Starcrasher (Shades Space Opera Book 1)

by Rock Forsberg

  ‘This is it, Avalon, your home,’ Tredd said to Aino as they started walking. ‘Isn’t it?’

  She nodded. ‘It looks so big from out here.’

  The walls of the compound seemed smooth as metal, and stood firmly upright from the ground like solid rock. It was a gated community all right. Tredd immediately sought out any defence mechanisms, but could not pinpoint anything. If there was something, it was hidden from sight.

  As they strolled towards the entrance, the immensity of the walls became apparent. On screen they had seemed smaller, but in reality they must have been over one hundred metres tall. To top it all, above the entrance gate stood a shining tower at least three times as high.

  At the gate they were greeted by a life-sized human figure on a screen behind a heavy glass surface. She was clad in a green robe with brown leather accents and a shiny golden buckle in the shape of a symbol of infinity. When she spoke, her voice boomed through the speakers, too loud for her otherwise courtly demeanour.

  ‘Welcome home, Aino, on this joyous day. And welcome to Avalon, Tristram, Evie and Eddie. We have no secrets here. Come, children, come join us in the light.’

  She curtsied and showed the way. Then the whole screen turned upwards, creating an opening through the wall.

  ‘Come on, let’s go!’ With a cheerful expression, Aino beckoned for them to follow her.

  While Aino seemed to be overjoyed about being back, Tredd had a weird feeling about this place. He could not decide whether it was good or bad, but he knew they were going to find out soon enough.

  Soon after they entered the corridor, the woman in the green robe appeared again. This time she was real – or at least she appeared real to Tredd. ‘I am Adessa, pleased to meet you,’ she said with a soft voice and a smile. She bowed her head slightly and gestured with open arms. ‘Please follow me and I will take you to Henning Dal.’

  Tredd stepped up to her. ‘We are here to meet with the leader of your organisation.’

  Her smile widened and she nodded in a sanctimonious way. ‘Yes, I know. On behalf of the whole of Avalon, I would like to express my sincere gratitude and joy for returning Starlight Henning Dal’s daughter home.’

  Aino took Tredd by the hand, and looked up with a smile on her face. Tredd replied with a shrug. However weird this place seemed to be, there was no mistaking that Aino was excited to be back.

  ‘Look at all those stars,’ Aino said, and pointed to the ceiling. The small corridor had started to open wider and taller, and through the ceiling panels they could see a galaxy dense with stars, more vivid and colourful than they had ever been in reality.

  ‘Yes, dear,’ Adessa said looking down at Aino’s joyful face. ‘They are beautiful, aren’t they? In Avalon, we cherish nature, but accept technology.’

  While the girls marvelled at the virtual starscape, Tredd pulled Eddie aside, and whispered, ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Well, you know, I’ve seen some of these gated religious communities before,’ Eddie said, rubbing the back of his neck. ‘I even visited the one close to where we live down in Bella. They were completely self-sustained, growing all their food locally, generating their energy themselves, and so forth. I can’t speak for these guys; it all depends on their system.’

  Tredd thought of what Eddie said. A few metres away Evie chatted with Adessa and Aino. As the ladies started walking again, Tredd motioned for Eddie to follow. ‘What do you mean, “system”?’

  Eddie caught up to walk beside Tredd. ‘It’s unlikely that these folks go out a lot. These kinds of communities are like independent states with their own political and legal systems, schools, etc. Sometimes more, sometimes less. But by the looks of it, and knowing that Aino wasn’t aware of anything else on the planet – even its name – this one is likely on the more isolated side.’

  ‘I see,’ Tredd said as they neared an archway. ‘Well, I hope this Henning guy is a good bloke. I’d hate to leave Aino with a religious freak.’

  ‘So far so good.’ Eddie walked with Tredd under the archway.

  They came into a hall with a view that made even Tredd gasp – a rare occasion. The community was much larger that he had thought. Behind a huge glass wall were expansive grounds: hills and forests, pastures and white dwellings, lush nature and robotic machinery. From their vantage point it was a soothing blend of green, blue, white and grey. They could also see humans in all white, like tiny ants among the huge, bigger-than-houses robots. It was like a canyon, a world within, surrounded by the enormous wall of the high-tech building that encircled the perimeter. It must have been dozens of kilometres in circumference. Above the grounds, the real sky peered through an almost completely transparent force field. The circular tower they had seen from the outside rose high above them.

  ‘This is amazing…’ Evie said, leaning against the window.

  ‘Beautiful,’ agreed Eddie.

  Aino only smiled and gazed over the grounds, her foot on the floor ventilator. ‘I can see our house from here. Over there,’ she said, pointing out of the window. ‘The white building beside the lake, on the left, can you see it?’

  Tredd thought he saw Aino’s house. It could have been any of the numerous buildings by the big lake, and there were many lakes. ‘The small one, close to the farm robot?’

  ‘Silly,’ Aino said, ‘they’re not farm robots. They’re the big boys. OK, they do farming, but they also provide transport and emergency services. Anyway, that’s not it. It’s the one closer, the bigger one. There are two rhengos by our house too.’

  ‘I see.’ To Tredd the house looked grandiose even from as far as they were, but perhaps that was to be expected of the leader’s dwelling. It could have been much more elaborate – it was still the same white as the other buildings, however large it was. ‘Your family must be very special in this community.’

  Aino shrugged.

  Adessa stepped beside Tredd and said with a soft voice, ‘Aino and her family are normal people like the rest of us. Everyone is equal in this community. It’s been like this ever since the late, great Jilius Dal.’

  ‘He’s my great-grandfather,’ Aino said, looking up at Tredd.

  Tredd did not want to say anything to Adessa, even though he could clearly see the contradiction in what she said. He always thought to each their own, realising that arguing about it would not benefit anyone. For his purpose of ensuring Aino’s safety, this did not seem to be a bad place. But before he could let her go, he wanted to meet up with the man, Henning.

  While Tredd was pondering, Aino, Adessa and Evie continued chatting about what they could see. Eddie was in his thoughts, looking into the distance. Evie smiled. Adessa touched Aino by the hand and said, ‘Your father is yearning to see you, dear. I will take you.’

  ‘Is he at work?’ Aino said, and pointed up. Behind them spread a row of elevators, presumable taking people up to the tower and down to the grounds.

  ‘Yes, he is, and he’s waiting for you. Want to go up?’

  ‘Yes, yes, yes!’ She bounced around, unable to stay still, but then she paused, shifting her eyes between Adessa and Tredd and his crew. ‘Can they come?’

  Adessa smiled with soft eyes. ‘Of course. If they wish.’ She turned to Tredd. ‘Captain Bounty, you and your crew must be tired. You are welcome to take a rest, and—’

  ‘Thank you, but I promised Aino I would take her to her parents,’ Tredd said with resolve. He wanted to pull through to the end – not just deliver Aino back to where she came from, but ensure she was safe. He also wanted to find out if anyone here knew about Aino’s abilities. ‘I will rest only after she is safe.’

  ‘That is very noble of you, though I can assure you that she is completely safe within our community. However, I am happy to accommodate your wishes. What about you two?’ Adessa asked.

  Evie sprang to them. ‘I’m with Aino.’

  They all turned at Eddie, who was leaning against the window, looking over the green fields and forests like he was mesmerised.r />
  ‘Eddie, pal?’ Tredd said.

  Eddie turned around, and ambled back to the others. ‘I’m sorry. This place got me thinking of home. I haven’t seen my family for a while. If you would care to excuse me, I would like to take the opportunity… if I may use your presence facilities?’

  ‘We have a few presence rooms by the guest lodge,’ Adessa said. ‘You are free to use one as you wish. I will ask someone to take you.’ She raised a hand to her ear and spoke a few soft words.

  Eddie fixed his eye on Tredd, and said, ‘If you don’t mind. I’ve been away from home for too long.’

  ‘No trouble, pal,’ Tredd said. Standing there, overlooking the lush greenery and hearing what Eddie said, made Tredd feel his connection to his home planet stronger than before. His childhood and teens had passed in front of his eyes, together with a vision of his friends, his mother and sister, and a fading ghost of his father. But it was all gone now. He was so close and yet infinitely far.

  ‘Eddie, dear, Yonatan will pick you up in a minute. Just wait here,’ Adessa said, and turned back to Tredd. ‘Let us go then. Starlight is waiting for you in his office in the tower.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  JILL COULD NOT MOVE. She was strapped to a robotic chair, the straps holding her in place, making sure she did not slump. The creepy doctor had injected her with something that had paralysed her from the neck down.

  She knew she was sitting, but it didn’t feel like it. She felt like she had nothing below her neck, like she was just a languid head floating above the robotic chair. Like a display object, she sat there while Vorlar ordered her around. Now she rolled onto the command bridge, where he was already waiting for her.

  ‘You know these backwoods?’ Vorlar asked, pacing by her.

  Of course she did. ‘That’s Eura.’

  ‘Good girl,’ he said, and stopped to look at the screen. ‘You and Aino share the same planet of origin. Perhaps that’s why you let your judgement fail. Where you see a little girl, I see a monster.’

  ‘She’s not a monster. It is men like you who make her one.’ She wanted to rise up to him, but the most she could do was tilt her head. She couldn’t feel her electricity, not the slightest tingle, even when she tried.

  Vorlar chuckled. ‘It’s so easy to be led astray by perception. Unless we remove her curse and take control of her powers, she will eventually bring about the total destruction of everything.’

  Jill knew what he meant by removing the curse. Vorlar wanted to transfer a large part of her brain’s function to a computer system in hopes of capturing her abilities in order to create a weapon. In the process, Aino would become a brainless living corpse – if she survived.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ Vorlar said, and walked towards the main screen, his back to Jill, ‘but consider this: unless we act, within our lifetime, everything will be gone… That is all of history and all of the future, everything the five races have ever accomplished and anything that they might ever accomplish. What’s one girl compared to the number of lives and potential lives lost?’

  His simple, inhuman options infuriated Jill. ‘You can’t know that for certain. You’re not a human. Can’t your halfling brain conceive an option where she lives?’

  ‘Not a human?’ Vorlar said with disdain and stomped in front of her. ‘I am more than just a human. My father’s heritage is a victorious history of war, but also history of arts and science – humanity, if I may use the word. If left unattended, your cute friend will eventually destroy all of Dresnean history and all of our shared future. Humanity is not just for humans. And for that matter, your gene pool has also drifted far from what you would call human, as has Aino’s.’

  Jill clenched her jaws, but maintained her business face to hide the fact that she knew where he was headed. ‘What is that supposed to mean?’

  Vorlar squatted down before Jill. ‘Did you ever think that you were different to everyone else?’

  Of course she did. She remembered feeling like a weirdo every day of her childhood. Nobody knew it though. She looked good, was sociable, and never an outcast; she carried her electric secret in silence. Perhaps she was social, because a silent moment with herself would always bring her down. To her it was better to fill every waking moment with carefree chatter than to succumb to thinking about her own existence. At nights, throughout her teens, she fell asleep listening to ‘Happy Tales’. Her room sensed when she fell asleep and paused the story, and when she woke up in the morning, or even in the middle of the night, she had the system resume the story immediately. Not one quiet moment alone.

  ‘A child of the Project Renascence, you are a mutant,’ Doctor Killock said, when Jill did not respond. She sauntered past behind Jill. ‘That is, an individual with new genetic characteristics resulting from mutation. And yes, we know what you can do: a million volts, perhaps more.’

  Jill had always felt it. It made her flee from Eura, leave everyone behind, never letting anyone see her true self. After Rogg died, she had realised that the electricity from her body could kill. In the navy she could hide – no one got close and no one got intimate. Then Tristram had come along, and she felt the electricity sparking again. Unknowingly he had ignited her, but she had to push him away again. It was the only way. He is just a normal guy, and I’m a killer freak of nature… In my embrace his heart would stop.

  ‘But it’s over now,’ the doctor said from behind her.

  What? Did she mean her electricity? That moment it dawned on her: she felt no tingles, absolutely nothing. Feeling hopeful, she said, ‘What did you just say?’

  ‘It shouldn’t have made her think slower,’ the doctor remarked. ‘Perhaps removing her electrical current made her lose some IQ points, whatever.’

  Jill turned her head towards the doctor. ‘You took away my electricity?’

  ‘I did you a favour, girl’, the doctor said, walking around in front of Jill. ‘You’re a normal human now. Well, a paralysed one, but still. Being one of the affected is a burden, you know. You will thank me for removing it.’

  So it was true; she was normal. A smile of relief started forming on her face. However, she was not going to thank the doctor. When once her power would have been useful, she was now incapacitated. ‘Why did you do this?’

  The doctor stopped and brushed her blonde curls aside. ‘Life’s too short to spend anointing inflamed gigasheep bums,’ she said, glancing at her pink fingernails. ‘The girl is a pinnacle product, but pales in comparison to what we could achieve by combining the outcomes of the Project Renascence with our new mainframe, multiplying the abilities. Enter a new breed of human.’ She raised her hands up.

  ‘You’re crazy!’ Jill said, staring at the doctor, who almost trembled in her hubris.

  The doctor lowered her hands and stepped towards Jill. ‘You doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results – that is the definition of crazy. We will change the world.’

  They will, but into what? Jill thought. Her own power alone could wreak havoc, and it was nothing compared to Aino’s stellar abilities. A pumped-up version in the hands of the Dawn Alliance would surely pose an existential threat to the whole of humanity. Jill frowned at the idea and looked away at the main screen. A small interstellar freighter floated in a close-up view.

  ‘You see that ship over there?’ Vorlar said. He pointed a finger at the screen and leaned against the control desk with his other hand. He did not expect an answer. ‘It’s a Rutger and its crew has gone terrestrial.’

  Jill didn’t say anything. Instead she blinked and took a slow breath. She knew who to expect.

  Vorlar trod past her and lowered himself close by her side, almost touching her cheek. ‘It’s your friend, the guns-blazing Mr Bounty, and his motley crew. They’ve gone down to Avalon, the home of the Project Renascence.’

  Jill felt his breath on her neck and smelled the murky spices of Dresnean food.

  ‘We will go down too,’ he said with a low voic
e, just by her ear, ‘and you will get to see home before you go.’

  Jill tried to breathe calmly.

  Vorlar spun around to face her, just centimetres away. ‘This time they will not escape. Whoever thought it would be a good idea to have prisoners camping in their own ship? Ah, but you let them go, you took away all protective measures.’ Vorlar squeezed her cheeks between his rough fingers and grinned.

  Jill felt disgusted, but hid behind her calm façade.

  ‘Now…’ Vorlar turned his back on Jill and took a few steps towards the screen. ‘We will pull in this little ship. But first, I want to see the detailed scan.’

  ‘Scanning,’ a crewmember replied. A rotating view of the ship appeared, and various data started filling the screen around it. Jill could see that some company in Spit City owned the ship and that the only person inside was the mechanic, Berossus Dengo. She was relieved to see that both Tristram and Aino had already gone. For what it was worth, at least they had a head start. After a moment of relief, the doctor’s evil giggle made Jill tense again.

  ‘It’s just the poor big baby on board,’ the doctor said. ‘They’ve left the dullest tool in the box.’

  Vorlar smirked. It was better to not underestimate anyone, but with the intelligence Jill had gathered, the mechanic was the weakest link. Apparently he was scared of going down to planets – the likely reason he had been left behind.

  ‘Let us fetch the mechanic.’ Vorlar turned around and pointed at the doctor. ‘Doctor Killock, pull any information he has, and we shall estimate if he is worth anything.’

  Jill felt sorry for the guy. He was an innocent bystander, in a wrong place at the wrong time, and once Vorlar got what he wanted he would become bio-feed.

  ‘Pull them in,’ Vorlar ordered.

  THE COOL NIGHT-time air of the landing pad swept Jill’s brow as her robotic chair whizzed her down the bridge behind the vice admiral. Two teams of soldiers followed behind her.

  The small interstellar cargo ship they had just pulled in rested on the landing pad in front of Jill. Compared to the sleek ships they often captured, this was a dented old container – and a familiar one to Jill. Soldiers and security robots surrounded it in a perfect circle.