The Unbounded, page 10
“I know,” he whispered, embarrassed.
“Oh, Melawn,” Thayne, sighed, squeezing Melawn’s shoulder gently. Then Thayne glanced back at the screen, concerned. “Just in case, better round up some chocolate.”
10 OUT OF SYNC
1-Splendor-1083 BE
Cheetah, near ARA2
Hot. So hot. Lanezi was sleeping on the deck in the quarantined area. He reached to throw off his blanket, but he didn’t have one. Careful! his mind reminded him. Whisper. And Kiwi . . . and . . .
“Are you okay?” Zahar asked from their makeshift kitchen in the Med Bay.
“Hot.”
“Well, no wonder, you’ve got five podpups sleeping on you.”
Lanezi propped himself up on his elbows, sending colored furballs rolling off his chest onto the deck.
Zahar turned to look at Lanezi. “Happy New–” she froze.
“What?”
She took a calming breath. “You have a rash.” She drew her finger across her nose. Lanezi reached up to his face. There were bumps across his nose that itched fiercely as soon as he touched them. Zahar pointed to the exam bed. “We need to scan. Dr. Tenshi, come to the Med Bay please.”
14-Splendor
It had been a long and boring two weeks. Lanezi watched anxiously through the window as Tenshi checked the blood of the other crewmembers to make sure the vaccine had taken.
“A few more minutes before it’ll be safe to let you come out,” she told Lanezi.
“Thank you,” he turned and walked away, pretending not to care. His gaggle of podpups tripped over themselves meandering after him. A gaggle or a pod? Or a pack? No. Nothing that organized. More like a mess. He scowled down at them. They all looked up adoringly at him. Maybe there was no official word. After all, who would be so crazy as to bond with five podpups? I’m destined for a life of fuzz.
His sickness had added two weeks to their quarantine while Tenshi worked on the vaccine. In those two weeks, Zahar had ended up taking care of him, seven podpups, and two alien babies, who were now in the purple of health. Zahar never got the alien rash, and somehow managed to avoid bonding with a single podpup.
Euro and Io decided to stick around after the testing, as anxious to get in as Lanezi was to get out. After only a few minutes, Lanezi heard the twins cheer, the door opened, and they were beside him with quick hugs and perfunctory requests for permission. Each little pup gurgled in excitement with more hugs, more playing, and more love to go around.
Lanezi collapsed on the couch with Whisper, harboring a hope that a couple pups might rebond with Io and Euro.
“They knew, Lanezi,” Io said, looking over at him in innocent amazement.
Lanezi, confused, glanced at Euro. “Knew what?”
“That you needed a family, of course,” Euro explained.
Stunned at the thought, Lanezi sunk further into the couch, the weight of years of responsibility on him. His life would be consumed.
3-Glory
Zahar had lived in the Med Bay for weeks, but now that Thayne was having one of his mindstorms, she decided to get out—and take the babies with her.
The twins came along as official babysitters. True to their word, they were good at feeding. They were also good at rocking, playing, crawling on the deck talking nonsense, and even smooching little purple cheeks. The babies ate it up. They gained weight. They got loud. They started rolling around. Most encouraging of all, their headbands glowed with astonishing colors.
Zahar pointed out that the colors were consistent with what they were doing or feeling and that both babies ran the same colors when, apparently, they felt the same. The ARA2 doctors agreed to observe and study the matter. Dr. Tenshi was skeptical, but the twins had no doubts.
“White means ‘I’m going to cry until I get what I want,’” Io explained.
“Yes,” Euro agreed. “Pink means ‘Play with me.’”
“White with a brown streak is hungry and pink with a purple streak is happy,” Io continued, making a streaking motion across his own forehead. Zahar just wrote down whatever the twins said. And she worried. Every day of quarantine that passed meant they would be docking soon. The babies would certainly be transferred to the ‘experts’ on ARA2. Zahar warned Io and Euro, but nothing would stop them from loving with all their hearts.
15-Glory
Nearly two weeks later, Lanezi went to the kitchen early to feed the podpups so he could at least sit down with the crew for a few minutes of dinner. He was demoted to the junior crew table anyway, the furthest possible seat from Thayne, so that the Captain wouldn’t be bothered by the pups’ inevitable visits to the table.
Lanezi didn’t mind the company of teens; he liked them all very much, but he felt completely left out of operations. He missed the more professional talk of the adults.
Zahar had prepared the food, which meant they had protein cubes with choices of brightly colored sauces. The twins took turns guessing the flavors until a drift of conversation from the other table caught their attention and they were simultaneously quiet.
“You think they’ll make you turn over the DNA data?” Melawn was asking Dr. Tenshi.
“Of course. Once they get around to it. They’re aliens. We have no treaties, no research agreements, nothing. We’ll want our record to be clean before we start negotiations.”
“But no one has said anything yet?” Melawn asked.
“No, we still have the babies. Once we turn them over, I expect a cleaning crew.”
Zahar, Io, and Euro exchanged sad looks.
“What tests are you running, Doctor?” Nkiroo asked.
“Anything related to radiation resistance.”
“But you’ll have to turn over the data too,” Melawn commented.
“Yes, that’s why I’m focusing on the most important thing. If I learn anything, even the slightest hint, I can apply that to the rat project, even if I don’t have the data.”
“How is the research going?” Thayne asked, with no regard for the patients sitting right there, perhaps because he knew that Tenshi was always open with them.
“Mutant rat life expectancy has been increased 20%. I believe I can increase that to 60% or better in the two years we’ll be waiting for the jump convoy. I’ll have to find immediate passage back to Sector 1 for myself and the twins.”
“Doctor, there is no guarantee that a workaround for Firelight will have been found by the time we get back,” Nkiroo cautioned.
“We’ll have to find something. I promised to return the children.”
There was a beat of silence as everyone stared at the Doctor, the twins in perfect innocence, the others in appalled shock. Obviously, Lanezi thought, Tenshi is not from the outer sectors.
“How could you promise?” Melawn whispered.
“I have every intention,” Tenshi replied, insulted.
Nkiroo leaned forward to whisper to Tenshi. Lanezi only knew what he was saying because it was what any of them would say. “This is the outer sectors, Doctor. Tomorrow is not a promise.”
Dinner petered out, weighed down by the news that the babies were leaving soon. Lanezi stayed to help Dr. Tenshi with cleanup duty. Luckily, the teens took all the pups so they wouldn’t be in the way.
“Doctor, I’m feeling much better. Do I have to have an exam to be cleared for full operations?”
Tenshi stopped her work to gaze sternly at Lanezi. “You have not been removed due to your physical health issues.”
He blinked in surprise.
“You must complete your therapy before you can be officially reinstated to the command order,” she continued.
“Thayne said the arrest was all a mistake.”
“It may have been. But you admitted to lying. You must complete the Truthfulness Therapy.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Lanezi asked, embarrassed.
“It’s all in your medical instructions, didn’t you read them?”
He hesitated. He hadn’t really gone past the first page, assuming it was all the usual.
Tenshi continued, “Certainly you have studied your options in the release document?”
Lanezi shook his head slowly.
Tenshi fully rounded on him now. “Did you think an infraction of this magnitude would just disappear?”
“Well . . . no. I guess I’ve been distracted.”
“Yes, we’ve had some distractions, but you have a serious problem you need to confront—and speaking of distractions!” She turned back to her work shaking her head. “Even if you complete the therapy, I don’t know how you are going to go back to operations with five podpups.”
“I’ll have plenty of time, and the teens help me take care of them.”
“It’s not the time! You don’t have any work to do! I have to do more research on this, but there is some clinical evidence that too many podpups can affect your mind.”
“What?”
“Especially five! Some psychologists claim even one.”
“It sounds like a myth. Maybe we could just ask Dr. Obala.”
“We cannot ask anyone! The fact that we have alien podpups aboard is classified!”
“Oh, right.”
Tenshi was glaring at him now, probably wondering what else he just didn’t get. “When can I start the therapy?”
“It’s all in your file. You should have started immediately.” She turned and went down the stairs, clearly done with him.
At breakfast with Zahar, Euro, and Io, Lanezi commented that the doctor had said that pups affect your mind. “Especially five pups.” Lanezi grabbed an empty bottle Summer had thrown. “No throw!” he interrupted himself.
“That’s ridiculous,” Zahar scoffed. “People have five children and it doesn’t ‘affect their minds.’”
“Maybe it does,” Io said, tilting his head in contemplation.
“Our parents have seven children,” Euro added.
“They do get confused sometimes.”
Lanezi smiled in sympathy for the distant couple with four identical boys. “Well, it’s not the same” he objected, “because people get bonded to the podpups.”
“People get bonded to people too,” Io said, as Zahar rolled her eyes.
“Not the same way. It’s like I always know where they are, what they’re feeling and, God help me if they’re hungry.”
Zahar laughed, but the twins seemed puzzled. “I always know where Io is, what he’s feeling and if he’s hungry—” Euro suddenly seemed sad.
Io, downcast too, said, “We used to know where Calli and Gani were too.”
“But now . . .”
“It’s like there’s space . . .”
“Like a dark void.”
“You can’t see.”
“You can’t feel.”
Zahar put a hand on each boy’s shoulder. “I’m sorry you’re so far from home. Have hope. For now, the Cheetah is your home.”
But they scowled at that. And Lanezi did too. And Zahar bit her lip. Sunburst had been a home, Lanezi thought. Cheetah was . . . not.
14-Beauty
Finally, another two weeks of quarantine passed with no sickness. But the crew was grumpy in the morning because they had to give up gravity for the near future. Once they were docked at ARA2, they would not be able to spin up.
Lanezi kept an eye on the screen, allowing Cheetah to bring in the ship and dock. Some pilots liked to do it manually, but it was really much safer to let the computers work it out—and that’s the way the ARA2 docking monitor wanted it.
“Ten minutes to docking burns. All crew, signal secure,” Nkiroo announced.
“Secure!” Euro and Io practically shouted from right behind him. He’d allowed them to ride in the Command Bay for the docking. Nkiroo was there too, acting as monitor. It was overkill. Io could have brought in the ship with the computer’s help. But Lanezi had enough respect for the unexpected not to go that far.
He received secures from the rest of the crew and Nkiroo officially ordered them to stay in place. The computer link was established and Cheetah started the first of several planned burns. Docking was more unnerving to Lanezi than jumping. It always seemed at the last that the ship was coming in too fast. He glanced at the screen and then at the quickly growing dock lights. Something . . . “Kiro . . .” Lanezi murmured nervously, embarrassed to let it get to him.
And then he couldn’t stand it. Some red alert system in his brain snapped into overdrive. Lanezi flipped the manual override switch, but nothing happened. In a panic, he glanced at his s’link, already in the slot. Level 6 flashed on the side. Six! Thayne demoted me! An alarm sounded and ‘computer sync failed’ flashed on the screen.
“Kiro! I need level 3 to override!” Even though Nkiroo was quick and coordinated, it took agonizing seconds for him to get his s’link in the slot.
“Cheetah, manual override!” Nkiroo ordered.
Lanezi burned 1g back, sending the thrust right at ARA2. He glanced down at the screen for deceleration numbers, but they were scrambled and blinking. Better to waste fuel than ram them, but he had no real-life experience doing it without the numbers. Simulations from his training days came flooding back to him; the feel for the mass and thrust, the last seconds of panic approach before the simulator screen would flash ‘failure,’ the doing it over and over until those last seconds seemed like a slow motion never-ending float. He burned back again, 2g this time.
“Estimate 3g, 16 seconds for full stop!” Nkiroo shouted.
“We don’t have 3g on the forward thrusters!” Lanezi objected, but Nkiroo would know that.
“Give it all you’ve got,” Nkiroo said in resignation, pulling the Cheetah vent alarm.
Lanezi did it, going for the full stop instead of the match. ARA2 was on comms, venting alarms going in the background. For 30 seconds no one on the Cheetah could move. They almost scratched the paint when they finally slowed and then moved slightly back. Lanezi kept it up another 20 seconds before letting off. Then they lurched forward in their seats. Lanezi was gasping for air and trying to think straight. “Do you have forward motion?” he shouted to Nkiroo.
“No,” he said.
“Cheetah, auto track sideways to stay with our port!” Lanezi looked out the window to see how close they were to the next ship. They needed to stay in their docking lane. Smooth thrusting started to the right.
“Are we okay now?” Euro whispered.
“Yes, but we need to dock.” Nkiroo cut the venting alarm, not that anyone had been able to prepare, and spoke to the whole crew. “Sorry everyone. Sync failure. We are currently out of danger. Please stay secure while we sort it out.”
Lanezi flicked through the screens, hunting for the one his instincts told him to look at. “Computer capacity – 93%.” He looked at Nkiroo. “That can’t be right.”
“Sync speed failure—that’s what ARA2 is telling me.”
“Cheetah, display computer use,” he ordered.
Nothing happened. “Nkiroo . . .”
Nkiroo ordered the computer to comply.
Four huge programs were running, taking over almost all the resources of the computer. “What are you people doing?” Lanezi complained. The Cheetah was the most advanced ship in the outer sectors. That it should run out of thinking power was unthinkable. One program had Melawn’s name, one had Nkiroo’s name and two had no name. They were marked classified. Nkiroo immediately stopped his program and called Melawn to stop his. “We’re still at 54%,” Lanezi said. “Get Thayne to stop his programs while I reprogram the dock.”
A few seconds later, one more program stopped.
“He says he can’t stop the last program,” Nkiroo whispered.
Something more important than not crashing the ship?
Cheetah docked at ARA2
When it was all over, when the Cheetah was safely docked, when ARA2 was stabilized, when Nkiroo had apologized and explained, when an inquiry was officially opened and the ARA2 commander had interviewed Lanezi, Dr. Tenshi, Thayne, and Nkiroo and closed the inquiry with a reprimand against all four of them plus a point put on Lanezi’s record, his first, Lanezi zipped himself into his sleeping sack and cried. He could have killed someone, which happened, during jumps, not docking! Pilots were not permitted to fly without their level 3 clearance and he had not thought to check or run it up during the dock. He was also responsible for checking the computer, something he never did on the Cheetah as it had always seemed so unnecessary. Dr. Tenshi, Thayne, and Nkiroo were all reprimanded for allowing Lanezi to fly without full operations clearance. All the crew except Thayne had come to the Command Bay to check on each other and support Lanezi. Nkiroo had quietly promoted him back to level 3. “Promote him or replace him immediately,” had been the order of the ARA2 commander.
The next morning, Lanezi stared at his latest painting in progress. It was nothing like all his other work. It was . . . fuzzy. He opened the computer capacity screen and checked it. They were using 91% again. He opened his medical file and read through the requirements of his therapy. Since Nkiroo had promoted him, he felt honor-bound to finish as quickly as possible. He determined he would not leave his cabin until he was done, so he worked day and night, with breaks for exercise and food that was delivered.
As part of the therapy, he had to come to terms with his ‘situation’, to choose the pathways to hope, to commit to honesty, and to do right by every person he met. He accepted the responsibility of the podpups, deciding that God had some reason and that five podpups were not a particularly burdensome test anyway. He embraced being their protector. He gave them more attention, trained and exercised them, brushed them himself, even if the teens did it again later, and talked to them, not just silly podpup talk, but real talk, from one being to another. They flourished. He prayed. He painted. He worked on his therapy. The twins visited him every morning and had their lessons with him. Every evening someone else in the crew visited. They seemed to have planned it out. Except Thayne never came, of course. And Lanezi was just as glad.
10-Light
