The Only Game in the Galaxy

by Paul Collins

  She hit a button, setting off battle station alarms throughout the ship. To the colonel she said, ‘You have that attack vector?’ He nodded. ‘Okay, you have the helm and tactical. Karkov, Alisk, let’s lock and load!’

  ‘Aye aye, chief,’ said Karkov, grinning at the archaic expression.

  The Pulsaris, Anneke’s ship, went in blasting. They took out three ships, hitting their drive cores and setting off chain reactions. Two more were damaged, unable to fire back at them.

  Anneke, in a rare moment of flippancy, streamed a picture of her grinning face to the armada’s flagship. The Pulsaris sustained heavy broadsides almost immediately. The penalty of hubris, she thought as automatic shockers dampened the vibrations across the ship.

  Over her suit radio, Anneke heard someone yell, ‘The drive is hit. I repeat, the drive is hit!’

  ‘Get us out of here,’ Anneke ordered over her suit radio. ‘Use planetary drive!’ She turned and addressed the crack combat unit lined up before her. ‘It’s show time, ladies and gentlemen. Follow me!’

  She turned and ran full tilt into the active jump-gate, blaster at the ready.

  BENTHOS sat in the hermetically sealed cell, wringing his hands. He was tall, wiry and bearded, with little hair on his head. A religious miner from Omega, he had no idea why he was there.

  ‘Let me out,’ he called for the hundredth time. No one had spoken to him, no one had communicated at all. He’d been walking home from church with his clan and family, looking forward to a big noisy luncheon, as was the custom of the Omegans, and then he’d felt an awful wrenching sensation in his chest and head. He’d closed his eyes, sure he was having a dizzy spell, and when he’d opened them he was in a strange room and there were men with guns and others wearing lab coats. They sat him down and took his blood and placed it in the machines around him.

  Then he was beamed aboard a ship. The people had not hurt him, but nor had they spoken. The lack of communication had hurt him more, as if he wasn’t worth talking to, wasn’t even human.

  Or would soon be dead.

  The thought crossed – and recrossed – Benthos’ mind. He did not fear death. His people believed in the Great Spirit that perpetually reincarnated its kindred. Whatever these people did to him, he would come back, maybe not on Omega, but elsewhere in this fine vast galaxy. Perhaps these people, in a way he could not fathom, were his kindred spirits. Perhaps together they would fulfil their destiny …

  The ship rocked suddenly. Benthos heard a dull explosion, followed by a series of high-pitched whines. Pulse beams. He’d know that sound anywhere. The miners used modified pulse weapons for scouring the rich minerals from the ground, and once he had fought as part of a local militia when his country had been threatened. A battle long ago resolved.

  Over the next forty minutes he heard more explosions, feeling odd vibrations in the deck plating, and hearing sirens blasting an alert.

  We are under attack, he thought. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. He wished his new friends well, whoever they might be.

  All of a sudden, pain started in his joints and spread along every nerve pathway in his body, like liquid fire. Soon his muscles ached and cramped. He vomited copiously.

  Benthos tried to stand, but his balance had gone. He groped out blindly to steady himself on the edge of a table.

  ‘What have you done to me?’ he demanded hoarsely.

  And someone finally spoke to him.

  ‘You are the first in a great experiment. Calm yourself, brother.’ The word ‘brother’ sounded mocking, yet Benthos felt strangely soothed by it. He sat down again, folded his hands in his lap, and waited.

  The Great Spirit would deliver him, he had no doubt.

  From outside the lab, Maximus watched the experiment proceed, as he had numerous times before. The transmogrifying virus worked rapidly, once they had input the man’s DNA and blood.

  The changes were internal, and though the man must have been experiencing considerable pain, he did not scream like the others, but sat composed almost, as if the pain meant nothing to him. Maximus gained a grudging respect for the miner. He doubted he would have met his own fate with as much equanimity – though he, unlike Benthos, knew what was coming.

  Within the hour the transformation was almost complete and Maximus stared into the screen at the face of a monster staring back.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Very good.’ He turned to Bleaker, who had just arrived. The captain was staring at the creature on the screen, pale and silent. ‘Report.’

  ‘Sir, they’ve boarded the vessel, we’re not sure how. The shields are intact. We’ve managed to isolate them temporarily, but they are breaking out of the aft hold area and will soon be amidships.’

  ‘Hold them as long as you can, Captain.’

  ‘Of course, Admiral,’ said Bleaker hoarsely, avoiding looking at the screen as he turned to go.

  ‘And Captain?’ Bleaker stopped. ‘Tell the Envoy to launch the seed ships.’

  Bleaker nodded, eyes down. Maximus smirked as the man hurried aft. You either had the stomach for greatness or you did not.

  He lingered, watching the transformation of Benthos reach completion, then hurried to the bridge and watched the seed ships – modified escape pods, with their own internal navigation and propulsion systems – drop towards the planet.

  Within minutes, seeding – across the tiny globe – had begun.

  Damage reports flooded in. Maximus’ ship had taken serious punishment. Lengthy repairs would be needed before she could limp home. Not too serious, he reflected, as long as there was an intact vessel for him to transfer to when the time came. Though that was doubtful as Anneke’s ship, also wounded critically and leaking air, had accounted for three more of his vessels. Damn the woman, he was running out of spaceships.

  The more pressing problem, though, was Anneke’s infiltrators. He could just abandon ship and blow this one to smithereens (though a similar ploy not too long ago hadn’t worked) or – no, he had a better idea. One almost poetic in justice.

  Down on the surface of Omega, life went on as it always had. Luncheon break was over and workers drifted back to their jobs, enjoying the early spring sunshine. High overhead, the chlorine-atmosphere world of Gamma Pavonis, a rich source of precious minerals, hung in the sky.

  On this day it was no longer alone. As workers from Benthos’ estate gazed upwards they saw a small black sphere, – a speck at first, which grew to the size of a playing ball – swoop out of the aquamarine sky and dart away eastwards, veering slightly so that it passed over the town itself.

  ‘Where are they now?’ Maximus asked.

  ‘Decks eight and nine, sir,’ said Bleaker. ‘They breached our main squad so the field sergeants regrouped on ten.’

  Maximus studied the tactical display in front of him. ‘Prepare to abandon ship, Captain, but I want it kept hush-hush. No loudspeakers.’

  ‘And the field teams?’

  ‘Leave them in place. We’ll pull them out at the last minute.’

  Bleaker looked unhappy but issued the orders.

  ‘Now I want you to ready the jump-gate and lock on to the attackers.’

  ‘All of them, sir?’

  ‘All of them. Oh, and lock onto the subject in the lab and return him to the surface – but not until seeding has fully commenced. We don’t want him damaging prospective recruits.’

  ‘Admiral, begging your pardon, but locking onto so many individuals will require a vast amount of power. I’m not sure the system is capable.’

  ‘It is if you remove the safety override on the hyper-drive and re-channel the power output to the jump-gate.’

  Bleaker stared at him. ‘Sir, that would cause a cataclysmic explosion!’

  ‘Hence the reason we’re abandoning ship, Captain. There should be a grace period of several minutes before the drive reaches critical overload, during which we ourselves will transfer to the Albatross. Now please proceed. Contact me when you’re ready.’

 
‘And the destination for the transfer, Admiral?’

  ‘Omega, of course.’

  ‘Aye, aye, Admiral.’

  Maximus went aft to his quarters, three decks above the fighting. He let himself in, gathered his personal possessions, then turned to find Anneke Longshadow holding a blaster on him.

  He whistled. ‘You never cease to amaze.’

  ‘Thank you. You, on the other hand, were sloppy. No offence intended.’

  ‘None taken,’ said Maximus cheerily, though he was startled at being so easily caught off guard. Perhaps he was becoming too preoccupied with other matters. Or perhaps he was getting slow.

  ‘Sit down in that chair and tuck your hands under your thighs.’

  Maximus smiled and complied. ‘Bit jumpy, aren’t we? And there I was thinking we were almost comrades.’

  He watched her carefully. It was obvious that Anneke had her memory back, but he needed to know how much she recalled of the intervening period. She had not remarked that he was back in his renovated semi-permanent disguise as Nathaniel Brown, the default renovation he used everywhere except RIM.

  ‘You’re as delusional as ever, Brown.’

  There. She had used his cover name. If she remembered his real identity she would have called him Black. Interesting. He wondered if there was a way to use this and if any of the neuronosis was still in place.

  ‘Now. What are you doing here? What’s happening down on Omega –?’

  Maximus internal mike spoke in his ear. ‘Admiral, I’m detecting an intruder in your quarters,’ came Bleaker’s voice. ‘You may not be able to answer, but if you are in danger, please initiate a self-diagnostic.’

  Maximus uttered the sub-vocal command initiating the program.

  ‘Very good, Admiral. We have a lock on the intruders. It took some time to analyse their personal shield harmonics, but we have pinpointed each of them. Shall I commence transfer? Please initiate another self-diagnostic.’

  Maximus smiled at Anneke. The exchange had only taken a few seconds. From her perspective, he imagined she thought he was deciding how much to tell her.

  ‘Why don’t you go down and take a look for yourself?’ he said, setting off the program once again.

  Anneke frowned. ‘That’s twice you’ve –’

  Anneke disappeared. Maximus chortled but his mirth was cut short. Panic spread across his face as he too vanished from the room.

  Maximus’ face was still etched with panic when he rematerialised, along with several of his men, including Captain Bleaker, in the middle of a dusty road covered with a thin layer of black tar. On either side rose two- and three-storey buildings, shops, and above them, looking like it might fall at any moment, the sharp green face of Gamma Pavonis.

  Maximus knew exactly where he was and what had happened.

  While he had been getting a jump lock on Anneke’s team, she had been doing the same to him, no doubt with the idea that whatever he was up to would have to cease, at least temporarily.

  But Anneke had no idea what that was. Unfortunately, Maximus did.

  Within seconds of arriving he had whipped a re-breather from his belt and locked it over his face. Bleaker, seeing this, did the same, his eyes startled above the cheek guards of the device. As one the other seven troopers attached theirs.

  Maximus didn’t kid himself that the re-breather would protect him, but it stopped, for a moment, the terrible panic that gripped his chest.

  He beamed a message through to the Albatross. No doubt by now his flagship had erupted into a glowing ball of fire.

  The answer came back almost immediately. The Albatross had taken damage. It would be several minutes, maybe longer, before they could transport Maximus off-planet.

  I will become one of my own monsters, he thought starkly and ran. He needed to get indoors as quickly as possible. He needed as many insulating layers between himself and the outside air of Omega as he could get.

  And then he needed to get off this world!

  The others followed him. Reaching the nearest building, he glanced inside. Several Omegans were already in the process of transforming in the lobby.

  As Maximus swerved to the next building, one of the men looked inside and almost vomited. He turned to the others, horrified. ‘What in the name of the gods is happening here?’ he asked, his expression pleading.

  Ignoring him, Maximus pushed through the door mirage of the next building and found himself inside a shopping mall. On the primitive side, it was set up like an open-air market with a maze of stalls and banners. There, too, people were changing. Maximus realised with a jag of desperation that it was too late; nowhere was safe. Without a doubt, the virus had already penetrated his lungs, was now diffusing through his bloodstream, locking onto his red blood cells, injecting alien DNA into them, like something out of an industrial parts catalogue.

  Well, it’s done, thought Maximus. So much for the Envoy’s Kadros. He checked the charge on his blaster. It was nearly full – just as well. He was going to need it shortly, though he must be careful not to exhaust it; he would be needing one final charge.

  For himself.

  He checked his watch. Five minutes had passed. The first mild symptoms would appear in the next ten.

  There was one thing he could do before he died. He could watch Anneke Longshadow die. There was no time for his planned inventive death.

  ‘Spread out,’ he ordered his men. ‘Find Anneke Longshadow. I want her alive, hear me?’ The men, grumbling and increasingly fearful, searched the nearest buildings and side streets. Maximus knew the two groups would have beamed down in reasonable proximity to each other.

  There was no danger from the local populace as yet. They were too consumed by the horrific pain of transmogrification. If the group had jumped down twenty minutes later, it would have been different.

  Maximus came on Anneke himself within minutes of landing. He didn’t bother shooting. In fact, he holstered his weapon and walked into the midst of Anneke’s team. She saw him coming, saw him put his gun away.

  ‘What have you done, Brown?’ she asked in a hushed tone. She was white-faced, stunned.

  Maximus shrugged. ‘I’m building an army.’

  Anneke frowned. ‘Like those – things – on the Orbital Engineering Platform?’

  ‘The virus needed testing, as did the effectiveness of the final product.’

  ‘Final product? Listen to me, you sick little bastard, these are people. They’re not products. They’re not here for you to play out your diseased God complex on!’

  ‘A cousin of this virus is what created the Sentinels.’

  Anneke stared. Maximus saw that she had guessed as much, but the realisation still shocked.

  Maximus went on: ‘But for reasons I haven’t been able to determine, the Sentinels retained not only conscious volition, but a rather pesky moral code.’

  ‘Are you immune?’ she asked, picking up on his lighthearted tone. She did not realise that only his training was keeping him from screaming in sheer terror.

  I know what’s going to happen, he kept thinking. Oh God, I know …

  ‘Sadly no,’ he said, with a small wincing smile.

  Alisk, who had been listening, said, ‘Will it hurt?’

  ‘There are no words to describe how much.’

  Alisk swallowed. She looked sweaty and pale: precursor symptoms of transformation, or just a normal glandular reaction to fear. He felt pale and clammy himself, come to think of it.

  Screams erupted from a nearby building. Anneke’s team murmured and backed away.

  ‘There’s nothing to be done,’ said Maximus. ‘The process is irreversible. If it’s any consolation, you won’t die.’ Some looked relieved at this. ‘You’ll just wish you had.’

  Behind him, his own team had started to gather. For a moment both sides aimed weapons at each other, but as more bloodcurdling screams rent the air weapons were slowly lowered. There is camaraderie in Hell, Maximus thought cynically.

  Sudde
nly, one of Anneke’s troopers fell to his knees, clutching his chest, his face contorted with pain. He tried to rip his tunic away, as if to stop the agony.

  One by one, in quick succession, the others reacted the same way. One woman bolted, running down the street, shrieking. Where does she think she’s going? Maximus wondered.

  So far, he had felt nothing. Nor was Anneke showing any signs of infection. No doubt they both possessed immaculate immune systems, but the virus, Maximus knew, would overwhelm even these. He had engineered it that way.

  Alisk grabbed her arm, dug her newly-formed claws in and hissed in pain. Anneke lowered her gently to the ground and sat beside her, stroking her brow.

  ‘Maybe Lob was right,’ Alisk said through gritted teeth, managing a tight grin. Then came more pain, in great bone-wrenching jolts, Maximus knew. She swatted Anneke’s hand away, snarling in pain.

  Suddenly, Maximus – and his men – were no longer there.

  ANNEKE stared at the spot where Maximus had been. She knew his ship had transported him back, but it made no difference, she decided. He would simply carry the virus up to his shipmates.

  Alisk grabbed her arm, dug her newly-formed claws in and hissed in pain. All around them, the others had started to change. But so far Anneke remained untouched.

  It could only be a matter of time.

  Anneke dug out her medkit and gave everyone in her team a massive painkiller. It might at least lessen their torment a little, she thought.

  That’s when she saw the first monsters.

  A small knot of creatures – the transformed citizens of Omega – came crashing into view at the end of the street. They saw her immediately, maybe smelt her also, as they continually sniffed the air like deformed hounds from Hell.

  And like hounds they came loping towards her.

  She flicked her blaster to maximum stun and opened up. The blasts slowed them, overloading their nervous systems, but didn’t put them down; Anneke had a feeling that, once the transformation was complete, nothing would stop them.