The Middle of Nowhere Read online

  As he did every day, Brik whispered a command to his office. The room began to darken. He stripped off his uniform and pushed it into an overstuffed hamper; although laundry was usually handled by the ship’s utility robots, the decontamination procedures had delayed the performance of many of their routine duties.

  Naked now, Brik began chanting softly to himself, restoring himself to the center of his being, softly counting through the spaces of his existence, identifying each, accepting it as part of his identity, cherishing it and including it as part of who he was.

  As he chanted, he moved. He circled precisely through the seven patterns of selfness. Neither a dance nor an exercise, but something of each, the ritual took him methodically up the ladder. There were seven major steps of engagement in the existence of a self-aware being, and multiple minor steps as well—all the way from the unbeingness of unconsciousness at the bottom to a white-light, oceanic awareness at the top.

  He began with his spine, the animal center of his body. He twisted and stretched through a series of deliciously painful exercises. He felt the tension like a tide, pulling him simultaneously inward and out. His muscles tightened with effort, tightened beyond pain, into that burning threshold where the very tissues began to tear against themselves, triggering the release of specially tailored hormones in his body, and even more potently designed endorphins in his brain. He became intoxicated with his body now and cycled through the dance a second and a third time, each time rising to greater peaks of agonies and ecstasies. To a Morthan, the two were the same sensation. Overwhelming. Almost uncontrollable.

  As he expanded his physical being, so did his awareness seem to grow, leaping beyond the boundaries of his skin, beyond the panelled walls of his cabin, beyond the carbonate foam hull of the starship, beyond the stars, beyond the farthest stars of the galaxy itself to finally encompass a universal awareness of the dual paradox of enlightenment; the mutual existence of everything and nothing in an infinite realm.

  He held that state for as long as he could—humming with a deepthroated sound, almost a purr. When he was truly focused, he could hold himself at that white-light moment for achingly long seconds before he peaked and crashed exhausted back into himself, paradoxically both empty and refreshed.

  In this state, he did not try to think. He simply let the thoughts come. The pictures flowed, one after the other. He did not try to give them meaning. He simply let them happen. He watched them pass across his consciousness and noticed his reactions. Sometimes anger, sometimes fear. More and more these days, curiosity.

  Humans had no conception of the complexities of the Morthan consciousness. That Brik had no way to enlighten them without turning them into Morthans themselves did not frustrate him, although the barrier of imprecise communication that the spiritual gap represented did give him more than occasional annoyance. Rather, he felt an increased responsibility to make up for the lack of wider awareness that he saw in his human colleagues with extra caution on his own part.

  Naked, and finally relaxed, the huge Morthan at last folded himself into a meditative posture and waited. When he was ready for the next step, he whispered a second command, and the holographic displays shimmered to life with pictures of past horror.

  Brik sat alone in the dark, surrounded on three sides by holos of a dead Morthan named Esker Cinnabar. As he had done almost every day in the five weeks since the Star Wolf had completed her last mission, he studied the pictures. There was so much to learn.

  Brik did not think much of most of the tools humans had designed for measuring competitiveness, but there were exceptions. One was the Skotak Viability test. It determined with what Brik thought admirable precision just how difficult a living organism would be to kill. (Humans did not realize that this was the proper use of the test, of course; they thought it was for making decisions about healing the injured; but Brik saw no reason to be bound by the limited assumptions of others.)

  A good rating for a human would have been in the range of seventy-five to eighty; an exceptional rating would have run as high as ninety. Cinnabar, while alive, had registered a Skotak Viability rating of one hundred thirty-two, before augmentation. After augmentation—biotech implants, the addition of an optical nervous system, half a dozen different devices to protect him from the commonest forms of particle weapons and slugthrowers—Cinnabar’s Skotak Viability rating had shot up to approximately three hundred and ninety.

  Brik would never have let someone else run the Skotak Viability test on him; it would have given away information that might one day cause his death. (It had helped cause Cinnabar’s.) But he had run it on himself, in the privacy of his quarters. And he found the results . . . interesting.

  Esker Cinnabar was among the Morthan Solidarity’s elite. He had received the finest training in all the martial disciplines; even before augmentation he would have been rated as a certifiable Berserker. The Solidarity did not waste the resources necessary to create an Assassin on any but the best.

  And Esker Cinnabar’s Skotak Viability rating, pre-augmentation, was one hundred thirty-two.

  Brik’s was one hundred thirty-six.

  But Esker Cinnabar was better trained than Brik. Brik knew it to be true; the greatest warriors the universe had ever seen had trained Cinnabar.

  Brik’s fathers had trained him. Later, Brik had trained himself.

  In all the Alliance there was no one competent to teach him the things he needed to know now. The experts were all with the Solidarity, were all his enemies.

  So Brik sat in the darkness and watched all the hours of holos that had been made of the Morthan expert Esker Cinnabar. Watched Cinnabar move, watched him talk. Watched him indulge in rage, and experience it. Watched him threaten and cajole, watched him kill and watched him die.

  Over and over again.

  And learned...

  There were movements here that Brik still couldn’t puzzle out. Were they products of the augments? At his workstation, he had tried to factor out every behavior that was the result of implants and augments, reducing Cinnabar’s virtual self to a pre-augmented state; but despite his careful analysis, he still wasn’t sure if he was seeing the actual behaviors of the unaugmented Cinnabar or if the virtuality was still polluted with residual effects of the bioengineering.

  Brik frowned in concentration. His muscles twitched in sympathy. He ran the display in slow motion and copied out each movement. They were uncomfortable and unfamiliar. How had Cinnabar trained himself to move like that? The best movements were those that used the body’s own power. Was there something he was missing here? There had to be.

  But even as he struggled to master the skills of his enemies, he regarded them with a measure of contempt. The war in space would provide little opportunity for hand-to-hand combat, yet it was clear that the Morthan Solidarity was continuing to place undue emphasis on personal discipline and strength. This was a misplaced direction of resources, and might very well cost them significant strategic ability.

  Unless he was missing something else—

  Why would the Morthans spend so much time and energy on personal enhancement? What were their ultimate intentions? It was a question that he could not answer now; he did not have enough information; but it was also a question that he would like to discuss with Commander Korie when he returned to the ship.

  There was a knock on the door—a soft, almost tentative sound.

  Brik switched off the holo display of Cinnabar. The walls faded to gray. Although he had no nudity taboos of his own, Brik knew that many humans would be startled by his unclad appearance. He stood up and reached for a robe. “Enter,” he rumbled, vaguely annoyed at the interruption.

  The door popped open and Lieutenant Junior Grade Helen Bach stepped politely in. “I hope you don’t mind my interrupting, Commander. I know you need your personal time, but . . .” She glanced around uncertainly, a little startled at the starkness of the room.

  “But?” Brik prompted.

  “I was wond
ering if you would like to join me for dinner?”

  Brik considered the invitation; not only the surface meanings, but the subtext as well. “Most humans don’t like to eat with Morthans,” he said noncommittally.

  “I grew up on a Morthan farm.”

  “Yes. You told me that.”

  “Well, I . . . I think I need to talk to you. About my responsibilities.”

  “I am not here to provide... counseling services.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Bach said. “Um, this isn’t easy for me. And you’re not making it easier. I just thought because we’ll be working so closely together now that we could be friends, that’s all. Friends talk.”

  “Morthans don’t have . . . friends.”

  “But humans do.” She met his gaze, unafraid. “And it seemed to me that maybe Morthans—I don’t know, maybe... I mean, you’re on a shipload of humans—” Abruptly Brik’s stare seemed more intense than usual. Bach ducked her head in sudden embarrassment. “Never mind. I apologize if I misunderstood.”

  “Lieutenant—” Brik stopped her before she could turn away. “I appreciate the gesture, I think I understand the motivations behind it, but it’s inappropriate.”

  “Say again?”

  “You’re projecting your own perceptions onto me. You are assuming behaviors that are not here.”

  “Oh,” said Bach. “Thank you, sir.” Her expression closed. “I’m sorry for disturbing you. It won’t happen again.” She stepped back out and the door popped shut behind her.

  Brik stared at the silent wall for a long moment, puzzled by Bach’s behavior. He understood neither her invitation nor the reasoning behind it. It annoyed him—not the invitation, but the fact that he couldn’t understand Bach’s motivation.

  He sat back down again, but found himself unable to restore his concentration, and that only increased his annoyance more.

  Humans.

  Hall

  Gatineau finally found the cargo bay. It took him more than an hour, and he wasn’t happy about it. The chief would not think well of him for wasting so much time; but somehow, he had gotten turned around in the maze beneath the engine room and ended up at the forward airlock instead. He wasn’t quite sure how that had happened, but apparently his sense of direction didn’t work the same way in space.

  When he actually stepped into the big chamber of the bay, he stopped in amazement and stared. Where every other part of the vessel seemed small and cramped, the cargo deck was actually roomy enough for a tennis match. Possibly two. Halfway up the wall, a wide catwalk circled the room. Forward, it opened into both the port and starboard passages. Aft, it led to two standard airlocks. Below the catwalk was a much larger cargo lock.

  At the moment, the floor of the cargo deck was divided into taped off rectangular areas, each one filled with a variety of supply modules and crates. As he watched, a robot pushed an anti-grav sled into the bay, bringing another load of equipment. A work crew rushed to unload the sled.

  A skinny little man with large eyes and ears and a shrill penetrating voice was striding up and down the aisles, calling out orders to his harried crew; there were at least six. They were all wearing shorts and T-shirts, the standard working uniform. The skinny man waved his arms; he shouted and pointed; he cursed and cajoled; he kept up a constant stream of chatter as directed the sorting of the materiel into various taped-off rectangles.

  As Gatineau approached, he checked the officer’s nametag. Chief Petty Officer T. Hall. “Sir?” he asked.

  Hall turned around in midbark and blinked at Gatineau, as if discovering something left uninventoried. “Who’re you?”

  “Uh, Crewman Robert Gatineau, Third Class, Engineering Apprentice. Sir.”

  “Well, Crewman Robert Gatineau, Third Class . . . let me give you a piece of advice,” Hall said officiously. “Rule number one: never interrupt.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

  “Now, what is it?”

  “Chief Leen sent me to retrieve the moebius wrench. Sir.”

  “The . . . moebius wrench.” Hall blinked again. His brow furrowed slightly.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Uh, right. The moebius wrench. Um, let me see—what did we do with it?” Hall scratched his left eyebrow as he tried to remember. He had a peculiar expression on his face.

  “The left-handed one, sir. If you please.”

  “Ahh, yes. The left-handed moebius wrench. Um. Hm. Right... right. Let me think. Here, put this box over there. Third row, four squares down. No, not there—the next one. Good. Now, help us move these canisters. There’s a good fellow.”

  “Sir, I really need to find the moebius wrench—”

  “Yes, I know. Just give us a hand here while I try to remember.”

  “What is it exactly we’re doing here?” Gatineau asked after a few more moments.

  “Swap meet,” said one worker. Her nametag identified her as Sherm.

  “We’re putting out everything we have to trade. We’re practically stripping the ship,” said the other woman, Hernandez. “Chief Leen thinks we’re going to need a whole new fluction system. We may have to build it from spare parts.”

  “No, we won’t. I was just there. All we have to do is recalibrate the attack velocity of the fluxor hammers to compensate for harmonic errors. It costs us a couple points off the high end, but that’s part of the margin built into the design, so we’re not really losing anything; and we can still realize FTL velocities . . .”

  “Right,” said Sherm, shoving a large heavy module into his arms. “In the meantime, put this in L-7.”

  After a while longer, after he’d lifted and carried a dozen more crates, after he’d stumbled over the same cargo-bot for the third time, Gatineau decided he’d waited long enough. He put down the last crate and approached Chief Petty Officer Hall again. The thin man was striding down one of the rows and cursing softly as he counted off. It wasn’t going to be enough.

  “Sir?”

  “What did I tell you about interrupting, son? Rule number one, remember?”

  “Yes, sir, but I promised Chief Leen—”

  “Oh, yes, that’s right—here, just help us unload this next sled and—”

  “The moebius wrench, sir?”

  “Right, right.” Hall appeared distracted. “Wasn’t it stored with the Klein bottles—?” He began coughing ferociously into his fist. He turned away from Gatineau, until the seizure passed. He cleared his throat repeatedly, all the while waving away Gatineau’s concerned assistance. He moved away through the goods and equipment strewn methodically across the floor of the cargo deck. Abruptly, he turned grim-faced back to Gatineau. He looked as if he were biting his cheek from the inside. “The moebius wrench, right?”

  “Yes, sir!” Gatineau replied brightly.

  “Y’know . . . I distinctly remember giving it to the union steward. That’s Reynolds. He’ll have it or he’ll know where it is. You’re going to have to check in with him anyway. Let’s see . . .” He referred to his clipboard. “Yes, Reynolds is working below the keel. He’s supervising the detox on the electrical harness. He’s probably down in the fuel cells right now. They’re looking for a systemic discontinuity in the lower yoke. Y’know, he could probably use an extra hand. He’d appreciate any help you could give him.”

  “But, Chief Leen—”

  “Yes, I know Chief Leen. He won’t need that wrench until tomorrow or the next day. He’s like that. He’s always thinking three days ahead. You find your way down to the lower yoke right now and tell Reynolds I sent you.”

  “Yes, sir.” Gatineau was puzzled, and more than a little bit frustrated, but he wasn’t going to question the orders of an officer. “Find the inner hull and tell Reynolds you sent me. Chief Petty Officer Hall, right?”

  “Just call me Toad,” he said. “You need anything, you go to Toad Hall. Remember that. You give, you get.”

  Gatineau had the weirdest feeling that Petty Officer Hall wasn’t telling him something.
Nevertheless . . . he turned and headed for the passage through the keel again. He glanced over his shoulder once and saw that Hall was watching him go; he was still wearing that same peculiar expression. Hall smiled brightly and waved bye-bye at him. Puzzled, Gatineau waved back. But he went.

  As soon as Gatineau was gone, Hall turned back to his supply team. “Well, what are you waiting for?” he barked. “Ruffles and flourishes? Come on, get your butts off the ground! I need those medallion-armatures tallied—”

  He was interrupted by several flashing red lights and warning buzzers. “Docking!” someone called.

  Hall grunted in annoyance, but he stopped what he was doing and waited. So did everyone else.

  The Star Wolf had three boats: two transfer boats and a larger dropship that doubled as a cargo shuttle. Although the transfer boats could be brought into the cargo deck for maintenance, they were usually moored to the port and starboard airlocks when not in use. There was also a mooring for a captain’s gig above the Bridge, but no small boats had ever been made available to the Star Wolf.

  The dropship could be hung below the keel, but was more often moored to the large cargo lock at the stern; the larger access allowed the craft to open its entire fuselage to the cargo bay, vastly simplifying the transfer of massive containers. But this was not the Star Wolf’s dropship arriving; instead, it was an ancillary craft temporarily assigned to the service of the Sam Houston. Chief Petty Officer Hall had gotten notification of its arrival only thirty minutes previously, via a low-amplification tight-beam signal.

  Korie was the first one through the cumbersome detox lock, stepping through even before the hatch had finished opening. He was accompanied by the familiar soft thump of pressure balancing as the minor differences in atmospheric pressure between the two vessels equalized; it was felt in the ears, more than it was heard. He was also accompanied by a particularly irritating jazz-trumpet rendition of Dixie, the signature anthem of the Houston. The acting captain of the Star Wolf was carrying a thicker than usual “grief case” and he looked unhappier than usual. He was glowering with real annoyance.