Abductees

by Alan Brickett

  Connor resisted the urge to look around and see what his skin could feel as phantom touches. He could see Marc doing it already, and he didn’t want to be that paranoid.

  “Yes, ok, it is a scary world we live in with those kinds of possibilities. And I really don’t want to accept that it would be that easy, but sure, it could be that,” Connor said.

  The others all looked at him because he had interrupted their private thoughts about whatever could be happening to their real bodies somewhere.

  “Look, guys, I know that it is scary, I mean really scary. Thing is, though, we’ve been handling it so far. And I think Lekiso has had the right idea. Sitting about doing nothing won’t achieve anything. If it is an experiment, then they or it or whatever will just find a way to prod us into action anyway. But if we stay active, keep our eyes open and explore, we’ll either find the gaps in whatever they have built or be more prepared for what is going on. If this…parasite…is what gets us closer, then I say we do it.”

  “Win-win, hey, mate?” Ormond didn’t look like he was being mocking this time.

  “I think I agree with the big man. Paranoia will only get us so far. And sure, Lekiso has been keeping us going, and I think that despite the thugs, it has been going well for us.”

  Everyone looked at Meriam, and she looked back.

  “Oh, okay, yes, I’ll admit that it has been good to be doing something. I’d even say anything to learn about what is happening. I’m with Connor. I just don’t like it... Not knowing. ”

  “Luv, that makes five of us.”

  Automated log update.

  Subjects have been equipped with supplies registered under the parameters for this stage of their acclimatization and modified to fit in with this time period and location.

  Stock lists updated.

  Subjects have been provided with a sample case and relevant hint within parameters of allowed communication at this stage. Subjects have responded correctly in their interpretation of what is required and are proceeding to acquire the specimen for analysis.

  Monitoring continues.

  **

  Domum lived and died by a caste system which they called a Manor.

  They worked their way up to being the dominant species on Domu despite the intense competition of predators which evolved in the same high gravity world. Usually, a xenobiologist would wonder at the bone density required to hold a humanoid upright in such an environment.

  There was also the question of how much room there was inside the skull for a brain.

  As things turned out it was the females of the species who took charge of their evolution. Their gender had slimmer bones and less musculature, a gender difference that enabled them a higher brain capacity.

  A close parallel to insect cultures formed, relying on a queen for a genetic creation. The females would create bloodlines among their offspring and the genetic pool which grew in relation to the needs of a tribe or later a city.

  The longer explanation over time is that the Manors grew around these matriarchs, with rules set down from the females. It was a society dominated by genetic selection where those Domum who didn’t meet specific standards were kept from breeding.

  Each Manor developed an individual method of maintaining the status of a breeder, even of a place of prestige within the Manor.

  Manor Vax was the enforcement and protection arm of the Domum people. With agreement among the female rules of the Manor Vax set around their world, a cease-fire and alliance started then over centuries formed a single entity.

  Training and officers, warfare, naval operations on the sea and in space.

  Manor Vax provided the armed forces, policing force and all officers involving command of areas that needed a firm hand. There was another Manor for trading, another for diplomacy. Manor Alim had the scientists and doctors who spent most of their time in genetics and medical practice.

  Research was more out of interest than a driven requirement for progress.

  The females of the Manor’s spent a lot of time with Manor Alim, altering and advancing the DNA of their own Manor members. Stronger and faster, better dexterity and hands, improved smell and eyesight for diplomats or traders to tell lies and happiness.

  Status and prestige in Manor Vax came from victories and following the correct rules of command. As with most warrior cultures, it became a rating based on honor, where it could be gained or lost within unspoken and written rules of behavior.

  Military victory was not always honorable; it had to be done in the right way and within the right Manor Vax leniency. After all, there were very few requirements for battles in the Galactic Citizenship, so Manor Vax members had to have as much restraint as quick reactions to take up violence.

  Upholding command, serving command and moving up officer ranks or specialist forces was a way to earn privilege. The careers for Manor Vax were set out, steps and protocols defined and the honor earned, although not in points, was clear.

  If a Domum of Manor Vax lost honor for any reason, regaining that honor was so much more difficult that it may as well be impossible. This was an added incentive for any Manor Vax Domum to consider the rules and protocols very carefully.

  Their actions were always up for judgment, harsh judgment.

  * *

  Commander Obragon Vax of the Domum fleet operations and central navy looked out at the Puzzle Box through the wide arcing viewports at the top of the command center.

  Around him bustled other Domum officers, all of a lower rank, going about their daily tasks with the usual efficiency. Obragon Vax liked to think that he had helped to improve that efficiency, and he would not be wrong.

  This cycle, he felt good, pleased with himself and his attendant staff.

  They were performing well in this crisis of refugees and panic-driven rumor. Most of these Domum didn’t know what a real crisis was, or real panic. He had watched many of them come and go already as their tours of duty at the Puzzle Box came and went.

  At eighty-six Domum years old, he was in his prime for a Domum. With most habitable worlds falling into the same general range, and the inhabitants tending to be mammalian, years were a good, even measurement.

  Give or take a few days, the general orbit of a habitable world around its sun was about the same for most citizens. A Lanillan year was fifteen days longer than a Domum one, but mostly, they matched.

  Obragon Vax considered that he might spend the next eighty years at this posting.

  It might take at least that long for his excellent service to make up for the failures on his record. But then, the military tribunal had sentenced him to spend the rest of his natural life until retirement at the Puzzle Box.

  Where he would not be able to be a danger to those who served under him, not again.

  Outside the viewing arcs, he recognized the patterns of lights clustered around the husk of rock that had once been almost half of a planet core. The heavy metals and other precious minerals had been mined.

  All that was left were scraps and harder-to-reach areas. That particular cluster was the mining station, at the end of one of the magnetic carriageways.

  Other lights were the tugs moving around cargo haulers.

  From here, Obragon Vax could call up displays that would outline every part of the Puzzle Box, showing him the arcs of the carriageway rings lined up through space and the vectors of anything moving. But he didn’t need to turn them on unless he had to track something specific.

  The cluster of lights on his far left was the Danane Hub, the closest hub to the command center. Out beyond that, against the black backdrop of what had been a palladium-rich planetoid, he could see the clean vertical line of lights from Kole Hub.

  The Puzzle Box was no longer a mystery to him. After eighteen Domum years spent there, the mustached commander knew the place very well indeed.

  The consoles of processors and new displays had been brought in at his request to update the ones that had been here when he had started. They were over
a hundred years old at the time, and with his remaining influence, he had helped to upgrade various systems for better management of the Puzzle Box.

  He hadn’t been able to get everything he wanted.

  Some of the carriageways were off, and no one could say much about the station defenses. If it came to a fight, they were in poor condition.

  Dealing with the merchants and mining associations had been simple enough diplomacy for the most part. His training in Manor Vax had prepared him for the ins and outs of various kinds of negotiation tactics, all based on the principles of being ready to run an operation anywhere.

  During his training, he had never thought to wind up the commander of an old and unimportant place like the Puzzle Box.

  On the outskirts of the protected galactic citizenship, the station was only running because other species used it. Its placement a millennia ago had almost dropped it below the acceptable value margin of the surveyors and miners of Manor Holn.

  Only the uniquely empty solar system and the relative ease of accessing the wealth in the chunks of space rock kept it viable.

  If the system could have been colonized, then it would have been offered to the galactic council for the nomination of settlement. As it was, the Domums had mined great wealth from the system, and even after that, there was a profit to be made from the other species’ businesses.

  The merchants and business factors of Manor Iton had made sure that the Puzzle Box would stay open and, of course, that it would have a military and naval presence.

  Over the years, Manor Vax had steadily removed the amount of presence necessary to run the Puzzle Box, its glory days long past, and left it for Obragon Vax to manage into its final rest, and him along with the place, it seemed.

  But he would make sure his command was above reproach while he still had a say in the matter. Obragon Vax lived for the distinguished principles of Manor Vax, even now.

  An officer sitting at a nearby console stood up and saluted before interrupting. “Sir, our monitoring program you asked for on the species called ‘humans’ has sent us a notification.”

  Obragon Vax smiled at his reflection in the surface of one of the metal consoles, polished daily by his direct command to maintain proper standards. The humans had brought him some level of interest apart from the daily drudgery that had become his life, and not like the tedium of managing the incoming refugees either.

  They were interesting.

  “What is it that the Manor Uld programs have to say that is of such great importance?” Obragon Vax made his way around the consoles to look over the broad shoulder of the officer who had gotten his attention.

  On display, he watched the humans leave their airlock and go around the docking arc to the lift of Enone Hub.

  The officer froze the image of the five just before they entered the lift and started down.

  Selecting another few buttons that glowed under the tactile interface, he activated the monitor program’s scans. An overlay was rendered onto the image, equipment on the humans’ hips and backs highlighted in solid geometric shapes and colored in orange.

  “Sir, the humans are armed.”

  “Well, well.” Obragon Vax couldn’t help the smile he wore again.

  “It seems that these humans may well be quite new and even more interesting than I had hoped.”

  As commander, he had every right to apprehend them and question them again. Weapons on the station were outlawed above specific grades of damage, to prevent a hull breach mostly, but the outdated sensors could easily be fooled.

  The readings from the officer’s display generally showed self-defense levels of armaments, but of course, the program couldn’t match the design or other core energy signatures.

  The thing was, it had been a very long time since there had been something this obvious going on in the Puzzle Box. He had stamped out the minor criminal activities, larceny, and as much organized crime as he could find.

  What he couldn’t pin down with proof, he kept a very close watch on through the station systems.

  So, all the remaining activities were essentially not worth the expense and extra effort to put a stop to. That didn’t mean that Obragon Vax did not want to, but it was at a point where it was like a strategic game between the various criminals and his officers.

  So, it was entertaining, and he kept their effect to a minimum while they still enjoyed enough privilege to stay. It was a cold war truce of sorts, one that he could manage.

  These humans, though, presented a new challenge.

  They were an unknown quantity that stood out amid all of the thousands of refugees that were just a chaotic side effect of something bigger. He wouldn’t be the only one who thought so.

  By now, the humans had attracted attention, and he had raised their profile by inviting them to the command center and then releasing them.

  He believed them when they said they didn’t know why they were there, but that meant they would find out and show him, or they would be ground down and would leave, one way or another.

  For him, it added a whole new aspect, which could be promising, and he really hoped that they would rouse things up enough that he could get some more answers. The entire refugee exodus to the Puzzle Box and the vague threat of the Tempest had him on edge.

  He’d admit that, pirates or not, they were interfering, and he wanted to do something about it.

  “Let the monitoring programs keep an eye on them.”

  * *

  On their way out of the airlock and along the corridor, the humans went back to the private channel they shared.

  Lekiso certainly liked to keep them on the move, and she wasn’t kidding: not even halfway down the corridor of the docking arc, and she was asking Marc about what a good place would be to find aliens or refugees more open to talking.

  “Uh, I’m not sure. This hub has a lot of levels with different shops and places for different purposes. Where do people usually go for this kind of thing?”

  “Really, mate? You don’t know?”

  Marc didn’t need Ormond’s banter right now.

  All that talk about what could be going on and the different possibilities really worked on his anxiety.

  Meriam said kindly, “Look for a place with food and drink, where they would go to relax and feed themselves. That’s always a good setup for humans. We ate and drank just now, after all. I hope it’s the same for anything else that eats or drinks.”

  “Good idea,” Connor agreed.

  “Uh, right. Okay, well, there is a food court kind of area two levels below the market concourse we were first on. The market covers three levels, and below that are two food courts. Perhaps we start at the top one and see?” Marc followed the other four into the elevator when it was called.

  They all agreed, so Lekiso selected the floor number, and it started down.

  “Everyone, check your systems and correlate. It seems that Marc is going to be support, so feed him your specs and options.” Lekiso issued the instructions fluidly, almost like orders, but she left it kind enough to stay away from that level of authoritarianism.

  Marc thought that it probably helped that she didn’t get bossy or military.

  Ormond didn’t seem to appreciate it if she did get military, and Meriam would always pout a bit when she did. He didn’t like it either, really. The situation was tough, and yes, he knew she was helping by keeping them busy, but he didn’t like being treated as a soldier.

  So, her change in approach improved his mood a little.

  “Uh, below those levels is the medical center for the Enone Hub. Do you think it would be good to go and check that out?”

  “I’m not sure; bothering people while they are getting medical treatment seems a bit rude?” Lekiso was hesitant at the end there.

  “Well, boss, with the refugees we have coming in, there may be something to learn from those who were close to the action, and that would be the injured, right? So, perhaps the docs around here will be able to tel
l us somefing.”

  Ormond was probably only being decent in the conversation because of the tone from back on the ship, Marc thought. Either way was fine by him. It was stressful enough going out and about.

  “I’ll go with Ormond to the medical center,” Connor volunteered.

  “I can coordinate within a fair distance according to these setups. Then you can look after Marc, and Meriam can apply her social graces to find you, people or aliens, to talk to at the food court.”

  “Sure, let’s do that,” Lekiso agreed.

  The short trip before the elevator doors opened had them reviewing the new systems they interfaced with. There were a lot of new functions. Marc had a lot more computational power and interface options; the technical data and processing in the devices attached around his forearms was incredible.

  The devices themselves were shaped like metal bracers with plastic and circuitry inlays with a display embedded on each one. They differed from the ones the others had in function and size, although it did seem as if they could adjust around the edges to fit the size of any human arm.

  He also had some upgraded functions to the singlesuit systems, like added speed and strength if he needed to use it, and that seemed to be standard for all of them.

  Meriam’s additions were biological, environmental, and mapping systems. It seemed the kind of tactical role Marc would perform was in technology and computer networks while hers was different.

  It made sense, sadly, since Marc could focus on only so much at once.

  It was sad because that meant that they really were being geared up for specific roles in a team. This was more evidence of forethought and strategic setup that their abductors had put into the situation, which bothered Marc a lot, that and why they were kept out of the starship that had abducted them.

  Perhaps whoever took them didn’t want the humans to use the new technology and weapons to take over the ship, hijack it, and return to Earth somehow. But Marc doubted that; anyone who could put all of this together would definitely control the on and off switches and render the humans powerless if they decided to turn on their captors.