Parallel Extinction (Extinction Encounters Book 1)

by T. R. Stevens

  “I still owe you a promotion, Sergeant, or should I say Major? Major Amio. It sounds good to me.” He moved a z-vellum on his desk to reveal a set of new emblems. “Put these on.”

  “Yessir. Thank you, sir.” Amio was decompressing from the stress, trying to find his stride. He took the patches, swapping them for his Sergeant’s insignias, and then returned to attention.

  The admiral leaned back into his noisy office chair, assessing him. After an uneasy moment for Amio, the man surprised him again. “In fact, Major, as you know, I now need a ‘sidearm’ replacement, having lost Hanson to his drinking problem. That wasn’t in his record you know; you never can tell what is going to set people off, can you?”

  “No sir.”

  “In any case, I’m asking you to take his place. I’m not appointing you, though, Amio. I feel that you have done me a favor—that business with Bartell and all—so I’m giving you the option here. I have pressing need, so I want no quibbling about your commitment to the tasks at hand. If you will take the position, you will be in my confidence. In my review of your service record, I have found that you have the type of unwavering dedication to duty that I look for. Is there anything I missed, which might prevent you from taking the position that I’m offering?”

  Amio had to think fast. On one hand, it was great news, he was completely in the clear for the thing that had worried him so much. Yet, on the other, to be working so closely to a man who appeared to be engaged in something illegal or immoral would have some negatives. Like accessory? Then again, if Swan was up to no good, as Coop and Hanson seemed to think, then Amio could monitor his actions, and maybe prevent an atrocity. If it wasn’t too late. And a refusal might have its own negative ramifications.

  He made his decision. “No sir, nothing prevents me from accepting your generous offer. When would you like me to report for this position?”

  “Upon that acceptance, Major, I consider your presence here, in front of my desk, as reporting for your first assignment. I have an immediate need. As my new adjutant, you are hereby recorded as sworn to secrecy.

  “The need that I speak of has to do with the top-secret nature of the interstellar drive aboard our ships.” The admiral dove right in. “Apparently, what we thought were natural forces, which we harnessed years ago for the purpose of interspatial transit, are in fact ‘beings’ of some kind, and now they are attacking us.”

  Amio was only half-hearing what the man was saying. Part of him was still waiting for an accusation that was not coming. The game was still on, but Amio could feel Swan studying him as he spoke; he maintained his best military façade. “Major Amio, aren’t you surprised by any of these amazing things that I’m telling you?”

  In the dry voice of obedience, he replied, “Yes sir. It’s amazing, sir. What can I do to assist in this crisis, sir?”

  He watched a smile spread across Swan’s face as the man felt a level of authority that had been missing in his repartee with General Hanson. “Good question, Major Amio. I have recently employed a scientist to focus on the origination and intelligence question. Her name is Tasimov. What I need to know, even more than those answers is: how do we recapture these escaped creatures? Or maybe, how do we protect ourselves when they attack?

  “I would like you to make your acquaintance with this woman, and look over her shoulder. Give her this,” he handed across a chip that contained his idea for a trap. “That’s top secret; tell her to isolate her terminal before she slots that. Report anything that might be of importance, positive or negative, directly to me, right away.

  “Keep your eye on her; I don’t trust her. Make sure that she feels the pressure of answering this question as paramount, and as rapidly as possible. Make sure she has what she needs to get the results I want.”

  CHAPTER 57

  EVENT: DAY 16, 0900 UT

  “All hands, assume Stations, Red. All hands assume Stations, Red.”

  Taylor was furious. “This is it,” she said to nobody but herself. The captain had unexpectedly confined her to quarters. All wound up, her adrenaline pumping, she webbed in against all her natural inclinations. With frustrated rancor, she considered her body’s needs. This must be bad for me.

  They were flying into the space where the attack had taken place on Pirate Patrol One, the Seeker. The spot where the pirate scow remained.

  She and Jennifer had been sharing a great deal in their secret shorthand language. The young soldier had told her of the briefing that she’d received the day before. Garrison had been here already, and there had been no evidence of any current threat. He and Astra were gone now. Taylor still couldn’t think of the woman’s name without twining in an element of disdain.

  Of course, it was against orders for Jennifer to share even that, but the girl had gotten sisterly with Taylor, and was happy to share all the good stuff, though only because she was secure in the secrecy of their hidden communication. Taylor hoped there would be some good stories—the poor girl had been assigned to the investigation team and was nervous, though less so after the news from the Quantum Butterfly.

  Taylor had continued to see Ensign Friday—Chris. While their relationship never progressed to a sexual one, it had been modified in different and important way—he was more in the role of a teacher. As it turned out, Chris unofficially acted in the capacity of Ship’s Counselor, with aspirations toward making it official. That piece of information explained the openhearted looks that she and Chris received, when together outside of his cabin. She now understood the feelings behind those looks. For the first time in her adult life, Taylor had a deep connection with a man that wasn’t based on sex. Chris was curious about that, and, while sharing, she discovered things about herself that she’d never imagined.

  He told her a bit about himself, his background, and his connection with Quilliam Spence; the alien story. He explained that it wasn’t a cover-up, per se, but BUMP wanted the credit for Quantum Butterfly’s spacetime-altering drive. The alien story was not publicized, and was largely unknown. It was what the government wanted. Subsequent to Spence’s mysterious transfer and the strange looks that Chris earned from telling the story, he didn’t bother sharing it anymore.

  After their first extended meeting, Taylor had come away with the clear understanding that sex would not be possible with Chris. It plainly was not going to happen. Not now, at least. She still found him hot, and she wanted him, but she did her best to set that aside. She had another need of him. First though, she wanted to expand the confidentiality to exclude the prying ears of BUMP. And she engaged Jennifer as a co-conspirator in her plan.

  “I can get him into bed,” Jennifer assured Taylor; she had a friendship with him but not a counseling relationship. Taylor coached and assisted her on what she needed her to do, starting with arranging Jennifer’s bunk with the spinning slings, like Levinson Hahn’s.

  “Now, Jen, he doesn’t go for overt come-on’s…”

  “TJ,” Jennifer’s tone had been of annoyance, “I can handle it. Trust me.”

  Taylor had given her the ‘trust’ sign, and Jennifer did as Taylor asked, which was to arrange a data dump to Friday’s implants. He would then have the language and cipher that she and Jennifer had been sharing.

  Using a more mature approach than the usual tease, her friend was successful in her quest. Fortunately, Taylor got to see Chris before the captain had imposed his confinement on her. She had launched into her cadence of gestures, feeling a bit shy about it, but committed to the communication that was crucial. As she began, Chris’s mouth dropped open. She finished and watched him digest what she had said. After a moment he gave the gesture that he now innately knew, indicating curiosity.

  He had been taken aback. “My mind automatically began a subtext when you began your strange gestures and movements. A sentence unexpectedly formed in my head.”

  Conscious of any possible monitoring, Taylor had curtailed hi
s explanation and kept her secret communiqué to a critical outline of the facts that she knew.

  In contrast to the tenseness that Taylor had felt in that moment, when her therapist launched full into the gesticulations of the secret language, Taylor burst out with laughter. It was so different on him than on Jennifer. He just couldn’t make it look ‘cool’. So it looked hilarious. He’d been a bit embarrassed, but, being a good sport, he played the fool, and shared his part of the conversation with a blush. In a few awkward moments, he had revealed that Jennifer had talked him into taking the data dump while spinning in the cocoon, but she then refused to tell him anymore. He couldn’t make any sense of the cipher until now.

  While happy that the other shoe had dropped, he was concerned for both the seriousness of the situation, and that this classified information had been shared with him. He made it clear that his sense of rightness was impinged. “For now, though, Taylor, I’ll keep the confidence through the current crisis, unless duty makes this impossible.”

  She had been risking exposure sharing it with him, but she trusted him. Taylor responded with her gestures and faces, feeling foolish herself in the spirit of the moment. Both of them had found the humor in it, despite the gravity of the topic. Afterward, Taylor experienced a greater sense of relief than usual, having conveyed her burden.

  Though still only an ensign, there was something powerful and commanding about him. She figured he’d be Captain Friday someday.

  As she lay on her bunk, a static sound broke the silence and her wandering thoughts. She recognized it as the signal that an announcement was about to come across, ship-wide.

  She waited tensely.

  CHAPTER 58

  EVENT: DAY 16, 0910 to Day 18, 0005 UT

  “All Hands Stand Down, Stations Yellow.”

  Taylor had practically launched from her bunk fastenings at the all clear. Not getting any info from the terminal in her room, she headed to the mess hoping to find Jennifer. The captain’s action against her caused a growing question to burn brighter still: Why had they let a civilian on board? She couldn’t figure that one out. She had not been able to get near the captain to ask him directly.

  She spotted her friend in the rapidly-filling mess, and waved. Suited up, with her helmet under an arm, her friend made a beeline for Taylor. Jennifer did a little dance as she approached, with a wink and shake of her head. The attention that lingered on Taylor instantly transferred to the cute crewwoman, doing what appeared to be a sexy victory dance. Some of the men whooped at her in a good-natured way.

  As they came together, Taylor responded with some more subtle movements, ending with the two bumping their fists. The abbreviated but complete rundown in those movements and scripted facial expressions, said, essentially, ‘false alarm.’

  Jennifer picked up the conversation verbally after that, sharing non-secret details of what was next. “I’m off, for the moment. New orders came in. Our team leaders are with medical and salvage teams that are going over, first off.”

  The essentials broke down to a basic salvage operation. Taylor was disgusted, sharing with the ensign that she had secretly hoped to confront some kind of danger out here in these far reaches.

  “Sorry TJ, most missions are pretty boring, standard routine. Chasing down pirates is left to the Pirate Patrols, and there’s not much excitement out here in the fringes. This whole fiasco, with the rumors and all, is the most excitement—by a huge margin—that I’ve ever seen.” She excused her nervousness by this fact and said that sex was what usually kept the missions from being interminable.

  Taylor had found that to be the case already. She was chomping at the bit for something to ward off the boredom that she feared was headed her way. She didn’t do well with tedium. It depressed her; a dangerous thing for her physiological condition—she needed the adrenaline, at least some. She didn’t feel like hunting down more crewmen for sexual escapades; that fact said to her that things had already progressed toward that biological black hole. Though she’d been warned by her doctor to avoid letting her levels fall, she preferred to establish her chemical balances through natural activity, rather than with something from the infirmary. She expressed her concern to Jennifer.

  “Well, since this is only a salvage, maybe you can be an observer on the crew, and come over to the derelicts.” Her friend found her later and told her that the word had been an unequivocal NO.

  Taylor thanked her and they gave each other an elbow bump and hip check, which was just an affectionate see you around.

  Taylor spent the next forty hours or so trying to avoid medication. She visited with Chris a couple of times, finding the new self-revelation to be a kind of medicine all its own. She got in a couple of required workouts, and took a few extra hours of sleep to kill off some of the time on her hands. It threw off her clock in relationship to ship-time, and she found herself wandering the halls in the off-hours, wide-awake. It had the feeling of a hotel in the early a.m. hours—a hushed environment, sounds muted; crewmembers she didn’t recognize passed her in the corridors, giving a silent acknowledgement as they stepped by. Taylor had not dodged the depression bullet completely—she didn’t bother to turn as she passed attractive crewmen—neither to give a longer look, nor to see if they were doing the same.

  She made up her mind that she needed to do something about that, and headed to Hahn’s cabin. Sleeping or not, she figured he’d jump on the opportunity for a good fuck. As that particular word expressed in her head like a punctuation mark, a tingle began—she was on the right track.

  Surprising her, just as he had the first time, the door slid open before she signaled. “Hey TJ, great to see you. I never get more than half-a-glimpse of you heading off down some hall on the arm of another guy. Or coming outa here with Jennifer. Did you come to see me?”

  She stood listening, feeling her need. The man talked too much. She dilated her pupils and watched his face change, his mouth opening slightly in confused awe; like something suddenly finding itself in a spider’s web. She stepped through the door without verbalizing her response, then reached to his crotch and pressed her full body against his, eliciting a gasp as the door slid closed.

  A couple of hours later, having recharged her chemistry by a good fraction, she emerged from his cabin with him. He waved and went the opposite direction to his duty post. The halls were more populated, Shift change. With each muscle contraction required to step down the hall in her boots, the warmth between her legs radiated outward, filling her. It was delicious. She was happy, floaty.

  Her mind wandered to Garrison as she meandered. In the last day, she had admitted to herself, finally, that she was actually missing him. Her last couple of sessions with Ensign Friday had turned a key in her, helping get past the jealousy and hurt feelings. With new insights, she no longer blamed Garrison for his reaction to the flight assignment with Astra. Taylor couldn’t remember where she’d seen the woman’s face, but it was a face that was unforgettable. She would have been thrilled to ride along with them, had it been possible, just to be that close to the woman. Lucky Garry. She’d even gone so far in her forgiveness to have imagined the two of them getting into it, hot and heavy. She was surprised at herself as she fantasized, getting turned on to the point that she’d needed to take some private cabin time to do something about it.

  Drifting about, now, she’d once again roamed toward the mess hall. Without even remembering the transition to spin-ring, she found herself standing at the entrance. Beyond its pseudo gravity, it had a draw all its own, and was the main center of any social activity that did not take place behind closed doors. It was full of the morning shift, readying to head off to duty stations. Not feeling hungry, she wondered what might be best to do, when a warning whistle sounded followed by claxons. Lights began to flash red. “All hands, assume Stations, Red. All hands, assume Stations, Red.”

  The milling crowd in the mess scattered in a dead run.
What could be happening now? Surprise attack? A chill ran down her spine. The, startlingly loud call to stations, the red light pulsing, had tipped more than a few drops of adrenaline into her system. It was good; she was feeling charged up after her dearth, and in no mood to return to the confinement of her quarters—captain’s orders or not.

  CHAPTER 59

  EVENT: DAY 16, 1900 UT

  Amio reflected on how his unwitting role had put the captains in danger.

  The admiral had orchestrated Amio’s hand in getting Bartell aboard the Quantum Butterfly but, regardless, Amio had been prepared to acquire Bartell’s participation, as requested. A matter of duty. It would have been done through Taylor, using the carrot of her getting onto the Medallion.

  It had all been outlined in his original meeting with Swan, before the sergeant’s promotion to the station. At the time, in a z-brief the admiral had sent back with him, he’d been given suggested dialogue for luring Garrison. It was written in a way that implied that he, the receiver, held a lesser intellect than the message writer. It was the sort of discrimination that he’d struggled against during his entire career.

  And Swan knew all about his career, but also, through whatever spy networks the man used, the circumstances of Amio’s personal life, and how it gave him positioning for this opportunity.

  In the end, to his relief, he had not needed to pursue Garrison. The sergeant’s relationship with Taylor, such as it was, had not been subjected to this manipulation.

  Instead, Garrison had come of his own accord to Amio’s door, walking right into what now appeared to be a trap set by the admiral through him. Amio was unwitting, and so, unwilling to take on blame for whatever the man’s fate turned out to be. He was more concerned about Taylor.

  Now, the newly promoted major found himself in a precarious position. The admiral had not uncovered his deception around Hanson and Cooper, which seemed due to the fact that the man was distracted by other pressing circumstances. Amio’s fine line meant he needed to make sure that Swan’s attention remained elsewhere, while he took some further steps to discern the realities of the man’s actions—and how illicit they might be.