by Tim Lebbon
He had been a normal child with simple desires. His mother had been a nurse on an Earth-orbit station, his father a physical educator for the military. Until his fifteenth birthday, Marshall had been a normal boy obsessed with normal boy things. He’d played zero-G soccer, sung in a band, enjoyed schooling, and had been hypnotized every time he saw Jenny Anne Francis in a bikini. Then when he turned fifteen, he was approached by a recruiter for Weyland-Yutani. His imagination was set aflame by the things she told him, and his parents had done little to douse those flames. They saw a good career for him in the Company. It was an opportunity few people were afforded, and Marshall grasped onto it with both hands.
Seven years later he was assistant to one of the Thirteen.
Seven years after that his employer died, and Marshall was tagged as the natural successor. From apprentice to one of the most powerful men in the galaxy in the space of fourteen years, and to what did he ascribe his success?
He didn’t give a fuck about anyone.
Actually, that wasn’t quite true. His success was due to the fact that he could convince anyone that he did give a fuck about them.
But he didn’t.
So when General Bassett’s image appeared on his holo frame, requesting contact, Marshall swilled the last of his single malt down and prepared his concerned face.
“Gerard,” the General said. “I trust your mission got away successfully?”
“Halley and her people launched several hours ago, yes.” Marshall frowned. “Honestly, Paul, I’m sorry I had to rip her away from her real duties, but… you know.”
“Not a problem.”
“And for lending her the Pixie, you have my eternal gratitude.”
The General waved the comments aside. He looked troubled, and that wasn’t a look that Marshall was used to from the old man. It made him feel troubled too.
“So, this sabotage attempt,” Marshall began, but Bassett waved that aside.
“It’s being looked into. My concern is that it might somehow be connected with what I have to tell you. Some intelligence just in, which I think you should relay to the rest of the Thirteen.”
“Concerning the terrorist actions?”
“Concerning the Yautja.”
Marshall’s blood ran cold. All the talk of war, the preparations, the buzzing undercurrent of activity throughout Charon Station, he’d believed that it was all unnecessary. The Yautja were not a war-like civilization. They were barely a civilization at all. Their high level of technology was an oddity, and he wouldn’t have been surprised if it was discovered that their weapons, ships, and martial technology had somehow been inherited—or stolen, from another alien species.
“The attacks?” Marshall asked.
“We’re used to occasional attacks. These are just more concerted. No, what troubles me the most is Yautja ships making it into the Human Sphere.”
“Only along the Outer Rim, though,” Marshall said.
“They’ve started using dropholes,” Bassett said. “They shouldn’t have the ability, the tech, and codes, but somehow it’s happened. Seven instances so far, and other drophole traces are being checked right now.”
“Where have they dropped to?”
“They’re working their way inward. A couple have been intercepted and destroyed, but others have vanished. It’s an incursion. They’re spreading.”
Marshall leaned back and closed his eyes, wondering how he would communicate this to the rest of the Thirteen. He could see the opportunities here, as would they. The valuable knowledge they could glean from captured Yautja, alive or dead.
“It’s your job to stop them,” he said.
The General bristled, face turning pale. “And I’m doing just that. But I thought it appropriate to inform you, especially as we’re now in a state of war.”
“War can be good for progress,” Marshall said. “Thank you, General. I’ll communicate your concerns.” He cut the link.
He sighed and took a deep breath, pouring himself more whiskey. He would have to initiate a call to the Thirteen soon, tell them the news. They were the Company, though, and each of them had individual resources spanning the entirety of the Human Sphere. If he left it a few more minutes, enjoyed his drink, and considered what the near future might bring, it was likely that they would already know.
17
ISA PALANT
Love Grove Base, Research Station, LV-1529
August 2692 AD
In the days and weeks following Svenlap’s destruction of Love Grove Base, everything went from bad to worse. Isa Palant tried to keep a grip, attempting to coat the continuing bad news with a silver lining that might help her, and her fellow survivors, see their way through to a rescue.
When one of the indies chewed on the barrel of his laser pistol in front of them all, she could only curl up and cry, with the stench of cooked brains in her nose.
Milt McIlveen was by her side, as he had been for the past forty-four days. Any negative thoughts she’d had about him as a Company man had vanished long ago, because he gave without taking, nursing her hope even as hopelessness ghosted his eyes. He was very honest with her—he said that being positive for her and the others was the only way he could handle the situation. A classic distraction technique, he told her, but she didn’t give a damn.
McIlveen was a good man. He didn’t deserve this.
None of them deserved this.
On day one after the attack, the one indie who had managed to emerge in her combat suit walked the mile to the landing pad, through one of the worst storms to ravage the base in recent memory. She was gone for five hours, and they’d almost given her up for dead when she stumbled back into the network of rooms beneath Processor One. Shaking, her suit’s support systems challenged to their fullest in the storm, she brought news that they’d all feared.
The Pegasus had been destroyed, and the resultant fire had ravaged the landing pad. She had salvaged a food bundle and dragged it across the dusty landscape behind her, step by terrible step.
On day three, two of the burn victims died.
On day five, the remaining burns survivor also died.
Day six brought a few shreds of positive news—the first since the explosions. Sergeant Liam Sharp, commanding the seven remaining indies, managed to get an old communicator working. At least sixty years out of date and probably unused since the atmosphere processors had been completed, many of its systems had corroded in the acidic atmosphere before the oxygen levels had risen. After spending days replacing circuits and making inspired repairs using an array of everyday objects, he announced that he might have enough power to send one sub-space SOS signal. They composed the message and sent it, and a couple of hours later they received a confirmation from a deep space freighter three light years away.
The communicator died soon after, but they could only hope that their situation would make it back to the Company.
That was their share of good news. Two days later, two of the indies returned from a scavenging mission deep beneath the processor and reported that their wristpads had picked up high levels of radiation. McIlveen had managed to rescue his kit bag after the initial explosions, and he ventured down several levels with a multi reader. He returned ashen faced, and said that they all had to leave… now.
They couldn’t tell for sure whether Svenlap had damaged the huge atmosphere processor on purpose. Perhaps the explosions at the nearby base had caused a tremor that ruptured a sealing tank, or maybe debris falling around and into the processor was to blame, but the levels were dangerously high, and increasing. The outside might be storm-ravaged and the atmosphere unsafe to breathe for any length of time, but the least safe place on the planet was where they were now.
Downing iodine tablets from a first-aid kit one of the indies carried, they ventured out into the storm and approached the ruined base once again, but there was no home there. Much of it had been ravaged by fire and left open to the elements. Part of one wing still sizzled with a toxi
c stew of water and sulphuric acid from a bank of old-fashioned batteries, destroyed during the blaze. They spent a day sheltering miserably beneath an overhanging spread of roof structure, but when part of it collapsed during the night they knew they had to leave.
Palant knew the base and its surroundings better than anyone, but it still took some time before she thought of the storage hangars. Almost two miles south of the base, they had been used to store construction equipment and machinery during Love Grove’s construction. Closed up since then, shut off, she didn’t know anyone who had ever been inside. Last time she’d seen the hangars, one of the roofs had caved in, and the other was one half of a massive dune—dust and grit from decades of storms piled against its side and back.
It was a sheltered space, but little more.
Right then it was what they needed.
So on the twelfth day following the attack, seventeen survivors undertook a harrowing march across the desolate landscape and found one supply hangar still standing. The indies forced a way inside, and when they entered it was like going back in time.
Much of the construction machinery had been left behind, parked in the hangar and abandoned, some with doors still open. Tires were flat and petrified, metals were rusted, no engines worked. Stacked around the edges of the hangar were piles of rusted steel, bags of hardening compound, boxes of electrical and plumbing supplies, and other material and equipment. A clothing rack hung adorned with brittle atmosphere suits, some of them personalized by people dead for decades.
A couple of rucksacks sat at the base of the rack. No one explored them, although Palant stared at one for a long time. It contained a forgotten history, and it deserved to be left alone.
Most welcome of all, there was a wind turbine on the roof that McIlveen and some of the others took several hours repairing. They scavenged parts from the hangar for the turbine wings, long since torn off and buried in the sand. Once they were done, they were elated to discover that a low-level lighting system still worked. Everyone cheered when the lighting glowed on.
Day thirteen began with an assessment of food and water supplies. Even if the freighter had conveyed their distress signal, Sharp calculated that a Company rescue could still be at least another forty days out. It might be that a vessel closer by might come to their aid, but they couldn’t rely on that. With such vast distances involved, and such extensive flight times between dropholes, few privateers could divert from their mission unless forced to do so. It was a harsh reality, but space was a harsh environment. Everyone knew their place, and accepted the risks they took.
Water wasn’t a problem. The survivors rigged moisture nets across the massive dune outside, and soon discovered a dozen places throughout the hangar where water dripped steadily from the wide roof. Purifying drops were in plentiful supply.
Food was a problem, because they’d been unable to rescue much from the base. There were plenty of protein pills and other supplements, but hunger soon bit in.
* * *
As the days passed, survival became a routine. Though the hangar was large, most of it was a wide open space, so there was little privacy. They performed their toilet needs outside, but most of the time they remained in the building, away from the continuing storm, the violent winds, and heavy rain. Between the downpours came blown sand and grit that would scour their skin.
They made several trips back to Love Grove Base to salvage what they could, but each time they returned with less. Some wall panels soft enough to sleep on. A box of canned drinks, and a few bottles of base-brewed whiskey, which was rationed by Sergeant Sharp.
The sergeant had impressed her since Svenlap’s attack. He was good in a crisis, level-headed, and serious, and he more than anyone had kept them all together. McMahon brought a board game for the two kids, and Palant felt a burning behind her eyes as she watched them playing, losing themselves for a while, drifting away from the awfulness of orphanhood, the desperation of their situation, the death that stalked them all.
A couple of weeks later, with no means of communicating beyond the base or of receiving news, there came the sound of a ship.
* * *
Palant stood and rushed toward the doorway. They’re here! she thought, and she imagined Gerard Marshall stepping from a Company ship to rescue them all. It was a ridiculous idea, she knew, but she also knew that she hadn’t been terribly rigorous in uploading her research findings. A man of endless resources, he’d still want to know what she had discovered from the two Yautja corpses.
Or maybe hunger was driving her mad.
“Isa!” Sharp called, jogging after her. “Wait!”
She wasn’t the only one rushing toward the wide doors at the hangar’s end. McIlveen was there, too, along with several other survivors, all eager to be the first to see the ship coming in to rescue them. They’d already ensured that there were enough signs at the base—fixed to the structure, sprayed on the exposed walls—telling any rescuers where the survivors were holed up. Nevertheless, human nature made Palant want to rush outside and wave her arms.
She skidded to a halt as Sharp caught up with her. He touched her shoulder, then turned and pressed his back to the doors, addressing those gathered there. They were panting and weak, already tired from their dash across the hangar.
They’d need some proper food soon.
“Let’s wait,” Sharp said.
“What for?” someone asked.
“Just… wait. You employ me and my troops to look after you. We’ve done that since Svenlap, and we continue to do that. Let us do our work.”
Palant noticed that his sidearm was unholstered, the laser pistol’s status glowing a steady green. McMahon was with them, too, her own weapon held down by her side.
“This isn’t rescue,” she said softly, causing a grumble of whispers from some of the others.
“Not from who we were hoping for, anyway,” Sharp agreed. “It’s too soon. But that’s not to say someone else didn’t receive our message, and decide to come for us.”
The blasting roar of a ship’s engine sounded from outside, closer than the base. Its tone changed, and then lowered in volume as the ship touched down.
“Maybe salvagers,” McIlveen said. “They might be pissed, ’cos survivors mean they don’t get the salvage.”
“Or pirates,” another of the scientists said.
Sharp held his hands out and lowered them slowly, pleading for calm.
“Just let us do our work. Connors, you and me. McMahon, you stay here with the others. Keep an eye on the doors.” He whispered into his wristpad, and McMahon touched her finger to her ear and nodded.
Testing their comms, Palant thought. Or he’s telling her something else. Her expression gave nothing away.
Sharp and Connors, a small, wiry woman, opened the door and slipped outside. McMahon killed the lights, and Palant pressed to her side to watch through the open doorway.
Sergeant Sharp led the way, heading away from the hangar and toward the base. The indies had set up a series of posts supporting a thick cable, a safety line between base and hangar in case someone was caught outside in a blinding storm. It wasn’t needed now—the storm had abated somewhat, and the air was as clear as it ever got—but Sharp and Connors followed its line nonetheless.
Somewhere ahead of them, the lights of a landed ship glowed in the gloom.
“No comms yet?” Palant asked.
“Nothing,” McMahon said. “My suit’s scanning all frequencies, but all I get is silence.”
“Maybe they think we’re dead.” It was an unsettling idea, and it made Palant more suspicious of the newly arrived ship. Maybe they were salvagers or, worse, pirates—in which case Sharp and Connors would have to be careful.
“Do you think…” McMahon began, but she trailed off, words lost to the wind and Connors’ long, agonized scream.
Something protruded from her back. A hundred yards away, Palant couldn’t make out exactly what it was. She gasped, confused. Beside her, McMaho
n lifted her weapon and aimed it through the door.
“No,” Palant breathed. “McMahon, no.” Deep down, something was whispering to her. A truth she could not bear.
Surely fate wouldn’t be so cruel?
Sharp was running right to left, taking moving shots at something out of sight.
“Sarge!” McMahon cried. She itched to get out there, but Sharp must have ordered her back.
“What is it?” Palant asked. “What does he see?” But really, she already knew. Much of her life had been spent studying them, and now in the presence of a living Yautja her bladder loosened, her limbs felt weak, and she cursed whatever luck had brought them to this place and moment.
Sharp paused and turned in a slow circle, gun raised ahead of him. He spun and crouched, and the shadows manifested into a huge shape, eight feet tall and rushing right at him. He got off one shot which went wide, then the beast thrust forward with both hands. Something glimmering burst from Sharp’s back. His arms and legs jerked and shook as the Yautja lifted him high on the end of a trident spear.
Sharp screamed, and the Yautja howled a wild, exuberant war cry.
McMahon pushed forward and Palant grabbed her arm, tugging at her.
“No!” Palant said urgently. “It’ll kill you, too. Don’t, they’re gone, and Liam wouldn’t want—”
“But the Sarge!” McMahon shouted. Palant followed her gaze. Sharp was quivering on the raised trident, sliding slowly down as the points pierced and tore through his guts. He swiped out at the Yautja and caught it across the face, but it barely seemed to notice. He struck again.
The alien shook the spear so that Sharp slid further down.
“The Sarge is gone!” Palant shouted. “Listen to me. I know these things. That’s my job, knowing as much about them as I can, and I’m telling you, if you go out there waving your weapons, it’ll kill you. We don’t even know if it’s alone.”