“Yes, yes: the news broke. I’m up to my ears in it.” It was all Mosphei’ and ship-language, nothing hidden, and everything hidden: they passed information the way they’d learned to do in the Bu-javid, where every wall had ears, and most of all he took reassurance from Jase’s tone, and the simple fact that Jase was personally in touch. He knew about the tank. Jase had an immense amount to absorb; and he was utterly, terribly vulnerable when he did it. He wondered that Jase could find the courage, at the moment. “I’ll take care of it. As things stand, I’ll be packed in fairly short order; I understand the dowager is packed—”
“ Her gear is already boarded, along with some few personnel.”
“We’d better really get moving, then.”
“ First watch tomorrow is soon enough. If you wait until fourth, you’ll be mixed in with crew boarding. Senior captain’s expressed a preference to have all non-crew on before the board-call goes out. We’re leaving people. There’ll be partings. We want to give them room.”
We. Jase had finally included himself among the captains, mentally. “Understood. We’ll make it. No problem. We’re packed fairly light, considering. If you need to contact me, don’t worry about the hour.—And if you just want to stop by before that for a sandwich, we do compare more than favorably with the crew lounge.”
Jase seemed to be amused: at least he skipped a beat, and since Jase’s sense of humor usually vanished under stress, that response was reassuring. “ I’m sure. Take care. See you after undock— maybe before, but that’ll be on business.”
“See you,” he said, and gave the unit back to Yolanda. “He can’t get loose. But he seems all right.”
Yolanda had stayed and listened, with never a sign that he ought to extend the questioning.
“He seems fine,” she said. He trusted her instincts, at least on that issue. And his exchange with Jase—the sort they’d learned to make in Shejidan—was like old times, all the old signals, crisp on the uptake and easy in delivery. Jase was fine, at least as regarded his freedom and his safety now.
Jase was attempting to gain an expertise he’d hitherto dodged and defied. In no wise could he bring himself up to speed with this late start, but he could learn what was going on, what was routine and what wasn’t—if schedules meant the technical minutiae of ship-function, the things that should happen from undock to the moment they exited the solar system.
Jase wasn’t idle. He’d never thought it, but he began to understand what Jase seemed to be undertaking, finally—not wholly surrendering to Ramirez’s plan for him, no, he knew Jase’s stubborn self-will. Jase hadn’t given in. But Jase was far too clever to choose ignorance, either. Information came available to him, and Jase grabbed it while his feet were still—so to speak—on station decking, and before his range of choices diminished. Yolanda worried about his state of mind, and maybe a friend ought to worry about him battering himself against his own ignorance—but it was Jase: it was pure Jase, this headlong attack at a problem he could single out for his own.
Worry later, he thought. Right now Jase was doing things that made thorough sense to his longtime partner—if not the healthiest choice for a man who needed real sleep. There wasn’t much of that going on in his own apartment, either.
By supper, his staff adamantly, with a flourish, presented his favorite dishes, clearly determined that the paidhi should have a regular, sit-down meal and an hour-long hiatus in his problems.
After supper, better still, Narani reported their own packing complete, ready for boarding at any moment, while the ship-status showed 42% complete. The departure wasn’t moving on schedule, he was sure, and he hoped for a reprieve—any reprieve, from any source. Tabini saying, no, he didn’t have to go—that would do… though it wouldn’t happen, and it shouldn’t happen. There were worse things than going. Staying, while someone who’d make a mistake went in his place—that was worse.
He stayed up re-drafting letters until he knew he made no sense, and accidentally failed to store the right copies, three of them in a batch.
That was how things were going. He’d had two brandies, and sat staring at one of the pictures he’d chosen to take, thinking of camping on Mospheira’s north shore, and Toby’s yacht at anchor just off the cove.
Fire, fire on water, that night they’d fought off Deana Hanks’ hopes of a war, around the beached wreck of a boat.
They’d had some successes… the side of reason and interspecies sanity. They weren’t out of hope. They’d won the big ones.
But to this hour he’d utterly, wholly, failed his family. He didn’t have time left to do the things he needed to do, there wasn’t a relationship he had on the island that he hadn’t offended, and as things stood now, Barb had heard the news and learned he was on his way out of the solar system. He’d failed to send the letters he still had to send; he’d lost the draft, and his mother and his brother had to get the news the hard way.
So he had to get the letters written—again—not as good as they’d been before he lost the drafts, but the best he could.
On two brandies—he tried.
Dear Barb,
I have to thank you for your loyalty to my family, particularly in the last few years.
I can choose the right words for the job I do, but I never said the right things at the right time between us— maybe because I didn’t listen that well, maybe because I had too much of my attention elsewhere, and presumed too far… all of which is behind us at this point. We still rely on each other in ways in ways I have no right to ask— but knowing you’re where you are, where I can’t be, leaves me deeply in your debt. I hope, but have no right to ask, that you’ll shed some of the good advice you’ve given me on my brother and my mother.
I count on you, without a right or a claim, and I can only pile the debt higher. With more good memories than bad
—Bren.
He didn’t send, not immediately. He slipped it into an electronic folder to send when departure was imminent. The words finally came to him. The dam was broken.
Toby, by the time you read this you’ll know the situation, where I am and why I can’t be there. I can’t ask you to explain this one to Mother. I just want you to know I couldn’t have a better brother.
For your kids, for you and Jill… for all of you, I have to do this.
For all the rest of it,—
It was like writing a will. It might well be one. And he couldn’t dwell on the situation, or grieve over it—the job didn’t budget time for that.. It never had.
I wish you the life you need and deserve.
Maybe after this there’ll be time for me to pay you back at least a fraction of the favors I owe you. My fondest memory, the best human memory I have, is the sight of you at the rail of the oldMolly yacht, sailing in to save our skins. That, and you and the kids on the beach. I didn’t get a family, except yours. I wish I’d been a better brother.
I wish everybody my best.
At very least— forgive me the bad bits and be sure I’m thinking of you often.