The tunnel was at the back of the asteroid, where an engine construct was bedded in. It was out-of-bounds with large notices to explain such. But notices like that are for adults to obey, not youths.
“Hey, Xian, when I close my eyes I can see shooting stars!”
“Shut up, Gillan. It’s defects in your vitreous humor.”
“Boring! They sure look like shooting stars. Wonder how I’ve never seen them before?”
“Cause your an idiot. I thought we came here to make out.”
Gillan opened her eyes and grinned. “Sure, c’m’ere and kiss me. You’ll see stars.”
They kissed, and the stars sparkled. But it wasn’t love, or lust, or hormones.
§
“We must close the engines down. It has to be the source of radiation. A generation ship can not go about losing people, especially its youth!” Shihong’s pulse throbbed in her neck, blood hissed in her ears. Her proposal should be the obvious solution, but Yuri had so much influence on the council and they had already been arguing for an hour.
One of Yuri’s acolytes responded.
“The deaths are tragic. In such a small population it’s dreadful. But, c’mon, perspective. It’s only eight. If the engines were malfunctioning, we’d have seen more. The data is inconclusive, and we’re skirting as close to an exotic cluster as we have since launch. It’s every bit as possible that the radiation comes form there.”
Shihong looked at the council’s chair, Kendra. It was for her to lead them. She opted for cowardice.
“Let’s quarantine the area where the illness is thought to have come from, check for radiation levels, and have engineering inspect the engines. We’re still accelerating, and the longer we do, the shorter the trip will be for our grandchildren’s children.”
In the corridor outside Yuri waited like a leech looking for its next fleshy victim. The member who spoke for him succumbed readily, overplaying her role. Yuri expanded with pride, smiling smugly at Shihong, who headed for the travel-tube.
Back in her quarters Shihong opened her diary and recorded events from the meeting as she recalled them, as she interpreted them. Yuri was becoming too powerful, his influence spreading too far.
Nepotism and family lineage should not have prevailed on the Long March to the Stars. Control of power on the generation ship was designed to be diffuse, with patronage not an option. Yuri Dovadenko was son of the ships first captain. He was handsome and charismatic, and somehow convinced people that his father’s long years of training and service could be passed genetically - even the parts from after Yuri’s birth.
In the last year his influence had become harder to control, to deny.
The intercom pinged.
“Hello.”
“Shihong?”
“Yuri.”
“We should talk.”
Shihong closed her eyes and sighed. “We are.”
“I’m worried for you. So many years on the council, all the while remaining active in engineering. It’s taking a toll.”
“Your concern is appreciated, but unnecessary. My health is fine, physical and mental.”
“Yet you want to turn the engines off.”
“And for sound reason, Yuri. You need to hope there are no more deaths. They’ll be on your hands.”
“Mine? I’m not a member of the council. You work hard enough to make sure of that.” The bitterness in Yuri’s voice was unmissable.
“I’m following the example your father set,” Shihong said.
“Well he’s dead, and your autocratic grip is slipping. Things are changing, Shihong. The Long March needs a more focused leadership, one that can ensure we achieve our objectives.” Yuri paused for a moment. “I thought you might appreciate that considering your ancestor’s history.”
Shihong cut the connection without warning. It was enough dealing with his overweening pride and manipulation of the council, without listening to vague threats. Recently she’d wondered if it was worth it. She could come off the council and concentrate on training new engineers. There was an appeal to giving up the fighting, the wrangling, and burying herself in the physical nuts, bolts, and equations that was her real passion.
Yuri’s control of the council was already widespread. Maybe it was time to step aside. Let Yuri deal with Kendra’s lack of leadership.
The com pinged again.
“Hello,” Shihong said.
“Now, that was just rude.”
“It was meant to be, Yuri.”
“But you never let me tell you why I called.”
Shihong bit back an expletive, and stayed silent.
“Aren’t you going to ask me?” Yuri said.
“Why did you call, Yuri?”
“There’s a message for you in The Suite.”
The line went dead. Shihong swore at his petty playing and jumped up.
The Suite was at the front of the ship, near the bridge. It contained the entangled communication system. There were few messages from home now. A handful of university departments maintained contact, but the fanfare which went with the launch was all but forgotten back on Earth and Mars. Governments had changed, priorities had changed. The twenty-third centuries grand experiment was already ancient history to the nations and peoples that launched it.
Deliberately shielded from the hubbub of the ship, The Suite was quiet. Shihong was relieved that Yuri had contented himself with passing on the message, and wasn’t there to greet her.
Shihong had been expecting it for a while. There used to be one a month, one a year, then they became sporadic. She was one of the last on board yet to receive a final message from home. Forty years of flight time, thirty-five of them at a velocity near enough the speed of light for her twin back on Mars to have aged twice as fast. Each time there was a new message she readied herself best as possible, but how do you prepare to hear the last words of your sister, a twin now older than either of their parents had lived to?
She pressed the icon, and the screen filled with Meilin, in a hospital bed. The date stamp showed the message was over a month old. Shihong frowned, but her sister started talking.
“Watching your messages over the years has been like looking in a mirror reflecting the younger me, the inside me. I don’t know what you think when you see how old I’ve got. For a time I thought I looked like dad, but he never got to be a hundred-and-six. Somedays I wonder who sucked the air, the life, out of me.” Meilin looked away from the camera and stopped talking. Her shallow breaths reminded Shihong of when they played with kites as children and wind whipped the twists of colored paper they tied into the kite’s tails.
Eventually Meilin spoke again. “I’ve missed you more than I’ve ever told you. Missed you even more than I’ve missed Gordon since he died. Sometimes it’s like I can feel your presence, but all stretched out because of the distance between us. That’s just me being fanciful.” She coughed, and the little color in her face faded further. When the coughing stopped she said, “That’s enough. Time to say goodbye properly. I’ve recorded this while I can, but it’s not to be sent until after… until, well, you know. I love you, sister, and I’m proud of you.”
The screen went blank. Shihong stared through the tears as diffracted memories of childhood played in blurry silence.
She’d wondered how it would feel when her last link home broke. The truth was she felt no different. The presence Meilin claimed to feel was manufactured, an ersatz emotion created for her missing sibling. Shihong never felt the need. The sorrow was real, the loss was an agony which she would carry like her mothers coffin, a burden which meant more than the weight inside. But when Shihong stepped onto the Long March to the Stars for the first time any ties to Mars, or Earth, or humanity’s home solar system, ceased to have meaning. The ship was her home, it had been since the day they accepted her to join the crew. It was her raison d’être, taking the grasping offspring of a lucky primate and thrusting it into the vast cosmos.
She was still watching memories of her sister laughing at their inept kite flying attempts when the klaxon started.
Her wrist communicator began vibrating. “Hello?”
“Shihong?” It was Kendra.
“Yes.”
“It’s the engines. You were right.”
“Shut them down now, Kendra, shut them down now.”
“I can’t.”
“Kendra, do it now. There is no alternative!”
“But—”
“How many more have to die, Kendra?”
Shihong cut the link without waiting to hear Kendra’s weak excuses for inaction. She called engineering and gave the order which should have been made hours ago. The process of shutting the engines down began. Long March to the Stars was already traveling at over point eight six the speed of light. The thrust that would be lost in the next few weeks or months was minimal, important only to the likes of Yuri.
She called Kendra again, noting that she was at the hospital. “How many are affected?” Shihong asked.
“There are twenty in the ICU. Maybe another ten or twelve being monitored closely.”
Over thirty, and with eight dead already. It was the worst catastrophe since ergot poisoning in the third year of travel. That had killed fifteen people in the end.
“I’ve cut the engines.” Shihong said, sure of her action.
Kendra said, “It was the right thing to do.”
“So, You’ll support me at the council?”
More silence. Would Kendra back her? Maybe not with Yuri’s influence, even if lives had been saved.
“I’m not sure I’ll be there,” Kendra said.
“Why?”
“I’m in the hospital.”
“This isn’t a time to play the compassionate politico, Kendra.”
“I’m one of the casualties.”
“What? How?”
“I was visiting the area, meeting the families.”
Shihong groaned.
Kendra continued to talk. “They say I took a big dose. I’ve already spoken with Captain Tarnayev and you’re now acting Council Chair, becoming permanent. I—”
She broke off and Shihong heard coughing and retching. Another voice instructed Kendra to end her call, and re-attach the face mask. The connection cut off.
Shihong looked around The Suite. A few minutes ago she’d been listening to the last message of her already dead sister, and wondering if that’s what she would look like in thirty or forty years. A wizened husk who didn’t recognise herself in the mirror. She’d also been considering leaving the council & its responsibilities. Now she was chairing it. She opened a terminal and looked at the Hospital report. Another two deaths and more expected. And all of them avoidable.
Her intercom buzzed. It was Yuri.
“I heard what happened to Kendra,” he said. “That’s a blow.”
The months of irritation, of being needled and harassed by Yuri, had drained Shihong. And now, thanks to his meddling people were dead or dying.
“I warned you, Yuri. I warned you that if there were more deaths they’d be on your hands. Kendra’s death is on you. Every person dying to day is on you, and your lackeys.” While she spoke, Shihong accessed the security system. Her authorisation as acting Chair was already active. She opened up some systems. “At least I can do something about it now. Sit tight, security will be with you shortly.”
She cut of Yuri’s protestations before he could formulate them. Leaning back in the chair she smiled as she remembered something Yuri had said about the Long March to the Stars needing focused leadership. She wondered how he’d enjoy the focus that was about to be put on him?
She opened her comm. “I need to speak to the Captain. There’s going to be a trial.”
end
This story is the original from which My Beautiful Oubliette spun out. Obviously it's a very different story with a very different focus, but the idea that there would need to be a place for an exceptional prisoner to be held stuck with me and, eventually, I got round to writing it.
text by stuartcturnbull, art by jodywhiteley via Pixabay