Hey again.
Disclaimer: Mirkana Falcon does not own Outlaw Star.
Fair warning for anyone reading this fic: This chapter alone took a considerable amount of time. I was going to wait until I had more written to even post it, but on my friend's advice I've decided to post the first chapter anyway. I'm in high school and don't have a lot of spare time, so it will probably be quite a while before I update again. Sorry.
Thanks, as always, to Katome for her neverending encouragement. Luv ya! ^_^
I hope you enjoy my story.
~Mirkana Falcon
VIRAL SOUL
PROLOGUE
The blazing comet-streaks of sub-ether space slowed and hesitantly crawled backward across the universe-silvery, retreating milk rivers trailing behind them tide pools of light. After the chaos of sub-ether travel, normal space seemed especially dark and tranquil. However, at this time in history space, which had at one time contained a perfect cave-like darkness like the eye socket of a skull, had changed drastically. It was the home of countless worlds-not desolate balls of dust, but thriving, living planets. As time had changed, so had the view of man's final frontier. The pale stars scattered throughout its reaches had long ceased to dazzle the eye of man.
Lounging in the Shangri La's cockpit, Ron MacDougall thought with complete confidence as he gazed out at those gleaming specks that he knew them all.
"We have completed normal space re-entry," Ron's brother commented. "The sub-ether drive has been disengaged."
Ron's conditioned features remained loyally smooth as he winced inwardly. It still bothered him when Harry talked that way. The tone Harry's voice took on when he dictated the ship's actions set his teeth on edge. Inclining his neck, he glanced down at the control panel. A smiling, two-dimensional image of a young man, pale-faced and long-haired, watched him from a monitor mounted there. This was the only visible remnant of Ron's younger brother.
Looking back into the dark of space, Ron replied, "Good. How far are we from the station, Harry?"
"Just a sec." There was a pause, and then: "It's close enough for my scanners to pick up. We should dock in approximately three hours."
Ron nodded and fell back against his seat, slipping his cramped hands behind his head. Countless outlaws, merchants, and businessmen docked at Altaus en route to the Heifong system; he'd find work there. Money wasn't tight, but he'd been unemployed too long. Being out of a job left him nothing to do but sit around and think. For a ruthless non-outlaw under the service of the almighty wong, Ron thought far too much.
The hard-faced man chewed his lower lip. Work was slightly more complicated now. Everything done outside of the ship had to be done alone. But it was okay. Ron had always been very capable, and he was thriving. The MacDougall brothers were still thriving. It was just another display of their amazing tenacity and ability to simply survive, even, Ron thought grimly, in the worst of situations. That cataclysmic escapade in the Galactic Leyline, now a year and five months behind them, had altered his way of life irreversibly; yet life went on, and at times Ron realized with a dull and distant amazement that he often forgot about what he thought of as the former life. In fact, nothing outward had changed in the elder MacDougall brother. The changes in his mentality were inside, where they didn't make a difference.
"Take over from here, Harry," Ron muttered, shutting his eyes. He wondered if he could fall asleep there, sitting in his chair. His idle mind began to drift rebelliously.
"All right. . . setting course for Altaus," Harry said. "Just leave everything to me, Ron."
"Mm," came the reply, concealing another inner spark at Harry's mechanical tone. That sound just struck him wrong; it was strange, unfamiliar. . .
{It doesn't sound like Harry.}
Dimly, Ron envisioned his huge fist crushing that weasely little voice. It was an exact copy of Harry; it had his appearance, his personality, and his voice-at least when it wasn't spewing computer-talk. It knew everything Harry had; it just didn't have a body like Harry did. it was confined to a ship's computer, but it was still his little brother. Harry was a construct, and therefore it was conceivable that he might never die, as long as he could always continue on in the form of. . .
{A copy of mental information. . . }
Again Ron struck with his mental fist. Shut up, you stupid bastard, he pretended to rage at the voice. It had all of Harry's features and therefore it was Harry. He was Harry, Ron corrected himself. Not it. he. Ron reasoned with himself as if he were talking to a child. It made perfect sense for Harry to be able to exist inside a computer, because Harry had been synthetic anyway and very at home in cyberspace. The backup copy was Harry, and it contained everything that had ever been Harry-his mind, his personality traits, his looks, and even. . . even. . .
Ron's eyes opened and the thought vaporized. He didn't need all this unwanted philosophy. Altaus and work, he resolved, were of the highest importance. Work would eliminate idleness; with idleness, thought, and with thought, doubt.
His eyes focused and the space station, a glittering monument to the versatility of man, bobbed out of space, its faceted dome a much stronger attraction for the eyes than the fleeting and whispery stars. His waist bent, moving his torso forward, and his large hands slipped easily around the helm's handles; the feeling of control swept over him and filled him up solidly, like concrete. Although the ship was on autopilot, he was always in control as long as he was behind the wheel.
CHAPTER 1
Daryl Frost squinted into the whorl of dust that seemed impenetrable even by his vehicle's headlights and mentally kicked himself. Why in the world, of all places in the galaxy, had he suggested they go here? Daryl always made a conscious effort to be wild and outgoing, but his true nature was cautious and it always got the better of him when there was any risk of danger.
Even at 20 mph, navigating through this maze of boulders constituted danger to him.
His glasses flashing in irritation, Daryl tweaked the rearview so that it aimed at the backseat. "Hey," he barked. "I'll have none of that in here."
Daryl's violet-haired brother kept his eyes closed and his arms twisted around his girlfriend's waist. Daryl had no doubt they were ignoring him on purpose.
"I mean it, Rafe! After this, you'd better save it for when we reach the ruins."
His brother sat up and smiled away his brother's tension with a mellow grin. "Don't take so long, Dare. Lorrie and I are getting impatient back here." He gave the woman on his lap's waist a squeeze.
The woman called Lorraine leaned forward against her bare, slender legs and tucked her head against Rafe's neck at an angle to peer up at Daryl's glaring eyes in the mirror. "Loosen up, Daryl," she purred. "We won't scratch your leather."
Before Daryl could think of a retort a rock loomed up on the car's right. He jerked the wheel and smirked when they both toppled over.
Rafe bobbed back into view, his casualty unfazed as he draped his arm across his girlfriend's narrow shoulders. "All right, have it your way," he grinned. "But go a little faster, huh?"
"You've got all the time in the world. You cool it and let me drive," Daryl snapped.
Mocking exasperation, Rafe gave up. His older brother entertained a flash of resentment, knowing Rafe was only rolling over because he felt sorry for him. He sighed and wished desperately that he hadn't suggested they choose this place to blow their last few days of spring vacation.
After the Altaus police force had broken up a party the trio had attended at a friend's house, Rafe and Lorraine had longed for an uninhabited place to pursue their passions. Daryl dug up the ball of dust whose junkyard- like landscape he was currently weaving through while glancing through the atlas for such a place, and information about it on the internet had wildly excited all three of them. The place was abandoned-and rightly so, he saw now. The ruins were, indeed, ruined; leveled by an earthquake and now void of intelligent life. What better place than the ruins of the legendary Galactic Leyline to enjoy the dwindling hours of freedom?
Of course, back then Daryl had still had a girlfriend, and hadn't counted on going along as a chauffeur. But Daryl hated being the lead anchor to Rafe's fearlessly energetic charisma and so had insisted he would go. Drinking and partying in their lawless little world, he reasoned, might help him forget about his loss.
He sure didn't feel any better now.
As he veered around another boulder, Daryl stole another glance into the mirror. Rafe and Lorraine were snuggling again. He wasn't happy. What he needed right now, he thought, was a beer.
But of course, he was the driver.
This vacation sucked ass.
"I feel sorry for Daryl." Lorraine tossed her raven-black hair over her shoulders while she settled herself against a crumbly stone wall.
Rafe clattered up after her, sweat dripping from his brow as he hoisted a small cooler over the edge of the last step up. He flopped down and attacked the thick patches of dust clinging to his pant legs. "He volunteered," he said at last. Lorraine shrugged.
Rafe didn't want to talk about Daryl. Shooting one of his mellow smiles in Lorraine's direction, he turned to his cargo. Inside the cooler's top were a bottle of wine on ice and two glasses-perfect and classic, he had thought. Once he'd poured a glass for himself and one for Lorraine, they both forgot all about Rafe's brother. They moved closer, savoring the warmth of each other's bodies. The sky was the most perfect ink-black sprayed with stars, and the air seared in their lungs, making the heat stand out more. The syrupy night air and the wine created a kind of sense-dulling hypnosis-the kind of sensation Rafe secretly loved.
While he sipped his wine, Rafe noticed his fingers twisting something pliable. He glanced down and realized it was the green stem of a tiny plant. If Lorraine hadn't spoken up, he might've picked it.
"Didn't think anything could grow on this rock," she commented, leaning across him.
"Yeah. it's odd." Rafe moved his hand back and studied the plant more closely. It was minute, with serrated leaves sticking out from the stem and three tiny round buds at the top. Fine white hairs coated the buds. Rafe brushed them and they stuck in his fingertip. He rubbed his thumb and index finger together and they vanished like dust.
Hot breath on his neck brought Rafe's attention back into line. Lorraine hadn't moved away and was leaning over him. Her eyelids fluttered. Rafe's palm found the curve of her cheek; he caressed her wax- perfect flesh. Throughout this sensuous interaction, a part of Rafe's mind realized that he moved with only the slightest ripple of thought. The feeling that he had just the barest control over his actions was deliciously thrilling. Lorraine's head was tipped back, her throat moving as she sighed through parted cherry lips. It held Rafe's interest for a few moments until his hands found their way to the main point of interest. Lorraine's navel-length top was stitched up from the next down by two strips of leather tied at the neck; Rafe's fingers found these and began to toy with them, feeling their softness. Then with a burst of excitement he seized one dangling string and pulled it loose.
Lorraine fell forward onto the curve of his chest-the beating of Rafe's heart and the symphony of their labored breathing blacked out the landscape, so the moment became almost an unconscious thing.or perhaps it was the wine. But whether it was the night's spell or the spell of alcohol, Rafe and Lorraine's minds had burned down to the smallest glowering cinders. There may have been one moment throughout this intertwined exertion of passion when Rafe's eyes turned up to the sky, and he returned just enough to realize that the moment had swallowed him; he was a young man with endless days ahead of him; he was in the arms of the woman he loved; the future was a dim glow somewhere in the space inside his head, with no emotion attached to it. But all these things added up to the happiness he was just now experiencing, and absorbing it was so much more compelling than thought.
***
In a part of the void that would have been far away without the convenience of sub-ether travel, Ron MacDougall was chasing after a curious object.
Actually, this object was the beginning of one of fate's little jokes.
Ron didn't know that yet.
"I'm overriding the input course. It's about eighty percent complete," Harry's voice said from the Shangri La's control panel. "I should have it at a stall in two minutes."
"Once its engines are disabled I want it in the retrieval hatch," Ron said, hands lightly gripping the controls.
"Roger. Soon as it's stalled I'll position us. Eighty-six percent."
Ron frowned at the small, egg-shaped craft on his monitor. As they were approaching the space station a few minutes back a call had come through from Altaus' ground control. The autopiloted craft had been on a collision course with the station, and they had offered Ron two hundred Wong to destroy it.
"Have you identified the nature of the craft, Harry?"
"Yeah. It's a garbage pod."
"Garbage pod?"
"Yeah, the autopilot must have malfunctioned. I've got it ninety-five percent disabled now. I'm preparing to open the hatch."
Autopilot malfunction was the only explanation for a renegade garbage pod. Dumping garbage in space was illegal, and normally the pod's course would deliver it to the nearest star for incineration. Ron hadn't destroyed it himself for one reason. Out of curiosity, he'd run a check on the craft to get its ship's ID number. It came from the Discovery. Gwen Khan's ship.
Once Ron saw that, he knew he had to see what was inside.
The Shangri-La glided over the pod and slid to a halt. Soon Ron felt the ship vibrate as a group of mechanical docking arms hauled the pod into his ship's belly. Then the hatch smoothly closed behind it. Ron left his chair and exited the cockpit into the galley.
"Should I resume our course?" Harry asked.
"No. Stall. If it's trash I want to dump it after I have a look."
"I'll disarm the lock."
Ron tried to walk calmly down the hall, but he had to fight to keep from jogging to the cargo bay. It was only Gwen Khan's trash, but he felt oddly anxious to have a look inside the pod. He was ashamed to feel his heartbeat pick up a little as he neared the cargo bay's doors, which slid graciously open as he approached.
The lights flickered dimly in the ship's underbelly as Ron approached the squat, egg-shaped machine. Although it was naught but a lowly garbage disposal unit, the thing managed to look excitingly nifty to the untrained eye. A sort of space-age plastic, indestructible to just about everything save the heat of a sun at close range, coated its body. Two cylindrical propulsion units, still hot, adorned the large end of the egg. Two pushable tabs next to the hatch's outline allowed one to open it once the lock had been disengaged. When Ron eagerly pressed them with his thumbs, they gave with a pop. The hatch came free with a hiss and began slowly to peel away from the unit.
Ron squinted into the pod. He expected to see chemical containers or ruined lab equipment-something you would associate with a science lab.
When he actually saw what was inside, his knees nearly gave and he ended up standing there, cold, for an incredible length of time, gaping, staring, and clenching his muscles in rage, horror, and a whole mess of other violent sensations.
The off-course pod's cargo was a cadaver.
The ship's intercom suddenly crackled sharply, making Ron jump wildly. "Ron, what's its cargo? Is everything okay down there?" Harry had decided to look into Ron's long silence.
Ron shook his head wildly, trying to get his blood flowing again. He concentrated on keeping his voice steady. "It's nothing. Some lab junk."
"Shall we dump it?"
Ron paused for a very long time.
"Ron? Do you want to.?"
"No." Ron hoped his voice sounded confident. "We'll take it with us to the station. Dump it later." He fumbled for the hatch, brushing a trailing lock of the corpse's long green hair back into the pod before he slammed it tightly shut.
The air in the space station managed to feel open and natural until you looked up, because although the sky was sky-hued, the city lights reflected on the habitat's glass shell and turned everything less real. Suddenly you began to notice that there seemed to be too much gray in the air; perhaps the accumulation of steam from the small vehicles allowed for transportation in this spacedrifting snow dome, or even from the steam of so many breaths trapped inside. Altaus was as natural a community as ever there was, otherwise, but looking up moved comfortable reality off the mark a bit.
Ron MacDougall was looking in the exact opposite direction of the sky. That was well done, because reality was already several aeons to the left of the mark for him. Anyone who met Ron could guess that he was unused to feeling small. His rough hands gripped his head tightly, helping his skull to hold everything inside.
Denial-the word had been a ghost in his head for months, but now it peeled away from the walls and finally took shape in his mind. With Harry's voice always speaking to him and Harry's face always alive in animation right before him, Ron's mind had managed to dance around the reality of his brother's actual death. He'd seen Harry's dead face with his own eyes, but then. . . well, the way he'd woken up, with the thing already speaking to him, it was like waking from a nightmare.
Now the body was back again-or at least, the one Harry had been forced to part with after his accident on the ruins. It didn't matter-it meant the same as the one that lay in the Galactic Leyline. The thoughts swirled through Ron-harsh wind shrieking through a small hole chipped in a pillar of rock-and he understood and did not feel. Harry had had a soul. Ron wasn't sure where souls went after the body was gone, but he suddenly felt certain they didn't go to backup disks.
Ron stood, carelessly knocked a discarded napkin off the dirty gray table in the sterile gray terminal. What he'd been doing wasn't healthy.
It was time to bury his brother.
Ron left the terminal, and began to wander the streets in search of a church.
A/N: That's all for now. I hope you come back for chapter 2, although it might be awhile.
Disclaimer: Mirkana Falcon does not own Outlaw Star.
Fair warning for anyone reading this fic: This chapter alone took a considerable amount of time. I was going to wait until I had more written to even post it, but on my friend's advice I've decided to post the first chapter anyway. I'm in high school and don't have a lot of spare time, so it will probably be quite a while before I update again. Sorry.
Thanks, as always, to Katome for her neverending encouragement. Luv ya! ^_^
I hope you enjoy my story.
~Mirkana Falcon
VIRAL SOUL
PROLOGUE
The blazing comet-streaks of sub-ether space slowed and hesitantly crawled backward across the universe-silvery, retreating milk rivers trailing behind them tide pools of light. After the chaos of sub-ether travel, normal space seemed especially dark and tranquil. However, at this time in history space, which had at one time contained a perfect cave-like darkness like the eye socket of a skull, had changed drastically. It was the home of countless worlds-not desolate balls of dust, but thriving, living planets. As time had changed, so had the view of man's final frontier. The pale stars scattered throughout its reaches had long ceased to dazzle the eye of man.
Lounging in the Shangri La's cockpit, Ron MacDougall thought with complete confidence as he gazed out at those gleaming specks that he knew them all.
"We have completed normal space re-entry," Ron's brother commented. "The sub-ether drive has been disengaged."
Ron's conditioned features remained loyally smooth as he winced inwardly. It still bothered him when Harry talked that way. The tone Harry's voice took on when he dictated the ship's actions set his teeth on edge. Inclining his neck, he glanced down at the control panel. A smiling, two-dimensional image of a young man, pale-faced and long-haired, watched him from a monitor mounted there. This was the only visible remnant of Ron's younger brother.
Looking back into the dark of space, Ron replied, "Good. How far are we from the station, Harry?"
"Just a sec." There was a pause, and then: "It's close enough for my scanners to pick up. We should dock in approximately three hours."
Ron nodded and fell back against his seat, slipping his cramped hands behind his head. Countless outlaws, merchants, and businessmen docked at Altaus en route to the Heifong system; he'd find work there. Money wasn't tight, but he'd been unemployed too long. Being out of a job left him nothing to do but sit around and think. For a ruthless non-outlaw under the service of the almighty wong, Ron thought far too much.
The hard-faced man chewed his lower lip. Work was slightly more complicated now. Everything done outside of the ship had to be done alone. But it was okay. Ron had always been very capable, and he was thriving. The MacDougall brothers were still thriving. It was just another display of their amazing tenacity and ability to simply survive, even, Ron thought grimly, in the worst of situations. That cataclysmic escapade in the Galactic Leyline, now a year and five months behind them, had altered his way of life irreversibly; yet life went on, and at times Ron realized with a dull and distant amazement that he often forgot about what he thought of as the former life. In fact, nothing outward had changed in the elder MacDougall brother. The changes in his mentality were inside, where they didn't make a difference.
"Take over from here, Harry," Ron muttered, shutting his eyes. He wondered if he could fall asleep there, sitting in his chair. His idle mind began to drift rebelliously.
"All right. . . setting course for Altaus," Harry said. "Just leave everything to me, Ron."
"Mm," came the reply, concealing another inner spark at Harry's mechanical tone. That sound just struck him wrong; it was strange, unfamiliar. . .
{It doesn't sound like Harry.}
Dimly, Ron envisioned his huge fist crushing that weasely little voice. It was an exact copy of Harry; it had his appearance, his personality, and his voice-at least when it wasn't spewing computer-talk. It knew everything Harry had; it just didn't have a body like Harry did. it was confined to a ship's computer, but it was still his little brother. Harry was a construct, and therefore it was conceivable that he might never die, as long as he could always continue on in the form of. . .
{A copy of mental information. . . }
Again Ron struck with his mental fist. Shut up, you stupid bastard, he pretended to rage at the voice. It had all of Harry's features and therefore it was Harry. He was Harry, Ron corrected himself. Not it. he. Ron reasoned with himself as if he were talking to a child. It made perfect sense for Harry to be able to exist inside a computer, because Harry had been synthetic anyway and very at home in cyberspace. The backup copy was Harry, and it contained everything that had ever been Harry-his mind, his personality traits, his looks, and even. . . even. . .
Ron's eyes opened and the thought vaporized. He didn't need all this unwanted philosophy. Altaus and work, he resolved, were of the highest importance. Work would eliminate idleness; with idleness, thought, and with thought, doubt.
His eyes focused and the space station, a glittering monument to the versatility of man, bobbed out of space, its faceted dome a much stronger attraction for the eyes than the fleeting and whispery stars. His waist bent, moving his torso forward, and his large hands slipped easily around the helm's handles; the feeling of control swept over him and filled him up solidly, like concrete. Although the ship was on autopilot, he was always in control as long as he was behind the wheel.
CHAPTER 1
Daryl Frost squinted into the whorl of dust that seemed impenetrable even by his vehicle's headlights and mentally kicked himself. Why in the world, of all places in the galaxy, had he suggested they go here? Daryl always made a conscious effort to be wild and outgoing, but his true nature was cautious and it always got the better of him when there was any risk of danger.
Even at 20 mph, navigating through this maze of boulders constituted danger to him.
His glasses flashing in irritation, Daryl tweaked the rearview so that it aimed at the backseat. "Hey," he barked. "I'll have none of that in here."
Daryl's violet-haired brother kept his eyes closed and his arms twisted around his girlfriend's waist. Daryl had no doubt they were ignoring him on purpose.
"I mean it, Rafe! After this, you'd better save it for when we reach the ruins."
His brother sat up and smiled away his brother's tension with a mellow grin. "Don't take so long, Dare. Lorrie and I are getting impatient back here." He gave the woman on his lap's waist a squeeze.
The woman called Lorraine leaned forward against her bare, slender legs and tucked her head against Rafe's neck at an angle to peer up at Daryl's glaring eyes in the mirror. "Loosen up, Daryl," she purred. "We won't scratch your leather."
Before Daryl could think of a retort a rock loomed up on the car's right. He jerked the wheel and smirked when they both toppled over.
Rafe bobbed back into view, his casualty unfazed as he draped his arm across his girlfriend's narrow shoulders. "All right, have it your way," he grinned. "But go a little faster, huh?"
"You've got all the time in the world. You cool it and let me drive," Daryl snapped.
Mocking exasperation, Rafe gave up. His older brother entertained a flash of resentment, knowing Rafe was only rolling over because he felt sorry for him. He sighed and wished desperately that he hadn't suggested they choose this place to blow their last few days of spring vacation.
After the Altaus police force had broken up a party the trio had attended at a friend's house, Rafe and Lorraine had longed for an uninhabited place to pursue their passions. Daryl dug up the ball of dust whose junkyard- like landscape he was currently weaving through while glancing through the atlas for such a place, and information about it on the internet had wildly excited all three of them. The place was abandoned-and rightly so, he saw now. The ruins were, indeed, ruined; leveled by an earthquake and now void of intelligent life. What better place than the ruins of the legendary Galactic Leyline to enjoy the dwindling hours of freedom?
Of course, back then Daryl had still had a girlfriend, and hadn't counted on going along as a chauffeur. But Daryl hated being the lead anchor to Rafe's fearlessly energetic charisma and so had insisted he would go. Drinking and partying in their lawless little world, he reasoned, might help him forget about his loss.
He sure didn't feel any better now.
As he veered around another boulder, Daryl stole another glance into the mirror. Rafe and Lorraine were snuggling again. He wasn't happy. What he needed right now, he thought, was a beer.
But of course, he was the driver.
This vacation sucked ass.
"I feel sorry for Daryl." Lorraine tossed her raven-black hair over her shoulders while she settled herself against a crumbly stone wall.
Rafe clattered up after her, sweat dripping from his brow as he hoisted a small cooler over the edge of the last step up. He flopped down and attacked the thick patches of dust clinging to his pant legs. "He volunteered," he said at last. Lorraine shrugged.
Rafe didn't want to talk about Daryl. Shooting one of his mellow smiles in Lorraine's direction, he turned to his cargo. Inside the cooler's top were a bottle of wine on ice and two glasses-perfect and classic, he had thought. Once he'd poured a glass for himself and one for Lorraine, they both forgot all about Rafe's brother. They moved closer, savoring the warmth of each other's bodies. The sky was the most perfect ink-black sprayed with stars, and the air seared in their lungs, making the heat stand out more. The syrupy night air and the wine created a kind of sense-dulling hypnosis-the kind of sensation Rafe secretly loved.
While he sipped his wine, Rafe noticed his fingers twisting something pliable. He glanced down and realized it was the green stem of a tiny plant. If Lorraine hadn't spoken up, he might've picked it.
"Didn't think anything could grow on this rock," she commented, leaning across him.
"Yeah. it's odd." Rafe moved his hand back and studied the plant more closely. It was minute, with serrated leaves sticking out from the stem and three tiny round buds at the top. Fine white hairs coated the buds. Rafe brushed them and they stuck in his fingertip. He rubbed his thumb and index finger together and they vanished like dust.
Hot breath on his neck brought Rafe's attention back into line. Lorraine hadn't moved away and was leaning over him. Her eyelids fluttered. Rafe's palm found the curve of her cheek; he caressed her wax- perfect flesh. Throughout this sensuous interaction, a part of Rafe's mind realized that he moved with only the slightest ripple of thought. The feeling that he had just the barest control over his actions was deliciously thrilling. Lorraine's head was tipped back, her throat moving as she sighed through parted cherry lips. It held Rafe's interest for a few moments until his hands found their way to the main point of interest. Lorraine's navel-length top was stitched up from the next down by two strips of leather tied at the neck; Rafe's fingers found these and began to toy with them, feeling their softness. Then with a burst of excitement he seized one dangling string and pulled it loose.
Lorraine fell forward onto the curve of his chest-the beating of Rafe's heart and the symphony of their labored breathing blacked out the landscape, so the moment became almost an unconscious thing.or perhaps it was the wine. But whether it was the night's spell or the spell of alcohol, Rafe and Lorraine's minds had burned down to the smallest glowering cinders. There may have been one moment throughout this intertwined exertion of passion when Rafe's eyes turned up to the sky, and he returned just enough to realize that the moment had swallowed him; he was a young man with endless days ahead of him; he was in the arms of the woman he loved; the future was a dim glow somewhere in the space inside his head, with no emotion attached to it. But all these things added up to the happiness he was just now experiencing, and absorbing it was so much more compelling than thought.
***
In a part of the void that would have been far away without the convenience of sub-ether travel, Ron MacDougall was chasing after a curious object.
Actually, this object was the beginning of one of fate's little jokes.
Ron didn't know that yet.
"I'm overriding the input course. It's about eighty percent complete," Harry's voice said from the Shangri La's control panel. "I should have it at a stall in two minutes."
"Once its engines are disabled I want it in the retrieval hatch," Ron said, hands lightly gripping the controls.
"Roger. Soon as it's stalled I'll position us. Eighty-six percent."
Ron frowned at the small, egg-shaped craft on his monitor. As they were approaching the space station a few minutes back a call had come through from Altaus' ground control. The autopiloted craft had been on a collision course with the station, and they had offered Ron two hundred Wong to destroy it.
"Have you identified the nature of the craft, Harry?"
"Yeah. It's a garbage pod."
"Garbage pod?"
"Yeah, the autopilot must have malfunctioned. I've got it ninety-five percent disabled now. I'm preparing to open the hatch."
Autopilot malfunction was the only explanation for a renegade garbage pod. Dumping garbage in space was illegal, and normally the pod's course would deliver it to the nearest star for incineration. Ron hadn't destroyed it himself for one reason. Out of curiosity, he'd run a check on the craft to get its ship's ID number. It came from the Discovery. Gwen Khan's ship.
Once Ron saw that, he knew he had to see what was inside.
The Shangri-La glided over the pod and slid to a halt. Soon Ron felt the ship vibrate as a group of mechanical docking arms hauled the pod into his ship's belly. Then the hatch smoothly closed behind it. Ron left his chair and exited the cockpit into the galley.
"Should I resume our course?" Harry asked.
"No. Stall. If it's trash I want to dump it after I have a look."
"I'll disarm the lock."
Ron tried to walk calmly down the hall, but he had to fight to keep from jogging to the cargo bay. It was only Gwen Khan's trash, but he felt oddly anxious to have a look inside the pod. He was ashamed to feel his heartbeat pick up a little as he neared the cargo bay's doors, which slid graciously open as he approached.
The lights flickered dimly in the ship's underbelly as Ron approached the squat, egg-shaped machine. Although it was naught but a lowly garbage disposal unit, the thing managed to look excitingly nifty to the untrained eye. A sort of space-age plastic, indestructible to just about everything save the heat of a sun at close range, coated its body. Two cylindrical propulsion units, still hot, adorned the large end of the egg. Two pushable tabs next to the hatch's outline allowed one to open it once the lock had been disengaged. When Ron eagerly pressed them with his thumbs, they gave with a pop. The hatch came free with a hiss and began slowly to peel away from the unit.
Ron squinted into the pod. He expected to see chemical containers or ruined lab equipment-something you would associate with a science lab.
When he actually saw what was inside, his knees nearly gave and he ended up standing there, cold, for an incredible length of time, gaping, staring, and clenching his muscles in rage, horror, and a whole mess of other violent sensations.
The off-course pod's cargo was a cadaver.
The ship's intercom suddenly crackled sharply, making Ron jump wildly. "Ron, what's its cargo? Is everything okay down there?" Harry had decided to look into Ron's long silence.
Ron shook his head wildly, trying to get his blood flowing again. He concentrated on keeping his voice steady. "It's nothing. Some lab junk."
"Shall we dump it?"
Ron paused for a very long time.
"Ron? Do you want to.?"
"No." Ron hoped his voice sounded confident. "We'll take it with us to the station. Dump it later." He fumbled for the hatch, brushing a trailing lock of the corpse's long green hair back into the pod before he slammed it tightly shut.
The air in the space station managed to feel open and natural until you looked up, because although the sky was sky-hued, the city lights reflected on the habitat's glass shell and turned everything less real. Suddenly you began to notice that there seemed to be too much gray in the air; perhaps the accumulation of steam from the small vehicles allowed for transportation in this spacedrifting snow dome, or even from the steam of so many breaths trapped inside. Altaus was as natural a community as ever there was, otherwise, but looking up moved comfortable reality off the mark a bit.
Ron MacDougall was looking in the exact opposite direction of the sky. That was well done, because reality was already several aeons to the left of the mark for him. Anyone who met Ron could guess that he was unused to feeling small. His rough hands gripped his head tightly, helping his skull to hold everything inside.
Denial-the word had been a ghost in his head for months, but now it peeled away from the walls and finally took shape in his mind. With Harry's voice always speaking to him and Harry's face always alive in animation right before him, Ron's mind had managed to dance around the reality of his brother's actual death. He'd seen Harry's dead face with his own eyes, but then. . . well, the way he'd woken up, with the thing already speaking to him, it was like waking from a nightmare.
Now the body was back again-or at least, the one Harry had been forced to part with after his accident on the ruins. It didn't matter-it meant the same as the one that lay in the Galactic Leyline. The thoughts swirled through Ron-harsh wind shrieking through a small hole chipped in a pillar of rock-and he understood and did not feel. Harry had had a soul. Ron wasn't sure where souls went after the body was gone, but he suddenly felt certain they didn't go to backup disks.
Ron stood, carelessly knocked a discarded napkin off the dirty gray table in the sterile gray terminal. What he'd been doing wasn't healthy.
It was time to bury his brother.
Ron left the terminal, and began to wander the streets in search of a church.
A/N: That's all for now. I hope you come back for chapter 2, although it might be awhile.