Princess of the Void

A shift in the bed's surface awakens him, as Sykora slips out from the covers. He doesn’t open his eyes. He hears her moving around the cabin, the sound of her getting dressed and made up. As she brushes her hair, she hums quietly to herself. He recognizes the tune, a Sister Rosetta Tharpe song he played for her back on Maekyon—Earth. Back on Earth.

He hears the scratching of a pen. There’s another subtle shift in the bed as Sykora returns and places something on her pillow. He hears her breath pause. Her hair brushes his exposed shoulder as she leans in and lays a slow, gentle kiss on his temple. And then she’s gone, the hydraulic hiss of the cabin door announcing her exit.

He feels a pang of loneliness. And he admits it to himself: It’s not his old life he’s yearning for. Maybe it never was.

Those thighs pressing together so softly, his treacherous brain whispers. What would they feel like pressing on you? That body. So small, but so full. So yielding to the touch. She’s right about you. You might break first.

For the first time, he lets himself picture it fully. Being Sykora’s husband. Discovering her routines and her loves. Letting her dote on him and tease him, and teasing her back, the way they talked before lunch on Ptolek II. Standing by her side at her affairs of state and trading little affectionate touches, without artifice or reservation. Sharing her bed, and watching her shake and whimper the way she did last night, but from above her, inside her.

This is dangerous. This is Stockholm Syndrome. He must stand firm. He can’t want her truly until he can want her by choice.

His lethargy rises again, and he lets it clamber back into dominion over his mind. Sleep isn’t nearly so confusing.

When he awakens again, he’s still alone in Sykora’s expansive bed. There’s a folded-up piece of paper lying on her pillow.

Darling—

Early meeting today with the chief engineer. Apparently, there are a dozen obsolescences per square foot that MUST be addressed or we’ll all suck cold vacuum. Waian says our fine vessel is a creaking jalopy. Who knew?

You may employ the cabin in whatever way you please. Should you wish to tour any part of the Pike, I’ve made Hyax available to you. Don’t take any of her grousing personally or let her intimidate you—it’s how she is. The price we so often pay for talented people. She’s a doll, honestly. Just a chewed-up doll with its felt all crinkly.

Breakfast is in the nook and there’s a communicator for you on the nightstand. My contact information and Hyax’s are both present, though I’ll be slow to respond while Waian tries to budge my budget.

I wish

I hope that

I will be free at 1300 hours and would be grateful for your company back in our cabin. I hope to have a surprise for you!! A very chaste & proper one. Hands to myself. Promise.

Your wife,

Fondly,

Sykora

Grant eats breakfast. Today it’s a wedge of grainy, seeded bread, crusty and fluffy and fresh from the oven, accompanied by an oblong rinded fruit in an eggplant shade of purple, which he peels to reveal a creamy, peppery flesh that sticks to his fingers like brie.

He picks up the communicator and flicks its on switch. Most Taiikari technology he’s witnessed so far is minimalist and tactile—all big, chunky controls and purpose-built programs. The communicator’s a stark contrast from his old phone with its dozens of apps. Its sole menu is a white-on-black list of names, and the extent of its controls are a scroll wheel, and two pleasingly clicky buttons.

It’s still disconcerting, the way the alien glyphs trigger the pathways in his mind. He scrolls from the first entry, which Sykora named MY BEAUTIFUL WIFE, to the second entry, BRIGADIER SOURPUSS.

He picks one of the buttons at random and presses it. The menu flickers and the word SPEAK appears on it.

“Um. Hello, Brigadier Hyax.” As he says it, the sentence appears onscreen. “The Princess says you’re available to escort me within the ship. I don’t have any specific destinations in mind—I guess I don’t know enough about the place. But I’d be grateful to visit anywhere that might educate me.” He clicks the button again. The text stays in place.

Three familiar dots appear beneath it. They resolve into a response.

on my way

you text like a grandmother

“The keyboard is a slide-out. Like this.” Hyax pulls and the communicator’s back slots downward, revealing a circular touch panel that looks like a radar screen.

Grant squints at it. “How do I use that?”

“I will leave a more patient being to show you how to type, Maekyonite.” Hyax slides the lift’s door shut with the push of a diode. “Shall I teach you how to shoot a Taiikari gun?”

Grant perks up. “Hey, all right.”

“Promise you won’t kill your wife with it.”

“Sykora mentioned you were brusque.”

“We’re going to be going to the far end of the Pike. I’m going to boost us.” Hyax’s tail flicks the catch on a button Grant hadn’t noticed before, large and bright yellow. “Kindly keep your hand on the rail.”

Grant has to crouch to close his fist around the railing. He braces himself. Hyax hits the button. The expected burst of speed doesn’t come. Instead, there’s a queer weightless feeling in his chest and Hyax floats from the ground. Her tail loops around the railing and she crosses her legs, canting to one side as they go.

A hum rises in pitch. One wall of the lift is glass, and he watches through it as the floors they skid past become a flickering blur of light and color.

“How fast are we going?” he asks.

“The firing range is near the tail of the spire,” Hyax says. “About a mile. So…”

The flickering slows and becomes floors whizzing by again. Grant sees a crewmate strolling along what he thought was a wall, and realizes that the lift is turning in space as well. By the time it stops and dings, it’s back in alignment. Hyax’s legs unfold just in time—the gravity kicks in and her chunky combat boots tap onto the ground.

“That fast,” she says.

“How does the gravity work?” he asks.

She disembarks. “What does it matter?”

“I’m just curious.” He follows her down a clinically-lit hallway. “It’s fascinating. I thought maybe it was from the engine thrust, but then how would the lift—”

“Inquire with Chief Engineer Waian.” Hyax interrupts him. “She’ll quickly cure you of that. The woman has an endless appetite for words like centripetal.”

She rests the edge of her tail on a panel on the wall. The light above it blinks green. They step through a sliding door (Grant, as usual, stoops) into a floor-to-ceiling arsenal of chunky black firepower.

Between a rack of heavy-caliber marksman rifles and a gaggle of grenade launchers, Hyax plucks a pistol from the wall. “Here we are. Unprinted.” She presses her thumb to its switch and it blinks blue. She passes it to him. He imitates her action. “Thirty seconds after first activation, it imprints on any thumb that’s supplied. Like a baby tek’ka bird. That’s yours now.”

He gingerly takes the pistol. It’s small in his hand, like one of those James Bond guns, but it’s heavier than it looks. “Does Sykora know you’re giving me this?”

She passes him a holster. “Are you going to tell her?”

“I guess not.”

“Test failed. Now it’s mine again.” She presses her tail to another door, which releases a trilling five-second buzz and then slides open. “Step through.”

He bends his head again. He’s going to clock himself on one of these some day.

They emerge into a cavernous shooting range. A pool of light illuminates their firing platform; the tunnel beyond is massive and polygonal, studded in places along every facet, floor-to-wall-to-ceiling, with craggy outcroppings and geometric cover. Two Taiikari, a man and a woman, look up from their booths, pulling their shooting earmuffs off.

“Brigadier.” The woman salutes, fist-to-chest. She’s tall for a Taiikari, and a fetching shade of periwinkle. “Uh. And Prince Consort.” She salutes him, too, though her fascination slows her.

“Comrades.” Hyax’s voice echoes. “Kindly give us the chamber.”

She indicates her broad-chested, goggled companion. “Ensign Kamen and I were in the middle of a shooting competition, Brigadier.”

“You may flirt with Ensign Kamen outside the firing range, Gefreitor Reina. Clock out and I’ll permit you back in once we’re finished here.”

“This doesn’t mean we reset,” Reina says, as the Taiikari pack up. “I’m still ahead fifteen to twelve in points.”

Ensign Kamen stows his rifle onto a magnetized harness. “See, I remember fourteen.”

They continue bickering on their way out of the chamber.

Hyax pulls a lever by the chamber entrance. With a deep rumble, the tunnel beyond the platform rotates clockwise, until the lane directly before the booths is a smooth, slotted plane.

Hyax taps a console by the closest booth and presses a foot pedal. A set of a half dozen thin wooden targets shunt from the floor.

“Here we are.” She gestures to them. “You’ve shot a gun before?”

“On Maekyon,” he says. “Once or twice.”

“Let’s see Maekyonite technique, then.” She passes him a pair of shooting muffs.

He slips them on, squares up in as close to a Modified Weaver stance as he can remember, aims down the sights, and fires.

The recoil he was expecting is barely enough to jostle his wrist. An outsize hole, the size of a fist, blasts out of the closest target’s center mass. Four more shots. The action is so smooth this thing almost feels like a toy, like an arcade center gun, if not for the splintering craters it’s opening.

“Better than I expected.” Hyax peers downrange. “Your stance is odd. You were expecting more recoil, I think.”

“I was.”

“I’ll feel superior about that, then, if not your accuracy.” She turns and saunters toward the armory. “I’ll fetch my own pistol, and then I can give you the diatribe I’d intended to give you.”

“A diatribe? What have I done to earn a diatribe?”

“It's what you haven't done.” She opens the armory door. “Your ridiculous abstinence from your smokeshow wife.”

“How do you know about that?”

“Because I’m not a fool, Prince Consort.” Hyax rolls her eyes. “Every time I see her, the Princess is jumpy, distracted, and so desperate for dick that she’s clawing her eyes out. That is not a well-fucked woman. Excuse me a moment while I pick a sidearm.”

He sighs and places the gun on his booth counter. “Promise you won’t shoot me."

“I promise I won’t shoot you,” she calls. “Fatally.”