by Jamie Sawyer
“Gonna cost yous,” the boy said. “Ten credits get you there and back. No touch by gangs. Me see to it.”
“Nice try, kid. I’ll just take directions, and those for free.”
The boy was mixed Indo-Asian stock; maybe thirteen or fourteen. A small gang of them were arranged about the corridor, ducking and diving between the tourists. Making a little on the side, pick-pocketing and making do. Like most of the children running amok around the base, this one was strangely stunted – his face much too old for the rest of his small body. Whether that was a lifetime of living among the grav-generators, or old-fashioned malnutrition, it was hard to say.
The boy rolled his eyes. “I can do it for five, sees. But no less. Gotta lotta business today. Launch day, see? I know these corridors.”
Reluctantly, I realised that the boy was probably right. I’d already got lost twice on the way here, and the passageways were tortuously labyrinthine. There was an enforced no-fly zone in effect. That meant no air-cars, no inter-base transport. I needed to make up lost time if I was going to stop her…
“All right. Five credits.”
“Up front, yes?” the boy said, flexing an open palm in my direction.
I rifled in the pocket of my fatigues. Found a credit chip and dropped it into the boy’s palm. Despite his full vac-suit, he wasn’t wearing gloves.
“Name’s Vijay,” he said. Pocketed the credit chip in one of the many pouches lining the outside of his suit. “I be your guide today. And you?”
“Conrad. And if I get robbed on the way, Vijay, I’m promising you that I will kill you.”
“Me no scared of death, soldier,” Vijay said, flashing a yellow-tooth grin. “I born a bred Calico Base, see? Death walks here.”
Vijay started off down the corridor.
“When you get down, Soldier Conrad?” Vijay asked.
“Conrad is just fine. And I came down a few hours ago.”
“Me copy,” Vijay said. “Me like real military, sees?”
“Mmmm. I see.”
We passed through public halls, through big expanses with domed roofs. Calico had that slightly out-of-control feeling about it: of a plan gone awry, the hallmarks of a hundred changes in administration. Buildings were planted atop buildings. Structures sprouted from other structures. There was probably some architectural significance to the design work – this was, after all, a civilian facility, and how things looked was apparently as important to the builders as what they did – but it was lost on me. There were temples here and there, breaking up the monotony of grey buildings and metal scrapers. Those were painted in more exotic and enticing colours, as though to ensnare new followers. Lots of images of Old Earth, looking far greener and bluer than when I’d seen her last.
“I been a here since the start,” Vijay said. “Start a me, at least.”
“I follow that. Your folks first-generation colonists?”
“Or something. I no know ’em. No matter. I get in a Guild, get me accredited. Get me a rig, go a mining like the rest ’em.” He nodded in determination. “Get me a good life. Why you wanna come a Calico, anyhow? We no see so many soldiers a these days.”
“They’re building a station,” I said. Although I could give the kid the exact details, because none of it was classified – not any more – I thought better of it, and summarised what I knew. “A few star systems out. A big base called Liberty Point. It’ll divert traffic away from here.”
“That good a bad,” the kid said. “Probably mean less war a here, but maybe also less tourists. You sound American.”
“I am. That a problem?”
“Not for me. For lots out here, it is though. Maybe you should a get something else a wear?” He pointed out a clutch of tourists wearing bright orange, faux-Calico vac-suits. “You want one a these suits, I can find someone who can get you one. Rated for the vac and all.”
“I don’t need a suit. My uniform is fine. I don’t want to miss this launch.”
“You seem awful keen to get there. You got a girl aboard or something?”
“Something,” I said. “Are we far?”
“No,” he said. “I can even get you into a press pit, for a little extra. It’ll be one a the best places to watch a launch.”
I don’t want to watch the launch, I thought. I want to stop it.
“Do that,” I said. Didn’t even ask about the credits.
For his faults – mainly, that he wouldn’t stop talking about the history of Calico, about where he was from, and about the various items that he could acquire for me for just a few more credits – Vijay proved to be a reliable and decent guide. We carved our way through the passages and conclaves until we reached the transport sector. All the while, the timer clicked down. Anticipation was mounting inside of me. I’d already faced multiple simulated deaths by then – and started my meteoric rise within the Sim Ops Programme – but this was anxiety of an entirely different calibre.
If I didn’t do something now, then Elena would be gone for good.
Through the transparent domed ceilings, I saw that the sides of star-scrapers had been dedicated to the celebration as well. The faces of the lead crew cycled through: in fifty-metre glory, each of them smiling towards the camera. It was sickening.
“Don’t they know what they’re doing?” I said aloud.
“They want a peace, see? That’s what you military types don’t understand. They want a go see a Krell and talk to ’em.”
“It’ll never work.”
“But if this Treaty,” Vijay said, wagging his finger in a sage fashion, trying to appear far more knowledgeable than he actually was, “works out, then we’ll all be winners. They talk about a Quarantine Zone or something.” Vijay ducked between two men wearing blue and green robes, swinging incense burners. “Shuttle bays a this way.”
It was there that Elena would be boarding, using the Calican shuttle terminals to reach the Endeavour. The actual expeditionary fleet was far above us, visible only as a collection of blinking lights, lost to the sea of stars.
“We start a build a space elevator,” Vijay told me. “It gonna be real good for finances.”
A metal beanstalk grew from the transport sector, surrounded by a series of industrial cranes and scaffold structures. Only a few hundred metres long at present, the unfinished elevator would connect Calico Base to the orbital docks: would allow for faster transport to and from the surface. Right now, the shuttles were the fastest option. That, and it gave the Alliance media machine plenty of opportunities to parade the crew before the cameras.
“Where’s the press pit?” I asked.
Vijay pointed. “Down a that a way. I got a pass.”
The boy led me to a gangway. Sector security – men dressed in big blue vac-suits, with white lettering across their chests and backs – milled among Alliance Military Police; identifiable by their black flak-suits and the carbines slung over their chests. Vijay waved his wrist-comp at the nearest guard; a man with a head and face of tattoos, and missing front teeth. The guard raised an eyebrow in disbelief that a station rat would have a press pass, but was obviously too lazy to bother making the necessary checks.
“Go a through,” he said. “Enjoy a show.”
“We will, sir. Thanks a much, see.”
The shuttle bay had been completely given over to the launch and thousands of people were piled into the chamber; doors currently sealed, sixteen staunch transport shuttles on the apron, surrounded by launch scaffold and steps to the passenger cabins. Mostly unnecessary, but all part of the show. In the midst of the hangar, a military band paraded up and down the apron: fuckers in dress uniform playing their songs, barely audible above the combined cheering of the crowds. Civvies were blowing horns, waving flags, chanting.
I was glad that the press pit – despite its name – was elevated, overseeing the civilian onlookers. To my surprise, there was a mixture of press and military in the pit. The area above and around me was abuzz with news-drones – tiny cameras an
d microphones recording everything for posterity.
An enormous LED countdown flashed with TIME UNTIL BOARDING – 45 SECONDS AND COUNTING! SPONSORED BY DELAT ENTERPRISES!
There were no seats, but Vijay secured us a place near the front of the pit next to a female military reporter. I jostled my way forwards. I could see right down into the landing gantry from here: would be as close as I could get to Elena. Directly beneath us was a clear corridor, policed with security staff: a cordon holding back the swelling civilian masses.
I can’t let her go, I told myself. She can’t do this.
“Great! You’re Sim Ops, huh?”
A female reporter stood beside me. Flame hair spilled over her shoulders, and a tight smart-suit clung to her body.
“What gave it away?” I said.
“Your uniform, actually.” She smiled at me with full red lips. It was an award-winning smile. An expression designed to make the recipient feel at ease.
“I was being sarcastic,” I said.
The woman shrugged off the implied insult. Two small news-drones circled her head. “How many deaths for you, Captain?”
So she could read rank insignia as well, huh? “Too many.”
She smiled that Pulitzer-winning grin again. I vaguely recognised her from one of the news-feeds that the Alliance military regularly put out; Cassi Something? Her deep green eyes flashed; data dancing across her pupils. I guessed she had an uplink with the Calico Base mainframe.
“Captain Conrad Harris, one hundred and twelve transitions,” she said. “Impressive.”
“That’s a dangerous toy. Lot of intel could get into the wrong hands like that.”
“Core News is careful,” she said, tapping the holo-badge on her chest. The name read CASSI BROOKE, CORE NEWS NETWORK. Brooke nodded at the hangar. “Looks like you’re just in time, soldier-boy.”
The countdown flashed: BOARDING! BOARDING! BOARDING!
The crew were protected by a military cordon, and were now being hustled to their waiting shuttles.
Shit. This is it.
Faces projected on to massive billboards, holos of the brave men and women of the Alliance expeditionary force.
Brooke began her spiel, speaking not to me but the news-drone in front of her. “Ten minutes to launch, people! The atmosphere here is incredible. The festivities have to be seen to be believed. The UAS Endeavour is currently kilometres above us, in Calico’s galaxy-famous orbital docks.”
I gripped the safety rail of the pit. Far from being incredible, the atmosphere was dizzying. Beneath me, flags of a hundred colonies, of tens of nation-states, were being flown. Representatives from pretty much every colony, outpost and national body had gathered here.
“The Endeavour’s mission specs are staggering,” the reporter said. “She’s one of the largest non-military vessels ever built by the Alliance. Capable of prolonged faster-than-light flight, with the most sophisticated quantum-space disruption drive ever installed in a ship of this size.”
I fought to see the gathered crew. Everyone wore the same deep-blue vac-suit, carrying black boxes on hoses connected to their chests. Again: part of the show. Parodies of earlier explorers, of the first astronauts that had probed the dark of outer space.
“She is, we’re told, equipped for any eventuality,” the reporter continued. “Made to counter whatever the Krell Collective have to throw at her. But we mustn’t forget that the Endeavour is one of several starships tasked with this mission. There are in fact sixteen ships on this expedition.”
Their names were known all across Allied space: had already captured the public’s fickle imagination. The AFS Lion’s Pride, HMS Britannic, UAS Ark Angel… Many of the vessels were multi-nationals, each differently constructed, with a dedicated role on the expedition.
“And here comes the crew!” the reporter gleefully squealed.
I panicked. Here she was.
This was a photo opportunity, and nothing more. There was no functional purpose in boarding the crew in this way. One by one, they climbed the scaffold towards the outer shuttle doors.
“Commander Cook!” someone declared. “Christopher Cook is the expedition leader, as well as the captain of the Endeavour.”
He turned, paused, waved at the crowd. His face – middle-aged, wise, smiling – appeared twenty-storeys high on the billboard. I felt like I knew the man already. I’d read multiple interviews in Dispatches, in the Alliance Daily. His face had been plastered over every publication that Psych Ops could put out.
“One of our own,” Vijay interrupted, nodding proudly. “He a Calican, you know.”
Cook was a family man: three wives and sixteen kids. That was supposed to be some sort of reassurance to the public, a subliminal suggestion that the mission would be coming back – that he wouldn’t be abandoning his family.
“Cook’s second-in-command, Lieutenant Reji Ashwari!”
Another familiar face, another cheer. Another practised walk up the gantry, into the waiting transport.
“Sergeant Thomas Stone!”
The faces went on and on. Almost all of the crew had military, or pseudo-military, titles. That had been a deliberate conceit; to get the public onside. I’d already dug into the files, tested my sources. Only Stone had any actual military experience, and he’d been assigned a five-man simulant team to provide security.
“You a okay there, see?” Vijay said. “Look a pale.”
I swallowed hard. “Five men for all those ships.”
“Dr Elena Marceau!”
I leant into the rail. Waved a hand at her, shouted. Of course, my voice was drowned by the sea of noise around me: the jubilant, senseless, pointless cheering.
Then Elena’s face appeared on the billboard and it took all of my strength not to pass out. I teetered on the edge as she took the walk towards the waiting transport. There was only a couple of hundred metres between us, but it may as well have been light-years. Soon, once she had commenced her mission into the Maelstrom, it would be.
I’d never forget the way that she looked that day. The vac-suit was fitted, not as puffy as the older-style EVA gear, and her lean figure was evident as she strode the gantry. The French flag on one shoulder, the Alliance on the other. Because she was a pretty face for the cameras, Elena’s inner suit hood was lowered. Her long dark hair was pulled back in a semi-utilitarian style; her red lips glossed, cheeks blushed. She had never looked more beautiful.
She paused at the end of the gantry. Framed by the open shuttle hatch. Scanned the crowd. None of the other crew had done that. Dallied at the access. Was she looking for me, or was that just my imagination?
“She’s going to be putting the schedule out…” Brooke muttered to me, sotto voce. “She’s only the fucking shipboard psych, for Christo’s sake…”
There were a lot of people between her and me. I felt her gaze turn in my direction. Those dark eyes lingered on the press pit. Did she see me? We made – or at least, I thought that we made, fleeting eye contact.
Don’t go. Please; don’t go.
The second – that was probably all it was – passed, and Elena disappeared into the ship.
I can’t let her do this.
I leant forward, tested the safety rail. It was firmly attached, would hold my weight. There was an open security corridor beneath me, only a five-metre drop.
“What you a do, boss?” Vijay asked, as though the cogs in his brain had started to whirr. “That’s not a good idea—”
“Fuck it,” I said.
I leapt over the railing. The crowd was still cheering, still yelling like the bunch of idiots that they were, and hardly anyone noticed me. I landed hard on the floor, went into a roll. Knew that I had to think and move fast: that to reach the shuttle I’d have to get past security—
“Hold it!” someone shouted, moving at the end of the cordon. “Stay where you are!”
Vijay and Brooke were watching me from the press enclosure, leaning over the railing. The Mili-Pol reacted faste
r than I’d predicted and moved on my location. Supporting security-drones flitted over the heads of the civilian crowd.
“I can’t let her go!” I yelled, tearing towards the shuttle.
Two figures appeared at the end of the open corridor, storm batons drawn and shock pistols at the ready. Big MPs wearing full flak-suits focused on me. Others were closing in too, circling the closest approach to the shuttle boarding gantry.
I swung a solid punch at the first MP. Connected with his nose; sent the brute sprawling backwards in a spray of red. He yelped, dropped his baton, cursed at me. I sidestepped the second, moved on towards the shuttle—
“No you don’t!” the soldier yelled. “This is a restricted area!”
“You don’t understand!” I shouted back, feeling hands grasping at my collar, dragging me back. “She can’t do this!”
“Yeah, well, she’s already gone,” the MP growled.
I slammed an elbow into the trooper’s ribs, felt a solid connection with bone. The man gave an angered groan in response, but didn’t go down like the first. He fought back, pulling me further from my objective, the open boarding hatch of the shuttle suddenly seeming an impossible distance. I struggled some more, lashed out with fists and feet—
A storm-baton slammed into my back. The device was made for exactly this purpose: a non-lethal, but extremely painful, method of detaining suspects. Electrical discharge danced up my shoulder as I slumped to the floor. Soon I was incapacitated, a pair of MPs were above me, slamming the batons into me again and again, until I couldn’t fight back any more.
I caught a glimpse of the press area as I went down. The reporter watched on with intrigue in her eyes. As I rolled onto my side, and consciousness began to evaporate, I saw the shuttle boarding hatch. Elena was inside that transport, and very soon she would be leaving for the Endeavour and the Maelstrom.
That was the last time I saw her.
I blacked out.
CHAPTER SIX
CALICO
Cruising at FTL speed, the Independence grazed the edge of some Japanese space holdings – technically, for now at least, still Alliance territory – and moved through French airspace. The trip took three days; no need for a quantum-space jump, so no need for the damned freezers. En route we lost several prisoners to miscellaneous medical conditions, and the tally of stable survivors dropped to sixty-two.