Nimisha's Ship
- Автор: Маккефри Энн
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «Nimisha's Ship». Краткое содержание книги:
When Nimisha takes an experimental ship on a solo test flight, something goes horribly awry, marooning her light-years from home on a planet as deadly as it is beautiful. Now the ruthless members of a rival branch of the Rondymense family are given the chance they've been waiting for: to reclaim the Ship Yards by any means necessary.
Only Nimisha's ingenious child, Cuiva, stands in their way. But for how long? For just when her daughter needs her most, Nimisha is in a precarious situation herself--and unable to help. But Nimisha has never given up in her life--and she's not about to start now . . .
Nimisha's thoughts right now were more on something to fill her empty stomach than on her heir.
"I'll have a mixed fruit juice, a green salad, and Mercassian bread," Nimisha said as she strode across the carpeted deck. A single chair and table emerged from the wall just as the dispenser chimed the arrival of the order. So Nimisha settled immediately to her meal with a pleasant thank-you.
"You're quite welcome. Let me know if you wish anything else," said the dulcet dispenser AI. It spoke in a lilting tone and, while Nimisha didn't need to respond, much less express appreciation, the habit of courtesy had been so ingrained in her that she was unable to break it. Some of her friends found it amusing but then, few of them traveled the distances she did and could appreciate the companionship of other voices, AI or human. And Nimisha had been well drilled by her womb-mother: Courtesy was the Mark of True Nobility and aided the Instillation of Loyalty. And No One of Any True Breeding assumed Service.
She grinned, wondering how often she had heard that litany, as she tucked into the salad-crisply green with odd crunchy seasoned bits, just as she liked it. She remembered the day that she had auditioned voices. She'd had half a mind to use her mother's sultry one. But Lady Rezalla would not have considered it in any way a compliment, nor were her mother's highbred tones and elegant diction suitable for any AI on this ship.
Nimisha had listened to voices on tri-d, selected those she liked and felt she could bear hearing constantly, and contacted an agency to act for her. The contralto was a young actress, determined to break into big time tri-d, who dutifully read through the material supplied, enunciating culinary words and displaying no curiosity as to the limitation of the audition. She had certainly been grateful for the credit lodged to her account when she finished the day's reading.
The man she had chosen for Helm's voice had been an entirely different matter: He was a well-known compeer, and he had agreed only after haggling with both her and his agent as to price. Once that was finally settled, he had rattled off the required pages of dialogue and vocabulary in a professional manner, but he was curious as to the usage.
"Do I have to be… only…" and he had leaned toward her, his eyes and manner seductive.
"Dear man, how would I survive listening to your voice thousands of systems away from your presence if we were to indulge…" She paused, smiling as she ran a delicate finger down his strongly modelled jawline. "… in an intimacy? I know-" And again she paused, this time in compliment."-your reputation."
When he leaned forward across the worktop that separated them, Nimisha rose from her chair in a graceful whirl toward the door and waved her hand across the control panel. "That'll be all, pet," she said, using her "business" voice, a tone guaranteed to reduce ardour.
With a rueful smile, he tipped her a saucy wave as he exited. "You may be sorry," he murmured. Annoyed, she pressed the fast-close stud of the door controls and just missed his left heel.
Her mother's long-term friend, Lord Physician Naves, had started his medical career as a diagnostician but was now more in demand as a body-sculptor. He had assisted in the massive sculpting necessary to put young Lord Vestrin back together into the handsome figure he had once been before his accident. He had been charmed by her request to use his voice.
"Not that I'm expecting any trouble," she assured Lord Physician Naves, "but when you roll off those unpronounceable diseases and suggest procedures in that gorgeous voice, one is instantly comforted and feels safe."
The older man, who had let his hair go silver-a contrast to his young and vigorous countenance-preened slightly. He was very fond of Lady Rezalla's body-heir and thought her most original to have struck out for herself in a profession of her own: so different from the languorous women and men whom he was called upon to body-sculpt. He smiled and winked at her.
"I've always considered my voice a professional asset. For you, Nimi, I'll be happy to lend my vocal support." Then he went on, repeating a familiar concern of his. "Far too many financiers, bankers, and entrepreneurs in our line. We need some diversity, some other role models for the next generation, or no one will be able to speak in anything except debentures, compound interest, and multiple mergers." He effected a shudder. "There is, after all, only so much you can say about those."
"And infinite queries for you to answer for those of us who think we've contracted something lethal in our travels."
"Precisely." He put both hands on her shoulders, giving her a little shake and sternly eyeing her. "But, of course, I shall be only an emergency feature? You'll be careful?"
"I always am," Nimisha said, having no need to remind him that she had had only very minor scrapes in her career as a test pilot-nothing more than a sprain and bruises. As the saying went, any landing you walk away from is a good one. "Oh, how is Lord Vestrin progressing?"
Lord Naves's expression became very solemn. "That young man feels the world owes him something. Which I assure you it doesn't. His… ah… reconstruction is almost complete and indeed, there were some improvements he insisted on in the facial reconstruction. Symmetry is just not natural. It is, indeed, those minor flaws that give the whole countenance its character. Of course, character is a lack that body sculpting cannot repair. Nor can Lady Vescuya's devotion to her son be considered an asset." He paused, a fleeting look of dismay crossing his handsome and definitely asymmetrical features. "But she has been devoted."
"So he'll be more handsome than ever?"
Lord Naves gave her an odd look. "Illusory, of course," he said, flicking his fingers to dismiss this topic of conversation. "Good luck, my dear," and Lord Naves had given her four tenderly fond embraces. "At least the essence of me will be at your command. I feel much more confident about that."
This shakedown flight was no more than routine, she thought, tearing off a chunk of the Mercassian bread and using it to sop up some of the salad dressing.
One second she was eating, the next, some subtle instinct had her on her feet and running to the bridge, swaying with the erratic motion of a ship gone unstable and yelling "Report!" at the top of her voice.
"Instruments indicate emergence of wormhole-"
"There isn't a wormhole in this sector."
"Ship's library confirms wormhole phenomena…"
She caught sight of the boiling white pout of disturbance that could be nothing other than a wormhole plugging open the space directly in front of her.
"Helm to starboard! HARD!"
If they were lucky, they might just slip under the edge of the yawning maw that seemed to be sucking the ship in. From this angle, the hole looked far larger than it might actually be, for after all it wasn't supposed to exist at these particular coordinates in Delta Quadrant. She'd chosen this area, off main shipping routes, so she could let out the Fiver's engines without running any other vessel down. The seventy meters of her ship were no more than a splinter at its perimeter, yet she might just be able to skim past.
Fighting against the bucking of the deck beneath her feet, she pushed herself into the pilot's chair, fingers flying to program and release a Mayday beacon, propelling it well astern of her ship. With her left arm, she fumbled into the safety harness but had no time to fasten the belt when the ship juddered and inexorably yawed to port, unable to execute the starboard manoeuvre though she could hear both thrusters and engines roaring to comply. The wormhole had got her and the ship was slipping over its thick lip and down into the brilliant, roiling interior of the tunnel it made. A tunnel to where? She clung to the right armrest, struggling to secure herself in the harness.