Page 5 of Adrift!
They’d left the salon in a state of disarray, fleeing the anomaly for the safer confines of the lifepods. Now, adrift in the dangerous Zarnax Zone, Captain Nehivar had decided evacuating passengers in the small, defenseless pods was too risky. They’d stay together until they could restore the engines or make contact with rescuers.
But until then, the bar was very sticky.
He and Felicity swept through the salon, wiping and straightening. When Chef Styr arrived alongside the deck tech Griiek guiding a hover cart laden with meal bins, the four of them arranged the buffet as appealingly as felt appropriate under the circumstances.
This was what he’d been looking for when he signed on to the crew: a place to belong. He just wished it wasn’t under such desperate circumstances.
Although maybe such extremis was needed to bring people together.
Except for Remy McCoy, of course.
When Felicity straightened, her blue eyes wide and bright, Ikaryo glanced over his shoulder to see the captain striding through the salon doors.
The big Kufzasin male swept the room with an assessing, then approving glance. Although that last might’ve been when he lingered on his cruise director. Ikaryo exchanged his own more subtle glance with the other crew members, and while Griiek seemed oblivious to the undercurrents—which was understandable since Monbrakkans usually reproducedvia parthenogenesis—the Elnd chef fluttered the edge of one phonoplast in amusement.
A cosmic connection, just like the brochure promised.
“I wanted to be here when the passengers come for the meal, in case there are any questions,” Nehivar said in his rumbling voice. Considering he’d been reluctant to interact with their guests earlier, Ikaryo wondered how much of that change was due to the sunny cruise director. “Before they arrive, let’s review supplies and available power.”
Ikaryo sent his updated inventory to their common data access and scanned Chef’s additions. They’d worked closely together on the evening’s menu before the launch; now they’d need to be prepared to stretch their provisions over an unknown time period. He considered the numbers again. No one would go hungry tonight, but…
The implants in his arm strained and he realized both his hands were balled into fists. Very deliberately, he set his hands on top of the cleared bar, relaxing them as the first of the passengers wandered in.
They still looked shocked and shaky as they filed past him to collect beverages to go with their meals. His usually pulsar-steady fingers twitched again, remembering how he’d supported Remy. In her sleek dress and heeled shoes, she’d looked elegant and statuesque, like an exotic work of art in a style he’d never seen. But her bare skin under his fingers had felt achingly familiar, a fantasy half remembered.
Where was she? She’d kept to herself while they’d sheltered in the lifepod, just like she hadn’t mingled during the first part of the cruise. Felicity had said Remy regretted accepting the ticket, but why?
Not that he had any reason to ask. Painstakingly, he stacked his glassware a little higher around him.
The captain and Felicity circled among the guests who’d settled on the plush couches around the salon, and Ikaryo half tuned to their official apologies and assurances. He was about to suggest to them that he go check on any missing passengers (which was only Remy) when she appeared in the salon doorway.
Cold feet. Felicity had said it wasn’t a literal Earther expression, but Remy had fabricated a pair of soft, oversized foot coverings in place of the heeled shoes.
She marched directly up to his bar. “I know it’s all fake synthequer, but I need a drink.”
Since there were basic food services in the staterooms, he knew she was actually looking for more than that. Almost all species that traveled beyond their planetary systems were sociobiologically communal beings since the inherently individualistic ones weren’t able to create the complex systems required to achieve spaceflight. Closed worlds like her Earth were caught somewhere between, not yet fully demonstrating their ability to muster the group effort required to reach the stars.
But here she was, and looking none too happy about it.
What kept her stuck?
Snagging a large glass goblet, he poured a few shots from several bottles with one hand while the other hand diluted the yellowish fusion with a mixer from the bar dispenser. Under the weight of her attention, he wielded his tongs with an extra flourish to add a small red seed.
The drink fizzed, small bubbles combining violently into a large iridescent eruption that rose all the way to the rim of the goblet and then past it, towering almost to the height of Remy’s nose as if it might overflow…only to pop into silvery nothingness.
He poured the cheery orange remnants of the completed reaction into a more reasonably sized mug and nudged it toward her. At the movement, a few last bubbles dimpled the surface before subsiding.
She blinked at the drink and then at him. “Wow. What a show.”
“For you and your”—he peered over the edge of the bar—“fuzzy orange socks.”
She crossed one foot atop the other, balancing awkwardly. “I wanted something besides my heels. Just in case we have to run away again.”
She meant run away from the anomaly, of course. So why did he get the sense she was escaping more than that?
While he considered her, she took a drink and then peered into the mug. “What is this?”
“A restorative tonic from my homeworld. It’s not quite the traditional recipe—a lot more bubbles in this one—but it’s close enough, and these cinder fruits won’t last.”
