Zach Hughes - For Texas and Zed

Texican lads began tinkering with their airorses before they knew enough math and physics to understand the theory behind the hardware involved, and, indeed, tinkering seemed to be a natural ability with most Texicans. Lex knew the workings of a blink generator without knowing fully the theory and the whys of its working, but he could take one apart and clean it and test the various components and replace faulty ones, and the small blink generator on his Zelda , back on Texas, made the Empire machines look like primitive imitations of the real thing. He was shocked by the total lack of refinement.

Of course, the Empire generators did the job, but they were bulky and cranky compared to the souped-up models used onTexas, and not one advance had been made, seemingly, since the blink was perfected for the great expansion outward from Earth. It was thus with most Empire hardware. It was basic, stripped-down stuff of a simplicity which made it duck soup for Lex. However, very early he decided, having learned the operations of a ship of the line from his training manuals, that he did not want to be stuck below decks in the generator room mucking around in the Empire's primitive power plants. He had little to gain from ten or more years of service in the battle fleet, but one thing he could do, and that was observe. To observe, he had to be where the action was, and so he purposely made himself look to his instructors as if he were a six-thumbed novice with mechanics and showed his best on the controls of various beam and ray weapons.

On weapons, he allowed his reflexes, which could guide an airors inches off the uneven terrain of the deserts ofTexas, full play. He was fractions of a second faster than any other trainee at programming the automatics which guided the weapons, and when assignment time came, he was sent to gunnery school on a planet some light-years away from the cold training planet where he excelled at knocking drone targets out of space.

It all took time, but not enough time. Days seemed both to crawl and to fly past. Hours in classrooms were devastatingly slow, but weeks went by without conscious observance. It was the months, building up to years, which seemed longest. Gunnery trainee Lex Burns had been offTexasfor six months when he was assigned to the training ship T.E.S. Crucis . Behind him were endless long, lonely nights, countless humiliations, small victories, moments of looking upward to the crowded skies of the galaxy and thinking of home. He was more alone than he'd ever been while roaming the Bojacks of home in solitude. He formed no close associations. The Empire trainees seemed cold, distant, forming their little groups for games and talk and gambling without inviting the big outworlder to join. Not that Lex wanted to join in with the Empireites. They were a scurvy lot in general, runted, harsh-voiced, arrogant without reason. No, he was content to be the loner, obeying orders, doing each assigned task to the best of his ability, remembering, at times, Billy Bob's suggestion that he come with him and steal an Empire ship.

Perhaps, in the endless years ahead, he would think about it. In training, of course, escape was impossible. He didn't know where to run even if be could escape.

"Where is your home planet?"

"What course did you fly into the galaxy with the Texas fleet?"

"If you don't know where the planet called Texas is, tell us about the skies of Texas. What are the star formations?"

Under deep hypnosis, drug-induced, leaving small shards of memory, the voice of a man speaking quietly: "They are not primitive in their techniques, for if they were, there would be a residuum of the knowledge we seek. However, if the knowledge has been truly erased, there is no way of putting it back, at least not by someone who does not have the knowledge."

In his mind were dozens of interrogation sessions and he remembered with satisfaction their deep interest in the Darlene space rifle, their consternation upon discovering that the last active battle between the opposing forces came about not because of a Cassiopeian miscalculation, as they had long believed, but simply because one Texican had strayed, was captured and was rescued by a small Texas fleet.

The concept of a world moving, using all its resources, to save the life and liberty of one man was alien to them.

"Do you expect us to believe that your planet sent a fleet to rescue one unimportant prospector for metals?"

"No Texican is unimportant to Texas."

"He was the son of a great man then? Or he had important friends?"

"I think he was just a loner, an old prospector with a junk ship trying to make a dollar."

"When you kidnapped me," she said, standing before him in formal Empire uniform, small, beautiful, coldly distant, "were you acting on orders from higher up?"

"No, ma'am, I just liked you. I thought you liked me."

"Just answer the questions," said the Lady Gwyn.

"You acted like you liked me," he said, grinning. "That night on—" "Shut up. Was this a plot to hold me for ransom?" "No, I just wanted to marry you." "Lady," asked the uniformed guard with her, "shall I still his insolent tongue?" "Let him talk," the Lady Gwyn said. Lex was seated, chained to his bunk in the prison. "What did you

hope to gain by kidnapping an agent of the Emperor himself? Surely my momentary attraction to you did not make you think that a cousin of the Emperor would choose to live out her days on an outplanet herding some dirty animals?"

"You liked me on the way back to the Empire, too," Lex said. "Enough," said the Lady Gwyn. "He is hopelessly stupid." On the way back to the Empire he hadn't had much to lose and she was there, taking over the cabin of

the First Officer, having her meals served there, not choosing to associate with the lowly Texas crew. One day out, when the routine of blink, rest, blink and rest was established and the ship was running smoothly, Lex took her tray from the steward and delivered it in person.

In order to carry more cargo, the flagship had been stripped of luxuries. It was warm in the cabin and she was dressed in nothing more than the undergarments worn by a Texas girl, low-cut panties and a nearly miraculous bra which supported where no support was needed by some invisible means which had always puzzled Lex, not being too familiar with the article of clothing.

"Your food, ma'am," he said, knocking on the door.

He heard the inner lock pushed back. "You may put it on the table," she said, before opening the door. Then she tried to close it in his face, but he pushed in, almost spilling the contents of the tray. "Get out," she said coldly. "I don't believe I will," he said. "I will inform the Captain," she said, taking a step toward the ship's communicator link in the cabin. He

stood quickly between her and the unit. "You are in enough trouble," she said, as he put the tray aside and looked down into her face. "M'am, since I'm in Empire trouble, I been reading all about your laws. Seems there's no law against

what I'm going to do to you." She backed slowly away. "Don't touch me." "Well, I don't think I'll just touch you," he said, advancing. "Way I look at it you were the one who

issued the invitation back there on Polaris Two. What we did there seemed to be fun, but didn't seem to matter much to you, so if it doesn't matter to you I don't see why we should spend a couple of weeks or more without having fun, do you?"

"I will have you publicly whipped," she said, as he caught her, pulled her to him, held her arms as she tried to scratch his face.

"I figure worse things than that are already lined up," he said. He picked her up bodily and threw her, somewhat roughly, onto the bunk. He discovered that the fragile-looking bra was stronger than it seemed, for when he ripped it away the straps left red marks on her delicate brown skin.