Remember the Starfighter

by Michael Kan

  Julian rubbed his shoulders, hoping to change the subject. He had been brought here for a reason, and it was not to reminisce, or to make amends.

  “Yes,” Landon said. “Few know about this.”

  The transport continued on its path, the final destination close. Julian had been told nothing about why he had been summoned, but he had a good guess.

  “I’m betting this has something to do with what I brought back?”

  Landon nodded.

  “The matter is urgent. Extremely urgent.”

  Abruptly, the darkness surrounding the transport lifted. A white glow beamed through the glass, the aura flashing with each passing second.

  “We are crossing through several barriers of dense energy shielding,” Landon said. “Security has been exceptionally tight. But soon we’ll arrive.”

  Facing the window, the commander gestured out to the Alliance research facility below. Embedded into the station’s superstructure was the building, a mesh of light glimmering from its domed design.

  “Some of the Alliance’s best scientists are there, working tirelessly,” Landon said. “But still they need our help.”

  Julian also watched, a gateway to the facility opening before the transport. But unlike Landon, he was less than focused. He was angry.

  “This had better have been worth it,” he said. “A lot of good people died on Bydandia.”

  He touched his face, picking at the implants on his cheeks. Rubbing the thread-like fringes, Julian wished he could rip them away.

  The transport slowed to a crawl and docked at the facility. Shutting his eyes, Julian leaned his shoulder against the window.

  “The Endervars,” he said gritting his teeth. “What do they want?”

  Looking upon Julian, the commander could both see and feel the suffering. It twisted like a knife, the pain digging in.

  Landon sensed the loss, the panic — the grief transferring to him.

  “They killed me,” Julian said. “All for this.”

  He pointed to the glass, his finger directed at the facility. He thought he knew what was there. The body of an enemy saved when so many had died.

  “No,” Landon said. “It’s not what you think.”

  He placed his hand on Julian’s shoulder, and pulled down his hand. “What you brought back wasn’t the enemy.”

  “What?”

  The commander backed away, his mind going over the situation. Even Landon wasn’t quite sure how to explain.

  “Well, that’s the most probable conclusion,” he said. “No, Julian. It’s a she. An Android. One that comes from Earth.”

  Chapter 22

  The fabricated fibering pervaded through the body like flesh, the bones themselves composed out of a dense skeletal plating. Light alloys made up the different joints, synthetic tissue wrapping itself around mechanized gears and what the scientists said were a network of energy nodes.

  The scans showed this and more, detailing the intricate innards of the subject that lay before Julian on the display. Nanoscopic filaments ran data to and fro, connecting themselves to the thousands of components embedded within. “Classification: autonomous robotic construct” the report displayed, the analyses pointing to a complete absence of organic matter.

  “She’s entirely artificial,” Landon said, as he stood next to him inside the lab room. “Nothing to indicate any sort of bio-mass. Mainly just metal, and plasmatic compounds.”

  Julian nodded, fully aware of the scans and their conclusions. But as he gazed at the image, he became fixated on what he saw. It was stunning.

  “The face… it’s changed,” he said. “It’s human.”

  Projected on the lab room wall displayed a real-time view of the subject, outfitted in the same distinct metallic gear Julian had seen before. From neck down, the plates of polished silver weaved on, segmenting around arm, leg and chest. Gone was the damage, the suit’s nanotechnology healing the ruptures and cracks that had once riddled its surfaces. But even more jarring was the subject’s once featureless face, the armor peeled back to reveal human-like skin. Julian walked closer to the image, realizing he was staring at a young woman, the white lips pursed into silence. Comatose she lay, her body strung against a raised platform in the center of the room. Long black bangs drooped close to the woman’s brow, as a pair of sepia rimmed irises seemingly stared back.

  “Appears very life-like, doesn’t it?”

  Julian looked over his shoulder, hearing the palliative voice of a translation module. At the lab’s doorway entered the Alliance scientist. Swiftly, the official approached, not walking, but levitating from the floor.

  “This is Director Jira Sekandry, head researcher of this facility,” Landon said. “The team here has been overseeing study of the android.”

  Julian stood still, recognizing the translucent shell of the scientist’s rotund body.

  This was the first time he had met a member of the Lanadi Yissau, a founding race of the Alliance. The scientist saluted, placing its tendrils across its chest. Like them, it lived off an oxygenated atmosphere, discarding the need for an environmental suit. But to move, the scientist relied on anti-gravity fields, boosting its delicate frame through the air.

  “It’s rare to see a human on the station, especially two of them,” the scientist said, speaking through the module. “But even rarer is her, the specimen you brought.”

  Extending out its tendrils, the scientist pointed to the real-time image of the woman.

  “She’s been like this for five of your standards days. Utterly silent. Not a sign of any physical movement. We can only surmise that she no longer wishes to cooperate with us.”

  Julian gazed at another scan, one that spliced through the subject’s mechanical suit. Under it, he could see the outline of a human body encased within, the hourglass shape of a woman apparent.

  “Are we sure she’s from Earth?” he asked.

  The scientist drifted away, linking its tendrils to a nearby console bay.

  “There’ve been a number signs, the most evident being her human design. The other is the remarkable fact that she speaks your language, Terran Neo Standard, in addition to the African, Asiatic, Marsonian variants. Perhaps more. She revealed this the moment she retracted the armor from her face and spoke to us.”

  The room then became lit with columns of holographic panels, the data reports surrounding Julian and Landon.

  “These extensive scans were also taken of her body. As you can see, much of the technology is foreign to us, yet some of it may be strikingly familiar to you. Look.”

  In front, of Julian hung the image, a microscopic shot of the android’s inner systems. A scan had noticed a repeating sub-atomic signature throughout the body. Looking closer, Julian saw the matched identifier.

  “This says EarthForce,” Julian said.

  “Yes. I believe that was the name of a military organization on your ancestral homeworld before it was invaded,” the scientist replied. “There are also other markers showing old Terran tech, pre-Exodus era.”

  “That would be over 2,000 years ago.”

  “But the major revelation was when the subject began divulging her background. She says she is from Earth, and that she escaped the enemy shield. As far as we know, she is the first being ever to do so.”

  The scientist displayed portions of the recordings, showing the woman standing, and speaking behind the interrogation room’s force field walls. Gathered data had collected hours of content, the files covering topics on Earth, the enemy, and her mission.

  “It says here, her objectives are to stop the Endervars. That the enemy was tracking her ship. Is this true?”

  "Supreme intelligence has analyzed the evidence, and concludes there's a 79 percent chance our subject is speaking the truth,” the scientist said. “However, there's also a 20 percent chance she covertly is an Endervar, or in some way aligned with them. You of all people should know the dangers.”

  Julian nodded, feeling the pang of By
dandia’s destruction still fresh in his mind.

  “Regardless,” Landon interjected. “It’s absolutely imperative we re-establish contact with the android. That’s why our presence was requested.”

  He looked back at the image of the subject, and saw the woman’s vacant face.

  “Have you tried accessing her systems directly?” Julian asked.

  “So far, our attempts have failed. The coding used to design her is based on old Terran computing languages, but it’s far evolved beyond that era and is alien to us. Almost living it is. At best, we would need several cycles to decipher and crack it. But I’m not even sure it’s possible.”

  “She’s that advanced?”

  “Indeed. But I think we’ve found a way to re-establish contact.”

  The subject may have gone silent, but scans showed the woman to still be active, the scientist explained. Activity in the artificial brain, assumed to be dormant, had in fact remained high, even spiking to new levels in the five days that had passed. But also active was a communication signal emanating from the subject’s body.

  “The information she’s sending is encrypted, but the frequency we recognize. In fact, it’s still in use, and basically a variant of Uni-trans standard,” the scientist said. “We’ve isolated the transmission band.”

  The holographic displays dimmed, as the scientist passed on the research facility’s security clearance to Julian’s bio-ID. He looked at the digital feed embedded on his wrist and noticed the automated codes downloading into his comm-band.

  “The woman pleaded to speak with you,” Landon said. “She wanted to know about us, about humanity and its fate. That’s why we’re here. To gain her trust.”

  In moments, Julian would see the subject for himself, this time closer than ever. But before he did, he glanced off at the collected scans and images. Catching his eye was not the woman’s face, but another data point among the many. This one, however, was simple.

  “Subject’s designation,” it read. “Name: Arendi Soldanas.”

  ***

  She wished it was an error, a wayward protocol gone rogue. Perhaps a neural node had become unhinged. Or maybe a stability field had abruptly dispersed. Whatever it was she needed to know. Something to shed light on the phenomena inside. An explanation to justify her current predicament. She was frantic.

  The diagnostics had come through. The end result the same. “Repairs completed,” they had said. “No damage detected.”

  It was not the first time she had read the scans. Nor would it be the last. The deep diagnostic, initiated on her own behest, had just cycled through her entire body, sending nearly every internal system into hibernation mode. Over a billion times she had initiated the scan, hoping to find the anomaly. She was certain it was there.

  --Arendi Soldanas

  Amid the sea of near endless data, she detected the words. Her name, a simple term, pulsating in the chaos.

  --Arendi Soldanas

  Isolating the coding, she found that it had come through her own communication beam. The message was short, used on the same frequency as her creator. But this was all too strange — someone was speaking to her.

  --Can you read this? Are you there?

  Slowly, the new words appeared, as her internal processes continued to run the diagnostics a hundred times over.

  --Arendi, do you understand this?

  She went into high alert, afraid her captors were infiltrating her systems. Scans showed there to be no such evidence, but still she feared. What was happening to her?

  --You will come to no harm. We only wish to talk.

  She wanted to ignore it, to close herself off even more. Why should she trust them?

  --Please.

  It wasn’t safe. The diagnostics. She needed to find the flaws. To stop the fear.

  --Please, I am a friend. I am human.

  She nearly silenced the message, until she saw the words. “Human,” it said, her mind focusing on the term.

  --As requested, we are here. We wish to speak with you.

  The diagnostic abruptly halted on her orders. She hesitated, wishing she could hear the directives of her creator. But only the mysterious voice remained, hanging in the void.

  --It’s imperative we speak. Please respond.

  She accessed her communication subroutines and finally embraced the voice. “I am here,” she replied. “Can you hear this?”

  --Yes. We wish to establish contact.

  “Who is this?”

  --My name is Landon Vyuranas. I come from New Terra, a human colony established after the fall of Earth.

  “You are human?”

  --Yes, and I am not alone.

  Hearing the words, she fully reactivated her systems. Normal operating parameters resumed, as her sensory outputs powered back on. Pushing herself off the platform from which she lay, the woman then accessed her eyes.

  It was not a lie. Not some malfunction, or a hack instigated by her captors. In front of her stood her visitor, the scans cross-referencing the image with the historical data. Visual mapping delineated each of the physical features, moving from the strands of white hair to the pores of the skin. “Human” the analysis concluded. “Male.”

  The man stood calmly, his body dressed in a suit of leathered black. Looking at his face, she examined his lavender eyes, only to be drawn to his lips. He was smiling.

  “Do not be alarmed,” he said softly. “You will not be harmed.”

  He slowly approached, a sheen of light glowing around his arms and hands. “I am Landon. You are among friends.”

  She stepped forward, and noticed the force fields that had once constrained her had been lifted. The booming monotone voice of her interrogators was also absent. Around her, she could feel the oxygenated air flow and wisp against her armor. Looking back at the man, she delved into the scans, and saw the movement. The exhale of the lungs, the beating of a heart — all of it was there.

  “You,” she said. “Humanity. It has survived?”

  “Yes. Very much so.”

  The man known as Landon extended out the palm of his hand. Neon beams emerged from his wrist, displaying not just light, but an image projected in the air.

  “Do you recognize this?” he asked.

  The image itself was a rendered three-dimensional model, built from holograms, and spinning on its axis. Though miniature in form, what it depicted was vast, and yet very familiar. Habitat domes clustered around the structure’s center, while giant engines protruded from its rear.

  “This is one of the seed ships,” she said. “Built for the great exodus.”

  “Correct. This particular ship was the New Terra and launched from the Titan colony orbiting Saturn in 2798 A.D. My ancestors were among its passengers. Using the old gate-drives, we traveled 1600 light-years away and named our new colony after the seed ship that brought us there.”

  The image then changed, depicting a view of a planet surrounded by three moons. “New Terra” it said. Gradually, the image grew, including another planet, and then another, all of them listed as colonies.

  “In total, six seed ships escaped the fall of Earth,” he explained, pointing to the half-dozen different worlds that had appeared. “Millions survived, establishing new homes for generations to come.”

  She gazed at each of the planets as they orbited before her. Worlds teeming with atmosphere, resources, and life. It was far more than she and her creator could have hoped for.

  “Let me introduce you to someone else,” he said.

  The figure walked forward. “Human, male” her scans showed. But visually, there was more, the man’s physical features matching an image still in her memory banks.

  “This is Julian Nverson, the captain who recovered you,” Landon said.

  He was different than the other, his face both thin and gaunt, the garb he wore a suit of indigo fabric. On the man’s skin, she could see unusual markings, streaks of vein-like blue imprinted on his cheeks.

  She walked c
loser to him as she re-loaded the memory and compared it to the present. Flashes of a once dead human raced through her mind.

  “Captain Nverson,” she said softly.

  She remembered the sight on the ship. The man had been lifeless for days, the oxygen on the vessel depleted. Air itself had withered into vacuum and ice.

  “You are the pilot. And yet you are alive. How?”

  He nodded, pointing to the blue markings on his skin.

  “It’s called a rejuvenation, a common procedure. It can revive the severely injured or even the dead.”

  Pulling down the collar of his uniform, he showed that the markings extended to his neck.

  “Julian is human like I,” Landon explained. “His people, however, were descended from Earth. They went on to establish Haven, one of the six colonies.”

  “Haven,” she said, knowing the name well. “The largest of the seed ships.”

  She closed her eyes, feeling the memory resurface. Data streamed through the woman’s systems, her mission and its objectives coming into view.

  “We knew of the seed ships, but we could only speculate on their destination,” she said. “So we chose Haven and followed its projected path, traveling through the galaxy to find it.”

  “Then it’s true,” the pilot said. “You really are from Earth.”

  “Yes. That is my homeworld,” she said. “And what of yours? Is that where we are?” Are we on Haven?”

  “No, this is a space station,” Landon said.

  “But what of Haven? Are we orbiting it?”

  The two men paused, unsure how to respond.

  “My apologies, but Haven was recently lost,” Landon said.

  “Invaded,” the pilot interjected. “It’s now under enemy control.”