On the ride back, he dialed Kit.
“Hey Kit, so I found work.”
“That was fast.”
“Yeah. It’s some kind of pilot position for the Institute.”
“You place satellite in orbit. Sure, sounds amazing.”
"No, nothing like that. Listen, I need someone to look after Charles for me. Besides, maybe the two of you would be good for each other.”
“Why would fuzzy ball of knives be good for me?”
"Well... furry animals are supposed to be therapeutic.”
“I don’t need that kind of therapy. Just take murder machine with you.”
“I would, but I can’t. The director says I can’t bring any pets.”
“Fine, fine, but you owe me for this.”
“Awesome! I’m leaving in a couple hours, so I'll swing by right now and drop her off at your place.”
“Yeah yeah.”
John closed the call. Those two are destined to get along.
_____________
He dropped Charles off with Kit, then took another shuttle back to the North Cove hotel. As the automated taxi pulled into the Cove's small parking space, he saw a private shuttle looking out of place, parked next to the Cove’s modest main entrance. John's taxi pulled to a stop, and he exited, then walked towards the sleek, all-black shuttle. Partway there, a slender man with close-cropped black hair moved from the hotel's entrance to intercept him. The man wore dark glasses and a long black overlapping tunic tied closed in the front at the waist with a simple gray sash. Subtle gray designs adorned both front edges all the way around the neck. His pants were baggy around the thighs and bound snugly with gray cloth below his knees. He wore simple, soft, flat-soled shoes, and John had the uncomfortable feeling that the man wasn’t so much walking on the ground as he was floating over it.
“Mr. Veran?”
John smiled. “I am he.”
“Isaiah sends his regards.”
“I’ll be right back. I just need to grab my bag,” John replied.
“Very well.” The enigmatic man turned and moved silently towards the black shuttle. “Do not be long, Mr. Veran. Isaiah is a busy man.”
John went through his apartment quickly, shoving the few odds and ends he'd brought with him from the Last Chance into a big duffel bag. He left the hotel's entrance after checking out and saw that the private shuttle was already powered up, so he hurried towards the open passenger door and hopped in, closing the door behind him. The vehicle immediately began to move out of the Cove’s modest parking space towards one of the city's main roadways.
The black-clad man deftly wove a spidery course through the increasingly heavy mid-afternoon traffic. “Did you forget anything, Mr. Veran?”
John looked around the luxurious passenger compartment, trying to remember what he was forgetting, because one always forgets something. The shuttle's interior was upholstered in black leather, with ample room for passengers. “I don’t know where I’m going, so I can’t exactly pack for the trip, can I?”
“The Institute will provide anything you need once you arrive.”
They drove for another hour before reaching a Zenith Airlines transit terminal. John’s chauffeur pulled into a private parking space, then exited the sleek shuttle and motioned for John to follow. Walking into the terminal, John passed through the entrance and heard the vehicle they had arrived in power up again. Looking back he caught a brief glimpse of a figure climbing into the same passenger compartment he had vacated minutes before, then the door closed and the black shuttle rolled out of its parking space and cruised away.
John followed his cryptic guide into the river of travelers queuing up to pass security screening before boarding an orbital transit ship.
“So I didn’t catch your name.”
John’s chauffeur looked at him impassively. “Yes.”
He stared at the man, trying to gauge if the man was being serious or if he was making a joke. “That’s a really unique name. You’re the first Mr. Yes I have ever met.”
His impassive guide considered him for several seconds. "Indeed. Yes, would be a very unique name.”
They passed security, then walked down a long hallway and boarded an automated orbital transit ship. John and his guide found seating next to a window and snapped their safety harnesses in place.
A cordial voice echoed through the passenger compartment. "Please remain securely strapped in for the duration of your flight. Zenith Airlines cannot guarantee your safety if you do not follow our safety guidelines. Thank you, and enjoy your trip with Zenith Airlines, the premier in orbital travel."
John felt the ship shudder and rise into the air. He watched the terminal fall away into the distance as the ship slowly picked up speed. Soon they were through the clouds and into low-earth orbit. The shuttle bore them towards Koskinen Station, one of Terra Prime’s busiest inter-system transit stations. John watched Terra Prime in all its vivid hues of blues, greens, and browns calmly turn below him while they angled for a rendezvous with the station.
After nearly 30 minutes in zero-g, the same polite voice spoke again. “Docking with Koskinen Station in eighty-three seconds, please have all your transit documents ready before entering passenger screening. Thank you for flying Zenith Airlines.”
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
They waited for gravity to return as the automated ship slid effortlessly into a docking cradle on the station. Mr. Xiao rose from his seat next to John. “Shall we proceed?”
John pulled his duffel bag off the seat next to him and followed Mr. Xiao towards the egress ramp. He’d only been able to get his enigmatic travel companion’s last name during the hour-long flight, but it didn’t make the man any less reserved. It did, however, make John feel more comfortable than traveling with some nameless entity.
They were next in line for passenger screening, prompting John to dig around in his duffel for his transit documents. Unmoved by John's mounting distress, Mr. Xiao stepped towards processing and handed some identity cards to the officer on the other side of the security screen.
After exchanging a few words with the transit officer, Mr. Xiao turned and observed John with an unreadable expression. “Is anything wrong, Mr. Veran?”
John dug deeper into his duffel, nearly spilling some clothes onto the station's decking while he frantically shuffled things around. “I can’t find my identity and transit documents.”
“You do not need them. We have already been cleared. Our next transport is this way.” Mr. Xiao turned and walked at a leisurely pace towards the hangars.
John stared at Xiao’s retreating back for a few seconds, then hurried to catch up before he lost him in the crowds. “You got me cleared without my papers?”
Mr. Xiao stopped and looked him in the eye. “I just registered you as luggage, Mr. Veran.”
Before he could fire back, Xiao handed him something then resumed his previous course. He thought he might have seen a slight twitch in the corner of Xiao’s mouth. Looking down at the transit and identity papers he was holding, he realized they were his.
“You forgot them at the North Cove, Mr. Veran. You were preoccupied, so I looked after them for you.”
“How very charitable of you,” said John as he irritably shoved his documents into a pocket on his duffel. Then a thought occurred to him, and he moved the documents to a pocket on the inside of his jacket next to his skin.
They walked down the white, spotless corridor past several large doors. Each one they passed marked a reduction in the ever-present flow of humanity. Eventually they reached a gentle bend in the hallway, then were faced with one final door set into the end of the passage.
Mr. Xiao unlocked the door and let John through. “Our final flight awaits.”
John grimaced. “Oh good, I love final flights.”
They continued down the transparent, pressurized tunnel past several exotic-looking ships resting outside on the hangar's airless deck towards a sleek black vehicle about three times larger than the orbital jumpers John was most familiar with. The ship's hull swept in graceful lines from the bridge and crew section resting on the hangar deck up and over a massive ring-shaped section that John assumed was some kind of drive. The drive was perpendicular to the floor and partially obscured towards its apex by the gentle arc of the ship's hull. It appeared so fragile that John doubted it would survive atmospheric entry, but it was smaller than any FTL-capable ship he'd ever seen, short of an FTL-comm drone.
They were still twenty or thirty meters away from the ship’s bridge section when a door unfolded, lengthening while it lowered to become a boarding ramp that extended across the flexible pressure-sealed coupling connecting the ship to the transparent tunnel they were in. Up close, John could see the ship wasn’t resting directly on the deck but was actually about half a meter above it. He couldn’t see any struts or wheels to explain this, though. Maybe they were just artfully hidden from view to give the illusion of levitation?
“Sexy ship. So where's it taking me?”
Xiao walked up the ramp in silence. Once John stepped into the ship's airlock, the ramp behind him raised and folded itself in an odd way to form an external door, then produced a cascade of clicks as it locked in place. He could feel the pressure change slightly as a positive air seal was created.
“The Galea Nebula,” said Xiao.
John stared at him in astonishment. “In this ship? That’s over sixty parsecs away!”
"Yes, it is. However, the trip will be more than sixty parsecs. We must make a few stops before reaching the nebula.”
The interior airlock door opened, allowing John and Mr. Xiao through it into a softly lit corridor.
Xiao raised his hand over his ear. “We are onboard, Captain... Yes, Captain, at your convenience.”
John couldn’t see any communication equipment on Mr. Xiao. Not even the most modern uplink was totally invisible. “But that means it’ll take more than a month to get to your secret staging area.”
Xiao walked down the corridor for about ten meters, then entered a door to his right. “I very much doubt that Mr. Veran. Isaiah, is a meticulous man. He does not enjoy tardiness.”
“Well, then he’s going to love us when we’re almost two weeks late for his party.”
They walked through another door onto a small bridge with a panoramic view of stars arrayed across the entire forward half of the room.
John was shocked that they were already in space. No transition or change in momentum, and the gravitys still on!
Xiao stopped behind a medium-built, dark-skinned man with graying close cropped hair. "Status Captain?"
The man turned around and bowed slightly at the waist, a motion that Mr. Xiao mirrored. “We're underway. Koskinen Station Control said it would be another twenty minutes before we're cleared to enter FTL. Hyper lanes are always busy in the Terra Prime system.”
Facing John, the man extended his hand. "Welcome, Mr. Veran. I hear you'll be our jumper pilot for Isaiah’s little party.”
John shook the captain’s hand. “Quite the impressive ship you have here, Captain Jeffries,” John said through a stiff smile.
Surprise flickered across the otherwise impassive face of Mr. Xiao. He hid it well, but it was the most emotion John had seen him show during their whole trip.
“She’s a true joy to fly, Mr. Veran. Can I call you John?” Captain Jeffries replied, apparently unfazed by the use of his name. “I should be formal, but I’m no longer in the UED navy, so formality often becomes cumbersome.”
“Sure, but only if I can use your first name too, Dorrin,” John said, rather pleased with himself.
This time it took Xiao more than a few seconds to recover his composure, but recover he did. Captain Jeffries, on the other hand, didn’t appear to be put out in the least.
“Capitol! We dine at oh-eight hundred. You're more than welcome to join us.”
“I would love to see more of your ship, Captain. You even have gravity. I’ve never heard of an FTL ship this small with gravity.”
“She’s impressive, isn’t she? I’ll send my mechanic to show you around once you’ve stowed your luggage. In the meantime, I’ll leave you in Mr. Xiao’s capable hands.”
Xiao executed the exact same half bow as before, then stood by the bridge exit while he waited for John.
John almost saluted, then remembered himself. "Thanks, Captain. You’re all heart.”
Dorrin smiled. “He’s one of the best, John. You’re in good hands.” He then turned to a bridge officer working at what looked to John like a communications panel.
John followed Mr. Xiao down a single corridor running along the vertical arch of the ship. Even though walking along it should have felt like climbing up a gently sloping hill, John got the strange impression that no matter where he stood, he was always looking down the slope. The ship’s artificial gravity system must be fairly complex to accomplish such an engineering feat.
His room was simple but expertly designed, with a large, seamless floor-to-ceiling viewport dominating the main living space and soft accent lighting placed at strategic locations. He threw his duffel on the bed across from the spectacular window, then walked over to the transparent wall segment and watched as stars burned like tiny punctures in the fabric of reality. Suddenly, the universe wheeled about as he saw Koskinen Station slide into view. Then everything rippled, and the ship plunged into abyssal darkness as they jumped to FTL. Nothing but a wall of blackness was visible beyond the edges of the ship. He sighed, then moved his hand next to the nano-composite window in a vertical top-down gesture, causing it to fade from completely transparent to the same color as the other walls in the room. The blackness of FTL travel always made him feel uneasy.