Daedalus (Interstellar Cargo Book 2)

by Matt Verish

  Fej crossed his arms as he considered an answer. “Possibly to return the favor.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “Your aim might’ve been murder, but what you actually accomplished was to prompt an evolution of sorts while sending us on a one-way trip to another universe. My guess as to why she erased your short-term memory is that she wanted you to awaken—”

  “To the same helplessness she and the rest of the crew of the Daedalus experienced upon passing through the black hole,” Cole finished, though he still didn’t understand how he’d failed to destroy the ship. Looking around the desolate lab, he figured he was about to find out.

  “You successfully compromised a mission you didn’t fully understand,” Fej continued. He pointed to the center of the lab, where it appeared as though a large, circular—perhaps cylindrical—piece of equipment had been removed. Heavy scratch marks were gouged into the floor, across the thin layer of dust that had settled around it. “What you thought was a weapon of mass destruction was actually a sophisticated tool.”

  Suddenly Cole knew what once resided within the dust circle. “This ‘tool’...by any chance did my mother have it returned to the Daedalus?”

  Fej’s surprise Cole the chills. “That’s right. But how do you know that?”

  “I saw it. Along with its testy guardian, Archytas. Just before you guys came and got me.” He rubbed the stubble on his jaw, his mind starting to assemble the pieces. He had a bad feeling whatever this tool was, it was also responsible for what happened to Fej. “What exactly is that thing? And what was my mother doing with it in Sagittarius A?”

  “That is the question you should have asked before you attempted your sabotage.” He sighed, suddenly looking tired. “It was a particle collider, and to be honest, most of us didn’t learn of its existence until after the tragedy. We were told we were on a reconnaissance mission. There were plenty of rumors around the ship about Harper’s motives—even talks of mutiny—but few of us actually knew what she had planned, or with whom she was conspiring.”

  “Black Dwarf,” Cole said darkly, recalling the trouble the radical group had caused prior to his infiltration of the Daedalus all those years ago.

  “Yes. She eventually admitted this, though there were other parties involved as well.”

  Cole stood up a little straighter. “Who?” Please don’t say....

  “Research,” Fej said, finishing Cole’s thought. “So she claimed. Apparently a shadow organization affiliated with the governmental division was doing their dirty work. Someone by the name of—”

  “Dr. Kingston Dartmouth,” Cole said, returning the favor of interruption. His head was spinning. “Better known as The Singularity.”

  “Yeah.” The glowing eyes narrowed. “I thought you were unaware of such classified information going into your mission.”

  “I’m sleeping with his daughter,” Cole answered. “And let me tell you, in terms of brilliance, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree. The jury’s still out on her sanity.”

  Fej was shaking his head, though a hint of a grin had crept into the corner of his mouth. “I’m not really surprised, though I can’t even begin to imagine how you pulled that off.”

  Cole interlocked his fingers and cracked his knuckles. “It was easy. I unknowingly allowed her and two other plants to kidnap me from my job and force me into assisting their own terroristic, political agenda. Then, I helped Lin—Kingston’s daughter—and one of the terrorists—to double-cross one of her partners—both of whom are members of my crew—and now we’re all the galaxy’s most wanted criminals. I swept her off her feet by outsmarting her one-time vindictive AI creation, and introduced her to a life of crime under the thumb of my now deceased gangster brother.” He clapped his hands together and sighed.

  Fej’s head had not ceased shaking. “You’ve been busy over these last fifteen years.”

  Now it was Cole’s turn to shake his head. “Nah, this all transpired over the last month. I spent most of my post-Military career keeping a low profile and working as an interstellar cargo pilot for SolEx.”

  “Is that why you wear company leather working gloves?”

  Cole cringed. He flexed his hands, the leather creaking. Then, against his better judgment, he slipped one of them off to reveal his horrible burns. “I only wear to them to cover up the constant reminder of how I failed to take out the Daedalus. I played with fire and literally got burned.”

  “Those are serious burns, Cole,” Fej noted with slight disgust. “How’d you manage?”

  Cole nodded toward the dust circle. “That so-called particle collider. In my haste to sabotage what I thought was a weapon, I must’ve triggered a reaction. Presto! Cooked fingers. And speaking of cooked...” He looked Fej up and down. “I suppose my meddling is to blame for your transformation as well.”

  Fej sighed. “Your meddling started a chain reaction of events which led to an unexplainable explosion, temporarily leaving the Daedalus dark. We drifted toward the event horizon, and by the time we managed to bring the ship back online, it was too late. Harper made a last-ditch effort to jump the ship out of the black hole, but we were driven further in.

  “I don’t recall much during that time, only that something...strange...happened, and I can only attribute it to the burst of energy expelled from the compromised collider. It was as though we all became energy. I’m not sure. I do believe that the only reason we survived was because of what you did.”

  “Don’t say that,” Cole said. “It’s because of me that you’re here. Not the other way around.”

  “Maybe, but like I said before: you were the only one with the courage to stop Harper.”

  Fej’s words did not lift the heavy guilt from Cole’s shoulders. “You never told me how she planned to use the collider.”

  Fej seemed reluctant to return to the topic. “She never revealed those plans to me, but,” he gestured to himself, “we all concluded that what you see in front of you is what she was hoping to do to the whole of humanity.”

  What the...? “Wait. My mother, Admiral Harper Musgrave, flew the Daedalus out to the center of our galaxy so she could employ some sort of energy burst to evolve the human race?”

  Fej nodded, his eyes upon the floor.

  “For what possible purpose?” came the rhetorical question.

  “I don’t know, Cole. She was a loose cannon by the time you intervened. The crew didn’t know what to think.”

  “Yet you still followed her orders,” Cole said. “And continued to do so even afterwards.”

  Fej scowled, but then his expression softened. “You’re right. We did. But you know as well as I do, a crew looks upon its admiral as though they’re infallible. Even when the evidence is staring them dead in the face. She’s a living legend, and no one was willing to disobey her orders for fear of being labeled a traitor.”

  Cole couldn’t argue. “Only I was stupid enough to take on that mantle. I guess you have to be born a bastard from a career Military mother and a murderous gangster father to have the balls to stand up in the face of adversity.” He wiped his hand down across his face.

  “I regret my lack of action every day,” Fej said. “It’s the reason I don’t resent my change. It was earned.”

  Cole didn’t want to argue that point. “Speaking of change, your opinion of my mother must’ve changed some time after you came here. Why else would you have continued to follow her into the abyss?”

  Fej held up his index finger. “Regardless of how we felt toward Harper, in the time of our greatest need, she did her best to see us all to safety. At least initially.” He turned away.

  Cole knew he shouldn’t press the issue, but there was one last batch of questions he had to ask. “You said my mother did her best to see the crew to safety. If that’s the case, then where is the crew? I haven’t seen a soul, other than yours. And speaking of you: what are you still doing here? Why didn’t you make your escape alongside her when you had the chance?”


  “I couldn’t leave you to die here all alone, so I finally stood up to her. Better late than never, I suppose. Had I the strength and the courage, I would’ve finished what you started. Unfortunately, some of us evolved more than others.” His grin was short-lived. “As for the crew...I’d rather not say. Not yet, at least.”

  The strength and the courage? Cole thought, frowning. “ ‘Not yet’? Then you insinuate that there will be a time down the road where you will tell me. You have a plan?”

  Fej was shaking his head again. “No plan. Just a means of transportation.”

  Fej had told him that none of the ships in the makeshift camp were able to fly anymore. “Care to explain yourself?”

  Fej straightened, looking like the soldier Cole recalled from years past. “Organitech.”

  “And that means...?”

  “Biomechanical coalescence. It’s a term the crew of the Daedalus concocted to explain the anomaly that befell us. The burst of energy from the collider affected us in different ways.” He gestured for Cole to follow him. “A lot of us died during the evolution. Those who survived acquired new abilities.”

  “Acquired new abilities,” Cole repeated. “What, like those old-fashioned comic book superheroes?”

  Fej did not laugh, nor did he refute Cole. He slowed in front of a door that led to one of the connected ships. “We’re far from superhuman, but our strength has increased as a result of the change.”

  “Alright, quit dragging out this explanation,” Cole said, exasperated. “Since when did you become a long-winded storyteller?”

  “Sorry.” Fej turned toward the door, and it opened on its own. They entered the short hallway beyond. “I’m not good at this sort of thing. You’re the first person I’ve explained this to who didn’t experience it all firsthand. It’d be better if I just showed you.”

  “Alright. But what’s so difficult about explaining your change?”

  Fej didn’t answer as he made his way through the compact ship. Cole recognized it as an escape vessel, constructed to hold upwards of fifty passengers, supplies, and weapons. None of those were present.

  When Fej entered the cockpit, he stood in front of the flight console and turned to face Cole. “Is this supposed to answer all my questions?” Cole asked, wondering if maybe Fej had been breathing this planet’s air for too long. Had the change affected his mind as well?

  Cole considered himself an experienced, well-traveled man. He had seen many sights in his forty years of life, both good and bad. And what he’d not seen in person, he’d probably researched to some extent through his Ocunet. But there was nothing documented that he knew about the pairing of man and machine in quite this way.

  Maybe his alcohol had been laced with hallucinogens. How else could he explain the sight of his friend’s body as it literally fused to the console and merged with the ship?

  18

  CANNIBAL

  Organitech. Now Cole understood. Tissue and technology working in concert. The marriage of man and machine. The Singularity’s master plan finally unveiled.

  And it terrified him.

  He struggled to understand what the purpose would be to “upgrading” the human race. Control? Weaponization? Or was it merely the whim of a madman? And if it was madness, why had his mother signed on to assist Lin’s crazy father?

  There were no answers here. Fej was merely the end result. What Cole wanted his friend to explain, however, was where they were headed. The escape vessel was clearly functional, despite having been told the contrary.

  Cole wasn’t sure where to look, now that Fej had become one with the ship. So he stared at the console. “Neat trick, buddy. Not sure how you got your clothes to follow you in there, but that’s not important. Your performance only gave me more questions. Care to give me a rundown of things before I question my sanity?”

  The console illuminated. “Despite my reservations, I’m bringing you back to the Daedalus,” Fej said, his voice surrounding Cole.

  “I thought none of the remaining ships on this planet functioned. Are you going to teleport me?”

  “The technology inside me might be advanced, but teleportation is not one of the perks.”

  Cole’s grin was short-lived as the trembling engines came to life. He sat in the pilot’s chair, deciding against interfering with the controls. “So, what exactly do you expect me to do once you plop me in front of my mother? Besides die from suffocation or destruction by her superhuman hands?” He tapped his head and chest, both which were bereft of the means to survive space. His rifle slid off his shoulder, and he let it fall to the ground with a clatter.

  “I will transfer the modified oxygen from this planet into your suit,” Fej said.

  “Care to explain how?” Cole asked, knowing the smaller craft was incapable of accomplishing oxygen replenishment. “I left my suit back in your hodgepodge camp. Besides, you would have to somehow modify the...uh....”

  The opening of the cockpit door drew Cole’s attention. No one was there, though he was compelled to investigate. “This your doing, Fej?”

  “You didn’t think I would fly you all the way back to the Daedalus without your suit, did you? And yes, I did modify the ship so it contains an oxygen replenishing unit. It’s currently refilling your suit’s tanks as we speak.”

  Cole peaked through the door to the passenger hold to see his suit was draped across a few of the empty seats, his helmet resting snugly inside the material. The oxygen tank was connected to a valve that was protruding from the armrest. He didn’t see any other valves on the remaining seats. How fortuitous.

  “Um, is there someone else aboard?”

  “Negative.”

  “Hm. So you’re telling me that with your artificially grafted telekinesis, you established contact with this hub of ships and used your Organitech powers to maneuver my spacesuit into this hold?”

  “More or less.”

  “Not with teleportation.”

  “Doesn’t exist, Cole.”

  Cole threw up his hands. “Of course not. What was I thinking? Mankind’s only managed to manipulate our cells so that they can deconstruct and reconstruct complex circuitry and inanimate objects. We’re way far off from teleportation.”

  “I detect a hint of sarcasm.”

  “Oh yeah? Well at least your new operating system didn’t delete that portion of your brain.”

  Fej responded with a hearty laugh. “I’m glad you’re here, Cole—even if it’s only for another few minutes or so.”

  “Optimistic.”

  “Realistic. I’ve had a lot of quiet time to think.”

  Quiet time, eh? Seems unlikely in this environment. “I know you said you don’t want to discuss it, but I need to know everything you can tell me about what I’m up against. To start, where’s the rest of the crew? The Daedalus can carry five thousand people. Other than my mother—who I can’t remember talking to—you’re the only other person I’ve seen.”

  The console sighed. “Including myself and Harper, there are only seven of us left.”

  “Seven!” Cole was stupefied. “That many people died during the explosion and passage through the black hole?”

  “Not entirely.”

  Cole recalled the damage to the Daedalus’s hull. Maybe that’s what he doesn’t want to talk about. “What can you possibly tell me that’s going to be more shocking than learning I’m responsible for the majority of deaths aboard your ship?”

  There was a moment’s pause before Fej answered, “The Changed are responsible for their deaths. Not you. Those of us who evolved that day... We... I....”

  Cole’s stomach knotted as he felt his friend’s pain through the loudspeaker. What could have eradicated over ninety-nine percent of the crew? That it wasn’t an alien invasion was a disappointment. He pondered this as the escape vessel tore from the planet’s atmosphere and sped into the unfamiliar universe.

  “Look,” Cole began when Fej fell silent. “I don’t need to know the details su
rrounding your trials and tribulations. Whatever happened, happened. I won’t judge you. I can’t judge you. Not after the shit I’ve pulled since that day I condemned the crew of the Daedalus. Shit, karma took a nice healthy bite outta my ass for what I did. Heh. I had to flee the galaxy just to—”

  “Cannibalism.”

  Cole’s jaw hung slack. He stepped back and placed his hand on the back of the flight chair for support.

  “Not in the sense you might think,” Fej said.

  “Is there another kind of cannibalism I don’t know about?”

  “We didn’t eat each other despite what the term implies. There’s no proper way to describe the acts we committed in order to survive. Those of us who evolved discovered the change came with a steep price. Over time, we could no longer subsist off a typical diet, so we had to find sustenance elsewhere.”

  “In each other,” Cole said, disgusted.

  “In other changed individuals,” Fej clarified, clearly upset by the comment. “Most of us died during transition, some to starvation, and a great deal more due from fighting. We were desperate to survive, and that’s when we discovered Absorption.”

  The term made Cole’s stomach lurch. It didn’t take a strong imagination to envision what it meant.

  “Spare me the rest of that horror story, Fej,” he said, waving his hands. “I know I asked, but I’m rescinding my request.” He changed the subject, considering the destroyed exterior of the Daedalus. “Instead, I’d rather learn about the damage your ship incurred post-black hole.”

  Cole’s friend’s long pause also gave him pause. Another sensitive subject?

  “There were riots,” Fej finally answered. “That’s all I’ll say. It was a dark time.”

  Riots? Cole thought. Over what, I wonder? He had been given the bare bones of the truth, but there were obvious secrets yet untold. He was also bothered deeply by the acknowledgment of Absorption. For now, enough dark revelations had been revealed, and he would not press Fej any further.

  “My mother?” he said. “What makes her so special that she survived everything that’s happened?”