by E. M. Peters
“Does someone want to fill me in?” She asked, undaunted by Ndale’s accusing look.
Bob stepped forward. He stood out in his orange robes, like the sun in their universe of thousands of souls. “The Runners have not returned. It was suggested that we pick a leader before anything else is discussed. I nominated you,” he added.
Gee, thanks – Alexa commented silently to herself.
“And I nominated myself,” Ndale filled in.
“Javier was also nominated,” Luca added. Javier stood backed by a smaller group than Ndale’s – but he had backers, nonetheless.
“I did five tours back on Earth,” another man spoke up and stepped towards Bob. “I think that makes me qualified to lead in dangerous situations.” He looked the part – his hair was closely cropped and his brow line was ridged, as if he spent most of his time with the same serious look on his face.
“Who are you?” Alexa wanted to know. It was the first time she could remember ever laying eyes on him.
“I’m Marcus,” He pivoted slightly and held out his arm. Two young boys approached sheepishly. “These are my boys, Ryan and Peter.”
It suddenly made sense why Alexa had never seen the man. He resided in the Red section.
“Cute kids,” Ndale commented. “Seems like they might need their father’s full attention.”
“If anyone among those who are nominated has the biggest drive to keep us safe, it is me. My blood is here. I have the most at stake.”
“I don’t need to have kids to have a strong survival instinct.” Ndale pointed out.
Marcus glared at him in open distain. “We should vote. Now.” He suggested. The chamber filled with agreement.
“Hold on…” Alexa found herself saying. She raised her hands to quiet the crowd. “We don’t know anything about each other. We can’t just pick a leader arbitrarily.”
“You coordinated all of us during the attack,” Bob pointed out. “You saved a lot of lives. I know that much.”
Agreement sounded throughout the chamber.
“Much of the ship knows who I am,” Javier spoke up for himself. “I made it a point to get to know as many people as I could during the voyage.”
“You enforced the ration, of course you know everyone.” Ndale countered. “I’m the one who knows what everyone wants and how to get it.”
“Military coordination is our best chance at surviving this marooning.” Marcus proposed sternly.
“We came here to escape the rigors of our past government,” Alexa pointed out. She did not entirely disagree with Marcus, but something in her recoiled from the man and the idea of his tenure as a leader.
“Yea, look at what they’ve done to us!” A voice sounded from above.
“This place isn’t like anything they said it’d be!” Another agreed from the opposite side of the chamber.
“But what if the others attack again?” A third voice asked from within the mass of people.
“They will most certainly attack again,” Marcus agreed. “We can’t afford to subscribe to some lofty ideal of a paradise – intellectual or physical. We’ve all witnessed firsthand we have been denied entry into the Garden.”
His reference made Alexa stiffen. The small glimmer of rhetoric smacked of extremism that was rampant in the areas of Earth where soldiers were often deployed. Technology on Earth had allowed most of its inhabitants to believe they were all Gods of their own world. Outside of that, Agnosticism was the popular belief of the world, but in select pockets… the old Gods still ruled – Yahweh, God, Allah.
“I agree that we should vote,” Ndale spoke up. “And let it be known that I remember those who support me.”
“I am confident for a vote,” Javier put in, eyes leveled squarely at Ndale. Alexa recognized right away the rivalry that appeared to be between them. She decided if she had enough energy later, she would try to figure out why that was.
“Fine,” Alexas caved. “What method are we using?”
The four candidates exchanged glances.
They had clearly not thought that far ahead.
Alexa sighed and looked up to the masses, “Who still has a working OMNI?”
Almost everyone raised their hands. It made sense – it was only day one into a loss of power. Everyone’s devices would hold a charge for at least a week. “Alright,” she thought about their options. The ship’s server would be down with the power outage, but their devices could still communicate with one another through the individual wireless fields. She pulled out her own glass device and blew the dirt off it. “I’m setting up a folder on my device.” She did so as she spoke. “Save a file with the name of your vote to it.” She continued. “Those without working devices…” She pivoted and scanned the room, her eyes finally falling on Luca, “Come see Luca and he’ll register your choice.” She regarded the three other nominees. “Agreed?”
Javier nodded, Ndale shrugged his consent and Marcus showed his agreement by not actively protesting.
“Alright.” She said and everyone remained still, eyes on her. “Go on then,” she prompted everyone into action. After a few moments, she realized that she had been so focused on the task that she had completely forgotten to recant her nomination.
Well, fuck. She thought to herself, sighed, and registered a vote for Javier.
ɸ ɸ ɸ
Patrick was only vaguely aware of a light shining in his face. It acted as a beacon, pulling him out of a deep, involuntary sleep. His first instinct was to raise his hand to shield himself from the light, but as he tried, he found that he could not. His hands were bound behind his back.
This revelation brought him into full consciousness and he awoke with a jerk. At once, he realized he was lying on his side on a cold, hard floor. It was dark, except for the light shining into his face.
“Stop wasting the light,” a voice spoke harshly.
“We’ve waited long enough,” another answered.
“Well you shouldn’t have hit him so hard.”
“Shut up.”
Patrick groaned as his head throbbed when he tried to sit up.
“Where am I?” he asked through squinted eyes.
Someone spat on him, “Government scum!”
Patrick blanched and forced himself to sit up. “Stop shinning that thing in my face.” He insisted. “And I’m not government.”
“Lies!” The man accused. “You came here to finish the job! Leaving us here to starve wasn’t enough, was it?”
A boot appeared from the darkness and dug into Patrick’s chest, pushing him back down to the ground.
“Stop it!” The second voice reasoned. “We need to get John. He said to come get him as soon as he woke up.”
“Fine, you go get him.”
“You’re coming with me.”
“I’ll have him singing by time you get back,” The malicious voice argued.
“Come on,” there was a sound of a scuffle, and Patrick supposed the sane man was dragging the less stable one from the space.
A bright light appeared at the sound of a hatch opening. Patrick didn’t have enough time for his eyes to adjust to the contrast and it closed quickly.
He lay in sudden silence.
“Rick?” he called out the name of one of his scout pilots. “Aaron?” He tried the other. No response came. His voice echoed off the walls of the small rectangular space.
He had a very bad feeling about the fates of Rick and Aaron. He had no concept of how much time passed before anyone returned. It seemed like forever and not long enough all at once. He was trying to avoid a vertigo feeling of total darkness combined with the aching in his head. When his captors did return, it was with several others. The door opened, light flooded in and hands grabbed at him, pulling him from the ground and dragging him out of the space.
The light hurt his eyes. The suns were angled in the distance, pointing at them like giant spotlights – it had a morning light feeling to it, but Patrick ultimately wasn’t sure of anything on th
is planet. He’d had a couple hours to observe it before being assaulted. He was seriously beginning to question his life choices.
He tried to walk the best he could, but the group half-carried, half-dragged him to where ever they intended to take him. He looked around, having to look between the bodies to see any of their surroundings. They were still under the canopy of the stone trees, but cargo containers were positioned – seemingly at random – throughout the strange forest floor. Some looked homier than others.
His eye caught a group of people clutched together near a fire that was smoking out. A few of their group were bloodied and a few were shaking their heads as a member of their group spoke, though Patrick could not make out the words. As he was drug past, the group looked up at him with narrowed, suspicious gazes.
Finally, the co-pilot was deposited on a bench sized stone – one of many that formed a circle. On the other side of the circle, a man sat and observed him with a mask of an expression. No one spoke.
“Where’s Aaron and Rick?” Patrick broke the silence.
“Dead,” the man spoke without any particular inflection.
Patrick felt his stomach twist. “Why?” He asked, feeling breathless.
“Why have you come here?” The man ignored his question.
Patrick blinked at him, still feeling the shock of the loss of his crew. “We’re… we’re colonists from Earth.”
He searched the faces of those around him. They, surely, were also from Earth. But it didn’t make sense – what were they doing here and why had they turned so savage? He could not possibly imagine them as the scientists sent ahead of Colony One.
“This is no time for lying,” the man cautioned.
“I’m not lying,” Patrick countered forcefully. “I am the co-pilot of the Earth ship Colony One.”
His words made the others stir uneasily. They regarded one another and finally turned their full attention to the man at the other side of the circle.
“That’s impossible.”
“If you had a bio stamp scanner you would know I was telling you the truth.”
“We left those back on Earth,” The man responded. “You cannot be from Colony One.”
“Why not?”
“Because we are the survivors of the Colony Three mission.”
Patrick felt his mouth drop, but could do nothing to stop it. It was his turn to deny it, “That is impossible. We have only just arrived.”
“World Corp swine.” Someone said and the Leader’s eyes snapped to the offender, silencing them immediately.
“Although…” Patrick ignored the slur, caught up in his own racing thoughts. “Our coordinates were off, we had to course correct. It took us three months longer than what was planned to arrive here.”
“You must understand how far-fetched that sounds,” the man pointed out.
“No less far-fetched than a Colony Three mission. There was no such thing planned when we left Earth.”
“Yes, well,” The man’s gaze wandered reflectively as he spoke, “They wasted no time packing up thousands of people to be forgotten to space. We assumed there were no survivors from Colony One or Two – that they had either died long before we arrived or never arrived. There certainly wasn’t a welcoming party when we got here.”
“How long have you been here?” Patrick wondered.
“John,” a voice cut in. It was anxious but respectful. “Why are we even entertaining this man with information about us? He could have a transmitter on him. He’s dangerous.”
“I’m not dangerous, I’m concussed,” Patrick corrected.
John leveled his gaze at Patrick for long, tense moments. “Unbind his hands,” he said and Patrick let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Cut out his bio-stamp and put him back in the cell.”
“What!” Patrick exclaimed. He stood instinctively and a few men closed in on him. “I’m telling the truth!” he exclaimed, but John’s attention was already far removed from the present, giving Patrick no hope of resisting his fate.
ɸ ɸ ɸ
John was only passively aware of Patrick’s screams as a chunk of flesh was scraped from the co-pilot’s arm. His thoughts were turned inward at the new developments – new developments that only seemed to confuse the situation further.
Of the twenty-thousand people they had managed to cram onto the Colony Three ship, a mere 1,200 people remained. That was over 18,000 remains seeding the ground of their new home – the ones that were in any condition to bury, anyhow. Many were almost entirely incinerated as the behemoth colony ship powered up and departed with most of her passengers in the blast-zone. Very few survived without some damage – John himself sustaining burns up his entire left leg. A giant scorch mark still scarred the land where their ship abandoned them, like the shadow of a nuclear blast, complete with outlines of colony passengers unable to escape their fate.
John rubbed his leg as the scar tissue ached at the memory. He had been cracking open one of the first unloaded containers – furthest away from the ship and off to its port side – when the ground began to rumble under his feet. His first thought was earthquake, so he backpedaled from the container and took inventory of the others. He saw a group of people pointing towards the ship, and then rush towards it. Despite the ground still shaking, he scaled the container to get a better look at what was happening.
The mammoth ship’s engines were the source of the commotion. He watched as the teems of people all reacted differently – some scattering, others rushing towards the ship in an attempt to clamor up the rapidly closing ramp. Those who made it were only able to hold on halfway up, the angle becoming too extreme and they fell several dozen meters to the harsh, rocky ground.
The heat of the engines intensified and he watched as several hundred people directly in the wake passed out from the overwhelming heat and fumes. John’s muscles tensed at the sight of it – his first instinct was to run to them and try to drag as many people to safety as possible. His hesitation was what saved him – the engines hit critical mass and a moment later, the thrusters engaged – bathing the passengers of Colony Three in a jet wash of fire and supercharged vapor.
John watched as skin melted from people’s bodies. Most were dead before they hit the ground – if enough of their remains survived to fall. The fireball grew and John was forced from his horrified position atop the container. The blast of energy threw him several meters and he hit the ground hard, making his head spin. It was only the searing pain working its way up his left leg that pulled him out of his daze. He rolled – putting out the fire that threatened to consume him – and dragged himself back towards the container to shield himself from the continuing heat wave as the colony ship propelled itself forward.
He crawled into the container, burrowing his way into the supply of freeze-dried food. He curled into a fetal position as the container vibrated violently for long, terrifying minutes until Colony Three was several kilometers away. When it was all over, all he could hear was his own heavy breathing and the rush of blood in his ears. He stayed curled up in the metal box until he could calm his breathing, keeping his eyes clenched closed and doing everything he could to un-see the melted faces of his fellow passengers. It took some time to convince himself to crawl out from the container. When he did, the smell of burnt flesh was overwhelming, making him sway where he stood. When his hearing returned, a chorus of agony rose up to greet him, hundreds of people moaning and calling out for help all at once.
It was more than his spirit could take, and part of him was lost that day – a big part. He stumbled into the field of the dead and dying, mechanically helping those he could, in what ways he could. It took several hours before any semblance of order or a plan could be worked out. Those injured the least triaged the wounded and saved who they could.
John had not been a leader before their misadventures on Colony Alpha. Quite to the contrary – he was an inconsequential welder in a small production zone in Norway. The zone was shut down right bef
ore the launch of Colony Three – the entire pool of workers winning the lottery for the voyage. It was unprecedented, but the motives seemed clear – there were talks of plans to convert the production zone into luxury properties. The Northern sections of Norway were one of the few places that still had somewhat of a natural landscape left to it.
He had not wanted to leave Earth. He thought he was one of the lucky ones – living somewhere the air was fresher and the scenery more pleasant. Many of his fellow workers felt the same. In contrast to their lives back on Earth, the voyage had been crowded and uncomfortable with few options in accommodations and food. Infighting over resources was common – especially between passengers from different cultures. Everyone had boarded the ship with different expectations, different feelings of entitlement and different methods for getting what they wanted. There were no distractions – the ships servers devoid of entertainment that could be streamed through an OMNI. It was a no-frills voyage, meant for efficiency, not comfort.
It had been barely-organized chaos until the shock of losing 90% of their manifest hit. It was a fluke that John stood out – he was the one who suggested unloading all the cargo as a first measure when they landed. His insistence was their only saving grace; the containers had served as shields to some of the heat and debris from the colony ship’s departure – including himself. It also provided enough resources to limp by with, in addition to make-shift housing as they tried to scrape by a living.
With the Captain and co-pilot perishing with the others, John was seen as the next natural choice. It was another burden he had not asked to bear, but had nonetheless. He quickly realized the only way to keep order was to impose strict rules around rationing and punishment for disobedience. It wasn’t how he envisioned the new world, but it worked. So much so that he was beginning to forget what life back on Earth was like – the rules there were so different from the rules here. One of his first orders was to dig out all survivors’ bio-stamps. This disconnected them from their OMNIs, linking with the Runners and any possibility of being identified remotely. They were in full survival mode with complete understanding of the betrayal heaped upon them by their own government.