by C. C. Ekeke
“I DON’T CARE!” Her brother’s anger tasted of torment. “She doesn’t hate you!”
“Tomás, bastante!” cried Liliana. Suddenly the doctor was twelve years old again, cowering before her brother’s blind rage. She could feel tears welling up.
“Cállate Liliana!!” Tomás roared. “STOP COVERING FOR HER!!” Tomás’s TriTran image became staticky just then.
He tried to speak again. But something seemed to constrict his voice. The image of him normalized and Liliana, through watery vision, noticed his wide eyes loosing their crazed glow. Tomás began to focus on her again, blind rage giving way to regret. And a wave of gratitude washed over Liliana.
A nanochip at the base of Tomás’s brain constantly monitored his med levels. Should Tomás start losing control, like now, the chip immediately released a payload of depressants into his bloodstream.
Finally Tomás sank to his knees, head lolling forward. “Lo siento, Ana. I got…carried away,” he murmured in a languid voice. “My drug cocktail is kicking in now.”
Liliana nodded in silence, wiping her tears away with long fingers and staring despondently at the floor. She mentally checked off the long list of inhibitor drugs in Tomás’s bracelet, which suppressed his Zenitrophin levels and regulated Tomás’s mental state—Zenitrophin being the neurohormone produced exclusively by humanoid maximals.
Tomás, a maximum like Liliana, had manifested at fourteen years of age, four years earlier than she. But unlike Liliana, Tomás had difficulty controlling those abilities, as his body produced too much Zenitrophin. No doctor or solution had been able to help, and the problem worsened with age. Then, three days before his eighteenth birthday, one of Tomás’s outbursts on a space shuttle almost killed their whole family.
From then on, his home had been a secure Section M facility in Cuende, explicitly for maximums with uncontrollable and dangerous abilities. Since that horrible day thirteen years ago, Liliana couldn’t ride any spacefaring vessel without extreme bouts of terror and nausea. And from that day forward, their mother hadn’t visited or spoken to Tomás once.
He straightened up with a deep breath and eyed his younger sister. “Muy 1ueno,” he said snidely.
Liliana’s tears finally stopped, but the pain of seeing her brother like this didn’t, even after thirteen years. “I will find a way to make you better, Tommy.”
Tomás chuckled. “You always say that, Ana.”
“Because I mean it,” Liliana insisted, meeting her brother’s gaze.
“I know.” Tomás smiled affectionately. Something off-screen caught his gaze and sobered him up. “Looks like my little tantrum cut our call time. So I’ll be quick.” The elder Cortés sibling leaned forward. “Were you truly happy at your previous job with San Ysidro Medcenter?”
Liliana sniffed and shook her head. “I was bored.”
“And is this Star Brigade outfit the answer?”
“That’s what I keep hoping,” Liliana looked away. If only she could answer ‘Yes’ with complete certainty.
Tomás leaned back as he studied his sister’s ambivalence. “Even if this Brigade thing doesn’t work out, I know you’d have given it your all. You wouldn’t be you if you didn’t, Ana.”
A comforting warmth filled Liliana’s heart. She opened her mouth to respond, but then Tomás’s TriTran image began to flicker. Their time was almost up. So she blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “Gracias, hermano mio! Te quiero!”
“Yo te quiero también, Ana.” Immediately after that, Tomás’s image vanished. Liliana now sat alone staring at the spot where her brother had just been.
She remembered when first manifesting, how Tomás’s condition had dissuaded Liliana from even trying to gain mastery of her maximal abilities.
Tomás had been the one who persuaded her to learn the fundamentals of her abilities. That was why she had chosen an accelerated medical residency on the military starbase that housed Star Brigade.
Tomás had been as right then as he was now. “I have to try harder,” she murmured. That meant overcoming her space phobia. And not by way of drugs or neuronanocyte enhancement. With that goal in mind, she changed into military-issue cargo pants and a long-sleeved black tee. She dashed out of her quarters in the middle of the night, knowing exactly who to ask for help.
With help from Hollus’s computer system, Liliana found herself in a launch bay between two long rows of Shadowlancers fighter jets. This launch bay had a more diminutive and sparse appearance than Hollus’s other bays that Liliana had dared to peek into. Dim, monotone halolights splashed down from the ceiling, accentuating the bleak ambiance. But that hardly bothered Liliana. Seeing so many spacecrafts, despite their smaller size, almost turned the doctor’s legs to spaghetti beneath her.
Small metal tubes…stupefying speeds! Liliana’s stomach began to churn. She stopped and shut her eyes. “Khrome?” she called out, the echo of her voice bouncing off the surrounding walls.
“What?” came a computerized and curt reply. Liliana’s eyes popped open. The short, stocky Thulican stepped from behind the last Shadowlancer on her right and kept walking until he stood right in front of Liliana.
The doctor had three inches on Khrome. But his burly wall of armored muscle made her slim build look like a toothpick. The Thulican cut quite an intimidating pose, especially with the irritated look on his noseless, blue face. Liliana couldn’t believe this was the same playful, devil-may-care Khrome who cheered her up the moment she stepped foot on Hollus two weeks ago.
“What is it, Liliana?” he asked with less bile. Usually Khrome called her ‘Lily’ or some random nickname he’d make up on the fly. But with the newest Brigadier that Captain Nwosu just recruited, Liliana understood completely.
“Hi,” Liliana realized that her stiff tone matched her current posture. Focusing solely on Khrome helped the doctor relax a bit. “How are you?”
He looked taken aback. “Captain Nwosu just recruited a member of the species that had my race enslaved for five decades. And when I should have resigned outright, somehow our fearless leader convinced me to stay.”
“Yeah, he has a way of doing that,” Liliana forced on a smile, which Khrome didn’t return.
Marguliese, the Cybernarr. Friend of Captain Nwosu’s or not, the Cybernarr species was no friend of the Galactic Union. Which meant no one outside of Star Brigade could know, per Nwosu’s orders.
Liliana had been actively trying to forget about Star Brigade’s newest recruit. But how could she after Marguliese had saved her life today? Or how Marguliese had later stopped Liliana from calling San Ysidro to beg for her old job back. Liliana shuddered.
“Even worse, we’re stuck with her until this stupid-ass Maelstrom crisis is handled,” the Thulican raged. “How do you think I feel, Liliana?”
Liliana, expecting this response, offered a shrug. “Probably pissed.”
“You guessed right,” Khrome grumbled. “Been tweaking these ‘lancers.”
“Wait—what?” Liliana turned her head to take in the numerous spacecrafts around her. Though it was universally known how technologically gifted Thulicans were, their capabilities still continued to amaze her. “You serviced all these crafts tonight??”
“Yeah,” Khrome shrugged nonchalantly. It was easier to forget that he was probably smarter than almost every sentient on Hollus Maddrone. “I started after that meeting about Maelstrom’s comeback speech. Fixing stuff usually helps me think. But after Marguliese,” Khrome looked like he’d swallowed acid saying her name. “Part of me doesn’t want to report for training tomorrow.”
Liliana stared down at the floor. All these spacecrafts were beginning to make her head swim. “This whole Brigade experience seems to be throwing everyone’s routine off kilter.”
Khrome didn’t respond. In the awkward silence that ensued, Liliana decided to get to her point. “Hey,” she began, still looking down—avoiding any view of the Starlancers. “Let’s help each other with our respective hang-up
s?”
Khrome snorted, “Khrome-Tastic has no ‘hang-ups.’”
The doctor looked up incredulously. “Cybernarr?”
The Thulican’s glare turned murderous.
Liliana shrank back. “Riiiight.”
Khrome caught himself and sighed. “What would you suggest?”
“Let’s go somewhere and talk.”
Khrome rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Like Hollusphere or Pilot Pub?”
Liliana cleared her throat. “I was thinking somewhere off starbase.”
The Thulican’s round, yellow eyes grew wider in dawning recognition. “I know just the place.”
Half an orv later, Dr. Liliana Cortés wanted to kick herself—hard. Off starbase, she fretted. She should’ve suggested Pilot Pub. Yes, it reeked of liquor and seedy pilots, but anything trumped sitting on a flying shuttlecraft.
The Unionjack flew on autopilot as they put more distance between themselves and Hollus. All the while the stocky Thulican paced back and forth, ranting about his deep loathing for Marguliese and the Cybernarr race.
Liliana remained seated and listened, nodding when necessary. But her queasiness grew with each small bump of turbulence in Zeid’s atmosphere. The shuttle, traveling at sublight speed on stellar drives, was about to breach Zeid’s atmosphere and head for open space. Liliana dared a few glances out the shuttle’s front viewport, catching the unexciting sight of Zeid’s green gases. That, at least, didn’t make her feel worse.
Abruptly, the Unionjack shot forward into a slingshot hyperspace jump, rocketing out of Zeid‘s atmosphere. Liliana got slammed against the wall behind her, but this time she was strapped in. Instinctively shutting her eyes as the vivid green faded into white, her stomach lurched. Before she knew it, the jump ended. The shuttlecraft slowed to stellar speeds, hyperspace breaking back into tiny twinkling stars separated by gaps of inky black.
Liliana waited a moment to let her stomach settle, her anger boiling over. She shot to her feet and directed all that fury at Khrome. “You programmed in a slingshot jump…and DIDN’T TELL ME?”
The Thulican had the gall to smile. “I did.” His smile stretched obnoxiously to either end of his shiny blue face. He folded his burly arms across a broad chest. “How do you feel?”
“Like punching in your teeth…if it wouldn’t shatter my hand!”
Khrome snorted despite his lack of a nose, his round yellow eyes alight with mirth. “No doubt. How do you feel?”
Liliana bristled. “I just told you—” She stopped. Aside from seriously wanting to hurt him, Liliana actually felt little nausea—if any. “Jittery,” she began. “But not too queasy.”
“Thought so,” Khrome chuckled.
Now Liliana just felt quite confused. “But how was this different from all the other hyperspace jumps?” the doctor pressed.
“For starters, you didn’t think a slingshot jump was coming,” Khrome turned towards a long side closet to the left-hand side of the shuttle. “And, aside from the fact that we weren’t on a mission, you actually enjoyed your traveling companion this time.”
Liliana arched an eyebrow. “Huh.” The Thulican was right, mainly with the latter reason. Anyone with two working brain cells could agree that Khrome was far more enjoyable company than V’Korram Prydyri-Ravlek. Still, the duplicity bothered her. “I don’t like you!” she blurted out.
Khrome tooted skeptically, “You loooove the Khrome-Daddy.” Then he began to rummage through the closet he opened.
“Oh, so now we’re back to the jolly third-person references?” Liliana quipped.
“What can I say? Helping out buddies always hits my happy button.”
“But what if my space sickness comes back?” Liliana’s shoulders slumped miserably. The whole ‘small tube flying at stupefying speeds’ dread started to worm back into her thoughts. “I mean, that could have just been a fluke that I didn’t feel like yakking all over this—”
“Hey, we’re not done yet. My helping hands have only begun to work.” Khrome now produced a helmet and manila spacesuit far too slender-fitting for his burly self. This was obviously why he handed them both to Liliana. “Here.”
Liliana stared blankly at both objects in his mitt-like hands.
“This is the point where you take both items and put them on.” Khrome thrust said items in her face again.
The doctor continued to stare with a puzzled frown. “Why would I do that?” Her brain, for all its xenobiology smarts, seemed incapable of grasping any reason for donning such garb—ever.
Khrome shrugged. “Since we’re going sub-orbital diving on Terra Sollus, ya might need some protection.”
Liliana’s small brown eyes slowly drifted up to Khrome. Then she broke into a nervous titter. “Good one, Khrome. Almost had me there!”
“Actually, that slingshot jump took us about three and a half orvs in realtime away from Zeid,” Khrome said, completely serious. “And we still got another orv to go. You still haven’t taken your spacesuit and helmet.”
Liliana opened her mouth to retort, a whole new wave of fear ramming her in the gut. Khrome beat her to the punch. “I’ll be with you the whole time. It’s quite safe!”
Liliana folded her arms and struck an obstinate pose. “This isn’t funny anymore, Khrome. Take me back to Hollus now.”
“Can’t do that.”
Liliana’s annoyance spiked. “You absconded with me under false pretenses.”
“Because you’d have freaked if I told you what we were doing. And because you aren’t ready to be a Star Brigadier yet.”
“You don’t know that,” Liliana snapped back. “And you have no right to hold me on this…shuttle prison.”
“Well then,” Khrome withdrew the helmet and spacesuit from her reach. “What I do know is that you came to me for help.” The Thulican’s voice took a serious tone. “How can I count on you on a field mission if you haven’t dealt with this problem?”
Liliana tore her gaze away. They both already knew that answer. The only sound in this shuttlecraft was the steadfast hum of stellar drives propelling them toward Terra Sollus.
“Give me those.” She snatched away the articles in Khrome’s hands. Liliana stepped into the shuttlecraft’s lavatory and came out ten macroms later in the manila spacesuit, with the helmet held under her arm. It fit her svelte body perfectly. But she walked forward with stiff and utterly graceless steps, clearly not used to wearing a spacesuit.
“Shut up,” she growled at Khrome as he stood shaking with barely suppressed laughter. Liliana plopped herself down miserably in a passenger seat. The journey didn’t disquiet her nerves anymore, probably because she was so mad at Khrome.
“We’re here,” Khrome announced. Another bout of turbulence shook the Unionjack back and forth for a few macroms, merely the shuttle breaking through Terra Sollus’s atmosphere. This made Liliana shoot straight up to her feet with helmet in hand. But the spacesuit was a bit stiff and the ship still shuddered from the outer turbulence, so she had to stutter step so she wouldn’t fall forward. The rattling subsided, and Liliana’s gaze caught something beyond Khrome.
Terra Sollus’s endless blue flooded the entirety of the front viewport. The shuttle now soared just underneath Terra Sollus’s atmosphere. White, cloudy billows had a dreamlike fuzziness as they floated past the viewport, revealing the green and brown chunks of landmass several thousand miles below. That was enough for Liliana to avert her eyes away. She took several deep breaths to calm her nerves, which didn’t help. “This sub-orbital jumping will only make my phobias worse!” Liliana whined.
“Put on your helmet and you’ll see that it won’t,” Khrome appeared next to her. To her surprise, he wore a strictly encouraging expression on his noseless blue face. “Now, your suit has about twenty-two orvs of oxygen in it, but I doubt you’ll need that much.” The usual jokiness in his tone was nowhere to be found. Liliana put on the helmet, after which Khrome dotingly made sure all the latches and air pressure seals were secure
d. Now wearing her helmet, she sucked in another deep breath. Nothing out of the ordinary, save the tang of processed air on her tongue.
“What about your suit?” Liliana asked, and realized the stupidity of that question. Khrome was courteous enough to just silently sneer. He didn’t need a spacesuit or helmet.
“Okay,” Khrome began. ”We’re currently about 50,000 feet over Nahrain, somewhere around the Arabian Desert—away from spacelane traffic. We’ll jump out and be free-falling at a terminal velocity of about 140 mph. Then your suit’s gravity repulsors will kick in at around 5500 feet. I’ll slow down my descent around the same time. Liliana?”
The doctor just nodded idly in blank-faced terror. “Okay,” she whispered tersely to everything he said. “Okay, okay.”
“Alright,” Khrome turned her towards the wall they had their backs to. “Navcom, open left side door with the barometric forcefield in place.” Immediately, a sizeable portion of the Unionjack’s sidewall slid away, replaced by Terra Sollus’s vast sapphire skies. Adding to this view was the steadfast roar of strong winds buffeting the shuttle’s outer hull. Liliana’s stomach roiled.
Khrome began moving toward the shuttlecraft opening, clearly expectant that Liliana would do the same. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. Thoughts of open space, randomly smashing into a passing shuttlecraft or worse, the grav repulsors on her spacesuit malfunctioning, ran rampant through her mind. The realization that an endless gulf of everything and nothing awaited her sent stabs of panic and nausea through her. “I’m…not sure…I can.” Her breaths were too shallow, too quick, a precursor to hyperventilation.
“Liliana,” she heard Khrome’s calm, mechanized voice. “Take deep breaths.” She did as she was told, gulping in slower breaths of air. “Now look at me.”
Slowly she opened her eyes and saw Khrome standing before her. He placed both hands reassuringly on her arms, which covered up a good portion of them. “I’ll be there the whole time. Remember how Captain Nwosu said there was no ‘I’ in team. Even though there is a ‘me.’”
That won a panicky laugh out of Liliana. Suddenly, her legs felt a little less lead-like.