Barry Longyear - Enemy Papers

As we approach the open ramp of the lander’s entrance I can see three beings at the bottom of the ramp. There are no lights showing. Rick hands the thick envelope to one of them, then fades into the shadows. I look around for his Drac companion but Dulo Rin is gone. Two of the lander’s crew turn, walk up the ramp, and enter.

"Are you the passenger?" asks the one with the envelope.

"Yes," I answer.

The one with the envelope holds out a hand toward the ramp and I begin climbing toward the darkness of the lander’s interior, satisfied somehow because the extended hand was human. Inside the craft’s interior I see the remaining two members of the crew greet me with impenetrable expressions and impatient gestures. They are Dracs. I am to hide in a compartment beneath the floor plates in the small cargo bay. There is a plastic foam mattress and a blanket at the bottom of the compartment. There is a plastic container for water and another for waste.

"These are our bargain no-frills accommodations," says one of the Dracs.

The other picks up a floor plate from where it was leaning against the bulkhead and says in English, "Hop in and I’ll check with the captain about the in-flight movie." I do not understand their jokes and I do not join them in their laughter. I would not laugh in any event. They are Dracs, corrupt, and I am filled with shame.

As I sit on the foam mattress, the two Dracs and one of the humans slip the plates into the deck and bolt them down, the noise hurting my head. When the silence comes it is dark and I am left alone with my fears.

Will these corrupt humans and Dracs simply dump me in space, divide their dishonest gains and never be discovered in their murder?

Will I be captured by the quarantine force and be punished?

If there is trouble with the flight, will anyone have the time to remove the deck bolts and set me free?

If I make it to Draco, will I be ignored, my pleas to address the Talman Kovah disregarded? Or will I be scorned and cast out as one who never stood the rites before its line’s archives?

I feel a vibration through the mattress, and soon a sharp whine assaults my hearing. My hands cover the sides of my head, but the whine seems to come from everywhere. A sudden jolt followed by a brain-numbing roar, and I feel myself being pushed into the plastic foam. Soon I cannot hold up my head and my arms feel as though they are made of stone. Still the pressure increases until I cry out from the pain. With all my strength I push myself until I fall over on my side. I fall on the foam but with such force my head feels like a split melon. I am paralyzed for an eternity, my breaths ragged and shallow, the air growing deadly cold, the blanket out of reach.

Am I worthy? This is no longer my question. I have never been in space before and I think I am going to die.

At the orbiter the two Dracs drag me, feeling more dead than alive, out of the hidden compartment, dress me in a brown one-piece uniform, and smuggle me out of the lander as part of the lander crew. Without speaking they hurry me through passageways, down stairs, across hangar decks, and through more passageways. In moments I am in a pale green uniform disguised as a member of the orbiter crew. A Drac and a human I do not recognize take me through more passageways until we reach a gigantic hangar deck housing a sleek black swept-wing craft five times longer than the lander. The human pulls me into an alcove and holds out a black and gray uniform while the Drac takes turns at preparing some kind of identity badge and keeping watch.

"Do you have any skills?" asks the Drac. "We need to place you in the crew."

I think for a moment and say, "I know how to kill and stay alive."

The Drac smuggler gives me a cold look and the human interrupts by asking, "You can do maintenance on all kinds of Drac sidearms, can’t you?"

"Yes, as well as a considerable variety of human weapons."

Another cold look, this time from the human. The Drac enters a number of codes into my badge, tests them with a small light set into a stick, and nods at the human. The human faces me and says, "My friend here has diddled with the data and entered you as a member of the crew of the Tora Soam ."

The Tora Soam . The ship is named for the most destructive Drac traitor who ever carried Aydan’s Blade. What insanity could cause such a bizarre misapplication of honor?

"Do you understand ?" urges the human.

"Yes. Where is this ship?" I ask.

"Off station." Seeing my look of confusion, he points toward one of the view ports. "Out there, in orbit with the station about a hundred klicks away. Gavey klicks?"

"I understand."

He nods his head toward the ship that fills the hangar deck. Several dignitaries and their attendants are standing together, talking and waiting. "This is one of the Soam’s shuttles. When the crew starts to board, we’ll attach you to a friend of ours who’ll get you on board and settled in. Our friend has found you an open slot to fill. In case anyone asks, tell them your real name and that you are in Maintenance Six, Ordnance. This is a diplomatic ship to Draco―only couriers and paper wizards―so nobody should need your services. You’ll have your own quarters and rations, so stay out of sight, keep your mouth shut, and you’ll do fine."

The smugglers' friend is Binas Pahvi, one of the Tora Soam’s fourth officers. The money Zenak Abi paid for my passage does not exchange hands. Instead the human hands Pahvi a heavy container of Amadeen’s sole export: happy paste. I can imagine a trail of spittle dreams from Amadeen across the galaxy to Draco. Pahvi has what the humans call devil eyes. I am kept out of sight as much as possible, but I think nearly everyone on the crew knows what is going on. Perhaps they all receive a share of Zenak Abi’s payment. Perhaps they don’t care. It is an attitude I do not understand. Those who have the grit of Amadeen in their pores learn that death trails uncaring steps. It is the first of many reminders that war makes its own race of children, aliens to those who have not had the same parent. Those crewing the orbiter and the Tora Soam are not warriors with missions. Instead they are laborers and technicians putting in time in exchange for pay.

The ship’s armory is a small compartment opening onto the weapons bay and onto the armorer’s quarters. It consists of a workbench and lockers filled with test equipment, tools, and supplies. The tools have no wear on them, the supplies have never been opened, and most of the ship’s complement of weapons is still in sealed shipping bags. The weapons that are unpacked and assembled are either filthy, out of power, or both. This obscene lack of preparedness is nothing to me. I have no stake in the mission of the Tora Soam .

I stay in my tiny quarters and while away the time with human and Drac theatricals on my monitor. When I can no longer stand the shows, I play the games offered on the monitor until I feel my brain turning into excrement. In desperation I begin unpacking, cleaning, and powering up the ship’s sidearms. It is good work and I find more meaning in it than in my mission to the Talman Kovah.

There are both humans and Dracs among the Drac diplomatic mission and among the crew. All of them are young, humans and Dracs both. Too young to have fought on Amadeen before the quarantine, too young to carry the scars of the USE-Dracon War. They serve the Dracon Chamber’s diplomatic corps keeping the fighting on Amadeen out of sight and the blood off the boots and sandals of the politicians.

There is one member of the crew who did serve on Amadeen before the quarantine. It is the captain and pilot of the Tora Soam, Aureah Vak. Vak is almost as old as Zenak Abi. It has been thirty years since it fought on Amadeen, but I see its eyes every time I look into a mirror. Too old to fly combat now, the pilot ferries passengers from Draco to the Amadeen orbiter and from the orbiter to Draco. Yet the war Vak fought is still alive to its ghosts.