Carbon Life

by HR Ringer

The MV Crystal Scarab, wreathed in blue and white swirling ethereal clouds of charged energy particles, dropped into ‘normal’ space just over a million kilometers from the Mass Relay that would be their conduit back to the Hades Gamma cluster. Captain Uzor Saelon performed a routine sweep of the immediate area as the navigator and pilot conferred about the coordinates needed to travel to Patatanlis in order to discharge the drive core. Once that chore was done, they would hop the relay for a ride back to the Antaeus System.

  Septivus Vulpez had been fortunate; Paravin, the first planet orbiting Han, was home to an unmanned station in geosynchronous orbit. Vulpez found a small treasure trove of Matriarch Dilinaga's ancient written texts on board; further, there was one text in particular that had indicated a similar deposit was located on Mavigon; what they found there was quite possibly every bit as valuable as all the texts found so far. A figurine of Janiri, the asari goddess of seasons, storms, and agriculture; it stood approximately 40 centimeters high and was in excellent condition despite its apparent age, which Vulpez estimated it to be 2000 to 2500 years old, possibly closer to 3000.

  It was carved from a single piece of Bolan wood; extremely dense and tightly grained, this wood was prized for its beautiful colors and the contrasting striations brought about by the hardening process once a piece had been carved. It was thought by most asari the Bolan tree was extinct, as it had been over a thousand years since a single specimen had been seen anywhere else in the galaxy. To have found this carving, undoubtedly once in the possession of the Matriarch, was a discovery of the first order.

  In addition to listing all of his discoveries (with still photos where necessary) on his personal datapad, Vulpez had carefully logged all of his findings in his personal journal, a small book he kept hidden in an interior pocket of his jacket. At 87 days, this excursion had taken a lot longer than he would have liked. Having to visit two planets to recover everything accounted for much of the additional time, but the rewards for this trip would be extensive.

  He had carefully placed all of Matriarch Dilinaga’s texts into a specially designed case; each was separated from the next by a piece of archival material designed to resist the effects of centuries of neglect. The pages were delicate, and Septivus was taking no chances with the brittle relics. He intended to present them to the asari councilor on the Citadel, and did not wish to be seen as a simple profiteer of ancient artifacts.

  Septivus had just picked up the Janiri figurine, intending to place it in a special case when he was tossed across his compartment by an abrupt course change simultaneous to a staggering impact at the vessel’s stern. It appeared they had come under attack.

  * * *

  Corporal Claudine Phillips had grabbed a mug of coffee and joined Traynor and Yuán in the main cafeteria as the two women were about halfway through their meal. Phillips told them all she knew about Walsh’s and Holden’s murders; unfortunately, it wasn’t much more than what Traynor had learned from the e-mail she’d received.

  “Evidence was made to look as if each of them managed to obtain a knife and cut their own throats,” Claudine said. “Only problem is, there were no knives left behind in their cells and the blood spatters on the overhead and walls indicates someone big stood right behind each of them and sliced them open. Nothing on surveillance video, no unusual noises, nothing.” Phillips took a pull from her mug and continued with, “Whoever it was, they were quiet and left no trace of their entrance or exit from the cellblock, or the entire compound, for that matter.”

  Samantha was quiet as she thought about Cerberus and the group’s penchant for secrecy and clandestine wet work. “Can I take a look at the ‘stills’ from your evidence vids… the ones taken before their bodies were removed?”

  “Don’t know what good that will do, Serviceman, and I cannot show them to you in here, in public… they’re classified.”

  “Has Alliance Command been notified?” Traynor asked.

  “Most certainly, Serviceman. And the answer to your next question would also be ‘Yes’; Gonzales’ family has been notified that her murderer was found dead while in our custody. Certainly not the resolution I had hoped for, as the question of ‘why’ still remains. I sincerely doubt we will ever know their reasoning.”

  Xiùlán fixed Phillips with a hard stare as she asked, “About the photos, Claudine. Can we meet in a secure conference room, perhaps in your department? It might be helpful to have another pair of eyes, or two, take a look… ?”

  Claudine thought for a moment, then brightened visibly. “There’s a secure conference room up a level and down the passageway. My security credentials can get us in… you two ready to go?

  Traynor didn’t hesitate. “You even have to ask? Lead the way, Corporal, please.”

  * * *

  As Captain Kryllê Ghydgryz brought the batarian pirate vessel Black Slayer out of the shadow of the planet Patatanlis, he marveled at his good fortune. The salarian freighter he had been waiting for, the ship he had very nearly given up on encountering after 87 days of orbiting the planet, had virtually flown into his lap! Never one to squander such a gift, Ghydgryz had immediately sent the Slayer into the ‘shadow’, the area of the planet between his own ship and the freighter he coveted.

  His pilot increased the ship’s velocity while he sent word below decks, ordering his eight toughest men to form a boarding party and standby. Kryllê Ghydgryz intended to take every last bit of freight from his victim and leave no witnesses behind – the freighter would simply become another victim of a navigational error, the manner of its destruction forever hidden by the damage caused in a high speed impact with the rocky planet below.

  Coming out of the planet’s shadow on the far side, sensors confirmed the freighter was still on its original heading, set to perform a partial orbit in order to discharge the heat from its mass effect core. Ghydgryz guessed the ship’s captain would have performed a preliminary sensor sweep of the system, looking for any ships (such as his own) that would be a danger to a defenseless freighter.

  “Weapons control!” Ghydgryz barked at the man sitting behind the ships pilot. “Target their engines and environmental systems… I want that vessel disabled, not destroyed! Are… we… clear?” The man flinched at this last question, even as he responded in the affirmative. Their last ‘victim’ had been hit in a particularly vulnerable portion of their engine controls; the resulting explosion had torn the ship apart and spilled its cargo and crew over a fifty-million cubic kilometer area. Ghydgryz hadn’t even been able to recoup the cost of the two ship-to-ship missiles used to take it down.

  “Target plotted, Captain. One missile is hot, another on standby,” came the word from the weapons officer.

  Kryllê acknowledged the report as he continued to watch his sensor readouts. He waited until it was clear the freighter had completed discharging its drive core and was changing course to head for the Mass Relay. While it was in the middle of its turn, Ghydgryz gave the command. “Fire!”

  The deck beneath his feet answered his command with the vibration from a missile launch; in less than a minute, it reached its intended target and detonated, destroying the engine pod and ancillary controls. The catalyzed fuel mix being pumped under high pressure to the now destroyed engine ignited into a fireball that quickly burned out as the freighter’s computer shut down the turbo-pumps. The freighter began slowly tumbling as it drifted on its interrupted trajectory; halfway through its turn towards the Mass Relay, it was now on a path that would take it well past the ancient machine. As maneuvering thrusters did not possess enough thrust for such a radical course correction, the now powerless ship would continue on into the gas cloud surrounding the Han system. Unfortunately for the MV Crystal Scarab, it was about to receive intervention of a hostile kind, as the Black Slayer closed in for the kill.

  * * *

  Traynor sat beside Claudine and viewed the photos on the corporal’s omni-tool; a whispered sonovabitch escaped her as she took a closer look at the way Marianna Walsh’
s body was lying on the concrete floor of her cell.

  Yuán placed a hand on Traynor’s shoulder and asked in a low voice, “Something you care to share, Sà mǐ?”

  Traynor looked first at Xiùlán, then at Phillips, before returning her gaze to the photo being displayed on the omni-tool. “Walsh’s body position seems strange to me. She didn’t simply fall to the floor when her throat was cut. See this?” She pointed to the rigid posture of her limbs. “She should have collapsed as she died, like a puppet… a marionette… as if her strings had been cut. Walsh is lying in the floor stiff as a board, everything rigid, like she died and fell while standing at attention. Is that possible?”

  Yuán took a close look over Claudine’s shoulder to see what Sam was talking about, and then added in a contemplative tone, “My guess? Marianna Walsh was under the influence of a stasis field when she was killed… the effects of the field didn’t wear off until after she’d fallen to the floor. How… ?”

  Phillips perked up at this revelation. “… Her assassin was either a biotic or had a mass field generator. I believe you both may be on to something… it would explain the effortless way both were killed! No fighting back, no verbal protests.” The corporal entered this information in her omni-tool and stood to leave. “The assassin only needed to be in the same room with them… once they were restrained in a stasis field, slicing their throats would be easy.” Directing her gaze first at Traynor, then at Xiùlán, she added, “Thanks for looking at this with me, both of you! I’ll forward this additional info on up the chain… maybe it’ll help us catch whoever did this.” As the trio left the conference room and Phillips secured the entry behind them, she added, “I’ll let you know what we find.”

  * * *

  Yuán Xiùlán had been in the ‘harsh environment’ practice room for over three hours. She was fully armored up, including a breather helmet sealed to her suit. She hated the restrictions imposed by the helmet, but felt she needed to practice for a worst-case assignment. She had set the gravity and atmospheric pressure to twice that of Earth normal; batarian pirates and slavers, part of the sim program Traynor had written and uploaded, randomly popped up from cover and out of simulated buildings, allowing her to practice with her enhanced Serrice Council omni-tool.

  Serrice Council had written code that, once downloaded and integrated into her omni-tool, allowed her to quickly have the mini-fabrication unit create a xīlā shǒu lǐ jiàn [希拉手裡劍 - hira shuriken] – a Japanese throwing star. She could reset the parameters of the fabricated star, from a six-pointed star to the four-bladed weapon she favored over most all of them. The length of the razor-sharp edge of each blade ensured the target would receive injuries when the star hit. If the spinning star glanced off her intended target, the blades would slice whatever they touched; if her throw was accurate, the leading edge of a single blade would penetrate the target and stick there. In either instance, the fast-acting synthetic neurotoxin imbedded in the white-hot ceramic material would almost instantly induce respiratory paralysis to stifle any screams for help, followed by heart failure in the unfortunate victim.

  She had honed her skills with her omni-tool to the point where she virtually only needed to think of what she wanted to do. In this case, with her arm bent at a 45° angle while holding her hand straight out, first two fingers touching her thumb, she merely had to make an overhand throwing motion with a follow-through release of her fingers for the tool to instantly fabricate and launch a shuriken. In this manner, she could throw one every two seconds.

  Quite by accident, Xiùlán discovered she could generate and toss a shuriken horizontally. By holding her forearm across her chest, hand folded down towards her body with fingertips pointing to the rear, she could accurately fling a spinning star a much greater distance – the star actually flew aerodynamically, particularly in a thick atmosphere.

  Xiùlán had thought a star wouldn’t be able to penetrate armor plates; she was thrilled to discover the weapon would penetrate any exposed ‘under-armor’ skin – those portions of a person’s armor that could be seen between the actual plates. Shoulder joints were the most exposed, but a person throwing an arm up to shield their face could be hit in the portion of the forearm not covered by a gauntlet plate. Any of these penetrations would result in a quick death for anyone unfortunate enough to be so targeted.

  After four hours of ‘killing’ computer generated enemies, Xiùlán felt comfortable using this new method of silent death, but knew she would need to continue practicing every chance she could get. After dialing back the environmental controls and deleting Traynor’s program, she headed to her quarters. A hot shower followed by lunch with Samantha would give her a chance to talk about their upcoming graduation and short vacation. It would be good to be back on Earth again, even if it was only going to be for a few short weeks.

  * * *

  Septivus Vulpez knew he only had minutes to act before the freighter on which he was a passenger was boarded by pirates hell-bent on killing the crew and taking every last bit of cargo on board. That he and his archeological treasures were the only cargo on board would probably not be looked on with any pleasure by whomever had attacked the MV Crystal Scarab.

  He quickly placed the Janiri figurine in a specially padded case and sealed it against the environment. Attaching the case to the sealed container holding Matriarch Dilinaga’s texts, he finished attaching the armor plates to his suit, then pulled on his helmet and sealed it. Slinging the carrying strap for the container over his shoulder, he picked up his ERCS Banshee assault rifle, activated its auto-targeting feature and set it to fire three round bursts through its partially silenced muzzle before parking his backup, a Striker X pistol, in the dock at his left hip. Septivus was damned if he was going to be captured or killed by pirates without a fight… he’d spent too many years in the turian military to let himself be easily taken.

  Septivus felt the shudder as what he guessed was the attacking ship approaching close enough to penetrate the Scarab’s kinetic barriers… he estimated he had only a short time to get to the lower reaches of the virtually empty hanger where his personal shuttle was stored. His shuttle was FTL capable, but did not have the range he needed to reach all the systems he wished to explore, which was why he had employed the Crystal Scarab. If he could get to his shuttle and launch it without being detected, he felt he could make it to the Mass Relay and return to the Hades Gamma cluster.

  Quickly looking around his small living area, Septivus made sure there were no obvious signs of his occupancy before he left and headed down the corridor for the cargo area. The pirates would learn of his presence soon enough once they had the manifests with the records of his payments. Eschewing the main elevator for a crew ladder in an adjacent access tube, he descended to the lower engineering level, which would quickly take him to the main hanger housing the freighter’s shuttle and his own personal shuttle.

  He heard shouts of anger and fear behind him, followed by the sounds of gunfire. Thinking, ‘Spirits! Bastards have already boarded!’ he readied his assault rifle as he paused, his back to the left bulkhead outside the hatch leading into the small hanger. Taking a deep breath as he actuated his personal shield generator, Septivus let it out as he triggered the haptic lock to open the hatch and rolled around towards the opening, allowing his Banshee to lead the way.

  He reflexively pulled the trigger, sending three combination shredder/proton rounds into a batarian raising his heavy pistol to answer the threat implied by the opening hatch; Vulpez viciously kicked the pirate in his mid-section, knocking the dying batarian to the deck as he reset his aim and fired again. His second three-round burst literally took the head off his buddy as he was attempting to discover why his companion had fallen.

  Septivus knew his good fortune wouldn’t last forever, so was not surprised when a pair of bullets penetrated his kinetic barrier and buried themselves in the armor covering his left upper arm and shoulder. The inertia spun him around and dropped him to the deck,
where he quickly scrambled to his knees; bringing the Banshee up, he blindly pointed it in the general direction of his assailant and began repeatedly pulling the trigger, spraying three-round bursts through the hanger until one found the pirate that had shot him. The batarian screamed an obscenity as he attempted to recover from the impact and bring his pistol back up, allowing Septivus the time he needed to take more careful aim and fire once again; the pirate silently died before his body finished collapsing to the deck.

  Septivus looked quickly about as he shifted his assault rifle to his left hand so he could take a quick look at his arm and shoulder. While the rounds hadn’t entirely penetrated either ceramic plate, they had transmitted all their inertia to his body. He expected he’d be quite sore for a time; at least he’d be alive to complain about it.

  Taking another quick look around the hanger, Vulpez shifted his weapon back to his right hand and set off for his shuttle, parked in a rear corner behind the Scarab’s own shuttle. Unfortunately, the batarians had turned a small pack of Varren loose on the ship as soon as they boarded; Septivus found out the hard way just how quiet a Varren could be as he moved past the gap between the two parked shuttles. The creature leaped out at him as he walked past the stern of the Scarab’s shuttle, clamping down on his left lower leg with a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. The turian cursed his ill fortune as he fell towards the attack; the creature let go and yelped in surprise as Vulpez’s full weight came down hard on the back of the foul-smelling creature.

  Once again, his hard-plates prevented major injuries, but some of the teeth had penetrated his under-armor in a most painful way. With the Varren mindlessly squirming underneath in an attempt to get out from under his former victim, Septivus quickly switched his Banshee to full-auto, placed the muzzle as close to the Varren’s head as possible and pulled the trigger.