by E. R. Torre
B’taav shook his head.
“Because the Argus was the Charybdis bomb.”
“What?”
“Did you think a device capable of destroying an entire solar system would fit into a suitcase?”
“So making the bomb is...?”
“A dream. At least at this point. Where would the makers get the money and material? And if they did, just how many years do you think it would take them to build it? A hundred years, if not more. Even assuming the project was somehow started, it wouldn't be long before word of its construction leaked. At that point, Epsillon and Phaecian agents would come swarming in. Depending on who arrived first, the project would either be seized or sabotaged.”
“That’s why Francis Lane was after the bomb’s plans, rather than the device itself,” B’taav said. “She had everyone thinking the device could be towed away with the Xendos. She had them chasing after something that was all around them. How did you know?”
“Francis Lane was a strong, intelligent woman,” Merrick said. “I've had my eyes on her for quite some time. She kept most of the information about the Argus well hidden. Once she left her palace, my agents searched her files more thoroughly. We didn't discover the truth about the Argus until after you guys were in Titus. Good thing, too, as the Phaecians were more than ready to resume the war right where we left off. Once they realized schematics were all that could be retrieved from the Argus, cooler heads prevailed. We even convinced them to send Overlord Octo as an observer on the Dakota. He witnessed firsthand our good intentions of routing out the traitors and destroying that damned ship.”
“If she knew the bomb might not be replicated in her lifetime, what did Francis Lane hope to gain?”
“Maybe she hoped to start the project and leave it for her offspring. Maybe she envisioned the Royal Epsillon Empire rising once again.”
“Why did you guys keep up the facade that the Charybdis device was an imminent threat?”
“We couldn't simply assassinate a Phaecian Cardinal and one of our highest ranking Industrialists. We had to let events work themselves out. Besides, the more people on the Argus, the greater the temptation. There was too much of a risk that someone might just sprint off with the ship's knowledge. No, it was better to keep the number of people on board at a minimum. In the end, Inquisitor Cer will tell Overlord Octo how we in good faith rid ourselves of that ship and kept the War's biggest secret a secret.”
“There is more, though.”
Merrick smiled. “Of course there’s more. I’ve suspected for quite some time Stephen Gray’s industries were in league with the pirates raiding my ships. If Gray’s death at the hands of my personal agent doesn’t send a message to those bastards to stop messing with my property, then nothing will.”
B’taav nodded. Profit and loss, industrial one-upmanship. It was something so banal, yet easy to understand. The Independent suddenly felt very exhausted.
“Am I done here?”
Merrick’s smile remained firm. “Yeah. You’ve earned a good vacation. Your room aboard our ship is…”
“Number 5334, fifth level crew quarters,” General Jurgens said. It was the first time he spoke since the four were left alone. It was clear who the power in this group was and who were the underlings.
“Thank you.”
“Why don’t you come back to see me in a month or so and we’ll plot out your next job?” Merrick said.
“Sure.”
B’taav broke away from this small group and headed for the lifts. Lieutenant Daniels followed him.
“Next time,” he said. “Maybe they’ll let me catch you.”
“If it's in the script,” B'taav replied. Despite his exhaustion, he laughed. Lieutenant Daniels joined him.
Soon the elevator arrived, and the Independent was gone.
CHAPTER SEVENTY
B’taav spent the next few days resting in his room aboard the Dakota.
From his window he saw the Erebus asteroids fly by at incredible speeds. At first there were many but their numbers slowly dwindled. It wouldn’t be long before they arrived at the Titus space station. From there, everyone involved in the search for the Argus would return to their respective homes and jobs and lives.
Once, while taking a walk outside his room, B’taav spotted Maddox and Nathaniel on the ship’s leisure decks. The two had obviously grown close. Nathaniel acted like a normal child, and Maddox wisely kept up that act. If anyone suspected the boy was something more than he appeared, they never showed it.
B'taav didn't see much of Inquisitor Cer during the return trip, nor did he expect to. She was an Inquisitor, and she had to remain at the side of Overlord Octo, both as her duty and, certainly, for debriefing. Despite this, he spotted her a couple of times walking the forward decks alone and watching the stars. They avoided talking to each other, because on a military craft, every wall had ears.
After two more weeks of flight, the Dakota was hours away from the Titus Space Station. B’taav watched the station grow larger from that same forward deck. It felt like several lifetimes passed since he was this close to civilization.
“I’ll be leaving soon.”
B'taav turned. Inquisitor Cer stood beside him.
“They finished with your ship?”
“Days ago,” Cer said. “But they nonetheless had to re-check it a few more times. Just in case.”
“You'll have to pardon our suspicious nature.”
“If the roles were reversed, I would do the same to your ship. I might even be in charge of taking it apart.”
“When are you leaving?”
“Soon.”
“It’s been a pleasure working with you,” B’taav said.
For a few moments the two watched the approaching space station. She was a very old and battered piece of equipment, but she was a survivor. Until recently, the only known survivor of the Erebus explosion. That title was hers once more.
“I hope we see each other in the future,” Inquisitor Cer said. “I also hope that the circumstances for such a meeting don't prove quite this interesting.”
“Agreed,” B’taav said. “Have a good flight back.”
Inquisitor Cer gently laid her hand on B’taav’s cheek. Her stony brown eyes lost their harshness in the Dakota’s artificial lights.
“You too,” Inquisitor Cer said. She retracted her hand, turned, and walked away. B’taav remained on the forward deck. An hour later, he spotted the Xendos fly out of the Dakota and begin her slow approach to the Erebus Displacer.
For a moment, the ancient ship was parked just outside the Displacer's hollow core. And then the Displacer gate came alive with energy. The Xendos' thrusters ignited and the tiny cargo ship entered that core.
There was a burst of light and the Xendos, and Inquisitor Cer, were gone.
EPILOGUE - ONIA
The Epsillon light cruiser Goodwin exited through the Onia Displacer at exactly 1600 hours local time. The ship corrected its course and began a standard approach into the desert planet over which the Displacer orbited.
At one time, Onia was a fertile garden of a planet. When the Phaecian and Epsillon Empires assigned the Erebus system as their neutral border, the proximity of the Onia system made it a logical choice for an Epsillon Military Intelligence base. The planet’s lush flora was decimated as countless space ports, industry, and spy centers were created. Stripped of her vegetation, the planet heated up and eventually turned into a barren desert.
After the war, the Epsillon Empire abandoned the planet. All the military bases and industry were swallowed up by the shifting sands and forgotten by all but the few scavengers that remained planet side. Since then, she has housed no more than a few hundred thousand people.
“Captain Torin wanted her to go here,” Nathaniel said as the ship kissed the planet's atmosphere. “That's what he was going to tell her. Afterwards...”
B’taav and Maddox eyed the planet's yellow surface. Nathaniel chewed on his lower lip but otherwise t
ried to keep his emotions in check.
The Goodwin's heat shield glowed a fiery red as she broke into the planet's atmosphere. After a few minutes of maneuvering, B’taav had the ship on a steady course toward the airbase in the city of Monier.
The light cruiser came in for a landing just past 1650 hours. Its passengers were off the ship and their cargo was loaded into a waiting vehicle at exactly 1714 hours.
The driver of the vehicle, an ex-military man personally recommended by Lieutenant Daniels, drove the desert buggy out of the city and deep into the shifting sands that made up the planet’s surface. He kept quiet for most of the journey, though at times checked to make sure his passengers and their cargo were fine.
Nathaniel couldn’t bear to look through the buggy’s window. He had an especially hard time looking at the casket that lay in the pad behind him. His emotions grew even more pronounced when their vehicle approached the villa.
Once there, it was hard for Nathaniel to keep still. The place was withered with age, but the walls of the four main buildings still stood, even if each of their roofs collapsed in time.
B’taav asked the driver to stop in the middle of what was left of the villa's entry. He asked the driver to wait and, along with Maddox and Nathaniel, exited.
Maddox still had considerable trouble moving. While he had become proficient with the use of crutches, the soft sand proved tricky to maneuver. Nathaniel helped the Titus bartender step away from the buggy. Once done with that task, his eyes returned to the complex.
B’taav headed to the rear of the vehicle. He opened the trunk door and activated a compressed mechanized derrick. It hoisted the casket out of the buggy and onto the sand. The derrick remained locked to the casket and, after B’taav pressed a series of buttons on its control panel, the casket's antigravity function kicked in. The casket hovered a couple of feet off the sandy floor.
The derrick and casket followed B’taav as he walked back to Maddox’s side. Nathaniel stood several feet away. Tears formed in the boy’s eye as memories of his ancient home flooded his mind.
“I never thought I’d see this place again,” he whispered. Though his voice was still that of a small child’s, B’taav and Maddox thought of him as the adult he was. “I didn’t think—”
Nathaniel stopped.
“Where is it?” he asked.
“It’s behind the buildings and over a hill,” Maddox replied.
“Show me.”
They walked past the rotted villa and closer to a desert hill that lay beyond. They noticed a fragrant smell drift over the barren sands. It was coming from their destination.
“There it is,” Maddox said.
Nathaniel ran up the hill and stopped. Maddox and B’taav, followed by the derrick and casket, soon reached the boy's side. Before them was an incredible sight.
In the desert world of Onia, there existed one place that still contained a large amount of vegetation. A wild bush grew for several hundred meters into the distance. Bright red flowers protruded among vibrant green leaves. The flower’s scent overwhelmed the dusty nothingness that filled the Onia air.
Nathaniel walked to the edge of the bushes. He reached out to touch them, but stopped. The flowers were protected by thorns.
“Where is it?” he asked Maddox.
“Keep going along the edge of the bushes,” Maddox said. “You’ll find it there.”
The boy thanked Maddox and headed off. B’taav and Maddox allowed him his space, but followed nonetheless.
“What is to become of him?” B’taav asked.
“The boy will need help. Good thing for him I've suddenly got a lot of free time on my hands.”
“Sounds like you won’t have that much free time after all.”
“Let’s just say now that the purpose in my life is fulfilled and the Argus is gone, I’ve found something else to do,” Maddox replied.
“His memory imprint is already decaying.”
“I know. He gets...lost...sometimes. He'll be in the middle of a conversation and just stop talking. He'll...” Maddox paused. “I'll be by his side. I’ll make sure once the memories are gone, he grows up to be a fine, normal, and healthy man.”
Up ahead, Nathaniel stopped. He bent down and stared at a small, rectangular stone marker. He brushed the sand aside, revealing an inscription. B’taav and Maddox approached. They all read the writing on the marker.
Angela Torin, dedicated wife and mother
She belongs to the heavens now.
Nathaniel's breath grew labored and more tears rolled down his cheeks.
“She was my life,” the boy said. “When Admiral Cambridge ordered me to take the Argus into Erebus, I knew our time together was at its end. She was to be the last to leave the ship, so that I could give her my legacy, the Geist...the Geist Cube—”
He stopped talking. His voice was choked off by the emotions swelling within him.
“My very last memories from the Argus are of sitting in the Project Geist chair. It hadn't been used in a long time and it was...dusty. When all was ready I told my First Officer to turn the machine on. There was a bright light and...and I was thinking about my wife. I was going to see her immediately afterwards, to give her the cube and send her off. I was going to say goodbye. I...I must have done so, but my memories end right there.”
Nathaniel sobbed for several more minutes.
“I don’t know what I said to her. I don’t have those memories. I wish to the Gods I knew what I told her when I saw her that last time.”
B’taav instructed the derrick to lower the casket and dig a hole next to Angela Torin’s grave. In a few minutes, the machine was done.
B’taav ordered the machine out of the pit and to the casket.
“They were good people,” B’taav said. “I doubt any of us would have been able to make those sacrifices.”
“To the sacrifices of true heroes,” Maddox said.
“We commend your soul to the Gods,” Nathaniel said.
B’taav pressed a button on the derrick. It gripped and lowered Captain Nathaniel Torin’s casket into the freshly dug grave. When it reached bottom, young Nathaniel was composed. The derrick rose from the grave and buried the casket. Captain Nathaniel Torin would rest for eternity beside his beloved wife.
Nathaniel returned to the red flowers that surrounded them.
“She spent many hours in the Hydroponics level of the Argus,” Nathaniel said. “I heard from others that gardening was her greatest joy. I was so jealous. You don’t know how often I wished she would spend more time with me. I had it all wrong. I should have spent more time down there with her.”
Nathaniel reached for one of the flowers and gently pulled it to his nose.
“It smells so...beautiful.”
“When she got to Onia, she proved quite a gardener,” Maddox said. “Everything you see around us she planted. When she died, they thought the plants would die, too. They were wrong.”
“She created everything here?”
“Yes,” Maddox said.
“The plants,” Nathaniel said. “What are they?”
“Roses,” B’taav replied. “They’re roses.”
As the words left his mouth, his gaze drifted. The first wave of starlight made its presence known through the dull orange sky.
THE END