The Swallowtail Voyages 1: The Engineer's Escape

by Trip Ellington

  “Come on,” she whispered, staring at the core. With labored breaths, she fell into a fetal position. In the flickering shadows of the cave, Skye wondered how many attempts the Council would make before giving up; how many times they would send her to die. Was her life really so expendable? She shut her eyes and the breaths came a little easier. Her thoughts drifted to Mal. She could almost hear him calling out to her again. She smiled at the thought.

  “Skye?” Her eyes snapped open to see the blue light over her chest pulsing.

  “M-Mal?” Skye called out. She rubbed her hand over the glowing crystal.

  “Hello, Skye,” Mal’s voice chirped, sounding confused. “I’m back. How am I back online? I do believe I saw you die, and horribly; although my memory appears mistaken.”

  “You’re not mistaken,” she said. “the Council sent more than one copy of us, Mal.”

  “Oh dear me, I see,” Mal said as he accessed Skye’s vision of the three lifeless forms in front of Skye. “How tragic. The other two certainly weren’t here when we were here. All three?”

  “And I’m the fourth, unless there are others who didn’t come this way. Would my version of Mal have known about any of this?”

  “Not if we weren’t in range of the ship—we are too far to transmit, although, there would have been a record that they had been deployed previously. So, yes and no. You and I know only as much as we have each experienced without that transmission.”

  “Could you give me a status update on my suit, please?” Skye asked.

  “Certainly, certainly,” the other Skye’s Mal replied. He sounded flustered. There was a scratching sound nearby on the bank. “Good heavens. What is that?”

  “I don’t know,” Skye whispered as she strained to see in the dim light. The sound was coming from the rock-like device that she had found earlier. It was swinging wildly on the ground, like a pendulum. It knocked lightly against the ground as it moved, and Skye heard a faint scratching emanating from inside. She picked up her welder and approached the stone slowly.

  “What is that, and why did you keep it in your possession?” Mal asked.

  “It’s a transmitter of some kind,” Skye answered. The black exterior of the device was softening, melting into liquid form. It fell away into a puddle, revealing a carapaced, slug-like creature. It was roughly two meters long, with a brown, segmented body.

  Skye crouched down onto her knees, keeping the welder within striking distance. She was taking no chances.

  “Can you find out what it is, Mal?”

  “I’m scanning it now,” Mal said. “Hmm…I’m not seeing any discernable defensive capabilities, Skye.”

  The slug-like creature crawled up the bank and over to the corpses, pausing at the version of Skye that had suffocated. It lifted its carapaced upper body and tapped at the helmet three times with its tiny front legs before crawling to the burned one, rising and tapping it three times, and then crawling its way to the final corpse, tapping it three times also before turning toward the pool of polyatomic ion. It crept its way down the bank back toward Skye, pausing next to her. It rose upon its legs, curving to the side as though considering her, before tapping her three times on her crouched knee. Skye remained motionless as it crawled swiftly to the edge of the polyatomic ion pool. It plunged straight into the depths of the pool without hesitation, sinking swiftly beneath the surface.

  Chapter Nine

  “Well then,” Skye said. “That was definitely unexpected.”

  “Indeed,” Mal agreed. “I have nothing like it in my database.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “From the data I’ve collected, I was under the assumption that the stone would have been some sort of—,” Mal began.

  “Communications device,” Skye finished Mal’s sentence. “That what my Mal thought as well.” It was a strange feeling, talking to a Mal who had an entirely different recollection of events of this mission.

  “Exactly,” Mal said. “But it was clearly not a stone but a living entity inside a chrysalis.”

  “One problem at a time, I suppose,” Skye exhaled. “Did you and my former incarnation find an exit by any chance?”

  “Sadly, no,” Mal replied. “You…she… died when one of those massive things damaged her helmet. She had no way to replace it.”

  “Yeah,” Skye said. “It’s only because of them that I’m alive right now.” She dropped her still-active welder on the ground and removed the helmet from one of the corpses. She held the helmet in place between her legs while she unclasped the clamps on her own helmet. Taking a few deep breaths, she threw off her helmet, and put the scavenged one in place.

  “Much better,” Skye said once the suit had repressurized. “Let’s see if the HUD is functional again.”

  “Trying it now,” Mal said. In an instant, the dark cavern lit up in outlines of green.

  “Much better,” Skye said. She picked up her welder and placed it back in her belt.

  As Skye began to hike up the bank, she purposefully averted her eyes from the corpses. It troubled her to come face to face with her own death. Was this the first mission where the Council had sent her multiple times? At the back of the bank, there was another wall, just like in the tunnels; smooth, with the same black electrical tubing running along it like veins filled with poison. There was a large, round door in the center; larger than any of the other doors that she had yet encountered.

  “Oh! Another door!” Mal said excitedly. “My Skye and I figured out how to open them.”

  “That was you?”

  “Yes! We set up the panels at the side to hook up to the ITPs.”

  “Thank you for that,” she said. “It saved my life.”

  “Oh, very good!” Mal said. “Let me help you through the steps. It will require your welding tool, a sonic driver, and your set of chronopliers.”

  “Okay,” Skye said. “I’m going to have to take them out one at a time since I only have one hand.”

  “One hand? Where did the other go?”

  “It was crushed in a door with one of the Celaenans.”

  “Celaenan? What is that?”

  “The large buggy things,” Skye replied.

  “Ah! A new word!”

  “Funny. That’s what you said when I first came up with it.”

  “I’d imagine so,” Mal said. “Now you will have to remove the panel with the sonic driver.” Slipping the flat end of her sonic driver beneath the edge of the panel, Skye removed the entire metal piece from beside the door.

  “Okay.”

  “Now, look for the wires that operate the opening and closing mechanism.” Skye looked at the wires quizzically.

  “They’re all the same,” she said, inspecting the mass of wires beneath the panel. It was the same as with the other panel—the wires were all the same matte black color, and each had matching width and length.

  “It will stretch between the panel and the top right of the connection,” Mal instructed. “My Skye and I searched for a while before figuring out which operated which. The whole process ate up almost an hour of our time.” Skye noted which wire connected to the door at the top right of the panel, and then found where it connected to the door.

  “You will want to cut it and then re-route it by crossing it with the wire that controls the opening speed.”

  “You can control the speed of the door?”

  “Yes,” Mal replied. “You wouldn’t believe how slowly these things open by default.”

  “Which wire am I looking for?”

  “The one which connects to the front of the panel, and the third connection to the bottom.” Skye located the wire, and then pulled her utility knife out of her belt. She then sliced both wires, crossed them, and placed the panel back on the door.

  “Now you need to revise the link up,” Mal said. “You will need to reconfigure the metal by softening it with the welding tool and manipulating it into the correct configuration with your chronopliers.” Skye heated the panel
and its metal link up until it glowed yellow from the heat. She then used her chronopliers to mold the metal to the proper shape displayed in her HUD by Mal. When she was finished, she replaced her chronopliers into her tool belt, and stepped back.

  “How long until it is ready to open?” she asked Mal.

  “Use your hydration tube to cool it.” Mal suggested. Pulling her hydration tube from her suit, Skye siphoned off some water, using it to cool the newly fixed ITP link up. She then pulled her ITP device from her utility belt and attached it to the link up. The door lock disengaged with a loud and decided clunk, and a wave of dusty, stale air pushed through as the air pressure equalized between the two areas. The room felt as though it had not been entered or inhabited for a long time. Skye removed her ITP and stepped inside.

  The door closed behind her with a thunk. She looked around; it was an enormous circular room lit by orange lamps that hung by the ceiling. Just like the first room she encountered, there was a circle of ornate, metallic pedestals. Around them, in concentric, widening circles, were row upon row of of identical black stones, just like the one that had hatched outside filled the room.

  “Chrysalises,” Mal said. “They all appear to be in stasis.”

  “There are thousands of them,” Skye said. “Why were they all sealed in this room?”

  “I’m not sure,” Mal said. “Note how carefully they have been placed.”

  “Why would they go into stasis, do you think?”

  “I’m scanning the database now,” Mal replied. “Oh my.”

  “What is it?”

  “Though I don’t understand it fully,” Mal said. “There are records of a terrible disaster; one that nearly destroyed the Celaenans. Billions died.”

  “That’s horrible,” Skye said. “So a disaster strikes and these creatures go into stasis, but who moved them here?”

  “Perhaps the same Celaenans who attacked the colonists,” Mal suggested.

  “I’ve thought about this before,” Skye said. “And I’m just not convinced that the Celaenans that attacked the colonists are the same race that left the logs and built all of this.” Skye said, gesturing to the ornate room. “It’s just puzzling.”

  “So what now, Skye?” Mal asked.

  “It didn’t hatch until it touched the polyatomic ion,” Skye said as the realization occurred to her. “It’s the liquid form of it that wakes them up.” Skye looked about the room, noting that a section of the vein-like tubing had collapsed, just like the section in the alcove. She began to walk over to it.

  “If I repair it, then the flow of ion to the room will be restored, waking them,” she deduced.

  “Are you sure you want to awaken these creatures?” Mal asked. “It’s not a part of our original mission.”

  “Whatever these creatures are, they’ve been trapped here for a very long time,” Skye said. “No matter what, I am going to solve this mystery and we’re getting out of here alive.” She pulled a section of tubing from her utility belt, preparing it with the tips of her chronopliers so that it could be hooked up to the damaged tubing, bridging the gapped section. Mal laughed with excitement.

  “Skye, you always manage to new ways to surprise me,” Mal said. “We may even be the initiators in a first contact situation!”

  Skye smiled. She carried the tubing over to the collapsed section. As she reached out to replace the tubing, she lost her balance and her legs collapsed beneath her.

  “Skye? Are you alright?” Mal asked.

  “Mal! What’s going on?” Skye gasped as her words slurred. “What’s wrong with me?”

  “Running a diagnostic now,” Mal said. His voice was panicked, as well. It took a few moments before Mal’s voice sounded morosely in her ear. “We’re… we’re out of time, Skye.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When I came back online, I didn’t think to check how much time you had…and your forty-eight hours is almost up.”

  “How much longer do we have?”

  “Ten minutes…at most, but we are losing power quickly.”

  “Is there any way that we can override that limit?”

  “Anything we would try would require a massive influx of energy…” Mal said. “Unless you still have the disruptor?”

  “Lost it back at Fori,” Skye replied mournfully.

  “The plasma blaster?” Mal asked hopefully.

  “I dropped it when I fell into the waterfall,” she replied.

  “My Skye fell into the waterfall, as well.”

  “What about the black cables?” Skye asked. “They have an energy signature.”

  “It wouldn’t be enough. We need something that carries a higher voltage.”

  Skye sank backwards, sprawling nervelessly on to the ground. She looked up at the ceiling, where the lights were glowing dimly and glanced back to the damaged section. A wave of disappointment settled over her—she wanted to help the slug-like creatures to reawaken. She didn’t like the idea of dying, only to be stumbled upon by another naive replacement. Her mind wandered to the sad corpses of her copies, lying like rag dolls upon the bank.

  “Skye!” Mal cried. “I’m shutting down.”

  “Mal, please don’t go. I can’t lose you again.” Her consciousness began to fade to black, and she struggled to stay awake. Mal didn’t respond, and tears sprung to her eyes as she found herself alone again.

  She heard the dull sound of the door opening. She screamed hoarsely as she saw a Celaenan approaching her, its six thin legs skittering across the floor. In a last ditch effort, Skye tried to lift her hand to pull out her welding tool, but her arm refused to obey. t flopped uselessly against her abdomen before it slid downward, bouncing against the floor. She was trapped in her own body.

  The Celaenon stood over her. It cocked its head to the side. It lowered its upper body so that it hovered directly over her, its triangular face a mere six inches above Skye’s own. It lifted one of its large, sharp forearms, one of the two that protruded from its abdomen. Reaching forward, it slid the end of its arm under her hand and lifted it from the floor.

  Looking directly into her eyes with its own tiny, black ones, it tapped very gently three times at the very center of her palm. Something inside of Skye relaxed as she recognized the gesture.

  The Celaenan deftly picked up the tubing that Skye had prepped. It turned over the piece in its tiny, claw-like hands, studying it, and looked back and forth between the replacement tubing and the broken area on the wall. With deft precision, it placed the tubing to the wall, using it to bridge the break—it fit perfectly. It held up its other long arm, and a flow of polyatomic ion shot from its hand, sealing the ends and forming a single, unbroken piece.

  Finished, it turned away, skittering across the room to one of the pedestals. It was made of the dark solid state polyatomic ion. It was carved in a triangular shape, with a flat top and three smooth sides. In the top, there was a triangular indentation. The creature leaned forward and its head split open down a seam in the middle, and it fit its head into the indention.

  The lights in the room flared, brightening as though there were a severe electrical surge. Skye heard the sound of flowing liquid, and watched as the room flooded with polyatomic ion. All of the chrysalises became submerged in the liquid.

  The Celaenan lifted its opened head from the pedestal and Skye gasped as she saw the slug-like creature stretched out within the head cavity before the Celaenan’s head closed back together.

  “Mal, I wish you could’ve seen this,” Skye mouthed breathlessly. The liquid inched toward her immobile body, but the Celaenan rushed over to her, gesturing with its many arms. It made clicking sounds, desperately trying to communicate a message that was lost on Skye.

  It leaned forward, picking Skye up gently with its longer arms.

  The Celaenan walked over to a tub-shaped opening in the wall, placing Skye’s body into it. It reached forward, tapping her on the helmet three times, in a slow, pointed manner, before it erupted in a series
of incomprehensible clicks and pops. Skye realized that the tub had begun to fill with the metallic liquid of the polyatomic ion. Out of the corner of her darkening vision, she saw that the chrysalises were beginning to move, dozens of the slug-like creatures beginning to hatch.

  As the tub filled, Skye saw dozens of of the freshly-hatched slugs crawling into the tub, tearing at her suit and prying at her mouth and eyes. As her suit dissolved and the ion touched her flesh, Skye tried to scream. As her mouth opened, the slugs forced her mouth open even wider and the polyatomic ion flooded in. She gasped a panicked lungful of the liquid and all faded to black.

  Chapter Ten

  Skye inhaled deeply, her lungs filling with air. She opened her eyes to find that she was in the Swallowtail. Through the viewing portal, the red light of Celaeno beamed in. She sat up.

  “Good morning, Skye,” Mal said brightly.

  “Mal! You’re back!”

  “As are you!”

  “What happened to us?” Skye asked, recalling her last memory. She felt refreshed.

  “You’ve just been reprinted,” Mal replied matter-of-factly.

  “But we were out of range,” Skye said. “How were we able to sync with the ship?”

  “We have our new friends to thank for that one,” Mal replied. “The Celaenium Matter is so much more than what we thought, Skye. Once you woke them up, they were able to communicate again.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not following,” Skye said. She held her right hand to her face and flexed her fingers.

  “I’m getting there!” Mal said. “The polyatomic ion, as it turns out, acts as a planet-wide neural network for the Celaenans. They are able to communicate simultaneously with all of the Celaenans that are submerged within the liquid. Once we were submerged, we became a part of their network, so to speak.”