One Giant Leap

by Heather Kaczynski

  All of them glowing, pulsing, in impossibly bright fluorescent colors.

  They filled the acres of space above my head, moving past me in undulating waves, unaffected by my presence, each going its own way. As I watched, the creatures would occasionally leap from one stone-tree to another, appearing to fly like nothing on Earth could fly, in pulsating waves of their bodies. They landed effortlessly, using long talons on the ends of their long arms to pierce the skin of the stone-trees and cling and crawl like rock climbers.

  My attention was diverted as small orbs of orange and green lights blinked lazily by my face. I peered at the closest one. It could’ve fit in the palm of my hand.

  It was alive. Cilialike protrusions fluttered as it moved through the air, like microscopic amoebas or pond scum, but macro instead of micro. A baby version of the massive creatures above?

  I was standing on the floor of some bizarre alien ocean. Instead of salt water, space. Aliens like deep-sea creatures, creatures like jellyfish and octopuses and sea slugs that didn’t have names in any human language.

  A large one passed near my head, floating or flying or swimming by, as black as night but shot through with electric-blue streaks that pulsed violet in time with some mysterious beat. It was trailing translucent arms full of wicked-looking spines.

  I ducked unconsciously. But the creature moved past, seeming unaware or unconcerned by the odd creature in a space suit.

  How did these things move? They almost appeared to be swimming. Was this still a vacuum, or had I passed without notice into a chamber with some sort of atmosphere?

  I looked up. And up, and up, and up, at the acres of space over my head.

  About two or three stories high, silver arches that seemed ancient, with the aged patina of old metal, crisscrossed in the stone treetops. The arches seemed original to the ship, but the trees . . .

  Dozens of tall, narrow spires reaching so high I couldn’t see where they ended—like pine trees with branches that all reached upward instead of outward. Trees with no leaves, but whose topmost branches seemed covered with lichenlike growths of brilliant, tiny flowers.

  The spires seemed out of place in the architecture, more organic and colorful than the otherwise black and metallic space. The creatures were living on the spires, smaller ones swinging among the weird upside-down branches and larger ones seeming to float between the trunks at the higher elevations.

  Somewhere far above, blue light hummed and pulsed like something living, and open corridors branched off the arches into dark places I couldn’t fathom.

  I turned around to see an entire section of exterior wall was clear, a window the size of a skyscraper. And through the window, beneath an unimpeded and breathtaking view of the Milky Way, was a narrow slice of the bright and impossibly blue Earth below us, swathed in perfect white clouds.

  I sucked in a breath, dizzy at such a view of the universe. But were these creatures even aware of it? They didn’t appear to have faces, let alone eyes.

  Was that why none of them were trying to kill me? Did they not sense me? Or was I not considered a threat?

  It was almost as if an alien god had heard Earth sea creatures described to it and had re-created them in its own image. A drug-trip version of the sea.

  As I studied them, I realized there were three different types of the weird sea creatures. There were the small buglike ones that moved slowly and clumped together in softly glowing masses in the branches and hovered in sparser numbers around me like dust motes.

  There were the ones the size of my arm, sluglike and beautiful, crawling up the trunks of the tree pillars, glowing and flashing lazily in bright, colorful patterns.

  And finally there were the ones the size of cars and trucks, formless shapes that seemed to be a central body and many yards of arms of varying sizes, some thin as hair, some thick like wire cables, some ending in sharp spines that were mainly kept tucked into the body.

  These had bodies that glowed and changed, too, undulating as though they had no bones, but in the snatches of light their skin glittered and shone like something metallic, making me think they were covered in some layer of bony plating like interlocking fish scales.

  Which ones were the vrag? All of the above? None?

  Sunny, talk to me, I thought, awe taking my voice away. What am I looking at?

  Sunny stayed silent. I’d only ever known her to do that while struggling to calculate, and thought maybe this question was beyond her.

  I changed tack. Is there atmosphere in this chamber?

  There are nonearthlike atmospheric conditions at this level, Cassie.

  They had themselves a little mini biodome here. Well, biocylinder, anyway.

  One of the smaller octopuslike creatures, this one glowing rosy red tinged with pink edges, bumped gently into my arm. It instantly turned the bright emerald green of summer grass, as if in surprise, and then weaved its way past me, unconcerned.

  I watched, mesmerized, as it defied whatever gravity was holding me to the floor. But it came close enough for me to see pulsing tubes among its tentacles. I searched my memory’s cataloged index of sea creatures and thought I remembered that octopuses—or was it squid?—used jets of water to propel themselves through the ocean. But if this was the aliens’ method of floating, what did they use? Some form of compressed gas? I could feel nothing so delicate as air passing across my insulated suit, but anything more substantial would have given me some form of sensory feedback.

  A thin, wirelike tentacle brushed my helmet as it passed, jolting me in surprise. Burning. Almost like a . . .

  A static charge. These things were electric.

  Shit shit shit.

  “Sunny, you still there?” I asked out loud. “Did that mess with you at all?”

  No, Cassie. Only a temporary power surge. I am still here.

  I took a steadying breath and then an unsteady step toward one of the thick treelike trunks. I touched it gingerly with my gloved fingertips. It was solid. A few feet above my head, one of the sluglike creatures inched along the skin of the pillar, gliding slowly over small spots of color like tight, spiral fractals of flowers that glowed softly in the darkness.

  Just then, a large octopuslike creature a shade of soft lavender pulsing with blue spots latched on to the pillar over my head with its long spike-ended arm.

  Pebbles like metal shavings fell audibly onto my helmet. I brushed them away without taking my eyes off the creatures. My neck began to ache, but I couldn’t look away.

  None of these things seemed to notice me at all. Not that I would be able to tell what they noticed or didn’t notice.

  Something had brought me here. Something wanted me to see this.

  Where do I go? I thought. What am I supposed to be seeing here?

  As I watched, the lavender octopuslike creature above me speared into the stone again and again with its razor talons. Finally, one long talon drew out something glowing and wriggling, pierced onto its sharp blade. Swiftly, the creature brought the worm into the center of its body, to a circular mouth ringed with tiny razorlike teeth, and closed over it.

  Shuddering, I backed quickly away. They hadn’t been violent to me, but they were obviously dangerous. Those talons could cut cleanly through my space suit.

  Where was Luka? Where had they taken him? And why?

  I had to find him.

  As I watched, I realized there was a pattern to their movements. The large ones moved slow and leisurely, but they were all coming to and from the same place: a large opening to the far right of the chamber.

  I pointed my feet in that direction, toward an arch that looked as though it had been forcibly chipped away at, perhaps to make it larger.

  The closer I came to the arch, the more a current thrummed up my body, warm and vibrating. It felt like the ship was encouraging me, saying yes, yes, this way.

  This was not what I was expecting. But I didn’t feel fear. No one had threatened me; I had been kept safe and welcomed in. I was susp
icious, yes, and scared for Luka, but not yet afraid for myself.

  Until I crossed under the arch, I was not afraid.

  In the massive chamber, a grayish-white mass filled the entire space, suspended or hanging from some ceiling that was so high above I could not even see it, stretched out from wall to curving wall.

  It was like some monster out of a child’s nightmare. A horror with no face. Both a fat spider and its web, nearly the height of Odysseus, with thousands of legs the size of trees, each of them pulsing, reaching, circling, undulating. The overall color was pearlescent white, but with colors that danced under the skin of its many appendages.

  It reminded me of auroras and lightning storms on Earth. Flashes of blue like crackling electricity traveling up one arm, fading into lazy green tendrils of color that dissipated as they neared the body’s center.

  A thousand scrabbling, reaching claws. I couldn’t make sense of it beyond this. Too much movement, too much color; it was like an optical illusion in constant motion. A few thin, wirelike tendrils floated in the air, miles long. The glowing octopus creatures were beautiful mermaids compared to this—this monstrosity of a Lovecraftian horror. I couldn’t decide if I was disgusted and repulsed or fascinated and enchanted. I was all things at once.

  The horror of it dawning slowly, I was frozen to the spot, gaping.

  But then one of the tendrils began snaking its way toward me and I fell backward in my gut instinct to get away, scrambling on my hands and feet like a crab, still unable to tear my eyes from it, sick chills breaking out over my skin as though I could feel the touch of these spidery legs crawling across my body like a hundred tarantulas with grasping claws—

  The arm shot toward me, whiplike, wrapping multiple times around my torso and stopping my retreat cold.

  I gasped against the binding of my rib cage, trying to scratch or pull at the arm. But there was no response. I might as well have been trying to cut steel cables with my fingernails.

  Cassie, she says to be calm. Sunny’s ridiculously unperturbed voice came to me. She wishes only to talk.

  I wasn’t sure what to do until I realized that it held me firmly, not painfully. Waiting me out. I felt watched by the impossibly huge tarantula being despite it not having any visible eyes.

  Gradually, I forced myself to see it as less horrible. Its arms never stopped waving and undulating, calm, gentle, patient. Now it was like seagrass in a tidepool. I had the bizarre thought that it was trying to calm me down.

  Wait.

  “Sunny—how the hell do you know what it wants?”

  I realized with a sinking sensation that Sunny might not be Sunny anymore.

  God-Mother communicates with electrical energy as I communicate with you, Sunny told me. She is using considerable amounts of her energy to relay messages through radio bands.

  A creeping sensation filtered over my scalp as I realized what was happening. “Stop Wi-Fi-ing into my brain!” I shouted.

  She wants you to be calm. She will give you reason to trust.

  And with that, one of the larger, thicker arms moved closer. Held still, I could do nothing but watch as the arm—wider across than my own body twice over—unfurled some distance away from me and retreated, revealing Luka.

  The arm holding me loosened, allowing me to cross the short distance and catch Luka’s limp body as it fell. He looked just as he had when I’d last seen him, no worse for wear, helmet still intact. Whole and alive, condensation on the inside of his mask telling me he still breathed.

  His eyes fluttered open as I knelt over him anxiously. He peered up at me with a grimace. “Cassie?”

  Relief exhaled out of me in a rush. I bent over him, tightening my arms around his shoulders even as he struggled to sit up. I pulled away to let us both get to our feet but did not let go of his hands. “Are you okay?”

  He seemed dazed. “I am . . . unhurt. What are we doing here?”

  “I have no idea.” Why had it taken him and not me? Why did it give him back? How could I even guess at the motivations of something I didn’t understand at all?

  Sunny’s voice in my head stopped me. God-Mother’s wish is to communicate with you directly, Cassie, as you are now doing with me.

  “What, you mean like . . . letting that thing connect to my brain? No way!”

  Luka, party only to my side of the exchange, looked alarmed, and then his eyes darkened with suspicion.

  It is the only way she can explain why you are here, Sunny told me. The vrag do not have verbal language. You will not be at risk, Cassie. I will protect your brain from undue influence.

  “You mean she has the capacity to control me?”

  I do not know, but it is probable she has many skills beyond my capacity to understand.

  “Mine, too,” I agreed softly, looking up into the wide expanse of alien intelligence looming over us.

  “You are communicating with your AI?” he asked.

  “The thing, the alien . . . it and Sunny are . . . communicating through electromagnetic waves or something. Sunny calls it God-Mother, and God-Mother wants to communicate directly with my neurons like Sunny does.”

  “Cassie, no,” he said, alarm sparking his eyes as he grabbed my hands. “This thing—it lies. I know only a little, but—I think this is the hive mind of these vrag. It’s like a biological computer, pure nerve endings. You won’t be able to go against its will.”

  A chill of fear went through me. And yet, I felt an odd surety that this was something I needed to do. Maybe it was Sunny’s reassurance that she could protect me, or the fact that the vrag had had ample opportunity to hurt me and hadn’t. “It brought me here, to you. It didn’t hurt you, and it could have. It just wants to talk. If we can find a way to work this out peacefully, it’s best for everyone, isn’t it?”

  “Cassie.” His voice was flat with anger now, something I’d rarely heard from him. “Vrag killed my family. Don’t let it in your mind. It’s trying to trick you. It’s given you no reason to trust.”

  “Did it try this with you?” I asked.

  He pulled his hands from mine and put them to his face, turning away in frustration. “It . . . tried. I believe. I can’t understand it in any form of words. It’s . . . it’s like being near a power plant, all raw electricity. I . . . felt . . . that it wanted to.” He turned back to me. “I did not let it.”

  “It didn’t force you, then. You were its prisoner and you’re still you—it hasn’t tried to coerce you.” I took his hands again. “Something’s going on here. This isn’t how I expected this to go. But we’re trapped here on this ship unless we can communicate. I think it brought us here to tell us something. Don’t you think we need to understand why?”

  “Please don’t do it, Cassie.” He was shaking his head, pleading now. “Do not do this.”

  I couldn’t believe I was considering it, but I was. Maybe it was God-Mother’s weird electrical energy trying to coerce me. But more so it was my own curiosity. An alien species that was so very alien. Wanting to impart some secret knowledge to me. The chance of me coming all this way and then not seeing it through was pretty close to zero.

  Did I trust a computer program to have the capacity to protect me like this? Did I trust that this computer program was not capable of lying or being manipulated? Should I trust Luka, or my instinct?

  “Will you do it with me?” I asked. “Please. Think of Earth. If we can somehow avoid war and save Earth, this is worth doing. Isn’t it?”

  He shook his head, more pained than I’d ever seen him. “My family, Cassie.”

  I came closer, pulling his helmet against my own. “Don’t you want to know why? To understand? To end the killing?”

  His shoulders shook with repressed emotions. He was shaking his head as he said, “I do not want to do this. But you’re right. I see no other choice.”

  “Together, then.”

  He nodded, his eyes screwed shut.

  Take off your helmet, Sunny said.

  I took
a breath. “It’s safe? I can breathe?”

  You can breathe, Sunny said. God-Mother has altered the gas ratios of this chamber to make them nearer to Earth levels. But she cannot stay in this state for long.

  With trembling hands, and a sense of logic that was screaming at me that I was going to get both Luka and myself killed, I reached up and unlatched my helmet.

  Thirty

  ONE OF THE wiry appendages floated gently toward me. I flinched. It wavered in front of me, waiting, patient.

  Alarm bells were jangling in my head and my heart. But I was so intensely curious. I’d already lent my brain to Sunny and to Pinnacle. This would be an entirely new plane of existence, of communication.

  I’d always wanted to go where mankind had never gone before. I only felt guilt that I was dragging Luka along, half unwilling. But whatever we might discover, I wanted us both to know it.

  I nodded, more to myself than the creature—which couldn’t see me anyway. “Okay,” I whispered.

  The hovering arm wavered. Waiting for express permission? How could it tell?

  Cautiously, I lowered my head in offering. Luka did not move, head pressed into my shoulder, as if unwilling to see what was about to happen.

  The tentacle advanced, making contact with the top of my scalp and threading itself, almost gently, through my coiled hair. The end split into even finer ends, and I felt a dozen tiny tingles like static pulling upward at my hair follicles. I shuddered involuntarily.

  And then, all at once, like the flip of a light switch, I was no longer inside my body. I was joined with the immensity of a being older than me, who had traveled far and seen much, yet had no words to communicate to me.

  At the same time, I felt distantly connected to Luka’s body. I was aware of him, of his breathing, of his anxiety—the tone of his thoughts, if not the thoughts themselves. Whatever was happening directly to me was happening indirectly to him through our touch.

  And then all at once I felt swept away from my consciousness and Luka’s, both of us taken away from ourselves into the consciousness of another. Of something greater, larger.