End Game: Second Epilogue End Game: Second Epilogue End Game: Second Epilogue

Lindsay Buroker

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1. Second Epilogue

1

Second Epilogue

Mica stepped back, admiring her work. The new RMA generator gleamed in the light, standing out among the dented and faded machinery surrounding it. Alisa had finally gotten a few replacement parts. Mica tapped the power button, and green indicators came on.

“It’s lovely,” Yumi said from her spot beside the hatchway. She sat cross-legged on the deck instead of in the perfectly acceptable chair at the computer console. Nothing new there.

“The generator? Or the smooth ease with which my talented hands installed it?”

Yumi’s eyebrows drifted upward. “The generator has a nice aura.”

“Glad to hear it.” Mica swatted her shoulder as she walked by and grabbed a rag off the console. Now, if she could get the rest of this place to gleam. “I hate it when poorly auraed parts come in.”

Bangs, grunts, laughs, and thump-thump-thumps drifted in from the cargo hold.

“They’re being quite noisy out there,” Yumi said. “Would you like me to close the hatch?”

“Nah, my new engineering assistant is out there. He said he’d be in here as soon as he finishes his game.”

“Your new assistant?” Yumi leaned around the jamb to peer into the cargo hold. “Beck?”

He and Ostberg were playing some game they had improvised that used the open space and involved throwing a ball at a sensor pad on the wall. Apparently, more points were awarded if the ball bounced off one or more other walls before striking the sensor. Mostly, the game involved men making a lot of noise.

“Ostberg,” Mica said. “He’s got a knack for the mechanical, and he’s sticking around to learn from Stan, so I might as well teach him enough to keep this boat in the sky. I’m not staying here forever.”

“Still talking of leaving? Now that things have settled down?”

“I don’t trust the captain not to find a way to get us all killed, settled or not. Besides…” Mica touched a hand to one of the dented old panels. “The ship has grown on me, but I still want to do more with my life than keep an old beater flying. I want to build things.”

“Is the ship the only thing that’s grown on you?” Yumi asked a little shyly.

Mica met her eyes. “No, not the only thing. Are you determined to stay here? I thought you might be ready to move on too. Perhaps to some nice safe planet that’s unlikely to be harassed by pirates.”

“I still worry about Andrew catching up with me if I stay in one place.”

“The mafia prince?”

“Yes,” Yumi said. “Being out here seems safer, surrounded by cyborgs and Starseers.”

“Ah, well…” Mica polished some smudges with her rag. “I’m not leaving tomorrow. Ostberg’s just a kid. It’ll be a while before I’d feel safe leaving you all in his hands.”

A brown ball flew through the hatchway, bounced off a panel, and would have hit Mica in the shoulder if she hadn’t dodged quickly enough.

“Definitely not safe leaving anything in Ostberg’s hands now,” she growled, stalking over and picking up the ball.

“Actually, that was me,” Beck said, leaning through the hatchway. “I was going for a three-pointer.”

“Is there a point deduction for losing the ball?” Mica propped it on her hip, considering keeping it as a way to end the game. She didn’t want to spend all day waiting on Ostberg.

“Losing the ball? Like to some troll or ogre in a mountain cave? That doesn’t usually happen, so it’s not covered in the rules.”

Mica looked at Yumi. “Did he just call me an ogre?”

“Possibly a troll.”

“I’m definitely keeping the ball.”

“I want to play,” came a young voice from behind Beck. Jelena. “Can I play?”

“You’re too small,” Ostberg responded.

“You’re too big.”

“I really need to talk to the captain about this new policy of allowing children to stay aboard the ship,” Mica told Yumi.

“I don’t think she’s going to ask her daughter to leave.”

“Perhaps children could have a curfew. Or be restricted to their cabins.”

“You’ll make a warm and loving mother someday,” Yumi said.

“I may gag.” Mica tossed Beck the ball and followed him through the hatchway, hoping to snag Ostberg from the silly game to do some far more worthwhile training. He was a child, too, technically, a fourteen-year-old one, but his aptitude for machines made her willing to keep him around. Plus, thanks to his height, he could reach things in engineering that she couldn’t. That made him handy.

But Ostberg did not appear ready to head into engineering. Beck tossed him the ball, and he bounced it several times as he considered a route that would get him closer to the sensor.

“I can hit that target,” Jelena said, flipping a braid back over her shoulder. “Let me play.”

“You’re too little,” Ostberg repeated, “and even if you weren’t, we can’t play with three. The teams need to be even. You’d need to have a partner.”

Jelena’s face scrunched up thoughtfully. “A big partner?”

“To make up for your littleness, absolutely.”

“Be right back,” Jelena blurted and raced for the stairs.

Beck groaned and punched him in the chest. “You know who she’s going to get, don’t you?”

“Nah, she’s scared of him,” Ostberg said.

“Not when she needs someone to hide behind.”

“There’s no need to hide in wall ball.”

“Are you sure? When Mica glared at me, I experienced the urge to hide.”

“Good,” Mica said, standing in the hatchway. “If your game is over, why don’t you come in here and learn a thing or two, Ostberg? Aren’t you supposed to be learning things while you’re out here in space? Alisa promised your parents you’d be educated, I’m certain of it.”

“Stanislav is teaching me Starseer tool-making techniques,” Ostberg said.

“Uh-huh. How about learning something that could get you a job someday?”

Ostberg scratched his head.

Jelena appeared on the walkway again, striding out with her chin held high and a smug expression on her face. Leonidas came after her, looking down at Beck, who groaned audibly. Mica only sighed. Well, once Ostberg got thumped a couple of times by a cyborg elbow, he would be ready to give up the game. Assuming he didn’t have to go to sickbay. Not that there was anyone up there to tend wounds now that Alejandro had left with Thorian. As alarming as it was, Leonidas was their most experienced medic left aboard the ship. There was something alarming about having a hulking cyborg apply one’s QuickSkin and burn ointment.

Jelena, perhaps worried that Leonidas wasn’t rushing down to the game quickly enough, jogged back to him, took his hand, and led him at a quicker pace. Leonidas appeared bemused at this, but went along with it, striding down the stairs to the deck to join Beck and Ostberg.

Beck tossed the ball at Leonidas’s chest. For most people, it took two hands to grip it, but he caught it with one.

“Rules?” he asked Beck.

“Our usual wall ball rules.”

“These aren’t the usual players.” Leonidas gave Ostberg a pointed look, then a less pointed one to Jelena, who issued that sly smile that meant she was planning mischief.

“No using Starseer powers to manipulate people or balls,” Beck said. “We already agreed on that.”

“That was before,” Ostberg whispered to him. “Maybe we should get to use them now. Cyborgs are extra fast, right?”

“Yeah, but wouldn’t your Starseer powers and Jelena’s just cancel each other out?”

“Of course not. She’s just a little kid. I’ve been training for more than five years.”

Jelena scowled mightily at him, then looked up at Leonidas, as if hoping he would fix her problem—or perhaps beat up Ostberg for being derisive.

Leonidas picked her up and put her on his shoulders.

Jelena grinned triumphantly as she grabbed the top of his head. “Now who’s little?” she asked, peering down at Ostberg.

He sighed, rolled his eyes, and said, “We’re ready.”

Leonidas bounced the ball over to Beck, offering them the opportunity to shoot first.

“I guess Jelena isn’t afraid of him anymore,” Yumi murmured. She had come to stand in the hatchway with Mica, and she shined a pleased smile into the cargo hold.

“Apparently not,” Mica said as the game resumed, Jelena hanging on tight as Leonidas lunged toward Beck and the ball. “He is useful for hiding behind. And riding, apparently.”

“Handy, since Jelena hasn’t been able to talk the captain into getting a horse yet.”

Mica snorted.

Beck wasn’t a poor athlete, but even with Ostberg guarding him from Leonidas’s advance, Leonidas darted in and snagged the ball away before Beck could shoot. He passed it up to Jelena and held her legs as he ran toward the target. She chucked the ball at the sensor pad on the wall. It bounced off a couple of feet away. Leonidas rebounded it, and even though Ostberg and Beck swarmed him, trying to block, he found an opening and shot it up there. It struck the center of the pad with a resounding thunk.

“Easy, Muscles,” Beck said. “We’d like to be able to keep playing. That won’t happen if you break the sensor. Or the ball.”

“Don’t listen to him,” Jelena said, giving Leonidas something between a clap and a head pat as she kept her grip with one hand. “It was stellar.”

Leonidas smiled slightly at this praise and tossed the ball to Ostberg. “Your turn.”

Alisa came out onto the walkway, smiled at the game, and propped her arms on the railing to watch. The action continued on with jeers and insults being thrown between the parties, though they were tamer jeers and insults now that Jelena was playing.

Mica sighed and backed into engineering. “I don’t think my engineering assistant is going to be ready to get educated any time soon.”

“No. You can educate me if you wish.” Yumi wiggled her eyebrows. “You know I enjoy learning new things.”

Yes, Mica did. And she appreciated that. She hoped she could convince Yumi to come along one day when she left the Nomad. But she need not worry about that now.

“I suppose that would be acceptable,” she said nonchalantly. “Better shut the hatch so we’re not disturbed by wayward balls.”

“Of course.”

• • • • •

Alisa sat on the walkway with her legs dangling over the edge, unable to wipe the smile off her face as she watched Leonidas and Jelena compete against Beck and Ostberg. After the first few points, Leonidas had set Jelena on her feet, and they were playing normally now, if it could be considered normal how often the ball made its way to Jelena and how often Beck and Ostberg found themselves unable to get around a cyborg back to steal it from her. Jelena didn’t hit the target very often, and Leonidas let the others shoot frequently enough that they remained interested in the game and the score wasn’t overly lopsided. Alisa hoped her daughter’s aim would improve with age and practice. Being able to peg a pirate in the head with a blazer—or a ball—was a good skill to have.

“She will have many other skills,” came a soft voice from behind her.

“Such as sneaking up on people and prying into their thoughts?” Alisa asked.

Stanislav walked out and stood at the railing beside her. “I wasn’t sneaking. You failed to hear my approach over the clanging and banging of that game.”

“And the prying?” She gave him a frank look.

“I was curious to know if you are content now that your daughter is back with you and she’s no longer fleeing from Leonidas.”

“You could have asked,” Alisa said, though she wasn’t truly irked with him. He was far less nosy and intrusive than Abelardus, though thankfully Abelardus poked his telepathic fingers into her mind less often these days, now that he had Young-hee to harass. Or love. Or both.

“Yes,” Stanislav agreed.

“I’m sure she’ll make a lovely Starseer, but I still think being able to hit targets is a good skill to have. While Yumi is teaching her math and science, and you’re teaching her mental thingies, I’ll make sure she can pilot and shoot.”

Stanislav eyebrows lifted at the word thingies, but he was too polite to comment on—or mock her for—the term. “I’m sure she will grow up to be a well-rounded adult with a superior education.”

“I hope so. Someone has to be superior on this ship.” Alisa looked at his face, noting the lines at the sides of his eyes. Several weeks had passed since the confrontation with Tymoteusz, but he still appeared tired, and older than he had when they’d first met. “How are you doing these days?”

“I am well.”

She squinted at him.

“I am recovering,” he amended quietly. “The battle was arduous. So was losing my brother. Even though we were never close… our parents died years ago, so he was my last tie to my old life. I am pleased that I’ve found you and Jelena—very pleased—but the deaths of so many others…” He sighed. “I find myself rather aware of my own mortality now.”

“It’s a good thing that you’re a young grandpa then. If you avoid epic battles with relatives, you could live a long time still.”

He smiled. “I shall endeavor to do so.”

Stanislav watched the game with her for a while, his smile lingering as Jelena hurled balls around Ostberg and Beck in an attempt to hit the target. Alisa found the moment companionable.

After a few more minutes, Beck bowed out of the game, saying he had sauces to prepare for their next stop. Alisa swore that he managed to arrange more business than she did. They had dropped the peas and corn off on Perun—along with Alejandro and Thorian, who had met a group of shady figures in Starseer robes—but Alisa hadn’t been able to find an outgoing cargo. Perun, it seemed, was struggling to produce any surplus these days, or even provide enough food for its own citizens, and times were tough. After visiting, Alisa had offered to take her sister-in-law Sylvia along on the Nomad, but she’d been on her way out to the family farm, where she would stay for a time, doing her art in the countryside.

“I’ll join you for dinner later,” Stanislav said, waving as the game came to a stop.

He headed back toward the cabins, his robe swirling at his ankles. Alisa would have to try to talk him into getting some normal clothing. How could one avoid thinking about one’s mortality while wearing that somber black robe? Maybe someone just needed to put a few stickers on it.

Leonidas took a break when Beck did, leaving Ostberg to alternate shooting at the sensor with Jelena. He glanced at Alisa a few times, probably wondering if his new duties aboard the ship required that he play with a nine-year-old girl. But he did not vocalize his objections. Alisa decided she might be able to trust him with babysitting duties if she and Leonidas ever wanted to slip away, such as for a honeymoon. She smiled at the thought as the men tramped up the stairs.

Beck continued on to the mess hall, but Leonidas sat down beside Alisa, also dangling his legs over the side.

“You’re not sweating,” Alisa observed. “Were your opponents not challenging enough?”

“Perhaps you should have joined their team.”

“Because my superior athletic skills would have tipped the scales against you?” She quirked an eyebrow, doubting she would have made a difference even if she had worn her combat armor.

A glint entered his eyes. “Because you’ve been known to make me sweat.”

“Ah, yes. I do have that gift.”

“Quite.”

Alisa leaned against his shoulder. “Thank you for playing with Jelena,” she said quietly, so the words wouldn’t trickle down to the kids.

“Of course. I was pleased she asked me. Even if she only chose me because she wanted an advantage, it seems a promising start to… something.” He hitched a shoulder.

“Becoming a family?”

“Or a trophy-winning wall ball team.”

“Is that actually a sport? I thought you boys made it up.”

“Thus ensuring the competition will be sparse when it comes to winning trophies.”

“Very sparse.”

Leonidas smiled and wrapped his arm around her waist. With the children diverted, they could get away with an embrace. Though Jelena hadn’t made any outbursts or other blatant objections lately when she had caught them close to each other. With time, they shouldn’t have to choose their private moments so carefully.

“Have you had any thoughts about having children of your own?” she asked. “Now that you’ve spent a little time around Jelena? And now that she occasionally talks to you?”

He hesitated, looking toward the hold below, and she wondered if she was asking too soon. But he had brought up the idea before on his own.

“I’ve had thoughts, yes,” Leonidas said. “But I am a little concerned… that perhaps we would have to seek help in that area.”

“Help?”

“Between our various adventures into radiation-filled areas, I do wonder if we’ll have trouble conceiving naturally and if there will be potential for problems.”

“Admiral Tiang said your sperm was fertile and sufficiently motile.”

“I’m not sure that means—” Leonidas frowned over at her. “You discussed my sperm with Tiang?”

“Tiang has proven willing to discuss anything from cookie recipes to penile function without reservation.”

“Oh, I know that, but, ah…” His frown deepened. “Did you ask?” The unspoken question of, Were you also concerned? seemed to follow even though he did not voice it.

“I didn’t ask, actually. He volunteered the information. In the moment between requesting that Beck cater his daughter’s wedding and saying goodbye to me. I’m sure he felt that was the natural time to bring it up.”

Leonidas’s mouth twisted. “Is it strange that I can easily imagine that?”

“I believe Tiang is the strange one. He’s hoping I’ll keep him apprised as to whether we’re able to conceive. I suppose it wouldn’t be a bad idea to visit an expert the next time we’re picking up cargo on a core planet. You have bathed yourself in radiation again since Tiang last looked at your sperm.”

“Me? I’m certain your bath was just as long.”

“Yes, but my genes apparently like that.”

“I’m not sure that’s quite how it works.”

“No?” Alisa asked. “Too bad all our medical specialists have left, and there’s no one to consult. Maybe we should invite Admiral Tiang to come visit the next time he has leave. He seemed to enjoy his time here.”

“Perhaps a doctor who specializes in fertility would be preferable over an eccentric research scientist who performs cyborg upgrades and creates biological weapons.”

“You don’t think that would be an easy topic to master for someone of his knowledge and talents?”

“I think I’d prefer to discuss my… fertility with someone less odd.”

“Really, Leonidas. After the nice things he said about your sperm.”

“Would you want him examining your reproductive organs?”

Er, would she? He was a quirky fellow. Not that the fleet medic who had done her military entrance exam had been that normal, either. It probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to find a civilian doctor she liked somewhere and swing by for regular visits. And a reproductive organ exam.

“Presumably, we should both be checked out before we attempt procreation,” Leonidas added.

“Attempt procreation—you sound more like a scientist than a security officer.”

“An engineer, perhaps. Out of curiosity, I did some research on the sys-net. Did you know there are all manner of charts and tracking programs that can be downloaded to assist in the process?”

“Charts?” Alisa wrinkled her nose. Leave it to him—he sounded excited by the prospect. “I was thinking we could just attempt procreation the natural way. Often and vigorously.”

“I am, of course, amenable to that.” He squeezed her and leaned the side of his head against hers. “But a few charts couldn’t hurt. You can never have too much data, after all.”

Alisa closed her eyes, imagining him rolling over in bed after a vigorous lovemaking session to record data. Or perhaps he would follow her to the lav, offering tests to keep track of when she was ovulating. How funny that he found Tiang odd.

“Perhaps we should wait until after the wedding before we get serious about this,” Alisa said. “We haven’t picked a date or a location yet. Talking about babies may be premature. Unless we want our first child to feel scandalized when he or she one day realizes he or she was a guest at our wedding. I’m certain the Xerikesh Scrolls say something about waiting until after wedlock before engaging in sexual relations.”

“In that case, we’ve already been scandalous.” His eyebrows twitched. “Numerous times.”

“No, we’ve been sinful. It’s only scandalous if there’s proof of your deeds, such as public records of wedding dates and birth certificates.”

“That’s an interesting way of interpreting the religion.”

“I’m an interesting person.”

“Yes. Yes, you are.” Leonidas waved toward the children still playing below. “Shall we leave them to each other’s entertainment for an hour or so and go be sinful?”

“All the talk of baby making got you in the mood, eh?” Alisa pulled herself to her feet. She’d had the same thoughts on her mind and didn’t have to be asked twice.

“Especially the part about charts.” He also stood, taking her hand and leading her toward the cabins.

“You’ve already downloaded some of those tracking programs, haven’t you?”

“Just so I can look them over and see which is best.”

“Our next few years together are going to be interesting, aren’t they?” Alisa asked, squeezing his hand.

“I certainly hope so.”

THE END