Space Bound: A Dragon Soul Press Anthology

by J. E. Feldman

  Chaika’s mouth was dry. This wasn’t possible. None of it could be.

  But this time she had something to pick at. This time she had a loose thread she could pull in an attempt to understand what this world had become.

  “You shouldn’t know about nuclear weapons,” she said. “Not if They came during the first world war.” Not if there were no airplanes, no rockets, no way to carry them.

  “That’s when They came,” the Representative said, “but I came from another time. I remember what things were like. I remember the destruction. I remember the world coming to the brim of destruction and then tipping right over.” He didn’t laugh that time, but his mouth worked silently. “I’m one of the lucky ones, little seagull. All my damage is on the inside. I still look just fine.”

  Except for the wild light in his eyes and the way his dry lips sometimes moved without actually speaking, he was right. He did look just fine. He might even think he was just fine.

  That was the most terrifying part about him.

  “That never happened,” Chaika said. “The war never got so hot.”

  Not yet, a rebellious little voice in the back of her mind whispered, and she suddenly wondered what would have come in the next year, or the one after that, if she had made it back to the world she knew. What would have happened if she had simply vanished? Would everyone assume she had gone down in the ocean and drowned? Would they think the Americans had shot her down?

  Had her disappearance been what began the war?

  “How did you do it then?” she asked. “How did you come from one time and bring Them to another? How did you so destroy history?” It was what he had done, after all. There was no other way to say it.

  “Would you like me to show you?”

  She would like nothing less. She nodded.

  The Representative held out his hand. She did not take it, but she did follow him further along into the waste. Grey earth crunched beneath her feet, releasing a bitter smell that made her breath catch in her throat. Everything here had turned foul and sour. Even the dirt seemed to have been turned into nothing but a venomous powder. All around the pair, They drew back as though out of respect. Chaika didn’t trust that one bit, but she was glad not to have to look at them any longer than was necessary.

  “It came during the war,” he said. “The bombs fell on Kogalym--they fell on every part of the Soviet Union--and when I crawled out of the shelter, I saw there was nothing except this.”

  He stopped and gestured at a great hole in the ground, right in the center of the blasted area. Even the lightning couldn’t seem to illuminate it. It was like nothingness had fallen out of the sky and hollowed out part of the ground before coating the crater.

  “What is it?” Chaika asked.

  “It’s called a wormhole,” the Representative said. “Have you ever heard that term?”

  Chaika shook her head.

  “It’s a way to travel from one place to another. From one time to another. I had nothing else to live for, so I stepped into it, expecting to die. I didn’t know it was a wormhole at first, of course.” He laughed again. “I found that out once I met Them. They pulled me out of the depths of space and despair, showing me there was something I could do. There was a way I could prevent the war. There was a way I could save the world.”

  Chaika shook her head. She wasn’t sure when she had begun to shake it, but once she started, she couldn’t stop. “You didn’t save anything,” she said. “You damned us all.”

  The Representative turned to her so sharply she was surprised he didn’t fall in the hole right then. “Damned you by stopping a nuclear holocaust from ever happening? You don’t understand. You haven’t seen what the world can become with those bombs. You haven’t seen what they can do.”

  “No,” Chaika said, “I haven’t. But you haven’t seen the world from above.”

  “No. I haven’t.” The Representative stared in confusion. “Why would that matter?”

  If she were a poet, she would know how to answer him. If she were a poet, she would know exactly what words to say that would convince him that flight was the achievement of every moment humans had spent looking up at the stars, wondering and wishing. She could tell him about the swirling clouds and twisting landmasses, and how powerful, fragile, and miraculous they could become. If she were a poet, she could tell him that maybe flight wasn’t worth the risk of destroying humanity, but saving it wasn’t worth being forever bound to the earth and terrorized by Them; wherever They had come from.

  But she wasn’t a poet. She was a soldier and a pilot.

  She was also a parachute jumper, or had been at some point in her life. That knowledge of what it was like to fall and trust that she would be caught partly gave her the strength to grab hold of the Representative and throw the pair of them into the hole.

  She didn’t know what would come of the fall. She didn’t know whether anything would come of it at all. All she knew was that this was how it had begun and it would only be fitting if it ended that way too.

  James Romag

  James Romag is an insatiable reader who recently decided to get serious about writing. He edited The Santa Claus Stories of L. Frank Baum and co-edited the Monsters, Movies & Mayhem anthology, both from WordFire Press. His story Framing Marta will appear in the forthcoming Unmasked anthology (summer, 2021).

  James is an Air Force veteran who lives in the foothills of the Colorado Rockies, where he spends his time hiking, running, cycling, reading, and writing as much as possible. He also enjoys a craft beer now and then, particularly when someone else is buying.

  James has a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of Wisconsin and an MA in Publishing from Western Colorado University.

  Learn more on Facebook.

  LifeSource

  James Romag

  Averik’s bright emerald eyes stared through the porthole at the lunar surface three hundred miles below. Two decades of unrelenting obsession had brought him here. The voyage had taken longer and required more effort than he’d hoped, but he never questioned his purpose. Never wavered despite the obstacles. It had proved simple enough to bribe his way into the Time Lapse that ferried his hired Tachyon shuttle across the first of the galaxies and nebulae. The three alien agents on duty controlling the Time Canal subchannel proved a bit more difficult, though eventually, Averik was able to negotiate in private with the creatures to access an unreserved slot into the final galaxy. The recollection of his “negotiations” with the Time Canal agents brought a thin smile to his face. It might be a while before all their body parts are found.

  His palms sweat as his shuttle began closing in on its target at last. The unmapped moon’s bleak mountains and craters exhibited no sign of life, though Averik knew there would be activity in the shadows, with the promise of immortality in the corridors tucked below the rust-colored landscape.

  Averik referenced his dream log. This part of the Carro-Q2 galaxy was not on any astronomy chart, yet somehow, he knew that this moon--the closest of four orbiting Planet Yeko--was named Kardr. He was pleased with himself at the accuracy of his drawings, despite their crude nature, as the shuttle approached Kardr’s terminator line, crossing from daylight into darkness. The sun held steady at the horizon of the pole, where a brief reflection caught Averik’s eye moments before the shuttle passed to the backside of the moon.

  “There,” he said. “Land in that area near the pole, on the daylight side.”

  JaspenTu’s dark hair bobbed as she nodded in agreement. “Saw it,” said the captain. She’d built her space transport business from nothing and mostly enjoyed the adventure of shuttling wealthy clients to far-off, unfamiliar locations. She eyed Averik. “Can you explain why an unmapped, uninhabited moon would have something like that?”

  He gave a rehearsed, casual shrug. “No telling how old that is. Who even knows what we just saw? Could be from explorers who passed through. Maybe from settlers long since gone. Might even be natural mineral fo
rmations. If it was past explorers and they’ve already done some drilling and digging, it could save us some time.”

  “You mean, could save you some time. I’ll say it again. My crew was contracted to get you to and from these four moons. That’s it. You’re the one who’ll be digging or sampling or whatever it is you intend to do. Regardless, you still agree to depart for the next moon in forty-eight hours—terrestrial time—no matter what you do or don’t find?”

  “You’d be willing to stay longer?”

  “Not a chance,” she said. “Even from up here, something’s off. I’ve developed a sense about these things, so be cautious. We’ll touch down, and my team will remain inside to monitor your video and audio feeds while you explore.” JaspenTu adjusted the spacecraft’s thrust. “You never did explain how you know about this place. I’ve been piloting for more than twenty-five years and had no awareness of it. This planet is so remote, I can’t even pull up the solar system on my charts, and this moon does not exist. Say again what you’re calling it?”

  Averik tucked his dream log into a side pocket on his space jacket. “Kardr. Not sure how I know that. I just do.”

  “Hunh. I’m surprised you haven’t already named it after yourself. You’re convinced it’s loaded with tyntium?” JaspenTu’s voice carried a skeptical tone.

  “It would be one of only three known locations in the universe, but not solely tyntium. By my calculations, it’s also loaded with a dozen other extremely rare minerals. That’s why I hired you and didn’t want anyone following us.”

  She still wasn’t certain how Averik had acquired passage through the Time Canal and couldn’t bring herself to trust him. JaspenTu had never yet stranded a client, but also would never put her crew in danger if the client didn’t follow her direction. Two days on this alien moon was the maximum she’d leave the crew and spacecraft exposed.

  It was the nature of her business that JaspenTu contracted out for many bosses like Averik. Those who typically hired spacecraft like hers had too much wealth and no shortage of arrogance, but she knew how to work their egos.

  JaspenTu kept her eyes on the shuttle monitors, but tipped her head slightly in Averik’s direction. “Forty-eight hours. You’ll be back onboard for liftoff, no exceptions. Remember, my crew always comes first.” Before he had a chance to argue, she played to his vanity and said, “Still can’t believe you were able to get us into a Time Lapse and then that Canal for the last leg. Amazing. That’s intergalactic federations only. I know only one pilot who’s traveled through a Lapse, and he worked for the government. Wasn’t even allowed to talk details about it. Never heard of a private citizen with the contacts or influence to do that.”

  Averik leaned back, his compact frame nearly disappearing into his chair. He ran his fingers through his sandy hair. “The right amount of unregistered currency and favors can open lots of doors. You just have to know how it’s done.”

  “Must be a heck of a payoff you’re expecting.”

  He was small enough that he had to lift slightly out of his seat to gaze out the porthole again. “If I find what I’m looking for down there, my company will establish robot colonies and break even after only two shipments back to Vel. After that, the dividends will be enormous. Might even hire you for some of the transport needs before it’s all automated to help you grow your fleet.”

  As far as Averik was concerned, there were no minerals worth mining on Kardr. He’d never even bothered to find out. His trip to Kardr had a different objective, and there was no chance the spacecraft’s three-person crew would be making the return trip home with him.

  The dreams started nearly fifteen years before he’d hired JaspenTu’s Tachyon shuttle. Initially, Averik would wake and try to chase the wispy images in his mind before they slipped away. Though he couldn’t fully recall them, the dreams smoldered and stirred something within, tapped into his lust for power and immortality. Over time, the dreams became more vivid and more tangible. Averik began his dream log, sketching an exoplanet and its moons and describing the ancient race guarding the LifeSource. The dreams became his secret reality. During sleep, he walked among the alien protectors, joined their chants, drank from the well of eternity, and felt the presence of the LifeSource, and stared at the obelisk carved with names immortalized in letters and glyphs he couldn’t comprehend.

  From the first, he understood the images in his dreams were not to be found on Vel, his own planet, though Averik had no concept of where the aliens could be found. Locating the LifeSource became all-consuming. Money, of course, was no obstacle in his quest. His mother owned the rights to innumerable mines on Vel and its neighboring planet, each enterprise employing hundreds of robots. His father owned a near-monopoly in artificial intelligence copyrights and computer operating systems. Before Averik turned eighteen, he’d already begun working for his parents, manipulating financials, stealing innovations, and obstructing competition. His business practices tripled his parents’ net worth by the time he was twenty-four. Power and wealth came naturally to him. Power and wealth nourished him. Power and wealth made him hunger for more of the same.

  To locate the mysterious Kardr of his visions, he trekked endlessly across his own planet, studying constellations through the seasons, seeking new galaxies, validating locations of Time Lapse entry and exit points across the universe. He was drawn again and again to one sector of the heavens. Each night, the dreams took control of his will, enticed him, impelled him toward his goal: immortality. And with immortality would come infinite power.

  Averik recalled history lessons from when he was a young boy; tales of spacenauts traveling to distant galaxies in search of the well of eternity. There were rumors that reports—staticky and only partially decipherable—were occasionally transmitted back from those explorers, with a handful proclaiming to have found something known as the LifeSource. Those spacenauts either never returned to Vel, or, as many believed, returned but inhabited a secret society, never to be part of the mortal sector again.

  True or not, that would not be Averik. Once immortal, he would return to Vel and make his presence known. With nothing to stop him, the entire planet would be his for the taking.

  Barely five years ago, he finally saw it all clearly. His dreams directed him to Yeko and its moon, Kardr. He at last knew where the LifeSource awaited.

  Averick immediately hired JaspenTu’s Tachyon shuttle for the voyage. Using a cover story of mineral prospecting, he swore the small crew to secrecy.

  On the spacecraft as they journeyed closer to Kardr, the dreams grew ever stronger and more tantalizing. Averik felt the cool pink stone of the underground corridors, smelled the musty air as it clung to his face, drank from the well of eternity, and tasted it on his tongue. The dreams were so real that he sometimes confused his waking and sleeping hours.

  He knew when he reached the LifeSource, he would keep it to himself at all costs. JaspenTu’s crew was expendable. Averik had spent much of the voyage to Kardr in the copilot seat, watching and learning how to fly, while surreptitiously impairing the others’ spacesuits, weakening a few spots, distressing some of the seals. Once exposed to the thin Kardr atmosphere, the suits would fail. It would be painful, but quick. The crewmembers would suffocate while Averik remained safe in his own spacesuit. He would claim the LifeSource for himself, destroy its origin and maybe its keepers, and pilot the Tachyon shuttle back home to Vel on his own.

  JaspenTu secured her helmet. She jabbed a video screen on the console and spoke through her headpiece. “Full space gear, terminal positions.”

  The captain powered back as the Tachyon shuttle made a final orbit before beginning its vertical descent. The first mate was strapped in a seat behind her, monitoring all systems. The navigator glanced out the front portal.

  “That’s not a natural form,” he said, pointing at the structure Averik and the pilot had spotted earlier while circling the poles. As they drew closer, the object first appeared to be a metal dune, then became clearer as a thre
e-sided pyramid. The pyramid’s base resembled an isosceles triangle, with two slowly rising elongated sides and one short one. The elongated sides pointed toward the sun, while the base was at the terminator line, facing darkness. “Someone or something built that. I thought we were the first here. This was supposed to be unexplored.”

  “Not a total surprise,” said Averik, again feigning indifference. “We’ll still touch down. After I unload my equipment and get set up, you can start programming the self-navigation for the next moon. It’d be a shame for you to come so far and never set foot on this moon, but that’s up to you. In any case, forty-eight hours of our time and we depart, as agreed. No reason to get anxious.”

  The touchdown proved uneventful, but the captain left the thrusters idling while the first mate and navigator moved from their seats to run post-landing checklists. Averik stood and doublechecked his space gear. The fabric was thin and lightweight, strong but not indestructible. He studied the seals and the flow of oxygen, tested the suit’s safety. It was his nature to trust no one.

  The captain’s voice came through his earpiece. “I’m showing gravity around forty percent of Vel, about what we anticipated.”

  “One moment for the atmosphere composition,” said the first mate. “It’s, ah, some oxygen, not enough to sustain us. Mostly carbon monoxide, methane, nitrogen, and a few unrecognized gases. I’ll take samples and analyze later. I’m also going to have to run some diagnostics on our control systems. Our nav systems flickered just for a second as we crossed the magnetosphere.”

  “Can we open the hatch already?” asked Averik. “I want to set foot on solid ground.”

  “Wait one,” said the captain. She addressed her two subordinates. “Any indications of animal life? Or even plant life?”