The Mammoth Book of Futuristic Romance (Mammoth Books)

by Trisha Telep

From the center of the floor, Carrollus called, “Permission to institute tactical alert?”

  “Granted.”

  The bright lights illuminating the command center died.

  I gasped and dug my fingers into the arms of my chair. The floor had vanished. I was sitting in space. From what I could deduce, the entire command center projected from the main body of the ship. The hull, so opaque in bright light, disappeared entirely in the dark. It looked as if every single station hovered in the vacuum.

  My heart thundered in my chest. I’d never imagined a front-row, first-person view of my return to Earth. We’d barely begun moving and I was giddy with anticipation.

  I’d been right. The ship edged away from a particularly large asteroid, crossed Mars’s orbit, and then swung toward the far side of Earth’s moon.

  Disappointment stung me. I’d hoped to get a first-hand glimpse of the red planet.

  Carrollus paced the central floor, flinging commands and acknowledgments to the staff manning the stations lining the now-invisible tiers. Tension stood out in the rigid set of his shoulders and in the fire I caught burning behind his eyes when his gaze sought mine for a split second.

  The ship arced, altering trajectory, turning us toward Earth. Stars blurred and turned to streaks of light. I slid sideways in my seat before the webbing caught and held me.

  Carrollus steadied himself with a hand on the table.

  The tug to the right eased, but I pressed back into my seat. I assumed that meant engines were hurling us at Earth.

  I couldn’t see the planet. For several irrational moments, I couldn’t ease the panic clenching my gut over having misplaced home. We were aimed right at the sun. The planet had to be there, somewhere.

  “We’re coming in above the ecliptic plane,” Grisham said.

  Had my scanning the sky been that obvious?

  “And we’re coming in fast,” he went on. “When we slow for descent, the planet will be below us and to your right.”

  As if on cue, our trajectory shifted. I lifted out of my seat. The web caught me, and I was glad Grisham had made me strap in.

  I slammed into the chair when the ship slowed. Earth appeared right where Grisham had said it would. We were directly above the North Pole. As the planet loomed swiftly larger and grew to dominate the field of view, a flowing, multicolored sea of light danced in the upper atmosphere. In places, the light curled out into space as if beckoning us.

  I caught in an enchanted breath and leaned as far as my restraints allowed so I could watch the play of light and color. Sure, I knew the display was the result of photons emitted by ionized nitrogen, or by nitrogen and oxygen atoms in an excited state returning to ground. It didn’t change my sense of awe and wonder in the slightest.

  Some native people called the aurora the “Dance of the Spirits”. I thought I understood why. The light moved like a living, breathing thing. The ship would drop down through the seething sea of color and the aurora would protect us. Watching the light show from space, I could almost believe in magic.

  The thought made me smile.

  As we plummeted nearer, the ship shuddered. First contact with the exosphere. Or was it entry into the thermosphere?

  I glanced at Carrollus to find him watching me. Rippling green, white, blue and red light illuminated the faint smile on his face. My cheeks flushed.

  “We haven’t seen a show this intense and vivid in a very long time.”

  “If ever,” Grisham agreed with his commander.

  The ship bucked.

  I glanced back at Trygg, wanting to ask whether or not I’d been set up.

  His feet left the floor. Or maybe the floor left his feet. I couldn’t be sure which. My stomach turned over. Fear spread a bitter chill through me.

  He caught hold of a rail. It saved him from being thrown over the tier one stations.

  “Commander!” Grisham thundered. “Station and secure!”

  Carrollus, hand going from one rail to the next up the tiers, climbed to our position and took the chair on the other side of me.

  Once he’d activated his restraints, his thigh rested against my leg. Little curls of heat reached from his body to mine as if our individual electromagnetic fields exchanged secrets while we sat strapped to our chairs.

  Electricity jolted me. My awareness narrowed to Trygg Carrollus, despite the turbulence rattling the ship.

  I forced myself to wonder how the ship would handle the heat of re-entry. As far as I knew, spacecraft didn’t enter atmosphere at anything approaching the speed of meteors. On purpose.

  In the blink of an eye, we were in the midst of the aurora, and even though I knew the supercharged particles couldn’t penetrate the hull of the ship, pressure built inside my sternum. Was the red glow cresting in front of us the Northern Lights or the atmosphere heating the hull?

  Voices rose as crew members called out information in their own language over the creaking and groaning of the craft. Anxiety and tension edged high in the clipped phrases.

  It surprised me to find how much I could deduce of message content from the tone of the speaker’s voice. While I didn’t actually know what was going on, I had to give Grisham points for affording me a front-row seat for the Northern Lights and the subsequent landing.

  Our descent slowed and the pile-up of red in front of us dissipated even as the jolts rocking the ship intensified. What layer was this? Mesosphere? Stratosphere? I clutched the arms of my chair tighter, as if my grip alone could hold the ship together as we hurtled through the sky of my home world.

  We’d hit weather in the troposphere, the final, thickest layer of Earth’s atmosphere. Did they know? Surely Carrollus did. Could their instruments tell them when wind would present an additional challenge to navigation?

  “Entering stratosphere. Eight miles above the Arctic Ocean!” Vran shouted above the clatter of the ship.

  “Watch for commercial aircraft!” I hollered.

  “Negative contact on sensors, ma’am!” a young woman replied.

  “Leveling off,” another young officer yelled, “for glide to designated landing zone!”

  “Ground station communications outages confirmed,” someone else called. “Comm silence on all channels used by native technology.”

  My interest piqued. They had communications tech that would cut through the geomagnetic storm? Good. It might be the only way to know what the Orseggans were doing.

  “Tropopause and the North Slope!”

  “Engines to minimum. Stand by braking thrusters,” Carrollus called.

  I didn’t know how he did that, speaking so that everyone heard him, yet without sounding as if he’d bothered to raise his voice.

  “Engines at minimum. Braking thrusters, standing by.”

  To my surprise, the ride smoothed out as we descended. I shot a glance at Carrollus, who concentrated on a holographic panel readout projected in front of his seat.

  “Fire braking thrusters,” he ordered.

  “Firing braking thrusters.”

  I fell forward into the webbing holding me.

  The ship slid sideways in the sky, leaving my stomach far behind. Wind shear. Looked like my twenty-five-mile-an-hour winds had increased over the mountains.

  “Get us on the ground!” Grisham bellowed.

  “Yes, sir!” several voices answered in unison.

  We slowed. Vran counted down the distance to touchdown. At zero, we hit with a jarring crunch. The nose of the ship tipped down and we slid and spun ninety degrees.

  Heart in my throat, I gasped. A few people screamed. The ship slid to a halt.

  I think we’d all stopped breathing, as if afraid the slightest twitch on our part would send the ship plunging into a crevasse.

  “Hull temperature?” Lieutenant Vran said.

  Even though the answer was ostensibly in English, the number and temperature measurement were meaningless to me, and I had no idea whether or not we’d cool fast enough to hide.

  “Permissio
n to power down?” Carrollus requested.

  “Granted, save for planet-side monitoring,” Grisham said. “Get me a feed from the ISS chip.”

  Naturally, they had a sensor on the International Space Station.

  “On your screen, sir!”

  A piece at a time, with every system that powered down, the ship drifted into slumber. Stillness settled over the vessel.

  For no good reason, adrenaline flooded my system. I hated waiting.

  “Sir?” a young woman said into the silence. “The scouts are on approach.”

  I glanced outside. The command center remained transparent in the power down. We’d set down on a slope. It appeared that we’d triggered at least a partial avalanche. In the brilliant glow of the aurora overhead, I could see where snow had cascaded past the nose of the ship. I hoped we were too big to be buried.

  “The scouts are coming in fast, not masking their arrival,” Grisham said, his voice hushed. “Crossing Saturn’s orbit.”

  “They’ll be seen by ground stations,” Carrollus replied. “They may afford us some distraction.”

  Even the enchantment of the Northern Lights faded as I waited for the scout crafts’ arrival. If they weren’t fooled by our ruse, we were sitting ducks.

  Grisham marked the scouts’ approach by each planetary orbit they passed. Jupiter. The asteroid belt.

  As the Orseggans approached the orbit of Mars, my breath stumbled in my chest. The aurora had suddenly dimmed. Without the particle activity in the atmosphere, our last defense was gone. The scouts would see us.

  Then it hit me. The aurora wasn’t dying out. It was the snow. The hull had cooled, and blowing snow had begun accumulating on the hull as hoped. I relaxed.

  “They’re approaching Earth from behind the moon,” Grisham said. “Damned sloppy. I’m surprised they haven’t been detected by ground-based personnel.”

  “Monitor the Twitter feeds of the conspiracy theorists,” I offered. “They break all the UFO reports first.”

  “Here we go,” Grisham said, ignoring me, but leading me to believe he had a line on Earth-based communications, even from within the aurora field. “First query away.”

  “I hope they don’t set up camp,” I muttered. “We’ll be effectively under siege.”

  “They won’t,” the captain replied. “Your world isn’t desirable.”

  “We like it,” I protested. “And you certainly seem to have found a use for it.”

  “We like the world, Ms Selkirk, but your species is crazy.”

  I bit back a laugh.

  “Second query from civilian telescopes. The Orseggan sighting is being escalated to military channels.” The old man leaned back in his chair.

  “Ms Selkirk,” he said, “I can scarcely believe it, but it appears your scheme has worked. The scout is reversing course to the asteroid field. I expect they intend to use it as cover to round the sun and have a sensor scan of each planet on their way out of the solar system. They clearly didn’t expect us to be in system. They aren’t looking that hard.”

  I grinned at the muted cheer that went up. Something sharp lodged in my heart, making the backs of my eyes burn. Was that happiness?

  “Merry Christmas,” I said. I met Trygg’s gaze and played my trump card. “Now, open a door and let me walk away?”

  Carrollus scowled and tensed beside me. “No.”

  I bridled.

  “The cold and the terrain would kill you within minutes, Ms Selkirk. Commander,” Grisham said.

  Desperation shot through me. “Teleport me home!”

  “Ms Selkirk!” Grisham snapped. “Our orbital position is no impediment to returning you!”

  “No time like the present,” I shot.

  I didn’t realize I’d dug my fingers into the arm of the chair until Carrollus covered them with his warm hand. “Returning you is power-intensive. If we send you home now, we can’t lift off for hours.”

  Recognizing that the danger to the ship now came from my own planet, I slumped. The unhappiness in Trygg’s voice convinced me he was telling the truth.

  “Was this a set-up?” I blurted out.

  He frowned. “A set-up?”

  “To make me feel – I don’t know – like I’d contributed?”

  “Humans are still arrogant,” Grisham muttered. “At least some things never change.”

  I flushed.

  “I wish it had been a set-up, Finlay,” Carrollus said. “Then we wouldn’t have had to risk exposing ourselves to your world. A risk we’re still taking.”

  I believed him.

  “Lift,” I said. Defeat by my own moral code – that insisted my concerns take a back seat to their survival – tasted sour.

  “You heard the lady. The ISS sensor has lost the Orseggan scout behind the sun. Put out some rocks to simulate a meteor landing and wake us up in preparation for departure,” the captain commanded.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Systems woke slower than they’d gone to sleep. Grisham estimated the Orseggans had passed Neptune’s orbit by the time Carrollus issued the command to fire the engines and take us out of atmosphere.

  Acceleration hit, pressing me into my chair. I gathered that some property of the ship buffered us from the worst of the g-forces. I could still breathe.

  We were pointed right at the rippling river of neon light twisting like a living thing above us. The ship shook, squeaking and protesting at the mistreatment.

  “We’ve been spotted,” Vran said, “doesn’t look like the fighters will overtake, though.”

  Despite the assurance, I waited, nerves tingling in anticipation of a missile strike. The magic of the Northern Lights would shield us again, if we could get to the other side before the F-15s closed.

  It seemed like hours before Vran yelled, “Exiting atmosphere!”

  “Get us under cover!” Grisham ordered. “Keep us out of sight!”

  “Yes, sir!” several voices answered.

  We leveled off and the ride smoothed out.

  Grisham released his restraints and rose.

  Carrollus unfastened his, and then leaned across me to press a series of buttons on the arm of my chair.

  The web holding me to my seat released me.

  “Ms Selkirk,” Grisham said, “you’ve saved our lives. I doubt you’ll ever know what that means to us.”

  Registering the regret in his voice, I levered myself to my feet. The icy pulse of fear in my gut made me waver.

  Trygg closed a hand around my upper arm to support me.

  The resulting shower of internal fireworks annoyed me.

  “Don’t you dare tell me I’ve seen too much and that you can no longer afford to send me home.”

  “That is the problem,” Grisham said.

  “It isn’t,” I countered. “Do an internet search on UFO abductions. Have a look at how the people who report them are treated. No. Wait. I’ll demonstrate.”

  On autopilot, I stuck my hand in my jacket pocket. My cellphone was still there. Why?

  Commander Carrollus didn’t strike me as careless. He’d have searched me. Why leave me my phone? Had he assumed it was useless on the far side of the moon?

  We weren’t out that far, yet.

  I yanked the phone out of my pocket and lit the screen. One bar. Must be a satellite still in range. Lucky me. I hit “quick dial” for Jill, and then punched the “speaker” button. The line clicked twice, and then began ringing.

  I caught the concern in the old man’s face and, shaking off Carrollus’s hold, I put distance between us.

  Jill picked up mid-ring.

  “Fin!” she said, her voice carrying through the room. “How’d the interview go?”

  “You’re on speaker,” I said.

  “So I hear. The interview. Spill.”

  “About that,” I said. “Turns out the interview was a front for a bunch of aliens who’ve kidnapped me for sex. I’m not going to make your Christmas party.”

  Alarm spiked in Grisham’s
face. It warmed my heart.

  “Ha, ha, very funny,” Jill grumbled.

  I turned the phone and an I-told-you-so glare on the old man.

  Carrollus, trying not to smile, seemed abruptly to find the toes of his boots fascinating.

  “I really won’t make the party,” I said.

  “It went that well?” she prodded, her tone riding high on excitement.

  “That remains to be seen. I can’t say much.”

  Jill gasped. “You’re under NDA already?”

  “I suppose a non-disclosure agreement is one way to look at it,” I said. “Look. Jill, you aren’t going to see me for a while.”

  “This isn’t you trying to get out of the holidays, is it?” she grumbled. “You aced the interview and now you’re holed up in some secret lab? That had better be some damned fun research.”

  Carrollus stared at me.

  “I can’t answer that,” I said. “And this will be the only call I’m allowed. I’ll have to give up the phone in a minute.”

  “How long will you be gone?” she demanded.

  I pinned a meaningful look on Grisham. “Unknown.”

  “You have to be back in time for Christmas,” she protested.

  “I’m nobody’s present, Jill.”

  “Because you’re afraid to care for anyone, again. That’s your Christmas gift from me to you, my professional, psychiatric evaluation. No charge. Finlay. What do I tell the school?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Your students will think—”

  The phone went dead.

  I rubbed my forehead and tried not to see the sudden concern crinkling Carrollus’s brow. I handed him the phone.

  “You misled your friend about us,” he noted as he took the cell, pulled the battery, and pocketed both, one on either hip.

  “A demonstration. You can put me back without fear because no one will believe me if I say I was abducted by aliens.”

  “The demonstration is not lost on me,” the captain said, his tone grave. “You ceded us thirty days. Allow us to use that time to thank you properly for your assistance. Commander? Escort Ms Selkirk to her quarters.”

  All the words were right. He insinuated that he’d send me home, but something in Grisham’s tone told me he didn’t intend ever to let me go. I swallowed a huge, jagged lump of fear.