Voidstalker

by John Graham

  “RESTORED.” Boomed the observer’s voice.

  “Are your systems back online?” Viker asked.

  “Correct.” The observer replied, “That is what the word ‘restored’ means.”

  “Fricking smug xeno-computer,” Viker muttered in annoyance.

  “I’m sure it didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, Viker.” Bale joked.

  “The observer finds your propensity for private communication amongst yourselves most curious.” The observer observed without actually sounding curious at all.

  “We need you to put up those barriers before the Faithful can get in!” Gabriel shouted.

  “Unnecessary.” The observer replied, “The Enthralled’s pursuit attempts have left them concentrated around the chamber from which you arrived, at the exact opposite end of the observatory from your current location. Even if they knew your location, it would require a considerable amount of time to reach you.”

  “What about the Swarm,” Cato asked, “can it reach us via the same path?”

  “No.” the observer reassured them, “the observer sealed the entrance to the gravitic transport network as soon as the voidstalker embarked. It cannot follow.”

  “Good, so the sooner we get to the other four chambers, the better.”

  “Correct.” The observer confirmed, “It would be most efficient for the four of you to split up, one individual per chamber.”

  The squad collectively flinched.

  “No fricking way we’re splitting up.” Viker said over the comm.

  “If you harbour reservations, voice them aloud.” The observer demanded.

  “We’re not splitting up.” Gabriel replied.

  “Clarify your reasoning.” The observer commanded.

  “Four guns are better than one in a firefight.” Gabriel explained, “We’re not dividing our strength just to save time on the task.”

  “The voidstalker wishes to prioritise the concentration of meagre firepower over time-efficient completion of the task at hand?” the observer enquired.

  “Correct.” Gabriel answered emphatically, “I don’t care if it takes us four times as long to get you back online; we’re not splitting up.”

  There was a moment of silence.

  “Understood.” The observer noted.

  The glowing circuitry on the newly restored central column went black, and the column receded back into the ceiling, reopening the entrance to the gravitic transport network.

  “Please enter the gravitic tunnel,” the observer requested, “the observer will transport you to one of the remaining four chambers.”

  “You know the drill!” Gabriel said.

  * * *

  It was a relatively brief ride on the train back home, but it felt like forever. Aster spent the entire journey feeling totally crushed. There were no goodbyes or reassuring explanations for why she was being suspended – her colleagues and subordinates would be informed of her ‘period of leave’ by email – just the deauthorisation of her security clearance, the collection of her smartphone from storage, and an elevator ride down to the station.

  If she hadn’t broken into Lawrence’s office and snooped around in the first place, none of this would have happened. No red chip. No blackmail. No cloak-and-dagger scheming. No cloud of suspicion hanging over her head. No potentially career-ending suspension. The events of the past day or so were ultimately her fault.

  By the time she got to the apartment door, she was fighting back tears.

  The biometric sensor flash-scanned her teary eyes and Aster hurried inside, slamming the door shut behind her. She ignored the maganiel android standing guard in the hallway and headed straight for the master bedroom, closing the door behind her more gently this time before flopping down on the bed in despair.

  It felt useless to cry about what had happened, let alone wallow in self-pity over a partly self-inflicted predicament. She’d only been suspended from work, after all; and unlike the poor souls at the Loki facility, she was still alive.

  Rolling over to stare at the ceiling, Aster felt the tears roll down past her ears. She couldn’t help but wallow in self-pity; self-pity was all she could manage right now. Having unearthed more questions than answers, her stupid hunt for the truth was now effectively over. That ought to be a huge relief, but it wasn’t.

  There was a little knock on the door.

  “…Yes?” Aster called, hastily composing herself.

  The door opened a crack and Orion peeked in, his younger siblings visible behind him.

  “Hey, sweethearts.” Aster smiled at them, hoping her eyes didn’t look too red.

  “Hi mommy.” Orion replied with a weak smile, he could see his mother’s teary eyes.

  “Come in, sit down.” Aster beckoned them to come inside.

  Orion opened the door a little wider and walked in clutching his tablet computer, followed by Rose and Violet. Together they climbed onto the bed and sat down.

  “Leo’s still sleeping.” Violet said.

  “That’s ok, let him sleep.” Aster replied, “So what did you learn today?”

  “Ionic and covalent bonds in chemistry, algebraic long division, and how to construct while loops in a program.” Orion replied, playing with his tablet computer.

  “Are you understanding it ok?” Aster asked her oldest child.

  “Mostly.” He replied.

  “We also had an essay on the history of space exploration.” Rose added.

  “I’m sure you did great.” Aster reassured them with a hug.

  “How was your day, mommy?” Violet asked.

  “Tough.” She replied, a gross understatement, but truthful enough.

  “Are we going to see Grandma again?” Orion asked.

  “Not any time soon.” Aster replied, “Why?”

  “You don’t seem to like her very much.” He noted astutely.

  “What makes you think that?” Aster asked, embarrassed that her children had noticed. Orion went silent and started staring at his feet.

  “Nothing.” He said sheepishly.

  “Ori recorded you talking.” Rose blurted out. Orion flinched in embarrassment and jabbed his sister’s shoulder in retaliation.

  “Hey! Don’t do that your sister.” Aster remonstrated.

  “But she told on me!” Orion protested.

  “But it’s true!” Rose counter-protested.

  “Apologise to your sister, now!” Aster snapped.

  “…Sorry.” Orion mumbled half-heartedly.

  “Now what’s this about a recording?” Aster asked, her curiosity piqued.

  Orion frowned self-consciously; then with great reluctance, he pulled up an audio file on his tablet and pressed the play button.

  “…By asking me here, you’re guilty of conspiracy to commit corporate espionage.” Aster’s own voice played over the speaker.

  “And by coming, you’re officially complicit.” Grandma Jezebel’s voice played in response, “unless, of course, the real reason – the one you’d like me to corroborate if the investigators ask – is that you simply came to–”

  Orion paused the recording, embarrassed that his snooping had been found out. Aster was stunned. Not by the recording itself, but by what a stroke of luck this was.

  “How much of my conversation with Grandma did you record?” she asked Orion.

  “All of it,” Orion replied sheepishly, “from when you walked in to when we got in the taxi. If you want, I can delete it–”

  “No! Don’t do that. Actually, could mommy borrow your tablet for just a minute?”

  Orion nodded and handed over his tablet. Aster went over to the armoured closet where the maganiel was usually kept, and the children quietly left to give her some privacy.

  Aster slid her thumb across the access pad. The light went from red to green and the doors of the maganiel’s armoured closet opened. The maganiel was still standing guard in the hallway, but there was a little side compartment next to its alcove containing an electronic screen a
nd a communications box. It was labelled: “EMERGENCY USE ONLY”.

  “Pretty sure this qualifies.” Aster muttered as she activated the device.

  “Please state your emergency.” The box demanded.

  “Someone attempted to blackmail me into committing corporate espionage, potentially involving xenotechnology.” Aster replied to the box.

  “Do you have evidence for that?”

  Aster placed Orion’s tablet on top of the comm. box’s interface pad, established a wireless connection, and uploaded the audio file.

  “File received,” the box replied, “standby.”

  Aster heaved a sigh, though not of relief. She had now ratted on Jezebel Thorn and indirectly ratted on her bosses, thereby officially violating her employment contract. She would never have dared to do so without proof, which had been the whole point of trying to pull that bait-and-switch with the data chips in the first place. Now that it was done, she had to trust that the DNI would believe what they heard on the file.

  Still, there was something tremendously satisfying about sticking it to her sleazy bitch of a mother-in-law. The kind of woman who would use members of her own family, including her own grandchildren, to further her own goals. Perhaps that shouldn’t be surprising for a vulture capitalist who’d gone into business after being mysteriously widowed.

  * * *

  The sudden change in gravity and the sensation of having one’s guts yanked downwards were no less disorienting the second time around. The walls became a high speed blur and the roaring of the air in the gravitic tunnel was reduced to an imperceptible din as the auditory sensors filtered out the otherwise deafening noise.

  Gabriel hugged his weapon close and kept his feet together as he hurtled along the tunnel at breakneck speeds before veering suddenly to one side. The tunnel was uncomfortably narrow, wide enough for two or three people to stand shoulder-to-shoulder, but narrow enough to worry about hitting the side at such speeds.

  A light appeared at the end of the tunnel and in a split second it rushed up to meet Gabriel. He re-emerged, just like before, on the ceiling of another hemispherical chamber. The sudden deceleration yanking his innards upwards as the gravity field dramatically slowed his descent, landing him squarely on his feet.

  Standing upside down on the ceiling, the retracted column beneath Gabriel’s feet protruded from its slot again to reseal the tunnel entrance. Gabriel jumped to one side to avoid being pushed back into the tunnel, and the change in gravity carried him down to the floor. This time, he was able to twist his body in mid-air and land squarely on his feet again.

  Gabriel looked around the chamber with his weapon at the ready, scanning for threats. But there were no targets to be seen; in fact, he was the only person present. Viker, Cato, and Bale had all jumped into the gravitic tunnel before him and should be here already. So why weren’t they here?

  “Squad, sound off!” Gabriel ordered them.

  There was no response. In fact, his squad members’ comm. signals weren’t showing up in his HUD at all, and neither were their tracking signals or bio-readings. It was as if the three of them had completely vanished.

  “Viker! Bale! Cato!” Gabriel shouted, “Someone, respond!”

  Silence.

  Gabriel felt a surge of anger in his chest. They had been tricked; he wanted to shout and rage at the observer for its duplicity in splitting them up and still expecting them to help restore the columns. And for what? It wasn’t even clear why the observer needed them restored.

  As logic began to encroach on his anger, Gabriel acknowledged that, whatever the truth of the matter, the observer couldn’t – or wouldn’t – respond until the blocks were restored to their appropriate sockets. Once they were, he could demand answers.

  Gabriel looked around the chamber and found that he was in a makeshift armoury. Racks of armour and weapons lined the walls as well as jump-packs, spare gravity belts, and all manner of other military-grade equipment, most of it non-standard.

  More interestingly, the chamber was dominated by a 3-D fabrication module that towered over everything else. 3-D fabricators were very difficult to design or build from scratch, and those capable of manufacturing weapons were illegal. For all their insanity and barbaric experimentation, Gabriel couldn’t help but be impressed by this enemy’s resourcefulness, even if that ‘resourcefulness’ had come from knowledge imparted by the Swarm.

  There was also a large, semi-automated workbench with a half-assembled submachine gun and its components lying discarded on top. Stacked to one side were a pair of black oblong blocks, the very items for which he was searching. Gabriel stowed his weapon and picked up the two blocks, one in each hand.

  His motion tracker flashed red.

  Without thinking, Gabriel dropped the blocks and drew his weapon again as he spun around to face the threat, just in time to squeeze off a few rounds. The target’s shielding rippled and flashed as it slapped aside the few bullets that he managed to fire; then she extended a hand in a ‘stop’ gesture, causing a circular pattern on her palm to light up.

  Gabriel felt an invisible force grab him and hoist him into the air, yanking his limbs out into an X shape. He was helpless. His shielding was still active, but the force holding him in mid-air felt far more intense than the gravitic tunnel, like being restrained by a dozen invisible hands. He still had his gun, but it felt far too heavy to move.

  Gabriel had seen this kind of technology before, but it was often too large for a single user to carry. That the Faithful had managed to shrink the technology down to the size of a glove was genuinely impressive. Not that being impressed helped him much.

  His captor was a lithe female figure in a jet black suit of combat armour with a bulbous black helmet and a featureless visor. She looked like the mysterious figure who had opened up the door to the labs for them earlier; the one the squad had decided to designate as the ‘black widow’ – it might even be the same person.

  She curled her fingers, and Gabriel felt the gravitic force pull him in until he was face-to-face with his captor. Holding him in place directly above her with one hand, she slid her free hand across the side of her helmet, causing the visor to retract and reveal her face.

  Her face was Human, devoid of androgenising cybernetics or other modifications. Her skin had a living hue without the corpselike complexion of the monsters in the Faithful’s ranks. Her eyes were icy blue and her hair was raven black. She was disarmingly attractive, a strange observation to make about a lethal foe. Black widow was the right designation.

  “Why are you trying to restore the Temple?” the black widow asked.

  “It’s not a temple.” Gabriel pointed out dryly, talking through his helmet speakers.

  The black widow smiled – or was it a snarl?

  “The only way of knowing about the totems and the keys is through enlightenment by the Voice,” the black widow looked at him with an icy stare, “But you haven’t been enlightened, so why are you attempting to restore the Swarm’s prison?”

  “I like puzzle games.” Gabriel answered sarcastically.

  The black widow used her gravity glove to pull Gabriel in even closer until they were almost close enough to kiss. Those piercing blue eyes seemed to stare straight through his visor and into his own, and part of him couldn't help but stare back.

  Gabriel felt a strange ripple of emotion run through his chest.

  “I’ll kill you if you don’t answer.” The black widow said in a gentle tone.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Gabriel replied.

  The black widow thrust her hand back out again, and the action threw Gabriel violently upwards. He hit the ceiling with such force that it triggered his shielding, and the resulting repulsion sent him into an awkward spin on the way back down. The black widow’s control over him was broken, and in mid-fall he hit the activation button on his gravity belt.

  The chamber was actually oriented sideways relative to the moon, and so the moon’s gravity caused him
to dramatically change direction in mid-fall by 90 degrees, causing him to land on what was technically the wall.

  Gabriel landed on his back and opened fire, but the black widow had resealed her helmet and her shields easily swatted his bullets aside. How could a figure that thin have shields that powerful? Thanks to his belt, Gabriel was safe from her gravity glove, but he would need a different weapon to kill her.

  But the black widow didn’t give him time to re-arm. She swerved and danced as he continued shooting, as if pure agility were enough to defy his bullets. As she bolted back and forth with preternatural speed, she drew a tactical baton from behind her waist, flicking a switch which caused the tip to glow electric blue.

  Defying the chamber’s topsy-turvy gravity, the black widow then used the gravity glove on her free hand to boost herself off the floor and land on the ceiling opposite Gabriel, then propel herself back down again in order to land on top of him.

  Gabriel switched to concussive shots and fired at his airborne opponent, but his shots barely slowed her descent as she extended the glowing tip of the baton towards him like a lance. Gabriel slid to one side to avoid her as she fell, but was too slow to avoid the baton.

  The tip brushed Gabriel’s foot, sending a bolt of electricity surging through his armour. The energy-absorbent layers redirected the power surge across the suit’s systems and sent some of it arcing out from his limbs, but it was enough to temporarily short out the exoskeletal motors in his suit. Had it made contact with his flesh, he would have been fried to a crisp.

  Gabriel crumpled to the ground in mid-dive as his suit motors were briefly paralysed. System alarms flashed in his helmet HUD, warning him that his exoskeletal motors were non-responsive, like he couldn’t already tell from the fact that his armour felt ten times heavier.

  Before he could get up, the black widow pounced on top of him and planted her boot on his chest. Standing over him like a dominatrix, she flipped the baton around in her hand and flicked another switch. This time, a long spike emerged from the opposite end of the baton, and she raised it with both hands like a stake, ready to deliver the killing blow.