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Chapter Twelve




“It’s good to have you back,” Nathan placed a hand on Rufus’s shoulder as they strode down the length of the Neptune Belle’s cargo hold.

Rufus only grunted in reply, pulling his rolling luggage behind him. Both Nathan and Aiko had offered to take it from him, but he’d refused both times. It wasn’t that heavy anyway in the ring’s half gravity, and consisted mostly of clothes, a few wigs, a small supply of panacea, and his Pentatheon bible, liturgy book, and prayer book.

“I said—”

“I heard you,” Rufus interrupted.

“It’s true,” Nathan continued smoothly. “The ship hasn’t been the same since you left.”

“No doubt.”

They stepped onto the freight elevator, and Nathan selected B Deck. The elevator shuddered into motion.

“You sure you don’t want to be paid for this?” the captain asked him.

“I’m sure.”

“I’d feel better if we paid you.”

“I don’t require compensation,” Rufus said, his tone growing somewhat weary. He’d had this discussion with Nathan before, many years ago. “A clean place to sleep and good food to eat will be payment enough while I’m in your company.”

“If you say so,” Nathan replied with a shrug. “And you do like Aiko’s cooking.”

“I . . .” Rufus permitted himself a slim smile. “That I do.”

“She’s thrilled to have you back, by the way. She even went grocery shopping in Faelyn’s Clash. I think she’s picking up ingredients for a few of your favorites.”

“That does sound like her.”

“That said, I’m not big on the idea of paying people in hamburgers.”

“If your conscience feels so tarnished by this arrangement, then perhaps you should consider making a donation to the Order.”

“Maybe I will,” Nathan replied, sticking his hands in his pockets. “Though, you do realize if I paid you, you could make a donation whenever you want?”

Rufus let out a tired exhalation.

The freight elevator came to a halt on B Deck, and they headed  down the hall.

“I mean,” Nathan continued, “it’s not like I’m going to turn down cheap crew. Especially when they have skills like yours. Aiko and I can use every spare c’troni we can scrounge up, after all.”

“Nathan, let’s be clear on one thing: I’m not, nor have I ever been, a member of your crew.”

“Oh, sure, sure.” The captain waved the matter aside, stopping in front of a pressure door. “Do you still want your old room back?”

“I—” Rufus paused and frowned. His eyes caught the gleam of a silver plaque on the door. It read: rufus sen qell.

“I’ll get that fixed.” Nathan tapped the plaque with a knuckle. “Rufus ziin Qell. Two I’s in the middle, right? Aiko will fab a new one for you.”

“You put my old name tag back on the door?”

“Didn’t have to. It’s been like that since the day you left.”

“Then my room is . . . ?”

“Just the way you left it. We’ve never carried enough passengers for us to overflow into the old crew quarters.”

“Completely untouched?”

“Well, Aiko’s done some cleaning, but that’s it.” Nathan bobbed his head to the door. “So, you want this room or one of the others?”

Rufus frowned and stared at the plaque, which stood as an affront to his assertion he’d never been a member of the crew. Of course, he’d never officially joined Nathan’s team, but he’d also been onboard long enough for Aiko to put the plaque on the door.

“My old room will do just fine,” he said at last.

“Great!” Nathan removed a key fob from his pocket and handed it over. “Make yourself at home. We’ll take off once Aiko’s back from her shopping run.”

Rufus nodded, though Nathan was already heading back to the elevator. He pressed the fob against the reader. The door slid aside, and he stepped in and took a deep breath.

The place smelled faintly of lemon.

He rolled his luggage up to the side of the bed and stared at the small five-sided icon of the Pentatheon hanging on the wall. He pressed a splayed hand over his heart and bowed to the icon, then unzipped the top of his luggage, removed his prayer book, and flipped it to one of the bookmarks.

He cleared his throat and began to read one of the prayers, softly yet firmly.

Someone knocked just as he finished, and he clapped the book shut.

“Hey there,” came a soft, feminine voice.

Rufus turned to find a nekoan leaning against the doorjamb, her golden eyes glinting, ears pert and attentive, arms crossed over her chest.

“What was that?” she asked.

“A request for a safe journey.”

“For yourself?”

“For all of us,” he corrected gently.

“And the Pentatheon can hear you?”

“In a manner of speaking.” He tapped one of the metal tabs behind his ears. “Through these, I can speak to them. Not directly, of course. No one’s been able to do that for four thousand years, but many contact points remain—we call them junctures—and through those, I can commune with them.”

“Which involves prayer?”

“For me, the words are more a focusing tool than actual worship. I suppose back in the Age of Communion, anyone could do this, but nowadays it takes a great deal of mental discipline for even the most sedate junctures to hear our wishes. Through meditation, I’m able to focus my mind, making it more receptive to the lingering thoughts of the Pentatheon.”

“Neat.” She flashed a toothy smile and gave him a brief wave. “I’m Vess, by the way.”

“Short for Vessani?” Rufus asked. “You were born on the cylinder we’re heading for next?”

“Yep, that’s me. In a way, this whole trip is my fault.”

“I believe Nathan worded that last part a bit differently.” He dipped his head toward her. “A pleasure to meet you, Vess.”

“Likewise.” She tilted her head, and her tail swished behind her. “So, you’ve trained your brain to connect with old technology?”

“More or less. Why do you ask?”

“I grew up in low-tech, so I’ve been playing catchup ever since. I only made it this far because I’m a damned good pilot and an excellent shot. I pick up what I can where I can.”

“Don’t we all?” Rufus let out a sigh. “I wish we understood the Pentatheon better. The megastructures we live on, the divergences in your body, the implants in mine. None of these would be possible without them, and yet we know so little about how all of this came to be. Or why humanity now finds itself so alone.”

“At least we have ourselves for company.”

“I suppose that much is true.”

“Oh!” Her eyes lit up. “You know who you should talk to?”

“Who?”

“Joshua! He loves discussing all that science stuff. Give it a try. I bet you’ll find you two have a ton in common!”

“Thank you. I just might.”


It was grill night on the Neptune Belle, and Rufus breathed in the savory aroma. A row of juicy patties sizzled on the grill, and Aiko-Six flipped them over before adding a slice of cheese on top of each. Once the cheese oozed over the patties, Aiko-Six placed them on buns.

Aiko-One finished assembling the burgers, layering slices of lettuce, tomato, onion, and pickle before adding a swirl of her homemade sauce to the top bun.

“They smell great, Aiko,” Rufus said with the happy grin of a man whose stomach was primed to become even happier. “My mouth’s watering.”

“Thanks!” Aiko-Six replied. “I try my best.”

“For which I’m grateful.”

“Aww. You say the nicest things!”

Aiko-One served each burger with sides of fried rice and green beans. She placed a platter in front of each of the four hungry mouths, then returned to the kitchen counter to assist Aiko-Six with the inevitable second round.

Vessani grabbed her plump burger with both hands and brought it up to her mouth, but then paused when Joshua cleared his throat. She gave him a quick sideways glance, her mouth agape.

“I believe Rufus would like to say something before we begin,” he told her quietly.

Her eyes scanned across the room, landing on the three other plates, each untouched. Her ears twitched, then drooped. She set her burger down, wiped her hands off on the napkin, and waited.

Rufus spread a hand over his chest and bowed his head.

“Divergence, we thank you for this bountiful meal and the nourishment it will provide. Amen.”

Nathan didn’t bow his head during the short prayer, but Joshua did.

“That takes me back,” the young engineer said over the rustle of utensils. “Reminds me of my time at the university.”

“You earned your degree on Saturn?” Rufus asked.

“That’s right. Well, one of them. Megastructure engineering from Kronya Founding College.”

“Ah, Kronya! Lovely school, and a lovely city. I was there myself for a semester before I moved to Qell. How was your stay?”

“In a word, illuminating,” Joshua said. “I quickly learned how behind Neptune is at understanding the Pentatheon.”

“Isn’t that the truth,” Nathan grumbled with a head shake.

“The professors at Kronya made some of my Neptunian teachers look like simpletons by comparison. I had a lot of catching up to do during my first semester, though . . .” Joshua hesitated, then smiled, almost apologetically. “I could have done without them draping all the science in mysticism.”

He paused to gauge Rufus’s reaction. When the cleric showed no signs of offense, he continued.

“It’s the way many of the professors mingled faith with fact. It made penetrating down to the core scientific truths difficult at times. I knew going in that Kronya Founding was a religious college. But it’s also one of the few Saturnian colleges open to foreigners.”

“This may surprise you,” Rufus replied, “but I’ve had similar thoughts myself. I may have been trained at Qell, but I soon found my own thoughts at odds with Church dogma.”

Joshua’s brow creased. “But aren’t you a Church cleric?”

“Cleric, yes. Church, no.” He brushed the flaming pentagon on his breast. “I’m with the Lucent Order. You’ve perhaps heard of us?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“You can think of us as seekers of forgotten knowledge.”

“Why black?” Vessani asked all of a sudden.

Rufus leaned back in mild surprise. “Excuse me?”

“Your clothes. You look like a member of Dirge’s crew.”

“I . . . what?”

“You call yourselves the Lucent Order, right? Why not wear something less gloomy?”

“Oh, that.” Rufus wore a wan smile. “We wear black to represent our unenlightened state. We live in darkness, seeking lost knowledge. We haven’t found it yet.”

“How long have you been looking?”

“About six hundred years. The Order started as a monastic offshoot from the Church, though much has changed since then. These days, about half our members hail from outside the Pentatheon faith.”

“Doesn’t that place you at odds with the Church?” Joshua asked.

“Not at all, as long as we stay true to our mission. From the viewpoint of the faithful, the Pentatheon grant their blessings through technology. From that perspective, faith and science are intricately intertwined, as your time at Kronya University demonstrated. We in the Lucent Order merely seek to illuminate how those blessings are given form.”

“And yourself? Do you share that belief?”

“I . . .” Rufus hesitated, and his lower lip trembled. “I find myself with more questions than answers these days. More than that, I’d rather not say.”

He cleared his throat and glanced down at his meal. Next to Joshua, Vessani swished her tail nervously. Her eyes flicked from one man to the other.

“You okay there, Rufus?” Aiko-Six asked from behind the counter.

“I’m fine.”

“You look like something’s weighing on your mind. I’ve been getting this vibe from you.”

“I . . .” Rufus sighed, then gave Aiko a sad smile. “Am I really that easy to read?”

“So, something is bothering you?”

“From before we arrived?” Nathan asked.

Rufus nodded. “I’ve been getting these visions recently, and they’ve been progressively growing clearer.”

“What sort of visions?”

“I haven’t been able to make sense of them. They’re just disjointed words and images. When I have one, I can feel . . . something akin to hunger. Or pain. A deep, old sense of loss and emptiness.” He shook his head. “There really isn’t much more to say.”

“Do you think it’s related to the pentatech artifact we’re after?” Joshua asked. “The fact that your visions are growing clearer suggests at least the possibility.”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” Rufus drew in a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “I suppose we’ll all find out eventually.” He turned to Nathan. “I’ll let you know if I learn anything from them.”

“I know you will,” Nathan replied, then turned to the others. “And I say that from experience. His talents have been lifesavers more than once. That’s one of the reasons he was my first pick for this job.”

“That, and I work for hamburgers?” Rufus asked, a sudden twinkle in his eyes.

“Hey, now. It’s not my fault the Order requires you to make a vow of poverty.”

“Technically, it’s a vow to pursue understanding above all else. We view the accumulation of wealth as a distraction from that mission.”

“Getting back to your visions,” Joshua said, “do you think they’re linked to the Scourging of Heaven? You emphasized the old sense of loss.”

“It’s impossible to say. Many junctures exude an aura of timelessness, but this one is different. More ancient than any other I’ve felt. And vast.”

The table fell silent after that, quiet except for the sounds of clinking utensils, the chewing of food, and the sizzle of the next round of burgers. Vessani plucked a coffee bulb from Beany and filled her thermos with it.

“Rufus?” Joshua asked after the long silence.

“Yes?”

“What do you believe happened during the Scourging?”

“Well, the Church has never formally recognized one version of events over the other, and likely never will in our lifetimes. Partially, that’s due to how vague the Scourging verses in Genesis are, which has led to endless debates about what to do with various apocryphal texts. Likewise, the Order has never been able to prove—or, for that matter, disprove—any of the major theories. In short, I don’t think anyone knows what really happened. Though, I do believe the answers are out there.” He made a sweeping gesture to the side. “Somewhere.”

“But what do you believe?” Joshua sounded genuinely curious.

“I believe they left because they had to, that their departure was necessary for humanity’s survival.”

“Then you believe the Devil of Proxima is real?”

“I’m a little less firm on that point, though it’s possible the Devil exists in some form. Certainly, all the changes to the solar system during the Age of Communion could have been noticed by intelligences elsewhere in the galaxy. We’re talking about an age that stretched across fifty thousand years, ranging from the creation of the Pentatheon all the way to the Scourging of Heaven roughly four thousand years ago. Fifty thousand years is a long time. Something . . . malevolent could have been drawn to us. Something that required the full might of the Pentatheon to fight off. Something that left horrible scars all across our star system. Something they might conceivably still be fighting. If so, then the reason they haven’t returned is because the Scourging of Heaven has yet to end.”

“Interesting.” Joshua nodded thoughtfully, then glanced back toward the kitchen with a mischievous grin. “That’s leagues apart from the Jovian version of events.”

“Don’t look at me,” Aiko warned, pointing a spatula at him. “I’m not stepping into that quagmire! You two are free to debate whether Divergence is the Great Betrayer until the end of time, but leave me out of it! Otherwise, all of you can kiss your second round of burgers goodbye!”

“Oh no!” Vessani gasped, sounding worried. She’d already demolished her first cheeseburger and most of her sides.

“Best talk about something else.” Nathan swept a gaze across the whole table. “Nobody gets between me and Aiko’s cooking.”



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