Jelaza Kazone
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
“Last I heard, it was better to be doin’ something than doin’ nothin’,” Clarence said into the silence that followed Theo’s account of her meeting with the portmaster.
He glanced around the circle of present crew, including Joyita, on the big screen at the bottom of the room.
“Speaking only for myself, o’course. I’m the last to deny the fleshpots o’Surebleak to any who wants ’em.”
“Fleshpots?” Kara repeated, wrinkling her nose. “A kind of stew? It does not sound at all appetizing.”
“Fleshpots,” Joyita said, “is an archaic usage referring to a place of bold or lascivious entertainment.”
“One readily comprehends how it came to fall out of use,” said Kara, and glanced to Theo. “Are there…fleshpots…on Surebleak, I wonder, or is this Clarence’s fancy?”
“Listen to the woman! Isn’t there Ms. Audrey’s House o’Joy right downtown? Best of its kind on the planet, is what I hear—though Mack had some rare words to speak on the topic of Angel’s Place out in Boss Feenan’s turf, what was.” He shrugged. “Not visited myself, and I don’t doubt it’s fine, but that’s Mack’s growing-up territory there, and memories o’home are always sweetest.”
“So it is said, by some,” Win Ton commented, not being one of those so afflicted, as Theo knew. “We assume that the portmaster will accept Bechimo’s proposal,” he continued, “but what if she does not?”
“Borrowing trouble?” Theo asked him.
“Planning for all contingencies,” he told her, with a little too much dignity.
“Of course,” she said politely, and leaned back, her eyes straying to the ceiling.
“My feeling is that Portmaster Liu knows an opportunity when it comes into port. She’d rather everything was smooth and, and unexceptionable while the survey team’s working, but at the same time, it’s hard to show yourself and your port to advantage when it’s all running glitch-free.
“Bechimo’s proposal gives her a chance to show she’s flexible and versatile, and not afraid of change. It makes sense that Surebleak will be the test zone—the judgment was made here and the ship named in the appeal for a judgment is here, too. No better place to test it, really.”
She sighed.
“I want to say the survey team will be favorably impressed, but the only thing I know about this particular survey team is that at least one team member thinks that Clan Korval’s home port isn’t fit for anything but a Do Not Stop.”
“Survey teams are theoretically objective,” Win Ton said.
“If there’s a team bias, it’s supposed to be included in the final report,” Clarence added. “Still, that’s a long hill to climb, even grantin’ it’s one o’ three. Might be Portmaster Liu is feelin’ a little extra pressure to excel, which’ll do well for Bechimo and his crew, assuming he’ll have us along.”
“Of course, I will have you along, Clarence,” Bechimo said, his voice originating from Joyita’s screen. “I would scarcely undertake such a project without my crew; we are a team. This is aside the fact that it will increase the value of the test case, to demonstrate that Complex Logics do, indeed, work well with humankind, and that such teamwork is beneficial to both sides of the equation.”
“Never did agree with the premise o’the Complex Logic Law—that the AI population is set on wiping out humankind. If disgust hasn’t driven ’em to it by now, I’d say we’re safe from that quarter.”
He paused, eyes on Hevelin as the norbear bumbled over to Win Ton and arranged himself against the former Scout’s knee.
“As to what we’ll be doin’ with ourselves if Portmaster Liu decides she can’t afford to be bold—”
“Your pardon, Clarence,” Joyita said, looking up from the row of screens in his supposed tower workroom. “Portmaster Liu has just called and asked to speak to Bechimo.”
Theo grinned and leaned forward, watching Joyita’s face. There was a general feeling in the room as if the crew was holding its collective breath. Hevelin, against Win Ton’s knee, murbled and turned to face the screen.
“Captain.” Bechimo’s voice sounded a little…rushed. Theo felt a jolt of elation; inside her head, bond-space was glowing.
“Captain, Portmaster Liu has given me leave to pursue my service to the community. I have provided her with a map of those areas identified as most in need, and a tentative timetable. I will need to coordinate closely with her office, so that we do not disrupt traffic or cause a hazardous situation.”
“Excellent,” Theo said, feeling the grin get wider.
“I have been cleared to lift in three hours local.”
There was a small pause.
“Will my crew accompany me?”
Theo looked around the circle of them, seeing her own eagerness reflected in their faces.
“We’ll be boarding within the hour,” she said.
“Yes, Captain,” came the answer four times over.
“That,” said Bechimo, “will be satisfactory. The ship is ready.”
• • • ✴ • • •
The schedule here in the stronghold of the captain’s kinsman was much like the schedule Chernak and Stost had followed aboard Bechimo. In addition to language, history, social studies, and maths, they were fortunate to have gained two new sparring partners with novel and challenging methods—a real gift, as they had been too often of late sparring with each other.
There had also arrived in their quarters a so-called field judgment which they read with puzzlement, awe, horror and, at the very last—applause. Joyita need no longer hide his nature! Captain Waitley need no longer expend energy better used in command defending her ship Bechimo—a Work, yet not of the Great Enemy’s making—from brigands and cowards such as Captain yos’Thadi. It meant—it meant that this new universe in which they found themselves had been changed in amazing new ways.
So great was their hilarity that they drew the attention of Nelirikk, Captain Robertson’s aide, who, upon understanding the root of their joy, introduced them formally to Jeeves, not a mere security ’bot—no! Named also in the judgment, the foundation on which this new document of liberation had been raised, it was a heady few hours of discussion with like minds, and learning to know Jeeves a little.
Truly, this was a brave new universe in which they found themselves, that such things might happen.
There were also interviews. This was a benefit provided to them by the captain’s kinsman, so that they might be assigned where they would be of the most use.
They had only yesterday been interviewed by Commander Relgen of Relgen’s Raiders, a mercenary force, which their studies gave them to understand was an honorable path for soldiers in this time and place.
Commander Relgen and her second had been soldierly, displaying and expecting proper discipline. She put her questions with a commander’s sternness, giving attention not only to their answers, but how they presented themselves.
Near the end of the interview, she took time to speak directly to their former service, and to praise their dedication to duty.
After she and her second had departed, Stost had attempted to find from Diglon if he thought she might offer them a place in her troop, but Diglon, wisely, did not claim insight into the mind of command. They would need to wait, which was the lot of soldiers in all places and all times.
Wait, then, they did, filling their time with study and with exercise.
They missed, which they admitted only to each other, the company of Joyita and of Grakow, whom they had met on the grounds during a march around the perimeter. He had saluted them as a comrade, while introducing another of his persuasion, with orange and white fur, identified by Diglon as “Paizel.”
They missed also Clarence, and Kara, and Win Ton, Hevelin, Captain Waitley…well, all of Bechimo, which had been their first posting in this strange new universe.
It was only, said Chernak, that they wanted the familiar, after all the change they had endured. Likely, this odd emotion would leave them once they had found a new duty station.
They were in the study room, working through advanced equation sets. Both were pilots and very good at math, so they returned to the maths program as a reward for having successfully completed modules in more difficult subjects.
“We ought,” said Stost, “petition the house to allow us to train on dummy boards.”
Chernak gave him a stern look.
“Dummy boards, my Stost? Have we not left the creche?”
“Assuredly, Elder. Do you think that the generosity of the captain’s kinsman will extend to ceding us a ship so that we might practice live?”
Chernak sighed. “In truth, neither he nor Captain Robertson are fools.”
“A request for practice boards will show our enthusiasm and—”
The door to their study room opened. A slight figure in an overlarge leather jacket strode in, pale hair rippling in the breeze of her passage.
Chernak and Stost scrambled to their feet, chairs squeaking across the stone floor as they came to full attention and each brought a fist smartly to the opposite shoulder.
“Captain!” they said in unison.
She paused in her purposeful stride and looked up at them, brows drawn.
“At ease,” she said in Terran.
They relaxed into parade rest.
She looked well, Stost thought, taut and full of energy—the look, in fact, of a soldier with a mission before her. Could it be possible…?
“I came to let you know,” Captain Waitley said, continuing in Terran, “that Bechimo has been assigned a task by the port. We’re lifting within the next few hours. Is there anything you require from the ship, anything you’re missing here that we can provide? Do you have any messages that I can deliver for you?”
“Captain,” Chernak said. “We want for nothing.”
She hesitated, but Stost did not.
“Respectfully, we remind the captain that we are not without skills and may be useful to her and to the ship in this new assignment.”
The captain sighed, thin face showing what might have been regret.
“I’m aware. I’ve written a letter of recommendation for both of you, outlining all of your skills. If I was selfish, I’d bring you on board for this, but that would be short term. You need to settle yourselves, long term, and I respect you too much to rob you of that opportunity.
“My brother and his lifemate are committed to seeing you honorably situated. You can depend on them as you would…myself. Am I understood?”
Stost felt rather than heard Chernak’s sigh.
“Captain, you are understood,” she said. “We would,” she added, “wish the crew to know that we recall them as comrades. It was an honor to serve with them.”
“Yes,” Stost said, hollowly. “An honor.”