by Scott Rhine
The Moving Finger docked with the Sikorsky and Omar prepared to send the warning to the Fleet when Bella placed her hand on his. Zane watched as he looked up at her, pain in his eyes.
“Are we really going to help the Fleet destroy another world?” She whispered.
“The alternative is death, yours, mine and hers.”
“Is this what she would want?”
“She isn’t here. This is a decision I have to make. I’m choosing the lives of my crew and hers over a world of strangers. Damn me to hell, I’m going to choose to save the ones I love.” Omar prepared to send the message which would cause the Fleet to flee the system.
“Easy now. There is no reason to get so emotional about this.” Price said, sliding into the cockpit without invitation.
“Not get emotional? Those are your people that are going to die out there.”
“That assumes that you will be able to get your message out and that your Fleet will ever leave this system.”
“What are you saying?” Bella asked. Zane realized he already knew what the man meant, his instincts screaming out that this man was the enemy.
“I’m saying that I now have control of this ship and through it will have control of the Fleet in moments. So there is no reason for you to concern yourself with the morality of your actions as you will be doing nothing. We will die here but my people will live on.”
Zane eyed his rifle, which sat a meter away. The man seemed unarmed but his instincts warned him against using such a high tech weapon. These people seemed capable of using any technology to their benefit and if Franklin was correct needed nothing more than their minds to do so. Instead, he improvised. Zane winked at Franklin and nodded toward the rifle.
Franklin launched himself at the rifle, making noise as he moved. Price’s attention turned to the small man and he sneered at the rifle in contempt. His smile froze as Zane hit him from behind, knife in hand. Knives are messy weapons in zero gee and this one was no exception. Zane grabbed the man’s head and sliced through his neck expertly. Blood sprayed in a slow moving arc through the cockpit. Zane held the man’s head back as his lifeblood flowed out. Omar’s hair shot outward from his skull and dug into the ship’s systems. The dark man turned to Zane, his eyes wild with data searching.
“He’s not dead yet. The bastard’s still in the system!” Omar screamed. Zane drove the knife into the man’s eye, pushing with enough force to tear through the man’s brain and twisted the handle down with a ferocious yell. Price’s eyes rolled back and the body went limp.
Zane twisted the knife around in the dead man’s head again, just to be sure, before pushing the corpse away from the cockpit into the corridor. Franklin turned the filtration systems into emergency mode and the blood began to move into the ducts, clearing the air.
“Damn it!” Omar said. “We’re too late. He managed to lock down the Fleet. I’ve got chatter all over about systems being down. We’re dead in space.”
“Not if I have anything to say about it.” Franklin said. “Pulan, get that body to the medbay. Between us we can figure out how he did his little tricks.”
“Even if you can, it doesn’t mean you can do anything about it.” Bella said.
“If the alternative is dying here, I’m going to do what I can.” Zane helped Pulan get the body into the medbay and then got out of the way. Minutes felt like hours as the rest of the crew floated aimlessly in the corridor as the two resident geniuses worked. Zane tried to eavesdrop but most of what they were saying sounded like gibberish until he heard Franklin snap at Pulan.
“Just do it! I know what the odds are.” A minute later, Pulan appeared at the hatch. Zane thought the creature was incapable of showing human emotion but he thought it looked upset. His atomo moved sluggishly and their colors were muted.
“Bella, I am sorry. It was his decision to take the risk.”
“What risk?” She replied, her voice cracking.
“We were able to determine that nanoparticles of material pervaded the body and were attached to his brain in a variety of ways. Franklin believes that it is these particles that Price used to disable the Fleet. He also believes that he may be able to gain control temporarily by injecting a portion of the material directly into his frontal lobes. We believe it more likely he will die in the attempt. However, it was the only solution which gives us a chance at escape before the star’s mass ejection wipes out the Fleet. We should say that even if he is successful there is little chance he will survive the procedure.”
Bella’s face froze and after a long moment she began to nod slowly. “Third time’s the charm.” She murmured to herself.
Zane felt numb at the thought of Franklin’s death. The potential loss affected him more than any of the myriad deaths he had been a party to in his short life. He realized with a start that he had known Franklin longer than any other being alive. The two men had not always gotten on well but he had come to expect that the little man would always be there. He waited impatiently outside the medbay while Bella was inside.
After what seemed like an eternity, Bella opened the hatch. She held Franklin in one oversized arm, cradling his body as one might a child. Zane had once thought their size difference comical but now, seeing her anguish, he repented his earlier opinion. There was nothing funny about how she held him. Zane found hope when he saw the man’s eyes open and focus on him.
“No, my friend.” Franklin’s voice was barely audible. “I will not recover from this. I have only managed to slow the progress of the nanocytes. I hope I have enough strength left to reverse what Price has done to the Fleet.”
Zane led Bella to the cockpit of the small ship. Omar sat in the pilot’s chair, his hair vibrating as he attempted to regain control of the ship. When he sensed their approach he stopped and moved out of the way. Bella placed Franklin at the console. Franklin leaned forward and placed his hands on the console lightly and closed his eyes. Zane worried that the man was losing consciousness again. He could see the man’s lips moving and his brow furrowed.
All at once, the wall lit up as displays began to flash across it. Zane watched in amazement as dozens of screens of data scrolled and pulsed with light as though alive. The pace seemed to intensify for a moment and then all went dark except for a single message file displayed on the screen.
Hovering on the wall was this message: Fleet control restored. Estimate twenty three minutes remaining before stellar collapse will reach this distance. Local ships inbound to act against the Fleet. Due in twelve minutes. They will be able to lock the Fleet down remotely again in three minutes. I have sent the location of a nearby system to the Fleet captains in order to coordinate a retreat.
Zane turned back to Franklin after reading the message and found the man unconscious once more. He helped Bella return him to the medbay while Omar called the Sikorsky to recommend they take Franklin’s advice and leave before the local ships arrived.
Franklin remained unconscious for several hours, long after the Fleet had escaped Unity. Zane waited in the medbay with Bella. He wanted to offer Bella some condolence but his experience had not prepared him for the grief she wore so visibly. In the end he simply sat and waited.
Omar sat in the cockpit arguing with the few Fleet captains attached to the Sikorsky. They would be out of contact with the rest of the Fleet until the rendezvous as each ship had fled as soon as it was able. Zane couldn’t hear much except occasionally when the man’s voice rose but he gathered that some blamed him for the near disaster. In the end, he too left the cockpit and sat with the rest of the crew.
When Franklin finally stirred a wave of relief spread throughout the room. The man seemed more alert than before and was able to sit up. He had a strange glassy look in his eyes but seemed otherwise ok to Zane.
“I have managed a sort of truce with the nanocytes.” He said.
“Nanocytes?” Omar asked.
“As we previously noted, the corpse is riddled with machines. The term may be loosely applied h
ere though given their complexity and size the appellation micro might be more apt.” Pulan said.
“It’s more complex than that.” Franklin said. They are more like an artificial symbiote though for me they are proving parasitic in nature. Even now they are co-opting my system in an attempt to recreate their full network. There are thousands of different templates coded into them, much like DNA codes for our organs.”
“Can’t you control them?” Bella asked. Franklin frowned at the question.
“Yes and no. I have been able to access the top level functions, much like their version of frontal lobes but I can’t control their autonomous functions. It’s a little like breathing. I can make them hold their breath but eventually I have to give in. I have been able to prioritize their actions toward my extremities, where they will reengineer my limbs. This will slow their progress in my brain. In the end though, they will return to altering my brain which will kill me.”
“Why?” Bella asked. “They didn’t kill Price or anyone else from that world.”
“The people of that world are given the nanocytes very young, when the brain is more malleable. This inherent plasticity lessens the older one is. An adult brain is unable to adapt or accept the changes needed to access the nanocytes completely. My extremities will also suffer but there is less likelihood of the changes there being fatal.”
“But you’re young, aren’t you? I mean, you are physically mature but your brain is only a few years old. Won’t that make a difference?” Zane asked.
“That fact is probably why I am not dead already. We were grown to full size quite rapidly and our brains imprinted with information. This has left our brains less vulnerable than Omar or Bella but our brains are still mature organs. I’ve had the time to run many simulations and the result is always the same. I will die, likely within a week.”
“How could you run simulations? You’ve been unconscious the whole time.” Omar asked.
“My body was not capable of movement but my mind remained active. I was able to utilize the processing power of the nanocytes and through them the ship’s mainframe. I’ve learned more in the few hours I’ve been asleep than in all the years of my life.” The small man smirked and continued, “I’ve also read your mail, Omar. Who would have thought you had words in you that could melt an iceberg like that one?” Zane watched Omar’s face flicker from confusion to anger. Then the captain laughed, a deep rumbling laugh accompanied by a rueful shake of his head.
“You’re dying and take the time to tell jokes. Is there any way we can help? Could an EMP knock these things out of commission? They are machines after all.”
“Some of them would shut down yes, but these aren’t machines in the classical sense. Many utilize organic systems as complex as our own. In a sense they are as alive as I am. When outside of a living system they will quickly become dormant but don’t die as our cells would. They are made to work within a human body and utilize ATP, sugars and fats as their power sources, though much more efficiently than we do. Some are also capable of utilizing raw electrical fields as well. They are really quite amazing.”
“I can’t believe you’re so calm about all of this.” Bella said. “These things are killing you. It almost seems like you don’t even care.”
“Please Bella, I had time to adjust while unconscious. Don’t think I am not aware of the costs. I am simply fascinated by this level of technology. I also want to use the time I have left constructively. Spending it wallowing in self pity seems like a waste.”
“Excuse me if I don’t take your impending death as well as you do.”
“Bella,” Franklin began, placing his hand on hers. “I am so sorry. I forget that you aren’t a soldier like Zane and I. For us death is a fact, an inevitability. If the Fleet had never come to our world I likely would have died a dozen times over by now. Our lifespans were measured in months, not years. Every day with you has been a treasure and a gift. If my fate has finally caught up with me, as least I had a chance to love you.” Bella embraced Franklin, her massive arms almost hiding the man from Zane’s sight.
Zane watched the two lovers embrace for a long moment before backing quietly out of the room. For the next few days he stayed on the Sikorsky in his quarters there. Franklin was quarantined on the Moving Finger by order of the Sikorsky’s captain. Zane also avoided contact with Bella and Omar. He had no words to give Bella but it was Omar’s gaze that he wanted to avoid more. The man had a way of challenging him without a word and in this case he knew he would fail.
Zane confronted himself with the fact that he felt nothing. Whatever was in Franklin’s makeup that allowed him to love had not been included in his design. In truth, Zane knew that he was the true alien on the ship, more so than Pulan. Even that creature felt the same emotions as the others. Never had Zane felt so out of place as he did during this time of grief. When Franklin sent for him, Zane nearly didn’t go. He had no desire to watch the man die.
Upon entering the medbay, Zane was mildly surprised by the changes that had come over his long time companion. Franklin’s limbs were streaked with silver lines which branched like lightning strikes. His fingers had curled up into rough claws and his extremities were pulled in as though the tendons had grown too short. Franklin’s eyes, too, were streaked with silver and black but the retained their decisive focus.
“Come in Zane.” Franklin’s voice sounded distorted, an almost electric whine to its pitch.
“How are you?” Zane asked.
“Too busy dying to answer stupid questions. And don’t bother with false words of concern. F class are/were intelligence experts. I know more about your brain chemistry than anyone within a hundred light years. Z class are designed to lead men to their deaths. You aren’t designed to form emotional bonds with others or mourn their loss.”
“So why ask me to come here?”
“Because I’m not like you.” Franklin replied, a half smile crossing his face. “Zane, you are the closest thing I have left to a friend in this universe. It pains me to know how much you will miss out on in life. Your design will forever make it hard for you to relate to others. I can’t change that design and don’t know if I would if I could. I don’t know that something intrinsic about you would be lost in the attempt. I would like to offer you something that might help you in the future though. Will you accept it?”
“I guess so.” Franklin motioned for him to come closer and reached out as best he could with both hands to hold Zane’s head, drawing their foreheads together. “Close your eyes.” He commanded. Zane did as he asked.
Zane felt a slight tingling sensation where their skin touched. In his mind’s eye an image formed, Franklin as he had been, a big smirk on his face. The little man looked around at the void in which he stood and shook his head.
“This is the best you could manage, eh?” Zane didn’t hear the voice with his ears and the words came to him as more of a gestalt, like speaking in a dream. “I guess this is what it looks like in a mind without any imagination. If you don’t mind I’ll spruce things up a bit.” The void around the little man swam with color and then he sat in a quiet bar, sipping a drink.
“What did you just do?” Zane said, his alarm rising.
“I just infected your head with nanocytes.” Franklin replied. “Not to worry though. These have been tailor made. They will not reproduce and kill you like the ones I got stuck with.”
“Why would you do that?”
The little man shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. Listen Zane, you’re going to have a tough time of it without me looking after you. This implant is going to be our little secret. It contains a poor man’s version of me. It doesn’t have my genius or skills but it might be able to help you see things you might miss otherwise. Just don’t tell Bella.”
“Why not? If anyone should have a piece of you, it should be her, not me.”
“If this copy were anything more than a shadow, maybe. It’s not though. If I put myself in her mind it woul
d tie her to me forever. She should be able to love again in a way she could not if she has an old lover setting up shop in her brain. If she knew that I could even do this much though, she would demand it. So it’s just between us, ok? Promise me.”
“Very well. So you’re going to be a voice in my head from now on?”
“Nothing so intrusive. The program isn’t that good anyway. It’ll just watch out for you, nudge you in the right direction. You can always ignore it. I’ve even built in a code you can use to disable it completely. That way if it becomes a bother you can dump it.”
“I won’t do that. This is going to be the last bit of you that exists.”
“You might. I’m pretty obnoxious at the best of times. Omar is about to come in so you better open your eyes now. Our secret, remember.” The image faded out.
Franklin’s prediction was correct as Omar entered the room a moment later. The dark man looked worn down. When Omar turned to Zane the soldier could feel the inevitable question in his captain’s eyes. Still not having an answer to that question, Zane averted his own and turned back to Franklin. The little man seemed frailer than ever, as though their exchange had tired him.
“Omar,” Franklin turned to the captain. “I don’t think I’ll be able to finish that task you requested. If Captain Kharzin had let me interface with the Sikorsky’s computers I might have had the processing power to get you the answers you need. The Finger’s systems just aren’t powerful enough given the time I have left.”
“It’s ok Franklin. It was a long shot at best.” Omar replied. “You just rest now.”
“That won’t help anything at this point. I’ll tell you what I have gathered from examining the data though. I don’t think we were responsible for that stellar collapse. There were data relics left over in this stuff when I took it from Price, pieces of his memory. Four ships were sent out within hours of our arrival in their system. That’s more than they usually launched in a month. Each was dispatched on short notice to a system far outside their normal operating range, in different quadrants of space. I think it was those subsequent launches that caused the collapse.”