Lieutenant Alvarez approached. “Good morning, General,” she said briskly, and then added, “Ma’am,” to accommodate the fact that Faia was standing there as well. Then she shifted her attention back to Cypher. “Your ship had maintenance issues. We’ve got you on the
Hesper
, sir. Runway two-seven. It’s only a class-B Ranger and cargo transport, but if you give me another hour …”
It didn’t matter in the slightest to Cypher. One ship was pretty much like any other, and so he gave it no thought. “That will be fine, Lieutenant.”
Alvarez smiled at that. “Yes, sir. Just between you and me, the boys on board are pretty excited to rub elbows with the OG. I’ll see you on board, sir.” She saluted, and Cypher briskly saluted back. Alvarez then headed off to make sure the ship was ready.
Faia looked at Cypher with curiosity. “OG?”
“The Original Ghost.”
“Oh, right. Of course. How could I forget?”
He watched her warily, uncertain of whether his wife was kidding him. He noticed a look clouding her expression. Something close to doubt.
“It’ll be fine,” he said with a confidence he did not truly feel but firmly believed he had to display. If she wanted her husband to spend time with their son, that was what he was going to do even if not all of it made a whole lot of sense. He would speak with Kitai, and he would try to understand this remarkably sensitive boy he and his wife had brought into the world. Even if it killed him. Or Kitai. Or the both of them.
Suddenly there was a loud, nearly deafening bang behind them.
Instantly Cypher grabbed Faia’s wrist and twisted so quickly that she barely knew what had happened. All she knew was that one moment she was facing Cypher, and the next he had pulled her behind him to provide her bodily protection. His cutlass was already in his hand, and he was making sure that Faia remained behind him while he determined where the threat had originated.
That answer came less than two seconds later. There was a worker on an overhead gantry making some minor revisions, and his wrench had slipped out of his hand. It had clattered to the floor only a few feet away from Cypher and Faia, and that was the noise to which he was reacting.
Cypher scowled at the worker, who called down, “Sorry!” Cypher, annoyed, made an irritated noise and then reached down for the fallen tool and tossed it back up without giving it further attention.
Cypher then looked back to Faia, about to ask her whether she was okay. He saw, however, that she was smiling up at him. She looked pleased and flattered, and it was only belatedly that Cypher realized the truth: She was flattered that he had automatically moved to shield her from perceived danger.
He released her then, muttering, “Sorry,” since he actually felt a bit embarrassed to be seen acting in such a
protective manner, especially when it wasn’t necessary. Faia, for her part, reached up and removed the scarf she was wearing. To Cypher’s surprise, she was wearing the necklace he had brought her the previous evening. It sparkled against her skin, and Cypher couldn’t help smiling at the symbol it presented. It seemed to him that at least on the surface, he was going to be getting a second chance with his wife.
Assuming, of course, that everything went well with Kitai.
That brought Cypher back to worrying about his son. Because the truth was that he still had no truly clear idea how to discuss anything with the boy. Kitai was like a mystery to him and always had been. Cypher hugged his wife, enjoying the nearness, but his mind was still on Kitai. If his marriage depended on fixing his relationship with Kitai, this nearness he was feeling with Faia and the possible rebuilding of their relationship might be a complete fantasy.
He looked in Kitai’s direction and saw to his surprise that the boy was engaged in conversation with a female Ranger. He nodded in their direction and said to Faia, “Who’s that grown-up hitting on our kid?”
“Now, now,” she said. “Go easy on him.” Then, in a softer tone, she said, “Go make some good memories together. Come on.” Not permitting him any opportunity to respond, she slid an arm around him and walked with him toward Rayna and Kitai. She dropped Cypher off with his son and his female Ranger friend. “Rayna. Good to see you again.”
“You too, Mrs. Raige. Uhm,” and Rayna inclined her head toward the control tower. “So … I’ll watch you take off from the tower, okay?”
Rayna promptly headed off. Faia watched the way Kitai was regarding her and smiled inwardly. She reached over to him then and gave him a strong motherly hug. As she did so, she said in a low voice to Kitai, “Take it easy on your father. He’s a little rusty.”
She could see by Kitai’s expression that he had no idea
what she was talking about. The perfection he ascribed to his father was tremendously amusing. Sometimes it served as a benefit, other times a flaw. She realized it was anybody’s guess how it would turn out this time. “You understand what I’m saying, son?”
Clearly he did not, but he nodded. Then, with a final look at his mother and also Rayna’s retreating figure, he started to head off after Cypher.
Before Cypher and Kitai could make it to the ship, they were both stopped in their tracks by an extremely loud voice from a ramp way overhead:
“Stand me up!”
All hands approaching the vessel turned their attention to the speaker. It was a Ranger veteran, a man in a mag-lev chair being taken to a medical transport ship. The chair was hovering above the ground. There were two attendants with the man, one on either side of the chair, and they were looking at him in confusion.
“General Raige,” said the Ranger, “I was on the plateau. You saved me and four others. And I just came from seeing my baby girl’s face for the first time.” Upon realizing that the attendants had not heard his command, he repeated it with greater force than before.
“Stand me up.”
“That’s not necessary, Ranger,” Cypher told him.
The Ranger ignored the words of his commander. Instead, in an even louder voice, he shouted,
“Damn it, stand me up!”
The attendants had been the targets of all the shouting they were going to endure. They nodded to one another and, moving as one, helped the Ranger out of his chair. All of the support was on them, because the Ranger himself had none to provide. His heavily bandaged leg buckled; the other was missing completely. Standing up was a complete impossibility, yet through sheer willpower alone he managed to persuade his aides to get him on his feet. Once he was sufficiently erect, he raised his trembling hand and broke off a salute.
Cypher Raige immediately snapped to attention and saluted back. Kitai felt pure wonder there as he watched
this random Ranger forcing others to bring him to his feet so that he could offer proper reverence. Kitai couldn’t help wondering what it felt like to have Cypher look at you as an equal, not some academy washout.
Cypher then dropped his salute and walked over to the Ranger. The man’s eyes were filled with tears, as overjoyed as he was to see the great Cypher Raige coming right up to him. Cypher whispered in his ear, calming him, and then gestured for the assistants to stand aside. He gripped the Ranger firmly, one hand holding each of the man’s arms, and eased him into the chair. Then Cypher stepped back and tossed off a final salute. The Ranger returned it and then muttered to his escorts, “Okay. We can go now.”
Kitai watched as the soldier was led to his medical transport. Then he hastened to catch up to his father. As they approached the ship together, he whispered to Cypher, “What did you say to him?”
“What he needed to hear.”
He turned away from his son then and walked briskly toward what Kitai was now certain was their vessel.
It was, Kitai realized belatedly, the same vessel he’d seen them pushing the large pod into. He wondered briefly if perhaps the pod was the entire reason they were heading toward another world. Or was it simply a secondary mission? Perhaps even something as simple as an addition to a zoo collection? He didn’t know for sure what any of this was about.
What he did know was that his father wasn’t exactly in a state of mind to be particularly helpful in explaining things.
Well, that was nothing new.
The seats that lined the passenger bay of the
Hesper
were relatively simple and unadorned. They stretched
up one side of the corridor, allowing sufficient space on the other side for people to walk past. There were crisscrossed straps attached to every seat so that people could buckle and seat themselves.
There was an observation port in the wall opposite Kitai through which he could see Nova Prime dwindling to a small dot rather than the planet where he had dwelled his entire life. Within moments it would disappear into nothing and become simply another small bit of matter in the sky field behind him.
Cypher Raige was in the adjacent seat. He was paying no attention to Kitai at all. Instead he was scanning through what appeared to be a dossier on his smart fabric. He was paging through the holographic document slowly, one page at a time. Kitai had always been told that his father had an eidetic memory, and now he was seeing what appeared to be proof of that. Cypher seemed to be studying each page until he had it committed to memory and then turning to the next.
“I’m reading
Moby Dick
.” The remark about Kitai’s latest reading undertaking simply popped out of his mouth with no serious thought given to what he was actually saying.
“Your mother told me,” Cypher said. He barely glanced at his son when he said it, continuing to go through the dossier one page at a time. Then he stopped, as if realizing that simply informing Kitai of his mother’s knowledge was somehow an insufficient response. He lowered the dossier for a moment and said, “That’s great.” Or at least he tried to say it. Unfortunately, it sounded like a halfhearted attempt to avoid coming across as indifferent.
Before he could continue his less than sterling response, there was a low, sharp whistle from the intercom. The pilot’s voice crackled over it, announcing the travel time remaining before they would arrive at Iphitos.
It was a general announcement intended for everyone on the vessel, but Cypher seemed to take it as addressed
to him and him alone. The overhead lights were dimming, and instead of continuing the conversation about an ancient whale, Cypher said brusquely, “I’m gonna grab some rack. Recommend you do the same.”
Before Kitai could say anything to the contrary, Cypher’s head dropped back and his eyes closed. He was asleep in less than a minute. Kitai attempted to copy his father’s behavior, but it didn’t work. Long minutes passed, and Kitai simply sat there, eyes wide open, his brain working furiously. Sleep was simply not an option for him. Perhaps his father was accustomed enough to spaceflight that he could treat it like something to be endured rather than to be excited about. But Kitai simply didn’t have that ability. He was so stoked by the fact that he was traveling through space that all he could do, even in the dimness of the corridor, was sit there with his eyes wide open in endless fascination with the vehicle in which he was riding.
Eventually the only thing left in the section was the sleeping sounds of the other Rangers. Kitai sat there long enough to convince himself that slumber was not going to be coming his way anytime soon. If that was to be the case, what possible advantage could be gained by just sitting there in the darkness?
Softly, softly—because he was positive that his father could hear anything and everything—Kitai unbuckled the belt that was restraining him. He gradually eased it off his chest and rose. The only thing that could be heard was the low hum of the ship and the gentle snoring of some of the sleeping Rangers. They all had their cutlasses with them, tucked across their chests or laps. If Kitai had even been thinking about trying to take one of them, he wouldn’t have gotten away with it.
Instead he crept down the aisle, bypassing everyone as he made his way to the aft cargo hold. He figured that if that pod he’d spotted earlier was going to be kept anywhere, that was where it would be. But at the far end of the hallway he saw a large sign over the exit door that spelled out the parameters of where he could travel
in a fairly explicit fashion:
RESTRICTED AREA. DO NOT ENTER. HAZARDOUS CARGO
.
The sign deterred him for exactly five seconds, time enough to look behind him and confirm that all the Rangers were still sound asleep. Then he darted under the sign and headed into the cargo hold.
In front of him was a small flight of metal stairs that led into the belly of the ship. The area was dark and creepy, and the only thing he could hear was the distant hum of the ship’s engines. At the end of the narrow walkway a heavy mesh fabric was drawn, obscuring what lay behind it.
Kitai took a deep breath to steady the pounding of his heart and then released it slowly to calm himself. Then, ever so gingerly, he made his way toward the fabric. Finally, when he was within a meter or so of it, he tentatively reached out and gripped it. He remained that way for a few seconds and, when it garnered no reaction, pulled it aside a few centimeters and peeked beyond it.
Glancing through revealed only the ship’s cavernous, dark, and mysterious cargo hold. The pod was definitely in there, but all he could get was glimpses of it. Nothing much beyond that.
He started to enter the hold area—that was when something reached out from the darkness and grabbed his arm. Kitai let out a startled gasp and tried to pull away, but he had no luck. Instead, the face of a gruff military officer shoved itself at him. Maintaining a hold on Kitai’s arm, the man snarled practically into his face. “Can you
read
?”
Kitai said nothing, mostly because his throat had frozen up, removing any possibility of his producing any useful words.
The security chief looked to be in his mid-fifties. His face was round, the top of his head covered in a shock of red buzz-cut hair. “I said, can you read? There’s a sign back there. Says ‘
AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY
.’ Why didn’t you read
that
?”
Kitai took an unusual step: He didn’t answer the
question. There was no point in responding to it, because it wasn’t going to end well for him. He’d seen a sign, had ignored it, and had gotten caught. The only shot he had was to move past it and into something more pertinent to him.