Bastion Science Fiction Magazine - Issue 8, November 2014 by R. Leigh Hennig Michael Andre-Driussi Spencer Wightman CJ Menart Rob Steiner Alexander Jones Jedd Cole B. Brooks

Author:R. Leigh Hennig, Michael Andre-Driussi, Spencer Wightman, CJ Menart, Rob Steiner, Alexander Jones, Jedd Cole, B. Brooks [R. Leigh Hennig, Michael Andre-Driussi, Spencer Wightman, CJ Menart, Rob Steiner, Alexander Jones, Jedd Cole, B. Brooks]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bastion Publications
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

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After the street lamps went off in the oak grove and the Diana worshipers began their rituals, Kaeso located one of the many supply caches he kept hidden across Roma. This one was beneath a boulder covered by shrubs. He pulled out the metal box and handed Calvina several items: the gray uniform of a fishing guildsman, plastic chits amounting to two hundred sesterces, and a mesh Umbra hood.

Calvina stared at the hood curiously.

“I’ll need to cut your hair to make it fit,” Kaeso said.

She nodded distractedly.

“You’re name is now Vivia Laelius and you are a Remiges First Class on the tuna freighter Pisces.”

Calvina smiled sadly. “My father was a tuna fisherman in Ostia. I thought I would be too…until the Collegia took me.”

“Took you?” Kaeso said, looking for a knife in the cache box. “I thought Vestals wanted to be Vestals.”

“Not always. In my case the gods chose me by giving me the face of the ‘ideal’ Vestal. The Collegia found me when I was thirteen and took me to the Temple for training.”

Kaeso knew he was dangerously close to learning more about the mission object than he needed. Caring only distracted him from the important details. Like surviving.

He found the knife and looked up at her.

“I have to cut your hair now.”

Calvina let Kaeso slice her long braided hair until it was only an inch above her scalp. When he was done, she glanced at the pile of dark hair on the ground and then raised her chin. “I look like your sister now.”

Kaeso smiled before he could stop himself.

She rubbed her head. “I hear short is the Liberti style for women.”

He winced at a flash of memory. His Liberti wife, from a life before Umbra, had the same short hair as Calvina. Then he saw his wife’s ship explode, heard her screams on the comm. Gods, I can’t remember this, not on a mission. He ordered his implant to clamp down the memories like he always did when they came. The memories faded. His mind compartmentalized, enabling him to concentrate on the task before him and nothing else. His implant would give him new tasks when it was time for them.

The mission became his sole focus again. And he stopped caring about its object.

“It is. Put the hood on.”

Calvina slipped the hood over her head. While the hood was deactivated, she looked like someone wearing a translucent metallic sock. Kaeso focused his implant on the cover identity Galeo had given him. The hood flickered and then became the face of Vivia Laelius, an ethnically Zhonguo woman from Terra’s eastern Asia.

“Did you change me?” Calvina asked. “I can’t tell.”

Kaeso nodded, and then inspected the hood to ensure it completely covered her head and neck.

“Say something,” he said, checking whether her projected mouth synced with her voice.

“You are saving my life, sir, and I don’t even know your name.”

“Nor will you,” Kaeso said. The hood worked to his satisfaction. “Let’s go.”

Calvina followed without speaking. Kaeso was glad for her silence; he already knew too much about her.