“Grab him before that force starts sucking again!” cried Northern. “I don’t want to lose him.”
Laura’s impulse was to ignore the order, to simply turn and rush back to the shuttle. All her danger signals, intuitive and otherwise, were up full. This place was not stable, to say the least! But instinct was reined in by her concern for Northern. What the hell was going on inside of her? she wondered.
“He wanted to take a dive, Northern!” she said. “Let him! We’ve got to get out of here and we don’t have time to fool with him! This place is going to blow!”
“You heard my order, dammit!” Northern growled angrily. “You grab one side and I’ll take the other!”
Laura opened her mouth to protest but realized there wasn’t time. She had to decide, and instantly she did, though the decision had nothing to do with instinct or intuition.
She took hold of one of Shontill’s limply dangling forward limbs, made sure of her magnetized footing, then started to move. Sweat beaded her forehead and she could see from the lights in Northern’s helmet that he was perspiring as well, his face ashen.
“Okay, Captain, but we’ve got to hurry or none of us is going to make it outta here!”
For once, Laura was grateful for the previously awkward weightlessness in the chamber. They’d never have been able to haul this limp monster back in any kind of gravity. Even now it was difficult to squeeze through the narrow portions of the passageway and still be mindful of their hurry.
As soon as they passed the comband interference barrier, Gemma Naquist’s static-riddled voice erupted in their headphones. “ … of there! Red alert! I’m reading threshold level energy interaction, indicative of disruptive potential. Captain Northern, dammit, do you read me? If you don’t already know it, this whole derelict is going to blow up. What did you do?”
“Prepare airlock for unconscious alien, Midshipman,” replied Northern. “Pull him in, and then Laura and I are next. We lost Bey.”
A moment of silence, then Naquist said, “Roger. Over.”
By this time, the passageways were vibrating intensely, filled with bits and pieces of the alien ship floating, detached, which Laura and Northern had to make their way through. Rasping breath sounded in Laura’s ears. She wasn’t sure if it was her own or Northern’s. Sweat stung her eyes as the temp-controller of the suit struggled to compensate.
A shrill keening interrupted further transmissions. Laura had to shut off communications to keep the noise from splitting her eardrums. No matter. She knew what they had to do.
It seemed a frustrating eternity, but finally the running lights of the shuttle shone through the darkness of the passageway. Laura and Northern navigated Shontill into the open airlock. Immediately, it closed.
“C’mon, c’mon, hurry!” Laura whispered tensely, and she could read the same urgency in Northern’s eyes.
A bit of debris clunked against Laura’s helmet. A glance behind her showed a barely visible stretch of hallway crumpling in upon itself. Even as she saw this, she noticed a tug of force, as though that awful place, that horrible portal, were tugging her back toward it.
Something to grab onto! She looked around, seeing nothing.
The door wasn’t open yet! Was Gemma having trouble hauling that goddamn alien through? She cursed the thing even as she grappled for a hold in the alien wall. Something was sticking out; she grabbed it. Northern was on the other side, holding onto an abutment.
Dammit, Gemma! her mind screamed. Hurry!
The force grew stronger.
Finally, the airlock opened. There was a good four meters between it and her.
Laura took out her gun, thumbed it to low, steady power, and used it as a retrorocket. It was difficult, but she made it, grabbing hold of a handle to keep her in place then reholstering the weapon.
Northern followed her lead. By the time she grabbed him and helped him in, it was more than evident that the whole alien artifact was shaking apart.
The door cycled closed. Air rushed in. Before the process was complete, however, Northern tried his comband and found the jamming effect gone.
“Disengage and head back for the Starbow, full speed!” Northern ordered.
“Aye, aye, sir,” Naquist’s voice crackled over the channel. Almost immediately they were slammed against the side of the lock by the G-force from the thrust. Midshipman Naquist had been all ready for that particular command.
A green all-clear light flashed, and Northern pushed his way into the interior of the shuttle. Laura saw over his shoulder that Shontill, still unconscious, was haphazardly strapped into a grav-couch and Naquist was harnessed at the controls.
“What happened?” Naquist demanded immediately.
“Later,” Northern said breathlessly. “Just signal ahead and ready the docking bay, then as soon as we’ve boarded get the goddamn shield up and get away from this thing.”
“First Mate Thur is fully cognizant of the situation and is prepared to do just that, sir.”
“Good, let’s just hope that hellish thing gives us a chance to get back, if it’s really going to go up.”
“We must have tripped something,” Laura said, getting rid of her helmet, relishing the cool air of the shuttle’s interior. “Dunno if it was a trap or if we just goofed. Goddamn alien almost got us all killed.”
Northern explained briefly what they had found and also Ratham Bey’s fate. Just as he finished, Shontill awoke, raging. With no difficulty, he broke the straps then tore his helmet off. His face was swathed in a dark ugly purple. He looked out of control.
“Go back!” he screeched. “We must … go back!” Then the alien broke out into incomprehensible clickings and clatterings: its alien tongue.
The captain’s cool, though, had returned. Calmly, he lifted his gun and said in a clear, articulate voice, “Now, Shontill, my friend. Laura Shemzak and I just risked our lives to rescue you from certain death, but I have no compunction about blowing your head off if you act up anymore. You will stay put, and we will go back to the Starbow and put her into a place where it cannot be affected if your people’s vessel blows up.”
The sight of the gun seemed to calm Shontill immensely. At least he made no more threatening motions, gestures, or sounds.
“The way … will be … closed up,” the alien said hopelessly.
“If that’s the way it is, fella, that’s the way it is,” Laura said. “But we got a look at it, you’ve proved your point. No attilium in our bags, true, but we got a detailed set of recordings on the phenomenon, right here in this baby.” She tapped the portable sensor board. “And once we find my brother and he puts his head together with Dr. Mish, ain’t no way we’re not going to be able to get through to this Omega Space, or whatever you call it.”
Shontill slumped back motionless, his expression unreadable.
“Vu-plates don’t look good, Captain,” said Naquist.
Laura glanced at the full picture of the Frin’ral artifact floating like an angry metal thundercloud in the infinite sky. Traceries of lightninglike energy jagged around the ragged periphery like demon claws, ripping and tearing the hull to tatters. Debris orbited the ship closely, like hovering insects above a dead and rotting body.
Captain Northern turned to Naquist and she had an answer ready for him: “We’re going as fast as we can and I’ve got force screens up.”
Northern shook his head. “Those energies we saw … felt. Amazing. I don’t want to be anywhere close to that aperture when it seals up.”
“Two minutes to docking bay,” said Naquist.
“I can’t help but feel as though that portal was left like that … on purpose,” said Northern. “As though the Frin’ral knew that there would be people wanting to find their secret … and they wanted to deal with them.” He turned to Laura. “We should have listened to you, Laura. I’m sorry.”
Laura was taken aback by his apology. She should have learned by now, she thought, not to be surprised by anything Captain Tars Northern did. He was nothing if not erratic.
“I don’t know what it was, Captain. I can’t analyze it and I can’t say whether or not it’s going to show up on the sensor readings … but it felt real bad.”
“Noted. We’ll pay more attention to your intuitions in the future. I think I’m already putting more faith in them than I do in Dansen Jitt’s.”
Seconds later the docking bay had swallowed them up and they’d locked into the shuttle’s compartment.
Northern contacted the bridge immediately. “Get the hell out of here quick, Thur!”
“Antigrav engines at full, jump-stasis on line, and force screens up, sir. What happened?”
“We’ll tell you when we get up there.” He looked over at the alien. “Shontill, perhaps you’d like to go to your cabin. Anything you need we’ll be glad to supply.”
“I wish … to observe … what occurs,” said the alien. “I can promise … I will be … of no danger. I am resigned … to the ship’s fate.”
“Very well, then. Let’s head up.”
The crew were at their stations, efficiently making sure that the Starbow was heading out of harm’s way. As the shuttle exploration team arrived on the bridge, still in their pressure suits, grimy and sweaty and upset, they were met with the sight of the central vu-tank swelling with the Frin’ral derelict from which they had barely escaped with their lives.
Captain Northern immediately assumed command with the ease of a man donning a suit tailored specifically to him.
“How long till safe entry of Underspace?” he asked Thur, who had stepped over by the sensor station.
“About five minutes, sir,” the First Mate replied.
Dr. Mish, in his usual post by the sensors, looked up, quite agitated. “I think we are safe at this distance and with the shields—”
“And you want to hang around to record the portal sealing,” Captain Northern finished for him, annoyed. “Dammit, man, it’s your ass I’m watching out for here!”
Dr. Mish grinned. “And shouldn’t I be the one to decide the state of the armor about that ass?”
“In this kind of situation, I wonder. You’re entirely too obsessed with this goddamn Omega Space, Mish! I saw it, felt it, and it’s immensely powerful.”
“We’ve got detailed sensor recordings, Doctor,” Laura offered, wanting to get far away from that place herself.
Mish shook his head. “Insufficient. Sensors show the reactions inside that ship, at the portal, are near critical. At the moment a slow implosion effect, somehow triggered by you, is pulling the entirety of the vessel inside the portal bit by bit. Hence the crackup more than obvious in the screen. Presumably without sufficient stasis devices, the rent in normal space will simply seal up. During that time, if we observe the spectrum fluctuations, record the energy emanations et al, we might learn a great deal not only about the portal, but about Omega Space itself.”
“But Doctor, at the threat of our lives?”
“I assure you, dear boy, we shall be at the point where at the least sign of danger we can instantly sink into Underspace. Besides, I should warn you, because of the nature of these energies, I suspect we are no safer in the Underspace dimension than in more normal planes.”
“Well then,” Captain Northern said, his tension fading somewhat. “If that’s the way it is—”
Dansen Jitt looked up from his plotting controls. “Course all set for resumption, sir, and might I add that if you’d like my opinion—”
“Thank you Mr. Jitt, but no thank you,” replied the Captain. Since he had spoken to Dr. Mish, Laura noted that his spirits and aplomb seemed to climb back to their normal cocky level. It was almost as though he depended upon Mish, and the Starbow, for buttressing his personality. “We symbiotes shall honor our host’s wishes,” he said, saluting the doctor. “Presumably for the interests of all.”
Laura was too tired to object. Besides, she had no particular instinctive impulses one way or the other. However, she was only too glad to take Northern’s suggestion of strapping herself into a grav-couch to prepare for any possible disturbances. The rest of the crew did so as well—except for Shontill, who would not fit but agreed to be tied to a strong railing support. His wide, moist eyes never left the vu-tank image of his race’s derelict portal craft. What strange alien thoughts flitted through that brain of his? Laura wondered. What emotions … ? To have the hope of contacting one’s lost brethren again after so many drifting, lonely years placed tantalizingly in reach, then snatched away ….
Still, the alien watched all the proceedings of the next few minutes stoically, green eyes unblinking, brown crest running calm and unruffled from squat skull to tail.
It did not take long for the promised implosion to reach its end. Laura and the crewmembers watched as the gigantic Frin’ral ship crumpled in upon itself, exuding a panoply of bright phantasmagoric energies like degenerating halos. When the ship was entirely gone, only a large oval distortion, a wavery bit of somethingness against the starfield, was left—and then that, too, winked out.
“Got that, Dr. Mish?” asked Captain Northern.
“Yes, though it’s going to take a while to analyze,” returned the white-haired extension of the starship.
“Good. Gentlepeople, please prepare for resumption of Underspace course for Snar’shill, Dominus Cluster,” said Captain Northern, who then turned to Shontill. “Well, Shontill, good fellow, sorry it did not work out the way you wanted … but you’re still alive, and we’ve got some new and valuable data.”
“I regret … the loss … of your lieutenant,” the alien replied, unbuckling himself. “It should have been I who … fell into … the portal.”
“And gotten killed?” Laura said, bouncing out of her chair. “Sorry about Bey and all that, but you’ve got to survive to get what you want.”
“There’s no proof that Bey died, Laura,” Northern replied, scratching his nose solemnly. “And as far as I’m concerned, this steps up considerably my commitment to getting the facts on this Omega Space. Bey was a good crewmember and I’d like to take that statement out of past tense, if I possibly can.”
“I don’t understand, Northern,” said Laura. “You weren’t so hot on going back for another crewmember when I first met you.”
“You refer to Kat Mizel, I presume,” said Northern, grinning. “An entirely different situation, I assure you. Now, in the meantime, we have an opportunity to deal with your little problem, Laura.”
“You mean those implants,” Laura murmured.
“Yes, and because of the delay it will not be necessary for Mish to use his Genghis Khan model for the operation, You can do it yourself, can’t you, Mish?”
“Certainly.”
“First thing in the morning, then, Laura, after you’ve gotten a bit of rest. We’ve not had an exactly uneventful day. Besides, that way the doctor can prepare for the operation, right, Doctor?”
“And it will be a great pleasure, my dear, to be of service.”
Laura looked around at the assembled bridge crew. She couldn’t get over the amount of interest and caring reflected in their eyes. It was difficult to accept that the people around you cared a lot; she certainly wasn’t used to it after working for as cold an employer as the Federation, and dealing with the vile, ambitious people the system produced to maintain the starways. She even caught a flash of sympathy, if not empathy, in Silver Zenyo’s usually catty eyes.
The emotion this aroused was difficult to deal with. Laura laughed it off. “Well, this won’t be the first time someone’s been mucking around in my interior.”
Before now, it didn’t seem she had the equipment to feel anything about getting all manner of stuff planted inside of her. Now, though, it felt … funny.
She
patted Shontill on a shoulder. “Sorry about all this. I think I know how you feel.”
Shontill looked at her with what could have been interpreted as a bemused expression.
“You want somebody to walk you back to your place?” Laura asked. “I’m headed to my own cabin, and it’s right on the way, I think.”
Shontill looked over to Captain Northern, who simply nodded and said, “Go ahead, Shontill. You’ve got to realize that you really aren’t alone, you great beast. You’re with us, aren’t you?”
Laura imagined that it must have made a very odd picture, her diminutive self leading away a seven-foot alien. Even as they walked, Laura felt bad that she had wanted to leave him behind, unconscious.
What was happening to her? she wondered. Where once she had been tight and linear, now she was getting kind of unstuck and loose.
The thought of the unconscious alien made her say, “Oh, Shontill, we never checked to see about wounds.”
“I thank you … for your practicality … Laura Shemzak,” returned the alien. “But I am … as you may recall … highly metamorphic and regenerative.”
“I wish,” said Laura, “that was true with me.”
She also wished she could deal with some aspects of her life she could never divulge, not even to these people who had become her friends.
Chapter Nine
All her life she’d been surrounded by machines. At first the idea of actually being riddled with them was not at all threatening. After all, cyborg implantations were quite normal on Earth and its associated planets. There were thousands of doctors specializing in that kind of adaptive interface surgery.
But Laura had never before been actually operated on by a machine behind the machines. She had mentioned this to Dr. Mish and he had simply pooh-poohed the notion. He was as well equipped as anyone to do the job, he pointed out, and if something went wrong …. Well, he had plenty of ocular prosthetics to replace her eyes with!
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