The Dark Beyond the Stars : A Novel (31 page)

Tybaltgaped. “Sparrow was a friend.”

“A friend who competed with you, however briefly, for the woman you later partnered with. Motive need go no further than that.”

For a moment, I thought the Captain was referring to Hamlet,then realized he meant the one night I had taken Ophelia against her desires. The Captain had eyes everywhere. I waited to be called to testify, so I could deny the allegation.

The Captain made a final notation,then clapped his writing slate shut.

“I said I would have trusted you with my life. It would have been trust misplaced.” Then Tybalt vanished for him as completely as if he had slipped through a crack in the deck. “The prisoner is condemned.”

We stood there in silence, all of us too stunned to move. If we’d had to vote on the crew member most loyal to the ship and the Captain, there was no doubt who would have won. I wondered why the Captain had done it, and then he obligingly told us. We had just started to shift toward the hatchway when he motioned us back.

“The trials are over.” There was a grim smile on his face and I thought of a picture I had once seen in the computer’s memory matrix, of a tiger. “I hope they serve as a warning to those who would betray the
Astron
or its purpose and thus betray the Earth itself.”

Heron had been condemned for attempted murder.

Noah had been condemned for attempted mutiny.

Tybalthad been condemned as an object lesson.

In two thousand years, the Captain should have learned better.

****

In two weeks, we finished our job on Aquinas II. We found no life of any kind. Aquinas II was a windswept, lonely planet of water-icemountains , lakes and rivers of methane, sudden storms, crater-marked plains, and smog dense enough to drastically limit visibility. It was a dirty planet with air we couldn’t breathe and water we couldn’t drink.A primitive planet, stillborn and barren. If only it had been closer to its primary, if only it had been warmer, if only there had been plate tectonics or deposits of radioactives —anything to heat up its chilly interior.

But it was a cold planet and a dead one. There were no tracks to mark the slow passage of an Aquinas snail, no tiny pathway indicating where an overburdened proto-ant had wandered, no trail of bubbles in the methane lakes or streams where something very tiny had scooted by, its flagella whirling…

The disappointment on board was so devastating that some of the crew were glad when it was announced we were leaving, even though they knew we were heading into the Dark, Nobody had computed how many generations it would take to cross it, and so far as I knew no studies had been done on the
Astron’s
ability to survive the crossing. But I doubted that the ship could. Heron and Noah and Tybalt hadn’t been seen since their trials and the speculation was they were being held somewhere on the Captain’s deck. Ophelia, Crow, and Loon were present for meals but absent much of the rest of the time. More than once I was afraid the long arm of the Captain had reached out to take them intocustody, that Snipe had been wrong and their trials would be announced at any moment. When they were present, they ignored me and I ignored them. Guilt came with association and I knew they didn’t want to put me in peril. My own motives were more selfish. I had grown to love “Sparrow”

and had no wish to be flatlined because of the company I kept.

Half a dozen time periods later, when we were about to leave orbit, a stricken Portia broke the suspense and confirmed a rumor. Quince had told her the three prisoners wouldn’t be sent to Reduction after all. They had been stranded on Aquinas II and would die whenever their air ran out or the batteries for their life-support systems were exhausted.

Tybalthad been right after all. The Captain didn’t know us. If they had been sent to Reduction, they would have become part of the food we ate, the water we drank, and the air we breathed. In a very real sense, they would have been with us forever.

But stranding them on Aquinas II was like refusing somebody a formal burial back on ancient Earth. It went against the religion of the
Astron,
vague and undefined as it was, and it was something I doubted the crew would accept.

As for myself, while I didn’t really care what happened to Heron, I cared very much what happened to Noah and Tybalt .

They were my friends, but I had done nothing to save them. It didn’t take me long to realize I couldn’t live with that.

We wouldn’t leave orbit for twenty-four hours but the life-support systems of those stranded on Aquinas II couldn’t function for nearly that long. I had no plan at all except that somebody would have to plead with the Captain to save the lives of Noah and Tybalt .And maybe Heron as well. If they could flatline my memories, perhaps they could do the same for his, and a newborn Heron might turn out to be a happy Heron and a credit to the ship.

But who would speak for Noah?

Or intercede for Tybalt ?

Or plead for Heron?

I was very young; I had lived less than a year as Sparrow, and in my heart I knew the Captain’s mind could be changed. Noah was an old man who led a mutiny so inept it hardly qualified as more than conversation. And if Tybalt had been tried by a jury, the Captain could not have found twelve crew members who would have condemned him as disloyal.

There was no logic at all in the sentences the Captain had handed down, and that should have warned me.

The first person I approached was Ophelia. This time I announced myself and received permission to enter. She was floating by the far bulkhead of her compartment, replaced now by a view of Outside. She looked much as the Captain usually did, staring moodily into infinity. She didn’t turn when I entered.

“You’re a fool, Sparrow. People will know you came to see me and they’ll report it to Kusaka .”

I ignored her sarcasm and told her why I was there.

“You really think somebody could convince Kusaka to change his mind? Forget it, Sparrow, there’s nothing to be done.”

“They’ll die,” I said.

“So willwe all.Eventually.” Her voice turned evenmore bitter . “I should have been tried instead of Noah, Kusaka knows that. And he knows that I was the one Tybalt partnered with, however briefly.”

“Then why didn’t he put you on trial?”

She shrugged.

“Perhaps he picked names at random.” Her face twisted. “Perhaps he figured that I would live longer than Noah and therefore would be more useful to him.”

“How much do you think Noah told him?”

“No more than Kusaka already knew.”

There must have been a great battle of wits between Noah and the Captain. The Captain would have wanted to know the names of everybody connected with the mutiny, but Noah wouldn’t have revealed anything.

“The Captain has access to drugs,” I pointed out, adding reluctantly: “He’ll use them on other mutineers.”

“So? You can’t tell what you don’t know, I’m sure Kusaka has already found that out. His only alternative was to make examples of some of us and he chose Noah. It could just as easily have been me—I thought it would be me—but maybe Noah was more… expendable.”

“And Tybalt ?”

Sadness softened her features.

“ Tybaltknew nothing. I never burdened him with useless knowledge, even when we argued.”

She was convinced there was nothing to be done and I was increasingly unwilling to accept that.

“You must know somebody who could plead their case with the Captain,” I said. “We don’t have much time.”

I had pushed her too far and she got angry. “Don’t blame me for your own sense of guilt, Sparrow! If I could have volunteered to be tried in their place, I would have. Noah didn’t ask and wouldn’t have let me even if I had offered and Kusaka had agreed. As for Tybalt , you know nothing of what passed between us. And how sure are you that your assumptions are correct? Would it shock you if I suggested Kusaka might have made a lucky guess? But if anybody ever asks me, I don’t know that for sure. As far as I’m concerned, Tybalt and I stole what time we could and at the end of it, we parted friends and thanked each other.”

I felt foolish and turned to leave but she was still angry and stopped me at the hatchway to threaten me.

“I’ve told you more than I intended, Sparrow. But don’t forget that you can be denounced, too, and your death as ‘Sparrow’ would be just as final as Noah’s or Tybalt’s , even though your body remained.”

Unable to help Noah, Ophelia had lashed out at me in frustration—but it still hurt.

“I trust you, Ophelia—apparently more than you trust me.”

There had been levels to the plotting that I never suspected. Implied in Ophelia’s sudden outburst was that Noah had never been the head of the mutiny and that it was even possible Tybalt had led a life of elaborate deception. I didn’t believe it—I knew him better than that—but Ophelia had introduced the worm of uncertainty and perhaps that’s what she intended.

But I couldn’t resist toying with a new idea. Maybe there hadn’t been a series of mutinies over the years but only one, one that had lasted for generations. Ophelia’s suggestions of complexity hinted at it. The next person I went to was Huldah . At one time, if Loon was correct, she had partnered with both Noah and Abel, and Noah had become the ostensible leader of a mutiny while Abel had become one of the Captain’s men. Or had he? In a moment of anger, Noah had once said he would trust Abel with his life. Wheels within wheels… Perhaps Abel had played both sides. But if he had, he had been a fool for underestimating the Captain.

****

Huldahwas alone in her compartment, a sunken-faced old lady wrapped in several layers of black cloth for warmth, sipping at a bulb of Pipit’s special tea and knotting a string tapestry. Her voice was tired but her eyes were alert and intelligent. Once again she had put aside the role of matron.

“Don’t bother offering condolences,” she said without rancor. “We both knew it would happen sooner or later.”

I offered them anyway. “You know how I feel,” I said. “How the crew feels.” I floated there in silence, waiting for her to ask me the reason for my visit,then realized I had no time to be polite.

“I wondered if you knew of someone who could plead with the Captain for their lives.”

“I have no influence with the Captain, Sparrow.”

“I wasn’t thinking of you.” I lied—she might have had more influence than anyone. “I thought you would know of somebody who does.”

Her fingers were unsteady as she tied another knot.

“There’s no special person to whom he would listen—all of us are mayflies compared to him.” She gave me a sidelong look. “Arguments might persuade him. Perhaps you know of someone who has persuasive arguments?”

The only crew members I knew of who might argue with the Captain were all Seniors, and of the ones I knew best Noah and Tybalt were dying on Aquinas II while Ophelia couldn’t intercede and Huldah wouldn’t. From the expression on Huldah’s face, I had the uncomfortable feeling I was overlooking somebody but couldn’t think who.

She tied a few more knots,then said impatiently: “You once shared the Captain’s table with him.At his invitation.”

“Thrush?”I said, disbelieving. “He wouldn’t help me if I asked. And I wouldn’t ask. Nor would the Captain listen.”

“Thrush may be spoiled sperm”—she shrugged—“but he thinks like a scientist. And a scientific argument might carry some weight with the Captain.”

“Why would Thrush do anything for me?”

“Not just for you, for Noah and Tybalt and Heron—for all of us.” She was watching me with those too-alert eyes, gauging my reactions. She was very anxious that I see Thrush and ask his help. There was something I didn’t understand.

“Thrush raped your daughter—yet you’re asking for his help through me.”

She became impatient once again.

“I hope Thrush will lead a long and unhappy life and I’ve no doubt that he will—it’s in his genes. I’ll admit I’m using you, Sparrow; I can’t go to him myself. But you know things about Thrush that he wouldn’t care for the Captain to know. You could use them against him.For Noah’s sake—and Tybalt’s

.” She added under her breath: “For your sake as well.”

But I knew of nothing with which I could threatenThrush nor anything I could offer him. Nor could I think of any possible arguments he might advance that would influence the Captain. Huldahwas an old woman, I thought with a trace of contempt, and one in whom I had already placed too much faith. I wanted to ask more but she shook her head and bent low to pluck at the string tapestry. I was almost to the shadow screen when she stopped me.

“You underestimate yourself, Sparrow.”

“It’s because you ask the impossible,” I said, angry. I had the feeling both she and Ophelia wanted me to play the hero.

“It’s impossible only if you don’t try.”

I was young and could still be shamed into actions I would regret later. I turned and fled through the hatchway and down the corridors to Thrush’s compartment. I didn’t think about what I would do once I got there because if I did, I knew I wouldn’t do anything at all.

****

I stood just outside his shadow screen and asked for entry, expecting to be turned away with a sneer. There was a moment’s pause and then the shadow screen vanished and I was staring into what I later learned was a rain forest. Huge tree trunks soared for hundreds of feet into the air and the leafy canopy at the top was so thick, the sky was a patchwork of green. Brightly colored birds swooped through the branches and, high up, monkeys swung from limb to limb. Little things with lizard eyes scampered through the underbrush at my feet and lianas and creepers hung in front of my face. It was warm and humid and it smelled as I imagined a jungle should smell.

It was a masterpiece.

I knew of nobody else who had the ability to program a compartment falsie of such complexity. Once again I was forced to rethink my opinion of Thrush. He was more than just a scientist, and considerably more than an artist. It took an effort of will to remind myself that, for reasons I would probably never know, he wanted me dead.

It didn’t take him long to remind me of that.

“Come in,Sparrow, don’t stand out there in the corridor.”