THEY DROVE in a groundcar from the rigger hall, gliding along the roadway. They passed around the far side of the hills, into a gorgeous pink sunset—with two of Gascon's Landing's three moons just hanging there, slim crescents shining in the reddish glowing sky. They drove to Dap's father's friend's cottage, where the dreamlink machine was located.
Jael felt a rush of nervousness as they got out to walk up a short path to the retreat. It was a real house, not a multi-dorm. Dap touched her arm, smiling reassuringly. The gesture helped her to overcome her doubts; she drew a breath and accompanied him to the front door. Dap fumbled in his pocket and fished out a slim metal wafer and slid it into a slot in the edge of the door. "The Donovons don't believe in ID bracelets—you have to use a key," he murmured. The door clicked and swung inward on hinges. Jael followed him in.
She peered around the front room as Dap secured the door. The house was small but elegantly designed, with a curving wooden staircase and soft-textured beige and white walls. Jael strolled around, touching the wall surfaces and banisters with a certain fascination. Perhaps it was a consequence of living in the rigger halls too long; it startled her to encounter luxury.
"Back here, Jael."
She followed Dap into a small sitting room, in the center of which was a silver-hemisphered device standing waist high. Dap passed his hand over the device, and it came on, producing a golden light. She'd never actually seen a dreamlink machine before, but she knew what it was: a specialized type of synaptic augmentor. It should be no big deal, compared to a rigger-net. As she approached it, she felt a soft inner glow pass through her. It seemed to match the light that the hemisphere produced. The feeling stayed with her as she crossed the room to where Dap was moving a pair of seats into the fringe of the glowing field. "We'll let it coalesce for a few minutes. Would you like something to drink?" he asked. "Some sparkly?"
Jael nodded. She sat and tried to relax while Dap disappeared into the kitchen; she smiled, drumming her fingers, and murmured thanks when he returned with two slender glasses of carbonated water. She inhaled a faint scent of juniper and lime; it tickled her nose and throat as she sipped it. Dap took the other seat and clinked glasses with her.
"What do we do now? What's going to happen?" she asked, thinking, this is your cousin, good old Dap—why are you worried?—he knows what he's doing.
Dap leaned forward and winked teasingly. She wondered if he was amused by her naivete, or perhaps being just the slightest bit flirtatious. She blushed and took another sip of sparkly. "You'll know what to do," Dap said. "If you can handle the net, you'll have no trouble with this." He settled back into his seat looking relaxed and eager, and Jael thought, I'm worrying about nothing after all. Nothing. The field was growing in intensity, very slowly, a pleasant glow surrounding her mind.
Dap began to talk, just idle conversation about this and that, riggers and family—his, fortunately, not hers (they were actually second cousins, and she knew his parents and sister only slightly)—and all the while, she felt the glow sinking deeper into her mind, warming her, almost a physical sensation that tingled at the edges of the iciness that lingered inside her. She shivered as Dap suddenly shifted tracks and described his last flight—a three star-system hop, fast and exciting—played in the net as skipping-stone islands across a broad, sun-spanked sea. His eyes sought hers as he spoke, laughing. "Jael, it was just the two of us, Deira and me. The owner was going to come, but canceled out at the last minute. No owner, just the two of us, captaining ourselves, and crafting this vision!"
As he spoke, Jael began to see a glimmer of the vision Dap had held during the flight—just a glimpse at the edge of her own vision, dancing like spots before her eyes as his memories were spun out in a tapestry of words and expression. His words tugged at her as he spoke of the intimacy he had experienced in the teamwork with Deira, as they'd piloted their star freighter through the Flux. "Jael, that was the best part about the trip," he said, his eyes still seeking hers, holding them just a little longer than she wished them held, his thoughts reaching out to hers. "But it was fleeting." And his voice turned a little wistful. "She's already gone out on another flight, this time on a long haul with three others. I miss her already." Did his voice catch, just a little? He kept talking. "But the experience . . ." And sparks of excitement seemed to radiate from his voice as he spoke again of the flight itself. "Imagine an absolutely clear, deep sea and an enormous, beautiful sky and a series of islands laid out like jewels on the sea . . ."
Something in Jael knotted up as he went on, causing her to choke silently. She tried to contain it; she didn't want to let her envy show. But as the warmth of the field worked its way slowly through the remaining iciness inside her, she felt certain feelings of resistance giving way, and she realized that there was no need to hide her feelings from her friend. That was what the dreamlink was all about—wasn't it?—tugging loose feelings, sharing them. As she looked at Dap, she felt a gentle release of something within, and she no longer only heard his words . . .
Dap's vision of space . . . the space he had flown . . . blossomed open directly in her mind. The glowing blue sea, and the space freighter leaping over and through that image of a sea like a magnificent dolphin, plunging through the clear waters and the air alike, plunging through—or rather, around—the light-years of normal-space distance as a dolphin plunged through the sea. And she glimpsed the woman Dap had rigged with, Deira, and his attraction and growing intimacy with her. She felt his exultation, the feeling of release and freedom that came from steering a ship through the Flux. She'd felt that herself, those few times she'd flown, but never with the kind of intimacy that Dap was showing her in this memory.
Jael shivered with envy, and with nervousness, because she sensed in Dap a sly querying interest toward her now. But he had assured her that his interest was only friendly, that he would never push her into anything she didn't want. She could trust him, she had to trust at least someone in this world, and what was she so afraid of, anyway?
Deira and I . . . we shared this vision, and more. Can you see, Jael? Can you feel it?
As she sensed Dap's thoughts, feelings stirred in her heart that she could no longer control. Yes, she felt it, and she did not want to know such envy, but she couldn't help it. Before she knew what was happening, thoughts and images began to gush up out of her own mind like water from a fountain. They spilled out into the image of space, into the dreamlink . . .
First came memories of her own training flights, dancing down the lanes of nearby space, among some of the cluster-mate stars of the sun of Gaston's Landing. It was sheer joy, like swimming for the first time, stroking and panting and dancing across the sea of stars. It was demanding to find the way and keep the vision steady—oh yes! But every light-year passed was a triumph, and she and Mara and Joizee-Bob (wherever they were now—how she missed them!) had threaded the passage so well on their last flight that they'd arrived ahead of schedule, wishing that they could turn around and fly it again. Such a release of feelings she had in the net! Such cooperation!
And those memories mingled with hopes of flights to come, flights that would vault the distances of much greater space, with new crewmates or maybe some of the old, flights that so far were nothing but hopes . . . hopes, and frustration, and pain . . .
She quickly tried to divert her thoughts from that, but the direction was inevitable; she could not control it. Before she could even catch her breath, she was showering Dap with other visions. Visions of the past . . .
Visions of pain.
Glimpses of her frightened half-brother Levin, steeling himself against the abuse of their uncaring father, so frightened that he was unable to reach out even to his sister, rejecting even her sympathy. Glimpses of Levin striding out of the house and out of sight down the road in dwindling daylight; of Jael herself gazing at her father's closed door, unable to gain his attention, suffering and wanting and needing . . . but her father was too busy with the machinations of his business, too busy with his consorts . . .
Jael, what is this? Dap whispered.
Images of Jael, years later, this year, arming herself with a self-esteem she didn't feel, and reporting to the rigger hall. But it wasn't like the rigger school, where she'd known classmates she liked and trusted, where at least some people hadn't known yet of her father. Instead, the images were of her rigging on the only two paying flights she'd gotten in the year since her graduation, before word of who she was had spread finally to the last corners of the shipping community. They were solitary flights, because she was fearful of seeking out companions, ashamed to let her fellow riggers know of her deep loneliness and need . . .
Jael, I had no idea! It . . . it doesn't have to be that way!
The anguish welled up in her. Doesn't it? What was I supposed to do? Can't you see that no one would fly with me? No one, no one . . .
But Jael, you have to assert your rights. You can't just . . . I don't know . . . hide from it!
Oh no? How about this? She couldn't prevent it from spilling out now in a great rush: all the years of loneliness and failed hope, glimpses of her inner self that she had never meant to let anyone see. It was all pouring into the dreamlink now, thundering onto Dap like a waterfall: her anger toward her father for ruining her dreams—not by forbidding them, but by failing to care, failing to make her dreams his own—by destroying the honor of the name LeBrae through his greed and dishonesty in the spacing business. And there was anger not just toward her father, but toward her brother as well—for his unwillingness to stand, and to live. And anger toward herself—for not cutting them both loose and making her own way in the world—for being a failure, not just as a rigger, but as a person.
In the dizzying energy of the dreamlink, she could sense that the link between Dap and herself was straining, like a fabric being pulled, stretched, torn. What was she doing? The openness of mind and soul was the dreamlink's strength, and its danger. Leaking back to her through the link was Dap's surprise, and dismay, his astonishment that anyone could feel, or could release such staggering need.
Just fantasies, she lied to him, but the lie crumpled in an instant. I can't help it, I didn't want you to—and her coherent thoughts broke off as her embarrassment became a trembling glow, reddening the images of the link.
Jael, he whispered, I didn't expect—how could I know? How could you be keeping all of this inside?
And Dap's thoughts blurred into a hiss of static as he struggled to absorb what she'd shown him. For a few moments, no words came back to her through the dreamlink, no comprehensible thoughts. Dap seemed so appalled by her need. He seemed to want to pull away. She sensed his . . . what? Revulsion?
Jael, I knew it was hard for you, but . . . how can you . . . how could anyone . . . live with this? And his thoughts lost all clarity and spun away.
Dap! You promised me understanding! Wait—please don't—!
But it was too late; the bond was severed, torn by Dap's horror. What else could he possibly feel? Dap! But he was already doing what any sane person would do. Without a sound he closed himself off from the dreamlink. Without physically moving, he faded like a ghost from the glow that had become the world around Jael, the glow that was now only a suffocating shield around her, protecting only her own hurt and self-loathing. She sensed that Dap could no longer even look at her; she sensed him rising from his seat and turning away, leaving the room. And she cried mutely in pain.
She made herself her own last audience; she let her pain dance in the field like threads of fire, tightening around her like a noose, choking her. There was no one here to help her escape from her pain—there never had been, not in Dap, nor in her father before—they forgot their promises and closed the door on her, one just like the other. She wanted to kill someone, she wanted to kill them both, she would kill herself with this hatred if she didn't do something to—
—control it—
—bottle it—
—which she did, gathering it in from the burning glow of the dreamlink and wrapping it tightly around her finger and corking it back inside where it belonged. And then, when she knew she was safe and still sane, she rose and turned off the dreamlink augmentor. The glow died, leaving the room cold and silent and sterile. There was nothing here that could hurt her now.
Except what lived within her.
Unwilling to cry, unable to answer Dap's croaking harshness—"Wait, Jael! I'll take you home!"—from the hallway, she strode out of the room and out of the house and began the long trek on foot back to her room, through the gathering evening darkness.