by C. Gockel
The flight computer accepted her passkey and rolled through its familiar protocols. To her primed imagination, the stryker’s sounds seemed more menacing, as if the ship knew her intent. The Cass’s computer continued to count down the bay depressurization as she sealed the Jocosta ’s canopy.
The engines hitched once but activated. There was no time for a pre-flight check. There was time only for luck and prayers. The j-drive spool-up took mere seconds, not the plodding forever of a velo. A deep hum resonated through the body of the stryker. It vibrated her bones and wrapped her brain with its numbing harmonics.
It failed to drown out the insistent voice on the vox headset:
“Just answer me.” There was a fierce desperation in the plea that she could not shut out.
If I do not do this, they are dead, or worse.
She could not choose a fate for Jon and Tyron. They did not deserve that. For a moment, another weak moment, she paused. Her fingers actually hovered over the abort sequence.
Instead, she triggered the vox open.
“I’m sorry, Jon.”
Then cut the channel.
The Jocosta glided effortlessly from the hangar.
Nyxa make me your vessel. Nyxa make me your fiery sword and your instrument. Nyxa guide my hand and my eye. Nyxa clear my Path.
The prayer rolled on and on, a litany in her head. She muttered it under her breath in a tuneless humming, unthinking. It was something to fill the empty air of the cockpit.
Uncle would not have been pleased.
He would not have condoned this destructive and violent act. The man was long dead, having abandoned them both to a place of hard choices.
The Jocosta was nothing, a mote of dust compared to the Questic . A science vessel named in ancient Eugenes to mean the quest for knowledge. The word had a darker meaning too: to interrogate under torture. That was not an innocent accident. Nothing within Tristic’s power was ever innocent for long.
Erelah felt the hybrid’s presence push against that barrier in her head. It held, firmly. She had learned that the harder the force Tristic exerted from without, the more solid the barrier would become. Her voice would never torment Erelah’s mind again, but she could sense her excitement. The beast thought her broken, surrendering and finished.
Erelah relished the correction that came next. Although, delivering it was likely to bring her end.
Time. Be patient.
Nyxa make me your vessel. Nyxa make me your fiery sword and your instrument…
The message she wanted to see rolled onto the heads-up. The Questic ’s engines were nearing a powered-down state. Their fuel reserves were low. The image of the drive field around her midsection glowed a hot yellow-orange, like the smoldering embers of a forge.
Here she would make a different weapon. Here she could become a fiery sword.
Nyxa guide my hand. Nyxa clear my Path.
Everything that came next seemed from far away: a story she was telling in her head. Her hands did not shake as she keyed in the final commands. They were the hands of someone else, a warrior twin. She was braver. Her spine did not quiver. She sat bolt upright in the seat. This twin did not waste thought on failed farewells or lost futures. She did not flinch as she felt the surge of energy engulf the stryker. The radiance grew around them, blinding and fierce.
With her warrior twin, Erelah embraced the blackness that followed.
Chapter Forty
Sela understood why Erelah had left the viewer active while the rest of the Cass’s systems remained locked out. She wanted witnesses for an impossible feat, the last act of incredible bravery that Sela had dismissed as a coward’s end.
This was not cowardice. As a soldier, to witness such an act of self-sacrifice from one who had been ally and enemy alike, she was rendered speechless.
A deadly blossom of azure veined with white consumed the entire midsection of that hideous Ravstar vessel. The hulking metal beast crumpled inward and folded toward the mouth of the flex point Erelah had created with the stryker. The skin of the carrier undulated under the ravages of the distortion wave.
A tremendous ball of fire issued along the exposed side of Tristic’s carrier. The flames quickly snuffed out in the cold of space. For a brief flickering moment, the wash of blue grew stronger still, eating metal wherever it landed.
“Great violence and force,” Sela muttered in awe, as the full scope of Erelah’s meaning flooded her.
After a punishing period of conduit travel, the reserves on the carrier’s velos must have been nearly drained. Somehow, the tiny stryker had the ability to trigger a flex point. This was the catalyst for an explosion that blessedly had little fuel. It had been just enough to mortally wound the Questic .
Otherwise, we would not still be here.
The vortex vanished, leaving the ravaged carrier to twist against an invisible eddy, a huge gash dissecting its decks. It listed like a crushed insect, floating and writhing on the surface of a pond.
Around Sela, the command loft of the Cassandra popped back to life. The once red-barred consoles now resumed their prior interfaces. The drives hummed in a building crescendo as spool-up was initiated.
Erelah had done this. Or, more correctly, she had done this through Sela.
Their window was short. Regardless of the mortal wound that had been rendered, there was no real guarantee Tristic had been destroyed. The Cassandra was vulnerable to capture. Jon would have argued against it, but he was not there to stop her. He would have wanted to search the wreckage, seek out something that remained of his sister, as unlikely as it sounded.
They could not risk that hesitation. Sela made the decision for him. Another fault in the growing list of harms done against him.
She guided the Cassandra through the rapidly-splaying field of debris. At first, the vox was alive with the sound of living ghosts. Hectic voices pled for rescue. Others responded with ineffectual orders. Sela snapped the speaker off.
I have witnessed the end of too many things already.
Within moments, the aptly named dead node was a memory as the Cassandra limped its way through the conduit.
Jon remained at the other side of the bay door for a long time, knees drawn up, back pressed into the curve of the bulkhead. He watched some private landscape with red-rimmed eyes. Was he recounting every sin? Blaming himself for every squandered opportunity and wasted hope?
He never did say. Sela did not ask.
Chapter Forty-One
“You have the look of a woman with a thousand miseries.”
The voice interrupted the mire of her thoughts as Sela stared into the mysterious depths of the mug before her.
Sela did not look up. “Get a lot of dates with that one?”
“You tell me.” Jon slid into the booth across from her.
Her position in the tavern was tactically sound. Back to the wall. Facing the door. All of the similar spots were occupied here. All the other patrons watched the door too, hands nervously flitting to sidearms. Just in case. It was that kind of place.
Business was slow. The gaming tables were not even in play. A crime boss had cut off the Hadelian port in retribution against some rebellious clan of Zenti pirates. Sela cared little for the details. It simply meant that this place was comparatively peaceful. And everyone here had other things to worry about.
“It’s been ten days. Hard time finding you.”
“Found me.”
The truth was: she wanted to be found. She had finally decided earlier that day. It had been easy to elude him, Sela recalled with a stubborn sense of pride. She knew he would not depart and would, with matching stubbornness, seek her out. A bond held them in each other’s orbit, like two damned stars, destined to eventually decay into each other and bring everything in the space around them to a crushing end.
“Sela.” His voice was wide, gentle.
She finally looked at him, and the rusty hook in her heart turned. Jon was clean-shaven once more. His thick dark hair was
neatly groomed. His broad shoulders were squared beneath the sharp lines of a jacket in good repair. Once more he was her perfect Eugenes captain.
But that was never the truth, was it?
“You wanted some space…some time to think,” he prodded. “So let’s hear it.”
She could tell that he was steeling himself, waiting for her to say something damaging and permanent. Is that what he thinks of me?
“There’s no place for me,” she said. “I don’t know where I belong.”
The ghost of his infamous lopsided grin surfaced. “Could say the same of me.”
“You had a life before…all of this. Before the Regime. I didn’t. I know only one way to look at the Worlds.”
“I’ve never believed that about you. Not for a second.”
He leaned across the table. His hand rested atop hers. She stiffened, fearful that he would say those strained words again. Three little words like overburdened ships cursed to flounder. He had not said them again since that day on Tasemar. That was eternities ago.
“What now, cap’n?”
“You tell me, Ty. Your choice.”
Across the marred surface of the table, she studied him. There was fear in not knowing what came next. There was undeniable love for this man. It was such a costly vulnerability. Daily, these thoughts warred like ancient gods from the old stories. She watched as a mere mortal, with everything to win or lose.
Sela rose. The table wobbled on its uneven legs as she slid out of the booth. She allowed her hand to trail down his arm.
At the doorway, she stopped and drew in a long steady breath. Looking back over her shoulder, she waited for him to follow her out into the eye-watering brilliance of the world beyond.
She could imagine no other Path.
Continue the Series
Allies and Enemies: Rogues , the second book in the series is available at your favorite vendor. Click Here .
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Traveler in the Dark
Ex Situ Book 1
Deirdre Gould
Sixteen hundred years ago, they fled Earth. Now their long journey may finally be at an end. None of them have ever walked on soil, felt rain, or breathed unrecycled air.
Their resources nearly spent, they sent a last exploratory mission to a new planet. It's ideal... but they are not alone.
In the struggle for survival, they must make a choice. Sacrifice another species or accept their own extinction. And time is running out.
Acknowledgments
Special Thanks to:
Misti Paudel for her inexhaustible patience in answering medical questions
Kevin Malady for the same in science questions
Siobhan Malady for reading the terrible drafts every time
Rebecca Emery, Her dad Rick, and her cat, Wookie for letting me shamelessly abuse their names
Robert Frazier for coming up with Airlock Lovers for me
Chapter One
Issk’ath stood for a long time on the edge of the great nest. None of the nest’s machines ran without the colony. The large tunnels slumped or dissolved in the rain with no one there to repack or smooth them. The beautiful, sculpted chambers of the queen lay clotted with mud, lost with the swarm. Issk’ath had remained for a long time. Many mating seasons. It believed it was just making certain, just standing guard so that nothing returned. So that nothing changed.
And nothing did. No new input except the predictable alteration of the stars and the creep of the returning vegetation. The lack of stimulation made the iteration worse. It was boredom that drove Issk’ath to examine what it had done.
The colony had been erratic, self-destructive, swarming. Even after several iterations, Issk’ath could see no fault with that conclusion. They had to be stopped. It had to save them from themselves. But the queen— the queen had given it the name as she died. It hadn’t been a compliment.
“Issk’ath,” she’d stuttered, her slim legs buzzing with pain as she rubbed the words out, “I call you for the nymph that burned the clutch.” Her wings had opened, gently, but it was not in fondness.
“It is for your own good,” it had chirped, accepting the moniker immediately. “I was created to protect you.”
The queen let forth a breathy hiss. “This is not protection. This is murder.”
Issk’ath extended a slim antenna to touch hers. “It is survival. Join the colony and be at peace.” A sizzling spark traveled down the connection into Issk’ath, settling in its thorax with the others. She had been the last.
So it had perched here many, many seasons. Long after the exoskeletons had dissolved. Issk’ath stood there and iterated, wondering if it had missed an alternative path. The doubt whittled at its processing power.
And then, one windy night, there was a rattle. A buzz. Nonsense really, a practice stridulation. But it was nearby, Issk’ath was certain. And it moved to find the sound.
An egg long buried that had hatched at the wrong time? A survivor that crept up to the surface out of desperation? Issk’ath wasn’t sure, but it had to be found. Had to be added to the colony and saved. At first, Issk’ath merely listened, waited for its tympana to catch the errant sound. But the vibrations were erratic, almost as if the source were talking to itself. So Issk’ath cautiously scraped its legs, sending a carefully pleasant greeting. It brought no response. Issk’ath repeated the greeting often as it looked, its efficient sensors bringing it closer and closer to the soft rattle. It was either a female or a nymph, it concluded. The song was too soft for a male. Issk’ath would have to make certain there wasn’t a clutch. It might involve persuasion. Issk’ath was reluctant to persuade. It was not optimal. It could cause pain. Issk’ath was programmed to ensure survival at any cost, but it preferred to avoid pain.
The mega-foliage was, at last, returning to the planet, all these mating seasons after the swarm and Issk’ath wove its way through a thick ridge of trees toward the sound. They were short, little more than thick brush, but they tangled and reached, growing taller each season. One stood alone on a hill, larger than the rest. A seedling, maybe, that had been missed by the voracious colony, saved just in time. The stuttering buzz came from it. Issk’ath slowly circled, sending out reassuring chirps as it did. It halted beside the tree and its gaze flicked over the roots, expecting a small nest or a shelter of some sort. But the hill was empty. The rattle came again, from just above. Issk’ath looked up. A lone leaf, tough and curled, dead as the colony. It ought to have fallen away, but the tree clung to the corpse anyway, played with it, shook it in the wind, a lone violinist in the silent world. The leaf shuddered in the breeze, scraping against the bark, the sound almost a voice, almost a laugh in Issk’ath’s tympana. It reached up, spearing the leaf. It crumbled and whooshed away. Issk’ath looked around itself.
There was no input here. There would never be. There was nothing to protect. The world had been saved. The iteration was all that was left.
It was not optimal.
A slim ray of fire swam down the horizon and Issk’ath watched it as it burnt to gray. A meteor. Was there input out there? Was there something besides the iteration?
Its creators had set it only one goal, only one purpose: protect. Protect the colony. They never planned for it to fulfill its purpose. Issk’ath was never meant to need another. And they weren’t here to program another. It could wait, here, another millennium, two. It knew there would be no changes. Nothing remained to be born again. Issk’ath had made certain, there were no more eggs, no more nymphs. Only the lesser species remained, those too small or weak to threaten the colony or to be of use. Even if something evolved from them, it wouldn’t be similar to Issk’ath’s people. Perhaps nothing sentient would ever exist again.
Issk’ath rejected the idea, running the algorithms. Maybe it was true here , but out there— it waved its antennae gently toward the sky, scanning for patterns. Out there, there ha
d to be someone. Something that needed Issk’ath, that would renew its purpose. That would make it more than just a container for others. Input. More.
For the first time in many seasons, the processors fully woke up, began calculating instead of just maintaining. Issk’ath started planning.
Chapter Two
“Earth’s flaming mantle! Does anything work in this ancient rust pile anymore?” Andrei Titov smacked the side of the food printer and it splattered tan liquid over the counter top.
“Hitting it isn’t going to help. Get Emery to look at it. Her dad’s in maintenance.” Gang Liu calmly wiped up the mess.
“Maybe she’ll actually be useful for something on this mission then. She can fix the coffee maker while we do the real work,” Beatrice Martham tapped through her media feed as she talked. “That is, if she doesn’t wash out before then.”
Liu frowned. “That was unkind, Martham. Emery’s worked harder than anyone else during training. She’s got as much right to be here as anyone else.”
Martham sighed and turned toward him. “It’s not Emery . It’s that they’re considering sending an anthropologist on an exploratory mission. Her spot could go to someone more useful. An engineer or a meteorologist. What’s an anthropologist going to accomplish?”
Titov shrugged. “Maybe the uppers found evidence of some sort of civilization. Can’t hurt to have someone who knows how to interpret things— especially when we don’t know the language.”
“Oh, please. You don’t really think we’re going to find little gray men down there, do you? If there were an advanced civilization down there, we’d have seen signs, even with the interference. Lights, telecommunication signals, structures or roads. Something. ”
“And if there is civilization down there, but it isn’t advanced, it’s what? Not worth the bother?” Rebecca Emery emerged from the hallway and wandered over to the food printer. “We can just conquer the indigenous societies right? No need to come to a peaceful arrangement or attempt to understand them—”