Lacuna: The Prelude to Eternity (13 page)

[“The link is complete,”] said Saara. [“Grafting on the support structure now.”]

Liao watched as the upper part of the limb unfurled, folding over her shoulder and latching onto the skin, anchor points affixing. Those hurt—the local anaesthetic did not reach that far—but she gritted her teeth through it, enduring the pain, clenching her new fist to help. The metal groaned as she applied pressure then slowly relaxed as the pain faded.

“How do you feel?” asked Saeed, dabbing at the small amount of blood that leaked out of the small wounds.

“Good,” said Liao. “That last bit was rough. It’s all good now, though.” She sat up, her balance off. The prosthetic weighed more than she’d anticipated. Liao steadied herself, swinging her legs over the side of the bed. She rolled her shoulder experimentally. “No, it feels good.”

[“Excellent,”] said Saara. [“The prosthetic will take several days to fully integrate, and there may be residual effects, but at the very least, it does seem to have made a strong link.”]

“Like it was made for me.” Liao flexed the strong metal fingers, admiring the sheathed claws at the end of them. “You know, this might be a big advantage. I suspect at least some of our inability to communicate with the Alliance is biological difference—we’re just too different. At least a part of me looks Toralii now.”

Saara held her arm up, dwarfing Liao’s prosthetic. Her yellow eyes shone with amusement. [“It is…
cute
.
That is the only way I can describe it. Like one from a child.”]

“I was hoping for intimidating.”

[“Alas, Captain, such a thing would rarely be intimidating to a true Toralii warrior.”]

“So maybe that’s another title they’ll add onto my name whenever they feel the need to make the whole thing even longer than it currently is,” she said. “Liao the Kittenclawed.”

They laughed.

“Now,” said Saeed, a wide, eager smile growing across his face, “there’s one more person you will want to meet.”

Liao stiffened with anticipation, unable to keep the feeling contained. The door to the med-bay opened, and one of the nurses brought in someone she had wanted, more than any of the others, to see. Liao steeled herself. It was important that she remained calm, controlled, dignified…

But when the nurse brought Allison out, aged eighteen months and with a face full of curiosity, dignity went out the window, and she cried uncontrollably. Liao reached for Allison like a starving woman, her arms hugging her, dragging her child close to her chest.

“Careful, careful,” the nurse said.

Her child. Liao’s fleshy arm shook as she hugged her baby, eyes closed, breath coming in ragged gasps.

Allison began to wail. Liao, fearful she had hurt the baby, released her grip, but the child was unharmed. Instead, she was recoiling from the metal of her mother’s prosthetic.

It was cold, Liao realised. “I’m sorry,” she said by reflex, guilt welling up within her. “I-I thought I crushed her.”

[“She is unharmed,”] said Saara. [“Do not worry.”]

How could she not worry? Her own child, for whom she had given so much, reacted with fear around her. Allison squirmed away, back into the nurse’s hands.

“Yeah,” said Liao, her tone completely unconvinced. “I think she just needs some time to adjust.”

“So do you,” said Saeed. “It’s a big change. Muscle strength, coordination, temperature… everything is going to be different. It’ll take some time to get it right. Don’t take this to heart.”

She knew, rationally and logically, that Saeed was right, but that couldn’t shake the nagging doubts that gnawed at her. “I know.”

Saeed stood, passing a critical eye over the arm, apparently to satisfaction. “Well, now you’ve got your arm back, I suppose you should get ready for the big relaunch, yes? A Broadsword from the
Tehran
will take you down to the surface.”

The
Beijing
, her
other
child, was returning to space. Kamal would be in charge, of course, but when it came to the operation and relaunch of her ship, she should be on board. She had to be there.

As much as she wanted to be here instead.

C
HAPTER
IV

Even the Mighty

*****

Operations

TFR
Beijing

Space near Velsharn

T
HE
B
ROADSWORD
N
IGHT
R
AVEN
TOUCHED
down with a dull thump and the fading whine of engines powering down. For a moment, there was nothing, and then the voice of the pilot filtered through the ship’s systems.

“Captain Liao, we have arrived. Welcome back to Eden.”

With a faint hiss, the loading bay door opened, and daylight from Velsharn’s star poured in, followed by the powerful scent of fresh air, blooming flowers, and the faint, distant scent of the ocean. An undercurrent of the smell of civilization—oil, bodies, muck—came with it, a synthetic tinge to an otherwise perfectly natural and wonderful breath of air, but the dominant smell, lording over all others, was nature, clean and fresh.

Savouring the moment, she breathed deeply through her nose, taking it all in. Living in the Toralii healing tank had had no scent, and the air aboard the
Rubens
was sterile and empty. This was full of life, exactly what she needed.

Liao walked down the loading ramp to the landing area.
Night Raven
took off behind her, returning to the sky. She walked from the large clearing into the settlement proper and, as typically happened, her presence drew whispers from all around.

They were not entirely happy whispers. Liao knew, as much as she had accomplished in command of the
Beijing
, her tenure had not been perfect. Initially, when Saeed had told her she had made Captain, she felt she didn’t deserve it. She didn’t think that anymore. Self-pity would accomplish nothing, and to dwell on the past was weak thinking. It would get her nothing.

She had made many mistakes. She didn’t ever deny that, wearing her errors like a badge pinned to her uniform, owning them. Command was hard. Command was
damn
hard, and she would refute anyone who told her otherwise. Maybe someone could do a better job. No,
certainly
someone could do a better job—but they weren’t here, and all humanity had was her.

If wishing for something made it true, they wouldn’t still be on that rock.

She put the whispers out of her mind. Most of them seemed to be focused on her arm, anyway. She made no attempt to hide it or the burns on her face. They were, now, as much a part of her as her prosthetic was, and in some way, it was a relief, vindicating her choice to join the military.

If she had chosen the easy path in life, she would not have survived the destruction of Earth.

Liao walked toward the
Beijing
, the huge ship dominating the centre of the settlement. Since the bombardment, a lot had changed. Before the attack, everything had been temporary. Tents and crudely assembled structures made from bulkheads removed from the various ships of the fleet or cut from the
Beijing
’s hull, had largely all been replaced by demountables, properly anchored buildings, and concrete stairways leading to underground command and shelter bunkers.

In a few short months, the tent city had been transformed into an actual city. Shepherd had been right—Americans were industrious people.

Seeing the
Beijing
, though, made her smile, even if it was a sad smile. The ship was scorched, broken, defeated—it listed slightly to the left, having slumped there after being damaged by the Toralii worldshatter device. The hole where the weapon had struck, pointed towards her, was crosshatched with steel reinforcing, and a half dozen constructs worked over it, insects weaving together a new hull.

Incredible.

Ben itched at her mind, and
Scarecrow
, and the Toralii prisoners… but there was one other task that was more immediate: the relaunch of the
Beijing.

The hangar bay was open. This, in and of itself, was unusual, but more noticeable to her was that the whole open mouth of the ship was clear of debris and civilian equipment. Someone had even mopped the mud out.

It almost, if one tilted one’s head to the side to account for the lean, looked like a real ship again.

She knew the layout of the
Beijing
like the skin of an old lover. She walked through the corridors, turning down the winding passages, working her way to the core of the ship. The Marines gave her entrance to Operations although she was truly unclear if she was permitted to be there or not, and she entered to a buzz of activity.

Operations had been completely restored. The hole in the roof was gone, as though it had never been. Even the surface had been repainted although if she looked carefully, there was a slight discolouration that betrayed the repair.

“Good evening, Captain Liao,” said Kamal Iraj, standing in front of the command console. Liao looked up at him. He was taller and of late had, apparently, been growing his hair out. It was similar to her own although more consistent. He had a thick, jagged scar running from between his eyes down the left-hand side of his face, courtesy of a Toralii Marine’s knife. It seemed to be slowly fading.

Liao gave her XO a warm smile in return. “Good evening, Commander. Good to see you’ve kept the ship in good order during my stay aboard the
Rubens
.”

“Better than good order. The ship’s not just brand new—the heuristics on the constructs were able to provide some minor modifications to the ship itself. That repair job is actually stronger than the original material—a small percent stronger, a small percent lighter, just the cumulative difference in manufacturing capabilities and engineering knowledge. The plan is to treat this as an upgrade to this section and, eventually, replace the entire ship with the same materials.”

“Sounds good,” she said, feeling a vague sense of relief that her ship’s injuries would be repaired and even improved.

Her smile turned to a slight frown as she surveyed the Operations team, seeing Jiang on duty at Tactical, but the Communications console absent Hsin. He should have been here for such an occasion.

“Where’s Lieutenant Hsin?” she asked. “Did he call in sick for the relaunch?”

The room fell silent, the startup proceedings halted save for the low buzz of computers in the background.

Iraj inhaled softly. “Mister Hsin was killed in the battle. A replacement from the
Washington
is being trained, but they have not qualified yet.”

A memory flooded back to her, of the worldshatter device breaking through the top of Operations. Hsin’s console was—
had been
—at the epicentre of the blast. All that had remained was a smoking, red-ringed hole boring straight down toward the ground. She had seen it with her own eyes, but the true impact had not yet sunk in.

“Of course,” Liao said, her voice quiet. “My apologies.”

Liao moved to the centre of Operations, standing by Iraj, surrounded by machines and her crew—what was left of them, anyway. For the first time in a long time—she did not know precisely how long—she felt home again.

A part of her wanted to conceal the prosthetic and pretend everything was normal, but her metal hand was the new normal. She folded her arms in front of her, defiantly displaying the faux-Toralii limb for all to see. She was actually thankful. Anywhere else, her injury would be the end of her career, but serendipity had come through for her. Her prosthetic was as good as a Human arm, more or less, and even if it still had its problems, humanity were not in a position to be picky about their crew.

“Captain Liao?” Iraj stood back. “If you could, I think I speak for everyone when I say, we’d like you to take us up.”

She hesitated. “I’m not at my best,” she said. “Still heavily medicated. Still getting used to”—she held up her prosthetic hand—“this.”

“I’ll be here with you the whole time,” said Kamal. “The last time the
Beijing
wasn’t yours to command, look where we ended up. This time… I don’t want to make the same mistake.”

She wanted to say no—her CO’s logical, rational mind implored her to say no and that it was a really bad idea—but she couldn’t.

The
Beijing
was her ship. She was back. Everyone needed to know, most importantly herself.
 

“Very well,” she said, glancing down at her command console. “All sections report.”

[“Engineering reports the
Beijing
is ready for launch,”] said Saara. Seeing her at Summer’s console would take some getting used to. Saara had temporarily worked there before, during their interactions with Ben in his construct body, but seeing her there and knowing that Summer wouldn’t ever be there to take up the mantle again was sobering. [“All reactors are providing power. The reactionless drives are functional—there’s a minor fluctuation in some of the secondary conditions, but it’s well within acceptable parameters. All hatches are sealed. Decompression doors are holding. The outer hull above us is decompressed, but the constructs will continue their work even as we are in orbit, and only the outer layer is damaged. This is not a concern.”]

Jiang spoke up from Tactical. “Prelaunch conditions are optimal. There’s not a cloud in the sky. Radar is clean. The
Washington
is providing launch telemetry and aligning our ascent corridor. As soon as we’re clear of the city, we’ll be moving out over the ocean.”

A wise precaution. If something failed, crashing into the sea would not endanger the population below.

Liao hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

Dao, their navigation officer, was the next to report. “All ships report and cross-check that the airspace above Eden has been cleared. We have a solid uplink to the
Rubens
and the
Tehran
.
They’ll be ascending with us past three thousand metres. The
Madrid
is on long-range patrol. They’ll come running if we need anything.”

Hsin would have been the next to report in. Liao mentally berated herself for her earlier mistake, but she tried to put it out of her mind.
Just another error.
His sacrifice had been noted. Fortunately, for a brief jaunt into space, that workload could be shared between Navigation and Communications. They would need a dedicated communications officer to be combat ready—the candidate from the
Washington
was a promising lead—but for now, simply having the ship fly was enough.