by Paul Grover
Her voice held a lingering sadness.
“There was something about Angelo, something… special. I could sense it when I was around him. He saw the world differently. He was softly spoken but had a voice that could move a mountain. I see the same in you Mira, so do the others.”
“You are shitting me, right? You know what a fuck up I am?”
Shannon stopped. “Tell me.”
Mira motioned for her to go to a private channel and she told her everything. When she was done Shannon stepped forward and put a hand on her shoulder.
“How is any of that your fault? Abusers get into your head and make you think you’re worthless. My second husband was good at it. He was more about control than physical violence. They make you feel like shit; it’s what they do.”
“Amy wasn’t a bad person… At first things were good.”
“Mira, no abusive relationship starts abusive… but look at you now. You came back from it.”
“Yeah, I guess. I’m a long way from perfect, Shannon.”
There was a pause.
“Mira no one is perfect but some people make everyone else better. You are one. I saw Alex’s face when he came aboard.”
“Kite? Yeah, we went through a life or death thing… Us misfits have to stick together.”
“He’s kinda cute too…”
“Oh, Shannon don’t. I’ll puke in my helmet…”
She flicked back to the public channel.
Alex was screaming. Barnes’ voice boomed over the top. She could hear Tish and Monica in the background.
“What’s happening?” she yelled. “Rich? Alex?”
Laughter.
“I thought it was one of those roots or… a snake. It came right at me when I opened the locker!”
“Alex, Rich report!”
“It’s okay Mira,” Tish said. “Alex has just been hit in the face by a giant cock.”
She glanced at Shannon, who gave a hand shrug.
“What?”
“It wasn’t mine either,” Barnes said.
“Thorny, I opened a locker and a… a giant rubber cock fell out; a pilot’s prank I suspect. I will need counselling after this.”
Crews on long hauls always invented ways to prank each other. It was one of the ways spacers kept hold of their sanity.
“When he says it’s not his,” Monica added, over the link. “Rich is engaged in some wishful thinking.”
“I will puke now,” Mira said to Shannon. She made a retching sound and laughed.
They continued toward the main lab.
“Mira,” Monica said. “While I have you on the link, I have studied at the images Rich sent over. I concur with his findings. It looks as is if some of the crew attacked the others in almost feral attacks. Some were using weapons, knives and blunt instruments. I’m disturbed by how many bite and claw marks I have seen.”
Mira shuddered. “Thanks, Monica. Do you want tissue samples?”
“No, we don’t have adequate containment and if whatever caused this was a pathogen I don’t want to bring it on board.”
Mira acknowledged with a double click of her link.
Shannon boosted the door open and they walked into a wide room at the far end of the lab area.
Mira stepped over a tangle of roots. Her boot slipped; she steadied herself and glanced down to see the putrefying remains of a human being.
“Urrgh! I just stepped in a person.”
Tangled in the roots at her feet was a body; the black twisted material pierced the man’s coveralls, emerged from his mouth and eye sockets. A fog of tiny luminescent particles hung above the body.
The name on the man’s coveralls read “Walsh”
“The bodies look like human agri-bags,” Shannon said.
“Fucking gross,” Mira replied. “He’s the officer who sent the distress call.”
Mira wondered if she would ever understand the purpose of this strange technology.
“Over there.” Shannon pointed. Two tanks were lined up against the bulkhead. One was broken, the other intact. They were similar to the tank that had given birth to her on Arethon. Mira could tell they were not part of the Sagan’s infrastructure; they were the same black material as the Ark, albeit with a tinted translucent front. The intact tank was fogged with mist.
Mira walked toward the object. She sensed a similar compulsion as she had with the Ark.
Without thinking she released the collar on her right glove, dropping it on the deck.
“Mira!” Shannon screamed. “What about contamination?”
Foglets swarmed around her, entering her suit. Her skin tingled as they alighted on it. Her helmet visor fogged and filled with the tiny organisms. They invaded her mouth and nose. Mira staggered and gasped for air. She relaxed; a feeling of blissful well-being descended on her mind.
“Rich, Alex. I need you up here now!” Shannon yelled over the comm. To Mira it sounded distant and irrelevant.
“It’s okay Shannon,” Mira said. Her voice sounded dead and lifeless to her own ears.
“Mira,” Monica came over the comm. “Your heart rate is through the roof, 200 bpm. None of your vitals are sustainable.”
Mira placed her hand on the tank. A few seconds later a blue glow appeared behind the translucent screen. Foglets swirled, the lights flickered; a console on the other side of the lab exploded.
“The reactor has spiked, thrashing at 123%,” Tish reported.
Five points of light extended from Mira’s hand. They turned into a glowing, ghostlike skeletal hand, mirroring her own. The glow extended, and a forearm was shaped. The radius and ulna differed from human bones; they were longer, thinner and looped over each other.
“This… this is supposed to happen,” she whispered.
Energy coursed through her body. Her nerves became highways of charged particles. Something inside her was guiding the Foglets in the tank. An unseen mind was shaping the tiny life forms, guiding them to convert energy to matter.
The Foglets churned until a skeleton stood before her, outlined in energy. Muscle and fat grew over the bones, organs formed. A heart started to beat as lungs filled with air.
Mira was transfixed as the unconventional birth unfolded; her own heart thundered in her chest. Her breathing was rapid. Every muscle was rigid, yet she was fully aware of her surroundings. Alex and Barnes had arrived. Shannon gestured for them to stand back.
Blood pumped through the carcass's arteries. The blue and red of the muscle fibres were hidden with skin; hair grew and facial features formed. Two black eyes irised open and stared at Mira.
It was the face Mira had first seen on Arethon and again on the Torrence.
“Zenia,” she whispered.
The being in the tank smiled as the glass cracked in a flash of blue light.
Mira staggered back to avoid the falling shards. The world swam into focus, and her head spun. She took a breath and steadied herself.
“I’m okay,” she whispered over the open link. She coughed. Inactive Foglets scratched her throat. “I don’t know what’s happening here, but I am okay.”
“What about this stuff in the air?” Barnes asked.
“I don’t think we have to worry about it,” Mira replied, not really knowing why or how she knew. She could not take her eyes off the alien who stared back at her, a curious smile on her thin-lipped mouth.
Zenia stepped out of the tank. Her hand caught on the broken shell. She raised it and studied the black blood flowing from the wound. The cut closed and sealed, leaving no scar or trace save for the trail of dried blood.
The newcomer was tall and thin, her skin light blue. Her face was angular, eyes round. Her body was feminine, yet Mira could see no hint of genitalia. Her breasts were small with no nipples. Most striking was her hair. It was fine, black and reached to her lower back.
The entity did not resemble the Pharn she had witnessed in her dreams, but neither did it look human; instead it occupied a space somewhere between.
The being looked at Mira and blinked in a complex pattern, resembling a lens aperture closing and reopening.
“I have become,” she murmured as she surveyed the ship. “I am cold.”
“Rich, find a blanket or something. We should get her back to the ship.”
Mira assumed Zenia’s gender as female. Her body choice seemed to echo the assumption. She took Zenia’s arm and guided her away from the broken tank. Shannon found a lab chair and Mira sat Zenia on it. Barnes wrapped a blanket around the newcomer’s shoulders. Long, thin fingers gripped the edges of the silver mylar sheet and pulled it close to her body.
“Alex, find an equipment locker and locate a suit. She’s about your size,” Mira said.
Zenia was shivering, her lips trembling.
“Sensation… it is intense, exquisite.” She ran her finger over Mira’s bare hand.
“Thank you, Mira Thorn,” she said through chattering teeth. “For helping me become what I am.”
“I did nothing. It just happened,” Mira replied. “Is that how I was made?”
“No, you were cloned from genetic material using a process of accelerated cell division. This body was created from the conversion of energy to matter; the result is similar, but the process is not. Unlike you, I have no DNA. My form can be replicated by similar machines but not by biologiocal processes.”
Zenia appeared as she had on the Torrence, but there was something else, a hint of Amy to her manner and her body shape. Zenia’s voice was similar to her own. The creature sitting in front of her had created a hybrid body based on the knowledge she had gained and her previous physical self. Mira glanced at Zenia’s hands. They had four fingers unlike the Pharn who she knew had three. Zenia’s eyes were the same as the people she had seen in her dreams.
She has become who she wants to be. Like you can, Thorn.
Barnes found a stack of flight suits. They were grubby and too big. Mira helped Zenia into the one closest to her size.
The comm system whined in her ear. There was a brief fizz of static and Tish came through.
“Mira, what the fuck happened? We lost contact with you.” There was a pause. “Who is that?”
“It’s okay, Tish. It’s complicated. Have Monica prep; our friend looks healthy but we should check her over.”
“She survived what happened over there?”
“No, something much weirder just happened.”
“Are you okay?”
“Tish, I’m fine. I’m getting immune to weird shit now.”
Barnes picked up Mira’s glove and gave it to her.
The air was clear of Foglets. Every flat surface was covered in a fine sheen of silver. She clicked the glove back into place.
“Did you find anything on the main deck?” she asked Barnes.
“The core has been pulled. All system and logs have been wiped. I found a maintenance log and transmitted it to Tish. It might hold something.”
“They were here,” Zenia said. “Others. They wanted the secrets of this ship.”
“How do you know?” Barnes asked, suspicion lurking in his soft question.
“The cloud told me,” she said. “The crew of this ship landed on a moon orbiting the largest gas giant. They brought this technology aboard and could not contain it.” Zenia pointed to the ruptured tank.
“Why did the swarm kill them and not us?” Barnes asked.
“The swarm is driven to reproduce until its numbers are such it can function as a hive mind. This cloud had reached maturity. It understood the death of humans was wrong. It expressed regret before I deactivated it.”
Mira shuddered at Zenia’s calm explanation.
“One mature colony can create many complex structures. However the colony will die during the process. This cloud is different.” She pointed to the surrounding space.
“How so?” Barnes asked.
Mira tried to read the big man’s face; it was both fascinated and repelled. Barnes’ expression echoed her own conflicted feelings.
“It is configured to act as a weapon… they construct but they also destroy. It is our technology, corrupted by the ones who became Blackened. These structures you witness, the ones you call roots, corrode and consume everything around them. They can render worlds uninhabitable. I can control them because the technology is common to Pharn and Blackened.”
“Would this have happened on Baikonur?” Mira asked.
“Yes, if I had not stopped the cloud, the station and its inhabitants would had been consumed,” Zenia replied.
Mira took a breath of tanked air, suddenly aware of the antiseptic smell it carried. The suit’s environmental system was compensating for being open to vacuum.
If an infected crew had made it off the station… Mira shivered at the implications.
“We should go… this ship has no more answers. Let’s talk to her back on the Chance.” Barnes said.
Mira stood.
Shannon knelt next to Zenia and pulled a hydration pack from her suit. “Here.”
Zenia took the silver pouch and drained it.
Shannon passed her a respirator. “This is cleaner air.”
“I need food and fluids,” Zenia said.
“We’ll take care of it,” Shannon replied.
Mira had to admit Shannon was good at this stuff.
Alex returned with a spacesuit. Shannon took it and equipped Zenia for the return journey. The suit bore the corporate branding of Regina Enterprise.
“Is it always like this?” Shannon asked Mira.
“Shannon, this is one of the least weird things that has happened recently.”
Zenia laughed, stopped abruptly, then laughed again. It was as if she were trying it out.
Mira watched the being sitting on the battered lab chair. The way she cast her gaze around the ship, the way she moved her eyes first, then turned her head reminded Mira of a predator. Zenia had a casual aloofness that Mira found disturbing.
“Zenia, are you gone from inside me?” Mira asked. “You no longer live in my head?”
Zenia cocked her head, first left, then right. The gesture reminded Mira of a puzzled dog.
“I did not live in your head. You were a vessel for my energy. I used the technology aboard this ship to create this shell. I reside within it now.” She made an expression analogous to a human smile. “I have missed sensation. This is… fucking amazing.”
She sounds like me and that freaks me the fuck out. Physically she reminds me of Amy… that also freaks me the fuck out.
“Zenia, we’ll clip you onto the line with Shannon. She’ll help you get aboard our ship. Monica will want to look at you to make sure you are working properly,” Mira said.
“I understand. Your doctor will be disappointed. I function correctly.”
“You heal quickly…”
“I function as intended.”
“Will I still heal, now you are gone?”
“You will revert to your normal function. There is no energy in you now.”
They returned to the airlock.
“Mira,” Tish said over the com. “I need you to get your funk on. I’m detecting a build-up of energy; a storm system is heading our way.”
Mira acknowledged her and closed the link.
“You heard her, come on. Rich you’re first; Zenia and Shannon will follow. Alex and I will bring up the rear.”
“What about this ship?” Barnes asked.
“Leave her; she is in a stable orbit.” Mira replied.
Barnes clipped himself to the transit wire and pushed off. He landed in Second Chance’s airlock and waved.
“Now you two.” She hooked Shannon to Zenia and the pair of them to the wire. Shannon pushed off.
Arcs of blue energy leapt between the ships as the storm closed in. Mira exhaled as Shannon and Zenia made it to the airlock, unaware she had been holding her breath.
“You’re next Alex…”
He stepped onto the lip of the airlock and reached for the line.
An energy discharge knocked Mira to the floor, turning the world into a bright white realm of burning pain. She staggered to her feet, trying to blink her vision back to normal. Her com-link fizzed and popped in her ear.
“Alex! Where are you?”
There was no reply.
“Alex, can you hear me?”
Tish came over the channel.
“The energy discharge hit him. I can’t see him Mira!”
She staggered forward and scanned the open space around the vessels, a moving speck against the star-field caught her eye.
“No!” she yelled. Mira spotted a pair of mag-harpoons in a rack on the wall, grabbed one and made a judgement on Alex’s trajectory, her pilot’s training kicking into action.
She launched herself on an intercept vector. It was risky; once she committed there was no changing course.
Static cleared and voices cut through; rapid fire radio chatter between crew members. Barnes’ voice cut through urgently.
“Astronaut off structure. Tish can you intercept?”
“No! I… Let me… I have no visual, no sensor trace. Fuck!” Tish’s panic was evident in her voice.
“Tish I am on it. Keep the ship where it is,” she said. Her voice calm and confident.
“Mira, what are you doing?” Barnes yelled as she passed over the ship. Mira made no reply, she was aiming the harpoon to allow for maximum line deployment. Her trajectory took her over the ship. As she crossed the centre line she fired the harpoon at the hull, releasing her breath as the green strobe indicated a successful anchoring. She clipped the other end onto her suit.
Alex was ahead of her, tumbling away from the vessels. He was coming up fast. She had misjudged the angle; she was too low.
As Mira passed beneath him she reached out, extending herself to her full length and somehow connected with his leg. She held on and pulled herself up. “It’s okay Alex. I have you.”
“Who has you, Thorny?” he asked groggily.
“Nine hundred metres of carbon fibre cord and the mass of the Second Chance!” she replied as she pulled herself in front of him and clipped her suit to his.
“This is cosy,” he said.
“Yeah… I hope that’s the grip of the harpoon digging into me…” she replied. She rolled her suit. The Second Chance was growing smaller and smaller. Behind the ship the great black sphere hung in the void, arcs of energy rippling over its surface.