“Very possibly, sir.”
“Is there any reason to think the Eliani matrix is still on the ship at all?”
“There is no reason to think that it is not, Captain.”
“In other words, you don’t know anything about anything concerning the Eliani matrix.”
“I have provided you with all known data at this point. Trace efforts are continuing, sir.”
“You still think this is a trap?” Vox asked me.
“It’s sounding better and better by the minute. But shut up and don’t distract me, will you?”
To the intelligence I said, “All right, keep me posted on the situation. I’m preparing for sleep, 612 Jason. I want the end-of-day status report, and then I want you to clear off and leave me alone.”
“Very good, sir. Fifth virtual day of voyage. Position of ship sixteen units beyond last port of call, Kansas Four. Scheduled rendezvous with relay forces at Ultima Thule spinaround point was successfully achieved at the hour of—”
The intelligence droned on and on: the usual report of the routine events of the day, broken only by the novelty of an entry for the loss of a passenger and one for the escape of a matrix, then returning to the standard data, fuel levels and velocity soundings and all the rest. On the first four nights of the voyage I had solemnly tried to absorb all this torrent of ritualized downloading of the log as though my captaincy depended on committing it all to memory, but this night I barely listened, and nearly missed my cue when it was time to give it my approval before clocking out for the night. Vox had to prod me and let me know that the intelligence was waiting for something. I gave 612 Jason the confirm-and-clock-out and heard the welcome sound of its diminishing music as it decoupled the contact.
“What do you think?” Vox asked. “It doesn’t know, does it?”
“Not yet,” I said.
“You really are a pessimist, aren’t you?”
“I think we may be able to bring this off,” I told her. “But the moment we become overconfident, it’ll be the end. Everyone on this ship wants to know where you are. The slightest slip and we’re both gone.”
“Okay. Don’t lecture me.”
“I’ll try not to. Let’s get some sleep now.”
“I don’t need to sleep.”
“Well, I do.”
“Can we talk for a while first?”
“Tomorrow,” I said.
But of course sleep was impossible. I was all too aware of the stranger within me, perhaps prowling the most hidden places of my psyche at this moment. Or waiting to invade my dreams once I drifted off. For the first time I thought I could feel her presence even when she was silent: a hot node of identity pressing against the wall of my brain. Perhaps I imagined it. I lay stiff and tense, as wide awake as I have ever been in my life. After a time I had to call 612 Jason and ask it to put me under the wire; and even then my sleep was uneasy when it came.
10.
Until that point in the voyage I had taken nearly all of my meals in my quarters. It seemed a way of exerting my authority, such as it was, aboard ship. By my absence from the dining hall I created a presence, that of the austere and aloof captain; and I avoided the embarrassment of having to sit in the seat of command over men who were much my senior in all things. It was no great sacrifice for me. My quarters were more than comfortable, the food was the same as that which was available in the dining hall, the servo-steward that brought it was silent and efficient. The question of isolation did not arise. There has always been something solitary about me, as there is about most who are of the Service.
But when I awoke the next morning after what had seemed like an endless night, I went down to the dining hall for breakfast.
It was nothing like a deliberate change of policy, a decision that had been rigorously arrived at through careful reasoning. It wasn’t a decision at all. Nor did Vox suggest it, though I’m sure she inspired it. It was purely automatic. I arose, showered, and dressed. I confess that I had forgotten all about the events of the night before. Vox was quiet within me. Not until I was under the shower, feeling the warm comforting ultrasonic vibration, did I remember her: there came a disturbing sensation of being in two places at once, and, immediately afterward, an astonishingly odd feeling of shame at my own nakedness. Both those feelings passed quickly. But they did indeed bring to mind that extraordinary thing which I had managed to suppress for some minutes, that I was no longer alone in my body.
She said nothing. Neither did I. After last night’s astounding alliance I seemed to want to pull back into wordlessness, unthinkingness, a kind of automaton consciousness. The need for breakfast occurred to me and I called up a tracker to take me down to the dining hall. When I stepped outside the room I was surprised to encounter my servo-steward, already on its way up with my tray. Perhaps it was just as surprised to see me going out, though of course its blank metal face betrayed no feelings.
“I’ll be having breakfast in the dining hall today,” I told it.
“Very good, sir.”
My tracker arrived. I climbed into its seat and it set out at once on its cushion of air toward the dining hall.
The dining hall of the Sword of Orion is a magnificent room at the Eye end of Crew Deck, with one glass wall providing a view of all the lights of heaven. By some whim of the designers we sit with that wall below us, so that the stars and their tethered worlds drift beneath our feet. The other walls are of some silvery metal chased with thin swirls of gold, everything shining by the reflected light of the passing star-clusters. At the center is a table of black stone, with places allotted for each of the seventeen members of the crew. It is a splendid if somewhat ridiculous place, a resonant reminder of the wealth and power of the Service.
Three of my shipmates were at their places when I entered. Pedregal was there, the supercargo, a compact, sullen man whose broad dome of a head seemed to rise directly from his shoulders. And there was Fresco, too, slender and elusive, the navigator, a lithe dark-skinned person of ambiguous sex who alternated from voyage to voyage, so I had been told, converting from male to female and back again according to some private rhythm. The third person was Raebuck, whose sphere of responsibility was communications, an older man whose flat, chilly gaze conveyed either boredom or menace, I could never be sure which.
“Why, it’s the captain,” said Pedregal calmly. “Favoring us with one of his rare visits.”
All three stared at me with that curious testing intensity which I was coming to see was an inescapable part of my life aboard ship: a constant hazing meted out to any newcomer to the Service, an interminable probing for the place that was most vulnerable. Mine was a parsec wide and I was certain they would discover it at once. But I was determined to match them stare for stare, ploy for ploy, test for test.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” I said. Then, giving Fresco a level glance, I added, “Good morning, Fresco.”
I took my seat at the table’s head and rang for service.
I was beginning to realize why I had come out of my cabin that morning. In part it was a reflection of Vox’s presence within me, an expression of that new component of rashness and impulsiveness that had entered me with her. But mainly it was, I saw now, some stratagem of my own, hatched on some inaccessible subterranean level of my double mind. In order to conceal Vox most effectively, I would have to take the offensive: rather than skulking in my quarters and perhaps awakening perilous suspicions in the minds of my shipmates, I must come forth, defiantly, challengingly, almost flaunting the thing that I had done, and go among them, pretending that nothing unusual was afoot and forcing them to believe it. Such aggressiveness was not natural to my temperament. But perhaps I could draw on some reserves provided by Vox. If not, we both were lost.