Conversations on the Fortune’s Smile: Nine

Nerila checked the controls on the last biostorage stasis unit. Like the others, it was at optimal. Like the others, it would keep the corpse inside exactly as it had been at almost the moment of death, give or take the time for transport and the autopsy. 

Except unit 3, Nerila thought. Helmi Alpassi. Not quite as she was at death. 

About six inches shorter, for one thing.

She turned to leave, saw an unexpected figure in the doorway and felt her heart-rate kick into overdrive in the second it took her to identify her visitor.  Fisk.

"Gonna make you wear a  bell around your neck," she said, aware her voice was shaking. 

"Sorry," Fisk said. "You looked busy."

Nerila shrugged. "Administration, mostly." She around at the stasis units and back at Fisk. "Probably not the greatest idea for you to be down here, Fisk."

He followed her gaze. "I wanted to talk to you. Your tech said you were down here."

"What about?" she asked. "No, wait. Come on."  

When she took his arm to draw him with her out of the room and towards her office it was a couple of seconds before the bicep beneath her fingers relaxed and he acceded to her urging. Nerila got him into her office with the door closed before she said anything else.  

"How are you feeling, Fisk?" she asked, pointing him at the visitor's chair.  

"Fine." He shrugged as he sat, ran one hand over the fuzz beginning to show on his scalp. "Like nothing worse happened than a bad haircut."

"Mmm hmm?" Nerila fished a scanner from her drawer and pointed it at him. "Headaches? Dizzy spells? Sleeping okay?"

"No. No. Yes."

The scanner gave her readings in the normal range.  Pulse a little fast. Nothing that she wouldn't expect to see in a fit and healthy young man under a fair bit of stress. "So what did you want to talk to me about, Fisk?"

He hesitated, looked down at his hands, and then met her gaze. "Cloning."

"What about cloning?" Nerila asked gently and evenly.  

"That body ...  my body. Is it possible ... can you clone that brain? That pattern?"

"No, Fisk. Cloning only works on a living brain. Otherwise we would have. Back-ups are the sec-" She stopped.

"Second best option?" Fisk finished for her.  

"Medically." Nerila stressed. "Because it's not guaranteed. That's all."

"Sure," Fisk said. "Sure." He hesitated again. "So, you can't put that pattern - those memories on a new clone?"

Nerila shook her head firmly. "No. Not possible."

"If you can't put it on a blank clone, could you put it on an active one?"

"An active - " Nerila sat back in her chair. "No-one writes a neural pattern over an active clone. A  living person."

"But could you? Write it ... " Fisk tapped his temple with one finger. "On here?"

"Not only do I doubt I  could, I wouldn't." Nerila leaned forward, folding her hands on the desk. "Fisk, the injuries ... the pattern would be badly damaged."

He shrugged, and said with a tight smile. "I'm backed up. Living proof right in front of you. And damaged or not, there are things in that brain that aren't in this one. What happened."

"Fisk ...  no. It's a bad idea."

"A worse one than sitting around doing nothing when there might be a way to find Pilot?"  

Nerila sighed. "Look. I know it's frustrating. But - "

"You  don't know." Fisk's voice rose for the first time. "I've watched that feed. The XO thinks I can pick something up that Ami didn't understand, but there's nothing. Whatever I heard, whatever they said, it's not on the recording." He clenched his fists. "It's in the brain of that body down the hall. So help me get it out."

"It's not medically possible." She smiled to soften it. "I'm good, Fisk, but I can't raise the dead."

"Can somebody else? Station medical? Pilot's Sansha friends? Some experimental procedure?" Fisk smiled tightly. "I'll volunteer to be the first guinea pig."

"I really doubt it," Nerila said. "I really,  really doubt it."

"Will you ask? Will you find out?"

Nerila hesitated.  

"Pilot's been gone a week, Nerila," he said. "A  week. You know what can happen to someone in a week?"

"You're asking a  doctor that?" she snapped.

"Then  ask. Find out. Ask Ami's CMO. Ask on station. Ask the big research corps."

Nerila shook her head. "It's a bad idea. It's worse than bad."

"Just ask, Nerila." Fisk put his hands flat on her desk and leaned forward. "We all owe Pilot. Just ask."

Reluctantly, Nerila nodded. "I'll ask. No promises past that. But I'll ask."  

She saw him relax, then.  I promised to ask, Fisk. That's all.

The words died on her lips.  

Doesn't matter how loud I say them, she thought. He'll hear what he wants to.

What he  needs to.

Whatever I say.

Conversations on the Fortune’s Smile: Eight

(This story is also part of the Into the Dark series, co-authored by Silver Night, the first story of which can be found here)

It ought to fit. Mitch turned the gasket a millimeter to the left, turned it back. It ought to fit.

It didn't.

He held it under the worklamp bolted to the side of his bunk and considered whether or not to file another fraction off the rim. Too much more and we'll be dealing with lateral movement when she spins up.

Maybe one more pass with the file ...

The door chime interrupted his thoughts. "Yeah," he said. "S'open."

Nerila.

She stepped inside, breaking  rule one , tapped the keypad by the door to close it behind her in violation of rule two, tapped it again to engage the privacy lock in flagrant and direct contravention of rule three.

Never be in each other's quarters. Never be alone together in any place either one of us might be known to expected to be. Never do anything that might make Luisa suspicious.

"Sweetheart ... " Mitch said. His quarters were so small he would only have needed to stretch a little to touch her. He resisted the temptation. "This is asking for trouble from the XO."

Nerila folded her arms and hunched her shoulders, shot one quick glance at him from red-rimmed eyes, and stared at the floor. "I don't care," she said to the deckplates. "I don't care."

Mitch put it together then: her hair still damp from the shower, the false-floral scent of soap that eddied around her every time she moved, her long surgeon's hands reddened by scrubbing, the note of sour alcohol on her breath.  

"Autopsies?" he asked gently.  

Nerila nodded.

It turned out he didn't need to stretch at all, or perhaps she was already moving towards him as he opened his arms to her. She pressed her face against his shoulder, clutching at him as if she were drowning.  

As if we both were.

" Six!" she blurted, heaved a shuddering sigh, and was silent for a long time. 

When she finally let go of him and lifted her head, Mitch asked: "Were they all .. in Significance?"

Nerila nodded. "Yeah. So tomorrow, or the next day, or next week ... " She shrugged. "It'll be like it never happened. For them, anyway."

He brushed his fingers over her cheek, erasing traces of tears. "That's good."

"It  happened, Mitch." She sighed, slipping her arms around his neck, more loosely this time, and leaning against him. "But yeah. It's good. Mitch?"

"Mmm?" he murmured against her hair.  

"When did you have your last scan?" she asked.  

"Dunno, exactly." He thought about it. "Couple of weeks after the first one? Maybe ... three months?" He shrugged. "Got busy, you know?"

"Me too," Nerila said. "If I got shot in the head tomorrow, I'd wake up ... none of this would have happened."

He ran his hand down her back. "It would have happened."

"Not to  me," Nerila said. "Mitch, let's go tomorrow, let's get the scans done. I don't want ... I don't want this not to have happened. I don't want to forget. Tomorrow, Mitch, I don't care how busy it is. Please?"

He tightened his arms around her. "Yeah," he said. "First thing."

Nerila sighed in relief. "Okay," she said.  

Mitch hesitated, and then asked: "Do you ever think about it?"  

 "About what?"

"About ... about what it'll be like. In the long run. Once, twice, three times ... losing a week here, a month there. Who we'll be, ten years in the future. What we'll keep."

Nerila shook her head. "Ten years? I don't think about ten days, Mitch. Day at a time." She laughed without humour. "Had a future, once. Traded it for a glass vial. No. Ten years? No-one can plan that far ahead."

"You never think about it?" he said, smoothing his hand over her hair, gently so the callouses on his palm wouldn't snag the strands. "What you want?"

She sighed. "You know, if Pilot doesn't ... if Ami can't find her, if she's too late ... you know where she left her money to?"

"Camille, right?" he said. "And her family. If anyone can find them."

"Mostly. Enough, for the kid to live out her whole life in luxury, that's for sure. But not all. The rest ... to the crew. To  us." She drew back a little, looking up at him. "That's how life is, Mitch. Someone can just stop, a pilot even, a pilot inside her own security. And people like you and me can wake up richer than we ever dreamed. What kind of plans can anyone make in a universe like that?"

Mitch shrugged.  

Nerila narrowed her eyes. "What, you have plans?"

"Some," he admitted.  

"Like what?" When he hesitated, she poked him in the chest with one long finger. "Like  what? And so help me, if you say anything that involves marriage and babies and a fishing lodge on some backwater planet ..."

He smiled down at her. "Marriage and babies such a bad idea?"

"With me it is," she said seriously.  

"Not what you want?"

"What I want ..." She shrugged. "This ship. This job. My licence.  This. Today, and tomorrow."

"And the day after?"

"Worry about it then," Nerila said. She studied him. "That a problem?"

"No," Mitch said. "No. It's not a problem."

"Good," Nerila said. She yawned suddenly. "Can I stay? Tonight?"

"Bunk's pretty small," he said.  

She grinned. "I'll fit."

"Sweetheart ... " Mitch said. "Asking for trouble."

"Not if Ami can't find Pilot," Nerila said sadly.  

"She'll find her," Mitch said.  

"Let's blow that bridge when we're on it," Nerila said. "Mitch. I can't be - let me stay."

He couldn't say no to her.  I couldn't ever say no to her, not from the first time she sauntered into the engineroom with that smile.

And I knew we were asking for trouble, even then.  

The bunk  was small, and neither of them were built on the petite scale. Nerila fell asleep almost immediately, her drop into oblivion one Mitch remembered from the days when he was still drinking his way down the ranks, one he envied her now. 

No, it's not a problem.

Not yet, it isn't.  

He shifted her a little, not needing to worry she'd wake, trying to stretch the cramp out of his arm.  Marriage and babies ... He wouldn't have put it that way, exactly, but he couldn't deny that some idea of a life where he and Nerila could eat together without worrying about rumours, could talk about the day ... Could wake beside each other, every morning. Could lie like this, every night ...

Maybe in a bigger bed,  he thought, trying to stretch his arm again. 

Blow that bridge when we're on it, he thought. Won't be today, or tomorrow.

Or the day after, even.

He lay and thought about the uncertain future, about  bridges and trouble and somewhere there might be a bigger bed and shared breakfast, listening to Nerila breathe, staring sightlessly into the dark. 

Conversations on the Fortune's Smile: Seven

On his way out of the door of the mess, Private Visa Honka hesitated, then turned back. "M'm," he said. "Do you think she'll be different?"

"Who?" Corporal Satu Weilin asked absently, most of her attention on the datapadd she'd been reading while she ploughed through two helpings of flavour-enhanced beef-substitute.

"Alpassi. Do you think she'll be different. When she comes back."  

Weilin looked up, letting the datapadd drop to the table. "Different  how?" 

"I don't know." Honka shrugged. " Different."

"She's still Alpassi," Weilin said firmly.  

"Yeah, but ..."

" But nothing. She's still Alpassi. She just won't remember the last two weeks. And she'll be bald." It was Weilin's turn to shrug. "Worse things than being bald."

"How did it happen?" Honka asked.  

"Landcar accident. Brake failure, or something." Weilin looked at her empty plate, then glanced at the servery. "Flipped, broken neck. Instant."

"That's ....  random. For a marine."

"Life happens, right? At least for Alpassi, this time, life happening wasn't fatal." Weilin pushed her plate away. "Thanks to Pilot's generosity."

Honka paused. "I don't know what I should say to her."

"Just treat her as normal," Weilin said. "She's  Alpassi. Just ... bald. And a little amnesiac."

"Yeah. Yeah, I guess so," Honka said without conviction.

"You'll do more than  guess so," Weilin said sharply. "It's an order, Private."

"Yes'm," Honka said.  

He turned to go, and was almost out the door when Weilin spoke again.

"Visa," she said quietly. "If you don't know what to say to her - remember. We're all in the Significance program. Next time it could be me. Or you."

"Bald and amnesiac?" Honka said with a ghost of a grin.

"In your case, Private, an improvement," Weilin said dryly. "Now get out of here. Don't you have range-time booked?"

Honka sketched a salute, and was gone.

Weilin listened to his footsteps fading down the corridor, then made a note on her datapadd for CTO Hurun.  

He wants to know what to say to her, she thought. What to say to a woman who died three days ago and arrives back on the ship tomorrow.

As if I know.