Galaxia

by Kevin McLaughlin

  Cain arrived at his quarters and grabbed his tool kit. He eyed the soldering pen on his desk along with the processor, briefly considering calling Lilith to cancel, but stopped himself. She deserved his help, and he was glad to do it, strangely enough. She’d been cast aside by the family, the same as him, and he empathized. He wouldn’t ignore her like the others. She deserved better than that.

  A knock at the door broke his concentration, surprising him. He put his tools on the table and checked the view screen. The camera showed Seth standing in the hall, waiting. What was he doing here? Shouldn’t he be at dinner?

  The door opened and Seth gave a small wave. “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey,” Cain answered. “What’s going on?”

  “I came to see if you were doing alright. That whole thing with Abel. It was—”

  “Stupid?” asked Cain.

  Seth nodded. “Yeah, a bit.”

  “Did you leave the party, too? Won’t they be pissed?”

  “I told them I’d be back in a few minutes…said I had to run to my room to get something.”

  “Thanks, but I’m fine,” said Cain. He snatched his tools and showed them to Seth. “I’ve got tons of work to do, anyway.”

  “I believe it. I’ll get out of your way,” he said, stepping aside.

  Cain entered the hall and the door closed. “Thanks.”

  Seth smiled. “We should play some Interstellar Fighter sometime this week. Think you’ll be free?”

  “Maybe,” said Cain. “I’ll let you know.”

  He waved goodbye to his brother and took off for the elevator. It was nice of Seth to check on him, but completely unnecessary. Cain could handle himself, no matter what anyone thought. He wasn’t a child, despite how they treated him.

  One day they’ll understand, he told himself. One day they’ll see the kind of man I am.

  * * *

  Seth stopped by his room to get a sweater—his excuse for ditching the party. He’d wear it for an hour, then discard it. No one would ask questions.

  He was more concerned with Cain. His brother had kept to himself more and more lately, cutting ties with the rest of the family. Seth had to tell himself that Cain had always been this way, but there was no denying how bad the problem had become. He’d gone to dinner for how long, exactly? Twenty minutes? It had to be a record.

  Seth wondered if his brother really did have work to do, or if the whole thing was just an elaborate ruse to avoid confrontation. Maybe he was only pretending to leave, but why go through such a hassle? No, thought Seth. Cain would tell me if something was wrong. He always does.

  The lights flickered overhead as Seth arrived on deck two, a short walk from his parents’ room. He stopped, glancing at the nearest fixture. A moment passed, and he started to look away, but then the lights blinked again. He tapped his com. “Lilith?”

  “I’m already looking into it,” she said, appearing on the screen in an engineering uniform. She held a wrench in one hand and a screwdriver in the other. “My best guess is another electrical short, but it’s hard to—”

  The ship shook violently, knocking Seth to the floor and killing the lights altogether. He rolled into the outer wall, slamming his jaw into it, making him bite his lip. “Lilith!” he yelled, spitting blood onto the floor. “What’s going on?”

  She didn’t answer.

  The screen on his com had gone dark. “Lilith?”

  Again, nothing.

  He held the wall and climbed to his feet. He had to get to his father’s room and figure out what was happening—to make sure the family was safe.

  Seth ran through the halls, passing other rooms along the way. Several crew members stood in their doorways, confused and unsettled. “Check the other rooms!” he blurted out as he passed a few of them. He didn’t wait for a response.

  As he neared his parents’ quarters, he found the door wide open. Everyone but his mother stood in the hall near a large window, a thousand stars behind them.

  Adam waved when he saw him coming. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m good. What about you?” asked Seth. He looked at each of them, lingering on Azura. She seemed to be in one piece. He must have shown his concern, because she seemed to notice, and gave him a nod. Good, he thought, and let himself relax.

  “Your mother took a spill, but she’s fine,” said Adam.

  “She did? Are you sure she’s alright?” Seth peered inside the apartment. His mother was lying on the couch, with Uriel beside her.

  She waved at him. “Don’t worry about me, honey,” she said.

  “I’ve got her,” said Uriel.

  Abel tapped Seth’s arm. “Any idea what just happened?”

  Seth shook his head. “I was on the com with Lilith when it happened. She was saying something about a power outage, but then I lost her. I think she was running a diagnostic.”

  “I can’t seem to reach her, either,” said Adam. “I tried Engineering, but it looks like the entire communications system is offline.”

  “I’ll go check on them and report back,” said Azura.

  Adam nodded. “Stop by Medical on your way. Make sure the doctor is there. If she’s not, you’ll need to locate her.”

  “Got it,” she said.

  “After you’re done, meet us on the bridge,” said Adam. He glanced back in the apartment. “Uriel, would you mind staying with Eve? I don’t want to leave her alone.”

  “Of course,” Uriel said.

  Seth could tell his father didn’t want to leave his wife alone, but he had to tend to his duties. It was expected of him, as it was of them all. The mission came first, before everything. This ship was the last fragment of humanity left in the galaxy, as far as any of them knew, which meant they couldn’t fail.

  Adam turned back to his sons in the hall. “Seth and Abel, follow me to the bridge. We’ll need to set up runners to coordinate with the other departments until we get the com back. I need everybody working.”

  “Not a problem,” said Abel.

  “Alright,” said Adam. “Keep checking the systems periodically. As soon as they’re back, I expect reports. Understood?”

  Abel nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  “No problem,” said Seth.

  “Give me a minute. I need to check on your mother before we go.”

  “Of course,” said Abel.

  As his father went inside, Abel followed, and Seth’s eyes drifted to the window. In the distant blackness, thousands of stars flickered, twinkling and glowing from untold light years away. Here in the far reaches of the galaxy, the Eden floated in a vacuum, spiraling towards some unknown end. With every passing moment, the ship moved further away from the only home its crew had ever known. The birthplace of their race. There was so much at risk out here. So much to lose if things went wrong.

  Seth saw his face reflected in the glass, and he looked into his tired eyes. He would give anything to be home on Fiore, walking in the summer fields of the open country, Azura by his side. He longed for it now more than ever, and wondered for a moment why it couldn’t be.

  A scrap of debris floated across the window, startling him. It resembled the hull of the ship. A shredded piece of gray metal. Had there been an explosion? Had they hit something?

  Several more shards emerged, coming into view. Each varied in size, growing steadily larger by the moment. The longer he watched, the more he saw, until at last a cloud of dust and chunks of metal appeared, filling the area outside the window.

  As Seth backed away, preparing to tell his father, he saw what looked like the head of a man, severed and burned, floating gently in the dark.

  Chapter 5

  Nearly two hours after the incident, Seth and the rest of the department heads convened in one of the conference rooms. Adam had called them together once the communication system came back online.

  At the center of the table, Lilith appeared in a holographic display, attempting to explain the situation. “Most of bay four is gone. We lost fifty-seven
pods. Several others were damaged.”

  “How many dead?” asked Adam.

  “Seventy-three.”

  Several officers gasped. In all the years since the Eden had departed, there had never been a disaster like this.

  “Run us through what happened,” said Adam.

  “There was a power surge,” Lilith explained. “From what I can tell, several power relays were already damaged. I think they were the cause of the explosion.”

  “Why didn’t we know about this? What’s Engineering been doing?” asked Adam.

  “It’s not their fault,” said Lilith. “We run scans every single day, but none of them picked these malfunctions up. They never received proper maintenance because no one knew they needed it. If the accident hadn’t occurred, we never would have known.”

  “Does this explain the power outages we’ve been having recently?” asked Uriel.

  “I believe so,” said Lilith. “I’m still running diagnostics to verify.”

  “I can’t believe we lost over seventy people,” muttered Azura.

  Seth thought of the floating head outside the window, and flinched. He wished he’d never seen it.

  Adam nodded. “Be that as it may, we can’t let anything like this happen again. I want teams from engineering to sweep the ship. If our scans couldn’t detect a couple of faulty relays, then there could be others. I want them found. Understand, Chief?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Chief Codan, the head of Engineering. “My people are on it as we speak.”

  “Good,” said Adam. “I want updates every six hours from each of you. Send them to me directly.”

  They all agreed.

  “Dismissed,” ordered Adam, and the officers began to leave.

  Seth followed them, but as he reached the door, he felt his father hand on his shoulder. “Hold on for a second,” said the old man.

  Azura glanced briefly at them from the outer hall, but continued. Once the door shut, Adam let out a sigh, leaning against the table and staring at the floor. “Lilith, I need the room to talk with my boy, if you don’t mind,” he said, looking at the hologram.

  “Of course, but Captain, I should also note that we are about to begin our deceleration towards the next planet. We’ll need to start preparations soon.”

  “How soon?” he asked.

  “I was supposed to start this evening. Thanks to this evening’s events, I’ve had to push them back. Right now, I’m predicting midnight.”

  “Can we deal with this at a later time?”

  She frowned. “I’m afraid not. The window for deceleration is rather small. Only about twelve hours. If we don’t start soon, we’ll miss the arrival point, which means we’ll have to double back around. Also, once we’re out of warp, we’ll only have six days before we get there, which leaves little time to prepare. I’ll need to perform several long range scans. Our departments will have to recheck supplies. I need your digital signature on all of it.”

  “Understood. Thank you, Lilith. I’ll meet you on the bridge shortly so we can start.”

  “Yes, sir. See you soon.” The hologram evaporated into thin air.

  Adam glanced at Seth, motioning for him to sit. “I need a favor, son.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I need you to run an investigation.”

  “What do you mean? What kind of investigation?”

  “I need you to look into this accident. Ask questions, check who was nearby, look at video feeds. That sort of thing.”

  “You want me to investigate the crew?”

  “That’s exactly right,” his father said.

  “What for?” asked Seth.

  Adam hesitated. “There are a few things about the incident that don’t sit well with me.” He thumbed the edge of the table. “Earlier, when you were helping me on the bridge, I asked Uriel to check the video feed when the incident happened. She came back a few minutes before this meeting and said they were blank.”

  “It was probably the power outage,” suggested Seth.

  Adam shook his head. “The power was still working several minutes after the recordings went dark. It’s a little strange, right? Uriel’s checking to see if maybe someone deleted them manually.”

  “Are you saying you think there’s a saboteur on the ship?” asked Seth. “A traitor?” It was an outrageous assertion, to say the least. They were using a bare-bones crew, with most of the colonists asleep in the population bays. A little more than two hundred people were actively living on the vessel, and he knew a lot of them. Seth couldn’t imagine any of the crew being a terrorist or a murderer. The thought of it turned his stomach.

  “Relax, son,” said his father, who must have seen the worried look on his face. “I don’t think anyone intentionally did this. I just think it’s worth looking into. We need to explore every angle when so much is at stake. It’s part of the burden of command. You can’t leave anything unchecked, not when there are lives on the line. Do you understand?”

  “Yeah, I do,” said Seth.

  “Good,” said Adam. “I need you to do this for me. I’m too busy or I’d handle it personally. You heard Lilith. Between the mission and the aftermath of today, I’m sure I’ll have my hands full. You and Uriel are the highest ranking security officers we have. Do you think you can handle this?”

  “I’ll take care of it,” said Seth.

  “Thank you, son. You can start by checking in with Uriel. She’s down in Security. If all goes well, she’ll tell you there’s nothing wrong and the video is fine.”

  “And if she doesn’t?” asked Seth. “What’s the next step?”

  “For now, let’s just hope it ends there.”

  Chapter 6

  Seth and Uriel sat together behind the video monitor, waiting for the analysis of the footage to finish. The machine had been going for nearly thirty minutes.

  Uriel tapped her fingers on the desk. “This is taking so long,” she finally said.

  “Should we come back later?” asked Seth. As much as he enjoyed playing sleuth detective, he also promised Azura they’d meet up later. According to the clock, her shift ended ten minutes ago. She’d head to his quarters next, expecting him to be there.

  “No, it won’t be much longer. Maybe twenty minutes.” She tapped the screen on the console, pointing to a timer. “Ignore my complaining. I’m just tired.”

  It was understandable, given today’s events. “It’s almost midnight. I get it,” said Seth.

  Uriel sighed. “I hope Adam’s wrong about this.”

  Seth sat behind his desk in the corner, stretching his legs and cracking his back. His eyes burned after an increasingly long day. He closed them and tried to relax. A moment later, a hand touched his shoulder. He awoke to see Uriel standing over him. “Hey, get up,” she said.

  “Huh?” He must have drifted off.

  “You were snoring,” she explained.

  Snoring? He only did that when he was truly beat. I need to go home and get some sleep.

  “The results are ready,” she said, pointing to the workstation.

  “What’s it look like?” he asked, joining her there.

  “Hold on. I’ll bring them up.” She typed in a command and leaned back, tapping the sides of the chair and clicking her tongue. “Give it a second.”

  A readout appeared on the screen, covered with numbers and, as far as Seth could tell, random nonsense. “Good news?”

  Uriel stared at the screen, scrunching her nose. “Um…”

  “What?”

  “It looks like there’s a problem with the recording.”

  “What kind of problem?”

  She paused. “I’m not sure.”

  “Did someone delete the video footage?” he asked.

  “I don’t know if anyone came in and deleted it, but they definitely altered the data.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Normally, I could go in here and check the records to see who modified what. I’d get the name, typically,
along with the date and time. There’s nothing here.”

  “So? Doesn’t that mean no one accessed the logs?” asked Seth.

  She shook her head. “No, you don’t understand. The analysis is still showing a modification. See this break in the feed here?” She pointed to one of the red lines on the screen. It had a small gap near the middle. “Normally, you might see this during an outage, but look over there. This number near the edge of the screen. You see it in the corner?”

  Seth had to lean in to spot it. “You mean this?” he asked, motioning to the tiny number. It currently read Cam225x41.

  “Right. Any idea what it means?”

  He shook his head. He didn’t have much experience with the surveillance systems.

  “The screen we’re on is for this camera, hence the Cam part. Next is the designation the camera falls under. This one is number 225. With me so far?”

  “Sure,” he said.

  “The next part is the 41. That’s how many times the data on this screen was modified. The feeds don’t get dumped or altered very often unless we’re running a maintenance check on them. In this case, camera 225 was altered 41 times.” She clicked on Cam225x41 and the screen changed. A long list of names and timestamps appeared. “This is the log. We can see almost all of the 41 entries.”

  “Almost?” asked Seth.

  She scrolled to the bottom. “Notice anything next to the final two timestamps?”

  Seth leaned in. “There’s no name next to the dates.”

  “Right,” she said, nodding. “Someone deleted their name from the log, which frankly shouldn’t be possible. We have security checks in place to prevent this sort of thing.”

  “Does this mean the video was tampered with?”

  “The feed itself gives no indication of being modified, but this log entry says otherwise. We can see right here that someone accessed the file. First at 1920 hours, then again at 1930.”

  “Before and after the explosion,” said Seth.

  “Exactly,” said Uriel. She held up her hand. “Don’t get me wrong. This could be a weird glitch. Maybe.”

  “But you don’t think so?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “It’s just suspicious.”