False Horizons

by CJ Birch

  I’ll just have to make sure we don’t get separated, and the only way to do that is to be better than him. We reach the end of the hall, which has two windows on either side looking out at the rest of the bulbous section of the ship. A small cargo ship is attached to the side, and I hope it’s the ship they just recruited from. I’m not sure who I’d feel sorrier for, the Varbaja or Ash if they captured the Persephone. If Sarka couldn’t break her, and I know only half the things he’s capable of, then no one can. She’ll die letting them try.

  The next morning I look for any of my crew at breakfast. Tup isn’t with us so we’re fending for ourselves. Sarka sticks with an all-meat diet. I’m tempted to do the same. At least it tastes similar to beef. I’ve had it only once—the day I graduated from Delta Academy. Kate got it special for us. It’s strange having grown up on a cattle farm and only ever eaten beef once. It’s expensive, as is all meat back on the Belt. It was only for special occasions, unless you lived on Alpha.

  Sarka and I pick a table in the back with fewer people. It’s almost quiet. Sarka uses his hands to rip into his breakfast, tearing off a piece of meat and packing it into his mouth. The sight puts me off my meal. Not a hard thing to do. I place a green stick in my mouth and tentatively bite down. Then again, maybe I should just stick to meat.

  “We need to find a way off this heap,” Sarka says through a mouthful.

  “I agree. But how?”

  “Leave that to me. I’ll have a plan before the end of the day.”

  “Oh no. We aren’t following any of your plans. We need to lay low for a while, let them forget about us.”

  “That’s stupid. We need to get out as soon as possible. If we’re not out of here in two days, we’ll never leave.”

  “Two days?” How has this man commanded an army for the better part of a century? I’m starting to think either the Union fleet isn’t as good as we claim to be or the Burrs have been very lucky. I lean back and fold my arms. We’re going to have one hell of a fight, two captains used to taking charge. I already know it would be stupid to get separated from him, but he’s going to make this so much harder.

  “Listen, Jordan. I’ve been doing this a hell of a lot longer than you, so for once you should just trust me.”

  “I’m here because you took me hostage. On my own ship.” My voice is beginning to rise above the din. A few tables down we get a couple of looks. Right now I don’t care. “If you’d wanted to leave on your own you could have asked. I would’ve let you take an escape pod.”

  Sarka throws a piece of gristle on his plate. “Staying on that ship probably wasn’t the best idea for anyone.”

  “Why? Because you planted bombs? I don’t believe you. Why would you plant bombs on a ship you were on? You didn’t know Ash and I would make it off the planet. No thanks to you, by the way.”

  “Those bombs would go off only if I detonated them or something went wrong. The ship is fine.”

  “Why would you even plant them in the first place?” My voice is deafening. I lower it as two men in uniform saunter over to us. “Over a hundred people are on that ship.”

  Sarka shrugs. “You never know when a bomb will come in handy. Or several.” He waves a hand at me. “Relax, will you? Hartley probably had them all disarmed in a few minutes. They weren’t very sophisticated.”

  “If anything happens to my ship, I will kill you.” I keep my voice low this time but slap the table for emphasis.

  The two soldiers stop on either side of Sarka. “You have a problem?”

  “No problem. We’re done. Where do I go from here?” I ask.

  One of them nods to someone behind me. When I turn, Tup is making his way through the crowd. I pick up my tray to dump it.

  “You’re going to waste all that food?” Tup asks.

  “I lost my appetite.”

  “Shame. You’re going to need it today.”

  Sarka stands as well, but Tup waves him down. “I’ll be back for you once I drop her off.”

  Sarka frowns. It’s not always easy to tell. His face tends to hold its shape. “Where are you taking her?”

  “Don’t worry. You’ll see each other again at the halfway meal.” A quick battle rages behind Sarka’s eyes as he decides whether to back off or make a fuss. We’re outnumbered, even without the two soldiers still flanking him. He drops back into his seat and gives me a tiny wave with his fingers.

  I turn to follow Tup, but all my bravado has disappeared. I had one goal, stick close to Sarka, and I’ve already screwed that up. I dump my tray at the exit. “Where are we going? Why aren’t Sarka and I training together?”

  “We’re assessing your strengths and weaknesses today. Your only opponent is yourself, so you don’t need to do it together. Also, we find people perform better if they know their shipmates aren’t watching them. It takes some of the pressure off.”

  That’s a strange thing to say. I’d rather my crew mates watch me than these people. If I felt like cattle yesterday, I have a feeling today it’ll be a lab rat. What’s the best-case scenario? They think I’m great, hand me a weapon, and put me in the front line? No, thanks. If I fail every test, will they have me cleaning toilets?

  “What sorts of things are they going to make me do?”

  We stop at the end of a hall. He taps in a code and a lift door opens. “It’s different for everyone. They don’t want to keep the tests the same, in case the soldiers start sharing with new recruits.”

  “And what happens if we fail?” I follow him into the lift. This one has windows running the circumference.

  “There’s no pass or fail. It’s not that kind of test.”

  We’re both silent as the lift descends with a soft hum. Once we’re free of the upper section of the ship, the lift shaft becomes transparent and we’re sinking into space. We’ve moved a large distance in the short amount of time we’ve been on the ship because their sun is much closer. Not far off the starboard bow an asteroid, trailing debris, travels through the system.

  “The recruits you brought aboard yesterday, were they the same species as Sarka and I?”

  Tup drags his eyes from the stars and looks me up and down as if he hasn’t noticed me before. “No. We’ve never seen your species before.”

  We soon sink back into the ship and reach our deck. He motions me across the hall and opens a door opposite the lift.

  I enter and stare, and then I blink, hoping it’s an illusion. It’s not.

  “You’ve got to be shitting me.”

  Chapter Seven

  Ash

  Over the next couple of days, we work to get the Persephone at least able to sustain life for more than a day. We keep losing emergency systems. Hartley constantly reminds me that they weren’t designed to work like this, but we don’t have a choice. The illya offered to let us stay on their ship, but I won’t give up that much control. I can’t pin down anything sinister about them, and that’s what bothers me the most. They’re too perfect.

  Yesterday I was on the bridge with one of them—a young woman, as far as I could tell. There’s not much difference between the sexes. Not like the avians—or nishga, as the illya call them—who amputate the wings of their females. That was an easy indicator. This woman was explaining how they care for the nishga by keeping the planet hidden from the rest of the system. The next system has a few habitable planets, but a group the illya call the Varbaja control them. If the Varbaja were to learn of this planet, they would immediately kill the nishga. So the illya wander the galaxy harvesting asteroids for resources and keeping an eye on the planet. That whole story smacks of pretty wrapping, like one of those stories they tell you as a kid that sounds too perfect until you get older. Once the glossed-over details come out, suddenly the truth doesn’t look so great.

  Hartley thinks I’m being too cynical. He almost swooned when he saw their engine room. They use dark matter for propulsion—don’t ask me to explain it because the whole thing sounded like they were talking gibberish. I swear, Hart
ley almost pissed himself. Now they can do no wrong. He wants us to adapt some of their technologies for the Persephone. I know Jordan wouldn’t approve, and I don’t want to do anything to her ship while she’s gone. It really does feel like she’s coming back, like she went on a brief mission while I hold down the fort. I’m being optimistic, and I know my expectation could bite me in the ass later. But I wouldn’t be able to function if I thought she was dead. She doesn’t feel dead. In my mind I still picture her out there somewhere.

  It’s been four days now, and I’ve not had a single panic attack. I’ve been sleeping better and haven’t felt like I’m not doing enough. It’s hard to admit, but I think the medication the doctor gave me is helping. I’d been expecting the usual pattern. When things don’t go right, I tend to fixate, and that turns into a slow dive. I mope for days and then start to panic that I’m not doing enough, so I come up with projects to keep me busy, which helps. Within a day my mood lifts and I’m back to normal. But with whatever I’m taking, none of that happens. Four days of smooth sailing.

  On the fifth day it all goes to hell.

  It started off great. We got a new quantum computer hooked up to our system. It was different than our old one, but Hartley said he could make it work. And for a while it did, but then something went wrong. Hartley’s still not sure what. Then systems started shutting down, including our emergency systems.

  I was on the bridge when the environmental system failed. If you run backup systems with no main computer, as Hartley pointed out on several occasions, there’s no warning system. And oxygen doesn’t immediately dissipate when the system making it stops working. It takes hours for us to suck up all that oxygen and breathe out carbon monoxide. So while we were going about our day, we were slowly killing ourselves just by breathing.

  Also, oxygen deprivation and carbon monoxide poisoning affect everyone differently. And it’s not always easy to see the signs. I guess it’s fortunate that Vasa tried to kill me by locking me in the filter room and sucking out all the oxygen because I know what it feels like.

  I was on the bridge early this afternoon when the front porthole became blurry. When I stood up to take a look I stumbled, and that’s when I noticed I wasn’t the only one looking sluggish.

  I staggered to one of the portable oxygen tanks we keep throughout the ship and began rounding up people to evacuate the ship. We got everyone out without any injuries. Nothing the doctor can’t fix with some pain medication.

  But now we’re without a ship.

  Hartley assures me the failures were bound to happen, that they were only a matter of time. Hartley says I’m being paranoid. It was our first night on the Kudo—that’s what the illya call their ship. They’d just shown us to our cabins—mine is twice the size of the one on the Persephone—and Hartley turned to me before entering his. “You only feel this way because you’re in charge.” His smile was sympathetic, which is unusual for Hartley. He doesn’t have a lot of empathy for people. “Don’t worry. We’ll get the Persephone back together again.”

  I nodded but didn’t say anything, too choked up to respond. He’s right though. I feel like a failure. The Persephone is sitting empty in their ship bay. I feel like I’ve abandoned my only child.

  Meanwhile, Hartley is in geek heaven. Their technology is centuries ahead of ours. Stepping onto their ship is like traveling through time. I don’t even recognize the materials used for the bulkheads or the covering on my cabin floor. It’s so strange, but the carpet reminds me of the Tartan Track on the Persephone. It has a give to it, but more than that, it molds to your feet when you walk on it.

  My room has a view of the planet, but I haven’t wanted to look. It makes my stomach tight. I find it hard to drift off to sleep tonight. Too much is going on in my brain right now. I keep thinking about Jordan. If she were here, would we still be on the Persephone?

  I already miss our ship. If I were there now I could go for a run on the track and clear my mind. Running is the only thing that’s ever helped. I contemplate for a millisecond running around the corridors of this ship, but my thought is gone in a flash.

  I lie in the soft bed and pull the covers over me, hoping the act of getting into bed will help. It never has. I usually lie awake for hours staring up at the ceiling. For some reason, tonight a strange thing happens. As soon as my head hits the silky pillow, my brain begins to mellow. My thoughts scatter, and I’m drifting off before I can wonder how I got so tired.

  The next few days pass in a blur. We have so much to accomplish in such a short amount of time. The illya have been very helpful. I’m surprised by how much they know, even about our technology. It’s like asking Hartley to work on the first engine ever invented.

  Every morning I meet him in the mess for breakfast, and we discuss the day’s projects. Hartley is still the slowest eater I’ve ever encountered. By the time I arrive in the morning he’s already been there an hour, and I still finish before him. It’s a good thing he works fast or he’d never get anything done.

  I hate to admit it because it’s like treason, but the food is so much better than on the Persephone. They have real meat. Okay, so they don’t actually raise their own livestock on board, but it’s grown in a lab. Hartley assures me that it’s real; it just hasn’t ever been alive. All the benefits of taste without the negative moral dilemmas to go with it.

  This morning Hartley is sitting with Yakovich, who I haven’t seen much of since our talk outside the escape pod. I had a meeting with Bragga the first day to ask if they could scan for Jordan’s escape pod. So far, nothing. They said we could leave orbit and begin the search today. I find it hard to believe we haven’t found a trace of them. Something should be left over from their rocket burn.

  I take a seat at the table next to Hartley, and before I’m even sitting an attendant is placing a plate with several slabs of pink meat and a hunk of what they refer to as loaf, which resembles our bread. I tend to pick around the vegetables, which don’t taste as good as the rest. Hartley, however, has discovered their hot sauce. He slathers it over everything, even the loaf. It’s best with the greens. If I liked my food spicy, I’d consider it. I bet it helps with the bitter aftertaste.

  “So what’s on the agenda today?” I ask.

  Hartley pauses, his fork halfway to his mouth. “The environmental systems went down because we tried for too much right off. We need to work backward, so I’m starting with the least essential systems and working my way up.” He lifts the utensil to his mouth and inhales a piece of meat slathered in a bright-green sauce. “Today we’re working on integrating the door-locking system.”

  “I don’t want to be on this ship any longer than we have to. Don’t spend all your time on non-essentials. We have to get the Persephone livable as soon as possible.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain.” He salutes me with his fork.

  “I get a promotion I haven’t heard about?” When I don’t smile back, his grin falls.

  “No, Lieutenant.”

  I jump at the tap on my shoulder and turn to find Vonn bowing his head at me. The young man is still holding the translating device in front of him like a shield.

  “The captain would like to have a word with you, Lieutenant Ash.”

  I hope this is about the search they’re doing for Jordan’s escape pod. I bid Yakovich and Hartley good-bye and follow Vonn out of the mess. I’m expecting Bragga, but instead I’m led to the bridge and introduced to another man, Kalve. He’s the tallest man on the bridge and possibly of the crew. Still, the top of his head only reaches my nose. His uniform ripples along his arms and legs, hiding powerful muscles. I have no doubt that this man could kick my ass if he needed to.

  He’s introduced as the captain, which means Bragga isn’t in charge of the ship, only the illya. That must get confusing. He waves me over to a console with a star chart on it. Their bridge is the largest I’ve ever seen—two floors, with lifts on both sides leading to a lower deck. I hear a low murmur of voices speaking below us but
can’t actually see anyone. The deck we’re on almost looks like it’s floating above the other. In front of us are the planet and expanse of stars beyond. We’re currently orbiting the dark side, so no details of the planet are visible. It almost looks like a black hole where stars should be.

  Kalve directs my attention to the map, zooming in on our location. “After accounting for your escape pod’s thrust potential, we mapped the farthest in the system it could have traveled and searched in all directions by sending out short-distance probes. We’ve encountered nothing.”

  I feel like I’ve jumped into a tub of ice water. “What does that mean? You’re giving up?”

  “We also searched for debris and found nothing. They couldn’t have gone farther than our search pattern on their own without being picked up.”

  The tub of ice water thaws. “So there’s hope?” I try not to sound so goddamned relieved, but I can’t help it.

  “The only other ship in the area is your own, the main ship you mentioned before. I forget the name you said. It’s possible they rescued them.”

  There’s no way the Posterus picked them up. Their engine is down. Or it would be if they still had one. They’re months away from being mobile. But it’s possible the Brimley picked them up. The other Union-fleet ship headed out in the opposite direction of us. I’m skeptical, but anything to get us away from this hellish planet.

  “Okay. When do we leave?”

  “We will be under way within the hour.”

  “Good.” I turn back to the giant display in front. The alien sun is cresting the edge of the planet, bathing it in light and creating a cascading haze of purple along the thermosphere. It would be beautiful if I didn’t know what was lurking below.