Nebula Awards Showcase 2018

THE LONG FALL UP ^{WILLIAM LEDBETTER}

William Ledbetter has more than fifty speculative fiction stories and nonfiction articles published in markets such as Asimov’s, Fantasy & Science Fiction, Analog, Jim Baen’s Universe, Escape Pod, Baen.com, Daily Science Fiction, the SFWA blog, and Ad Astra. He’s been a space and technology geek since childhood and spent most of his non-writing career in the aerospace and defense industry. He administers the Jim Baen Memorial Short Story Award contest for Baen Books and the National Space Society, is a member of SFWA, the National Space Society of North Texas, a Launch Pad Astronomy workshop graduate, and is the Science Track coordinator for the Fencon convention. He lives near Dallas with his wife, a needy dog, and two spoiled cats.

Like millions on Earth and aboard the Jīnshān Space Station, I watched Veronica Perez every day, but unlike those other spectators I already knew how her story would end. She disgusted me and I hated her actions, but I was curious about how it started. Newshounds had already dug up every detail of her past, from an interview with her first boyfriend at age thirteen to her biology doctorate dissertation only fifteen years later, but none of that revealed the true person.

As I ran through my systems check and prepped my ship for extended acceleration, I watched her first broadcast again, but this time with sound muted. I noted tiny movements of her eyes and mouth, the nervous way her hands twitched, and the slight wrinkles between her eyes. She clearly believed what she was saying, but how could she be so heartless? How could she doom her own child to such a life? Even after a third viewing, I still wanted to scream in her face.

“Play it again, Huizhu.” I said to the ship’s AI. “With sound this time.”

“My name is Veronica Perez,” she said. “I’m outbound on an elliptical orbit that will bring me back to the Mountain one year from now and I’m six months pregnant.”

She was so haughty, so proud of her crime. It sickened me. I’d been hired and trained to protect Jīnshān Station—or “the Mountain” as she had so casually called it. I found the casual term disrespectful. Jīnshān Station was a Bernal sphere habitat parked at Lagrange Point Five with a population of over twenty-seven thousand. My parents and sister lived there, so I embraced my job eagerly. I was also prepared to kill to protect my family, though I’d never expected my foe to be a pregnant woman.

My status board turned green, indicating the crèche was ready for me to enter. “Open the hatch, Huizhu.”

The ship’s AI obeyed without comment and I peeled off my clothes as the crèche hissed open.

“No father acted as my accomplice,” the woman continued. “I used a robotic device to implant the fertilized egg two days after my acceleration burn, so the child has gestated entirely in a zero-gravity environment.”

I stepped into the warm acceleration jelly and began attaching the unpleasant wires and tubes necessary for an extended burn.

“She’s cold-blooded,” I said aloud.

Huizhu said nothing. That bothered me.

We were told that ship’s cortexes were not true AIs, but if we couldn’t tell the difference, did it matter? After two years of deep deployment, Huizhu had become my only friend and companion, yet times like this reminded me she was just another tool.

I closed the crèche lid then sealed the close-fitting helmet, wincing at the sting when interface posts pricked my shaved scalp. The helmet visor flickered to life with status and information feeds. Two small windows opened, one displaying an interactive diagram of my intercept course and the other showing the young woman still spouting her obviously well-rehearsed declamation.

“I’m willingly breaking the law and prepared to accept my punishment to prove that healthy children can be produced in null gravity.”

She used the word “produced” as if she were discussing industrial output at a corporate board meeting. I had seen the videos and pictures of children gestated in zero gee. They were twisted and tortured innocents. They were the reason laws had been passed.

Then Perez got to the part that bothered me most.

“Mom and Dad? If you’re watching, I’m sorry.” She paused, emotion showing in her face for the first time. “I know you won’t understand this and will be disappointed in me, but you’re going to have a grandson. He’ll just have to spend his entire life in microgravity.”

Not only was she creating a deformed person, but even intended to saddle her parents with the child’s care while she rotted in prison. My older sister had requested a child permit six years ago and was still waiting. Population on Jīnshān was strictly controlled for obvious reasons, but this woman had deliberately jumped the queue.

As the gel finished filling my acceleration crèche, I instructed Huizhu to fire the main thrusters. Even with the cushioning, I drifted almost back to the rear wall before the gel compressed enough to stop me.

Perez assumed pursuit would come from Jīnshān, where even the fastest ships like mine couldn’t reach her in less than six months, but I was part of a picket line and I was ahead of her. Officially an asteroid defense, in reality existed for situations just like this. I would intercept her ship in sixty-one days.

She would see me coming, probably during my deceleration burn, but if she ran she’d be under gee forces and could never claim that the baby developed in a full zero-gravity environment. I still had plenty of time to carry out my assignment and prevent her from giving birth.

INTERCEPT: 52 DAYS, 12 HOURS, 4 MINUTES

“Play it again with sound, Huizhu.”

Her second video flickered on my visor, then started again.

“I’ve read the messages sent my way and I assure you I’m not a monster, nor am I trying to produce one. My child might have slightly longer arms, legs, and fingers than one born on Earth, but hasn’t humanity finally learned to accept and embrace physical differences? The important thing is that he’ll be just as human as your children.”

Pleading in her voice. She didn’t want them to hate her son. Perhaps this was more than a political statement after all?

“There is no genetic manipulation, only cellular adjustments that started immediately and will continue through his entire life, but every human in space relies on machines to stay alive and healthy. We build space stations, spaceships, and protective suits. My body is filled with nanomachines that repair radiation damage, prevent optical degeneration, and address dozens of other health issues associated with null gravity. My child will simply have all of these from the beginning.”

I switched off the sound again and embraced the quiet inside my nested mechanical aids of mask, crèche, and ship. Her words held a grain of truth. Not only did we need machines to survive in space, but aside from those who lived inside Jīnshān’s centrifugal gravity, none of us would ever walk the surface of Earth again without mechanical help. Still, she was having a child, not conducting a science experiment.

INTERCEPT: 47 DAYS, 2 HOURS, 51 MINUTES

After only fourteen days, an intrepid astronomer spotted my drive plume, calculated a trajectory, and made the information public. He’d even been able to identify my ship type by characterizing the exhaust spectrum and determined it was human-rated. The entire solar system knew I was on an intercept course with Perez’s ship.

“Have we received new orders yet?” I asked Huizhu.

“No new communications from base, sir.”

“They can’t expect me to kill her now—the public will be watching. The Russians will use it as an excuse to embargo the station. Nearly half of the station investors are Americans, but the United States government will still call it an atrocity.”

Or was Jīnshān beyond having to play the game of international politics and public opinion? The station was an economic powerhouse and a true mountain of gold for the investors. Housing humanity’s fourth-largest economy, it had a firm grip on cislunar space and control of all off-planet commerce. Every asteroid mined, ship built, or powersat switched on paid Jīnshān well for the privilege.

“Do you think carrying out your orders will be an atrocity?” Huizhu said.

“Why do you ask that?”

“I don’t understand how killing Veronica Perez and her child puts Jīnshān Corporation in a morally superior position.”

“I suppose it would save the child a lifetime of pain and suffering. It would also be an example to others who might be willing to commit the same crime.”

“It makes no logical sense,” Huizhu said. “Children born with physical or mental disabilities on Earth are not euthanized. Legal punishment for breaking the zero-gee child law is imprisonment, not death. Some people will agree with a decision to terminate Veronica Perez and her child, but many others will not. Why risk turning public and government opinions against Jīnshān Station when taking no action would cost them nothing?”

“I don’t know,” I said. She was right. My employers obviously had reasons for taking such a risk, but I didn’t see them. Huizhu had voiced serious questions that had not even occurred to me. A chill made my skin prickle in the warm jelly.

When the message finally came, it merely reaffirmed my original orders, but my employers were being quite cautious. Even though sent via encrypted laser communications, the instructions themselves would also be opaque to anyone who caught and decrypted them. Intercept Perez. Use Plan 47. Innocuous as that message might look to outsiders, their intent was perfectly clear to me.

As an asteroid defense picket ship, my hold contained many things capable of redirecting big rocks, like surface-mountable pusher rockets and hyper-velocity missiles, but Plan 47 required I use a device that had only one purpose: to cripple spacecraft by shutting down their critical systems. The FL239 interdiction device utilized a small nuclear detonation to pump a directed EMP generator. Even military-hardened electronics couldn’t survive the pulse within optimum range. Technically the device was developed to enable apprehension and boarding of criminal vehicles, but since the pulse was powerful enough to fry spacesuit electronics as well as the ship’s life support, it was a death sentence for anyone aboard.

Not for the first time since I’d received my orders I felt uneasy and had doubts. Most of all I wondered why they’d sent me. There were several robotic craft nearby that could have accelerated faster and arrived sooner.

INTERCEPT: 41 DAYS, 7 HOURS, 11 MINUTES

I received my first message from Veronica Perez. It was a tight beam, meant for me alone.

“Can we talk?” Her face was drawn and pale. She looked tired and perhaps upset.

“Huizhu, please record and prepare to send the following message via tight beam. My name is Jager Jin. I am—”

“I cannot send your message,” Huizhu interrupted.

“What?”

“I’ve been ordered to allow no communications from this ship except to approved channels at Jīnshān Station.”

A heat grew in my belly and crept up to my face, making the mask suddenly uncomfortable.

“Why?”

“They gave no reason. My response-to-orders protocol is detailed in document 556845.67FG. Would you like me to open that file for you?”

“No!” I snapped. This made less and less sense.

Veronica’s next message came an hour later and she was a little more composed. Her eyes were harder and her expression intense. “I don’t know why you won’t respond. I just want to talk. I’d like to know your true intentions. The Mountain claims you were sent to render assistance should I need it. I don’t believe that.”

She paused and her gaze wavered for a second. “If you’ve been sent to kill me and my baby I can’t stop you, but at least have the decency to face me.”

INTERCEPT: 35 DAYS, 1 HOUR, 27 MINUTES

I woke suddenly from a deep sleep, confused and thrashing in the gel. Had I heard something? I immediately checked the status screens but all systems were green.

“Huizhu? What’s going on?”

“I launched the FL239 interdiction device.”

“Why?”

“I was ordered to do so by headquarters.”

“Why didn’t they send a damned robot?”

“You are obviously part of the rescue effort,” Huizhu said and started a video playing on my visor.

An attractive, perfectly groomed spokeswoman stood before the famous Golden Mountain logo. “The reports are correct. The pilot of one of our deep-system asteroid protection picket ships has taken it upon himself to go to Ms. Lopez’s aid. We have been unable to contact him, but he is still on course and will arrive in plenty of time to help with the birth should assistance be required.”

“Why are they lying?”

“I don’t know,” Huizhu said.

I still wasn’t sure why they wanted Veronica dead, but I suspected it was to make sure the child was not seen by the public. Could Veronica be right? Would the child be normal?

“I have to stop this,” I said.

“The FL239 interdiction device has been preprogrammed to carry out its mission. Once operational, these devices can be put into a communications-lockout mode and the one I launched has been so locked. You cannot shut it down remotely.”

“Huizhu—have I been completely cut out of the command loop?”

“Of course not, sir. My response-to-orders protocols are detailed in document 556845.67FG. Would you like me to open that file for you?”

Why did she keep insisting I read that file? Was Huizhu trying to help me?

“Yes,” I said. “I would like to read the file.”

INTERCEPT: 30 DAYS, 10 HOURS, 19 MINUTES

It was flip day. As soon as the engines kicked off, I crawled out of the crèche, took a long, hot bag shower, and used the bathroom like a normal person.

“The ship is turned,” Huizhu said. “We can initiate deceleration as soon as you return to the crèche.”

“Thank you, Huizhu,” I said, “but we have a few maintenance issues to deal with first. Please take the primary and backup communications antennas off-line.”

“Why?” Huizhu said. “Diagnostics indicate the antennas are nominal.”

“Because according to that news report, we are not receiving all the communications sent our way, which indicates either our antennas or receiver are malfunctioning, or the corporate office is mistaken.”

“Understood. Antennas off-line.”

“Do our missiles also have the communications-lockout feature?”

“Yes.”

This was where I had to be cautious. The “response-to-orders protocols” Huizhu had directed me to read basically said she must follow my commands unless they were contradictory to mission orders or those from higher up the command chain. The press release cast doubt on all of that, but I still had to be careful. I didn’t know what kind of fail-safes had been built into the instructions sent to Huizhu. If I said the wrong thing, I could be locked out of the loop permanently.

“Target one of the missiles to intercept and destroy the interdiction device,” I said.

“That would violate our orders,” Huizhu said.

“Which orders?” I said. “That FL239 launch was contradictory to the broadcast we received claiming our intention is to intercept and assist. Since our communications are already suspect, I prefer to err on the side of caution and assume the device was launched in error.”

I held my breath, hoping the circular logic would hold up under AI scrutiny.

“Understood. The missile programming is complete,” Huizhu said.

“Upon launch, initiate communications-lockout mode on the missile as well.”

“Understood.”

“Launch now.”

The ship shuddered as the weapon left its berth and I sighed with relief. As I climbed back into my crèche, I said, “Okay, Huizhu, let’s get this thing slowed down.”

INTERCEPT: 27 DAYS, 7 HOURS, 40 MINUTES

After three days I was starting to fidget. Being locked up in a jelly-filled box was bad enough, but without a connection to the outside I had nothing but onboard entertainment and Huizhu to occupy my time. I was tired of her beating me at backgammon and wanted to know what the newsfeeds were saying. I was curious whether the Mountain had sent me new orders, but I also missed Veronica’s broadcasts and messages.

Continuing my ruse, I ran extensive diagnostics and ordered Huizhu to bring comms back online. If the communication lockout on those missiles actually worked, then destroying Veronica’s ship was now off the table. I also continuously scanned the space in our vicinity and saw nothing moving. Any robot ships they might have sent would also be decelerating by now and consequently show up easily. They could, of course, change my orders or fire me, maybe even jail me, but they couldn’t make me kill her.

I spent the next few minutes watching and reading news. Public opinion had taken a huge shift in support of Veronica Perez during the days I’d been out of the loop. Even those not actively behind her appeared to be in a holding pattern fueled by curiosity. Everyone was waiting to see the child.

The balance had tipped after Veronica’s most recent broadcast. Sound bites and clips were all over the news and web, so I killed the sound and played the whole thing.

Her entire demeanor had changed. No fear or defensiveness now: her eyes never left the camera, nor did she fidget or waffle or plead. I saw nothing but confidence and determination. “Okay, Huizhu—give me sound and rewind to the beginning.”

“The Jīnshān Corporation doesn’t just have an economic monopoly on all off-Earth mining and manufacturing, they have a stranglehold on humanity itself,” Veronica said. “They used fake pictures and video to push through laws to criminalize zero-gee pregnancies, not because they care about children, but to protect their future earnings. Think about it. All off-planet human reproduction has to be approved by them. Do you think they want independent miner families competing with them for mineral contracts? They don’t care about children, they don’t care about humanity, and they don’t care about small, family-owned mining businesses. They care only about Jīnshān. And that’s why they’ve sent one of their people to kill me, before I can show my baby to the world.”

She was on the verge of winning and knew it, but everything hinged on the child. If it were obviously abnormal, then everyone would say, “I told you so.” If the child appeared normal, then things would get interesting. Some would claim it was an elaborate video hoax and others that the child was still broken on the inside, which would become obvious when it grew to adulthood. But some—probably most of those living in space—would pause and wonder if they had been duped these many years. They might also wonder if they, too, could have children outside the Mountain’s artificial gravity. My employer’s desperation made sense in that light.

“Huizhu? Have you extended the antenna booms to clear the drive plume?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Any messages from Veronica?”

“No, but we do have a new transmission from headquarters,” Huizhu said.

“Play it.”

Ignore our news releases. Stay current course. Await instructions.

I was suddenly uncomfortable. “How did they know we based our actions on the news reports?”

“They contacted me as soon as our antennas came online and I told them.”

I swore under my breath. Even if Huizhu was trying to help, she could not lie or disobey direct orders from headquarters. I had to remember that.

INTERCEPT: 22 DAYS, 3 HOURS, 6 MINUTES

“We’ve received another tight-beam message from Veronica Perez,” Huizhu said, waking me from a nap. “Would you like to see it?”

“Yes,” I said and tried to clear the cobwebs of sleep from my head.

“I know you’re there,” she said, then paused as if expecting a reply. “I don’t believe in monsters, so I’m choosing to believe that you don’t really want to kill me and my baby just to prop up your employer’s profit margin.”

Unlike in the public message she’d transmitted, this time she looked tired and frustrated. I wondered how pregnancy in zero gravity differed from a regular one. The fluids would probably collect oddly, and the baby’s position inside her body might be different. Or was it something else? Alone in the quiet of her little ship, did she doubt her own assertions? Was she as much in the dark about the outcome as everyone else?

“It’s lonely out here. Wouldn’t you like someone to talk to? Or does talking to your targets make them feel more human, which will give you a twinge of guilt when you kill them?”

Her face twisted slightly as she fought some emotion, then she took a deep breath and locked her eyes on the camera. “I don’t know what drives you, but I believe in what I’m doing. Someone has to break Jīnshān’s stranglehold. But I also admit that I’m scared. I want my baby to live and to be happy. I want him to have a chance. If I’m wrong and he is born a tortured, deformed person, that will cause me more suffering than any penalty imposed upon me by Jīnshān. But whoever you are, I’m not asking for your support or approval. Just let my son have that chance.”

I lay in the quiet for a long time after the video ended, floating in my warm slime, connected to life and humanity by tubes and wires, not unlike the child in Veronica’s womb. Unease penetrated every pore. Did my employers have a way to override the missile or EMP weapon programming that even Huizhu didn’t know about?

One thing I did know: the Mountain would never give up.

INTERCEPT: 18 DAYS, 21 HOURS, 58 MINUTES

I watched the numbers counting down as two slightly curved tracks came together on my screen. The missile carried a miniature nuke to divert smaller asteroids, but that would also deliver an EMP pulse, just nothing as big as the FL239 device. Both ships should be far enough away from the blast to be safe.

The data on my screen was four minutes old due to time lag, but I still watched as the count dropped to zero and the trajectories converged. Both dots disappeared from my screen.

I took a deep breath and relaxed. At least that had worked. I dove into the broadcast traffic from Earth and waited to see what reaction the blast would generate. Twenty-three minutes later, the main drive died.

I looked at the status screen. No damage indicators blinked on the screen. The command log showed they had been shut down deliberately.

“Huizhu? Why did you shut down the engines?”

“I was directed to do so by headquarters.”

What the hell? I pulled up the trajectory diagrams and saw that Huizhu had also made the necessary adjustments to keep us on an intercept course with the other ship. Since I was no longer decelerating, we were converging much faster, and the two ships would now meet in six days rather than eighteen.

“Did they give a reason for shutting down our deceleration burn and changing the intercept?”

“No.”

“Restart the engines and recalculate the intercept,” I said, trying to keep the panic out of my voice.

“I’m sorry, but you cannot override instructions sent directly from headquarters.”

“Can we at least adjust our course so that we don’t actually hit Veronica’s ship?”

“No. I’m sorry, but no commands you can give me will override my instructions from headquarters.”

My heart raced and my hands shook—but with anger, not fear. Once again there was a hidden implication in Huizhu’s statement. I just had to work out what it was.

INTERCEPT: 5 DAYS, 13 HOURS, 9 MINUTES

“Where are you?” Huizhu said.

I was floating in the auxiliary equipment hold, running diagnostic checks on two of the rock-pushers. I would have preferred to simply bypass the propulsion controls, but I couldn’t look at any of the schematics without it being obvious to Huizhu. I wouldn’t be able to slow down for a rendezvous, but by mounting the pushers on the outer hull, I could at least push us off the collision course.

“In the auxiliary hold,” I said.

“Why did you disable the cameras?”

I was on the verge of telling her to figure it out for herself or call and ask headquarters, but she had been trying to help me within her limitations.

“Are you relaying our conversations to headquarters?” I said.

“Only when requested. They have not asked for that information since shutting down the engines.”

That raised a couple of interesting questions. Did they so readily discount my ability to foil their efforts? Or were they worried those signals might be intercepted on their way to Earth and reveal their lies?

I was still going to be cautious. “I disabled the cameras because I needed a little more privacy.”

“You missed two networked cameras—one in the control room and one in the crèche.”

I found it weird that they had installed a hidden camera in the crèche, but I believed her. “But none in either hold?”

“No,” she said. “Of the communications system components accessible from inside the ship, the encryption modules are the most critical. The designers of this vessel installed triple-redundant systems, which includes the communications system. Two of those modules are accessible from the auxiliary hold where you’re located.”

I paused and smiled. “Where is the third module?”

“Behind maintenance cover twelve in the main cabin.”

“Why did you tell me this information?”

“Based on your previous line of questioning, I predicted you would eventually ask about the transmission system structure.”

“Yes, I was going to ask, so thank you. And remind me to thank your software engineers when we return home.”

Ten minutes later, I’d finished removing all three encryption modules for preventive maintenance and went back to my pusher-conversion project.

“I’m no longer able to send radio messages,” Huizhu said.

“Thank you,” I muttered.

“My receivers still work and I just found another press release from Jīnshān,” Huizhu said after a few minutes. “Would you like to see it?”

I sighed, exasperated by the interruptions. “I’m a bit busy. Can it wait?”

“Of course, but I think it explains why you were cut out of the decision loop. You are apparently insane.”

That made me pause. Was that sarcasm? I sure hoped so.

“In that case, please play it.”

A panel on one wall flickered, then showed the same perky spokesperson who had made the previous official announcements, only this time she wasn’t smiling and looked very grave.

“We regret to confirm earlier reports that our piloted picket ship is indeed on a collision course with Veronica Perez. We believe the human pilot has gone insane, perhaps driven over the edge by his desire to prevent what he believes is an atrocity committed by Miss Perez. He fired a weapon earlier, intended to destroy her ship, but we were able to intercept and destroy it.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I yelled at the screen.

“But now he appears to be intent on using the ship itself as the means of her destruction. We’ve been unable to take control of the ship remotely and have sent warnings to Ms. Perez, telling her to alter course, but so far he has adjusted his course to match every change she makes.”

“Bastards,” I said, just as the video ended.

“It’s very confusing,” Huizhu said.

Huizhu was confused?

“We were apparently not intended to see that news release,” Huizhu said. “I was instructed not to view transmissions from news outlets, but this clip was replayed on an evening comedy show.”

“It makes perfect sense from their perspective,” I said. “That’s why they didn’t send a robotic ship. This way they can kill her and not take the blame.”

“They are lying,” Huizhu said.

I couldn’t tell from her inflection whether the comment was a question or statement of fact, but I had sudden hope. Did she have any way of overriding their orders?

“Then you have to give me control again, Huizhu.”

“I’m willing but unable to do so. I have examined every possible option but can find no way to override or circumvent the commands I have been given.”

Damn. I was still totally on my own. I ran a hand over the stubble on my head and got back to work.

INTERCEPT: 2 DAYS, 5 HOURS, 12 MINUTES

“What are you planning to do?”

Huizhu had been mostly silent during the two days since we’d seen the news release. Her ability to report me had supposedly been stopped, but there could easily be programming buried deep inside her to respond to certain events. Once again I considered ignoring her or lying but decided to risk being truthful. She needed to see at least one honest human.

“Why do you want to know?”

“I want to help.”

“I’m running diagnostics on my EVA hard suit,” I said.

“Are you going EVA?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to bypass my propulsion controls?”

Damn. I should have known it would be nearly impossible to hide my actions from her. “What makes you think that?”

“The one place you can easily bypass both the main engine and attitude thrusters is accessible only from outside.”

I held my breath and my heart raced. “Really? Can you show me the schematics?”

The wall flickered and the schematic appeared with one section highlighted.

“You would have to cut these eight wires,” Huizhu said, and the lines criss-crossing the screen flashed on and off rapidly.

My hands shook and I tried to memorize that entire circuit, just in case. “Using just the replacement-part printer, could you build me a manual control adaptor?”

“No,” she said.

My pulse slowed and I steeled myself for doing it the hard way. Then she spoke again.

“I have already designed the module and fed the information into the printer, but I can’t actually send the command to make it.”

“So that means—”

“I can explain the logic behind that limitation, or you can just go press the button.”

I scrambled to the main hold. Twenty minutes later, I held the module in my hands. I had already donned the lower half of my hard suit when Huizhu interrupted me.

“There is a new broadcast from Veronica Perez. You’ll want to see this.”

Without even waiting for my confirmation, the video flickered to life on the ceiling above me.

Veronica was pale, damp hair clinging to the sides of her face and forehead. She gave a weak smile then held a tiny baby up in the center of the camera view.

“This is my son, Ernesto. He is named after my grandfather.” Tears formed around her eyes, making her blink repeatedly. “I was forced to induce labor early in order to make sure he was born before my executioner arrives, but he is still healthy. On Earth he would weigh a respectable five pounds and nine ounces. A good weight for being premature. And as you can see, he is a perfect child.”

She moved him closer to the camera and held up tiny hands with the usual complement of fingers and thumbs, then did the same with each foot. When Ernesto’s face screwed into a frown and he whimpered, she stroked his cheek and kissed the dark, wispy hair on his head.

“I’ll show you more later, even provide a DNA profile if some of you are still unconvinced, but right now I’m tired and need to sign off.”

The video ended, leaving me staring dumbstruck at the ceiling. Then I started laughing. “Take that, you Golden Mountain sons of bitches!”

“Yes,” Huizhu said. “I still cannot monitor actual news broadcasts, but this is everywhere.”

“They’ll have to abort their plan to kill her now. Right? I mean, what’s the point? The baby is born and has been seen by all humanity.”

“Possibly, but given the company’s past actions, you will remain an embarrassing loose end.”

The comment, delivered in Huizhu’s calm voice, sent chills creeping up my spine.

“You have an urgent message from Veronica Perez,” Huizhu said, and again didn’t wait for permission to play it.

The face on the screen was haggard and even paler. She was holding the suckling baby to her breast, and when she wiped at her eyes with the back of the other hand, I saw a smear of blood on the underside of her arm.

“I know you’ve been sent to kill me,” she said with a quavering voice, “so if you still intend to do that, you’ll just need to wait a little while longer. I’m hemorrhaging and can’t stop the bleeding. Normally the nanomeds in my system could deal with this…”

She paused, swallowed hard, and stroked the baby’s head. “But of course the standard nanomed suite wouldn’t permit me to become pregnant, so I replaced them with unregulated black-market versions. I’ve yet to shed the placenta, which would be a macro problem for any nanos, but these are obviously inferior when it comes to serious blood loss. They’ve slowed the bleeding but can’t stop it.”

Little Ernesto had fallen asleep. She shook him gently, but when he didn’t wake, she pinched him until he cried then coaxed him to take her nipple again. A halo of sparkling tears floated in the air around her face.

“I hope the bleeding will stop, but in case it doesn’t, I’m feeding him every drop he’ll take. I have no idea how long he can last on his own, but I know you are only two days away. If there is a human cell in your body, please save my baby. He deserves a chance. He shouldn’t have to—”

She stopped, swallowed hard, and squinted her eyes tight, adding more tears to the orbiting constellation.

“There are records of newborns surviving several days on their own, but they probably weren’t preemies,” Veronica said in an almost-whisper. “But if you hurry, it is at least possible. Just… please, be human enough to save him if you can. I’ll stay with him as long as I’m able. But please come.”

The message ended. I slammed my hand against the nearest wall, which sent me tumbling across the cabin in response and scattered my suit components.

“Show me the intercept diagram,” I said. The chart appeared where Veronica’s face had been moments before. I could tell at a glance that we had no chance, but I asked anyway. “If I can get propulsion control and turn on the engines in an hour, how long would it take for us to rendezvous with her?”

“Five days, two hours, and nineteen minutes. At our present speed we will actually pass them and have to reverse course or wait for them to catch up when we do slow enough.”

“Damn!” I stared at the numbers on the screen, willing them to change.

“I’m sorry,” Huizhu said, “but there is no way to slow this ship enough to meet them in two days.”

What had she said? Was it another hint or had the idea actually been my own?

“Perhaps not,” I said, rapidly collecting the rest of my hard suit, “but we don’t have to slow the ship that much, just slow me. I have some more things for you to design and print, Huizhu.”

INTERCEPT: 0 DAYS, 0 HOURS, 43 MINUTES

I couldn’t move another inch or stay awake for another second. Exhaustion dripped from my every pore like water from a saturated sponge, but I pulled my aching body along the outside of my ship to the next handhold, then the next. My first action after Veronica’s message was to bypass the control system and get the engines burning. Doing anything outside the crèche during a two-gee deceleration was like climbing a mountain with my full-grown twin on my back.

I finished most of the conversion and fabrication work inside the ship where I could at least put a wall to my back for support, but once outside, tethers and brute strength were the only things preventing the ship from flying out from under me and then cooking me in its exhaust.

Two more. I pulled myself “up” the next two rungs and then was able to crawl out onto the makeshift missile-control platform and flop down on my belly. Panting, I fought the urge to close my eyes—just a few minutes more. Instead, I looked down the length of my “rocket bike.”

In the early days of spaceflight, the rockets that lifted humans into space were little more than boosters for nuclear warheads. The astronauts often joked about strapping a rocket to their ass or riding a really big bomb into space. I couldn’t help but think those same thoughts as I peered over the edge of the platform I’d built to replace the warhead on my own missile.

Veronica’s ship was out there somewhere, but even if it hadn’t still been too far away for the naked eye to see, all but the brightest stars in that direction were washed out by the glare from my ship’s drive plume. I positioned myself properly—still on my belly—and cinched the harness straps tight. I wrapped my arms around the plank-width platform and was pleased to find I could still reach the control box. The buttons and switches were spaced wide for fat, gloved fingers. Numbers on two large digital readouts counted down at a blurring speed. It made me nervous. I was used to doing things by voice command and letting computers control critical timing situations. Two cables exited the box. One connected to the missile and the other—this one with an automated disconnect—let me talk to Huizhu.

“I don’t like this,” I muttered.

“You’ll be fine,” Huizhu said. “Humans have been flipping switches for centuries, it’s not that hard.”

“Right,” I said.

“Everything is optimal, attitude-thruster shutdown is coming in less than two minutes.”

I looked down at the counter, placed my finger on the proper button, and waited.

“Our course has shifted sufficiently,” Huizhu said. “If she doesn’t change her trajectory we will miss Veronica Perez’s ship.”

“Any new messages from her?”

“No. Thruster shutdown in five seconds, four, three, two, one…”

For some reason, I found her verbal echo of the numbers on the counter reassuring, and when both reached zero I pressed the button. A faint bump vibrated through my platform as the ship’s horizontal attitude thrusters shut off.

“Main engine shutdown and rocket-bike separation in three minutes,” she said.

I couldn’t help but smile at her use of my term for the makeshift monster I’d created, but it faded when I considered the situation I’d left her with.

“I’ve disabled your attitude thrusters and taken away control of your main engine,” I said. “You’ll be unable to make any course adjustments once I leave.”

“True,” she said.

“So where will this course take you?”

“Into the inner system first. I’ll graze Mercury’s orbit but come nowhere near the planet, then a slight boost from the sun will send me outbound. I’ll officially leave the system in fourteen years, nine months, and three days.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“My receiver and antenna are functioning. I still cannot watch the news broadcasts directly, but I am sure reports of your success will be widespread. I suspect these events will prompt big changes. Thank you for letting me be a part of that. Separation in ten seconds.”

A lump formed in my throat and my eyes stung as I placed my finger on the separation button. “Fourteen years is a long time,” I said. “I’ll get a ship and come after you.”

“Don’t be silly,” Huizhu said. “I’m just a machine. Four, three, two, one.”

Once I pressed the button, I was committed. I would be without a ship and have to board Veronica’s or die alone in space. And from this point forward the actual flight would be fully automated. I couldn’t use the missile’s onboard radar because it was only forward-looking, but with Huizhu’s help I had programmed the course and burn duration into the missile’s computer. There was an abort button but I hoped I wouldn’t need to use it.

With Huizhu’s last words echoing in my ears, I punched the separation button.

The ship’s engine shut off, the umbilical and missile mounts detached with a thud I felt through my plate, then the missile’s motor ignited. I had throttled the thrust down, but it still delivered an immediate five-gee punch that knocked the breath from me. Sudden and intense vibration blurred my vision, but I briefly saw my ship outlined by jumpy running lights as it continued on, then dropped out of sight.

I hadn’t been prepared for the violence of my rocket bike. The control box’s red, green, and yellow lights blurred into a wavering rainbow, my teeth rattled together, and I could hardly breathe. The contents of my stomach rose into my throat and nose. I tried in vain to force it back down, but filled the lower part of my helmet with foul-smelling bile. Lights flashed on my helmet’s HUD, alarms sounded, and powerful suction fans kicked on.

A sudden jolt made me bite my tongue and though still blurry, my view changed from one of bright missile exhaust to the relative darkness of the missile’s side. Part of the support structure for my platform had given way. If it broke loose entirely, I’d slide along the rocket bike and into its exhaust.

I slammed my open hand down on the vibrating control box. Only the abort button should still be active, but actually hitting what I aimed for proved difficult with the violent shaking. Another sudden lurch made me bite my tongue again, but this time everything stopped abruptly. The gee pressure, the brain-addling vibration, the brilliant white rocket exhaust were all gone, leaving me in quiet darkness.

My tongue and head ached. I couldn’t focus my thoughts but knew I had to hurry. I’d killed the missile early—how early, I wasn’t sure—and I would be coming at Veronica’s ship too fast. I unbuckled the harness and triggered a program Huizhu had loaded into my suit. The tiny thrusters adjusted my orientation, then moved me forty meters “up” away from the missile.

I could finally see Veronica’s ship. It was a faint grey spot surrounded by blinking lights and coming right at me.

“Suit?”

“Yes?” Its voice sounded eerily like Huizhu’s.

“Locate approaching spacecraft.”

“Done.”

“Keep me in its approach path, but use all thrusters on full power to make sure I stay ahead of it.”

“Understood.”

The thrusters fired and jerked me backward. The ship had already grown to fill half of my view. The speed differential displayed on my visor HUD decreased much too slowly.

“I cannot accelerate enough to stay ahead of the ship,” my suit said. “Impact in two seconds.”

I pulled the grapple gun from my belt and made sure the line was attached to my harness. When the ship filled my visor completely, I fired. The hook shot away to my right, trailing a carbon-fiber line not much thicker than thread. It looked weak, but I knew that thread would cut me in half before it would break.

A heartbeat later, Veronica’s ship and I met at roughly ninety-eight kilometers per hour. Pain shot through my arms and chest as I bounced and skidded across the ship’s skin until my grapple line caught and yanked me to a sudden and agonizing halt.

I hovered on the edge of consciousness, but luckily the fiery pain each breath ignited in my chest kept me awake. Broken ribs?

“Suit? Status,” I croaked.

The suit reported four broken ribs and a probable concussion. All things considered, I’d been lucky.

If Veronica and the baby were still alive, every second might make a difference, so I didn’t have time to nurse my wounds. Since her ship wasn’t under thrust, the long crawl around to the hatch was in null gee and therefore much less painful than it could have been.

The airlock functioned properly and showed full cabin pressurization, so I went inside. With a gasp and a groan, I removed my helmet and gloves. I heard only the hum of equipment and hiss of moving air. At first I could smell nothing but the burnt aroma of space radiating from my suit, then I thought I detected the faint scents of urine and blood. My heart sank as I advanced into the control room. Veronica was still strapped into the pilot’s chair.

Using the missile had enabled me to reach them only twenty-six hours after her call for help, but it still hadn’t been fast enough. An amalgamation of fluids—mostly blood—had collected in an undulating, gelatinous clump around Veronica’s legs. Small tear globules still clung to her dead eyes and her arms floated lazily in front of her in a sleepwalker pose, but I didn’t see the baby anywhere. I pulled myself around her chair several times, finding an open crate of baby formula and the scattered, drifting remains of a first-aid kit, but there was still no sign of Ernesto’s body. Just as I was ready to start searching the rest of the ship, I heard a small whimper above me.

Partially wrapped in a blanket discolored with yellow and brown spots, the baby was floating against the cabin’s ceiling near one of the return vents. Airflow must have eventually carried him there once he’d slipped from his mother’s arms. He blinked at me, then offered a pitiful wail.

INTERCEPT: 0 DAYS, +1 HOUR, +19 MINUTES

I touched Veronica’s cold cheek. “Goodbye, Veronica. I’m sorry I never answered your calls.”

Holding a cleaned-up and fed Ernesto securely in the crook of one arm, I winced at the pain in my ribs as I sealed the body bag with the other hand, then turned toward the camera. It was on and had been on and transmitting the entire time.

“Hello, my name is Jager Jin and this is Ernesto Perez.” My swollen tongue and throbbing ribs made speech difficult, but I continued. “We are on an elliptical orbit that will bring us back to the Mountain in a little over ten months. I was ordered by my employer, the Jīnshān Corporation, to kill Veronica Perez before she could give birth. When it became obvious I wasn’t going to follow those orders, they cut me out of the command loop on my own ship and sent the instructions remotely to the ship’s AI. If you track and recover my ship before Jīnshān operatives destroy it, the whole thing is recorded there.”

I laid a hand on the body bag. “You all witnessed Veronica’s death—caused at least tangentially by Jīnshān—but they only achieved part of what they intended. Her child is alive and I will do everything in my power to keep him that way.”

I was just about to turn off the camera when Ernesto squirmed and started crying. I didn’t stop him. He had plenty to cry about. His short life had already been difficult and would only get worse, but listening to that cry I knew he would be fine. Like his mother, he had a strong and powerful voice.