Guess we’re about to find out what’s up, Williams thought as he got up from his chair. “Nereid, you still good for this?”
She nodded. “Yes, I will be fine.”
Nereid stood next to the transport’s main exit, using her psionic powers to extend the reach of the overshield as the doors opened, giving everyone access to the tormented world outside. Her abilities were quick to filter out the heat and radiation that had been lurking on the surface for years. It drew an impressed look from Rivera while she scanned and read the data that outputted to the holographic screen of her EAD, confirming it was safe for them to exit outside into a protective bubble, conjured by Nereid’s thoughts.
“Wait, you guys are going to step out just like that?” Chang called out to them from the cockpit.
“Shouldn’t be an issue if we’re quick,” Williams said to him.
“Our track record in Sirius isn’t too good,” Chang said. “How many times have we stopped to take a look and ran into trouble?”
Williams retreated to the rear cabin. “Rivera, you said this was a merc ship, right?”
“Probably, or an Imperial one masquerading as one,” she said.
Williams looked up grinning at the overhead storage compartments where weapons and equipment were normally kept. “Last time I checked, mercs liked guns,” Williams said, reaching up and pulling the storage compartment open.
Hashmedai weapons fell to the floor with a loud clatter. Plasma rifles, pistols, and swords of varying sizes made a small pile in front of Williams. He shifted through it handing off pistols or rifles to everyone.
Rivera pushed the rifle he offered her back at him. “I don’t like violence, remember?”
“Yeah, yeah, Zen pacifist stuff, I forgot,” Williams said, and tossed the rifle in the air. Chang shiftily grabbed it as he joined them.
“What’s the game plan?” Chang asked as he powered it on.
Williams stood next to the opened exit of the transport and watched the hellish landscape. “The game plan is the same as our original exit strategy,” Williams said. “Make it up as we go, with guns blazing if necessary.”
Nereid stepped outside first and, with a quick flick of her wrists, forced the psionic bubble to reduce the light levels around her. Sirius A was after all bright enough to instantly blind unprotected human eyes. Williams joined her after tucking a plasma pistol in his pocket. Rivera and Bailey followed, all took care not to distract Nereid too much as she walked forward, keeping the bubble around them. Should her barrier fail because she lost focus, they’d be vaporized by the heat instantly.
Williams grimaced when he looked back at the transport. Blue light traversed around a barrier covering it, meaning its shields were keeping it safe. Nereid’s overshield protection had faded in order for her to maintain the bubble they used to trek across the surface. We need to hurry this up; the transport’s shields won’t last long in this heat.
“Well, there it is,” Nereid said as she stopped in front of a silver-colored metallic sculpture. “What do you think it does?”
Rivera kneeled next to the object, passing her EAD scanner above and around it. The EAD’s results populated its small holographic screen. “Whatever it is, it’s blazing hot, probably not a good idea to touch it until it cools.”
Nereid extended her hand above the object and forced a psionic barrier to appear around it. “The best I can do is shield it and prevent the heat from escaping,” she said, showing visual signs of mental agitation across her face.
“Good enough for me, let’s go,” Williams said.
Nereid took care of bringing the object back as the four went to backtrack to their transport and it’s failing shields, past the uneven hills and rivers of lava flowing. A mesmerizing sight in the skies above them blotted out the sunlight from Sirius, drenching the landscape with darkened levels of light.
Williams looked up. Williams’ jaw dropped.
He hoped the UNE ships would arrive quickly, the opposite of what he was wishing seconds earlier. A majestic vortex appeared high above, red and magenta clouds spewing away from it amongst frightening lights of thunder bolts.
“A storm in space . . .” Williams said with concern. “Bailey, is this what you and the others saw the night we vanished?”
Bailey nodded having viewed the phenomenon brewing in space above them. “Yes, this is exactly what it looked like.”
Organic ships appeared from the clouds in droves. Alongside the ships were the flapping wings of dragons, seemingly resistant to the heat, radiation, and hostilities of space and the planet they were on as they swooped down, descending to their location. The invaders had arrived.
“Shit! Alright, let’s move, people!”
The dragons were quick to move. They appeared simply as dots amongst the ships that emerged from the clouds, growing in size within a matter of seconds to large reptilian creatures shrieking their cries of oncoming death toward the four that ran back to their transport. The dragons repeatedly collided with Nereid’s barrier like dive-bombing hawks. Dragons that were augmented with cybernetics sent quick pulses of tachyon beams upon them and their transport, and others opened their mouths and allowed waves of plasma to burn from it.
Ignoring the assault from above and the thoughts of what the invader fleet had planned to do with the Sirius system, they ran past the rocks, craters, and such amidst the diving dragons, immune to the hostile environment. A barrage of tachyon beams crashed into the ground, the explosive blast in the aftermath tossed the four to the ground, cooled by Nereid’s gifts, gifts that were quickly fading. Williams pushed himself back up, relieved to see the opened transport door was close, distraught as he saw Nereid panic and attempt to backtrack.
She’d dropped the object, and as long as she continued to look for where it had dropped, their bubble would remain stationary as it only moved with her. If she didn’t board the transport for their escape, then none of them did.
“Nereid, let’s go!” Williams shouted as the circling dragons above prepared their next attack.
Nereid’s attention remained fixed on the fallen object, outside of the reach of her bubble. “But the device—”
“Fuck it, we got to get out of here.”
Nereid remained stationary as did his eyes on the dropped device. Running back to retrieve the object was risky as it would be more time outside, more distractions for Nereid’s mind to deal with, and a greater chance of her bubble shattering. He wanted the object in their possession just as much as she did, after all, it could very well hold the answers to the many questions in regard to their disappearance from Sirius.
Answers they’d never get if they remain outside any longer. Williams tugged on Nereid’s shoulder, pulling her closer to the transport. They had to leave it behind.
The second wave of dive-bombing followed by tachyon blasts, the terrorizing show of chaos that came in the aftermath, saw the four close the last two meters needed to board their idle transport. Rivera and Bailey boarded first, Williams was due to step in next, when he ran into the protective bubble, meaning that Nereid retreated backward, forcing it to move with her.
“What the hell?” Williams spat as he spun to face Nereid and her unexplained action. “Nereid, seriously, we need to get back to the transport—”
Williams caught wind of her reasoning.
The circling dragons above were no longer circling. Rather they stood calmly on the smoldering terrain. A figure walked away from the standing gathering of dragons, a stunning woman suited up in a dragon-inspired armored dress with long, flowing blonde hair. She was armed with a Voelika, just like Nereid and used its power to create a bubble-like barrier around her.
Williams’ voice grew firm as he repeatedly cursed and pleaded for Nereid to return to the transport, words that went unanswered. Nereid moved to retrieve the artifact and then stood gawking at it and the woman with her gathering of dragons. Both parties showed no signs of hostilities toward each other as the mysterious and armored w
oman rested the palms of her hands upon Nereid’s psionic bubble, causing an oval section of it to glow orange then fade. The mysterious woman entered Nereid’s bubble as if the newly created oval was a doorway. She eyed Williams, forcing his breathing and heartbeat to race, it made him wonder if he was about to experience the last moments of his life.
The woman brought the figure at the end of her Voelika forward, and eyed Nereid next with a stern glare. Nereid bowed before the woman and kissed the figure on her Voelika. Williams winced. “Nereid, what are you doing?”
“Begging for forgiveness,” Nereid said.
“Okay, well, when you’re done with that, can you ask her really nicely if we can go back to the transport with the artifact and not get attacked?” Williams said.
“She needs it,” Nereid said as her hands slowly offered the artifact to the woman.
“So do we, and you know that.”
“Yes, but—”
“I’m not going to pretend I know a lot about your culture and religion, Nereid. But these dragons and this woman? They’re the enemy; they’ve taken the lives of innocents across the galaxy and not long ago were trying to kill us.”
The woman set her Voelika aside in preparation to receive Nereid’s offering to her with both hands.
“It’s not that easy,” Nereid said.
“Yes, it is, tell her to fuck off. Don’t let her manipulate you.”
“Please, Williams, do not make me choose,” Nereid’s voice became apprehensive. “The Goddess will not be pleased with me.”
Williams retrieved his hidden pistol and took aim in the direction of the two. “Don’t make me choose, either.”
The mysterious woman stopped and glared at Williams and the new threat he unexpectedly became.
Nereid made her choice.
The mysterious woman was about to make hers.
Williams made his and pulled the trigger.
Two bolts of plasma shot the artifact from the hands of the mysterious woman. Her voice snarled as a result and then later, her psionic powers. Everything became a blur to Williams afterwards. His body was pushed to the right, then to the ceiling of the bubble, then someplace else. It was most likely by telekinesis powers. His plasma pistol had flung out from his hands when he finally crashed onto the ground, amidst the sounds of multiple Voelikas charging with psionic energy, and Nereid and the mysterious woman having at each other.
Williams pushed his body up and grinned having caught a glimpse of a ship that emerged in the horizon over the mountains, one he didn’t recognize.
He assumed the worst and hoped his death would be quick and painless.
39 Foster
XSV Johannes Kepler
On approach to Sirius wormhole, Wolf 359 system
August 12, 2118, 16:55 SST (Sol Standard Time)
Captain Rebecca Foster gave the personal computer in her quarters a long glance. The qmail message inbox was devoid of any messages in regard to Williams, other than the approval messages IESA and the UNE government left her, granting her request for him and the rest of the Carl Sagan’s crew to be reinstated and placed back under her command. A message her mother sent, stating that Williams had left with Chang to go on a camping trip was the last message she received from Sirius.
Damn it, Dom, you picked the worst time to be out of range of a relay tower, she thought while shutting the computer off to slip into her uniform.
Foster exited her quarters moments later and smiled at the stars moving outside the ship, visible from the observation windows. It was a splendid feeling, knowing that she was once again back on a ship, in command of it at that, flying toward her next mission, flying to the Sirius system were it all started.
She rode the lift down to the middle deck, musing at the fact that a trip to Sirius via FTL and utilizing connecting UNE-built wormholes, took less than a day, opposed to the seventeen years it took for the Carl Sagan to arrive via sub light directly from Earth. Foster swung into the labs before marching onto the bridge to check-in with Odelea. The two never did get the chance to speak much after their departure from the station to travel to Sirius.
Foster gasped loudly as she entered. The lab was stuffed full of equipment Odelea had brought over to the Kepler . . . including a containment field chamber that housed one of the so-called Dragon Knights. He didn’t look pleased to be held prisoner as Odelea stood before it, running tests, Foster figured. Tests that Foster was not made aware of.
“Odelea . . .” Foster groaned as she approached her.
“Greetings, Captain, how are you?” Odelea said, keeping her face buried amongst hovering holo screens.
“I know I said to bring what you need, but . . .”
Odelea faced Foster, folding her hands before her waist in a prim and proper manner. “I need all of this, and more, but it was the best the Union could do given the limited time.”
Foster gestured to the Dragon Knight as it sat upright, mumbling to itself in its strange language. “You didn’t tell me about that.”
“He will not bring harm to anyone so long as the containment field is active.”
“And when it isn’t?”
“The crew without HNI will be the only ones able to subdue him,” Odelea said. “Furthermore, I had a secondary damping field installed within this lab. Should it escape, its ability to hack HNI will still be neutralized until it leaves the lab itself.”
“You really should have checked with me first about this,” Foster said face-palming.
“He is the sole reason why I have made so much progress toward understanding their people. Without him, I have little else to work with. It is imperative we keep him here.”
The thought of a powerful enemy being held as a POW, prodded and tested on her ship without her consent, annoyed Foster. Their mission, at the end of the day, was to prove to the invaders they weren’t their enemy, what Foster saw before her would convey otherwise. If Sirius hadn’t been a stone’s throw away, she would have ordered the Kepler back to the station to get rid of the Dragon Knight. If Odelea had to go as a result, so be it. A crew member doing things behind Foster’s back had no place on her ship.
“Odelea, I can’t guarantee it’s going to say—”
The Dragon Knight threw itself onto the force field keeping it in place, making direct eye contact with Foster. Its finger pointed at the alien tattoos that dressed Foster’s hands and began to speak to her in its language.
Foster stepped past Odelea, standing directly in front of the field and the vicious and dangerous human-looking alien inside clad with its dragon-like armor. “What in the hell do you want with us?” she asked, not that it would understand.
“With us?” Odelea said, flicking through page after page of holographic notes. “He seems to have taken great interest in you.”
“What is he saying?”
Odelea’s finger slithered down the holographic note written in the Radiance language. “I’m not sure; I will need some time to translate it as none of these words are in my notes.”
Foster nodded and went to take her leave. “Let me know when you’ve found somethin’.”
She arrived on the bridge after walking through the straight corridor. Pierce was awake and sitting at the science officer’s station, a steaming mug of coffee was resting on it. Foster made a mental note to ask him where he got it, there was no coffee maker in her quarters or office, and she sure as hell could have gone for one.
EVE’s faux humanoid hands performed the last adjustments and modifications to the remaining computers on the bridge, allowing for personnel without HNI to use them with ease. All the while, she remotely operated the ship, flying it toward its intended destination of the Sirius system via the wormhole network.
Foster smirked at Tolukei, grateful that Radiance allowed him to return and serve under her command once again, and grateful he was all too pleased to man the shipboard psionic station once again.
“Tolukei, good to see you back in action,” she said, taking her
seat in the captain’s chair.
Tolukei rubbed the sides of his neck. “It is . . . finally good to not have that slave collar on.”
Foster reviewed the ship’s readiness via a holo pad, everything was green. Her qmail inbox, however, remained unchanged, nor were there any other notifications that would have given her better insight as to where they could get ahold of Williams and Chang once they entered the system.
“EVE, any word from the UNE in Sirius?” Foster asked.
“Nothing, Captain, would you like me to try follow-up with them again?”
“Please, I’m gonna need my team back in order to pull this mission off.”
“Contacting UNE command in the Sirius system, please standby,” EVE said, and then replied a second later. “I am unable to establish a connection via the QEC network. Attempting to use other nodes, please standby.” EVE paused briefly, searching for another means of sending a message to Sirius via QEC. “There is no response, Captain, the Sirius network appears to be down.”
“Are you sure it’s Sirius?”
“Yes, Captain, the QEC is only able to establish a communication to a fixed point. The QEC aboard the Kepler, for example, can only communicate with Amicitia Station 14, which in turn must relay the signal to other nodes throughout UNE-controlled space, eventually reaching Sirius.”
QECs were able to send transmissions faster than the speed of light, and so if there was a problem within the network, it shouldn’t take long for an android like EVE to try all possible relays, and conclude which was operating correctly, and which wasn’t.
“Captain, I have also confirmed with Amicitia Station 14 ops that Sirius has indeed gone dark,” EVE added.
Butterflies filled her stomach as worst-case scenarios came into Foster’s head. None of them saw a pretty outcome. They were unable to contact Sirius, and no new messages were received from Williams. The system, as far as she was concerned, just got consumed by the fog of war. A fog that rendered the fate of her team there, unknown, along with her mother.
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