Confluence, p.14
Confluence, page 14
Eschala shook her head. “They’re Ohclat; it’ll grow back.”
“That’s not the point. I don’t need protection.” Ryan saw a comm flash messaging off his wrist device. He spoke down toward it. “No…I don’t!”
Khattara raised her hands. “Alright, alright…point taken. But you need to understand that I’m not gonna stand on the side watching as some bully mob takes after you.”
Ryan smiled wide and nodded. “Yeah. Got that.” He bowed his head. “Thank you.”
The main portal for the skiff opened, and both drew in the crisp night air. After the sound of Rex’s departure faded, Khattara whispered, “Hey, I had fun tonight.”
Ryan chuckled. “Yeah. That took me back a few. Thank you.”
◊ ◊ ◊
Ryan was exhausted as the door to his quarters shut behind him.
A female voice from behind the proverbial curtain broke the silence. “Nonstandard recreational activities over the past five hours have well exceeded your regular conscious interval. Several biological markers indicate a need for regeneration. However, new vessels at Hadley’s Crucible are still waiting for your attention in order to be formally initiated into the fleet. You also have multiple messages from the Aunts and Mehvis. How would you like to prioritize the tasks before your regenerative cycle?”
Ryan ringed his fingers into his eyelids. “Ahh, Vi.” A chirp caught his attention before she could respond. Ryan pressed on the screen, and Khattara’s face peered back.
“Hey, what’re you up to?”
“Uh, I just got in from clubbing…with uh, you.”
“Right. That was awesome. I’m still just a little keyed up. I was thinking about taking a run in the simulator. You wanna come with?”
“It’s late, and you’re insane.”
She giggled. “Maybe. You wanna come with?”
“Ahh…I gotta…I can’t.”
Khattara tilted her head and smiled. “Gotta what? You have some other appointment at this hour?”
“No, not really…just some paperwork stuff. I’m really tired too. I’d just slow you down anyway.”
“Nah. It’d be fun. Come with.”
“Sorry, I can’t.”
“Oh, OK…well…”
Ryan closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Maybe you could just talk to me for a minute or two.”
“Uh, sure. What do you wanna talk about?”
Ryan smiled with closed eyes. “I don’t care…It’s just…”
Khattara cocked her head. “Just what?”
Punchy with fatigue, his head rolled over to the side, and he spoke quietly. “Your voice…it puts me at ease.”
“Really?”
Ryan’s eyes shot open, and he raised his head. “Yeah, right…That’s weird. Sorry.”
“No, you’re fine.”
“I should really…I’ve gotta few errands to run, and it’s late.”
“OK…well…hey, today was awesome. Best op yet. Nice job.”
“Thanks. You too. Good night, Eschala.”
Ryan closed his eyes for a few moments and took a deep breath. “How many ships we have out at the foundry?”
Violet responded. “There are currently twenty-four vessels awaiting your inspection. An equal split are slated to join into Virginia and Stella’s wings. We could change the protocol and allow new ships into the fleet without meeting you. Would you like to—”
“No. It’s important. They’re brand new, and I can at least meet them. Are we ready with the portals?”
“Affirmative.”
The quantum portal gate in Ryan’s quarters that led up to Rex was disguised as a framed, five-foot-tall, rectangular mirror propped against the wall just beside the bedroom doorway. Ryan ducked his head and shuffled through it.
◊ ◊ ◊
Khattara cocked her head and thought for a moment. Gotta run errands…at this hour? She accessed a system terminal and typed the following: Locate Eylon Walach, authorization Khattara Menduvalli.
After a moment, the system flashed a response: Eylon Walach campus location not available.
Khattara shook her head.
Ryan was about to step through another portal gate to the foundry and stopped. Thirsty. He made his way down the passage for a drink of water. Without realizing it, he’d carried his academy identification badge to orbit inside his pocket.
Back on the surface, Khattara thought for a moment. Her head cocked, and she typed into the terminal: Expand parameters, include planet-wide search.
The system responded: Planetary location not available.
Khattara had nearly turned away when the next message scrolled up.
Identification badge located. Current position is high orbit over Centauri.
Ryan set his water glass down on the counter and spoke upward. “Thanks for the drink, barkeep.” The compartment lights flickered as Ryan mumbled, “Now to induct the newbies.”
Khattara shook her head as she typed: Verify identification badge for Eylon Walach is located in Centauri orbit.
The system responded in the affirmative at the same moment Ryan stepped through the portal to the foundry.
Khattara typed quickly: Locate exact orbital position and identify ship or platform.
The system sat blank for a few moments, and Khattara cocked her head. The response followed: Exact location data not available. Badge locator no longer available.
Khattara mumbled, “What? No.” She banged on the keyboard: Explain telemetry loss.
Telemetry loss unknown. Badge locator no longer in orbit. Would you like to perform a diagnostic?
Khattara trilled and shook her head. Strange Paavi Ryan Walach…Where are you, and what are you up to?
8
Mugs Around the Fire
Khattara glanced back at Khorthat’s concerned eyes and, without hesitation, dove out of the slowing vehicle.
A message chirp stirred Ryan in the darkness. He groaned and fumbled for the device resting on his bedside table. His eyes squinted open and closed at the text message; it was Khattara. Although it was far before his normal operating hours, she’d been awake for two hours.
Hey, you up?
I am now. It’s dark outside. What’s up?
Sorry. Can you stop by my quarters before our op?
Sure. You OK?
Yeah, just want to talk about something.
OK. See you in a few hours.
◊ ◊ ◊
Ryan yawned as he pushed the call button outside Khattara’s quarters. The door opened instantly, and she stood just inside, motioning for him to enter.
Ryan dropped his bag by the door and cocked his is head. “You OK?”
“Yeah. I just…last night when we were talking—”
“Oh, uh, sorry if what I said made you uncomfortable.”
Khattara squinted at him. “What do ya mean?”
Ryan made a circular motion with his hand. “The thing about your voice, uh…you know, putting me at ease.”
Khattara shook her head quickly. “Nah. That’s not what I’m talkin’ about.” She paused for a moment. “You said you had some things to do, and that seemed odd. Did you go out?”
Ryan’s head drew back. “What do you mean?”
Khattara drew closer, and her gaze locked to Ryan’s. “I thought you said you were going out. I thought it was odd, so I ran a locate on your badge. It said you were in orbit.”
“Oh?”
“Before I could narrow the location and platform, the signal was lost.”
“Huh. That’s strange.”
Five seconds passed as the two gazed at each other. Khattara cocked her head. “Were you in orbit?”
“You mean right after we talked?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s a little crazy, don’t you think? How could I possibly get to orbit so fast? Logically speaking, it must have been a glitch. And why would you be checking on me?”
She held her lock on his eyes, and Ryan shifted sideways. Glancing down, Ryan did a double take on a rare element in Khattara’s quarters. It was a personal effect, a picture. “Whoa! Is that you there? You look so young. When was this taken?”
Propped up at the back of an end table was a small photo encased in a simple, worn wooden frame. The image had been captured in poor light; it showed an older man with his arm around a far younger Khattara. She had a strange smile that Ryan couldn’t decipher. Both of them were holding up small mugs that looked like the crude metal kind issued from a field kit.
Ryan snatched the picture up and looked at it more closely. “Is that a family member with you there?”
Khattara cocked her head and smiled as she looked at the small-framed picture. She took it from Ryan’s hand and gazed deeper into the moment frozen in time. The side of one cheek tightened as she gazed at the man in the photo and rubbed over the glass with her finger. “Not exactly, but for me he was chosen family.” Her head shook gently as she peered at the image. “I never told him how dear he was, but he knew.” Khattara nodded. “He was a teacher and a guardian. He was the best soldier I’ve ever known.”
Ryan’s eyes widened as he thought about her story on the LUND freighter. “Is this…Kortat?”
She smiled. “Khorthat.”
He nodded and studied it with renewed interest. “Wow. Where was this taken?”
She nodded for a moment as the memory took her back in time.
◊ ◊ ◊
More than a century earlier, the Centauri Crown had dispatched an entire battle group from the King’s Guard to verify the integrity of a demilitarized region in the narrows between the northern and southern continents of a planet named Kzuhu. The unincorporated world was the fifth body in a system on the fringes of the Aligned Systems. The Centauri were providing oversight and peacekeeping forces in a truce between the nomadic tribes that loosely comprised the two predominant dueling world powers.
A bright-eyed, twenty-three-year-old crown observer was embedded among nine hundred Centauri soldiers on a mission to verify a desolate line of peace. While not officially a member of the King’s Guard, Khattara was dressed like every other soldier on the mission.
Her mother had been against Khattara’s participation, but General Bayhden had allowed the assignment. In addition to hundreds of regular troops, he knew Khorthat, along with the rest of her guard detail, would provide protection. What he didn’t anticipate was Khorthat breaking into the ship’s armory before the battle group had left orbit. Khorthat used his authority to release an additional rifle. He opened the breach, looked down the barrel, and then tossed it to one of his men.
“Soldet Bhladen, do you agree the platoon should keep a spare rifle at the ready?”
“Never can be too sure. Like you always say, Coldet, safety first.” Bhladen smiled and turned. “Lady Khattara, sorry to burden you, but would you be so kind as to look after the squad’s spare rifle?”
Khattara returned their smiles as she took the weapon and examined it. It was her personal rifle; somehow Khorthat had managed to smuggle it on the ship. She slung it over her shoulder as another soldier handed her a clip of ammunition from his reserve. Two others retrieved spare clips and handed them to her.
Khorthat approached with an impish smile. Without breaking eye contact, he retrieved a compact, large-caliber pistol from his back beltline. He spun the familiar weapon around in his hand. It was a favorite from Khorthat’s collection, and in her younger years, Khattara had been gleeful to see it when they practiced together at the shooting range. Khorthat spoke softly. “I’m having a terrible time with my back again. Would you take pity on an old soldier and carry this for me?”
As Khattara grasped the handle, she noted his regular service pistol holstered on his side. She smiled again. “Thank you.” He winked at her and moved back toward his seat.
General Bayhden played over a prerecorded mission and planetary briefing while they traveled. In the middle of the playback, Khattara’s personal device indicated an incoming message. It was also from her uncle, a personal message urging her to follow Khorthat’s instructions. Bayhden expressed his hope that her participation would improve the situation for the civilians of Kzuhu. The king felt it would bode well for local confidence in the peace process when the press reported a member of the royal family had covertly toured the area and determined the region was once again safe for civilians to return. Khattara knew she was being used as a tool for the crown, but the benefit was mutual; the mission provided an opportunity to escape her palace prison.
Later on the planet surface, a convoy of six-wheel armored transports groaned down a compact dirt road. A plume of reddish-white dust rose off them like a shark fin into the clear orange sky. Khattara’s platoon was circling back from the inspection of a fence line marking the extreme northern frontier of the demilitarized zone.
The Kzuhu countryside was a vast, dry wasteland. Some manner of prehistoric wind and water had scoured the land clear of soil save sporadic tufts that rose five to ten feet above the rocky surface. These islands of soil held various types of thorny brown scrub brush and spindle-stalk grass. The expanse between was a puzzle-like mosaic of crumbled bedrock separated by an occasional crag-edged ravine.
This was Khattara’s first off-world experience since Shorcanton, and her hand periodically found the grip of her pistol. The transport continued to sway as it crunched over bumps in the war-damaged road. She exchanged a glance with Khorthat, and as their gazes connected, one corner of his mouth rose. Sitting across from her, he’d been watching her eyes. She moved on, gazing out windows in the vehicle and drawing in more of the scenery outside. Khattara could feel a dryness in the air with each breath, and it left her nose feeling like the cracked ground of a dried lakebed. She surveyed the expanse out the window, and her lips curled into a smile. Every imaginable iteration of the color brown was represented on the palate outside.
Marvelous!
The desolation was stunning, and she imagined what it would be like to reside in an expanse with such rugged beauty.
A few moments later, their convoy slowly overtook a civilian transport loaded with refugees. Khattara watched the faces as they passed and wondered about the daily lives of these people. The eyes of one face stood out and connected with hers. A younger girl, perhaps eleven or twelve cycles old, smiled and followed Khattara’s gaze. The contact jarred something deep within, and Khattara abruptly turned forward in her seat. For a moment the musty vehicle interior smelled like the concrete ruins of Shorcanton. Khattara’s hearts raced, and she squirmed in her seat. The warrior flexed her muscles and focused her mind as she had learned to do in Khorthat’s training drills.
Strong body, strong mind…strong body, strong mind.
Khattara sat taller as a warrior presence returned and reinforced her clarity in the moment. There was another detail in that passing moment, and her eyes grew wide. Khattara bit down on her lip for a few seconds before looking over her shoulder through a small back window.
That girl.
The child had been alone, perched on the roof of the vehicle’s cab. Her high cheeks and large round eyes were Tzhadihk. The planetary briefing they’d received en route had identified physical features of this tribe, and their origin was the northern lands. Khattara’s head cocked, and her eyebrows came together. The others in the passing vehicle were not Tzhadihk and had features consistent with people from the south.
Why would a child of the north be alone and traveling south with adults of a sworn enemy?
Before Khattara’s thoughts could ferment further, the Centauri soldier manning their vehicle’s turret bellowed, “Incoming fire!”
Rapid booms off the turret gun reverberated through the cabin, along with the clinking of spent, hot casings cascading down on the metal deck. The armored transport was nearly across a bridge that spanned a deep ravine, and they accelerated forward with a roar. Khattara looked back, straining to find the civilian vehicle behind them through the veil of dust their own vehicle shed with their increasing speed. Bouncing and swaying, she caught a glimpse of rocket exhaust trails headed toward them from the far canyon wall of the small gorge they’d just crossed.
Another voice cried out, “Incoming! Cover, cover, cover!”
After nearby explosions scattershot debris against the vehicle exterior, Khattara raised her head and peered out. She could see multiple explosions along the road from the bridge all the way up past their current position. The transport driver continued taking evasive action, and the vehicle screamed ahead through smoke and debris. As they cleared the far side of the barrage, Khattara stared out the narrow, horizontal back window.
The area behind them was a growing column of dust and smoke. The civilian transport vehicle they’d just passed had been consumed somewhere inside the angry churn and was nowhere in sight.
That girl!
A memory flashed like sheet lightning through Khattara’s mind. With perfect clarity she was right back in the moment when a transport ship had climbed up and away from the surface of Shorcanton. A chill raked up her backbone as she recalled the sense of abandonment. Her mind jumped further back in time to a piercing shriek that had shattered a quiet palace night. The glossy-eyed warrior in the present moment twitched in her seat. The tremor was like the rumblings of a woken volcano, and the memories were a magma rising quickly. Khattara shot from her seat.
Brow furrowed, she erupted, “STOP! Stop the transport! Emergency stop!”
Quickly shuffling forward, Khattara continued to yell at the confused driver. As he slowed under protest, she mashed an emergency release button for the side entry. Khattara glanced back at Khorthat’s concerned eyes and, without hesitation, dove out of the slowing vehicle.
