by JN Chaney
That was more like it.
I continued floating away from them, toward the empty void at my back. It was satisfying, watching them squirm. I expected I’d get the beating of my life in a few minutes, once they had me inside one of their ships…but fuck if it wasn’t worth it.
Right as three of the soldiers were getting close to me, with one angry-looking asshole at the forefront, something happened.
A green glow came over us, which I could see reflecting off their helmets and suits, coming from behind me.
The soldiers stopped where they were, motioning to each other to return to their ships. They scurried like crabs on a beach, a mad panic in them.
To make matters worse, the glow had grown stronger and brighter. It was beginning to encapsulate my own suit. I raised my arm, trying to look at the reflection of the tiny dash on my wrist.
A split in space had formed, creating an opening to slipspace. The swirling emerald shined brightly against my plating.
That was when the ship emerged, its massive circular hull squeezing through the lightning walls. At first, I didn’t recognize it. The panel on my wrist was shit for viewing, with its dents and smudged surface, but after a moment I began to piece together what I was seeing.
It was Titan, coming back to the fight.
One of the strike ships burst forward, towards me, probably in a last-ditch effort to pick me up, but before it could get too close, a ray of blue light overtook us.
Nearly all of the strike ships were caught inside of it, along with me. I began to drift upwards, away from the enemy ships, which seemed to be totally motionless. The ship that had been on its way to me was frozen in place, immobilized and unable to either attack or flee.
Meanwhile, I continued to move at a 45-degree angle, the blue light encapsulating me as it brought me closer to the source.
Closer to Titan.
Realizing my com was still turned off, I switched it back on. “Hello? Anyone reading me?” I asked.
“Welcome, Captain Hughes,” answered Athena. “I apologize for the delay.”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I asked. “I thought I told you to run.”
“I did as you asked, but changed the plan mid-flight. I shifted the tunnel to curve back to the edge of the system, hoping to assist The Renegade Star.”
“Where’s Abigail? Did she get away?” I asked.
“I sent a command to Sigmond the moment we arrived. He was in the process of opening a tunnel, not far from our present location,” she explained. “Ms. Pryar should return momentarily.”
I let the beam carry me deeper into the megastructure. It only took a minute or so before I was brought inside one of the docking bays—different from the one The Star typically parked in. I floated over the floor, the blue light surrounding me, and gently came to a rest, right on my ass.
I got to my feet and, before I could say anything, a display appeared on the nearby wall, showing the ships outside, still trapped in the beam. “Captain,” said Athena, appearing in the corner of the screen. “What would you prefer I do with these vessels?”
I briefly considered telling her to slam them together, until each of the strike ships was nothing but a piece of metal and flattened Union soldiers between them, but then decided against it.
Not because I didn’t want to. I would’ve loved to watch those assholes get what they deserved. It was just that we had to get our asses out of here before the rest of that fleet caught up with us. They must have certainly noticed Titan by now, so it wouldn’t be long before they were all over us. “Let’s head out. Open a new tunnel, and as soon as The Star is here, set a course and get us out of this godforsaken system.” I twisted my helmet, snapping it off. “And Athena, one last thing.”
“Yes, Captain?” she asked.
“If any of those strike ships tries anything, use one of those heavy cannons of yours and blow them straight to hell. Don’t leave a scrap of metal behind.”
FIFTEEN
The Renegade Star docked a few minutes after I was back on Titan. The second it landed, we were already pushing into a new tunnel, well on our way to anywhere-but-here.
Abigail found me a few minutes later. I could see she was steaming, before she even got to me. “Jace Hughes! How dare you force me to leave you behind! Do you have some sort of death wish?!” She marched straight up to me, sticking her finger in my face. “You can’t just throw your life away and expect the rest of us to let you do it! What sort of idiot are you? Answer me, goddammit!”
I stared at her as she glared up at me. “You sure let yourself get worked up, don’t you?” I asked.
“Don’t try to change the subject! I could have handled those ships! You can’t just make all the decisions, Jace! So what if I’m in danger? You don’t give yourself up to save me!”
I started to walk past her, towards The Star. “Who said I was saving you?” I asked. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to save up the cash to buy this ship? It’d take ages to get a new one.”
She let out an angry snarl, which made me chuckle. “You’re hopeless!”
I climbed aboard my ship and sealed the lift so I wouldn’t be disturbed.
“Welcome back, sir,” said Sigmond. “I’m relieved to see you’re still alive.”
“Thanks, Siggy,” I said, taking a sip of my drink. It burned the part of my lip that I’d chewed, but I didn’t care. “Athena, you hearing me?”
“Yes, Captain,” she answered.
“I want to be alone for a few hours. Don’t bother me unless you have to.” I paused. “Don’t bother me at all. Bother Freddie or something.”
“If you wish,” she answered.
I grabbed a bottle of whiskey and collapsed in my sofa, pouring myself a drink and putting my feet up.
I raised my cup. “Here’s to nearly getting caught and killed, Siggy.”
“Here, here,” said Sigmond.
I lowered the cup, staring down at the swirling liquid. “Here, here,” I muttered, but didn’t take another drink. Instead, I sat it on the table in front of me and watched it. I stared into it, although I couldn’t say why. I started to reach for it, but dropped my hand to my side instead. For some reason, I just didn’t want it anymore.
* * *
I managed to fall asleep pretty quickly, all the energy drained from me. When I finally awoke, it was the early morning, which meant I’d slept for nearly ten hours.
I showered and pissed, then tossed my jacket on and holstered my gun on my hip.
No doubt, everyone was probably still asleep. It would be the perfect time to take a walk and stretch my legs.
“Enjoy your stroll, sir,” said Sigmond.
I shot him a rude gesture as I exited the ship, then made my way into the nearby corridor.
The sleeping quarters for the rest of the crew were along this hallway and one other, which allowed each of them to stay in close proximity, should anything need their collective attention. The only exceptions were me and Dressler, who was still on my ship in Abigail’s old room.
It had been my idea originally to have everyone’s quarters nearby. We’d encountered an alarming number of emergency situations before now, so we’d be stupid not to expect more of them, as today had proven. The closer their rooms, the faster they’d be able to mobilize, or so the hope had been. You can never predict how anyone will react in an emergency—not until it actually happens.
Titan had a cafeteria, which used long-term stasis pods to keep various amenities intact, including meals and drinks. There were far less now than when Titan had first switched to emergency power, two thousand years ago, and many of the pods had stopped working by this point. Still, we had enough food and water to keep us going for the next three centuries. There were only eight of us, after all.
I entered the cafeteria and walked up to the dispenser, pressing the button I knew produced a hot plate of eggs and bacon. It arrived in less than a minute, steaming and smelling like the real thing, although
I knew it was simply reprocessed organic matter, adapted to fit a certain kind of taste and texture.
I took my seat in one of the ten, thirty-seat benches, and had a bite. Not bad for a two-thousand-year-old omelet, I thought.
It sort of reminded me of the food in juvie, back on Epsy. They used to feed the kids there the same meals every week, most of which was disgusting variations of the same soy compilation. Breakfast was different, though, because it was hard to mess up eggs, even the fake stuff. It was one of those foods that they’d somehow managed to replicated and genetically modify without losing the flavor. Some of the kids had doused theirs with ketchup and mustard, but not me. I always ate them plain, no matter what. I took another bite, letting the synthetic yellow egg melt in my mouth, and smiled. This shit was even better.
I finished my meal and set it to the side, then sat there for a while, just enjoying the quiet. No sassy nuns, no noisy kids, no Freddie pestering me with questions. Only the gentle quiet of a mostly empty megastructure, spiraling through a slip tunnel.
Before I could relish in the thought for much longer, I heard the pitter patter of tiny feet running through the nearby hallway. I glanced up at the open door, only to see little Lex shuffling into the cafeteria. "Mr. Hughes?" She asked me. "What are you doing here? How come you're not asleep?"
I could ask you the same thing, kid."
She gave me a mischievous grin, one that told me she was clearly up to no good. "I was just exploring." She walked over to the other side of the bench, throwing her feet over it and dangling them.
"It's a bit early for you to be exploring, don't you think?"
"I couldn't sleep. I don't know why," she said.
I gave the kid a slight nod. "I know how you feel. I've been there." I thought about my own insomnia, back in Juvie. The other kids and I used to stay up late, telling stories about where we'd been before we got there. Most of the time, they were all just made up, make-believe little tales we told to impress the others, and we all knew it. None of us came from an exciting life. None of us had ever left the planet. Personally, I used to say that I was the son of a Renegade, and that somewhere out there my dad was flying around, kicking ass and getting rich; that someday he'd come back for me, and we’d do it all together. Part of me wanted to believe, but the other part knew the hard truth of it. Some nights I stayed awake thinking about the old man, wondering where he was and what he was doing. It was nights like those when I thought too much about it, the possibilities of what might have happened to him, where he might have gone. It kept my mind from winding down.
All that worry fades when you get older, and it stops happening every time you shut your eyes, but everyone still has nights like that. They just happen less often than they used to. For me, I poured myself a glass and the problem took care of itself. Too bad for Lex, because I wasn't about to give her any booze. "Do you go exploring every night?" I finally asked.
"Yeah, almost," she said, grinning.
I laughed. This whole time I'd been passed out, thinking this kid was fast asleep, but all the while she was out and about, wandering all over this giant ass ship. "What areas have you been going to?" I asked, genuinely curious.
"Um, I like to go to the 12th deck, mostly," she said tapping her chin, appearing to think about it. “It’s pretty there.”
“Pretty, huh?” I got out from the table, back on my feet. "What say we check it out and you show me?”
She swiveled around and leapt off the bench, quickly running to the hall. I could see the excitement in her face, swelling her cheeks. “Let’s go! Let’s go!” She exclaimed.
I eased myself up and joined her. She was suddenly so full of energy, like a switch had gone off. “Yeah, yeah, settle down, kid,” I said, patting her on the head. “Don’t make me regret this.”
* * *
The 12th deck was unlike any of the other places on Titan that I had seen before now. There was so much more machinery here. Circuitry along the walls, chairs and consoles in every spare corner, and the further we walked the more elaborate the architecture seemed to become.
After a time, we came to a door, sealed like the one in the engine room. Just like that, Lex activated it and it opened with ease. We entered inside and continued walking deeper and deeper. For a while it was just one hallway after the next with a few offshoots and open doors leading to nothing in particular. At least, from what I could see. I tried to stop once or twice, but Lex insisted we continue forward. Whatever we were here to see was still ahead of us.
The ceiling opened up a short time later. It was nearly twice the height of the other decks, which made you feel like a dwarf. Inside each of the rooms, I could see body-sized pods, similar but different to the ones in the medical bay. I wanted to stop and examine them, but Lex kept tugging my hand to keep going, so I let her, and we did.
Directly ahead of us, in the main atrium of what must be the central hub of whatever this was, I saw a large wall sized machine, radiating with the blue glow. Lights seem to pulse, almost like a beating heart, but far slower. “What the hell is this thing?”
Lex giggled, letting go of my hand and running up close to the structure. As she did, her tattoos began to glow the same as the wall. I don’t mean that they glowed steadily, like they normally did. I mean that their glow matched the other’s rhythm, coming and going with the same sort of cadence that the wall seemed to have. I didn’t understand it, but something told me this was normal.
Normal for Lex, that is.
“Isn’t it neat?” Asked Lex. “I don’t know why, but I really like it.”
“But what is this thing?” I asked.
She seemed to think for a minute, then shook her head. “It’s just pretty. Isn’t that okay? To just be pretty sometimes?”
I stared up at the wall, examining it for longer than I could say. I must’ve stared for several minutes, almost getting lost in the light. There were several cracks in the material, where it seemed to get brighter.
I glanced down at Lex, hoping she’d say something else to give me a clue as to what this was, what any of this was, but she never did. She only stood there, staring at the glow, enjoying the moment, or as she’d put it, the beauty of it all.
Part of me wanted to agree with her, that maybe sometimes being beautiful was reason enough for a thing to exist, but I’d never been such a romantic.
This structure had been built, created with hands like mine, and that meant it had a function. A purpose.
Everything artificial always had a purpose.
I left the wall, noticing that there were several open doorways surrounding the atrium. I walked over to one and peered inside, spotting more of those strange pods. They were larger than the medical ones, about twice the size, and uglier, like these had been thrown together without concern for aesthetics.
I walked into the room, going over to one of the pods to get a better look. They were all closed, sealed like the others we found in the medical bay. All but one, I noticed, which I hadn’t spotted until just now. It stood alone, almost isolated, on the other side of the room, its lid cracked to reveal a small bed inside. It was so much smaller than the others, and thinner, too.
“I see you’ve found the hatchery,” said a familiar disembodied voice.
I turned to see Athena appear directly behind me. She gave me a pleasant smile, the way a parent does when the child does something right. I wasn’t sure if it was nice or insulting.
“You know, Captain, if you were curious about this section of the ship, you could have inquired with me about it. I would’ve been more than happy to tell you about it or explain its function,” she told me.
I cocked my brow and glanced back at the pods, then at the glowing wall where Lex was still standing. “Honestly, before I got here, I had no clue where I was heading. Once I was here, the thought to ask you just never hit me.”
“I see you’re interested in the graphing pods,” she said.
“Graphing pods?” I asked.
&
nbsp; She nodded. “That is the name of those machines in each of these rooms. I could see by the look on your face that you were curious about them.”
I glanced at the wall again. “I’m curious about a lot of things on this deck. For example, what the hell is that thing, and why is it glowing? Also, why the fuck is Lex glowing with it?”
Lex looked at me, probably hearing her own name, and waved, a big smile across her cheeks.
Athena glanced at the girl and back at me. “That is simply the power converter, which takes energy from the core and prepares it to be used in a very specific way that is unlike any other throughout this vessel.”
“I take it the wall has something to do with these pods here,” I asked thumbing behind me at the room. “What are they for, exactly?”
“You are correct, Captain,” she told me. “These pods draw a special kind of energy from the converters you see there. This is actually something that I have been meaning to discuss with you since your arrival. However, do to the lack of a usable core, the energy output required would have been too great for me to demonstrate the function of this section.”
“And what exactly is the function, as you keep saying?” I asked.
She walked closer to where I was standing, next to the little pod and glanced down at it. “You came here in search of something,” she said. “You came here because you found a little girl who was unlike any you’d ever seen before. A little girl with answers to questions you never thought to ask.”