by Trent Falls
Euler disappeared down the hall. Zao kept his gaze on John for a few moments before turning away and following Euler to the flight deck. The cockpit door sealed behind the two men, leaving Julie and John alone in the cabin.
John’s weight wobbled in his chair, as did Julie’s. The ship had jostled slightly. John knew it was from the docking ring of the mercenary ship detaching from the Russian transport.
Outside, the submarine-shaped vessel pulled away from the white hulled Russian vessel. The merc ship banked away, rocketing off in a surge of power towards the far distant stars.
Inside the Russian transport, Julie found herself staring at her uncle for a while. John remained in silence. He had allowed Julie to see a side of himself that he swore she’d never know. She had some understanding of what he was capable of from seeing what he had done during her rescue, but seeing John interact with Euler and seeing him have a dismissive approach to the life and death of the people they killed was alien. Julie still couldn’t see Uncle John as being that man.
“This is why I didn’t want you to go into space, Jules.” John noted to her indirectly with a disappointed tone. “When I look into your eyes I see those same dreams I had in my head when I was your age.” John took a very deep sad breath. “I didn’t want to see you turn out like me.”
Julie remained silent for a moment. She truly didn’t know what to say. It took her many uncomfortable seconds to think of a response. “There was a war. You did what you had to do to survive.”
“I did what I had to do because I was ordered to. When you’re in the military, you do what you’re ordered to do. You’re trained to kill. You’re trained to do it without thinking of it, like it’s just part of some menial job you do over and over again. And for what? To take some piece of land, some city or beachhead someone thinks is important?”
“You can’t keep doing this to yourself, Uncle John.” Julie protested. “You’re going to drive yourself nuts.”
John chuckled in a few breaths. In a few more he was laughing. “Yeah” John grinned, finally looking up to glance at Julie, “yeah, you’re right. Sometimes the answers are so simple.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to sound mean.” Julie shook her head.
“No, you’re right.” John grinned. “There’s nothing I can do to change the past. That’s what Doctor Jeffries told me. I have to learn to deal with things that I’ve done, come to terms with them no matter how ugly.” John took a deep sniveling breath. In another breath he seemed to return to normal. He was reenergized and alert. He sat up in his chair. “We’re going to have to see this through until the end, Julies. They’ll take us to the planet. They’ll see there’s nothing there and they’ll let us go.”
“You really believe that’s what will happen?” Julie asked skeptically. She was scared.
“Yeah, I think so.” John lied confidently.
Julie was hesitant to ask the question in her head. “Do you think we’ll find the Norn? Do they really exist?”
“No.” John replied with certainty.
“Do you really think that? I mean, you act really differently from one moment to the next when people ask you about them.”
“I don’t know what to think anymore, Jules.” John squinted. He genuinely looked to be unable to recall his own memories. “My head is a jumble of crap. I can’t seem to think straight half the time when people ask me about the Norn.” John opened his eyes and took a moment to look around the cabin. There were about nine rows of chairs, all padded in the same blue fabric as his. “At this point I want to go to the planet myself, if only just to convince myself what’s right.”
John noticed Julie looking around the cabin as well. She seemed to be searching of some means of escape as well. Julie and John were trapped in a tin can, out in the vacuum of deep space, probably several dozen light years from Earth. At that point they were stuck going along for the ride.
“Did you see Alex escape?” John asked Julie.
“No, they hit me and you at about the same time I think.” Julie replied. “I saw Alex looking back at us for a split-second before I passed out. I only know he escaped because I heard those guys talk about it.”
“The guys in black that hit us?”
“Yeah.” Julie answered.
“Well that’s something at least.” John noted aloud.
John sat back in his chair, allowing himself to finally settle in. The chair was by no means luxurious but it wasn’t as uncomfortable as airliners on Earth. Interplanetary vessels, by law couldn’t be excruciatingly uncomfortable. John’s jaw still hurt from being socked by Euler.
“I think we got some time before we get where we’re going.” John settled into his chair as best he could. “You should try and get some sleep.” John’s eyes shut. In a few seconds he was out.
Julie let out a sigh. She wished she could fall asleep as easy. To be unconscious and have the escape of a dream, if only for a few moments, seemed a very welcome idea.
The Russian vessel continued on through space, blasting through into hyperspace towards their destination in the Pegasus constellation.
Chapter 23
The Xen GRV-33 Nomad took a broad path around a massive green gas giant as they charted their way through the HD209458 solar system. The rings around the planet ran at a high angle, almost like Uranus. The pilot of the Nomad could see the rings extend high to his right for as high as he could see. The giant green cloud planet nearly filled his entire field of view at his left. It was awe-inspiring while also terrifying given its proximity. The pilot continuously checked his flight path, making sure his preprogrammed route wasn’t taking him too deep into the gas giant’s gravity well. If they strayed too deep into the well the Nomad might not have the power to escape. They would plummet into the gas giant where they would die within the brutally crushing depths of its thick green clouded atmosphere.
All the same it was an incredible sight. For the pilot it was incredible to think on how he was essentially sitting in a titanium bathtub hundreds of light years from home looking up at a planet twenty times bigger than his own.
The pilot checked his main screen again. Behind him the scanning officer sat looking away behind their recon fighter. The planet was on his right side and occupied a bit less of his field of vision due to the orbit-like flight path of their Nomad. The scanning officer paid little attention to the view. His hands worked quickly over his workstations. A main screen was set in from of him, set at an angle within a glare shroud to keep outside light from obscuring the sensor readings.
“What are we doing out here again?” the pilot asked, looking out the left side of the cockpit towards the massive green gas giant.
“There’s a planet in the system that seems to be obscured.” The sensor officer replied. “The Ao Shun is picking up only ten planets but there seems to be a gap between the third and fourth.”
“Are you sure?” the pilot asked. “It could just be the way the planets formed in this system. Or maybe one broke up.”
“There’s no evidence of any major asteroid belts.” The scanning officer replied. “It’s subtle but my readings seem to suggest there’s a gravitational influence on the fourth planet suggesting something’s inside its orbit.”
“That’s crazy! If there were a missing fourth planet we should be able to detect it.” the pilot noted. “Even if there were such a thing as a cloaking device could you cloak an entire planet? Even if they used scatter-jammers we’d pick up a ton of gamma radiation.”
“I’m not saying it makes sense. I’m just explaining what I’m doing.” The scanning officer noted, his eyes still fixed on his screens. “Zao said we were looking for a breathable planet. Nothing we’ve charted yet fits that description.”
“So you’re using the gas giant to refract the sensor readings?” the pilot noted.
“Very good! I figured the narrow beam spectrometer would be able to break through any jamming if I put the suspected spot of the planet on the other side of the
horizon of this gas giant. Not a bad guess.”
“Give me a break, Nills. I had to take physics too to become a Navy pilot, you know.” The pilot grumbled.
“Yeah, yeah.” Nills smirked.
“So you find anything?” the pilot pressed.
“Nothing yet.” The sensor officer replied. “I know it’s out there, though.”
Julie drew a four of spades. She couldn’t place the card so she set it down and drew again. Nine of hearts. She set the card down on the ten of clubs then the stack moved over a bracket topped by an eight of spades. She drew another card she couldn’t use and set it down on the off-white tray table in front of her.
It was probably her fifteenth game of solitaire. Julie sighed and looked out the ovoid window at her left. Like any starship, the window was comprised of about five different glass lights. The black void beyond was perpetual night. If she focused she could see through the glare to a distant nebulae, glowing with a faint reddish hue against the star-filled black millions of light years away. Even at hyperspeed, they had been traveling for about six hours. It had been so long since Julie had seen the sun. She longed for daylight. As she thought of it further she realized that she really missed Earth. She missed home; the routine of going to school, seeing friends. She missed Boynton Beach. Space had lost its appeal. It was no longer this place she daydreamed about.
Julie sighed. She wanted to go home.
John stirred in a chair a few feet away across the aisle. He had been asleep. He took a deep breath as he awoke. His eyes looked forward blankly. He was grateful for a dreamless sleep. He took another breath and smiled. A dreamless sleep. No nightmares. No horrific reliving of the past. He was grateful to have genuinely gotten decent rest. He figured he would need it for whatever lied ahead.
John’s eyes turned up to look at the Xen soldier standing watch over him. He didn’t seem like a bad guy. He was young, with dark hair typical of Xen Asian ancestry. The young soldier had done nothing to John. The soldier had actually treated them well, attending to their requests in a respectful manner. It was strange. Twenty years ago John would have thrust a knife into the boy’s heart and not have thought anything of it. In his mind, John knew he was still capable of doing that to this new younger soldier. He wouldn’t think twice about it either, especially if it meant protecting Julie, his ward and adoptive daughter.
A part of John hated himself for being so bloodthirsty. It was terrible that he had developed that rage to such a point. He wished he could look on the Xen soldier and see him as just another human, not a man wearing the enemy’s uniform.
“How much further do you think?” Julie asked her uncle indirectly as she set another card down on the tray table.
“I don’t know.” John replied in a low tone. “I don’t know how far out we’re going. This ship doesn’t seem to have the legs for deep space exploration. I don’t know. I could be wrong.”
“What do you think they’re going to do with us?” Julie asked plainly.
John looked over at his niece with some surprise. She didn’t seem worried about her fate. Perhaps she had enough of being terrified to the point that she was numb.
“I don’t know. We’ll probably be seeing this through to the end, I’m guessing.” John said, taking a good look at Julie. “How are you holding up?”
“Okay I guess.” Julie smirked, still involved in her game of solitaire. “You know what I’ve been thinking of?”
John answered with silence, looking at Julie for her to continue.
“I keep thinking of that night you showed up after mom died.” Julie continued with a vacant expression, laying the next card down in her game of solitaire. “Ms. Carol and the social worker did their best to make me feel okay. I remember feeling panicked. I didn’t know what was going to happen. Mom was the center of my world and when she died….”
John silently looked away as the events of that night replayed in his head as well. He remembered how young Julie looked. At eighteen years old she still looked a little like that girl.
“When you showed up, in your uniform, I just knew things would be okay.” Julie continued, still focusing on the cards on her tray table.
“Julie, I…”
John was interrupted by a sudden feeling of deceleration. He grabbed the armrests of his chair instinctively. Julie finally looked up from her cards, which somehow didn’t slide forward despite the feeling she felt of slowing down drastically. She looked about the cabin. The soldier watching them remained standing, though he did reach out to hold one of the stainless grab bars set throughout the cabin.
“We’ve come out of warp.” John noted, looking around the cabin in no particular direction.
Julie gathered up the cards. She looked around the cabin again, then at the soldier before putting the cards away. She suddenly felt a sense of urgency grip her, as though something bad was about to happen.
John could feel the ship. Its handling became looser, almost like a boat on the ocean in extremely faint chop. The subtle movement thinned out to eventually become unnoticeable.
“Where are we do you think?” Julie ventured to ask.
“I don’t know.” John shook his head with genuine uncertainty.
The Glazkov, the Russian spacecraft transporting John and Julie, flew swiftly through the black of space. It was at about half light speed and decelerating fast. Only the inertial inhibitors protected those inside from experiencing the incredible shift in speed. The boxy shaped craft, propelled forward by three wide nozzle shaped thrusters, headed towards a large growing rectangular shape.
The rectangular shape continued growing ahead of the ship until reaching immense scale. It was the Ao Shun, the Xen carrier. The Nanjing was close by cruising behind the massive ship to its port side.
The Glazkov banked as it flew towards the Ao Shun, turning towards the opening in its rectangular nose. The path ahead was a cavernous square deceleration channel, lit brightly in red to allow pilots on approach to see every detail of the landing corridor. The deceleration channel was clear. The Glazkov turned slowly into the channel, cutting its speed even further once inside. A series of successive force fields slowed the craft. The force fields also allowed the internal hangar environment to be maintained. A huge door slid back on the left side of the approaching ship. The hangar bay beyond the door was lit in a bright white light that cut through the red of the approach tunnel.
The Glazkov slowed to 60 kph in the tunnel, reducing speed further as it turned in towards the hangar bay opening. Its repulsors were at full power, carrying the eight ton space transport gingerly down to the hangar deck below.
The hangar was in an orderly state. Several Nomad recon fighters were parked along the side, secured by heavy wire pulled taught. Two staggered rows of GV-55 Foxbat starfighters were set into the walls, accessible by catwalks suspended high above. The hangar itself seemed rather quiet. There were no maintenance operations underway. No unnecessary crewmembers were on the deck. For a major Xen carrier, the hangar bay was rather still. A small group of Xen officers waited on the deck, gathered in two rows as though they were waiting on some middle-tier dignitary.
Scott Euler emerged from the cockpit again as the Glazkov settled in for a landing. Lieutenant Zao was not far behind him. They moved in a routine manner, gathering in front of the large flat screen monitor where Scott had argued earlier with John.
John held his look of contempt on Scott, though he softened it a bit from their previous conversation. The inside of John’s mouth still stung a bit from when Scott had punched him.
“Alright, let’s move them out.” Scott gestured to John.
The Xen soldier guarding them moved into action. He approached John and removed the handcuff rung holding him to the left armrest of his chair. The soldier then shackled the freed clasp against John’s right wrist, securing both of John’s hands in front of him. The remaining set of cuffs holding John’s right hand to the right armrest was then released, allowing John finally to stand.
The soldier hauled John up to his feet. John had only stood once during the entire flight to use the restroom. His legs felt heavy beneath him from having sat for such an extended period. It took a few seconds for John, at his age, to get them moving again.
Julie was helped to stand up in much the same manner.
“Don’t think of trying anything funny, Carn.” Scott addressed John directly. “Even if you got away from us there’d be no way in hell you’d get off this ship alive.”
The soldier kept watch on Julie and John from behind. Zao opened the main airlock hatch. A hiss of compressed air escaped the seams. The inner door to the airlock slid open. The thick outer door slid open just after, with the thick four inch wide magnetic bolts visible at the seams of the door panel as it withdrew. Outside a group of stairs folded out from beneath the spacecraft.
John and Julie were ushered out first. They both moved cautiously as their hands were bound in front of them. John couldn’t help but look up at the massive chamber of the hangar bay.
He was in a Xen carrier! The closest he had ever been to one was the Xinglong a few weeks earlier. He never dreamed he’d be standing inside of one! He looked around at the Xen soldiers and officers standing there waiting for him. There were about a dozen soldiers, all armed with submachine guns. They looked to be part of the ship’s security detachment. Two other middle ranking officers, a male and a female, flanked one very important high ranking Xen; Captain Shin.
“Come on, let’s keep moving.” Lieutenant Zao indicated to John from behind.
John continued down the stairs and walked out towards Shin. John had known about Xen ranking insignias. They were required study in the war. No one wanted a grunt killing off enemy senior staff, particularly if they had good intelligence to offer. The Xen ranking indicators on the uniform hadn’t changed much.