Everyone rose from their chairs and took a step back, confused as to the nature of the instruction.
“So, what do we—”
Oxade’s swivel chair spun around. The spider-like metal plate liquefied and formed into one, solid mass.
“What’s going on?”
The liquid metal stretched out across the floor. The armrests tilted up and into the air.
Alex’s chair performed the same action, only this time, a circular magnetic plate sprung out from its side.
The two melded together and stretched apart like three-day-old chewing gum.
CLUNK-SCHWIPP.
The metallic rope snapped in half, forming two lifelike androids. The fabric from the chair sunk into the metal and pushed out into the shape of a head.
“Wow,” Nutrene looked at Oxade for a response. “Is this what I think it is?”
Maar smirked as he moved to the head of the table, “Opera Charlie, meet your fourth and fifth crew members. Poz and Neg Bass.”
Poz, the ‘male’ droid of the duo, stood three-foot-high and looked like an ugly, mini metal beach ball. He tilted his perfectly circular head up at Oxade and blinked his set of peculiar eyebulbs.
“Greetings. I am Poz Bass. I will be joining you on Opera Charlie.”
“But-but—” Oxade failed to process the marvel of technology standing before him, demanding an introduction, “What is this?”
“This, as you’ve seen, is not an inanimate object,” Maar said. “Poz and Neg are prototypes of USARIC’s latest venture with Manning/Synapse. Death drones. Ruthless killing machines. Now, don’t be rude. Shake Poz’s hand.”
Oxade turned to the droid, this time focusing on his face. A dreadful synthetic skin glistened in the ceiling light. Oxade heard the whirring of Poz’s internal mechanism. A very subtle squelching noise followed with every microscopic movement.
“Yeah, put it here,” Oxade slammed his palm into Poz’s hand. His skin immediately absorbed into the droid’s hand.
“Hey, hey, my fingers,” Oxade tried to wrench his hand away.
“Ha-ha-ha,” Poz released Oxade’s hand and trundled over to his counterpart, “I am sorry. I was attempting humor.”
Oxade looked at his hand. It was immaculate, as if nothing had happened.
“I f-felt my soul leaving my b-body,” Oxade stammered. “What the hell are these things—”
“—We are death drones,” explained the pulchritudinous Neg. Affecting a more feminine touch, she slid her arm around Poz and seemed to weld into the side of his body, “Of course, we’d rather have been named something less killerish. We are state of the art killing machines, but that’s not all we are.”
SCHLOOOOO—
Neg’s entire frame amalgamated into Poz’s body, doubling their height as they twinned into each other. Oxade, Alex, and Nutrene were now looking at a fully-formed killing machine. An exo-suit unraveled down their bodies.
“They look like Jaycee, now. Don’t they?” Maar smiled at the trio.
STOMP!
The giant droid in the exo-suit stomped forward and spun its hands around, leaning into Oxade’s face, “Human?” it asked in its threatening grunt of a voice.
“Y-Yes.”
“I thought so,” it held out its palm and closed its fingers, forming a blue-hued fist.
THWOCK!
The hulking mercenary punched Oxade in chest, catapulting him across the conference table. Crain moved out of his path as he landed on his ass and whined.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake—” Nutrene jumped behind her chair and focused her monocle on Alex, “I’m not going to Saturn with them.”
“Get up, Oxade,” Maar said. “You’re the captain. You’re meant to be setting an example.”
“Y-You c-can’t expect us to go on Opera Charlie with them?” He climbed to his feet and brushed himself down. The USARIC logo had torn away from its stitches due the violent nature of the punch.
Maar stood behind Oxade and addressed the team, “I think the five of you will get the job done just fine.”
SCHLOOOOOOP!
Poz and Neg twisted into each other in a miasma of metal and pulled themselves apart. They trundled to the table like a pair of scary Siamese twins and pointed at the vector scope of Opera Charlie.
“Is this our new home?” they asked in tandem.
“Yes, it is,” Maar said.
“We go to Saturn and kill everything.”
Maar nodded, “Yes, but bring Anderson, the cat, back with you. Safe and sound.”
“What if she doesn’t want to come back?”
Maar made eyes at them, “Listen very carefully to me. Oxade is in charge. He’s the captain. So, you do as he says.”
“Yes,” they said.
“Nutrene is the medician. If something happens to any of you, like you’re injured or seriously hurt, she can fix you. Right?”
“Right.”
“And Alex Hughes is in charge of the weapons on level two. Not that you guys need a gun, of course.”
Poz slammed his elbow into his own ribs. His forearm broke out like an accordion to reveal a triple barreled canon, “We have our own guns.”
“I know you do,” Maar winked at Neg, who pressed her hands together and fluttered her metallic eyebulbs at him, “Your sister, here, is a lethal little minx, too. I’ve no doubt you’ll be able to complete the job.”
“Excuse me, Maar,” Alex said. “There’s something I don’t understand.”
“What is it, Hughes?”
“Well, if Poz and Neg are death drones, why do you need us humans to go with them? They don’t need oxygen. Resources wouldn’t deplete as fast?”
Maar sighed and made the mistake of touching Poz on his shiny head. An electric spark frazzled the holographic image momentarily.
“We made a mistake with Opera Beta. They’re all Androgyne Series Three, except for Haloo Ess, the botanist and, of course, Anderson herself. We won’t be making the same mistake again.”
“What’s the mistake?”
“Sending Series Three units on a manned mission. They went missing. They reported seventy-two hours’ worth of oxygen, not that it matters to the majority of the crew. But they have the answer.”
“If I may add, Maar,” Crain interjected. “The whole idea of using Androgynes on a manned mission to Saturn was to preserve USARIC’s bottom line. A minimal financial outlay.”
“What does that mean?” Nutrene asked.
“Quite simply, it was the cheapest option. All we need to know now is what happened to them. Quickly, and quietly.”
Alex shook his head and took a final look at Pox and Neg, “So you’re sending humans up with the new generation?”
“That’s right.”
“And you want us to kill everything that moves?”
Maar and Crain nodded with a quiet solemnity.
“You leave in four days’ time,” Maar waved the Opera Charlie vector image away from the table, “It’s a three-year round trip. I suggest you put your affairs in order as soon as possible.”
Ten Minutes Later…
The men’s bathroom.
Alex splashed cold water on his face. He squeezed his eyes shut and looked at his face in the mirror. A fine USARIC logo imprint loomed in the bottom right-hand corner.
“You look like hell,” his reflection moved its lips as he spoke. “A year and a half to Saturn and we might not find anything.”
Biddip-biddip…
“Damn it.”
He rolled up his sleeve and looked at his forearm. The Individimedia ink sluiced around and from three blinking dots. He took one last look at his face and thumbed the ink to his wrist.
“This is Alex.”
“It’s me,” the voice of a woman came through the pricks in his wrist, “Are you alone?”
“I’m in the bathroom.”
“How did the briefing go?”
“Yeah, it went fine,” Alex turned to the stalls. Two of the five were locked but
he knew he was alone, “Listen, I can’t talk right now. I’m still with the crew.”
“You’re definitely on, though? Right?”
“Yes, I’m on—”
CLUNK.
The door to the bathroom opened. Oxade walked up to the floating urinal concourse in the middle of the room.
“Hey, good buddy,” he said to Alex. “All set?”
“Yeah, amaziant, thanks,” Alex pressed his right palm over his left wrist. A muffled question from the woman warbled through his fingers.
“Who you talking to, there?”
“Oh, you know,” Alex fake-smirked and made his way over to the hand drier, “Women trouble. She’s always calling.”
“Ha. Tell me about it,” Oxade unzipped his front and proceeded to relieve himself, “Seems you have an admirer. Nutrene’s got the hots for you.”
“Has she?”
“Don’t act like you haven’t not noticed.”
“Hmm,” Alex turned to the drier. A bead of sweat formed across his brow and rolled down the side of his face. He spread the pinpricks on his wrist and dipped his left hand into the drier. He couldn’t afford Oxade to overhear his call…
Interstate 45
North Texas Border
Grace had the face of an angel. Her long, flowing brunette hair raced down the back of her combat fatigues.
She pushed her finger against her ear and tried to keep herself steady in the passenger seat of the 4x4 as it raced along the uneven ground.
“Siyam, please,” she said to the driver. “Can you at least try to keep us steady?”
“I am, I am,” Siyam, the African-American driver, said. He focused on his rear view mirror. “You want us to get pulled over?”
“Sorry, Alex,” she returned to the cables streaking out from her wrist, “I didn’t hear what you said. Can you say again—”
SWWIIISSSHHHHHHHHH!
A deafening, prolonged thunder rocketed through her ears. The frequency forced her to snap the earpiece from her head and fling it to her lap.
“Jesus Christ!” she screamed. “What’s that noise?”
Siyam threw Grace a look of anger as he stepped on the gas, “What’s up with him?”
“He said he was in the bathroom, and then this—Ah, my ears feel like they’re bleeding,” she fumbled for the device and pulled the wire from her wrist.
“Maybe he can’t talk?” Siyam said. “If he says he can’t talk, then he can’t talk.”
“No, I need to know he’s okay. I need to know the mission is on,” she slung the earpiece against her head and spoke into her wrist. “Alex? This is Grace. Do you read me?”
“Yes—” his voice chimed in to a static rumble, “Everything went well, but I can’t talk right now.”
“Did you pass the training? Please tell me you passed at least.”
“Yes, I did,” Alex snapped and hushed his voice, “Where are you?”
Grace looked over her shoulder and watched the border control center disappear from view, “We’ve just passed border control. About five miles from Corsicana.”
“What happened?”
“Oh, the usual,” Grace said, “Those Nazis at border control practically performed a cavity search on Siyam.”
“That figures. Racist scumbags,” Alex snorted through her earpiece, “Any news on where the subjects are headed?”
Grace grabbed Siyam’s left arm and ran her fingers over the ink.
“Hey, what are you—”
“—Shut up for a minute and keep your eyes on the road. I need to look at something.”
She held his arm up and looked at the white ink break apart into thirty separate dots.
“Ten miles south-southwest,” Grace said.
The screen on the dashboard of the 4x4 showed thirty flashing dots swarming toward a dotted line, “We know from Moses’ absorption effort in the compound that they’re chipped. We have their locations on screen.”
“Okay.”
“I just hope we can find them in time. Alive, ideally.”
“Be careful when you get there. USARIC have reprogrammed them. You don’t know how they’ll react.”
Alex pushed through the USARIC reception area and headed for the entrance. An iron bust of Dimitry Vasilov took center stage in the middle of the area.
He glanced at it as he walked into the bright, clear sunshine. The warmth of the sun rays calmed him down despite the noise coming from the launching jets on the airstrip.
“I can’t believe this is where Denny took the shot.”
“Are you there right now?” Grace asked.
“Yes.”
“I made contact with the kid. Jamie.”
“Oh, really?” Alex seemed surprised, “You found him?”
“Yeah, there must be a million Jamie Andersons on Viddy Media. Struck gold on the hundred and twentieth one. You’d have thought those Brits—”
“—Did he confirm Anderson’s involvement with Opera Beta?”
“Yes, he did.”
“Good,” Alex said with relief, “that tallies with what I heard at the briefing. Both ends covered. That’s better than substantiated fact, now.”
“Anderson took Bisoubisou’s place. She’s up there with them.”
“I knew it,” Alex punched the air with excitement. A gaggle of USARIC officials on their smoke break looked over at him in bemusement, “Good work, Grace. That’s exactly what we thought.”
“I know, right? If Beta’s report is correct, then Jelly is the one who decoded Saturn Cry. They’re in receipt of the answer. We just have to hope they’re alive.”
Alex turned away from the spluttering officials and caught the magnificent Space Opera Charlie spacecraft standing proud within its scaffolding in the horizon.
“Five more days, Alex,” she whispered from his wrist.
“You got that right.”
He took in the sheer enormity of the spacecraft standing in the distance, “Five more days…”
CHAPTER NINE
The Control Deck
Space Opera Beta - Level One
Space Opera Beta hung in the vacuum of space surrounded by zillions of tiny, bright stars. A bright and vibrant Enceladus drifted behind it. The last of its pink light blossomed against the universe’s canvas and swallowed in on itself.
Nothing left. The universe was serene.
Saturn’s surface took up the majority of the view through the windshield by the flight deck, appearing to oversee the vessel like a maternal juggernaut. Her rings no longer revolved.
The communications panel lay dormant, a giant husk of its former self. The emergency strip lights across the ground provided the only indication of life or action aboard the spacecraft.
The communications console rumbled to life. Its light snapped on. The processor fired up as if it was struggling to awaken from a deathly slumber.
WHIRRR-POP.
A shower of orange sparks blew out from the mainframe. Four sides of a rectangle fizzed a few inches away from it. Its outline stormed through the air and produced a full hologram of a book.
Manuel had awoken.
“Oh, my,” he fluttered around and wrestled with the pages between his covers.
FRII-II-ITT.
The sheets shuffled together like a deck of playing cards. He slapped his covers together and fanned every page out like an extended accordion.
“Ah, that’s better.”
He shifted around to the communications panel, “Ooh, we’ve left Pink Symphony, I’m happy to report.”
The holographic tome opened out and cast a beam of green data light at the communications panel.
Each circuit within the mainframe whirred as they fired up.
“This is Manuel. Autopilot of Space Opera Beta. Open communication channels, ports one through one-zero-fifteen.”
The screen on the panel snapped to life.
“Assess current location.”
A slew of white text ran up the screen.
�
��Feeling better, I see.”
BEEP.
The screen displayed its update:
USARIC S.O.B. SIT-REP_
Date: September 1st, 2122
Location: Enceladus (orbit)
Engine & Payload: Operational
Thrusters (Auto & Manual): Operational
Communication channels: Open
Distance to Earth (miles): 750m
Communication incoming_
“I see you’ve survived whatever happened to us. I thought we’d never see each other again,” Manuel shut his beam off and fluttered up against the screen, “Twenty-one-twenty-two? Did we really skip three years? Feels like it was just yesterday. I guess to us it was, actually. Hmm.”
He folded the edge of one of his pages and brushed over the last entry, “Communication incoming? Run banked communications.”
The text bled out into a white flat line. A mountainous waveform sprawled across the screen from the right-hand side.
Static blew from the speakers as the flat line wriggled around. It curved up as Oxade’s voice spoke.
“This is Captain Oxade Weller of the rescue vessel Space Opera Charlie. Do you read me?”
Manuel flipped over two pages and copied the waveform across the blank slate, “Keep playing.”
“I repeat, this is Captain Oxade Weller of USARIC’s Space Opera Charlie rescue program. Contacting Opera Beta on a frequency of zero, five, four, niner. Does anyone read me?”
Manuel slapped his pages together with applause.
“Oh, my. We’re going to be rescued,” he pressed his pages back and transmitted a beam back to the panel.
“Speech-to-text.”
As Manuel spoke, the panel transcribed his message in white text, “This is The Manuel, autopilot of Space Opera Beta. Can confirm connection. Crew are in hyper-sleep. Oxygen conservation in process. Ess-oh-ess. Please confirm bridging instructions. Send.”
The text appeared on the screen and then vanished.
“Thank God. How very thoughtful. Good old USARIC, sending a ship to come and take us home.”
Hyper-Sleep Arena
Space Opera Beta
The five occupied hyper-sleep pods buzzed to life. Their transparent plastic panels slid open one by one.
Star Cat: War Mage Page 11