Supernova (10 page)

“It
means a temporary promotion,” he explained. “They’ve handed me a shitbox and
they want to see how I handle it.” He paused. “Excuse my language.”

“Excused.
I’ve said worse.”

“Officially,
I’m still a commander. There will be two captaincies opening in the next few
months, and I want one of them, on a battleship.” For Rian, this was babbling.
He shut up. “Apologies,” he muttered. “I didn’t mean to bore you. You have more
important things to be thinking about.” He curled his fingers around his cup.

“And
those things scare the hell out of me,” she replied.

Her eyes
met his, and her hand slid across the table to touch his hand that was gripping
his teacup. He almost jerked back out of surprise, but held still. At the touch
of her skin against his, he felt a spark, a near-tangible sensation of
understanding and something else.
Want?

What was
she doing? She wasn’t supposed to be offering him comfort. It was disconcerting
to him, and he averted his eyes before she could see his reaction or he hers.

He
pushed any thoughts not concerning her safety and well-being from his mind and
let go of her hand. He had to. She was not a woman from the Commons or even the
Fringes; she was itching to go home and couldn’t. Any other kind of
entanglement was the last thing either of them needed.

Chapter 6

Lily
stayed close to Dr. Ashford and a young nurse around Lily’s age named Mora
Kharn when the
Defiant
docked at Rubidge Station. As Rian feared, there
was a group of journalists waiting for their arrival, having already harassed
another docked Fleet ship and not getting the story they were looking for. They
were clustered in a public corridor outside the airlock access way.

“Just
ignore them,” Mora whispered to her. Lily nodded and walked faster to keep up
with the taller woman’s long stride. She clutched a Fleet-issue overnight bag
holding a change of clothes borrowed from Mora, who had promised to take her
shopping. “It’s just in case,” the nurse said. “None of my stuff will fit you anyway.”

The
Defiant
was being taken out of service during its repairs at the station, which meant
everyone had to stay off ship. Lily alternated between the thrill of being on a
real space station and the terror of being caught unaware by a predator. She wished
she at least had the option of returning to her cabin, the only sanctuary she
had.

You
wanted to start over,
she told herself.

The
media shitstorm began that morning. Rian had called her in at a crew meeting in
one of the ship’s conference rooms and explained that somehow the tabloids had
learned of a time traveler, and every action was being taken to find out who
had blabbed. He talked about ship-wide invasive scans and comm audits, and Lily
tried and failed to keep up with the terminology. It didn’t look like the
Defiant
had been mentioned by name in the media, but Rian was still furious. He was
calm, but she recognized the ticking in his jaw and his fists clenching and
unclenching.

Fleet
had had no choice but to confirm that time travel had been made possible by an
enemy faction, but gave no other details. Mora had downloaded one of the
tabloids to what looked like an e-reader and had shown it to her before they
were cleared to leave the ship. “They all have exclusive stories with insiders
at Fleet, and one says that the time traveler is only from a couple of years in
the future and another says five hundred. I think you’re safe.”

The crew
had to walk through a series of security checkpoints to the inner area of the
Fleet outpost after leaving the public corridor. They passed through a huge
circular doorway and everyone was subject to palm and retinal scans, and then
through something that reminded Lily of an airport security scanner. Her
curiosity was piqued when one of the men in uniform whistled. She turned her
head, ready to tell him what he could do with his whistle, but Mora rolled her
eyes.

“Go to
hell,” Mora shot back.

Taz
forced his way through the scanner, and the grunt said hello to him. “You’re
holding up the line,” he said, and caught the look between Mora and the
security officer. Mora glared at his amused face. “Let’s go,” Taz said, and
pushed them both.

“What
was that?” Lily whispered.

“Too
much
sala
a couple of years ago,” Mora said, and left it at that.

She was
issued a station badge and assigned to a room in the Fleet barracks. She looked
around for Rian, but Taz said he was probably in a meeting. “You’re a popular
topic of conversation,” he grinned. “You’ll probably have to go, too.”

As if on
cue, her new badge trilled and she jumped. She tapped it. “Hello,” she said
sunnily, as though she were answering the phone. She couldn’t help it; it was
an old habit. Mora and Taz snickered. Lily didn’t see what was so funny. She
didn’t have a rank or title like they did, and it felt weird referring to
herself as Stewart.

Rian’s
voice—purely professional—requested her presence in conference room four at her
earliest convenience. “I can go now,” she answered. It wasn’t like she had
anywhere pressing to be, unless she counted Mora promising to take her
shopping. She didn’t have a clue where the conference rooms were, but Taz was
already leading the way. Lily barely got out a “See you soon” to Mora before
she had to take off.

“Lucky
you,” he said. “You get to meet Admiral Kentz. He runs Fleet in this quadrant.”

Lily
almost had to run to match Taz’s longer strides. “I don’t like the way you said
‘lucky.’”

He
slowed down and shrugged. “I’m not good with authority.”

“I never
would have guessed.”

“It’s
why I’m still an ensign on a garbage scow after six years in Fleet,” he
continued. They walked through a maze of hallways and security points before
turning down another corridor lined with glass-walled rooms. They headed to the
end of it, and Taz said this was where the bigwigs at Fleet met for high-security
issues.

The door
opened before either could press their hands into the palm lock, although Lily
doubted it would have worked for either of them. A tall, dignified man in his
sixties with short white hair stood in the doorway, his Fleet uniform decorated
with gold braids and medals. Rian stood at his side, looking far less pompous
with his simple insignia. “Ensign Shraft, thank you for escorting Miss Stewart,”
Rian said. “Dismissed.”

Taz
saluted and turned back down the corridor, and Lily was sorry to see him go.
His presence would have made dealing with the suits a little less intimidating.

The
windowless conference room was overtaken by a huge table running down its
center, with small inset computer screens at each chair. The walls were
decorated with pictures of stations in deep space and officers in varying
styles of uniform. More than a few had features that weren’t quite
human—elongated eyes there, light blue hair here, an occasional greenish cast
to the skin. There was a replicator along the back wall, and a few people
inside had cups in front of them.

“Sit
down, Miss Stewart,” said the white-haired officer. She met Rian’s eyes, and he
looked at a pair of empty seats near the head of the table. The older officer
took his place at the head and Lily followed Rian, sitting next to him.

She didn’t
know what to say, and all eyes were on her. There was an assortment of men and
women in uniforms as decorated as the one at the head of the table, and despite
their polished military stances, they regarded her curiously. “Hi,” she said
self-consciously. Their eyes never left her. Did any of them have a friendly
bone in their bodies, or was it programmed out of them in boot camp? A few of
them shifted in their seats, but no one returned her greeting.

The
white-haired man finally spoke. “Good afternoon,” he said. “I’m Admiral Donn
Kentz.” He quickly introduced the others around the table, a mix of admirals
and senior captains from nearby zones and stations, many with names Lily would
have trouble pronouncing later.

Well,
they probably thought
Lily Stewart
was a weird name, too.

He then
emphasized that everything said in the conference room was top secret and had
to remain that way, with a pointed glance at Lily. When all was said, Admiral
Kentz steepled his fingers and tried to smile. She quickly figured out it was a
gesture the admiral was unused to. “How are you faring, Miss Stewart?” he asked
in an artificially bright voice.

Lily
sighed. “About as well as anyone would expect, considering I’ve been vaulted
ahead more than eight hundred years,” she said. She hadn’t meant to sound
sarcastic, but it was a stupid question she was tired of hearing. “I’m fine,”
she clarified. “Wonderful.” She caught Rian’s startled expression in the corner
of her eye. “Actually, Captain Marska and the
Defiant
’s crew have been
very supportive.” She deliberately placed emphasis on
Captain
.

The fake
smile didn’t leave the admiral’s face. “Commander Marska has told you about
your chances of returning to Earth?”

Jerk
. “Slim to none,” Lily replied.

“Correct.
We’d like to hear your version of the events, Miss Stewart.”

Lily
suppressed a sigh and told the admirals about her last day at Lazarus Cryonics,
her creepy employers, and the kidnapping. Waking up drugged and disoriented in
the cargo bay, and finding out she had been sent to the year 2867. She left out
her conversations with Rian.

“How do
you know these Nym people haven’t done this to others?” she finally asked. “I
could be one of hundreds.” It was something she had mulled over when the
Defiant
was docking at the airlock.

The
officials around the table glanced at one another. “Unlikely,” a woman said.
Lily tried to place her. Admiral Brynn, Brynon, something like that. “We would
know about it. The Kurran Empire and the Commons have always been on friendly
terms, and we would have told one another.”

“Who
says any time travelers got stuck in only your jurisdictions?” Lily asked, and
then regretted it. Rods up their asses or not, these people had to know what
they were doing, and she was hardly an expert in intergalactic diplomatic
relations. For all she knew, civilized space was limited to just this
Commonwealth, Kurran Empire, and the planets they called the Fringes.

Rian
elbowed her slightly, and she shut up.

“Our
surveillance in Nym space shows no actual indication of time travel,” Admiral
Kentz pointed out. “They have been more active outside the Fringes, though, and
this is probably related to it.”

“Exactly.
That’s why I think I may not be the only time traveler.”

“You
are,” the admiral told her. “You don’t yet understand your new home. Believe
me, we would know if this had happened before.”

“I’m
sorry,” she said. She couldn’t keep the frustration from coloring her words. “I’m
a little stressed out about this whole situation. I think anyone would be if
they found out they were a traveling exhibit for 850 years after waking up
drugged in a strange place.”

“You
haven’t been an exhibit that long,” Kentz said, as though that made everything
okay. “The artifacts being unloaded from the
Defiant
right now before
she goes into the repair bay are being thoroughly investigated and documented.
The original manifest has been scrutinized and so far the artifacts’
whereabouts have been confirmed. You were added to the exhibit only three years
ago, which corresponds to the Nym’s activity close to our territory.”

“So I’ve
only been stared at for three years instead of eight hundred,” Lily snapped. “Fabulous.”
Beside her, Rian let out a very strange cough behind his hand.

“Miss
Stewart, I assure you that you were always treated with dignity,” Kentz
protested, his voice dripping with condescension. “The Commonwealth Space
Historical Society was very excited to discover such a well-preserved specimen
for its traveling collection, and you were going to stay in the new museum here
permanently.”

“I’m not
a specimen,” Lily shot back. She was really starting to resent being treated
like an idiot.

“Lily,”
Rian hissed through his teeth.

“Commander?”
Kentz raised an eyebrow at him. Rian looked down at the table.

Curiosity
got the better of Lily. “Where was I all that time, anyway?”

“On
Darcan-2, a small planet close to Earth, mostly used as a mass crypt for
cryonic remains,” another admiral replied. He looked at Kentz, and the older
man nodded consent for him to speak. “Earth began storing them there in 2150.
It was forgotten about when cryonics was finally abandoned due to its failure
rate, and the planet was finally cleaned out a few years ago by an
archaeological team. You were there.”

“Why
were all those bodies left on Darcan-2?”

“Earth
was well into an environmental crisis at the time,” Kentz interrupted. “Its
non-renewable resources had been depleted and it was badly overpopulated.
Earthlings were looking into other habitable planets. Darcan-2 was one of the
planets considered for colonization by the Interplanetary Relocation Committee
and they decided to test its habitability factors using the remains. That was
the experiment that finally killed any lingering faith in cryonics. None of the
bodies reanimated, of course, but it was discovered that the crude preservation
techniques were toxic when exposed to air. So the IRC decided to turn Darcan-2
into a cemetery and it was, as Admiral Betner said, pretty much forgotten.