Queen & Commander (Book One of the Hive Queen Saga)

Chapter Sixteen: Ceridwen Lives

A/N: The complete ebook of this story is on sale for 99cents (similar international pricing) from April 15 - May 15, 2014 at Amazon, B&N, Kobo, iBooks, and Smashwords.

The wail cut through Rhiannon’s self-pity like the spring on a mousetrap. It circled through her cabin, echoing off the steel-and-Kevlar and making itself known over and over again.

Galvanized by the realization of Danger!, she bounded to her ship-linked station. She’d hunt through the protocols to decipher the siren.

She didn’t need to. Large scarlet letters flashed on a white background OXYGEN LEVELS CRITICAL. PRESSURE WILL REACH FATAL LOWS IN 120s. 119s. 118s.

She felt body-heat behind her and moved to the side, letting Gavin take his turn at her station. In scant seconds, he found the leak location. Scant seconds that might differentiate life or death. Scant seconds that impressed her with his competence. Scant seconds that rolled away her anxiety over Llewellyn.

She needed to focus on this new problem.

Gavin in the lead, the foursome raced through the halls, trusting Gavin for directions. Trusting Gavin to know how to fix it. Trusting.

They skidded to a stop in a room bristling with polished, silvery tanks. Rhiannon had seen these before, but didn’t know how they worked.

Gavin dropped to his knees in front of a forty foot cylinder. He popped the floor panel beneath it, ripping out wires and cursing.

Rhiannon stood beside him, head throbbing with the run and the noise and—Manawyddan’s beard!—the hypoxia. All the headaches. All the shortness of breath. All the overheating. They weren’t from stress. They were signs of oxygen deprivation. How could I have missed that? Missed that for days.

Unsure how best to help, she took precious moments to observe her other two crew-companions. Gwyn backed off to just inside the door, staying out of the way. Victor hovered at Gavin’s shoulder. His hands fluttered towards the tank, then into his pockets. Only to come out and flutter again. He bit his already puffy and blue-tinged bottom lip and muttered something to himself. Whatever the muttering was, it didn’t distract Gavin.

It didn’t help him either.

A voice rang out, mixing with the wailing sirens. “What’s going on? Somebody! Somebody, please! Call up to the pilot house and tell me what’s happening?” The voice paused, as if waiting for an answer. She could hear gasping hyperventilation over the speakers. “Rhiannon? Alan? Are you there? Please? I’m sealed in... I need... Rhiannon?”

She hadn’t brought her pad with her when she’d followed Gavin. She couldn’t flash Luciano a short, reassuring message. And she didn’t have time for more than that. She needed to be here. Needed to help fix this. Needed to make space for Gavin to work. To breathe.

First, get Victor out of his way. Again she assumed the posture: straight lines and tightly leashed strength.

“You.” She pointed at Victor with her arm at a perfect ninety degree angle. The command in her voice startled him into obedience. “Read off the warnings.” She pointed to another screen that fluctuated with words and graphs. Maybe Gavin already knew everything the screen was saying, but maybe it’d help. Besides, it got Victor doing something positive.

Under her willpower and not his own, Victor moved to the screen. “Red line, main tank at fifteen percent.”

To Gwyn, she snapped, “Go change the lithium filters.” It couldn’t hurt to clean out the air filtration system. Whether or not the problem had anything to do with the carbon-monoxide scrubbers. And it’d give Gwyn something to do.

The remaining air rang with harsh panting over the speakers. “What’s going on? My hands look expanded and wrinkled. I’m turning into a puppet! Hello? Rhiannon? Rhiannon!”

Gavin looked like he needed another pair of non-puppet hands. He had one tool in his teeth and another behind his ear. She held her hand under his mouth until the pliers dropped into it. He grunted his thanks, then tried to explain. “The airflow regulator is wired backwards. Our oxygen’s going outside.”

She’d never studied this. All she knew was that air going outside meant bad things for the atmosphere-deprived humans inside. “Can you fix it?”

He held out a hand for the pliers she’d taken from his mouth. She slapped them into his palm. All-speed.

Gavin threw himself across the floor to the foot of another forty-foot tank, this one with a red tape ring around the bottom circumference. Someone had scratched Auxil. into the red. Still on the ground, Gavin punched the floor plating to open another panel.

Luciano was crying over the speakers now. “Ave Maria, piena di grazia, il Signore è con te. Tu sei benedetta fra le donne e benedetto è il frutto del tuo seno, Gesú.”

She couldn’t translate it exactly, but knew it was a plea to a power even higher than his Queen. When this was over, she’d find a way to raise him up. She wouldn’t fail her Hive. She’d directed Victor, had helped Gavin so far. She could rule them all. She could be the Queen and Commander they needed.

Silence. The sirens stopped their blaring, retreating to their homes.

A hiccup from over the speakers.

Gavin flopped onto his back, pushing the panel next to his head closed. Sweat darkened his white linen shirt. “Yes.” He smiled a smile of exhaustion and victory. “I can fix it. Shipwide oxygen concentration will increase by five percent increments until we reach thirty percent or so overall. It’ll help us acclimatize.” He looked at the tool in her hand, salvaged from his hair. She pushed the first panel closed as she’d seen him do the second. “Thank you.”

He meant it. She could tell. In this moment, everything said was the ultimate truth. Disaster averted. Truth revealed.

A disembodied voice, too loud now that it no longer had to compete with the wailing. “Can someone tell me what just happened, please?”

Rhiannon would do more than that. She was done with hiding and researching. It was time to be Queen, though she’d rely on Manawyddan’s cleverness to figure out how. It was time to lead her people into a better future.

She took Gavin’s pad from his relief-slack hands. Her first act: open a ship-wide call.

“Mandatory dinner tonight. I’ll explain everything then.”

She’d explain to Luciano what had transpired. She’d explain how the future was going to go. She’d explain that now she was ready to be their Queen and Commander.

Her second act: lie down beside Gavin, putting herself on his physical level like the management texts said would make her people more receptive.

“I’d like you to be ship’s Handsman,” she said. “I trust you to take care of all these physical things.”

She’d originally expected that post to be Alan’s, knowing that he not only studied physics but was also working on building a miniature Alcubierre tensor jet in his spare time. She was glad she’d held off on offering it until they’d been underway a while. After this performance, she knew Gavin deserved the responsibility and the trust. Where was Alan? He hadn’t shown up in days. She’d have to check on him if he skipped another dinner.

Gods. She hadn’t been showing up either. How could they count on her?

No wonder Gavin, Victor, and Gwyn wanted to take over.

Well, that was in the past. She’d be Queen and Commander now. If they gave her a chance.

Gavin tilted his head to rest on her shoulder, and she tried not to startle at the contact. The first friendly touch she’d felt since Gwyn had braided her hair.

His large, blue eyes looked up into her face. “I’d be honored,” he said.

She imagined she could hear the bond between them singing, like in the films. She had her chance. She’d do right by them. She’d be the best Queen a Hive could have.