Original: "The Remnant Fleet," Chapter 26
SO MANY WORDS WRITTEN TODAY. :D And this is not the end. It's extremely very close to the end, but it is not the end.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The Biju Sprinter was towed into the hangar bay of the Wakerran ship, where Bauwerji could see a squadron of small fighter ships waiting to be sent out. Sautoriau mercenaries were also waiting for her in three rows of three. It was quite a response; she wondered if she should feel honored that the Wakerran considered her such a threat that she sent so many guards to escort her.
The ship landed with a quiet thump, and the Sau surrounded it with their weapons drawn. She was ordered to surrender herself without delay or belligerence. The canopy slid back and she pushed herself up into a crouching position on the saddle. One of the Sau climbed up to secure her wrists before hauling her out of the cockpit.
“If you do anything to my ship, wait until I’m dead. Otherwise, I’m coming after you.”
The Sau looked over her bloody, bruised form and hissed through his teeth. “I doubt we’ll have to wait long.”
She was limping when they led her out of the hangar. She was covered in sweat, and something was dripping down her face. Whether it was blood or sweat, she couldn’t tell. The Sau enclosed her in a circle, all of them at least a head taller than her, all of them armed to the teeth. Whenever she was too slow, they nudged her forward with a clawed hand or the butt of their gun. She shuffled her feet, the right one dragging because it wouldn’t step properly. That could be a problem in the future. If she had a future.
The corridors were identical to the last Wakerran ship she’d been on. She had memorized the layout the first time, so she didn’t have to expend her attention to remember the way back to the hangar. Instead she tried to think of a way to still be alive in ten minutes, to need the escape route. Currently the only thing she could fathom was if Indira activated the weapon and wiped out every Sau aboard. She could take care of the Socigines herself, if necessary. Almost as if to mock that idea, she felt a flash of pain from the cut on her side from her first encounter with the Wakerran people.
They arrived at the bridge, where she saw the first difference from the first ship: this Socigines had a vast control center built up around what looked to be a throne. She was svelte and gorgeous, her legs folded up underneath her. She smiled when Bauwerji was brought into the room but kept her dark-eyed gaze locked on the screen in front of her.
“I could have just destroyed your ship and moved on.”
“Thanks for choosing the personal touch,” Bauwerji said.
The Socigines grinned wider. “I know I look different from you, but we have met before. Twice now. I almost feel as if I’m about to wage war against you, Bauwerji Crow.”
She started to respond, but a thought occurred to her. “Telepathy, right? That’s how you’re connected to the other Socigines?”
“No,” she said, “but it’s close enough for you to comprehend, so if you wish to call it that...”
“And you can only invade someone’s mind if they let you in?”
The Socigines said, “As you can tell by the fact I’m not making you kill yourself right now.”
Bauwerji stepped away from her Sau escorts. “I want you to think about something. Your twin, or double, or however you think of yourselves, is our prisoner right now. She’s locked in a cell with at least a dozen weapons aimed at her. Will you feel it when she dies? Never mind. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that she managed to take control of two people on our station. One is dead and the other is in custody.”
“Foot soldiers. What do I care?”
“You care because of what that represents. You think you can wipe us out with some superweapon? Good luck. You might take out a species. You might defeat a planet. A few billion lives lost. It would be a tragedy. But you know what else it would be? A call to arms. Every species in this quadrant would rain down hellfire on your heads.”
The Socigines smirked. “Well... except the Ladronis.”
“Wanna bet?” Bauwerji stepped closer to the throne. The Sau brought up their weapons, but Bauwerji ignored them. “I’m giving you permission to look inside my head, because I want you to fully appreciate what I’m about to say. Go on. Go way back. Know who is speaking to you. My name is Bauwerji Cro--”
“Daughter of Omjia Crow, Kellen Crow, and Jania Crow. Granddaughter of We’quean Crow. Great-granddaughter of--”
She blinked away the memory. For a moment she had been back there, standing in the clay dome of the opvoedor’s study. She looked at the Socigines and focused on another memory from about a year later, on a warm mid-year night, when the heat lingered long after the sun had set. In the middle of the wildflowers, when she
crouched and used her blackened fingernails to pluck a wild-haired flower from its stem. Bochelm, the girl who had been racing ahead in the moonlight, came jogging back. Her skirts swayed around her hips like part of the night that had broken free to clutch at her body. She crouched and pushed her hair out of her eyes. Bauwerji held up the flower and touched Bochelm’s nose with it. Bochelm waved her hands, ducked her chin against her chest, and sneezed.
“You sound like an ardilja.”
“I do not.” She rubbed her nose vigorously with the back of her hand.
Bauwerji snickered and twisted the stem of the flower between her finger and thumb. “It’s okay. I think they are very cute.”
Bochelm pulled her lips back to reveal her upper teeth, wrinkling her nose and crossing her eyes in a mockery of an ardilja. She curled her fingers and made chittering noises. “Am I? Maybe I am! I am a nasty little pest hiding in your trees!”
“You are more of a pest than a whole clot of ardilja!” She threw the flower at Bochelm and stood, turning to flee. Bochelm pursued, but her skirt hindered her ability to sprint. The space between them grew until finally Bochelm stopped and put her hands on her knees.
“Bauwerji! Please, don’t leave me behind!”
Bauwerji stopped and turned. She looked at her friend, the desperation in her eyes, and jogged back to her. “I was only playing.”
“I know.” She touched Bauwerji’s cheeks. “Don’t leave me.”
“I won’t. Not ever.” She tilted her head and touched her lips to her friend’s. Bochelm collapsed against her, and Bauwerji opened her mouth. She felt herself growing against her uniform trousers, aroused in a way she never had been with her male partners. Bochelm felt it against her hip and moaned into Bauwerji’s mouth.
They made love there, standing, their clothing pushed aside rather than removed. Bauwerji wept when she came, and tears rolled down her cheeks when her best friend knelt in the mud and took her erect clitoris into her mouth. It was glorious, more than she had ever hoped for. She opened her eyes and looked up at the stars as she climaxed against Bochelm’s tongue, knowing that her destiny was in the stars and in the love of a beautiful woman.
She flinched away from the memory, the unexpected pain at remembering her lost love. Bochelm had survived the initial Catarrh attack, but they lost track of each other soon afterward. Bauwerji assumed she was dead, but she had no way of knowing for certain. Her heart ached but she focused on the Socigines that had just experienced the same moment.
“A little girl, barely in her twos, picking flowers in the moonlight. So simple. We thought we had known hardship. We didn’t know a goddamn thing. We didn’t know what fear was. We didn’t know how far we could be pushed and still survive.” She took another step closer. “Look again. Look ahead five years and see what that girl was doi--”
Don’t see him as a person, she told herself. If you see them as people, you’re done. You can’t do what needs to be done and your people die. Your people fucking die, so stop crying and do what needs to be done. She was speaking out loud, she realized, and she pinched her lips shut so she wouldn’t get blood in her mouth. The Catarrh lay underneath her, the bone of his skull-plate shattered. His teeth were around him on the ground. Bauwerji realized she was crying.
She pulled upward on the knife and peeled away another strip of muscle. Her hands were trembling when she dumped it in the upturned helmet. Meat was meat. Catarrh meat was stringy and tasted odd, but it was protein and she needed protein. All her people needed a proper meal. She swallowed her bile and cut into the soldier’s body again, fresh tears washing the dirt from her face.
Don’t see him as a person, she told herself.
“That was my first war,” Bauwerji said. “What do you want to see next? My Karezz supervisor telling me to take my jumpsuit off so he could fuck me from behind while I worked on the Sprinter? How about when my ship was skimming close enough to the Cetidroi warships that I could see the rivets holding it together? I could feel the heat coming off of it. How about the smell of burning flesh because I stood by and watched as a Catarrh transport burned? I’d jammed the doors. I lit the incendiary. And I burned seven men alive. Or how about this one?”
Bochelm and Bauwerji lay together on a high platform, nestled against the ceiling of their room. They had just finished making love. Bauwerji was still sore, her thighs still wet. Her hair was loose, the braids meant to honor her family not yet tied. Bochelm asked, “Where would you like to be stationed?”
“With you.”
Bochelm kissed Bauwerji’s nipple. “No. Seriously. Where?”
“Somewhere quiet. I would like to be stationed in a tall tree somewhere. Taller than all the others around it so I have a carpet of green under my feet. And at night, I can see the moons and the stars and I can smell wildfires in the distance.”
“Sounds peaceful.”
“Mm. Somewhere peaceful. A quiet place.” She nuzzled Bochelm’s hair. “That would be paradise. Especially if you are there with me.”
“I never got my quiet place,” Bauwerji said gravely. “Look at me. My side is barely stitched shut. I’m covered with blood. I think I might’ve broken my leg, and I don’t even know where. My hand... I cut open my hand on a broken dish I used as a shiv. I have killed. I’ve slaughtered people. The girl who dreamed about spending her entire life in a tree killed someone less than an hour ago because she was in my way.”
The Socigines was no longer smiling. “What does any of this have to do with our current stalemate?”
“Because I want you to know exactly what you’re doing. You’re a scout, right? You’re supposed to report back to the Wakerran what they can expect if they invade us?” She held her arms out to either side and stepped back. “This. They can expect me, and entire planets of people like me. You tell us it’s a hopeless fight? You threaten us with destruction? Then you’d better kill every prolekta one of us in the same instant or the survivors will come after you. We will sacrifice everything. The things that make us who we are? We’ll toss it aside so we can survive. If you go to war with us, we will fight. We may not win. But we’ll take as many of you with us as possible.”
The Socigines said, “The Wakerran are prepared to do whatever is necessary...”
“For what? Why? Just to say it was done? If you get that stone, you waltz in here... say you take out the Karezz first. Please do. You’d be doing everyone a favor. But the Paisian won’t stand idly by. I think your ships won’t stand up against one of theirs for long. That’s why you’re just sitting here. You’re waiting for your pals to show up and lend a hand. But if you declare war on us, we’re not going to play fair. We’re not going to wait for your reinforcements.”
“Your fellow species are... not... capable of...”
“War. The great innovator. Some of the greatest and most terrible things have been invented to wage war. Can’t wait to see what the Occamian come up with. Or the Irikoan. Or if the Sau wise up and realize you’re just saving them for last.” She looked at the mercenaries. “You consider that at all? If your little goons decide to have an uprising before you destroy their planet?”
The Socigines looked distinctly uncomfortable.
“How much is it worth to you, Socigines? How many Wakerran are ready to die just to clean out this sector? This cluster of races they’ve never even met? How many are willing to lay down their lives for this cause? Can you even estimate how many it would take? You have a chance to find out. Roll on, open fire, and start this war for your people. Go to war against every Balanquin, Karezz, Occamian, Irikoan, Paisian, and Karezz in this system. You might wipe some of us out. You might exterminate all of us eventually. But the Wakerran are going to suffer heavy losses before they achieve that victory. So I’m going to ask you one more time.”
She stepped up to the base of the throne and looked into the Wakerran woman’s dark eyes.
“Is it worth it? Is this a war you really want to wage?”
Silence from the Wakerran. Bauwerji could hear the Sau mercenaries breathing from across the room. She was trembling, from fear or blood loss or shock, she didn’t know or care. She refused to look away from her opponent.
“My sister is unharmed?”
“As far as I know.”
“You will release her at once.”
“If you want her, you’re more than welcome to have her.”
The Socigines curled her hands into fists. “We will come into conflict one day, Bauwerji Crow. Perhaps not in your lifetime, but it is inevitable.”
“Maybe so. We’ll be waiting for you.”
“Take her back to her ship.” One of the Sau made a shocked noise. The Socigines ignored it. “I will expect my sister to be delivered at once.”
Bauwerji said, “The sooner she’s off the station, the happier we’ll all be.”
She turned and walked away. The adrenaline was fading, and now she could feel pain coming in from all corners. She was almost to the door when the Socigines spoke again.
“Balanquin.” Bauwerji turned. The Socigines was again facing forward. “You’re a formidable opponent. I would not be eager to go against you in a fight. And you don’t have to worry. I have released my hold on your mind.”
“Good,” Bauwerji said, since she couldn’t think of any other response.
“I hope we meet again.”
“All due respect, I don’t. Once you have your sister, you’re gone. You stay on your side of the universe, we stay on ours.”
The Socigines nodded slowly.
Bauwerji turned and limped back into the corridor. The Sau followed her, confusion radiating off them like heat or a bad smell. They trailed her all the way to the hangar and stood silently as she mounted her ship, settled on the saddle, and sank forward. She caressed the controls, exhaustion settling over her like a cloak as she fired up the engines. She was still trembling as she activated the reverse thrusters out of the hangar and back into the gentle currents of space.
Once she was clear of the ship, she opened a channel to the Quay. “Officer Bauwerji Crow to Admiral Reshef.”
“Bauwerji? Please tell me you’re in one piece. You fell off sensors a while ago.”
“Mm. Yeah. Sorry. Got... snapped up. Listen, ‘Dira. You have to release the Socigines. Let her go back to her ship.”
Indira said, “You negotiated a prisoner exchange?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Not to sound ungrateful, but what do we get in return?”
Bauwerji sighed. “Peace, Indira. We get peace.”
Silence. And then, “We’re preparing her for transport now.”
“Good. I m-might need some help at the docks. I think I can get the Sprinter home, but I’m feeling really weak, Admiral. Feeling tired.”
Indira’s voice was soft. “I’ll be there for you, Bauwerji. I promise.”
Bauwerji nodded. “Good. I’ll see you... I’ll see you then.”
“We’ll light the way for you.”
Bauwerji opened her eyes and looked out ahead. Past the Karezz and Paisian blockade, through the sea of broken ships, the Quay shone like a beacon. It was fully powered, it would seem. All systems go. It looked like Heaven. Bauwerji smiled at the sight of it and tightened her grip on the Sprinter’s controls. It wasn’t as far away as it looked, she decided, and she pushed her foot down to speed her return home.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The Biju Sprinter was towed into the hangar bay of the Wakerran ship, where Bauwerji could see a squadron of small fighter ships waiting to be sent out. Sautoriau mercenaries were also waiting for her in three rows of three. It was quite a response; she wondered if she should feel honored that the Wakerran considered her such a threat that she sent so many guards to escort her.
The ship landed with a quiet thump, and the Sau surrounded it with their weapons drawn. She was ordered to surrender herself without delay or belligerence. The canopy slid back and she pushed herself up into a crouching position on the saddle. One of the Sau climbed up to secure her wrists before hauling her out of the cockpit.
“If you do anything to my ship, wait until I’m dead. Otherwise, I’m coming after you.”
The Sau looked over her bloody, bruised form and hissed through his teeth. “I doubt we’ll have to wait long.”
She was limping when they led her out of the hangar. She was covered in sweat, and something was dripping down her face. Whether it was blood or sweat, she couldn’t tell. The Sau enclosed her in a circle, all of them at least a head taller than her, all of them armed to the teeth. Whenever she was too slow, they nudged her forward with a clawed hand or the butt of their gun. She shuffled her feet, the right one dragging because it wouldn’t step properly. That could be a problem in the future. If she had a future.
The corridors were identical to the last Wakerran ship she’d been on. She had memorized the layout the first time, so she didn’t have to expend her attention to remember the way back to the hangar. Instead she tried to think of a way to still be alive in ten minutes, to need the escape route. Currently the only thing she could fathom was if Indira activated the weapon and wiped out every Sau aboard. She could take care of the Socigines herself, if necessary. Almost as if to mock that idea, she felt a flash of pain from the cut on her side from her first encounter with the Wakerran people.
They arrived at the bridge, where she saw the first difference from the first ship: this Socigines had a vast control center built up around what looked to be a throne. She was svelte and gorgeous, her legs folded up underneath her. She smiled when Bauwerji was brought into the room but kept her dark-eyed gaze locked on the screen in front of her.
“I could have just destroyed your ship and moved on.”
“Thanks for choosing the personal touch,” Bauwerji said.
The Socigines grinned wider. “I know I look different from you, but we have met before. Twice now. I almost feel as if I’m about to wage war against you, Bauwerji Crow.”
She started to respond, but a thought occurred to her. “Telepathy, right? That’s how you’re connected to the other Socigines?”
“No,” she said, “but it’s close enough for you to comprehend, so if you wish to call it that...”
“And you can only invade someone’s mind if they let you in?”
The Socigines said, “As you can tell by the fact I’m not making you kill yourself right now.”
Bauwerji stepped away from her Sau escorts. “I want you to think about something. Your twin, or double, or however you think of yourselves, is our prisoner right now. She’s locked in a cell with at least a dozen weapons aimed at her. Will you feel it when she dies? Never mind. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that she managed to take control of two people on our station. One is dead and the other is in custody.”
“Foot soldiers. What do I care?”
“You care because of what that represents. You think you can wipe us out with some superweapon? Good luck. You might take out a species. You might defeat a planet. A few billion lives lost. It would be a tragedy. But you know what else it would be? A call to arms. Every species in this quadrant would rain down hellfire on your heads.”
The Socigines smirked. “Well... except the Ladronis.”
“Wanna bet?” Bauwerji stepped closer to the throne. The Sau brought up their weapons, but Bauwerji ignored them. “I’m giving you permission to look inside my head, because I want you to fully appreciate what I’m about to say. Go on. Go way back. Know who is speaking to you. My name is Bauwerji Cro--”
“Daughter of Omjia Crow, Kellen Crow, and Jania Crow. Granddaughter of We’quean Crow. Great-granddaughter of--”
She blinked away the memory. For a moment she had been back there, standing in the clay dome of the opvoedor’s study. She looked at the Socigines and focused on another memory from about a year later, on a warm mid-year night, when the heat lingered long after the sun had set. In the middle of the wildflowers, when she
crouched and used her blackened fingernails to pluck a wild-haired flower from its stem. Bochelm, the girl who had been racing ahead in the moonlight, came jogging back. Her skirts swayed around her hips like part of the night that had broken free to clutch at her body. She crouched and pushed her hair out of her eyes. Bauwerji held up the flower and touched Bochelm’s nose with it. Bochelm waved her hands, ducked her chin against her chest, and sneezed.
“You sound like an ardilja.”
“I do not.” She rubbed her nose vigorously with the back of her hand.
Bauwerji snickered and twisted the stem of the flower between her finger and thumb. “It’s okay. I think they are very cute.”
Bochelm pulled her lips back to reveal her upper teeth, wrinkling her nose and crossing her eyes in a mockery of an ardilja. She curled her fingers and made chittering noises. “Am I? Maybe I am! I am a nasty little pest hiding in your trees!”
“You are more of a pest than a whole clot of ardilja!” She threw the flower at Bochelm and stood, turning to flee. Bochelm pursued, but her skirt hindered her ability to sprint. The space between them grew until finally Bochelm stopped and put her hands on her knees.
“Bauwerji! Please, don’t leave me behind!”
Bauwerji stopped and turned. She looked at her friend, the desperation in her eyes, and jogged back to her. “I was only playing.”
“I know.” She touched Bauwerji’s cheeks. “Don’t leave me.”
“I won’t. Not ever.” She tilted her head and touched her lips to her friend’s. Bochelm collapsed against her, and Bauwerji opened her mouth. She felt herself growing against her uniform trousers, aroused in a way she never had been with her male partners. Bochelm felt it against her hip and moaned into Bauwerji’s mouth.
They made love there, standing, their clothing pushed aside rather than removed. Bauwerji wept when she came, and tears rolled down her cheeks when her best friend knelt in the mud and took her erect clitoris into her mouth. It was glorious, more than she had ever hoped for. She opened her eyes and looked up at the stars as she climaxed against Bochelm’s tongue, knowing that her destiny was in the stars and in the love of a beautiful woman.
She flinched away from the memory, the unexpected pain at remembering her lost love. Bochelm had survived the initial Catarrh attack, but they lost track of each other soon afterward. Bauwerji assumed she was dead, but she had no way of knowing for certain. Her heart ached but she focused on the Socigines that had just experienced the same moment.
“A little girl, barely in her twos, picking flowers in the moonlight. So simple. We thought we had known hardship. We didn’t know a goddamn thing. We didn’t know what fear was. We didn’t know how far we could be pushed and still survive.” She took another step closer. “Look again. Look ahead five years and see what that girl was doi--”
Don’t see him as a person, she told herself. If you see them as people, you’re done. You can’t do what needs to be done and your people die. Your people fucking die, so stop crying and do what needs to be done. She was speaking out loud, she realized, and she pinched her lips shut so she wouldn’t get blood in her mouth. The Catarrh lay underneath her, the bone of his skull-plate shattered. His teeth were around him on the ground. Bauwerji realized she was crying.
She pulled upward on the knife and peeled away another strip of muscle. Her hands were trembling when she dumped it in the upturned helmet. Meat was meat. Catarrh meat was stringy and tasted odd, but it was protein and she needed protein. All her people needed a proper meal. She swallowed her bile and cut into the soldier’s body again, fresh tears washing the dirt from her face.
Don’t see him as a person, she told herself.
“That was my first war,” Bauwerji said. “What do you want to see next? My Karezz supervisor telling me to take my jumpsuit off so he could fuck me from behind while I worked on the Sprinter? How about when my ship was skimming close enough to the Cetidroi warships that I could see the rivets holding it together? I could feel the heat coming off of it. How about the smell of burning flesh because I stood by and watched as a Catarrh transport burned? I’d jammed the doors. I lit the incendiary. And I burned seven men alive. Or how about this one?”
Bochelm and Bauwerji lay together on a high platform, nestled against the ceiling of their room. They had just finished making love. Bauwerji was still sore, her thighs still wet. Her hair was loose, the braids meant to honor her family not yet tied. Bochelm asked, “Where would you like to be stationed?”
“With you.”
Bochelm kissed Bauwerji’s nipple. “No. Seriously. Where?”
“Somewhere quiet. I would like to be stationed in a tall tree somewhere. Taller than all the others around it so I have a carpet of green under my feet. And at night, I can see the moons and the stars and I can smell wildfires in the distance.”
“Sounds peaceful.”
“Mm. Somewhere peaceful. A quiet place.” She nuzzled Bochelm’s hair. “That would be paradise. Especially if you are there with me.”
“I never got my quiet place,” Bauwerji said gravely. “Look at me. My side is barely stitched shut. I’m covered with blood. I think I might’ve broken my leg, and I don’t even know where. My hand... I cut open my hand on a broken dish I used as a shiv. I have killed. I’ve slaughtered people. The girl who dreamed about spending her entire life in a tree killed someone less than an hour ago because she was in my way.”
The Socigines was no longer smiling. “What does any of this have to do with our current stalemate?”
“Because I want you to know exactly what you’re doing. You’re a scout, right? You’re supposed to report back to the Wakerran what they can expect if they invade us?” She held her arms out to either side and stepped back. “This. They can expect me, and entire planets of people like me. You tell us it’s a hopeless fight? You threaten us with destruction? Then you’d better kill every prolekta one of us in the same instant or the survivors will come after you. We will sacrifice everything. The things that make us who we are? We’ll toss it aside so we can survive. If you go to war with us, we will fight. We may not win. But we’ll take as many of you with us as possible.”
The Socigines said, “The Wakerran are prepared to do whatever is necessary...”
“For what? Why? Just to say it was done? If you get that stone, you waltz in here... say you take out the Karezz first. Please do. You’d be doing everyone a favor. But the Paisian won’t stand idly by. I think your ships won’t stand up against one of theirs for long. That’s why you’re just sitting here. You’re waiting for your pals to show up and lend a hand. But if you declare war on us, we’re not going to play fair. We’re not going to wait for your reinforcements.”
“Your fellow species are... not... capable of...”
“War. The great innovator. Some of the greatest and most terrible things have been invented to wage war. Can’t wait to see what the Occamian come up with. Or the Irikoan. Or if the Sau wise up and realize you’re just saving them for last.” She looked at the mercenaries. “You consider that at all? If your little goons decide to have an uprising before you destroy their planet?”
The Socigines looked distinctly uncomfortable.
“How much is it worth to you, Socigines? How many Wakerran are ready to die just to clean out this sector? This cluster of races they’ve never even met? How many are willing to lay down their lives for this cause? Can you even estimate how many it would take? You have a chance to find out. Roll on, open fire, and start this war for your people. Go to war against every Balanquin, Karezz, Occamian, Irikoan, Paisian, and Karezz in this system. You might wipe some of us out. You might exterminate all of us eventually. But the Wakerran are going to suffer heavy losses before they achieve that victory. So I’m going to ask you one more time.”
She stepped up to the base of the throne and looked into the Wakerran woman’s dark eyes.
“Is it worth it? Is this a war you really want to wage?”
Silence from the Wakerran. Bauwerji could hear the Sau mercenaries breathing from across the room. She was trembling, from fear or blood loss or shock, she didn’t know or care. She refused to look away from her opponent.
“My sister is unharmed?”
“As far as I know.”
“You will release her at once.”
“If you want her, you’re more than welcome to have her.”
The Socigines curled her hands into fists. “We will come into conflict one day, Bauwerji Crow. Perhaps not in your lifetime, but it is inevitable.”
“Maybe so. We’ll be waiting for you.”
“Take her back to her ship.” One of the Sau made a shocked noise. The Socigines ignored it. “I will expect my sister to be delivered at once.”
Bauwerji said, “The sooner she’s off the station, the happier we’ll all be.”
She turned and walked away. The adrenaline was fading, and now she could feel pain coming in from all corners. She was almost to the door when the Socigines spoke again.
“Balanquin.” Bauwerji turned. The Socigines was again facing forward. “You’re a formidable opponent. I would not be eager to go against you in a fight. And you don’t have to worry. I have released my hold on your mind.”
“Good,” Bauwerji said, since she couldn’t think of any other response.
“I hope we meet again.”
“All due respect, I don’t. Once you have your sister, you’re gone. You stay on your side of the universe, we stay on ours.”
The Socigines nodded slowly.
Bauwerji turned and limped back into the corridor. The Sau followed her, confusion radiating off them like heat or a bad smell. They trailed her all the way to the hangar and stood silently as she mounted her ship, settled on the saddle, and sank forward. She caressed the controls, exhaustion settling over her like a cloak as she fired up the engines. She was still trembling as she activated the reverse thrusters out of the hangar and back into the gentle currents of space.
Once she was clear of the ship, she opened a channel to the Quay. “Officer Bauwerji Crow to Admiral Reshef.”
“Bauwerji? Please tell me you’re in one piece. You fell off sensors a while ago.”
“Mm. Yeah. Sorry. Got... snapped up. Listen, ‘Dira. You have to release the Socigines. Let her go back to her ship.”
Indira said, “You negotiated a prisoner exchange?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Not to sound ungrateful, but what do we get in return?”
Bauwerji sighed. “Peace, Indira. We get peace.”
Silence. And then, “We’re preparing her for transport now.”
“Good. I m-might need some help at the docks. I think I can get the Sprinter home, but I’m feeling really weak, Admiral. Feeling tired.”
Indira’s voice was soft. “I’ll be there for you, Bauwerji. I promise.”
Bauwerji nodded. “Good. I’ll see you... I’ll see you then.”
“We’ll light the way for you.”
Bauwerji opened her eyes and looked out ahead. Past the Karezz and Paisian blockade, through the sea of broken ships, the Quay shone like a beacon. It was fully powered, it would seem. All systems go. It looked like Heaven. Bauwerji smiled at the sight of it and tightened her grip on the Sprinter’s controls. It wasn’t as far away as it looked, she decided, and she pushed her foot down to speed her return home.