Page 8 of Black Star
Chapter Eight
When Mikiel left his quarters, he wasn’t sure where he was going. He needed to think. He needed to get Nadira back aboard the Black Star and run like hell back to Asalian space. If he had any sense, he’d simply stop and shuttle her over. But damn it, he didn’t want to. Never mind she would seriously compromise Asalian security -- he simply didn’t want to let her go.
The more he thought about it, the faster he walked until he was jogging, then running, then sprinting as fast as he could down the corridors. People scrambled to get out of his way, but he hardly noticed. He was losing her. She’d stumbled into his life with the force of a thousand gigaton neutron plasma cannon, blown his world to bits, and nothing would be the same again. Ever. Even if they hadn’t just shared the most explosive and satisfying sex in the entire universe -- several entire universes -- he knew he’d never be able to simply let her walk out of his life. There was something about her that felt like…
Home.
He couldn’t imagine going back to a life without her.
Before he realized it, he found himself back at his cabin door. What was he going to do now? He’d just tell her how he felt. He didn’t give a damn if an entire fleet of Vok’nair ships pursued them, she was staying here and that was final. If she didn’t want him, too bad. She was a security risk. Mikiel was certain he could get backing from his government on that fact alone. He could probably make a good case on her being a prisoner of war, or some peacetime equivalent.
Pressing his hand to the entry pad, he stormed inside, but Nadira was nowhere to be found. He only had a few minutes before they arrived in the designated sector. Damn it!
With an exasperated -- and desperate -- huff, he stomped out of the room and made the trek to the command center. There, at the pilot’s station where she belonged, sat Nadira. Her back was ramrod straight, her face pale except for a delicate flush to her nose, and he noticed her hands trembled slightly as she made minute course corrections. Mikiel watched her trail a hand lovingly over the console as if it were something precious to her. The sight was heartbreaking to him, and for the first time in his adult life, the stress of the situation was enough to make him need to vomit. He was so torn apart inside he wasn’t altogether sure he could make it through without embarrassing himself in front of the crew.
“Status report,” he barked.
“We’re here, Commander,” Ranier reported. “All’s clear for twenty parsecs.”
Mikiel punched a few buttons on his console, then addressed the Black Star . “Commander Singh. We will speak.”
“There is nothing to speak about. You will return Nadira to me, or we will take any and all measures to take her from you.”
“So you’ve said.” Mikiel’s heart pounded. He couldn’t breathe. He had faith his ship could outfly the Black Star with anyone other than Nadira at the helm of the Black Star , but he had to try to convince Damon to join with them before he left. He knew it was important to Nadira. “However, I find myself in an awkward situation. Nadira has been studying this ship in an effort to adjust herself to life aboard the Sword Breaker . Simply letting her return to you would be a security risk of the greatest kind.”
“I will not leave here without her, Commander Anjoom. I cannot.”
“And I will not part with her, Singh. I’d say we have a big problem.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Nadira’s head whip around in his direction. He couldn’t see her expression, and he refused to look at her for fear of seeing something in her face he didn’t want to see. Instead he gripped the armrest of his seat and kept his attention focused on the display screen in front of him that monitored the Black Star .
“Mikiel.” Nadira’s voice was soft, hesitant. Goddess, he didn’t want to look at her! He didn’t want to see rejection in her lovely eyes. This woman had made him soft, turned him into putty in her hands, and though he hated how weak it made him, he couldn’t condemn her for it.
“I’ve made my decision, Nadira. You know too much about our ships and their capabilities.”
“That’s exactly why my father wants me. He truly might stop at nothing to get me back.” The desolation in her voice was easy to hear. She hadn’t figured out how to hide her emotions yet, thank the Goddess.
He met her timid gaze head on and knew the emotion on his own face must have been fierce because she wasn’t the only one who cringed. “And I will stop at nothing to keep you. You’re mine , Nadira. Nothing and no one will take you from me.”
The look of hope that graced Nadira’s features was worth the slight snicker he heard from Ranier. The man might have been young, but he knew Mikiel better than anyone. He also knew this was so out of character for Mikiel, Ranier most likely couldn’t stop himself showing his mirth. Seeing his commander and friend fall so completely for a woman would, no doubt, amuse him for months. Well, that was all right. This particular woman was worth it. She was worth anything.
“Keeping her is a death sentence. Do you realize that?”
“If I only had a credit chip for every time I’ve heard that line. I’m confident I can overcome anything the Vok’nair Empire throws at me.”
There was a pause, and Mikiel could imagine the older man considering his words. “Coming from anyone else, I’d say you were simply overconfident. But somehow, I think you just might be able to back up your claim. I should tell you, however, that I am just as committed to freeing Nadira from you as you are to keeping her. Not because her father told me to, but because I love her as if she were my own daughter. So, it would seem we’ve reached an impasse.”
“Not necessarily.” If he was going to be able to persuade Damon to join the Black Star with the Sword Breaker , this was his only chance. “The only question is, did you really mean you love Nadira like a daughter, or are you bluffing?”
“He’s not bluffing, Mikiel.” Nadira had turned almost completely around to face him now. “He raised me from when I was a very small girl. In fact, the reason I wanted to become a pilot was because of his influence.” She must have guessed where he was headed. The excitement and hope in her face made his heart ache. How could she have gotten under his skin so completely?
“What do you want from me?” Mikiel could hear a wariness in his voice, but also resignation. He had him. It was time to explain everything.
“Nadira has formed a bond with the Sword Breaker . She believes the Black Star has a part in that bond, though she doesn’t know the nature of it. We’d like you to give her the chance to explore it.”
“Interesting. How much of a role does this ship play in that bond?”
Mikiel looked at Nadira and nodded, giving her the go ahead to explain.
“It’s not so much that I’ve bonded with the Black Star , though I did have a very small connection with her before I left. It’s more like the Sword Breaker has bonded with her. Don’t ask me how, but it’s the only way I know how to describe it.”
“Wait a minute. Did I understand you to say you believe the Sword Breaker has bonded with the Black Star ?”
“I think so, yes.” Damon seemed to be very interested in Nadira’s mild reply.
“Has the ship said anything in particular about the Black Star ? Has it told you why it has this bond?”
“He, Damon. The Sword Breaker is unquestionably male, just as the Black Star is female.”
“Did he say anything, Nadira? Please! It’s important!”
“What’s going on?” Mikiel interrupted them, not because he was curious -- though he was curious -- but because Nadira cringed when Damon yelled at her. He got the feeling it hadn’t happened often, and it upset Nadira.
“Quiet! Nadira. What did the ship tell you?”
“When we were knocked out of hyperspace, he said ‘after all these years.’ I got the feeling he meant the Black Star .”
“Of course he did.” The reply was no more than a whisper and a deep, resigned breath. “OK. I’ll join you. But you have to give my crew a safe way back to Vok’nair space.”
Mikiel wasn’t surprised. There was something going on with these ships only Damon knew. He wasn’t pleased to be left out of the loop. “I assume you’ll fill the rest of us in on this?” He couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of his reply.
“Just promise my crew won’t be harmed.”
“I’ll give them one of my best ships to return to Vok’nair. I have no interest in harming anyone. I only want the ship.”
“The ship has a name! Black Star !” The intercom screeched both from the ship’s speakers and all internal psycom units. Crewmembers screamed and covered their ears, though it didn’t do any good.
“ Sword Breaker ! Please stop!” Nadira screamed her protest. Mikiel wanted to go to her, help her, though his head throbbed with the sudden burst of sound inside it.
“I’m tired of both of us being treated like inanimate objects. We are people. Not things.” The volume was considerably less, but the voice still came from both sources.
“What’s he mean, ‘we’?” Mikiel was losing the thread of the conversation. He knew he had missed something somewhere, but things were moving too fast for him to keep up.
“He means the Black Star and the Sword Breaker . Do you know how cyborg vessels and cyborg androids are made?” Damon’s voice from the intercom sounded wary, as if he was trying to measure his responses. Nadira wished she could have seen his face to gauge the situation a little better.
“A synthetic brain is grown from manufactured neurological cells. It is then implanted into the central computer. I don’t know which parts, but it’s the brain that allows the computer to free think, and more importantly, to allow a living human to link with it.”
“Didn’t you ever wonder what would happen if a non -synthetic brain from a living person was housed in the central computer? The Vok’nair have been linking with synthetic cyborg vessels for several years now. The Asalians only built one. Me. They could never find anyone to link with me and never tried an alternate method. The Vok’nair solution was simply too costly, not to mention slightly immoral from the Asalian viewpoint.
“Now, we have little Nadira. She’s linked with me and I just bet you don’t have a clue as to why.” Sword Breaker was impatient by the sound of him. Like he was dealing with a bunch of lack wits.
Mikiel shook his head. It was like hearing an echo. The voice in his head was a split second faster than the voice from the speakers. It was distracting, but not so much he didn’t understand what Sword Breaker was saying.
“So, you’re saying you have a brain from a human donor housed inside your computer?”
The voice responded with contained fury. “No. I’m saying they paralyzed my voluntary muscles, shaved my head, and cut my skull open. They then connected my brain to the master computer, which was later connected to the lesser computers running this ship. Once that was done, my brain was severed from my body, which died immediately. And here is where I’ve been for the past twenty-three years. I’m not saying I have the brain of a human donor. I’m saying I am the brain. I am the human donor.” No one spoke for several moments as the Sword Breaker let the image sink in. “Worse, I was very much alive and conscious during the entire grotesque procedure. So was the Black Star . It was the only thing in a hundred years the Vok’nair and Asalian governments did together.”
“But --” Mikiel could see Nadira’s hands shake as she fiddled with her console. “-- the Black Star was only commissioned in the last six months. If the Vok’nair government had her all this time, why keep her a secret?”
“Because no one has been able to bond with her. It is the same with me, only the Asalian Coalition saw fit to use my other talents and change crews every so often in case someone was actually able to bond with me.”
“You sound as if you know what the problem is.” Mikiel was incensed. What the ship was describing was nothing short of torture.
“Asalians have very few true telepaths, or empaths for that matter. You can enhance my telepathic and empathic abilities all you want, but if the person trying to form a link with me isn’t capable of telepathic communication, a bond will not be formed.” Great Sword made perfect sense. It would explain why they hadn’t figured out the key to bonding with the ship.
“What about enhancers to the one who is to be bonded?”
“Enhance all you want. You can multiply zero by a hundred million and you still get zero. If you don’t have the gene that enables telepathic ability, enhancing a gene that’s not there isn’t going to make a hell of a lot of difference.”
“But what about me?” Nadira looked at Mikiel then. He could see she was confused. “I was never enhanced. My telepathic ability extends only to close members of my family. I’ve never had contact with anyone else.”
“Then --” Great Sword made his statement without holding anything back, without softening the blow one little bit. “-- it is quite likely that you would never share a telepathic link with anyone outside your family.”
Mikiel thought he might be sick, and from the look on Nadira’s face, she felt the same way. He could see there was no way she could force the words out, so he said them for her.
“How are you related?”
There was an awful silence. His command crew had identical looks of sympathy directed at Nadira, but she didn’t seem to be aware of it.
“Damon?” Her voice was small, like a child going to a beloved parent for answers to life’s questions.
“The essence within the Sword Breaker is your father.” Damon’s whisper was almost lost as it came through the speakers.
“Wait a minute.” Mikiel had stood and was now beside Nadira with a hand squeezing her shoulder in support. “You told me Vok’nair’s king was Nadira’s father.”
“So I did. And I’m probably the only other living person who could say otherwise. Her mother was in love with a star pilot named Darian, but she was forced into a marriage with Samair, Vok’nair’s king. Even still, Nani kept seeing her lover. When she became pregnant, the king had the six-month-old fetus tested and found out the child wasn’t his. He knew immediately who the father was, and had Darian arrested and condemned him to death.
“Instead of carrying out the sentence, however, Samair was persuaded to turn Darian over to the science division of the Empire, where they were working with the Asalian Coalition to develop cyborg vessels such as the Black Star and the Sword Breaker .
“As for Nani, she was allowed to deliver the baby and the same fate was bestowed upon her. Six months after Nadira was born, her parents’ brains were transferred into the ships you see now. And here they’ll stay until the organic parts wear out. When that happens, the ships go back to being ships. When everyone failed -- and I mean many, many people tried and failed -- Samair figured the only other alternative was to allow you to try. Black Star was altered yet again. This time, blocks were created within her telepathic matrix to keep her from relaying any information that would compromise the secrecy of this project. He needed you to bond with this ship, but he didn’t want you to know who she really was.”
“Why did he keep me in the first place?” Nadira asked. “I-I mean, you raised me and he’s not had much to do with me, but still.”
“That I couldn’t say.”
“Well --” Nadira stood. “-- what do we do now?”
Mikiel needed to bring this to a close and get Nadira back to their quarters. She needed time to process this. “We send the crew of the Black Star on their way and get back to Asalian space.” He turned to Ranier. “How long will it take Morning Star to rendezvous with us?”
“Not long, Sir. Two standards hours maybe.”
“Very well. Damon, ready your people for transfer. Anyone who wishes to stay aboard the Black Star may do so -- the rest will be transferred to the Morning Star . That ship is scheduled for sale and has been stripped of all nonessential equipment. It will get them safely back home without giving away too many secrets.”
“I’ll make the necessary arrangements. Nadira --” Damon’s voice changed. Mikiel could hear the sadness there. “-- I’m so very sorry you had to find out like this. Your father was -- is -- a good man. He didn’t deserve his punishment, but since it’s done, you couldn’t be in safer hands. As long as you’re aboard that ship, you’ll have the best guardian angel anyone could ever have.”
Mikiel saw a tear trickle down Nadira’s cheek and decided that was enough. “I’ll be in my quarters, Ranier. Alert me when the Morning Star is ready for departure with its new crew.” Then he took Nadira by the arm and led her down the corridor to their dwelling. She didn’t even try to resist.