If Ossuary Crypt Two was eccentric but charming, Mausoleum Companionway Three was fresh and raw and depressing. Walled and floored in foamed stone with a surface of artificial basalt, it was inset with niches. In many of these there floated pathetic bundles of leather and bone, ritually enrobed in their helmetless space suits. These vestments had not protected their wearers from a ghastly fate; the signs of violent death were obvious and distressing. Their former owners had embarked on this chapel, or been extruded en route, with the highest of hopes, that they might one day descend to the world-ocean of Shin-Tethys, there to breathe the oxygenated atmosphere and sun themselves beneath an alien star. I checked each sad relic carefully. For the most part, their bones were wired together competently enough, but one or two had come adrift from their suspension cords, and here I deployed the restraint kit and glue gun to anchor them back in their niches. (The talking box made itself helpful at this point. “Cable-stabilized objects must be able to withstand plus zero point six slash minus zero point three g normal to verticality, dropping to half that loading when subjected to off-axis jolts. Use the cable tensiometer to verify stability under load, then reattach to anchor point.” With footnotes and diagrams to explain what all of those instructions meant.)
I worked my way around another six Mausoleum Companionways. Each was the final resting place of twelve skeletons. The last one contained nine which were much smaller—juveniles, I suppose, for the Fragile don’t come in chibiform models, or even in lineages. Every Fragile is a unique type specimen, unlike any other—it’s as if they’re all prototypes for a lineage that never makes it into mass production. The juvenile uniques probably didn’t even understand where they were, much less what killed them. I found this idea quite unaccountably sad, so I hurried my check on their attachment points, quickly dusted their bones, and moved on as fast as I could.
Companionway Eight differed visibly from the others: it had a side door—an air-lock portal, in fact. As I approached I saw that it was shut, but the passive pressure indicator showed that the other side was at standard temperature and pressure. “Krina, on the outer wall, please open the door to Maternity Cell One and check for acceleration stability of all unanchored fittings.”
“What’s Mat-Ernity Cell One?” I asked the box, puzzled.
“Please open the door—” As I said, these things bore only a thin veneer of intelligence: Once you crack the ice and tumble into the howling void of thoughtlessness beneath, the illusion ceases to be comforting and becomes a major source of irritation. (Which is why I prefer my tools to be less conversational and more functional; there is less scope for self-deception if your spreadsheet is too dumb to massage the figures until they show you something pleasing rather than that which is actually there.)
I pulled the cycle handle, and the door irised open, allowing a gust of hot, moist air to escape.
“Hey! What do you think you’re—”
“Excuse me?” I asked.
“Who are you?” The occupant of Maternity Cell One glared at me from the middle of a huge free-fall web bed. The bed filled the spherical cell from one side to the other, a patchwork quilt of brightly colored embroidery cushions lashed into position with bungee cords: Toys and baubles drifted in the air around it, flashing and glittering distractingly. The occupant was quite tightly cocooned inside it, with only her face visible, roseate and cherub-cheeked, handsome perhaps, but let down by a tousle of matted green hair-fronds and angry, close-set eyes. She was clearly humanoid, but the cocoon made it impossible to tell whether she was Fragile or Post. Fist-sized bots—not xenomorphs but tools—hummed and darted among the cloud of toys, paying court and shepherding the baubles around her.
“Krina, on the outer wall, please open the door to Maternity Cell One and check for acceleration stability of all unanchored fittings.”
I displayed the talking box to the bed’s occupant apologetically. “I’m Krina. I’m sorry, I don’t know your name, I didn’t know there was anyone in here; the box just told me to—”
“I’m not a who, I’m a what! I’m the Gravid Mother!” She pronounced it as if disclosing a valuable piece of information to a potential enemy. “You might be a who, but I am not: I am a valuable component of this mission. What is that box and why does it have the effrontery to think you belong in my boudoir? What’s going on out there? Nobody tells me anything!” Two pairs of golden brown fists emerged from the bedding, petulantly twisting a pillow. Dark, beady eyes tracked me, sullen and suspicious. “Tell me everything! What’s going on out there? I know they’re up to no good!” Another fist pushed out through a fistula between duvets: this one was green and prickly and held a lobster-claw-tipped grip extender. “Did Rosa send you?”
“Er. Who’s Rosa?”
This was clearly the wrong thing to say. The Gravid Mother opened her mouth, screwed up her eyes, and began to bawl. Lachrymatory exudate pooled alarmingly around her nose, swelling into gelatinous globules that wobbled like avulsed eyeballs as she sobbed. “Rosa’s gone and deserted the mission, hasn’t she? They’ve forgotten I’m here!” She gasped for breath, causing layers of blankets and quilts and pillows to heave and ripple like an exotic dessert topping. “Nobody remembers! You, you—”
“Who’s Rosa?” I tried again.
This time the talking box decided at random to chip in. “Rosa, Lady Cybelle: Head of Mission and Communicant Priestess of the Inseminatory. Located in Sarcophagus Two, Holy Sepulcher of the Body of our Fragile Lord. Attention: consumable status of Sarcophagus Two is off-line. Please inspect.”
I let go of the box in astonishment; it floated toward the howling emotional vortex. “You don’t know who Rosa is!” she sobbed.
“She’s the priestess, no?” I felt slow. “I was only hired by Deacon Dennett a few hours ago . . .”
There was a stupendous snuffling noise, and the bed shook violently. Then the two giant tears floated away from the face they half obscured, wobbling violently. “Aleksandr hired you?”
“Would that be Deacon Dennett? Black skin, blue eyes, very thin, works on the engines—”
“No, Aleksandr is the choirmaster!” She peered at me suspiciously. “You really are new here, aren’t you?”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to say! This box wants me to clean in here. Do you mind if I do that, or would you like me to go away?”
“Oh clean, clean, clean away!” The spiky arm waved randomly. “It’s not as if I can stop you! Oh, damn. Throw me that monitor box, yes, that one near your head. I need to check my gestatogen levels again.” Her crying jag died down, save for the odd snorting afterquake as she cleared her gas exchangers and plugged a spiky needle from the monitor into one of her arms. “Talk to me while you clean. Where are we? What’s happening outside my demesne?”
I commenced hunting down dust bunnies and drifting messes, of which there were many. The Gravid Mother’s attendants gave me a wide berth while I worked. “I’m Krina. We just left—are leaving—Taj Beacon, where the chapel put in for repairs. Next stop is high orbit around Shin-Tethys. I’m working my passage to Shin-Tethys because I reached Taj just too late for a regular passenger berth, and I’m not rich enough to buy my own transport. Deacon Dennett said there had been an accident, and lots of people left at Taj Beacon—the ones who weren’t killed.” I glanced at her sharply, but she showed no sign of being affected by my mention of the accident. “Have they left you alone in here? Can’t you come out?”