The Ship Who Sang (8 page)

The tape ended with a silent hold cue to Helva. It took her a moment to realize that, though she had the mission information, she had received nothing on her new partner. No matter how temporary this assignment, it would take time. Some basic biography would be essential for Helva to function effectively in partnership with Kira. Obediently she cut the tape, activating a record-store of the balance for later playback. It would appear there were many unusual factors in this assignment. Central Worlds moves in mysterious ways, itself to sustain.

‘Well,' Helva exclaimed, to end the brief silence after the mission portion of the tape was silent. ‘I hadn't expected motherhood at my tender age. I see I have underestimated the demands Central Worlds makes of its minions.'

Her attempt at levity touched off a violent response in Kira and Helva wondered what under a first magnitude star had she got for a partner.

‘Read this tape on me before we proceed with the mission,' Kira said in a dead voice, all her previous vivacity wiped out.

She slammed the store button, shunting the mission tape to the ship files, and inserted a second reel. With an almost savage twist she
turned on the audio, sitting stiffly erect and motionless as the tape played back, either deaf or impervious to the biograph.

Kira Falernova Mirsky of Canopus had finished all but a year of brawn training. She came from a Service-oriented family that had brought up 10 generations to illustrious – and once, exalted – careers in Central Worlds' service branches. She had left the Training School on marital leave that had lasted two years, ending at her husband's death. A long term of hospitalization and therapy followed during which time, the tape noted, Kira had asked for and taken medical training but did not reapply for brawn education. She had responded to a high level request to take this temporary assignment, since her training had matched perfectly the needs of this particular emergency.

Then followed a rattle of personal indices, emotional, psychological and educational, which Helva translated, as she was expected to, to mean that Kira Mirsky of Canopus would make an unusually fine brawn if she gave herself half a chance. The tape ended abruptly, as if there should be more. The omission, probably on the last tag of the mission reel, seemed to sing out its absence far louder than the tritest concluding evaluation or recommendations. Central Worlds had many devious facets and perhaps such an obvious omission was one. Surely Kira sensed it. That damned biograph left too much unsaid, particularly apparent to a brawn trainee. Helva's
mind danced with the possibilities and gnawed mental teeth against the silent hold-cue. In the meantime, Helva was faced with a very awkward situation, her new partner stiff with anticipation and predisposed by Central Worlds to make a bad first adjustment to Helva.

Helva made a rude, sibilant noise and was relieved to see Kira react in surprise to it.

‘Brains they got?' Helva demanded contemptuously. ‘I don't call that a proper tape. They forgot half the garbage anyway. Ssscheh!' and she repeated her exasperation noise. ‘Oh, well, I expect we'll do fine together if only because they left out the usual nonsense. Besides, the mission
is
temporary.'

Kira said nothing, but the woodenness left her slender body as if an anticipated ordeal had been canceled. She swallowed hard, licking her lips nervously, still unsure of her position, having steeled her nerves for something unpleasant.

‘Let's get the cargo aboard and turn me into a rocking ship.'

Kira rose, her body awkward, but she managed to smile at Helva's column. ‘With pleasure. Have your holds been outfitted?'

‘“With yards and yards of lacing/and a bicycle built for two on it,”' Helva replied, quipping from an ancient patter song. She was determined to establish a comfortable empathy.

Kira's smile was less tentative and her body motion became more fluid.

‘Yes, it would look like that, I guess.'

‘Of course I've never seen a bicycle built for two . . .'

‘Or a purple cow?' and Kira giggled girlishly.

‘Hmmm. Purple cow, my dear brawn, is an all too apt analogy for our present occupation,' Helva replied, ignoring the edge to Kira's laughter. ‘And don't tell me I'll have room for 300,000 mechanical teats in the cargo space Central Worlds saw fit to give me.'

‘Oh, no,' Kira said. ‘We don't have but the first 100,000 accounted for as of the time the tape was cut. We'll swing out from Regulus toward Nekkar, picking up donations as we go, deliver them within the 4-week time limit when the fetuses must be either implanted or decanted, and swing around the Wheel until we do meet the quota.'

Helva knew this from the tape. ‘Three hundred thousand isn't a very big number for a planetary population of a million that needs to expand.'

‘My dear KH-834,' and Kira savored the name, ‘the word “temporary” particularly when used by our beloved Service, has elastic qualities of infinite expansion. Also, another team, with drone transports, is recruiting orphans from unsocialized worlds to insure the proper age variations. But born children aren't
our
concern.'

‘The heavens be praised!' Helva muttered under her breath. She did not have room to transport many active live bodies nor the inclination, not so soon after Ravel.

Kira smiled back at Helva over her shoulder as she contacted the Hospital Unit to request transfer.

‘Will you activate the pumping equipment?' she asked Helva, who was in the process of doing just that.

The miles of plastic tubing, once filled with the tiny sacs of fertilized ova, would contain the nutritive and amniotic fluids necessary for the growth of the embryos.

The continuous ribbon of tiny compartments, each with its minute living organism, was prepared for the voyage with the caution and care of a major surgical operation on a head of planet. Each segment must contact an intake point for the nutritive fluid and an outgo valve for the dispersal of wastes. Each meter of ribbon was inspected to insure that the proper contact was made. The ribbon and its fluids as well as the encasing tube buffered the embryos with more invulnerability against the rigors of space travel than had they been carried in a natural womb. As long as the KH-834 made the journey to Nekkar within the 4 weeks, all 30,000 fetuses would live to be born.

It became apparent to Helva that Kira was dedicated, in a detached if professional way, to the assignment. Central Worlds might be relying on a maternal instinct as additional insurance for the mission. Helva, to her inner amusement, found herself, the pituitarily inhibited shell-person, rising nobly to the
challenge. Kira, obviously young enough to some day enjoy motherhood, was completely uninvolved. Yet the affinity Helva felt toward these minute voyagers was basically a shell reaction. They were, after all, encapsulated as she was, the difference being that they would one day burst from their scientific husks, as she never could nor even desired to. Still, she felt a growing protectiveness, above and beyond the ordinary, toward her passengers. The situation didn't appear to touch Kira's psyche, and that puzzled Helva.

She struggled to identify the coldness of Kira's reaction and could not. Then the technicians who had effected the installation of the precious cargo withdrew, and Helva was busy with the mechanics of takeoff.

It was a pleasure to have a passenger who knew how to take care of herself. Not that Theoda had been a burden in the psychological sense of the word, but Kira knew the procedures and Helva did not need to spare a thought toward her. Takeoff was under minimum thrust, not that the triply buffered embryos could suffer damage had she blasted off with all power, but Helva preferred to take no unnecessary chances and there was plenty of time to reach Nekkar in Böotes' sector.

First planet of call would be Talitha, where 40,000 future citizens of Nekkar had been prepared. After lift, Kira made a careful check on all circuits in the nursery, confirmed her findings
with Helva's remote monitors and informed Cencom that they were clear of Regulus and driving toward Talitha.

The formalities ended, Kira swung slowly around in the gimbaled pilot's chair. Her slenderness lost in the padded armchair, she seemed both too fragile and young for her responsibilities.

‘The larder is well stocked,' Helva suggested.

Kira stretched leisurely, moving her shoulders around to ease the taut muscles across her back. She shook her head sharply, sending a shower of hair fasteners slithering across the cabin as her braids came tumbling out of the coronet. Helva watched, fascinated. Shoulder-length hair was the common fashion among spacewomen. The tips of Kira's braids brushed the floor. Whatever maturity she possessed departed with the severe coiffeur. Like the prototype of an ancient fantasy creature, Kira rose from the pilot's chair and moved across the deck to the galley.

‘You wouldn't by any remote computational factor stock a beverage known as coffee?' Kira asked wistfully.

Helva chuckled, remembering Onro. It seemed to be an occupational necessity.

‘I have three times as much as normal service inventory suggests,' Helva assured her.

‘Oh,' and Kira's eyes rolled upward in mock rapture, ‘you
know
! The ship that brought me here was a provincial transport from Draconis and hadn't a drop on board. I nearly perished.'

Kira flipped open the proper cabinet and broke the heat-seal, sniffing deeply as the fragrant aroma rose from the heating liquid. She gulped down a sip, grimacing against the heat. With an expression of intense relief, she leaned against the counter. ‘You and I are going to do nobly together Helva. I'm sure of it.'

Helva caught the rasp of fatigue in the lilting voice. Would she always receive passengers in the advance stages of exhaustion? Or was something the matter with Helva that all her visitors tended to fall asleep once aboard her? As a nursery ship this could be an asset, Helva thought acidly.

‘It's been a long day for you, Kira. Why don't you get some rest? I'm staying up anyway.'

Kira chuckled knowing that the brain ships never slept. She glanced toward the cargo holds.

‘I'll listen with all ears perked,' Helva reassured her.

‘I'll just finish my coffee and take a short snooze,' Kira agreed. At the cabin door she turned back toward Helva's column, cocking her head slightly, her green eyes sparkling.

‘Helva, do you peek?' Her expression was prim to the pursing of her lips.

‘I assure you,' Helva replied with great dignity, ‘I am a very properly mannered ship, Scout.'

‘I shall expect you to conduct yourself decorously at all times as behooves a person in your position in life,' Kira replied so haughtily that Helva imagined her pedigree sprinkled with royal ancestors.

Head high, Kira stepped into her cabin only to trip on one of her swinging braids and tumble into the room. Helva was sorely tempted to get a glimpse of Kira's face.

‘Don't you dare look in!' Kira exclaimed, her voice breaking with laughter.

Helva had promised nothing about turning off sound and heard Kira giggling softly. In a short while only the sound of a sleeper's shallow, slow breathing broke the stillness of the ship.

Helva took out of the file the portion of the tape which followed the hold-cue. The excerpt was brief and enigmatic.

‘Scout Mirsky is a practicing Dylanist, accepting this assignment in Central World Service without suspension of her craft. Accordingly she is not to be permitted shore leave on the following planets, as her activities constitute an infringement of planetary laws restricting proselytization of government groups and/or an embarrassment to Central World Service: Ras Algothi, Ras Alhague, and Sabek. Subject Scout and Ship designate are not, repeat, are not, to approach planets of stars Baham and Homan in the Pegasus Sector or planets of stars Beid and Keid in the Eridanus Sector.'

Nothing could be clearer than that, but the reasoning behind such restrictions was unfathomable. And Kira was a practicing Dylanist, whatever that was. The name had a familiar ring and the guitar that Kira cherished suggested a musical group of some sort. Well, mused Helva,
she'd let it come up in conversation naturally.

The 6 days to Talitha were livened by Kira's rapid switches of mood and manner, from gamine to queen, welcome to Helva after Theoda's stolidness and as counterpoint to her painful memories of Jennan. Helva literally did not know what Kira would do next. However, when it came time to check their passengers, Kira was deftly professional and painstakingly thorough.

Dubhe, the second planet on their tour, called in to confirm a contribution of 40,000 fertilized ova, to be ready at touchdown. Kira checked computations on ETA at Dubhe, arriving at the same figure simultaneously with Helva. Child she might look, child she might play, but Kira's working mind was sharp and accurate.

The transfer at Talitha went without undue incident because Kira's acute attention to detail averted the one possible accident. An attendant, too eager to finish his assignment, tripped over the leads to a fluid tank in the now-crowded cargo hold.

Kira lit into him with a furious catalogue of his ancestors, his present worth, his future career potential, and his probable imminent demise if he repeated his awkwardness. She did so in three languages other than Basic that Helva knew and several that had the advantage of sounding ever more vicious. Yet the minute she had exhausted her choler, she turned, coolly collected, to the head of the detail with apologies.

Once lifted from Talitha, Kira shook loose the pins that held her braids and settled in the pilot's chair with a sigh of relief.

‘I caught three of your descriptions of him, but the others were beyond me.'

‘I find that old Terran Russian, mixed with liberal neumagyarosag, is extremely vitriolic in sound,' Kira said. ‘Actually I was only repeating a recipe for a protein dish called paprikash. It sounds much, much worse, doesn't it?' She grinned broadly at Helva, her green eyes wide.