Supergiant (Gigaparsec Book 2) (6 page)

“What was that about ice cream?”

Roz had been mumbling out loud, the
way she did when working out a difficult repair. Paralyzed with embarrassment,
she could find no way to explain the comment. She wanted to crawl under the bed
and hide.

Then Max slapped his forehead.
“You’re right. The milk at Just Desserts is already marked for export. We
already have the cold storage space because we’re conserving energy. The
farmers are about to choke the milk supply to corporate worlds. If we buy old
Herb out on the sly, we can name our price on Phoenix.”

“Yeah,” she said weakly.

He kissed her on the forehead, and
she stopped breathing. “You’re a genius. I’ll go up to the roof to tell the
others on my comm link.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t worry. It uses military
encryption. No one will eavesdrop. We just need incentive for Herb to keep
quiet about the deal.”

She had to break out of this daze.
How long did she have to meet and apologize to the head chef of
Le Viande
?
All she could squeak out was, “Chef?”

He snapped his fingers. “You’re
right. We can offer the ship’s cook position to Herb’s wife. Perfect.” He
planted another kiss on her, this time on her cheek.

She closed her eyes and melted,
nearly fainting back to the bed.

Max backed off. “S-sorry. I just
got excited. I’ll be right back.”

“Mmm,” she said, unable to move.

Later, Roz was indescribably mellow
and floating on happiness when she spoke to the chef. She complimented his
immaculate kitchen and apologized for criticizing his cuisine simply by
smelling his garbage. By the time they were finished, she and Max were treated
to dinner so they could tell everyone how good
Le Viande
really was.
This was the romantic date she had been waiting for.

Max leaned over to her. “See, you
catch more flies with honey than vinegar.”

All she could reply was, “Mmm.
Honey.”

Wednesday afternoon, Roz returned to the safety of
The
Inner Eye
. Her first visit was to the jungle room. She brought a set of
colorful, carved wooden blocks for the little one to play with. Instead of
focusing on the gift, Jeeves threw himself into her arms and squeaked, “Mee-mee,”
which was the closest he could achieve to Mommy.

The added joy was enough to push
even her stoic nature over the edge, and for the first time in many years, she
cried.

The mimic had grown so much since
they met that he looked like a fuzzy sweater vest draped over her. Once Roz
smuggled Jeeves safely back to her bedroom, she inspected the ship repairs from
outside to inside in a cloud of bliss. Her two favorite males loved her or were
heading that way.

Reuben and the two repairmen
followed her as she circled each violation in red marker. At a touch of her wrist
unit, Roz recorded her observations for entry into the ship’s log. As she
indicated a jagged weld which could snag suits, Reuben asked, “Did you get a
new hairdo or something? You look … different.”

Grady nodded. “Sort of healthier.”

“I had a lovely delousing after my
prison stay for a suspected killing spree.”

Specialist Bertram backed away a
step.

Reuben shook his head. “No, that’s
not it.”

After examining the new control
couplings on the bridge, Roz reviewed the security recordings. She thought
herself very kind when she dismissed Bertram with, “I’ll have to redo a quarter
of your hack jobs. Even that I could have lived with, but you used an electric
socket-wrench next to a fuel tank valve. A tiny leak and a spark could have
ended us all.”

She took the heavy adjustable
wrench off her hip and shook it. “That’s why we professionals use these. I
suggest you leave before you’re charged with sabotage.” For someone known to
blister hides over a loose nut, this was calm. Humming to herself and tapping
her computer pad, she canceled his contract early due to nonperformance. “I’m
sending the order to terminate you now.”

Bertram fled in panic.

Reuben laughed. “He’s afraid you
wanted us to kill him. The station is rife with rumors about us being
unscrupulous criminals and you beating subordinates.”

“Hmm.” Nothing would disturb her today.
To Grady, she said, “You have a permanent job, ensign. Don’t make me sorry I
chose you.”

“Sir,” he said with a salute. He
got to work fixing the highlighted mistakes immediately.

That evening, Roz floated down to
the common room. Then she spun playfully on a chair, something she hadn’t done
since age five, when her injury had changed everything.

Ivy peeked out of their room.
“You’re back.”

“Max is negotiating for some
high-value cargo and a cook.” Roz’s voice went a little soft when she said his
name. He was the sweetest man she had ever met.

“He said you might need my help
explaining a few things. How far did he get with you yesterday?”

“Two kisses and a glorious meal.”

“About time.” Ivy gave her a wide
welcome hug.

That’s when Roz noticed the freaky eyes.
She jumped a little and pointed at the golden irises and slotted pupils. “Some
sort of weird VD?”

“Huh? Oh, the contacts. Forgot
about them. I bought them from a costume shop to spice things up a little with
Reuben. We did a little role playing.” Ivy popped the lenses out while she
remembered.

“TMI.”

“Step into our room for what will
probably be the most important discussion of your life.”

“The sex talk? I don’t think we’re
close to that stage yet.”

“I meant about your unique genetic
circumstance.” Ivy pursed her lips.

“Oh, Max didn’t want to risk
talking in public, but I told him the theory was ridiculous.”

Ivy led her into their room and
closed the door. “First let me lay the groundwork for what caused him to go
looking for zebras instead of horses in your history.” She put the contact
lenses away and then handed over a photo of Roz with glasses at seventeen.

“I had surgery to get rid of those
awful things when they fitted me for my first space helmet.” Roz smiled.

“You used the same picture for both
your student ID and yearbook.” Ivy placed a second photo on the bed, taken for
Roz’s ID at the space station. “These are the only two photos of you—in
existence.”

“So? The first half of my life was
outside in a field with my face covered by a breathing mask. Not many photo
ops. Besides, Max dislikes cameras, too.”

“You don’t like being seen—period.
Your advisor described you as the invisible woman. Other than your math
classes, other students don’t even remember you.”

Roz crossed her arms. “Okay, now
you’re just being mean.”

“No. I’m being accurate for a
reason, and you’re being purposely dense.” Ivy paced the room. “Fine, let’s
come at this a different way. Every Human child in the Union has a psi
evaluation at age ten, before puberty. Science teams missed you three different
times. Then your camp doctor checked the null box for them.”

“Lots of kids miss—”

“No. They don’t. In the last
century, you’re the only child they missed on Napa.”

“Doesn’t mean my doctor was wrong.”

Ivy closed her eyes. “I had my
sisters check your family tree. Your great grandfather’s name, Armando Mendez,
was an alias. No one with that identity ever left Earth on any ship.”

“Data-entry people goof up,
especially for other languages.”

“There was no photo record of his
entry or papers.”

“You’re saying he was an illegal?
Okay.” Roz’s voice had risen a little in volume. She struggled to resume her
good mood.

Ivy raised a finger. “Illegal is
just the tip of the iceberg. A hundred years ago, Union research on Nightmare
was developing an assassin, not unlike our friend Max, who could slip in and
out of difficult places. The program worked too well, and one of the inmates
escaped—Ormondo Arnez.”

“Do you know how common names like
that are in Spanish areas?” Roz asked. Spanish was one of only ten Human
languages officially spoken outside Earth.

“Can you tell me how sneak suits
work?” Ivy asked, shifting to the other side of Roz.

Wrinkling her brow, Roz gave the
textbook answer. “The material knows that it’s being observed and adjusts the
projected image to fool the viewer into believing nothing is there. As long as
you don’t move too fast, you seem—invisible.”

“That’s only one application of a
talent the Magi gave us. Members of elite Magi exploration teams still employ
the gift to make sure other species don’t know they exist. ‘The hand of the
uplifter must never be seen.’ For some reason, the mutation didn’t persist
among Humans. Only about five people still possess it after the annihilation of
the diplomatic ship
Gandhi
and the invasion of New Hawaii.”

Roz nodded slowly. “Probability
Mechanics, or PM for short. When used in social networking theory, it can tell
you the chances of any given event occurring in the matrix. In conjunction with
the Quantum Computing talent, it can define a probability cloud of outcomes and
lead the computer to the correct prediction. We use it to find failure modes in
complex systems and plan around them with safety features.”

Ivy made a continuing gesture with
her hands. “Does this sound similar to anything that happened to us recently,
say in the quantum capacitor tubes inside the subbasement drive?”

When Roz remained mute, Ivy filled
in the obvious. “
I
don’t have the PM talent, which is why the tubes
didn’t react the same for me in later experiments.”

“But the first time—”

“
You
were holding my hand.
You helped me see the clouds and find the answer.”

Roz blinked. “You’re saying I’ve
been a talent my whole life, and my superpower has been that men won’t notice
me? How come Max pays attention?”

“He’s a null with incredible mental
defenses. I can’t even tell he’s alive when I’m shaking his hand. Your magical
‘pay no attention to the cute girl behind the curtain’ doesn’t affect him,” Ivy
said with a grin.

“Maybe the others didn’t pay
attention to me because I’m a mute.”

“Max confirmed it twice with
genetic sequencing. You’re what they call a ‘sport’–a trait that lies dormant
for a few generations. As the only known woman with the gift, your eggs are a
national treasure.”

Now I’m a galactic-level freak.
Roz shook her head. “I don’t belong to your company’s bioscience division.”

“You need to be protected. We serve
all humanity, not the Llewellyn’s bank balance.”

“I’m not an assassin.”

“That’s the application that Humans
twisted the gift toward. Women might manifest differently. The pure gift, the
raw form, is about possibilities. The quantum energy responded to you.”

“The charge is almost gone, should
be entirely by our next jump,” Roz said.

“You’ve used your talent to escape
poverty and fix complex systems. Echo said your instincts about star drives are
better than hers, and she’s been studying them for over a hundred years longer.
She helped
build
this ship, and you spot failure points that weren’t
even on her radar.”

Taking a deep breath, Roz asked,
“So what does that mean?”

“We know why you react to subspace
jumps. You see things the rest of us are blind to, honey. You may be the only
one of our race who can. Combined with the new star drive, who knows what
you’re capable of? Echo wants you to go over some of the physicist theories
with her to see if you can visualize them as well. Max and my sisters will try
to locate other mechanics to give you exercises and pointers to develop your
gift, but you’re pretty unique.”

Roz thought about Max’s reluctance.
“Why isn’t Max telling me this?”

“I’ve been assigned to observe you
around the clock until further notice. The Llewellyns want to study your
talents to see what people may have overlooked in their need for war. Every
month we’ll give you a complete brain scan and physical because in the past
women with this trait have been given a strict drug regimen from the time
they’re discovered. We don’t even know why they took the medication other than
suppression, since some of the file is classified.”

“Why can’t Max study me that
close?” Roz said.

Ivy shrugged. “He’s recused himself
from the case because of unprofessional behavior.”

Roz’s ears burned. “The car
accident wasn’t my fault.”

“No, honey.
His
conduct. You
admitted yourself, he kissed you twice. He’s your superior in the ship’s command.
He considers that sexual harassment.”

“We weren’t
on
the ship. The
kisses weren’t even on the lips.”

“That the contact was welcomed will
be noted on the record. Max is afraid your innocence and lack of other choices
may cloud your judgment. He doesn’t want to use the power differential to
influence you, especially now that you have protected status.”

Roz deflated. “So now that I’m
special, he’s afraid of me? I’m too good for him? This sucks.”

Ivy put an arm around her. “If he’s
the one, it’ll happen. You always accomplish your goals, but first, you need to
find a copilot. Because when we do pull the great milk swindle, we’re going to
need to fly out of this place like the Phibs are invading. We’ve sold all the
grain we’re going to, and paying the Blue Claw Clan for those two dead Saurians
ate most of our profits. Kesh said if we can leave a day ahead of schedule,
we’ll earn an extra five hundred credits each. Reuben should have the designer
clothing and furs loaded in a few hours.”

The new cargo choice was smart, Roz
reflected. Lower density meant less fuel to burn and better maneuverability.
Whatever Kesh didn’t sell at the next stop, they could use for padding around
the power crystals. He certainly seemed to be accomplishing more for the team
than she had. “Can I just sit here and feel sorry for myself for a while?”

“Sure,” Ivy replied. “The
candidates for pilot are all off duty now. Take until tomorrow morning.”