Home: Interstellar: Merchant Princess (24 page)

“M, wait, about your sister,” John called, but Meriel had already rounded the corner.

***

Meriel knocked on Molly’s ready-room door.

“Ah, Meriel,” Molly said. “I wanted to talk to you. The—”

“XO,” Meriel interrupted, “I think the
Tiger
may be in danger because of me.”

Molly stopped. “How so?”

“Someone followed me here.”

Molly smiled. “As a pretty young woman, you should be flattered. How does that endanger the
Tiger
?”

Meriel fidgeted uncomfortably. “May I sit, ma’am?”

Molly nodded.

Meriel sighed and began, “You know about the
Princess
, right?” she said, and Molly nodded. Without mentioning Cookie or John, Meriel told her what she had learned about the conspiracy, about how Alan Biadez, BioLuna, and the archtrope had tried to take over Haven using the mil-tech pirated from the
Princess
. She showed Molly the Treaty of Haven document.

“Where did you get this?” Molly asked.

“From the wife of a BioLuna executive who died about the time of the
Princess
attack.”

“How do you know it’s legitimate?”

Meriel’s jaw dropped. The document had no routing information to verify the provenance. That meant it had never been transmitted and was either the original or a copy. It also meant she could have just typed it up a few minutes ago—that is if she were crazy enough.

“I trusted the source,” Meriel said softly, realizing how unreliable that sounded.

“You think they followed you and will attack the
Tiger
to get to you?”

“Maybe not me. But the information? Yes.”

“How will we know that this threat is real?”

“I don’t know, ma’am,” Meriel said. “I think the
Princess
had an aggressive military-grade virus in the cargo manifest. I checked the
Tiger
manifest and found nothing. Please, ma’am, don’t accept any late cargo.”

Molly nodded. “Acknowledged. Stay, please.” She tapped an icon on her link. “Captain, Cookie. Be on alert this trip for a hijacking.”

“What do you expect?” Meriel heard the captain say.

“If we’re lucky, an annoyance,” Molly said. “If we’re not so lucky, a hijacking.”

“On it, ma’am,” Cookie said.

“And, Chief, please scan our systems for aggressive viruses, mil-tech. And check the bonafides on our new passengers.”

“Aye, ma’am,” Cookie said, and Molly tapped her link again.

“Thank you, ma’am,” Meriel said.

“I’ve always been straight with you, Meriel. I need the same from you.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Are you taking your meds regularly?”

The question came out of the blue, and Meriel immediately betrayed herself with a blush. “I’m not making this up, ma’am. Really. I have it all here, the treaty, the photos—”

“Doc came by and said you had some daydreams about the
Princess
and the kids you grew up with,” Molly said.

Meriel wondered how Doc had found out. She looked at her hands in her lap and could barely speak. “I only talk to a very few people about them anymore.”
Apparently not few enough
, she thought.

“The meds are a condition of your work card, Meriel. Promise me that you’re taking them.”

“Yes, ma’am, I am,” Meriel lied again.

“Dismissed, Chief,” Molly said, and Meriel left.

Molly thought for a few moments and then called the doctor.

“Doc, any particular reason why Meriel might be feeling anxious about being followed?”

“If she’s off the meds, she’s delusional. A paranoid fantasy would fit her symptom profile.”

“Acknowledge. Out.” Molly put the link down and shook her head.

***

Meriel elbowed her way through the overcrowded passengers to the galley, where Cookie checked the
Tiger’s
systems for mil-tech viruses.

“I did a standard Hff4 virus sweep of the manifest and data sets,” Meriel said while loading up a tray of food for her sister, “but found nothing sophisticated—no hot links in the manifests. Cargo memory is cold.”

Cookie nodded. “You’re hungry.”

“Yeah, girl stuff, real snackie,” Meriel said to shut him up.

“Eat fast and report back here afterward. I’m calling the security team together. Five minutes. And try the applejack,” he said absently, and Meriel grabbed some pastries.

Inside her cabin, Elizabeth tore into the food. “You left me starving, M.”

“Sorry. Took longer than I planned, but I learned a lot.” She described what she and John had learned about Haven, the treaty, and the conspirators.

“You’re kidding,” Elizabeth said with her mouth full of pastry. “An Earthlike colony? Makes sense that they’d try to steal it. Earthers will kill to get out of Sol system for a little freedom.”

“The people doing this, Biadez, the archtrope, the BioLuna CEO, they’re already on top of the system, fat and happy. They want to exploit everyone else who is trying to immigrate.”

“Those are big carnivores, M,” Elizabeth said. “You remember the dino-sims on Enterprise?”

“Yeah, it feels like that to me, too.” Meriel wanted to rant, but Elizabeth had drifted into her own thoughts.

“Everyone we loved, real people, killed just for being at the wrong place at the wrong time,” Elizabeth said. “It could have been any ship, any crew…” She raised another bun to her mouth but stopped and closed her eyes.

“What is it, hon?” Meriel asked.

“It couldn’t have been just anyone, M. Only the
Princess
.”

“Why?”

“Mom knew about Home. Or almost. She was close and would have gone public with information she should not have had.”

“The Alderson video?”

Elizabeth nodded and looked down at the treaty on the console. “Damn. It’s like the cheap novels; some thug burns down the family farm just because it’s in the wrong place.”

“Except that no hero is coming to the rescue. The hero lit the torch. It’s Alan Biadez, for God’s sake,” Meriel said, crossing her arms. “I didn’t think it would feel this bad. It’s like a kick in the chest. Harry keeps Biadez’s poster in his cabin like he’s a holo star.”

“I’ll bet that’s why they issued restraining orders to cut Teddy out of the custody hearings,” Elizabeth said. “To keep us isolated. That was the Biadez Foundation’s doing.”

“Damn. The Foundation paid for the investigation and worked side by side with the troopers.”

“Wow. They could have covered up anything.” Elizabeth said.

“Oh, jeez!” Meriel said. “The Biadez Foundation knows how to contact all the kids. If Biadez knows, then BioLuna and the archtrope know too. Damn. The only people who
don’t
know are the people who can protect them.”

“I’ll alert them, M,” Elizabeth said.

“Tell ’em to go dark, hide.”

“They’re not gonna like it,” Elizabeth said.

“They’ll like dead even less.”

“OK. I recycled my link. What do you have here that can I use?”

Meriel pointed to the comm console, and Elizabeth began to draft the messages.

“I know you look up to Biadez and the Foundation,” Elizabeth said while she drafted her text, “but they’re bastards. I’ll never forgive them for what they did to you. What they tried to do to all of us. The drugs. The separation. We were just kids.”

Meriel sat with her head down. “I brought this on us, Liz.”

Elizabeth stopped texting. “What are you talking about?”

“They might have left us alone, but I stirred it up again. I screwed up. I only wanted us to have a normal life. I hoped to keep us together like Mom wanted.

“Sis, we all read our own obituaries before we were fifteen,” Elizabeth said. “We’re never gonna have a normal life.”

“But now we’re all targets.”

“You can’t blame yourself for this, M,” Elizabeth said, and then she took her sister’s hand.

“If I’d left this alone, we might not be in danger now.”

Elizabeth shook her head. “If you’d left this alone, we’d all be dead.”

“You helped me, Liz. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“Don’t be dumb. I was ten and a basket case. Mom was dying.”

“You didn’t believe me?”

“That she was just sleeping? No. I saw you trying to wake her and how scared you were. And later, you tried to hide it, but I knew you were hurt bad.”

Meriel looked down, and her shoulders shook, but Elizabeth lifted Meriel’s chin up and looked her in the eyes.

“M, you still don’t get it. You can’t mess up with us. Most of the kids remember what happened back then. You kept going when we just wanted to sit and cry. They don’t know what you had to do…with our folks; they don’t want to know. But they know you did it for us, to protect us. They’d die for you, M.”

“I won’t let them.”

“Yeah, we know. But it’s not up to you. We all know that the life we have is a gift. No one says it, but we know, and you just can’t mess up after that.”

After a long pause, Meriel sighed. “I wanted the meds, Liz,” she said. “I couldn’t handle it. I’m sorry we drifted apart. But it was all too much.”

Elizabeth put her palm on Meriel’s cheek and smiled at her. “I know, Sis. But I don’t care. I need you, all of you, not that zombie with the meds.”

Meriel sat up and dried her eyes. She paced the room while Elizabeth went back to messaging the other orphans.

“Was I really so bad?” Meriel asked. “On the meds.”

“Hon, you’d stare at the wall and drool.”

“Really?”

“Well, almost. OK, big Sis, what’s next?”

“I warned the XO. She warned Cookie, our chief of security. I need to report to him,” Meriel said and checked her link. “I’m late.”

“Worried about another
Princess
?”

Meriel nodded, and Elizabeth continued. “What do you have here?”

“Suits and breathers are in the closet,” Meriel said.

“What about weapons?”

“I only have two stunners here under the deck plates.”

“That’s all? Nothing deadly?”

Meriel shook her head. Elizabeth’s concern was justified. A stunner would not kill an attacker; it would just knock him unconscious for a few minutes. Repeated use might cause seizures and permanent brain damage, but it would not kill.

“Cookie has the vests and lethal weapons,” Meriel said. “Hard-suits are near the air locks.” She paced her little cabin. “OK, you send the alert to the kids and their families.” She pointed to Moira’s message chip. “We need copies of this ready to synch with the outbound beacon. Nick should have one. And another should go to our lawyer. And Teddy. We still have about two hours before jump. I’ll report to Cookie and help with the security planning.”

Elizabeth nodded.

“I’ll stay on the link when I’m with Cookie, so let me know if you need anything.”

Elizabeth nodded again, and Meriel left to see Cookie.

***

Meriel ran into John in the passageway on the way to the galley.

“Hey, Cookie said you had two rations of food. I thought I’d stop by. I could help you eat it and chat a bit.”

Meriel kept walking. “Sorry, John, I need to report to Cookie now. I really don’t have time.”

“I really want to talk with you,” he said. “You mentioned Liz, and I—”

Meriel stopped in her tracks and walked back to him. “Shhh,” she said and looked around and behind them. “This is our secret, remember?” She had to tell him now. She leaned closer and whispered, “I stowed her away in my cabin. I had to. They’d arrest her and throw away the key. Maybe kill her.”

John frowned. “Did you tell the XO?”

“I will, just not yet. Liz is in protective custody, and this will just get them into trouble. I added her weight to the cargo to make the mass work out, but the center of gravity will shift a bit.”

John nodded. “Meriel, I need you to—”

“Really, John, I need to report to Cookie. We may be in big trouble,” she said over her shoulder and rushed away.

***

John frowned as he watched Meriel hurry away. Doc could be obsessive and had not convinced him that she was delusional, but Meriel had lied to him, and he wanted confirmation before helping her again.

He went to a console and pulled up the administration app to check utility use in Meriel’s cabin, specifically water and lighting. Her cabin lights had been on all day, but that could point to a defective motion detector that drove the environmental controls. The record showed toilet flushes at the same time the roster said she was on duty, but it would not be the first time that someone had returned to his or her cabin without logging out. John noticed a red highlight on the cabin effluents and pulled it up to show a graph of something called Aristopine. He looked up the drug reference: an antipsychotic, just like Doc said, and expensive. BioLuna was the exclusive supplier. The effluent monitors signaled that she took them on schedule. Then why would Ferrell say she was skipping her meds and was delusional?