A Thread of Time: Firesetter, Book 1 (8 page)

“They had a great love,” I said, rewarding
him with these few chosen words. 

“Indeed.  Everyone should be so fortunate
in this life.”

I nodded, or maybe, I merely sat in
silence, for there were no words which I could think to say.  I had not been so
fortunate and truly doubted that I ever would be.  In fact, I doubted anyone
was, or that the Emperor and Empress, nearly two centuries ago, were quite as
magnificent or admirable as history had described.

“When I was a child,” my companion
continued, leaning back on the bench once again.  “This fountain was always
silent.  The Empress Sara thought it wasteful to turn it on.  A pity it was,
for you can see how truly charming it is.  For the cost of a few coins, I
believe this beauty is well worth the price.”

Now, the gentleman pulled himself to his
feet in a manner of one who has toiled long and hard that day.  Then, he dipped
his head slightly in a bow, the sort a gentleman made to a lady of this court. 

“Perhaps, we shall meet again.  Tell me
your name, young beautiful maid?”

“Ailana,” I replied.  “May I know yours,
good sir?”

“Ailana.”  He dipped his head again.  “It
is a Karupta name, although your looks do not suggest it.”

“I am of the motherland, although I have
been raised in Farku, in the Duchy of Korelesk on the continent’s western
border.”

“Ailana of Farku then,” he replied, a tiny
smile drawing upon his lips.  “I shall enjoy seeing your beautiful smile in the
daylight.  I will look for you when the sun is out.”  Turning his back to me,
the gentleman strode away.

“Your name, sir?” I reminded him.  “It is
only fair that I know with whom I speak.”

“Of course,” he called over his shoulder,
telling me nothing more.

Chapter 10

Lance

Right after my disastrous attempt at
romancing Nurse Moosy, I briefly, very briefly, fell for a spacewoman named
Jill.  She was an officer, a young lieutenant and although we had nothing in
common other than our human genetics, somehow we ended up in bed. 

It could have been that I was vulnerable
and on the rebound after my failed Andorian love, or maybe, she pulled rank on
me, ordering me into her bed.  Alternatively, and most likely, I was drunk when
we met in a bar.  We were just two lonely galactic sailors looking for a night
of companionship and love.

Actually, Jill and I spent more than a
single night in a hotel room, but in hindsight, I couldn’t recall exactly how
many.  We crossed paths several times at spacebases throughout the fourth
sector and each time we met, we immediately went to bed.

Eventually, Jill transferred to the
Columbia, which was stationed in the twelfth sector, thirty light years away. 
Our trysts ended then, and frankly, I forgot about her altogether, until out of
nowhere she suddenly reappeared.

It was nine years later when we bumped
into each other in the Officer's Club on Spacebase 37-D.  During the
intervening time, Wen, Noodnick, and I had all graduated from Officer Candidate
School and were now commissioned and serving on the S/S Discovery. 

Wen was a lieutenant, managing the
storerooms on deck five, while Noodnick was still an ensign in engineering.  As
for me, somehow my previous affinity for laziness and slovenliness had been
replaced with an aptitude to command.  I had advanced to Lieutenant Commander
and was serving on the bridge.  Go figure.

At any rate, one afternoon while the ship
was loading up stock, Noodnick and I had a few hours leave to waste in the
spacebase bar, while Wen was occupied in his stores.  Noodnick and I, although
we had been friends for a number of years, had little to discuss, especially
since he didn't speak.  Still, his companionship was comfortable.  Sitting with
Noodnick was better than sitting alone.  At least this is what I told myself
whenever I tried, but failed to pick up a girl.

“Did I ever tell you why I joined SpaceForce?”
I was saying, rolling my cold brewskie between my fingers, leaning my elbows on
the bar and staring forlornly in the mirror. 

I liked to drink my beers from the bottle
since that bar on Spacebase 25-C where the barkeep was a wolf-man from the planet
Canina IV.  The guy was nice enough, and although he claimed it was efficient
and ultra-hygienic, I just couldn't wrap my head around drinking from a glass
cleaned by his long tongue.

Noodnick didn't respond.  Frankly, if he
had responded, I probably would have fallen off my stool.  At any rate, I
continued with my story assuming he was listening.

“I inherited this coin from my dad.  It
was an old Imperial dollar, and for a while there, it was the only thing of
value that I owned.  I wanted to cash it in, use whatever it was worth to pay
my bills.  I ended up keeping it, holding on to it for old time's sake.  I
don't know if it's worth anything or not.  What do you think, Nood?  Do you
know anything about those kind of things?”

Noodnick sipped his drink.  He drank beer
through a straw, which for some odd reason, the chicks seemed to find very
attractive.  I supposed, Noodnick wasn't a bad looking guy, despite his lack of
conversation, but why the girls swarmed around him, I never understood.  They’d
grab the empty stools by his side, talk endlessly as if he was listening, rub
his arm and proposition him, while completely ignoring me.  He must have been
emitting pheromones or doing something I couldn't see.  Whatever it was, the
dude was one lucky bastard, while I was a loser no matter how hard I tried.

“I was hoping in our travels, we might be
going by the old Empire, and then I could ask someone about it, but after more
than a decade in space, I’ve never been called into that sector.”

Of course, Noodnick didn't respond to this
either, or to the woman who was insisting she would buy him another drink.  I
wondered if I just shut up, kept my mouth completely closed, never saying a
word, would I get as lucky as this schmuck?

Probably not, I decided, glancing in the
bar's mirror, spying Wen as he wandered in through the door.

“Oh hey, Lancelot!” Wen called, waving
wildly as if I hadn't seen him two hours ago. 

I removed my cap from the neighboring
stool, but before Wen could get halfway across the room, another person plopped
herself down by my side.

“Jill!” I gasped, recognizing her
instantly. 

Actually, that was a lie.  I only
recognized her by the name tag snapped to her chest.  She wore captain's bars
and a patch from the S/S Asteroid, which was about the stupidest name assigned
to any ship.

At any rate, I made room for her and
expressed my pleasure at this odd coincidence.  Actually, that was a lie too,
as I wasn't at all that happy to see her again.  In fact, if it weren't for Wen
taking Noodnick's newly vacated seat and refreshing my brew, I would have
gotten up and left in a hurry.

“Lt. Commander,” Jill said coldly, which
had nothing to do with the icy shot of vodka in her hand.

Regarding me in the mirror with narrow,
judgmental eyes, I saw a trace of disgust flit across her face.  I might have
been looking at her in the same way.  With added lines to her face and gray
scattered throughout her hair, I was thinking she hadn’t aged all that well
either.  With the two of us scowling at our reflections, it was a fair bet that
we weren’t going to end up in bed this time.

“What a coincidence,” I exclaimed, raising
my new bottle in a mock toast.

“Not at all,” Jill replied, knocking back
her shot.  “Come with me.”

“Yes, Ma'am!”  Maybe, I was wrong?  Come
to think of it, Jill didn’t look half bad.  In a hurry, I gulped my beer,
figuring with the lights off, we could pretend the intervening years had never
happened.  I followed her out of the bar, winking at Wen, who watched us with
surprise.  I waved to Noodnick who was now closeted in a booth with three young
women.  Noodnick didn't say anything, of course, and I may have been wrong, but
I think I saw him give me a
thumbs up
.  “So, where to, Captain?” I
asked, sauntering a little.

“Shut up,” she growled and led me down the
mall to a pizza parlor called,
Chunk o' Cheese.

Once, on another spacebase, the guys and I
had gone in there to look for girls.  Wen had read an article that said family
restaurants were a good pickup place.  It might have been, but we didn't stay
long enough to find out.  Frankly, the place looked toxic.  We couldn't hear
ourselves talk, let alone think.  The pizza tasted like someone had baked it in
grease scraped off the floor and every few minutes, some animatronic animals
started singing and dancing in the middle of the room.

“Uh, Jill,” I called, over the ruckus. 
“If you want pizza, there's a better place two decks down.”

“Shut up!” she snapped again, which I
clearly heard despite the dancing drumbeat of a pair of animatronic mice. 

Jill hurried to the furthest corner of the
room, to a small booth.  There sat a young girl, smiling at the dancing idiots,
and nibbling on a pizza.

“Hi,” the girl called to me, turning the
most amazing pair of emerald green eyes upon my face.  “Are you my dad?”

“Uh…no.  Not me.”

“Oh.”  She frowned, “That’s too bad.  I
like you.  You seem nice.”

Gazing down at the sea of bright red hair
spilling across her shoulders in wild curls, I decided I liked her, too,
surprising myself with this thought.  Never before had I cared for any kid.  In
my mind, children were a necessary nuisance ranking slightly below Wen and
Noodnick, and significantly below dogs when it came to my choice of companion.
Furthermore, there was no way I could be her dad.  Nobody that beautiful could
ever be related to me.

Glancing back at Jill, who was looking at
her cell, I concluded that nobody that beautiful could be related to her
either.

“I've got to go,” Jill mumbled, pecking
the kid on the top of her curly head.  Then, she glared at me.  “Good luck,
Lance.”  She snickered, and rushed away before I could protest.

So, there I was, alone with the little
chick and her 15” pie.

“She'll be right back in a minute, I'm
sure.”  I nodded and forced a smile, while glancing at the uneaten pepperoni
and cheese.  Was I hungry enough to risk my good health?  Already there was a
thick pool of grease forming on top.

The girl blinked her emerald eyes and
nodded as if she knew.  Setting her pizza back on her plate, she turned her
attention to the hideous fake mice.

“There you are!” Wen cried, at exactly the
same moment the mice finished their song.  “I thought I saw you go in here. 
You hate this place, right, Lance?  Remember that time we found a rat tail in
the supreme combo on Spacebase 25-C?”

“Wen.”

“Three years ago, I think.  It was right
after that cruise through the thirty-seventh sector.”

“No!  I'm saying your name, not asking you
when it was.  I remember when it was even though I've tried to block it out.”

“Why?”

“Wen!”

“What?”

The child started to laugh.  Her freckled
cheeks turned a rosy, pink hue as the music bubbled from her throat.

“You guys are funny!” she cried, clapping
her hands with delight.  “I like you both.  Are you sure you’re not my dad?”

“No,” I snapped.

“Are you going to finish this?” Wen asked,
sitting down in the booth and gladly helping himself to a slice.

Then, the music and dancing started again,
this time with chickens who were even uglier than the mice.  Wen smiled
broadly, clapping his hands in rhythm with the girl.  I, on the other hand, was
starting to get a headache, a bad one, which would require at least two
migraine pills, or a significant amount of alcohol. 

I collapsed in the seat across from Wen
and Little Red, wondering how much longer until Jill returned.  Furtively, I
glanced at my watch every few seconds.

“This is great!” Wen proclaimed. 

Little Red giggled.  At least she was
having fun.

“Yep,” I replied.

Jill didn't return.  An hour later, the
pizza gone, Little Red leaning sleepily against Wen's shoulder, I glanced across
the restaurant, catching a glimpse of a starship outside.  The Asteroid was
written across her side.

“What the fuck?” I shouted to the
consternation of the parents at the neighboring table.  Bolting from the booth
and racing to the window, I watched the Asteroid drift away from my view. 
“Wen, does that say Asteroid?”

“Sure does,” Wen exclaimed.

“Goodbye, Mommy,” the girl called, waving
her hand.

“She left you here?” I gasped. 

The child shrugged and blinked her eyes,
great limpid pools as green as the oceans on Talas III.  Like the oceans, they
were wet, filling with tears, threatening to dribble down her cheeks.

“I'll call my commanding officer and get
the ship to come back.  Don't worry, kid, we'll make your mommy come get you.”

“She won't.  She told me goodbye.”  The
girl sniffed and reached up with her thin arms.  “Pick me up, Daddy.  I’m tired
and I want to go home.”

“Wen?” I called.

“Now.”  Little Red yawned.  “Please
Daddy.  Let’s go to your ship.”

“No, I mean, Wen!” I shouted at my friend,
who had gone back to watch the animatronics do their thing.  I wasn't sure what
type of animal was dancing now, other than they appeared insanely weird.  They
each had three heads, seven legs, two tails and reproductive organs.  Frankly,
they shouldn't have been dancing with children present to watch their
anatomically correct organs swing.  Instinctively, I put my hand over Little
Red’s eyes.  “Wen!  Get over here!”

“What?”  Reluctantly, he turned back to
me, a crazy smile on his lips and a deep purple blush creeping up his cheeks.

“This kid---uh---”  I realized I didn't
even know her name.

“Sandy,” she murmured, her arms still
outstretched.  “Pick me up.  I’m tired.”

“Come on, Wen,” I announced, reaching for
the kid and hefting her across my shoulder, where she promptly wrapped her arms
around my neck and laid down her head.  Striding past the animatronics, I
headed out into the busy mall.  “Jill abandoned Sandy.  What kind of a mother
does that?  We've got to take her to the base's police station.  I'm sure they've
got some kind of social services there.”

“That's terrible,” Wen agreed, his eyes
still glancing back at the dancing naked things.

“What a b-i-t-c-h,” I continued, spelling
for Sandy's benefit.  “I mean, what sort of cruel parent would do that to this beautiful
child?”

“But, I wasn't abandoned,” Sandy murmured
sleepily.  “Mommy said it was time for my daddy to take care of me.”  Then, she
shoved her nose into my neck and started to snore.