Take a quick look at an earlier version of the opening scene:
http://writeryourbabyisugly.blogspot.com/2012/11/sample-post-opening-scene-from-bubbler.html
That version is much edited and improved from the original, which started with (kiss of death) the main character waking up. Since that point I have edited a hundred times, and the book is getting cleaner all the time. The title character's name has changed, but that's just a superficial edit; check out the current version.
Comments welcome, and for the record, the process of posting this generated a batch more edits. :)
Bubbler
Prelude
1
News, again, and it hadn’t been new for weeks.
“The Archbishop of Pradna again refuted rumors of a major schism forming in the Ptokeriat, citing the faith’s basic tenets of personal responsibility and peaceful cooperation as reassurances against the growing number of terrorist actions claimed by the group known as the Hand of God.” The voice droned on, no more interesting than the last dozen times he’d heard this segment.
A month on the flagship hadn’t killed Tam yet, but he bunked with a dry-breathing human who liked political news and suffered night terrors, and he felt the reaper closing. He glowered at the bookcase speaker as music switched to another repeated newscast - starships got no new material in transit.
“Another vote was tabled in the Federal Collegium today pending the arrival of the new Delegate from Hydra. The previous Delegate is still unavailable for questions regarding his sudden and unexpected recusal, and though speculation abounds, his office insists that they know no more about it than anyone else.”
Tam’s jaw muscles cramped. He worked them out. He had to stop frowning so much.
He watched as Cay faded again - blink, blink, nod. The boy sagged onto the desk and pushed his reader off. It drifted to the floor in the dense fluid, flipping once and sliding back and forth before settling to the velcro-fuzzy floor. A drop of drool crawled across Cayleb’s lip as he exhaled the hyperoxygenated perfluorocarbon of the room, stretched into a thin line and broke; the bubble of saliva fled for the ceiling vents with a second close behind.
He pressed his lips together. Since Cay came aboard Tam had lived in a state of hope and annoyance - but it would be a lie to say that was new. Tam lifted his own reader and turned a page on the screen, but knew it wouldn’t take long now. A Delegate’s son, surely he had a great Destiny, yes? To represent his world abroad? To make new alliances and prevent interplanetary wars? No, not Tam; his fate was to be hidden away in protected compounds and secret, private islands where his father wouldn’t be shamed by a crippled son, and now to share a room with a nightmare-prone human for a month of repeated reports and broken sleep.
“In other news, the Pellan Delegate has again relinquished her allotted time on the Collegium floor to the spokes-being from the Property League. The official translation of the ensuing speech is thought to mean that the entity wants her species protected from any more AI implants until they have evolved to a point of natural sentience on their own, but opposing theorists include a wide gamut of alternate interpretations. Some contend the entire agenda is no more than a plot to damage the servient industry across the Dominion.”
Spokes-being. Entity. Those things weren’t even synths, they were just glorified, AI-assisted bugs. Tam ground his teeth.
For a moment Tam had managed to distract himself. Cay spasmed on cue, blowing a flurry of tiny bubbles from his nose. The news cut off and the lights blazed; Maith had anticipated it. Her voice sounded from the wall speakers as she slid from her niche. “Mer Joans suffers another ill dream, my Lord. Shall I touch him?” Tam flinched, blinking and squinting against the sudden brightness, and shielded his eyes with the webbing between his fingers.
He set his reader down on the desk and glared at his bunkmate. Cay strained against his strap, abdomen heaving. Do, he signed with flared nostrils and a curt nod, and dim the lights.
She undulated across as the harsh glow faded. Tam grumped at the body wrap she’d begun wearing, not for a modesty to which she’d never been conditioned, but for the young human’s comfort. Maith had been modeled after them, the standard type most common in the Dominion, but small and perfect. He brooded as she woke the dry-breather.
Tam tried to imagine a whole race of them. Normal. He choked back his envy.
“Mer Joans. Cayleb Joans. You are not drowning. Breathe, sir.” Maith loosed the belt and Cay bobbed to the ceiling. The rap of his skull on impact did more to calm him than her soft drone. Tam unclipped his own anchor loop and drifted free of his desk, though not as fast as Cayleb. Maith had said standard humans were lighter than Hydrans, and could stand no more than superficial pressure changes. Yet I’m the handicapped one.
Tam began to sign. Maith’s voice translated over the speakers, morphing into Tam's own irritable tones.
“My master asks: What’s wrong with you, Cay? By the damned, we got the only guest chamber fitted for us on this bottle, so unless you want to sleep up on the command decks, you need to stop!” Tam rubbed his tired eyes with the heels of his hands, then continued his rant.
“And before you think you’re going to try that, those are full of crew running around doing ship stuff, and they’re too busy to have you sprawled underfoot. Damned! Take care of him.”
Tam sucked his lungs full before he opened the hatch netting and kicked up into the next room, leaving Maith to handle Cay. He heard her soothe the young man as she helped him undress, reminded him to put his foot in a loop, to breathe through his nose to keep the bubbles from gathering in his sinuses, that slow and deep was better.
The muted light from below lit the salon in streaks and rippling shadows. True water pressed him with less weight, embraced him. The PFC droplets he’d splashed into the room settled and rolled back to the hatch.
Tam breathed a bit out. It ran down his chin and chest and crotch, headed for the bedroom below and reprocessing as small air bubbles floated from his nostrils to the ceiling.
Real water he thought, waving his hand, creating currents. Not Hydra’s seas, but a healthy approximation with a few agents to help the life support system. Cool to his skin, comfortable. Tam tasted the salt on his tongue, just a shallow breath to savor in his throat against his useless gills. Actual water. This is what my father is breathing in his room. He set his jaw and closed his inner lids, slid his outer down over the nictitating membranes and swallowed. My Lord and sire, Ra Salipoor Den, statesman and exemplar of our planet’s people, Senate Liaison to the Dominion Governor…appointed Delegate for the planet of Hydra to the Federal Collegium, and last of the great gen Salipoor but for me, Den Salipoor Tam, his handicapped bubbler son by a commoner wife. Alas, how the mighty have fallen.
He buried his face in his hands.
Enough. I will find a way to be more than the handicapped son of a rich and powerful nobleman. I will be more than a rumor whispered by shaking heads.
I will find a way to matter.
