by Sara King
“They are my friends, but they’re not stupid.”
“That’s why I’m giving them one last chance. We’ll stand out here for one hour. If they don’t appear before then, you’re going for a boat ride.”
“Juno, please.” Athenais hated the way her words came out like begging, but the lap of the waves against the dock was beginning to unnerve her.
Smiling at her, Juno put the handheld to her face and depressed the receiver. Across the entire island, her voice boomed, “You hear that, my friends? Athenais and I are standing on Dock 27. The ship to take her to the bottom of the ocean is waiting behind her. We’ll be here for one hour. If you do not show yourselves before then, we’ll be leaving and you won’t see her again.
Juno lowered the handheld and grinned. “Now we wait.”
A lump of dread formed in Athenais’s gut as she stared out at the endless blue expanse beyond the ship. She was going to the bottom today. She could feel it.
Pressure
Dallas woke with a groan. Before she even opened her eyes, she began vomiting. The hoses attached to her face pumped it away, though the smell remained. Moaning, Dallas sat up and pulled off the breathing gear.
“Tommy?” she managed, around a parched throat. “Where are you?”
A white-cloaked technician hurried to the edge of the tank. “Try to stay calm, miss. You were infected with a cerebral parasite. We had to replace some damaged brain matter and seal the hole.”
Dallas sat up immediately. “You sealed the hole?! You bastards!” She started wading out of the regen pool, ripping off the monitoring apparatus.
“She’s delusional,” the woman called over her shoulder. “Someone get the guards.”
“I’m not delusional. Where’s Stuart? Tommy!” Dallas shouted, shoving away the hands that tried to restrain her.
“Miss, Colonel Howlen has returned to his duties,” the cocoa-skinned woman who seemed to be in charge said. “Who’s Stuart?”
Dallas squinted at the head technician. “You don’t look Utopi. Where are your uniforms?”
The technician gave her fellows a confused look. “What is a Utopi?”
Dallas backed away, making the regen liquid swish around her. “Wait a minute.” Horror was beginning to trace little curdles through her stomach as she saw that the room around her was made of stone, not metal and polymers. “Where am I?”
“This is the most specialized medical facility on Xenith,” the woman said, her brown eyes flickering over Dallas with obvious concern. “You’re lucky, young lady. You had very serious injuries. It is a great honor that it was the Emperor’s Will to restore you.”
Oh that stupid bastard. He brought me back… Dallas looked the woman up and down. “So I’m a prisoner, then?”
“Our Guiding Light is threatening to drown you, so that would be my guess.”
Dallas gulped. “Drown me?”
“Yes. She’s taking the divine Athenais to her eternal grave as we speak. The ones she seeks did not come to save her.”
“Divine.” Dallas snorted. “Riiiiiight. And my ass is made of solid gold.”
The woman blushed suddenly and looked away. “I’m sorry. I’m not supposed to speak with my patients. You’re just so…innocent looking. I…” The woman cleared her throat and straightened. “If you are feeling well enough to leave the tank, I’m afraid I must have those two men escort you to a cell.” She hesitated only a moment, her eyes softening briefly before she added, “Of course, if you are still ill, we can always give you more sleeping medication and let you return to regen.”
Dallas glanced at the rough-looking Warriors standing by the door, then back at the regen pool. “Uh. I’m still dizzy. And my head hurts.” She wiggled her fingers. “And I have achy joints. And my stomach is gurgling. And my—”
Looking relieved, the woman interrupted, “Definitely not healed yet. Let me get you some more floater wash. You seem to have taken well to it.”
“Floater…wash?”
The technician ignored her, rooting through the cabinet behind her to remove a blue vial of liquid. She poured a glass of water and added a single drop from the vial, then mixed it together and handed Dallas the ceramic cup.
“What’s this?” Dallas asked, wrinkling her nose at the glass.
“Something to help you sleep.”
“Smells like fish.”
“You’ll like it. Trust me.” The woman smiled at Dallas, then winked.
Dallas took a deep breath, pinched her nose, and downed the concoction.
Almost immediately, she began to feel more relaxed. Grinning, Dallas sank back against the edge of the tank and allowed the technician to reapply the stinky breathing equipment.
She was still spread out like this, half in and half out of the water, when someone came and whispered in her ear, “Tonight. Black boots.”
By the time Dallas crawled far enough out of her dreaminess to look, the speaker was gone.
Athenais stood on the deck of the ship, staring straight ahead. The sun was setting low on the horizon, a thin band of red and orange. It was beautiful, one of the few aspects of surface life that she liked, and even that was linked to the stars. Athenais ached to be back on her ship, as it had been before setting out on this fool’s quest. She missed Squirrel and Dune and Goat and reminded herself that she still had to repay Governor Black for killing them.
She refused to think of the millions of gallons of water under her feet.
“Nine and a quarter miles,” Juno said, reading her handy little pocket-gauge. She lowered it, looking up. “I think this will do, don’t you, Athenais?” She gave Athenais a slow, malicious smile, her eyes glittering like black jewels. “Or would you rather go for the full ten miles?”
“Just get it over with. Stop being petty.”
“Petty? I’m being considerate. If you prefer deeper, we can keep going.”
“Don’t you have something better to do?” Athenais snapped. “Like, I dunno, a planet to run?”
“My planet is a well-oiled machine,” Juno said, her smooth features filled with conceit. “It runs itself.”
Athenais continued to stare out over the horizon.
“Then let’s get this over with,” Juno said. “You’re boring me.”
Like a toy that just lost its appeal, Athenais thought.
Juno motioned at the gold-armored Warriors, who moved in on Athenais like twelve gleaming statues, herding her toward the six hundred pound anchor sitting in the middle of the deck. Above it, a crane waited to lift it up and over the edge.
Athenais sat down amidst the hooks, still staring out at the sunset beyond the ship. She did not even flinch as a Warrior handcuffed her hand to the spine of the anchor. Just her hand, Juno had patiently explained, so that she could fully experience the futility of trying to free herself. After all, it was so much more depressing to be able to thrash against the anchor for the next seven millennia. Being lashed to it without any wriggle-room, Juno had gone on, would get boring.
Another stepped in and gave her a long look, his brown eyes holding hers for a moment too long before he began winding rope around her body. Regret, then? At least somebody knew the kind of Karmic horseshit this was heaping on themselves. What goes around comes around, Juno. The woman was going to get hers. In spades.
As she felt the rope tighten around her stomach, Athenais started thinking of her many different families, on many different planets. Eventually, they all had died, and she’d returned again to the stars. The stars were always constant. Never changing, always right where she needed them to be—
Her attention snapped back to the moment when Juno slapped her.
“Don’t think I’m letting you zone out,” Juno said, squatting beside her, face on level with Athenais’s. “After everything you’ve done, I’m not dropping you in until I see fear in your eyes.”
Like a sick child torturing a puppy, Athenais realized. Are all of us this messed up? She glanced at the sunset again. She decide
d maybe, but in different ways. Marceau killed colonists for power and experimented on children. Angus had established himself as the most feared planetary dictator in the Quads, happily taking in the rest of the Utopia’s rejects. Rabbit had lain relatively low, but he also had that weird duality going on between reclusive monk and ruthless criminal overlord. And, for her own part, while Athenais certainly had no desires to rule a planet of misled morons in the guise of a patron deity, she had probably killed, all-told, several billion people, if her wartime pursuits with the rebels were taken into account. After all, Utopian carriers held a lot of people, not just the hundreds of thousands of fighters that couldn’t be allowed to leave dock in a war-zone. Between her seven thousand years of bombing-runs, piracy, and sabotage, Athenais wouldn’t be surprised if she had ended a planet or two worth of lives. It had come to the point where killing no longer bothered her. Did that make her like the rest of them?
“We can take all the time you need for this to ‘sink in,’ so to speak,” Juno said, grinning smugly at her own pun. When Athenais didn’t react, Dr. Berg’s smile faded a bit and her eyes darkened. “Or perhaps we should let you dangle in the water an hour or two before cutting you loose? Perhaps you need a taste of what’s to come, to really get into the spirit of things?”
I hate her, Athenais realized. Until now, only her father had earned that cherished place in her brain. Not even Angus, when he’d been removing body-parts, had won her hatred. Yet this woman, with her cruelty, her conceit, her vain self-importance… It was triggering all the right buttons in her, sending that overwhelming surge of loathing up through her system, like a nasty oil eating at her heart. The fact that Juno had had complete control over an entire planet for millennia left Athenais with at sick feeling in her stomach.
“If you’re waiting for something, you might as well take us back,” Athenais said. “Otherwise, we’re gonna be here a long time.”
Juno was silent a moment, staring into her eyes.
The Warrior finished tying the knots—well out of reach of her one free hand—and gave a slight tug to make sure they were secure. Athenais felt her gut twinge again before she hid it.
But Juno had caught it. The woman smiled slowly, lips curving in malignant glee. “No, it’s there. You’re terrified.”
Thoughts of cold, crushing blackness flashed through Athenais’s mind and she looked away.
Juno stood up and ruffled her hair. “There we go. All right! Get this thing moving! I want it overboard in thirty seconds!” She lowered her voice and glanced at Athenais. “Before my friend, here, has a chance to find that little box she keeps stuffing herself into. Right, Athenais?” Her brow crinkled with a slight frown. “Then again, I suppose you spacer-types might use a canister to compartmentalize, instead.” Sneering with delight, Juno said, “You’ll probably get better use out of it, anyway. Canisters are better under pressure.” She patted Athenais’s head. “Lots and lots of pressure.”
Athenais closed her eyes as the crane began to hoist, jerking the anchor under her. The crane groaned as it took the anchor’s weight, then Athenais was swinging above the deck, at eye level with Juno. Then she was being hoisted higher, lifted over the gunwales of the ship.
Athenais glanced down, watching the deck of the ship swing out from under her. Her heart began to pound in her chest and she gripped the anchor to keep her hands from shaking.
“Enjoy your vacation to Hell,” Juno said, her eyes soaking it up like a malicious child.
Athenais looked straight at her. “Deep space, Juno. I’ll pack a few extra cores, just for you.”
Juno frowned. “Cut it loose.”
Athenais reflexively sucked in a breath. In the next instant, she was falling. She hit the water with such force that she was torn from her seat and upended, being dragged downward by her wrist.
…torn from her seat? The ropes had given way?
Ragnar! Athenais thought, stunned.
But water was whipping around her body, filling her ears with a liquid roar and thrashing her back and forth like a ribbon in the wind. Frantically, she jerked on the handcuff, twisting at it despite the fact she knew the metal rings were solid. She could feel the pressure increasing as the anchor pulled her under. Already, her ears were screaming, threatening to burst. The cuff remained securely in place.
Athenais closed her eyes and stopped struggling. She was moving too fast to get her feet on the anchor and she was using up her air. Ridiculous, she knew, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to suck in a lungful of water and end it quickly. Already, the pressure was intense. She felt her ears pop and strain, the water grow colder.
Something slammed into her in the darkness. The force of it jerked her to the side, nearly tearing her arm from its socket. Spikes of pain lanced through her leg, startling her into releasing the rest of her precious air in a scream. Something was attached to her ankle, piercing her skin with sharp teeth.
Not being able to see made it worse. Athenais kicked out, trying to get the thing off of her. Whatever it was grabbed her other leg in an equally painful grip and began pulling itself toward her main body. She felt the teeth release her calf and take hold again in her thigh.
Athenais’s lungs were beginning to pulverize her ribcage with the need for air. Water was rushing into her ears, pushed inside from the enormous pressure around her.
Whatever it was didn’t have the decency to eat her. Instead, it dragged itself down her body, successively biting and pulling, biting and pulling. When it reached her shoulder, it latched onto the arm attached to the anchor.
Inwardly, in an oxygen-starved haze, Athenais laughed. The stupid beast didn’t even have the brains to let go of her. Like a fish brought to the surface because it wouldn’t let go of the bobber, this unfortunate little predator was going to share her fate.
And then the thing bit down hard enough to crush bones.
Athenais sucked cold water into her lungs in an attempt to scream. As she struggled, the thing started shaking, tearing muscles and tendons loose. Then she was free, the water coming to a rushing halt around her. She felt warm blood flooding from her arm into the ocean around her, felt the blood-heated water hit her face, but forgot that when the beast used its grip on her missing arm to drag her toward the surface.
“I’m sorry about your arm, human. I didn’t have time to save more of it. We were getting too deep.”
Despite the fact they were under the water, Athenais heard the voice as clear as if she were on dry land. A rush of giddy relief washed over her. It was Taal!
As she was losing consciousness, Athenais thought, Maybe I’ll take him into space, after all.
Juno was watching the last corner of the sun disappear beneath the waves when she saw the splash behind them. Squinting, she shielded her eyes with her hand and peered at the orange, dusk-tinted sea. Then she lowered her hand, cold fury building in her stomach.
“Stop the ship,” she said. “Someone get me a rifle.”
As the sailors furled the sails, a Warrior obediently handed her his gun. Juno brought it up, sighted, and fired.
The ocean exploded in a froth of red.
“Turn us around,” Juno said, handing the gun back to the Warrior.
By the Warlit Sky...
Athenais woke on the deck of a ship. Her shoulder had stopped bleeding and the beginning of a new arm was already beginning to form.
“How’d you do it?” Juno said.
“Do what?” Athenais pushed herself up with one hand, her heart sinking. Where was Taal?
“Floaters. You made friends with floaters. Who the hell makes friends with floaters?! They hate humans! They have never helped humans!” Juno actually stomped her foot as she screamed the last, shoving her fists against her sides in impotent, infantile rage. Athenais thought it was funny.
Smiling, she said, “I just promised to take him to the stars.”
Juno stared. Then she burst out laughing. “And he believed you?! A pirate?”
Athe
nais prickled. “I gave him my word.”
“So?” Juno sneered. “Surely a mind-reader would’ve known that you were never planning on taking him anywhere.”
“He saved my life, didn’t he?” Athenais growled. What was Juno trying to say? She would’ve kept her word.
“Since when did you care if somebody saved your life?” Juno laughed. “You’re a user, Athenais. Just like me. Empathy isn’t in your blood.” Juno paused. “Do you ever wonder if we even exist anymore, Athenais? Do you wonder if you only think you’re you, but your spirit left the first time you died? You think maybe we’re just robots? That maybe we don’t have souls anymore? Sometimes I feel like that. Soulless, you know?”
“Stop trying to mindscrew me,” Athenais said.
“Oh, I know you’ve thought the same thing,” Juno laughed. “I’ve seen it in your eyes, Attie. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
Athenais did not answer. She was looking at the deck beneath Juno’s feet, a slice of dread cutting through her being.
Crimson blood speckled the planks, a different color than her own. Slowly, Athenais looked up.
Taal was bound to the mast. Dead. The bulb on his neck was deflated, large slabs of flesh cut from his tail. The smell of cooking fish wafted up from the kitchens belowdecks. Athenais’s stomach churned.
Juno followed her gaze, her thoughtful expression contorting into a disdainful sneer. “We made sure to cut off the meat while he was still alive. Best tasting, that way. When they die, the wash hits their system. Makes it taste fishy.” It was then that Athenais noticed the blood spatters on Juno’s boots, saw the crimson stains on her sleeves, saw the curved blade sheathed on her belt.
Athenais’s remaining hand found its way to Juno’s throat and she slammed the other woman against the gunwales in the surge of fury that followed. “You petty, selfish bitch!” she shouted into her face, slamming the back of her head against the boards. “I’m going to drag you so far into the Black that you are never found!”