Trapped

by Scott Bartlett

  “Chat away,” the other Husher said with a sickening smile. The scar that ran along his cheek turned white, stretching his left eye downward in a sad, deformed shape that seemed to fit the man. “I’ve got all the time in the world.”

  “You should be dead.”

  “So why aren’t I?” The man shrugged, then turned to roll back into his bunk. “Oh, wait. Let me guess. You have some sad moral imperative that compels you to spare me. There’s something good—something worth saving in me. Is that it?”

  Husher sneered. “You’re beyond saving.”

  “Yet here I am, your favorite pet, taken along on your little adventure.”

  The public didn’t know this madman was here. He’d already been tried for crimes against humanity and sentenced to more than a dozen life sentences, so the idea that he’d been taken outside the Milky Way wasn’t likely to sit well with anyone.

  Hell, it didn’t sit well with Husher. If he’d had his way, the wretch would have been brought before a firing squad and pumped full of metal.

  But Husher, Iver, and other people at pay grades Husher wasn’t allowed to imagine had all agreed: given that this Husher belonged to the version of humanity that had created the AIs, having him on the mission could prove vital.

  That didn’t do anything to prevent Husher’s skin from crawling whenever he was around him. “You know why you’re here. And when the time comes for you to help us, I expect to get all the cooperation I require. If I don’t get it, I’ll have you sliced apart and put back together again, over and over, until you’re just a sack of water that splits at the seams.”

  The other Husher leaped to his feet and came to the edge of the cell in two steps. Husher knew the prisoner was close enough that he could reach through the bars and grab him, but he refused to step back. He didn’t break eye contact as the man slammed against his cage, nose flaring.

  The marines on either side of Husher reacted by hardening their stance, their weapons aimed squarely at the bastard’s chest.

  To Husher’s surprise, his doppelgänger was smiling. “Are you listening to yourself? I know you think you’re better than me. More…righteous. But what I did to that pathetic bird angers you, so much so that you’re willing to do the exact same thing to me.” He chuckled, with real mirth spilling into his voice. “I’m not frightened. You don’t know what pain is, Captain. You destroyed my whole world. I haven’t even begun to destroy yours.”

  Husher said nothing for a long moment, holding his double’s gaze as the man’s chest rose and fell, and the humor slowly drained from his bloodshot eyes.

  One second. Two. Three. Four.

  The other Husher finally broke eye contact, his lips twisting. “Why did you come down here, Captain?”

  Husher waited a few seconds longer, and when he spoke, he did so quietly. Deliberately. “When the time comes, you will help us. Or you’ll get that execution that the rest of the universe seems to think you deserve. It won’t be quick. It won’t be painless. And you will regret it.”

  His double looked for a moment like he would scream in Husher’s face. Instead, he reached out his hand for a handshake. “I’ll make you a deal.”

  The marines on either side of Husher looked warily on.

  Husher looked down at the hand. Like his face, it was deformed. There seemed to be no part of the man that wasn’t hideous.

  He sniffed. “What deal?”

  “I will help you. I’ll tell you anything you want to know about the AIs.”

  “And in exchange?”

  “When this is over, I want to see my son.”

  Husher blinked. That, he hadn’t expected. Of course the other Husher had a family. In fact, it was saving his son that had driven him to offer his surrender in the first place, so that Husher would spare what remained of the Progenitor universe.

  Nevertheless, it surprised him whenever this creature was motivated by anything other than hatred.

  “I can arrange it,” he said. “But it won’t be easy.”

  “So it’s a deal, then?”

  Husher studied the deformed hand stuck through the cell bars. In truth, he had no idea if the man’s son was still alive or, if he was, where he might be. But it was possible that he could be tracked down, and it wasn’t an unreasonable request. In fact, if he was being honest, Husher had had no idea that his double was being denied access to his son.

  He shook the other Husher’s hand.

  As expected, his twin clamped down instantly in an attempt to drag Husher forward into the bars. He stood ready for the little tug of war, but the marines around him weren’t. They started to shout for the prisoner to let go.

  “No,” shouted Husher, not liking the strain in his voice. Was it his imagination, or was his twin stronger than he remembered? “No,” he said again, his voice calmer. “I’m OK.”

  The other Husher leaned forward until he could whisper in his ear. “They’re going to finish what we started. We’re all dead already.”

  The man’s grip went limp, and he pulled the hand away to return to his bunk, a bounce in his step. “Thanks for the visit. It’s great to know we can still talk.”

  Husher nodded at the marines, then turned to leave without another word. As soon as he was outside the brig, his com buzzed.

  “We’ve arrived at the target dimension,” said the voice of Lieutenant Commander Cory Long. The Coms officer seemed bothered by something.

  “And?” Husher wasn’t used to having to prod senior bridge crew for information.

  “We have contact.”

  “What kind of contact?”

  Long paused again. “I have no idea.”

  Chapter 12

  Combat Information Center

  UHC Relentless

  Husher stepped into the CIC, reaching the command chair in a few quick steps. He’d expected his XO to vacate it the moment the hatch into the CIC opened, but Shota was still staring at the viewscreen. Husher was about to say something when his eyes were drawn up to it as well.

  With that, Shota finally seemed to sense his presence. He moved to allow his captain to sit.

  “What are we looking at?” Husher asked.

  Tremaine spoke from the Tactical console. “It was there when we dropped into the dimension. It’s like they were waiting for us.”

  The visual was dominated by a single humongous ship of some kind. It dwarfed even the Providence, and it took a lot to make a supercarrier look small. In fact, whatever the vessel was, it was almost as big as all the ships in the battle group put together.

  The thing was bulbous and asymmetrical, like a giant germ in space, its surface mottled with dark purples and greens. But there was something else strange about the hull. It was…hazy, almost as if in constant motion.

  “What can you tell me about it?” Husher asked.

  Winterton was hunched over his console, shoulders rigid. “Not much, sir. It’s barely showing up on radar. It’s hard even to get a good sense of where the thing ends and space begins. Its edges appear to be constantly shifting.”

  “Has it changed shape?”

  “Sort of.” The sensor operator shook his head. “It’s more like it has no clear shape.”

  “An amoeba in space?” Shota offered.

  Winterton gave a small nod. “For lack of a better term, I’d say that about captures it.”

  “Is it organic, then?” asked Husher. It seemed impossible that any living thing could survive contact with the vacuum of space for very long.

  “It’s difficult to say at this distance, sir. It’s absorbing more than ninety percent of our radar. The sensors can’t get much data on it.”

  “It’s moving toward us,” said his XO, a low growl in his voice.

  “Get me a visual.” A second later, the main display showed a closeup view of the thing. Husher watched the—vessel? creature?—slowly growing on the viewscreen. “How fast is it approaching?”

  Winterton tapped at his console. “It’s taking its time. And it�
��s not taking a direct path.”

  “Has it deviated from its path since we arrived?”

  “No, sir. It had to be moving in our direction even before we arrived.”

  “I don’t like it,” Shota said.

  Husher nodded. “It is damn strange, but then again, we are in a different dimension.”

  “It hasn’t made any aggressive moves yet,” Tremaine put in.

  “Right,” Husher said. “But it also hasn’t stopped moving toward us, now that we’re in its flight path.”

  Shota shifted in his seat. “That’s suspicious enough.”

  “Have we tried hailing them?” Husher asked the Com officer.

  “Yes, sir. But we’re getting nothing but static.”

  Shota leaned forward farther. “Let’s put a shot across its bow.”

  Husher glanced up at his XO to see if he was joking, but his face was the picture of focus. “We can’t do that, Commander. Not without a direct threat or orders from the admiral.”

  The XO crossed his arms, clearly unconvinced. “If we got a distress signal, that implies there is a threat here somewhere. I see one ship right now, and it doesn’t look to be in distress. So my money’s on that one being the threat.”

  “How do we know it’s not in distress?” Husher thought back to his conversation with Ochrim, and the Ixan’s description of the language the message was written in. “That signal was sent in a way unlike anything we’re familiar with. It’s possible that vessel is trying to communicate right now, using an entirely different medium. One we don’t have access to.”

  He waited a beat, but Shota had nothing more to say. “Nevertheless,” Husher continued. “Let’s sound general battle stations. Arm the point defenses.” He wouldn’t have done that back home, since it would be picked up as an immediate escalation. But here, facing some huge thing that was clearly alien, he didn’t think his actions would get the same response. And it was just as likely that Shota was right.

  The lights on the bridge took on a reddish hue as the order spread throughout the Relentless.

  Husher tapped at his chair’s armrest. “Are these the coordinates the distress call came from?”

  “As near as we can tell, sir,” Winterton said, still poring over the sensor feeds. He shook his head. “Whether they’re friend or foe, it’s definitely too big a coincidence that this ship just happens to be here. Assuming it is just one ship.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I can’t be sure, but there appear to be…” Winterton seemed to grasp for the right word. “Seams. All along the surface. And according to the computer modeling that I’m running—keep in mind, sir, this is all done off the cuff—they seem to match the seams on the opposite side of the ship.”

  “But you just said you couldn’t get a fix on the hull. That it was like an amoeba. That doesn’t sound like something that has consistent markings.”

  “I know, sir. It’s the damndest thing. Even though the overall structure is amoeba-like, there’s definitely a design. The way the hull appears to be sectioned…to me, it suggests the whole thing is divided into roughly equal portions.”

  “Almost like it’s made of building blocks,” Tremaine said.

  “Or weapons.” Shota glanced back toward Husher. “We really need to get it to stop approaching us.”

  “Agreed. Have we heard from the admiral?”

  “Transmission incoming now, sir,” said Long.

  “On screen.”

  The threat board faded from the viewscreen, replaced by the CIC of the Providence. “We can’t get a good lock on this thing,” Iver said without preamble.

  Next to him, Captain Jeremy Daniels was nodding. He motioned to one of his bridge crew off-camera. “Back on screen,” Daniels snapped.

  In the same instant, Winterton said, “Sir, the ship’s profile is changing.”

  “On screen,” Husher said, and the image of the Providence’s deck was replaced by the huge ship once again.

  But it wasn’t a huge ship anymore. As they watched, it seemed to come apart. The entire outer hull of the ship was sloughing off, like a great insect molting.

  No. The skin wasn’t being discarded, Husher realized. Instead, it broke apart into perfectly symmetrical shapes that mirrored the seams they’d observed earlier.

  “They’re ships,” Husher said, understanding what he was seeing now. “The hull itself is breaking into smaller units.” His suspicions were confirmed a moment later when the smaller symmetrical pieces started moving under their own power. They had drive engines of some kind. And Husher didn’t doubt that where there were propulsion systems, there were weapon systems, too.

  “There are at least fifty individual vessels now,” Winterton said calmly. “Make that sixty. No. Seventy.” He shook his head in frustration. “It’s hard to distinguish them.”

  Husher’s gaze flicked to the viewscreen. Sure enough, the small ships were now a thick cloud of even smaller craft, flying forward in a formation-less swarm toward the human battle group.

  And that swarm was closing fast.

  Chapter 13

  Combat Information Center

  UHC Relentless

  “Admiral, I’m suggesting we use our quantum engines to fall back,” Husher said.

  There was a pause that dragged on long enough that Husher glanced over at his Coms officer. He was about to ask if they were still in contact with the Providence when Iver spoke.

  “You’re suggesting we turn tail and run?”

  “I wouldn’t characterize it that way.” His spine prickled with annoyance. The fact he even needed to say this to a man with more stars on his shoulder than him rankled. And Iver wasn’t just a pencil pusher, either; he’d had plenty of time in a command chair. “Tactically, we don’t know what we’re up against. Plus, there’s no reason to defend this position. We can simply reverse course—”

  “Turn tail,” Iver repeated.

  “—and find another entry point in the system that doesn’t have these things running around it.”

  “What makes you think that they couldn’t follow us?”

  “Maybe they can, Admiral. But we should at least determine that before we engage.”

  “It may help us get a better sense of their capabilities, Admiral.” Shota stepped into the frame at Husher’s side. “We can formulate a much better line of attack that way.”

  Iver nodded slowly. “I see you’ve managed to mold the commander in your likeness fairly quickly, Husher.”

  Husher frowned. What’s Iver playing at? This didn’t seem like the man who’d sent him on this wild goose chase in the first place. Wasn’t it Iver who fought to have me on this mission? And now the man seemed dead set on attacking an unknown force, without any knowledge of their capabilities.

  Unless…“Sir, do you know something you aren’t telling us?”

  The admiral didn’t flinch. “If these things were able to track our approach, they may very well be able to retrace our steps right back to our home universe. We cannot, under any circumstances, allow anything from this universe to make it back to our own.” His eyes were narrow, and his mouth was drawn into a tight line. “Do you understand me, Husher?”

  Husher shook his head. “I have no intention of leading these things home. If anything, I want to lead them elsewhere. I’m suggesting we reengage the quantum engines and fall back, but not along the vector we used to get here.”

  Iver shook his head again, a single tendon rigid on his neck. For the first time, Husher thought he understood what was happening.

  Iver’s terrified.

  He didn’t know yet if it was because Iver truly did know something that he didn’t—some intel he was privy to that Husher wasn’t—or if it was a general fear of what this universe might infect their own with.

  Husher glanced at Shota, who seemed as frustrated as he did. The young man was as gung-ho a first officer as Husher had had for a long time, maybe ever, and yet here they were trying to convince an a
dmiral not to go off half-cocked. Maybe this was the legacy of the Third Galactic War. Maybe going through that hell had broken all of them, and they just hadn’t realized it yet.

  Shota pointed at the side viewscreen. On it, Husher saw the alien vessels closing fast.

  “Admiral.” Husher resisted the impulse to lean forward. “We need a decision.”

  The moment he said it, he knew it was a mistake. The old man might not be thinking straight, but the one thing sure to get his dander up would be the perception that a subordinate was trying to push him into a hasty call.

  “No.” Iver’s tone was flat, and brooked no argument. “We can’t take the risk of letting them off the hook. They were here waiting for us, which makes them a direct threat to our mission, as far as I’m concerned.”

  Before Husher could respond, the admiral vanished from the viewscreen, replaced by the cloud of incoming alien ships.

  “Sir,” snapped Long from the Com console. “Priority message from the admiral to the entire battle group. We’ve been ordered to attack along with the other four destroyers, while the cruisers hold the second line.”

  Husher cursed under his breath. “Tactical, put it up.”

  Husher didn’t need to explain to Tremaine what he meant. The viewscreen split, and a view of the battle group appeared as a series of dots set against a black background. Distance and speed markers floated over each dot. Already, the other destroyers were surging forward, forming up to launch a frontal assault on the incoming swarm.

  “Helm, do you have coordinates?”

  Moens gave a sharp nod. “Yes, sir. They were attached to the admiral’s orders.”

  “Very good. Get us in position immediately.” Husher turned to his Tactical officer. “Set condition one throughout the ship. Arm point defense systems.”

  “Yes sir,” Tremaine said as his fingers flew over his console.

  His XO was shaking his head. “This is a mistake.”

  “We’re following a direct order,” Husher snapped. He stared daggers at Shota. “The only mistake is to question it.”

  The younger man faltered, his mouth falling open for a moment before it clamped shut, his chin jutting out. “Yes, sir.”