Seemed unlikely, that last. Aliens are alien. I’d come to be very fond of them, in my way, and they were clearly people with different personalities and intelligence levels. Courage, too, I thought as I remembered waking up with Blackears after my rage at being denied a cold death in the stars. I could have torn him to pieces before they could get in, and he’d known that. For all of it, they were alien, and past my understanding. Would I have hauled a half-dead alien into my ship and patched him up? Mebbe. Depended.
Would I help a community of unknown humans in unknown trouble? I lay on the bunk staring at the ceiling and thinking about that one until my stomach rumbled at me. I ate, found the bathroom behind a sliding panel in the wall, and used the facilities, including a quick ‘fresher to get my skin tingling and cleansed. That helped my thought process. I’d been going around in circles. Lack of data. That was my problem. I just didn’t know enough.
The chat rooms were, I knew for a certainty, monitored. Even the ostensibly private ones. If there were truly encrypted channels, I didn’t have access. Time to do this the old-fashioned way. The hatch slid back and forth into the wall, but closed, I had access to the maintenance panel. The room I was in had never been meant to be a cell, and it wasn’t the first time I’d had to deal with an ornery hatch.
As I worked, I planned ahead as much as I could. If whatever was wrong aboard was a disease, I’d be exposed already, or only exposed through contact with an inhabitant. By the message boards, so few were active I was pretty sure I could avoid contact. Scope it out, come back here and wait more. Until I was sure they weren’t coming for me.
Using a broken handle from the extruded eating utensils I’d gotten with my meal, I faked the hatch clasp so it wouldn’t show as open on someone’s screen somewhere. Getting the clasp out and handle in meant slow, tricky work. Sort of like maneuvering waldoes to pull chunks of the good stuff from a spinning asteroid. Work I was right at home with. With that accomplished, I pulled the hatch toward me enough that I could wriggle through the gap. I left it open.
The corridor was empty, and I felt no vibrations under my stocking feet. I had left my boots in the room, knowing I wouldn’t need or want them for this expedition. I'm making this tale too long already, so I won't bore you with what happened, because nothing happened, other than me getting all worked up over it. I was damp with fear sweat, and nothing happened. There were no people anywhere. Hatches stood open, revealing apartments that must have been much nicer to live in than the plain little room they'd put me in. I went in a couple, movin’ slow and easy. There was no one home. No bodies, which would have been a relief ‘cept it occurred to me that a nice simple plague would be better to understandin’ than this whole lot of nothingness. Meals stood forgotten on the table in one place, just startin’ to smell off. I was reminded of a certain teenaged child’s room, and knew the family here was gone, had been gone for no more nor less than a couple of days. It wasn’t warm, nor was it cool. Food spoilage is pretty predictable.
I went on to the next place, a little bolder. No food out, there, but the bunks were mussed, a tangle of blanket and sheets. I bent over, getting my face close enough to take a whiff. Sour sweat, stale. Like someone had been afraid, or sick. I backed out fast. The corridors were stone silent. I stood still and listened, but the only sound was my own heart pounding. I got to a certain point where I couldn't take it anymore and retreated to my room.
Once my hatch was back in place, I got back into the chat rooms on the entertainment channel. Sure, if there were people in there, they must be somewhere. I arranged a meet-up. Well, I thought I had.
Chapter 3: Fighting for Life
I don't know who was more surprised when I showed up, him or me. He was the dark-eyed man from the squad that had gotten me, and I was... not supposed to be able to leave the room he'd locked me in. He stood there in an empty caff staring at me over the forlorn tables and chairs. I couldn't smell anything cooking.
"Where are all the people?" I broke the silence, and my voice echoed a little.
He closed his mouth. "How did you... Do you make a habit of appearing from nowhere?"
"Certainly not. But I had decided you forgot where you put me." I crossed the room and sat down. I was using my best manners and speech. I c’n talk correct. I jus’ don’ usually bother. But doin’ it made me feel smarter. I needed smarts, right about now.
He folded into a nearby chair as though his strings were cut. "No. Not really. I've been... trying to keep control."
"Over the message boards? And you didn't answer my question."
"Which... oh. Um." his face looked as though he'd bitten something very sour.
"Is it contagious?" I asked curiously.
He closed his eyes. "How did you... No, don't answer that. No, it's not. It was, ah, inadvertent. But manually administered, so unless you," He opened his eyes and looked narrowly at me, evidently remembering I was supposed to be in quarantine.
"Not that I'm aware of." I assured him. "Manually administered? A vaccine?"
He nodded, "there was an outbreak, below. We received the customary prophylactic vaccine, after a lengthy wait and embargo of traffic, which was difficult. I don't know..." He fluttered his hands in an odd, helpless gesture, closing on air. "Perhaps we were too hasty."
"We?" I was beginning to wonder if he was the only survivor on the station. No - I had seen the marines, before.
"The head of Medical and I - I'm Dayne Broach, by the way, Head of Security."
"And you already know I am Jade."
He cocked his head. "Just Jade?"
I nodded firmly. I'd left my family name behind in the stars. "Call me Jade Star, if you must have a patronymic."
"You are a very unusual woman, Jade Star." He leaned back and looked at me through narrowed eyes. I had no idea what he was seeing. I'd taken no steps to look at myself since arriving on the station, and on the alien ship, there had been no mirrors in a culture that groomed one another. The shiny walls gave me a distorted sense of youth, but little else. They groomed me, too, which is why I knew my hair was far shorter than a normal human woman would wear it, although no shorter than I'd kept it when young and living my life in an exosuit. My man had liked it long, but loved me enough to put his eyes behind my need for hair that didn't mat and stink under a baldcap.
Might be white, that hair. The little people who'd fixed me up wouldn't have known it was black-dark-chocolate when they took me in as an old woman with snowy white hair. Hell, for all I knew, it was striped or spotted like their fur coats tended to be. I looked back at him for a long time, unwavering in his gaze. I'd been looked at before. Looked at with fire and lust and longing, but what was in his eyes was something else entirely. He wasn't seeing me the woman. He was looking at my soul.
"I came to you with nothing,” I began to speak, and he sat bolt upright.
"Nothing?" His voice rose loud in the empty room, echoing. "You had a full load of Almeida's Stones, Jade!"
I checked my initial response, the words dying in my throat. So... they had been unable to let me go without a final gift. I knew the carrying capacity of the scooter down to the last kilogram. A full load... would buy me my very own planet, should I so desire. Or at least a continent to settle down on. Holy... I shut down the rush of thoughts, although the hormones flyin’ through my system were unstoppable.
"Does me no good, without a buyer. And I don't think there are buyers aboard."
He slumped as my words sank in. "No. Jade, people are dying. And worse."
I raised an eyebrow and crooked my mouth in a half-smile. "Iff'n you tell me zombies, I don’t want to hear about it.
Dayne leaned forward. “Not zombies, of course not. But changes, and I don’t know what’s happening and Greff... Greff locked himself in and won’t come out. But he might talk to you.”
“Why me?” I paused, “And who’s Greff?”
“Greff is, sorry, I should have remembered I hadn’t told you, he’s the Head of Medical. An
d he blames himself for this. I don’t think he’s killed himself, at least I hope not. I keep sending him messages that we need him.” It all came out in a rush, like he was getting it off his chest.
I could see his agitation even though he was keeping his body still and his voice mostly even. Advantages to old include plenty of time to learn how to read someone cold. “Why me?” I asked again. I already knew I’d try, but I needed more information before I went at this Greff.
“You’re new. You aren’t...” He did the gesture again.
“He might open up to me.” I filled in. “Bein’ young and female and all?”
Dayne nodded. I knew I looked young, mirror or not. Hands don’t lie, nor does the feeling of skin taut over cheekbones for the first time in decades. Now... It been a long time since that conversation in an abandoned station, and you’re looking at me funny because you know how long it’s been. Sure you do, or you wouldn’t have spent all this time tracking me down. Do I still look young? Don’t answer that. I don’t feel young.
I stood up and looked down at Dayne. “I can only try. I’m no expert, mind.”
He stood up. “I’m desperate.” He locked eyes with me. “Do you want to see...”
I shook my head firmly. “No. I don’t.”
Sounded cold, even then to me, but the reality was that I was an old woman even then, and old women don’t care what they say. Old women have learned to be ruthless, knowin’ that they are the ones who keep the family goin’ but only if they are hard and cold... cold as space.
The station was none of mine. But I didn’t have anyone right then, my life had been stripped clean and the slate washed… (another sayin’ that only made sense when I looked it up, but it worked nicely for the way I taught my young’uns. Raised them up calling the wall section we used for school the Slate. Four generations have passed through those rooms and all of ‘em call it the Slate. So I kept a bit of Earth Lingo alive. Eh.) Now I was taking on a burden t’wasn’t rightly mine, but I didn’t see why not. I couldn’t flee this place, and even if I could, wouldn’t. Mine just by right of association.
Dayne led me through eerily empty corridors. There were a couple of times I felt like we were being watched, but when I looked around, there was no one. We were alone. I felt vibrations through my stocking feet, which were getting cold. I missed my boots now. I should have put them on for the meeting, but I’d wanted that extra sense more than the hard soles.
He stopped at a hatch. The hatches in this area were made like doors, there were niches in the walls filled with green plants, which seemed to be sadly neglected, some dying and some growing wild. It was an attempt, I supposed, to make it look like a planetside neighborhood. Not a bad use of space, when I thought about it. No need to isolate all the hydroponic gardens in their own space, and a plant was cheery. I’d always kept as many going on the rocks as I could, they made the air better.
Dayne gestured at the hatch, which had a diamond-shaped clear window in the middle of it. He was standing to one side, where he couldn’t be seen. I shrugged and lifted a hand to knock, just like on a planet. Before I could, the hatch slid open and a hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me forward.
Chapter 4: Reasoning out the End
Off-balance, I stumbled into Greff’shome, the hatch whisking shut behind me. I started to turn, and felt the cool muzzle of a gun against my neck. Pretending to have lost my balance entirely, I fell forward, and rolled with my momentum. Coming up facing the man who was pointing... a hypospray?
“Don’t move!” He shouted, waving the injector gun at me.
I raised my hands. “Don’t shoot?”
“Who are you?” The muzzle of the gun dipped and wavered. It was no real threat to me from this distance, but I politely kept my hands in the air for him.
“My name is Jade.” I told the shadowy man. He was pressed against the wall by the hatch, and the lights were off inside. “Are you Greff?”
“Why did he send you in here? Are you supposed to kill me?” Which answered my question in a roundabout way.
I shook my head, knowing he could see me in the light from the corridor through the hatch glass. I couldn’t see movement out there, and wondered what Dayne was up to. “No, I’m supposed to talk you into comin’ out and helpin’ people. Seems there’s a sickness...”
He lowered the gun all the way. “Where did you come from? And how long have you been on board the station?”
Where had I come from, indeed. A long time ago, it felt like. “I came onboard yesterday, I think. My time sense is off.”
He groaned. “You’re not one of them.”
“Um, who?” I was watching him carefully as he slumped down the wall a bit. Man gets in that shape, he’s liable to do most anything.
“The infected. No, more than that. The Altered.”
I could hear the capital letters in the dramatic tone he put on.
“Suppose you explain to me. I’d been told it was a vaccination gone wrong.” I looked around. The place was neat as a pin. I took a step forward and peered into the corridor, very aware of Greff standing next to the hatch. “Seems we’re to be left alone. Have you coffee? Or tay?”
He nodded, his face hidden in the shadows so I couldn’t tell what he was feeling. “Come on, then, and I’ll try to explain.”
He ducked his head and looked at me, as he passed me, “I’m afraid it’s not real coffee. Not after so long without a ship docking. Earth is a long ways from Termine.”
I followed him into the tiny kitchen area, sitting across a counter-top from him and watching him get water and add a scoop of granules to it. He made himself a cup, too, so I decided to trust him and drink it.
“I had an emergency and was forced to landing here. But I’ve only seen one person in the flesh - Dayne, who says he’s head of security - and six people in Marine exosuits. Suppose you fill me in.”
Rather than come around and sit on the other stool beside me, he leaned against the counter, facing me over it. Once he’d taken a sip of his drink, I followed suit. Nothing like real coffee, but that followed with Dayne’s comment about an embargo, caff was simpler to replicate synthetically. Even for the fake stuff, it was pretty horrible, and I did my best to choke it down without making a face.
“He is head of security. He’s not a bad man, just...” Greff slowed to a stop, his mouth open, his eyes flicking back and forth from my face to the hatch behind me. I felt a crawl up my spine that was all in my head. There wasn’t anyone there.
“Suppose you begin at the beginning. There was an outbreak downplanet?” I could read the fatigue on him, in the light of the kitchen, and he showed signs of sleep deprivation. It sure looks a lot like drunk.
He took a deep breath. “We started to get reports of an unusual bacterial infection, through medical channels. I don’t think I saw a hint of it on the public news channels, and I don’t - didn’t - have time to pay attention to the independent newsies. I made a note of the symptoms, briefed the customs officers, and carried on with other things. Then the embargo hit. One day, traffic as usual, the next...”
He swallowed a big gulp of his caff and set the cup down. “You understand that we’re autonomous. We don’t have to get supplies from the planet to survive?”
I nodded. “Most stations are, in case of emergencies just like this.”
“Well this was an emergency. We didn’t get any communications for a full planet week - that’s a station ten-day - and then when they came back online, no video. Voice only.”
I cocked my head at him. “What about the independent channels?”
He nodded. “I didn’t think of it, but one of my nurses did - you should understand, we have three doctors, and about thirty nurses, on station. He brought it up on my screen and I couldn’t believe it was real, at first. But then we found more video...”
“What happened?” I was really curious, now. He had trailed off and was staring into thin air in a way that made me nervy.
“I figured tha
t out much, much later. They sent us a vaccine, a bacteriophage - do you know what that is?”
I shook my head and took a drink. The story behind the story was unfolding. The station had trusted the planet, and that had been used against them.
“A bacteriophage works by attacking and killing bacteria. Only these had been altered to insert a bit of DNA into the human genome - it’s complex...”
I held up a hand to stop him. “I don’t need the details. I think I see where you’re going with this.”
“Viruses can do that. Not that I’m sure what was in the vaccine was what they were telling us, now. But then? I accepted the shipment and started vaccinating the population. You can’t vaccinate everyone, you know. Best you can hope for is herd immunity, where enough people are immune to protect the people who aren’t from coming into contact with the contagion.”
He took another gulp of his caff. “We thought... no, we didn’t think. We just did what we were told, like good little minions.” His voice was bitter and he put the empty cup down with a bang. “I personally gave dozens of good people the vaccine. I...” His voice broke and he stared down at his hands, cupped around the mug.
“You had no reason to doubt them. Sure, you’d have been crazy to test it with no warning somethin’ was wrong.” I tried for soothing, and it must have worked, as he nodded.
“There was no need to test it. And every need to get it out to the general population if the embargo was to be lifted. We can sustain ourselves, but it was killing the economy. And families were separated... we’d hoped this would be the end of it.”
“And it wasn’t?” I wondered if he was one with family on the planet. I also wondered what had been on those videos.
“We were busy, beyond busy, with the vaccinations when my nurse showed me the vids. And I didn’t believe, not at first. That wasn’t possible, couldn’t be real. Vids lie, we all know that.”
I nodded agreement. Vids were easily enough manipulated. The more perfect it was, the more likely a lie. I might be just a rockjock, and this out of my realm of sureties, but I did know that.
Jade Star (Tanager Book 1) Page 2