When Places Call Read online

information wasn’t all that embarrassing. It wasn’t even confidential. It was just something he never told anybody before, and he hadn’t had any intention of telling anybody.

  “Her name is Rose.”

  “Of course,” Kira said, patting the ship wall fondly.

  The photo of Mio Wy’s ship flickered away and was replaced by a clip of Turobeck’s shuttle un-docking from a space station and zipping away into the starlight.

  “So you are a Turobeck fan!” Kira’s face was practically glued to the screen.

  They watched the clip replay over a few times, the petit spacecraft blasting away without much fanfare. Kira rested a hand against the screen, causing the ship to freeze mid-flight.

  “Another shuttle I never was able to find,” Kira said.

  “You probably never will. It was lost along with Turobeck.”

  “Hmm, lost to the cosmos. An unglamorous ending, but perhaps fitting.”

  Kira took a step towards the door, but paused to give Turobeck’s shuttle one last look.

  “It’s probably falling to pieces by now, but I think if I ever were to fly, I’d want to fly that one.”

  In that moment, Iguru wanted to find it and steal it for him. He shook himself, mentally and physically, and quickly fled for the main cabin. Kira followed more sedately, casting lingering glances at the mechanics.

  “This is where you fly,” Kira said.

  Kira rested his hands on the back of the pilot chair. His touch was reverent, but his gaze was eager.

  “Yes,” Iguru said, angling himself towards the door.

  Kira ignored him and instead studied the displays, the green of the numbers flashing over his face.

  “Do you think I could…?” Kira swallowed, “May I?”

  Iguru pretended not to understand, but his insides felt strangely itchy. It would be the height of stupidity to allow Kira access to his controls, and yet…. He had once been that boy, hadn’t he? Couldn’t wait to sit in the pilot seat and take control for the first time. Once he had asked his instructor ‘may I?’ and after that, nothing could’ve turned him away from the stars.

  “Co-pilot,” Iguru grunted.

  Kira launched himself into the co-pilot chair and strapped himself in, so unabashedly eager it almost made Iguru feel embarrassed. Iguru made a big show of slowly getting into the pilot seat. This was his ship. He’d run the show.

  “Rose,” he barked, “prepare for Launch Sequence Alpha.”

  “Launch?” Kira asked, “We’re not actually going to go anywhere, are we?”

  “Relax princess,” Iguru said, “I’m not going to kidnap you.”

  “Well you couldn’t, seeing as how we’re still in the hangar, but I’ve never so much as hovered off the ground-”

  “Do you want to go through the sequence or not?”

  He never thought Kira would be a nervous babbler.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Then check the flight system software.”

  Rose had already begun double-checking that the software was still uncorrupted and ready to load; Kira studied the read-outs Rose provided and Iguru moved to the next step. He activated the navigational systems and felt Kira jump in the seat next to his as the controls moved and automatically began to test their own functionality. The cockpit came alive with the sounds of a mechanical dance and displays glittered with information in the red lights of the cabin.

  “Engine status?”

  “Propellant in storage. Storage tank is at optimal level.”

  But instead of Rose’s voice answering him, it was Kira’s. Iguru startled, not expecting the closeness of it, possessing a rich texture that computer voices usually lacked. For the first time in years Iguru’s hands forgot themselves but even as he missed a step, Kira covered for him. He had quickly familiarized himself with the Centralized Engine Indication Monitor.

  “Cabin temperature and pressure is normal.”

  Iguru flicked on the cameras and a view of the hangar bay materialized.

  “Debris?” he asked.

  “Launch site clear,” Kira responded.

  “Activate communication systems.”

  Kira’s hands flitted above the dashboard. It was a mix of manual and electronic instruments; some of controls were still manual, while others were screen based. Eventually, Kira found what he was looking for.

  “Activated.”

  “Weather report.”

  Hands dashing over the screens, Kira brought up a report of weather in the space surrounding the planet, the last one Iguru had been able to download before he had passed out of all satellite range. It would have to be good enough.

  “Destination?”

  Iguru cut a glance at Kira, who had gone so beautifully still, face awash with all the possibilities.

  “Where do you want to go?” Iguru asked.

  “Do you know…I’ve never really thought about it?”

  A collector of star poetry and space ships should have a destination in mind, should have imagined the journey at least a thousand times.

  “Maybe because I’ve had the adventures brought to me, I never thought about having my own.”

  Surely a lie for if Kira did not dream of far off places, then he would not be sitting in the co-pilot chair at this moment.

  “If there was no Safety, no mansion, no unnamed planet, where would you want to go?”

  Even over the sound of the whirring computers he could hear Kira swallow and perhaps it was cruel, but Iguru shut off the outside cameras and brought up a map of everywhere he had been. It unfolded across the Navigation Display like black silk, a dark expanse that glittered with tiny bright pearls. The stars were rotating, boiling hot masses, and attached to them were their satellites: strange planets and sycophant moons. Destinations Kira had heard of but never been.

  “I think,” Kira said slowly, studying his options, “that I would simply enjoy going somewhere with a name.”

  “Then let’s go,” Iguru said.

  Rose announced, “Launch configuration calculated and inputted.”

  Already he could feel the burn of the flight, the initial thrust that left him breathless with lungs on fire. Iguru reached toward the Flight Control Panel, ready for main engine start, and his fingers brushed up against Kira’s. Kira grinned unabashedly at him, so bright that Iguru forgot to even look at his eye and as one, they activated the engine.

  The Naked Rose bloomed before them, thundering with power, the stars ready to be flying under her hull. Iguru braced himself, ready for the liftoff, when he abruptly remembered that it was not going to happen. This time, it was Iguru who swallowed. He had to look away as he cancelled the main engine start. They were never going to go anywhere, but Iguru had for a split second thought that maybe they could.

  He could see the dreams he had long forgotten he used to yearn for: someone at his side, someone in his ship, the co-pilot chair not simply functioning as a foot rest any longer. Nine years ago, he had thought Randir would fill that space. Nine years ago, he had been a fool. It would do him good to remember how love and infatuation had been his downfall.

  He was here for Ananke, she was his only way forward. With her, he could alter the past and change his future. Whatever thoughts he might have otherwise were nonsense, even if they screamed possibility! at him. Perhaps once he had been a man fit for companionship, but that man was no more.

  The silence was loud compared to the roar of The Naked Rose’s engine.

  “It would be grand, wouldn’t it, to simply fly away and leave all the rest behind,” Kira said.

  His hands were on his knees, prim and proper, but Iguru knew better now. He saw the eagerness there, barely restrained, hands ready to hit the main engine start and go. Iguru was beginning to understand why he didn’t just leave Safety. Some dreams were never meant to be realized.

  Iguru stood up, breaking the quiet atmosphere as his joints popped loudly. Kira laughed a little and the spell of spaceflight was sha
ttered.

  “Thank you,” Kira said.

  He stepped toward the exit. Iguru stood awkwardly in the middle of the cabin, hands hanging uselessly at his side. He hadn’t been on a date in many years, but he still knew what one felt like. This felt a bit like one, with Kira waiting expectantly on the threshold, as if Iguru was supposed to give him a goodnight kiss and send him off.

  “I’ll be visiting Ananke. You’re welcome to stop by of course, but I’ve dragged you away from your repairs for too long already.”

  Like when they first met, Kira’s words said cooperation. But his tone said something different, and Iguru suspected it might be something like companionship, something less sinister than Iguru had originally suspected.

  Kira flashed him one more smile before walking out. Iguru eventually got his legs working and went to the exit hatch, leaning against it heavily. Kira was already leaving the hangar, but did give him a final wave. Iguru, completely out of habit, waved back. He quickly caught himself and lowered his hand.

  It wasn’t until Kira was well and truly gone, and his cheeks had cooled, that he realized he wasn’t alone. Hidden by darkness, the butler stood on a balcony overlooking the hangar. His eyes, however, glinted from the glow of the work light and gave him away. Unintimidated, Iguru stared back and crossed his arms. The butler’s eyes didn’t blink and he reminded Iguru of a lion watching its prey under the cover of night. Eventually the butler turned away, silently and without an explanation.

  Hitting the lever, the hatch snapped shut and Iguru was left alone, well-protected in The Naked Rose. There was only one thing that was a little off…his entire space shuttle smelled of