by Geoff North
Strong turned in the chair and looked up at him. “Are you quite all right, SIC?”
Red hair. Green eyes… Goddamn you, Alexander Edmund, this isn’t funny. “What—” Barret cleared his throat and tried again. “What have you found, doctor? Anything less than a swarm of Alderamin bugs swimming through his blood isn’t worth dragging the Commander, or me, from the bridge.”
“Not Alderamin bugs, but something I think you’ll find equally disturbing.” She turned back to the computer screen and brought up an image of the Exodus shuttle. “Ada finally provided me Agle’s complete physiological report. I had my suspicions before, but this is proof positive.”
Barret leaned down beside her for a better look at the screen. “It’s the back-end traveling quarters of Agle’s shuttle… Sleeping bunks, washroom, supply cabinets.” The smell of her so close was intoxicating. You’re eighty-seven years old. Quit acting like a love-struck teenager, and do your goddamn job. “Why are you showing me this, doctor?”
Strong clicked a button on her keyboard several times, focusing in on a meter-square section of the cabin. “There, beneath the bottom bunk, just above the floor. Can you see it?”
Barret leaned in further, squinting his old eyes. “Looks like a hatch of some sort, perhaps an evacuation tube.”
“That’s exactly what it is,” Strong confirmed. She zoomed the image in even closer. “Look there, a centimeter from the handle.”
It was easy for Barret to see the dark oblong-shaped smudge at such a magnified level. “Is that a finger print?”
“Left thumb print… Captain Agle’s.”
“It’s blood, isn’t it?”
The doctor nodded.
Barret straightened back up and crossed his arms over his chest. “You called the bridge for that? Agle was stranded on the Exodus shuttle for months. He obviously cut himself. Maybe accidently, maybe not. Hell, if I’d been stuck in there for that long, I probably would’ve slit my wrists and throa—”
“It isn’t Agle’s blood.”
“It has to be Agle’s blood.” Barret’s eyes suddenly widened. He looked back to the screen. “Someone was there with him. A Pegan stowaway… perhaps an Alderamin.”
“The blood is human. He cut the body into pieces and forced it out into space through the emergency waste tube.”
“He must have had a good reason,” Barret sat on the desk’s edge, trying to comprehend what could’ve happened. “It had to have been self defence, there’s no other explanation.”
“There’s one,” Strong said grimly. “It’s been gnawing at me ever since we first brought him onto Retribution. How he could’ve survived so long on that shuttle with the limited rations.”
Barret was shaking his head adamantly. “You can’t be serious, doctor.”
“I’m afraid I am. Captain Shain Agle is a cannibal.”
Chapter 17
“This is Captain Rastaban Drac of the Sol Ship Ambition… please respond.”
“Discontinue the automated hail, Argus.” Captain Drac stepped down from the dais and stood with Vin. “If saving their lives wasn’t enough to warrant a conversation, I can’t think of anything else I want to say to them.”
Drac’s command second grabbed him by the arm. “I thought you said we had plenty of time. Why are you giving up on them now?”
“Time we have, but my patience and good will is wearing thin. It isn’t giving up, CS. I’m simply taking this encounter to the next level.”
“What level is that?”
Drac ignored her and went to the sensors alcove presently manned by Nash. “Has there been any more weapons movement activity in the last few minutes?”
“None, Captain. The one hundred unidentified missiles are still loaded into their port side chambers, but I’ve detected no energy spikes in the last twelve minutes to indicate they’re set to launch.”
“Allowing them to get that far was a mistake,” Drac muttered. “We’re in too close to maneuver effectively. I should’ve opened fire on them as soon as the Pegan ship was destroyed.”
“It may very well be defensive posturing,” Nash said. “Try not to overanalyze the situation, Captain.”
“I’m a disappointment to you, aren’t I, Nash? I’m nothing like our last captain… your old friend.”
“I have never compared you to Ly Sulafat. I serve one captain at a time. Perhaps you should worry less about my feelings, and concentrate fully on a way to end this stand-off.”
Rastaban half-grinned at the robot. The right side of his face remained deathly still in a mauve grimace. “That’s exactly what I intend to do.” He marched over to the helm-navigation station. “Begin backing us away from Retribution, slowly. No need to startle them.”
“Any particular heading, Captain?” Kalin Aurig asked.
“The one we’ve been on for months, Earth. If our silent friends out there wish to follow, that’s completely up to them.”
Vin Vir picked up on her captain’s lead. She called over to the weapons section. “Keep those forward cannons locked on that ship, milun. Open fire the second Nash reports any energy buildup in their missile chambers.”
“You can count on me, CS Vir!” Atlas Tau called back.
The fighter pilot had shown great courage and fast reflexes during the attempted rescue mission back on Pega. Vin had recommended they train him for the bridge weapons section, and Rastaban had whole-heartedly agreed. His enthusiasm needed to tone down, but he was a welcome addition on a constantly short-handed bridge. Losing half of their ten-thousand-person crew during the war had left most sections under-staffed and over-worked throughout the ship.
Ambition started backing away. Captain Drac returned to his command chair and watched the ship they’d saved from certain destruction begin to shrink on the view screen.
“Most unfortunate,” Nash commented. “And worrisome.”
“It appears they don’t want anything to do with us,” Drac said as Retribution continued to recede before them. “But it looks like we’re going to end this meeting with both vessels intact. That’s a good thing, isn’t it, Nash?”
“It is, Captain. However, I’m worried for our future. How will we be received when Ambition eventually returns to Earth?”
The captain had no answer for that. He settled back into his chair and started to brood. Retribution was now nothing more than a bright spot of light on the screen.
“Incoming transmission!” Argus Cor announced. “Captain… Retribution is hailing us. Audio and visual signal available.”
Rastaban leaned forward. “Put them on screen.”
The bright point of light in space disappeared. In its place, a man standing at a large table appeared. Two people were seated on either side of him. Rastaban caught the slight hike of his eyebrows as he saw Ambition’s captain for the first time. Good. He hesitated another moment before introducing himself. “I’m Commander Alexander Edmund of the warship Retribution. Are you Rastaban Drac—are you Ambition’s rightful captain?”
An odd first question to ask, Rastaban thought. “I am. Command was transferred to me from Captain Ly Sulafat ten months, eleven days ago.”
Edmund paused again, glanced at an older man next to him. He began nodding slowly. “You’ll have to forgive my awkwardness, Captain. We have been given… alternate information.”
“I don’t see how that’s possible, Commander Edmund. This is the first time we’ve met.”
“Not exactly. There’s a guest onboard Retribution undergoing medical treatment.”
Rastaban looked down at Vin. She mouthed a name. Agle.
“Shain Agle is a traitor,” Ambition’s captain replied. “He stole one of our shuttles and abandoned us. He’s a criminal.”
“He’s much more than that, I’m afraid.” Edmund sat on the stool behind him. “I would like to meet you in person, Captain. Permission to return your shuttle with a handful of my crew?”
“Of course, Commander. I trust you’ll be returning Agle to us as w
ell?”
“Oh yes, we most definitely will be.”
Chapter 18
The further Ly Sulafat walked through the burned-out field, the farther away the rectangular black building seemed to recede. Stop looking at it. That only makes it worse. Look away…. Look down. The grey carpet beneath his bare feet had turned to green ice. Sulafat stopped. He placed his hands on his knees and bent over. Where did the ashes go? This isn’t Pega. Where did I put my boots? A tingling sensation started in the thick skin of his heels and the pads of calloused flesh beneath his toes. Snot-colored frost appeared along the bulging veins on top of his feet. The tingling intensified, started to burn. The frost crawled up around his ankles.
This isn’t good. He tried lifting his left foot, but it wouldn’t budge. He tried harder and heard a ripping sound as it began to pull free. A big chunk of skin remained, adhered into the ice like a sock torn in two pieces. Sulafat’s right foot left even more frozen flesh behind. Keep moving. Doesn’t hurt at all now.
He continued across the field—but it wasn’t a field anymore. He was on a narrow bridge. When did that happen? His skinless feet clicked against cold ice. Sulafat looked back and saw puddles of blood freezing solid where he’d stepped. Definitely not on Pega. He looked ahead again and saw the domes. This is Alderamin 4.
Purple lightning forked through the sky. A blast of ice pellets slapped into his face, blinding him. Sulafat rocked back, his boney heel slid along the ice and slipped off the edge of the bridge.
He was falling. Falling. Falling forever.
Sulafat kept his eyes closed. I don’t want to see it coming. Maybe I’ll be dead before I reach the bottom. He could hear a high-pitched whistle. Where was it coming from? His chest started to ache. Sulafat reached for his ribs, but his fingers went straight through. There was a hole in the middle of him. How did that get there?
He dug at his insides, scratching along the remains of scarred organs and burnt bone, searching for something. My heart… Where has my heart go—
Sulafat hit the bottom.
“Oh, you poor thing. Did you hurt yourself?”
“Bottom,” Sulafat blubbered. “I fell on my bottom.”
Eta Sulafat helped him back to his feet. “I’ve warned you a hundred times not to jump on the furniture, Ly. Are you ever going to learn to listen to your mother?”
Ly rubbed his sore bum and stared at the arm chair he’d slipped off. There were twin streaks of blood on its cushioned seat. He looked down at his feet. They were all boney. He wasn’t wearing any pants, and his legs were nothing but bones too.
“Am I dreaming, Mommy?”
“Yes, dear, but try not to let it trouble you. Come sit at the table for dinner. Your father will be home from work any moment, and he’ll want to hear all about your adventurous day.”
Something soft and warm was in his hands. “My ball… I found my plastic ball. I lost it so long ago.” He placed it on the floor. The toy rolled away on its own and disappeared under the furniture, leaving a little trail of red on the white carpet. Ly wiped his bloody fingers clean on his shirt. He looked up at his mother with a puzzled expression on his face. “Daddy’s not coming home for dinner. Daddy’s dead.”
“Don’t be silly. He can’t die. Now tell me, what does your father do?”
“Daddy works in the engineering levels. He makes the ship move around the stars.”
Eta smiled beautifully for her son as he crawled up into the kitchenette chair beside her. “That’s right, Ly. You’re such a clever little boy. What else does your father do?”
Ly scooped some vegetables onto his plate. “All kinds of important stuff.”
“You can do better than that.” She poured them each a glass of purple water. “How exactly does your father make Ambition move?”
“He forces dark matter protons through a kilometer-long anti-grav column into a collapse chamber. The dark matter protons implode, unleashing the energy required to bend the gravity-time field.” Ly took a sip of his water and sneered. “Uuck… Tastes like farts.”
“No one ever said liquid methane tasted nice.” Eta’s smile had vanished. Her mouth looked smaller somehow. “Now tell me something else about the fold drive. Is it true you converted the propulsion technology into some form of weapon?”
“Why are you asking me all this, Mommy? Where did your eyes and mouth go?”
A door whisked open behind him.
A voice Ly hadn’t heard in more than sixty years spoke. “It smells absolutely wonderful in here. I’m starving.”
Ly turned in his chair and saw Kep Sulafat standing in the open cabin doorway. His father. He was just as Ly remembered him. Tall. Broad shoulders. Silver receding hair that looked like wavy little wires. The constant, warm smile and dimpled cheeks.
Kep spotted Ly at the table and his blue eyes sparkled. “I hope your mother made plenty of food. I’ve brought all your brothers and sisters home with me.”
“I don’t have any brothers or sisters.”
“Don’t be silly, of course you do.” Kep stepped fully into their home, allowing a rush of little grey people to run in after him. They spilled into the living room, scrambling and crawling up over the furniture on scrawny little legs and arms. Their oblong-shaped heads were too big for their tiny bodies. They tripped and fell on the carpet. They rolled and tumbled across the couch and chairs.
“I don’t like them!” Ly shouted. “Make them go away!”
The grey people came at him. They clustered around his dangling feet, clawing at his arms with long, wormy fingers. Ly drew himself up into a ball on the kitchen chair, but the scratching and probing continued.
“Settle down, children,” Kep said in a soft but stern tone. “Your brother is scared. Allow him room to breathe, and then you can ask your questions.”
They remained crowded around Ly, but the touching stopped. They stared at Ly with immense black oily eyes and waited.
“What… what questions?” He asked.
One of the beings leaning against him tilted its head to the side. “How did your people convert the video drones into collapse bombs?”
Another one tapped his shoulder. “Is Ambition headed back to the Sol system?”
The questions came from all around him.
How many collapse bombs are left on Ambition? Will your people share the technology with anyone on Earth? How many Mars revolutionists are there? Did your people find the Pegan Rift? Is there a hidden military base on Titan? How did Retribution destroy Taranis? What is the status of Annihilation? Have you been in secret contact with ROSP, or any other Earth governments?
Ly stood up on the chair, shut his eyes, covered his ears, and screamed. “Stop it! Stop asking your dumb questions, and GO AWAY!”
“Sit down,” his mother said. “There’s no need to behave like a baby.”
Ly sat down. The little grey people were gone. His father was sitting at one end of the table, devouring the food off his plate, and gulping down the purple water straight from the pitcher. Ly looked at his mother sitting across from him. Except it wasn’t his mother. It may have had her voice, but it certainly didn’t look like Eta Sulafat any more. The thing sitting there was monstrously large. Its hunched back was pressed up against the wall, and its head touched the ceiling. The table groaned as it leaned forward on massive arms. “Retribution. Let’s start with that… What do you know?”
Ly closed his eyes again. He couldn’t stand seeing that horrible, featureless face any longer. “I—I don’t know what you mean. I don’t know what Retribution is.”
Kep reached across the table, knocking plates and glasses to the floor. He took hold of Ly’s wrist and started to squeeze. “You lying little bastard. Tell me what I need to know.”
“I can’t. I won’t.”
His father was still grinning. Ly squirmed in the chair. Eta squeezed harder.
Sulafat jerked his arm back and opened his eyes. It was over. He was lying in an uncomfortable bunk. Tor Emin was snoring
beneath him.
Fingers touched the side of his face. “I liked you better as a child,” Sheratan Ries whispered. She let out a little giggle. “Not this wrinkled old shit you’ve become.”
He sighed and stared at the dark ceiling less than two feet from his face. “I’m still dreaming.”
“This isn’t a dream. I was there when the Hunn Prime introduced itself to you. I’m here with you now.”
“You knew where I just was,” Sulafat said. “You saw me as a child. This is still a dream.”
“I’m a ghost. I can travel wherever I please these days.”
He refused to look at her. “I don’t believe in ghosts.”
Sheratan hooked a finger around his chin and forced him to stare into her grey eyes. “You’d better start believing in them now, Sully. I may be dead, but I might also be the only one that can save your life, the lives of our people.”
“A spirit in my head will rescue us all. I don’t think that’s something I should share with the others.” Sulafat touched her fingers. They felt cold. “I’m too old for this, Sher. Let me go back to sleep.”
She gave his chin another sharp tug. “No more sleep. You weren’t dreaming, not really. The Hunn Prime was with you, I saw it. He was in your head with his minions. They were trying to draw information from your subconscious. They were asking questions.”
Sulafat was already starting to forget. He struggled to bring it all back. “I was on Pega somewhere, and then I fell. Onto the floor of the cabin I grew up in with my parents. My mother was there.” He moaned silently. “My father… I saw him too. He died when I was seven years old. An accident in the engineering levels.”
“Those weren’t your parents, you know that. It was the Hunn Prime.”
Sulafat rubbed his eyes with trembling fingers. “Yes. It was the Hunn. Inside my head… the things they wanted to know… some of it made sense—the video drones we converted into collapse bombs, where Ambition was headed. The rest was gibberish… Retribution. Rosp. Something about rifts? I don’t know what any of that meant.”