On The Imperium’s Secret Service (Imperium Cicernus) (6 page)

“The drives are handling well,” Mai said, thoughtfully.  “Power curves are nominal; little feedback...  Hell, if I didn't know better, I’d say that there was almost
no
feedback.  Whoever designed these systems knew what they were doing.”

Mariko nodded.  Drive field generators
always
produced feedback, feedback which wore away at the generators and eventually forced them to be replaced.  Most of her basic maintenance classes had been focused on preventive measures that saved the cost of replacing the generator.  But
Bruce Wayne
seemed to be advanced enough to minimise the effects of feedback.  She’d heard rumours about such generators, but the costs mentioned had been so high as to make them prohibitively expensive for almost everyone.  Lord Fitzgerald, clearly, could afford almost anything.  Just how rich was his family?

She shook her head a moment later.  A Grand Family’s wealth was almost impossible to describe in simple terms.  They’d have vast fortunes, but they’d also have corporate stocks and shares, massive patronage networks and thousands upon thousands of people who owed them a favour or two.  Turning back to the helm console, she activated the gravitational reader and studied the hazy line that marked the edge of the planet’s gravitational field.  They would cross it in less than five minutes.

“Check the phase drive,” she ordered.  They’d both already tested it twice, but they hadn't been running the sublight drives at the time.  “Is it still ready to go?”

“Yes,” Mai said, flatly.  She was never happy when her sister questioned her competence.  “The phase drive looks ready for instant activation and transit into phase space.”

“Good,” Mariko said, deciding not to make an issue of it.  The hazy line came closer and closer...and then they slipped across it.  “Prepare for activation in ten, nine, eight...”

A deeper hum ran through the ship as the phase drive came online and powered up.  “Ready,” Mai said.  “...Two, one...
now
!”

The stars in front of them seemed to twist into a whirling spiral of light and then winked out altogether, leaving nothing but the omnipresent darkness of phase space. 
Bruce Wayne
had effectively created a pocket dimension around herself that would allow her to travel faster than light.  A timer started counting down to the moment when the pocket dimension would collapse, returning her to normal space in another star system.  Four days, seven hours and twenty-one minutes.  Unless, of course, a pirate managed to track her course and set up an artificial gravity well in her path...

“See,” Mai said.  “I
told
you that the phase drive was working.”

The intercom beeped before Mariko could come up with a response.  “Well done, both of you,” Lord Fitzgerald said.  Mariko was tempted to point out that it was easy to fly a ship as advanced as
Bruce Wayne
, but kept it to herself.  “Please would both of you join me for dinner now?”

“Of course,” Mariko said.  It wasn't as if they had a choice.  “We’ll just check the drives and everything and then come join you.”

***

Happy Wanderer
hadn't had a real kitchen; they’d had to make do with pre-packaged meals they’d purchased at military surplus stores. 
Bruce Wayne
did have a real kitchen, but it was evident that Lord Fitzgerald didn't know how to use it either.  Mariko couldn't understand why he hadn't brought along more staff members, even as she decided to simply heat up a packet of foodstuffs that Lord Fitzgerald had picked up from somewhere.  They were pilots, not cooks.  She knew better than to claim that she could cook when the best she could do was boil water and make coffee.

“Food isn't so important on this ship,” Lord Fitzgerald explained.  For all of his chatter, he seemed oddly diffident when it came to talking about himself.  But if he was ashamed of his own uselessness, why didn't he take lessons in piloting his ship, or cooking for himself?  “I used to serve in the Grenadier Guards.  Their cooking was appalling.”

Mariko blinked in surprise.  It seemed unlikely that Lord Fitzgerald had served in
any
military unit, certainly not one of the elite.  And even if he had, surely he would have taken his own staff with him when he’d transferred...no, she didn't think that she believed him.  He was just trying to impress them.

But Mai seemed fooled.  “Why didn’t you get them to cook better food?”

“It turned out that a consortium of senior officers were conspiring to use the food allowances they’d been set by their superiors to enrich themselves instead of feeding their men,” Lord Fitzgerald said.  “They bought the cheapest food they could find for the soldiers and pocketed the difference.  The Guards were on the brink of mutiny when they got their latest unqualified commanding officer whose parents had purchased his commission.  Me.  It took me several weeks to work out what was happening and then I made a stink about it.  But the conspirators had some highly-placed allies who were draining the military of its funding and a couple of them managed to frame me as being involved with the thieves.”

He shrugged.  “So I got given a choice between resigning my commission and taking a long vacation or being the star attraction at a drumhead court martial.  I thought about it for a few minutes, managed to secure the dismissal of the worst offenders and then resigned and went off on
Bruce Wayne
.  And then eventually I ended up at Dorado.”

Mariko took a bite of what tasted roughly like chicken and considered.  Could the story be true?  But surely anyone who had had any military experience would know more than Lord Fitzgerald?

The conversation went on and on into the night.  Mai listened to everything Lord Fitzgerald said and seemed to believe him, while telling him everything about their family.  Mariko could believe that their mother would be overjoyed at the thought of linking their family to a Grand Senator’s, even though it was unlikely ever to happen.  Lord Fitzgerald merely smiled and listened indulgently as Mai chatted on, before eventually rising to his feet and dismissing them.  They all needed sleep before starting the promised training sessions on the holographic creator.

“Good night,” he said, as he left the kitchen.  “Don’t forget to turn off the lights after you go to bed.”

Mai was still chuckling at the weak joke twenty minutes later.

Galactic Standard Time was an illusion, one fostered by an Imperium that liked to believe that everything of importance marched to Homeworld’s drum.  Most starships operated according to the local time of their destination, allowing their crew and passengers to become accustomed to the environment without suffering starship lag.  Lord Fitzgerald had altered the ship’s clocks to follow Tuff’s local time, but it still felt like local night to Mariko.  It
was
local night on the planet they’d left behind.

She lay on her bed, staring up at the ceiling.  Their lives had changed overnight, from prisoners and slaves to...employees of a wandering aristocrat.  Part of her was unable to grasp how quickly everything had changed, even though she knew that they had good reason to be grateful.  They were free, or as free as they would ever be, actually taking wages for their services.  It wasn't quite the life of an independent trader she’d hoped for when they’d departed Edo, but at least they weren’t servicing Carlos.  And they could eventually buy themselves free and purchase another starship. 

But she was worried, more worried than she wanted to admit, about Mai.  Her sister seemed to have changed during their time in jail, clinging to Lord Fitzgerald as if he was their saviour – and indeed, he
had
been their saviour.  Mariko had had her own crushes when she’d been younger and she knew how easy it was to delude oneself into believing that one’s affection was returned, but it might be dangerous to start any romance with Lord Fitzgerald.  Mai had followed their mother in reading all the social news from Homeworld, including hundreds of carefully-written articles praising the Imperium’s aristocracy.  She might believe that Lord Fitzgerald was a Prince Charming in truth.  Mariko, a little older and a little wiser, knew better.  Lord Fitzgerald might use Mai and then discard her, as so many other aristocrats had done to their young lovers.  Mariko would have understood if a romance came to its end; Mai was too young to understand that certain romances were doomed from the start.  Lord Fitzgerald would eventually be expected to have children and a Class Two Citizen, assuming that they were still considered Class Two, would not be a suitable mother.

Shaking her head, she stood up and picked up her nightgown.  One thing her father had taught her, more than once, was that if she had good reason to fear something, it was better to confront it directly.  Plain speaking, he’d said, was easier to understand than anything else, even if it did sometimes cause offense.  And that was most important of all when discussing marriage agreements.  Mariko knew that he’d rejected no less than three suitors for her hand because they hadn’t been blunt enough to suit him.  And because they didn’t bring anything he wanted or needed to the family.

Donning the nightgown, she stepped out of her cabin and into the darkened corridors.  The lights came on automatically, illuminating the wooden panelling and giving the whole ship a faintly spooky atmosphere.  It
was
possible to fly an advanced starship with one or two crewmembers, but it left the ship feeling isolated, almost abandoned.  Mariko had never had any problems onboard the
Happy Wanderer
, yet
Bruce Wayne
seemed to feel haunted.  Perhaps it was the ghost of Lord Fitzgerald’s dead pilot, she told herself; Lord Fitzgerald hadn't been very clear on how he’d died.  Cursing under her breath, she walked up to deck two, tapped a computer to check the status of the phase drive, and then stopped outside Lord Fitzgerald’s door.  She hesitated, just long enough to curse herself for her own cowardice, and pressed her hand against the door chime.  There was a long pause and then it hissed open, revealing a fully-lighted cabin.  Lord Fitzgerald sat in an armchair, reading a datapad.  He looked up at her as she entered his cabin and smiled.

“Can’t sleep?”

“No, Milord,” Mariko admitted, feeling herself flush.  She was tired, and she knew that she needed to sleep before they started running more simulations tomorrow, but she also felt too keyed up to sleep.  “I wanted to talk to you.”

“Draw some hot milk from the producer,” Lord Fitzgerald said, waving towards a small drinks machine set into the nearest bulkhead.  Mariko had seen a small collection of expensive wines and other drinks in the kitchen, but it seemed that Lord Fitzgerald was not in the habit of drinking to excess.  There certainly didn't seem to be any alcohol in his cabin.  “And then have a seat and talk to me.”

He put the datapad aside, blanking the screen first, and looked up at her expectantly.  Mariko wondered if he’d been accessing porn or something else he would have preferred not to share with anyone else, but there was no way to know.  Besides, she wasn't sure that she
wanted
to know.  Lord Fitzgerald seemed more of a decent aristocratic fop than anything else.  Or perhaps not.  He was wearing a pair of tight pyjamas and it was alarmingly clear that he was stronger physically than she had expected.  It might have been the product of the body shops, or genetic modification like her own, but it was still surprising.  She hadn’t seen him lift anything heavier than a knife and fork.

Mariko settled down and studied him for a long moment, trying to decide what to say.  She knew how to bargain with other traders, or planet-side shipping agents, but she’d never had to broach such a delicate subject with anyone.  The hot milk tasted good in her mouth, good enough to make her feel like yawning.  Lord Fitzgerald merely watched her and waited patiently for her to speak.  Unlike some of the spoiled children she’d known from Edo, he seemed perfectly capable of waiting without becoming impatient.

“I need to talk to you,” she said, finally.  Lord Fitzgerald nodded, his lips twitching into a very brief smile before fading back into a droll blandness that seemed almost mocking.  “It’s about Mai, my sister.”

Lord Fitzgerald lifted a single eyebrow and waited.  “She...she has a crush on you,” Mariko said, stumbling over the words.  She sounded absurd, she knew, and yet she couldn't think of anything better to say.  “Please don’t act on it.  I...”

She broke off.  “Speak freely,” Lord Fitzgerald said, dryly.  “I have learned the hard way to listen to truth when I hear it.”