The Agathon: Book One

by Weldon, Colin

  “Fuck,” he said.

  “That’s not good. The poor girl looks like someone took a pot shot at her from inside the ship.”

  “Why would someone do this?” she said. Emerson shook his head.

  “Better go see the captain,” he said.

  Engine Room

  14:55 Martian Standard

  “It was definitely an explosive device,” said Emerson.

  “No doubt about it. We found trace elements of a polymer compound with pentaerythritol tetranitrate. Pretty crude stuff but effective if placed along one of the distribution nodes, which it was. We’re lucky the bulkheads did their job or we would not be here to talk about it.” He was still wearing half of his EVA suit, but was clambering out of it while he was talking to Barrington. Boyett was beside him looking pensive.

  “You’re telling me someone on board this ship tried to blow us up?” Barrington said.

  “Looks that way, and the visual sensors on that deck were deactivated three minutes prior,” Emerson said. The captain went quiet.

  “Captain, we need to land to repair the outer hull,” Tosh said, breaking the silence in the engine room.

  “Who knows about this?” Barrington said, sidestepping Tosh’s comment.

  “Just the crew on the EVA and us, but it’s a small ship, Captain,” said Emerson. Barrington turned to Tosh.

  “You want to land the ship?”

  Tosh looked at the lifeless Betty. “Going into hyperspace with a hull breach this size is not recommended,” he said. “The gravitational distortion could destabilise the integrity of the hull and we all know that’s not a good thing.” Barrington nodded and turned to leave.

  “Charly, you’re with me,” he said to Boyett, who quickly followed step. They left the engine room and made their way into the hallway of the ship. Barrington was silent until they reached the lift.

  “Bridge,” he said out loud. “Well?” he said to Boyett.

  “Well?” she responded, raising an eyebrow.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “Sounds like our friend is back,” she said.

  “This is all we need right now. Christ,” Barrington said, hitting the side panels of the lift with a closed fist. The doors of the lift opened up to the bridge and the pair stepped off. The bridge went quiet. Barrington took the centre seat as Boyett relieved Chavel from flight, who then retook his station. Tyrell was at the rear of the bridge at a science station conducting star mapping. Barrington thought for a moment. His thought process for dire situations was a disciplined one. He began segmenting each problem into its own containment area within his mind. He walled the issues with fortified structures and accessed them only in order of priority. This was an easy choice. He had to fix the ship first.

  “David, what are the conditions of the nearby planets? Any of them suitable to land on?” he said. Chavel looked at the captain.

  “There is no atmosphere present on any of the planets sir, but gravitationally the second planet is two thirds that of Earth.”

  “Charly, set a course,” Barrington said.

  “Aye, sir,” she said. She seemed to get a sudden surge of enthusiastic energy. Barrington had to guess that deep inside she was glad to be finally flying something. The star field began to shift in the viewing screens as the ship was manoeuvred towards the dead planetary system. Barrington looked at the view screen.

  “Barrington to Carrie Barrington,” he said, touching the comm panel.

  “Carrie here,” came a swift response.

  “You okay, Dice?” he asked.

  “I’m good. A little shaken but none the worse for wear.”

  “Good,” he said. “Can you come to the bridge please?” he added.

  “Sure thing,” she said. He had not asked her to formally come to the bridge before and could hear her surprise. Not unlike when he called her to his room when she was young and had misbehaved.

  “Be there in five,” she added and clicked off the comms.

  He turned to Tyrell. “Tyrone, any idea where the hell we are?” Tyrell had been looking at the captain curiously.

  “Yes. We are one hundred and twenty-seven light years from the Sol system. The only star system within ten light years is the one white dwarf system we are currently on route to, designated Beta 32442-99/GH. There is very little information on it unfortunately, other than the reference. It was deemed to be of little astronomical relevance. The Agathon’s course would not appear to have been altered by the explosion. While there are G type stars we could travel to which would provide a more hospitable environment to humans, I would agree using the FTL with a compromised hull would not be advisable.”

  He returned to his readings and began scanning the surrounding area.

  “Thank you, Doctor,” Barrington said, still looking at the view screens. The lift doors opened and Carrie walked onto the bridge. Chavel met her gaze and smiled.

  “Boyett, you have the con,” Barrington said and stood from his chair. He walked over to Carrie and placed a hand on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. She reciprocated by holding his arm. He walked to the lift and stepped inside. He waited for Carrie to enter, then told the lift their destination. They stood quietly for a moment.

  “I have a job for you. I want it done quickly and quietly.” Carrie nodded as he relayed his instructions to her mentally. There was a look of shock on her face as he told her about the explosive device.

  “I’ll try,” she said out loud.

  Carrie Barrington’s Quarters deck 8

  16:45 Martian Standard

  Carrie’s quarters were simple. A double bunk in the corner of the room was positioned next to a floor to ceiling window, allowing for magnificent views into the unending vista of space. A pair of man’s boots lay at the foot of the bed. She had to remind herself they were there in case her father walked in. She had told Chavel not to leave his things lying about, but men would be men. A small flower decorated the centre table of the rectangular space. She kept the lights low and made her way over to it. She lifted the table up carefully and placed it out of the way. She unbuttoned the top fastenings of her jumpsuit to give her some air and knelt on the soft flooring. She closed her eyes and slowed her breathing, as the drawbridge of her mind let slack the chains that held it locked.

  She awoke in her castle in front of a battlement, staring down at the faces of those on board The Agathon. They stared up at her blankly from across the moat. Slowly she reached her arm up and beckoned them to enter. One by one they started to walk towards the drawbridge, which had settled on the surrounding grass. As they each entered the courtyard, their voices began to drift upwards towards her. Their mouths remained closed, but the voices seemed to carry in the surrounding air. The sound of whispers swelled up as the intimate thoughts of hundreds began to merge into a swell of voices. She closed her eyes as the mayhem of it began to overwhelm her.

  “Stop!” she shouted at the top of her lungs, while placing both hands facing out as if to fend off an attack from a wild animal.

  “You will wait your turn!” she shouted into the onslaught of thoughts. The noise subsided as the courtyard full of The Agathon’s crew and passengers stared up at her. She saw her father, David, Doctor Tyrell and the others all looking at her with blank expressions, awaiting her commands. She walked across a stone-covered path and made her way down a carved stone staircase. The crowd watched her as she descended. They split apart and made a path for her to walk through.

  “Okay,” she said quietly to the waiting faces.

  “Let’s begin.” She stretched out her arms and faced her palms to the sky. Her guests followed suit. She began to walk amongst them, grazing their fingertips as she passed. Each time she touched a hand her mind was flooded with images. She touched Chanda Pell, a botanist from the colony on Mars. A slender Indian woman who grew the most beautiful ger
aniums she had ever seen. She saw through her eyes as she let herself drift into her mind. She saw the hydroponics bay with Chanda’s eyes, as she tended to the growing trees and foliage. Her mind was clear. Unclouded. At peace. It lingered on thoughts of a man. Her husband. She found herself in a wheat field on a sunny day, unfolding a large blanket on the ground and laying her head on his lap as his fingers coursed through her hair. The sun felt warm as sadness filled her. She imagined what he may have been doing when the ground on which he was standing vaporised. She wondered if he felt any pain. She buried the pain and tended to the greenery. Carrie opened her eyes and touched the hand next to hers. Douglas Griffiths, a dark-haired man in his forties. One of the Atmo Two technicians from Yorkshire in England. She had met him only once. He was a quiet man with a soft way about him. He was in his quarters reading an old spy novel on a clear pad. He loved to read and had thousands of listings. He wished he were more social and feels lonely on the ship. His time in the main machine room of Atmo Two flashed past her mind. Fixing, tinkering, monitoring, reading. A solid working man with no family. Insufferably shy, but a gifted mechanical mind. A mind that could do no harm. She moved past him and glanced at another open palm. Trisha Davenport, a solidly built security officer sent from the Jycorp Station. Like Griffiths, she was in her quarters but not reading. She was out of breath. Carrie felt the strength of her heartbeat as she raised and lowered her body close to the floor, repeating push up after push up. She had a disciplined mind. She found comfort in routine. She was no stranger to battle. Her thoughts were of a gunfight in a dark rundown city on Earth. Someone was killed. A man she was with. She was alone and surrounded. She opened fire against an unseen enemy, but was hit in the chest by a pulsar. Her thoughts returned her to her room as she continued to exercise. Carrie stayed with her mind, following her thoughts through her transfer to the ship right up to the present moment.

  After a minute of scanning she moved on to another. She touched the hands of as many of the crew as she could. Ed Clifford, a young chemist from the Jycorp Station, originally from Toronto. Dezydery Castellarnau, a twenty-four-year-old German medic from the colony, now stationed in the medical bay under Doctor Brubaker. She was struggling to cope with the loss of her entire family on Earth. Carrie knew her mind and she moved on quickly. This girl could not harm anyone. She moved through the courtyard. A representation of David Chavel stood before her. She pulled her hand back and moved past him. There was no need to move into his mind. They had shared enough to know what she needed to know. Charly Boyett’s outstretched fingers met hers. She saw her on the bridge. She felt no fear. Her mind was confident and daring. She watched the view screens as the approaching planet grew in size. Her mind was focused. She felt the ship under her fingers responding to her delicate movements. She felt anger towards whoever would attempt to destroy it. The ship had been her baby. The sadness she repressed was kept at bay with trained and deliberate purpose. Carrie left her mind. She touched another. Erin Canaleta, a thirty-year-old biochemist from the colony. She was in a lab staring at a small Holo image of a young girl. Her daughter.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered at the image. Carrie’s mind was filled with images of the girl in a hospital bed. Her face had sunken black eyes as the life signs faded on the medical readout above her bed. Her mind became flooded with a multitude of flashing images of the birth, life and death of the little girl.

  Carrie withdrew from her mind, unable to stand the onslaught of sadness. She stopped in the courtyard and stared at the faces of The Agathon’s personnel. She felt pain and something else. Something that did not belong. There was little in the minds of The Agathon’s crew to indicate motive for destructive acts. She continued her search through the crowd of minds. Kristina Padrosa, a thirty-four-year-old engineer. Abigail Storer, a thirty-one-year-old engineer. Oliver Alcoverro, a thirty-six-year-old physicist. Harry Featherstone, a forty-one-year-old mathematician. Atanazja Roach, a twenty-eight-year-old FTL technician. Leigh Jordan, a thirty-three-year-old plasma engineer.

  Doctor Tyrone Tyrell. “GET THE FUCK OUT!” came the ferocious scream. Carrie was thrown across the courtyard by a blast of energy, as the images of The Agathon’s crew shattered into a thousand pieces.

  She covered her ears for fear they would burst. She looked at the broken shards of the people as they began to fall in pieces all around her like snowflakes. The black figure of her dreams stood in the centre of the courtyard. A man-sized version of The Black under containment in Tyrell’s lab.

  “Insects!” it screamed. It moved forward towards Carrie. She crawled backwards towards the entrance to the castle. It slithered across the courtyard, forming tentacles with its liquid surface. They extended towards her, as she managed to get to her feet and run to the entrance.

  “Weapons,” she screamed as the tentacles of the liquid monster reached for her throat. From within the castle walls an arsenal of pulse cannons emerged from the walls and began to fire a ferocious volley of bright energy pulses against the intruder. Carrie closed her eyes as the deep vibrating screams of The Black echoed within the castle walls. It began to change colour and vibrate, as it released its tentacle from around her neck and exploded with a bright white light.

  Carrie opened her eyes suddenly. The jolt back into consciousness sent her reeling backwards and into a side table that she had moved.

  It smashed under her weight, sending small shards of glass into her skin. She fought to catch her breath as the memory of the unexpected intruder in her mind remained burned into her eyes. She reached down and looked at her cut hands. The injuries were minor. She picked herself off the ground and straightened her hair. Walking over to the washbasin, she steadied her nerves. There was something evil on board this ship. And that something was linked with Tyrone Tyrell. She saw nothing in his mind, but something attacked. Something more powerful telepathically than she was. She turned on the overhead light and looked into the mirror. Her face was slightly cut on one side but nothing a dermal regenerator could not heal. Her eyes caught a glimpse of something standing behind her. A dark figure was behind her. She screamed and turned. The empty room looked back.

  She fought to regain control of her exploding heart.

  “Easy, Carrie,” she said to herself under a panicked breath.

  “All hands, this is the captain,” came her father’s voice. “As some of you may be aware, we have sustained some damage which requires us to land on a nearby planet to repair. As this is something we have not attempted yet with this vessel, I would ask that you begin preparations by securing your quarters and workstations and strapping in while we conduct the manoeuvre. Stand by for atmospheric entry, in twenty-three minutes. Barrington out.”

  Carrie looked out the large window at the grey planet approaching. The feeling of something in her mind began to scare her. As if something had been left behind during her scans of the crew. She drew water in the basin and threw it onto her face.

  “Tyrell to Carrie Barrington,” came the calm voice over her comm panel. She froze.

  “Tyrell to Carrie Barrington,” he said again calmly.

  “Carrie here, Doctor. Go ahead.”

  “Would you mind coming to my lab as soon as possible? I need your assistance securing the equipment before we touch down on the planet.” She looked at her reflection in the mirror and tried to let go of the images.

  “Be there in five minutes, Doctor. Carrie out,” she said more abruptly than she had planned to before cutting off the transmission. There was something strange about his tone. She finished cleaning her hands and decided she would make a quick stop-off at the medical bay to heal her cuts before going to the lab. She looked under her bed at the container, which held her pulse gun, but let it be. Just checking that it was still there.

  14

  Agathon Bridge

  16 days since departure

  13:00 Martian Standard

  “Okay everybody, stay ale
rt. Let’s just take this nice and easy and by the numbers. Charly, you have complete abort authority if you don’t like what you see. Just blow the dorsal thrusters and get us up. Clear?” Barrington said to Boyett, as she began easing the ship into the gravitational pull of the planet.

  “Got it, sir,” she replied. Her focus on the view screens was laser-like.

  “Chavel, keep an eye on the terrain gradients.”

  “Sir,” he replied, looking over the computer displays of the surface. Jerome Young had joined them and was sitting at one of the stations looking at mappings of the planet. It was desolate. Like a dust cloud had descended on the whole surface from a volcanic eruption. The thin white light of the mother star cast an eerie glow over the peaks and valleys of the scarred world.

  “Looks like there were oceans here, sir,” said Chavel.

  “Let’s see it,” Barrington answered. Chavel flicked the images of the sea beds onto the far left viewer, to leave the centre viewer clear for Boyett to navigate. Barrington stroked his chin with one of his fingers. Boyett gave the images a quick glance and saw what Chavel was talking about. Huge sea beds regressed from a large central continent, as if they had just emptied themselves into space. What was now a grey desert world looked like it had been sucked dry.

  “Amazing,” Barrington said under his breath.

  “One hundred and twenty kilometres,” Boyett said, bringing them back into the moment.

  “David, let’s get these struts out,” Barrington said calmly.

  “Yes, sir, activating landing struts.” He tapped some commands into his panel and waited. He tapped the commands in again.

  “Eh, sir, I have a negative response on the landing struts.” Boyett flicked her eyes towards the captain, but maintained her steady approach.

  “Barrington to engine room,” he said with a slight urgency in his voice.

  “Emerson here, sir. Bear with me two minutes, we’re working on it. One of the outer doors is jammed.” There was silence on the comms as Barrington remained silent.