The Sunseed Saga

by Brett Bam

  “I’m not going with you.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I can’t just leave her Bert. I’m going to stick around and wait for a rescue team. I’ve got plenty of supplies and the atmosphere in here will keep me for at least a week.”

  The doctor looked extremely unhappy, and shook his head as Jabesh spoke. “This is a bad idea, Ron. We have no idea what’s happened and the Otherc is damaged. This is our last chance.”

  “Relax. I’m going to stay, and once this crisis passes I’ll be right here to bring her back in to berth. I can’t just leave her out here drifting free.”

  “Ron, it was a Coronal Mass Ejection!” He pointed at the blazing sun outside the airlock. “All space around us has been affected. There might not be a rescue team. Life, Luck and Fate alone know what’s going on inside that rock,” he grasped the shoulders of his captain’s exposure suit to drive the point home. “We need you Captain.”

  Ronid Jabesh broke contact and saluted his friend. Then he pointed out of the airlock, his gesture plain and final. As Bert jumped from the ship his left small finger tagged the hatchway ever so slightly, because he hesitated at the last. His trajectory was altered and a slow spin was introduced. As he drifted across the gulf he turned again and again to see the Otherc drifting away into space, her captain framed in the open door of the airlock. After the third rotation, Ronid Jabesh disappeared and the airlock cranked slowly shut again. Bert turned his almost frantic attention from the vanishing ship to the approaching dock. It looked like an old cobweb, torn and shredded and dotted with the bodies of its victims where dead starships had tangled in the walkways. For a brief moment, he wondered if his captain was the only sane one among them.

  Jeremiah Comfort did not kill the boy in his basement. He left him there for hours, all alone. Whenever he imagined the horror the little boy would be exposed to when he found the skulls, he smiled. And yet Comfort knew he could not play with the child for long. He was just a prelude to what Comfort really wanted. Kulen De Sol. He had done this before, played with one boy while he thought of another. Then the darkness came and he saw his opportunity. He heard the world outside his church falling apart. The crashes, the screams, the quake, and what came after. The blood and the fire and the flood. It all happened outside while he hid in his chambers in the depths of the church, probably the safest environment in the asteroid. The worst of the chaos of the first hours passed him by, but he listened to the creaking of the rock and knew that his world was forever changed. He went into his office where he had a view down the centre of the chamber. Fire was everywhere. It was the only source of light. He knew then that they would all die. Something horrible had happened, the worst thing possible. This little bubble in the ocean of space had turned toxic. It would soon kill them all and there was nowhere to run. Whatever had happened on Earth had finally caught them here and it was their doom. Millions were dead already, and he would be soon.

  And so, he began to think more and more of Kulen De Sol. That ultimate prize there, all locked away in the darkest of holes. The thought was tantalising. Could he get away with it? Stalk down there and simply take him? In the chaos, and with the power out, it was more than possible. And with that thought came the thrilling conviction that tonight, his last night, Jeremiah Comfort was going to go hunting.

  The first thing Agent Jericho thought of when the lights went out was his daughter and the massive distance between them. She was deep in the chamber city, somewhere on the opposite side of the asteroid. Miles and miles of chaos strewn darkness lay between them, and he had a job to do. He was standing in a room filled with screens, they were all dark now. The operators of the screens sat in mute horror as the power outage grew longer and longer with no relief.

  Gamaridia had an unbelievably complicated sky. There were hundreds of satellites, each with its own supportive paraphernalia in the space around them. Public traffic lanes navigated between solar reflectors and comms towers, agricultural bubbles and residential splinters. Rock slid past rock in an intricate ballet, controlled in large part by the activities of the men in this room. Most importantly, the asteroid was spinning to maintain internal gravity. Flight vectors for space traffic were a complex thing to manage in the swarm of spinning stone. It was an information hub, a nexus in the network. The longer they were disconnected from what was happening, the greater the disaster they would sink into.

  Beyond the screens was a set of wide windows which looked directly down the length of the docking spindle. The stars swung a tight orbit centred on it, rotating once every hour. The docks were oriented vertically to the spindle. Ships would touch down on it and then be shifted via tug to a dock. At the base of it, in the centre of the web, gravity was minimal. At the outer edges, far below and above, gravity was stronger. The control centre was set at the base. It was a circumference room, so the ceiling was the floor on the other side of the room. It was possible to walk around it in five minutes and be standing where you started. There was a comprehensive view of the sun-filled sky. It burned bright enough to outshine the stars.

  There were gasps as a bright light blossomed on the far side of the bay. The explosion was far below them, and they watched from the windows as the flames unfolded. The intricate web of walkways and pipelines which threaded through the docks surrounded them on all sides. A dim object drifted away from the docks, moving outwards parallel to the spindle. A ship, loose from its moorings and powerless. They watched as suited figures made a desperate jump from the stricken ship back to the docks. The hulk of the space ship simply drifted away. They watched a second and a third fireball bloom and die. They all seemed frozen in shock, not knowing what to do, powerless and unsure how to proceed.

  Then a ship came roaring over the horizon. It was without doubt the Ribbontail. It had full power and function. Jericho suddenly felt a cold understanding grip him. EMP pulse followed by a raid, this was pirate activity. Had they detonated a nuke in nearby space, something big enough to close down the whole city? One ship was here to raid the whole asteroid? It didn’t make sense to him, why would they do this? This wasn't piracy, this was an act of war.

  They'd murdered everyone on this asteroid, he had no doubt of this. Hate blossomed large and strong. He watched as the Ribbontail flared its approach, slowing as it matched trajectory with the slowly spinning spindle. They were docking at the base of the spindle! They would pass by right outside this office’s front door. He went to set an ambush, and so he had just turned away from the windows when the flash of light hit.

  It was so bright it illuminated the room before him and cut his shadow across it like a streak of oil over canvas. It came through the polarised and protected windows like a welding torch. Everyone else was blinded by its sudden onset. He got his hand up in time to prevent being hurt and turned toward the source. He squinted into the light behind his hand, trying to see past it. There was something coming around the docks. It was a bright light moving backwards and forwards at terrific speed. Like a sniffing dog, he thought. It swept straight over their heads forcing them all to cower in fright and for more than half the people in the office to clamber under their desks and join the other half who had already done so. The light stopped above them, perched on the docking spindle. There was no sign of the Ribbontail. Kedesh Jericho was up on his feet and sprinting down the space between desks toward the front office doors. He fetched up his gun as he ran.

  Chapter 27

  Gamaridia

  “Are you insane? We can’t go back to that rock.” Oscar was passionately opposed to the idea. He wasn’t the only one, Jack Mac seemed to be hesitant to return. Everyone else looked to Dalys.

  If she took this opportunity to run, they would make it clean and easy to Saturn. It was their safest option. However, millions of lives were at risk and Kulen thought he had the answer. She looked at Jack Mac.

  “What do you think?”

  Jack Mac stood, straddled over a bench. He had been cleaning a gun and now he had
the weapon in the crook of his arm. “I’m ready to stay here. To help all these people. Whatever assistance we can provide we will. But here we have this crazy kid, with the rainbow eyes, who grows too quickly, can predict danger, is stronger than any of us, and apparently doesn’t need to breathe. Somehow, he has the ability to kick-start that asteroid the way he just kick-started this spaceship? I’m not convinced that this is the smartest option. For example, son,” he looked at Kulen intently, “what exactly did you do here? How did you make it work? Do you understand that thing on your hand? Can you guarantee that you won't make the situation worse?”

  Kulen returned his gaze with those rainbow eyes, like pools of reflective oil. It was tremendously disconcerting.

  “I gifted this ship a small piece of me, of this machine.” He held up his right hand. “I planted a seed inside, and it has begun to grow. You see it as a return of light and air and electricity, I see it as the blooming of new life, the start of a miracle.”

  Jack Mac shook his hand and his head. “Enough with the flowery bullshit, kid. It still stinks. You somehow powered up the ship after it was exposed to what seems to be a sun flare of epic proportions. How exactly did that work?”

  Kulen was silent.

  “Because how I understand it, with a pulse of hard radiation as high as we felt, circuitry melted, fuses blew, complex computers became scrap metal. A million tiny little parts have to be repaired in order for any of this to be working.”

  Kulen laughed. “Are you looking for reassurance from me? I know that what I did seems impossible to you. If it helps, think of it as just some highly superior technology. I infused the ship with an energy that charged the electrical systems. I healed all the scars and burns, I planted the seed of something beautiful but very small. It will grow and change with time.”

  Jack Mac leaned in, menacingly close. “I don’t know about any of you, but I think this kid is nuts. I don’t know how he did what he did and neither does he apparently. What I want to know is,” and Jack Mac leaning in menacingly close, making Kulen blink a little, “can you do it again? And on something as big as that rock? How will you get something that big started again? Hocus-pocus?”

  “I don’t need any of you to come with me. I can do it alone.”

  “Oh yes, you did so well on your last excursion into that place when everything was normal, now you want to go back in when it’s dark?”

  “Yes, I will bring the light.” As he said this his hand grew bright and shone hotly. Jack Mac stared, speechless.

  “Yeah, okay. I’m in.” Jack Mac draped the gun casually across his shoulder and winked at Dalys. His submission to this power triggered a lot of exchanged looks.

  Dalys bowed her head, thinking for a moment. The crew waited silently.

  “Okay, Moabi, get us decked out for an excursion. I mean weapons gear and emergency kits. I want it all on the deck in the staging area in 15 minutes.” Moabi was a blur, moving out of the portal and down the ladder to the holds. “Curtis, get ready to assist wounded civilians. I want all the pain killers and antibiotics we’ve got as well as a truckload of emergency first aid packs for distribution. Empty your closets, you’ve got 15 minutes.” Curtis moved away in a hurry, far more carefully than Moabi.

  “Oscar, I want you slotted into your couch and online with all of us. I want you to make sure we can talk to each other the entire time. No radio silence periods allowed, okay? Also, when everything comes back online these folks are going to want to know what's been going on out here. So deploy a couple of drones to film the satellites and track their orbital variances.” Oscar started the climb into his couch, the lights already flashing in his eyes. Dalys turned to Jack Mac.

  “You, or me.”

  “Me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “You have to fly this bird. Nobody can do it like you can. She’s our eagle and our eye in the sky and at the end of the day, she's our salvation. I’ll take them inside.”

  “Watch out for The Otherc’s crew. I don’t think they’ll be very accommodating if you meet them. And you heard me, no radio silence. I mean that.”

  They shared a look. Time and experience working together meant they understood one another.

  “You really believe this kid can do what he says?”

  Dalys looked at Kulen, still just a child.

  She shrugged, “We have to try.”

  Dalys kept her boost light and constant so the crew could work at a single gravity. The trajectory brought them around in a large curve which would complete just in front of the docking spindle. Dalys pushed through the pressure curtain and settled the Ribbontail on the spindle like a butterfly on a flower. The doors irised open and a line dropped. Moabi rolled out of the hatch and dropped the two metres to the deck. He turned and caught a bag thrown by Jack Mac. The others swarmed down the ladder. Once they were down and moving, Dalys lifted off, her spotlights lighting their way into the darkness. The crew she left behind rushed through the light toward the doors ahead of them, taking long strides in the minimal gravity. The light changed from the clear, blue, white of the spotlights to a more organic orange as Dalys fired the boosters and swept away, gaining height quickly.

  And then something exploded in the sky. A bright light blossomed suddenly. It moved at blinding speed and was suddenly close, like a swooping predator. They were bathed in its light, caught like deer in the headlights, frozen and fearful, looking sharply at the fast, bright thing pointed at them. The light whipped around the asteroid twice, making tight orbits before coming slowly over the endcap to shine down into the web work of the docks.

  Dalys instinctively hid from it, dropping the Ribbontail out of the light and into the shadow of the asteroid, hiding like a lamb from a lion. She made a fast decision and flipped the ship over to boost away from the asteroid. She receded in its shadow and finally altered course to slip in behind an agricultural bubble. She moved down a row of solar converters, staying slow and always in shadow.

  Kulen screamed and turned to run from the light, colliding with Curtis. She caught the boy in her arms and held him tight. He was shivering in panic.

  “Please, let me go, it's coming!”

  But Curtis held him fast. “What is it Kulen?”

  “Can't you see it? It's the fabric of screams, it's come for me. It's going to swallow me up again! We have to go! We have to go now!”

  Curtis took his hand and started to run with him, towed along by a surprising strength.

  “What the hell is that?” yelled Jack Mac, hands on his burning eyes.

  The light swerved sharply and circled the docking spindle, shining aggressively. Jack Mac had his goggles down and his hand up so his sight wasn't too badly flashed out. He squinted at the object as it settled above them. It was still blindingly bright, but on the edges, he saw detail taking shape, a curved blade spinning out of the light like a blossoming flower.

  Jack Mac let the image burn into his retinas. He shut his eyes and stared at the afterimage, still a bright hot spot on his eyelids. The hot spot wouldn’t fade, and for a scary spasming moment, he thought he'd damaged his eyes. In the afterimage’s detail, he thought he saw the shape of a familiar ship. That bright hot thing looked remarkably like the Ribbontail, but how was that possible?

  “That's a ship up there.”

  Moabi looked down at him as the light began to fade.

  “What do we do?”

  “We get inside.” The two men turned and followed Kulen and Curtis, catching them at the doors to the interior, which were closed. They yanked the powerless doors open and the group burst through. They were now at the base of the spindle, in a wide open commercial area used by a large amount of people every day. There was a plaza, some trees and a hedge, there were office buildings opposite. The spindle stretched out into space like a rapier blade splitting the sky. They were standing in the open, time to get moving.

  “Into the office block, quick as we can.”

  Jack Mac moved forward at a r
un, the young Kulen ran carefully behind him and had no hassle keeping up. Curtis followed while Moabi took the rear. They darted across the flagstones toward a solid bank of black windows. Two smaller windows turned out to be a sliding glass door. As they approached, the doors swept open and a uniformed man stepped into the breach. He had an automatic rifle with grenade launchers and two holstered guns on his hip. It was Kedesh Jericho and he pointed the rifle at Moabi, his squad fanned out behind him.

  “Halt! Surrender yourselves now or face execution.”

  “We came back to help.” Jack Mac raised both hands as Curtis and Moabi caught up to them.

  “Help? You did this!” Jericho shifted his aim to pin Jack Mac to the floor with the wide gaping mouth of the barrel.

  The blinding light flashed again behind Jack Mac’s shoulder, this time it was a spotlight. The spotlight flared across the plaza, sweeping toward them. It zeroed in on the group at the door and froze in place. Kulen broke his gaze away first and turned to Jericho.