she could see him properly. He had warm brown eyes, she saw. Deep, very dark—
“You…?”
He nodded. “And another man we’ll call Baseball. I go by Warhorse, technically speaking.”
Ray lowered her head back to the pillow to try and think. The question looming largest in her mind was a big thundering “how?” She was certain of only one thing: that she absolutely, definitely, one hundred percent had been stabbed in the heart which as far as she knew was about as dead as dead got. She could remember her last thoughts for fucksake. She hadn’t even been afraid, not really. More… robbed.
“…My friends?”
“They made it.” Shane had a warm, soothing voice. “They’re nearby.”
“And…” Ray tapped her chest lightly. “How…?”
“Medicine has advanced a whole hell of a lot since you guys left,” Warhorse informed her. His voice was warm too, but so chest-shakingly deep it could never be called smooth or gentle despite the Latino lilt that touched some of his vowels. “But we also, uh, called in a special favor for you.”
For a few seconds a kind of silence descended. ‘Warhorse’ obviously didn’t know what to say, Shane was watching intently, and Ray…
Ray blinked. Then the ceiling went blurry and then… oh God…
Everything hit her, all at once. The years of pain, of guilt, of fear, the shock of losing Berry and Conley, the full horrible reality of her own brush with death all came slamming down on her at once and the only thing she could do about it was hold on and try not to be washed away by her own tears.
Both men rushed to her side. Shane took her hand, the one with the drip line in it, and squeezed gently. Warhorse’s huge callused mitt enveloped her other hand. Ray felt too weak even to turn her head, too weak to do anything except lay there and mourn.
Eventually—she had no idea how long—Shane pressed a handkerchief into her hand, which raised it to her eyes and nose without prompting. Part of her noticed in a detached way that her skin looked loose and old. The fact that her hand was shaking didn’t help the impression: She felt, and maybe looked, somewhere on the wrong side of eighty.
“My crew? My family?” she asked, latching onto something to do, or at least talk about.
“Your family are in a hotel just ten minutes away. It’s the middle of the night right now… we can send for them, but you should probably rest for now.” Shane fiddled with the drip. “The doctor said to give you some Valium if you want it. Just enough to help.”
Ray looked at the line in her hand and gave up. “…I don’t know. If the doctor thinks that’s best… I don’t know. Yes.”
Shane nodded, finished presumably dosing her up, and then gave her some space. Ray looked at Warhorse.
“…Jesus. Have you slept?” she asked him. He looked downright haggard.
“Yeah, I’m just tired.”
“Don’t you have a family or something to go home to if it’s the middle of the night?”
He beamed at that. “Yeah! A newborn son, Diego. He’s, uh, pretty demanding.”
“…And you’re here?” Ray asked.
“I live in town, it’s no big deal. I just put him to bed about two hours ago actually.”
“So why are you here?”
He shrugged hugely. “I save lives.”
Ray sighed. Maybe Valium acted faster than she thought because she was already feeling a lot better about things… but she couldn’t take that for an answer.
“I’m grateful,” she said. “God, I… I don’t know how I can ever repay you. But you should be at home with your son.”
He chuckled to himself, “¡No te preocupes! It only takes me literally two minutes to run home, and I had to see if you made it. You did, so I’m happy.”
“I still can’t believe it… I could have sworn…” She touched her chest again.
“And you’re right. But like I said, things came a long way since you were gone. But I’ll leave it to the doctors to explain.”
“…Right. I guess I need to, I don’t know. Plan for maybe having a life again.”
“Sleep first,” he said. “Worry about life mañana. It’s just one day at a time, y’know?”
Ray nodded and rested her head again. “Good advice.”
He smiled and stood. “Hey, uh…don’t be a stranger. I’d like it if you visited! You know. If you feel up to it.”
“I’ll do that… thank you.”
She was already falling asleep as he murmured a warm “De nada” and left.