Provider Prime: Alien Legacy

by John Vassar

  “Ja’faal? The Elders have asked us to talk to you. They believe you are still alive.”

  The male spoke now, trembling visibly. “They have told us you are far away on a distant planet, my son. We thought you were dead. For all those cycles, we thought you were dead. You had been taken from us by one pretending to be an Elder. We don’t understand why…”

  The mother spoke again. “I understand why. Because you were special. You were the most intelligent. We should have been allowed to watch you grow. We should have been proud. Instead, we were punished in the most cruel way...”

  Like a giant, mechanical reptile the Sentinel crawled on all fours towards the airscreen, its limbs screeching on the metal deck. “Mother! Father! I didn’t mean it… I never wanted to go with them… they said it was my duty, they said-”

  His mother’s voice continued over Ja’faal’s pleas. “Now they are telling us that you have been forced into something evil. We cannot believe this. You were always such a good youngling.”

  Still shaking, his father said, “We know in your heart that you understand good from evil. That you would never disgrace our world. That you would never dishonour Vis’haan. So, if you see this message, you must stop. Come home to us. Come home to your villa and your studies.”

  The image had slowly panned out as Ja’faal’s parents had been talking. There, in the frame, were what Mitchell assumed were two of the ‘Elders’, their robes shimmering in the light of a red Vis’haani sky. And there, to the right of them, was Commander Ga’naal.

  The Sentinel dragged itself to its feet. Mitchell saw that it, too, had begun to shudder. The words sounded wrong, emanating as they did from a machine. ‘I never meant to go away! I never wanted to be a Provider.’ Ja’faal of Vis’haan raised the autom’s arms towards the vision of sanctuary. ‘Please. I want to come home now…’

  ‘Lee Mitchell. We suggest that you move away from the Sentinel and guide the Vis’haani with you. Please do this with the utmost urgency.’

  Mitchell tapped the side of his head and pointed towards the portal. Understanding his meaning, the Vis’haani officers helped their commander to his feet.

  Ja’faal, trapped forever in the shell of the Sentinel, was clutching at the frozen images. Reaching out at last to the ones he realised he still loved. At the portal, Ga’naal turned with difficulty to stare at the Sentinel. To Mitchell, he said, “It pains me to destroy one of our own in this way. But there is no alternative.”

  The massive Sentinel was standing, transfixed by the images on the airscreen.

  Ga’naal said, “Please forgive us, Ja’faal of Vis’haan.”

  The trembling stopped. A column of dust around Ja’faal was suddenly pushed into the deck from above. The Sentinel jerked downwards by a few centimetres, as though a large weight had landed on its shoulders.

  ‘What is this? Why are you hurting me? Mother, I am sorry! Please, I just want to come home!’ The Sentinel’s left knee buckled, then collapsed. Impossibly, the autom’s body appeared to be compressing.

  Mitchell turned to Ga’naal. The alien commander’s hand was gripping his shoulder. “By all that is sacred. This is the most terrible way for a Vis’haani to die…”

  The Sentinel was now less than a metre high, flattened beyond recognition. Still Ja’faal’s voice called out, ‘Help me! I can’t hold up the sky… it is killing me! Mother, it is-’

  The giant autom shuddered into the deck in a grotesque tangle of metal. Light crackled from within for a few seconds, then there was nothing. No sound in the vacuum, no voice from Ja’faal.

  After a moment, the distorted remains sprang upwards a few centimetres.

  ‘Lee Mitchell. The Vis’haani vessel has indicated that the gravity well has now been removed. It is safe to approach the immediate vicinity.

  ‘Lee Mitchell, can you hear Us?’

  “Yes. Yes, I can hear you.”

  ‘Do you understand what has happened?’

  “Yes. The Vis’haani mother ship…”

  ‘It is fortunate indeed that the vessel is capable of such speeds.’

  Mitchell took a cautious step forward. “We must be sure that Ja’faal has been neutralised. Please ask the Vis’haani to verify.”

  ‘We concur. We are the same, but We are different. We have news of Rayna Ash that is cause for elation. Sub-Commander Charlis confirms that she is alive. Her Identification Node had been removed by the medical team at Lomonosov as a precaution following her abduction.’

  “Thank you. I knew that she was alive. But I am elated nonetheless.”

  Ga’naal had removed his hand from Mitchell’s shoulder. “I apologise for the intrusion. In the circumstances I had become… overwhelmed.”

  Mitchell smiled at the Vis’haani commander. “If you think that’s embarrassing, wait until you see me with Rayna.”

  “This is your female? Your mate?”

  “She is much more than that,” said Mitchell.“And she has just saved all our lives.”

  “Then I look forward to meeting and thanking her in person.”

  ‘Lee Mitchell. Qa’laan, the science officer from the Vis’haani vessel, has scanned the remains of Ja’faal’s autom host. There is no electromagnetic or sub-ether activity at any level. We believe that Ja’faal of Vis’haan is no more.’

  Mitchell walked slowly across to the lifeless heap of metal and looked down. One of the pincers had skewed out from the crushed remains. It looked as though it was reaching upwards.

  He turned away and walked back through the portal with his companions.

  Mitchell could see that Rayna Ash was holding back tears. Her courage had been incredible. She had faced the entity Ja’faal and beaten him. He prayed now that the cost had not been too high. He released her from his arms and stroked the hair away from her face. ‘Sure you’re okay?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Rayna. ‘Takes more than a little old alien to keep this girl down.’

  Mitchell held both her hands and looked deep into her eyes. ‘I don’t know how you did it, but we’re all grateful. Ga’naal would be here in person to thank you, but he was injured. He’s being treated by his own people.’

  Rayne looked at him with childlike glee. ‘I saw them, Lee! When I was in Ja’faal’s mind I saw what they looked like. And their planet. Vis’haan is beautiful, just like they are. Strange and beautiful.’

  ‘Maybe one day we’ll get to see it,’ said Mitchell. ‘Thanks to you, we have a chance.’

  The tears came now. ‘I’m not proud of how I did it. Just after you rescued me, I sensed something strange. I could tell there was something other than a machine inside the – what do you call it? Sentinel? But it was lost. Lost and frightened like a small child. It didn’t make sense until just now. I was with you and I could feel that you were in danger, but then I found I could feel Ja’faal as well. But it was like there were two minds inside. One bad, full of hate and wanting only to kill. And behind that, the child.’

  Mitchell said, ‘And you spoke to the child?’

  Rayna’s head dropped. ‘That’s the bit I’m ashamed of. I lied to it. I had to, Lee, to save you.’

  ‘No-one’s blaming you, least of all me.’

  ‘I spoke to it like a Mother would. I told the child I would save it, that I would take it back home. I told it what it wanted to hear. The hateful side tried to stop me, and I think it would have done if the Vis’haani hadn’t showed the recording of its parents. That seemed to push it over the edge. I had to pull away from it then or it would have dragged me under...’

  ‘What you did gave us enough time. You saved all of us.’

  ‘Lee?’ Rayna Ash looked up at him. ‘Remember we talked about what FedStat might have to do when this was over?’

  Mitchell sighed. ‘Yes, I do. But I’ll try to persuade-’

  ‘I want them to do it.’

  ‘Why? You’ll never have seen the Vis’haani! And these things are not always accurate – or safe. What if they erase your memories of us
?’

  Rayna smiled at him. ‘As long as you seduce me straight afterwards I promise I’ll fall in love with you all over again.’

  Mitchell put his arms around her. It’s a deal.

  Her smile faded. ‘All those people at Lomonosov. All of them died because I was there.’

  ‘They died because Ja’faal was insane. That was not your fault.’

  ‘It doesn’t make any difference. You know how that works after Gem and Dunny died, I know you do.’ Rayna pulled away from him, then looked so deep into his eyes he almost felt like they were one person. ‘Agent Soames was killed. She was lovely inside, Lee, did you know that? A lovely, gentle person. And she believed in what she was doing. She-’

  Mitchell grabbed her shoulders. ‘I know it hurts. I can feel it. But you have to let it heal naturally before rushing into a decision. What about your work? What if that disappears along with the bad stuff?’

  ‘I can’t take the chance that time will make it better, Lee. I just can’t, I’ll go mad...’

  You won’t. I won’t let you. You can hold on to me, you can let me share it.’

  Her tears were dropping onto his fingers now. He felt the guilt coursing through her soul and it stabbed at him from all sides. God knows what it was doing to her…

  ‘The medtec who examined me at Lomonosov. The one who took out my IDN because he thought it might be dangerous. I didn’t even know his name. He was still examining it when the skimmer hit. He was right underneath it and I didn’t even know his name…’

  Not your fault. It was all Mitchell could think to her.

  She looked up at him, then cradled his face in her hands. ‘I could almost deal with that, with your help. I think I could, honestly. But what I know I can’t deal with is that I killed someone today. It doesn’t matter that he was a murderer many times over, that was just part of him. I killed a little boy, Lee. A scared, little boy who just wanted to go home. And I can still hear him screaming...’

  For a split second, before she shielded him from it, so could Mitchell.

  Just over an hour after three Vis’haani and a human had left the coms room in Area-1, the standby light on the medtec autom changed from red to green. It had remained unnoticed and undamaged throughout, along with the coms array a few metres in front of it. No-one saw the diminutive autom move forward and engage a sub-ether link with the array, because no-one was watching. It would be days before FedStat engineers began the work of clearing up the rubble that been Cytec Assembly Plant T-1.

  The autom stood motionless for three minutes and seventeen seconds. The amount of data to be transferred was considerable and although its memory core had undergone extensive modification, it could not approach the speed of a mainframe. It was, however, fast enough. No-one would discover these modifications until months later and still their significance would not be realised. It would be assumed, wrongly, that Thorne or Steinberg had customised the medtec unit for some unknown purpose.

  Transfer complete, there was a pulse from the coms array that lasted less than a second. There were no FedStat vessels or DS Agents close enough for the energy surge to cause concern.

  The autom self-deleted its memory core, took three steps backwards and returned to its original position.

  The pinlight on its torso turned back to red.

  55

  The portal’s deadlocks snapped open. Twenty-two days since his fateful conversation with Nathaniel Devlin, Lee Mitchell stepped into the office of the Director of Delere Secos at Sat-1. The room was brighter now, the faux wood panelling had gone and the giant vista panel had lost its ornate surround. Not everything had changed, though. The newly-appointed Commander Axel Charlis had kept the leather multichair and the wooden desk. Mitchell had barely seen Charlis since their return from Lomonosov, but had a good idea why he had been summoned now.

  ‘Agent Mitchell. Sit down. How are things at DS? Settling back in?’ The trademark visor sat on the desk a few inches from Charlis’s fingertips.

  ‘Well enough,’ said Mitchell with a easy smile. ‘Had my first run-in with a sceler within a day of being active.’

  ‘So I saw from the report. Your first arrest since reactivation.’ Charlis looked up and added, ‘Congratulations, by the way. You’re the first man in history to be reinstated to Delere Secos.’

  ‘Scary how quick it all comes back to you. On the subject of which, are you with us again?’ Mitchell tapped his temple, now home to a standard DS neural link.

  ‘Yes… although it took the med team five hours and three attempts to get me back on the grid.’

  ‘At least it didn’t try to burrow its own way in.’

  Charlis looked at him quizzically for a moment, but said nothing.

  Still no sense of humour required to run Delere Secos, then…

  ‘Any news on Devlin?’ Mitchell asked.

  ‘No change. Not much cause for optimism, either. Whatever Thorne used is being suppressed by the meds, but it’s still got a grip...’

  Mitchell wondered if Ja’faal of Vis’haan would ever be referred to again by his real identity. The whole First Contact incident was being kept under a Level 10 security cloak. The SenANNs themselves had given him strict instructions to refer to Ja’faal only as Roderick Thorne.

  ‘But they haven’t given up?’

  ‘No. And while I’m in command, they won’t.’

  Mitchell nodded his support. ‘So, Commander. You wanted to see me.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Charlis. ‘It concerns the Excalibur.’

  ‘I guessed as much. She’s got to be due back any day now.’

  ‘She was,’ said Charlis, picking up the visor. ‘Until yesterday, that is.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The new comet that’s all over the media at the moment. The one that our top scientists appear not to have predicted, although everyone on Earth can see the damn thing as clear as day…’

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘It’s not a comet. It’s the remains of the Excalibur.’

  Mitchell stared at the new DS commander. ‘How? They were just a few weeks away when we left Lomonosov.’

  ‘We’re still trying to clarify. But it seems that their inertia systems failed. When they decelerated on Earth approach, momentum simply ripped the ship apart. The ruptured continuum drive left a thousand-kilometre streak across the sky.’

  ‘And you believe that?’ Mitchell suddenly realised there was another implication. “SenANNs. Why didn’t you tell me of your Brother’s death?”

  Charlis stood and walked towards the vista panel. He put on the visor and adjusted it carefully. ‘Why would I not believe it?’

  ‘What?’ Mitchell marched across to him. ‘You’re saying that this isn’t the most convenient way to cover up the whole incident with Thorne? No need for memory manipulation now, the poor bastards are all dead!’

  His mind called out to the SenANNs again, but without response.

  Charlis turned sharply back. ‘Be very careful, Agent Mitchell. You’re seeing conspiracies where there are none. One thing I am certain of is that this was an accident.’

  ‘Really? Who convinced you? The High Council? The SenANNs?’

  ‘My own science team, since you ask.’ Charlis removed the visor again and looked into Mitchell’s eyes. ‘Listen to me, Mitchell. I know you’ve been through a lot. We all have. But there is no hidden agenda here. The incident with Thorne is dead and buried, like he is. We found the security breach. Hell, you found it.’

  “SenANNs. I have to talk to you.”

  Charlis’s eyes narrowed. ‘Mitchell. Do you hear what I’m saying? The Excalibur is a tragedy, yes, and it’s hard to take on top of what DS has just gone through. But it is just a coincidence, nothing more.’

  Mitchell walked slowly back to the desk. Please, God, don’t let me be right…

  Quietly, he said, ‘Why did you order me here?’

  ‘I wanted your advice,’ said Charlis. ‘The High Council asked me to oversee h
ow this is handled by the Populus media. The comet cover story gives us options, but not much time to get the Excalibur incident straight.’

  ‘You could always tell them the truth.’

  ‘We could.’ Charlis placed his hands on the back of the leather multichair. ‘But my guess is the High Council would prefer the Excalibur to be lost outside Sol System. It was sheer good luck that no wreckage impacted on Earth.’

  Mitchell looked down, a sick feeling rising in his gullet. ‘I suppose you’re right.’

  He reached into his tunic pocket and pulled out a small, grey device with what looked like a shoot emerging from one end. It shimmered as he placed it on the desk in front of them.

  Charlis leant across and picked it up. ‘What’s this? Another one of your sound-cocoons?’ He smiled at Mitchell, then replaced it carefully on the polished oak. ‘You should make one that looks like something ordinary for a change.’

  Mitchell put the Vis’haani translator back in his pocket. He felt the blood draining from his face. ‘Commander. I may not be the best person to consult with on this. I respectfully ask that you seek council with someone else.’

  Charlis looked back at him with concern. ‘If that’s what you wish, then of course. You don’t look well, Mitchell, are you feeling okay?’

  Mitchell tapped his temple again. ‘Been feeling a bit odd since they put the real one back. Although nothing compared to what you seem to have gone through.’

  Charlis smiled again. ‘I was out while they did the painful stuff. But whatever they did, it worked. I feel like a new man.’

  Mitchell said, ‘I’m sure you do. If there’s nothing more, Commander?’

  Charlis gestured towards the portal, still smiling.

  The deadlocks clamped shut behind him as Mitchell turned left down ‘B’ corridor, stumbling in his haste to get... anywhere.

  “SenANNs!”

  ‘We are here, Lee Mitchell.’

  “Why didn’t you tell me about the Excalibur?” Mitchell was half running, half staggering as he reached the central elevator.