Zach Hughes - Mother Lode

She had developed the faraway gaze of the deep spacer, but the tiny squint lines at the corners of her large, almond-shaped, sea-green eyes were becoming. Other than that her skin was flawless. Her nose, she felt, was just a little too cute to be dignified. Her lips were wide and full. She looked up as a tall, mature man came through the security door onto the bridge. Her feet dropped to the floor. «As you were,» the newcomer said. «How's it going, Erin?» «Slow,» she said. «That eager to leave us?» She shrugged. «Yes and no,» she said truthfully. «I haven't seen my father in six years.» «As I remember it you're from Terra II.» «New Earth,» she corrected automatically, for Earthers felt that the formal name of their planet was a bit stilted. Lieutenant Commander Jack Burnish knew very well that Erin was a New Earth girl. He knew quite a lot about her, for until she had learned quite by accident that he had a wife and family on Delos III, she had held nothing back from him. «Commander?» she asked formally, breaking the silence. «Is there something I can do for you?» «Erin—» He moved closer. There was a pained look in his eyes. For a moment she remembered, and felt that soft, sliding, melting feeling in the pit of her stomach. She shook her head, tossing her short, ashen hair. «Erin, I—» «If you have no business here, Commander, I am on watch, you know.» Her voice was cold, service standard. «I loved you,» Burnish said. She looked at him evenly for long moments, her face set in serious lines, before she smiled and said softly, «Bullshit.» «I hope you find what you're looking for back on Terra II,» he said. She opened her mouth to correct him, but remained silent. For two years she had thought that she'd found the universe in Jack Burnish's arms. She'd always been a sucker for older men, although she would have fought any head-shrinker who tried to hang a father complex on her. She was by no means a promiscuous girl. There'd been a boy at the Academy, and then Jack, and after she'd found the holo-tape from Jack's wife and children there'd been two others, quite discreetly, aboard Rimfire. The ship had been a long, long way from home, with years stretching ahead before she made the last left turn and headed back into the starred regions of the Milky Way Galaxy and that little grouping of suns and worlds that made up the U.P. Sector. Jack's deception had left her empty and very, very lonely. With the others she was simply trying, unsuccessfully, to fill the void inside her with shared passion. For the last three years of Rimfire's voyage she had kept to her own bed. She had learned that without love the act of coupling was almost comically sweaty, strenuous, undignified, quickly finished, and in the aftermath somewhat damaging to one's self esteem. At the end of her last watch aboard Rimfire she put on a full dress uniform, tucked the last few items of her personal gear into her bag, and went to knock on Julie Roberts' door. The captain was in gown and slippers. «I'll be leaving on the next shuttle, ma'am,» Erin said. Julie rose, gave Erin a solemn salute, then came to put her arms around the younger woman. She squeezed, stepped back. «You are a good officer,» she said. «If you change your mind, your rank and position will be reserved for you for a period of six months.» «I know. Thank you.» The captain smiled. «Thanks, but no thanks?» «I'm afraid so.» «We're getting a unit citation. Leave your home address with personnel and I'll have yours sent along to you.» «I will, thank you.' « «Have a good life.» «And you,» Erin said. The shuttle dropped away from the big ship. Looking back, Erin saw the harsh outlines, the dingy, service gray paint, and felt a moment of sadness. In a way it was like leaving the womb, for the ship had been her home, her haven in a completely hostile environment. The crew had been her family while ship and complement were at awesome distances from the nearest outpost of human exploration. Rimfire looked worn and old and tired and that was odd, for there was nothing in space to erode her original sheen, to dull her paint. Thirty minutes later Erin was on the ground. She had fourteen hours to wait before catching her flight to New Earth, so she was in no hurry to exit the shuttle. She waited for the more eager crew members from Rimfire to get on with their planetside liberty before leaving her seat. A few of them called out one final good-bye. She was the last one off the shuttle. She stepped out of the hatch and had to reach for the railing of the boarding ramp as dizziness swept over her. «You'll be fine in a minute,» said one of the shuttle's crew from behind her. «Ain't it a bitch? You breathe recycled air for long enough and the real thing hits you like a good belt of booze.» She breathed deeply, tried to define the smell of the air. The answer was that there was no smell. No scents, no flavorings, only an exhilarating keenness and a feeling of clean purity. For years she'd lived with the subliminal odors that accumulate when a closed ship recycles air and organic wastes. On Xanthos, where industry was prohibited, there was a purity to the air that really did seem to intoxicate her. The planet was one huge city. From Xanthos the lines of command and administration extended over parsecs of space to the various U.P. planets and beyond into the areas of exploration, to dim and distant planets not well suited for human habitation, to Old Earth, the planet from which space-going man had emerged thousands of years in the past, to her home, New Earth, where the space travelers had struggled against long odds to overcome the loss of all technology and their own history to blast their way back into space on the ravaged resources of a planet. After checking into an X&A B.O.Q., she placed a blink call to New Earth to tell her father that she would soon be on her way home. She was told that there'd be a two-hour delay. She went out onto the streets and walked. Civilization buzzed, hummed, honked, whistled, roared, whispered, sang about her. Humanity swarmed, making her feel just a bit ill at ease. She envied the Old Earth Power Givers, females who could soar above the crowded street, their tiny, jeweled scales reflecting the lights. Now and then she saw a Healer, one of the males who was so highly valued in X&A because of his ability to explore places that were deadly to the Old Ones, meaning ordinary men like those who had left the home planet before the Destruction. Once and only once did she see a third form of the race that had mutated on Old Earth after the Destruction, a Far Seer, his bald, pointed head gleaming, his eyeless face moving from side to side as he made his way unhesitatingly among the throngs. One never saw the fourth Old Earth mutant, the idiot savant Keeper, in public. She took a moving sidewalk to a shopping complex and marveled at the richness of goods on display. After buying a few luxuries for herself and gifts for her father, she ate alone in a beautifully decorated little restaurant that specialized in the cuisine of the Tigian planets, drank two glasses of a beautifully dry Tigian wine. The communications blink routes to New Earth were still jammed. She had a lovely night's sleep in her room on the B.O.Q. with the windows open. She had to bundle up under heavy covers, but the unladen sweetness of the air made it worth it. She had a leisurely breakfast next morning, tried to call New Earth again without success, left the B.O.Q., grabbed a taxi, and was soon aboard a passenger liner enroute to Tigian I, II, and III; Trojan V; Delos; and New Earth. The bed in her stateroom was prepared. She stripped to her singlet, punched a Do-Not-Disturb message into her communicator, and slept. Her stateroom was, when compared to her quarters aboard Rimfire, luxurious. There was no limit to the amount of water she could use, so she filled the bathtub until she could slide down and soak with only her face showing.Читать дальше