Heart of the Nebula (12 page)

“
Because those
‘protections’ are worthless.”

To her surprise, he actually looked like
she’d hurt him. He nodded slowly and took a long breath, keeping
his lips pressed tightly together. There was a sadness in his eyes
that she’d never really seen in a man before. Perhaps she’d
misjudged him.

“
Look, I don’t really care
about any of this stuff. Just let me off at the next place we dock,
and I’ll be fine.”

“
That’s the thing, though,”
said James. “Technically, what you’ve done is a criminal offense,
and as the ranking security officer on this ship, it’s my
obligation to take you into custody and bring you back for a trial.
If I let you go, it would be a direct violation of my
duty.”

Kyla scowled.
So he
is
trying to manipulate me.

The humming at the serving bar stopped, and
the spider-like robot once again hovered toward them. It set down a
platter in front of her, filled with thick, creamy bean paste. It
smelled delicious, with a mind-numbing blend of spices and what
looked like real tomatoes. Her stomach growled—the scent was so
strong, it practically made her drool. It took all of her
self-discipline not to shovel it all in her mouth, but with the way
James was manipulating her, that was the last thing she was going
to do.

“
Go ahead,” he said.
“Eat.”

“
What do you want from
me?”

“
What do I want from you?”
he repeated, a puzzled look crossing his face. “So long as you
don’t make trouble, all I want is to see you safely back to the
Colony.”

“
And then what?”

“
Nothing—nothing at all.
It’s my duty to serve and protect all of the citizens of the
Colony, even stowaways like you. But if you behave well, I can
vouch for you.”

Behave well.
If he was expecting her to be submissive, he was
in for a rough surprise.

“
Let’s get something
straight,” she said, pointing a finger at him. “I don’t want your
gifts, I don’t want your bribes, and I sure as hell don’t want any
favors. If you think I owe you anything, I swear I’ll throw this
food in your face. I’d rather starve to death than be anyone’s
bitch.”

“
Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said
James, raising both his hands. “No one said anything about
that.”

“
You don’t have to say it.
We both know I’m your prisoner.”

He sighed heavily. “Look, let’s be
reasonable. You’ve broken the law, but you’re a citizen of the
Colony, and as such it’s my duty to look after you. I’ll see that
the captain gives you a place on this ship, and we’ll treat you as
another passenger until we return home. If you don’t do anything
rash, I’ll do my best to see that you get off with a light
sentence. Then you’ll be free to do as you please.”

“
And what if I want off
before then?”

“
I’m afraid I can’t let you
do that.”

“
The hell you can’t. You’re
just holding out because you want to fuck me.”

He gave her a sharp look that silenced her
immediately. “I have never accepted favors or bribes from anyone,
and I don’t intend to start now. Don’t flatter yourself into
thinking you’re going to change that.”

Footsteps sounded on the stairs behind them.
Kyla turned and saw a middle-aged woman in a crisp white uniform,
her expression stern and unyielding. James rose to his feet.

“
I have to talk with the
captain now, but I’ll be back once we’re finished.”

“
You’re going to decide
what to do with me, aren’t you?”

He nodded. “Enjoy your food.”

Without looking back to see if she’d eat, he
joined the captain and walked down the hallway, leaving her alone.
She looked down at the plate of savory food before her and tried to
clear her thoughts before giving in to her hunger.

Who was this James, and why was he treating
her so well? It didn’t make any sense. He claimed that all he
wanted to do was serve and protect, yet the fact still remained
that he was keeping her prisoner. Could she trust him? It made no
sense—no sense at all.

The only thing that made any sense in that
moment was the plate of beans. With no one else to watch her, she
picked up her fork and dug in.

* * * * *

“
A stowaway?”

“
That’s right,” said James.
“Sara and I found her while we were, ah, having dinner
together.”

“
I see,” said Captain
Jarvis. She sighed and shook her head. “Well, we’re too far out to
turn around now, and we don’t have the facilities to hold her. The
best we can do is leave her with the port authority at Gaia
Nova.”

“
With all due respect,
captain, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“
Oh? Why not?”

Because I can save
her,
James thought. The girl had obviously
led a hard life, and he’d be damned if he threw her to the
wolves.

“
The girl is a full citizen
of the Colony, and she has every right to our protection. We have
no embassy at Gaia Nova—no way to ensure that she’ll receive that
protection.”

“
Irrelevant,” said Jarvis,
waving her hand. “She’s a stowaway on my ship, and I want her off
at the first opportunity.”

James stiffened.
Irrelevant?
How can you
possibly say that?
But then he remembered
that Jarvis was a civilian, not a member of the Corps. She’d never
sworn the oath, much less put her life on the line to serve or
protect her fellow citizens.

“
Yes,” he said, narrowing
his eyes. “And as the highest ranking military officer on this
ship, I am formally requisitioning the resources of this private
yacht to detain her until we return.”

Captain Jarvis frowned.
“You want to do
what
?”

“
Not ‘want,’ Captain. This
is a formal exercise of my military authority. The girl stays with
us until we return to the Colony.”

“
But that’s absurd. We’re
already at the maximum number of passengers, and—”

“
I’m sure we can find a way
to make it work,” he countered. “If necessary, she can stay in my
quarters, and I can double up with Lars.”

“
And how do you plan to
keep her detained there? The doors only lock from the
inside.”

“
She’ll behave—I’ll see to
that.”

Jarvis glared at him, clearly upset with his
affront to her authority. If this weren’t a civilian ship, he would
never be able to get away with this kind of stunt.

“
Very well,” she said,
sighing loudly. “I’ll comply with your demands,
Lieutenant.
”

“
Thank you,
Captain.”

“
I’ll thank you when that
stowaway is off my ship.”

James saluted, and Jarvis left—for her
quarters or the bridge, he wasn’t sure. For a moment, he considered
returning to Kyla on the observation deck, but he hesitated.
Something told him that wasn’t a good idea just yet.

What is she running
from?
he wondered as he slowly paced the
corridor. No doubt she had stowed away on the
Freedom Star
in order to leave the
Colony forever—but why? If the situation back home was really that
miserable, that meant that he’d failed.

Not yet,
he told himself.
There’s
still time to save this girl.
If she
honestly felt that the only way to solve her problems was to run
away, then he’d have to convince her otherwise. One way or another,
he would change her mind—even if it took the whole voyage to do
it.

Part II: The Guardian

Chapter 6

Sara palmed open the door to the bridge and
stepped casually inside. The astrogator on duty glanced up briefly,
but turned back to his work as Captain Jarvis rose to greet
her.

“
Ah, Sara,” she said,
offering her hand. “Good to see you.”

“
And you. Have you spoken
with Lieutenant McCoy?”

“
About the stowaway? Yes,
we… discussed the situation not an hour ago.”

Jarvis’s voice had a hard edge to it; Sara
guessed there had been something of a confrontation.

“
And what did you
decide?”

Jarvis scowled. “As the ‘highest ranking
officer on this ship,’ the lieutenant has ‘requisitioned’ this
transport to detain her for the length of the voyage.”

Sara frowned. “He has? But where will he
keep her?”

“
I believe the lieutenant
is working that out now.”

What are you trying to do,
James?
Sara thought to herself.
What do you hope to accomplish by this?
Now that she had cooled down a bit, she had to
admit that there was something admirable in the way he’d reached
out to the girl. Whatever his faults, he tried to do the right
thing as he saw it.

“
Well?” asked Jarvis. “Are
you going to try to change his mind?”

“
Why? Would you have done
anything different?”

Jarvis snorted. “Certainly. I’d have dropped
her off at the next port and washed my hands of her.”

“
You wouldn’t have brought
her back to the Colony?”

“
Bring her back? Sara,
she’s a stowaway. She doesn’t belong on a ship like this,
especially for such a sensitive diplomatic mission.”

Sara agreed, but the situation had changed,
and there was little they stood to gain by opposing James on this
issue. She knew when to pick her battles.

“
The girl seems harmless
enough. As long as she stays out of the way, I don’t think there’ll
be a problem.”

“
Perhaps.”

“
M
y
father will see to it that you’re adequately compensated for your
troubles,” said Sara. “And once we return to the Colony, the girl
will be tried and convicted for her crime.”

Jarvis squinted, as if she were still
unsure. “But what about the mission?” she asked in a hushed tone,
glancing at the astrogator to make sure that he was out of
earshot.

“
Don’t worry,” Sara said
softly. “If anything, it will make things easier. So long as James
is preoccupied…”

She didn’t have to finish the sentence.
Captain Jarvis’s lips turned up in a smile as she nodded.

Sara turned and glanced out the forward
bridge window. The massive spherical bulk of a starlane jump
station loomed near in the shimmering starfield. Like a
half-forgotten monolith, it marked the only sign of human
habitation for light-years in any direction. A tiny handful of
ships moved back and forth between brightly flashing buoys that
marked the zones for incoming and outgoing traffic. Sara watched as
a bulk freighter passed through the orange lights and flashed
briefly before it disappeared into jumpspace.

“
How long before we
arrive?” Sara asked.

“
Two of the starlane
stations are down due to maintenance,” Jarvis reported. “Still,
that won’t prevent us from continuing on our own drives. Barring
any unforeseen complications, we should arrive in the Gaia Nova
system in less than two days.”

“
So we should arrive
early.”

“
Yes, but only by about
twenty standard hours.”

“
Very well. Thank you for
your understanding, Captain.”

Sara left the bridge, musing that twenty
hours would give her precious little time to establish a meeting
with her contacts. She would have to be quick—Jarvis’s quick nod at
the end of their conversation had told her as much.

Well, as the daughter of the Colony’s
shrewdest politician, she didn’t anticipate that being a
problem.

* * * * *

“
So we’re almost at Gaia
Nova,” said Lars, whistling a little as he leaned back in his
chair. “What are you going to do about that stowaway while we’re
there?”

“
Sterling and I will take
turns watching her,” said James. “She won’t interfere with your
work.”

“
You sure you can handle
her and the mission at the same time? She’s a feisty young thing.
Reminds me of my sister.”

James groaned. It was true: the girl had an
attitude that was starting to get on his nerves. Even though he’d
gone out of his way to treat her well, even giving up his quarters
to give her a bed to sleep on, she had treated him with nothing but
contempt. At least she hadn’t tried anything genuinely stupid, like
running out in one of the escape pods. Then again, once they
arrived at port, it would become that much harder to keep her from
running away.

“
Not a problem. We’ll bring
her back.”

“
Funny that she would
choose a luxury yacht to stow away on. How did she manage to get on
board?”

“
I don’t know,” said James.
“But I don’t think she chose the
Freedom
Star
for any particular reason. It was
probably just the first ship to leave.” Which made him wonder: how
many runaways like Kyla were stowing away on the other
ships?

“
Interesting. And why
exactly do you want to help her?”

“
Because,” said James, then
stopped and shook his head. “I don’t know. It’s just—have you ever
worked really hard for something, only to have someone tell you
that it’s all been for nothing?”