She rolled over and dropped her feet to the floor. She winced as she put weight on her hurt leg, but was able to stand. She walked to the cougaroid. It looked at her, with defeat in its eyes. She took its hand in hers. The fur was surprisingly soft to the touch.
“Do you have a name?”
The cougaroid gave her a sidelong look. “Scarif.”
“I am Elaira,” she said, softly. “Don’t be scared. They will heal you.”
“They…kill…my kind.”
“No…It was an accident,” Elaira said, then she paused, unsure of how to say what needed to be said next. “We…didn’t know. I didn’t know. My friend that came…didn’t know.” She paused again, summoning courage before she spoke. “My father…didn’t know.”
Andy stood next to the girl, looking down on both of them. “The CC wants to resume repair work on your level. But we need help from both of you.”
“What do you mean?” Elaira said.
“For obvious reasons, we cannot simply return to level 11 with no warning. We need help preparing the inhabitants—” Andy looked Scarif directly. “All inhabitants—for our return.”
The creature hissed. “Most of our land is dead. Food is scarce.”
“We can heal the land. We now know how to heal your sick. You must tell your kind this.”
This is what I set out do. Helping them will show everyone Dartmuth wasn’t mad. He would be remembered for who he truly was. “I…I believe them. I will help,” Elaira said with enthusiasm.
“Thank you,” said Andy. “However the CC requires both of you.”
The girl took Scarif’s hand with both of hers. “We are sorry for everything. Truly. Please help them to help your kind. I…I beg you.”
The cougaroids eyes went wide with surprise. It sat up, looking around the reds standing nearby. It gently touched its side, where the wound was dressed.
“You have healed my wounds,” it said. “You have healed my sickness.”
“What do you mean,” the girl asked.
“It had radiation sickness, as well. It affects his kind differently. It causes great suffering in their bodies that does not stop until death.
“In pain…all the time? I understand why you attacked anyone that came near.”
Scarif nodded. “Now the pain is nearly gone. It’s wondrous.” It looked to Andy. “You can do this for my kind?”
“For most. For some, it may be too late, but we will try. Healing the land and as many of you as possible, your kind will have a future free from the pain.”
The creature traded looks with Elaira and Andy for a few moments.
“I will help you,”
Elaira looked to Andy. “It’s done. So you will heal the land?”
“Yes,” Andy said. “Soon, we will take you back to your level. But be aware, the CC has warned us there will be resistance from your people to this. It will take a lot of time, possibly years for this work to be completed. You must have patience.”
“Will we be able to see you?”
“Yes. For the short term, we will meet you where you came in and give you medicines that you can take back to your people and begin the healing process. Eventually, we hope to begin accompanying you back your villages.”
“That would mean I would have to go to The Forbidden Place often,” Elaira said.
“I will make certain you are safe,” said Scarif.
“You will need this,” Andy said, reaching behind his back. He held his hand out to Elaira.
Her eyes lit up as what she saw. It was Dartmuth’s gift. She took it and slipped it on her wrist.
“Thank you! Thank you!”
Andy handed another of the bands to Scarif.
The cougaroid held up, sniffing it. He smiled as he put it on his own wrist.
“I have something to show both of you.” Andy said. “Something to help you understand.”
“What is it?”
***
Andy had taken them back to The Spire. He said he wanted to take them somewhere before returning them home. He said he wanted them to leave with a full understanding of what The Warden was.
After they went inside The Spire – the main elevator – as Andy called it, the large doors closed. The floor hummed all around them. Elaira’s insides felt strange, as if they were being pulled downward. After several minutes, it stopped. The Spire opened up. Andy gestured for Elaira and Scarif to step out. When they did, both of their mouths went agape.
They were looking at the night sky, but it was more black and brilliant than ever before. The black blanket above them was dotted with thousands and thousands of crystal pinholes; many times more than they two had ever seen.
“This is the observation dome,” Andy said.
Both Elaira and Scarif walked in circles, their eyes wide and locked on the blackness above them.
“This…is truly amazing,” the creature said.
“To put into your understanding; The Warden is like a canoe. The sky you see is like a large lake that never ends.”
“…And we are all in the canoe?” Elaira said.
“Yes.”
She continued to stare at the sky. The Warden…it moves through the lake. We are all inside.
“I…think…I…” She paused and looked at Scarif.
He looked back, with wonder in its eyes and nodded.
“…We…understand.”
Andy walked over to her and took her hand. He prodded her rukey, with his other hand, tugging at it. She saw the bruising was worse than usual
Scarif looked on, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m fine.” Elaira said.
Andy pinched the strap with his thumb and index finger. It snapped and fell off her arm, revealing the hideous bruise underneath.
“No!” She said. “What have you done? I’ll never be a hunter now!”
“That’s not true,” Andy said. “There is more to hunting, than the kill.”
“There is also knowing when not to kill,” Scarif added.
Elaira looked at the both of them, confused.
“You are a true hunter now.”
-End-
Thomas J. Rock
Tom has been a story teller for as long as he can remember, going to back to grade school when he recorded stories as radio dramas on cassette tape. Years later, Tom picked up the writing pen, seriously, and sent submissions to the Star Trek Strange New Worlds Anthology and The Writers of the Future contests. Tom’s fiction is inspired by the works of Heinlein, Asimov, and Larry Niven and he strives to create good characters and a strong speculative fiction element, in keeping with the grand tradition of the genre.
Currently, Tom is working on the military space opera series CARSON LYLE’S WAR. All of Tom’s published work is available on Amazon. You can find out more about CARSON LYLE’S WAR and everything else Tom is doing at http://thomasjrock.wordpress.com where you can also sign up for his newsletter and receive the newsletter-exclusive story: CARSON LYLE AND THE KING OF RYGEL.
Mission: Restore
A Story from Metamorphosis Alpha™
Aboard the Warden – Deck 10
by Craig Martelle
STATUS: “Bridge Access Authorized. Welcome Back, First Officer Binnatz”
“Maybe we’ll just go and find out. And no, you can’t stop me from coming, because this is really interesting!” Meles said, excitement creeping into his telepathic voice.
Jimmy had no comeback. He waved his arm, and the elevator doors ripped at foliage and pulled apart, revealing what seemed to be an unused elevator. Jimmy pulled a vine out of the way, holding it for Meles to get past.
Once on the elevator, Jimmy spoke confidently, smiling. “Command Deck, please, Deck 10.”
The elevator took twenty seconds to transit from Deck 11, slowing to a stop. The doors opened with less trouble than they had on the previous deck. Jimmy looked out, standing in the doorway so the crew wouldn’t see the badger before he had a chance to explain.
Meles cough
ed behind him.
Jimmy noticed it, too. The air smelled stale. It wasn’t anything like the clean air of the forest on Deck 11 or even the recycled air flowing through the maintenance corridors winding their way throughout the ship.
Lights flashed from consoles throughout. Numerous positions seemed active, but there were no people. Jimmy walked slowly from the elevator, not noticing that the doors closed when he and Meles were clear.
The badger was unusually quiet, but Jimmy didn’t notice that either. He saw the raised platform and the commanding chair where the captain would sit. He approached it from behind, breathing a sigh of relief when he saw the helmeted figure.
“I’m sorry sir, why are you in a spacesuit?” Jimmy asked, looking around quickly to make sure he hadn’t entered a hazard zone.
He moved around the front, Meles walking around the other side. Together they stood as they saw the cracked faceplate and the skeleton within.
Jimmy looked around in shock, seeing a few more figures who had died at their posts.
“Who knows when we’re going to get to our new home?” Jimmy asked, his voice sounding small in the large space.
“Maybe you are home,” Meles replied.
***
Jimmy flopped to the deck, holding his head in his hands, his shoulders heaving as he wept.
“Now, now,” the badger tried to soothe the distraught human. Meles whistled through his teeth until he found something else to do.
As a badger, he was constantly in search of food. The work stations and equipment throughout the bridge area of Deck 10 smelled stale without any organic matter. He dropped to all fours and sniffed the deck around the consoles. He sneezed and ruffled his whiskers but continued his exploration.
“I don’t like it here, maybe we should return home,” Meles suggested.
“Home,” Jimmy replied, saying it as if it were a question more than a statement. “What does that mean? I thought we lived according to a master plan. At the end of our journey, we settle on a new planet. Everything in between was maintenance. That’s what I do. I fix things. I live to do the maintenance for a dead crew.”
“You live to do the maintenance for a living ship and its inhabitants. People will always die, but the ship still travels through space, does it not?” Meles wondered as he continued his fruitless search.
“I have a badger for a friend and a fellow maintenance tech who is probably wondering what has happened to me. Do you think he can track me this far from our command center?”
“How would I know? I’m a badger.”
“The computer would know.” Jimmy activated the comm link on his powered armor. “Jimmy six five reporting. Computer, are you there?”
“Of course, Jimmy. Where else would I be?” the computer replied.
“I can’t answer that.” Jimmy looked around, unsure of what he wanted to say before settling for the truth. “I’m on the bridge and the command crew appears to have died a long, long time ago. Can you please update me on the ship’s status and estimated arrival at the colony planet?”
“I cannot. I do not have access to that data. You should not be on the bridge, Jimmy six five. That is a restricted area,” the computer replied in her pleasant voice.
Jimmy felt an edge in what the computer was saying. He hoped that she wouldn’t summon security bots.
“We shall return immediately to Deck 11, computer. Mission report is that the command band was successfully recovered and is in my possession. It will be returned to main tech storage as directed. End report.”
“When?” the computer prompted.
“Soon,” Jimmy deflected.
“You’ve left Willie alone for far too long. He gets into trouble without you there.”
Jimmy leaned back to look in disbelief at the comm device strapped to his wrist. He contemplated answering, but hadn’t heard a question, so he tapped the device to turn it off.
“The computer doesn’t want me up here, Meles. What do you think about that?”
“I don’t want me up here,” the badger shot back telepathically.
“It’s hiding something.” There was no revelation. Jimmy had known all along that he was never supposed to go to the bridge. His world was constrained within his main tech work area and wherever on Deck 11 the computer deemed it safe for him to go.
The computer controlled his life, but now it was no longer in control. It wanted him back.
Jimmy stood, sure that he didn’t want to see only what the computer wanted him to see. There was a bigger world out there. An entire universe. He looked at the screens that showed the view outside the ship. He put his helmet in the captain’s lap.
“Don’t go anywhere with that. I’ll be back,” he told the dead man. “Meles! Let’s see what there is to see.”
“Why do you have to yell? Are humans deaf by nature or did you come to that condition by your own loud misdeeds?” the badger asked.
“My loud misdeeds?” Jimmy wondered, trying to speak softly. “I’m pretty sure that’s not it. Maybe your furry ears are too sensitive? In deference to my new partner, I shall endeavor to not offend your badgerly sensibilities.”
“You don’t need to run your pie hole at all,” Meles told Jimmy.
“But it seems so unnatural,” he replied using just his mind.
“Maybe your way is unnatural.” The badger stood upright and sneezed again. “There’s nothing to eat up here but dust, which I seem to have ingested far too much of already. Let’s leave this place.”
“Don’t you want to know?” Jimmy asked, gesturing with a broad sweep of his arm to take in the entirety of the bridge, much of which disappeared into the darkness behind the elevator.
“Where are we going and when will we get there?” he asked aloud.
“Computing,” a voice responded from a workstation nearby.
Jimmy jumped back and crouched, his heart pounded in his chest. “Hello?” he ventured.
“Computing,” the voice reiterated.
Jimmy inched forward. “I wish there was more light in here,” he said.
The illumination came up slowly, showing the entirety of the space, including the area beyond the elevator.
More bodies, mummified, stacked like firewood. “Computer,” Jimmy said, barely above a whisper, “what happened in here?”
“Computing,” the voice replied.
Meles moved forward, unperturbed. He strolled past the elevators using his upright, two-legged gait. He sniffed the bodies from a distance, before moving to a sidewall with numerous panels and sliding doors.
“I smell food,” he said, before starting to pry at one of the door panels.
“Hold on,” Jimmy called out with his mind and hurried to the badger’s side. “You don’t want to break it.”
Jimmy knew exactly what the device was, but wasn’t sure why it would be active if there was no one to eat what it produced.
“It’s the food processing system. What would you like to try?”
“Beet soup with extra mushrooms,” Meles replied without hesitation.
“Food processor, I order one bowl of beet soup with extra mushrooms, please.”
“Is that how you have to do it?” Meles wondered while he sniffed as the smell from the other side of the small door changed. A red light shining above the door turned green, but then started flashing red. “I can smell my stew! Where is it?”
“You’ve jammed the door. Look out,” Jimmy replied in a huff. The badger’s prying claws had wedged the door against the track. Jimmy didn’t have his tools so he used the next best thing. He popped it back onto the track with a swift thump using the heel of his hand.
The door slid open, and Meles shoved Jimmy out of the way to get at the bowl.
He stuffed his badger snout into it and splashed the red juice in a circle on the deck. Jimmy jumped back so it wouldn’t get on his boots.
“I could use something, too. It’s been a while,” he mumbled. “Maple and brown sugar oatmeal, please,
in a large bowl.”
He stepped around the badger to retrieve his meal from the processor.
“More!” Meles belched. “Much more.”
The badger stopped demanding more food after the seventh bowl.
“By all that’s holy, how much can you eat?” Jimmy said. He’d finished his oatmeal long before and sat at an empty dining table, waiting on his companion.
“I can’t tell you that as I’ve never truly eaten until I could eat no more. Wouldn’t that be glorious?” he pondered.
“I don’t think so,” Jimmy replied, before getting up and setting out to further explore the extensive bridge.
“We are en route to Cagulon Minor and should arrive in just under three hundred Earth-standard years,” the computer reported suddenly.
“Holy cow!” Jimmy blurted.
“I’ve heard of cows.” Meles stopped and looked at the ceiling, his eyes unfocused as he tried to think if he had heard of them or not. “Maybe not.”
“Is that where we’re going to stop and land the colonists?” Jimmy asked.
“Is that your order, First Officer?”
Jimmy pursed his lips and looked around. The command crew were almost deified in his mind, yet here they were.
Dead.
The computer thought he was one of the few who controlled the ship. “Is that what you think we should do?” Jimmy asked tentatively.
“It is not my place to advise on this issue. Are you giving the order to begin our slowdown in preparation for attaining orbit around Cagulon Minor?”
“Yes. Do that. Wait. It takes three-hundred years to slow down?” Jimmy wondered.
“It takes exactly that. We’ve already bypassed our primary, secondary, tertiary, and a number more. Cagulon Minor is the fourteenth backup colony planet.”
“Holy cow!”
“There it is again. What is a cow?”
“Yes. Stop at Cagulon Minor.”
The ship jerked, and Jimmy staggered. “Preparations for arrival have commenced.”
“The system locked the crew onto the bridge because of excess radioactivity within the ship. Cascading failures rendered the food and water systems inoperable. The command crew died of thirst within days of the accident.”
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