Time Salvager
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T
O MY GRANDPARENTS AND THOSE WHO CAME BEFORE ME
I grew up in a rural part of Taiwan in the back of my grandparents’ convenience store. My memories are hazy, but I remember vignettes—lush jungles, swarms of dragonflies, green everywhere, and lots and lots of rain. Some of my sharpest memories include making a bow and arrow out of a kite and shooting it at my brother (totally safe, I’m sure), biting the principal’s son’s nose until he bled during kindergarten because he took my toy, and stealing instant noodle packages from my grandparents’ general store so I could suck on the pepper during nap time.
My paternal grandparents raised me until I was five years old while my parents were in the United States getting their advanced degrees at the University of Nebraska (Go Huskers!). For the most part, it was a good childhood, except for having an outhouse, showering with a bucket, and having chickens nip at me once in a while.
When my parents returned to take my brother and me to America, I remember telling my crying grandmother that I’d stay with her. I didn’t, of course, but I always wondered what life would have been like if I had never left Taiwan. On one hand, I probably would have studied harder. On the other hand, I probably wouldn’t have become an author.
I reflect on the decisions made by my parents, grandparents, and ancestors that have led to where I am today, writing this acknowledgment for
Time Salvager
. A change of heart, a freak accident, or a seemingly inconsequential left turn instead of a right at some intersection, and everything could have been different. I hope they’re all proud of what came from their choices, mistakes, and sheer luck.
My mother’s father passed away before I was born; her mother when I was in high school. My grandmother on my father’s side passed away eight months before my first book,
The Lives of Tao
, came out. My surviving grandfather, a retired teacher, is now in his nineties. He’s still sharp, exercises, and loves that new television I bought him in 2013 when I went back to visit. That may be the last time I see him alive.
To all my ancestors, thank you for leading lives that have allowed me to exist, to be an author, and to present
Time Salvager
to the world.
This book is dedicated to you.
Wesley Chu
, Chicago, September 2014
A sliver of light cut through the void, shooting toward the center of the battle display. Every soul on the bridge, breaths collectively held, eyed its path as it streaked across space. The room was dead quiet, except for the droning voice counting down to the point of impact. An explosion the size of a thumbnail blinked and flowered to fill half the display, then darkened again.
The bridge erupted into cheers as the Neptune Divinity flagship’s holographic avatar disappeared. But the celebration was short-lived. Captain Dustinius Monk’s voice cut through the chatter.
“Station status!” he demanded. The grim news of the health of the ship trickled in.
“Shield arms down,” a bridge acolyte said.
“Mobility thrusters offline,” another added.
“Aft hull breached.”
The list of the ship’s injuries continued to grow longer as each station confirmed the already perilous situation. It was a miracle and a testament to her crew that the
High Marker
, the flagship of the Technology Isolationists, was still intact.
Grace Priestly yawned, bored. She was usually bored when dealing with the painfully slow mental pace of average humans. She wondered how long she would have to wait for someone to say something interesting.
Then Monk’s second in command, sounding close to panic, reported in. “We are not past the termination shock wave, Captain!” The chatter died and the room became dead silent again.
“Can we get any of the shield arms functional?” Monk asked.
“Not without extensive exterior repair.”
“Get me just one damn shield arm and I can deflect the blast!” Captain Monk roared, his voice cutting through the tension in the air. The rest of the crew froze in place. “What about engines? Side thrusters? Any way to move her? Anything, for space’s sake!”
“We’re adrift, Captain.” The acolyte standing next to him shook his head. “Power core down to six percent. There must be damage to the Titan source as well.”
“Convert more immediately.”
The acolyte’s face turned white. “Captain, the systems acolyte reports the converter is gone.”
“Gone? How is that possible?”
“She is at a loss, Captain.”
Monk pulled up a display and stared at the blast wave of the Neptune Divinity flagship. He brought up another screen and scrolled through the data projections. His body stiffened and the blood drained from his face.
He glanced over at Grace, who stared back with cold indifference. Monk began spitting out orders in rapid succession, doing everything he could to prevent the impending disaster. Every hand on deck worked frantically as the ship’s clock counted down to the impact of the wavefront barreling toward them.
Grace knew better. They were doomed the instant the fusion missile struck the enemy ship. With the main engine and side thrusters offline and all three shield arms inactive, the
High Marker
was completely exposed. The brunt of the blast wave would carry her away from the solar system toward the heliopause, from which no ship had ever returned.
Grace knew this was a high probability outcome, as did Monk. That’s why, with the
High Marker
’s propulsions disabled, he had asked for her authority to execute a planet cracker missile at such short range. Even knowing the potential consequences, she had still ordered it launched. After all, if they were going to die, the least they could do was take out the enemy.
The captain and his crew were fighting to save the
High Marker
, but as far as Grace was concerned, they might as well be attempting to raise the dead. There were definitely enough bodies lying around the ship for them to try.
Still, it amused her that Monk fought so hard against the inevitable. The captain was a smart man, having been a spacefarer for all of his eighty years. If Grace hadn’t known better, she would have guessed that the noble captain was trying to do whatever it took to save his ship. But Grace did know better. He was putting on a show for her, because having the High Scion of the Technology Isolationists die on his ship would shame his family line for all time.
Or perhaps Captain Monk wasn’t going through the motions and was actually deluded enough to try to pull off a miracle. Grace certainly hoped not. She’d hate to think she had made the mistake of putting an imbecile in charge of her flagship. Well, there were no such things as miracles, and Grace tired of watching their pointless exercise. The
High Marker
was doomed.
The blast wave’s impact jolted the ship, knocking those standing off their feet. Half a dozen more alerts lit up the battle display. Grace, sitting in her gravity chair, watched the crew scramble to combat these new problems as the
High Marker
was swept up by the forward force of the blast.
Grace stood up and looked at her pet. “Come, Swails. When the good captain is ready to report, he can call my cabin.”
Swails, her man pet, stood and fell in step next to her. Her wrinkled hands caressed his perfect face. The poor idiot was incapable of grasping what had just happened. He had probably never had an original thought in his beautiful head, but then, that was the way she liked her pets. The bridge crew stopped what they were doing and waited respectfully as she passed.
“Oh, do continue trying to save the ship,” she remarked, gliding out of the room. Those dolts would work themselves to death playing this futile game. Such a waste. Grace thought she had guided the Technology Isolationists to be better humans than this.
“Come, pet,” she said, motioning to Swails again as she walked down the wreckage-strewn walkways. The flagship
High Marker
was the most advanced ship ever built by man. What the Technology Isolationists lacked in numbers and resources, they more than made up for in power and technological prowess. But even then, sheer numbers and resources could overcome that power, and that was exactly what the Neptune Divinities had been doing. There was only so much opposition any faction could muster without proper resources, after all.
The
High Marker
had been set upon shortly after her rendezvous with the research base on Eris. The flagship, her two escorts, and the dozen or so reinforcements summoned from the planet below took on sixty-some Neptune Divinity ships and won. Pyrrhic victories might not be true victories, but they were still better than the alternative.
The ship attrition rate on both sides of this massive battle was near total, save for the
High Marker
, which was now being knocked out of the solar system. Unless they could repair the engine, a feat no ship had ever accomplished without a space dock, they were doomed to die either in the cold of space or upon impact with a celestial object. Grace hoped the
High Marker
crashed into something interesting like a plasma cloud or a black hole, out of scientific curiosity, of course.
She decided to maximize the use of her remaining time alive and have her pet fuck her senseless. Might as well die happy.
They reached a partially collapsed intersection of the ship. A metal beam and several large fragments of debris blocked their path. Grace saw the blackened remains of a leg sticking out from the rubble and carefully stepped over it, trying to avoid dirtying her dress.
“Help me, pet,” she said.
He dutifully complied, gently holding the tips of her fingers as she slowly swung one leg over the beam, and then the other. She moved well for a ninety-three-year-old. Grace watched as Swails jumped over the beam and fell in line beside her again. His movements felt wrong. She played that mental image of him over and over in her head. Something had been bothering her since they had boarded; Swails wasn’t himself today.