Noumenon Infinity Page 26

  “How I did it is important, Toya,” he said firmly. “That you accept who I am and how this happened—not as something in spite of my ‘problems’ but because of them—is important to me.”

  “I’ll tell everyone about your imaginary friends if you want. Doesn’t matter. I’ll stand by you. Crazy or no, you’re still my brother.”

  But it does matter!

  He wanted to rail at her, to explain how she was getting in her own way, refusing to truly see the situation for what it was. But something struck him. Her apology had been sincere . . . from her perspective. She was letting him in again. Which gave him a chance to get to her.

  They could get past this. It would be difficult, but that’s what families are: difficult. She was worth the effort, especially now that he had only a few years left before retirement.

  Toya had stopped acting like he was already gone, and he wasn’t about to look this gift horse in the mouth.

  “Thanks . . . I think.”

  She looked disappointed, but before she could say anything, Jamal lunged forward, scooping her into his arms. “No, really. Thank you.” She might not have accepted the echoes, and I.C.C. might not yet agree that they were real and not a symptom of a damaged brain. The crew might whisper about him from now until forever, but that was fine.

  It was fine, because he was fine. He would make them all see, through living his last years as he saw fit, that there was nothing to fear.

  “Thank you,” he said again.

  Three and Five gave him happy nods, arms slung around one another, comrades at last.

  Chapter Five

  Orlando and Ming-Na: Here There Be Dragons

  Convoy Twelve

  Fifty-Four Days Since the Accident

  Dr. Yolanda Taylor stopped making notes with her stylus as Mrs. Tan fell silent.

  The captain’s wife sat across from her, on the newly repaired, extra-cushiony reclining chair. She’d favored it these last few sessions, over the straight-backed seat she used to occupy. Unlike a lot of well-padded furniture, the recliner had a shallow bench, so it wasn’t too difficult for Mrs. Tan, at thirty-nine weeks pregnant, to get back up on her own once she’d settled in.

  “Ming-Na?” Yolanda prompted. Mrs. Tan didn’t let anyone call her by her first name with company around. But here, in the seclusion of the office, she’d insisted upon it.

  Ming-Na’s eyes were fixed on the slit between the heavy curtains, which hid the window from view. Most patients these days asked for the curtains to stay closed. Looking at the stars was too much. And now, knowing that there were more than stars on the horizon—knowing there were structures, which meant there had to be builders—was too much plus too much.

  The crew wasn’t prepared to flounder like this. To be adrift, their food stores dwindling—positionless, pointless, with something brewing in the distance. Those structures were a promise from the universe. Some kind of cosmic sign. But a sign of what, no one was sure.

  “Ming-Na?” Yolanda prompted again. “You were talking about the captain . . . ?”

  She was clearly tired, withdrawn. Her black eyes were half-closed, like shades drawn over a private family scene. But Yolanda’s job was to draw them back, to see beyond, to help others through this mess.

  “I don’t want to talk about Orlando anymore,” Ming-Na said abruptly.

  Good.

  Mrs. Tan liked to deflect, to talk about what her husband was up to so that she didn’t have to talk about herself. She was aware of the habit, was trying to get better at opening up. But she was used to being reserved, was most comfortable in the guise of unshakable.

  But everyone quakes for something.

  “I can’t . . . I still can’t comprehend how long it’s been. One hundred thousand years. I miss my mother most,” she said, fingering the red scarf tied around her midsection. She’d worn it every day for weeks now. As a comfort, she’d explained. It was an old funerary tradition; expectant mothers were supposed to disassociate themselves from death, from grief, and if they couldn’t, a red sash was worn as a protection. And with the whole convoy awash in grief—with Mrs. Tan unable to escape what felt like an unending funeral—she’d latched onto whatever relief she could find.

  That was a common trend among the crew. Everyone seemed to be holding more steadfastly to their traditions than they might have otherwise, seeking solace in what some of them once considered superstitions.

  “It’s selfish, because it’s not even her so much,” Mrs. Tan continued. “She was supposed to come visit on the last transport ship. She said she’d help me with the ma fan. But she put it off, concerned she was coming too early, that she’d upset things. She’d promised me next time, though. Next time.” She wriggled uncomfortably, arms gripping the sides of the chair with intensity. It was as though she wanted to grab her belly—perhaps protectively, perhaps in anger, it was difficult for Yolanda to tell. “It’s my first. And I don’t have any siblings. Orlando’s brother doesn’t have . . . didn’t have children. I’ve never been around children. I’m excited for her to be born, but I thought Ah Maa would be here to help. She was even going to bring our family recipe for pork knuckles and ginger stew. The mess chefs were going to make it for the whole crew, and now . . .” she trailed off bitterly. “And now, not only is my mother dead—gone—but this baby. It was supposed to be a first, but not like . . . not like . . .”

  “You have friends aboard. Other mothers aboard.”

  “Yes, but it’s not supposed to be like this. And now, with the baby acting the way she is . . .” she trailed off again, her eyes finding the gap in the curtains once more.

  Yolanda shivered and looked over her shoulder at the air vent. The ventilation system hadn’t hiccupped, but she was unexpectedly cold. “What do you mean?”

  “She doesn’t wiggle the same. She barely moves at all. Before the accident, she would kick often. Especially after meals. Now she’s . . . still.”

  “I assume you’ve asked the medics about this?”

  “They tell me everything is fine. But the baby doesn’t feel the same.”

  Was this a projection? Was Ming-Na taking the external change and applying it internally? It would not be unusual for a mother-to-be to feel differently about her baby if her life were suddenly upended.

  But there was something about the expression on Ming-Na’s face that made Yolanda reconsider. The captain’s wife had never been one to project before. She deflected, which was an entirely different defense mechanism. She’d never shown signs of twisting the particulars of a situation.

  If she said the baby felt different, it was likely because it was different.

  “You’re under a lot of stress,” Yolanda said. “That’s going to change the way your body processes things and produces hormones. The baby is likely responding to that.”

  “I know,” Ming-Na said. “But it feels wrong.”

  Fifty-Seven Days Since the Accident

  An uneasy routine had settled into Captain Orlando Tan’s bones over the past few weeks. He’d get up at 0600, take a shower, brush his hair and his teeth, then make tea and wait for the smell to rouse Ming-Na. He’d help her out of bed, and when he was sure she was steady, would pour a cup for her, himself, and one to offer his paternal grandfather’s ancestor tablet. They’d set it in a small nook in the third bedroom of their newly expanded quarters, made it as dignified as they could with a red garland and a place for incense, though for safety reasons they could not light the sticks.

  He’d argued with his father about the tablet’s removal from the ancestral shrine. The convoy would be close, Tan himself wouldn’t be gone more than a few years—it felt wrong to take it. But his father had insisted that he needed an ancestor to watch over him.

  Tan had accepted in the end. Now he wondered if their misfortunes might be tied to the spirit’s displacement. Or had his family been spared during the accident because he was lucky enough to have an ancestor with him?

  At first the tablet had fe
lt like a burden. An expectation of observance, of tradition, that he hadn’t planned on participating in on his tour of duty. But now it was an undeniable comfort, even through his wariness, his wondering. It was a reminder of home, a connection to family.

  He remembered visiting the ancestral shrine at his grandparents’ often. He’d grown up there, with his parents and cousins and uncle. Theirs had been a grand stone building, set in with other ancestral shrines, at the back of a long row of houses that flanked a narrow street on the fringes of Guangzhou. If he closed his eyes, he could still smell new rain sizzling off the sun-warmed roof tiles.

  Only the shrine wasn’t so grand, he realized now. It had only seemed large and imposing to a small child. There were so many tablets there. And here there were so few, when, if the navigators were correct and they’d leapt a hundred thousand years forward, there should be so, so, many.

  Yes, it was good that his father had broken up the collection, he decided, despite the taboo. Even when he was young, there had been a decline in keeping shrines. He’d pitied his friends who didn’t have one to visit on days of remembrance, though they hadn’t seemed to mind. And in the end, he’d grown up into “modern” man—disconnected. Ironic that he should revive his connection now, when everything else had fallen away.

  Others on the ships were mourning in their own way, finding their way back to their own lost traditions. There was a hall on deck one plastered with photographs and effigies.

  “I do not feel like I am in mourning,” Ming-Na told him, striding up to where he knelt with the cup of tea, laying a soft hand on his shoulder. “I feel like I am drowning.”

  “I know,” he said softly, standing to kiss her goodbye for the day. He didn’t comment on how thin her face looked, how narrow her arms. She’d already been avoiding heavy and fried foods before the accident, and now . . . Everyone was slowly withering as the rations stretched.

  Just as he’d assigned Carmen Sotomayor a team to work around the clock on their interstellar position, so too had he given Justice Jax a party solely focused on genetic replication. Their convoy wasn’t designed to grow anything on its own, and that had to change, lest they perish.

  He headed to the officers’ mess for breakfast. There, he no longer ordered cheung fun for breakfast, as he had every morning before the accident. Now he had the cooks make plain congee. Not because it was tradition to eat nothing but congee when a family member died, but because it was practical. It wasn’t particularly nutritious, but it was easy to prepare in large portions from what they had left. And the waterier they made it, the further it would stretch. A savory meal was no longer a luxury anyone could afford.

  Halfway through his meal, seated next to his first officer, a voice over the intercom called to him. “Captain Tan, we need you on the bridge ASAP.”

  The breathlessness of the request sent him into immediate action. He swallowed his mouthful of porridge—as did Kurt Böhm, his aide—and together they rushed up to the elevators and rode to the bridge.

  “Report,” Tan demanded upon entering, immediately noticing the way his officers’ fingers flew over their consoles, heads bent to the task.

  This was third watch—they’d be changing over in another fifteen minutes, unless—

  Before anyone could answer him, his mind was already racing. Was it another accident? An injury?

  Second Officer Moscovici stepped into his space immediately, her breath high and fast, the words bursting out of her lips like she’d been trying not to scream them ever since they’d formed. “Navigation reports there’s movement in the direction of the object field, sir. Movement headed this way, via SD travel we think. We only picked it up because they emerged close enough.”

  He didn’t tell her to calm down. There was no reason to calm down. His heart had already started to beat itself silly, and he tightened his jaw. “Show me. Bring up the exterior feed. I want visual spectrum, infrared, and radar.”

  A petty officer obeyed immediately, changing the bridge’s windows to display the object field that currently sat aft of Pulse.

  He’d expected something shocking—as though the typical star field would be instantly blotted out by something hanging off the ship’s rear. But everything appeared normal. The objects were far-off, still starlike at this distance.

  “It’s most difficult to see in the visible spectrum,” Moscovici said. She nodded to the petty officer, and the display changed. The field became red and orange and white and yellow.

  There—there, he could just see it. A brief change in the makeup of the object field. One of the geometric structures suddenly grew appendages, then those appendages disappeared. Moments later, another structure’s formation distorted, blossoming the same appendages, only they were bigger now.

  Of course, the large objects weren’t changing at all. Something was moving in front of them, moving toward the convoy, growing larger in his field of view.

  Tan told himself to remain steady, stoic. Moscovici was flustered, so he had to be strong. “Give me another feed,” he commanded, hoping his voice was firm.

  Blue and purple, green and gold, reds upon reds upon reds—he didn’t pay attention to what kind of feed it was, just the colors and the contrasts. All he needed was confirmation that these things were indeed headed straight for them.

  It’s a fleet, he thought, his internal monologue now equally as composed as his exterior. It was everything in between that was stuttering and pumping and screaming with revelation. His blood surged, his lungs hitched, and his stomach cramped. He wished he’d eaten more of his breakfast.

  It was his duty to think clearly and order calmly, but his nervous system and vital organs had taken no such oath.

  Yet in that cool, rational mind, a spark of hope glimmered and drew his attention.

  What if they can help us? What if they’re just people—what if they’re human? Maybe we should just let them come.

  But the rest of him immediately dismissed the notion. You can’t risk it. You don’t know what they are—maybe that’s not even a fleet. Maybe it’s a swarm. Or a pod. Maybe you aren’t looking at ships at all, maybe you’re looking at the monsters themselves.

  There was no time to consider how to handle a head-on confrontation.

  Maybe these beings—if they were beings, for all they knew they could be automated sentries. Robots, guarding whatever was out there. That would make sense. How else could they have detected the convoy? The object field was at least two light-years away at its closest, and Pulse and Breath were so small, and they’d only been here for a few weeks. That wasn’t even enough time for physics to allow for observation of any kind. There had to be a detection system of some kind—a buoy or a grid they couldn’t see.

  Maybe these beings haven’t seen us yet? he considered, rounding back to his original thought. Maybe they just happen to be traveling this way? Maybe we’re no more interesting to them than any other pebble in their path? Maybe they haven’t actually noticed us?

  That could explain their approach. They seemed to be using SD travel—jumping and resurfacing, jumping and resurfacing.

  Either this was the typical way they traveled—perhaps they could not sustain SD submersion for more than a few minutes?—or they were giving the convoy a chance to spot them.

  Or they weren’t appearing right next to the convoy because they were just as wary of the new ships as the humans were of the object field.

  If that last scenario were the case, clearly their curiosity had overridden their caution.

  All of these possibilities ran through his mind in a blink’s time—a checklist of concepts and circumstances, neatly organized and scrolling past his inner-eye. Now, though, was the time to move past the what-ifs.

  Because no matter which of them was true—or if none of them were true—the convoy only had one possible reaction: run.

  The risk was too great. Dead space was one thing. If it was just a matter of floundering in a sea of stars, that meant they had to deal with
humanity against nature and their survival would be the stuff of Defoe novels. But if they had to throw in an external threat—unknown consciousnesses, or automations, or what have you . . .

  Entropy was one matter. But something that could outthink or outpurpose or flat out blow you out of the sky with its advanced weapons?

  They weren’t ready to meet anything like that. If the galaxy was a vast sea they were stranded in, they weren’t equipped to deal with what lay beneath the surface—sharks, whales, giant squid.

  “We need to dive,” he said steadily. “Sync the drives and initiate warning lights.”

  “Where are we going?” Moscovici asked.

  “Anywhere but here.”

  Her face contorted immediately, and he read concern in the lines of her brow.

  “Five-minute sprint,” he commanded. “On my mark.”

  Five minutes should be enough to get out of the way. If the approaching fleet had other business, then their course would not change. They’d fly right by the convoy’s new position. And if not . . .

  We’ll worry about “if not” if we get to that point.

  “Four . . . three . . . two . . . one,” Captain Tan said. “Dive.”

  The bridge went purple, the light giving everyone’s skin an alien, fuchsia hue.

  The minutes passed, agonizingly slow. Tan brought up the images and graph readouts on a monitor above a rear nav station, studying the objects while he took deep breaths.

  It was difficult to say how many there were. Ten? Fifteen? Twenty? It didn’t matter, really—anything past one put them at a disadvantage. They had no way to defend themselves. Their only option was to run.

  The seconds ticked by, and Tan counted every single one of them. He had to remind himself to breathe, to keep focused. Five minutes felt like forever, and as they neared the final moment, he let himself close his eyes. Everything will be fine. When the clock struck, he gave the command to resurface. The purple light returned, and moments later the bubble popped.