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Space traffic controller Thorn Katnir never meant to start a war. |
| Somebody put a piping-hot cup of rumig on my desk before I got here and my name is handwritten in cursive on the side. Maybe it’s a sweet gesture. Or maybe—and most likely—somebody wants to burn me. Either way, now I have two cups. Should get me through the next few hours. Workdays sitting two hundred feet above the ground with views of the clearest water I’ve ever seen on one side and untouched rainforest on the other are usually pretty rough. On the hardest days we can see the fish swim on our side of the breakwater and sailboats on the horizon, and the worst part? The air conditioning in the control room is perfect. “Two cups today, Thorn?” my coworker, Sue, asks from the next desk. His name isn’t actually Sue. Most of us can’t pronounce his real name aside, from the lady with a degree in interstellar linguistics, but as far as I’m concerned she doesn’t count. Freakin’ showoff. I turn to look at him, which doesn’t make much sense since he doesn’t have a face. I mean, not by Altairan standards. Somehow he sees everything with his brain—he’s explained it to me thirty times over the last three years and I still don’t get it—and speaks to us non-telepaths with a computer program. I’ve never had more in common with anyone else. “You know more than I do,” I say, turning to the holographic overlay on our floor-length windows. Two inbound, one on the approach, still minutes away. The other is close behind. I put on my headset and move it off one ear so I can hear Sue. “Slow this morning, huh?” “Aren’t you curious who left it?” Sue asks. I squint in his direction. Try to guess what my furry brown caterpillar of a coworker is thinking. Watch his midsection expand with each breath. No idea. “Do you know who left it?” “I might.” The transponder codes inch across the screen, against an ocean backdrop. I scoff. “Oh my gaelin, Sue. Give me something.” A pause. “Yeah. I know who left it.” “You know what—” I put my hands up. “I don’t even want to know anymore. Keep your secrets, hairball.” “Gladly. Blue-face.” “Skylark 4407, one heliometer from SPATZ, cleared for the ILS 14,” I say as the ship nears the final approach fix. “4407 cleared for the ILS 14,” the captain responds. I turn back to Sue. “Do you even know what blue looks like?” “Racist.” “Do you?” “Fuck you. Yes, I know what blue looks like. And to answer your question, the embargo is really slowing things down this morning. Hopefully things pick up in the afternoon.” I blink. “What embargo?” “Are you serious?” “You know how I feel about the news,” I say. It’s usually boring as hell and when it’s exciting it stresses me out, which was one reason I failed my middle school current events class. My pretty teacher was the other reason. Stretching the word into a few syllables, Sue says, “Right.” I get the impression he’s judging me. To be fair, I would judge me too. “I forgot. Anyway, Arcturus put an embargo on Cepheus and the whole galaxy is up in arms about it. I—never mind.” “No, what were you gonna say?” “I don’t want another war, Thorn.” I let out a sigh. Bite my lip. “Yeah. Me neither.” Silence until the ship touches down, its fuselage white-hot under the sunlight, then it’s Sue’s turn to handle them on the ground beyond the old runway. One of us could do the job today, but having an extra set of eyes—well, not eyes, I guess. Having an extra person working on the same problem is nice when they’re easygoing like Sue. Angel is a different story; kid could make a sunburn sound like life-or-death. Arrivals taxi faster than they should when he’s on the radio. When the ship stops at its gate, Sue asks, “Are you in the mood for Johnny Cash? I need something to break the silence.” “Kinda heavy, huh?” I smile. “I brought you something new today, if you’re in the mood.” “Sure. I mean, obviously we don’t have music where I come from. But you seem to have good taste.” “Well, that’s because you don’t have music where you come from. Silvia—” I say, watching the screen, “—could you play ‘Thorn’s Ultimate Legendary Playlist?’” “Playing Thorn’s Ultimate Legendary Playlist,” the computer lady says before the sound of guitar and trumpets. We make it to “Do you remember?” when Sue asks, “What is this?” “It’s called disco.” I lean back in my chair, hands clasped behind my neck. “What do you think?” “It’s—interesting.” “Come on, man, we’re like thirty seconds in.” My screen flashes. 6708’s shields fall for a split second and come back up. Must be an older ship. I swear some of these freighters are held together with spit. “Pisces 6708, everything okay?” “Fine. Thanks,” the captain snaps. “6708.” Their shields fall again after a few seconds and I look to Sue. Once is a glitch. Twice can be a serious problem, depending on who you are and what you’re flying. Maybe I’m paranoid, but my gut is telling me it’s more than a malfunction. “What do you make of that?” “What? Their shields? You know how unstable those old systems can be—they’re probably just cycling.” “Twice in thirty seconds?” “I—” He shuts up. “They just dropped again.” “They’re either in bad shape or something’s interfering with the . . .” Fuck. Not much can cripple a ship that way. They’re taking a hell of a risk running with their shields down, but it doesn’t matter. Sitting that close to narhim, they have to know they won’t make it out alive. “Thorn, that’s a Cephenean ship.” “I know. I know.” I rub my eyes underneath my glasses. “I’ll tell them to hold until the police can get here.” “Will they listen to you?” “No.” I take a deep breath. “Pisces 6708, hold stellar east of HAYDE, bearing 270 until further notice.” “Unable. I’m sure our shields tipped you off. We’re having some problems over here,” 6708 says through albik, a faint sound almost like weeping in the static, the song of narhim. Sure takes me back. The stuff is hard to hide—after a couple years of fighting they figured out how much it scared the Altairan Star Force and stopped trying. Never thought I’d hear it again. Shaking my head, I rehearse the code I’m still hoping I won’t need. Maybe I could talk them out of their suicide mission. I mean, if they weren’t already dying from radiation poisoning. “Pisces 6708, you have one more chance. Hold stellar east of HAYDE.” “Were you listening? We can’t stop. We need a clearance now,” 6708 snaps. “Why?” Should be an easy question. They don’t answer. “It’s like talking to a teenager,” Sue mutters. Dragging a hand down my face, I can’t help smiling. “Don’t you guys hatch fully grown?” “Yeah. Just trying to lighten the mood.” It doesn’t last long. 6708 isn’t slowing down. No matter what I tell them, and trust me, I’m using my entire vocabulary, nothing happens until I say, “Pisces 6708, let’s stop and talk about this. You have to discontinue or you’ll be shot down.” Waiting for an answer, I grit my teeth. Sue is already talking to a trooper, but she’s a few parsecs away. We’ll have to handle 6708 ourselves. Static crackles through the receiver. Muffled voices. Sounds like conflict in the cockpit—one of them is panicking and wants to stop but the person at the controls doesn’t—then someone says fairly definitively, “Burn in Hell, Altair,” and cuts communication. Guess I should have brought a couple beers. Might as well be buzzed when the apocalypse starts. “They really hate you guys these days,” Sue says. “Understatement. Huge understatement.” Highlighted in red, the transponder code is flying across the screen now. “You know.” The computer accepts my code and Cancer, our orbital defense system, arms. Now I hold the lives on 6708 and all the lives on Vega Prime in my hands. “My mom is from Sol. Maybe if we all die and I’m out of a job I’ll go back. Find myself.” “Going to climb Olympus Mons?” “No, I always thought climbing Olympus Mons was kind of hubristic.” Locked on. All I have to do is push a button when they come into range and two people become shadows before you can blink. “We sail around faster than light between star systems and we still have to walk to the top of a mountain for it to count? Thanks, but no.” “Isn’t Olympus Mons sort of a status symbol for humanoids?” Sue asks. “They’ll be in range after fifteen seconds. Think you can hit them before they get too close?” “I can, but—” Easier said than done. An error message swallows the transponder code: sensor malfunction. Must be a jammer. I don’t know why I’m surprised. We’ll have to make our shot in the dark now. “Last heading? 095, right?” “Yeah. Straight toward HAYDE.” Nice to have an extra set of eyes. An extra person. Whatever. “What do you have in mind, Thorn?” “Nothing good,” I say. “Silvia, extrapolate Pisces 6708’s time of arrival at waypoint HAYDE,” I tell the AI. “35.8 seconds until arrival at HAYDE,” computer lady says. Only thirty-something seconds to repent for a lifetime of sin? I’m going to hell. “Discharge Cancer when Pisces 6708 crosses the waypoint.” “Unable. System will not discharge automatically without sensor lock on intended target.” “Ask nicely,” Sue whispers. “Please?” “Unable,” Silvia says again. “System will not discharge—” “Okay.” I put my hands up. Bite my cheek. “Display a countdown on the screen and shut up, then. And turn off the music.” Twenty-five seconds. Twenty-four. Twenty-three. “Anyway, yeah. Olympus Mons is for those really rich people with too much time on their hands. The kind of money you have to make illegally.” “Currency confuses me.” “Me too, buddy.” My attention settles on the Discharge Proton Pulse button. Shifts to the timer. Back to the button. Ten seconds. We’ll be a case study in next year’s textbook whether Vega Prime lives or dies. “Last words, Sue?” Five seconds. “Try not to miss.” Zero. A vein of white light splits the sky in half and folds all the shadows in the room away and no oxygen is going to my head anymore. But we’re not dead yet. For once I’m not entirely disgusted by my government’s compulsions to build countermeasure moon-killers that kill bigger moons every year. Cancer isn’t even in the top ten. Teeth still digging into my cheek, I stare at the screen until the SENSOR MALFUNCTION placard goes away, and I have to laugh. I have to laugh because somehow I’m still around to see it go and the fish are still swimming back and forth on our side of the breakwater and none of the trees are in flames. Oh Gaelin. I really thought we were dead. “That’s a lot of radiation,” Sue says as the field diffuses across the screen. “Thanks for not missing.” Pressure is building between my eyes and whatever I had for dinner yesterday is trying to go on a comeback tour no one wants. Hands braced against my knees, I stare at the floor, bent on cancelling it. “That’ll be a hell of a cleanup effort, though,” I mutter. “Cleanup is better than recovery. You just saved an entire planet, Thorn.” “I guess.” Hands stuck in my hair, I lean over my desk, breathing air in four seconds at a time, holding it four, letting it out over four. I hate how easy it is to pull the trigger, how easy it’s always been. You don’t think about what happens afterward, just saving your own ass, then you end up in hell anyway. “You okay?” Sue asks. “You’re turning purple.” “Yeah.” Four seconds in. “Just keep talking.” My fingers curl against my head, like they’re grabbing the image of the Cephenean pilot’s last moments before I pulled the trigger on him twenty years ago, the first one. Either burned up or died on impact. I don’t want to know—I just want to stop thinking about it. “And if I do something stupid I need you to tell me.” “Stupid how?” “Stupid like vector someone into a moon.” Sue laughs. I crack and laugh a little too. Kind of fucked up to make jokes after a brush with the apocalypse, but Sue and I are the same type of fucked up, which is probably why he’s my best friend. Apocalypse averted and four flights vectored around the radiation spill—thank Gaelin I have something to do because I couldn’t take silence right now—Trooper Hideri shows up ten minutes after we needed her. She asks if she’s interrupting. I tell her no, we’re good at multitasking, and she doesn’t laugh so the rest of the conversation is pretty uncomfortable. Between questions Sue and I bring in too many starliners to remember and more interstellar police cruisers and by the time I get in my car to leave I’m too exhausted to go anywhere so I just put my forehead against the steering wheel and cry. Someone knocks on the passenger side window a few choice words into my breakdown and gets to watch me wipe my runny nose with my sleeve. Gross. Could have grabbed a napkin from the clump on the passenger seat. It’s Orym, laughing at me on the other side of the window. I’m probably turning purple again, smiling like the mess I am, through the tears. Seeing him happy always cheers me up, even when he’s happy at my expense. I didn’t care who came in after me—no one is going to make a bigger mess than I did—but I’m glad he volunteered. He has a way of fixing things. I unlock the door. Orym moves the napkins. Sits down beside me. Takes my glasses off to wipe my tears. Before either of us know it I’m burying my blotchy, snotty face in his shoulder and he’s cradling my head in one hand. Part of me hates him knowing I’m an ugly crier—the other daydreams in his arms. I’m usually not in the middle of a war flashback, but you know. I’ll take what I can get. “You’re okay,” he tells me, his voice like hissing seafoam. “You’re okay.” I’m sure holding your supervisor while he cries violates some federal policy. Shooting the people you were supposed to protect down is generally frowned upon too. Weird day. Orym lets me cry a few minutes longer, then lifts my head, hands against my cheeks. “I need to get up there, Thorny. And you need to go home.” “I know.” He puts my glasses back on. Most people would look at me like a downed bird—too bad, not their problem. Orym looks at me like he understands. I owe him a new shirt. “Are you okay to drive?” “Yeah.” I lean back in my seat. “Please don’t tell anyone I was out here crying in my car.” “Got it.” Nodding, he motions to the tear stains on his chest. “I spilled my water.” I half smile. “Doesn’t explain the snot, but thanks.” “Well, I’ll dry, won’t I?” he says, opening the door. “I hate to ask, but . . . narhim? Is it true?” I don’t answer. I can’t. Orym sighs and gets the rest of the way out. “Damn. Just when peacetime started to feel normal, huh?” He pats the side of the car. “Don’t watch the news tonight.” |
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