The Empty Warrior (32 page)

O’Keefe sighed. Options ran through his head. Should he be silent, angry, or should he just ignore her question as she had ignored his? In the end he decided it would be better to simply cooperate. Anything less would only further erode what was obviously the captain’s already low opinion of him.

“I didn’t have a whole lot of choice,” he began. “My parents were farmers and didn’t have enough money to send me to anything more than a state college, if that. But I was a good student, and I ended up getting into Annapolis.” He figured that the Captain had no idea what Annapolis was, but her eyes seemed to widen at its mention. However, she did not interrupt and he did not explain. “It was a good deal. I got a free education, a commission in the…” he paused; of course there were no words for military or Marines. He continued on another tack. “I got a good education in exchange for a promise to serve my political partition for several years afterward. I thought the conflict in Vietnam would be over by the time I graduated, but it wasn’t. So I did my duty. I went where they told me to go. I fought who they told me to fight. I was wounded. I was sent home. I was discharged. End of story.” He thought it wise, in light of her comments concerning Terran culture and war, not to mention that he had been enamored of the military from boyhood and that graduating from the academy had been the culmination of a lifelong ambition.

“So you contend that you were forced to participate in the conflict against your will. Is that correct, or is it not?”

“Well, that depends on what you mean,” O’Keefe answered, a little flustered. “No sane person looks forward to going to…to participate in a conflict, and I would have landed in the brig had I refused, but it wasn’t like someone put a gun to my head either.”

“Annapolis,” the captain said, as if musing aloud. “That is one of what you call your ‘service academies,’ is it not?”

“Yes, it is,” O’Keefe answered, surprised and at the same time a little anxious over her much more detailed knowledge of the United States than he had expected.

“Very well,” she said. O’Keefe sensed by the tone of her voice that the interview was over. “Your confinement to quarters is ended. You will have access to some further areas of the ship, but only in the company of myself, Mr. Busht, Dr. Beccassit, or Nurse Pellotte. The guards will of course accompany you as well.”

“Of course,” O’Keefe echoed sarcastically.

The Captain paused, as if stifling a comment, before continuing. “You will not, however, fraternize with any members of my crew beyond myself and the three aforementioned persons without specific permission from me, is that clear? Every effort will be undertaken to prevent any accidental meetings, but should they occur any attempt on your part to engage a crew member in any way will result in your confinement being reinstated. I will instruct Nurse Pellotte to arrange a short outing for you tomorrow after breakfast.”

O’Keefe tried to scowl at the woman but could not suppress a hint of a smile at the mention of Pellotte as an escort. The captain’s eyes narrowed knowingly in response.

“Perhaps,” she continued slyly, “we might even ease the strictures concerning the presence of the guards in some circumstances, if you prove to be cooperative.” She paused and watched intently as O’Keefe’s smile widened a bit, despite his best efforts to control the expression.

The captain nodded slightly. “We will see how things progress. It was a pleasure to finally meet you, Mr. O’Keefe,” she said perfunctorily. “We will speak again. But now, I’m afraid, I must take my leave. We are preparing to commence our homeward journey, and I should be on the bridge. Please do not be alarmed if you feel a few jerks or lurches as we gain way. The inertial dampeners are not in the best of shape, but my crew is exceptionally proficient, and the ship is repaired to the extent that she is perfectly capable of getting us home safely.”

With that the captain rose with feline grace and turned to the guards, at last allowing her arms to fall to her sides. “Contact Nurse Pellotte if you please, sergeant,” she said to one of the men. “I feel certain that our guest is quite ready for his dinner.” With that she crossed to the door and was gone.

O’Keefe was still convinced that the woman wanted something from him that she could obtain nowhere else. But, beside the fact that it seemed to have something to do with his wartime experiences and his higher education, he was forced to admit that he had been unable to learn anything of substance from her.

A few minutes before, that failure would have vexed him considerably, but no longer. Now his thoughts were fixated on the possibility of time alone with Kira Pellotte. So for the time being at least, he would swallow his indignation at the strictures the Akadeans had imposed upon him and do his best to be a good boy, in the hope that his confinement would continue to become less restrictive and that his fortunes might take a turn for the better.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN:

A Pawn in Born

“The captain has ordered that the ambulatory portion of your exercise regimen is to take place outside of your quarters today. Were you aware of that?” Pellotte asked from across the dining table.

O’Keefe looked up from his rather tasty breakfast of cold cereal and a fruit-filled muffin as if aghast. “What! I don’t get to use the treadmill?” Pellotte appeared confused and he dropped the pretext. “I’m kidding, all right? Your wonderful captain,” he said sarcastically, “did mention something about me being allowed to leave my cell today while she was here last night, but I didn’t know whether to believe her.”

Pellotte looked slightly stricken. “Why would you disbelieve the captain?” she asked, as if it were inconceivable that Nelkris could be less than honest.

O’Keefe chuckled. “Jailers aren’t exactly famous for dealing openly and honestly with the inmates. Information is power, power is control, and control is what prisons are all about.” He looked squarely at his nurse, daring her to refute his logic.

“You’re not exactly a prisoner here,” she said, pouting a bit. “These rooms are a far cry from the accommodations you would find in rehab.”

“Yeah, well I’m not exactly an honored guest either, now am I?” O’Keefe had spoken sourly, and popped the last chunk of muffin into his mouth as he had finished. He washed it down with several gulps of milk before continuing. “Certainly you will admit that you’ve been instructed to refrain from discussing certain topics with me. Every time I so much as mention anything meatier than shipboard gossip you suddenly have to leave.”

“Not telling someone everything you know is hardly the same thing as lying,” Pellotte said. “And besides, all that has changed now.”

“Oh, yeah? Changed how?” O’Keefe asked.

“I am now free to speak to you about anything I wish. I think the higher-ups have decided that since I am only a nurse and not privy to any big police secrets, there is very little damage that I can do.” She smiled brightly at O’Keefe, seemingly pleased at the turn of events.

O’Keefe was pleased as well, and returned her grin to show it. “Well I’m glad to hear that,” he said. “And I’m glad to be getting out of these two rooms as well. I’ve been getting a bit stir crazy in here. Any chance that I will get to see the stars while we’re out?”

“You can’t see the stars now, silly,” she said, leaning forward toward him on her elbows and giggling. “We’re going too fast. The only starlight you would be able to see would be directly before the bow. That would be very boring.”

“You know, I’ve been meaning to ask you about how you guys get around,” O’Keefe said. “I’d always been led to believe that at great speed time is not a constant. If we’re going as fast as you say we are, isn’t it supposed to be thousands and thousands of years later when we arrive anywhere? From the point of view of the people who live wherever we are going, I mean?”

“Well it would be, if not for drive envelope.”

“Drive envelope?”

“Yes. Without the drive envelope interstellar travel would be quite impossible, unless of course you didn’t care that everyone you were going to see would be dead long before you got there, which would make traveling anywhere a fairly inane exercise.”

“Yeah, you’ve got a point there,” O’Keefe said. “So what is the drive envelope?”

“Hmmm. It is really not within the area of my expertise, and I can’t say that I have a thorough understanding of it,” Pellotte said cautiously. “But I will try to explain. As the ship begins to move, we have generators aboard that produce something of a bubble around us, confining the space around
Vigilant
within that bubble. That space is carried along with the ship as it moves. So even though we accelerate to great speeds, relatively speaking we are not moving at all. Therefore there is no time distortion as we approach the speed of light. And then once we get close enough to the light barrier the deep drive kicks in and off we go, traveling many times faster than light without moving through space at all.” She looked at him cheerfully as if what she had said explained everything.

O’Keefe just shook his head. “I see, I think,” he said slowly, furrowing his brow as he did so. “But how can the drives work if the space around the ship doesn’t… No. No, I’m not even going to go there.”

“Yes, I know,” Pellotte said, commiserating. “It’s all very esoteric. And I probably didn’t explain it very well either. I simply content myself with the fact that it obviously works and don’t worry too much about understanding it.”

“I don’t blame you. So back to the subject at hand, just where
are
you taking me this morning?”

Pellotte giggled again. “We are going to the arboretum,” she said. “I think you will enjoy it.” She leaned in toward him over the table, her chin on her fists, smiling hugely, her dimples deepening on either cheek. If O’Keefe hadn’t known better, he would have sworn she was flirting with him.

“So what do I wear,” he asked. “All I have are pajamas and work-out shorts.”

“Just pull on a robe and wear your slippers. We will have the place all to ourselves, so it hardly matters.”

“Yes, so the captain informed me,” O’Keefe said as he stood and started to make his way back to his bedroom to find his robe. “No fraternization allowed. What is she so afraid of, anyway?” He had posed the question rhetorically, so it stopped him in his tracks when Pellotte actually answered.

“Contagion,” she said mildly.

“Contagion?” he echoed, turning back to face her. “What? Am I a carrier of some dreaded disease?”

“Psychological contagion,” she clarified. “The people who originally populated your world were just like any other random set of humans descended from the original Akadeans. No one really understands exactly how your culture…turned out the way it did. The captain merely wants to make sure that kind of thing doesn’t spread.”

“That’s absurd. Are you people so fragile that I could brainwash the lot of you?” O’Keefe was angry now, and loud.

“Be nice, Hill,” Pellotte said sweetly. “Contact between you and our people is forbidden. It may very well be absurd, as you say, but whatever else it is, it is also the law. And we are the police. Because of your presence, the captain and Willet Lindy may very well be in serious jeopardy upon our return. I think it is plain that Captain Nelkris has gone out of her way to accommodate your presence here with as little discomfort as possible to everyone involved. Now be good and go get your robe and your slippers, and let’s be off for the arboretum.”

O’Keefe was still hopping mad. He wanted to further dispute the point and he did not wish to be told what to do, but at that moment he could think of no piquant riposte to counter Pellotte’s reasoning. Besides, he told himself as he turned and sullenly shuffled off toward the bedroom, arguing with a woman in deep space was probably just as futile as arguing with one on Earth.

A few minutes later he and Pellotte, accompanied by the guards, were out the door and on their way. The lifts, as usual, were off limits. Pellotte insisted that it was only because a long walk would be good for his legs, but O’Keefe didn’t believe it for an instant. They just didn’t want his presence clogging up the system and inconveniencing the crew.

They had turned right when leaving his state-room, then farther along they had taken a left. In short order they arrived at a T-intersection. To the right lay the route back to sick bay, a trek intimately familiar to O’Keefe, but Pellotte led the group off in the other direction. Now they were headed toward the bow, into a part of the ship that O’Keefe had never seen. The long corridor was still sectioned off by airtight doors, and several times they had to wait as a hatch refused to open immediately. O’Keefe suspected that the delays were a result of the presence of crew members in the next compartment that he might “contaminate.” The thought rankled him but he merely scowled and said nothing.

There was, as always, a marked difference in the outer sections of the ship from the ones closer to the hull’s core, where both sick bay and his berth were located. Out here the scars of battle were nearly as plentiful as they were farther aft. Seemingly every third compartment was disfigured by the shining plates of bare metal that robotic repairmen had fitted smoothly into the corridor’s walls and arched ceiling. Some of the patches were large enough to cover the majority of the affected section. Three times they passed robots still hard at work. O’Keefe was beginning to feel almost thankful for the comatose state that had kept him from witnessing the combat that had caused so much damage.