Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Teleport active. Zen announced.

"About time!" Cally was out of her seat and heading to the corridor. Kerr looked across at Roj's frown.

"Oh dear," Vila said.

Kerr could see the image on his own screen now. A headshot of a young man with light brown curls. 'Del," it said under the picture. "Pilot". And the familiar pair of numbers, both counting up from zero in seconds. This Del was new, then, completely new.

His own numbers ticked away in the corner of his screen as usual. 1,824 hrs, 23 minutes, 12 seconds and 4,170 hrs, 54 minutes, 17 seconds. He automatically converted them- 76 days, ship time and just six more days to half a year, universal time.

"You don't think she's gone for good?" Roj said.

"It looks like it," Kerr said. They couldn't need two pilots and it was two days ship time since Jenna had failed to return from whatever they'd been doing on the planet they were currently orbiting.

This was going to hit Cally hard, he thought. Someone else ought to go down there, talk to this Del, proffer the small amount of explanation that they had available, reassure him as much as anyone on this ship could. Vila was their best people person after Cally but he wasn't physically robust and some of them, Kerr included, had been prone to violence at the start.

Roj had gone back to tussling whatever problem his screen had presented him with. He wasn't uncaring, Kerr thought, just a bit obsessive. He'd probably miss Jenna as much as the rest of them but for Roj the mission came first. Whatever it was. He needed to care about something and they hadn't been given many options.

Vila got slowly to his feet. Confrontation really wasn't his forte.

“Sit down. I'll go." That got Kerr a grateful look. He walked through the lit corridors, past the sealed doors that no longer bothered him.

Jenna was probably fine. They'd found a task for her other self on the planet below, that was all. The ship would visit this system again some day and she'd come out of the teleport as if nothing had happened, which of course would for her be precisely true. He couldn't quite bring himself to believe it, but it was possible, surely.

The teleport was still humming as he reached the closed silver doors. Cally turned to greet him, her face freezing as she read his own.

"It's not Jenna," he said bluntly. "It's someone new. Another pilot. You don't have to stay."

"Oh." Her voice was quiet.

Before he could suggest again that she leave the teleport went silent and the doors slid open.

"What the fuck?" The young man from the picture was staring round at the white walls.

"Your name is Del," Kerr said. It's what he had needed first.

"I know what my name is," Del snapped, stopped halfway out of the booth. "Hang on. No, I don't. Oh fuck! They've severed me, haven't they?"

"You know about severance?" Kerr was astonished. None of the rest of them had. "I suppose there's no point in asking how?"

Del shrugged.

"Background," Cally said. She was looking professional again. "As long as it's not linked to identity or specific memories we have access to all our background info."

This wasn't the conversation Kerr had expected. "What do you know about severance?" he asked Del.

"What I know will wait," Del said. "First, where am I and what am I doing here?"

That was fair enough. Kerr started back to the flight deck, gesturing to Del to walk with him.

"This is the Federation ship Liberator. She has a crew of 5, all severed. We're approaching six months of operation, universal time. We recently mislaid our pilot and it appears that you are her replacement."

Del kept up with his long stride easily. “So if we're all severed, what are our real selves up to?"

"We are just as real as they are," Cally was behind them, her voice sharp. "We call them outies. Outside the ship."

Kerr didn't like that term, but he supposed that 'real selves’ was worse. "Our ‘outies’ handle all off-ship matters. When we reach the destination we teleport out and the outies take over until our bodies are physically back on Liberator."

"It sounds like a clumsy way to run a ship.”

"Liberator's too much of a prize to trust to any one group. Severance is a neat solution. The outies can't get inside to hijack the ship and we can't take advantage of anything they are doing outside. If there were two crews we might conspire together, but you can't conspire with someone you can't ever talk to."

It had taken them a while to figure out this rationale from the limited info they got from Zen but Kerr had found it convincing.

"And you're OK with this?" Del demanded.

That was trickier. Kerr let Cally give her answer.

"We know nothing about the missions," she said. "But our outies do.They must think what they are doing is important enough to choose to be severed and to keep coming back here for."

"That's all you've got? Trust the people who put us here to have a good reason for it?"

"We don't all think that way," Kerr said. “Some of us are a great deal more cynical."

"And yet you're still here. Does this ship have shuttles?"

"No." Kerr was on more solid ground now with the predictable questions.

"Airlocks?"

"None."

"Cargo doors?"

"Not crew accessible. Cargo handling is automated from the bridge. There are internal hatches for our resupplies but they won't operate if anyone's close to them. The only way off the ship is the teleport."

“Six months on this ship and that's all you've got?"

"Five minutes of existence and you think you know better?" Kerr retorted.

"Kerr, be nice. He's bound to be disorientated. I think you're taking this very calmly, Del," Cally said.

"Am I? There's not much point in panicking. There's always a way out."

Kerr snorted. "Is that based on your knowledge of severance or just inane optimism?"

"Optimism, definitely. Better than being a sourpuss." He thumped a door as they passed. "What's in here?"

Kerr. supposed that he ought to be grateful for the lack of hysterics, not irritated. "All cargo's sealed. You can get a manifest from Zen- that's the ship computer."

Del looked back down the long corridor."How big is she?"

"Liberator? Just over three hundred metres."

"A freighter, then." Del sounded disappointed.

"Not exactly." He ushered Del into the flight deck. "That's Vila, Roj, this is Cally and I'm Kerr."

Del wasn't listening. He had swung behind the nearest console and now he looked up from it, around the room. "This isn't a Federation ship."

"Ha! I told you," Roj said to the others. "It just didn't feel right."

“Does it matter who built it?" Vila asked. "It's ours now."

Del shook his head. "I don't even know who might have had access to this technology. Fuck. I need my memories if I'm going to figure out anything."

"Get used to it," Cally said, not unkindly. "We are ignorant by design. Your outie chose this for you. You can't fight your own decisions."

"No?" Del was grinning, teeth white and perfect. "Watch me try."

No new instructions came down for several hours. They had time to show Del around the accessible parts of the ship and to settle him in an empty set of rooms. Without a pause for rest he was back on the flight deck. “How do I get the ship to respond to me?”

“Zen,”Roj said. “Acknowledge your new pilot.”

“Full crew authorisation needed for new voice print record.”

Kerr looked round at the others. “If we want to get anywhere we'd better do this.” The alternative was circling around this planet indefinitely.

There were nods of agreement, reluctantly in Cally’s case. But they had no way to get Jenna back. One by one they confirmed Del’s status.

Voice print recorded, Zen said. Pilot status confirmed. Full access provided.”

“Great.” Del started experimenting with the controls.

After a few minutes he looked up. "Why don't you just fly the ship away?"

"We tried that," Roj said

"And what happened?"

It was Vila who replied in an unusually hard voice. "We blinked and found that three days had passed and one of us was gone. We never saw him again."

“Did the ship change course in your absence?"

"That's not the point," he said. "Gan was gone."

"That is the point. Did she?"

"No," Kerr said, since Vila didn't answer. “She was still on the course that Jenna had programmed. We had to turn her around and obediently slink back to the scene of our pointless little rebellion." It had been the lowest point of his existence so far.

He sighed at Del's expression. "You're going to spend the next few days or weeks, or months if you're particularly stubborn, trying to find a way to get out of here. Most of the time we won't stop you, even though we know it's going to be fruitless. We don't expect you to take our word for that."

He looked around, garnering unspoken support from his crew mates. Jenna should be here, not this callow boy. "But if your actions put the rest of us at risk we won't hesitate to take you down."

"Kerr, wasn't it?" Del wasn't smiling now. "Well, Kerr, if you want to live in a cage like this, that's your business. But I don't. I'm getting out and I strongly suggest that you don't get in my way."

Kerr would never forget his first few hours on Liberator. He was prepared to cut the new boy a certain amount of slack, given the nightmare that he had just woken up to, and he said as much. "But you don't know anything about this place. You'll be wise to watch and learn from us before you act."

Del ran a hand over the pilot controls. "You asked me what I know about severance. I'll tell you.

"I know that you're ephemeral. You don't even have to fail them, just lose your utility. They'll turn you off and your replacement on with as little consideration as you'd swap out a laser tool for one with a different power setting.”

“I'm sure that's not true,” Roj protested. “They must know we're people - hell, they know that we're them.”

"You're telling us nothing we haven't worked out for ourselves." Kerr was running out of patience with his new crewmate. "But you're missing the most obvious conclusion, which is that if we make ourselves useless to them they switch us off now, not some time in the future. If you don't pilot this ship to where you're told to go, your outie will never set foot in this ship again. And if that's what you want, fine, but you can do it in a way that doesn't kill us too."

"You're slaves," Del was clearly disgusted.

"Well spotted, that. So?”

New instructions

Kerr saw Del twitch at the noise. Not all that nerveless then.

Operation commences in 13 minutes. All crew required.

"Zen, where's Jenna?" Cally addressed the flashing screen.

No information. It was Zen's most common response.

"I'll get the stuff from the galley." Vila said.

"I'll come with you," Roj got up. Cally was already heading towards the crew quarters, leaving Kerr and Del alone.

"Here is your first opportunity to make a stand," Kerr said. "If you don't take it there will be plenty more. If you do, I imagine this is goodbye."

"You advocate for them well," Del snarled.

"I advocate for us. We've decided that we want to carry on existing for now, even as slaves.”

“I get the impression that some of you have bought into this rather more enthusiastically than that.”

Kerr sighed. “Roj wants to trust the system. Cally trusts her outie. I don't think Vila trusts anyone. Maybe us, a little.”

“And you?”

“I do what I have to in order to survive.”

"I see. Well,” Del said. “I'll admit that I'm curious to know how this ship handles. Taking a stand can wait.”

Kerr felt a stir of relief. He didn't much care whether the brand new innie continued to exist or not but anything that went against their instructions made him nervous.

Chapter Text

Cally looked at her pale reflection. She knew that wasn't her outie looking back at her, but sometimes she needed to pretend.

“Give her back,” she said aloud. “Please.”

Manoeuvres commence in four minutes.

“Let's not go.” She was talking to no-one now, or perhaps to the absent crew. “Let's find her instead.”

Said aloud it was nonsense. Even if Jenna’s body was still down on the industrial planet below, Jenna herself was locked away in her outie's mind. She could only exist on Liberator and she wasn't here.

In three minutes they were leaving, and Jenna would be physically separated from her ship. There was a huge galaxy out there - how could they find each other again when the version of Jenna out there might not even know who either of them were?

Cally placed a hand against the smooth glass. “We've done everything you wanted of us. Give us this one thing. Or at least let us know if she's dead.”

Nothing, of course. As far as Cally knew she was the only one who talked to her outie, if you could call it talking when there was never a response. The existence of another her had always felt real, at times almost natural, but she ached at the impossibility of ever meeting them. These one-sided conversations were all she had.

“Do what you can, then” she said to her image. “I know you’ll try.”

She was the last to the flight deck.

The new pilot, Del, was studying something on the pilot console. Cally couldn’t read his expression but at least he was there. Kerr had the post next to Zen’s screen, ready to wrestle what information they might need out of the close-lipped computer. Vila lounged casually against the weapons console, already eating something from the box of refreshments they’d brought up from the galley, Roj was monitoring multiple screens as everyone’s back-up and the communications were waiting for her.

She took her place. “Instructions yet?” she asked the room.

“We’ve got a destination,” Kerr said. “On screen. Two days away at standard by eight.”

“Can someone give me a conversion to normal units?” Del sounded exasperated.

“It’s not that simple,” Kerr said. “When you’ve flown her a few times you’ll get a feel for it, or so Jenna used to say. Standard by eight is our ‘get there fast but without getting in trouble’ speed.”

“Zen, are we talking to traffic control?” Cally asked. Airspace was busy in this system but sometimes they just left orbit without using comms at all. All communication frequencies came via Zen, and most of the time Cally suspected the computer blocked them; certainly there was always much less comms traffic coming to her console than she imagined could be normal and some of it got cut off without warning. Nobody wanted them chatting to the outside world and she’d learned not to try.

Prior clearances obtained. An approved route away from the system flashed on her screen and she put it on main.

“Cleared to go,” she told the others.

“Here goes nothing.” Del slid the controls forward and the star field on the main screen rotated dizzyingly as Liberator turned and accelerated away.

The sky was the usual mass of white streaks. They’d been travelling at standard by eight for hours with little active navigation required, and Del and Vila were sleeping in the ready room next to the flight deck, mere seconds away from their posts.

“You persuaded him,” Roj said to Kerr. “Well done.”

Kerr shrugged. “Few of us are courageous or idiotic enough to fight a battle we can’t win.”

“Well, you know what I think about that. We’re here for a reason, Kerr. They aren’t treating us badly. If Del can come to terms with what he is, that’s all for the good.”

They were old arguments and Kerr seemed uninterested in taking them up again. “Doing what he's told might keep him alive a bit longer, anyway. I wonder how long they've been planning to replace Jenna.”

“You're assuming it wasn't an accident,” Cally said.

“Two days to find a suitable pilot, get him severed and onto Liberator? We weren't anywhere near the Solar System- it would likely take several days just to catch up with us.”

Kerr had a point, but Cally couldn't imagine why they’d deliberately get rid of Jenna. “Maybe they keep severed backups for us.”

“Now that's an unpleasant notion,” Kerr said.

She hadn't intended it that way. Volunteers on standby, she'd thought, getting on with their ordinary lives until the call up came. Maybe it paid well. She wasn't sure that she wanted to know what Kerr was imagining.

“Del seems to be coping all right so far,” she offered.

“Let's see what happens at our destination,” Kerr took one of the coffees.

Perhaps it would just be a cargo run. Cally didn't say that aloud; she didn't want to jinx it.

“This is ridiculous. Where exactly are we?” Del demanded.

Roj put the local star map onscreen. “That's our current galactic coordinates, exactly as per our instructions, and there are the stats for nearby systems - star mass, radius, luminosity, velocity, spectrum, number, size and orbits of planetary bodies. Everything you need to navigate this region.”

Del glared at the nearest blue-white star. “But what's its name? Is it inhabited? Population? Cultural origin? Political affiliations? Production and trade? Would it hurt to let us know the basic info about the people we might encounter?”

“We don't need to know,” Roj said patiently. “We don't do any of the diplomacy or trade.”

“Just the transport.” Del said flatly.

“Not just the transport.” Vila had been remarkably quiet since Del arrived, but now his voice was loud. “What do you think this console is for?”

“Weapons, obviously,” Del said. “Self defense, I suppose. We carry a lot of cargo and the ship itself must be hugely valuable.”

“Vila,” Cally said. “Do we have to do this now?”

“We might as well,” Vila said. “Then we won’t have to deal with his shocked protests in the middle of an operation.”

“I’m going to be shocked, am I?” Del walked down to the weapons console, fingered the buttons. “Don't tell me. You’re pirates?”

“We’re not that honest,” Vila said. “We follow orders.”

Del stepped back from the weapon controls. “Without even knowing who you’re attacking?”

“That’s right.” Vila’s voice was shaking slightly. They never talked about this, but Cally supposed he was right- Del had to know.

“Fuck,” Del said. “That puts a different complexion on things.”

“It doesn’t make any difference, “ Kerr said. “We obey or we are erased. We can’t pick and choose from our instructions.”

“It's not as bad as it sounds,” Roj said. “It's not as if we're carpet bombing civilian populations. We're talking about legitimate military targets.”

“So who is the Federation’s enemy?” Del asked.

“Terrorists, we think,” Kerr said. “ That fits the sort of operations we’ve been carrying out. And a few border disputes.”

“We don't know they are terrorists,” Vila said

“Why else would the Federation go after them?” Roj demanded. He turned back to Del. “Look, none of us like the military operations but it's part of what we are here for. At least we're not like most soldiers; we don't exceed our orders.”

“So,” Del said. “Vila thinks it's wrong, Roj thinks it's right, Kerr thinks it's the only way to stay alive. What about you, Cally?”

She sighed. “I wouldn't ever sanction killing innocents, and I don't believe my outie would either. I know none of you feel the same about your outies, but every time I step out of the teleport I know she's decided that what we're doing here is still worth it, so I have to believe that too.”

Del raised his eyebrows. “You have a rather good opinion of yourself. Yourselves. I don't know what reason my outie had for dumping me in here but if I ever get to meet him I'll punch myself hard in the nose and be damned to the consequences.”

Cally managed a smile at that. “I don't think it works that way.”

Whatever conclusion Del might reach about their more violent missions didn't turn out to be pertinent for the moment. They were directed into orbit around the fourth planet of the blue-white star and spent the next day and a half organising the loading of tanks of the green algae which was apparently its major crop. The locals were civil, at least to start with, and their freighters unloaded directly into Liberator's cargo bays once Kerr had made some hands-off adjustments to the robotic controls.

Even on minimal comms chatter Cally couldn't help but find out that the Federation planet was called Portwen and they weren't at all happy about the price they were getting for the algae. She knew better than to comment, but she wasn't surprised when the cargo loading ceased prematurely, nor when Zen instructed the crew to lock the ship down and teleport down to the co-ordinates provided.

Del looked apprehensive for the first time as he faced the teleporter. “This is where I could just disappear for good.”

“Yes,” Kerr said, not very helpfully. “But if that happens you won't know about it so it's hardly worth fretting about.”

“Why can't I just stay on the ship? A bit of bargaining can't need all our outies there and someone should mind Liberator.”

“Not how it works,” Roj said. “We're always either all here or all there.”

“They don't trust us not to talk to each other,” Kerr said, his voice dry.

“Or possibly not to blow the hell out of each other,” Vila said cheerfully. “Sorry, you've got to come with us. If it's any help it will be over in a second.”

They all took their separated places on the teleporter and Cally felt the usual prickle of nerves. She was here and then she was… here, standing not quite where she had been and the teleporter hum cut out as the doors opened onto the space they'd just left.

“Was that it?” Del demanded.

“Zen, elapsed universal time since we left?” Kerr commanded.

Three hours, seven minutes.

“I think they had dinner,” Vila said. ”Probably too much of it. All I want to do is sleep.”

“Apart from Vila’s unprecedented somnolence, is everyone OK?” Roj asked.

Everyone was.

“Congratulations,” Kerr said to Del. “You did well enough for them to want you back here, this time.”

Del was looking shaken. “How do you live like this?”

“That bit’s simple,” Vila said. “Nobody gives us a choice.”

Chapter Text

Vila lay curled up on his bed, waiting for the meds to kick in and the familiar pain in his gut to subside.

Food intolerance, Zen had told him when he'd first crawled over to a terminal to beg for help, convinced he'd been poisoned . It happened more frequently now, always after he'd been off the ship. He pictured a man wearing his own face, gleefully stuffing his mouth with forbidden fruits, knowing he wouldn't be around for the consequences.

Cally believed her outie was a good person, but Cally's outie didn't torture her for fun. It wasn't fair. Nothing about this whole life was fair. Kerr had that right, at least, though Kerr still thought they could play the system to make their lives a little more tolerable. Kerr didn't have gut-ache.

There was a med unit, but it wasn’t technology Vila recognised and he refused to go near it. He didn't entirely trust the tablets either but he could at least hope that swallowing two small white pills when his guts hurt wouldn't result in another hole drilled in the back of his skull and a sentence of hell without parole.

The knot in his stomach slowly eased. He had stretched out on the mattress and was mostly asleep when the door slid open.

“Vila? Are you all right?”

That was Roj’s special kind voice. Vila sighed. “Why?”

“We need you back on the flight deck.”

Vila sat up. “I thought this was a friendly Federation planet. Surely you don’t need me to kill anyone today?”

Roj stepped into the room, frowning. “You don’t… We all take joint responsibility. You know that.”

“You don’t all press the actual buttons though, do you?”

“Look.” Roj sat down on the bed next to him. Vila shifted a little further away. “Do we need to talk about changing round posts? Would that help?”

“No,” Vila said. “There’s too much blood on my hands already. There’s no point in soaking someone else in it at this point. I should have said no the first time. After once it makes no difference.”

Roj sighed. “We all wish there was something we could do to help you.”

“No need. Pretty boy pilot is right - this will be over for all of us soon enough.”

“If this is about Jenna, we still don't know what happened to her.”

“Nothing ‘happened’ to Jenna. They don't have to *do* anything to kill us, just don't turn up to work one day and pouff, we're dead. No bodies, no mess, no-one cares.”

Roj was shaking his head. “We're all decent people and that’s hardwired, I'm sure. They won’t think we're disposable.”

“Now you're sounding like Cally. If I was out there I wouldn't care how miserable my innie was. I'd be too busy counting the money they paid me to be severed.”

“They can't be doing this for money.”

Vila could think of no other reason. He rolled off the bed and picked up his jacket. He'd been sleeping in his day clothes. “We’d better get to the flight deck before they dock our wages. Don’t want to upset the employers.”

Roj trailed after him, with apparently nothing else to say.

There was silence on the flight deck. The main screen showed a set of co-ordinates, presumably on the planet below. Vila felt a little sick, but that was probably the food intolerance.

Launch one plasma bolt at the co-ordinates supplied, Zen instructed.

“Right,” Vila went to the weapons console and started to power up.

“Aren't we going to check what the target is first?” Del said.

“What's the point?” Kerr was watching Vila work. “We have our orders.”

“Targeters make mistakes sometimes. It's always the operator's responsibility to check.”

“Fine.” Kerr stalked over to his console and typed something. An image appeared on the screen, a huge lake held back by a concrete edifice, a grey river snaking out from the other side.

“It's a dam. Now what do you want to do, Del?”

“Zen. Why is this dam to be destroyed?” Del asked

No information.

“There you go.” Kerr was smiling, without much humour. “Maybe we're helping out the Iocals with a demolition project. Maybe we're not. They never tell us, and after a while we got tired of debating whether we were the good guys or the bad guys each time.”

Del turned on Roj. “So when you said they were all military targets, you were talking out of your arse.”

“I believe they are.” Roj said. “We've never been asked to fire aggressively on a population centre.”

“We've never been asked to fire on anything,” Kerr said. “We’ve been told. There's no point pretending that we have a choice,”

Launch plasma bolt, Zen repeated.

There would be consequences if they were slow to obey, but Roj had said they had joint responsibility, so let them decide, not him. “How about a vote?” Vila suggested.

“That’s a really stupid idea,” Kerr said sharply.

“Is it?” Cally had been quiet so far in the corner. “How else do we decide if there’s no consensus? Leave it to Vila? That’s not fair on him.”

No, it wasn’t. Vila did like Cally best.

“Or we could just choose not to attack a planet without reason,” Del said. “A vote won’t make it any better as far as I’m concerned.”

“Nor for me. I'm not going to risk my life on a bleeding hearts vote from you lot.” Kerr said.

“Then you launch the bloody thing,” Vila snapped at him. “I'll do it if we vote to do it but you're not in charge of me or anyone else here.”

“No I'm not.” Kerr jerked his head at Zen’s flashing lights. “They are.”

He walked over to Vila’s console and slammed his hand down on the fire control. There was silence for seconds, then the image of the dam broke up in white flame.

“Zen, any further orders?”

Stand by to resume cargo loading.

“Confirmed. That only takes two of us, if there's anyone else on this ship willing to actually do their sodding job.”

“I'll stay on shift,” Roj said.”I think you and I need to talk.”

“I’ve decided that I don’t think much of your outie,” Vila said to Cally.

They were sitting in the galley with a stiff-jawed and silent Del, eating the latest unpleasantly bland product of the food dispenser. Zen or its masters often tweaked the fare available depending on the performance of the crew and this tastelessness was no doubt a consequence of Vila’s disobedience. It could have been worse, and doubtless would have been if Kerr hadn't acted in his stead.

“Why my outie and not yours?”

“I know mine doesn't have any principles, but yours is supposed to be your guardian angel, isn't she?”

.“I'm not sure that's fair!” she protested. “I'm sure she does her best.”

“It is fair.” Del said. “We blew up that dam to intimidate the natives into trading on our masters’ terms. Either our other selves don't know what sort of piracy we're roped into or they don't care. Either way they aren't useful moral compasses.”

“I don’t understand.” Cally had gone from defensive to despairing. “I just can’t believe she’d sanction this.”

Vila’s temper was subsiding in the face of her obvious misery. “She knows things we don’t.”

“You can justify anything that way.” Del pushed the mush away and stood up. “Kerr’s a psychopath and you lot enable him. I think you should all rethink your life choices. It’s not like you’ve got a lot of them to think about.”

“What about your life choices?” Vila challenged him. “Are you going to die rather than obey orders?”

“I haven’t decided yet. Unlike you lot I haven’t surrendered all hope- I think there’s probably an alternative to both.”

They watched him go.

“I miss Jenna,” Cally said finally. “Maybe they wanted that dam destroyed. Maybe it was part of the bargain our outies made with them and that's why loading is restarting.”

“Probably,” Vila said. They were good at justifications. Del certainly thought so. But what did he know? He'd only existed for a few hours. He'd seen one mission, and thought that was enough to condemn them all. Kerr wasn't a psychopath. He just wanted to live.

“You never know. Maybe Del’s right and there is a way out.” Cally picked up the empty bowls and slid them into the disposal. “Wouldn't that be wonderful?”

Vila thought of all the things they'd done because there had been no alternative. “Great,” he said agreeably. “I think I need to finish my nap. See you later, Cally.”

He sunk his hands deep into his jacket pockets as he walked back to his rooms. By the time he got back he had pushed the dam incident out of his thoughts. He just wanted to sleep for a bit, to dream of faces he didn't recognise and places he'd never been. It was Vila’s favourite part of the day. Even the nightmares were better than life on board ship; at least their random illogicalities were natural. He flung himself on the bed, closed his eyes and quickly drifted off to sleep.

Chapter Text

“Terrorists are getting ambitious these days,” Kerr said. “Who would have thought they would weaponise an entire dam?”

Roj couldn't look away from the smoke filled image. “That's not funny.”

“No? Has our new arrival managed to shake your convictions at last?”

“I don't understand you,” Roj said bitterly. “You’d rather believe that what we're doing is wrong and that all this is pointless.”

“I’d rather not live with delusions. The kind of people who could make us exist like this are not going to be the good guys.”

“We don't know how desperate things are out there for the Federation. Maybe this was their best choice.”

"They enslaved us. I don't care how desperate they might have been,” Kerr said.

There was no point in arguing. It wasn't about facts. Kerr could live without a purpose and he couldn't.

The smoke was clearing. Water flooded over the remains of the dam. Roj wondered if there were people living downstream and whether any warning had been given.

He felt queasy. His gut said that Vila had been right to hesitate and Kerr had been wrong to act. But how could that be reconciled with his belief that obeying the orders they received was the right thing to do?

“I need to find out the truth,” he said, rather fast so that he didn't have time to change his mind.

“Good luck with that. Where are you going to start?”

“I don’t know yet. Will you help?”

Kerr frowned at him. “I'll say to you what I said to our enthusiastic new crewmate. I'm not going to do anything, or let you do anything, that will get me erased.”

“That's not an outright no.”

“I suggest you tread very carefully indeed.”.

Message incoming.

“Put it on video, Zen.” Roj said. Cally routinely insisted on audio only but he needed data.

A light skinned elderly woman looked at him, tired and unhappy. “We're ready to start shuttle loading again.”

“Good.” He stared back at her. Very careful. “Thank you for your hospitality earlier.” Vila had said they'd eaten and food and drink was basically his specialist subject.

She looked baffled, then frightened. “We’re sorry - we didn't know your colleagues wanted anything to eat. We’d have been happy to provide them with refreshments, of course.” She looked past him to Kerr. “You will tell them that, please, and give them our apologies.”

He hasn't intended to distress her further. “Please don't worry about it. It's fine. We’ll be ready for the shuttles to dock.”

The feed went black. Roj turned to Kerr. “Fuck.”

“Quite,” Kerr said. He looked almost as shaken as Roj felt.

“We shouldn't jump to conclusions,” Roj was trying to be the logical person that right now he didn't feel.

“No. But we should probably reconsider some of our assumptions.”

Roj didn't want to do that. It frightened him. But he'd wanted to investigate and this was where it was taking him. “We should talk to the others.”

“Yes,” Kerr said, and that flat assent scared him as much as anything else had that day.

“Are they monitoring this?” Del asked

“We don't think so,” Kerr said. “ As far as I can tell, all surveillance is based on Zen's reports and it doesn't listen to any speech but simple commands. They've never reacted to anything we've said, just to actions. It's a risk but a necessary one.”

“You’re taking a necessary risk? Things must be dire. What's the news?”

Roj related the conversation that he'd had with the woman. From Cally and Vila’s reactions they had grasped the implications immediately. It wasn’t surprising; they’d all spent a lot of time contemplating the bizarre mysteries of their existence. Del just looked puzzled.

“What’s so special about that?”

“She didn’t recognise us, “ Roj said patiently. “That means our outies weren’t among the delegates to the planet. And whatever Vila ate while we were away, it wasn’t provided by them.”

“Still not seeing the problem here,” Del said. “So your outies went somewhere else while ours went down to negotiate?”

“There is nowhere else,” Kerr’s voice was sharp. “The teleport had a single setting, down to the central hall where the delegates had been invited. We all teleported down there together. The teleporter was still set to the same co-ordinates when we all teleported back together. If our outies had split up on arrival down there that woman would have known about it, but she was certain that Roj and I hadn’t been delegates and that no-one had been offered refreshments. So where the fuck were we?”

“There must be dozens of possible explanations,” Del insisted.

“Then think of one,” Kerr challenged.

“Give me a chance to think about it for a bit and I will. Anyway, what do you intend to do about this supposedly impossible situation?”

“I’m not sure,” Roj admitted. “I think all we can do right now is take any opportunity to find out more. More than ever we need to know what’s going on in our absence.”

“Carefully,” Kerr added. “We’re potentially even more at risk of termination if they think we’re on the brink of finding out that something’s going on.”

The loading was completed and instructions came from Zen for the next destination. This time Del was provided with a system name and location, further out towards the galactic rim, while proper maps appeared on his console.

“Why the difference, do you think?” Roj asked. They were alone on the flight deck.

“There’s a lot of stuff on the way, not things you’d want to blunder into without warning. So needs must, I’d guess.”

“Is it still in Federation territory?”

“Right on the border. It should only be a day and a half travel but we’ll need to put off starting till tomorrow and then find somewhere for a local stop on the way while I get some sleep. It’s too dangerous for me to be away from the helm for this one,” Del said.

“It's fortunate that you remember this much navigation data.”

“It's disconcerting. I know what's in this part of space but I have no idea whether I've ever been in this area, or even what sort of ship I used to fly or for whom. This is no life, Roj. I want my memories back.”

“I wish that was even possible, but nothing we've found out about severance suggests it is. It's this or nothing.”

“I’m not going to accept that,” Del said. “Anyway, I’ve yet to see what ‘this’ consists of, other than work.”

“There isn’t much other than work.” Roj said.

“Come on. You’ve got plenty of free time while we travel. Food, drink, entertainment, sex- there must be something?”

“Ah,’ Roj said. “Well, we are sometimes provided with rewards when missions go particularly well. Better food, alcohol, movies, sim games, that sort of thing. Not, I’m pleased to say, any ship-generated opportunities for sex.”

“What about non ship-generated opportunities?” Del was smiling at Roj’s expression. “Come on, it’s a reasonable question. It’s not like I can go looking anywhere else.”

Roj sighed. “We don’t. No particular reason I suppose; it’s not something we’ve discussed, but it doesn’t happen. Or it hasn’t happened, as far as I know, at least not to me. I think I’d notice if there was anything going on with the others.”

“OK,” Del said. “Interesting. Thanks.”

Roj wondered whether Del had anyone in mind. Cally, presumably. None of the men struck him as particularly enticing. He wondered whether to warn Del that Cally was unlikely to be swept off her feet by a curly- haired charmer, but on second thoughts he decided he’d stay out of the matter.

Zen apparently approved of the way the loading had been concluded. There was fresh fruit in the evening’s supplies and a couple of bottles of wine. Not enough for the five of them to get more than slightly tipsy, but it was pleasant nonetheless. There were some awkward silences but somehow they mostly found enough things to talk about apart from the day’s troubling revelations. Not memories, obviously. Not plans for the future. Not Jenna’s absence. Not politics or beliefs, since they had been left with neither. Abstract ideas and imagination, Roj thought, were all that had been left to them.

It had been a while since he'd contemplated any aspects of his own existence. He had settled some time ago to the comforting conviction that there had to be a point to it all, that at least someone was seeing to their welfare even in this limited and frustrating way and that evidence of such consideration along with the obvious and regular co-operation of their other selves pointed to an essentially benign regime that he could and should be prepared to work for.

It was a shame that no one else agreed with this analysis but he hadn't been surprised. None of them except possibly Cally really had the temperament to put up with privations for the public good. He’d thought (and kept the thought to himself) that their outies must be significantly more public spirited than their severed selves.

Now he'd rashly undertaken to find out the truth and he already regretted it.

“I’m going to call it a night.” He pushed the remains of the pineapple away and stood up. Nobody came with him as he headed towards the private quarters.

That night Roj dreamed of Liberator, hanging silver against a dense backdrop of stars and galaxies. He’d seen schematics, of course, but he’d never seen the ship from outside. She was beautiful.

He woke with an ache of loss so acute that there were tears in his eyes. It made no sense, but then dreams didn’t. When he finally fell asleep again he experienced nothing.

Chapter Text

Thousands of newborn stars shone red amongst the coloured swirls of dust. The nebula was too large to go round and too diffuse to be outright impassable so Del was steering Liberator through with care.

It took concentration but not so much that he couldn’t keep his thoughts on Kerr’s challenge. There had to be an explanation for the missing outies.

“This dust is a bit thicker here. Vila, can you pull up a schematic of the current shielding?”

“Zen would say if there was a problem,” Vila pointed out.

“I’m sure it would but I’m a visual sort of person. Schematic?”

The ship’s detailed outline in a green haze appeared on the main screen. Del covertly pressed a key to save it to his console. “Thanks, Vila. That all looks fine. We can try going a little faster.”

A couple of hours later he looked up again from his screens. “We might be a bit off true. Did those tanks get loaded evenly?”

“Yes,” Roj said, sounding slightly put out. “I always make sure of that.”

“That’s odd. It feels like something’s a little unbalanced. Can you show me which storage holds are full and which empty?”

Roj protested a little more but eventually the main screen showed the outlines of the ship’s holds, red for full and blue empty. Del made a point of studying them.

“You’re right. That distribution shouldn’t be a problem. Oh well, maybe she always handles this way.”

The image of the holds were added to his console. When he next had a few free minutes he superimposed it on the ship outline. He could see the gap which was the space where they lived and worked, the outlines of the engines and the weapons.

And then there was the space that ran straight up the middle of the main ship, from the edge of the human area all the way to one of the nearer cargo doors, about three times the size of their living space.

He wasn’t exactly surprised. He wouldn’t have looked if he didn’t think it had been a possibility. Resisting the temptation to show the others straight away - he was not at all convinced that they weren't being monitored - he hid the images in a pile of star data and waited.

They were no more than a couple of hours away from their destination when Roj spoke up.

“Ship on long range scan. It’s going to go past at long distance, no action required.”

Ten minutes later Zen spoke.

New course required to intercept unknown ship on scan. Pass and full scan at 60,000 spacials.

“Do that, Del. “ Roj instructed.

“In a minute,” Del said. “I’ve got a couple of questions first.”

“Hurry up then.”

“All right. Question one. Why would Zen want to scan this ship?.”

“That’s one for you, Kerr,” Roj said.

Kerr sighed. “Zen doesn’t want anything. It’s a computer. It follows orders.”

“Well, we didn't order the course change. Our outies don’t exist right now. So who did?”

“Zen must operate on standing orders,” Kerr looked less than convinced by his own explanation. “Admittedly they would have to be quite precise to cover all situations. The alternative is that someone outside the ship is giving instructions, but the speeds we go at make that a logistical nightmare.”

“Ok then. What about the last stop?” Del demanded. “How did Zen know to send us down to the planet? Our outies didn’t know the deal was in jeopardy. They didn’t know anything since before we left the last place. That doesn’t make sense.”

“Perhaps whenever things stop going to plan Zen revives them to make more decisions?” Roj suggested.

“But that means it was Zen who decided on the delegation?” Del was frowning. “I mean, it’s a smart computer, clearly, but if it can operate independently like that why does it need us at all, let alone severed? Why can’t it make this course change itself? A ship this sophisticated must have automatics?”

Vila spoke for the first time. “We’re pretty sure that it can’t use weapons and it can’t go where it likes. Someone doesn’t want Zen taking off with their ship any more than they want us to steal her.”

“Someone,” Del said. “It all seems to come back to someone, someone other than us or our outies. Are you absolutely sure there’s only five of us on Liberator?”

“Of course there are only five of us,” Cally said. “We’ve been on the ship for six months. We’d know if there was a stowaway. The only way off and on the ship is the teleporter, and we know when that’s used, and the communications all come via the flight deck, and we monitor the manifests and the use of the supplies… it’s just not possible.”

“I’ve seen enough of the ship to know that every single one of those processes is monitored via Zen,” Del said. “What if it’s been ordered to lie to us about everything?”

Roj was staring at him. “Someone else on the ship. That's the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard. Can someone preserve my sanity by explaining to Del why it's impossible.”

There was silence. “I was afraid of that,” Roj said. “So. It's a working hypothesis. How does this fit with our missing outies?”

“If the teleport coordinates are lies, they could have gone anywhere.” Kerr was looking like thunder. “I owe you an apology, Del. Clearly I wasn't nearly cynical enough.”

“Fresh pair of eyes.” Del shrugged but he felt rather pleased. He made the required course change, then turned back to the others. “Take a look at this.”

“That’s the teleport room.“ Kerr pointed to the one place where their area backed up against the empty ones.

“That can’t be coincidence, “ Roj said. “Maybe we should take a closer look.”

“Not right now, “ Kerr warned. “Zen will react if we don’t carry out this scan. We don’t want to trigger anything until we get a chance to find out more.”

The flight deck was quiet as the ship approached the stranger. Kerr was running the scans. “It’s a small freighter, ID Theresis. No obvious Federation registration.”

He frowned. “Hang on. There are radio emissions. She’s trying to talk to us.”

“Zen, open communications with the freighter,” Cally said.

No communications available.

“No surprise there,“ Kerr said. “Try this one. Zen, transfer a record of the radio emissions detected on scan onto my console.”

Confirmed

“Convert the pattern shown on my console into audio frequencies and play.”

Confirmed

“Theresis to Liberator.” came over the speakers. “Good to see you again. We heard you were lost. Is Blake with you?”

“Who the hell is Blake?” Roj asked. “Can we reply, Kerr?”

“Not that way. I’m working on it.”

There was a long silence then Theresis spoke again.

“That’s good news. We’ll be pleased to have you on board. Dropping our shields for your teleport. Theresis out.”

All crew to the teleport immediately.

“They don’t know we overheard,” Vila said. “What do we do now?”

“You heard the other ship,” Cally said. “She’s Liberator’s ally. There’s no reason not to let our outies go over there, is there?”

“They kept us out of the loop,” Del said.

“That’s the way it’s always worked,” Roj pointed out. “We do the ship stuff, they do the outside stuff. It’s the whole point of the severance, to maintain security. I think we should carry on as normal for now and investigate this space when we get back.”

“I have to agree this time,” Kerr said. “We can’t afford to run after every hare and we mustn’t tip them off until we’re ready to act. I can’t see any harm in letting them visit their allies. It’s not as if they are likely to get us killed out there on a friendly ship.”

Vila shrugged. “What’s one more absence? It will be over in a few seconds anyway.”

So everyone else was agreed. Del sighed. He didn’t want to disappear again, even for a few seconds, but if that was the way it worked he’d have to go along with it. He was going to absolutely insist that they investigate the teleport room properly when they got back again, with no further delays.

They stood on their appointed circles on the teleport. The co-ordinates set were those of the other ship. Del’s heart was pounding.

Activate.

The doors closed and they were in darkness. As the hum started Del felt dizzy and then nothing.

Chapter Text

“Uh oh. Here comes trouble.” Vila put the plate of beans down.

Trouble stormed down the white corridor, past the two guards on their feet saluting. He slapped his hand on the sensor and the door to Avon's cell slid open. Behind the glass the others were crowding round to watch.

It was the Fed officer, the new one who had joined them on the pads in Jenna’s place the last two times. He shoved Avon up against the transparent wall. “Why didn't it work?”

The guards had their stun guns out. Not an opportunity to escape. Avon pushed back just enough to get clear.

“Tarrant, isn't it?”

“Lieutenant Colonel Tarrant to you.”

“I'm not in your tinpot army. What didn't work?”

Tarrant was clearly tempted to hit him again. Instead he stood back a little. “Zen has accepted my severed persona as crew. He's been piloting the ship.”

That was seriously bad news. Avon stayed expressionless. “So?”

“So on this side Zen won't accept my voiceprint. But it's the same bloody voice, it hasn't changed!”

So that's what they'd been up to. Avon had no idea why their trick hadn't worked and said so. “My best guess would be that Zen just doesn't like you.”

Tarrant did hit him then, a punch to the stomach that had Avon doubled over retching.

“You’re on borrowed time.” He raised his voice. “All of you. You won't be needed for much longer.” He gestured at Jenna. “She's already surplus to requirements, so if you care what happens to her you’d better start fucking co-operating.”

He stalked back down the corridor. The guards stayed on their feet, guns loosely in their hands.

“That bastard has my ship?” Jenna hissed.

“That’s it, then. This is over. At least I won’t have to eat their stinking food if they execute us,” Vila said.

“Not over yet,” Avon said, standing up and rubbing his sore gut, though he thought they were probably close to done. They’d had just enough time while Liberator was being stormed to issue commands that stopped Zen from recognising the incomers as operational crew, but the Feds had now had months to work on the problem. If they’d now got someone directing Zen on the other side they could do all the things with the ship that the standing orders had stymied so far.

Still, Lieutenant Colonel Tarrant hadn’t looked as if things were going well for him so there might yet be some time. Unfortunately Avon had no idea what to do with it.

He was still contemplating that when the manager of the prisoner unit came in, with two guards carrying bundles of fabric.

“You all know the drill,” the woman said. They did. One by one they would emerge from their cells, undress, shower, dress in whatever clothes they’d been given and put the black hood over their faces.

They’d tried resisting numerous times at every step of this process. It had got them nothing but beatings with the electric whip one guard wielded. It left no marks and no lingering pain but it was hell when administered. After a while they’d stopped fighting it, at least, Blake had insisted, until they came up with an actual plan with a hope of working.

So when it was his turn he followed the bored commands, stepped naked into the cold shower and the slightly warmer dryer unit then dressed in the familiar black leather they seemed to prefer for him. Looking round he saw Blake and Vila already dressed and anonymous under the close fitting hoods.

The women were always last- some vague sense of propriety on behalf of their captors, he supposed, though they would still be required to strip in front of the alert guards. Cally gave him a nod, which he returned. Then he pulled the black material over his head. It shrank around the contours of his face automatically and both sight and sound vanished. A guard took his arm and he followed like an obedient dog.

If the hood was meant to disorientate him it failed. Avon knew Liberator’s corridors well enough to know where they were even though this area of the ship hadn’t been frequently used in his day. They were heading towards the back of the teleport room.

He could tell when he was yanked onto the platform and shoved into place. A high pitched tone triggered the release of the black hood and he lifted it away from his face and dropped it on command. A quick look round showed that the platform held the four of them and the scowling officer in Jenna’s place, each standing on a separate circle. Four guards surrounded the platform, stun guns raised.

It happened then, the dizziness, the world fading out. This time he caught a glimpse of Blake bending down to grab a mask. Then everyone was gone.

Chapter Text

Consciousness faded out, then in again. The doors opened and Del stared out at the unchanged corridor, then looked round. They were all there moreorless as they had been. Only Roj had moved; he was staring down at a black piece of fabric in his hand.

“Zen, how long were we absent?” Cally asked.

Five hours and seven minutes. Crew is required on the flight deck.

Del realised that his shirt had changed from blue to purple. He couldn’t imagine ever getting used to this. “What have you got there?”

Roj stepped off the teleporter. “I’m not sure. It seems to be a bag of some sort.”

“Anything in it?” Vila asked.

“No.”

“That’s weird. Can I see?”

Vila took the black bag and turned it inside out. “There’s very fine wiring of some sort embedded in the fabric. And here’s a control unit. Interesting. I’ll play around with it for a bit and see if I can get it to do whatever it does."

“Vila’s our clever device guy,” Roj said to Del. “We’d better get up to the flight deck.”

“No. We should take a look at the teleport.” Del said. “We ought to take it apart.”

Nobody said anything.

“What’s wrong with that?”

Roj said, “It appears that we're out of the habit of disobedience. You’re right. We need to do this now.”

They spent some time poking around the teleport room.

Kerr said, “These doors are a new addition. It looks as if it was open plan before. The back wall is new too, and not that substantial. We could probably blow a hole in it, if we wanted to.”

“It’s not a wall,” Roj said. “These are doors as well, but they are hidden from this side. There’s a way into the rest of the ship.”

“We’d better go and say hello,” Roj suggested.

“With guns?” Del suggested. “I saw some by the flight deck.”

“We don’t have any reason to attack them,” Cally protested. “We don’t want to start a war. There’s no reason to think anything’s amiss out there.”

“Yes there is, “ Vila said from the side of the room. He held up his hand, swathed black to the wrist. “I know what this is now.”

“A glove?” Kerr said. “That’s not exactly threatening.”

“It’s a mask for controlling prisoners,” Vila said. He pressed a point in the fabric and it loosened. “It blocks light and sound but lets them breathe. Trust me, I know about these, fuck knows why.”

He shook the mask off his wrist and dropped it in disgust. “Nobody civilised uses this sort of barbaric crap. There’s something wrong going on through there, and someone wants us to know about it.”

They collected the guns and Del gave the others a quick lesson in their use. “I’ve never used this type of gun before but it seems straightforward enough. I’ve set them all to stun, since we don’t know who’s out there. Point and pull the trigger. I’ll go first- please don’t shoot me in the back.”

“Noted,” Roj said. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Vila had jimmied the controls to the hidden doors. “They should open in ten seconds.”

Del looked back to see the other four close behind him. “Here goes nothing. “ The doors opened.

There was a guard facing them, fumbling for his gun. Del shot him and he crumpled. No-one else in the room- Del called back, “Come on,” and surged forward into nothingness.

Chapter Text

Blake was moving forward, disconcertingly. He glanced down to maintain his footing and stumbled off the teleport. There was a familiar gun in his hand and the brown curls of the Fed officer ahead of him.

Tarrant turned, eyes glittering, and raised the gun towards him. Blake shot him without checking what setting the gun was on. Right now he didn’t really care.

There was a single guard dead or unconscious on the floor. Blake sidestepped Tarrant’s body and turned to see the other three following.

“What the fuck?” Avon was staring at the gun in his own hand. “What happened?”

“Don’t know, don’t care.” Blake checked the corridor, saw no-one.

He reset his gun to a lethal setting, considered shooting Tarrant in the head and decided against it. Instead he picked up one of the black masks, tugged it over the unconscious man’s head and triggered it closed, removing the Fed officer’s gun. That should slow down Lieutenant Colonel Tarrant for a while.

“We’re armed and we seem to have surprised them.” he said with a grin that he hadn’t used for a very long time. “ Let’s go take our ship back.”

Chapter Text

The teleport room ahead of Cally blinked and changed. She was no longer running but standing on the teleport pad, facing the other way back towards their living area.

The doors slid open and there were people there, people she didn’t know. She glanced to the side to see all four of her old crewmates. Jenna was there!

The woman in the front stepped forward, smiling.

“Welcome home,” she said. “I’m Jereis, the captain of the Theresis. The Liberator’s crew can’t be here, obviously, so they’ve asked us to greet you and thank you for all of us.”

“I thought we were the crew of Liberator,” Vila said quietly.

“We have absolutely no idea of what's going on,” Kerr said, stepping down. “I gather our heroic charge achieved something- would you like to tell us what?”

“The Liberator’s crew- your other selves - were being kept captive by the Feds. When you broke through and took down the guard they were able to retake both Liberator and Theresis. Your courage led to all our freedom.”

“Wonderful. So what happens to us now?” Kerr asked. He was not smiling.

“We don't know,” she said. “Severance is new to all of us. But whatever it is will need your input. The five of you deserve nothing less.”

Five. Cally spoke up. “Where’s Del?”

“Who?”

“Del. Our new pilot. Why isn't he here?” Her heart sank. Surely they'd have said if he'd been killed? There wouldn't be so many smiles.

“There's only the five of you,” Jereis was clearly puzzled.

“Look,” Roj said. “Del's severed. There's a hole in his skull. It's pretty conspicuous.”

Another woman tapped Jereis on the arm. “There's one prisoner like that. The drilling is very recent.”

“Brown curls, in his 20s?” Cally asked.

“Yes, but…”

“Then that's Del. Can you get him here please?”

“It can't be,” the woman said helplessly. “That's Del Tarrant.”

“Del, yes. That's what I said.” Cally was getting impatient.

Jereis was shaking her head. “You don't understand. He’s notorious round here, even for a Fed. He hunts down our ships, rebel, neutral, he doesn’t care. Most of the Feds here will be released but that one’s going on trial for his crimes.”

Cally felt sick at the thought of Del locked away. “I don’t care what his outie has done. Del’s one of us. He has as much right to negotiate about his future as we do. Get him here, please.”

They brought him along the corridor that ran behind the teleport, on the unsevered side. His face was bruised but he walked upright despite the wrists tied behind his back and the Theresis crewman’s hand on his shoulder. When he saw them he stopped.

“Blake,” he said to Roj. “I wondered how long until you came for your revenge.”

“It’s us, Del,” Cally said gently.

His eyes widened. “You’re the severed ones.” He looked at the teleporter with horror, and started backwards. “Fuck that. I’m not going there again.” They watched in dismay as two men grabbed Del while he struggled frantically to get away.

“Blake. What do you want to do with him? “ Jereis asked.

“I’m not Blake,” Roj said. “And I’m not in charge of anyone. I’m really sorry to do this to this guy, no matter whatever he’s guilty of, but we need to talk to Del.”

They dragged him over the teleport stand, fighting all the way. He was still twisting and kicking when Cally stepped up to him.

“Del. It's us.”

Del quietened, staring around. “Cally? What the hell is this?”

“Untie him please,” she said to the men.

“No!” Jereis said. “He's a murderer. We can't just let him loose.”

“Hey!” Del protested unhappily. “The gun was on stun. They'll tell you that.”

“It's not that,” Roj said. “The problem is your outie.” And to Jerais. “He is not responsible for that man's actions.”

Her smile was gone. “You say you're not Blake. I believe you. He's got authority here, not you. I will not be releasing this criminal on your say so. You want him - give me Roj Blake back and I'll see what he says about it.”

“I'm a bit confused,” Del said. “Did we win or lose?”

“Our outies won, apparently. Bully for them.” Kerr said. “But it seems that we are no more free than we were before.”

“Look.” Vila's voice was stronger than usual. “This is all a lot to take in. How about we have a talk among ourselves and get back to you? The galley's only a few doors away and I could really do with a coffee. And there was some leftover cake unless you lot have eaten it all.”

Cally blessed Vila’s talent for smoothing things over. Within a few minutes the crew were in the galley and had some privacy with their searingly hot coffee. The cake was not yet stale so she presumed only a day or two had passed, borne out by the newish state of Del’s bruises. He was still in cuffs and declined the prospect of being hand fed.

They pooled what information they had and found that Zen was considerably more forthcoming than it used to be. There was more information on Roj Blake available than they could possibly absorb, and enough on each of the others to give them some idea of what their outies had been up to. Del’s face grew bleaker as his other self’s activities were revealed.

“Right,” Jenna said eventually. “We know what we need to. What are we going to do?”

“Say that this side of the ship is ours?” Vila said.

“Zen says that's contingent on the severance signal,” Kerr said. “It could be set up to cover the whole ship, or none of it.”

“That's our negotiating point,” Roj said. “We want to exist on our ship, to control it, at least some of the time.”

“Can't we just agree to switch round every day or so?” Jenna asked.

“I can't,” Del said. “Unless you want to keep my outie in chains when he's not me. They’re not going to let Tarrant roam around the ship sabotaging their revolution.”

“So we set up an area that's always us, and you stay in it,” Jenna said, and looked round at the silence. “What?”

“We can't just stop Tarrant from existing,” Roj said. “That's what they wanted to do to us.”

“So what do we do?” Cally was feeling despairing. “We can't let Del be executed.”

“Seconded, with feeling,“ Del said.

“I imagine Tarrant doesn't want to be executed either, “ Roj said. “That gives us some leverage. We negotiate a place on Liberator with our outies, preferably without having to be quite so revolutionary as they seem to be, then we negotiate with Tarrant for a substantial period of being Del instead of being dead or imprisoned. A couple of years, perhaps, for a start. What do you think?”

“We can but try,” Kerr said.

Chapter Text

Kerr stepped off the teleport stand again. “Zen, report.”

In transit to Alpha Centauri. No emergencies detected. Vila is currently in S space. Update from Avon.

“Play it.”

His own voice, slightly altered, came through the corridor speakers.

“Nothing urgent to report. Blake’s been in contact with the Alpha Centauri B rebel group and we’re delivering weapons. I've left you some notes about Orac’s control functions. Whatever experiment you left running in Lab 3 exploded and fused the power outlets there. Do try to be more careful. I'm halfway through a game of chess with Del. Start your own game if you want to play- I'm winning this one. Scheduled change-over in three days.”

A pause. “Oh and Del’s taken up baking. His biscuits aren't that bad. We are going to have to find him more to do though. These random hobbies are getting out of hand.”

Kerr wasn't thrilled about gun running but he supposed it was just about within the terms of the Liberator Agreement.

It had taken him a while to get the measure of their outies, partly because he could never meet any of them in person. He'd decided after a while that Avon was no more offhand with him than he was with anyone else. They’d all struggled to get their other selves not to treat them as naive children, despite the Agreement. Sometimes Kerr envied Del.

Kerr had grimly determined to learn everything that Avon knew, but revolutionary politics was way down the list. He had listened to Blake expounding on the terrible treatment of Federation civilians but while they had their memories and the ability to walk out of their front doors Kerr wasn’t much impressed by their suffering. Now if the rebel lot (as they had taken to refer to their outies) wanted to go after whoever invented severance and drill a hole in their head without anaesthetic, he’d be right up there, armed and ready.

He reached the galley and found Vila sipping a cocktail. God knows what time it was in ship terms. “Everything OK?”

Vila waved an expansive hand. “Your outie was mean to my outie again so I think I’m supposed to punch you or something.”

Kerr dialled a coffee. He suspected that he’d recently had one but the habit stuck. “They don’t seem to get on very well, do they?” Gossiping about the rebel lot was a hobby of everyone in the S space.

“They’re both arseholes,” Vila said cheerfully. “Still, we’re stuck with them.”

“And how’s Del?” Kerr asked.

Vila smiled happily. “Still cute as a kitten. Jenna O’s taking over the helm soon so I’m afraid you’ll have to entertain yourself for a bit. We’ve got plans.”

“Spare me the details.” It was pleasant enough to hang out with whichever of the others was currently in S space but he always had plenty to do if he was to catch up with Avon.

Maybe Roj had the right idea; he treated Blake with mildly amused detachment and no sense of inferiority whatsoever. In contrast Cally and Cally O were bonded as close as two people who could never communicate directly could be.

Jenna was nearly as competitive as Kerr was, but Jenna O’s skills had transferred to her severed self much more thoroughly so the two pilots had started more on the level. And Vila had recently been too distracted with his curly haired friend to care at all what Vila O thought.

It was going as well as could be expected, Kerr supposed. He sipped the coffee. He remembered that he’d heard a word recently in his obsessive scanning of all the files they got access to that might relate to his condition.

“Zen,” he said. “Search all available Federation files for the word ‘reintegration’ in conjunction with ‘severance’.

It was probably nothing. He drained his coffee and waited for Zen’s reply.

The End