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beccaelizabethPeople who only travel one stop never get why we call it the Ladder. It’s a long, slow, haul up or down to the Gate, a carefully choreographed high inclination dance with every other packet and carrier waiting, then one flash of blue white light, and back down or up to the dance in the next star system. One bright hoop does not a ladder make.
I lay cradled in flight gel, secure from all g-shock any human could survive. The outer crystal was shield against sharper impacts, strong as starship hull and made of much the same stuff. Life support systems pulsed and hissed in gentle reassurance.
My hands twitched, as far as they were able. My feet pressed and paddled. I could feel it all pressing in around me, and I couldn’t see a damn thing.
“Breathe,” Malcolm told me, from the other capsule. “Use my eyes. It’s alright.”
“I’m trussed up like Cinderella and my brain feels like treacle. It’s not alright.”
“Snow White had the crystal casket, and your brain is fine. The analgesics will wear off. Just keep breathing, and look at the stars.”
“The stars are hardly reassuring at this speed. Blue shift, red shift, claymation movement. We’re riding the Ladder.”
“I know.”
“I did not aspire to do this again.”
“I know.”
He shifted in his gel wrap and I felt the pain shoot up our leg, worse for trying to pull away.
“You sure they got that spear out?” I winced and the pull on my forehead sent dull messages of inadvisability, pain in waiting behind the chemistry.
Malcolm relaxed his face into the blank on-duty mask and brought mine with him. That successful, he rolled his shoulders and started on down, training providing the right sequence to settle in to the flight beds. But I wasn’t done fighting. I clenched my fists – or tried, gel, splints and pain all springing them wide again.
Malcolm gasped with pain and twitched a long moment. “I remind you I am not half as doped as you are. Can we please just relax?” He began his routine again. “I can let you use my eyes, or I can go in to my place, but we cannot afford…”
“I know, I know.”
“… a feedback loop on top of all this. So which…?”
“Eyes! Please. Can we… Dark. Dark in here. Dark since…” Panic dissolved language into flashes, the mission, the ship, the dark.
And then there was light. A hint of misting from the gel, the case, the long serving hull, but beyond that, all the starry universe.
“I really do never get tired of this,” Malcolm offered, quietly.
“Even when it’s on the blink,” I agreed, with an equal load of subtext.
My partner and I relaxed, slowly, breathing steadily together as the stars flickered past. The grandest slide show in the universe, a new view every few seconds. Blue white red black. Blue white red black. Blue white red black.
“The red is just eyelids. You can’t but blink when it’s brightest.”
“The red says humans are here. I like the red.”
Idle and well worn thoughts. A comfort blanket while technology did its job.
I kept trying to find reference stars, but even when I thought I did they blinked before I was sure. Malcolm just settled back into hurry-up-and-wait, rehearsing old manuals in his mind. I swear, one day I’ll know as much about weapons as he does, just hearing him whisper in the down time.
“I could think of something more exciting.”
“That wasn’t a complaint.” I needed all the light routine I could get. Treacle brain was giving way to honey or syrup, and the trade off had its detriments.
“You know, the speed we’re going…”
“Gate pairs are the closest coordinated…”
“…we wouldn’t even know…”
“… deep space objects…”
“… when we missed?”
“… in existence. And Service ships do not miss.”
“Highcastle training, rah rah rah.” I pictured the cheerleader carefully. She looked like the very perky pilot from last shore leave, only wearing about half her uniform.
Malcolm rolled his eyes and swapped the uniform out for rec clothes, then sent back what she’d looked like last time he saw her, sheets in a tangle.
I sighed. “I miss beds.”
Hearty agreement.
The view blinked and drifted, gates spacing out some, then a light like a gold coin flicked past, moving visibly. A blink of gas giant out the corner of our eye and then blue white red black again past the system. Like a station flashing past an express train.
Malcolm took the thought and rolled through it, exploring the concept. My space born beloved, endlessly curious how we managed down a well.
“Like a lift, but mass transit.”
“And only horizontal.”
He blinked that away as the incomprehensible planet thing.
I thought train tracks, points switching, derailment.
“You know even Highcastle has a talent curve. We don’t even know if the pilot’s tail end.”
“Renata Boni,” Malcolm recited, service record in his mind’s eye.
“Renata?” I glitched panic at him, but this one he could let roll past.
“The Service retrains more thoroughly than it trains; reborns are excellent officers. Dedicated, focused… Boni has twenty years on the Ladder, excellent assessments, and unremarkable maintenance records.”
I settled in the security of his professional opinion. Of course he’d check.
“Your safety is my duty, and honour.”
I felt the ringing surety in him, and kept hushed the lingering doubts in me.
“All the rest is my pleasure, my love.”
I grinned. My face ached with it. I tried to stay above, away, detached, but the more of me started checking in the more the gnawing empty pit of worry opened up. Worry, if I could keep it only worry. Sliding the Ladder on a medical evacuation… stars and stones, how bad was it?
“Hey, enough of that. They sent a courier. They know they’ll get return on that investment. House or Castle will repair this.”
There was no doubt in him. Duty, honour, Service; it was truth like bedrock.
He waved away the metaphor and put pure maths in its place, the clear equations of space flight, that all matter followed. Newton, Einstein, and the Service codes, all equals to him.
I thought of my code eschewing Captain, with a mental smirk… then settled down. The unknown pilot I might doubt, but the Captain would move heaven and earth for me.
“We all would.” Malcolm blinked and showed me the heavens moving, slide by slide by slide. I tried to settle into the hypnotism of it, but our eyes were getting tired. Our everything was.
“Let me take the pain, and you get some sleep.”
I protested vaguely at this division of labour, his hours awake far more than mine since the… dark, moving, pain…
Malcolm slid a better image into place with firm precision. Bed. Warm sheets. Warm beloved.
“Sleep.” He took my pain in like taking the reins, every tug of it going to his conscious mind, mine only soft echoes.
I let him do it. If he could manage that, I was tired as all hell.
We let our eyes close and settled in to red black fast floating.
I lay cradled in flight gel, secure from all g-shock any human could survive. The outer crystal was shield against sharper impacts, strong as starship hull and made of much the same stuff. Life support systems pulsed and hissed in gentle reassurance.
My hands twitched, as far as they were able. My feet pressed and paddled. I could feel it all pressing in around me, and I couldn’t see a damn thing.
“Breathe,” Malcolm told me, from the other capsule. “Use my eyes. It’s alright.”
“I’m trussed up like Cinderella and my brain feels like treacle. It’s not alright.”
“Snow White had the crystal casket, and your brain is fine. The analgesics will wear off. Just keep breathing, and look at the stars.”
“The stars are hardly reassuring at this speed. Blue shift, red shift, claymation movement. We’re riding the Ladder.”
“I know.”
“I did not aspire to do this again.”
“I know.”
He shifted in his gel wrap and I felt the pain shoot up our leg, worse for trying to pull away.
“You sure they got that spear out?” I winced and the pull on my forehead sent dull messages of inadvisability, pain in waiting behind the chemistry.
Malcolm relaxed his face into the blank on-duty mask and brought mine with him. That successful, he rolled his shoulders and started on down, training providing the right sequence to settle in to the flight beds. But I wasn’t done fighting. I clenched my fists – or tried, gel, splints and pain all springing them wide again.
Malcolm gasped with pain and twitched a long moment. “I remind you I am not half as doped as you are. Can we please just relax?” He began his routine again. “I can let you use my eyes, or I can go in to my place, but we cannot afford…”
“I know, I know.”
“… a feedback loop on top of all this. So which…?”
“Eyes! Please. Can we… Dark. Dark in here. Dark since…” Panic dissolved language into flashes, the mission, the ship, the dark.
And then there was light. A hint of misting from the gel, the case, the long serving hull, but beyond that, all the starry universe.
“I really do never get tired of this,” Malcolm offered, quietly.
“Even when it’s on the blink,” I agreed, with an equal load of subtext.
My partner and I relaxed, slowly, breathing steadily together as the stars flickered past. The grandest slide show in the universe, a new view every few seconds. Blue white red black. Blue white red black. Blue white red black.
“The red is just eyelids. You can’t but blink when it’s brightest.”
“The red says humans are here. I like the red.”
Idle and well worn thoughts. A comfort blanket while technology did its job.
I kept trying to find reference stars, but even when I thought I did they blinked before I was sure. Malcolm just settled back into hurry-up-and-wait, rehearsing old manuals in his mind. I swear, one day I’ll know as much about weapons as he does, just hearing him whisper in the down time.
“I could think of something more exciting.”
“That wasn’t a complaint.” I needed all the light routine I could get. Treacle brain was giving way to honey or syrup, and the trade off had its detriments.
“You know, the speed we’re going…”
“Gate pairs are the closest coordinated…”
“…we wouldn’t even know…”
“… deep space objects…”
“… when we missed?”
“… in existence. And Service ships do not miss.”
“Highcastle training, rah rah rah.” I pictured the cheerleader carefully. She looked like the very perky pilot from last shore leave, only wearing about half her uniform.
Malcolm rolled his eyes and swapped the uniform out for rec clothes, then sent back what she’d looked like last time he saw her, sheets in a tangle.
I sighed. “I miss beds.”
Hearty agreement.
The view blinked and drifted, gates spacing out some, then a light like a gold coin flicked past, moving visibly. A blink of gas giant out the corner of our eye and then blue white red black again past the system. Like a station flashing past an express train.
Malcolm took the thought and rolled through it, exploring the concept. My space born beloved, endlessly curious how we managed down a well.
“Like a lift, but mass transit.”
“And only horizontal.”
He blinked that away as the incomprehensible planet thing.
I thought train tracks, points switching, derailment.
“You know even Highcastle has a talent curve. We don’t even know if the pilot’s tail end.”
“Renata Boni,” Malcolm recited, service record in his mind’s eye.
“Renata?” I glitched panic at him, but this one he could let roll past.
“The Service retrains more thoroughly than it trains; reborns are excellent officers. Dedicated, focused… Boni has twenty years on the Ladder, excellent assessments, and unremarkable maintenance records.”
I settled in the security of his professional opinion. Of course he’d check.
“Your safety is my duty, and honour.”
I felt the ringing surety in him, and kept hushed the lingering doubts in me.
“All the rest is my pleasure, my love.”
I grinned. My face ached with it. I tried to stay above, away, detached, but the more of me started checking in the more the gnawing empty pit of worry opened up. Worry, if I could keep it only worry. Sliding the Ladder on a medical evacuation… stars and stones, how bad was it?
“Hey, enough of that. They sent a courier. They know they’ll get return on that investment. House or Castle will repair this.”
There was no doubt in him. Duty, honour, Service; it was truth like bedrock.
He waved away the metaphor and put pure maths in its place, the clear equations of space flight, that all matter followed. Newton, Einstein, and the Service codes, all equals to him.
I thought of my code eschewing Captain, with a mental smirk… then settled down. The unknown pilot I might doubt, but the Captain would move heaven and earth for me.
“We all would.” Malcolm blinked and showed me the heavens moving, slide by slide by slide. I tried to settle into the hypnotism of it, but our eyes were getting tired. Our everything was.
“Let me take the pain, and you get some sleep.”
I protested vaguely at this division of labour, his hours awake far more than mine since the… dark, moving, pain…
Malcolm slid a better image into place with firm precision. Bed. Warm sheets. Warm beloved.
“Sleep.” He took my pain in like taking the reins, every tug of it going to his conscious mind, mine only soft echoes.
I let him do it. If he could manage that, I was tired as all hell.
We let our eyes close and settled in to red black fast floating.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-25 12:09 am (UTC)“I’m trussed up like Cinderella and my brain feels like treacle. It’s not alright.”
The former line made my brain read the latter in Trip's voice. :)
...
OK, this is real weird. I don't know yet if it's good or bad weird, just weird.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 06:14 pm (UTC)I'm fine with weird. It's sort of homey by now.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-25 02:42 am (UTC)~ c.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 06:16 pm (UTC)I did another section that may or may not provide clues.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-25 01:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-12 06:13 pm (UTC)I just wrote some more. and realised I hadn't answered comments on the last bit...