by H. G Ahedi
The admiral appeared at the door. Rage stirred inside Adrian, but before he could say anything, Dr. Kent came out of nowhere.
“Are you happy now?” Dr. Kent shouted at the top of his lungs.
The entire docking bay came to a standstill.
“Doctor . . .”
“You arrogant son of a bitch! Could you for once in your bloody life listen to someone?”
Anastasia came and stood between Dr. Kent and Admiral Donavan. “Gentlemen, please.”
“This is unacceptable. What you did was wrong!” Dr. Kent yelled. “Because of you, an innocent girl is dead. You and your stupid rules! We could have saved her.” Dr. Kent’s voice trailed off.
Argon and Emmeline appeared at the door. Looking at Emmeline, Adrian felt worse than ever. She looked as if life had left her. Her face was pale, her lips dry, and her eyes sunken in despair. The death of Delta had taken her soul. Argon held her, and she walked like a person who had been sick for years. Adrian didn’t have the heart to ask her about Delta, but he wanted to. Everyone fell silent as Argon helped Emmeline out of the docking bay. The doors closed behind them.
“We’re all angry. The best thing to do is stay calm,” said Anastasia.
Dr. Kent looked at Jacob as if planning to eat him alive. “I have always obeyed the rules set by the Imperial Command, and I have respected your judgment despite our disagreements. I trusted you. I was blind. I thought you could see what I saw. I didn’t realize I was making robots, not scientists, and I punished my students for thinking out of the box because the Imperial Command wants everything fucking neat. I punished Emmeline just for being curious. But today . . . I realized something. You are a monster! You have no humanity left in you! You took away a life, and destroyed our chances of studying the portal. You think so highly of yourself, you are the real criminal!”
“Chris, my friend I…”
“I am not your friend. Not anymore. We are done and I will not forget this.” Dr. Kent stormed out.
Jacob looked at Anastasia. “Is there anything you want to add?”
Adrian wanted to punch him, but he controlled himself.
“Just this,” she said coldly. “You had more friends twenty-four hours ago. Emphasis on the word had.”
Titan, Deck 3, Medical Bay 1
Anastasia wasn’t in the mood, but Dr. Finch wanted to tell her something very important. She entered Medical Bay 1 and felt her stomach churn as she eyed the six corpses of the Orias. A part of her wished they would just vanish so she could handle the situation with Emmeline. She had to save her; she hadn’t been able to save Delta, and that would haunt her for the rest of her life. She tried not to be emotional, but she had no idea how she was going to tell a mother she had lost her only child.
“Thank you for coming, Commander,” said Aceline, studying her face. “Are you all right?”
“Yes. Thank you. Tell me what you found.”
The medical lab was a small section of the medical bay, which was an extensive medical facility for the colonists and crew of Titan. There were three medical bays in total, but this one was the biggest. The lab was separated from the hospital by a gray wall with a large window and was equipped with the latest medical equipment.
Dr. Finch beckoned Anastasia toward the console. On it was the face of a young man with thick blond hair, blue eyes, and a chubby face.
“Who is this?” Anastasia asked.
“Ensign Tyler Lore. The vertebra Emmeline found in the debris belonged to him.”
Anastasia’s heart melted. Tyler was as old as Delta. Another young life lost. Part of her didn’t want to know any more.
“He served aboard Nightingale, an Earth ship that disappeared without a trace thirty years ago.”
The computer showed pictures and profiles of the rest of the crew. Anastasia wondered what had happened to them.
“The Nightingale’s last known coordinates were in Sector 256 of Tetra System that was surveyed by Prometheus two years ago. They found no traces of the ship or the crew,” reported Dr. Finch. He turned to the corpses that lay on the observation beds.
“Are any of them . . .?” asked Anastasia, trying to put her mind at ease.
“Human? No, but one thing is curious,” he said, walking toward the two corpses at the far end of the hall. “These two are from the same species, and so are the limb and the head that we found. The Orias are intriguing. Warm-blooded. We could say mammals like you and me. Their blood is green, and they’re very smelly. They’re vertebrates, and they have circulatory, muscular, digestive, and neurological systems. Their circulatory and neurological systems take up most of their energy, and interestingly, they have very slow digestive systems, meaning that they don’t have to eat very often.”
“What do they eat?” Anastasia asked.
“Anything living.”
“You mean they’re carnivorous?”
“Yep.”
“Okay. What else?”
“They have three lungs and require an oxygen-nitrogen environment to survive, but they can survive in thinner air. The third lung can store oxygen. While you and I would die in a couple of minutes without oxygen, these fellows can survive for over an hour at least.” Dr. Finch walked toward one of the corpses he had just autopsied. The insides of the alien’s body were gray.
Anastasia tried not to puke. “Let’s talk about communication. How do you think they might communicate?”
“By roaring.”
“What?”
“Yes. Animals communicate using signals, visual and auditory. From what I can understand, the Orias communicate with each other using sound-based signals.”
“So, they’re not telepathic?”
“No. They’re less likely to be telepathic themselves, but I think they’re controlled telepathically.”
“Controlled?” Anastasia asked.
“After examining their brain’s anatomy and physiology, it seems unlikely that they can strategize, but from what we’ve seen, they do.”
“So, something or someone is controlling them.”
“Yes. There has to be a controller of some sort on the Orias ship, or they are controlled by a very powerful telepathic being.”
“Okay. Anything else?”
“The age,” Aceline remarked.
Anastasia smiled at her.
“It seems the Orias do not age,” Dr. Finch said.
Anastasia looked from one doctor to the other. “That’s impossible.”
“Not for the Orias. Let’s take a look at the tissue samples.” He moved in front of a screen. “I’ve taken samples from each specimen for comparison.”
“These look identical,” Anastasia said.
“They are, and they show no signs of cellular degeneration.”
She turned to glare at him.
He continued. “Let’s say a boy of ten years, a middle-aged woman, and an old man are turned into Orias. They’ll have no cellular degeneration as long as they live. It’s like the aging gene is switched off.”
“They’re immortal?” Anastasia asked.
“Let’s just say that they don’t degenerate, but as you can see, they can be killed,” Dr. Finch explained. “It’s like their original bodily mechanisms just freeze.”
“But this information is invaluable for us,” Aceline added with a smile.
“How?”
“We can calculate at what time their original bodily mechanisms froze and determine how long they have been Orias.”
Dr. Finch smiled. “We’ve already found a pattern.” He led Anastasia to the first body on the left. “His bodily functions stopped approximately two hundred years ago.” Dr. Finch walked to the next one. “This one became an Orias about ninety years ago.” He came to stand at the next table. “He has been an Orias for about fifty years, and these three Orias, including those we’ve just found a few body parts from, have been a part of the Orias for the last twenty years.”
“Oh my God,” Anastasia whispered.
“It
means these could be the last species they might have eradicated before they showed up in our solar system.”
Anastasia felt a wave of unease wash over her. She stared at the bodies, hoping no one on Titan would turn into that.
Titan, Deck 1, Anastasia’s office
Everyone waited silently as Jacob went through the reports submitted by Dr. Finch and Aceline. Anastasia glanced at Adrian. He was still pale, but he looked better than yesterday. Evan was, as usual, at his side. Anastasia looked at Dr. Kent. For the first time in the last decade, he looked gloomy and distracted.
He tried not to look at Jacob, but the admiral appeared unmoved. He carried on with the same air of authority, as if nothing had happened. It was very different for her; she couldn’t sleep a wink. And she had found both Argon and Adrian at the Midnight Orchid in the middle of the night. She joined them, and she offered her condolences to Adrian. She felt torn. In ten years of her career, she had never lost a crew member. She recalled the horror she felt, and how she had to conceal her feelings when she told Delta’s mother about her daughters’ death.
The admiral finished reading the report and sat back. “So, they’re like dinosaurs. Very strong, can survive on limited food and oxygen, do not degenerate or age, and are slaves.”
“Well, dinosaurs were bigger, but you get the idea,” replied Anastasia. “Any luck finding their communications frequency?”
“No, not yet,” said Adrian.
Anastasia turned to Cyr.
“After Dr. Finch submitted the report, we began going through the debris again to find a mind-control mechanism. We haven’t found it yet.”
“Keep looking. What about the data module?”
“We’re still looking.”
Anastasia smiled. Patience was the key, and she understood that everyone was under pressure. “Thanks, Dr. Finch and Dr. Keston. We really appreciate your input.”
Dr. Finch nodded. “Now I plan to dissect the brain. Hopefully, we can find something else that could be useful.”
“Do it,” said Anastasia, thinking that it would be good to keep everyone busy.
Titan, Deck 1, Anastasia’s office
Two days later, things had settled down a bit. Anastasia called Dr. Kent and Admiral Donavan into her office to discuss the situation regarding Emmeline.
“We need to talk about this.”
“No. We need to sue him,” said Dr. Kent, pointing to the admiral.
Despite her feelings, she said, “Gentlemen. I know a lot of things have happened in the past few days. It has taken its toll on all of us.”
“No. That’s not it . . .”
Anastasia didn’t let Dr. Kent continue. “Dr. Kent, you’re forgetting a very important fact. The portal didn’t open by itself. There’s a high probability that Emmeline opened it. Has it occurred to you that if she can open it once, she could do it again?”
The doctor leaned back in his chair. “I know. I’m just angry.”
Anastasia smiled. She felt the same, but she didn’t have the luxury to express her anger. Her disappointment. Her pain. “That’s understandable. We’ve never lost someone so close to us. Admiral, it would have been really good if you’d worked with us on this. I understand your position and your authority, but everyone, including your tactical officer, warned you about entering that portal. When the probe disappeared, you shouldn’t have risked your ship and your crew. Delta and Emmeline were alive and well.”
“Look . . .”
“In the near future, I would appreciate it if you would let the experts help you in such matters,” Anastasia said firmly.
“My job was to bring them back,” Jacob argued. “To uphold the law!”
“No one told you to take that job,” Dr. Kent pointed out. “They would have returned, anyway.”
“Several people have gone past the perimeter and never returned.”
“But Titan is their home. Delta was born here, and Emmeline is dedicated to her work. They have friends and families. They would have returned,” said Anastasia. She took a deep breath. “Admiral and Dr. Kent, I understand that at the moment, the situation isn’t ideal, but you’re all I’ve got. You’re all Titan has, and we have about twenty thousand innocent souls on this space station. The Orias will come, and we might be our people’s only defense. I have no choice but to ask you to work together.”
Both men’s faces turned stony.
“And Dr. Kent, I’ve asked Argon to lock down Emmeline’s research for now. No one is to get access to it without my authorization. We need time, and so does Emmeline. She had to be taken to the medical bay.”
“Why? What happened?” asked Dr. Kent.
“She’s in shock, and the doctor says she’s not mentally stable. She doesn’t sleep, eat, or talk. It’s understandable. Her best friend, someone who was like her sister, is dead.”
Dr. Kent’s face turned grim.
“I’ve gone through her data in an attempt to understand what she was doing,” Anastasia said.
“You mean the mythical device?” Dr. Kent asked.
The room fell silent.
“W-What? What is that?” asked Jacob.
“You know about it?” said Anastasia.
“Yes, I do,” Dr. Kent replied. “It’s folklore.”
“I don’t think so,” Anastasia stated.
“What are we talking about?” asked Jacob.
Anastasia told the admiral what she knew about the mythical device.
“And you let her do this?” Jacob demanded of Dr. Kent.
“I don’t control her. If she wants to chase myths in her time off, it’s up to her!”
Jacob turned to Anastasia.
“I didn’t intervene because she’s a researcher; she was researching. From what I can gather from her notes, the device is real. She found it.”
Dr. Kent raised his eyebrows.
“What do we do with this device?” asked Jacob.
“You’re not getting your hands on it,” argued Dr. Kent.
“Gentlemen, let’s focus on the problem at hand, Emmeline’s future,” said Anastasia. “There will be a preliminary hearing by the tribunal.”
“Will she be court-martialed?” asked Dr. Kent.
“That depends on Emmeline’s story and how we present it,” Anastasia told him. “We know Delta’s death was an accident. But the fact remains that she and Delta crossed the perimeter without authorization. They found a hidden portal and landed on an alien planet. The Imperial Command has strict rules and procedures. They broke the law. What were they doing? Why didn’t they tell anyone? What was so important that they thought it was best to sneak out? Why the secrecy? Whether or not we like it, Emmeline will have to face the music and answer these questions.”
“Let’s not forget the Orias,” said Jacob.
Dr. Kent held his head in his hands.
“I agree,” said Anastasia. “Whatever happens, defeating the Orias takes precedence.”
“Commander, once Emmeline is better, I know she’ll be under scrutiny and probably serve a sentence. Can she still work at the Crystal Lab?” asked Dr. Kent.
Anastasia smiled. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Let me know if you need anything from me.”
“I don’t believe you,” said Jacob. “After everything she’s done. Broken the law, defied you. You still want her to work with you?”
Dr. Kent eyed him. “Yes, especially after everything she’s done.”
Haides Castle
“I’ve felt it again,” said a voice in the dark void. “Twice, after a very long time. The sensation is thrilling.”
It was more like a shadow than a physical being. A black smoke whirled through the barren hall. It formed the entrance to a gigantic ancient fortress. Its walls were made of huge pointed towers bent inwards. The ground was as black as charcoal, uneven and arid. The sky above offered one of the best views in the galaxy. An enormous creature bellowed as it flew over the dark structure.
The black
smoke moved through the hall, left the structure, and came to a standstill at the edge of the mountain. As far as one could see, there were millions of dark clouds gathered around the gloomy mountain ranges that surrounded the fortress.
A forest encircled the mountain on which the castle had stood since long before the dawn of time. The trees were dark and crooked, forming an unbreakable web around the fortress, making it almost impossible to reach.
The black smoke spiraled. There was no wind, just dead silence. Then, in the distance, a dull roar echoed. The smoke retreated and vanished into the castle.
Miles away from the castle, from within the forest, a red mist emerged. It rose above the trees and whirled up toward the edge of the mountain. Moving through the large entrance, it disappeared into the fortress.
Sturdy walls surrounded the red mist, and again, it felt sorrow for the figures buried within them, their carcasses separated by large columns and their faces frozen in time. The mist came to a stop in the middle of the stony passageway. On both sides were rectangular pools full of purple liquid. There were no ripples, no sounds. The passageway ended, leading to a spacious platform, upon which was a hefty chair. Behind the chair was a glimmering circular band. Unknown scribbles sparkled on its surface. Inside the circular band was a blend of bluish-whitish smoke, which moved in an anticlockwise direction. The dome-shaped ceiling displayed various star maps.
The red smoke took a humanoid form. Now, just a few paces from the throne, there stood an ageless bald man with simple features. In human years, he looked to be in his forties. He was well built and had a calm and collected look about him. His bright blue eyes showed his patience. He wore a long white overcoat, which touched the floor. He bent a knee.
“My queen. You called?”
“Aithon. I do not understand why you take this form.”
“I have the right.”
“Yes. You do,” she replied. “And you shall have it. Have you sensed it too?”