The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet Page 2

  “Losing your temper is one thing, but you are part of a multispecies crew, and you need to be mindful of that. Especially with somebody new coming aboard. And on that note, I’m sorry you have concerns about her, but frankly, she’s not your problem. Rosemary was the Board’s suggestion, but agreeing to take her on was my call. If she’s a mistake, we’ll get someone new. But until then, we are all going to give her the benefit of the doubt. Regardless of how you feel about her, I expect you to make her feel welcome. In fact...” A slow smile spread across Ashby’s face.

  Corbin looked wary. “What?”

  Ashby leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers together. “Corbin, I seem to recall that our new clerk will be arriving around seventeen-half tomorrow. Now, I have a sib scheduled with Yoshi at seventeen on the nose, and you know how he loves to talk. I doubt I’ll be done by the time Rosemary docks, and she’s going to need someone to show her around.”

  “Oh, no.” A stricken look crossed Corbin’s face. “Have Kizzy do it. She loves that sort of thing.”

  “Kizzy’s got her hands full replacing the air filter by the med bay, and I doubt she’ll be done before tomorrow. Jenks will be helping Kizzy, so he’s out.”

  “Sissix, then.”

  “Mmm, Sissix has a lot of prep work to do before the punch tomorrow. She probably won’t have the time.” Ashby grinned. “I’m sure you’ll give her a great tour.”

  Corbin looked at his employer with baleful eyes. “Sometimes you’re a real pain in the ass, Ashby.”

  Ashby picked up his mug and finished off the dregs. “I knew I could count on you.”

  Day 130, GC Standard 306

  ARRIVAL

  Rosemary rubbed the bridge of her nose as she accepted a cup of water from the wall dispenser. The lingering edges of the sedatives made her head feel foggy, and so far, the stims that were supposed to counter those effects had done nothing but make her heart race. Her body longed for a stretch, but she couldn’t undo the safety harness while the pod was in motion, and the pod didn’t have enough room for anything except standing up and walking out anyway. She leaned her head back with a groan. It had been nearly three days since the deepod launched. Solar days, she reminded herself. Not standard days. She needed to get used to making the distinction. Longer days, longer years. But she had more pressing things to focus on than differences in calendars. She was groggy, hungry, cramped, and in all her twenty-three years — Solar, not standard — she could not remember ever needing to pee quite so badly. The brusque Aeluon attendant at the spaceport had told her the sedatives would suppress that need, but nothing had been said about how she would feel once they wore off.

  Rosemary imagined the lengthy letter of complaint her mother might write after such a trip. She tried to imagine the circumstances in which her mother would travel by deepod at all. She couldn’t even picture her mother setting foot within a public spaceport. Rosemary had been surprised to find herself in such a place. The dingy waiting area, the twitching pixel posters, the stale smells of algae gunk and cleaning fluid. Despite the exoskeletons and tentacles milling around her, she had felt like the alien there.

  That was the thing that had hammered home just how far from Sol she was — the menagerie of sapients standing alongside her in the ticket line. Her homeworld was fairly cosmopolitan, but aside from the occasional diplomat or corporate representative, Mars didn’t see much in the way of non-Human travelers. A terraformed rock inhabited by one of the GC’s least influential species was hardly a destination of choice. Professor Selim had warned her that studying the concepts behind interspecies relations was vastly different from having to go out there and talk to other sapients, but she hadn’t truly understood that advice until she found herself surrounded by clunky biosuits and feet that didn’t need shoes. She’d even been nervous speaking to the Harmagian behind the ticket counter. She knew that her Hanto was excellent (for a Human, anyway), but this was no longer the safe, controlled environment of the university language lab. No one would gently correct her mistakes or forgive her for an unwitting social transgression. She was on her own now, and in order to keep credits in her account and a bed beneath her back, she had to do the job she had assured Captain Santoso she could do.

  No pressure, or anything.

  Not for the first time, a cold fist appeared deep within her stomach. Never in her life had she worried about credits or having a place to go home to. But with the last of her savings running thin and her bridges burned behind her, there was no margin for error. The price of a fresh start was having no one to fall back on.

  Please, she thought. Please don’t screw this up.

  “We are beginning our approach, Rosemary,” chirped the deepod’s computer. “Do you require anything else before I begin docking procedures?”

  “A bathroom and a sandwich,” said Rosemary.

  “Sorry, Rosemary, I had difficulty processing that. Could you please repeat your request?”

  “I don’t require anything.”

  “Okay, Rosemary. I will now open the outer shutters. You may wish to close your eyes in order to adjust to any external light sources.”

  Rosemary dutifully shut her eyes as the shutters whirred open, but her eyelids remained dark. She opened her eyes to find that the only significant source of light was coming from within the pod. As she had expected, there was nothing beyond the window but empty space and tiny stars. Out in the open.

  She wondered how thick the pod’s hull was.

  The pod swung up, and Rosemary shielded her eyes from a sudden burst of light, pouring out of the windows of the ugliest ship she’d ever seen. It was blocky and angular, with the exception of a bulging dome that stuck out from the back like a warped spine. This was not a ship designed for fussy commercial passengers. There was nothing sleek or inspiring about it. It was bigger than a transport ship, smaller than a cargo carrier. The lack of wings indicated that this was a ship that had been built out in space, a ship that would never enter an atmosphere. The underside of the vessel held a massive, complex machine — metallic and sharp, with rows of tooth-like ridges angled toward a thin, protracted spire. She didn’t know much about ships, but from the mismatched colors of the outer hull, it looked as though whole sections had been cobbled together, perhaps originating from other vessels. A patchwork ship. The only reassuring thing about it was that it looked sturdy. This was a ship that could take (and had taken) a few knocks. Though the ships she was used to traveling in were far easier on the eyes, knowing that there would be a solid, stocky hull between her and all that empty space was heartening.

  “Wayfarer, this is Deepod 36-A, requesting permission to dock,” said the computer.

  “Deepod 36-A, this is the Wayfarer,” replied a female voice with an Exodan accent. Rosemary noted the softness of the vowels, the pronunciation that was a little too polished. An AI. “Please confirm passenger identification.”

  “Acknowledged, Wayfarer. Transmitting passenger details now.”

  There was a brief pause. “Confirmed, Deepod 36-A. You are cleared to dock.”

  The deepod moved alongside the Wayfarer like some sort of aquatic animal swimming up to suckle at its mother. The hatch at the back of the pod slipped into the Wayfarer’s sunken docking port. Rosemary could hear the mechanical sound of catches connecting. There was a hiss of air as the seal expanded.

  The hatch door slid upward. Rosemary moaned as she stood. Her muscles felt as if they would splinter. She collected her duffel bag and satchel from the luggage rack, and limped forward. There was a slight gravitational discrepancy between the pod and the Wayfarer, enough to make her stomach lurch as she crossed the seam between the two. The feeling only lasted a few seconds, but combined with her foggy head, jittery pulse, and aching bladder, it was enough to make Rosemary cross the line from uncomfortable to vaguely miserable. She hoped her new bed was soft.

  She stepped into a small decontamination chamber, empty except for a glowing yellow panel affixed to a waist-high sta
nd. The AI spoke through a vox on the wall. “Hello! I’m pretty sure I know who you are, but can you swipe your wristpatch over the panel, so I can be sure?”

  Rosemary pulled her sleeve back, exposing her wristwrap — a woven bracelet that protected the small dermal patch embedded within the skin of her inner right wrist. There was a lot of data stored in that thumbnail-sized piece of tech — her ID file, her bank account details, and a medical interface used to communicate with the half-million-or-so imubots that patrolled her bloodstream. Like all GC citizens, Rosemary got her first patch during childhood (for Humans, the standard age was five), but the patch she had now was only a few tendays old. The seam of skin surrounding it was still shiny and tender. The new patch had cost almost half of her savings, which seemed exorbitant, but she had hardly been in a position to argue.

  She held her wrist over the yellow panel. There was a soft pulse of light. A twinge of adrenaline ran alongside the stims. What if something had gone wrong with the patch, and they pulled her old file instead? What if they saw her name, and put two and two together? Would it matter to people out here? Would it matter that she’d done nothing wrong? Would they turn away from her, just as her friends had? Would they put her back on the pod, and send her crawling back to Mars, back to a name she didn’t want and a mess she hadn’t —

  The pad blinked a friendly green. Rosemary exhaled, and scoffed at herself for being nervous at all. The new patch had worked just fine ever since it was installed. She’d had no trouble confirming her identity or making payments at any stops along the way. It was unlikely that the patch scanner on this clunky tunneling ship would have picked up any discrepancies that the high-end scanners at the spaceports hadn’t. Even so, this was the last hurdle to clear. Now all she had to worry about was whether or not she’d be good at her job.

  “Well, there you are, Rosemary Harper,” said the AI. “My name is Lovelace, and I serve as the ship’s communication interface. I suppose in that regard we have relatively similar jobs, don’t we? You liase on behalf of the crew. I liase on behalf of the ship.”

  “I guess that’s true,” Rosemary said, a little unsure of herself. She didn’t have much experience with sentient AIs. The ones back home were all bland and utilitarian. The university library had an AI named Oracle, but she had been a more academic sort. Rosemary had never spoken to an AI as personable as Lovelace.

  “Should I call you Rosemary?” Lovelace asked. “Or do you have a nickname?”

  “Rosemary is fine.”

  “Okay, Rosemary. You can call me Lovey, if you like. Everyone else does. Feels good to be off that pod, doesn’t it?”

  “You have no idea.”

  “True. But then, you don’t know how good it feels to have your memory banks recalibrated.”

  Rosemary considered this. “You’re right, I don’t.”

  “Rosemary, I have to be honest with you. The reason I’ve kept you chatting for this long is so that you don’t get bored while I scan you for contaminants. One of our crew members has very specific health needs, and I have to do a more thorough scan than some ships require. It shouldn’t be much longer.”

  Rosemary hadn’t felt that she’d been waiting long at all, but she had no idea what qualified as a lengthy amount of time to an AI. “Take all the time you need.”

  “Is that all the luggage you have?”

  “Yes,” Rosemary said. In fact, she was carrying everything that she owned (that is, everything she hadn’t sold off). She was still marveling at the fact that she could fit it all into two little bags. After a life in her parents’ enormous home, full of furniture and knick-knacks and rarities, the knowledge that she didn’t need anything more than what she could carry gave her a remarkable sense of freedom.

  “If you put your bags into that cargo elevator to your right, I can move them to the upper crew deck for you. You can pick them up whenever you head to your room.”

  “Thanks,” Rosemary said. She pulled open the hinged metal door on the wall, set her bags into the corresponding compartment, and latched the door shut. There was a rushing sound within the wall.

  “Okay, Rosemary, I just finished my scan. Hate to say it, but you do have a few blacklisted bugs in your system.”

  “What kind of bugs?” Rosemary asked. She thought back with dread on the spaceport’s smudged handrails and sticky seats. Three tendays since she’d left Mars, and already she’d picked up some alien plague.

  “Oh, nothing that would affect you, but they are things our navigator can’t handle. You’ll need to have our doctor update your imubots accordingly before you leave the ship again. For now, I’m going to have to give you a decontamination flash. Is that okay?” Lovey sounded apologetic, and for good reason. The only good thing about a decontamination flash was that it was over quickly.

  “Okay,” Rosemary said, gritting her teeth.

  “Hang in there,” Lovey said. “Flashing in three…two…one.”

  Harsh orange light filled the room. Rosemary could feel it move right through her. A cold sting cut through her pores, her teeth, the roots of her eyelashes. For a brief moment, she knew where all her capillaries were.

  “Oh, I’m so sorry,” Lovey said as the flash ended. “I hate having to do that. You look sick.”

  Rosemary exhaled, trying to shake off the needle-like twinges. “It’s not your fault,” she said. “I wasn’t feeling very well to start.” She paused, realizing that she was trying to make an AI feel better. It was a silly concept, but something about Lovey’s demeanor made any other response feel a bit rude. Could AIs even take offense? Rosemary wasn’t sure.

  “I hope you feel better soon. I know there’s dinner planned for you, but I’m sure you can get some rest right after that. Now, I’ve kept you long enough. You’re free to go on through. And may I be the first to say: Welcome aboard.”

  The vox switched off. Rosemary pressed her hand against the door panel. The inner airlock door spun open to reveal a pale man with a sour face. He changed his expression as Rosemary stepped forward. It was the most insincere smile she had ever seen.

  “Welcome to the Wayfarer,” the man said, extending his hand. “Artis Corbin. Algaeist.”

  “Nice to meet you, Mr. Corbin. I’m Rosemary Harper.” Rosemary shook his hand. His grip was limp, his skin clammy. She was glad to let go.

  “Just Corbin is fine.” He cleared his throat. “Do you…ah…” He nodded toward the opposite wall. There was a door painted with the Human symbol for bathroom.

  Rosemary ran for it.

  She came back out a few minutes later in a more positive mood. Her heart was still fluttering, her head still clearing, the lingering tingle of the flash still making her teeth hurt. But at least one of her physical complaints could be checked off the list.

  “Deepods are the worst way to travel,” Corbin said. “They run on scrub fuel, you know. Bunch of accidents waiting to happen. They really should be better regulated.” Rosemary tried to think up a response, but before she could, Corbin said: “This way.” She followed him down the corridor.

  The Wayfarer wasn’t any fancier inside than it was outside, but the mismatched corridors had a humble charm. Small windows broke up the walls at regular intervals. The wall panels themselves were held together with bolts and screws of varying shapes. Like the exterior, the walls were different colors — coppery brown to one side, dull brass to the other, the occasional sheet of soft gray thrown in for good measure.

  “Interesting design,” said Rosemary.

  Corbin scoffed. “If by ‘interesting,’ you mean it looks like my grandmother’s quilt, then yes. The Wayfarer’s an old ship. Most tunneling ships are. Incentives are provided to captains who upgrade old vessels instead of purchasing new ones. Ashby took full advantage of that. The original ship is about thirty-five standards old. Built to last, but not built with the comfort of the crew in mind. Ashby added bigger quarters, more storage space, water showers, those kind of things. All salvaged, of course. Don’t have th
e money to kit it all out from scratch.”

  Rosemary was relieved at the mention of improved living conditions. She had been bracing herself for the possibility of tiny bunks and sanidust showers. “I assume that Lovey was a later addition as well?”

  “Yes. Ashby purchased her, but she’s Jenks’ pet.” Corbin continued on without explanation. He nodded at the wall. “There are voxes in every room and in major junctions. No matter where you are, Lovey can hear your requests and transmit messages on your behalf. They broadcast to the whole ship, so be selective about what you say. Voxes are a tool, not a toy. Fire extinguishers are available throughout the ship as well. Kizzy can send you a map of their locations. Exosuit lockers are in the docking hatch, the crew deck, and the cargo bay. Escape pods are available on all decks. We also have a shuttle that is accessible through the cargo bay. If you see those emergency panels on the wall light up, head for a suit, a pod, or the shuttle, whichever is closest.” The corridor split in two up ahead. He pointed to the left. “Med bay is that way. It’s nothing state-of-the-art, but it’s enough to keep someone alive until we get to port.”

  “I see,” said Rosemary. She tried not to read too much into the fact that the only things Corbin had mentioned were related to emergencies or injuries.

  Loud, jovial voices came from a junction up ahead. There was a clang as something fell to the floor. This was followed by a brief argument, then laughter. Corbin’s eyes narrowed as if warding off a headache. “I believe you’re about to meet our techs,” he said.

  They rounded the corner to find a bird’s nest of wires and cables strewn about the floor. There was no order or sense to any of it, not that Rosemary could see. Algae tubes poured like innards from an open wall panel. Working within the wall itself were two people, a man and a woman, both Human — or were they? There was no question about the woman, who was somewhere on the cusp between her twenties and thirties. Her black hair was tied back in a lopsided bun, held together with a frayed, faded ribbon. She wore an orange jumpsuit smudged with grease and gunk, patched on the elbows with bright fabric and big stitches. There were hasty notes handwritten on her sleeves, things like “CHECK 32-B – OLD WIRES?” and “DON’T FORGET AIR FILTERS YOU DUMMY” and “EAT.” Perched upon her flat nose was a set of curious optical lenses. Rather than just one lens per eye, there were no fewer than half a dozen attachments welded onto hinged supports. Some bulged and magnified, others flickered with tiny digital panels. They appeared to be handmade. As for the woman herself, her dark olive skin looked as if it had spent a lot of time bathing in natural sunlight, but her indistinct features were undeniably Exodan. Rosemary thought it likely that she had grown up on an extrasolar colony — “out of the sun,” as they would say back on Mars.