Chapter Fifty-Six
Dreams are the products of imagination, and the fuel of civilization.
—Chia, a merchant prince poet
Back when they were small boys, Dux Hannah and his cousin Acey Zelk used to dream of running away to space together and sharing grand adventures, of meeting beautiful girls and getting richer than the grandest princes in the realm.
Living in the wild back country of Siriki, their plans had been vague in those days, more the fantasies of fanciful children than reality. Then they were enslaved, first by merchant princes and later by Mutatis, before using their wiles to escape from both. Thus, before their seventeenth birthdays, they had been abused by both sides of the ongoing galactic war. This might have left them feeling put upon and filled with hatred toward their captors, but it had done nothing of the kind. On the contrary, they remained upbeat, and harkened back to the “old days” when they planned to share fabulous journeys together.
Through all that they had shared, the boys had forged a bond between them, a friendship that extended far beyond the familial blood they shared. Their camaraderie had been forged in a crucible of perilous escapades, when any moment might have been their last. But they persevered through what they called “misadventures,” and lived to look back on the experiences, and even to laugh about them.
After escaping from the Mutati prison moon, Dux and Acey stowed away on conventional spacecraft and podships, vagabonding from one star system to another, from one pod station to another. If a place interested them, perhaps after talking with strangers along the way, they went down to the planet and investigated it.
Now they were on the third such world they had visited in the past few weeks, each time having to panhandle for shuttle fares, since they had no money. While podship trips were free of charge—traveling routes developed by the mysterious, sentient pods—shuttle trips usually were not. This could have left them stranded in space if they had not been able to figure out ways to get down to the planets.
It was risky leaving the pod stations and venturing down, so before venturing to the surface, they developed the habit of asking as many questions as they could. If they didn’t like the answers, or if they could not get enough information to make them feel comfortable, they remained in space and caught the next podship, bound for unknown sectors. This caused them to avoid both MPA and Mutati worlds, and to shun planets controlled by the allies of both sides as well, principally those of the Hibbils and the Adurians.
Such caution did not restrict their movements that much. The galaxy was a vast place, filled with colorful races and exotic worlds. In spite of their youth, Dux and Acey became good judges of character. That didn’t mean someone couldn’t slip something by them, but they did work hard at it, and they were both quite intelligent, despite having no formal education.…
On Vippandry, their shuttle descended past the Floating Airgardens, one of the Wonders of the Galaxy. The gardens, circular tiers of flowers and lawns that floated in the lower atmosphere, rose more than seven kilometers into the air and covered many cubic meters. They looked to the naked eye like holo projections, but were real, kept aloft by exotic, lighter-than-air plants from all over the galaxy, selected by master gardeners.
The shuttle pilot, a Vippandry with billowing white hair, acted like a tour guide for the trip down from the pod station. “You’re lucky,” he said. “The gardeners are at work now.” He laughed. “I should have charged you more.”
The passengers—an assortment of shapes and races—thronged to the windows, pushing for better views. They oohed and awed in their native languages, while gardeners wearing jet packs pruned the plants and added aerosol nutrients to the lighter-than-air soils. Dux thought they looked like bees or hummingbirds tending flowers, nurturing them.
At the Airgarden Gift Shop, Dux and Acey read a computerized bulletin board, looking for jobs. They paused to peruse enlistment ads for Noah Watanabe’s Guardians, and learned of the ecological engineering work they performed on several planets. The work sounded interesting to the boys, and they liked a good cause, but they had something more adventurous in mind.
They spent more than a day panhandling around the shuttleport, and on the narrow, cobblestone streets of the nearby old city. The following day they made it back to the orbital pod station.
While waiting for the next podship into space, they wandered along the sealed walkways of the station. Looking through plax viewing windows at the ships out in the zero-g docking bays, they watched the crews as they performed various tasks or just stood around chatting. One mixed group of aliens and Humans had a mechanical problem with their spaceclipper. Wearing breather suits, they had one of the engine compartments open, with parts scattered on the adhesive surface of a work platform. An old vessel, it had maroon-and-vermillion swirls on the sides, and the graceful structural lines of a bygone era. Somehow its crew had managed to keep it going this long, but to Dux it looked like the end of the line. The name of the vessel was emblazoned on its side in golden letters, “Avelo.”
As the two teenagers looked on, a Hibbil crewman stepped through an airlock and approached them, a rugged-looking little fellow dressed in black. He wore an eye patch, and a sword in a scabbard.
“Where you boys headed?” he asked in a squeaky voice.
“Deep space,” Acey said.
“That covers a lot of territory, doesn’t it?” He rubbed his furry chin. “No place in particular?”
They shook their heads.
“We’re a treasure ship,” the Hibbil said, gripping the handle of his sword. “I’m Mac Golden, official purser on the ship. I keep track of everything important for the captain.” The little fellow beamed proudly. “He considers me the most trustworthy person on the crew.”
“Your ship is full of treasure?”
“Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t. On this run, we’ve had a streak of bad luck, more trouble than you could.…” He paused, and stared at a podship as it entered the docking bay. Simultaneously, the crew of the treasure ship stopped working, to look.
The podship swung wildly and bumped into the Hibbil’s vessel, almost jerking it free of its moorings. Then the podship continued on its way, to the main docking bay at the center of the pod station. When it was safe, the crew returned to their work on the engine.
“That’s the third time one of those pods has nudged us,” Mac Golden said. “They seem impatient with us, but we can’t leave yet.”
“C’mon,” Dux said to Acey. “Let’s go catch our ride.”
But Acey hesitated. He watched the crew at work, then went over and spoke to them through a wall speaker. “These hydion drives can be temperamental, eh?” Acey said.
“You know anything about them?” one of the crew asked from out in the docking bay, a tall, black-bearded Ordian.
“Yeah, a little.”
A short while later the podship left, again bumping into the Avelo, and then continuing on its way.
Saying he might be able to help, Acey talked them into loaning him a breather suit. He went out and immersed himself in the engine work, examining the pieces carefully, discussing them with the crew, asking questions like a doctor diagnosing the symptoms of a patient. One of the men took an interest in Acey, a gray-beard who wore a dirty white shirt and a red sash around his waist.
“That’s Wimm Yuell,” Mac said. “Our captain.”
Dux nodded. A while later, a dark-skinned alien—small and swarthy, with a pointed snout—emerged from the ship and passed food bars around to the crew as they worked. He didn’t wear a breather, making Dux wonder where he was from. Dux got one of the bars from Mac. He found it delicious, but with fruity flavors that he couldn’t identify.
Acey kept working with the captain and the others, and they seemed to be following his advice. The crew was putting the engine back together, while Acey used diagnostic devices to test the components.
Bored and wanting to leave, Dux strolled down the walkway. He learned from a glyphreader panel hanging from the ceiling that the next podship wasn’t due for a couple of days.
Dux took his time, exploring the walkways and the waiting room, looking at reading material that had been left behind. He spent some time chatting with an old man who called himself the manager of the pod station, though Dux didn’t think any such position existed. He seemed a little touched in the head, but harmless enough.
By the time Dux returned, the crew was excited and smiling. They had the engine running, and were patting Acey on the back.
Coming over to Dux, Mac Golden said, “Your cousin asked just the right questions to get the mechanics thinking along the proper lines.”
“I was afraid he’d ruin something,” Dux said, glancing at the tough-looking little Hibbil.
“Welcome to the Avelo,” Mac said, reaching up and shaking Dux’s hand energetically.
When they were underway in space, Dux and Acey met the whole crew, an eclectic group of androids, Humans, and aliens who followed treasure maps, tips, and hunches all over the galaxy. They looked like a rough-and-tumble bunch, but took a liking to the young men.
Captain Yuell said to them, “You each get half shares to start, with the opportunity of working your way up.”
“That’s great, sir,” Acey said. “You can count on us. We can do men’s work, you’ll see.”
“We specialize in searching for merchant shipwrecks,” the captain said. “But it takes more than maps.”
“Well if you’re looking for luck,” Acey said, “I can provide that.”
“Luck has a way of changing around here,” Mac Golden said. “Don’t get too full of yourself. Not yet.”
Acey’s face reddened, and he said, “Yes, sir. Sorry.…”
The young men found themselves on a voyage unlike anything they had ever imagined, bound for unknown parts, with undiscovered adventures and treasures awaiting them.