Becoming Chosen
Chapter Sixteen

Dr. Quinton worries the measures we need to take to provide social stability will condition the crew into a incapacitating lack of decisiveness and imagination. He is wrong in this. Yes, we will be limiting their choices and inputs, but we will not be changing them as humans. True imagination and decisiveness are not very common, but they do crop up again and again. Instead of thinking of the travelers as stunted humans we should think of them as seeds. Hard and unyielding until the conditions are right, then they bloom. So will the people who are at the end of the vast journey.

-Dr. Sochi Romanov, Deputy Chair of the Culture Committee from minutes July 8th 2642, Sealed Archives

The last hour had been a series of shocks for Ronan. From the visit to the Captain, to his death, the crazy fleeing through a secondary air duct, and now listening to Miri and Ami, of all people, plan how to hide the two of them.

The Miri he thought he knew had vanished. Instead of the slightly ignorant girl who saw everyday things with wide-eyed wonder, now there was an unflinching decision-making machine.

She had been the one to find their escape route. She had been the one to insist they exit the ventilation system at the very first access door they came to. And it had been her to insist they go to Ami for further help.

Ami too seemed different. She had never been very pleased with Miri joining their little group of friends, but any reluctance was now gone.

“It’s your data-sets we need to do something about, and right away. The minute they look for Ronan and find him not in his quarters, they are going to ping his and yours. They will know where the units are in seconds,” Ami was saying.

“Aye,” agreed Miri, “Could we tie them to Skitters? Maybe behind the camera, where they can’t see? .”

“Hmm, not bad. The Skitters never work in groups, so short of someone directly controlling one, the only way for anyone looking for you to figure it out is to physically look at them. The only problem is I have an idea where you can hide, but it involves the ventilation system too.”

“Well, if they find the skitters, won’t they assume we aren’t in there? They think we are just running blind.”

Ami smiled, “They might at that! A bluff, I like it.” She took her own data-set off her dresser and made a call.

Ronan listened to her wake Zara, one of Ami’s co-workers and a sometimes hanger on to the group. He shook his head. It was time to stop being so passive. It didn’t matter right this second that Nesbit had killed the Uncle Cecil, or that he was now captain. Those were problems for later.

He needed to take a page from the girl’s book and focus on the immediate problems of escape and hiding.

“If we are going into hiding we will need supplies. Food, water and the like. Without the data-sets, we can’t just access them in any dining hall,” Ronan put in. Both Ami and Miri looked at him, the later with a glowing smile.

“Good thinking,” Ami said, “but leave it to me. We’ve got to get you two out of the way and soon. It’s not like Nesbit isn’t going to be hauling me and everyone who has ever said two kind words to you in for questioning. I wouldn’t put it past the slimy bastard to spread the blame around to more than just you, Ronan.”

“Right, you handle provisions. Where is it you want to hide us?”

Ami gave him a toothy grin, “Remember that hatch we were looking at the day before Miri came? Well, the scans I took turned up the code to open it. If what the ship plans say is true, the shaft it opens to cuts all the way to level one, just inside the hull. There are landings you can hang out on, and the best part, other than overall pressure, is that there is no monitoring in the shaft.”

“So, our hiding place is dark and cold?” Ronan asked.

“No, well, not cold, but dark. There are lights but if you activate them they will draw power and that will bring unwanted attention. Besides, it’s only temporary. Just until we figure out who in the officers we can trust and will help us.”

The door chimed, making both Ronan and Miri jump from the memory of the last time they heard that sound. Ami went to the door and let her friend in.

It took longer than it should have to explain what was going on, and what they needed Zara to do. Unlike Ami and Miri, she couldn’t put her shock at the Captains death aside. But finally, she agreed to take the data-sets units and put them on skitters. Ami also tasked her with sending Manny and Phillipe to see Ami, but tell them nothing and not use her data-set to get them.

As soon as the other girl left, Ami grabbed her pillow and a couple of blankets off the bed and bundled them up.

“Right, it’s the middle of third shift. We won’t have a better time to get the two of you through the halls and into the hidey-hole. Let’s move.”

It was nerve wracking, walking through the familiar halls, pausing at every corner, cringing at every door, fearing it would open and expose the three of them. But eventually they made it to an access hatch and into the ventilation tunnels. After that it was a much faster walk to the hatch Ami had found.

Ronan boosted Ami up so she could punch in the code to open the hatch. For a second he thought the ancient door wouldn’t move at all, but then it gave a jerk and started to lower itself into the tunnel. A thin metal ladder descended to the floor.

“Okay, up you go,” Ami told them.

Ronan took out the flashlight he’d snagged from the supplies at the hatchway and shone it up into the inky darkness. The ladder ran straight and true up and out of the reach of the light. There was a small ledge right at where the doorway would seal.

He climbed up and put a hand down for the blankets and pillow, their only supplies so far. Miri handed them up and put her foot on the first rung. Ami put a hand on her shoulder, stopping her.

“I’m the only one who knows the code. I’ll leave supplies on the first ledge here. Be sure you stay at least one ledge up at all times, right?” Miri nodded. Ronan watched as the two young women shared a long look. They were communicating something but for the life of him he didn’t know what.

“Right, you take care of Ronan,” Ami said.

“I will, I promise,” Miri told her.

“Better make sure,” Ami replied then motioned Miri to go up. After she was safely on the ledge, Ami punched in the code again and the hatch swung up, cutting off the light.

“What was that all about?” Ronan asked.

From the dark Miri’s voice said in a tone that suggested a smile, “Oh, nothin’. Just a girl thing, you don’t have to worry about it.”

Ronan was smart enough to know better than to ask again, but somehow being told he didn’t have to worry about it made him worry that much more.

Vince Tolland watched as FO, no, Captain Nesbit broke the news of Captain Collins’ death to the senior officers. He had to admit, Nesbit knew how to play his fellow officers. It was impressive. And it was working.

Tolland would have enjoyed it a lot more if there wasn’t the gnawing in his stomach. It was one thing to consider removing the old Captain, after all there was no harm in thinking about something. But it was quite another to live with the knowledge that his new commanding officer had the old one murdered in cold blood.

“This could not have happened at a worse time,” Nesbit told the assembled officers. “We have a mission critical maneuver in less than two days’ time. For this reason, I appreciate the confirmation of my captaincy by this assembly.”

Vince suppressed a snort. Of course the senior officers confirmed Nesbit. They were in shock that Captain Collins was dead, apparently killed by someone in the Tech. Now Nesbit was getting them focused on the task at hand, rather than thinking through exactly how something like that was even possible.

“While we must achieve our goals, it is also critical that we find the person or persons who have deprived us of our Captain. To this end, I am assigning Lt. Tolland to assemble records of who met with Collins in the last day. He will be spending his time investigating while we make the turn,” Nesbit told them gesturing to Tolland.

A few eyes swiveled to look at him. Tolland froze his face and gave what he hoped was a confident nod.

“As soon as he provides me with any new information, I will share it with you.” Nesbit stood, forcing everyone else to do the same. “In the meantime, I know you will all perform your duties to the best of your abilities. Captain Collins would expect nothing else, and neither do I. Dismissed.”

The officers began to file out. “Tolland, if you would stay,” Captain Nesbit asked. As if Tolland didn’t know they needed to talk. He had just hoped the new Captain would be too busy. He didn’t relish giving him the news he had.

Vince made his way to the front of the briefing room. He noticed that Nesbit had already changed his uniform to that of a Captain. A traitorous thought wondered how long he’d had that in his closet.

“Captain,” he said, with a slight bow of his head.

“Lieutenant,” Nesbit answered, as he waited for the last of the officers to leave. When the door finally hissed shut he speared Vince with his eyes. “How is your project going?”

Say what you like about Nesbit, and there was more to say than is wise, but he was good on operational security. The project he vaguely referred to was the data work that would frame poor Ronan Candemir for murder.

“Uh, that is what I need to talk to you about, sir. You see, when I was looking at Captain Collins’s daily meeting log, in preparation to insert a visit by Ensign Candemir, I found something.”

“And that is?” Nesbit asked, his tone showing he had zero patience for pauses in his report.

“Well, sir, it shows the Captain,” Vince said, then amended as he noticed Nesbit’s glare. “The former Captain had a meeting with the boy and that Miri girl.”

“Then there is no problem, we won’t even have to add a false record.”

“Yes, sir. But you see, the meeting? It was at the same time as you arrived.”

“What are you trying to say, Tolland?”

“Sir, it looks as though both Ronan Candemir and Miri Blaylock were in Captain Collins quarters, when you arrived.”

Nesbit paled visibly, and a muscle at the corner of his jaw jumped as he ground his teeth together.

“By the Void!” Nesbit hissed. “Do we have a record of them leaving?”

“No, sir. The door logs show them entering, but there is no log of them leaving. I, ah, took the liberty of going there, on the off possibility they were still hiding somewhere in the room. They weren’t.”

“Of course, they weren’t! Don’t be a fool, Tolland. Let me think.”

Nesbit turned away and stood, back to Vince, arms crossed and head down for a long minute.

“Very well, we have to assume they heard Ferro taking care of Cecil. It means we can’t bring young Candemir to trial. But that does not mean we can’t still blame it on him and that Chosen bitch. I will let it be known they are both wanted for questioning. You run a ship wide ping and find out where they are. When we know, I’ll send Ferro, and they will both die resisting arrest. It is not ideal, but with the turn-over preparations, it should pass.”

Vince could hardly believe his ears. One death was bad enough, even if it seemed like it was the only choice to preserve the Way. But now Nesbit was talking about killing two more. Things had only just begun and they were already getting out of hand.

He almost said as much, but one look into the cold, dark brown eyes of his new Captain told him that three deaths could easily stretch to four, if he did. Vince had no desire to have Ferro’s huge hands wrapped around his throat.

“Yes, sir. I’ll do it now and coordinate with Ensign Ferro.”

“Good. Dismissed.”

Vince made good his escape, though he couldn’t shake the feeling Nesbit was still weighing his value, which was greater, him dead or alive.

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