Things Fall Apart: Chapter 56

Newer York, 8 Tammuz 2541 AS

The next morning was much like the morning two days ago when they'd first traveled to Government Center, except that there was no new report to occupy their minds on the ride. Also, of course, Alexander was with them, this time, zir face once again done up in a design clearly inspired by, but far simpler than, zir's parent's had been the last few days. Singer found herself wondering exactly what the custom was, if a person's facial designs had to be registered, or could just change on a whim.

Alexander seemed only attentive to the scenery, rather than treating it like a novelty. Aloud, Singer asked, "Been here before?"

Alexander smiled. "I spent about two months here playing tourist before heading out to the Academy. I'd forgotten how green it is, but that's why I'm not craning my neck like a middie on their first shore leave, if that's what you mean."

"Kind of, yes. Can I ask how things went with Robina?"

"I'm surprised you didn't ask over breakfast. I commend your restraint, Captain."

"Thank you, Commander," Singer said in mock officiousness. "Of course, if you'd rather not..."

"No, it's all right. Nothing dire, no real secrets. It was emotional, but...I thought I'd have a lot more to shout at her, and found I had no real desire to shout at her at all. All the teenage angst and rebellion really takes on a new perspective in the face of all this. We cleared the air about a couple of misconceptions we'd each been harboring, which...if that's not a solid reminder that people should just talk to each other when they need to, I don't know what is. I'm not going to say the relationship is fixed, per se, but it's fixable, and we're unlikely to cause a scene at the table today."

Ellison was sitting across from them with O'Halloran, and responded, "I'd appreciate that, Commander. I'll also say, if I may, that I've known Robina a long time, and perfectly understand, myself, how she could have been an exasperating parent. She's a very good leader for the Revi'ini, in my opinion, but..."

Alexander allowed zirself a small smirk, and responded, "It is possible that I was an exasperating child, truth be told. I was recently reminded that The Rob was kind of a handful. In a legendarium where every Original has dozens of conflicting stories about them, The Rob's is, ironically, the most consistent, at least on that point. As a line, we are not the most convenable."

They arrived at Government Center a little time ahead of the others, with the exception of Governor Silverman, who Singer suspected had just decided to conduct whatever other business she had that day from Briefing One to await the rest of the attendees. The governor smiled, and rose to greet them as they came in. "Good morning, everyone. I hope you had a good Shabbat!"

Singer chose to respond for the party, saying, "It was relaxing, enlightening, and honestly, at moments, disturbing, but I will admit to feeling rested and certainly eager to pick up where we left off. May I introduce my executive officer, Lieutenant Commander Robin Alexander? Commander, here is Governor General Yehudit Silverman."

Singer barely managed to hide her amusement as the governor extended her hand, looked Alexander full in zir Revi'ini-decorated face, and blinked. Alexander, for zir part, took the offered hand as if there were nothing amiss and shook it politely. "Governor."

"Commander. Please forgive me. I was not aware..." She seemed uncertain how to complete the sentence in a way that wouldn't sound awkward and possibly even bigoted.

Alexander nodded, saying, "Of course, Governor."

Singer showed a wry face at this point and said, "I was also unaware, mind you, until Shabbat dinner, when a number of pieces fell into place. This is what I get for focusing only on my crew's service records, and not learning more of their backgrounds."

Grateful not to be thrown to the wolves, Alexander injected, "You did have a few other things on your mind."

"True, that."

They all moved to the sideboard to pick up drinks and such, and found their seats in time for the Revi'ini delegation to arrive. The governor continued to play host, "Robina, Seth, I trust you had a good Shabbat!"

Robina smiled and said, "Well enough. Certainly, dinner was quite enjoyable, especially when I discovered that a certain member of my mishpacha I'd been worrying about was alive, well, and recently promoted."

Silverman gave first Alexander, and then the president of Revi'i, a look that Singer interpreted as possibly sharing Ellison's opinion that she could see how Robina might not be an easy parent to have. Narrowing her eyes then at Robina, she said with possibly real severity, "We're not going to have any dramatics, here, are we?"

In unison, Alexander and zir parent said, "Oh, heavens no!"

They looked at each other and then cracked up.

Silverman just shook her head and said, "Two of 'em. I didn't know when I was well off."

A new person entered the room at that point, and Singer thought she'd never seen anyone look so stereotypically academic in her life. Simultaneously well-dressed and disheveled, clearly clean yet not entirely well groomed, with hair and beard that were not so much deliberately long as just not recently cut. He wore spectacles, something Singer had not seen on more than five human beings in her memory. Singer found herself firmly convinced they were a prop, and in fact that the entire appearance might be a pose.

Regardless, the governor greeted him as someone who belonged there. "Doctor Gupta! Thank you for coming so promptly. I know you take the Sabbath seriously."

He took the hand she proffered and responded, "Are you kidding? It was all I could do to wait for the invitation. As soon as Zephyr made starfall, I had my assistant keeping an eye on flight schedules to get me here as soon as the word came that I was wanted. It's true that I would not ordinarily miss dinner at home on Shabbat for anything. Nothing about current circumstances are ordinary."

The governor turned, still smiling, and Singer sensed a genuine gratitude and warmth from her. "Doctor Ashwin Gupta, here are the captain and officers of Zephyr..." She proceeded to introduce them, each in turn. Singer received his firm handshake and appraising eye, and sensed she'd been judged interesting, but only interesting. As he shook Alexander's hand, Singer could tell he'd immediately pegged zir as Revi'ini, and began to realize why her exec had resumed the practice of facial decoration, here. Idly, she wondered if there were a genuine taboo about a Revi'ini not appearing bare-faced.

Espinoza and Gupta apparently knew each other already, and exchanged greetings like old comrades. Finally, he came to Cadotte, and looked at them with deeper interest. "If I may," he said, "not many out of Tau Ceti are quite so obvious about augmentations. May I inquire?"

"You may, but perhaps not just now. As science officer, I suspect you'll be hearing a lot from me after this meeting, and I'll happily satisfy your curiosity down the line."

This seemed to be sufficient, although Singer sensed he wouldn't have minded talking about it now, either. Still, his concerns about the importance of the situation at hand seemed genuine. Silverman proceeded to introduce him to President Robina—which led to an almost expected comparison look between her and Alexander—and Seth, and finally he said, "I suppose we're mainly waiting on Donato then. Not like him to be late."

Silverman's face took on a look of concern, "No, it's not, and while he's not late, yet, he will be in a moment."

Letting the concern rest there, she led Gupta to the sideboard, where he poured himself some tea and picked up a small plate with snacks.

Say one thing for the folks here: you don't go hungry! Singer thought.

Donato was, in fact, about two minutes late and came in looking both agitated and embarrassed. He was also, notably, limping.

"Sorry to be late, folks. Tower hit me with interesting news en route and I needed to get the full download."

Silverman made light of it, "We were considering a search party. Also, why are you limping?"

Both of Donato's earlier emotions gave way to irritation, which he was trying very carefully to control. "One of the mishpacha's children has not yet learned to put their bricks away."

Singer had to control her urge to giggle. She felt Ellison's matching elation. It was wicked and vindictive, and she didn't care much, but she wasn't going to show it openly, if she could avoid it. Besides, there was about to be different entertainment.

"Well, come in, grab some coffee, and get off your feet. I think you know everyone here at this point except Singer's executive officer."

Alexander rose again, as Donato limped over to meet zir, "Admiral Jonathan Donato, Lieutenant Commander Robin Alexander."

Donato shook Alexander's hand with full respect, but Singer felt him startle as he first saw the designs, and then the resemblance under them. He looked from zir to President Robina, who was just smiling an innocent, beatific smile.

Singer sensed the man had several undiplomatic things he would like to say, not least of which because his right foot clearly hurt abominably to judge from how he was walking. But like Gupta, he knew they had business to attend to. So he just said, "Pleased to meet you, Commander. I'm looking forward to being a spectator as you, Cadotte, and Gupta get all technical and stuff."

Alexander was not fooled by the Admiral of the Outbound's pose. The DSR navy was, after all, almost more a corps of engineers than anything else. Still, this was a test of Alexander's own diplomatic abilities, which ze passed. "Pleased to meet you, Admiral," was all ze said. Ze did seem to take note of the fact that Donato's face was still slightly bruised, though.

Silverman had taken some pity on him and gotten his coffee for him, possibly to get him off his feet and speed things along, because she also said, "Now spill it, Jonathan. What did Tower find so urgent?"

"Our scout Alexei Leonov made starfall about forty-five minutes ago. She's two weeks early. She was supposed to make port calls at two TCT systems on her way home."

He stopped there, as if he was not sure how to break the rest of the news.

Ellison prodded him. "But...?"

"Well, first, once they got into range, they realized that the TC network was down. There were no relays from other polities out the direction they'd gone, so they had no way to ask or give news."

He stopped again. He was stalling. Singer thought that wasn't much like him, which meant this was going to be bad.

Silverman prodded next. "Am I going to have to go borrow your child's bricks and scatter them around your office to get this tale out of you?"

He sighed, heavily, and needing someone to focus on, chose Singer. "They went ahead and made their first port call anyway, at Ross 508."

Singer felt rather than saw Cadotte sitting up straighter. Donato caught it too, and instantly redeemed a great deal of Singer's opinion of him to date by shifting his attention to them as he said, with far more compassion than she would have credited him for even a minute ago, "I'm sorry to report that they found there was no port to call on."

Something happened then that Singer didn't know Cadotte could do. Singer lost all sense of their emotions. Looking over to them, they were awake, conscious, nodding, clearly unable to speak—and completely unreadable. Possibly, they were dissociating, for which Singer could not blame them at all. Singer had been in the presence of other people when they dissociated, though, and never lost the sense of their presence the way they did now.

"They of course did a sweep for any signs of survivors, but R-508 was all artificial orbitals, not even rocks like G-581. They ventured downwell in hopes maybe some planetside mining or industrial operation had survived, but there was nothing intact.

"Second port call was supposed to be at Serpent's Head. The results were...similar. After that, they reasoned all they could do was come home, tell us what they found, and hope that we knew more than they did.

"Leonov should be here in a few hours, and I've asked the captain to come straight here as soon she's able."

There was silence. Nobody really knew what to say next. Doctor Gupta finally broke it, saying, "I have said that I am eager to help you. My eagerness is even stronger now, not diminished in the slightest. But I will fully understand if you need some time to...assimilate this information."

Singer looked at her crew's face. Cadotte's was a mask, and they remained unreadable, but they shook their head. Alexander and Espinoza each looked more angry than anything else, determined. Like Gupta, they had just been given reason to redouble their efforts, not pause.

Singer could have used at least a couple of kilos to dissociate into the greenery again, but that could wait.

"I can't speak for everyone else at the table, Doctor," she said, "but I think the best way we can honor this news is to do what we came here to do."