“You’ll know everything at the moment you return, yes. But minute by minute, Raphael, you’ll forget.
Your memories of the past and what had been your future can’t coexist. By the twenty-four-hour mark, you’ll forget everything.”
“Twenty-four hours?” He straightened abruptly. “Gods damn it, that’s not fair! The first twenty-four hours I was on that damned ship were a bloody nightmare. It was chaos! The captain was stinking drunk, half the crew’d been left behind on shore leave, the sani-facs only worked on alternate decks . . . I was thrown in the middle of that and then told to expect an admiralty inspection. If I didn’t get that ship at least functioning my entire career was at stake!”
“Sounds like you pissed someone off royally on your previous posting.” Jezebel’s deep chuckle returned. “But be that as it may, child, you’re going to be here again.” She pointed to the middle of her palm. “You can pursue the fame and glory of your career. Or you can pursue the woman you love.”
He clutched the edge of the counter. “If you could just return me to the point where I got command of the Intrepid. The awards ceremony, right before that. My grandmother was there. Winnie and I—”
“No.”
His heart sank. “It has to be the Versatile?”
“Yes.”
He slowly relaxed his grip on the bar. “And if after the first twenty-four hours, I can’t change her mind?”
“Then you have ten years to deep-six the plans to use an X-7 to get off Delta Five. Take the shuttle, instead. At least then you’ll be there when Commander Montalvo asks Briony to marry him.”
Monty? His chief of engineering?
“And you’ll be there to hear it when she says yes.”
“I’m dying and she says yes?”
“Death has a way of making some people face their priorities.”
He understood that. It pushed his love for Winnie right to the top of the list. Then the station exploded.
And she said yes to that slime, Monty.
He balled his hand into a fist, nodded at Jezebel. “I don’t have any choice, do I?”
“You always have the option to turn down our offer.”
“That would be abysmally stupid of me.”
“You’ve shown a certain flair in that area before,” Jezebel said dryly. Chuckles came from the trio of women behind him.
Mac bit back his comment. “The Versatile it is, then. How do we do this?”
Jezebel retrieved a new glass from the rack behind her, pulled out a bottle of clear liquid from under the bar. “Drink up.”
He didn’t even hesitate.
It took him a few seconds to get his bearings. The corridors weren’t quite as filthy as he remembered.
Maybe the years had added more grime and stench to the memory of his first hour on board the ageing destroyer.
But those years and all his future mistakes would be gone. He was alive, damn it! And Winnie was around here somewhere.
He turned the corner, caught his reflection in the cracked mirrored wall as he passed by the ship’s gym.
The wide doors were open. Stuck as usual. The man who stared back was in his thirties.
Not forty-two. Thirty-two. He took his position as XO when he was thirty-two.
He hesitated for only a second, grinned, trudged on. Damn, it felt good to be alive. Young and alive.
Gray-clad crewmembers saluted stiffly as he strode by. Not one smile, not one friendly greeting called out.
That was just as he remembered.
Of course, it was only his first day. He’d do things differently this time. Get to know the crew, slovenly bastards that they were.
Get to know Winnie.
He stepped into an empty lift. “Engineering deck.”
It shuddered and jerked for fifteen seconds, then stopped, the doors squealing open.
He heard the low rumble of voices as he headed down the short corridor. Then a laugh, a throaty laugh that belonged to only one woman.
He wiped his palms down the side of his uniform pants. They were slick. His heart hammered in his chest and he regretted not stopping longer in front of the gym’s mirror. Did he look okay? He ran his hand through his short-cropped hair. Everything felt normal.
He stepped over the wide hatch-tread, immediately looked left towards her station.
Briony Winn. Lieutenant Briony Winn. His Winnie. Oh, Gods, she was there and she was alive and she was even more beautiful than he remembered. All of twenty-four years old. Impulsive. Animated. Sassy.
Downright sexy as—
“Commander Macawley, is there a problem?”
“No.” He shook his head without looking at the officer speaking to him. He held out his hand as if to push the woman away.
Winnie, Winnie. Look at me. Turn towards me. Give me that smile. Please, Winnie.
His bootsteps sounded muffled on the latticed decking. But she must have heard, because she turned.
Her eyes narrowed.
“Macawley. You’re late.”
Late? How could he be late? They hadn’t met yet. He clearly remembered his first few hours on board, touring the ship from top to bottom, from bridge to engineering. That was where he first saw her, sitting at her tech console on the left.
He glanced over her head at the stat-board. Eleven-twenty. He’d come on board at oh-eight-hundred.
That was about right.
But she called him Macawley. Not Commander. They hadn’t been introduced, yet she knew his name.
He stared back at the stat-board. Eleven-twenty-one. Galactic Date 874-987.
He’d been on board the Versatile for three months. He’d already made three months of abysmally stupid mistakes.
“That bitch!” The words exploded from his mouth before he could stop them. But no one turned at his outburst. Winnie seemed unruffled. They were already used to him.
That bitch Jezebel had tricked him. With her sultry voice and fanciful tale, she’d tricked him. He wasn’t starting at the beginning with Briony Winn, as she promised. He was—
She hadn’t promised. He grabbed the back of the vacant chair next to Winnie, leaned on it. Jezebel hadn’t promised to send him back to his first day on the Versatile. She had promised to send him back to the day that would make a difference in his relationship with Winnie.
No wonder the ship didn’t look as bad as he remembered. He’d been pounding it back into shape for three months.
He collapsed into the chair, leaned his elbows on his knees, then ran his hands over his face. He peered at Winnie from over the tips of his fingers.
Every finger represents a choice.
What was today? Damn it, why couldn’t he remember? Jezebel said . . .
. . . that he would begin to forget from the moment he got back on board. That his past and present memories couldn’t coexist.
Galactic Date 874-987. What was it?
Winnie was staring at him. “You okay? Maybe you should be in sick bay.”
“No. I’m fine. It’s just that—” Think! Think! What’s today? Or more importantly, what happened before today? “I need to talk to you. It’s a matter of . . .” He waved one hand aimlessly in the air, let his voice trail off as two techies thumped by in their thick-soled black boots.
“Life and death?” She wrinkled her nose at him. His heart did a flip-flop. “What is it this time? Can’t find a power outlet for your personal massaging recliner?”
Gods, he forgot about that. A gift from his uncle the senator.