Ouroboros Episode One

by Odette C. Bell

  Chapter 27

  Cadet Nida Harper

  They had attacked her ship.

  Out of nowhere, a vessel had materialized by the side of her cruiser and had started firing.

  The presence in her mind had taken sudden and immediate control of her body, sending pulses of blue light into the panel of the cruiser, but it had been too late.

  The enemy ship had already disabled every system and had overloaded the engines. There was a gaping hole in the side of the ship, which Nida was only protected from by the enclosed and sealed cockpit.

  Without the time to question or worry, the entity controlling her had screamed.

  An incredible, unbelievably powerful, sorrow-filled scream that had vibrated through every single centimeter of Nida, filling her with the most agonizing panic she would ever experience.

  Then, just before the enemy ship had finished them off, it dematerialized.

  Nida blinked in surprise as the image of it simply disappeared on her crackling, badly fractured viewscreen.

  Then more blue light had escaped her palms, traveling deep into the arcing console before her. Without a command, or at least a verbal one from her, the ship turned and continued along its original heading.

  Even though the engines were badly damaged, the blue light pouring from her hand seemed to sustain them, and they traveled on.

  Until they reached another system and found another of those terrible ships.

  In a series of incredible events, she watched the ship that had attacked her materialize and go after an experimental vessel she quickly realized belonged to the Galactic Coalition Academy.

  The United Galactic Coalition ship had no chance, and after a dizzying attack from the two enemy ships, its gun turrets failed.

  She watched, unable to do anything, as the two enemy ships squeezed in on the United Galactic Coalition vessel.

  Though she was quite new to space travel, even Nida could recognize the ships were preparing to board.

  Just before she could scream in terror, something happened to her own ship.

  With a commanding beep, the computer told her the cockpit was about to lose integrity.

  Time seemed to slow down, and she had a few precious seconds to realize what would happen.

  Then it happened.

  The side of the ship just blew open, and everything inside was pulled into space, including her.

  At first, she tried to fight it.

  Then she couldn't.

  ?.

  She waited for the vacuum of space to pull her inside out, but it didn't.

  She was alive.

  Dear god, somehow she was alive.

  With a glance down at her body, she now realized it was pulsing with the blue glow of the entity.

  She shifted her arms around, she stared at her fingers, then she looked out at space.

  She was in space.

  She was not wearing a spacesuit, she was encased in nothing but that light. Yet somehow, it kept her safe from the vacuum and cold.

  But she couldn't stay here forever; she instinctively knew that.

  She didn't know what she could do, though.

  Her hands, however, appeared to have information she didn't, and she soon found herself turning, angling her body until she clasped hold of the side of her broken ship. She pulled herself into it, grabbing onto the seat and muscling her body down until she sat. Then she grabbed the harness from the side and locked herself in position.

  The blue light pulsed from her, absolutely surging as it shot down from her hands and into every single centimeter of the ship.

  She had no idea what it was doing, but within seconds what remained of the engines began to pulse, and the broken panel before her blinked back into life.

  The ship began to move. Slowly, but it still moved. Toward the embattled Coalition cruiser.

  Within minutes she reached it, and as she approached, her body shuddered as blue light shot from her and out into space, coalescing against the side of the United Galactic Coalition cruiser.

  She felt cold. Dreadfully, awfully cold. It felt as though her blood had been replaced by liquid nitrogen.

  Whimpering as she closed her arms around herself, drawing her body in as far as it would go, she waited.

  The completely broken cruiser she was in inched closer and closer to the embattled Coalition ship, and then, just before it arrived, something incredible happened.

  The hangar bay doors at the back of the vessel opened.

  Then the blue light returned to her, snapping back into her body and bringing with it that comforting presence and reassuring heat.

  Nida was thrown back against her chair by the power of it, and when she forced her eyes open, she realized her broken ship was angling toward the open hangar bay doors. Within 40 seconds, it was inside. Then, briefly, a surge of blue energy left her, and seconds later, the hangar bay doors closed.

  Then Nida slumped. Her body fell limp against the harness holding her, and it took an enormous amount of energy to draw up her hand and unclasp the harness.

  She fell forward, slamming against the console, falling off it, and thumping onto the ground.

  Just as she tried to get her breath back, she turned to see something.

  Something truly terrible.

  Barbarians.

  Xerks and Mascars. They streamed in from the door on the opposite side of the room. Their faces drew slack, and they hesitated for a moment.

  She understood why they paused.

  She'd just boarded this vessel in a half broken ship.

  Oh, and she was glowing blue.

  Their moment of hesitation ended, and they drew their weapons and fired.

  Once again, the bullets never reached her. They slowed down as they neared, and the closer they got, the more they bent until they were pulled into a twisting vortex around her body.

  She heard screams and surprised shouts, but they didn't last.

  Nida stood.

  Then she walked forward. She pointed a hand to the roof.

  She didn't know what she was doing, but the entity within her did.

  Every Barbarian in the room lifted off the floor, their bodies floating no matter how heavy they were or how much armor they wore.

  She had a moment to register some of their expressions, then their bodies shot toward the ceiling of the hangar bay. She heard several resounding, bone-crunching thumps, and she walked on.

  She tried to scream, but she couldn't control her throat.

  She reached the door that led to the rest of the ship, and it opened before her.

  Though her movements were more coordinated this time, every step was still heavy and unsure, as if somebody had attached ropes to her limbs and tugged her forward without reprieve.

  When she reached the corridor, she saw more Barbarians.

  They fired at her, one even released a grenade, but it didn't matter; the bullets simply swirled around her, and the grenade warped, crumpling in on itself.

  Then she did it again. She took a single step forward, raised a pointed finger at the ceiling, and watched in silent horror as every single Barbarian in the corridor floated slowly off the ground then sped up and slammed against the ceiling.

  She walked underneath them, aware that several spatters of blood rained down on her shoulders and hair.

  As she took another step, she turned to her side and saw that the airlock several meters away was open, leading onto another ship.

  Through it, a group of Barbarians ran, but they didn't get very far. With a click of her fingers, they were slammed against the wall, pinned there by an invisible force that squeezed them closer and closer to the metal until they started to scream.

  She walked toward the open airlock, every footstep heavy. She reached it. She took a step into the other ship. She dealt with any Barbarians that came streaming toward her, then she slowly knelt down, planting both palms onto the floor. A shot of blue energy released from her hands, snaking across the metal, up the wa
lls, and into the ceiling. She waited there several seconds, suddenly seeing flashes of the rest of the Barbarian ship. The engine room, the galley, the quarters, the prison, everything. Then the entity appeared to find its mark and plunged deep into the engine core. Seconds later a red alert klaxon blared, and a computer voice warned that the ship was undergoing a catastrophic systems failure.

  Nida rose to her feet and walked backward out of the airlock. Then she closed it. She turned, and she continued walking through the corridors. Soon enough she found yet another open airlock on the opposite side of the ship, and she repeated the same procedure. She dealt with Barbarians, then dealt with their ship, finally closing the airlock after herself.

  While her body kept moving forward and the power kept surging through it, Nida herself was beyond terrified.

  She wanted to close her eyes to block out the gruesome sights and shut off her ears to the horrifying screams, but she couldn't.

  Instead, she was forced to watch and listen as the entity dealt with every Barbarian it could find.

  Finally, she pushed further into the United Galactic Coalition cruiser.

  She came across one last group of mercenaries.

  She rounded the corner that appeared to lead to crew quarters, and she saw them clustering forward toward a black shape.

  It took her barely a second to recognize the distinctive coloring and style of Coalition armor.

  Then she did it, one last time. She simply pointed to the ceiling, and every single mercenary lifted into the air.

  But it wasn't just the mercenaries - the man in the black armor did as well.

  Though Nida had resigned herself to her total lack of power in this situation, suddenly she screamed; suddenly she fought as hard as she could against the entity.

  "No," she commanded, "no, he's from the Academy, just like me. No."

  The mercenaries and the United Galactic Coalition soldier were still suspended in the air, floating there as if gravity had lost all hold of them.

  Then there was a snap.

  They slammed upwards against the ceiling, and again she heard the crunch of bone.

  But the man in the black armor did not.

  He simply floated there until slowly his body returned to the ground.

  She stared down at him, and though she couldn't see his face, she knew he stared up at her.

  Then she walked backward, the entity turned her body, and she strode along another corridor until she reached the door that led to the bridge. She forced her hand out and against the locked door, and in several seconds, it unlocked and opened.

  With one brief look around, she confirmed it was the one room in all of the ship that still lay untouched.

  She took several heavy steps in, then she heard it.

  Somebody calling her name.

  Her real name.

  "Nida, Nida," the man screamed.

  Despite the entity's control of her, she turned, and as she did, the United Galactic Coalition soldier sprinted into the room. Then he stopped several meters from her, and rocked back on his feet as if he didn't dare get any closer.

  "Nida?" he asked in a shaking voice.

  She couldn't recognize it, because it bore the same distinctive electronic monotone of anybody who spoke through armor.

  "It's me," the man said.

  Before he could say his name, she knew who it was.

  Carson Blake.

  Sure enough, he reached a hand up, touched something on his wrist, and his helmet opened revealing his face.

  And his shock.

  His intense, horrible shock.

  She knew what it was directed at.

  Her.

  What she'd done to the Barbarians.

  Suddenly, control returned to her body, and she clamped a hand over her mouth. She lost all balance, crumpling to her knees, and she wheezed in a breath as tears soaked her cheeks faster than they had ever come in her entire life.

  "Nida?" he asked one last time as he finally took a step closer to her.

  She shook her head.

  He slowly brought a hand up. "It's okay," he said in a falsely calm tone. But the calm didn't extend to his expression; his eyes were wide, his mouth pulled tight over his teeth, his cheeks slack, pale, and sickly white.

  She shook her head again, over and over, not caring that she strained her neck muscles.

  What had she just done?

  Those Barbarians?. She'd clicked her fingers or pointed at the ceiling and then?.

  She pushed her fingers even harder into her teeth, choking around them.

  "You're alive," he pointed out disbelievingly. "You're alive," slowly the palpable shock lifted from his face and thankful surprise replaced it. "How the hell did you survive?"

  She didn't answer. She couldn't.

  Instead, she turned, stumbled over to the wall, rested her back against it, and fell down to her knees. Then she crumpled her arms forward, tucking her head down.

  Silently she rocked back and forth.

  "Nida," he spoke her name so softly it seemed he'd forgotten the terrible things she'd just done. "It's okay," he took several steps toward her.

  She shook her head yet again. "What did I do?"

  "You saved this ship," he said in a firmer tone. "Now just wait there," she heard him turn and dart over to one of the consoles. "We need to get the hell out of here."

  "Remus 12," she found herself saying, the entity taking control of her mouth as she did.

  "Sorry?" Carson questioned.

  "Remus 12," she said in a far more forceful tone, "we need to go back. We need to go home. Remus 12."

  An almost electric silence spread between them, then she heard Carson type something on a panel. "Okay," he said simply.

  That single little word sent incredible relief rushing through her, and she let out a whimper.

  "Nida, it's going to be okay," Carson tried again. "Whatever is happening to you - we will figure it out."

  She finally tipped her head back, looking at him. "I know what's happening. We have to return home. Remus 12."

  He regarded her with pale cheeks and a drawn, tired look to his gaze. Then he nodded. "We are going there now. You disabled??I mean the entity disabled those Barbarian vessels. It looks like they will not be able to follow. It even took out their communication relays, so they won't be able to get off a message to any of their friends. I would send a communication back to the Academy letting them know that the Barbarians have violated our territory again, but there's something wrong with our communication relay too."

  "It has been disabled," Nida pointed out plainly, her voice calm and even.

  Carson turned back to her, a very careful look on his face as his gaze darted all over her. "What?"

  "You must not contact anyone. No more interruptions. Remus 12."

  He took a long moment to consider her, swallowed hard, then nodded. "Don't you worry; we will get there. But??just leave her alone," he managed.

  Nida knew who he was talking to. The entity.

  "We can get you back there. I'll give you my word, but leave her alone," he said, now speaking through gritted teeth.

  "We do no harm. Remus 12," Nida said again, the entity speaking through her.

  "Yes," was all Carson could manage. Though he turned back to the computer panel before him to type other things into it, eventually he turned, and he faced her once more.

  His eyes were wide, and he appeared to be trying to take in every single centimeter of her. "Are you still in there?" he asked softly.

  Though the entity had intermittent control of her, she managed to nod. "I'm fine," she said in a tight whisper. "We just have to get," she began.

  "To Remus 12. We are on it. It'll be a couple of hours. Then we will be there. Now I just have to?" he took some time to turn around and survey the bridge, "find some way of fixing the rest of the ship."

  "This ship will make the distance," Nida pointed out in a cold and efficient tone, "we will keep it running. You must do noth
ing but wait with us."

  Carson opened his mouth, appearing ready to say something, but whatever it was, it died on his lips.

  Then silence came.

  Sick, cloying silence that stretched between them and stifled the scene like choking smoke from above.

  Nida was the one that broke it. She couldn't take it anymore. The stress, the horror. She tried to get up, but she couldn't. So instead, she turned her sorrowful gaze on him. "I'm sorry," she croaked. "I didn't mean to. I couldn't control myself."

  He looked up at her sharply, and somehow, despite what she'd done, there was no blame in his eyes. Just concern. Incredible, powerful concern. "Nobody will blame you," he said slowly.

  "It just needs to return home," Nida said as she finally unhooked her arms from around her knees and stared at her hands. They were still bright blue, and if she concentrated, she could see those flashes of energy pull up from her skin only to sink further down into her palm and fingers like worms rising up from the earth only to wriggle back down again.

  "Why?" Carson asked. "Why do you need to return home?"

  "Because if we do not, we will become corrupted," Nida answered. Her voice was half her own and half the entity's. Half completely shocked and half completely sure of itself. Suffice to say, her tone shook up and down, and her voice rattled in her chest.

  But that didn't stop Carson from understanding her words apparently, because his eyes drew wide. "Corrupted? What does that mean?"

  "We are not from this place. We are from beyond. We must return to our home. If we stay here, we corrupt." Nida still sat with her back pressed up against the wall, and she was thankful for the reassurance it gave her.

  "But what does corrupted mean?" Carson pressed again.

  "Broken, changed, contorted, twisted, corrupted," Nida said.

  It was clear Carson couldn't understand, because he simply shook his head, finally pressing too grimy fingers to his brow and sticking his fingernails into the skin. He was clearly stressed, tired, and from the way he held his left shoulder, it appeared he was injured too. "Please, try to help me to understand. I'll do whatever you need me to, but I need to understand. How do you mean you will be corrupted? What will happen to you?"

  "Do not ask what will happen to us, ask what will happen to you," Nida found herself saying. The entity had full control of her voice now, and the calm it used to speak its words made them all the creepier.

  Carson dropped his hands from his head, no longer massaging his brow, and instead staring at Nida with a clearly worried expression. "Sorry?"

  "We will break your space. We do not belong here. If we remain, we become corrupted, and we corrupt everything around us, twisting it toward us, changing it," Nida explained.

  Carson stood a lot straighter, and the look in his eye became almost terrifyingly attentive. "You mean that was what was happening to Nida on Earth? That's why those TI objects were being attracted to her?"

  "Yes. Our presence within her distorts her implant, causing what you call TI objects to pull toward her. But this effect will eventually extend to all others. We cannot control this. We do not belong here. We must get home. Remus 12," Nida added again needlessly.

  Carson nodded, but it was clear that what he really wanted to do was shake his head and shout about how damn insane this was. "And once we get to the planet, you will??leave?" He stared at Nida, but it also appeared as if he was trying to look through her, quite possibly at the entity.

  "Once we reach our home, we will leave," Nida confirmed.

  Carson looked ready to sigh, but just as he began to, he pressed his lips tightly closed. "And Nida? Will you leave her alive? Will she be okay?" His tone was pressured, quick, and sharp.

  "There will be no damage," Nida noted in the calm voice of the entity, "but the longer we remain, the longer we corrupt. We must return home soon."

  Carson nodded, and finally he sighed. "Well, all you have to do is hold on for several hours. Can you do that? Or are you going to start??corrupting the rest of the ship? Are the panels going to be ripped from the walls and sent flying toward you?"

  Nida shook her head. "We can control ourselves. The closer we return to Remus 12, the easier it will become."

  Carson actually closed his eyes, planted a hand over them, and took several enormous, deep breaths. "That is the first piece of good news I have heard today. Right, we'll just ride this out. Nida, we'll get there soon. Don't worry," he added quickly.

  "I'm not worried," she said in her own voice.

  Carson dropped his hand and blinked an eye open. "Really?" There was an incredulous note in his voice.

  "I'm completely freaking out," she clarified.

  He gave the briefest, smallest of half smiles. "So am I. But it will all be over soon," he promised.

  That promise was like a warm hug, something to center her, something to calm her, and god knows she needed that right now.

  Then she remembered something very, very important. "Earth, the Academy, is everybody okay? What did I do?"

  Carson put a hand up to stop her. "Everybody is fine. Nobody was hurt. You??the entity managed to exploit the Endgame Maneuver. Basically, it infiltrated the entire Academy secure computer network, pumped the thing full of power, and transported every single person off Academy grounds, giving you the opportunity you needed to escape. Nobody got hurt," he repeated.

  Slowly Nida let her mouth drop open. "Endgame Maneuver? I did that?"

  "No, the entity did," he said pointedly. "Nobody is going to blame you for anything," he added.

  She wanted to believe that, but she didn't know if she could. Carson seemed to be ready to trust in her and to believe in her, but she wasn't so sure the Admiralty would agree.

  Still, perhaps now wasn't the time to worry about that. Her attention had to be focused on one thing: returning the entity to Remus 12. Everything else could wait.

  Or perhaps it couldn't. She jumped to her feet. "The Barbarians, god, what did I do to them? Are they okay?"

  Carson looked at her very carefully. "They aren't going to bother us," he said diplomatically.

  She pushed her head to the side as she stared at him askance. "You mean they all retreated back to their ships?" she asked na?vely.

  "No," he said simply. "You dealt with the threat," he added opaquely.

  She started to feel sick, very sick. "Where are they?" She turned to head off the bridge.

  Carson took several steps toward her, and went to reach out a hand to grab her arm, but stopped. Instead, he strode around her, planting himself firmly between her and the bridge door. "The threat has been dealt with. The Barbarians are vicious, vicious enemies. They were going to take this ship and kill the both of us. The entity dealt with them," he said simply. "Nobody will blame you," he added.

  She receded, staring at that very careful look in his eyes. "I killed them," she whispered harshly.

  He didn't move a muscle and neither did he say anything.

  "I killed them," she repeated. "Jesus Christ, I killed them."

  "Nida, if the entity hadn't intervened, this ship would have been stolen by the Barbarians, and both you and I would either be dead or on our way to be sold into slavery. And I really don't want to go into how horrible the life of a Barbarian slave would be. The problem was dealt with. You didn't attack their ship; they attacked ours. They started this. They were not willing to compromise. The entity dealt with it. That's the end of the story."

  She shook her head.

  God, it felt like the only thing she could do. It felt like simply by shaking her head she could make everything go away.

  But she couldn't.

  She couldn't deny the reality.

  She had killed the Barbarian attackers that had boarded this ship, she'd severely disabled the two Barbarian vessels, and god knows whether she'd left them life support.

  "Nida, don't be so na?ve," Carson said through clenched teeth, "you are in the Academy. When you graduate," he said, hesitating on the word when as if he
really wanted to say if, "you will become a full member of the United Galactic Coalition Army. You will devote your life to protecting those of others. And that comes with a price. You don't get to pretend to be nice anymore. You don't get to hang back when somebody else is in danger. You have to put your life on the line, and sometimes your peace of mind, to do what has to be done. If the Barbarians got hold of this vessel, it would equip them with what they would need to complete far more devastating attacks. And if they had got their hands on the entity," he said in a far quieter voice, "I can't even imagine what would have happened."

  She understood what he was trying to say, she really did, but it didn't help. She couldn't get past the fact that she'd murdered people.

  And yes, she was a member of the Galactic Coalition Academy, and yes, she knew that if she graduated, she would become a full soldier in the United Galactic Coalition Army. But somehow, she'd never put the two together. Somehow, she'd never really appreciated how dangerous space travel could be, and how it couldn't only threaten one's life, but one's moral integrity too.

  She felt so very sick that she found herself rocking backward, and then, without warning, collapsed to her knees.

  Carson rushed forward to help her, but he seemed too hesitant to actually touch a hand to her shoulder and arm. Instead, he hovered beside her, concern igniting in his gaze as he searched her own. "Everything will be fine once we get to Remus 12. Nobody will blame you," he repeated.

  She tried to nod, but she couldn't. Instead, she swallowed hard. Her hands were shaking, and so were her arms and legs, and no matter what she did, she couldn't stop them.

  "Everything will be fine," he said one last time through gritted teeth.

  "I dreamt this," she suddenly said.

  Carson paused, his once determined expression faltering. "Sorry?" He was still sitting on his haunches, a good half meter from her side. Concern flashed through his gaze. "What do you mean?"

  "Back on Earth, I dreamt of this. I didn't understand at the time, but now I see it was a warning," she noted in a far-off voice.

  Though she tried to focus on a patch of clean, white floor just past Carson's left knee, she darted her gaze up to meet his.

  He looked??freaked out. But that didn't stop him from inching a little closer. He still apparently didn't have the gumption to touch her, but now he was right by her side. "What did you dream of?"

  "It just started off as blue light. I would be standing on the surface of Remus 12, and I'd look down to my left palm, and?" she remembered how horrible the dreams had been at the time, how hard she'd tried to get that blue light out of her hand. But now she was covered in it, and now she'd surrendered to what it was. But that didn't stop her from remembering how terrifying the dreams had been. Taking several even breaths to calm her voice down, she continued, "and then the dreams started to change. Do you remember several nights ago when you came to my room and I demanded you take me to the hospital?"

  He gave a low, bitter chuckle. "Yes," he pointed out dryly. "I'm not sure I will ever forget."

  "I forced myself to go to the hospital because of what I dreamed, but the docs just told me I was stressed," she noted as she brought her hands up and stared at her fingernails.

  Finally, Carson touched her. He brought one of his own hands out and covered hers, pushing them down lightly, centering her attention as he did. She looked into his eyes, and he looked back into hers.

  "What did you dream of? It's okay; I'll believe you," he added with a light chuckle. "After what I've seen, I'll believe anything."

  She wasn't quite sure whether that was meant to be reassuring, yet she couldn't help but smile.

  Nor could she help but feel calmer, and safer than she had before.

  Because she wasn't alone.

  While the entity still remained in her mind, the sudden connection she felt with Carson was completely different.

  He didn't blink once and neither did he drop his gaze; he simply nodded at her to continue.

  He still had his hand on top of hers, and the warmth that translated down his skin into hers was astoundingly pleasant. It gave her the strength she needed to finish what she'd started, "I dreamt I was walking down the Academy halls, buckling the walls. Then people would come up to try to stop me, and I would," she wheezed, "I would," she couldn't say it.

  "Kill them?" he suggested softly.

  She choked, tears swelling in her eyes. But she managed to nod nonetheless. "Yes. I would do to them what I did to the Barbarians. Just point a finger at the ceiling, and they would go slamming into it. I'd hear the crunch of bones, and blood would drop on my face as I walked underneath them, and," she choked again, more tears streaming down her face. "I was terrified that it would really happen. The dreams were so vivid. That's why I went to the hospital. But nobody would believe me."

  "Hey, I believe you now," Carson took one of her hands in his and held it firmly. He no longer appeared scared of the blue light darting over her body. In fact, he didn't even glance at it; he only stared into her gaze. "We're heading to Remus 12. We will solve this. Together," he added.

  She nodded.

  "Now there's something I have been dying to ask you for over a week," he began.

  Her stomach involuntarily twitched with nerves.

  Not the kind of terrifying, panic-filled nerves that had been assailing her ever since she'd left Earth, but a different kind entirely.

  She fancied she even blushed, not that anybody would be able to tell considering how blue and glowing her skin was.

  "What happened to you on Remus 12? How did you sustain those injuries?" he finally asked.

  Oh, she felt like saying. That's it?

  Instead, she nodded her head. "It took me a long time to remember, but I do now. I found another set of stairs. When you and Commander Sharpe sent me back to the compound, I was walking in the dark, and I tripped down another set of stairs," she admitted with a cough.

  Carson gave a small smile.

  His lips pressed in, and his chin dimpled. It was categorically one of the cutest, most charming moves she'd ever seen.

  "Shut up," she said under her breath, even though he hadn't said a thing.

  "You fell down a set of stairs," he prompted, serious this time.

  "Yes," she sighed. "That's where I lost your scanner. Anyway, it was really dark, and I got turned around, and when I went to crawl up what I thought was the right set of stairs, it led me somewhere else. Into this room," her voice tightened.

  "What was in the room?" Again, his gaze darted around, searching hers.

  "Nothing??except a statue. It was holding a blue orb," she managed.

  She watched as the skin around his eyes slackened. He had mesmerizing eyes. They were large and violet. They were the kind of eyes you could happily stare into without ever getting bored.

  "A statue?" he prompted.

  "I walked over to it. I don't know. I felt like I was drawn toward it. And then, before I knew what I was doing, I touched it. Some kind of force erupted from it, I fell on my back, and?" she couldn't say the rest.

  "Nida? What happened next?"

  She finally withdrew her hands from his, and she tapped her chest. "The light rushed inside me. And then I don't remember anything else. Somehow, I got back up to the surface of the planet, and that's where you and Sharpe found me. And well?" she trailed off.

  "I know the rest," he nodded. Then he sat back, finally falling from his haunches, and landing onto his butt with a thump. He brought his knees up in front of him, and loosely held them with his hands. "Right," he managed as he scratched his eyebrow distractedly. "I probably shouldn't say this, but I'm going to say it anyway, Academy recruits are taught fairly early on not to touch weird looking glowing objects on alien planets."

  She pressed her lips together, letting them crumple in. "Shut up. Plus, I told you, I felt like I was being drawn toward it."

  He smiled. "I know. I was playing with you."

  Despite the situation, she lau
ghed.

  It felt strangely good. It felt that with just a little bit of humor it could make all the desperation and panic and agony simply drift away.

  ?.

  It couldn't, at least not really.

  As she sat there in silence, she felt cold, terrified, and overcome.

  "What do you think will happen to me once we return to Earth?" she finally asked in a falsely even tone.

  Carson didn't immediately answer.

  She looked up at him sharply.

  "I'll do what I can. Once the Admiral understands what happened, nobody will blame you," he tried.

  "You don't really know that, do you?" she asked perceptively. "It will all depend on what they believe. And hey, let's face it; they're probably going to lock me up on Jupiter Substation for at least a couple of months as they run tests."

  He winced, and he went to shake his head, but he stopped. "I'll fight for you," he said. It was a simple enough statement, but it felt like it was out of the blue.

  She ticked her head to the side, feeling awkward. She tried to push her hair behind her ears, only to realize how oily it was.

  Yuck.

  She was in desperate need of a good shower, a good sleep, and a good eat. As if to confirm that, her stomach gave a rumble.

  While the entity appeared able to sustain her with its own energy, perhaps the fight with the Barbarians had left it running on empty.

  Carson heard her stomach rumble, and he raised an eyebrow. "I take it you're just hungry, and you don't actually have a bear in your stomach," he quipped.

  It was a bad joke, but it made her laugh. Possibly a little too much, because once again, it felt incredibly good to laugh.

  Carson joined in, and when they petered out, he finished off with a smile.

  She stared at that smile for entirely too long, until she finally asked something she'd wanted to for the past several weeks. "Why are you helping me?"

  He looked momentarily taken aback, then he shook his head in disbelief. "Because you have an incredibly powerful entity inside of you that must be returned to Remus 12 before it corrupts space-time," he said very clearly as if she'd forgotten everything.

  She shook her head. "That's not what I mean. Back on Earth, before anybody really knew what was wrong with me, you were the only one who seemed to??I don't know, care. Why?"

  It appeared to be an uncomfortable question for him, and he receded a little, dropping her gaze and staring at his hands instead. "I don't know, really, I just?. You caught my eye," he tried.

  She really did blush this time, but once again, you would have required a microscope to see it past her vibrant blue skin.

  Her expression changed, though, and Carson clearly saw it. He put a hand up. "Sorry, that didn't come out right. I mean to say?. I don't know. You were just acting so strangely. And I couldn't help but be intrigued by what happened to you down on the planet. We found you lying in the dust with a broken rib, a severe concussion, and a sprained ankle. And everybody just seemed so content to believe you had fallen over. How in the hell does anybody damage themselves that much by falling over?" His voice became impassioned, and he gesticulated widely with his hands as if he was sharing some grievance that he'd been holding onto for a very long time.

  "I once fell over when I was walking down the street as a child, and broke my hip. And then, when I joined the Academy, in my first year, I received two broken bones, four concussions, and an untold number of abrasions. To be fair to everybody else on the mission, they just knew me better than you did," she admitted quietly.

  He looked at her as if he didn't want to believe her, then gently pressed his lips together. But his silence didn't last. "It still didn't make any sense. My instinct told me that something else had happened on Remus 12. So yeah, I kind of??followed you around I guess. I wanted to get the chance to talk to you, to ask what had really happened, but then??other things started occurring," he admitted.

  Nida didn't need to ask him to clarify what those other things were.

  The accidents with the TI objects.

  Carson looked cold, and even though he was wearing his armor, he brought up his hands and tried to rub some warmth back into his shoulders. Then he winced.

  She stared over at him, her gaze darting across the large dent in his arm. "You are injured. You should fix yourself up," she commented.

  "Yes, I should," Carson noted as he shrugged his shoulders, "but we've still got three hours, and I kind of??want to finish talking to you first," he managed awkwardly.

  Nida had no idea why he was being so uncomfortable, and she wasn't sure whether she should blush again. Instead, she settled on clearing her throat. "What else do you need to know?"

  "Nothing much. It just seems that I've been waiting for the past two weeks for a chance to talk to you, and it feels damned foolish to cut it short now."

  She sat there in silence waiting for him to ask a question, but when he didn't, she felt itchy and a little flushed. Scratching at her arms and sighing, she turned around to check the consoles and panels of the bridge. The ship seemed to be running itself, despite how damaged it had become in the Barbarian fight.

  Still, it looked incredibly sophisticated. "What kind of ship is this? I've never seen one before."

  "It's an experimental vessel," Carson said, his voice quick with excitement. "It's incredible. If I hadn't been surprised by that second Barbarian vessel, I would have been able to overcome the both of them easily," he added with a chuckle. Then he stopped. "Which brings me to my next question: how exactly did you get from your ship onto the Farsight?"

  "Is this ship called the Farsight?" she asked.

  He nodded.

  She paused. She searched for a way to explain what had happened to her without it sounding??totally and utterly impossible.

  "Well?" he prompted.

  "My ship depressurized," she finally blurted. "The cockpit ripped open," she admitted.

  His eyes drew wide. "Jesus Christ, how did you get out alive?"

  "Well?."

  "Did you get into a spacesuit quick enough?"

  She shook her head.

  "The entity protected me. Somehow??space didn't affect me. The cold, the vacuum - it didn't matter. The entity just kind of, well, controlled the remnants of our vessel, and managed to make it to the Farsight." When she stopped, she looked carefully at Carson to see whether he would burst into laughter.

  He didn't. Instead, he swallowed heavily. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised. That thing can do incredible things, and this is just another feat to add to its growing list of impossible abilities. Wow, I'm sure every single scientist in the Milky Way would want to get their hands on it to study that thing," he added.

  Nida stiffened. She didn't do it on her own. And suddenly her eyes narrowed. "We will return to Remus 12."

  Carson immediately put his hand up. "It was just a comment. It was just a comment. We are returning to Remus 12. You have my word."

  Slowly Nida relaxed.

  She even let a tight breath of air through her clenched teeth.

  Carson whispered a "sorry" and winced at his mistake.

  Then silence descended between them again. She wondered whether he'd finished asking his questions, but he didn't appear ready to leave her alone yet. He just sat there, occasionally running a hand down his armor, then shooting her a surreptitious look when he thought she wasn't watching.

  In a rush, she realized how lucky she was. If Carson hadn't shown so much interest in her, things would have ended very differently, wouldn't they? For one, she would have been killed by multiple flying TI objects. For another, the Barbarians would likely have destroyed her ship.

  She wanted to say something to him, but she didn't know how to frame her statement without sounding sappy.

  Carson finally pushed to his feet, touching the slash in the side of his armor as he did, his lips drawing into a thin frown. "Well, I suppose I should probably do something about this before the next surprise comes slamming our
way." He turned to walk away.

  She punched to her feet.

  He stopped and looked at her slowly over his shoulder.

  "Thank you," she blurted.

  "For what?" He shot her a curious smile.

  "For bothering me even when I told you not to," she managed.

  He chuckled. "Are you trying to say thank you for saving your life from the TI objects? Because if you are, you're not doing a particularly good job."

  She shuffled her feet, and when she looked up at him, he was still staring at her unblinkingly. "Okay, fine, thank you for saving me. If you hadn't shown so much??interest, I'm sure I would be dead by now," she choked over her words.

  He took a step back, then he did something strange. He bowed. "You are welcome. And I suppose I should return the thanks. If you?" his voice shook on the word you. "If the two of you hadn't boarded the Farsight when you had, I would either be dead or a Barbarian slave. I think we're even. Now, I really need to get this armor off and see to my damn arm."

  "Do you need some help?" She walked forward awkwardly, not because the entity had control of her - it didn't - but because??well, she simply felt awkward.

  Carson considered her and appeared to pay special attention to the blue glow encasing her skin, then he shrugged. "Okay."

  For a brief moment, she wondered if anybody else would have done and said the same thing in his position. She convinced herself they wouldn't. The doctors and scientists back at the hospital had been scared of the entity and had been scared of her in the process. But Carson?. He was different.

  Yes, Carson Blake was different.

  He was also injured, however, and she was going to do her best to help him.

  They had several hours left until they reached Remus 12, and they would need them.

  Yet, at that moment, she couldn't appreciate how much they would need them. Waiting on Remus 12 was a terrible, terrible surprise.