Defy the Worlds (Defy the Stars #2)(33)
“Genesis?” Zayan shakes his head, as if to clear it. “Wait, how did Genesis come into this?”
Abel’s explanation plays a symphony of reactions over their faces—horror, then hope, then uncertainty. He has no idea how they’ll answer, but he must ask: “I can send the contact information for Ephraim. If you can reach out to him and help him find a few ships to hire—Vagabonds you personally know and trust—”
“Can’t do it.” Harriet folds her arms across her chest. “You were at the Orchid Festival bombing the same as us. You saw what they did. You tell me this Dunaway wasn’t a part of that, all right, I believe you. But I don’t trust Remedy, and I’m not putting my neck on the line for them. Right, Zayan?”
But Zayan doesn’t answer. Only when she’s turned to him, eyes wide, does he say, “I think we have to do something.”
“Are you batcrap crazy?” Harriet explodes. “This is Remedy. You seriously want us to join Remedy?”
Zayan turns toward her, and Abel is no longer a participant in the conversation, only an observer. “Of course not. But that’s not what this is. We wouldn’t be attacking anyone, just helping run medicine to Genesis. That’s different.”
“You really think Earth’s going to let medical ships or anything else go through the Genesis Gate?” Harriet demands.
Abel doesn’t get a chance to answer, because Zayan immediately says, “That’s where Remedy comes in. They’d be—you know—the muscle. But we’d be doing good. Helping people.”
Harriet’s ire has faded, but her eyes remain wary. “We could get caught.”
“Yeah, well, nobody said doing the right thing was easy. And I know you. You’d never be able to live with yourself if you walked away from this.” Zayan turns from Harriet back to Abel. “So, what, we’d help this Ephraim Dunaway guy find some good Vagabond ships to hire—”
“No,” Harriet cuts in. Her tone of voice has changed, become electric. “We reach out to lots of Vagabonds. Tons of them. If you’re going to get a shipment through the Genesis Gate, you’re going to need as big a fleet as possible. You’re going to need… hundreds of ships, probably. If we put the word out that we’re standing up to Earth, putting together a rescue convoy, strength in numbers and all that—I bet we’ll find lots of volunteers.” To Zayan, who’s staring at her openmouthed, she says, “Well, if we’re doing this thing, let’s not half-ass it.”
Zayan grins at her. “This is why I love you.”
“Is that the only reason?” She arches an eyebrow.
Abel knows from experience that Zayan and Harriet are fully capable of flirting and taking care of key tasks at the same time, but this practice will leave them with no attention left over for him. “I’ll be out of contact for a while,” he says. “Work with Ephraim, trust your own judgment, and don’t wait to hear from me.”
That brings them back to him, concern clear on both their faces. “All right,” Harriet says slowly, “but if you need help, you call us. Anywhere, anytime. Got it?”
“Understood.”
It occurs to Abel to wonder whether Burton Mansfield has ever had friends who would pledge their loyalty to him, despite danger, without any hope of personal reward. Maybe not. Maybe that was one reason why he made Abel and wove Directive One so thoroughly throughout his brain. Mansfield chose to program love rather than earn it.
Abel knows down to the second the moment he’ll be within sensor range of Neptune’s moon Proteus. Yet he waits on the bridge for almost an hour beforehand, unable to focus on anything else, staring at the viewscreen and willing the alert to sound.
Without Zayan and Harriet, Abel doesn’t bother with his captain’s chair. Instead he sits at ops, checking and double-checking every system on the ship, waiting, waiting—
The proximity alert sounds. Instantly he brings up the long-range images of the moon Proteus. His viewscreen fills with unexpected details; he frowns as he identifies a docking framework and a passenger ship—an enormous passenger ship, one that could carry perhaps ten thousand individuals on shorter journeys, or thoroughly provision and entertain a small number in great style. Given the appearance of the ship, Abel suspects the latter. This vessel—surely the Osiris Mansfield spoke of—is as intricate and golden as any piece of jewelry found in an Egyptian pharaoh’s tomb, with designs in styles no doubt meant to evoke that comparison.
Abel frowns at its gaudiness. The extravagance is of course wasteful, so it must serve some purpose.
Its use can’t be tactical, he thinks. Therefore it is emotional. The passengers of this ship are no doubt rich, and they may wish for the ship to reflect their wealth and status. So the elaborate decoration is… symbolic.
He wonders whether Burton Mansfield helped choose the ship’s name. As Abel knows from experience, Mansfield likes symbols and allusions. In the ancient Egyptian myth, the great god Osiris is murdered by his brother Set, who dismembers the body and scatters the pieces far and wide. Osiris’s wife, Isis, and the other goddesses bring the pieces back together, though there’s one part they never find: the penis. So Isis creates a phallus out of gold for Osiris, then copulates with her reequipped husband, causing him to be resurrected as king of the world of the dead.