Forgotten Worlds

by D. Nolan Clark

  And … suddenly …

  She did.

  welcome

  she is with us now

  she is harmonizing

  you are welcome here

  i am so scared so scared

  it will get easier in time

  faster than archie did

  she is part of us

  very good

  Ginger opened her eyes.

  She hadn’t realized she’d closed them again. For a while she’d been looking only through the surgeon’s eyes, seeing only herself. Now she saw the Choir.

  She saw what they were all doing. Heard what they heard, felt what they felt. It was … still overwhelming. But if she let it go, if she didn’t try to absorb it all, she could handle it. Maybe.

  Maybe.

  Do not try for too much, not yet. Stay focused on my thoughts. Hear them as if you were listening to a human voice. Let the rest of the Choir become background noise. Good.

  “I’m scared,” she said.

  Except she didn’t say it out loud, and she hadn’t meant to say it at all. She pressed a hand over her mouth. Pointlessly.

  Rain-on-Stones laughed. She—she chirped, out loud, but in Ginger’s head it was a laugh, warm and kind. It felt good, that laugh. It felt so incredibly good, so welcoming, so accepting—there was no judgment in it, no mockery, just a sympathetic humor that she …

  That she …

  Ginger squeezed her hands into fists. “You—you manipulated my emotions, just then,” she said, a little outraged.

  No. I shared my own.

  “Either way, you—you—”

  Is it easier for you, to speak out loud? Archie was the same way at first. In time he came to understand. To harmonize fully. You will—

  “Yes.”

  She hadn’t intended to say that. It just came out. It—she realized she hadn’t said it out loud at all.

  You see? Already, you are becoming one of us. Adapting to our way. It is good. It is important. Years from now, you will look back and we will laugh together at this moment, at this separation you still feel, and you will understand that—

  “Wait.”

  —it was just the pain of a growing creature, an infant secreting her first layer of armor. Nothing will feel more natural, more—

  “Wait!” Ginger said.

  we will be whole

  she is with us now

  she will always be with us

  this part makes my head hurt

  wait wait wait wait wait wait

  not right since archie died

  we will have harmony

  she will accept us

  we accept her

  “Wait!” Ginger shouted, again and again, louder and louder until she felt 3,433 of them listening, focusing on her. She had broken the harmony and immediately waves of shame, waves of humiliation rolled over her, through her. She was as disruptive as a hatchling, she was refusing to join the consensus, she was defying her sisters, perhaps we should hear her out, give her time—so many opinions, so many voices all chiming in at once—

  “Wait,” she said, softer now. Chastened, but still she needed to know. She needed to ask a question.

  The Choir had already heard it, in her thoughts.

  Years from now, yes, Rain-on-Stones said/thought/felt. I said years from now.

  “But I’m—we, I mean, we humans, I mean, our ship, we’re only here a little while longer and then we’re leaving, I’m, I’m—”

  Panic/fear/laughter/doubt/ridicule/despair went off in her head like the grand finale of a fireworks display. The Choir did not understand. The Choir had just lost one of its members. The humans had been kind enough to donate a new one, a replacement for Archie. Someone who could heal the wound he’d left. Someone to make them whole again. Someone to complete the harmony.

  “I can’t stay here,” Ginger said. “I can’t, I’m so sorry if there was a miscommunication, but—”

  We need you, Ginger, the Choir said. Rain-on-Stones said, for them. For them all. How could you deny us this, now that you’re part of us?

  “But—for—”

  For the rest of your life, of course. Your new life with the Choir.

  “Hold your ground, Bury. We can do this,” Commander Lanoe called.

  Bury twisted around on his maneuvering jets and snapped off a quick burst of PBW fire, raking the side of a Centrocor Yk.64. The enemy’s vector field sparkled as it shunted off the worst of the attack, but at least one of his rounds got through and cut deep into the fighter’s armor.

  Three more Sixty-Fours were on his tail. He spun around until he was flying backward—so much easier when you were in space, and didn’t have to worry about air resistance—and launched a PBW salvo without even bothering to aim. His pursuers fell back, just a little.

  “Where the devil is Valk?” Bury demanded. “AI or not, I’d be damned glad for his help right now.”

  “He’s not coming,” Lanoe said.

  “What? Damn you, we need—” PBW fire splashed against Bury’s canopy, dazzlingly bright, the light sharp enough to make him cry out. Red lights flashed around him, red lights he could barely see. He threw his stick over to one side, an evasive reflex, and his inertial sink stamped him down into his seat, kept him from so much as twitching his fingers as his thrusters burned, hard, pushing him to something like safety.

  Except safety was in short supply. Dead ahead a full squad of Sixty-Fours lay in wait for him, flying in a formation so tight they might have been a drill team.

  Afterimages swarmed and flared before Bury’s eyes. His body ached from sitting in one position for so long, and from g-stress from the wild maneuvers he’d been pulling. A steady red light burned on the engine board in front of him. He was running out of fuel.

  But then virtual Aldis sights started popping up all over his canopy, crosshairs showing him where his computer had found firing solutions for the enemy fighters. Bury held down his trigger, letting his BR.9 worry about aiming, and threw himself forward into a tight corkscrew maneuver, throwing himself right into the enemy’s teeth.

  They were Centrocor militia, the best pilots the poly could field.

  But Bury was Navy. And that meant something.

  The Sixty-Fours broke ranks when he made it very clear he was going to fly right into their formation if they didn’t move. Fighters spun away from each other, some having to dance quick jigs to avoid colliding with one another. Some of them were quick enough on their feet to shoot back, and Bury felt his ship vibrate as some of those shots hit home. But one of the fighters in front of him came apart in pieces, its canopy filling with orange light.

  Four, he thought. For a moment he couldn’t guess why he’d thought that. He was far too busy swinging over onto one side to avoid colliding with debris and Centrocor ships, and then he was past them, out the other side. Four, he thought again.

  The last time they’d wrestled with Centrocor, he’d taken down just one of their pilots in the entire battle. Here—well—he’d shot down another one right next to the portal, down in the planet’s atmosphere. Gotten his third when he dropped his bombs in the sea. Now he had a fourth kill to his name.

  His tactical board wailed at him, lights there telling him that three of the fighters he’d just passed were already loading AV rounds. He was showing them his backside and if even one of those rounds hit him—

  Bury spun himself around on his long axis until he could see the remains of that pretty formation behind him. Perhaps he turned about just so he could watch.

  Commander Lanoe came down from on high like an avenging angel. His twin PBW cannon were already blazing away as he twisted through some complex maneuver that Bury didn’t even have a name for. One Sixty-Four burst apart, its airfoils spinning off in random directions. Particle rounds carved right through the big bubble canopy of another—and the pilot inside. Lanoe launched an AV of his own and took down a third ship before he’d even completed his run.

  On Bury’s tactical board, the
warning lights switched off, one, two, three.

  The rest of the Centrocor squadron burned hard to escape, as if they were running from the devil himself.

  “Where are they going?” Bury asked. “Why are they turning tail?”

  “Perhaps,” Lieutenant Candless said, her voice dripping with sarcasm, “you’d like to chase after them and ask them personally.”

  “No,” Ginger said. “No, that isn’t … I can’t stay here forever. I don’t belong here. I’m not one of you—I’m a human.”

  Archie was a human, and he was one of us. Don’t you see, Ginger? The Choir is not the name of our species. It is the name of the work we do. It is the name of our purpose.

  Ginger could see it, could feel it pulsing through her head, flowing through her. She saw the city below, not as a pile of dark buildings but as a promise. A covenant made with the universe. She saw the jars hidden away deep inside that city, hidden deep and protected. She knew what was in those jars. She knew what they meant—hope. A possible future for so many species that by all rights should be extinct. She saw the great work of the Twelve, the reason they had found to go on living, even after every other chorister was dead.

  They needed her—they needed her because while Lanoe had rejected their offer, they still held out hope. Hope that other humans would take the gift they were offering.

  “You want me to be your translator. You want me to talk to humans on your behalf, well, that’s—I mean—”

  We require a human, so we can speak with humans. We require you, because without you the work cannot continue.

  It wasn’t just a job they were offering her. It was a role in a harmony larger than any one species could create, a cosmic harmony. A future history, for choristers and humans and—and the—

  Images of aliens flashed through her head, so fast they blurred together. The species the Choir had contacted, whose genetic material they had collected—

  “Enough!” she said, loud enough that they listened.

  They all listened.

  “I didn’t know,” she told them. “When I agreed to have this thing put in my head, I didn’t know you wanted me to … to take on that responsibility.” She tried to look directly into Rain-on-Stones’s eyes, but—no, she didn’t need to. They were watching her.

  Three thousand four hundred and thirty-three of them were watching her.

  She had their attention.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so, so sorry if we gave you the wrong idea. If you thought I was going to spend the rest of my life here. I’m sorry if—”

  she lied

  but she is sorry

  her contrition is sincere

  we are repugnant to them

  hatchlings are always troubled

  the choir must be complete

  why would they lie to us

  if not ginger then who

  the humans lied

  “I said I was sorry!” Ginger slapped the release for the sick bay’s hatch and hurried out into the corridor, desperate to get away. They wanted her to stay forever, wanted her to live out the rest of her life among—

  Monsters?

  “No,” Ginger said, shaking her head. Rain-on-Stones had followed her out into the corridor. She backed away slowly as the chorister lifted two arms toward her, reached for her with those huge claws. “No, I didn’t think that. I never thought you were—”

  Ginger, we can read your mind.

  Ginger clamped her eyes shut. And still, she could see everything they saw. Hear everything they heard. She could hear her own breathing, heavy and ragged, hear it with her own ears and also as Rain-on-Stones heard it.

  You thought we were ugly. You thought we were terrifying. You thought we were too big. You thought we were scaly. You thought we were faceless monstrosities.

  “I—I—can’t pretend I didn’t—”

  And for all of that, for all that we frightened you. Still you were kind to us.

  Will you be so cruel now?

  The Choir is the work. The great work of the Twelve.

  Will you reject us?

  Are we monsters?

  She had to focus. She had to stick to the original plan, not let herself get bogged down in arguing about whether she had joined them under false pretenses. “Listen,” she said. “Please. Listen. I didn’t let you operate on me so that I could join the Choir. I’m sorry if that’s what you thought. I did it because Commander Lanoe needed to be able to talk to you. He wants—

  he wants too much

  he asked and we answered

  we offered him our greatest gift

  he thinks he can defeat the blue-blue-white

  he wants us to open a new wormhole

  we told him our history but still he demands

  it is far too dangerous to consider

  it is impossible anyway

  a ludicrous demand

  “Please,” Ginger said. “Just—just consider it. You could open a wormhole between the homeworld of the Blue-Blue-White and some human planet. Commander Lanoe suggested opening it near Balor, the star where our Navy has its headquarters. A wormhole would give our Navy a way to reach them. To fight them. I know your history, now, I’ve heard it, in the harmony—it’s terrible what the Blue-Blue-White did to you. What they did to so many—”

  Monsters.

  (monsters, she thought, the alien species in the jars all looked monstrous to her, and as soon as she thought it, of course the Choir heard it, too)

  “—species. If there is any chance, even a small one, that humans could defeat that threat, if we could make the galaxy safe for … for …”

  (she’d missed something. Something important, a quiet thought almost lost in the vast rush of voices that were streaming through her head)

  “Impossible,” she said.

  Yes, Rain-on-Stones told her. Yes.

  “You said it was impossible. You—you couldn’t open a wormhole like that even if you wanted to.” It was not a question.

  It was answered anyway.

  Yes.

  Bury checked his tactical board and saw that all of the enemy ships were pulling back, away from the planet.

  “We’ve got them on the run,” he called, unable to keep the glee out of his voice.

  “That,” Lieutenant Candless said, “would be an astute tactical assessment. If it were in any way true.”

  “She’s right,” Commander Lanoe called. “Bury, move back, come over here on my left side. I have a feeling we’re about to get a nasty surprise.”

  Bury obeyed the order, moving back into formation with the other two BR.9s.

  “They’re about to bring the carrier through,” Commander Lanoe told him. “They’re moving back to screen it—a ship is never more vulnerable than when it’s exiting a wormhole throat. Be ready to smash through their wall when I give the signal.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Bury replied. He glanced over, through his canopy. He could just see Commander Lanoe inside his fighter, and beyond him, on the other side, Lieutenant Candless. He flexed his fingers, shifted around in his seat a little to ease his aching back. Took a moment to study his damage board.

  The news there wasn’t great. He’d lost his secondary thrusters and had taken significant damage to the armor around his engine. A few more hits back there would finish him off.

  Not much he could do about it, except try to keep the enemy off his tail. As always.

  “There,” Commander Lanoe said. “It’s coming through.”

  On his sensor board he could just make it out—his long-range telescopes showed him the wormhole throat, and the cylindrical mass of the carrier coming through slowly, ever so slowly. Maneuvering carefully as if it had all the time in the world. Its captain must have assumed his screen of fighters would hold.

  Bury nodded to himself. All right. They had a chance here. If they could hit the carrier hard, push it back—

  A green pearl appeared in the corner of his vision. Lieutenant Candless, sending him a priv
ate call. He flicked his eyes across the pearl to accept.

  “Ensign Bury,” she said, “I would like to tell you something, while we still have a moment. It isn’t easy for me to say—it simply isn’t in my nature.”

  “I’m listening,” Bury told her. What was she on about now? Was she going to tell him that he’d disgraced himself by letting his fighter get so damaged? Maybe she was going to insult his shooting, as she’d once insulted his flying. Perhaps she’d forgotten how he was likely to react to—

  “I wanted to say,” she told him, “how very proud I am of you.”

  Bury inhaled sharply, in surprise.

  “The quality of an instructor can only be measured by one thing. The accomplishments of her students. Today, you have made me look very good.”

  “I—I don’t know what to say.” He was utterly flummoxed. What had happened to the Lieutenant Candless he knew? Where was the sharp tongue, the critical look, the cold, analytical mind? Where was—

  “Traditionally upon receiving a compliment, one says ‘thank you.’ Or are they so boorish on Hel they don’t teach their children basic manners?”

  Oh. There she was.

  “Thank you,” Bury told her.

  And surprised himself by feeling genuine gratitude. He knew he was a good pilot. Plenty of people had told him that before. Lieutenant Candless never had. This was the very first time she’d suggested that he’d shown anything more than basic competence.

  Somehow that made all the difference.

  “Okay, get ready,” Commander Lanoe said. Bury recovered himself and looked down at his sensor board. The carrier was all the way out of the wormhole throat now, surrounded by a dense cloud of fighters. “We know how to do this,” Commander Lanoe said. “We cover each other, we punch through that screen, and we drop disruptors into that carrier until it blows up. Easy. Now—break!”

  The three of them lurched forward, their engines pushing them hard to close the distance to the carrier. Bury hit his positioning jets until he was flying a broad corkscrew around the others, squeezing off bursts of PBW fire at extreme range just in case he might hit something by accident.

  Lieutenant Candless shot down the middle of his corkscrew, leaning on her throttle until she moved so fast she was just a blur in his forward view. His tactical board showed that she already had her disruptors armed and ready to fire.