Sarah Zettel - Fool's War

Despite two hundred of years of attempts to separate it out, gravity had remained a property of mass and motion. Without enough of either, you had free fall. Al Shei ran her ship at close to one gee acceleration. In that respect at least, the run was going to be comfortable.

The displays on the monitor in front of Yerusha all remained green. She read the numbers and thrust ratios one by one. Each was exactly as it should be.

The intercom started bringing up the voices from engineering.

“Station One, all normal and constant,” said Javerri, the FTL Assistant, who didn’t look like she ever got enough sleep.

“Station Two, all normal and constant.” Ianiai, a big, black bear of a boy who though the knew a lot more than he did.

“Station Three, all normal and constant.” Shim’on, who wore a yamulke and wouldn’t eat even cloned bacon.

Groundhogs at core, all of them.

“Check and check,” Al Shei’s voice answered them. “Intercom to Bridge. Engineering reports normal and constant, Watch.”

“Thank you, Engineering,” said Schyler. “Time to jump, Pilot?”

Yerusha touched a key and brought up the official time on her board. “Thirty-eight hours to jump point.”

Pasadena needed flat, smooth space to start from. Thirty-six AU from the Sun would put them close enough to the top of the Solar system’s gravity well that they could jump the rest of the way out.

Pasadena was, of course, a long way from being the only ship starting for a jump point this day, even this hour. A lot of the flight planning had involved logging in with Port Oberon’s flight-schedulers and finding out who else had registered a route so she could pick a clear path and reserve it. Yerusha had done runs that were held up at Oberon for over a week before there was room in the direction the ship needed to go. The delay this time had only been a day. She counted herself lucky.

“Received and agreed,” replied Al Shei’s voice. “Thirty-six hours to jump.”

“Intercom to Pasadena ,” said Schyler. “Secure from free fall.”

Yerusha snapped the catches on her harness and scratched hard under her left armpit. The new arm was a little stiff, but there wasn’t any of the pins and needles sensation that could accompany a new graft. Her discomfort came simply from the fact that no one seemed to have designed a free fall strap that didn’t chafe.

“And there ends the exciting part,” said Cheney, stretching both arms over his head until Yerusha could hear the joints pop.

“I wish,” muttered Schyler, letting his head fall back until he stared at the ceiling.

Yerusha exchanged a glance with her relief, who just shrugged.

“Pilot,” Schyler lifted his head, “we need to get some projections for the Vicarage to Out There to Wyborn Station jumps. Al Shei’ll want to go over all that at the next briefing.”

“Right away, Watch.” Yerusha got to her feet. “Relief,” she said to Cheney as she crossed the deck to the VR station.

“Relief active.” Cheney picked himself up out of his chair and plopped down into hers. He pulled out his pen and activated the reconfiguration menus to set the boards back to the way he liked them.

She wasn’t even halfway across the deck when the intercom beeped.

“Intercom to Watch,” Resit’s voice sounded out. “Schyler, if she’s free, I need to see Yerusha down here.”

Yerusha froze in mid-stride, but she managed to screw a “what the hell?” expression on her face.

Schyler gave her a heavy glance. “Acknowledged, Law. I’ll send her down as soon as I’ve gone over a couple of things up here.”

“Thanks, Watch,” said Resit. “Intercom to Close.”

Cheney bent over the boards, even though there shouldn’t have been much to see. Schyler jerked his chin towards the drop shaft hatch. Yerusha nodded and walked through the hatch. She heard Schyler’s footsteps follow her.

Inside the drop shaft was a staircase that spiraled all the way down to the engine compartment. The walls were lined with junction boxes, bundles of cables and wires, and endlessly branching ceramic pipes, color-coded in green, red, blue or orange depending on what they carried. Maintenance displays dotted the chaos, their readings shining bright green.

Yerusha walked down a couple of steps and turned, resting her new hand against the railing. Schyler followed her a split second later. He stopped one step above her.

Schyler leaned close to her and Yerusha felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. There was a cold sheen in his eyes that she had not seen there before.

He kept his voice soft and relaxed. “I already have one massive problem on this run,” he said. “If I find out your presence is going to add another, I will boot you out of here without slowing the ship down. Understand?”

“Absolutely.” Yerusha matched his conversational tone and folded her hands behind her back. “But if you’ve got problems this run, Watch, they’re not coming from me.”

“Glad to hear it.” Schyler straightened up. “Report to the Law then, Pilot. In her cabin.”

“Yes, Watch.” She touched her forehead, turned on her heel and marched smartly down the stairs.

The berthing deck was immediately below the bridge. The Pasadena had been built to keep the crew as far away from the engines as possible, just in case. The deck’s corridor was as bare and uninspiring as the bridge. Yerusha found herself wondering why Al Shei hadn’t invested in at least a pre-fab mural to brighten the place up a bit. The woman didn’t seem like one of the engineering aesthetic types who believe bare machinery was beautiful. Then again, she’d already heard rumors about some of the woman’s tight-fisted peccadillos, so maybe she shouldn’t be too surprised no cash had been laid out for corridor trimmings.

Yerusha kept walking around the curved hallway until she found the cabin labeled ZUBEDYE RESIT. The ENTER light shone green, so Yerusha just knocked once to signal that she was there and went inside.

The lawyer’s cabin was not so much living quarters as office. She had her bunk folded away. An active, permanent desk had been welded to the wall where most cabins had a fold-down set of boards. Resit sat at the desk, pouring over a set of films.

Yerusha wasn’t surprised to see her so deep into her work even though they were only five minutes out of free fall. As ship’s lawyer, she had to be a one-woman bureaucracy. She had to have a working knowledge of the local statutes wherever they were taking on or dropping off cargo. She had to make sure contracts, tax forms and manifests were all prepared and legal. The crew had to get reports on any behavior-related ordinances that would effect them, and cultural and legal advice had to be available to anyone who needed it. Al Shei and Schyler would have to know the circumstances under which they could seek work, and the contracts would have to be drawn up to cover cross-system traffic.

Much of the job could have theoretically been done from a station or groundside, but the expense of FTL communication prevented that. Unless you were a mega-corp or a monarch, it was easier and cheaper to bring your counsel with you.

A big input-output box sat on the corner of Resit’s desk. It had been unceremoniously piled with films filled with cramped Arabic writing. Guessing it was Resit’s AI law firm, Yerusha waved to the box in acknowledgement.

“Would you do me the courtesy of an introduction, Law?” she inquired, indicating the AI.

Resit’s mouth pressed into a long, straight line. Yerusha met her eye calmly. Resit obviously shared her cousin-employer’s prejudices.

“Incili. This is Jemina Yerusha.”

“How do you do, ‘Dama Yerusha?” answered the AI in a clear tenor voice with a slightly British accent.